Orthodox Truth

9 December OS 2018– Saturday of the Twelfth Week of St. Luke; the Conception of the Theotokos by St. Anna

Today’s Gospel reading in the daily cycle is Luke 13: 18-29. 

The Lord said this parable: Then said he, Unto what is the kingdom of God like? and whereunto shall I resemble it? It is like a grain of mustard seed, which a man took, and cast into his garden; and it grew, and waxed a great tree; and the fowls of the air lodged in the branches of it. And again he said, Whereunto shall I liken the kingdom of God? It is like leaven, which a woman took and hid in three measures of meal, till the whole was leavened. And he went through the cities and villages, teaching, and journeying toward Jerusalem. Then said one unto him, Lord, are there few that be saved? And he said unto them, Strive to enter in at the narrow gate: for many, I say unto you, will seek to enter in, and shall not be able. When once the master of the house is risen up, and hath shut to the door, and ye begin to stand without, and to knock at the door, saying, Lord, Lord, open unto us; and he shall answer and say unto you, I know you not whence ye are: Then shall ye begin to say, We have eaten and drunk in thy presence, and thou hast taught in our streets. But he shall say, I tell you, I know you not whence ye are; depart from me, all ye workers of iniquity. There shall be weeping and gnashing of teeth, when ye shall see Abraham, and Isaac, and Jacob, and all the prophets, in the kingdom of God, and you yourselves thrust out. And they shall come from the east, and from the west, and from the north, and from the south, and shall sit down in the kingdom of God. And, behold, there are last which shall be first, and there are first which shall be last.

Our Lord’s hearers wanted to know, “…are there few that be saved?” He refused to answer Yes or No, as if to say, “Numbers and percentages of other people being saved are not the point.” Instead He told them to pay attention to their own salvation: “…Strive to enter in at the narrow gate.” What is the narrow gate? Since we desire to be saved, obviously this is an all-important question.

We may think of the narrow gate in terms of our outer and inner life. In our outer life, the narrow gate is the way of life created by unwavering adherence to the True Faith and by unceasing attempts to live the Way demanded by the Truth, characterized by constant struggles that sometimes bring victories and sometimes bring defeats followed by repentance and renewed struggle. This unremitting warfare must last until death. By the grace of God and His mercy, if we remain on this path we will have a firm hope of our salvation.

Our present circumstances favor this narrow gate approach to life, because, given what is going on around us, we will find that simply by not giving up our Faith and not giving up the struggle to live according to the Faith, we will find ourselves among “the few,” whether we like it or not. We have to remember that fewer and fewer people – both Orthodox and non-Orthodox – are likely to understand us, and that this does not mean that we are on the wrong path, but rather the opposite. They will go their way, and we must go ours.   We must ask the Lord constantly for the humility to accept this, and in simplicity of faith we must persevere on this path laid out before us without condemning anyone else or being curious about their ultimate fate compared to ours. This quiet life of faithfulness in the midst of spiritual loneliness is our narrow gate.

This brings us to the subject of our inner life. St. Theophylact of Ochrid, in his commentary on this passage, responds to the protest of the damned, “…and Thou hast taught in our streets,” as follows: “Observe that it is those whom the Lord taught in the streets, that is, who only received the Lord’s teaching in public, who are rejected. But if we receive His teaching, not just in public, but also within the closeness of our contrite and compunctionate heart, then we will not be rejected” (The Explanation of the Holy Gospel According to Luke, c. 13, vss. 23-30).” Here St. Theophylact is not addressing those formally outside the Church but rather those on the inside, whether, as in Our Lord’s time, inside the Old Testament Church or, as in St. Theophylact’s and our time, inside the New Testament Church. In other words, being a nominal Christian of the Christmas-and-Easter-only variety, or even being a regular churchgoer who is outwardly decent but does not have an inner life of prayer, does not save.  We must cherish the Lord’s teaching “within the closeness of our contrite and compunctionate heart,” and if we do, then – rejoice! – “…we will not be rejected.”

These two aspects of the Life in Christ – the outer and inner – are intimately joined.   By striving to remain outwardly faithful, we will invite rejection from the world. The ensuing loneliness will drive us either into apostasy (whether formal apostasy or – what is more common nowadays – lifestyle apostasy, just giving up and living like everyone else) or in the opposite direction – to a more intense inner life of prayer. Which way we go is up to us, but that we must go one way or the other is not in doubt.

One piece of good news is that there is more Orthodox literature about the inner life available to us than ever before. In the midst of the cataclysmic destruction of Christian civilization over the past 100 years, there has yet, by God’s loving Providence, been a rebirth of interest precisely in the spiritual life, manifested by an explosion of new editions and translations of the Church services and of spiritual books, as well as the movement to return to traditional iconography and chant.  It is as if the Lord is saying, “I have given you a tough job, living in these times, but I am also giving you tools you to deal with it.”   There are in fact so many of these tools that the difficulty lies in choosing which ones to use. One simple tool that we can all use is to carry a prayer rope around with us constantly and force ourselves to say the Jesus Prayer every spare mental moment.  (More advice on learning to say the Jesus Prayer is available at our podcasts at https://www.spreaker.com/show/thoughts-on-spiritual-life).   

Let us then take heart. The Lord desires our salvation, far more than we do ourselves.   He does not require from us miracles but rather “…to receive His teaching, not just in public but also within the closeness of our contrite and compunctionate heart.”   This each of us can do and by so doing acquire a firm hope of our salvation.

7 December OS 2018 – Thursday of the Twelfth Week of St. Luke; St. Ambrose, Bishop of Milan

Today’s Gospel reading for the daily cycle is Luke 21: 28-33.

The Lord said to his disciples, Look up, and lift up your heads; for your redemption draweth nigh. And he spake to them a parable; Behold the fig tree, and all the trees; When they now shoot forth, ye see and know of your own selves that summer is now nigh at hand. So likewise ye, when ye see these things come to pass, know ye that the kingdom of God is nigh at hand. Verily I say unto you, This generation shall not pass away, till all be fulfilled. Heaven and earth shall pass away: but my words shall not pass away.

