Phil 4:4-9; John 12:1-18

The news of the miracle that we celebrated yesterday, the raising of
Lazarus from the dead, spread quickly throughout the environs of
Jerusalem. Our Lord Jesus Christ was already well known throughout the
land because of the many miracles that he had performed and because of
His preaching. Now He was nearby, at the home of Lazarus in Bethany.
Then the news came that Jesus was coming to Jerusalem the people of that
city began to get excited.

In the meantime, Jesus Christ had instructed His disciples to go into
the city to a certain place and there they would find a donkey with a
colt. They were to take this donkey along with her colt and bring it to
Him just outside the city. If anyone were to ask, all they were to reply
was that “the Lord has need of it” and all would be well. Things went
exactly as our Lord instructed them and they brought this colt, the foal
of an ass, to Him. Our Lord sat on the colt and began to ride towards
the gates of the city of Jerusalem. This action had great significance
for in that land where everyone walked, to ride a donkey even was the
prerogative of Kings. And the disciples, schooled in the Scripture,
remembered the prophecy that the King would come to them riding on the
colt of an ass. Inspired by this and recalling also their own
recognition that Jesus was the son of God, the promised Messiah, began
to cry out praising Him saying “Blessed is He Who comes in the Name of
the Lord”. Lacking anything else, they took off their coats and laid
them on the roadway as a kind of carpet on which Jesus would ride. When
their coats were not enough, they began to strip branches from the
nearby palm trees and lay them in the way. The people nearby, already
excited at the prospect that the great teacher and prophet Jesus was
nearby, observed the commotion and took up the praises of the disciples.
They too began to offer their own coats and then to bring more branches
to create this carpet for the King to ride on. Doing so, they took up
the song of praise that the disciples were singing. As more people
joined, the commotion got to be greater and the people inside the city
heard what was happening and they too began to spill out of the gates of
the city to meet the Lord and to join in giving Him a royal welcome to
the city. Soon there was a solid mass of people laying a carpet of
cloaks and palm branches on the road into Jerusalem and singing with
joy, “Hosanna in the Highest! Blessed is He Who comes in the Name of the
Lord!” welcoming our Lord Jesus Christ into the city as the promised
Messiah and King of the Hebrew people.

In the Epistle today we heard something that reminds us of this great
entrance and of the state of the people. “Rejoice in the Lord always and
again I say rejoice … The Lord is at hand. Be anxious for nothing and
fill your mind and heart with whatever things are true and noble and
just and pure and full of virtue and praiseworthy” Today, we too see the
coming of the King. The Lord is indeed near. Therefore, with rejoicing,
we take up the cry, “Hosanna in the Highest, blessed is He Who comes in
the Name of the Lord!”

What a wonderful thing to realize, that the Lord is near. Now for the
past 6 weeks we have struggled through Lent, working to draw near to God
and now, we hear that our labor has not been in vain, but that the Lord
is at hand. What great joy fills our hearts with this news that the
object of our labor, the goal of this work that we have been doing
together, is nearly upon us. And so the Apostle tells us first “Rejoice”
and then continues to describe for us how the nearness of our Lord
should affect us. He says first that we should be anxious for nothing,
but that we put all of our requests, all of our needs and desires, in
God’s hands. He has come and He will care for us. Does not the Gospel
tell us that just as we give good things to those we love, so also our
Lord will give to us good things and then as the Apostle reminds us, all
things that God gives to us work together for the benefit of those who
love the Lord. If we love God and put all of our trust in Him, then we
can confidently receive everything that comes to us with thanksgiving,
knowing that no matter what it is, all things are beneficial to the
working out of our salvation. This is important to remember especially
at the beginning of Holy Week, for during this week we will relive some
of the darkest, most dreadful and painful moments in the life of Christ.
With Him we will suffer, with Him we will be scourged and tortured, with
Him we will ascend the cross and enter the tomb. But even in the midst
of this there is the constant reminder that the Lord is near and that it
is necessary only to depend on Him and He will not abandon us in the
grave but that with Him we will also prevail over death and with Him we
will rise from the grave and with Him we will ascend into Heaven and sit
at the right hand of the Father. To this end the Apostle further
instructs us that having laid all of our prayers, our needs and desires,
in the hands of our Lord Jesus Christ, that He will in turn fill us with
His peace.

In order to maintain this peace within us, knowing that the enemy of
mankind will seek to destroy the gift of God in us, the Apostle tells us
to guard our hearts and minds and so preserve God’s gift. In order to do
this, he instructs us to focus our thoughts on those things which are
true, those things which are just, those thing which are pure, those
things which are lovely and of good report. And then also to further
meditate on that which is virtuous and praiseworthy.

In the coming week many things will be presented to us upon which we can
fix our minds and heart and so guard the gift of joy and peace that God
gives to us today. The approach of our Lord Jesus Christ to the cross is
indeed Truth; He is the epitome of purity and even hanging upon the
cross, when seen in the light of the hope of the resurrection, He is
lovely. This week, above all others, we are inundated with these things,
that we might fill our minds and hearts with them. In fact not only do
we partake of these images, these remembrances and blessings now, but we
also stockpile them within our hearts so as to be able to revisit them
throughout the coming year. Although Holy Week is the most intense
period of this remembrance, every week in our prayers we remember on
Wednesday and Friday, the cross and on every Saturday (Sabbath) we
remember the burial and on every Sunday we rejoice in the Resurrection.
All that we experience in this upcoming Holy Week is recapitulated for
us in a small way in every week of the year.

The Lord is near and therefore rejoice in the Lord, again I say Rejoice!
The Lord is near and therefore put all things in His hands, trust Him
and be anxious for nothing and He will give to you His peace which
surpasses all understanding. The Lord is near and so guard your souls by
looking only upon that which is true and just and pure and lovely and of
good report and virtuous and praiseworthy. Fill yourself with these good
things for the Lord is near and when He arrives, when He breaks forth
from the tomb and comes to us as to the Apostles in the upper room, we
will be ready for Him. Today of all days as we sing hymns of praise to
our Lord let us remember that He is near and is coming soon to us.
Rejoice, and again I say rejoice. Hosanna in the Highest, blessed is He
Who comes in the name of the Lord.

--
Archpriest David Moser
St Seraphim of Sarov Orthodox Church (ROCOR)
Homilies: http://groups.yahoo.com/group/propoved/
Website: http://stseraphimboise.org

File        : read only.doc
Description : read only reminder

John 20:19-31

My brothers and sisters, see how great is the love that our Lord Jesus
Christ has for us. In these brief paragraphs, the Evangelist recounts
for us just a few of the events that occurred following the
Resurrection. These things he tells us so that we too might have no
doubts but that we might believe and that our faith might be made strong.

After the crucifixion, the disciples and followers of Jesus Christ were
fearful. They still did not know what to think or what to do. They knew
that the rulers of the people, the Pharisees and the council of the High
Priest had succeeded in the bold move of arresting and crucifying Jesus
Christ. The apostles were afraid that they were next and so scattered
and went into hiding. Then on the third day, the incredible news of the
Resurrection came to them. First the women who had gone to the tomb to
embalm the body came back with an amazing story of an empty tomb and a
vision of angels. Mary Magdalene claimed to have seen the risen Lord
with her own eyes. The disciples did not know what to make of this, but
hope began to build in them that all was not lost. Peter and John ran to
the tomb and found it just as the women had said, that the stone was
rolled away and the tomb was empty. They began to dare to believe that
Christ was risen from the dead. Then Cleopas and Luke arrived and told
how Jesus had journeyed with them on the road and was known to them in
the breaking of bread (one of the first reminders that from the very
beginning the disciples kept the Lord’s supper as He instructed them).

  From these events the disciples began to believe that Jesus was indeed
the Son of God, that He was indeed risen from the dead and that all was
not lost. But still, they were afraid of the Jews, for they had not yet
received the boldness and courage of faith that was given to them by the
coming of the Holy Spirit. In order that they might not be captured,
they came together but secretly behind closed and locked doors. On the
same day that Jesus appeared to Mary Magdalene, after Peter and John had
run to see the empty tomb themselves and returned with the seeds of
hope, Jesus appeared to the gathered disciples. Though the doors were
locked, He was suddenly in their midst and they were afraid, disturbed
at this miraculous appearance of the Lord. And His appearance is the
first of these gifts that He gave to us out of His love. He saw the fear
and doubt of His beloved children and so He Himself came to them to
alleviate their fear and to put to rest all their doubts. And then He
gave to them the second gift of His love, for seeing their disturbance
at His appearance, He said, “Peace be unto you”. His peace, which passes
all understanding was given to the apostles that they might have no
confusion or disturbance in the presence of their Lord and Master. Then
He gave a third gift to them and to all the Church saying again to the
disciples, “As the Father hath sent me, even so send I you.” In this he
commissioned them as apostles going to the whole world to share the
Gospel of the Resurrection and to bring the Church to all men. And in
order to empower them to do this, He breathed on them – just as at the
Creation He breathed the breath of life in Adam so now He breathed the
breath of the new life into the Apostles. See here is a fourth great
gift, the Holy Spirit, Whom the disciples received here as a seed
planted in them and Who would come upon them in power on the day of
Pentecost. This was the fourth gift. And the fifth gift of love followed
again immediately when He said to them, “whose sins you forgive, they
are forgiven; whose sins you retain they are retained.” This power to
forgive sins, which up until now only He had held in Himself is the
power of life. Sin separates us from God, sin is death to the soul, but
the disciples were given the power to eradicate sin and so bring life to
the soul again. They were not given at this time the power to physically
raise the dead (although that gift did indeed come to them at the
descent of the Holy Spirit at Pentecost) but they were given the more
important gift of the power to give life to the soul which was dead from
sin.

Just in this short visit to His disciples, our Lord gave us these five
gifts of His love. However, He was not finished, for Thomas, one of the
twelve, was not with them that day. He had not yet returned to meet the
others after they scattered after the Resurrection. When he did arrive,
he expressed doubts – the same doubts that the others had initially had.
And again, eight days later, on the first day of the week – one week
exactly from our Lord’s previous visit – He came again to them in the
upper room. He knows the hearts of men and before Thomas could even
express his doubts, before he could even say a word, Jesus came to him
and offered His hands and His side saying to Thomas “be not faithless,
but believing” This is another great gift of love that our Lord pours
out upon us – it does not matter how weak we are, it does not matter how
often doubts assail us, it does not even matter if we say ridiculous
things as Thomas had said about putting his finger in the print of the
nails and his hand into the wound on the side of Christ – our Lord sees
the condition of our heart and He Himself comes to us and relieves all
fear, all doubt, all foolishness and gives to us exactly what we need so
that we might not be faithless, but believing.

All these great gifts of love our Lord gave to the disciples and to us
in the days following His Resurrection. He Himself comes to us when we
are afraid and confused and don’t know what to do. He offers to us the
comfort of His peace, which passes all understanding. When we receive
this peace, it does not matter whether we have all the answers, but
simply that we are filled with the love of God that we no longer worry,
for we know and trust that He will provide all that is needed. This
simple step – to receive these two gifts, the coming of Christ to us and
His peace – is sometimes one of the hardest for us for we perversely
like to cling to our fears and doubts. In our pride we want to ‘figure
it out myself’ and so we often do not notice the coming of Christ and we
resist His peace by placing our trust not in Him but in ourselves. But
He does come to us, not once, but whenever we have doubts, just as he
came to the apostles in the upper room not once, but twice so that they
might all be strengthened in faith – even Thomas who still had his
doubts. Knowing that our Lord gives us His presence and His peace, it is
necessary for us to look for these gifts, to actively surrender our self
reliance, our selfish control so that we might instead rely upon Christ
and recognize and receive from Him the gifts of His presence and His peace.

So that we might not be alone in the world, but so that we might be
joined to one another in Himself, He gave to us the Holy Apostles to
plant the seeds of belief and of His Church throughout the whole world.
You and I here who have embraced the Gospel and who have entered into
His Body through the mysteries of Baptism and Chrismation are the fruits
of those seeds. In order to give life to those seeds the gift of the
Holy Spirit, the Lord, the giver of life was entrusted first to the
apostles and then to the whole Church. It is this life of the Spirit
which animates and fills each one of us. And that life is bestowed upon
us by the forgiveness of sins – another gift given to the apostles on
our behalf by our Lord Jesus Christ. Just as we receive the life of the
Holy Spirit in the Church, so also that life is established in us by the
forgiveness of sins, the authority for which was given by Jesus Christ
to His apostles on this first visit following His Resurrection.

See then, my brothers and sisters, how we are loved by our Lord. He
Himself comes to us and gives us His peace so that our fears and doubts
and confusion might be abolished – and He comes not once but again and
again. He sent the Holy Apostles throughout the whole world, to all men
that even you and I who are so far removed by time and space from the
Resurrection might receive these gifts of divine love. He gives us the
life of the Holy Spirit and by forgiveness of sins rescues us from the
death of sin. How great is the love of God for us. What can we do in
return but to love Him all the more.



--
Archpriest David Moser
St Seraphim of Sarov Orthodox Church (ROCOR)
Homilies: http://groups.yahoo.com/group/propoved/
Website: http://stseraphimboise.org

Mark 15:43-16:8

Today, the Gospel narrative paints for us a most tender and beautiful
picture. Our Lord, having given up His life on the Cross, is given over
into the care of the Noble Joseph of Arimathaea. With the aid of
Nicodemos, the Noble Joseph takes the Body of our Lord down from the
cross and wraps it in fine linen and places it in a new tomb. The Body
then rests in the tomb over the Sabbath and at the first opportunity,
early in the morning of the third day of His death, the women disciples
of the Lord come to the tomb bringing the spices with which they would
embalm the Body. Such a picture of tender and true love we are given
today. While it is certainly touching to see the love of the living for
the living, when we see the love and care of the living for the dead it
is increasingly remarkable. St Nikolai Velimirovic comments, “The love
of the living for the living is wonderful. The sun’s light is never so
wonderful. The love of the living for the dead is wonderful. The moon’s
gentle radiance on a lake is never so wonderful. Man is sublime when he
cares for the living; man is more than sublime when he cares for the
dead. A man often cares for the living out of selfishness. But what
selfishness can there be in a man’s caring for the dead? Can the dead
pay him, or express their gratitude?”

When we care for the dead with love and tenderness, we demonstrate that
we are more than animals, we demonstrate that our lives extend beyond
the grave, that there remains a connection between the living and the
departed. St Nikolai again explains this connection: “when a living man
buries a dead one, he buries a part of himself with the dead man and
returns home carrying a part of the dead man in his soul. This is
especially clear –terribly clear- when a kinsman buries a kinsman, and a
friend a friend. … A mother, after a funeral goes to the graves of her
children. Who goes there? The children in the mother’s soul, the mother
lives only in one little corner; all the rest is a palace or the souls
of the children taken from her.”

If there is no life after death, if our lives in this world is all that
there is, then care for the dead becomes truly macabre. It is an
exercise in futility and a meditation on our own ruin. If there is no
life after death, then we are better to cast the dead aside, forget
them, and keep on enjoying the life that we have left. If there is no
life after death, then the death of a friend or even a lover is simply a
greater excuse for the unlimited indulgence of our every passion and desire.

And even if there is life after death, then if there is no resurrection,
again our care for the dead is meaningless. If there is no resurrection
then there is no link between the soul and the body and the
ministrations for the body have no impact on the soul. If there is no
resurrection then care for the bodies of the dead is merely an
indulgence of our own grief. If there is no resurrection then the soul
has gone its way, leaving the body behind like an unwanted husk, chaff
that is separated from the grain and left to blow in the wind or burned
as trash.

But there is life after death and there is the coming resurrection of
all men. Our Lord Jesus Christ has defeated death by His Glorious
Resurrection. He is the Firstborn of the Dead and by His death and
Resurrection has opened the gates for us that we too, at the end of the
world will be raised from the dead that we might live with Him in
eternity. The scripture tells us that in fact all men who ever lived
will be resurrected at the Great Judgment, we will all stand before the
Throne of God and be judged as complete and whole men – with a body and
a soul united together. Just as the body no longer is able to function
without the soul and falls prey to corruption, so also the soul is no
longer able to fully function without the body and is subject to all the
full effects of its own sin. Thus it is up to us who remain alive to
care for both the bodies and the souls of those who have departed this
life. It is our Christian duty to care for those members of the Church
who have departed this life, for we are joined not only as friends or
kinsmen (as St Nikolai describes) but also as members of the same body,
the Body of Christ. It is the mark of many saintly Christians that they
love to pray for the dead. Where there is the Resurrection, death no
longer separates us, but we are joined to one another as surely as the
various parts of a body are joined to one another. We pray for them as
for ourselves for they are part of us and we of them. We are united in
Christ and because of His Resurrection, death no longer has any power
over us, it no longer poses any separation between us.

How then do we care for the dead? What is our Christian duty to them?
How do we love them as we love ourselves? This past week, the first week
after Bright Week, on Tuesday there was “Radonitsa” or the day of the
commemoration of the departed. We had the opportunity on that day to
visit the cemeteries and there pray at the graves of the departed for
the rest of their souls and the forgiveness of their sins. On that
evening we celebrated the general pannykhida for all those among the
departed for whom we wished to pray. These days of the general
commemoration of the dead occur throughout the year. Beyond that though,
we have a more personal duty, to pray for those who were dear to us in
this life and to offer our prayers as thanksgiving to those who have
helped us in our lives. Let me outline briefly the joyful obligation
that we have as Christians to care for the dead.

On the day of death, if we have the opportunity, we should call the
priest to confess and commune the soon to be departed just before their
death and to say prayers for the separation of the soul from the body.
Once a person has died, immediately we begin to pray for the protection
and rest of their soul. A pannykhida is offered by the priest and the
people as soon as possible. We then prepare the body for burial by
washing it, dressing it in clean clothing and laying it in a coffin.
Once this is finished, as the body awaits the funeral, it lies in the
home, in the Church or in our modern practice in the funeral home, while
all who were dear to that person in life come to say farewell. Then the
body is brought to the Church for the funeral. At the funeral, we pray
for the soul of the departed person. We pray for his rest among the
saints, we pray for the forgiveness of sins, we pray for the protection
of the soul from the demons which would attempt to ensnare it. We pray
also for those who remain in this life, for their well being and
strength. Then finally, there is the prayer of absolution, asking God to
forgive all the sins of the departed whether known or unknown, committed
in knowledge or ignorance so that the effect of those sins on the soul,
now that it is no longer under the protection of the body, might be
blunted. Then we all come, beginning with those closest and dearest to
the departed, and offer one last kiss of farewell. Following the
funeral, we take the body in procession, singing as we go the hymn,
“Holy God”, to the grave where it will be buried. At the grave we again
offer a short trisagion for the dead and as we sing “Memory Eternal” the
body is lowered into the grave. We each sprinkle on the body a handful
of earth, participating in the burial in this very real way. Thus we
place the body of the departed into the safekeeping of the earth from
which it was created. Following the funeral, a meal is offered to all
who wish to come in the name of the departed – this is an act of charity
given not for ourselves but in the name the one who has died. This act
of charity is extremely important for it is counted as a blessing and
virtue by the one who has died. It is also frequently the custom to
offer other gifts of charity in the name of the departed both at this
time and throughout the ensuing years.

But our obligation does not end with this – for we also pray for the
soul. We offer a pannykhida on the third day of the death, and again on
the ninth and fortieth days of the death. Again, every year, on the
anniversary of the death of the departed we visit the grave and there
pray for their repose. But these formal prayers are not the only times
that we pray. We should also pray for the souls of the departed in our
own private prayers daily. And also whenever we come to the Divine
Liturgy, we should offer the names of our beloved departed to the priest
with a prosphora for their commemoration at the proskomedia along with
the Holy Gifts. In this parish we offer the opportunity monthly to come
together and pray a general pannykhida for those whom we wish to
remember. And then there are the days, such as this past Tuesday, which
are appointed as special commemorations of the departed and we pray for
them both in the Church and at the graves.

