Homily for the Sunday of Holy Fathers of the Seventh Ecumenical Council & Fourth Sunday of Luke in the Orthodox Church

 

Titus 3:8-15; Luke 8:5-15

 

Our culture tempts us to be constantly in a hurry and distracted.  We expect answers for the deep struggles of our lives with the speed of looking something up on the internet.  So many today have lost respect for the many years of preparation that it takes to develop skill and expertise.  The same is true of our disregard for the pursuit of wisdom, which typically comes through the long experience of a life well lived.  We must be on guard against becoming so accustomed to accepting quick, easy, and superficial answers that we lack the patience and focus necessary to mature to the point that we are able to bear good fruit for the Kingdom of God.

  

That is why we commemorate today the 367 Holy Fathers of the 7th Ecumenical Council, which met in Nicaea in 787.  The council rejected the false teaching that to honor icons is to commit idolatry, for it distinguished between the worship that is due to God alone and the veneration or honor that is appropriate for images of Christ, the Theotokos, and the Saints.  The council’s teaching highlighted the importance of the Lord’s incarnation, for only a truly human Savior with a physical body could restore us to the dignity and beauty of the living icons of God in every dimension of our existence.

 

The 7th Ecumenical Council addressed matters that strike at the very heart of how we embrace the vocation to become like God in holiness in a world that so desperately needs the peace of Christ.  Too often, however, we think that iconography simply has to do with art history and is unrelated to the question of whether we are becoming more like Christ and gaining the strength to seek first His Kingdom in the midst of our world of corruption.  The icons are not merely beautiful visual objects for they proclaim the Gospel, reminding us that to become a truly human person is to become like Jesus Christ.  He has restored the beauty of the living icons of God who had become disfigured by slavery to despair, death, and decay. 

 

Today’s gospel reading expresses what it means for us to become His beautiful living icons with different imagery.  In an agricultural society, He used the parable of the sower to call His disciples to become like plants that grew from the seed that “fell into good soil and grew, and yielded a hundredfold.”  He wanted them to become “those who, hearing the word, hold it fast in an honest and good heart, and bring forth fruit with patience.”  Not all who hear the Word of God will do so, even as not all seeds will grow to fruition.   Some never even believe, while others make a good start and then fall away due to temptation or “are choked by the cares and riches and pleasures of life, and their fruit does not mature.” 

 

We do not have to be experienced farmers or gardeners to see that this parable calls us to fulfill our potential as those who bear the image of God.  Our vocation is to become more beautiful living icons of the Savior, and we diminish and distort ourselves when we refuse to become who God created us to be.  Plants must grow and flourish as the kinds of plants that they are in order to become healthy and bear fruit.  Farmers must care for them accordingly.  The sun, soil, moisture, and nutrients must be appropriate for that particular type of plant in order for them to flourish. For us to mature to the point that we bear good fruit for the Kingdom, we must attend to the health of our souls with the patience and focus of a careful farmer or gardener.  If, to the contrary, we become distracted and careless for whatever reason, we put ourselves at grave risk of being “choked by the cares and riches and pleasures of life.”   

 

In today’s epistle lesson, St. Paul urged St. Titus to tell the people to focus on doing good deeds and helping others in great need.  He wanted them to avoid being distracted by foolish arguments and divisions, “for they are unprofitable and vain.”  St. Paul did not want the people to waste their time and energy on matters that would simply inflame their passions and hinder them from attaining spiritual health and maturity.  He called them to care for their spiritual wellbeing with the conscientiousness of farmers who are single-mindedly dedicated to bringing in a bumper crop.  If they let down their guard to the point of being so consumed by pointless controversies that they ignored basic disciplines like loving and serving their neighbors, they would risk dying spiritually like a neglected plant overtaken by weeds.  Remember St. James’ teaching that “pure and undefiled” religion is “to care for orphans and widows in their distress and to keep oneself unstained by the world.” (Jas. 1:27)

 

If we are to become “those who, hearing the word, hold it fast in an honest and good heart, and bring forth fruit with patience,” we must remain constantly on guard against allowing distorted desires of whatever kind to grow like weeds in our hearts and minds. We must do the hard, daily work of mindfully refusing to fuel our passions and rejecting the temptations that threaten to weaken our souls. Contrary to the immediate gratification that we have come to expect in so many areas of life, maturing to the point that we bear fruit a hundredfold for the Kingdom is going to take time and effort.  It requires patience not only of time but more importantly of repentance when we fall short of fulfilling our calling as living icons of God.  Instead of giving up when we do not get the results that we want on our own timetable, we must humbly acknowledge our weakness and focus on “the one thing needful” of hearing and obeying the Word of God. (Lk 10:42)  Doing so requires grounding our daily lives in prayer, fasting, and tangible acts of generosity toward our neighbors.  It requires shutting our eyes and ears to the ever-present nonsense and noise that so easily inflame our passions and lead us to seek first the fleeting pleasures and projects of this world of corruption.  It requires confessing our sins and struggling to reorient the desires of our hearts toward their true fulfillment in God. 

