Following the 'Mystic Torrent' of Holy Week

 

Holy Week at a glance

Dear Parish Faithful,

We have reached the saving passion of Christ our God.
Let us, the faithful, glorify His ineffable forbearance,
that in His compassion He may raise us up who were dead in sin,
for He is good and loves mankind.  

(Matins of Holy Monday)

As Orthodox, we "live" for Holy Week and realize that it is the key week of our liturgical year, as it will culminate in the Lord's Death and Resurrection - the great paschal mystery. As Fr. Sergius Bulgakov once wrote:

"Holy Week sweeps the Orthodox believer along as if on a mystic torrent." 

Our problem may just be observing Holy Week with focused attention and prayerful participation, as other demands of life impinge upon us in a never-ending flow of responsibilities - and distractions.

Therefore, I would simply like to provide a few pastoral suggestions that everyone can think about and perhaps incorporate into your daily lives as Holy Week unfolds:

• One must first make a commitment to Holy Week and make it the priority for your respective households, regardless of how often you actually make it to the services. This is a week of strict fasting, and no other activities should impinge upon that. Your commitment to making Holy Week the center of your lives is synonymous with your commitment to Christ.

• Try and arrange your schedules so that you are able to attend the services as well as possible. However, if you are not able to attend the services, it must not be because of something of "entertainment value;" or some other distraction that can wait for a more appropriate time. Be especially aware of Great and Holy Friday and Saturday. These are the days of the Lord's Death and Sabbath rest in the tomb. These are days of fasting, silence and sobriety. Respect that fact that you are participating in a great mystery - the mystery of redemption and salvation.

• Parents, you may think of taking your children out of school on Holy Friday and attending the Vespers service in the afternoon. Other children have their "holy days" on which they may miss school; and we, as Orthodox Christians, have our own.

• Reduce or eliminate TV and other viewings for the week. Keep off the internet except for essential matters. Struggle against smart phone distraction/app obsessions.

• Be regular in your prayers.

• Try not to gossip or speak poorly of other persons.

• Choose at least one of the Passion Narratives from the four Gospels - MK. 14-15; MATT. 26-27; LK. 22-23; JN. 18-19 - and read it carefully through the week. There is also other good literature about Holy Week and Pascha that could be read. Actually, this is an incredibly rich resource page from our own parish website that offers extensive and intensive insights into the meaning of Holy Week.

• If you have access to any of the Holy Week service booklets, read and study the services carefully before coming to church. This will deepen your understanding of that particular service's emphasis as Holy Week unfolds.

• If you come to the midnight Paschal Liturgy, do your best to stay for the entire service, prepared to receive the Eucharist. It does not make a great deal of sense to leave the Liturgy before Holy Communion. 

Our goal, I believe, is to make of Holy Week and Pascha something a great deal more than a colorful/cultural event that is fleeting in nature and quickly forgotten. To encounter this "more" requires our own human effort working together with the grace of God so that the heart is enlarged with the presence of the crucified and risen Christ.

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At the last of our Presanctified Liturgies for this year, we heard the following hymn:

I am rich in passions, I am wrapped in the false robe of hypocrisy. Lacking self-restraint I delight in self-indulgence. I show a boundless lack of love. I see my mind cast down before the gates of repentance, starved of true goodness and sick with inattention. But make me like Lazarus, who was poor in sin, lest I receive no answer when I pray, no finger dipped in water to relieve my burning tongue; and make me dwell in Abraham's bosom in Your love for mankind.

Does this possibly sound familiar to anyone? Do you know of anyone that this hymn may be describing? Is this person well-known to you? 

But our primary aim is to focus on the beauty and depth of Holy Week; a beauty and depth that flows naturally from Jesus Christ our Savior.