One final question remains. For whom then should we pray? First and
foremost we should pray for our departed parents and forefathers, our
grandparents and uncles and aunts and so on. Many families keep a
pamyanik or commemoration book with the names of their forebears for
commemoration. But not only your family members, you should also
remember your friends who have died, and those who have helped you in
this life, even if you have never met them personally. For example there
are many in this country who read and have benefited from the books and
articles of the Hieromonk Seraphim (Rose) but who never knew him in this
life. Through his writings, he may have given you a great spiritual
benefit, something uplifting. Return his gift by remembering to pray for
him. Many of you have read the lives of various spiritual persons who
are not commemorated already as saints. If their lives have blessed you,
then pray for them for rest for their souls. Remember your teachers and
fathers in the faith, those who have instructed you either by word or by
example, in person or by books. For those of us in this diocese it is
good to remember to pray for our beloved Archbishop Anthony of San
Francisco. During his life he prayed for us, now in his death we must
pray for him.

We care for the dead not in futility, nor even out of our own guilt and
grief. We care for the dead because of the Resurrection. If there were
no Resurrection then there would be no reason to care for the dead.
However by our loving care for the departed, by our prayers for the rest
of their souls, we proclaim the Resurrection of our Lord and our firm
and unswerving confidence that we too will participate in His
Resurrection and live with Him as complete creatures, both body and soul
united, throughout eternity.


--
Archpriest David Moser
St Seraphim of Sarov Orthodox Church (ROCOR)
Homilies: http://groups.yahoo.com/group/propoved/
Website: http://stseraphimboise.org

File        : read only.doc
Description : read only reminder

We have just heard the account of the healing of a paralytic at the pool
of Bethesda. There are many accounts in the Gospels of how Jesus healed
those who suffered from some kind of paralysis and yet this is the one
that is brought out for us every year on this the 3rd Sunday after
Pascha. These weeks after Pascha are a very special time, for, like the
disciples, we are filled with the joy of the Resurrection and yet there
is much that has not yet been revealed. The feasts of the Ascension of
the Lord into Heaven and of Pentecost with the descent of the Holy
Spirit are still a few weeks away. This time is when our Lord brought
all of His earthly teaching together for the disciples, reminding them
of everything that happened so that they might go forth into all the
world preaching the good news of God’s love for us and His victory over
sin, death and the devil which freed us to follow Him into His Kingdom.
This incident of the healing of the paralytic at the pool of Bethesda
contains much that reminds us not only of our Lord’s mercy and
compassion, but also of the effect of His coming upon our soul.

The pool of Bethesda was a well known place in Jerusalem. It was located
alongside the sheep gate in the walls of the city. This is the gate
where the lambs destined for sacrifice at the temple were brought into
the city. The pools original purpose was as a washing place for the
sheep. But the pool was more than just a watering hole for sheep, for it
was discovered that an angel of the Lord would come and stir the water
of the pool and those who were first to enter the pool at this
disturbance of the water was healed of whatever malady he might suffer.
As the miraculous properties of this pool spread, many of the sick and
disabled men and women of the area began to come and wait by the pool
for the healing visit of the angel. There was built around the pool a
structure with 5 porches and these 5 porches were soon filled to
overflowing with all manner of suffering men and women all waiting for
the chance to enter the water and be healed. Here was concentrated the
suffering of the whole nation. Around this pool the porches served as 5
storehouses of suffering, human pain and grief and sickness. In the
center of all this suffering was the pool which was the focus of all who
were there. Normally the pool was calm, but every once in a while it was
stirred up and at those time, the suffering, just for a moment eased a
little as some were healed. But still the vast storehouse of those who
continued to suffer remained as the waters calmed again, awaiting the
next angelic visit.

How like our own being this pool is. Around the outside of ourselves we
have the 5 senses, like the 5 porches. These senses take in the world
around us and provide us with the stage by which we interact with our
world. We see, hear, smell, taste and touch the world around us and
these sensations enter into our inner being and affect the state of the
soul. At the center of the senses, receiving the impressions from them,
lies the heart, like the pool surrounded by the 5 porches. Because of
our sinfulness, the senses have filled with the impressions of the
suffering world. We see the ugliness of the world and how sin has
twisted the things of the world which originally had declared the glory
of God, but now are used to try to deny even God’s existence. We see
also the beauty of the world, but only inasmuch as it titillates our
passions and tempts us to indulge our own desires. We hear the cruel
words that men have for one another and the cursing and swearing and
denial of God. We hear the moans and groans of the ills of the world. We
smell the odors of corruption and decay. We taste the food which we must
eat as a constant reminder that we do not have life in ourselves and so
must eat to live. We feel the pains and hurt of the world around us, and
we use our bodies to grasp at the ever more fleeting pleasures of the
world. The 5 senses are filled to overflowing with the imresions of the
sinfulness of the fallen world and have become, like the 5 porches,
storehouses of that suffering.

In the center of our senses is the pool of the heart. But that pool
which was meant to be a fountain flowing with living water, constantly
bringing the renewing and healing grace of God to our souls is quiet.
Only on occasion are we moved when something from the outside moves us,
as the angel moved the water of the pool. We temporarily inspired by
some muse or unexpected touched by the awareness of God’s beauty or are
stirred by some other divine intrusion into our self centered world. For
a moment we glimpse the divine. And that moment when we are awakened to
the presence of God, provides some relief from the suffering and from
the oppression of sin which fills the 5 senses. But this relief is short
lived for our heart, in its sinful and fallen state, is not capable of
maintaining that connection to the grace of God and again the pool falls
quiet and the suffering presses in around it.

Now to this pool at Bethesda comes our Lord Jesus Christ and to this one
man who had suffered there 38 years – he had come to embody all the
suffering of all the people who crowded all the porches. He lived in the
hope of those moments when the water stirred – the hope that each new
stirring of the water might be the time when he would be healed. But it
was not to be, for each time, by the time he reached the pool the
disturbance was over and there was no healing there for him. However,
our Lord reached out to him in compassion and mercy and by His word
healed this man who had suffered for so long, waiting for the angel to
come and stir the water. But now he was made whole by the coming of God
Himself.

When Jesus Christ comes to us, His presence is of a different quality, a
higher quality that even those momentary glimpses of the divine that
briefly stir the heart. His coming is not fleeting, it is permanent. He
does not make us come to Him, instead, He comes to us. When He comes to
us and when we begin to live in Him, drawing our life from Him, then He
Himself changes the still pool of our heart into a fountain of living
water not only bubbling up within us but flowing out from our hearts
through our senses into the world. The fountain living water that Jesus
Christ brings to us clears our senses of the suffering, ugliness and
cruelty of the world and allows us again to see and hear and touch and
taste and smell the glory of God which all of creation rightly
proclaims. No longer are our senses overwhelmed with the darkness of the
sinful world, but rather they are filled with the Light of Christ from
within and this light enlightens the world around us. Rather than being
the storehouse of suffering, weighed down the burdens of sin, with the
coming of Christ we are lifted up and become a font of divine grace
flowing out upon the world around us. The love of God, flowing through
us, heals and changes the world where we are. Rather than being weighed
down by the suffering of sin, we become the means by which that
suffering is healed and creation is restored. No longer do we see the
creation twisted to deny the existence of God, but now we see its true
nature proclaiming the glory of God for all to see.

Jesus Christ comes to us and heals us – but even more than this, He
lives within us creating within our hearts a fountain of living water by
which we are transformed and by which we also transform the world around
us. We are healed by Christ, not temporarily or partially, but
completely and eternally. And being healed, we become fountains of
living water, of the transforming grace of God, of God’s compassionate
and healing love to the whole world around us. This is the lesson of
this miracle. We see that not only are we healed, but we become the
means by which the world around us is healed by the grace and love of
Jesus Christ abiding within us.

Christ is risen and no longer are we held in the captivity and suffering
of sin – but we are freed and we ourselves become fountains of living
water flowing out to the world around us.

--
Archpriest David Moser
St Seraphim of Sarov Orthodox Church (ROCOR)
Homilies: http://groups.yahoo.com/group/propoved/
Website: http://stseraphimboise.org

John 4:5-42 & John 15:17-16:2

The Great Martyr, Trophybearer and Wonderworker George today gives us an
example of the supreme love of Jesus Christ. St George was a soldier in
the army of the Roman Emperor; he was also a Christian. When the Emperor
began a persecution against the Christians, ordering that the army seek
them out and capture them to be tortured and killed – St George did not
wait to be found out as a Christian and arrested, but went to the
Emperor himself and boldly declared that he was a Christian. This is one
of the gifts of grace that is especially apparent in the martyrs and
that is spiritual courage. We look at ourselves and it would be hard to
imagine what we would do in such a circumstance. How would we react if
we were faced with such a choice – to hide our faith in Christ or be
killed; to externally bow to the world, or to be tortured and killed for
our steadfast confession of Christ. Many of us, like the Holy Apostle
Peter, might be quick to say, “Even if all were to deny you, I will
never deny you” and yet, when the hour of temptation comes, like Peter,
we may well fail. But Peter is also an example of the forgiveness of
Christ, Who foresaw Peter’s denial and forgave him even before he
sinned. Later, Peter, along with the other apostles, was filled with the
Holy Spirit and this time, because of the grace that was in him, did not
fail, but was bold and spoke out, confessing Christ. On our own
strength, we are unable to endure even a fraction of the suffering of
even one of the martyrs. It is the grace of God that enables a person to
such a feat. St George, when faced with the choice to deny Christ or to
suffer and die, was so filled with the grace of the Holy Spirit, that he
boldly was able to confess Christ regardless of the consequences. He
then was indeed tortured, he did indeed suffer, and yet our Lord healed
him continually so that each new day, the effects of the torture were
erased. And so because of the evil madness of the emperor, the torture
continued. While the emperor became all the more enraged by St George’s
refusal to deny Christ, others were amazed at his faith and seeing St
George’s steadfast confession and the miracles that accompanied his
words, they too came to believe in Christ. Even the Empress herself was
so touched by St George’s love of Christ, that she too became a
Christian. When the Emperor found this out his rage and madness overcame
even his affection for his wife and he had her arrested and tortured as
well. But she too was filled with the grace of the Holy Spirit and
boldly confessed Christ up to the moment of her death. At this, the
emperor finally ordered that St George be beheaded, thus insuring his
death as well.

But all this was long ago, what about now, what about today, such things
would not happen in the modern world. And yet we have also another
example of just such murderous madness directed at Christians. Yesterday
was the day of a relatively new festal celebration – the memory of the
new martyrs of the fields of Butovo. Butovo was a “killing field” of the
Soviet secret police – the Cheka. In these fields, those that the
atheistic soviet state considered to be enemies were lined up and shot.
Their bodies were then covered with a thin layer of dirt and the next
group were brought in and shot right on top and so on. In this manner
whole layers of the dead were formed. In all there were more than 21,000
people killed in this place. Off those 21,000, no less than 940 were
killed simply because of their confession of Christ. As of 2005, 240 of
those slain have been identified and glorified as saints of the Orthodox
Church. This madness, this rage against Jesus Christ and His followers,
came upon the Russian land suddenly – for it came with the atheist
oppressors in the revolution. For 70 years that hatred raged unabated,
as Christianity was persecuted with a violence such as had never been
seen. Just as suddenly, the madness was thrown off when the Soviet state
fell. The Russian people and the Russian Church, once held captive by
this terror and madness were again free. In their freedom, the deep
roots of grace implanted in the hearts of the people, began to sprout
and bloom again – almost immediately. Where there was once a persecution
of Christian faith, there now bloomed a rebirth of faith. The field of
Butovo, which was once a killing ground where Christian martyrs were
slain became a shrine. A chapel was built and just a few years ago the
cornerstone of a new Church dedicated to the memory of these new martyrs
was laid by Patriarch Alexii and Metropolitan Lavr. In 2 weeks the altar
of this new Church will be consecrated, jointly by Patriarch Alexii and
Metropolitan Lavr - the heads of the newly reconciled two parts of the
Russian Church: the Church in Russia, once enslaved and now free; and
the Church Outside Russia, free but once in exile. While there is much
that separated and still separates the Church in Russia and the Church
outside Russia, all this is overcome and we are united at the graves of
the martyrs. All parts of the Russian Church suffered, some in fear and
secrecy, some in prison, some in exile, made to wander throughout the
earth with no home to call their own. All parts of the Russian Church,
however are healed and brought back together by the blood of the new
martyrs. All the grace that God gave to these honored sufferers enabling
them to confess Christ even unto death now is spilled over the whole of
the Russian Church bringing healing and restoration. It is fitting that
our reconciliation be marked by the consecration of this temple, at the
fields of Butovo where lie the relics of 940 and uncounted more who
boldly confessed Christ and were martyrs.

If such a madness can suddenly sweep over a land and culture that had
been steeped in the grace of the Orthodox Christian faith for nearly
1000 years, how much more possible is it that such madness could
suddenly sweep over this world which is becoming less and less overtly
Christian. The day may indeed come when we are called to account for our
faith, as were the Apostle Peter, St George and the host of the new
martyrs of Butovo. Our own courage will fail when faced with such terror
– but we do not rely upon our own courage, rather, we have living within
us the Holy Spirit, Who fills us with grace and Who will give to us,
should the time come, this spiritual courage that we will need to boldly
confess Christ.

In today’s Gospel, we heard how our Lord offered to the Samaritan woman
“living water”. This living water, which we mentioned last week, is the
grace of God which flows into us and from us like a fountain. The grace
of God pours from us to the world around us, and we become witnesses to
the glory of God. We become instruments for the salvation of those
around us. Because of the effect of this fountain of living water in us,
that is the grace of God freely flowing through us, we shine in the
world the light of Christ. But the ruler of the fallen world, the enemy
of Christ and of all Christians, the devil, sees this light and becomes
filled with hatred. And then the words of the Gospel are realized that
just as the world hated Christ and so killed Him – the world will also
hate us who follow Christ and will seek to kill us as well. That
persecution and killing might be overt as it was with the martyrs of
whom we spoke, or it might be covert, working secretly within our
hearts, pressuring and driving out our love of Christ; pushing us to
compromise our faith, to hide Christ; creating in us doubts and fears
that maybe this isn’t the true faith, this isn’t the right way, that God
doesn’t exist (or if He does that He doesn’t care). All of these are the
temptations, torments and tortures of the evil one, trying to get us to
deny Christ. But when we face these things, when we feel powerless
before these temptations, when our own courage seems to fail – we have
but to call upon Jesus Christ to grant us the gift of grace, the gift of
spiritual courage so that we can stand firm in our faith along with St
George and the New Martyrs of Butovo and boldly proclaim Christ to the
world.

Holy Martyrs and Confessors pray to God for us.

--
Archpriest David Moser
St Seraphim of Sarov Orthodox Church (ROCOR)
Homilies: http://groups.yahoo.com/group/propoved/
Website: http://stseraphimboise.org

John 9:1-38 & Luke 5:1-11

On the sea of Galilee, there were many fishermen who earned their
livelihood by going out to fish every day. On one particular day a
particular group of fishermen had been out fishing all night and had
caught nothing and so at the end of the hard night’s work, they sat on
the shore empty-handed, washing and mending their nets. A wandering
preacher came and used one of the boats as a platform for his teaching –
having the fishermen push out just a little so those who were following
this teacher could all come up to the shore and hear him as he spoke.
When he was done, he said to the fishermen, “Now go out and let down
your nets” These fishermen were a bit dismayed for they had already
worked all night and were tired. Not only that, they knew that at this
time of day the fish would be even harder to find. And on top of it all,
they had just finished cleaning the nets. But despite all this they did
as they were instructed and there was a great miracle. Not only did they
find fish, but so many fish that the net began to break. Their partners
also came and helped them bring this huge catch of fish in. From this
miracle, these fishermen recognized that this preacher was indeed a
great holy man. At this recognition, the preacher, our Lord Jesus
Christ, spoke to these men saying to them “come and follow me, I will
make you fishers of men.”

When our Lord called His disciples to come and follow Him, they hardly
knew who He was, and yet they chose to leave behind their work, their
families, their way of life. Today we remember one of those former
fishermen who left off catching fish and instead became fishers of men,
the Holy Apostle James, the brother of the Apostle John. James and his
brother John left their father and family to follow Christ. They
listened as He taught; they obeyed His instructions regarding how to
live. Despite the conflicts with the religious rulers, they persevered
in following Christ, even when He went to the cross and died and was
buried – still they remained faithful. And they all came to believe that
Jesus is the Christ, the Messiah, the Son of God. After the
Resurrection, with the coming of the Holy Spirit at Pentecost, they
became the heralds and preachers of this faith not only to Jerusalem and
the Hebrew people, but to all the world.

Also in the Gospel we heard how Jesus did something that had never been
done before; He healed a man born blind, that is with no eyes. Placing a
little clay on the eyes of this man Jesus instructed him to go to a
particular pool and wash off the clay. When he did this, he found that
he could see. But the Pharisees began to challenge him, pushing him to
denounce Jesus as a sinner – but the formerly blind man remained firm in
his confession of Jesus as a prophet and healer. Finally, Jesus came to
the blind man again and spoke with him. The blind man hearing that Jesus
was indeed the Son of God immediately believed and worshipped Him.

Both of these accounts show us three qualities of the spiritual life:
obedience, perseverance and faith. We begin our spiritual journey with
obedience born of meekness. Knowing that there is One greater than
ourselves, Who can guide us in our spiritual lives and finding this
person, Jesus Christ, we then begin to follow Him, to live in accordance
with His instructions, to imitate His way of life, to conform our own
self to Him. This is the first step of obedience. The fishermen did not
yet see the end result of their obedience, but they did know that Jesus
would lead them to greater spiritual heights. The blind man had no idea
what this business with the clay and the pool would actually gain him –
he knew that he had no eyes – and yet he too obeyed the instruction of
Jesus Christ which resulted in his miraculous healing. This step of
obedience is also the first step for us. Jesus Christ says to us, “come,
follow me” and then begins to show to us the path of salvation which
leads to union with God. However, it is up to us to obey, to follow the
path that He lays out for us, even when we don’t understand or realize
His purpose; still, trusting Him we obey and follow Him.

Both the Apostles and the blind man faced persecution, doubts, attacks
from all sides. There were temptations to deny Christ and to separate
from Him. But these attacks were met with the second quality that is
shown to us, that of perseverance. These followers of Christ, having
embarked on the path of obedience did not waver, but endured hardship,
endured persecution, criticism, mocking and so on, endured the
temptation to deny Christ and abandon Him. This perseverance served only
to strengthen their faith to confirm the fact in their hearts that they
will follow Christ. We too, when we set out to follow Christ will face
hardships, doubt, temptations, struggles, difficulties and so on. Such
spiritual struggle is inevitable. Some of it is the work of demons who
try to discourage us from Christ and draw us away from Him and so
enslave ourselves again to sin while there is also the pull of our own
fallen nature, our passions and self-centeredness that seeks to reassert
its mastery over the soul. Once we set out to follow Christ, we know
that we will face all these things and just as we see in the Apostles
and in the blind man, we know that perseverance will be necessary to
remain steadfastly on the path of salvation.

Where does all this obedience and perseverance lead? Finally it leads to
true faith, to a true realization and knowledge of Jesus Christ as the
Son of God. For the Apostles that is expressed in their response to
Jesus when He asked them, “Who do men say that I am” and then “Who do
you say that I am?” Peter responded for all when he said, “You are the
Christ, the Son of the Living God.” They had reached the point were
obedience and perseverance led to faith. The blind man also, when Jesus
asked, “Do you believe on the Son of God?” responded, “Who is he that I
might believe” Upon hearing the answer to his question that Jesus
Himself was the Son of God, the formerly blind man exclaimed “Lord I
believe” and worshipped Him. Here too obedience and perseverance led to
faith.