 

 Following St. Paul’s advice, we should all take a close look at our lives to see if we are wasting our time, energy, and attention on “foolish disputes” that distract us from patiently pursuing the healing of our souls.  We will find salvation not by arguing about whose opinion is correct on some controversial topic but by taking up the struggle to become like Christ in holiness, radiant with the divine energies as His beautiful living icons. Tragically, it is so easy not to recognize that we are being “choked by the cares and riches and pleasures of life” to the point that we never mature and bear good fruit.  With the patient attentiveness of a careful farmer, we must care for the garden of our souls each day, refusing to become discouraged by our failures.    Whether we realize it or not, we are all iconographers and gardeners with the responsibility to bring beauty and life into the world as we cooperate with the Lord’s grace through patient, persistent dedication.  In doing so, we do not work with paint or soil but with ourselves.  We do not work merely with our own talents but in cooperation with the mercy of the One has brought salvation to the world through His Cross and glorious resurrection on the third day.  In Him, we may all mature to the point that we bear good fruit for the Kingdom and shine brightly with heavenly glory.

 

 

Homily for the Eighteenth Sunday After Pentecost & Second Sunday of Luke in the Orthodox Church

 

 2 Cor.  9:6-11; Luke 6:31-36

People in our time and place often get carried away with the ideal of love.  Whether we mean falling in love, loving our family and friends, or loving our favorite food or activity, we talk about love a lot.  We have to be careful, however, not to make our fascination with love simply a way of serving ourselves.  It is so easy to make loving ourselves the basis of our attachments to the people and things who bring us pleasure and satisfaction.  There is nothing wrong with pleasure and satisfaction in and of themselves, and we should give thanks to God for all the blessings of this life.   We should certainly love ourselves as those who bear the image of God like everyone else.  The problem is that we are often so attached to our own pleasure and satisfaction that our love becomes simply a form of self-centeredness that extends only to those who give us what we want.  In other words, we are often simply in love with ourselves.  That is why Christ said, “And if you do good to those who do good to you, what credit is that to you?  For even sinners do the same.”  St. Maximos the Confessor taught that such self-love is “the mother of the passions,” which leads to a host of spiritual maladies.[1]  

Our vocation is not to treat other people according to how they serve our sense of self but to acquire purity of heart, for as the Lord said, that is necessary to “see God.” (Matt. 5:8) There is perhaps no greater test of the purity of our hearts than whether we respond with love and forgiveness to those who have wronged us and who do not bring us pleasure or satisfaction in any way. Remember what Christ said of those who crucified Him, “Father, forgive them for they know not what they do.” (Lk. 23:34)   As Orthodox Christians, our calling is nothing less than to embody the mercy of God from the very depths of our being. That sublime vocation goes well beyond being an outwardly religious or moral person who feels justified in determining who deserves our good will, care, and forgiveness for whatever reason.  If we are truly sharing in the life of God by grace as “partakers of the divine nature,” we will learn to love all our neighbors as He has loved us. 

In today’s gospel reading, the Lord spoke words that have always been hard to hear: “But love your enemies, and do good, and lend, expecting nothing in return; and your reward will be great, and you will be sons of the Most High; for He is kind to the ungrateful and the selfish.  Be merciful, even as your Father is merciful.”  In this passage from the gospel according to St. Luke, Christ does not rest content with calling His followers to limit their vengeance to “an eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth,” even though that Old Testament principle had placed needed restraint on vengeance. (Matt. 5:38) He did not affirm the common attitude of the time, “Love your neighbor and hate your enemy,” an attitude that unfortunately remains with us today in so many ways concerning religion, politics, ethnicity, and other factors.  (Matt. 5:43) Instead, the Savior calls His followers to be in communion with Him from the depths of our hearts to the point that we embody the divine mercy, loving our enemies like God, Who cares even for “the ungrateful and selfish.”  Yes, He cares even for people like me and you.

To become a person so radiant with the love of Christ that we convey His mercy even to people we do not like and who do not like us obviously requires much more than cultivating warm religious feelings or a sentimental attitude toward humanity in general.  To love our enemies as He loves us requires our deep spiritual transformation and healing as living icons of God.  We must not, then, rest content with confessing the Orthodox Faith, attending divine services, devoting ourselves to prayer, fasting, and almsgiving, and avoiding the most obvious forms of sin in our outward behavior.  These practices are all essential and we must not neglect or diminish them in any way.  We must remember, however, that they provide the basic foundation and structure of our life in Christ.  It is through them that we open our hearts to receive the strength to take up the difficult struggle each day to reject the habits of thought, word, and deed that so easily lead us to treat our neighbors according to our passions and not according to the mercy of the Lord.  If we persist in refusing to take up the cross of learning to love our enemies as the Lord has loved us, it will become impossible for us to love God, for “If anyone says, ‘I love God,’ but hates his brother, he is a liar. For anyone who does not love his brother, whom he has seen, cannot love God, whom he has not seen.” (1Jn. 4:20)   

St. Silouan the Athonite provides good advice on how to grow in love for those who offend us:  

I beseech you, put this to the test.  When a man affronts you or brings dishonor on your head, or takes what is yours, or persecutes the Church, pray to the Lord, saying: “O Lord, we are all Thy creatures.  Have pity on Thy servants, and turn their hearts to repentance,” and you will be aware of grace in your soul.  To begin with constrain your heart to love enemies, and the Lord, seeing your good will, will help you in all things, and experience itself will show you the way.  But the man who thinks with malice of his enemies has not God’s love within him, and does not know God.[2]

 

St. Paul wrote that “he who sows sparingly will also reap sparingly, and he who sows bountifully will also reap bountifully.”  The more fully we offer ourselves to the Lord, the more receptive we become to His grace. That is certainly the case for how we respond to those who wrong, insult, or disappoint us. We must refuse to welcome vengeful or judgmental thoughts about them into our hearts.  We must refuse to speak about them or treat them according to our passions.  Instead of focusing our attention on their errors or fantasizing about how to get even with them, we must mindfully pray for God to grant what is best for them according to His lovingkindness.  To pray for them with integrity, we must take up the struggle each day of relating to them as we would like them to relate to us.