Up to Jerusalem: Resurrection–Death–Resurrection

 

Up to Jerusalem:

Resurrection–Death–Resurrection

Authored By Orthodox Christian Mission Center

On this Thursday before Holy Week, Jesus’s friend Lazarus, the brother of Martha and Mary, has died and already been in the tomb for two days in the village of Bethany, about two miles outside of Jerusalem. Two days later, on Saturday, Jesus travels to Bethany and proclaims to Martha: “I am the resurrection and the life; he who believes in me, though he die, yet shall he live, and whoever lives and believes in me shall never die” (John 11:25-26). He then proceeds to raise Lazarus from the dead. It is significant to note that the passion of Holy Week the betrayal, suffering, and crucifixion, is bookended by resurrection. The Good News that OCMC proclaims is the certainty of Resurrection!

His Beatitude Archbishop Anastasios of Albania often tells a story of his time as a missionary in Africa and the importance of proclaiming the message of resurrection:

We were in a remote region in the highlands of western Kenya. It was night, and we arrived at a house that was in mourning. A little girl, stricken mortally by malaria, lay on a large bed, as if sleeping peacefully…We read a short funeral prayer, and I said a few words of consolation.

That night, as the rain fell on the banana leaves and tin roof of the schoolhouse where we stayed, I reflected on the events of the day. Away in the darkness, I heard a drum beating and knew it came from the house of mourning. In my weariness, I wondered, “Why am I here?” Various thoughts about missions came into my mind—preaching, education, civilization, development, peace, love. 

Suddenly, a light flashed across my exhausted mind and revealed to me the essence of the matter. “You bring the good news—the hope of resurrection! Every human being has a unique worth, and each will rise again. Herein lies human dignity, value, and hope. Christ is risen! You teach them to celebrate the resurrection in the mystery of the Church. You offer a foretaste of it.”

As we complete the Lenten fast tomorrow, let us embrace the resurrection of Lazarus and cry out “Hosanna!” to our King on Palm Sunday. And as we enter Holy Week on Monday with our Lord, as the Apostle Thomas proclaims, “Let us also go, that we may die with him” (John 11:15). It is only when we allow ourselves to be crucified with Christ that we can fully share in His resurrection. May we all live the mystery of death and resurrection in these coming days.

____

This was written on Thursday, but the raising of Lazarus is central to this short meditation, so it is a good one to read on Lazarus Saturday. OCMC has been proclaiming the Gospel of Death and Resurrection for many years now on a global scale.

LENTEN MEDITATION - Day XL — 'Glory to Thee, O God, Glory to Thee'

 

 

Dear Parish Faithful,

'Glory to Thee, O God, Glory to Thee' (3x)

When the soul enters into the trial of spiritual aridity, or dryness, for the first time, it becomes extremely dismayed. This is especially true if there was a disciplined devotion to worship in sincerity of heart. One begins to be troubled and to wonder why this has happened and to look for the faults that may be the cause.

But spiritual aridity is not a sign of any kind of failure in a healthy relationship with God. It is only an important phase that the soul has to undergo, which may be regarded as a kind of pruning to prepare the soul for a more advanced spiritual life, not contingent upon psychological incentives or subjective pleasures....

It is therefore wrong to be upset during the phase of aridity. It is also wrong to stop praying on the pretext of finding no pleasure in prayer, for aridity is a living part of the very nature of prayer. It is able, if we accept it with contentment and understanding, to raise us to the higher stage of pure prayer, which is not contingent on emotions, sentiments, or incentives of any kind.

Thus, whenever you feel that grace seems to have abandoned you, be content with its hidden action. Rely instead on the strength of the impetus previously gained from your life with God....

The best thing to do is to accept aridity as it is and persist in spiritual activity with calm and awareness. Allow yourself to exert every effort to keep on progressing at the speed of one who travels across the desert and is never deterred by the pleasures of the city he has left behind from striding across the arid wilderness until he reaches his destination....

Spiritual trials in general are not undergone for the sake of attaining perfection, for this implies a sense of self-deification. Rather, we should submit to the sovereign purposes of God so that we may fulfill his will, for our obedience to God is the foundation of our life with him, and it is only this that leads us to perfection.

