Life

Tags

Ascension, Christmas, Cross, Holy Spirit, Resurrection, St. Ambrose, Trinity, Worship

Yesterday, I spent time meditating on the title Life as it pertains to Christ the Tree of Life; however, St. Ambrose highlights the title in order to show how it applies to the Holy Spirit. In chapter three of the second book of his treatise On the Holy Spirit he observes:

So, then, the world had not eternal life, because it had not received the Spirit; for where the Spirit is, there is eternal life

Again, because today we are on the Eve of Christmas, let me try to bring this idea to bear upon the Nativity. Yesterday, I noted how the hymnody equated the Incarnation with salvation due to the reality of God becoming a human being and therefore shattering that which separates us from God, as we sing in the Stichera of Vespers for the Nativity:

Come, let us rejoice in the Lord as we declare this present mystery. The middle wall of partition is broken asunder; the flaming sword is turned back, the Cherubim withdraw from the Tree of Life, and I partake of the Paradise of Delight, whence I was cast out before through disobedience.

However, the Tree of Life is also the Cross, therefore more is yet to be done. Note all of the things accomplished by Christ in this prayer from the Anaphora of the Liturgy of St. John Chrysostom:

Remembering, therefore, this command of the Savior, and all that came to pass for our sake, the cross, the tomb, the resurrection on the third day, the ascension into heaven, the enthronement at the right hand of the Father, and the second, glorious coming.

All of this is necessary in order for what happens next in the Divine Liturgy:

Once again we offer to You this spiritual worship without the shedding of blood, and we ask, pray, and entreat You: send down Your Holy Spirit upon us and upon these gifts here presented.

And make this bread the precious Body of Your Christ.

And that which is in this cup the precious Blood of Your Christ.

Changing them by Your Holy Spirit.

In other words, our access to Christ, the Tree of Life, is through the descent of the Holy Spirit. Without that descent, there is no Incarnaton, no cross, no tomb, no resurrection, no ascension, no enthronement and no second coming. And without any of these, that descent is not accomplished in us.

Remember this the next time we pray Psalm 50(51):

Do not cast me out of your presence: do not take your Holy Spirit from me.

Amen.

Resurrection

Tags

Resurrection, St. Ambrose

Today is going to be a short post, due to the various demands of life (and three children). In the Introduction to the second book of his treatise On the Holy Spirit, St. Ambrose makes this passionate and beautiful statement about the mystery of the Resurrection:

O divine mystery! O manifest sacrament! we have escaped from the slayer, we have overcome the strong one. The food of life is now there, where before was the hunger of a miserable death. Dangers are changed into safety, bitterness into sweetness. Grace came forth from the offence, power from weakness, and life from death.

If only more of us, sixteen centuries later, had this kind of fervor and this eloquence. Amen.

Gift

Tags

Christmas, Cross, Holy Spirit, Resurrection, St. Ambrose, Worship

For a series of blogs that is ostensibly an exercise for the Nativity Fast, there has been very little in terms of actually speaking about Christmas since I began meditating on the writings of St. Ambrose. I would be remiss, therefore, if I didn’t discuss his use of Isaiah 9:6 — a verse strongly associated with Christmas — in the fifth chapter of the first book of his treatise On the Holy Spirit:

This good gift is the grace of the Spirit, which the Lord Jesus shed forth from heaven, after having been fixed to the gibbet of the cross, returning with the triumphal spoils of death deprived of its power, as you find it written: ‘Ascending up on high He led captivity captive, and gave good gifts to men’ (Ps. 67[68]:18). And well does he say ‘gifts,’ for as the Son was given, of Whom it is written: ‘Unto us a Child is born, unto us a Son is given’ (Isa. 9:6); so, too, is the grace of the Spirit given. But why should I hesitate to say that the Holy Spirit also is given to us, since it is written: ‘The love of God is shed forth in our hearts by the Holy Spirit, Who is given to us’ (Rom. 5:5). And since captive breasts certainly could not receive Him, the Lord Jesus first led captivity captive, that our affections being set free, He might pour forth the gift of divine grace.