The Apostle wrote that “Each one must do as he has made up his mind, not reluctantly or under compulsion, for God loves a cheerful giver.”  Our calling is not to meet some minimal standard of forgiveness but to become so radiant with the gracious divine energies that it becomes part of our character joyfully to love our enemies as He loves us.  As the Lord taught, “Be merciful, even as your Father is merciful.”  The healing of our souls is an infinite journey of theosis, of becoming like God in holiness in every dimension of our personhood. It is no surprise, then, that such forgiveness is such a struggle and that we so often fall short of being reconciled with others.  We must use our weakness in this regard for our humility as we call to the Lord from the depths of our hearts for the strength to grow in loving our neighbors as He loves us.  We must use our weakness as a reminder to keep a close watch on our thoughts, words, and deeds as we redouble our efforts to sow bountifully the seeds of Christlike mercy in our souls.  Then, as St. Paul taught, “You will be enriched in every way for great generosity, which through us will produce thanksgiving to God.”

The Eucharist is the Church’s great act of thanksgiving for the infinite love of God for sinful humanity and the fallen creation.  We lift up our hearts and offer bread and wine, which by the power of the Holy Spirit become the Body and Blood of the Lord, Who offered Himself without reservation for the salvation of those who rejected Him.  Since we become “one flesh” with Him in the Eucharist, how can we refuse to extend to our neighbors the same mercy and forgiveness that we have received from our Lord?  Remember what He said: “But love your enemies, and do good, and lend, expecting nothing in return; and your reward will be great, and you will be sons of the Most High; for He is kind to the ungrateful and the selfish.  Be merciful, even as your Father is merciful.”

 

 

 

 

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[1] Larchet, Therapy of Spiritual Illnesses, Vol. 1: 145.

[2] Archimandrite Sophrony, Saint Silouan the Athonite, 377.

Homily for the Sunday after the Elevation of the Holy Cross in the Orthodox Church

 

Galatians 2:16-20; Mark 8:34-9:1

 

            As we continue to celebrate the Elevation of the Holy Cross, we must remain on guard against the temptation to corrupt the Christian faith into a soothing piety that requires nothing of us because the Lord Himself has already done all the work.   Through His Self-Offering on the Cross, Christ has conquered death and brought salvation to the world, but for us to share personally in His great victory, we must take up our own crosses, deny ourselves, and follow Him each day of our lives.  Refusing to do so amounts to being ashamed of Him and wanting no part of His Kingdom.  No matter what we believe or how we feel about the Lord, refusing to take up our crosses means continuing in the old ways of death and rejecting the call to enter into the joy of eternal life.    

            Today’s gospel reading follows Saint Peter’s attempt to explain to Christ that dying on the Cross had nothing to do with being the Messiah.  That is when the Lord famously said, “Get behind Me, Satan! For you are not mindful of the things of God, but the things of men.”  The Savior did not fit Peter’s expectations for the Messiah, whom he expected to be a righteous military leader like King David.  By His sharp response, Christ demonstrated that following Him is not a path to success according to the conventional standards of this world, but a calling to embrace the deep struggle of offering ourselves for growth in holiness, no matter the cost.  

            The calling to take up our crosses also stands in stark contrast to the persistent temptation to use religion to exalt ourselves in our own minds and condemn a segment of our neighbors.   It is blasphemy to corrupt the great sign of our salvation into an instrument for fueling our self-centered desires and illusions.  To the contrary, our Lord’s Cross calls us to do the hard work of refusing to gratify our passions as we unite ourselves to His great Self-Offering for the salvation of the world.     

In our epistle reading from Galatians, Saint Paul opposes fellow Jewish Christians who relied too much on their own ability to obey the Old Testament law and would have required the same of Gentile converts.  Refusing to trust in his own ability to obey religious rules, he writes that, “I have been crucified with Christ, nevertheless I live, yet not I, but Christ lives in me; and the life which I now live in the flesh I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me, and gave Himself up for me.”  Paul took up his cross by enduring many struggles and difficulties out of faithfulness to the Lord, ultimately dying for him as a martyr.   He wrote to the Colossians that “I now rejoice in my sufferings for you, and fill up in my flesh what is lacking in the afflictions of Christ, for the sake of His body, which is the church.” (Col. 1:24)

There is obviously nothing deficient in our Lord’s great Self-Offering.  All that is lacking is our taking up our own crosses in obedience to the Lord’s calling to deny ourselves and follow Him. Because of our passions and the brokenness of our world of corruption, the struggle for healing inevitably requires suffering, but not as though pain were somehow pleasing to God.   Such suffering results from the inevitable tension we experience in embracing the struggle to offer ourselves fully to Christ. There is so much within each of us that does not want to do that. Truly taking up our crosses means fighting the difficult battle of confronting our own personal brokenness each day as we reject thoughts, desires, and habits that would keep us serving ourselves and the false gods of this world.  

  Christ prayed the night before His crucifixion, “Father, if You are willing, take this cup from me; yet not my will, but Yours be done.” (Luke 22:42) He ascended the Cross in free obedience, and no one forces us to take up our crosses either.  So many problems and pains come upon us without our asking for them in this life, and it is so easy to refuse to suffer in a spiritually healthy way. As Job’s wife suggested, we can “Curse God and die!” (Job 2:9) in response to deep frustrations and disappointments.  We can refuse to offer our wounds to Christ for healing by finding ways to ignore them or convincing ourselves that we are still better off than the people we like to condemn.  Doing so is simply a dead end that will fuel our passions, blind us with spiritual pride, and demonstrate how ashamed we are of Christ and His Cross.