—Matthew the Poor,  Orthodox Prayer Life: The Interior Way

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If I am not mistaken, Matthew the Poor, a very well-known and respected Coptic monk/elder, is referring by "aridity" what the spiritual tradition terms akedia. This is translated as "spiritual torpor," "listlessness," "apathy," etc. It literally means "not caring." It is a widespread spiritual condition, and not too many people - including desert-dwelling monks! - can escape its clutches. So encouraging, then, to hear how a spiritual master examines this condition and finds the providential dimension inherent in it.

A short personal note: When I was quite young, and well before I moved toward seminary and the priesthood, I encountered a small article about Matthew the Poor in Time magazine. This 20th c. desert-dwelling recluse (Egypt) really grabbed my attention at the time!

 

*** In yesterday's meditation on Phono sapiens, I failed to credit the author of the first paragraph, and hence that now rather unforgettable term. It was Matthew Gasda.

LENTEN MEDITATION - Day XXXIX — 'Phono Sapiens'

 

Dear Parish Faithful,

People who grew up with phones—and even many older people who didn’t—can’t read a novel anymore, sit through a film without looking at their phones, sit through a TV show without pausing it to check their emails, finish an article online—in short, can’t really do anything without multitasking. There’s no moment of rapture in reading the first page of a book because the mind no longer expects to reach the end. The old tools of storytelling are obsolete; distraction supersedes even entertainment, let alone art. And because we can’t narrate our lives, “we can’t construct narratives connected to our own inner truth.” Truth simply falls out of the human vocabulary, replaced by big data: charts, memes, viral clips. Phono sapiens is “lost” in a “forest of information,” without passion or purpose.

—Matthew Gasda

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Not exactly the usual "lenten" fare that I have been sending out this Great Lent. But no less challenging than what we have read thus far from a Church Father, or our more contemporary voices: Metropolitan Anthony Bloom, Frs. Alexander Schmemann, Thomas Hopko, and Lev Gillet, to mention a few. My contribution is not to add what you just read above, but to admit - confess! - that I, too, have found myself doing the same mindless and meaningless "stuff" with my phone. I am glad to be a member of homo sapiens, but distressed to even think that unless I am vigilant, I may be degraded to the ranks of Phono sapiens! In fact to curtail some of the above in my own life has been one of my focused "lenten projects" this year. Yet, I do continue to read long novels (and watch films) with great joy and attention, I am glad to further share. A suggestion: Choose a good, long novel for the summer and commit to reading it from start to finish.

 

LENTEN MEDITATION - Day XXXVIII — 'A Vocation of Loss'

 

Dear Parish Faithful,

[Sunday’s] gospel (Mark 10.32–45) describes Jesus’ ascent to Jerusalem before his Passion. Jesus takes the twelve apostles aside and starts to tell them that he will be betrayed, condemned, and put to death, and that he will rise again from the dead. At the threshold of Holy Week could we be “taken aside” by the Savior for a talk in which he explains to us, personally, the mystery of Redemption? Do we ask the Master to help us understand at greater depth what is taking place for our sakes on Golgotha? Do we make it possible for Jesus to meet us in secret? Do we seize opportunities to be alone and quiet with the Lord? Then the sons of Zebedee come to Jesus and ask him to let them sit with him in his glory, one on his right and the other on his left. Jesus asks them—and puts the same questions to us: “Can ye drink of the cup that I drink of?” The Master then explains to the disciples that true glory lies in serving others. For “the Son of man came not to be ministered unto but to minister, and to give his life a ransom for many.”

—A Monk of the Eastern Church, The Year of Grace of the Lord

_____

This is actually Fr. Lev Gillet (+1980). He once wrote: "What attracts me is a vocation of loss - a life which gives itself freely without any apparent positive result, for the results would be known to God alone; in brief, to lose oneself in order to find oneself." With an all-encompassing simplicity, he once wrote: "The Gospel is all that matters." Perhaps we can sense the truth behind those words most fully in the upcoming Holy Week.