As 2019 approaches, it would be fair to say that great numbers of people – at least those not completely oblivious through substance abuse or other forms of manufactured delusion provided so generously today by those who wish to delude us – face the future with dread.The familiar world of ten years ago, much less 25 or 50 or 100 years ago, has disappeared through an engineered cataclysm, an Antichrist revolution in morals, family life, and social structure so systemic and ubiquitous as to make even comprehending it, much less fighting it, seem impossible. Surely, one thinks, the chastisement of God must be around the corner: He has already passed sentence on man, and we are just waiting to learn what form the punishment will take.World War III? Famine? Plague? Anarchy and chaos followed by the police state with its concentration camps, torture, and genocide?  Who knows?

In the midst of these justifiable apocalyptic fears, the Lord tells us today not to fear but to have hope: “Look up and lift up your heads, for your redemption draweth nigh.”   He has just completed His great discourse about the end of the world,relating the terrors that will precede His Second Coming, but at the end He assures the disciples that all of these things, no matter how terrible, will, like everything in this life, pass away. Indeed, heaven and earth – the entire visible cosmos – will pass away. His words, however, will never pass away. Those who cling to His words,who make Him the foundation of their life and do not leave the house built on this foundation – the Life in Christ – will not perish: “In your patience possess ye your souls (Luke 21:19).”

In the passage immediately following today’s reading, the Lord instructs the disciples how to keep their faith and hope alive in the midst of apocalyptic trials:

And take heed to yourselves, lest at any time your hearts be overcharged with surfeiting, and drunkenness, and cares of this life,and so that day come upon you unawares. For as a snare shall it come on all them that dwell on the face of the whole earth. Watch ye therefore, and pray always, that ye may be accounted worthy to escape all these things that shall come to pass, and to stand before the Son of man. – Luke 21: 34-36

Therefore, to survive spiritually, to be still on Christ’s side when He returns and not on the other side, we must take heed to ourselves, which consists of a temperate and moral life characterized by watching and praying always.   Without a continual,conscious spiritual life according to the Church’s teaching, we will not survive spiritually: we will fall.

We see people falling all around us, including “practicing Christians” of various kinds – sadly, not excluding Orthodox people: they throw in the towel and adopt the latest delusion, the latest false teaching, the latest moral “Get Out of Jail Free card” from the teachers of the demonic New Order, some moral or intellectual or religious poison they would not have dreamed of swallowing even a year ago. All is well: there is a big party going on out there and they do not want to be left out. But they are sheep being fattened for the slaughter. And any day, any time, something inside us too could snap, and we could become one of them. Our vigilance must be ceaseless, while our reliance on God must be total.

The means to this ceaseless vigilance are well within our grasp,and they are so well known to us that we take them for granted and fail to use them: daily prayer at set times, the constant struggle for the Jesus Prayer, frequent confession, frequent Holy Communion, spiritual reading, constant examination of conscience and daily inner repentance, and all of the instruments of the spiritual life according to the tradition of the Orthodox Church. This “normal life” of Orthodoxy that has been going on all along has actually always been an apocalyptic life, an eschatological life, a life oriented to the End of the World; we just did not notice.  The times we are living through now and will be living through in the near future are what we have been chanting about and praying about and preparing for all along, if only we had known it.   The rehearsal is over: it is Show Time.  The curtain has risen, and we stand in the full glare of the lights. How will we play our part?

Many will say to me in that day, Lord, Lord, have we not prophesied in thy name? and in thy name have cast out devils? and in thy name done many wonderful works? And then will I profess unto them, I never knew you: depart from me, ye that work iniquity. Therefore whosoever heareth these sayings of mine, and doeth them, I will liken him unto a wise man, which built his house upon a rock:And the rain descended, and the floods came, and the winds blew, and beat upon that house; and it fell not: for it was founded upon a rock. And every one that heareth these sayings of mine, and doeth them not, shall be likened unto a foolish man, which built his house upon the sand: And the rain descended, and the floods came, and the winds blew, and beat upon that house; and it fell: and great was the fall of it. – Matthew 7: 22-27  

2 December OS 2018 -Nativity Fast; Saturday of the 11th Week of St. Luke; Holy Prophet Avvakum (Habbakuk)

In the daily Gospel reading, our Lord commands us to be vigilant, preparing for Judgment:

The Lord said to His disciples: Fear not, little flock; for it is your Father’s good pleasure to give you the kingdom. Sell that ye have, and give alms; provide yourselves bags which wax not old, a treasure in the heavens that faileth not, where no thief approacheth,neither moth corrupteth. For where your treasure is, there will your heart be also. Let your loins be girded about, and your lights burning; And ye yourselves like unto men that wait for their lord,when he will return from the wedding; that when he cometh and knocketh, they may open unto him immediately. Blessed are those servants, whom the lord when he cometh shall find watching: verily I say unto you, that he shall gird himself, and make them to sit down to meat, and will come forth and serve them. And if he shall come in the second watch, or come in the third watch, and find them so,blessed are those servants. And this know, that if the goodman of the house had known what hour the thief would come, he would have watched, and not have suffered his house to be broken through. Be ye therefore ready also: for the Son of man cometh at an hour when ye think not. – St. Luke 12:32-40

These words ring clear in this present season of Advent, the Nativity Fast, for as we prepare to celebrate the First Advent (=Coming, Arrival, Presence) of God in the Flesh, we recall his great and terrible Second Advent as well, when He shall come to judge the living and the dead. To help us in our practical spiritual efforts,St. Theophan the Recluse relates these words of Christ also to the Advent of the Lord each of us will encounter at the hour of death:

We must be ready at every hour – one does not know when the Lord will come, either for the Last Judgment or to take you from here; for you they are the same. Death decides everything. After death comes the results of your life; whatever you’ve acquired,you’ll have to be satisfied with for all eternity. If you have acquired what is good, your lot will be good; if you have acquired what is evil, then your lot will be evil. This is as true as the fact that you exist. All of this could be decided this moment – here at this very moment, as you read these lines – and then, the end of everything; a seal will be set to your existence, which no one can remove. This is something to think about! But one cannot be sufficiently amazed at how little people think about it. What is this mystery which is wrought upon us? We all know that death will come at any moment, that it is impossible to escape it, but meanwhile almost no one at all thinks about it – and it will come suddenly and seize us. Even then – even when a fatal disease seizes a person, he still does not think that the end has come. Let psychologists resolve this from a scientific aspect; from the moral aspect it is impossible not to see here an incomprehensible self-delusion, alien only to one whois heedful of himself.   – Thoughts for Each Day of the Year, pp . 270-271

Incomprehensible self-delusion – that’s it!   Where does it come from, and what can we do about it?