Since freedom is an intrinsic dimension of being in God’s image, no one can make us take up our crosses. Only we can unite ourselves to Christ in His Great Self-Offering for the salvation of the world. Regardless of the circumstances, we have the freedom to refuse to fall into despair, for any instance of suffering provides an opportunity to purify the desires of our hearts as we learn to entrust ourselves more fully to the Lord.  Difficulties by their nature present challenges to which we may respond in a Christlike way or according to our passions.  He offered up Himself fully upon the Cross and refused to respond in kind to those who hated and rejected Him.  Likewise, we may unite ourselves to Him in every dimension and circumstance of our lives, including those in which we are sorely tempted not to respond as He did. Illness, broken relationships with others, worries about the future, regrets about the past, crushed hopes, and even the worst losses imaginable all present opportunities to grow in “love, joy, peace, longsuffering, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control.”  Saint Paul wrote that “those who are Christ’s have crucified the flesh with its passions and desires.”  (Gal. 5:22-24)

Our self-centered and distorted desires usually rear their ugly heads quickly when we face trying circumstances.  If you are like me, you sometimes react like Jonah when the vine that gave him shade was eaten by a worm.  That was a very small thing, but Jonah became so angry that he literally wished he would die. (Jonah 4:5-11)   Other times we face circumstances so grave that we must struggle mightily not to fall into despair about life itself.  Whether in matters small or great, we have the opportunity to take up our crosses daily as we struggle to find healing for our souls.   

Doing so usually does not require anything dramatic or extraordinary. It is normally a matter of focusing on the basic disciplines of the Christian life, such as refusing to accept sinful thoughts into our hearts, forgiving those who have wronged us, and trusting that nothing “will be able to separate us from the love of God that is in Christ Jesus our Lord.” (Rom. 8:39) The more that we open our souls to the Lord’s healing strength through prayer, fasting, serving our neighbors, and otherwise responding faithfully to the daily circumstances of our lives, the less time and energy we will have for stirring up the impassioned thoughts that lead to sinful actions.  The less that we cultivate worry, fear, and resentment, the more we will be able to pray to God from our hearts to grant what is best in even the most broken circumstances. We must follow the Apostle’s teaching, “Be anxious for nothing, but in everything by prayer and supplication, with thanksgiving, let your requests be made known to God; and the peace of God, which surpasses all understanding, will guard your hearts and minds through Christ Jesus.” (Philippians 4:6-7)

To share in Christ’s victory over death, we must embrace the struggle of dying to all that would keep us from uniting ourselves to Him in holiness.  Our hope is neither in our own willpower nor in being superior to anyone else, but in the gracious mercy of the One Who offered up Himself for our salvation purely out of love.  Through the Cross, He has brought life in the midst of death, light in the midst of darkness, and joy in the midst of despair.  We will receive His healing in even the most difficult dimensions of our lives as we persistently offer ourselves to Him in humble faith, no matter what challenges, pains, or disappointments life may bring us.  That is how we may die to the corrupting power of sin and enter even now into the blessedness of His Kingdom.  It is how we may learn to say truthfully with St. Paul, “it is no longer I who live, but Christ Who lives in me; and the life I now live in the flesh I live by faith in the Son of God, Who loved me and gave Himself for me.” It is how we show that we are not ashamed of Him and His Cross, which remains a weapon of peace, a trophy invincible, and the great sign of our salvation.

 

 

 

Homily for the Sunday Before the Elevation of the Holy Cross in the Orthodox Church

 

Galatians 6:11-18; John 3:13-17

We may be tempted at times to think that we will find healing for our souls simply by   doing this or that.  We may assume that fulfilling our calling as Orthodox Christians means attending divine services, receiving the holy mysteries, and devoting ourselves to prayer, fasting, almsgiving, and other acts of piety. These are certainly indispensable practices for us to share more fully in the life of Christ, but they are not merely rituals or ends in themselves.  Our Savior calls and enables us to become not merely religiously observant but truly “a new creation” through His Cross and glorious resurrection on the third day. 

Today’s gospel reading is taken from Christ’s conversation with the Pharisee Nicodemus, who could not understand what it meant to be born again.  The Lord spoke to him neither of physical rebirth nor of the type of hypocritical religious legalism associated with the Pharisees.  Instead, He foretold the centrality of the Cross, saying that “as Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness, so must the Son of man be lifted up, that whoever believes in Him should not perish but have eternal life.”  He refers here to an event described in Numbers 21:8-9, when the Hebrews were saved from deadly snake bites when they looked at the bronze snake held up by Moses in the desert.  

In today’s epistle reading St. Paul argued against those who trusted more in their ability to obey religious laws than in the Lord’s great Self-Offering.  He wrote, “far be it from me to glory except in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ, by which the world has been crucified to me and I to the world.”  The Apostle opposed fellow Christians of Jewish heritage who thought that Gentile converts had to be circumcised in obedience to the Old Testament law.  He rejected that practice, “For in Christ Jesus, neither circumcision counts for anything, nor uncircumcision, but a new creation.”  As St. Paul taught, “you are all sons of God through faith in Christ Jesus.  For as many of you as were baptized into Christ have put on Christ.  There is neither Jew nor Greek, there is neither slave nor free, there is neither male nor female; for you are all one in Christ Jesus. And if you are Christ’s, then you are Abraham’s seed, and heirs according to the promise.” (Gal. 3: 26-29) By conquering death through His Cross and resurrection, the Savior has opened the gates of Paradise to all who respond to Him with faith and faithfulness, regardless of who they are.   As He said to Nicodemus in today’s gospel reading, “For God so loved the world that He gave His only Son, that whoever believes in Him should not perish but have eternal life.  For God sent His Son into the world, not to condemn the world, but that the world might be saved through Him.”

