Homily – An enduring faith.

Homily – An enduring faith. – May 11th, 2019

In the Epistle reading for today, Saint Peter writes of struggle, specifically here to that of servants under their masters. He exhorts them to be mindful of God in their suffering, and endure just as Christ endured. Indeed it is a gracious thing to be mindful of God when we suffer diverse sorrows, trials, and afflictions all for the sake of our faith. Yet, it is equally gracious for those of us who suffer likewise and simply endure because of our faith. For our faith is one of endurance, as Paul writes, stating that when we endure our sufferings for doing good, it is gracious in the sight of God. We are reminded elsewhere by James as to why we do so, writing in his Epistle that the crown of everlasting life is promised to those who love him who persevere in their faith. Though, it is not suffering to which we are called, for suffering in and of itself is not a good thing; but, the fruits of our suffering are what separate us from the world. In it we are tempered like steel against the anvil, and purified like a precious metal in the refiner’s fire. Our faith is a journey of purifying transformation.

Anyone who believes, or anyone who tells you that the Orthodox Christian faith is easy, anyone who says that a life lived in the shadow of the cross is comfortable, such a person is misguided. According to Saint Theophan the recluse, “All the saints accept the only true path to virtue to be pain and hard work… lightness and ease are a sign of a false path. Anyone who is not struggling, not in podvig, is in spiritual delusion” Podvig, a Russian word understood to mean “spiritual struggle,” is often used to describe our faith, for our faith is one of struggle. Our faith is a continual struggle against ourselves, against the passions of the flesh that persist against us daily. Our struggle is against the ailments of our minds and bodies in day to day life. Also, our struggle is against the world, against daily misfortunes, against people and their wills, against a symphony of noise wholly aligned against the silence of God. Nowhere in the whole of scripture was it ever lauded that our walk of faith would be easy. To say as much is a lie propagated by those false teachers and preachers of the prosperity Gospel, men and women who say that health, wealth and prosperity can be ours in this life through Christ.

Christ left everything behind in the performance of his ministry, and told others that did likewise, “everyone who has left houses or brothers or sisters or father or mother or children or lands, for my name’s sake, will receive a hundredfold and will inherit eternal life.” The Apostles lived austere lives, and all were martyred for their faith. The brightest lights of the Orthodox faith were the ones who sacrificed the most in the name of Christ, those who sacrificed of body, of ambition, of needs, of wealth and every worldly thing. Often when the world is at its darkest moments, the brightest lights shine through to dispel the shadows, such as those great Russian saints in Soviet Russia whom we venerate today. They have shown us that our way is not of this world, and have revealed that the greater our attachments to the things of this world, to the ambition and desires of self, the greater the sorrows of our struggle will be. The manner in which we respond to that struggle and suffering is a good barometer of our faith, and how close indeed we are to Christ in our lifelong pursuit of purification, and theotic illumination. Suffering and struggle proves the purity of the faith possessed of the faithful. It is a pure soul that meets hatred with love, injury with kindness, violence with peace, slander with silence, and insults with a smile.

How did the saints respond to their struggles within their own enduring faith? The Church recalls the response of Saint Lawrence, who was essentially grilled alive on a great gridiron over hot coals, entreated his torturers “I’m well done on this side. Turn me over!” The desert father Saint Macarius came across someone robbing his cell, so helped him load his beast of burden with his own possessions and sent him on his way, recalling to himself that “We brought nothing into this world but the Lord gave, as he willed, so it is done: blessed be the Lord in all things.” One Saint was threatened with death, and replied, “Ok, and then what will you do to me?” Abba Anthony says of those not able to bear insults, “You are like a village magnificently decorated on the outside but destroyed from within by robbers.” So it goes, on and on with examples from the hagiography of the Church. The more we are attached to the things and matters of this world, the easier sorrows find our soul.

Indeed, there are those who are murdered for their faith, their light extinguished by the very darkness they sought to enlighten, but I say they have it easy. Though they have made the ultimate and final sacrifice for their faith, they had but one choice to make. They can choose to live, clinging to the dead promises of this world, or they can choose life in Christ, and their struggle is over. They will are wreathed in the crowns of martyrdom. Though, this is not a common circumstance for most, as few will be forced to make such a sacrifice living in the relative comfort of their home.