Growing up, I despised Christmas. I hated the fights that would inevitably erupt over the trimming of the tree. I hated the disappointment of seeing gifts fall short of their imagined expectation. I hated the emphasis America placed upon a feast that ought to play second fiddle to the Resurrection. Even today it is difficult to stomach the advertising we see associated with Christmas, the horrific behavior of shoppers on Black Friday and the characterization of St. Nicholas as the head of some secret high-tech corporation whose job it is to deliver presents around the world every December 24th.

It is only since I have paid close attention to the hymnody of the Orthodox Church and the writings of the Church Fathers that I have learned to love this great Christian feast. This quote from St. Ambrose is a perfect example of why I am now able to look beyond the ridiculousness exhibited by the culture around me and see the beauty of a Child born unto us, a Son that is given unto us.

Note what St. Ambrose juxtaposes the Nativity with — the Cross and the Holy Spirit. Observe that on Christmas day, while Christians around the world are heralding the Incarnation of Christ, the Orthodox Church sings this during the Ninth Ode of the Christmas Canon:

Herod ascertained the exact time the star appeared; by the guidance of which the wise men with gifts in Bethlehem worshipped Christ; by Whom they were directed to go to their country by another way, abandoning that terrible, ridiculous infanticide.

In case we miss this, the Orthodox Church reads Matthew’s account (2:13-23) of Herod’s horrible crime the Sunday after the Nativity. On those years where Christmas falls on a Sunday (as it does this year) and the Sunday after the Nativity is superseded by the the Circumcision of Christ and St. Basil, the Orthodox Church reads this pericope on the 26th — the day after Christmas.

It is a reminder that though the Nativity is one of the most monumental moments in all of human history, the Incarnation in and of itself does not complete the salvific work of God. The great enemy death still holds sway. The sting of death will not be blunted without crucifixion.

St. Ambrose also reminds us of what it is that God accomplishes by sending His Son to the Cross:

And since captive breasts certainly could not receive Him, the Lord Jesus first led captivity captive, that our affections being set free, He might pour forth the gift of divine grace.

God’s plan for our salvation goes deeper than either the Cross or the Resurrection. There is a reason why we celebrate Ascension and Pentecost every year. The Risen Christ ascends into heaven with our humanity to sit at the right hand of the Father in glory and in perfect communion with the Holy Spirit. Our very nature is then prepared and readied to receive the gift of the Holy Spirit Himself — to become the tabernacle of God.

In our fallen nature — ripped away from God — we are incapable of being the dwelling place of God. Yes, we can have contact with Him — this is shown by the prophets, through whom the Spirit spoke — but we are incapable of crossing the divide that humanity created when we knew a world without God. Renewed in the Risen Christ, however, we are united with the New Adam — the new humanity — that sits at the right hand of God. We are therefore able to fulfill the image and likeness of God within us — we are able to become like Christ and experience the indwelling of the Spirit.

In turn, it is the Spirit that descends upon us and the gifts we set forth. It is because of this descent that we are able to partake of Christ Himself, in the Body and the Blood and thus experience the foretaste of the love of God the Father.

All this is made possible by the Nativity. This is why I have learned to love Christmas, to learn to love crying out:

Unto us a Child is born, unto us a Son is given!

Bible Study Notes: The Three Hierarchs

Tags

Arianism, Baptism, Old Calendarists, Resurrection, St. Basil the Great, St. Gregory the Theologian, St. John Chrysostom, The Law

This coming Sunday is the Synaxis of the Three Hierarchs. Around the year AD 1100 there was a raging argument plaguing the Orthodox Church — who was the greatest, St. Basil the Great, St. Gregory the Theologian or St. John Chrysostom? This strife was so contentious that the three saints appeared to St. John Mauropous, Bishop of Euchita (celebrated on October 5) who was a great hymnographer. Explaining that the glory they have at the throne of God is equal, they asked him to compose a common service for them in order to end the disputes. We have celebrated this service on January 30 since.