 

LENTEN MEDITATION - Day XXXVII — 'The Lord leads the humble...'

 

 

Dear Parish Faithful, Humility, in the Christian tradition, is called the mother of all virtues. It is the soil out of which grow faith, hope, love and all positive qualities of the spirit. The psalms proclaim that the Lord leads the humble in what is right and teaches the humble his way. They claim also, with proverbs and the prophets, that the Lord cares for the humble and gives them his grace. He listens to their prayers and vindicates them before their enemies. He crowns them with victory and clothes them with honor, giving them the whole earth as their inheritance in the upending kingdom which he establishes in the Messiah. —Protopresbyter Thomas Hopko, The Lenten Spring _____ Every virtue that we are exhorted to cultivate, is always preeminently revealed in Christ, the perfect and sinless Son of God become Son of Man. This is the universal teaching of the saints and any and all more recent theologians, as Fr. Thomas Hopko above. Bearing this in mind, we can then ask, who is more humble than:  "Christ Jesus, who, though he was in the form of God,  did not count equality with God a thing to be grasped,  but emptied himself, taking the form of a servant,  being born in the likeness of men. And being found in human form he humbled himself and became obedient unto death,  even death on a cross." (Phil. 2:5-8)

 

LENTEN MEDITATION - Day XXXVI — The Mystery of the Sacrifice of the Eucharist

 

 

Dear Parish Faithful,

If the priesthood established by the law has come to an end, and the priest who is “in the order of Melchizedek” has offered his sacrifice, and has made all other sacrifices unnecessary, why do the priests of the new covenant perform the mystical liturgy? How it is clear to those instructed in divinity that we do not offer another sacrifice, but perform a memorial of that unique and saving offering. For this was the Lord’s own command: “Do this in remembrance of me” (1 Cor 11.24). So that by contemplation we may recall what is symbolized, the sufferings endured on our behalf, and may kindle our love towards our benefactor, and look forward to the enjoyment of the blessings to come.

—Theodoret of Cyrus: The Eucharist

_____

An important perspective to maintain about the meaning of the "sacrifice" that we offer in the Liturgy. Especially after just hearing the powerful passage from The Epistle to the Hebrews, that "Christ ... entered once for all into the Holy Place, taking not the blood of goats and calves but his own blood, thus securing an eternal redemption" (9:11-12). 

The one sacrifice of the Great high priest, Jesus Christ, is not endlessly repeated, but rather actualized (re-presented) in every celebration of the Eucharist. That is why the ordained celebrant - bishop or priest - is considered to be the sacramental image of Christ, who "offers and who is offered" and who distributes Communion to the faithful. That is the mystery that we enter into at every Liturgy. 

LENTEN MEDITATION - Day XXXIV — Dangerous Prayer

 

 

Dear Parish Faithful,

If the Lord comes to us, we should receive him with great joy and humility. But let us be careful not to seek mystical experience when we should be seeking repentance and conversion. That is the beginning of our cry to God. “Lord, make me what I should be, change me whatever the cost.” And when we have said these dangerous words, we should be prepared for God to hear them. And these words of God are dangerous because God’s love is remorseless. God wants our salvation with the determination due its importance. And God, as the Shepherd of Hermas says, “does not leave us till he has broken our heart and bones.”

—Metropolitan Anthony Bloom & George LeFebvre, Courage to Pray

 

LENTEN MEDITATION - Day XXXIII — 'When you give alms...'

 

 

Dear Parish Faithful,

In his sermon on the mount Jesus not only gives instructions about prayer and fasting, he gives commandments about almsgiving as well. Indeed, in the sermon, this part comes first.... Jesus, once again, did not say if you give alms. He said, when you give alms....