Our Lord was lifted up upon the Cross because, contrary to the expectations of the Pharisees, even the strictest obedience to the Old Testament law could never make anyone “a new creation.” If legalistic outward observance had the power to heal our souls, then there would have been no need for “the Son of man [to] be lifted up, that whoever believes in Him should not perish but have eternal life.”  Likewise, prayer, fasting, almsgiving, and all the other spiritual disciplines of the Orthodox Christian life are not matters of legal observance whereby we satisfy, impress, or earn anything from the Lord.  They are, however, ways in which we open ourselves in humility to become more receptive to His grace as His “new creation.”

In order to celebrate the Feast of the Elevation of the Cross with integrity, we must follow the instruction of St. Paul not “to glory except in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ, by which the world has been crucified to me and I to the world.” That means we must not become Orthodox Pharisees who imagine we are more righteous than others because of how we pray, fast, or observe any aspect of our Orthodox faith as though it were some kind of personal accomplishment.  To the contrary, the more receptive we become to the Lord’s grace, the more aware we will become of our sinfulness and our ongoing need for the healing mercy of the crucified and risen Lord, Who was lifted up upon the Cross out of His infinite compassion and love for the salvation of the world.  In Him, we are “a new creation,” not as a reward for any act of piety or religious observance on our part, but because “God so loved the world that He gave His only Son, that whoever believes in Him should not perish but have eternal life.”   

 

 

 

Homily for the Fourteenth Sunday of Matthew in the Orthodox Church

 

2 Corinthians 1:21-2:4; Matthew 22:2-14

 

            We began a new ecclesiastical year on September 1, which also marked the beginning of the new civil year in the Byzantine Empire.  For the ancient Hebrews, September was a time of gathering the harvest and giving thanks to God. It was in this context that Christ read from the Prophet Isaiah in the synagogue in Nazareth to “proclaim the acceptable year of the Lord.” (Lk. 4:19) He said to the astonished people of His hometown: “Today this Scripture is fulfilled in your hearing.” (4:21) His neighbors quickly moved from praising Him to trying to throw Him off a cliff, however, when the Savior noted that there were times when God had blessed Gentiles through the great prophets Elijah and Elisha and did not come to the aid of Jews.  The Lord had promised to Abraham “In your seed all the nations of the earth shall be blessed,” but the dominant hope in first-century Palestine had become nationalistic, focused on building an earthly kingdom in which righteous Jews would be blessed and Gentiles and sinners would be put down.  (Gen. 22:18) 

 

            The people of Nazareth tried to kill Christ when He proclaimed that He was a very different type of Messiah than they had expected.  Today’s parable of the wedding banquet follows the parable of the tenants in the vineyard, which was last Sunday’s gospel reading.  The Savior used these parables in the week leading to His Passion to make clear what was at stake in the actions of the corrupt religious leaders who had blinded themselves spiritually to the point that they orchestrated His death.  The parable reveals that they had become so obsessed with their own desires for worldly power that they rejected the Messiah in Whom God’s promises to Abraham are fulfilled and extended to all.

 

            The context of the parable is a wedding feast for the son of a king, which would have been the greatest celebration imaginable in that time and place.  The prophet Hosea had spoken of the relationship between God and Israel as a marriage, and weddings were signs of God’s faithfulness in blessing the Jews from generation to generation.  It is not surprising, then, that Christ often compared the Kingdom of God to a wedding feast.  He is the Bridegroom and the Church is the Bride.  (Eph. 5:32) The book of Revelation also describes the fulfillment of the heavenly reign as a marriage banquet, the Wedding Feast of the Lamb. (Rev. 19:6-9)

             

            How tragic, then, that the religious leaders who should have been in the best position to enter into the joy of spiritual union with Christ refused to do so.  They were like the guests invited to the wedding in the parable who “made light of it and went off, one to his farm, another to his business, while the rest seized… [the king’s] servants, treated them shamefully, and killed them.”  In the parable, the king then sent his servants out into the streets to invite whomever they could to the celebration, “both bad and good; so the wedding hall was filled with guests.”

 

When Christ spoke of those who disregarded the invitation in order to go to their farms and businesses, He was criticizing those who were so obsessed with their wealth, possessions, and status that they refused to attend to the healing of their souls.  They were so passionately attached to the things of this world that they chose them over entering into the fullness of God’s blessing.  They were honored religious leaders, but the desires of their hearts were focused elsewhere.  It is not surprising, then, that the others who refused the king’s invitation “seized his servants, treated them shamefully, and killed them.”  Even as idolatrous rulers and false prophets killed the righteous servants of God in the Old Testament, those primarily driven by the love of money, possessions, and power stopped at nothing to destroy even the Lord Himself, Whom they perceived as a threat to what they held most dear.

 

In light of their refusal to come to the wedding feast, the king in the parable instructed the servants to invite as many other people as possible, including “the bad and the good.”  The Savior points here to the Church in which the distinction between Jew and Gentile is overcome, for He invites everyone to enter into the great joy of the heavenly banquet.  As St. Paul taught, “if you are Christ’s, then you are Abraham’s seed, and heirs according to the promise.” (Gal. 3:29) His fulfillment of the human person in God’s image and likeness is not reserved for those of a particular ancestry or nationality.   It is not reserved for those who have never fallen short of doing what is pleasing to God.  If that were the case, it would have nothing to do with us.  The good news is that, even as the king in the parable wanted the banquet hall to be filled, Christ came to save the entire world and turns no one away who responds to Him with humble faith, love, and repentance.