Thus, while reading the Epistle (Hebrews 13:7-16) and the Gospel Reading (Mathew 5:14-19) we tried to place them in context of this feast as well as the events of the readings themselves and our own lives.

The verse we spent the most time on was Hebrews 13:9:

Do not be led away by diverse and strange teachings; for it is well that the heart be strengthened by grace, not by foods, which have not benefited their adherents.

We asked the question, “What are diverse and strange teachings?” To understand this, we need to look at verse 8:

Jesus Christ is the same yesterday and today and for ever.

In other words, the truth that was taught to the Apostles is the same that was passed down from generation to generation down to us. The means by which Christ saves us has not changed. The reality of Christ Incarnate — both God and man — the crucifixion, and the resurrection has not changed. So, what we know about God, Christ and how we are saved has not changed throughout the ages. We might have clarified these truths, depending upon the context that the Church found Herself, but these basic truths have not changed.

Diverse and strange teachings call into question either what we know about God (and therefore Christ) or about how we are saved:

• In St. Paul’s time, there were those who insisted that fasting laws and getting circumcised were necessary for salvation. This calls into question how we are saved. If fasting laws and circumcision are necessary, then Christ’s saving passion is somehow incomplete.
• In the time of the Three Hierarchs, there was a teacher named Arius who taught that there was a time when the Son was not. He called into question what we know about Christ, God and the Trinity. If there was a time when the Son was not, then He is part of creation and of a fundamentally different essence than God the Father. As such, uniting ourselves to Christ would do us little good, since we are already part of creation. Only in being of one essence with the Father does uniting ourselves to Christ save.
• In our own time, there is the phenomenon of the Old-Calendarists. When various Orthodox Churches (Constantinople, Alexandria, Antioch, Greece, Cyprus, Romania, Poland and Bulgaria) started to switch to the revised Julian Calendar (which uses the Gregorian Calendar for fixed feasts) in 1924 (the last in 1963), there were those who refused to make the switch. These Old Calendarists broke communion with the Orthodox Church in order to form their own communion. In other words, they follow in the footsteps of the Judaizers of St. Paul’s time. They see the use of the Julian Calendar as necessary to salvation, calling into question the completeness of Christ’s passion.

The verse from the Gospel that we focused on was verse 18:

For truly, I say to you, till heaven and earth pass away, not an iota, not a dot, will pass from the law until all is accomplished.

The iota and the dot are the smallest of letters and strokes in the Greek alphabet. Thus, Christ is claiming that the law must be fulfilled completely. If we read some of the hymns from January 1 we see the Church declaring that Christ fulfills the Law:

The supremely good God was not ashamed to be circumcised in the flesh; but for our salvation He offered Himself as a type and example to all. For the Author of the Law fulfills the precepts of the Law and the things the prophets preached of Him — Stichera of Vespers for the Circumcision in the Flesh of Our Lord, God and Savior Jesus Christ

The Law reveals our sin, because fallen humanity is incapable of fulfilling the Law. Christ, being both God and man, is sinless. Therefore He is capable of perfectly fulfilling the Law — abolishing that which separates humanity from God. This He accomplishes for our sake. When we are baptized we are said to put on Christ (cf. Ga;. 3:27). Thus, the Law is fulfilled in us by Christ Himself. The Law is not the means of our salvation, Christ is.

Bible Study Notes: All Who Have Loved His Appearing

Tags

Baptism, Cross, Holy Spirit, Isaiah, Resurrection, St. John the Baptist, Theophany

Again, this week was short and sweet given the time of year and the number of people traveling. For the first time in weeks, however, we did not spend the majority of our time on the Epistle (2 Tim 4:5-8).

We focused primarily on the verse “For I am already on the point of being sacrificed” (4:6). This was probably the last letter St. Paul wrote before his martyrdom. He was in prison and awaiting his death. Of interest is the word “sacrifice,” because in some translations in is rendered “poured out as a libation.” The sacrifice St. Paul is referring to is the drink sacrifice in the Temple where the priest would pour wine, water or oil over the burnt sacrifice at the end of the service in order to put out the fire. This Sunday is the Sunday before Theophany. It is thus a preparation for the Baptism of Christ and the revelation of God as Trinity. This image of St. Paul himself being poured out as a drink sacrifice brought us to mind of Baptism where we die to the world and are created anew in Christ.