If we also desire to have this unshakeable faith in Jesus Christ. To
know beyond all shadow of doubt that He is indeed the Son of God, the
Messiah who is come into the world to save us from sin and to redeem us
and bring us into His Kingdom, then we must follow the example of the
Apostles and of this blind man. First there is obedience – to follow
Christ and to live in obedience to the way of life that He gives to us
in the Gospel and in His Church. Second, our obedience must also be
tempered by perseverance – holding fast to our confession of Christ,
continuing to follow Him despite the temptations, the doubts, the
hardships and persecution. This life of obedience and perseverance lead
us finally to faith, to the true knowledge of Christ that transcends
simple obedience and brings about love of God. It makes all of our
struggles pale in comparison to the joy of being with Christ. Faith,
true belief, brings about in us true love for God and this is what
accomplishes our union with Him. We are united in love to God Who unites
Himself to us in love.
These three qualities then, obedience, perseverance and faith, mark our
spiritual lives, define our relationship with Christ and bring about in
us the true love of God which unites to Him and brings us into His kingdom.



--
Archpriest David Moser
St Seraphim of Sarov Orthodox Church (ROCOR)
Homilies: http://groups.yahoo.com/group/propoved/
Website: http://stseraphimboise.org

Today, dear brothers and sisters, we celebrate a birthday. We celebrate
the birthday of the One Holy Catholic and Apostolic Church. It is on
this day, with the descent of the Holy Spirit upon the Apostles that the
Church was born. Up until this time mankind did not experience the
presence of God directly for he did not have God living within himself.
In the time of the prophets – that is the in the time of the Old
Testament prior to the coming of Christ – we experienced God through the
Law and the Prophets, through the words and promises that He gave to us
in the words of the Prophets and through the effects of His hand on the
course of history. All of these promises found their fulfillment and all
of history focused upon the coming of God into the world, the
incarnation, the birth of our Lord Jesus Christ. In the earthly life of
Christ, we experienced God no longer as an abstract, but now as a person
– the God/man Jesus Christ. In Jesus Christ we see for the first time
the union of God and man, we see what God had intended for us at
creation and what He still desired for us in our destiny. Still however,
while He was closer to us, He was not united to us. On this day, the day
of Pentecost, God Himself, the Holy Spirit descended upon the Church as
tongues of flame and began to dwell within those who followed Christ.
The descent and indwelling of the Holy Spirit breathed the divine Life
into the new Church, the Body of Christ. Just prior to His ascension,
our Lord Jesus Christ instructed His disciples to remain together in
Jerusalem. They were not yet united together by the one Spirit and so it
was necessary for a time for them to remain united by physical
proximity. However once the Holy Spirit came to them, they scattered to
the 4 corners of the earth to preach the Gospel. Although they were no
longer united by their physical proximity, now they were united by an
even stronger bond – the indwelling of the Holy Spirit. Now they were
themselves a living part of the One Body of Christ – the Church – which
is united by the One Holy Spirit of God Who lives within each member of
the Church, joining us all together.

In the Gospel today there are two distinct images of the effect of the
Holy Spirit dwelling in us. Our Lord first tells us that we will become
fountains of Living Water – that is the grace of the Holy Spirit. Then
again He tells us that we shall have the Light of life. Light and water
together symbolize the presence of God in us. When we are baptized, we
are often said to be “illumined” that is we become filled with the Light
of Christ. No longer do we walk in the darkness of sin for we are filled
with Light and that Light shines in us so that we become the Light of
the World. The living water, of which we have already spoken in the past
few weeks, is the grace of God which transforms us and unites us to God
Himself. We are not only filled with this grace but this grace overflows
from us and touches the whole world through us. With the coming and
indwelling of the Holy Spirit, Who is the source of that grace, now we
are filled no longer from the outside, but from our inner being does
this spring of divine grace pour forth. In this manner we have become
not only receptacles of divine grace, but we have become fountains from
which the divine grace flows.

Just as our Lord Jesus Christ in His incarnation is the God/man, so the
Church as His Body also manifests the same dual nature for the Church is
a living thing, it is a divine/human organism filled with the life of
the Holy Trinity. The presence of that Life is the result of the
integral presence of the Holy Spirit living in us. Being partakers of
the grace of God through the presence of the Holy Spirit, we now become
members of the Body of Christ – cells, as it were in the divine/human
organism that is the Church. By the Holy Spirit we are intimately united
to Christ and just as intimately united to one another. In the Church we
are no longer a collection of individuals, but we have become a unity of
persons – just as the Holy Trinity is One God in three persons. In the
Church we are the persons and we are united by the one Holy Spirit Who
lives in each of us individually and corporately.

John 7:37-52: 8:12

Thus with the coming of the Holy Spirit the Church is as a divine/human
organism is born. On this day God Himself not only comes to us as He did
in the Incarnation – but He becomes part of us, living within us in
unity with our own spirits, uniting us organically to God and to one
another. The parish community that we see and experience here around us
is the local visible manifestation of the One Holy Catholic and
Apostolic Church. Thus it is that we are united not only to each other
here, but we are united also to all of the other parishes and people in
the Orthodox Church – the other local visible manifestations of the One
Holy Catholic and Apostolic Church – who share in the life of the Holy
Trinity. Whenever we receive visitors from other places – whether it is
our own Archbishop Kyrill or perhaps a priest or a layman from a
different city – we manifest that unity. Whenever we visit parishes in
other cities and join with them in prayer, we manifest that unity.
Whenever we join in prayer with the other parish communities in this
city – we manifest that unity. The grace of the Holy Spirit that courses
through us makes us one, unites us together in the life of the Holy
Trinity and makes us to be the One Holy Catholic and Apostolic Church.

Today on this feast of the descent of the Holy Spirit, is the birthday
of the Church. The Church as a divine/human organism was born on this
day. Today we have become fountains of living water, overflowing with
the grace of the Holy Spirit to touch the world with God’s love,
compassion, mercy and grace. Today we have become the light of the
world, shining with the Light of Christ which illumines all men. Today
the Church is born for today the Holy Spirit has descended upon us and
dwells within us.

--
Archpriest David Moser
St Seraphim of Sarov Orthodox Church (ROCOR)
Homilies: http://groups.yahoo.com/group/propoved/
Website: http://stseraphimboise.org

File        : read only.doc
Description : read only reminder

Matthew 10:32-33, 37-38, 19:27-30

Last week we celebrated the “birthday” of the Church and this week we
remember all those who make up the Church – the whole body of the
saints. Sometimes it is suggested that this Sunday of All Saints is just
a way to make sure we get in all those saints who don’t have a
particular day on which they are remembered, but in truth our
celebration is more than that. On this day we remember that every person
who is within the Church is or is destined to become a “saint” – a
person who has joined himself to Christ and who is made holy by being
filled with the grace of the Holy Spirit that was first poured forth
upon the Church at Pentecost. Thus today is not only the celebration of
saints, but it is a celebration of every person that is part of the
Church – those who have finished their course on this earth and those of
us who still struggle with this life. We are all united together into a
single entity which is the Church the Body of Christ. On this day we
look forward to what God desires to make of us and above all remember
those whom we set apart as “saints” for they have left for us a “trail”
to follow – they have left the footsteps of their lives so that we too
can become like them, full of the grace of God and united to Him and to
one another in perfect love. Today we celebrate all those who make up
the Church, all those who are part of the Body of Christ.

In the Gospel today we heard our Lord set some clear boundaries about
who is part of His Body saying such things as: “Whosoever therefore
shall confess me before men, him will I confess also before my Father
which is in heaven. But whosoever shall deny me before men, him will I
also deny before my Father which is in heaven.” And “He that loveth
father or mother more than me is not worthy of me: and he that loveth
son or daughter more than me is not worthy of me. And he that taketh not
his cross, and followeth after me, is not worthy of me.” From this we
see that if we wish to be part of the Church, the Body of Christ, we
must place our Lord Jesus Christ above all and love Him and follow Him
more fervently than any other pursuit in our lives. We must love Him
even more than our own families. And in order to do this we must take up
our cross and follow Him – for if we do not love Him above all, if we do
not follow Him then we are not worthy of Him. Let us then look at what
He Himself says about loving Him and following Him.

Elsewhere, in His High Priestly prayer (Jn 17), our Lord indicated that
our unity with one another and with Him is of the same nature as His
unity with the Father (“that they may be one as we are” Jn 17:11). We
know that the unity of the Trinity is one of love. And we know that God
is Love. When we become one with God it is because we are so filled with
His Love that we become like Him and live and move and breath in Him.

How then does this help us define who are the members of the Church? Our
Lord also said just prior to this prayer, "If you love me, Keep my
commandments" (Jn 14:15) "He who has My commandments and keeps them, it
is he who loves Me, And he who loves Me will be loved by My Father and I
will love him and manifest Myself to Him...If anyone loves me, He will
keep my word and My Father will love him and We will come to him and
make our home with him. He who does not love Me does not keep My
words;..." (Jn 14:21-24) "If you keep my commandments, you will abide in
my Love, just as I have kept my Father's commandments and abide in His
love." (Jn 15:10) and "You are My friends if you do whatever I command
you" (Jn 15:14). These statements are part of our Lord's instructions to
His disciples immediately before He withdrew to pray for them in the
afore mentioned “High priestly prayer” and therefore they enlighten the
phrase in that prayer, "that they may be one as we are" (Jn 17:11).

Thus we see how it is that our Lord defines the limits of the Church -
the Church is composed of those who love Him and who therefore keep His
commandments. Or, he indicates in today’s Gospel “ye which have followed
me, … and every one that hath forsaken houses, or brethren, or sisters,
or father, or mother, or wife, or children, or lands, for my name's
sake, shall … inherit everlasting life.”

The disciples carried this same definition into their ministry and
teaching. For example, the Apostle Paul when talking about those who
were called to be within the Church said, "Circumcision is nothing, and
uncircumcision is nothing, but keeping the commandments of God is what
matters." (1Cor 7:19). The Holy Apostle John also tells us, "Now by this
we know that we know Him, if we keep His commandments. He who says, 'I
know Him,' and does not keep His commandments is a liar, and the truth
is not in him. But whoever keeps His word, truly the love of God is
perfected in him. by this we know that we are in Him. He who says he
abides in Him ought himself also to walk just as He walked." (1Jn 2:3-6)

  From this, we can say with confidence that the "limits of the Church",
those who love God and know Him, can be defined by those who obey the
commandments of Christ and "who walk just as He walked", or in other
words, those who follow Him. How then do we know these commandments. We
know the commandments of Christ from Holy Tradition - both that which is
written (Scripture) and that which is unwritten (the oral Tradition of
the Church). The "walk" of Christ which we ought to follow is the "walk"
of His Body, the Church. The way of life and the teaching of the Church
define for us the limits of the Church. If we follow the way of life
that the Church gives us, if we heed the commandments of Christ which
the Church teaches us, then we are within the Church - both by the
definition of Christ and of the Holy Apostles.

This then is the path for us. Today we remember that the Church is
composed of all the saints. Who are those saints? The very word “saint”
tells us for it is derived from the word which also means “holy” and we
recall that above all others God is holy. We become “holy” or “like God”
by loving Him more than anything else in our lives such that we are
first crucified and dead to this world and then by following Him, by
keeping His commandments and walking just as He walked in the path that
He has given to us – that is by living the life of Christ shown to us in
the life of the Church. This life of faith is not just about belonging
to a particular parish or following the requirements a particular
religion, but rather it is a way of life – something that permeates into
every part of our daily lives. If we wish to be part of the Body of
Christ, if we wish to be one of the saints, then it is necessary to take
up the cross and sacrifice our own life and then to follow Christ, to
live His life.

Today we remember all the saints – those who are already counted among
the choir of the saints and those (like you and I) who are still in the
process of becoming saints. My brothers and sisters, let us then follow
Christ, let us begin again in this moment and in every moment to come to
forsake our old life leaving it behind and instead to live the life of
Christ.

--
Archpriest David Moser
St Seraphim of Sarov Orthodox Church (ROCOR)
Homilies: http://groups.yahoo.com/group/propoved/
Website: http://stseraphimboise.org

Matt 4:18-23

“Follow me” This is the call of our Lord Jesus Christ to the apostles as
He began His earthly work. Andrew and Peter and James and John, who were
fishermen, upon hearing this call, left their nets, their boats even
their families and followed Him. Such a simple call, and yet it is the
call that leads us into the Kingdom of Heaven.

When God created man, He began to show our first father Adam the way to
go so that he might grow and develop and become like God. In the garden
of Eden, God said to Adam, “Follow me” and Adam with our first mother,
Eve followed … for a while. For a while, they lived according to the
instruction of God, growing and developing according to His plan. But
the evil one, seeing the wonderful bond between Creator and creature (of
which he had been deprived because of his rebellion), sought to destroy
that bond because of his own envy. Taking the form of a serpent, he
spoke to Eve, tempting her to break the law of God and eat of the tree
of the knowledge of good and evil. Eve stepped outside the law of God
and took of the fruit of the forbidden tree and having herself
disobeyed, she in turn brought this temptation to Adam, who followed her
in her disobedience. This begins the familiar account of the fall of
mankind from his original state of communion with God. Adam and Eve, who
had been following God, stepped off the path of salvation and ended up
losing their way.

But God in His infinite love for mankind, did not abandon them or us for
He Himself took on our fallen and flawed flesh and became Man. He did
this so that He might restore us to the path of salvation from which we
had strayed and then show us the way to live so that we might
successfully walk that path into the Kingdom of Heaven. And so, just as
He said to Adam and Eve in the garden of Eden, “follow Me” now He calls
the Apostles and to us saying “Follow Me”.

This is the call of Jesus Christ that we hear today, “Follow Me”. It is
simple and direct. God has become man and dwelt among us that He might
first restore us to the path of salvation and then lead us along that
path into the Kingdom of Heaven. We have only to follow Him, to do as He
instructs us and we will enter with Him into the Kingdom of Heaven.

There are, however, many difficulties along the way. Although the path
is simple, it is not easy. Just as Adam and Eve were tempted by the
words and snares of the evil one, so we also face these same nets of
temptation. Constantly the demons seek to lead us astray by suggesting
to us that we will find something better off the path, a shortcut, an
easier way, a better way; or perhaps we will be able to “take a break”
from following Christ and briefly indulge our own will and desire until
the path of Salvation and the way of Christ is but a distant memory.
These nets of temptation try to pull us away from following Christ and
return us to the captivity of sin death and the devil from which we were
freed. Just as the Gospel tells us that Andrew and Peter, “left their
nets and followed Him” so we also must resist the temptations of the
demons, leave behind the nets that would seek to entangle us and enslave
us, and follow Christ instead.

Other difficulties in taking up this path remain for we have many things
in our lives which compete for our attention with the path of Christ.
Because of our fallen nature, we have lost sight of the heavenly kingdom
and we see only our own worldly concern. Sometimes worldly cares,
attachments and goals loom so large that they block out the sight of the
Kingdom of God. Our careers; the desire for worldly prestige, status and
acclaim; worldly possessions; and so on can compete in our minds and
hearts with the call of Christ. In order to follow Him, we also have to
trust Him that He will provide for us all that is necessary and we have
to see that the Kingdom of Heaven is of greater value than that which
the world offers. Like James and John we must leave behind the “boat” of
our worldly ambition and activity and follow Christ.

The Gospel tells us also that James and John left their father Zebedee
to follow Christ. In this way we are also reminded that even the
strongest earthly ties, the ties to those that we love, must take second
place to the call of Christ. When a family is united in following
Christ, this is a blessed thing for there is then a common goal to the
family life and the family members encourage each other and help each
other to follow Christ. But when the ties of love and friendship and
family conflict with following Christ, then like James and John, we must
even leave those behind. By our willingness to follow Christ we may
bring others along with us, for remember that elsewhere in the Gospel we
see that the mother of James and John, who had initially been left
behind, became a follower of Christ, even one of the myrrhbearing women.
Nothing can be allowed to stand between ourselves and Jesus Christ.
Nothing can remain that will hold us back or pull us off the path of
salvation. We must forsake all for Christ.

Remember last week the words of the Apostle Peter when he said to our
Lord, “We have left all to follow you, therefore what shall we gain?”
And Jesus answered him saying, “In the resurrection, when the Son of Man
sits on His throne of glory, you who have followed Me will also sit upon
thrones…and everyone who has left houses or brothers or sisters or
father or mother or wife or children or lands for My name’s sake shall
receive an hundredfold and shall inherit eternal life.” This is indeed
the goal – to be with Jesus Christ in glory and to receive eternal life.

We have talked in the past and will continue to talk in the future about
the path of salvation and how to follow it. For today let us simply heed
the call of Christ to follow Him on that path and to leave behind
anything that would encumber us or hold us back. Let us then abandon the
web of temptations and desires that pull at us. Let us leave our boats
and all the worldly cares that are thereby represented trusting in our
Lord Jesus Christ to give us all that is necessary. Let us forsake even
the worldly ties of family and friends should they try to compete with
the call of Christ. Let us then hear and obey the call of Jesus Christ
to us today for He says to us, as He said to our first parents and to
the Holy Apostles, “Follow Me.”

--
Archpriest David Moser
St Seraphim of Sarov Orthodox Church (ROCOR)
Homilies: http://groups.yahoo.com/group/propoved/
Website: http://stseraphimboise.org

Matt 6:22-33

In this Gospel we find a very important truth. No man, says our Lord,
can serve two masters, either he will hate the one and love the other or
he will hold to the one and despise the other. In this saying we find
the path that leads to God. Very often when we engage in spiritual
struggle, our minds and hearts are turned towards contending with
temptation and evil. We focus on resisting the passions and putting them
aside. We deny ourselves and take up our cross. All this is good,
however, in this saying we find a more perfect way to turn away from sin
and to follow Christ.

The Gospel tells us that if we love one master, then we will hate the
other. Thus if we work to develop within our hearts the love for God, we
will naturally come to hate sin and to flee from it. If we hold to God,
then we will despise the temptations of the passions and of the world.
This is the secret then to overcoming sin – to love God. If we truly
love God then sin will have no hold on us. Indeed this is exactly the
advice once given to me in confession. I had been struggling with a
particularly difficult sin – I had put forth all my effort to resist
temptation when it came and yet inevitably I fell. I brought this
struggle in tears to confession. My confessor pointed out that such
habitual sin has power over us because we do not love God, for if we did
love God then that sin, which is so persistent, would no longer appeal
to us for the very reason stated in this Gospel. If we truly love God,
then we will hate sin for no man can serve two masters.

The Athonite elder Porphyrios gives the same instruction when he says,
“Devote your efforts to spiritual things and ignore the other things. We
can attain to the worship of God easily and bloodlessly There are two
paths that lead to God: the hard and debilitating path with fierce
assaults against evil and the easy path with love. … I find that the
shorter and safer route is the path with love. … You can make a
different kind of effort: to study and pray and have as your aim to
advance in the love of God and of the Church. Do not fight to expel the
darkness from the chamber of your soul. Open a tiny aperture for light
to enter and the darkness will disappear. The same holds for our
passions and weaknesses. … The object is not to sit and afflict and
constrict yourself in order to improve. The object is to live, to study,
to pray and to advance in love – in love for Christ and for the Church.
What is holy and beautiful and what gladdens the heart and frees the
soul from every evil is the effort to unite yourself to Christ, to love
Christ to crave for Christ and to live in Christ, just as St Paul said,
‘it is no longer I who live; Christ lives in me.’ … What must dominate
is love for Christ. Let this be in your head, your thought, your
imagination, your heart and your will. Your most intense effort should
be how you will encounter Christ, how you will be united to him and how
you will keep him in your heart.” Here Fr Porphyrios tells us again the
same thing as the Gospel and as my confessor – if you fill your heart
with love for God, then sin will have no place in you.

