Going to Church

Reading the bulletin in Church this morning, I noticed that next Sunday is already Zacchaeus Sunday, the signal that Great Lent is soon upon us. How did that happen? The way the liturgical year works, we fast, then we feast, then almost immediately we fast again. There is almost no “normal time.” Probably the single most important thing to me in my life as a Christian is going to Church. Whether it’s a fast (struggling to stand there and pay attention) or a feast (joyous, peaceful, balm for my soul), hearing the words of God and receiving the Eucharist is what makes everything else in life – every single other thing – bearable and even, mostly, good. When I can’t go to Church, well, let’s just say that crankiness is inevitably around the corner. To go to Church is like breathing.

I can think of only two negative experiences I have ever had in Church. I will tell you about one of them, but first I’ll share a little about myself. For better or worse, I always make things too complicated. My husband will tell you that I am not an “analyzer,” I’m a “synthesizer,” by which I think he means that I far prefer to connect everything all up together – all my experiences, thoughts, emotions, people, things, places, everything. While other people are great at focusing in on one thing – and are great at getting things done! – my mind is scattered all over the place trying to pull everything together. So one Holy Week, I was so happy to be in Church every day, because I know that only there I can find genuine holiness and beauty. But this time, there were too many words. You know how it is during Holy Week. You barely finish one service, and you are on to the next one, and every service has hymn after hymn after glorious (or, in the case of Holy Week, gloriously heart-wrenching) hymn. So many words, teaching me, exhorting me, drawing my heart one way and another, putting all the images and experiences and words of the disciples and the people of Jerusalem, Judas, and the Lord himself, in front of me to contemplate. It was too much. I simply could not make it all fit. While God knows, and the wisdom of the Church knows how it all synthesizes together, this was utterly beyond me.

At the time I thought this was such a negative thing, but as another Lent comes upon us, I am actually looking forward to it, services and multitudes of words and all. It will be a time to fast – to give up my “need” to put every last puzzle piece in place, to make everything fit. Giving up my need will then lead to the feast of joy that is Pascha, when the whole of creation, down to the darkest corners of the pit of Hades, will see Who it is that is victoriously in charge.

Recently I have learned that it is not we who inherit the Holy Spirit, but the Holy Spirit inherits us. We are grafted in, we are nourished and cultivated by God to bear fruit unto eternal life. It’s His work on us – in us – accustoming us to bear His Spirit as He takes us into Himself. The work of Christ in His Holy Passion and Resurrection from the dead can be no other than the work of the Son of God made man, ascending the Cross, descending to Hades to recover the lost sheep, and then ascending into heaven to bring His creation to the Father. It’s strictly unfathomable, and yet it’s all given to us when we go to Church.

Tracy Gustilo (SVOTS ’13) is an “itinerant” seminarian (she attends St Vladimir’s one semester per year). During the rest of the time she makes her home in Kansas City with husband Nick and four children, where she attends Holy Trinity Orthodox Church.

Bloom where God plants you

There’s something very “fruitful” about this idea: Bloom where God plants you. It really illustrates the drastic difference between success that belongs to you and fruit of the Kingdom that is produced when you truly see yourself as God’s plant… His creation… one through whom He can get His work done, if you offer yourself to be used. The simple, not easy, way this is accomplished is by truly recognizing that wherever you are, you are Christ’s ambassador. Whoever you are with… family or strangers… that is your community. Your job, wherever you are, is to see and love the people you are with, responding to their needs that you open yourself up to see… loving them fully without condition. It is by living as a citizen of the Kingdom and seeing your life as an offering that Christ’s healing will be brought to the people that He puts in front of you. And, consequently, your own poverty will be revealed to you and be healed as well.

St. Basil the Great poses these questions: “Did you not come forth naked from the womb and will you not return naked to the earth? Where then did you obtain your belongings? If you say that you acquired them by chance, then you deny God, since you neither recognize your Creator, nor are you grateful to the one who gave these things to you. But if you acknowledge that they were given to you by God, then tell me, for what purpose did you receive them?” If we do acknowledge that the stuff we have is from God, then why do we have what we have? Why would God give unequally to those He values equally? The more I experience community with the poor, the more it becomes clear what the answer is: community with the poor. St. Basil continues to discuss how the poor should benefit from what the rich are given and the rich should benefit from the patient endurance of the poor. The reason we have unequal amounts of stuff is so that we come together! And because we are literally spending time with Him, the one who equates Himself with the hungry and naked, the joy and healing is not able to be expressed in words. It’s not the “feel good” thing that people talk about when they “give back.” It’s the true joy of the Kingdom that comes when His people are gathered together around His table, serving each other and feeding each other in multiple ways.