The Gospel Reading is the first eight verses of Mark. We noted that the quote from Isaiah is not entirely from Isaiah: “A voice cries out from the wilderness: prepare the way of the Lord, make his paths straight” (40:3). The other half of the quote comes from Malachi, “Behold, I send my messenger before your face, who shall prepare your way” (3:1).

Baptism was not a new practice in Judaism. It was used for purification purposes and even as a means for proselytes to enter Judaism. So, what John was doing out in the wilderness was not something strange and new; however, what he was saying was: “I have baptized you in water; but He will baptize you with the Holy Spirit.”

The question was asked: When did Christ first baptize humanity in the Holy Spirit? He certainly sent the Holy Spirit at Pentecost. He also breathed the Holy Spirit onto the Apostles (John 20:22). Was He not baptized in the Holy Spirit at Theophany? Were not we, whose humanity Christ took on to Himself, baptized in the Holy Spirit with Him? Did not God say He was well pleased by this reality (Matt. 3:17)? This reality was then made accessible to all of us through the Crucifixion, Resurrection and Ascension of Christ. Now we all may be sealed with the Gift of the Holy Spirit Himself.

It was here that we found how these two readings spoke to each other. St. Paul writes:

Henceforth there is laid up for me the crown of righteousness, which the Lord, the righteous judge, will award to me on that Day, and not only to me but also to all who have loved his appearing. — 2 Tim 4:8.

At the Theophany, God reveals Himself as Trinity and Christ as God and Man. Those who love this appearing — we who accept God as Trinity and Christ as perfect God and perfect man — have a crown of righteousness prepared for us by the Lord.

Finding Our Own Egypt and Damascus

Tags

Christmas, Church and State, Cross, Gospel, Resurrection, St. Paul, Truth, Worship

Merry Christmas! Christ is born! Glorify Him!

I do hope everyone realizes that, in the Orthodox Christian world-view that this period — after Christmas — is when we should be celebrating Christmas, not in the days prior to Christmas. In many ways, our American culture has Christmas upside-down. We focus on the material — buying, getting and giving presents. We celebrate Christmas for months prior when we should be preparing and anticipating for the celebration. We see Christmas trees taken down the day after Christmas. We have made it politically incorrect to say ‘Merry Christmas!’ Our children are bombarded with the message that we need to “save Christmas” or find the “Christmas spirit” when the whole purpose of Christmas is to participate in the reality of God becoming a babe in cave for our salvation.

Imagine a world, for a moment, that stepped back from the material world, that fasted for 40 days prior and spent more time in prayer in preparation for a celebration that lasted a week. That is what the Orthodox Christian is supposed to do. In fact, if we didn’t have to get ready for Epiphany, I’m sure the Church would figure out a way to celebrate even longer.

We see this pattern of anticipation and celebration expressed on Sundays with the Sunday before and the Sunday after Christmas. Last Sunday we studied the genealogy of Christ — we were getting prepared for Christ taking on our humanity. Today is the Sunday after Christmas. The Gospel tells us of the Christ Child’s flight to Egypt in the face of Herod’s slaughter of the Innocents. This helps us to answer the question “Now that we have the Nativity of Christ, what are we supposed to do with it?”

In order to help us piece together this answer, the Church also gives us the words of St. Paul in his letter to the Galatians:

When he who had set me apart before I was born, and had called me through his grace, was pleased to reveal his Son to me, in order that I might preach him among the Gentiles, I did not confer with flesh and blood, nor did I go up to Jerusalem to those who were apostles before me, but I went away into Arabia; and again I returned to Damascus. — Gal. 1:15-17

Paul, on his way to persecute Christians, gets visited by the Risen Lord and is told that he needs to preach the Gospel to the Gentiles. In response, Paul goes to Arabia and Damascus. He tells us that he doesn’t return to Jerusalem for three years.