How then do we accomplish this task, how do we pursue the love of God.
First, my confessor told me, it is necessary to ask God to give you that
love for Himself. In prayer always be sure to ask of God that He would
kindle in your heart that flame of love for Him. Whenever you then sense
even the slightest warmth in your soul towards God, then immediately
focus on that spark of love and nurture it into flame. Fr Porphyrios
also tells us how to pursue the love of God. He says that we must “study
the words of the Fathers, through memorization of the psalms and of
portions of Scripture, through the singing of hymns and the through the
repetition of the Jesus Prayer.” And again he says that one should
“occupy yourself with hymns of praise, with the poetic canons, with the
worship of God … All the holy books of our Church – the Book of the
Eight Tones (the Octoechos), the Book of the Hours (Horologian), the
Psalter, the books with the Offices for the feasts and saint day
commemorations (Menaion) – contain holy, loving words addressed to
Christ. Read them with joy and love and exaltation. When you devote
yourself to this effort with intense desire, your soul will be
sanctified in a gentle and mystical way.” Finally he says, “(Reading)
the lives of the saints … the saints are friends of God. All day long
one can meditate on and take delight in their achievements and imitate
their way of life. … By reading these books you will gradually acquire
meekness, humility and love and your soul will be made good.”

So here we have some very specific instructions in how it is we nurture
the love of God in our hearts that drives away sin and draws us to Him.
First there is prayer – to ask God to kindle love in our hearts. There
is no better way to begin to love God than to talk with Him. Begin your
quest to love God with prayer and let prayer be a part of everything
else that you do. In this way, you will carry the awareness of God’s
presence with you at all times and in all places.

Second there is the reading and memorization of Scripture, especially
the Psalms and the Gospels. Take a little time each day to read the
scripture. At least read those portions of the Epistle and Gospel that
are appointed to be read in Church. These are printed out on the yearly
calendars that are made available to everyone and then again are
compiled in our parish newsletter each month. For those who wish to read
a little more, then begin also to read the psalms – just a few a day,
starting at the beginning until you finish, then begin again. One can
also take on a schedule of reading the Gospels and Epistles prescribed
as a part of the cell rule of various monasteries. This is to read each
day one chapter of the Gospels beginning with Matthew through the end of
John and two of the Epistles, beginning with the Acts of the Apostles
and finishing with the Apocalypse. In this manner the reading of the
Gospel and Epistles comes out almost even and when you are finished,
begin again. It is not important which “discipline” of reading the
scripture one takes up – it is only important that you read the
scripture daily.

Third, Fr Porphyrios prescribes reading the holy books of the Church.
These books that he names, the Octoechos, the Horologion, the Psalter
and the Menaion are the books used in the services of the Church. These
books are read to you every time there is a service here – and so when
you come to the services and listen carefully, or even better when you
come and help with the singing and chanting, you hear and read these
holy books. If you skip out on the services of the Church, if you make
excuses for yourself why you cannot come – then you miss this vital and
important help towards loving God. What is there in your life that is
more important than nurturing the love of God that keeps you from the
services of the Church. In these services we pray, we read the Scripture
and we hear these holy books read to us – all the things that have been
suggested as ways to develop the love of God, and yet it seems we always
find some reason not to come, there is always something more important.
What is more important than loving God?

Fourth there is the reading of spiritual books, especially the lives and
writings of the saints. Always have some kind of spiritual reading at
hand and every day read at least a portion of the life of a saint or
some of the sayings or writings of the saints. These lives and sayings
are the expression of the love for God manifest in the daily life of a
person who like you and I live in the world and who successfully
nurtured the love of God in themselves. What better example can we have
for loving God in our own lives? The saints are our friends, they are
our heavenly companions and they are united with us in the Body of
Christ. Their lives, their sayings, their writings are an inspiration
and example for us to follow in our own lives.

These are the things that we can do to kindle and nurture the love for
God in us – pray, read the scripture, read and listen to the services of
the Church, read and meditate on the lives and sayings of the saints. If
you spend all your energy on these things, then the love of God will
grow in you – and as you come to love God, then you will hate sin and as
you hold to God you will despise sin. Take up this “easy path”; this
light yoke of Christ; this labor of love and the love for God will grow
in you and sin will lose its appeal and hold upon you. It is true that
no man can serve two masters – therefore choose to serve Christ and
choose to develop within yourself love for Him.

--
Archpriest David Moser
St Seraphim of Sarov Orthodox Church (ROCOR)
Homilies: http://groups.yahoo.com/group/propoved/
Website: http://stseraphimboise.org

Matthew 8:5-13

When it rains, water falls to earth irrespective of the kind of ground
upon which it falls. The rain falls on the hills as well as the valleys,
it falls on the rock as well as the sand, it falls on the city as well
as the country. But the water does not stay where it falls, but as soon
as it hits the ground it begins a journey. That journey invariably takes
it from the highest mountain to the lowest valley. “Water does not stay
for long on the high steep slopes of the mountain, but rather runs off,
gathering into streams and rivers until it finds a low place, a place
where it can collect and remain still. Water does not collect on the
high mountain bluffs, but in low, level, deep places. Neither does God’s
blessing abide in the proud, who puff themselves up in opposition to
God, but in the humble and meek, , who have deepened their hearts by
humility and meekness, submissiveness before God’s majesty and obedience
to His will.” (St Nikolai of Ochrid) God pours out His grace upon all
mankind, but that grace only collects and remains in the soul that is
truly humble. “God is here on earth only with those whose hearts are
contrite and whose spirits are humble” (St Nikolai).

We can see therefore how vitally important humility is to the Christian.
St Seraphim tells us that the goal of the Christian life is to “acquire
the Holy Spirit” or in other words to fill our souls with the grace of
the Holy Spirit. That grace then affects us and transforms us into God’s
image and likeness and it unites us with Him. We cannot become like God
on our own – only God can accomplish this through His grace (as the
Apostle says, “we are saved by grace, not by works”) The way to collect
this grace and to make sure that it remains within our soul is to humble
ourselves.

What then is humility? It is a word we use often and we think we kind of
have a general sense of it, but we do not think about what it is.
Today’s Gospel reading gives us an example of humility in the person of
the centurion who came to Jesus begging for the life of his servant. The
centurion was a man of power – he was a military officer in command of a
company of 100 men. He could make anything happen within his sphere of
control. Anyone who lived or moved in the area under his command could
be brought instantly into his presence and would be compelled to do as
he wished by the force of his military might. This man would have
generally begun as a soldier himself, advancing through the ranks by his
skill and prowess in battle until finally he had acquired both the
notice of his betters and the admiration and loyalty of his men and he
was then raised to command his troop. He was about as high as a commoner
could rise without also being raised into the ranks of the nobility.
Here was a man who had much to be proud of for he had accomplished much.
And yet this centurion lowered himself to care for his soldiers. When
his servant became deathly ill, he did not just send for another
replacement and pack the ill man off to some obscure place in the
company to die. This centurion took upon himself the cure of his
servant, calling in physicians and healers, all that he could find. And
when these failed him, he reached out to Jesus, the teacher and
miracle-worker and begged Him to come and heal the sick servant. And
again we see how this centurion humbled himself, for he did not send
someone to fetch Jesus to him, but rather he himself went to find Jesus
and personally beg His help. And even further, when Jesus agreed to come
and heal the servant the centurion replied, “I am not worthy that Thou
shouldst come under my roof; but speak the word only and my servant
shall be healed.” Not only did the centurion humble himself to come in
person to Jesus for help, but he also recognized the greatness of the
Lord and his own unworthiness, not even demanding that Jesus come to his
house, but having faith on the great spiritual authority that rested in
Him to heal from afar.

This is our example of humility, this centurion who did not rely upon
his own power and authority, who did not insist on his rights, who
exhibited compassion for others, even when it was inconvenient and
unnecessary to do so. He had much to be proud of, but he put all that
aside when he sought out Christ. He did indeed “lower himself” thereby
providing within his soul a place for the grace of God to gather and rest.

How unlike the Jews this centurion was. Whereas he sought out Christ and
went to him asking for His help (when he could have simply sent a group
of soldiers to bring Jesus to him and demand that He heal the servant),
the Jews when they came to Christ, came to test and try to lure him into
some kind of trap so that he could be proven false. When a Pharisee
invited Jesus into his home, he thought to honor Jesus, but when it
seemed as though Jesus would come into the home of the centurion, the
officer himself saw that his home (although the seat of local power and
authority) was not fit to be honored by the presence of Christ. Whereas
the Jews sought the power to arrest Jesus, the centurion, who already
had that power, did not even consider to raise it to bring Jesus to
himself in his need – but went himself and begged not for Jesus to come,
but only to heal. He saw in Jesus the true Power and Authority of his
divinity, which the Jews were unable to recognize. The centurion saw
this because he was humble whereas the Jews were blinded by their own
pride. Their pride came from the fact that they were God’s chosen people
and they knew it. From the time of Abraham, the Hebrews were set apart
by God as the ones chosen to reveal Him to the world through the coming
of the Messiah. Being chosen by God brought about in the hearts of the
great forefathers a profound humility for they saw that they were not
among the great and powerful of the world and that all that they did
receive had been given them by God. But over time this sense of awe and
unworthiness waned and the people became proud of their status as “the
chosen ones” and even though there were many in the world who were more
powerful (such as Rome, locally evident in this centurion and others),
they considered themselves to be more worthy and better than all for God
had “chosen” them. This pride so blinded the Jews that when the Messiah
did come, they were unable to recognize him, but saw only a man, a
trouble maker, who threatened their accommodation with the powers of the
world. Only the humble were able to see Him as King and God but the
proud had no eyes to see nor ears to hear.

Now we too find ourselves in a similar place as the Hebrews of old.
Though we were nothing, God has “chosen” us and has given to us the
abundance of His grace. He has revealed Himself to us and given Himself
to us that we might be united with Him. We have the true faith, we have
the light of Christ which illumines all men. The whole world lies in
darkness and we, the Orthodox Church, bear within ourselves the Light of
the world. Some are born into the Church and have this Light and grace
as their heritage while others of us come into the Church at a later age
and have this Light and grace by our own choice. Either way we are
tempted to become proud, to forget that we in ourselves are nothing, we
in ourselves are unworthy of this grace, but that all we have and all we
are is from Jesus Christ. We must not let this happen, but rather, like
the centurion we need to nurture within our soul the virtue of humility.

Just a few short weeks ago we celebrated the feast of All Russian Saints
and it is tempting to see the vast choir of the Russian holy ones and
say to ourselves, God has chosen the Russian people because of their
great capacity for holiness. See how great we have become in the Kingdom
of God. But this would be in error, for God does not abide in the proud
and the strong, but chooses the humble and the weak as His servants. The
Russian land became the home of many saints because those very saints
lowered themselves, and set aside their own pride and instead put all
their hope on Christ alone. Those of us who were not born into an
Orthodox society, into an Orthodox home and not raised in the Faith
might be tempted to look at ourselves and congratulate ourselves that we
had the wisdom to choose the true Faith, that we were smart enough to
make this choice and strong enough to bear the consequences of that
choice. We might also be tempted to pride because of what we have done.
But this too is an error and must be set aside. While we were yet
sinners God loved us and we love Him because He first loved us. We are
here only because we are responding to the love of God. We bring nothing
to Him, but rather He gives us all that we have. Whatever we think we
have, we set aside and receive everything from Him. We are not smart or
strong enough to choose God, rather He, in His great mercy and
compassion has chosen us, and we only respond to His love.

This is humility, to realize that in ourselves we are unworthy, we are
without any goodness or worthiness. All that we have, all that we might
have, any good thing within us comes from God. We do not deign to honor
Him with our presence, but instead He honors us even though we are
nothing. We bring nothing to Him, but He gives to us everything. When we
exhibit any great skill or ability, we recognize that this is not our
own achievement, but rather that God has given to us this ability, this
skill, this strength and therefore we can claim nothing but all honor,
all praise, all recognition goes to Him alone. This is humility, that we
are nothing and God is everything. All that we are, all that we have is
from Him. All of our self worth, all of our self esteem comes not from
us, but from the fact that He loves us and showers his gifts upon us.
The more we develop and nurture this sense of our deep and abiding
dependence upon God for all things, even the most basic foundations of
our self, the more we lower ourselves and humble ourselves, the more we
become a pool, a lake, even an ocean of grace. And that grace transforms
us into the likeness of God and unites us with Him.

--
Archpriest David Moser
St Seraphim of Sarov Orthodox Church (ROCOR)
Homilies: http://groups.yahoo.com/group/propoved/
Website: http://stseraphimboise.org

File        : read only.doc
Description : read only reminder

We live in a time when evil reigns in much of the world. The struggle
with the "Power of Evil" permeates the Bible. and, throughout the
centuries it has been and still is of great concern in the Life of the
Church. Indeed, much has been experienced in her continuing struggle
with Evil in all of its manifestations.

In today's Gospel lesson, Jesus meets two men under the power
(influ¬ence) of demons. Others could not pass through that area because
of the fierce attacks of these men possessed by evil. But when Jesus
came, the demons cried out: What have we to do with You, Jesus, You Son
of God? Have You come here to torment us before the time? (Matt. 8:29).

In these words the demons acknowledged the Power of the Son of God, for
the power of God alone can overcome evil and God will ultimately destroy
Evil. The demons beg Jesus, If You cast us out, permit us to go away
into the herd of swine (Matt. 8:31). They ask the Son of God to permit
them to enter into a herd of swine. The answer of Jesus is the simple
command to the demons: Go (Matt. 8:32). This is the only conver¬sation
that Jesus has with the demons - brief and to the point. There is no
argument, no justification, no explanation; simply a command: Go.

When Jesus told Peter and His disciples that He must go to Jerusalem and
suffer many things from the Elders and Chief Priests and Scribes, and be
killed and on the third day to be raised, Peter rebuked Jesus and said:
Far be it from You, Lord; this shall not happen to You (Matt. 16:22).
Jesus then turned to Peter and said: Get behind Me, Satan! You are an
offense [stumbling block] to Me, for you are not mindful of the things
of God, but the things of men (Matt. 16:23).

Again the response is "No" to Peter who is speaking, not in harmony with
the will of God. The temptation to commit sin - to do evil - is to be
rejected whatever its source. Neither Scripture quotations, not even the
words of a "Disciple of Christ" who had just been called Peter - the
Rock - is to deter us from rejecting the evil intent. The Devil piously
quoted Scripture, and Peter piously protested the possibility of the
suffering, death and resurrection of Christ. But in both cases, the
intent was to oppose the Will of God, or to allow Evil to have its way.
and thus the only response is a categoric "No!"

Evil knows its place in the world, as the demons themselves indicated.
They had no place in man created in the Image and Likeness of God and
enlivened by the breath of God. They asked to be permitted to enter into
the "unclean animals," the herd of swine, a more suitable place of abode
for evil.

Evil has no place in man's world. It is the "Spirit of destruction and
death"; having entered the herd of swine, the demons drove them into the
sea where they perished. God is the "Spirit of peace and concord"; God
is the "Spirit of love and unity." for God is love. When man allies
himself with God through Jesus Christ. the Son of God, he places himself
squarely on the side of Good, of Beauty, of Perfection, of Peace,
Harmony and Unity. Therefore, any force that would tempt man away from
the godly path, must be rejected categorically, and in the words of
Christ, must be told to Go - Get behind Me, Satan.

We are reminded how important it is not even to enter into conversation
with evil. St. John Chrysostom observes in his interpretation of the
first chapters of the Book of Genesis. that man made himself vulnerable
to sin when he entered into conversation with the Serpent. The first
step in the commission of sin is to change the categoric "No" with which
we should always answer all temptations to sin, with a "Maybe", - to
consider the possibility of sin. This leads to the idea that there can
be a middle road. In our day, we are often told that there is a middle
road and we are tempted to compromise with Evil. But the experience of
the Church, which is our experience in Christ, clearly denies such a
possibility.  There is no middle road with sin.

In the first chapters of the Book of Revelation, the seven churches of
Asia are warned of the danger of compromising with Evil, and are called
to reaffirm their commitment to Christ, the Son of God, and to reject
Evil in whatever form it appears. The Church of Laodicea is the seventh
Church and its lukewarm Christianity is roundly condemned in these
words: I know your works, that you are neither cold nor hot. I could
wish you were cold or hot. So then. because you are lukewarm. and
neither cold nor hot. I will spew you out of My mouth … As many as I
love. I rebuke and chasten. Therefore be zealous and repent (Rev.
3:15.16, 19).

We need not despair even though we may have succumbed to the
blandishments of the Devil, for God does not want us to die, He wants us
to repent and live. As He told the Church then, He tells us now: Behold,
I stand at the door and knock. If anyone hears My voice and opens the
door, I will come in to him and dine with him, and he with Me. To him
who overcomes I will grant to sit with Me on My throne. as I also
overcame and sat down with My Father on His throne. He who has an ear,
let him hear what the Spirit says to the churches (Rev. 3:20-22). If we
"pass the test" and resist the temptations of evil, we will also conquer
evil, even as Christ Himself did. When we conquer we will receive the
ultimate reward¬ the privilege of entrance into the Kingdom of God,
there to reign with Jesus Christ, the Son of God, in the Eternal Glory
of Peace and Joy. Amen.

(This homily was taken from the book The Living Word a collection of
sermons compiled by Bishop Herman of Philadelphia)


--
Archpriest David Moser
St Seraphim of Sarov Orthodox Church (ROCOR)
Homilies: http://groups.yahoo.com/group/propoved/
Website: http://stseraphimboise.org

Matt 9:1-8

When Sir Edmund Hilary summitted Mt Everest, he was not alone, but was
accompanied by his Sherpa guide and until that last effort they had both
been surrounded by members of the climbing expedition who provided the
support that made it possible for Hilary to reach the summit. When we
learn about the heros of this world, we find out that they are rarely
alone in their accomplishments. The “hero” is only one member of a team,
the one upon whom the attention of the public is focused and around whom
the efforts of the team are organized. This is also the situation that
we find within the Church. We are not alone in our labor to work out our
salvation and to live the Christian life, but we are surrounded with
many helpers. We have the angelic host around us, especially our
guardian angel, who are unseen, and yet who support us and protect us by
their prayers and efforts in the spiritual world. There is also the
choir of the saints who await us so that we might enter into our reward
together. They too pray for us and intervene on our behalf as we work
out our salvation. Even these two heavenly groups are supplemented in
their efforts by the fact that we are not saved alone, but in the
community of the Body of Christ – the Church. We are surrounded by other
believers, others who are walking the same path as we are, others who
help us and whom we help. We support each other when we are weak; we
pray with each other; we rejoice together in times of joy and we mourn
together in times of sorrow. Together we travel the path of salvation.

In the Gospel today we heard of one of the miracles of our Lord wherein
He healed a man who was paralyzed. This man had been brought to Jesus on
a litter, carried by his friends. Here again we see the communal nature
of the Church and how it is we help and support each other. The sick
man, while he may have fervently desired to go to Christ and be healed,
could never have done so on his own – but those around him aided him.
They picked him up out of his bed, laid him on a litter and then carried
him into the presence of Jesus Christ. When he finally was set down
before Christ, our Lord did not heal his body, but first, through the
forgiveness of his sins, healed his soul. Only then did Jesus heal the
body, telling the paralyzed man to get up and walk. Our Lord did this in
order to instruct us about the effects of sin. Sin, when it enters our
soul and is not removed by repentance and forgiveness, wounds the soul
and the longer it settles there that wound festers and becomes more and
more disabling. Sometimes that sin is so great that it becomes
disabling, preventing us from even the slightest effort towards
repentance. It is at these times that we need our friends, our brothers
and sisters in Christ to come to us and lift us up and bring us into the
presence of our Lord and Master that we might be healed. This is done in
many ways. First and foremost, by our intercessory prayer for one
another. We should be remembering to pray for each person here in this
parish every day. It is not even necessary to know the inner state of
the heart to pray for another person. God knows what this is. All that
is required of us is that we pray for them with the simple prayer, “Lord
have mercy” and by this commend them into the care of our Lord and cover
them with the grace of the Holy Spirit that constantly surrounds us.