Our blindness to death comes from two places – the inside and the outside of us.   On the inside, despite the grace of baptism, the power of whose grace we do not activate enough by struggling against sin, our fallen nature denies the reality of death. This blindness is instinctive, unconscious, and we are all born with it. It comes from two sources, one natural and one unnatural.   The natural source is the memory of immortality that resides in the human heart since Paradise. We have inherited this psychosomatically from our First Parents, and there is nothing we can do about it. Actually, in itself it is a good thing:It gives empirical proof that man was created for eternal life.  Then there is the unnatural and sinful source of the blindness to death: the inherited Ancestral Sin that we are all born with, which carries the damage to the heart caused by our First Parents’ accepting the lie, “You shall be as gods.” I do not think I am going to die, because I think that I am God, that I am the source of my own life. All of my problems come from this.

The external causes of our blindness to death are illusion and distraction.   Because of modern medical science, we have the illusion that there is a cure for everything. Living in the”First World,” we are not confronted daily with infant and child mortality, and we do not see adults dying young on a regular basis in the homes around us and in our own homes, dying from infections or getting kicked by mules or bitten by snakes, or just malnutrition. We live in an insulated, cosseted environment in which daily physical problems usually do not rise above the level of discomfort and inconvenience. Even when we do become dangerously ill,we are prone to think not about death and God’s judgment, about the shortness of this life and the vanity of all things here below, but about hoping for a cure, so that we can eke out a few more years of biological existence.

Because of the frenzied environment created by the demands of work or school, interrupted only by frenzied “input” from the”news” and entertainment media, we are constantly distracted and agitated.   This world seems to be all there is, because it demands our attention at every waking hour. It won’t go away. We are little rats running on a wheel, and we are not allowed to get off, or so it seems.

How do we get off the wheel, calm down, face reality, and prepare for death?   The key moment comes when we have a break from our duties, and we make the choice either to be distracted by the news and entertainment media or to do spiritual works: spiritual reading, prayer, preparation for confession, and the various activities of spiritual life.   Every one of these moments is a moment of crisis, in the original meaning of the word: not simply an emergency, but an emergency characterized by judgment.It is a moment of judgment – we are being judged at that very moment by the choice that we make.   Life consists of thousands of such moments that interrupt the duties of our work, and the final result of the choices we make at these moments is what St. Theophan refers to above: “After death comes the results of your life; whatever you’ve acquired, you’ll have to be satisfied with for all eternity.” Now we know that we can take nothing from this world with us, except our soul. “What we have acquired” is virtue or vice, grace or separation from God, holiness or sinfulness. It is up to us.

Life is short, death is certain, judgment is eternal. Let us wisely use the free moments given us by the All-Merciful God, Who desires our salvation infinitely more than we do, and Who is waiting with invincible love to give us spiritual gifts, so that He may find us watching when He comes.

1 December OS 2018 – Nativity Fast; Friday of the 11th Week of St. Luke; Holy Prophet Nahum; St. Philaret the Almsgiver

Today’s daily Gospel reading is Luke 20: 19-26.

And the chief priests and the scribes the same hour sought to lay hands on him; and they feared the people: for they perceived that he had spoken this parable against them. And they watched him, and sent forth spies, which should feign themselves just men, that they might take hold of his words, that so they might deliver him unto the power and authority of the governor. And they asked him, saying, Master, we know that thou sayest and teachest rightly, neither acceptest thou the person of any, but teachest the way of God truly: Is it lawful for us to give tribute unto Caesar, or no? But he perceived their craftiness, and said unto them, Why tempt ye me? Shew me a penny. Whose image and superscription hath it? They answered and said, Caesar’s. And he said unto them, Render therefore unto Caesar the things which be Caesar’s, and unto God the things which be God’s. And they could not take hold of his words before the people: and they marvelled at his answer, and held their peace.

Most commentary relates this teaching of the Lord to the relationship that a Christian or the Church as a whole should have to the civil government. St. Theophan the Recluse extends this to examining the relationship we should have to secular society in general:

“Render therefore unto Caesar the things which be Caesar’s, and unto God the things which be God’s.” This means that each gets what is his own. In our times, instead of “the things which be Caesar’s,” we should substitute “the things which are worldly,” and say that worldly things have their turn, while the things of God have theirs. But everyone has rushed toward earthly things alone, and they leave the godly things behind. That is why godly things not only are left out of their proper place – that is, in the first place, as they ought to be – but are completely forgotten. A consequence of this supposedly unintentional forgetfulness is that the godly is darkened in one’s consciousness, and then both its content and foundation become unclear. From this come weakness of conviction and vacillation of faith. Then there is alienation from the Faith and the influence of the winds of various teachings. Everyone goes down this path when be begins to be careless about godly things; society takes this path when in its customs it begins to ignore what God requires of it. When godly things are left in the background, then emancipation from godly requirements begins to be established in society, in the intellectual, moral, and aesthetic sense. There occurs secularization (serving the spirit of the time) of politics, customs, entertainment, and then of education and all institutions. At the current time, people do not think, speak, or write about what is God’s, nor do they even keep them in mind – not in any of their undertakings. Is it surprising, given such a state of mind, that teachings contrary to the Faith find access to society and that society is inclined toward mass unbelief? – Thoughts for Each Day of the Year, pp. 270-271

The author wrote these words in the late 19th century, a time when the nations that dominated the earth were all officially Christian, including Russia, which was not simply any kind of “Christian,” but was in fact Orthodox. He could see that the spirit of worldliness was already so great among a critical mass of the Orthodox people – and especially among the leading classes – that the fall of the old outward Christian structures and their replacement by the rule of some kind of anti-Christian elite was a matter of time, unless there would be profound, nation-wide repentance in Russia and throughout the Orthodox nations – which did not occur. Despite the witness of many holy people, prophets whom God raised up at the eleventh hour, the Orthodox nations as a whole rushed to worship the Golden Calf offered by the apostate West, and they fell into the abyss.