Christ is the way, the truth, and the Life.. His is the way because He is risen, enduring the death of the cross for all men, to open the gates of paradise. He is life because He is risen, trampling down death by death! He is Risen because He is God incarnate in the flesh, he who condescended to become one of us, that we may be able to become like him. Though, while He is Risen do not forget that we are still fallen. He is Risen, but we will only rise with him through the patient and enduring struggle of our faith. Ours is a faith of action, a spiritual life that lives in friction against the world. It is in this friction, this very day to day struggle that we truly come to know ourselves and the depths of our own faith..

Ours is a vigilant faith. Ours is an enduring faith. When the darkness comes, we patiently wait for the coming dawn. When sadness finds us, we wait till joy finds us again. When chaos crashes around us, we await for the peace that the world cannot give. When the rain falls, we remember that the Lord is merciful, the Lord is just, and he rains on both the just and the unjust. Where the rain falls, the sun shines likewise, so while we recognize and remember that all things come from God, we also accept that these are not the measures of our spiritual life. Each is a test of our faith, good and bad, our struggles and successes, and each brings a suffering of its own. For we indeed were exhorted to carry our crosses daily. If Christ can carry his cross, even falling three times, on his miserable sojourn to his own death, then surely we can endure our own crosses, carrying them as we march to our eternal life.

So, as we distance ourselves from the end of Great Lent, let us not forget the gains we have made from our own struggles of faith, the ascetic practices undertaken and with which we sever our attachments to the things of this world. Such practices are our spiritual struggle through which we build up our faith and strength of spirit. Our struggles with the things of this world are the means by which that faith is tested, and in the perseverance of an enduring faith made even stronger. However, if you find yourself feeling as though you missed out, as though you failed in prayer, repentance, fasting, or any number of spiritual exercises for the building of our faith, then fear not. Great Lent will come again, and we will be reminded once again that He is risen! For, indeed our faith is an enduring faith, a journey of struggle and growth through which we grow into Christ. Even though Great Lent is behind us, our life in this world is still standing before us, so we must keep watch just as Saint John of Kronstadt exhorts us:

“Every day, hour, and minute, keep a strict watch and consider every thought, desire, and movement of the heart, every word and deed, and do not let yourself be defiled by one sinful thought, desire, or movement of the imagination, in word or deed, knowing that the Lord is the Righteous Judge Who is judging you every instant and is evaluating the inner man. Continually keep yourself pure for God.”

Faith is life. Faith is continual. Faith is enduring. Faith finds growth through struggle. We have faith because – He is risen! He is risen! He is risen! May we all live to rise with him.

Amen.

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What does it mean to be Christian?

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What does it mean to be Christian? – May 1, 2019

There is no easy answer to that question, and those who think the answer is easy, really don’t understand the Christian faith.

Christianity before I found the Church was a shallow and vapid expression of the Christian faith, and seemed focused on emotionalism more so than the truth. What feels good or feels right is indeed the truth in this cacophony of error. I spent most of my life as a protestant, and while everyone was teaching what THEY thought scriptures were saying, no one taught how a Christian should live, what it actually meant to be Christian.

As I dove into history, and focused on early Church history, there are certain elements and qualities in the Church, qualities and expectations in the life of a Christian, that just isn’t found today in most of Christendom. The Church, and its entire sacramental life and being within, should point to the Eucharist.

A Christian is a part of the body of Christ. One becomes a part of that body through Baptism. One participates in communion with that body by the Eucharist. One remains a part of the body by holding to the same beliefs, as taught and passed down (catholicity of the Dogmatic fabric of faith), and remaining in communion with one another, just as the three persons of the Godhead are in perfect communion and unity with one another.

As we were created human beings, with both body and spirit, we are to live our lives in recognition that we live and exist in both body and spirit. As such, those who live by mental ascent alone do nothing for the body. They continue to live in their passions, and do nothing to defeat the disease, of which sin is the symptom.

If the Church is the Hospital, the Priests her Doctors, and theology a therapeutic science for the soul, to be Christian is to work ourselves within the divine-human institution of the Church to the healing of mind, body, and soul, affecting a restoration of relationship with God. To be a Christian is to obediently follow the prescription of the Church, just as we follow a doctors orders to the healing of our bodies, for Christ is the Great Physician and those prescriptions are his. Ours is not a faith of passivity, but activity in love and compassion. We are the light to lighten the gentiles, because we are the body of Christ, and together we incarnate Christ in this world.

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Sacramental Lives

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Sacramental Lives – January 24, 2019

I had a short meditation of mine published last month in The Wonderworker, the publication of the Western Rite Communities of the Russian Orthodox Church Outside of Russia. It is presented below.

Homily – Sunday after Nativity 2019

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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.

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.