Prayer is not the only way that we help one another. Not only do we pray
for one another but we also can provide direct help – assisting with a
task that seems insurmountable to one person, but which is light work
for many, or simply listening as a brother or sister pours out his heart
to us, thereby sharing the burden of sorrow or struggle that they bear
within. Sometimes we are able to provide words of support or
encouragement, and sometimes it is sufficient only to listen, to offer a
touch of sympathy and friendship, just to “be there” with them. These
are the ways in which we support one another and help one another as we
travel together along the path of salvation.

Years ago there was a particular difficulty in my own life. I carried a
burden within my own heart, searching for help and guidance from God. I
was isolated from my friends by distance and circumstance. But in my
struggle there were two friends who never let me go. They constantly
called and spoke with me – not directly about my struggle, but about the
normal everyday “doings” of my spiritual life. Even though I was
withdrawing into my own little shell, they were unwilling to let me go.
I recall one evening I received a phone call from one of those friends.
I had been all that day in a situation where I was forced to face many
of my own deficits and was being pulled into the abyss of despair. But
this phone call forced me out of that spiral and my friend by his voice,
by his compassion, by his conversation, brought me into the presence of
Christ where I was healed. Like the paralytic of the Gospel, I was
unable, despite even my own desire, to turn to Christ because of the
weight of my own sin and despair, but he picked me up and brought me
into the presence of Christ – just by calling me and chatting with me
and pulling against the despair that had me in its grasp. He was
unaware, even at the time, of the timely nature of his call and of the
effect of his friendship – but simply because he was there, because he
had been praying for me, because he would not let me go, he brought me
into the healing presence of Jesus Christ.

This is what we can do for one another. We may not see into the secret
struggles of the heart that those around us face, but we can pray for
one another even as a matter of routine; we can be friendly towards one
another, we can listen to one another, we can encourage one another, we
can lend a hand to each other. We may never even know (as my friend did
not know) what the effect of our presence is for our brother, but be
assured that your word, your touch, your help, your prayers are real and
serve to lift up your brother in his time of need and bring him into the
healing presence of Jesus Christ.

We are not alone as we walk the path of salvation. We have our guardian
angel who walks beside us along with the whole angelic host. We have the
saints who surround us with their prayers and their helps. We have each
other, our brothers and sisters in Christ who rejoice with us, who
sorrow with us, who help us, who pray for us and who lift us up and
bring us into the healing presence of Christ – just as we also do for
them. My brothers and sisters, look around you here and see your fellow
travelers on the path of salvation. Pray for one another, listen to one
another, help one another, carry one another into the presence of our
Lord Jesus Christ that together we may be healed.

--
Archpriest David Moser
St Seraphim of Sarov Orthodox Church (ROCOR)
Homilies: http://groups.yahoo.com/group/propoved/
Website: http://stseraphimboise.org

Matthew 9:27-35

Over the past few weeks, we have heard the accounts of many healings by
our Lord. Each one has many lessons that are instructive to us not only
about the compassion and love of our Lord for mankind, but also about
the spiritual life. This miracle of healing of the blind men is no
different. In this miracle, filled with the compassion of Christ, we see
a model of our own salvation. In the healing of the blind men we see the
healing of our soul from its blindness and indeed from all of its
spiritual illnesses.

St Innocent of Alaska teaches us about our created nature and destiny
when he says: “We were created to live on earth unlike animals who die
and disappear with time, but with the high purpose to live with God —
not for a hundred years or so — but for eternity! Every individual
instinctively strives for happiness. This desire has been implanted in
our nature by the Creator Himself, and therefore it is not sinful. But
it is important to understand that in this temporary life it is
impossible to find full happiness, because that comes from God and
cannot be attained without Him. Only He, who is the ultimate Good and
the source of all good, can quench our thirst for happiness. ... It
seems that in the depth of our subconscious something reminds us that we
are just wanderers on this earth and that our true happiness is not here
but there, in that other and better world known as Paradise or the
Heavenly Kingdom.” In a similar manner we know that these blind men were
also searching for something. They had been born with sight, and then
lost it and were searching for a way to regain it, but they did not know
how. Mankind was created to live in eternity with God, and indeed did
live with God in Paradise, but through his sin, he lost that essential
connection with God in his life. Now mankind searches to find again the
happiness and joy that he once had which comes only through communion
and union with God.

When the God/man Jesus Christ told the apostles that He would go before
them to prepare a place for them and that they would follow Him, the
Apostle Thomas said to Him, “Lord we do not know where You are going,
how can we know the way?” Our Lord responded to Thomas, “I am the Way,
the Truth and the Life, no man comes to the Father except through me.”
(Jn 14:6) And again Jesus said at another time, “If any man would come
after me, let him deny himself, take up his cross and follow me” (Mt
6:24). Thus we see that the only way to regain that which we have lost,
the only way to return to the communion and union with God is to follow
Jesus Christ, who is Himself the “Way”.

The blind men, the Gospel tells us, followed Jesus around, crying “Son
of David have mercy on us.” They did not need to constantly explain
their lack of sight – it was obvious to all that they could not see and
that as a result of their disability, they were beggars. They had heard
that Jesus was a healer and so even in their blindness, they sought Him
out and found Him and began to follow Him around asking for mercy. How
are we any different from these men. We have lost something more basic
and precious than our sight – we have lost our union and communion with
God. We have heard that we can restore this loss through the One Who is
Himself the “Way” and so in our blindness we search out Jesus Christ and
having found Him, we begin to follow Him and to cry out to Him, “Lord
Jesus Christ have mercy on us”. We know that this prayer, which we call
the “Jesus prayer” is the most basic and comprehensive of all prayers.
By this prayer we call out to the One Who can not only fulfill our
deepest desire for communion with God, but He can see the internal state
of our hearts and knows the depth of our need even better than we
ourselves do. Therefore we simply cry out to Him, “have mercy” for our
need is obvious to Him.

In the Gospel, Jesus turned to the blind men and asked, “Do you believe
that I can do this” and they answered, “yes Lord.” He then touched their
eyes saying “according to your faith, be it done to you” and they
regained their sight for they truly believed that Jesus was their only
hope, their only recourse, the only One Who could fulfill their desire.
Jesus Christ also turns to each of us who follow Him and cry out to Him
and asks us “Do you believe that I can do this?” And the question that
we each must answer within our souls is “Do I believe? Do I really
believe that Jesus is the only Way, the only Truth, the only Life, the
only way to come to the Father?” and even deeper, “Do I believe that to
be healed by Him, to be restored into communion with the Father by Him,
will indeed satisfy the need and desire of my soul? Is this the way to
regain true happiness and joy?” These are not idle questions to be
dismissed with the perfunctory “of course I believe” or to just assume
the answer to be “yes” because after all I am an Orthodox Christian.
Remember that the One Who asks this question sees into your heart, He
sees whether or not you do believe; but He asks you for it is necessary
for each of us to confess that in ourselves, we are hopeless, in
ourselves, we are powerless, in ourselves there is no life, no joy, no
enduring happiness, in ourselves there is only cold emptiness and
darkness. Then when we know this of ourselves, we can truly answer “yes”
for we know that our only hope, our only desire, our only joy is to be
united to Christ.

Then He will touch us and restore in our hearts the seed of the Life of
the Holy Trinity and the presence of God is again within us. This seed
of Life must be nurtured and protected so that it may grow and consume
our whole being. We are now again in the place of our first parents Adam
and Eve, who had been given this same seed of Life within themselves at
their creation. Through their sin, they lost this seed and since that
time we have all been searching for it in our own lives. Now, having
found it again, let us return to the path of salvation and struggle to
stay upon it. If we sin, let us repent that we may be forgiven and so
not lose the seed of life. Let us live according to our desire for this
life so that it may grow more full and stronger and fill us more and
more each day. Let us give up our own lives that we may be filled with
this life that is given to us by Jesus Christ – the life of the Holy
Trinity which we can now share. This is the great treasure, the pearl of
great price which we have desired in the depths of our souls. This is
the Light that chases away the darkness in us; this is the Life that
fills the emptiness within us. The fruit of this seed is the happiness
and joy in our hearts for which we have sought from our birth.

The blind men followed Jesus and called out to him for mercy – and they
received their sight. We have lost something much more precious and
basic than sight – we have lost the life of God for which we were
created and which we were designed to share. Having found the only true
source of that life, Jesus Christ, we have begun to follow Him and to
cry out to Him saying, “Lord Jesus Christ have mercy on me!” And turning
to us He asks, “Do you believe that I can do this”. Indeed if we truly
believe, if we confess our emptiness and abandon ourselves into His
hands – He will heal us and fill us with His Life that we might live
with Him in eternity. Having received this life from Him, it is now
given to us to live according to the life that is within us – no longer
living for ourselves alone, but living instead the Life of Christ, the
Life in which we were created to participate. Having received this great
gift, it is now up to us to care for it and nurture it in our hearts in
order that this Life will grow in us and completely fill us bringing us
the joy and happiness which comes only from union and communion with the
Holy Trinity, our true God and Creator.

--
Archpriest David Moser
St Seraphim of Sarov Orthodox Church (ROCOR)
Homilies: http://groups.yahoo.com/group/propoved/
Website: http://stseraphimboise.org

Matt 14:14-22

When they were with Jesus, the apostles were constantly learning from
everything He said and did. As the God/man Himself, He taught them about
God and showed them the way of life that would bring them into union
with God. He showed them amazing and wonderful things (such as the many
healings they witnessed). He also showed them the necessity to trust in
His providence, as we see in this miracle today. He took 5 small loaves
of bread and two small fishes and with this fed 5000 men (along with the
women and children who were there). After this there were 12 baskets
full of remnants from this miraculous meal. All this from a small and
insufficient beginning.

This miraculous meal is only a type and an image of the heavenly banquet
that later He laid before the disciples and which He continues to lay
before us today. This is the banquet of His most holy Body and His
precious Blood. We begin to prepare this banquet with just 5 small
loaves of bread and a cup of wine. From these breads we select the
finest of the loaves and then cut out the center of that loaf. This is
the best of the best of the best of the bread. We then offer bring these
offerings to the Holy Table where we pray for the intervention of the
Holy Spirit to make these into His own Body and Blood. Now this bread
could be the best bread ever baked in the whole world and this wine
could be the most exquisite vintage ever produced – but in the end it is
still bread and wine. There is nothing that we could ever do of
ourselves to change them into the Body and Blood of Christ. These gifts
could never be perfect enough or even remotely sufficient to impart to
us the life giving and transfiguring divine grace of God. But still we
offer them to God as the best that we have. He takes our insufficient
and inadequate gifts and makes them perfect, and changes them into the
life giving Holy Mysteries and then returns them to us so that we might
partake of the Divine grace. We offer to Him the works of our hands –
the fruit of our labors and they are found to be insufficient and
lacking. But he takes our feeble and inadequate labors and makes up that
which is lacking in them and by taking them to Himself, they become
perfect and holy and super-substantial. These gifts become the life
bearing and grace filled Body and Blood of Jesus Christ which are then
imparted to each of us. And when we have all taken our fill, there is
still more left over for these inadequate and insufficient gifts of
bread and wine have become the super-abundant Body and Blood of Christ.
And so we come day after day, week after week, year after year, bringing
the best bread and wine that we have. And each time, although it is
imperfect and insufficient, He accepts our gift and fills that which is
lacking and makes it for us His own life giving and divine Body and His
own precious Blood. This is how God provides for us – we give Him what
we have and He makes it abundantly sufficient to fill our every need.

When the crowd had gathered in the wilderness, Jesus taught them –
giving to them first food for their souls. But as the day grew old, the
apostles knew that it would also be necessary for the people to have
food for their bodies as well. When they suggested to the Lord that He
send the crowd home to get food to eat, He responded to them saying,
“You feed them.” This was a foreshadowing of the moment after the
resurrection when Jesus would speak to Peter saying three times “Feed my
sheep” indicating the fact that the Apostles themselves would take what
they had received from Christ and through them He would feed the world,
not worldly food for the body which perishes, but rather the divine and
life giving spiritual food which imparts eternal life.

The disciples, however, did not yet grasp this and they responded in the
moment saying to Christ, “We don’t have food for this multitude. We have
only 5 small loaves and two fishes” Right from the beginning the
disciples knew that they could not feed this crowd – they had nothing to
give them. What they did have was not even sufficient for themselves.
But Jesus did not ask of them an impossible task so that they might be
ashamed or embarrassed or become despondent at the huge scope of the
task in front of them. Rather He asked this of them that they might
learn to see and depend upon the providence of God.

Jesus could have fed the multitude from the dust of the earth and the
rocks that surrounded them, changing these elements into a banquet of
unsurpassed quantity and quality. But this is not how God works in our
lives. Rather Jesus said to the disciples, “Give to me what you have”
and took their loaves and fishes and then He blessed them and broke them
up, and instructed the disciples to begin to distribute them and here we
begin to see the miracle. These few insufficient scraps of food that the
disciples had with them managed to feed the entire crowd of 5000 men
plus women and children. And not only this, but even afterward there
were 12 baskets full of remnants – more scraps than the original 5
loaves and 2 fishes. This is the providence of God and how God works in
us. When we bring to Him our needs, He does not simply produce the
solution from thin air, but rather says to us, “you do it” When we
respond, “We don’t have…” he turns to us as He did to the disciples and
says, “give me what you have”. We give Him our small and insufficient
resources and He blesses them and breaks them and returns them to us
seemingly unchanged and says “now go and do this”. Having received our
resources back from Him, we begin to find that they have indeed changed,
for what was once insufficient (only 5 loaves and 2 fishes) is now not
only abundantly sufficient but is super-abundant and super-sufficient
such that it provides not only the need that we saw (the 5000 men), but
also it provides for all hidden needs (all the women and children) and
still there is more (the 12 baskets of remnants).

Our Lord has brought us here to this place to do His work. Here in Boise
Idaho where there was once no Church, now we have three. And this one
Church of St Seraphim, He has given to us for the purpose of spreading
the light of Christ to the world. Here in this unlikely place, He has
caused and Russian Orthodox Church to exist – and all because the
founders of this parish trusted His providence and though what they had
was insufficient – still they gave what they had to Him and see what He
has made of it today. But the work is not done. Still there lies before
us the task of building up this Church – not only physically, but
spiritually as well. We need to add space to the Church, but we have not
the money and resources to do so. We need to build up the choir, but it
seems an impossible task. We need to recruit, train and raise up clergy
who will lead and care for the parish for our children and grand
children, but who is there to fill that role. We need to bring in more
and more people from the spiritual darkness and emptiness of the world
into the light and fullness of Christ for we are indeed missionaries –
but how can we accomplish this. We see the task that God has set before
us and we are inadequate, we are insufficient, what we do have is not
even sufficient for our own needs, let alone to fill the needs of
others. And yet, Jesus looks at us as He looked at His disciples and
says, “Give to me what you do have and I will make it sufficient for all
your needs.” God will not suddenly and mysteriously bring in masses of
people to the parish; He will not bestow some mysterious endowment of
cash like some divine lottery ticket; He will not have some priestly
candidate appear as if out of nowhere. That is not how He works. He
wants us to give to Him what we have and He then will take that and give
it back – seemingly unchanged – but as we begin to use what He has
returned to us, we find that now what was once inadequate is
miraculously abundant, what was lacking is now more than sufficient.

Our Lord Jesus Christ asks of you that you give Him what you have. Give
to Him your time and strength and skills, such as they are. Give to him
your money and other resources. Give to Him your prayers and alms. Give
to Him what you have and He will receive it and take it and bless it and
give it all back to you. You may not think what you have is sufficient
or worthwhile or worthy or useful – but if you give it to Jesus Christ
it will become all that and more. Give to Him that which you have, and
He will return it to you not only sufficient for the need, but
abundantly, with a remnant greater than the offering with which you started.

--
Archpriest David Moser
St Seraphim of Sarov Orthodox Church (ROCOR)
Homilies: http://groups.yahoo.com/group/propoved/
Website: http://stseraphimboise.org

Matt 14:22-34
1Cor 3:9-17

After the miraculous feeding of the 5000 – which we heard last week –
our Lord dismissed the crowd and went up onto a mountaintop to pray. He
did not, however, dismiss His disciples along with the rest of the
crowd, but set them aside, sending them in a boat across the sea of
Galilee where He said that would meet them on the other side. He did not
send them off separately, each to make his own way to the meeting, but
rather He sent them together, that they might support and help one
another. Then as the boat sailed away, Jesus Himself, retired to pray.

Even in this brief beginning there are two great examples. First is the
example of Jesus Christ Himself, who though He was the incarnate God
found it necessary often to enter into communion through prayer with the
other persons of the Trinity. The divine life that He shared as God
brought with it the desire for the communion and union of the Holy
Trinity. We cannot know the true nature of the Trinity since it is
beyond our ability to understand – but we can see some of the
characteristics of the Divine life by observing Christ. We do not fully
understand the exact nature of this union of God and man and even less
to grasp the nature of the oneness of the Trinity – and yet we can see
the importance of the communion between the persons of the Trinity by
observing that our Lord the God/man Jesus Christ often spent time in
prayer, communing in the life of the Trinity. We do know that “God
became man so that man might become god” as St Athanasius teaches. By
this he reminds us that the Gospels teach that we were created for the
purpose of sharing the life of the Holy Trinity. If the communion of
prayer, then was so vital for the God/man Jesus Christ who was God by
nature, how much more vital is it for us who hope to participate in the
life of God by grace.

During His time on this earth, our Lord revealed Himself completely to
the world through the Holy Apostles in as much as any man could
understand. In the teaching of the Apostles then, we can hear and
understand the nature of the life in Christ which we are meant to share.
The Holy Apostle Paul, writing to the Church in Corinth, speaks about
the Church as “God’s building”. We are not left to ourselves, but we are
joined, one to another to become the temple of God – the dwelling place
of the Holy Trinity. Our life as Christians is not an individual one –
the Church is not a collection of many small individual “temples of the
Holy Spirit” but we are all united together into one single “temple of
the Holy Spirit”. The life in Christ is meant to be a corporate,
communal life by which we are joined to one another through Christ.

This truth of the communal life in Christ, we see in the second example
from the Gospel today, for our Lord gathered the disciples together out
of the world (represented by the crowd which came to listen and then
left) and put them in a boat (the ark of salvation) together and sent
them across the sea of Galilee (through this life) to the place where He
would meet them (the Kingdom of God). He Himself at this time did not go
with them bodily, but rather went up to the mountaintop (ascended to
heaven) to pray. But even though He was not bodily in the boat with
them, still Jesus was present with the disciples. When the storm arose
(as in life when difficulties, struggles, even persecutions arise) the
disciples cried out together (in communal prayer – such as we have in
the Divine services) to God for help. And Jesus, in answer to their
prayer, showed that He was not separated from them, but came to them
walking upon the water. See how this one little account of the events
follow the miraculous feeding of the 5000 become for us an image of the
nature of the Church?

Those of us who respond to the call of Jesus Christ to follow Him into
the Kingdom of Heaven are first set apart from the world. We are
separated by our faith, by our baptism from the life of the world which
we leave behind, choosing instead the life of the Kingdom of God. We may
live *in* the world, but we are not *of* the world just as the disciples
having set sail were in the water, but they were not of the water. In
this new life we are not left to ourselves to sink or swim, but rather
we are placed together into a boat – that is the ark of salvation which
is the Church. Within the firm and substantial walls of the Church we
are preserved from sinking and drowning and from the worst ravages of
wind and wave. For this reason we are given, by God, a real and
substantial Church which is visible and identifiable in that within her
embrace the unbroken tradition and teaching of the Holy Apostles, which
is the revelation of Christ, is maintained with no alterations, no
error, no confusion. The ark of salvation remains for us solid and
unshakeable. This ark of salvation carries us through the stormy world
of which we are not a part, but through which we must pass to meet
Christ in the Kingdom of God. No matter how violent the wind and the
waves around us, we are safe within the life of the Church which
supports us, strengthens us, teaches us, protects us. Within the Church
we find many people, all of us sinners and in need of the healing help
and grace of God. But this does not change the solidity and holiness of
the Church itself. We who sail in this ark through the sea of life are
not saints, but are potential saints using our time to gather the
abundance of God’s grace that we might become, sometimes ever so slowly,
into His likeness. Even though we may be afraid due to the sinful
violence of the world around us, still all we need do is to call out to
God for help and He will come to be with us.