In other words, the Church is drawing a parallel between the Christ Child and Paul and therefore between the Christ Child and us. In both cases the world hates us and reacts with violence. Imagine if Paul immediately returned to Jerusalem claiming to be Christian. He would have entered into the teeth of persecution and retribution.

The peace that the angels declare to the shepherds in the field is God’s peace, not man’s. In fact, those who seek earthly power understand and see Christianity as a major threat to their goals. We and our King stand in the way. When we claim a God who is wiling to sacrifice Himself in order to protect and save us, there exists an eternal and unchanging rule of ethics and morality that holds that everybody, no matter who they are, has value. Such an understanding gets in the way of the power-hungry from making up their own version of morality (or lack thereof) that suits their present needs. It doesn’t allow them to determine who has value and who doesn’t. This is why the Church has always been under assault and, until we see the Second Coming, it will always be under assault. This, by the way, is why we are told to say “Happy Holidays” instead of “Merry Christmas!”

In the face of this assault, neither the Christ Child nor the newly enlightened Paul were ready for their appointed tasks. Each had to retreat and prepare. Christ had to allow his humanity to mature. Paul had to gird himself for the trials and tribulations that awaited him on his missionary travels around the Mediterranean.

In other words, celebrate the Nativity of Christ. Glorify the Living God that was willing to be born in a cave for our salvation. Revel in the reality that God so loves His creation; but be prepared for the assault that will come. Each and every one of us will be called to be martyrs — to witness to the reality of the Christ Child, of God Incarnate, of Christ on the Cross and Christ risen from the dead. We will be forced to make choices everyday between the morality of the world and the morality of God. Everyday we will be challenged to see the value in our fellow human being the way God does when the world wants to throw them away and turn their back on them. Someday, we will be called to boldly declare that Christ is our King instead of the politicians of the moment.

This is why the Orthodox Church gives us her services and encourages us to live our lives in anticipation and celebration. It gives us an opportunity to retreat into our own Egypt and Damascus. It gives us a spiritual place to find an internal silence where we can hear God in the stillness. As Elijah learned on the mountain, God isn’t in the business and noisiness of the world outside — the wind, the earthquake or the fire. God is in the stillness. Living in the cycles of the Church gives us the tools to learn to silence that business that invades our internal life. It allows us to fill ourselves with God. It gives the means and the power to return to the world and boldly declare the Gospel with our words, with our actions and with our very lives.

Today I pray that we hold on to Christmas a little longer this year — that we take advantage and celebrate the reality of Christ born in cave for our salvation. Allow that reality find its way into our heart and our inner life so that we find the stillness where we can hear God. Let us find our own Egypt and Damascus to prepare for the tasks that lay ahead. Let us gladly pick up our cross and do His will. Amen.

The Irony of Christmas

Tags

Christmas, Cross, Katavasiæ, Resurrection, St. Gregory Palamas, Worship

7· That is why God who sits upon the cherubim (cf Ps. 99:1) is set before us as a babe on earth. He upon whom the six-winged seraphim cannot look, being unable to gaze intently not only at His nature but even at the radiance of His glory, and therefore covering their eyes with their wings (Isa. 6:2), having become flesh, appears to our senses and can be seen by bodily eyes. He who defines all things and is limited by none is contained in a small, makeshift manger. He who holds the universe and grasps it in the hollow of His hand, is wrapped in narrow swaddling bands and fastened into ordinary clothes. He who possesses the riches of inexhaustible treasures submits Himself voluntarily to such great poverty that He does not even have a place at the inn; and so He enters into a cave at the time of His birth, who was brought forth by God timelessly and impassibly and without beginning. And – how great a wonder! – not only does He who shares the nature of the Father on high put on our fallen nature through His birth, nor is He subject merely to the utter poverty of being born in a wretched cave, but right from the very start, while still in the womb, He accepts the final condemnation of our nature. He who is by nature Lord of all is now ranked with the servants and enrolled with them (Luke 2:I-6), clearly making humble service to others no less honourable than the exercise of lordship, or rather, showing the servants as having greater honour than the earthy ruler at that time, provided of course they understood and obeyed the magnificence of grace. For the man who then seemed to rule the world was not counted with the King of heaven, though all his subjects were, nor was this earthly ruler reckoned then as one of them, but the heavenly Lord was. — St. Gregory Palamas, Homily Fifty-Eight on the Saving Nativity According to the Flesh of Our Lord and God and Savior.