 

“Many are called, but few are chosen.”  Those words end the parable right after the king ordered that the man without a wedding garment be thrown out of the celebration.  In that time and place, the host provided guests with the proper attire.  This fellow, after being invited to the great banquet, did not respond with gratitude and respect toward his host.  He must have refused to put on the garment, apparently wanting the benefits of being at the party on his own terms.  Thus, he excluded himself from the celebration.

 

We enter into the Body of Christ through baptism, in which we put Him on like a garment.  “As many of you as have been baptized into Christ have put on Christ,” wrote Saint Paul. (Gal. 3:27) Our baptism is the beginning of the Christian life, and we must attend mindfully to living each day as those who are entering into the Kingdom of God by grace.  If we do not, then the entire life of the Church will leave us cold, and we will find even the most basic spiritual disciplines to be burdens we would rather do without.   If we define what is truly important in life as fulfilling our usual set of daily obligations, satisfying our self-centered desires, and finding ways to distract ourselves from confronting the true state of our souls, then  we will always think that we have better things to do than to unite ourselves to Christ.  We will then become like that man who wanted the benefits of being a wedding guest without accepting even the most basic expectations of the invitation.  He was so focused on himself that he shut himself out of the great celebration every bit as much as those who had refused to come in the first place.

 

Living according to the “acceptable year of the Lord” is completely different from becoming like those who disregarded the invitation to the wedding feast or like the fellow who was thrown out.  We must not give our hearts to the things of this world but to the eternal blessedness of a Kingdom that we do not deserve.  Instead of making religion a tool for getting what we want on our own terms or pretending that this or that is somehow more important than sharing in the life of God by grace, we must cultivate the gratitude of those who are shocked to become guests at the Wedding Feast of the Lamb.  That is not simply a future hope but also a present reality, for we enter mystically into the Heavenly Reign whenever we lift up our hearts and offer bread and wine in the Divine Liturgy.  Our calling is to live each day as those who wear a wedding garment, the garment of light restored to us in baptism.  Recognizing that “Many are called, but few are chosen,” let us begin this new year in the Church with a steadfast commitment to make doing so the highest priority of our lives.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Homily for the Thirteenth Sunday of Matthew and the Leave-taking of the Commemoration of the Beheading of St. John the Baptist in the Orthodox Church

 

Matthew 21:33-42

 

In hearing Christ’s criticisms of the chief priests and Pharisees in today’s gospel lesson, we need to be careful about how we interpret His parable.  It is easy to fall into the trap of thinking that the point of the passage is that we should condemn those corrupt religious leaders as bad and praise ourselves as good, for as members of Christ’s Body, the Church, we are presumably the “other tenants who will give him the fruits in their seasons.”   To do so, however, is to refuse to hear the prophetic message of the parable, for as those who have received the fullness of God’s promises to Abraham, we have an even greater responsibility to resist the persistent temptation to keep all the fruit for ourselves.  The allure of doing so has remained with every generation since Adam and Eve, and we are no exception.

            Today’s reading from St. Matthew’s gospel follows the Savior’s triumphal entry into Jerusalem on Palm Sunday.  The crowds had welcomed Him as the conquering Messiah Who would cast out the Romans and establish an earthly kingdom, but they would soon reject Him when it became clear that His Kingdom is not of this world.  He told the chief priests and Pharisees that tax collectors and prostitutes would enter the Kingdom of God before them, for they had disregarded the preaching of St. John the Forerunner, even after notorious sinners had repented in response to his teaching.  They were like sons who had promised to work in their father’s vineyard, but did not keep their word.

 

Because of the great heritage of the Hebrew people, the religious leaders of the day had a deep obligation to serve God faithfully.  They had, however, become so corrupt that they were like the many false prophets and wicked rulers described in the Old Testament who had worshiped foreign gods, exploited the poor and weak, and killed those who dared to oppose them. In the days leading up to His crucifixion, the Savior compared them to those of previous generations who had thought nothing of murdering righteous people who truly spoke the word of the Lord.  In today’s parable, He foretold His own death at the hands of those who would not respect even the Son of God. 

 

            Because they rejected Him, the Lord said in the verse immediately following this reading, “Therefore I tell you that the kingdom of God will be taken away from you and given to a people who will produce its fruit.” (v. 44) Here He points to the coming of the Church in which there is neither Jew nor Gentile, for those with no ancestral connection to Israel are now “grafted in” as branches of the olive tree whose roots extend back to the covenant with Abraham.  (Rom. 11: 17) St. Paul warned Gentile Christians not to take pride in their status in relation to Jews who had rejected the Messiah, for “They were broken off because of their unbelief, but you stand fast through faith. So do not become proud, but fear. For if God did not spare the natural branches, neither will he spare you.” (11: 20-21)

 

            By faith in Christ, we have become the new tenants of the vineyard with an obligation to “give him the fruits in their seasons.”  That, of course, is precisely what the original tenants refused to do.  Instead of tending the vineyard and offering its fruit to their rightful owner, they wanted everything for themselves and even killed the son of the owner in order to take his inheritance.  We must read this passage as a reminder that, in order to be good tenants of the Lord’s vineyard, we must offer ourselves in union with His great Self-offering on the Cross for the salvation of the world.  Our calling is the complete opposite of using our blessings according to our passions in order to help us get what we want in this world.  That is a temptation fueled by the self-centered pride of wanting to keep all the fruit for ourselves, even as the chief priests and Pharisees distorted the spiritual heritage of Israel to give themselves earthly power.  