Seeing the Lord walking on the surface of the sea, unaffected by the
wind and waves, one of the disciples, Peter, was filled with an
exceptional burning love for God in that moment and desiring to be with
Christ he cried out and asked to come to Him on the water. Jesus bade
Peter to come and stepping out of the boat Peter became for a moment
like Christ, able to walk upon the surface of the sea unaffected by the
storm. But Peter, being still a man of fear and doubt, looked around at
the wind and the waves and lost his focus on Jesus Christ. At that very
moment, he began to sink into the water of the sea, overcome by the
storm. He cried out again, this time saying “Lord have mercy” and Jesus
was there at his side and raised him out of the water and set Peter
safely into the boat.

Peter, who though his ardent faith in Christ, for a moment manifested
his likeness to Christ, stepped out of the boat and began himself to
walk on the water. But he began to sink and immediately Jesus was at his
side. Jesus raised him up and put him back into the boat. No matter how
great our faith, no matter how filled with the Holy Spirit we may feel,
it is always necessary to remember that we are all saved together, not
without one another and not outside the Church. The Church is the ark of
salvation and conveys us through this life into the Kingdom of God. We
are meant to be together in the Church – to be saved together as one
body. Those who are stronger help those who are weaker and we all work
together in the Church. Should someone leave the ark and set out on
their own – even someone so great as the Holy Apostle Peter – they may
seem to succeed for a moment, but in the end will sink. When we do this
(and all of us do) our only salvation is the infinite mercy of our
loving and compassionate God who raises us up out of the water and puts
us back in the boat.

Brothers and sisters, we must always remember this secret of salvation –
we are the temple of the Holy Spirit. We are not a lot of little
individual temples running around –but we are joined together into one
temple. We are not saved separately, but we are saved together. From the
greatest to the least of us we travel together towards the kingdom of
God in the Church, the Ark of Salvation. We are united together by the
grace of God and by His grace we become the temple of the Holy Spirit in
which the Spirit of God dwells. We are bound together in Christ and so
let us preserve that bond in peace and love by the grace of God.



--
Archpriest David Moser
St Seraphim of Sarov Orthodox Church (ROCOR)
Homilies: http://groups.yahoo.com/group/propoved/
Website: http://stseraphimboise.org

File        : read only.doc
Description : read only reminder

Matthew 17:14-23

Every one of us has faced, or will face a crisis of faith. We come to a
point where we are confronted with the question, “Do I believe?” It is
at this point that our belief becomes a real issue for us. For many,
this crisis comes along with some grave illness or misfortune in life.
This is the certainly true of many of those about whom we read in the
Gospel. This crisis brings faith into the realm of immediate reality and
we see, is it strong or is it weak; do I really believe or not; is God
really there and my friend, or is He a stranger to me? These are the
questions that arise and that are brought into sharp clarity by such a
crisis. Sometimes in the Gospel, this crisis is met with a strong faith,
for example the ruler Jairus whose daughter was ill. In his hour of need
he sought out Christ and said, “If you come and touch her, she will be
healed.” Certainly no doubt there about the power and reality of Jesus
Christ but still some doubt about whether or not He would come. That
small doubt was wiped out immediately as Jesus began to come. We also
have the even stronger faith of the centurion who sought out Christ
because of his sick servant and said, “You need only say the word and he
will be healed” Indeed, our Lord remarked on his great faith. Stronger
still was the faith of the woman who spoke not a word, but simply pushed
through the crowd and reached out to touch only the hem of his robe.
Perhaps the strongest example of faith belongs to the Mother of God who
having given birth to the God/man as an infant and watched Him grow and
cared for Him as she raised Him from child to adult, then followed Him.
And even when she saw Him hanging upon the cross, and laid in a tomb,
her faith did not falter, doubt had no place, but she continued to believe.

Other times, however, the crisis of faith highlights the weakness of
one’s faith. Certainly one can point to the enemies of Christ, whose
faith in the coming of the Messiah was constrained so much that they
could only perceive Him in a twisted and narrow manner (which Jesus
Christ did not fit into). But often we find this weakness of faith among
those closest to Jesus. When confronted with the question of whether he
was a follower of Christ, the Apostle Peter denied Christ three times
and when he realized the weakness of his faith, went out and wept in
repentance. Even less was the faith of Judas Iscariot who after seeing
and hearing the great miracles, not only denied that Jesus was the
Christ the Son of the living God, but went on to betray Him into the
hands of His enemies. When he regretted his action, his faith was so
weak that he did not repent as did Peter, but instead fell into despair
and lost all hope.

Today we heard of another man, a father whose son was possessed by a
demon. His son was ill and he had sought out every possible healer and
still there was no change. Finally he came to Jesus Christ. At this time
Jesus and three of his closest disciples had retreated to the mountain
top to pray (those disciples - Peter, James and John - saw Him in all
His divine glory; this was the miracle of the Transfiguration) and so
was not immediately available. The other disciples, who in the past had
been given power over the demons and sent out to preach on their own,
tried to cast out this demon, but were unable. When finally Jesus came,
we see the weak faith of the father who said to Jesus, “If you can do
anything, …” He had doubts even about the power of the God/man over the
demons. And our Lord seeing this situation, with the weak faith of the
father, the twisted faith of the scribes who were there, and the
faltering faith of His own disciples cried out, “O faithless and
perverse generation, how long shall I be with you!” Then in order to
address this lack of faith and perhaps even heal it, he turned to the
boy and healed him. Later when the disciples asked why they could not do
this, Jesus answered them saying, “It is because your faith is weak …”

How had the faith of the disciples, of all people, become so weak. They
had earlier been given the authority to heal disease and cast out demons
and they went out into the land preaching and performing miracles in the
name of Christ. Their faith had been strong then and they burned with
its bright flame. But now, their faith is so weak that they are unable
to heal even this small child. What happened? Our Lord continued
speaking to his disciples, “This kind does not come out except with
prayer and fasting.” Here we see both the cause and the cure of their
weak faith. They had neglected those very things which strengthen faith
and so their faith was weakened.

First there is prayer. Somewhere along the line, the disciples had
become so accustomed to the presence of Jesus that they had begun to
neglect their own prayer. They presumed on their closeness to God and
their status as ones “selected” to follow Christ. They did not realize
that their faith was something that had to be maintained, something that
had to be cared for. Faith is rooted in our relationship with God. If He
is a reality to us, if He is an active and real part of our daily lives,
then our faith will feed off that relationship and will grow strong. But
if we neglect our prayer (communion with God) and starve our faith, then
it will weaken and our experience of God in our lives becomes just a
part of the background, something we presume upon (or even worse it
becomes just a myth or legend, a dim memory from childhood or from the
tales of our ancestors) If we do not pray, our faith will begin to
wither away from lack of care and maintenance and eventually we could
lose it altogether as did Judas. This is the beginning of the weakness
of faith – to cease praying.

Secondly there is fasting. This is not just the formal “fast” that we
keep by following certain rules of diet on particular days – rather this
is the very act of self denial (of which the formal fast is simply an
external expression). Jesus said that those who wish to follow Him must
first deny themselves. This ascetic struggle of self denial weakens and
conquers our natural passions and egocentrism which create barriers
between ourselves and God. When we begin to indulge ourselves rather
than deny ourselves, when we begin to make excuses for ourselves and
rationalize getting our own laziness in our spiritual lives, then we
begin to weaken our faith and build up barriers of self will which
separate us from God.

The lack of prayer and fasting weakens our faith. Even a person with a
strong faith (as the disciples once had) may begin to make excuses for
himself about why he doesn’t pray. In the beginning it is only a little
rationalization – I’m too tired to pray today; I’m too busy to stop and
pray now, I’ll do it later; I deserve a little break today so I’ll just
cut back this time. Then we begin rushing our prayers, not
concentrating, not attending to our prayers (or “multitasking” our
prayer life, relegating prayers to the verbal recitation of certain
words with the lips, while engaging the mind and heart in some other
activity). Soon we see that our prayer is pretty much dry, stale and
ineffective (no wonder since by our lack of attention we have stripped
it of all substance) and so we abandon it all together thinking, “I’m
doing ok, I’ll pray when things get difficult, but for now everything is
alright.” In this way our prayer begins to fail and our faith is
undermined and strangled.

In the same way we begin to view fasting, not as the constant ascetic
practice of self denial, of setting aside our own will and embracing
instead the will of God, but instead as a formal “rule” with no real
substance. Some people in doing this become “experts” in the legalism of
fasting and know exactly what to eat when and all the minute details of
the rules. Fasting for them isn’t about self denial, but rather about
the pride of knowing the rules and following them. On the other hand
there are those who throw out the rules and say, “it doesn’t really
matter what I do, as long as I have a good heart”. But then they deceive
themselves into thinking that all is well and so abandon the practice of
self denial entirely. In any case whenever we stop our ascetic effort –
whether it is for the reasons of self indulgence or laziness or just
plain lack of effort (for self denial is never an “easy” or “natural”
thing – it is a struggle to which we must force ourselves), then our
faith is undermined and becomes weak.

However, just as the lack of prayer and fasting can weaken faith, so
also the practice of prayer and fasting serves to strengthen faith. When
we notice that our faith is weak and we wish to change that, then we
begin to fast and pray with more purpose and fervor than before.
Regaining faith that has failed is a difficult task, but with God’s help
it is quite possible. The key is to begin small but constantly increase
and grow, never letting up, never getting “comfortable”. Start with what
you are able to do – maybe only a short rule of prayer of 5minutes a
day. Then increase to twice a day, then increase to ten minutes, then
add in short prayers throughout the day. Neither should one neglect our
corporate prayer – that is attendance and participation in the divine
services. Begin to force yourself to be at the Church more often – once
a month, once a week, twice a week, and so on – and to participate more
– sing along, join the choir, serve in the altar, whatever helps you
engage in the service. Also do not neglect the daily reading of the
Gospel, even if it is just a little, read some every day. This is the
way to begin again to build up your prayer and thus strengthen your faith.

The same with fasting – begin with what you are able. If you do not fast
at all, then first begin by abstaining from meat on the fast days, and
then include the dairy products and progress through the fasting rule,
never taking on more than you are able to complete, but neither allowing
yourself to become negligent and stagnant. Those who are married,
practice your self denial with your spouse. Give up some small thing for
your spouse and then something larger and larger – never expecting or
asking for even the slightest recognition. Children do the same in
regard to your parents and siblings. Even those who are without parents
or children or spouses can begin to practice self denial in the
community of the parish, in the workplace, among our friends. Then take
it a step further and not only deny yourself, but reach outside yourself
and give some kind of alms – some act of kindness for another person for
which you expect no recognition, no thanks, no reciprocation. Continue
to build on your fasting both in the formal expression of the fast from
foods and in the more internal asceticism of self denial.

Do not wait for a “crisis” to force you to strengthen your faith, but
begin right now, this very moment. Begin to pray, begin to participate
in the life of the Church, begin to fast, begin your internal ascetic
struggle, begin to make God real in your own life. This is the only way
to throw off the chains of the demons that assail you due to the
weakness of your faith. This is the only way to join yourself to the
life of Christ and to experience Him in a real and vital manner in your
life. Now is the time to begin to strengthen your faith, now is the time
to begin to make Jesus Christ real in your life. Do not let another day,
another moment go by before you engage Christ, but begin right now, in
this instant and do not let up. Strengthen your faith that you might
experience the reality of the living God in your daily life. When you
ask the question “Do I believe?” may God grant that you are able to
answer it with a resounding, “I do believe!”

--
Archpriest David Moser
St Seraphim of Sarov Orthodox Church (ROCOR)
Homilies: http://groups.yahoo.com/group/propoved/
Website: http://stseraphimboise.org

Matthew 18:23-35

Everything that we have, is given to us by God.  Of ourselves, we have
nothing, not even the air that we breath, the water that we drink or the
food that we eat.  The world around us – the beautiful sights and sounds
and smells that we enjoy every day – is all given to us by God.  There
is nothing that we have that did not come from Him.  He has given us all
this for a purpose, for a reason.  Every bit of what God has given to us
is given so that we might use it to acquire His grace and so become like
Him.  Some of what we are given draws us in spirit nearer to God simply
by its presence (such as the beauty and grandeur of the cosmos), some
things we are given to strengthen us for our task (such as the food that
we eat and the water that we drink).  Some things are given to us for
inspiration and as a foretaste of the joys of heaven and other things
are simply the tools by which we carry out our task.  In any case,
everything that we have in this life is given to us by God for the
purpose of working out our salvation.

We, therefore owe God a great debt – a debt which can only be paid by
using that which God has given us and returning it to Him.  But we have
cheated Him; we have taken what He has given, sometimes without even a
thought about Him, and used it all, not for His purposes, but for our
own selfish purposes.  Some things we have taken and used for ourselves
and others we have taken and twisted their nature so that they express
not the goodness of God but rather our own selfishness and sinfulness.
But still God is benevolent and loving towards us, in His love, giving
us every opportunity to return to His purpose and the path towards union
with Him.  As I mentioned last week, every one of us has or will face a
“crisis� moment in our lives – usually more than one – which will
challenge our faith.  These “crisis moments� are the times, when like
the servant in the parable, we are called before God and reminded of our
obligation to serve Him and our failures in doing so.  Sometimes – often
even – this crisis will involve our material well being (our
possessions, our financial resources, our status in the world, etc) or
even our personal well being (our health, our emotional condition,
etc).  The purpose of these crises is so that we recall that our great
Lord and Master is God Himself and that our purpose is to serve Him.
Sometimes He sees that we wander off the path of salvation and into the
forest of serving our selfish desires and so reminds us, sometimes
drastically, of the necessity of returning to Him.  In times like this,
what God desires is our own true response of repentance.  In the prayers
of the Church we see this all the time.  In every case where there are
prayers given for relief from various troubles, the prayer contains
first a plea for mercy and forgiveness of sins and only after this do we
then ask God for relief from our sorrows.  Listen carefully to the
petitions for those who are ill which are said during the liturgy – we
ask first for the forgiveness of their sins and then we ask for the
health of the body.  This is also seen in many of the healings performed
by our Lord during His earthly life – first He would say “your sins are
forgiven� and then He would raise the suffering one from the bed of
sickness and add “go and sin no more�.

This final statement, “Go and sin no more� is of great importance for it
reveals to us the purpose of the suffering.  In these situations, we
suffer not in payment for our sins but rather to encourage us to repent
of our sins.  If indeed we were to suffer in payment for our sins, it
would be unbearable, for our sins are so great, beyond our capacity or
ability to repay.  Therefore God, in His mercy does not demand from us
suffering as a payment for our sins, for not one of us would survive
such a trial, not even the payment for the smallest of sins.  What God
does demand of us is repentance.  In the parable, the servant who owed
the unpayable debt came before his master and asked only one thing –
“have mercy� he said.  And this is exactly what God desires to give to
us – mercy.

When we repent of our sin, God forgives us our sin and cleanses us of
all unrighteousness and sets us again on the path of salvation.  But
repentance implies for us that we are not only sorry for our past
actions which led us away from God but that we have completely forsaken
such action and struggle never to repeat them.  Repentance implies
change – a change in our way of life away from that which was sinful and
self centered and towards that which is God centered and virtuous.  This
was the kind of change the master in the parable expected to see in his
servant when the debt was forgiven.  But alas, the servant did not
change.  Rather he returned immediately to his sinful and self centered
way of life.  Forgetting the mercy that he had received, he then was
merciless towards those around him.  By re-embarking on the path of his
former sin, he brought down upon his shoulders the whole weight of the
burden all over again and in a worse situation than before.

This is for us a lesson in repentance.  It is not enough to simply
regret our past sins, it is not enough to be sorry for what we did and
to ask forgiveness.  God will indeed freely forgive us, however, He
calls us not merely to regret, but to repentance.  When we come to God
asking for forgiveness, He says to us, as to so many others – “Go and
sin no more�  If our repentance is without substance then we find that
we are back in the same place with the same sins and the same unpayable
debt as before.  Repentance is all about changing your life, about doing
away with the sins for which you have been forgiven.  In this parable we
see the example in the passion of greed – the servant through his greed
incurred great debt, but when forgiven of that debt still acted
according to his greed (rather than according to mercy that he had
received) and so his greed put him back in worse situation than he had
been in before.  Some of us may have confessed greed – but did we
repent?  Or perhaps it was selfishness, or anger, or judgment, or
laziness, or inattentiveness, or neglect of prayer, or lust or pride or
any number of sins.  Have you changed your life?  What are you doing
differently now to avoid these sins for which God has forgiven you in
the past.  As long as there is sin in your life – as long as you fall
short of the Glory of God – then there is no room for complacency and
contentment.  If you think your life is “good enough� then your standard
of what is “good� itself misses the mark for only God is good and “good
enough� is only when we are like God.   Rather our lives are meant to be
a continual struggle away from sin and a continual growth into the life
of Christ.  Every time you ask God to forgive your sins, whether in
Confession or in your own private prayers, then you are also committing
yourself to repent, to forsake the sin in your life, root it out, change
the way that you live, the way that you act, the way that your relate to
others so that this sin for which you ask forgiveness now does not
return to your life.

Whenever you come before God, asking forgiveness, remember that you come
not with mere regret, but with true repentance.  Repentance is a life
changing attitude for you are committing yourself to change your life,
to align yourself more closely with the life of Christ, to live
according to the purpose of the Creator to enter into His life, His joy,
His presence.  God loves you and desires that you will share His life.
Conform yourself to Him and He will bless you and strengthen you and
come to you that you might live with Him in joy and bliss of His kingdom
for all eternity.

--
Archpriest David Moser
St Seraphim of Sarov Orthodox Church (ROCOR)
Homilies: http://groups.yahoo.com/group/propoved/
Website: http://stseraphimboise.org

Matthew 17:1-9

Jesus, knowing that the final days of His earthly life were drawing near
wanted to give His disciples some kind of encouragement, something that
would help them not only in the trial of his crucifixion but also
afterward, after He had ascended into heaven. He knew that they would
face many trials and difficulties, even imprisonment, torture and
martyrdom. He knew that they would see His Resurrection and so would
begin to realize that death was no longer anything to fear as He had
conquered death. He knew that they would begin to grasp the reality of
the Kingdom of God through this and the reality of their own spiritual
life. However He wanted to give them a glimpse of what was to come for
them so that they could experience the reality of the Kingdom of God for
themselves, rather than just knowing about it and believing that it
existed. This experience of the Kingdom of God is what we celebrate
today in the feast of our Lord’s Transfiguration.

We too need this encouragement. It is often a temptation to let our
faith become simply words that we say and rules that we follow. When
this happens, we forget the goal for which we struggle, we begin to be
tempted with thoughts of despair even, thinking of this heavy burden
that we have taken on and this way of life that creates more difficulty
that it seems to be worth. But today renews for us the reality of our
destiny, shows us again what it is we are working towards. While the
Resurrection is the means of our salvation, the Transfiguration reveals
to us the fruit of our salvation. This is the reality to which we look
forward. We struggle to become “like Christ” but often without fully
realizing what that means. Today we are reminded that to be “like
Christ” is not only to follow His path through this life, but also to be
with Him in glory, to know Him as He truly is and to ascend to the
heights of heaven to be with Him. Today we get a glimpse of heaven, we
get a foretaste of glory. Today we are reminded of our own destiny and
shown again the fruits of our labors.