The wisdom and love of God is so amazing to me. He doesn’t just want you to come together with those you can provide for so that their needs are met. He wants you to be free from yourself as well! He wants you to focus on others so that you are free from your desires and worries. He wants you to see that He plants you where you are at any moment with the people you are with for their sake. You will experience real fulfillment and come to know your true self if you look to satisfy others. If you exist in the delusion that trying to satisfy yourself will comfort you and lead you to who you are, you will likely live in the misery of your own constant desire for what you don’t have. Last month I met Ashley at a gathering of people who serve breakfast to the homeless community every Saturday morning at an outdoor park in Detroit. As Ashley was coming through the food line, she hugged every person and thanked them, sharing with them that God loves them. We later had the pleasure of hearing her story. What she told my friends and I stunned us. She said with a smile, “God made me homeless about a year ago.” After everyone left the park, we saw that Ashley was staying.  She told us that she likes to stay and make sure all the trash is picked up. Bloom where God plants you.

Katrina Bitar (SVOTS ’09) has been doing youth ministry since 2001. She has been the Director of the St. Nicholas Camping Program in LA since 2003, and is currently the Director of the YES Program (Youth Equipped to Serve) of FOCUS North America.

SVOTS seminarian delivers sermon at 2012 Festival of Young Preachers

“I can’t imagine paradise without you!”[1]
The Author of the Law instructs his disciples (Matt 5:17–20)

Jason Ketz delivering his sermon

People love to follow rules! Right from the start — from our youth up, we have followed rules. Even as kids, we seemed to thrive on rules. We would even make games out of rule following. Did any of you play follow the leader? The whole point of the game is to follow rules, and kids love it!

As adults, we take rule following to the extreme. We have laws to protect people, customs to protect the status quo, and sometimes we have rules ‘just because.’ One set of customs told us each what to wear today. A slightly broader ordinance told us we had to wear some clothing. Etiquette tells us not to slurp our soup at lunch. And those of us who drive are familiar with a whole book of traffic laws.

These laws and rules and customs support our culture. Like the wooden frame of a house being constructed, law is the framework of our society. The rules outline how we all live together, how we all agree to interact with each other.

God gave the Law to Israel for this very reason. The Law of Moses brings God’s children together as one culture — one people. Authority, purity, sacred places and sacred spaces, tithes and sacrifice — all of these commands, all of these precepts outline how a society lives together in God’s presence. And the Law is the framework of God’s covenant — God’s promise to remember us, and our promise to remember God.

We believe this, but at some point, we forget our place. We focus in on the promise — on God’s blessings as rewards for our obedience. We try to earn these blessings, to earn God’s love and approval through our willingness to follow his commands. But the moment we think we understand how to earn blessings, we become the judges. We become the administrators of the law, and we interpret the law to best serve our purposes. And other people become a threat to our blessings. Suddenly, we’re no longer neighbors, but adversaries. The rules and laws no longer unite us, but divide us. Now we’re not working together. We’re competing against each other.

We play with laws and ordinances, and even with commandments and traditions like a poker game. Constantly trading cards, betting and raising, bluffing and calling each other’s bluff, exploiting the rules to our advantage. Making sure that we get the rewards, even at somebody else’s expense.

Does anybody remember the company Enron?  The most hated company of the last decade. They used their authority to hijack the power grid. They blackmailed state governments with rolling blackouts, taking taxpayer money in return. And they spent their employees’ pensions on their personal riches, until the whole company buckled under the greed of just a handful of executives who were drunk with authority.

Ponzi schemes, fraud, mafias and drug lords. With the wave of a pen or the click of a trigger, any of us can take a law we all agree on — a law meant to help us interact — we take that law and use it competitively. We use it to our advantage.

God’s covenant is not a private agreement. The Law of Moses promises eternal life to all humanity. It’s our way to paradise, and it’s available to everybody. We know this. We believe this, and still we figure out ways to abuse and exploit the ordinances of our Lord. Just as Enron used the power grid, we try to use God’s promise of paradise to our advantage, and to our neighbor’s disadvantage. When we imagine ourselves in heaven, we each have somebody who is not in that dream. All too easily, we can imagine paradise without somebody.