I don’t have much to add to the beauty of this paragraph. Palamas does such a wonderful job describing the supreme irony of the Nativity that I don’t feel I can add anything useful. I will, however, demonstrate how St. Gregory is plugging into major themes found in the hymnody of the Church. Note how she describes her wonder:

I see here a strange and paradoxical mystery. For, behold, the grotto is heaven; cherubic throne is the Virgin; the manger a grand space in which Christ our God the uncontainable reclined as a babe; Whom in extolling do we magnify. — Ode IX, Canon I of the Katavasias of Christmas

And how she compares the glory of Rome and Caesar to that of the Kingdom of God and Christ:

When the time came for Your Advent on earth, the first census of the Roman world was conducted. Then it was that You began to record the names of those who would believe in Your birth. Such a decree was published by Caesar, because the timelessness of Your eternal kingdom was revealed anew. And now, we in our turn, above and beyond a monetary tax, bring to You the wealth of Orthodox theology, O God and Savior of our souls. — Doxological Hymn from the Lauds of Orthros for the Nativity of Our Lord, God and Savior Jesus Christ

Finally, I’d like to highlight St. Gregory’s observation that “right from the very start, while still in the womb, [Christ] accepts the final condemnation of our nature.” Take note of this detail from the icon of the Nativity:

Christ is not depicted in a watering trough wrapped in swaddling clothes, he is in a tomb wrapped in a burial cloth. From the womb, His purpose was the Cross and Golgotha. As we sing the praises of the birth of Christ, let us remember His purpose: to suffer and die for us that we might find resurrection in Him. Amen.

Sacrifice

Tags

Armor of God, Cross, Gospel, Resurrection, Sacrifice, Worship

I have to make a confession. As someone who grew up playing with toy soldiers and fascinated with history (especially ancient and medieval military history), I adore the metaphor St. Paul uses in today’s Epistle Reading:

Brethren, be strong in the Lord and in the strength of his might. Put on the whole armor of God, that you may be able to stand against the wiles of the devil. For we are not contending against flesh and blood, but against the principalities, against the powers, against the world rulers of this present darkness, against the spiritual hosts of wickedness in the heavenly places. Therefore take the whole armor of God, that you may be able to withstand in the evil day, and having done all, to stand. Stand, therefore, having girded your loins with truth, and having put on the breastplate of righteousness, and having shod your feet with the equipment of the gospel of peace; besides all these, taking the shield of faith, with which you can quench all the flaming darts of the evil one. And take the helmet of salvation, and the sword of the Spirit, which is the word of God. — Ephesians 6:10-17

Metaphors, of course, invite us to apply them to our own lives. As 21st century Americans, however (being several centuries removed from soldiers using armor, shield and sword), this is not an easy a task as one might at first think. Fortunately, today’s Gospel gives us a clue. Christ tells the rich man:

Sell all that you own and distribute the money to the poor, and you will have treasure in heaven; then come, follow me. — Luke 18:22

Note the similarity this has to Christ’s more universal command:

If any want to become my followers, let them deny themselves and take up their cross and follow me. — Matthew 16:24

This gives us something to grab onto. Look at this imagery used in the Kontakion of the Elevation of the Cross:

for an ally, Lord, may they have You, peace as their armor, the trophy invincible.

Look also at the imagery from the Ikos of the Elevation of the Cross:

This very Cross of the Lord, then, let us all surely hold as our boast. For this wood is our salvation, the shield of peace, the trophy invincible.

Using this imagery we can then understand that the armor of God, the breastplate of righteousness, the shield of faith, the helmet of salvation and the sword of the Spirit are all the Cross. This is our key to applying the metaphor to our own lives. In order to put on the armor of God, we must deny ourselves, pickup our Cross and follow Christ. In a word: sacrifice.

