Does the Lord continue to sleep?

Dear Parish Faithful,

Remember, O Lord, those who are absent for honorable reasons. Have mercy on them and on us according to the multitude of Thy mercies.

~ Liturgy of St. Basil the Great

Today is the Fourth Sunday of Great Lent and we commemorate the great ascetic and spiritual teacher, St. John Klimakos (of the Ladder). However, every Sunday is first and foremost the Lord's Day, or the Day of Resurrection, for the Lord Jesus Christ was raised from the dead "on the first day of the week." In the Kontakion appointed for Tone 8, which we just chanted in the Service of The Typika this morning, this truth reverberates loud and clear:

By rising from the tomb, Thou didst raise

the dead and resurrect Adam. Eve exults

in Thy Resurrection, and the world

celebrates Thy Rising from the dead, O

greatly Merciful One!

This is the Christian hope that is the ultimate basis of our Faith: that the "sting of death" has been removed by the Death and Resurrection of Christ. However, the path to the Resurrection must go through the Cross. There is no other way. In order to rise from the dead, Jesus had to willingly and obediently ascend the Cross "in the flesh." That was the "cup" from which he had to drink, as this was the fulfillment of the divine economy, known to God from all eternity. 

Therefore, as we pass through these Sundays of Great Lent, and as we get closer to Holy Week, the appointed Gospel readings from St. Mark (8:34-9:1; 9:17-31; 10:32-45) for the final three Sundays of Great Lent focus on the three passion prophecies of the Lord. Jesus was not taken unawares of His impending passion.  (However, we must never lose sight of the fact that each of these passion prophecies culminates with an equal prophecy of the Lord's rising after three days). As Jesus set His face boldly toward Jerusalem and His appointed destiny with the Cross as the Suffering Servant of the Lord, He prepared His disciples for what was preordained to happen in the Holy City (Mk. 10:32).

"O faithless generation . . ."

This morning, we heard the second of those passion prophecies, following  the  dramatic  healing of the boy tormented by a "mute spirit" that often drove him toward self-destructive behavior: "The Son of man will be delivered into the hands of men, and they will kill him; and when he is killed, after three days he will rise." Again, Jesus is in control as He knows the will of His heavenly Father. But what is the response of His disciples to this prophecy: "But they did not understand the saying and they were afraid to ask him." 

In the dramatic episode of the healing of that young boy, Jesus was forced to rebuke His disciples by saying: "O faithless generation, how long am I to be with you? How long am I to bear with you?" It is my humble opinion that these words apply to each and every generation of Christ's disciples down through the centuries. And that probably includes all of us. It is a real struggle to be faithful, or so it seems to the vast majority of us.

"The Lord continues to sleep . . ."

As St. Gregory the Theologian said in the fourth century, when a famine was raging in his native land: "the Lord apparently continues to sleep" (see Mk. 4:38). And now, with a raging coronavirus threatening one and all; and as we await and brace ourselves for it to strike our tristate area with its peak wave, it is a challenge to remain faithful as our fears and anxieties are perhaps intensified; and as we may join St. Gregory in thinking that the Lord continues to sleep. But as the Lord then "awoke" and stilled the storm, so we believe that that will occur yet again as "peace" and a "great calm" will again be enjoyed by us all (Mk. 4:39). But for the moment, the storm continues to threaten us.

The days ahead promise no immediate relief, but only further dangers. We need to be cautious and careful. Yet, from our Orthodox Christian perspective, we emphatically believe that "God is with us;" and that God is not "angry" with us if our faith was ever to waver, but rather that God "is compassionate and merciful, long-suffering and of great goodness." The God who raised Jesus from the dead, is the God whose love is without limit.

This is an unprecedented event for the entire world. We trust that our scientists, specialists, and health care personal are doing their utmost to limit the extent of the coronavirus pandemic. We continue to pray for them and to cooperate with their guidance as they attempt to lead us through this crisis with their expertise. We also continue to pray for and support each other. And, as Christians, we continue to place our faith in the God who redeemed and saved the whole world - for the "life of the world"- in Christ Jesus our Lord.