What a horrible thing to say, right? That we could imagine paradise without a person?! And yet we do so constantly.  Sure, we don’t set out to think these evil thoughts. We set out to help people. We know that God forgives sinners, and that God loves everybody, so we just want people to change, to repent. To be saved.

Because we know that all people will be judged by God. And as students of the word, and students of the law, we know the law by which we are judged. We have heard the commandments — all of God’s “do’s and don’ts.” From Moses and the Prophets and Jesus and Paul. We know that we cannot relax them. Today’s text tells us this. So we have to make people understand — we have to help people, get them to somehow hear the same law we’re hearing. And oh, do we know how to manipulate people with this idea of sin.

Sexuality is one of those enduring examples of church authority. Our way of “helping the lost sheep.” Whether its preference or promiscuity, we comment on the disparity between what we see in the world and what we read in the scriptures. Some of us preach. Some of us write. Some of us pastor, and some of us keep our mouths shut and do the judging in our hearts and in our minds. But every one of us has rendered a judgment against another human being.

Our Lord has come today to knock us off our little thrones of judgment, because we’ve got it all wrong. Christ cannot imagine paradise without us. He can’t imagine paradise without us, so he doesn’t want us imagining paradise without each other. Because we are not the judge.

Our Lord meets us today in the midst of our legal competition, in the midst of our wicked card game of rules and customs and rewards and punishments. Christ takes Moses’ seat on the mountain, takes his place as the law-giver — and he gathers us all around for another familiar game of cards. And this time he’s the dealer.

There is only one round of cards being dealt, and the stakes are very high.  Christ tells us all that “not one iota of the law will pass away” (Matt 5:18). We like to judge by the law, so the Author of the law can show us how it’s done.  Jesus offers a radically intense reading of the commandments. “You have heard in the law…dot dot dot… but I tell you even more” (Matt 5:21f, 27f, 33f).  He teaches us that hating our neighbor is the same as murder (vv 21–6). He tells us that looking lustfully at another person is the same as adultery (vv 27–32). The Law structures and governs and judges not only our actions, but also our emotions and our thoughts.

All of the chips are in now, and we’re starting to see that we have a lousy hand of cards for this final round. As Christ has now explained the law of Moses, it’s impossible to follow! Game over, the house wins. Every one of us — all human beings will fall short under this law. Woe to us, scribes and Pharisees. None of us will be blameless in a judgment. None of us will be righteous by following the letter of the law. In fact, he tells us “unless your righteousness exceeds that of the Pharisees, you will not get into the kingdom of heaven” (Matt 5:20).

But suddenly this isn’t the same sleazy backroom poker game we know and love. Something more is going on here. Christ unexpectedly unites himself with — well, with the losers.  He blesses those who can’t follow the laws, who struggle with rules, who aren’t the most competitive. The outcasts, the downtrodden, the hurtin’ people. Christ unites himself to these people, because they are his creation. They are his chosen people. Long ago he promised to remember them all, and today he honors this promise. Our Lord remembers those we would just as soon forget. And he blesses them (Matt 5:3–12). He can’t imagine paradise without them.

Blessed are the poor, blessed are the meek, blessed are those who are persecuted, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven. Christ cares about his children. He can’t imagine paradise without any of us.

And if the people that we would just as soon forget are an image of our Lord…well that’s bad news for our exclusive ideas of heaven. Now, if we imagine paradise without each other, we’re imagining paradise without Christ. And paradise without the messiah — well, there’s another name for that place.

But instead of beating us at our own game of judgment, our Lord does something completely unexpected. He lays down his hand of cards and walks away from the game table. He reveals the law in a new light. This new righteousness our Lord speaks of. He’s not saying try harder, be craftier, or hang in there. He’s telling us to stop playing this silly game.

Today Christ instructs us to love each other, because he loves us. This is the great law of the law-giver; the great lesson given by the teacher. He teaches us on the mountain, and he shows us on the cross. “I can’t imagine paradise without you.” And when we return on Easter Sunday to hear to hear Jesus’ second sermon on the mount — we witness the resurrection — the perfect display of Love. The Father’s love for his Son, and our Lord’s love for his creation.