The apostles of Christ magnified the Master’s teaching about the need to help the needy. They insisted that human perfection consists in giving to the poor and following Christ. They taught, with Jesus, that the measure one gives is the measure one gets. They were convinced that the greatest imitation of God is to give everything without asking anything in return. And when such perfection could not be literally accomplished, the commandment to share one’s possessions, not from one’s abundance but out of one’s needs, was considered binding on all [Acts 4.32–35]....

A person who claims to believe in God but does not help the needy has no living faith.

—Protopresbyter Thomas Hopko, The Lenten Spring

_____

We often link together "prayer and fasting," as in last Sunday's Gospel reading from St. Mark, when Jesus taught his bewildered disciples that a certain type of "demon" can only be expelled through "prayer and fasting." (Mk. 9:29). But, we also know that in the Sermon on the Mount it is "prayer, almsgiving and fasting" that are grouped together as the three essential practices of an integrated whole in the "spiritual life."

LENTEN MEDITATION - Day XXXII — The Mercy of God

 

 

Dear Parish Faithful,

Having mercy is God’s most distinguishing characteristic. Pouring out his mercy, his steadfast love, upon his covenanted people is his main occupation. Mercy is at the heart of everything that God is and does and gives to his people. It is the people’s most treasured possession. The psalms, for example, describe the steadfast love of the Lord, which is the mercy of our prayer, in numberless ways. The steadfast love of the Lord is from everlasting and endures forever. It is higher and greater than the heavens, yet the earth is full of this steadfast love, and it extends to the heavens.

—Protopresbyter Thomas Hopko, The Lenten Spring

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In his inimitable style, Fr. Hopko is commenting on and expanding the meaning of the Hebrew word hesed. We certainly depend on it! And this is the background for our innumerable petitions: "Lord, have mercy!"

 

LENTEN MEDITATION - Day XXXI — 'Give rather the spirit of Humility to Thy servant'

 

 

Dear Parish Faithful,

There is a glory that comes from the Lord, for he says: Those who honor me, I will honor (1 Samuel 2.30). And there is a glory that follows us through diabolic intrigue, for it is said: Woe when all men shall speak well of you (Lk 6.26). You may be sure that it is the first kind of glory when you regard it as harmful and avoid it in every possible way, and hide your manner of life wherever you go. But the other you will know when you do something, however trifling, hoping that you will be observed by men.

—St John Climacus, Ladder of Divine Ascent, as found in The Bible and the Holy Fathers for Orthodox

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We commemorated St. John Climacus this past Sunday on the Fourth Sunday of Great Lent. That, in turn, brings to mind his great classic, The Ladder of Divine Ascent. Based on the Scriptures, St. John challenges not only conventional wisdom, but what may lie at the very core of our (fallen?) being: the need for praise, recognition, or the "glory that follows us through diabolic intrigue." That is why we pray for humility on a daily basis in Great Lent, through the Lenten Prayer of St. Ephraim the Syrian. What a hard gift to acquire!

 

LENTEN MEDITATION - Day XXX — C.S. Lewis: 'Our Desires are Too Weak'

 

Dear Parish Faithful,

"It would seem that Our Lord finds our desires not too strong, but too weak. We are half-hearted creatures, fooling about with drink and sex and ambition when infinite joy is offered to us, like an ignorant child who wants to go on making mud pies in a slum because he cannot imagine what is meant by the offer of a holiday at the sea. We are far too easily pleased."

—C.S. Lewis

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As is often the case, C.S. Lewis offers a fine twist to our usual perceptions.

 

LENTEN MEDITATION - Day XXIX — Desert Wisdom and Baptism

 

Dear Parish Faithful,

Abba Moses of Petra was terribly embattled by porneia. No longer strong enough to remain in his cell he went and reported to Abba Isidore. The elder begged him to return to his cell but he would not accept that, saying: “Abba, I haven’t the strength.” So he took him and brought him up onto the housetop with him and said to him: “Look to the west.” He looked up and saw an innumerable host of demons; they were milling around together and shouting, ready for battle. Then Abba Isidore also said to him: “Look to the east.” He looked and saw innumerable hosts of glorious holy angels. Then Abba Isidore also said: “Here, these are they who are sent by the Lord to help the holy ones; those who are in the west are they who are fighting against them. These who are on our side are more numerous.” When he had given thanks to God for this, Abba Moses took courage and returned to his own cell.