The society we live in today has “progressed” far beyond mere worldliness into purposely engineered demonic insanity – legally sanctioned, inexhaustibly funded, and violently imposed by the single, two-headed monster of big government/big business through its mind-control system, that malevolent thing which has murdered and inhabited the corpses of the mainstream churches, education, the arts, politics, and journalism. We are living with the logical outcome of the systemic fall into worldliness that St. Theophan was writing about in 1881.

All of this, however, should not surprise us or cause us to give up. It should certainly make us sober, but it need not steal our hope. This world has been perishing since our First Parents were expelled from Paradise. Truly Christian societies, in which the influence of the Church was paramount and a critical mass of the people lived by Her standards, are the exception, not the rule, in history.   God’s will to save us is still as great as ever, and His will to save us is far greater – infinitely greater – than our own desire to be saved. He loves us, and He will never abandon us. Lot was saved when he was the only righteous man left in Sodom. Though the world in which we live has turned into Sodom, unlike Lot we are not alone. As at the time of the Prophet Elias, there survive even now the hidden seven thousand who have not bowed the knee to Baal. The Lord, from all eternity, has purposed to put us exactly in this situation, precisely for our salvation, and He is both invincible and all wise. We have only to cooperate.

What, then, must we do?   The answers are, as usual, obvious, and they involve doing what St. Theophan is talking about in the passage above: putting the things of God first. Let us take the energy we spend obsessing over everything that is wrong – like deer staring at the headlights of the oncoming car – and put it into prayer, spiritual reading, going to Church, and giving support to our brethren, who are hurting as we are, through acts of love like spending time with them and listening to them. We have to be proactive about cutting off destructive influences and replacing them with the good things God wants to give us and is waiting to give us, things we still have access to, if only we will choose them over worldly things. It is a matter of setting our priorities and sticking to them.

Let us pray with heartfelt fervor – today, now, the minute we are finished reading this post – for a permanent and insatiable desire for the things of God, and the wisdom and courage to put them first in our lives.

30 November OS 2018 – Nativity Fast; Thursday of the 11th Week of St. Luke; Holy Apostle Andrew the First-Called

Today’s daily Gospel reading is Luke 20: 9-18

At that time, Jesus began to speak to the people this parable; A certain man planted a vineyard, and let it forth to husbandmen, and went into a far country for a long time. And at the season he sent a servant to the husbandmen, that they should give him of the fruit of the vineyard: but the husbandmen beat him, and sent him away empty. And again he sent another servant: and they beat him also, and entreated him shamefully, and sent him away empty. And again he sent a third: and they wounded him also, and cast him out. Then said the lord of the vineyard, What shall I do? I will send my beloved son: it may be they will reverence him when they see him. But when the husbandmen saw him, they reasoned among themselves, saying, This is the heir: come, let us kill him, that the inheritance may be ours. So they cast him out of the vineyard, and killed him. What therefore shall the lord of the vineyard do unto them? He shall come and destroy these husbandmen, and shall give the vineyard to others. And when they heard it, they said, God forbid. And he beheld them, and said, What is this then that is written, The stone which the builders rejected, the same is become the head of the corner. Whosoever shall fall upon that stone shall be broken; but on whomsoever it shall fall, it will grind him to powder.

The vineyard in the parable is the Old Testament Church, and the husbandmen (farmers) are the priests, scribes, and other leaders of the Old Testament Church. The servants sent to collect the rent are the prophets, whom the leaders of the Old Israel consistently persecuted and killed, and the son of the master is, of course, Our Lord Himself, whose judicial murder was the crowning achievement, so to speak, the ultimate logical outcome, of Old Israel’s long career of betraying their God. God took the vineyard, the Church, from these people, and He gave it to the Gentiles, or rather, to all, Jew and Gentile alike, who believe in the Lord Jesus Christ, are baptized in the Name of the Holy Trinity, and profess the Orthodox Faith.

This is the theological meaning of the parable. But the parable has also a moral message, a warning for us: the leaders of the New Testament Church, and by extension those who follow them, can also fall away and be cut off from the True Vine, Who is Christ.   Is this not what we see going on today, an apostasy of unprecedented scale and rapidity?   Supposedly Orthodox hierarchs can publicly teach just about anything – that belonging to  Luciferian organizations (the World Council of Churches, etc.) does not constitute apostasy, that the Vatican II Wacko Circus “church” of Pope Francis (“Who am I to judge homosexuals…” “Atheists go to heaven too…” etc.) is our “sister church,” that Mohammed is a true prophet, that Christians, Jews, and Moslems all worship the same God, that the Fourth Ecumenical Council is true for us but not true for the Monophysites (who are not really Monophysites but Orthodox like us only without the 4th through the 7th Councils but that’s OK), and on and on – and after a few scattered voices make a namby-pamby little protest with no teeth in it, most everyone just shuts up and keeps following them.   They will not break with these people because they believe these ecclesiastical potentates to be not tenants but owners of the Vineyard, and that nothing they say or do –  no matter how outrageous, public, un-repented, and long-enduring, (indeed generational) – can possibly change that.   On Judgment Day they will have another think coming.

Meanwhile what are we doing, the True Orthodox who are not following the apostate “husbandmen”?   Are we diligently working in God’s vineyard or just hunkering down in personal comfort, tut-tutting the wickedness of others and hoping the bad times will pass? We have bishops and priests. We have the wonderful divine services and above all the Divine Liturgy, Holy Communion, and all the Holy Mysteries. We have our prayer books, to help us say our daily prayers. Here in the “Western” world, we have varied and abundant food, making it easier than ever to keep the fasts, if only we tried a bit. Orthodox literature is more abundant and available than ever, both in print and on the Internet.   In short, God has given us our talent, and we have to put it to work. He is without any doubt going to demand it back with interest; we have His word for it.

Try this exercise: At the end of the day, write down what you did that day for God and for the salvation of your soul and other people’s souls.   How long will the list be?    Think about it.

29 November OS 2018 – Wednesday of the 11th Week of St. Luke;  Ss. Paramon and Philoumenos, Martyrs

Today’s daily Gospel reading is Luke 20: 1-8.