Jesus took three of his disciples, Peter, James and John, and withdrew
with them to the top of Mt Tabor to pray. There, He revealed His true
nature to them. Truly Peter had already stated that Jesus was the
Christ, the Son of God, but until now the reality of that statement was
not yet realized. Here, on the top of the mountain, Jesus showed Himself
to these disciples as He truly is. Here the cloak hiding the fullness of
His divinity was removed and they beheld Him as God. He was shining with
a great light – not that light was shining upon Him from somewhere else,
but that it was emanating from within Him for He is the light of the
world. And this great light nearly blinded the disciples, but as they
grew accustomed to it, they saw not Jesus alone but also the prophets
Moses and Elijah with Him as His servants. These two prophets help us to
understand that Jesus was not only another of the Prophets, but He is
the One Whom the prophets themselves serve and worship. Also we are
reminded that Moses and Elijah represent the living and dead – for Moses
had died and was buried while Elijah was taken up alive into heaven and
had not yet tasted death. And so we know that Jesus Christ is the
salvation of those who are alive on the earth at this moment as well as
those who have gone before us and have completed their lives on this
earth. This is the reality of the Kingdom of God to which we are called.
We shall not only live in the presence of Christ, but we will share in
His glory, just as did Moses and Elijah. Peter, James and John also came
into this heavenly experience to remind them that they too were destined
to share in this heavenly life, even while here on earth.
Why did our Lord only take three disciples with Him for this. There are
many reasons given, however, one is that not all the disciples were yet
able to survive the experience. Remember that Peter, James and John –
the three disciples who were closest to Christ – were themselves so
overwhelmed by this that they were physically thrown down and their
senses were completely overwhelmed. They were just barely ready to see
this. By this we are also reminded of the purpose of our Christian life,
all of our struggles, all of our preparations, all of our self denial.
The purpose is to prepare us to be able to participate in the heavenly
life. As it is we are ourselves so filled with the effects of sin, that
is with corruption, that we could not begin to even perceive this glory,
let alone participate in it. But the life of the Church slowly leads us
along the path of salvation by which we overcome the passions, by which
we purge from our lives the corruption that is the effect of sin, by
which the virtues are nurtured in us and by which we aquire the Holy
Spirit so that we are able to enter into the unveiled presence of God
and not only to observe Him, but to commune with Him and participate in
His life in heaven. Even in this life, we have seen that some of the
saints have come to the point of experiencing in their own lives the
glory of the Transfiguration. Our own St Seraphim was one of those as we
see in the account of his conversation with Nicholas Motovilov.
Motovilov describes the scene during their conversation when he could
not look at St Seraphim’s face for from it was emanating a bright light
– the divine light of the transfiguration – and that he himself was
bathed in this light and by the prayers of the saint experienced it.
This is only one of many accounts of how the life we live in the Church
leads to the experience of the Kingdom of God and our own
transfiguration not only in the next life, but in this life as well.

The Kingdom of God is not in the future for us, it is our present
existence. We are too blind and too deaf to perceive it yet. But as we
follow after Christ, as we pursue Him on the path of salvation, our
blindness and deafness begin to fall away and we get a hint or a glimpse
occasionally and those who have progressed far on this path of salvation
through a lifetime of following Christ to the exclusion of all else
actually experience a foretaste of the Kingdom of God fully even while
yet living on the earth.

Today we are reminded of our goal – what it is we are working towards.
This is not only our goal, but our destiny. We were created by God in
order to share in this very life in the Kingdom of God. We live in the
midst of this glory and this divine light even now, but we are still do
not have the eyes to see and the ears to hear so that we might perceive
this life fully. We get hints and glimpses as we follow Christ – but
these are only a fraction of the full awareness of the life in which we
live.

Let us then live the life given to us by the Church with more purpose,
with more vigor and strength, with more dedication for now on this day,
we see what it is we are striving for. We are not merely escaping the
flames of hell out of fear, but more importantly we are gaining the life
and light of Christ Whom we love. Today we see as though in a mirror
darkly, but in heaven we shall see Him face to face in all of His glory.
Let us then prepare with even more zeal for that day that we might be
prepared and ready to live in the Kingdom of God.

--
Archpriest David Moser
St Seraphim of Sarov Orthodox Church (ROCOR)
Homilies: http://groups.yahoo.com/group/propoved/
Website: http://stseraphimboise.org

Last week we celebrated the feast of the Transfiguration of our Lord.
This great miracle was given to the Apostles and to us as an
encouragement in the midst of trials. For the apostles, it was an
encouragement which would support them through the great suffering of
the crucifixion of Christ and which would constantly remind them that
our Lord, being divine, took on this suffering voluntarily for our
sakes. For us this miracle is a promise of what we have to look forward
to in the Kingdom of God to encourage us as we face the struggle of
living the Christian life. The vision of Jesus Christ as Light of Light
and true God of true God is a constant reminder that we are made in His
image and called to become like Him. That same divine light of Mt Tabor
which emanated from Him lives in us and just as he was transfigured on
Mt Tabor, so also we will be transfigured in the Kingdom of God.

Today we are given the parable of the vineyard. We are reminded that our
Lord has prepared this place for us and that here in this life we work
for Him to present to Him the fruit of our labors. In the vineyard of
this world we are given everything that is necessary for this work. The
vineyard is tilled and the ground turned up, the vines are planted and
surrounded by a wall to keep out the animals and predators; there is a
watchtower and a winepress, and everything we need to work in this
vineyard and to produce the fruit that God wishes. The vineyard is, of
course, this world and the workers in the vineyard are you and I. God
has set us here that we might work and bring forth the fruit of the Holy
Spirit in our own souls and thus present to Him these fruits.

The Lord has planted the vineyard and has sent his servants to work in
it. He gives them everything needed for their lives. But the servants
enjoyed living in the vineyard so much that they began to feel that the
place belonged to them and that they were there to enjoy the vineyard
without regard for the true owner. More and more the servants began to
consider as their own all the prosperity which they were able to get
from the grapes which grew so abundantly in the vineyard that did not
belong to them; and they gradually began to forget the owner of the
vineyard. The Lord gave them everything necessary for their life, but
they began to take it for granted. They had a different understanding;
they had the opportunity to use the vineyard and all the beauty of these
earthly goods which God gives to man. This captivated them so much that
they completely forgot, or better to say, they did not even give a
thought to the fact that all this was temporary; and that years would
pass, and the time would come when they would have return to the master
the fruits of their labors.

How like our world this vineyard is and how like us the workers are. God
has given us a body which requires food, drink motion, rest – the things
that we call the life of the body. But man also has a spirit, which
always strives for the ideal. No matter how good our earthly life might
be – in the human heart there will always stir that which cannot be
satisfied by what we have, because the image of God is in every person,
in his spirit; and that spirit also requires life – the life that comes
only from God. Although the vineyard workers were “all right” in their
physical life, in their spiritual life, they were dieing. They were
dieing because they have cut off the vital part of their spiritual life
– the life that comes from union and communion with God.

We live in this world and we are given all that we need for our lives
from God. We have air to breath, water to drink, food to eat, a time to
work, a time to rest – everything that the body requires is given to us
by God. The reason that He gives us this is for our own salvation.
Everything that we have is given to us by God in order to be used for
our salvation. It is our task, as workers in the vineyard to use that
which God has given us to produce the fruit in our souls which He
desires. But too often we forget God, or worse yet we don’t even think
of Him at all. We forget the transfiguration, the destiny become like
God and to share in His life for which God created us. Instead of using
what He has given us to produce spiritual fruit to offer to Him, we turn
our attention to the things that we desire, riches, comfort, worldly
honor and prestige, power, authority, the satisfaction of our whims and
desires. You know the list of what we desire in this world could go on
and on. The point, of course, is that we forget God and we forget His
purpose for us – to become like Him as He showed Himself to us on Mt
Tabor. We neglect to produce the fruit which He desires from us – that
is the fruit of the spirit – and instead focus on the fruit of our own
fallen desires.

God, seeing that we have fallen into this condition, sends His servants
to us to remind us of our true purpose. These servants: the prophets,
the pastors, the teachers, who come to us to set us back on the true
path are too often dismissed without honor, are mocked and ignored and
if they are too persistent in telling us what we do not wish to hear are
done away with – usually in modern times by being labeled as fanatics,
insane, or out of touch with reality, but there were and still are times
when in fact such people are martyred – imprisoned and even killed for
their faith. But God does not give up on us, rather He sends more
servants, our friends, our family, sometimes even strangers who cross
our path and they are treated just like the first. Sometimes these
warnings that God sends are not people but events, misfortunes,
illnesses, or other reminders that what we think we have in fact is not
really ours. Finally He sends us His own Son and we are face to face
with Jesus Christ – and we have a choice to make, whether we will return
with His help to the path of salvation or whether we will reject Him. If
we reject Him, if we turn away from Christ to serve our own desires,
then the time will come when we will face the Lord in glory empty
handed, and even what we think we have will be taken from us and we will
be cast into torment – the torment of our own soul and of our own
conscience – desiring life that God gives but having no way to obtain
that life, having turned away from the Source of Life to serve our own
desires.

Matt 21:33-42

This parable is in some ways the antithesis of the transfiguration. But
it need not be such a terrible thing. If we remember God, who has given
us this life, and continue to work for Him, to produce the fruit in our
souls which He desires, then we will not fear and reject the prophets
who come to shows us the path of salvation, but we will gladly walk with
them on that path. When the Son comes to us we will not reject Him but
He will excite in our souls the grace inherent in the fruit that we have
already gathered and seeing in Him the fulfillment of our destiny we
will embrace Him and follow Him into His kingdom.

God has placed us here in this world as though in a vineyard. He has
given us every possible thing that we might need to work out our
salvation and to produce the fruit of the spirit in our souls which He
desires for us. In order to welcome Him with joy when He comes and to
draw from Him the eternal life which our soul desires, we need only to
constantly remember Him, to work for Him. When we look at what we have
in this world, whether our wealth or poverty, whether health or
sickness, whether a position of high esteem and power or that of the
lowliest servant, we must recall that these are just the tools and raw
materials which are to be used to produce the divine fruit and not ends
in themselves. Keep this focus in your life and work to produce in
yourself the fruit of the spirit, that is love, joy, peace,
longsuffering, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self
control which are the natural result of the working of God’s grace in
us. This grace we acquire by living the life of the Church which brings
us ever nearer to God so that the miracle of our Lord’s transfiguration
may become in us and for us a reality.

--
Archpriest David Moser
St Seraphim of Sarov Orthodox Church (ROCOR)
Homilies: http://groups.yahoo.com/group/propoved/
Website: http://stseraphimboise.org

Matthew 22:35-46

When God created mankind and placed him in the garden of paradise, He
gave us two commandments by which to live, to love God and to love our
neighbor. When Eve ate of the fruit of the tree of the knowledge of good
and evil, she sinned according to the first commandment given by God –
she no longer loved Him above all but chose instead to love herself and
her own being more fully. She then violated the second commandment when,
rather than repent of her sin, she tempted Adam to follow her pride and
self love. She loved her self more than her neighbor and rather than
seeking to prevent him from falling into the same trap as she – she
dragged him down with her. Adam likewise violated his love of God by
trusting in his own pride and reason and rather than loving his neighbor
by encouraging Eve to repentance, he too placed his own self love above
all else and joined her in her sin.

After the fall and the expulsion from paradise, these two commandments
remain with us as the foundation for our whole relationship with God.
Love of God and love of neighbor are the root from which all the law and
the prophets flow throughout the sacred history of the Church. When God
gave the law to Moses, this law was predicated on the twin pillars of
love of God and love of neighbor. To simply look at the ten commandments
we can see this very easily. We first receive commandments concerning
our relationship with God – to have no other god, to refrain from
idolatry, to honor Him by the keeping of the Sabbath. Then from the 5th
commandment on we receive instruction on the love of neighbor – to honor
our parents, to refrain from envy, murder, falsehood, theft, adultery.
The ten commandments are no more than a restatement of twin commandments
of love of God and love of neighbor.

In the gospel today, the Pharisees come to our Lord and question him
concerning the law. They did not wish to learn but rather they hoped to
catch Him in some statement that would be grounds to do away with Him.
And so they asked about this law and our Lord answered them that first
we must love God with our whole being; heart, soul and mind. In making
this statement in this way, He points out how we must involve our whole
being in the love of God. Man was created as the crown of creation, in
him all of creation was summed up. In the story of creation we can read
that three times God created a new order of life – first that of the
plants, then that of the animals and finally that of man. And so each
order of life is contained in us. The basic functions of life, eating,
growing reproducing, etc come from the basic plant like life. This is
the life shared by all of creation. And even at this basic level we are
called to love God (to love God with all your soul). The second order of
life is that of the animals who unlike plants can move and express
desire and emotion. So also we share that life in our own emotions and
desires and in our pursuit of those things. With this animal like life
we are called to love God (with all your heart). The third order of life
is that of man. While the animals pursue their desire, men are given the
capacity to understand their world and to further their desires by this
understanding or even to overrule their desires and act in a manner that
has a higher purpose. This is the capacity of reason – the unique
characteristic of mankind. We are called to love God in this manner also
(with all your mind). These three aspects of our life are all involved
with our love of God. We are to love Him with our complete being.

Then our Lord goes on to elaborate even more – to attempt to teach the
Pharisees despite themselves. He continues that there is a second law
which is joined to the first – to love your neighbor as yourself. The
second law is, as we have seen, expressed the commandments given to
Moses. It is the means by which the love of God finds expression in our
lives. These two laws, love of God and love of neighbor are solidly
linked together, welded, if you will, to one another. If you truly love
God then that love will find its expression in the love of others – for
God is the lover of all mankind. We must have both of these qualities in
order to follow God.

There are two things which lead to perdition – evil doctrines and a
corrupt life. The first relates to the love of God. If we would truly
love God, then we must come to know Him – for how can we love that which
we do not know. We must have a right and true belief about God. But God
is greater than we are and He is unreachable by our own fallen being. We
cannot know God for He is beyond our grasp. How is it then that we can
love Him. We can love God because He first loved us and in loving us, He
reveals Himself to us. He revealed Himself in the creation of the world
and especially in the creation of man in His own image and likeness. He
revealed Himself in the giving of the law, He revealed Himself in the
words of the prophets. He revealed Himself in his provision for His
chosen people and the sacred history of the Hebrew nation. Finally,
wishing that we might know Him as fully as possible, God took flesh and
became man and dwelt among us and revealed Himself to us in His
incarnation. This self revelation of God makes it possible for us to
know God and knowing God we can love Him. However, it remains important
to love God as He is and not our own imagination of how god should be.
Thus the purity of belief and doctrine becomes important. God has
revealed Himself to us and that revelation is preserved for us unharmed,
unpolluted, unchanged within His Church. Only in the Orthodox Church can
we find the true belief of God and so only within the Church is true
love of God possible.

But it is not enough just to know God and to say that we love Him. That
love must find expression. The Holy Apostle John writes that “he who
says that he loves God but does not love his neighbor is a liar”. And
hence from the lack of love of God – from evil belief also flows a
corrupt life or a life without love of neighbor. This again points out
for us the importance of the Church for within the Church is preserved
not only the self revelation of God, but also the way of life which
expresses perfect love for our neighbor. If we follow the instructions
of the Church, submitting our own wills to that of God and denying
ourselves so that we might live not as we will but as the Church
instructs us, then we will live a life filled with love of neighbor.
Just as it is vital to love God as He is and not some false image of
God, so it is also vital to truly love our neighbor rather than to
deceive ourselves by pretending to love others while in truth acting
only in our own self interest. The Church teaches us not only what to do
to love others, but also teaches us how to quell our own self love and
how to overcome our own pride and egoism. The ascetic discipline
provided for us by the Church destroys our self love, our pride, our
self centeredness while at the same time the acts of righteousness and
mercy prescribed by the Church encourage in us the love of neighbor.

Our haven in this life, the place where we learn to love God and where
we learn to love our neighbor is the Church. In the Church God has
revealed Himself to us so that we might love Him and not some false
imagining of our own. In the Church God has provided for us the means to
overcome our own self love and to produce within our soul the love of
neighbor. In these two things, love of God and love of neighbor, all of
the law and prophets are contained. In these two things, love of God and
love of neighbor, we find the keys to the kingdom of Heaven. In these
two things, love of God and love of neighbor we become like God. In
these two things, love of God and love of neighbor, we find our salvation.

“Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, and with all thy
soul, and with all thy mind. This is the first and great commandment.
And the second is like unto it, Thou shalt love thy neighbor as thyself.”

--
Archpriest David Moser
St Seraphim of Sarov Orthodox Church (ROCOR)
Homilies: http://groups.yahoo.com/group/propoved/
Website: http://stseraphimboise.org

Moscow, August 21, Interfax - The Holy Synod of the Russian Orthodox
Church instituted a holiday to honour Christians who lived on the
islands of Great Britain and Ireland and were canonized before the 1054
schism that divided Christendom into the Western Catholic and Eastern
Orthodox Churches.

The holiday will be an annual event observed on the third Sunday after
Pentecost in the Julian Calendar.

The Synod, which met on Tuesday, also ordered that these saints' names
be included in the Menology after their Christian exploits have been
studied.

One of these saints, whose memory we celebrate today, is the Martyr King
Edward of England. This saint, who lived from 964 to 979, shows us an
example of one who received from God the rule over the empire of Great
Britain, as the servant in the parable who received from God 5 talents
and like that servant in the parable, he worked to increase what God had
given him, giving even his life in pursuit of that heavenly treasure.

The Martyr King Edward had a younger half brother, Ethelred, who was his
rival to ascend to the throne of Britain following their father’s death
in 975. The dispute over who would ascend to the throne was settled by
the archbishop of Canterbury, St Dunstan, the chief hierarch of the
English Church, who selected Edward and anointed him the king of all
Britain. Upon his ascent to the throne, Edward began immediately to use
his authority to set the Church in Britain back into good order. A great
disarray had fallen over the Church at that time in England as the
secular aristocracy attempted to use the Church and her material wealth
as their own. Edward faced civil unrest – even an armed conflict – led
by one of the nobles which was bent upon seizing the properties given to
the monasteries by the previous King Edmund and installing married
clergy and their wives and families in the monastic churches in place of
the monastics. The new young King Edward opposed this uprising and
sought to restore the monasteries to the monastics. Because the young
King Edward stood firmly in support of St Dunstan, the archbishop of
Canterbury, on behalf of the Church and her restoration, the nobles who
sought to control the monasteries and their lands joined together with
the Queen in a plot to replace Edward with his more easily swayed
younger brother Ethelred.

On March 18, 979 King Edward was out riding and sought to briefly visit
his younger brother in his home. The King’s stepmother, Queen
Ethledritha (Ethelred’s natural mother) came out to greet him as he
approached and invited him to stay and dine. The King declined stating
that he only wished to greet his younger brother. Even so the Queen
continued to implore him to stop, if even briefly, and the King finally
agreed to take a cup of wine with her there. One of her servants came up
to the king and greeting him with a kiss offered the King a cup of wine.
He took the wine, but as he began to drink, the servant acting as Judas
himself, plunged knife into the young king killing him. The Queen then
took the body and hid it in the hut of a blind beggar who lived nearby.

But God did not allow His servant to remain hidden for long. That very
night there came from the cottage of the blind woman a great light. The
woman herself, crying out “Lord have mercy,” miraculously received her
sight. Not only this, the stream into which the King had fallen when he
was murdered was found to have healing properties, such that those who
would bathe their eyes in its waters were frequently cured of blindness.
The Queen, seeing that the body could no longer be hidden in this
manner, for such a miracle could not be suppressed, took the body and
buried it in the marsh. But even this could not hide the relics of the
Martyr for within the year a pillar of fire began to appear over the
marshy grave of the Martyr King Edward. When the local people came to
investigate, they found the body of the martyr and removing it from the
swamp brought it to the nearby Church where the Martyr King was then
reburied. From the marshy grave where he had been thrown by his step
mother, after the body was removed, there arose a spring of sweet water
which also was found to have miraculous healing properties. As the news
of the martyr-king’s wonderworking intercessions spread, so also did the
account of his step mother’s treachery. Even some of those who plotted
with her abandoned their struggle against the Church and sought to honor
the martyred King. One of these nobles took the relics of the Martyr
King from the humble church where they lay and brought them to the
convent at Shaftsbury where they were venerated by all.

