Homily – Sunday after Nativity 2019

Children of God – A Homily given on January 13, 2019

Christ is Born!

As many of you are well aware, we celebrated the Nativity, the birth of our Lord Jesus Christ this past Monday morning. It was and is a joyous day, the first major feast day within the liturgical year and within the sacramental rhythm of the life of the Church. It is the day that the Son of God became incarnate in flesh. As we say every Sunday in the words of the Nicene Creed, that for us men, and for our salvation He came down from Heaven, and by the Holy Spirit was incarnate of the Virgin Mary, and became man.

God became man, and He became of his own volition that which we are by nature. He assumed Human nature, yet never sacrificing or diminishing his Divinity, His divine nature. By His incarnation, he participated fully in our Human nature, our humanity, so that we might be able to participate in His divinity. By the condescension of His incarnation, we are allowed to become by His Grace, that which He is by nature. This is of course theosis, the deification of Man, wherein he strives become like God.

Christ was the child of a woman, and adopted by Joseph, for he was not his by flesh or by blood, and he received sonship from His Father by this adoption. For in those days, when one was adopted by the Father, the patriarchal head of the household. the paterfamilias, he was granted not only His sonship by this adoption, but all the rights of inheritance from the Father also. Those sons thus adopted, became heirs to the estate. So, it is for a reason that scriptures emphasize our place as the children of the father, and that this is accomplished through our adoption by God as Sons and daughters of the living God.

We hear one instance of this concept of adoption in our Epistle reading this morning:

“But when the fullness of time had come, God sent forth his Son, born of woman, born under the law, 5 to redeem those who were under the law, so that we might receive adoption as sons. 6 And because you are sons, God has sent the Spirit of his Son into our hearts, crying, “Abba! Father!” 7 So you are no longer a slave, but a son, and if a son, then an heir through God”

And we also hear it elsewhere in scriptures, in Romans Chapter 8:

“14 For those who are led by the Spirit of God are the children of God. 15 The Spirit you received does not make you slaves, so that you live in fear again; rather, the Spirit you received brought about your adoption to sonship. And by him we cry, “Abba, Father.”

And yet again in 1 John Chapter 3:

“See what kind of love the Father has given to us, that we should be called children of God; and so we are.”

Indeed it is an astonishing act of love, that while we were all yet sinners, we should be adopted as Sons and Daughters, the children of God. This is a gift bestowed by the Love and grace of God. For, it is indeed glorious to be the child of an earthly king, to be accounted royalty by birth or by right, but how much more glorious and beyond compare is it to become the children of the Heavenly King. Yet, while we are elevated by our adoption into the heavenly kingdom, Christ condescended to become man by his birth and subsequent adoption into the earthly realm. He was born of the Virgin Mary into His humanity, and we are born into our birthright of the Heavenly Kingdom by our Baptism.

Let us remember our Baptisms, by which we received His most exalted mercy, that we should be called the children of God. As Children, we strive to be like our parents, for they are the ones that lead us in our growth, following in their steps, reaching towards their likeness. Therefore, let us follow in the steps of Christ, who is fully God, showing by our word and deed that we are indeed the Children of the living God. We should be holy just as He is holy. God is righteous, so too should we also strive to be righteous. God is Good, so too should we also strive to be good. He is merciful, so let us also be merciful, and compassionate. He is the Pure One and despises sin, so let us also despise sin, turning away from it, but let us never despise the sinner or turn away from them who are wounded in their sin. As God forgives, let us also forgive, for by the same measure by which we forgive, this shall be used against us. As Paul exhorts in his letter to the Ephesians “Be ye therefore followers of God as dear Children.” We we have shown ourselves worthy as Children of God, we shall receive the inheritance of the Kingdom, and the crowns of everlasting life promised to those who Love Him.

What is the Kingdom of God, that royal and heavenly inheritance to which we are promised as the true Children of God? To begin with, the Church is the Kingdom of God on earth; and the abode of the Holy Spirit, by which the presence and power of the Kingdom is identified. So, it is the Church which Christ built and left to us, this is the Kingdom we are inheriting, the Holy Spirit abiding in us. The Kingdom of God is Incarnated through the Church, the Holy Spirit dwelling within us as the perfecter of all things, our participation in the divine nature of God incarnating Christ within the Church. As the Apostle Paul has exhorted in his letter to the Romans, “The Kingdom of God is righteousness and peace and joy in the Holy Spirit. Whoever thus serves Christ is acceptable to God and approved by men. So then let us pursue what makes for peace and mutual upbuilding.” So, it is Jesus Christ that we must pursue in our lives, and in our pursuit of His holiness, following in His steps, we in turn become Holy.