Love is action and love is a gift freely given. Throughout his ministry, Christ shows us how to give this gift of love to each other. Every time he healed a person or cast out a demon, or fed a group of people, he brought them back into his community. He singlehandedly dissolved all of the exclusion we had mistakenly created. He tears down our walls, he breaks our defenses. He takes our rules and our laws and our customs that divide us, that make us unique, and he unites us once again as his creation.

Christ waits for all of us in paradise — in the resurrection. And as we journey through life in hope of the resurrection, we help each other along the way. And we help each other through God’s blessings.

Because God’s blessings are gifts, not rewards. And we are stewards of these gifts, not recipients. As stewards, we share our blessings with others — with the least of the brethren (cf. Matt 25:31–46). Those hurting people that our Lord has recently blessed, the ones who have nobody else to look after them.

And what better place to start caring for each other, to start helping each other, to start loving each other than through basic needs. One of the great fathers of the church said, “to a hungry person, God is a loaf of bread.” As we give of our possessions, our time and our talents to those who need them, we offer hope. We offer hope in God’s promise. Hope in paradise. Hope in the Resurrection. Hope in our Lord. Every time one of us gives a coat and a cup of soup to a homeless person, both people suddenly understand Christ’s love. The scales fall out of our eyes, and we realize something. We realize that we can no longer imagine paradise without this other person. These loving interactions with each other are glimpses into the kingdom. The fiery red sky before the brilliant sunrise.

Fr. Sergius Halvorsen, Assistant Professor of Homiletics at St. Vladimir's, served as Jason's mentor.

Our Lord’s great lesson is that we love each other. We give to those in need. We offer our strengths and our blessings to those who need them. But the least of Christ’s brethren, the weaker brother or sister — they not only live somewhere else, in shelters or slums. In fact, they are not even outside of this room. There is no “they” but only “we.”

So as we pause for a moment from our busyness, from our anxiety, from our theology — as we stop playing poker with all our rules and customs and expectations, we encounter our Lord. We encounter our Lord as we pause to ask the person sitting beside us how they’re doing today. Or maybe even “what’s your name?” We encounter Christ the moment we honestly say to one another “I can’t imagine paradise without you.”

Christ gives us each other to prepare us for the kingdom of heaven, through our love for one another. As we care for each other, little by little, and day by day, we come to understand the depth of Christ’s love. Today he has opened his law to us once again. Today he has renewed the covenant, and today he has invited us to his heavenly kingdom. Today we rejoice, because Christ has said to us all “I can’t imagine paradise without you.” AMEN

Jason Ketz (SVOTS ’12) is a third year seminarian at St. Vladimir’s Orthodox Theological Seminary. You can read more about his experience at the 2012 Festival of Young Preachers here.

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[1] This message was inspired by the lives and counsels of Elder Joseph and his contemporaries, all of whom were ascetics in Greece in the 20^th century. See H. Middleton, Precious Vessels of the Holy Spirit: The Lives and Counsels of Contemporary Elders of Greece. (Thessalonica: Protecting Veil Press, 2003), p. 123 and throughout.

The Lord’s Epiphany in the Jordan

Theophany of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ, Russian, c. 1800. Photo credit: The Temple Gallery.

The word “epiphany” means “manifestation” or “appearance.” It is used for the event of Christ’s baptism because it was in the Jordan, being baptized by John the Forerunner, that Jesus appeared to the world and manifested Himself as the Messiah, the Son of God, one of the Holy Trinity.

The Lord’s first public appearance takes place at His baptism for very good reason. Baptism is the symbol of death and resurrection; Christ came to the earth in order to die and be raised. Baptism is a symbol of repentance of sin, and its forgiveness; Christ came as the Lamb of God who takes upon Himself the sin of the world in order to take it away. Baptism is a symbol of sanctification; Christ has come to sanctify the whole of creation. Baptism is a symbol, finally, of radical renewal. When one is baptized the old is over and the new has come. And Christ has appeared on earth to bring all things to an end, and to make all things new. The act of baptism, therefore, contains in symbol the entire mystery of Christ, the whole purpose of His coming…

Detail from Theophany Icon, Russian, 19th c. Photo credit: The Temple Gallery

The baptism of John was a “baptism of repentance for the forgiveness of sins.” The people came to John for baptism “confessing their sins” (Mk 1:4-5). The Lord Jesus had no need of repentance. As God’s Son in human flesh He committed no sin. His baptism, therefore, manifests His complete identification with His sinful creatures. He literally becomes one of us, not only in our humanity, but in our sinfulness; not only in our life on earth, but also in our death. For as the apostle Paul has written, ‘For our sake He [God the Father] made Him to be sin who knew no sin, so that in Him we might become the righteousness of God” (2 Cor 5:21).