Even during this translation (transfer) of his relics there were many
miracles of healing and the Queen herself repented of her evil deeds.
Just like St Mary of Egypt, when the Queen sought to come into the
convent to venerate the relics of the saint, she was prevented from
entering the convent by an unseen barrier. She realized that this was
due to her sins and therefore like St Mary, she spent the remainder of
her life repenting of her sins. The veneration of the Martyr King Edward
continues today and his relics rest in a Russian Orthodox Monastery in
England.

Here we have an example of one who was given a great gift by God – the
control of an empire – and he took that gift and used it not for his own
wealth, but sought instead to use his authority and position to defend
the Church against her enemies. Each of us is likewise given gifts by
God – whether it be 5, 2 or even only one “talent” of wealth. These
gifts: our life, our possessions, our position, our resources, all that
we possess, are given to us for one purpose – to glorify God. In the Old
Testament, God demanded from his people a tithe, a tenth part, of all
they possessed as support for the priests and the temple. But that is
only a shadow, that is only small image of the truth that has been
revealed to us. We know that it is not the tithe, the tenth part, of all
our substance that belongs to God, but that everything we have comes
from God and is offered back to him. This is the call for each of us
then, to offer to God not a tithe, but the all that we have. This does
not mean that you must give everything to the Church (although it is
important to support the Church through your gifts) but rather that
everything that you have, everything that you do, every event of your
life must be focused on the glory of God. God asks of you nothing less
that your whole life given in service to Him. Every day that you live,
every moment, every penny that you spend, do so in such a manner that
will give glory to God and bring His grace to you. Whether you spend
your time in manual labor, in serving others, in teaching or in some
other profession or craft – do what it is that you do for the glory of
God and in the service of His Body, our Holy Mother Church. In this
manner emulate the Martyr King Edward and all the saints so that you may
offer to God the grace filled fruits of your life.

--
Archpriest David Moser
St Seraphim of Sarov Orthodox Church (ROCOR)
Homilies: http://groups.yahoo.com/group/propoved/
Website: http://stseraphimboise.org

John 3:13-17

This Sunday stands in the midst of two feasts; the Birth of the Mother
of God is just passed and the Exaltation of the Cross is approaching. In
these two feasts we see two aspects of God’s providence for us coming
together. In the Birth of the Mother of God we see the culmination of
the great preparation God has made through the centuries to set the
stage for the incarnation – the coming of God into the world as a man.
With the Exaltation of the Cross, we see the whole process of our
redemption by our Lord’s death and resurrection. Both of these events,
the incarnation and the redemption, are born out of God’s love for us.

The Gospel narrative that we heard also embraces these two great events
of God’s love for us. In speaking of the one who “came down from heaven,
even the Son of man” our Lord reminds us of the great mystery and truth
of the incarnation. The Son of God, the second person of the Trinity,
Who is in heaven and beyond our comprehension, descended to this world
and took flesh and became the Son of man so that we might know Him. He
then continues saying the “even so must the Son of man be lifted up”
telling us of the crucifixion which was to come. These two things, He
then says come from a single source – the love of God for the world,
“For God so loved the world…” and that their purpose is that “the world
through Him might be saved.”

In the midst of this, Jesus refers to one of the events recorded in the
scripture that occurred during the flight from Egypt and the wandering
in the desert. “As Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness…” calls
to mind a whole series of events in the history of the Hebrew people
that even every child would know. When the Hebrew people were wandering
in the wilderness, they were suddenly plagued by an infestation of
poisonous snakes. These vipers were everywhere in the camp and people
were being bitten and dying from those bites. Moses called out to God in
prayer that He might deliver the people from this plague. God instructed
Moses to fashion a serpent from brass and to set it up on a pole in the
middle of the camp so that all could see it. If someone was bitten, he
had only to gaze upon the brass serpent with faith in God and he would
be healed and would be saved from the effects of the poison. In the
words of Jesus Christ, we now see the brass serpent raised up on a pole
as a foretelling of the Crucifixion and of the means of our salvation.

Like the Hebrew people in the desert we too find ourselves caught in a
nest of vipers, being bitten constantly and suffering from the deadly
poison. But these are not physical vipers, they are spiritual ones – and
their “bite” is not limited to the sickness and death of the body, but
goes beyond that and afflicts the soul. These vipers are our fallen
passions and the demons who use them to tempt us. When we fall to the
temptations, we are bitten by these vipers and injected with the deadly
poison of sin which then brings about the death of the soul and our
separation from God. Our only help and deliverance can come from God for
if we try to free ourselves, then no matter how carefully we avoid the
vipers we see, there are 10 more hidden and ready to strike at us. We
need someone to lift us out of the nest of vipers so that we do not
incur further wounds. That person is the God/man Jesus Christ for only
He alone is without sin. He is the incarnate God who lifts us out of the
nest of vipers into which we have fallen and restores us on the path of
salvation.

Just as Moses accomplished the healing and deliverance of the Hebrews by
lifting up a brass serpent on a pole, Jesus Christ the Son of man
accomplishes our salvation by Himself being lifted up on the cross. Just
as those who with faith gazed at the serpent on the pole were saved from
the poison of the serpents, so also those of us who ascend the cross
with Christ are saved from the poison of our sin.

This great salvation is accomplished for us by God who descended from
heaven and became man and dwelt among us. But the incarnation itself did
not deliver man from the poison of sin, for we are caught in this nest
of vipers. It was necessary for someone to lift us out of this nest and
place us again on the high ground of the path of salvation. And this our
Lord did by ascending the Cross for us and from the Cross reaching to
each of us and taking us by the hand He lifts us out of the nest of
vipers, onto the Cross with Himself. But like Him we do not remain on
the cross, but He then sets us on the path into the Kingdom of God in
the safety of the ark of salvation which is the Church. The Cross, which
was an instrument of torture and death, has been transformed into the
instrument and symbol of our deliverance. Just as gazing upon the image
of the serpent, the agent of death, brought life to the Hebrews and
deliverance from the vipers – so also by gazing upon the image of the
cross, formerly the instrument of death, we are delivered from the death
of sin and receive the life of eternity, the life of the Holy Trinity.

This whole act of God, His descent from heaven to be incarnate in the
world and His self sacrificing voluntary ascension onto the Cross has a
single great motive and a single great purpose. The motive is His love
for us – “For God so loved the world” God has seen our fall into sin and
He hears our cries. Moved not by necessity but rather moved only by His
love for us, He came and dwelt among us and even sacrificed Himself that
we might be delivered from death and share in the life of the world to
come. And this then brings us to the single great purpose of His actions
– the salvation of the world. All of these things, the incarnation, the
cross, the grave, His death and glorious Resurrection came about for one
purpose – for us men and for our salvation. What is our salvation? It is
to share His life – the eternal life of the Trinity in the Kingdom of
God. It is to become like Him and to live in full, complete and
unrestrained communion with Him. So that this might come to pass God
Himself, moved by His love for mankind, descended from Heaven and took
flesh and became man. As a man He voluntarily gave Himself up to us,
sacrificing Himself for us men and for our salvation that He might bring
us out from the death of sin into His life and into union and communion
with Himself. St Athanasius sums up this act of God’s love for us very
simply, “God became man so that man might become god.”

--
Archpriest David Moser
St Seraphim of Sarov Orthodox Church (ROCOR)
Homilies: http://groups.yahoo.com/group/propoved/
Website: http://stseraphimboise.org

Mark8:34-9:1

This past week we marked together the feast of the Exaltation of the
Cross. The Cross is the symbol of our victory and stands at the heart of
our salvation. To ascend the cross with Christ and there to die with Him
to the world is the inescapable path of all who would follow Him into
eternal life. Our own Archbishop Anthony of blessed memory brings to
mind the hymns of the feast and through them points out the pivotal
place of the cross in our salvation:

“In the artistically figurative language of our marvelous Orthodox
divine service, the Cross of the Lord is compared with "just scales." In
the Church Slavonic language, this is expressed by the words "merilo
pravednoe" ("just balance"). ’In the midst of two thieves, Thy Cross was
found to be a just balance.’
…
But how does the balance of the Cross act according to the explanation
of the Church' s hymn? ’In the midst of two thieves, Thy Cross was found
to be a just balance: the one was brought down to hades by the weight of
his blasphemy, while the other was lightened of his transgressions unto
the knowledge of theology; O Christ God, glory be to Thee!"

This view of the Cross aligns directly with the Gospel which we heard
read today, “ For whoever desires to save his life will lose it, but
whoever loses his life for My sake and the gospel’s will save it. For
what will it profit a man if he gains the whole world and loses his own
soul? Or what will a man give in exchange for his soul?” The Cross has
become for us the criteria by which we evaluate our lives and reorient
ourselves towards heaven. As the Gospel tells us, it is necessary to
give up our worldly life in order to obtain heavenly life. The most
extreme example of this is, of course, the martyrs who quite literally
sacrificed their lives in this world that they might not lose the
eternal life of Christ. However, we are not all called to die as martyrs
for Christ, but we are all called to “lose your life for My (Christ’s)
sake” What then does this mean for us? How do we lose our lives that we
may gain Life?

St Seraphim of Sarov spoke quite eloquently on this when he described
the process of “acquiring the Holy Spirit” which is how he described our
salvation. He began by comparing his former life as a merchant with the
Christian life. The merchant’s goal, he reminded us, is to trade the
goods that he has for something that will bring him profit and that each
trade must be evaluated on the basis of what will bring the most profit.
For the Christian, we too are trading constantly to gain a profit –
however we do not seek the material profit of wealth, as a merchant
would, but we seek instead the profit of acquiring the grace of the Holy
Spirit. Our criterion then for how we conduct our lives is to ask what
actions will bring us more of the grace of the Holy Spirit and to choose
only those actions which bring the greatest spiritual profit. To apply
the image described by St Seraphim to the gospel, we can see that we
must indeed “lose” our life by “trading” what we have in order to
acquire in its place the grace of the Holy Spirit. If on the other hand,
we strive to hold onto the things of this world and our earthly life and
are not willing to give them over into the hands of God, then we acquire
only a little grace and the worldly life weighs us down. By saving our
own life, we lose the Life that Christ gives.

To return again to the hymn that Archbishop Anthony brings to our
attention, we can now apply it to the Gospel and see the meaning in even
greater light. Because of our sinful nature, our lives tend towards sin
and we acquire a great weight of sins which tie us to this world. When
we hold onto the sins of this life; pride, anger, remembrance of wrongs,
vanity, lying, acquisitiveness, greed, sloth, love of pleasure and so
on, we are weighed down like the thief on the cross who blasphemed
Christ. (It is important here to note that all sin weighs us down in
this manner. If we harbor pride or remembrance of wrongs or greed or
sloth in our hearts, it does not matter if we do not also blaspheme, for
we are still weighed down by our sins.) The only way to rid ourselves of
the weight of our sins is to let them go – to “lose” them.

The only way that we can lose our sins is by repentance. First we
confess our sins – that is we admit to God and to ourselves that we have
indeed sinned. Second we repent or turn away from our sin – changing our
lives so that this sin will not recur. Here is a very difficult part,
but something that relates to what we have already said. In order to
turn away from sin, it is necessary to give up those parts of our lives
which lead us into sin. The fathers also tell us consistently that the
way to combat a particular temptation is to practice the opposite
virtue. Are you greedy? then force yourself to give generously. Are you
slothful? then avoid relaxation and force yourself to be industrious. Do
you remember wrongs? then force yourself to forgive and act with
kindness and compassion towards those who have wronged you. In this way
we “lose” our lives so that we might instead gain the Life of Christ –
we “trade” with what we have in order to acquire the Holy Spirit. Even
temptations to sin can be used as opportunities to practice
righteousness and thus can be turned to the acquisition of the grace of
the Holy Spirit. In this way we turn our lives away from the paths that
lead to sin and by losing that part of life that was unprofitable, we
gain instead the Life of Christ.

Whenever we consider the Cross; when we see it, when we think of it,
when we speak of it, when we venerate it, when we trace it upon
ourselves, at this time we are faced with the choice of whether or not
to lose our lives. Will we ascend the Cross with Christ and trade our
own life for His Life that He offers to us or will we try to preserve
our sinful life in this world. Will we repent of our sins and acquire
the grace of the Holy Spirit, thereby losing that which weighs us down
and gaining that which draws us into heaven or will we continue in our
sins which hold us like great stones and prevent us from following
Christ and ascending with Him into heaven. The Cross is for us the just
scales, the point at which we must evaluate our own lives. The Cross is
the means by which we evaluate – will we lose our lives and ascend the
cross with Christ or will we choose instead to save our lives and turn
away from the Cross. Here is the decision point – a decision that we
face every moment of every day – will I give my life in exchange for the
life of Christ or will I turn away and hold onto my self centered and
sinful life. What indeed will a man give in exchange for his soul?

As we trace upon ourselves the cross of Christ; as we consider the Cross
that we wear next to our hearts; as we see the Cross before us, let us
consider its effect on us. Let us choose to lose our lives and follow
Christ, to acquire from Him in exchange the Life that He gives. Let us
no longer live for ourselves alone but instead live the Life of Christ.

--
Archpriest David Moser
St Seraphim of Sarov Orthodox Church (ROCOR)
Homilies: http://groups.yahoo.com/group/propoved/
Website: http://stseraphimboise.org

Luke 6:31-36

Last week we heard in the Gospel the necessity of giving up our own life
in order that we may acquire the Life of Christ in exchange. Acquiring
the Holy Spirit, as St Seraphim puts it, is a lifelong process and one
that involves constantly choosing our way of life on the basis of what
will bring to us the greatest spiritual benefit. The Gospel teaches how
to make these choices and today in the Gospel we heard one of the most
important general principles which is often referred to as “the Golden
Rule”: “Do to others as you would have them do to you.” But this is not
just about “acting nice” towards others so that they will in turn “act
nice” towards you. This spiritual saying is one of the most difficult
things in the Christian life. In order for us to understand what it
means in the process of acquiring Christ, our Lord expounds on it
somewhat, for He goes right on saying that we must love our enemies and
do good and give to others hoping for nothing in return. These are
difficult sayings! for to love our enemies goes against our very nature
and self interest and yet it goes right to the core of acquiring the
Life of Christ. What is the Life of Christ if it is not to love as God
loves, to be filled with the love of God and to express that love in all
that we do. The athonite elder Porphyrios expresses the necessity of
love for one another in this way:
“Above everything is love. The thing that must concern you, my children,
is love for the other person, for his soul. Whatever we do, whether it
is prayer or offering advice or pointing out some error, let us do it
with love. Without love prayer is of no benefit, advice is hurtful and
pointing out errors is harmful and destructive to the other person who
senses whether we love him or not and reacts accordingly. Love, love,
love! Love for our brother prepares us to love Christ more. Isn't that
perfect?
Let us scatter our love selflessly to all, without regard to the way
they act towards us. When the grace of God enters us, we will not be
con¬cerned about whether they love us or not or whether they speak to us
politely or not. We will feel the need to love all people. It's egotism
on our part to wish for others to speak to us politely. If they don't we
shouldn't be upset. Let them speak to us as they wish. We needn't
be¬come beggars for love. Our aim should be to love them and pray for
them with all our soul.”

See the importance that he places not only on the love of God, but
especially on the love of others as the means of loving God more. That
we should love all without regard for who they are or what they have
done is contained in the simple statement, “Let us scatter our love
selflessly to all”

Even when we recognize the necessity of loving all people without regard
for who they are – even to the extreme of loving our enemies, the
question remains of how we can do this. The elder helps us again with
this difficulty:

“If your brother is annoying you and wearying you, you should think:
'Now I’ve got a pain in my arm or leg and I’ll need to tend it with all
my love:…When someone injures us in whatever way, whether with slanders
or with insults, we should think of him as our brother who has been
taken hold of by the enemy. He has fallen victim to the enemy.
Accordingly we need to have compassion for him and entreat God to have
mercy both on us and on him, and God will help both. If, however, we are
filled with anger against him, then the enemy will jump from him to us
and make a mockery of us both. A person who condemns others does not
love Christ. Our egotism is at fault. This is where condemnation of
oth¬ers stems from. Let me give you a little example:
Let's suppose someone is all alone in the desert. Suddenly he hears a
voice crying out in distress in the distance. He follows the sound and
is confronted by a horrendous sight: a tiger has grabbed hold of a man
and is savaging him with its claws. The man is desperately shouting for
help. In a few minutes he will be tom to pieces. What can the person do
to help? Can he run to his side? How? It's impossible. Can he shout for
help? Who will hear him? There is no one within earshot. Should he
perhaps pick up a stone and throw it at the man to finish him off?
Certainly not; we would say. But that's is exactly what can happen if we
don't realize that the other person who is acting badly towards us has
been taken hold of by a tiger, the devil. We fail to realize that when
we react to such a per¬son without love it is as if we are throwing
stones at his wounds and ac¬cordingly we are doing him great harm and
the 'tiger' leaps onto us and does to us the same as him and worse. What
kind of love do we have then for our neighbour and, even more
importantly, for God?
We should feel the malice of the other person as an illness which is
tormenting him and which he is unable to shake off. And so we should
regard our brethren with sympathy and behave with courtesy towards them,
repeating in our hearts with simplicity the prayer 'Lord Jesus Christ',
so that the grace of God may strengthen our soul and so that we don't
pass judgment on anyone. We should regard all people as saints. We all
carry within us the same old self. Our neighbour, whoever he is, is
'flesh of our flesh'; he is our brother and, according to Saint Paul, we
owe no one anything, except to love one another. We can never pass
judg¬ment on others, for no one ever hated his own flesh.
When someone has a vice we should try to bombard him with rays of love
and compassion so that he may be cured and freed. These things are
achieved only through the grace of God. Think that this person is
suffering more than you.”

See how he has turned the wrongs that others do to us away from a
personal assault and into the symptoms of an illness which torments them
and which we can strive to cure. Now we no longer need to look at our
enemies with anger or even defensiveness, but rather we see them as ones
who are ill who require our sympathy and compassion. We can see that the
most effective treatment is not to make it worse by adding our anger to
theirs, but rather to counteract their anger and aggression with the
healing love which comes from God.

The secret which we must always remember is to deal with situations in a
spiritual way rather than in a worldly way for we are no longer of this
world, but we have become citizens of the Kingdom of God. Saint Symeon
the New Theologian writes in a similar vein:

“We need to regard all of the faithful as one and think that each one of
them is Christ. We need to have such love for each individual that we
are ready to sacrifice our very life for him. Because we ought never to
say or think that any person is evil, but rather to regard all as good.
And if you see a brother troubled by passions, do not hate him. Hate
rather the pas¬sions that are assailing him. And if you see that he is
being tormented by desires and habits from former sins, have even
greater compassion on him, lest you also fall into temptation, since you
are made of matter that easily turns from good to evil. Love for your
brother prepares you to love God more. Accordingly, the secret of love
for God is love for your brother. Because if you don't love your brother
whom you see, how can you possibly love God whom you don't see? He who
does not love his brother whom he has seen, how can he love God whom he
has not seen?”

Brothers and sisters, let us take to heart the words of the Gospel today
and make them our own, “love ye your enemies, and do good, and lend,
hoping for nothing again; and your reward shall be great, and ye shall
be the children of the Highest”

--
Archpriest David Moser
St Seraphim of Sarov Orthodox Church (ROCOR)
Homilies: http://groups.yahoo.com/group/propoved/
Website: http://stseraphimboise.org