This is our path, our armor, our protection and our call:

Lord, God Almighty, You alone are holy. You accept a sacrifice of praise from those who call upon You with their whole heart. Receive also the prayer of us sinners and let it reach Your holy altar. Enable us to bring before You gifts and spiritual sacrifices for our sins and for the transgressions of the people. Make us worthy to find grace in Your presence so that our sacrifice may be pleasing to You and that Your good and gracious Spirit may abide with us, with the gifts here presented, and with all Your people. — Prayer of the Proskomide from the Divine Liturgy of St. John Chrysostom

As members of the royal priesthood, we make sacrifice not just for ourselves but everyone. Indeed, we implore God:

Remember also, Lord, those whom each of us calls to mind and all your people. — Anaphora from the Divine Liturgy of St. John Chrysostom

We are called today to to put on the armor of God through sacrifice — by freely giving of our time, our treasure and our talents. We are called to bring these forth before the altar of God for our salvation and the salvation of the people. This sounds counter-intuitive. Our natural instinct is to hold on to what we have for our own protection. This is especially tempting in times of strife and we certainly are going through a period of economic strife. Remember, though, we are talking about the Cross.

God so loved the world that He sent us His Only-Begotten Son who willingly sacrificed Himself upon the Cross so that we might taste the Resurrection. The font of mercy and power that is the Cross is endless. When we chose the Cross, when we choose to freely sacrifice our time, treasure and talents (just as Christ freely went to the Cross) we not only get to participate in Christ’s sacrifice, we get to participate in His Resurrection.

Remember Christ’s own words to us today:

What is impossible with men is possible with God — Luke 18:27

Miracles will happen. Things you thought impossible will become possible. The love of God the Father will manifest in your life and that sacrifice will suddenly become resurrection. Amen.

Greatness, Mystery, Accessible and Permissible, Time and Inner Power

Tags

Atheists, Christmas, Pascha, Resurrection, Secularism, St. Gregory Palamas, St. John Chrysostom, Worship

Today I’d like to spend some time with the second sentence of the first paragraph of St. Gregory Palamas’ homily (I told you I could spend several days here):

Our address must be exalted therefore in accordance with the greatness of the feast, and enter into the mystery, as far as this is accessible and permissible, and time allows, that something of its inner power might be revealed even to us. — St. Gregory Palamas, Homily Fifty-Eight on the Saving Nativity According to the Flesh of Our Lord and God and Savior

There are five words/phrases that jump out to me: greatness, mystery, accessible and permissible, time and inner power. Let me explore each of them in turn.

Greatness

I spent some time yesterday on this, but it bears repeating: Christmas is one of the Great Feasts. I myself struggle with this — when the first Christmas commercials start as early as September/October, it is difficult not to be cynical. Let me quote the Liturgy of St. John Chrysostom:

Remembering . . . all that came to pass for our sake, the cross, the tomb, the resurrection on the third day, the ascension into heaven, the enthronement at the right hand of the Father, and the second, glorious coming.

None of these things are possible without the Incarnation, without the Nativity of Christ. Therefore, if we rightly understand that Pascha is the Feast of Feasts, we must acknowledge the greatness of the Nativity without which Pascha cannot happen.

Mystery

How can anyone rationally explain the Virgin Birth? Despite what the secularists and atheists would like us to believe, there are limits to what human reason is capable of. This is especially true of our understanding of God. Again, from the Liturgy of St. John Chrysostom:

You are God ineffable, beyond comprehension, invisible, beyond understanding, existing forever and always the same; You and Your only begotten Son and Your Holy Spirit.

Notice how God is described — St. John Chrysostom is using apophatic language. In other words, what God is not, rather than what He is. God cannot be contained by language, human reason is limited, a virgin birth cannot be explained and that is okay. It is a mystery, but one that has benefitted us all beyond our imagination.