At that time, as Jesus taught the people in the temple, and preached the gospel, the chief priests and the scribes came upon him with the elders, And spake unto him, saying, Tell us, by what authority doest thou these things? or who is he that gave thee this authority? And he answered and said unto them, I will also ask you one thing; and answer me: The baptism of John, was it from heaven, or of men? And they reasoned with themselves, saying, If we shall say, From heaven; he will say, Why then believed ye him not? But and if we say, Of men; all the people will stone us: for they be persuaded that John was a prophet. And they answered, that they could not tell whence it was. And Jesus said unto them, Neither tell I you by what authority I do these things.

Of course, these questioners – the chief priests, scribes, and elders – were not asking Our Lord this question because they sincerely sought the truth. Their minds were made up, and they were simply trying to trick Him.   Their minds were poniro, as we say in Greek – sneaky, twisted, and evil-intended – and they could not think straight or see straight or talk straight. For them, language was a tool to get power over others, not a holy medium of heart to heart communication.   St. Theophan the Recluse comments on this encounter to illustrate the difference between the mind of Faith, which is also the deep and reasonable mind, and the mind of hardened unbelief, which is superficial and unreasoning:

The priests, scribes, and elders did not believe in the Lord. In order to raise them up to faith, He offered them a question: “The baptism of John, was it from heaven, or of men?” Consider this without bias, and your reasoning will bring you to faith. What is said about John’s appearing can be said about every event accompanying the Lord’s advent in the flesh, and about His very advent, and all that comes into contact with it. Let each person consider all of this, and the conclusion will be the same: “Truly this was the Son of God (Matt. 27:54).” Various thoughts can come, confusion can arise, what seem like incongruities can be encountered; but at the end of all investigations one universal conviction will result: that it is impossible to think any other way than as is shown in the Gospels and apostolic writings. “Great is the mystery of godliness: God is manifest in the flesh (I Timothy 3:16).” This remains a mystery, but if the mind compels itself by a spiritual need to investigate it, then this mystery will become clear to the mind – and it will confess this way, and in no other way. Unbelievers either do not investigate it at all as they ought to, or they investigate it superficially, with a mind alien to it, or they take on a miserable state of mind that is opposed to what is required by the Faith. To justify their unbelief, they are satisfied with the most insignificant trifle to refute the Faith. The words of unbelievers shake believers, who, being satisfied with simple faith, do not seek clarification of the foundations of the Faith. Those words take them unawares, and hence they are shaken. – Thoughts for Each Day of the Year, p. 268

Why are we sometimes shaken by the specious (i.e., seemingly valid but actually worthless) arguments of the faithless? It may be that we have not studied our Faith enough, but that by itself is easily remedied – the books are all out there, and we have only to immerse ourselves in the tremendous wisdom and insight of the Church expressed by Her various exponents, in order to see how the Orthodox Faith is far and away the most satisfying explanation to life’s puzzle.   The underlying problem is not lack of knowledge but the lack of godly confidence caused by a passion we all suffer from, which is vanity.

This may be surprising to some people, for they often mistake timidity for humility, and imagine that if they are mealy-mouthed this shows that they are not vain. But what is humility? It is not groveling and acting like the doormat of the human race (a la Uriah Heep, for you English literature fans). True humility is knowing Who God is, who you are, and what life is really about. It is accurate knowledge of reality, that’s all.   If you know white is white and black is black, it is not humble to say that white is black, just because that will stroke someone else’s ego. On the contrary, it is extremely vain and proud, because it means that you think you have permission to overturn reality in order to luxuriate in the good feelings of some other finite creature. It is playing God.

A truly humble person is courageous.   Since he knows that God in His Providence is taking care of him, that nothing can be done to him that will defeat God’s plan for his salvation, he is not afraid of those who attack his Faith or of what they will do to him if he does not go along with them.

A truly humble person is confident in the truth.   Even if he does not understand every detail, even if he cannot answer every specific objection to his Faith, he knows that the Big Picture of Orthodoxy is as good as it gets, insofar as having a worldview, an understanding of what life is all about. If there is some little thing that has not been explained completely, he trusts that it is explainable to the extent he truly needs it to be, and with prayer and trust he seeks to grow in the knowledge of his Faith.

A truly humble person is meek. He does not have to snarl at someone who raises objections to his faith; he does not have to bite.   With the calmness and courage born of heartfelt certainty, he can serenely and patiently ward off the powerless arrows of false objections, even when his critic is unkind to him personally.

A truly humble person is compassionate. When he sees the unbelief of the other person, he says, “There but for the grace of God go I.” Having accurate self-knowledge, he knows the capacity of his own heart for self-deception, and therefore he recoils from condemning another person who has the same problem. With true sympathy, he wants this person in front of him to be delivered from deception, for he wants what God wants, and God is He “… Who will have all men to be saved, and to come unto the knowledge of the truth (I Timothy 2:4).”

Let us immerse ourselves in the treasures of our precious Faith’s priceless theology, pray for more accurate self-knowledge, and beg the Lord to save our neighbors who labor so painfully in the darkness of unbelief!

24 November OS 2018 – The Nativity Fast; Afterfeast of the Entry of the Theotokos; Friday of the 10th Week of St. Luke;  St. Clement of Rome and St. Peter of Alexandria (Slavonic Menaion: St. Catherine and St. Mercurius) 

Today’s daily Gospel reading is Luke 19: 12 -28.

The Lord said, A certain nobleman went into a far country to receive for himself a kingdom, and to return. And he called his ten servants, and delivered them ten pounds, and said unto them, Occupy till I come. But his citizens hated him, and sent a message after him, saying, We will not have this man to reign over us. And it came to pass, that when he was returned, having received the kingdom, then he commanded these servants to be called unto him, to whom he had given the money, that he might know how much every man had gained by trading. Then came the first, saying, Lord, thy pound hath gained ten pounds. And he said unto him, Well, thou good servant: because thou hast been faithful in a very little, have thou authority over ten cities. And the second came, saying, Lord, thy pound hath gained five pounds. And he said likewise to him, Be thou also over five cities. And another came, saying, Lord, behold, here is thy pound, which I have kept laid up in a napkin: For I feared thee, because thou art an austere man: thou takest up that thou layedst not down, and reapest that thou didst not sow. And he saith unto him, Out of thine own mouth will I judge thee, thou wicked servant. Thou knewest that I was an austere man, taking up that I laid not down, and reaping that I did not sow: Wherefore then gavest not thou my money into the bank, that at my coming I might have required mine own with usury? And he said unto them that stood by, Take from him the pound, and give it to him that hath ten pounds. (And they said unto him, Lord, he hath ten pounds.) For I say unto you, That unto every one which hath shall be given; and from him that hath not, even that he hath shall be taken away from him. But those mine enemies, which would not that I should reign over them, bring hither, and slay them before me. And when he had thus spoken, he went before, ascending up to Jerusalem.