The sole purpose of the Christian life is the acquisition of the Holy Spirit, the means by which we inherit the Kingdom of God as the Children of God, and this is achieved by the perfecting of virtue, as Saint Seraphim of Sarov details in his book, On the Acquisition of the Holy Spirit:

“Prayer, fasting, vigils and all the other Christian practices may be, they do not constitute the aim of our Christian life. Although it is true that they serve as the indispensable means of reaching this end, the true aim of our Christian life consists of the acquisition of the Holy Spirit of God. As for fasts, and vigils, and prayer, and almsgiving, and every good deed done for Christ’s sake, are the only means of acquiring the Holy Spirit of God.”

Christ is born, and through Him is born the Church; through Him is born the means of repentance; through him is born the means of sonship, and by virtue of this is given to us the means of inheritance of the Kingdom of God. By His birth, death, and resurrection, are we given the same opportunity for a rebirth by our baptism, our death to this world, and the same resurrection into eternal life in the presence of God. While Christ is Born, it is yet by His death that we are given the means to get there, by a continual repentance, participation, and purification of our very soul, so that it might withstand the scourging fires of God’s love.

This purification is but the first step in our Theoria, or the process of our gazing at, and being aware of God. It is the first step we take towards our own perfection. Yet, that step takes us closer to the source of Divine light, and as we move closer to the divine, we become more intimately aware of our misgivings and imperfections. The process of the acquisition of the Holy Spirit begins, and continues in repentance. Yet, we never really leave this stage, it is our continual journey on the spiritual way. It is the endless journey that we partake of in this life, and the next.

How does one purify their heart? Abba Poemon, a Desert Father of the Church, once said, “Do not give your heart to that which does not satisfy your heart.” If we have truly given our heart to God, then only the things of God can truly satisfy our heart. We give our hearts to God with the simplicity of a child’s love and acceptance, fully dependent on a faith knowing that our Father will provide for us, as our need and His will requires. “Unless you turn and become like children, you will never enter the kingdom of heaven. Whoever humbles himself like this child is the greatest in the kingdom of heaven.” A child is young and unassuming, they have not acquired wisdom and hold no great strength of knowledge. Children are curious and without guile. They are a book whose pages are still empty, yet to be filled with the knowledge of this world. So should our hearts be, so that the truths of revelation may be written there as we contemplate upon God.

Christ is born, and a child is born to us, the Son of God incarnated as a child of men, so that we may in turn become the children of God. Christ is born, adopted by Joseph as his Father, so that we may be adopted as Sons and Daughters of the Almighty. Christ is born, the creator of all things contained in a child’s body, weak and helpless, so that we may become like a child before God, weak and helpless in our infirmities. Christ is born, the giver of life who in the end chose death, so that we who are doomed to destruction, might in the end, choose life.

Amen.

Incarnating our Prayer life.

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Incarnating our prayer life – January 8th, 2019

Our prayer life should be lived, and our prayers should be interwoven with our life, otherwise they become vestigial words and phrases that we simply offer in our short periods we turn towards God. Our prayers and our actions should become two expressions of the same situation.

Incarnate Holiness

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Incarnate Holiness – January 8th, 2018

Holiness is the Love of God at work in a concrete, active, and deliberate act. Yet, Holiness is never an individual act. It is a situation, and an act that not only implies the totality of the Church, but that we are also members of the created world around us. ~ God and Man, Metropolitan Anthony Bloom

The Holiness of the Church should express both the presence of Christ and the inspiration of the Holy Spirit in each of its members and in the totality of its body. For the Church is the body of Christ, the locus of our encounter and participation with Christ, and thus the holiness of God. We are called to be partakers of His divine nature, and it is within and as the Church by which we accomplish this participatory act.

Nativity

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Christ is born! – January 7th, 2018

This morning we had a Divine Liturgy celebrating the Nativity at 630 A.M. It was a joyous gathering.

There was eggs and bacon for break-fast afterwards, but I had to go to work.

Worship the Lord with beauty.

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Worship the Lord with beauty – January 5th, 2018.

The clergy, and also the laity with them, ell have the unspoken responsibility of performing the liturgy as well and as beautiful as possible. For God is the source of all beauty, and as such is deserving of all beauty. The liturgy is the work of the people, and all people in participation of the Divine Liturgy should seek no less than to pour the contents of thier very being into their act of worship so that anyone witnessing this moment in time will be unable to discern if they are on heaven or on earth, just as the Russian legates reported back after their visit to Constantinople, Before Russia’s conversion and entry into the Orthodox Church. We not only worship the Lord in the beauty of Holiness, but in the beauty of our worship of Him in His Holiness, for He is the beautiful breather of stars and deserves nothing less.