 

In the celebration of the Divine Liturgy, we offer bread and wine for their and our fulfillment by the power of the Holy Spirit.  We then receive them as the Body and Blood of Christ for our healing and participation in the eternal life of the Kingdom.  Receiving the Eucharist serves no earthly goal and must not become merely a routine religious exercise.   It is truly our nourishment for the life of Heaven, our participation in the Messianic Banquet. The Savior’s Body and Blood empower us to become like Him in holiness as we manifest His restoration of the human person in the image and likeness of God. To be in communion with Christ requires offering ourselves to Him each day and refusing to think that there are any dimensions of our lives that we should keep strictly for ourselves.  He offered Himself fully on the Cross, to the point of death, burial, and descent into Hades, in order to rise up in glory for the salvation of the entire world.  If we refuse to offer the fruit of our own lives to Him, then we will eat and drink our own condemnation and reject Him even more tragically than did those who handed the Savior over to crucifixion because He did not serve their agenda for glorifying themselves.   

 

Today we conclude our commemoration of the Beheading of St. John the Prophet, Forerunner, and Baptist.  John was the last of the Old Testament prophets who prepared the way for the coming of the Messiah by boldly calling for repentance. In the terms of today’s parable, he was a servant killed by the tenants of the vineyard who wanted the fruit for themselves.  He denounced King Herod for marrying his own brother’s wife, Herodias, who resented the criticism to the point that she wanted him dead.  When her daughter performed a lewd dance at a party, Herod promised to give her whatever she wanted.  Following her mother’s depraved advice, the young woman asked for the head of John on a platter.  Herod did not want to have John killed but was afraid that he would lose face if he did not fulfill his promise.  So apparently while the party was still going on, John’s head was cut off and brought in on a plate for everyone to see.

 

In this horrific scene we see clearly the difference between the eucharistic life of offering ourselves to God and the corruption of slavery to self-centered desire.  From his miraculous conception by the aged and barren couple Zacharias and Elizabeth to his martyrdom, John focused single-mindedly on preparing the way for Christ as the fulfillment of the ancient promises to Abraham. The complete opposite of Herod and Herodias in their addiction to earthly power and pleasure, he was a strict ascetic who lived in the desert, wore camel’s hair, and ate locusts and wild honey.  He spared no one from a piercing call to repentance, mocking the Pharisees and Sadducees as a “brood of vipers” and telling the wealthy to share with the poor, the tax-collectors to repent of their dishonesty, and the soldiers to stop abusing their authority.   

 

As the new tenants of the vineyard called to give God “the fruits in their seasons,” we must heed the Forerunner’s instruction to “bear fruits worthy of repentance” if we are to gain the spiritual health necessary to make our lives in this world offerings to the Lord. (Matt. 3:8) It is so easy to become like the corrupt religious leaders who were so enslaved to their passions that they distorted their tremendous spiritual heritage into a way of serving themselves to the point of rejecting and condemning the Lord Himself.  If we do not want to fall into a new version of their sins, we must learn from the example of John the Baptist.  He fasted with incredible strictness, and we must deny our appetites for the richest and most satisfying foods through forms of fasting appropriate to our spiritual and physical health.  He lived in extreme poverty, and we must give our tithes and offerings to the Lord, sharing generously with those in need.  The Forerunner fearlessly called the powerful to repentance, and we must never make the mistake of thinking that allegiance to any earthly ruler, nation, or faction may take precedence over our fidelity to Christ and His Kingdom.  Through our habits, we will form ourselves either to become more faithful servants of our Lord or people like those who rejected and killed both Him and His Forerunner.    

 

Let us commemorate the beheading of St. John by cultivating a renewed awareness of the stark difference between living according to self-centered desire and making our lives offerings to the Lord.  Even as we offer bread and wine in the Divine Liturgy, let us offer ourselves without reservation, as did the Forerunner.  That is what it means to be the new tenants of the vineyard who will give “the fruits in their seasons” to the Master.   

 

 

 

Homily for the Twelfth Sunday After Pentecost & Twelfth Sunday of Matthew on the Leave-taking of the Dormition of the Theotokos in the Orthodox Church

 

1 Corinthians 15:1-11; Matthew 19:16-26

 

            Today is the leave-taking or conclusion of our celebration of the Dormition of the Theotokos, who upon her “falling asleep” followed her Son into the Kingdom of heaven as a whole embodied person.   Her translation to the heavens reminds us that sharing in the life of Christ is not an invisible mystical endeavor but requires offering ourselves to Him in practical, tangible ways.  Her unique vocation as His virgin mother surely required countless sacrifices in every dimension of her life.  It is simply impossible to find the healing of our souls if we pretend that what we do with any dimension of the creation, including our physical blessings, is spiritually irrelevant.

 

Perhaps more than anything else, how we use our money and possessions will reveal whether, like the Theotokos, we are focusing on “the one thing needful” of hearing and obeying the Word of God.   That was the case for the rich young ruler in today’s gospel lesson.   When he addressed Christ, he tried to flatter Him with the words “Good Teacher.”  He did not know that the Lord is truly the God-Man and thought of Him as merely another rabbi.  That is why the Savior responded, “Why do you call Me good? No one is good but One, that is, God,” for He knew that this man thought of goodness as a merely human quality that he imagined he had already attained. He thought that he had already mastered all that God had required in the Old Testament law and wanted to be assured that he had not overlooked anything.