 This parable of the Lord summarizes all history between the First and Second Coming of Christ.   The nobleman who goes into a far country to receive a kingdom is Christ, Who ascends to His Father, and Who will return at the end of time to judge the living and the dead. By sending the Holy Spirit and beginning the economy of the New Testament Church, He gives “pounds,” that is, all the gifts of grace which constitute the life of the Church, to His faithful followers, who are expected to multiply what they have received through faith and good works. The enemies of the returning king are those who oppose Christ and the Church, who will be dreadfully punished at the time of the Second Coming.

We are among the faithful followers, who have received our “pounds,” our gifts of grace. These gifts are indescribably great, coming from the Infinite God by means of His uncreated energies. Having received them, we are supposed to put them to work for the Lord, to bring ourselves and other souls into His Kingdom, as any good workman is expected to use the assets his employer gives him – tools, training, materials – to enrich his employer. How can we go about this?

One chief reason that we do not multiply our “pounds” is that we forget that we have them. Therefore a good first step is to take inventory of our “assets,” and to thank God for them. If we were conscious always of the gifts of nature and of grace that He has lavished on us, we would be constantly grateful as well as hopeful, and with both courage and humility we would set out each day to do His holy will. We should periodically sit down and enumerate all of these gifts, perhaps even writing them down to make this point to ourselves, and glorify and thank God for them.

It is very easy, indeed the “default position” of our fallen nature, for us unconsciously to ascribe both our good qualities and our good works to ourselves.   This is another chief reason we do not grow in grace, do not multiply the “pounds.” Therefore, a second necessary step is to acknowledge that without the Lord we would have nothing, indeed be nothing, and without His help we can do nothing. We must immerse ourselves in humility.

A third step is to seek to know and to do His holy will each day.   Yes, we have these “assets,” but we need the wisdom to know how to use them, for a third obstacle we have to using our gifts is lack of discretion.   Each day, let us set out saying, “O Lord, enable me to know and to do Thy holy will. I am blinded both by my own lack of understanding and by the distractions of the world. Enlighten my mind and my heart at every moment, so that in all that I do, I act in accordance with Thy holy will and for Thy glory.”

A cautionary word: The Lord does indeed work in us and through us, but most often He does not let us see it, lest we would lose our salvation because of pride. We must be content to trust that He is doing His work in us and through us, and wait in hope to be revealed on the Day of Judgment as His good and faithful servants.

Let us, then, set out this day and every day to multiply the gifts that our gracious Lord has given us!   Let us be grateful, immerse ourselves in humility, and pray for enlightenment. Let us live in hope and trust in His mercy, desiring fervently to hear His blessed words: “Well done, good and faithful servant. Enter thou into the joy of Thy Lord.”

23 November OS 2018 – The Nativity Fast; Afterfeast of the Entry of the Theotokos; Thursday of the 10th Week of St. Luke; St. Amphilochios, Bishop of Iconium; St. Gregory, Bishop of Agrigentum

Today’s daily Gospel reading is Luke 18: 31-34

At that time, Jesus took unto him the twelve, and said unto them, Behold, we go up to Jerusalem, and all things that are written by the prophets concerning the Son of man shall be accomplished. For he shall be delivered unto the Gentiles, and shall be mocked, and spitefully entreated, and spitted on: And they shall scourge him, and put him to death: and the third day he shall rise again. And they understood none of these things: and this saying was hid from them, neither knew they the things which were spoken.

 Here is something we see at various times in the Gospel: Our Lord’s most intimate followers often did not understand about the most important things, the central mysteries of the Gospel teaching. Only after His Resurrection and Ascension, and after they had received the Holy Spirit at Pentecost, were their eyes opened to receive the light of the great mysteries of the Lord’s economy for man’s salvation. St. Theophan the Recluse relates this experience of the apostles to our own spiritual life:

The Lord told the disciples about His suffering, but they did not comprehend anything He said: “This saying was hid from them.” Later, the faithful “…determined not to know anything except Jesus Christ, and Him crucified (I Corinthians 2:2).” Before the time came, they did not understand any of this mystery; but when the time came, they understood, and taught everyone, and explained it to everyone. This happens to everyone, not only with regard to this mystery, but to all the other mysteries as well. What is not understood in the beginning becomes understood with time; it is as if a ray of light enters the consciousness and brightens what was formerly dark. Who is it that elucidates it? The Lord Himself, the grace that lives in the faithful, or one’s guardian angel – but in no way is it the person himself. He is the recipient, not the cause. On the other hand, something else might remain incomprehensible for one’s whole life – not only for individuals, but for all of humanity. Man is surrounded by things he does not understand. Some are cleared up over the course of his life, while other are left until the next life – they will be seen then.   This applies even to minds enlightened by God. Why are things not revealed here? Because some things are incomprehensible, so there is no point in talking about them. Others are not proclaimed out of considerations for health – that is, it would be harmful to know about them prematurely. Much will become clear in the next life, but other subjects and other mysteries will also be discovered then. A created mind will never escape inscrutable mysteries. The mind rebels against these bonds, but whether you rebel or not, you cannot sever the bonds of mystery. Humble yourself, proud mind, beneath the might hand of God – and believe!