The Light of Joy

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The Light of Joy – January 3,rd, 2019

Remain in those prayers and spiritual labors that bring you great joy, for the joy of the Lord surpasses all others. Become the prayer you seek, for ours is an active faith. Those who remain in the light of such Joy, seldom fall into darkness of mind.

Understanding the Church

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Our understanding of Church affects our overall understanding of Christ, and all our theology that stems from this understanding, for indeed the Church is the body of Christ.

Understanding the Church – January 2nd, 2019

Ecclesiology is the Theology of our faith concerning the Church. As we believe that the Church is the body of Christ (and the vehicle of Holy Revelation), the understanding of Christ goes hand in hand with our understanding of the Church. Likewise, an improper view, treatment, and understanding of the Church can affect our beliefs and understanding of Christ. This is a malady of the Christian faith I believe we witness today across the Protestant milieu.

The Church is a divine-human organism, meaning that it is both equally and fully human and divine. Within the Church is contained the fullness of God, and the fullness of man, “but also in the frailty and brokenness and insufficiencies of man, and in that sense the Church is already at home and still becoming.” (1) It is within the Church that man encounters God, both spiritually and physically through her sacraments. It is through man’s participation with the divine nature of Christ, and the sacramental life and rhythm of the Church. that man is healed of his infirmities and becomes that which he was created to be. (1) It is within the Church that man encounters God, both spiritually and physically through her sacraments. It is through man’s participation with the divine nature of Christ, and the sacramental life and rhythm of the Church. that man is healed of his infirmities and becomes that which he was created to be.

We are summoned into this Church by Christ through the grace of God into an eschatological path of asceticism and denial of self. It is within the Church that the disciples of Christ are “ingodded” through the sacramental life of the Church, wherein we attain a better understanding into the fullness of Christ, his teachings, the Law of the Spirit of Life, and the Love of God. It is within the sacraments of the Church, more importantly the Divine mystery of our faith, that the Catholicity of the Church is fully expressed. For, the Church is the bride of Christ, a mystical union of the divine and the human, of Christ and his followers, united to Him in faith and participation in His divine will (for those who love him obey His commandments), as well as a partaking and participation with His body and blood, the spiritual food and medicine for our souls, for indeed whoever eats of His flesh and drinks His blood has eternal life, and will be raised up in the last day.(2) By this partaking and participation, the Church is a theanthropic (divine-human) communion of Jesus Christ with his people.

By this partaking and participation, the Church is a theanthropic (divine-human) communion of Jesus Christ with his people.

Why is there a tendency to force an ecclesiological Nestorianism upon the Church, with an overemphasis on the “invisible Church,” or the “spiritual nature” of the Church, by which all are supposedly in unity; yet, there is a rejection of the physical and manifest aspects – the human parts and expressions of the Church, and the teaching and understanding of her faith – in which there is great disunity? The overarching view is that we are united in spirit, a part of the invisible Church, but ignore the disunity and disagreements in theology, teaching, and overall praxis of faith as though it did not matter. This flies in the face of what Paul spoke to in first Corinthians, when he urged them all to be of one mind, and one accord.

An improper understanding and treatment of the Church will lead to an improper understanding and treatment of Christ, for the Church is the body of Christ, and it is through the Church by which we come to Him, and our understanding of Him.

¹Metropolitan Anthony Bloom. God and Man. (Crestwood, New York: Saint Vladimir’s Seminary Press, 1997),

² Ibid.

Pray Always

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Pray Always – January 1, 2019

If evil is the absence of God, and darkness is the absence of light, then surely those dark and sinister thoughts that plague the minds of many are the absence of prayer and holy reading, for holy reading is the source of much prayer. Pray continually, and read when you cannot bring yourself to pray.

Happy New Year!

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A New Year, a new endeavor!

As we move into the new year, there are so many things on the horizon. I graduated the Saint Stephens Program only a few months ago, and was ordained almost immediately after. Since then I have completed the second draft of a A Simple Catechism of the Orthodox Church, and it has already gained quite a following of people waiting for it to see completion. I have erected my website, my twitter, and established my digital presence, primed and ready for the coming year. With new projects and clergy conferences on the horizon, I look forward to whatever this year has to bring. I especially look forward to working on those tasks which I have placed upon my own shoulders, as I find ways to guide the Orthodox Church into the spirit of our age, and be better prepared and equipped for the evangelism of the modern world.

I look forward to whatever 2019 has to bring. May God grant us all many years!