Accessible and Permissible

There is an irony in these words that is not immediately apparent. God is not the one who limits the accessibility of the Nativity. God is not the one who denies us permission. We do. God has declared to all the world His Gospel. The Church has always acted in the open (they may have met secretly in times of persecution, but one need not look much further than St. Justin the Martyr to see that even under the threat of death, early Christians were very open as to what it was they were doing when they met). God has definitively acted within history. Our access to this reality is only limited by our own actions and belief. Are we going to give ourselves permission to celebrate the greatness of the Incarnation or not? The choice is ours.

Time

Time is part of creation. It, as is everything in creation, is radically different than God. This understanding allows us another layer of greatness to add to the Nativity — God not only became Incarnate, but entered into time.

Inner Power

Let me revisit the quote above from St. John Chrysostom:

Remembering . . . all that came to pass for our sake, the cross, the tomb, the resurrection on the third day, the ascension into heaven, the enthronement at the right hand of the Father, and the second, glorious coming.

All these things not only necessitate the Nativity, but they are all done for our sake. God does not need them. He didn’t have to do all these things. He chose to. He chose these things for all of us — for you. Imagine for a moment Christ on the Cross. As God, He is All-Knowing. Therefore, He knew of you. His love for us is so great, that He was willing to go through torture and death for you.

That knowledge, in itself, is power. God loves you no matter what. How much different can be your day, year, life be if you walk around secure in that knowledge? May we all accept the reality of the Nativity, accept all that has been done for our sake and live it. Amen.

An Exercise in Critical Thinking

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Abortion, Atheists, Bill Maher, Communism, Cross, equality, George Bernard Shaw, Martin Niemöller, Resurrection, Science, Secularism, Virginia Ironside

I have a confession to make. Bill Maher gets under my skin. I once was a big fan of his, and this is exactly why he reminds me of the person I used to be. At one time in my life I used the same arguments, the same logic and the same reasons Bill Maher uses in order to attack the faith I now hold dear. If not for God’s gift of reason, critical thinking and a good dose of humility, I would still be a pale imitation of Maher and miserable for it. So, when Bill Maher appeared on the O’Reilly Factor last week and made the facile observation that faith is the “purposeful suspension of critical thinking” (at about 19:00 in the this video) it really bothered me.

In response, I’d like to do a little exercise in critical thinking and see which does better — human secularism or a faith in Jesus Christ. First watch the following video:

Note the shocked expressions of both the host and the other guest (who I presume is an Anglican pastor). For a moment, let us imagine a world where Maher’s point of view holds sway. Christianity is deemed a relic of the past whose proper place is in the dust bid of history. What exactly is it that would justify the host telling Ironside that her willingness to suffocate a child is horrible? What argument does human secularism have? Indeed, by getting rid of God, does it not reduce morality to human will? And since human beings do not have wills of equal strength, does it not then fall to whoever has the strongest will? Do we not inevitably arrive at some variation of the following (courtesy of the playwright George Bernard Shaw and author of Pygmalion — later adapted into the musical My Fair Lady):

I am reminded of the quote attributed to Martin Niemöller:

They came first for the Communists,
and I didn’t speak up because I wasn’t a Communist.

Then they came for the trade unionists,
and I didn’t speak up because I wasn’t a trade unionist.

Then they came for the Jews,
and I didn’t speak up because I wasn’t a Jew.

Then they came for me
and by that time no one was left to speak up.

Without God — particularly a Christian God — by what standard would anyone be able to speak up? Indeed, It was Niemöller’s own Christianity that allowed him to speak out against the Nazis.

Ultimately, Maher’s views lead civilization down a road that ends in death on a massive scale. We have seen this pattern played out over and over again throughout history, most recently in the horror of the twentieth century when tens of millions of people paid the price for human arrogance.

Christian anthropology does not allow for the kind of rationalization of murder employed by Ironside and Shaw. Not only has God created each and every one of us in His image and likeness, but He, in the person of Jesus Christ, has taken on our humanity as His own. He shares our human nature. Thus, no matter how we might try to rationalize it, those few cells Ironside is so happy to do away with shares its human nature with God Himself in the person of Jesus Christ.

Get rid of God, and all we have left is a morality based on who is strongest. The result of that will always be death on a massive scale.