– from Thoughts for Each Day of the Year, pp. 263-264

These thoughts are related to the need to receive the Kingdom of God as a little child, according to Our Lord’s words.   God gave us a mind, and we naturally want to figure things out – this is understandable.   But we have to remember that our minds are both limited, because we are finite creatures, and, moreover, damaged, for, even after Holy Baptism, we still struggle with the effects of the Ancestral Sin upon our nature, though it does not have final power over us.   Thus we cannot understand even created things, much less God, without God’s illumination, which comes, as St. Theophan explains, either directly from His Holy Spirit or through the inspiration of our Guardian Angel.   We have to ask for this illumination constantly, both in order to receive this help, and also in order to come into a right relationship between God and ourselves as rational but limited creatures.   Nothing is worse than a proud mind; nothing prevents us so effectively as this from being saved. This is especially true when the mind is proud about religious matters, when somebody thinks he “knows it all” and refuses to be taught – this is the worst! An un-teachable person, no matter how outwardly pious, is incapable of effectual repentance: the harder he tries to perform the deeds of religion, the worse he gets!

The thought of all this should humble us and sober us up.   Every day we should ask Our Lord to enlighten us a little more, to reveal to us a little more what we need to know for our salvation, and especially to give us a little more self-understanding, which is the hardest thing of all. St. Isaac the Syrian says somewhere that it is a greater miracle to see your own sins than to raise the dead. Never was a truer word spoken!   We want to understand all kinds of mysterious things – how God could have created all things in six days, how Jesus could have risen from the dead, how some people are saved and others are not, when will be the end of the world, etc. – but we cannot understand even our own most elementary faults, and our own hearts are to us a closed book!

When I am in need of enlightenment, I like to recall the Spiritual Testament of the Elder Gabriel of the Kazan-Seven Lakes and the Pskov-Eleazar Monasteries, who reposed in 1915. This testament was his final word to his spiritual children, composed shortly before his repose:

Soon, perhaps, I will die. I leave you an inheritance of great and inexhaustible riches. There is enough for everyone, only they must make profitable use of it and not doubt. Whosoever will be wise enough to make use of this inheritance will live without want.

 First: when someone feels himself to be a sinner and can find no way out, let him shut himself alone in his cell and read the Canon and Akathist to Sweetest Jesus Christ, and his tears will be a comforting remedy for him.

 Second: when someone finds himself amid misfortunes of any kind whatsoever, let him read the Supplicatory Canon to the Mother of God, “Distressed by Many Temptations,” and all his misfortunes will pass unnoticed from him to the shame of those who assailed him.

 Third: when someone needs inner illumination of soul, let him read the 17th Kathisma [Psalm 118] with attention, and his inner eyes will be opened. The realization of what is written in it will follow. The need to cleanse the conscience more frequently in Confession and to communicate of the Holy Mysteries of the Body and Blood of Christ will arise. The virtue of compassion for others will be manifest, so that we will not scorn them but rather suffer and pray for them. Then, inward fear of God will appear, in which will be revealed to the inner eye of the soul the accomplishments of the Savior – how He suffered for us and loved us. Grace-filled love for Him will appear with the power of the Holy Spirit, Who instructs us in every ascetic labor and teaches us how to accomplish His will for us and to endure. In our patience, we will perceive and sense in ourselves the coming of the Kingdom of God in His power, and we will reign together with the Lord and become holy.

This world will not appear to us then the same as it appears to us now; however, we will not stand in judgment, but Jesus Christ will judge. We will see the falsity and sin in the world, but only through the Savior’s eyes, and we will partake of truth in Him alone.

Falsehood! We see it and yet we do not. This world with all its deceptions will pass away never to return, for it is a lie. Christ’s truth shall endure unto the ages of ages. Amen.

– from One of the Ancients, by Holy New Hieromartyr Simeon Kholmogorov (St. Herman Press, 1988), pp. 169-170

20 November OS 2018 – The Nativity Fast; Monday of the 10th Week of St. Luke; Forefeast of the Entry of the Theotokos; St. Gregory of Decapolis; St. Proclus, Archbishop of Constantinople

Today’s daily Gospel reading is Luke 17: 20-25.

At that time when Jesus was demanded of the Pharisees, when the kingdom of God should come, he answered them and said, The kingdom of God cometh not with observation: Neither shall they say, Lo here! or, lo there! for, behold, the kingdom of God is within you. And he said unto the disciples, The days will come, when ye shall desire to see one of the days of the Son of man, and ye shall not see it. And they shall say to you, See here; or, see there: go not after them, nor follow them. For as the lightning, that lighteneth out of the one part under heaven, shineth unto the other part under heaven; so shall also the Son of man be in his day. But first must he suffer many things, and be rejected of this generation.

 St. Theophan the Recluse uses the example of the Lord’s own suffering to illuminate the path of suffering of His true followers:

Having said that the Son of Man will appear on His day like lightning, instantly illuminating everything under heaven, the Lord added: “But first He must suffer many things, and be rejected of this generation…” He suffered in His person at one specific time [i.e., at His Passion and Crucifixion], after which sufferings continue in the person of believers. There is suffering as they are born, as they are brought up in the spirit, and as they ward of the actions of the enemy, both inward and outward…The sorrows, temptations, and wavering of faith due to unbelief are continual arrows. Words and writings that exude unbelief are the flaming arrows of the evil one. These days, the evil one has led many blacksmiths to forge such arrows. The hearts of believers ache when they are struck by them and see others struck…But the day of the Lord’s glory will appear – then all the secret darkness will be revealed, and those who have suffered will rejoice with the Lord. Until that time we must endure and pray. – from Thoughts for Each Day of the Year, pp. 260-261

We live in hope, awaiting the return of the Lord, the revelation of the secret thoughts of the hearts, and the Great Judgment.   Until then, we suffer outwardly and inwardly, especially because we are so few, because those outside the true Faith are so many, and because the propaganda of the Father of Lies grows stronger every day, not only emanating from those obviously against the Church in government, big business, the media, education, etc., but also, and more grievously,  from those who have power over the historical Church institutions – patriarchs, synods, theology professors, spiritual writers, and their “groupies” – who have made themselves instruments of the currently coalescing world kingdom of Antichrist.  The enemy is within the gates and pretends to be our friend.

When we hear deceptive and seductive arguments against our pure confession of Faith, especially very clever ones with a “holy” covering, our hearts may waver – “Maybe I am wrong, maybe it is alright to compromise in order to get along…these seem like nice people…they print nice books…they have nice YouTube videos, they have a lot of resources to do good…” and so forth. But deeper within our hearts, we know that these thoughts are exactly what we have always known them to be: lies from the Evil One.