In the Church’s celebration of the Lord’s Epiphany in the Jordan, the faithful are enabled to see Jesus made like them in every respect, entering the waters to identify with their fallen condition in order to bring it to an end and to create them anew for life in the kingdom of God. They become convinced through this liturgical experience that He is indeed the Christ, the Son of the Living God, who has come to save the world.

Excerpt from The Winter Pascha by Fr. Thomas Hopko (SVOTS ’63), St. Vladimir’s Seminary Press, 1984.

The “Our Father”

When Jesus’ taught His disciples how to pray, He gave them the “Our Father” (Matthew 6:9-13; Luke 11:1-4). They were not to mindlessly recite it, saying it with their lips only (Matthew 15:8; Mark 7:6) but rather that the words would be said with the heart and mind and become a vehicle for communion with the Father. This prayer to the Father becomes our own as the Holy Spirit bears witness in our hearts that we are God’s children, crying, “Abba” or “Daddy” (Galatians 4:6), a heartfelt expression of our love for God and devotion to Him. One of the most crucial ways of loving and obeying the Lord (Deuteronomy 6:1-5; Matthew 22:36-38; Mark 12:28-30; Luke 10:25-28) with all of our heart, mind and strength is to pray with attentiveness, i.e. to pray with all of our heart, soul, mind and strength. And there are no better words to use than those taught to us by the Son of God Himself.

The prayer begins with “Our Father Who is in Heaven,” telling us immediately whom we are addressing and who we are in relation to Him. Through faith in Christ and the receipt of the Holy Spirit in Baptism and Chrismation, we become, by grace (adoption), the children of God and co-heirs with Jesus Christ our Lord (Romans 8:17; Galatians 4:4-7). God has truly become our Father (John 1:12-13), our Abba. The One Who Is, and Who made all things has given us the right to call Him not only Father, but Daddy. And if God is our Father then we are all (as many of us who have been baptized into Christ) brothers and sisters. We are all part of God’s household and are all equally co-heirs with Christ.

We say, “hallowed be Your Name,” in other words, “Your Name is holy, may it be praised, and may it be kept as holy.” It is a reminder that God is holy and that we ought to give Him the praise that He is due. Throughout the Scriptures we see that the Name of God, the Presence of God and the Person of God are inseparable. To call on the Name is to invoke the presence of the person who is named. This is why taking the Lord’s Name in vain is a gravely serious sin that we need to repent of and confess.

We pray for the Kingdom (literally the reign or rule) of God to come fully on the earth so that God’s will will be done perfectly in our lives and in all the earth. The Kingdom of God was announced and inaugurated by Christ in His first coming, but we wait and pray for the fullness of that reign that will come only when Jesus returns. Next we pray for the “epiousion” (usually translated “daily”) bread or super substantial bread, or bread “of tomorrow.” In other words we pray for the sustenance needed for true life, the bread, which is the foretaste of the heavenly banquet, Holy Communion.

We pray that the Father will forgive us as we forgive others. Jesus tells us clearly that if we fail to forgive others that our sins will not be forgiven (Matthew 6:14; 7:1-2; 18:21-35). We pray not to be led into temptation but that we be delivered from the Evil One. In Mark 14:38 Jesus warns Peter to “watch and pray” so that he will not fall into temptation. Likewise we are to be diligent and to pray that we might not be tempted; and that we be rescued from the Evil One.

This is the prayer that the Lord Himself gave us. Let us pray it daily, several times a day. And whenever and wherever we pray it, let it be with attentiveness and understanding. In other words, let us pray it with all our heart, mind, soul and strength.

Originally from Trinidad and Tobago, Fr. Maximus Cabey (SVOTS ’11) was raised Roman Catholic. Always sensing a call to be a pastor and teacher, he has been involved in pastoral ministry in one form or another for the past 23 years. Fr. Maximus and his wife, Photini, live in Green Bay, Wisconsin, where Fr. Maximus serves as the priest at St. Matthew Orthodox Church.