 

This young man was very rich in a time when almost everyone else was poor.  He must have been part of a wealthy and well-connected family, likely on good terms with the house of Herod and the Roman authorities.  He was surely used to people telling him what they thought he wanted to hear in order to stay in his good graces.  And since people believed then that wealth was a reward for God’s favor, he surely did not expect a rabbi to do anything other than congratulate him on his holiness, much less to say, “If you would be perfect, go, sell what you possess and give to the poor, and you will have treasure in heaven; and come, follow me.”       

 

St. Basil the Great, who gave away his great wealth to found philanthropic ministries for the sick and needy, taught that the Lord’s strict words to this man revealed his lack of love for his neighbors.  Basil wrote that “Those who love their neighbors as themselves possess nothing more than their neighbor; yet surely, you seem to have great possessions!  How else can this be, but that you have preferred your own enjoyment to the consolation of the many…For the more you abound in wealth, the more you lack in love.”[1]  The young ruler had obviously laid up treasures for himself on earth and had given his heart to them.  (Matt. 6: 19-21)

 

When Christ spoke to him as someone who loved wealth more than God and neighbor and had therefore violated the greatest of the commandments, the young man confronted the sickness of his soul.  His pride, which was fueled by his passion for wealth and the praise of others, had led to the delusion that he had achieved perfect righteousness by fulfilling God’s law. When told to obey a command that revealed how weak he was before his passions, the man’s illusions of perfection shattered. And since his faith was in his own sense of personal accomplishment, he then fell into despair and walked away from the Lord in sadness.

            We should not be surprised that Christ spoke with the man about his wealth, for He gave great spiritual significance to our relationship with money and possessions throughout His ministry.  For example, the parables of Lazarus and the rich man, the prodigal son, the talents, the debtors, the laborers, the rich fool, the unjust steward, and the pearl of great price all revolve around economic matters.  In response to the gracious initiative of Christ, Zacchaeus repented of his greed and dishonesty by giving financially beyond what justice required to those he had wronged.  The Lord said that the poor widow who put two small coins into the treasury had given more than the wealthy “for all these out of their abundance have put in offerings for God, but she out of her poverty put in all the livelihood that she had.” (Luke 21:4)

 

            Our wealth and possessions are part of God’s good creation which He gives to us out of love for our flourishing.  We have all tragically followed in the way of our first parents, however, in refusing to offer them back to God for the fulfillment of His gracious purposes.  We instead tend to use them to gratify our self-centered desires to the point that they become our false gods. Our sense of security and identity, as well as our hopes and fears, are often more grounded in what we have or would like to have than in the Lord.  What matters is not how much or how little of the world’s resources we possess but whether we are finding healing from the passions that so easily keep us from becoming living icons of the gracious generosity of Christ to our neighbors, for He offered up Himself without reservation for the salvation of the world. 

 

            The Lord’s command to the rich young ruler forced him to confront his addiction to wealth and power.  While He did not give that same instruction to everyone, He calls us all:  to lay up treasures in heaven, not on earth; to serve God, not mammon; and to “seek first the kingdom of God and His righteousness” with humble faith that He will provide everything we need.  (Matt.  6:19-34) He calls us to eucharistic living, which means offering not only bread and wine but every dimension of our lives as we grow in communion with Him.  “Thine Own of Thine Own we offer unto Thee on behalf of all and for all” includes our money, possessions, and everything else.

 

            The Old Testament standard of tithing, or giving ten percent, remains the basic expectation for how we give thanks to God for His blessings.   Malachi 3:10 is the only passage in the Bible that encourages putting God to the test: “’Bring all the tithes into the storehouse,
…try Me now in this…If I will not open for you the windows of heaven and pour out for you such blessing that there will not be room enough to receive it.’” Tithing is like prayer and fasting, for we find the healing of our souls as we reorient the desires of our hearts to God by taking practical steps.  Investing ourselves in ministries to the needy beyond the tithe enables us to become more like the Lord in lovingkindness.  As St. Gregory of Nyssa wrote about almsgiving, “Mercy and good deeds are works God loves; they divinize those who practice them and impress them into the likeness of goodness; that they may become the image of the Primordial Being.”[2]   

 

            As with any spiritual discipline, we must take the steps that we presently have the strength to take, not out of legalism, but in order to open our hearts in humility to become more receptive to the Lord’s gracious divine energies.  When the struggle to trust in God and not in money reveals the weakness of our souls, we must not become paralyzed by guilt or walk away in sadness.  That is instead the time to confess our weakness as we offer whatever we can, no matter how small, and ask for His healing mercy to help us grow in manifesting the divine generosity.

 

No matter how great the struggle may be or how inadequate we may feel, we must remember what the Savior said about the salvation of even people like the rich young ruler: “with God all things are possible.”  The Archangel Gabriel said something very similar in response to the Theotokos’ question about how she, as a virgin, could become the mother of the Savior: “For with God nothing will be impossible.” (Luke 1:37) Then she gave her free consent to become the living Temple of God.  Let us follow her path into the life of the Kingdom of Heaven by offering every dimension of who we are and all that we possess to her Son in free obedience.  That is what it means to be in communion with Him as whole embodied persons.

 

           

 

               

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

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[1] Basil the Great, “To the Rich,” as quoted in Andrew Geleris, Money and Salvation (St. Vladimir’s Seminary Press, 2022), 54.

[2] Gregory of Nyssa, On the Love of the Poor, as quoted in Andrew Geleris, Money and Salvation (St. Vladimir’s Seminary Press, 2022), 31.