And we may still suffer, as well, from wavering in the face of the overtly anti-Christian propaganda: propaganda for the descent of man from apes, for the destruction of the traditional order of the family, for infant sacrifice masquerading as “healthcare,” for the normalization of sodomy,  for the equality of all beliefs, for “tolerance” of every kind of sin and disorder, for…you name it.

The Lord allows all of this, so that we may go more deeply into prayer and into studying our Holy Faith, in order to be strengthened more and more as the attacks increase more and more. We will either grow stronger or we will fall, but there is no standing still, no option to remain just as we are. We are on a pilgrimage, and we have to keep putting one foot in front of the other. We must feed on courage and hope from the Lord, obtained as His free gift after fervent prayer. We alternate between moments of darkness, when all seems lost, and brilliant flashes of light, when the gracious Lord, seeing our steadfastness in the midst of darkness while knowing our utter weakness and absolute dependence on grace, gives us the consolation of absolute assurance of His Truth, of the forgiveness of our sins, and of His loving presence in our hearts, whose sweetness is so great that we will endure anything rather than to lose it.   He becomes everything to us.

During the Nativity Fast, there is a peculiar kind of warfare deriving from our desire for the legitimate human consolations of the Christmas and New Year celebrations – the company of family and friends, the warmth of happy social gatherings, decorations and presents, and so forth. In their proper place, all of these are indeed good things. But today they have become so mixed up with improper, worldly, and foolish things, that even what was once good has become poisoned or at most empty, and to a Christian with sensitive Orthodox perceptions, this is extremely painful, not because we do not care about our family, friends, and co-workers, but because we do.  We desire their true good, and the nature of their true good is exactly what it seems most often impossible for us to convey or for them to understand.

In the face of all this, we must have recourse ever more deeply and persistently to our refuge, which is prayer. We must go into the closet of the heart and there “break ourselves” before God, pouring out our sorrows, our faith and lack of faith, our desire for the salvation of our loved ones, and our grief over the sins of all this perishing world.   We must surrender ourselves to Him and live only for Him. We must realize what it means to become not only servants but also friends of God. This process causes both great pain and great joy. It is a flaming crucible that lasts all of one’s life and climaxes in the last trial of death, until every impurity, every alloy of sin, worldliness, doubt, and unbelief is burned away.   This must be so, for to ascend unscathed between the awaiting ranks of demons at the hour of death, the soul must have already known by experience the meaning of the Lord’s words, “…for behold, the kingdom of God is within you.”

O dear Savior Who suffered for us, let us also in our little way suffer for Thee, that we might live and reign forever with Thee! To Thee be the glory, with the Father and the Holy Spirit, unto the ages of ages.   Amen.

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 When the soul of a man departs from the body, a certain great mystery is there enacted. If a person is under the guilt of sin, bands of demons and fallen angels approach along with the powers of darkness which capture that soul and drag it as a captive to their place. No one should be surprised by this fact. For if, while a man lived in this life, he was subject to them and was their obedient slave, how much more, when he leaves this world, is he captured and controlled by them? You can understand this, however, from what happens to those on the better side. Indeed, angels even now stand alongside God’s holy servants, and holy spirits surround and protect them. And when they leave their bodies, the bands of angels receive their souls and carry them to their side into pure eternity. And so they lead them to the Lord. – Homily 22 of St. Macarius the Great, “On the two possible states of those who depart from this life.”

17 November OS 2018 – Nativity Fast; Friday of the Ninth Week of St. Luke; St. Gregory, Bishop of Neo-Caesaria the Wonderworker; St. Lazarus, the Iconographer and Confessor; St. Gennadios I, Patriarch of Constantinople 

In today’s Gospel, the Lord warns us sternly against offending our brother: 

The Lord said, Ye are they which justify yourselves before men; but God knoweth your hearts: for that which is highly esteemed among men is abomination in the sight of God. The law and the prophets were until John: since that time the kingdom of God is preached, and every man presseth into it. And it is easier for heaven and earth to pass, than one tittle of the law to fail. Whosoever putteth away his wife, and marrieth another, committeth adultery: and whosoever marrieth her that is put away from her husband committeth adultery.   Then said he unto the disciples, It is impossible but that offenses will come: but woe unto him, through whom they come! It were better for him that a millstone were hanged about his neck, and he cast into the sea, than that he should offend one of these little ones. Take heed to yourselves: If thy brother trespass against thee, rebuke him; and if he repent, forgive him. And if he trespass against thee seven times in a day, and seven times in a day turn again to thee, saying, I repent; thou shalt forgive him. – St. Luke 16:15-18, 17:1-4

St. Theophan the Recluse points out that we offend and condemn others all the time, and we do not think about it, and yet these two sins are very hateful to God:

…Two sins which are very great in the eyes of God are not regarded as anything by people: offending and condemning. The offender, according to the word of the Lord, would be better off dead; he who condemns is already condemned. But neither the one nor the other think about it, nor can they even admit that they are sinful in any such thing. Indeed, what blindness surrounds us, and how carelessly we walk in the midst of death!   Thoughts for Each Day of the Year, pp. 258-259

How can we avoid these extremely common falls? The most powerful antidote is attentiveness. Let us assume that we are not uncommonly malicious (i.e., that our bad will is weak, just as our good will is weak- the state of most people, including the baptized), that we fundamentally intend to think and do well towards others, and that we fall into condemning and offending through the weakness common to all men. This usually occurs because we are not leading an attentive life. When we are not in a prayerful state, our minds being drawn out of ourselves, broken, and scattered over a thousand shifting impressions, we lose control of our thoughts, feelings, and actions.   In such a state, we cannot help but say and do that which offends, and at the same time condemn others in our thoughts and speech.

As we begin this holy fast to prepare for the Lord’s Nativity, let us ask the Lord to strengthen our weak will, and let us make a firm resolve to lead an attentive spiritual life, whose foundation is continual prayer.   Having said our morning prayers, let us take the Prayer of Jesus with us through the day, repeating it as often as possible – silently, of course, when in the midst of others, but repeating it nonetheless. This all-powerful weapon, the Name of the Lord, will cleanse and concentrate the mind, make us more aware of ourselves, and give us the lively sense of the Presence of the Lord, so that we will fear to offend Him and drive away this most desired Guest of the soul, by any offensive thoughts, words, or deeds directed to our neighbor.