—From Give Me a Word: The Alphabetical Sayings of the Desert Fathers

______

I believe that Abba Isodore was assuring Abba Moses that essentially God is far stronger than the Evil One. No matter the temptation - in this case "porneia" means basically sexual lust - the Christian, armed with the sign of the Cross, which is the outward manifestation of faith in Christ, has the necessary weapons to engage in this  "spiritual warfare" and emerge victorious. 

 It is essential, however, that we do not fight  these battles depending upon our own strength and resources, but always humbly seek the Lord's grace and presence. The angels in the "east" are more numerous, then the fallen angels in the "west." That takes up back to our Baptism, when turned toward the west we (or our sponsor) renounced and even spit on Satan. We then turned back to the east and confessed our faith in the victorious Christ.

 

LENTEN MEDITATION - Day XXVI — 'Types of This Tree'

 

 

Dear Parish Faithful,

“Oh how did we not remember types of this tree! For of old they were shown forth in many and varied ways and saved the lost. By a tree, Noah was saved, but the whole world, unbelieving, was destroyed. Moses was glorified through one when he took a staff as a scepter, but Egypt, with the plagues that came from it, was drowned as though fallen into deep wells. What it has now done, the Cross showed forth of old in image. Why then are we weeping? For Adam is going again to paradise.”

—Dialogue between the devil and Hades on their fall by the Cross, in St Romanos the Melodist’s On the Victory of the Cross, a crucifixion kontakion for Wednesday of Mid-Lent, as found in Hymns of Repentance (Translated by Andrew Mellas)

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St. Romanos the Melodist (his icon is on one of our deacon's doors) was one of the great masters of a kind of poetic theology, on full display in his magnificent kontakia. His use of typological interpretations of the Old Testament, together with his arresting metaphors - and a certain "daring" speculation - as is this dialogue between the devil and hades, has created a series of wonderfully resonant images that the Church has embraced now for centuries.

 

LENTEN MEDITATION - Day XXV — 'Cross-bearers' or 'Cross-wearers'?

 

 

Dear Parish Faithful,

But in order to be Christian, to be able to pronounce the words of the Creed, to say the Lord’s Prayer, to participate in the Liturgy, we must at least determine—not only to have a velleity, but a determination firm and clear—to live the words that we pronounce, to live our whole life on Christ’s own terms. Otherwise we are only spectators of the life, of the crucifixion, of the death of Christ. We are onlookers, interested listeners who may well be moved by one thing or another, but like the barren earth or the roadside of the parable we may well receive the seed for a moment or not receive it at all—and then, however much we proclaim our faith as an objective, intellectual truth, it does not reach us.

And this is a very important thing for us to realize and to remember, because that is how we all live, more or less, except the saints...

—Metropolitan Anthony Bloom, Churchianity vs Christianity

____

"Cross-bearers"  or  "Cross-wearers?"

 

The Eclipse: A Poem and a Reflection

 

Solar Eclipse, 4/8/24 - St. Theodosius Orthodox Cathedral, Cleveland OH

 

Dear Parish Faithful,

More Response to the Solar Eclipse: Here is a fine poem written by our parishioner, Neal Tew, following Monday's total solar eclipse.

Wonder thunders mutely in the heavens.

The planetary gearing drops her veil.

High in the sky the sun, abiding, hides,

as clouds their evening hues adorn.

The work-a-day world clogs and stills,

birds hymn their pillows ready,

and crickets their evensong intone.

Man and beast assemble 

in synagogue of earth and sky:

original orbits restored.

Silent psalms of praise,

the glory of God revealing.

Planetary Sabbath.

Interstellar engineering. 

4.8.24. 3:08 pm

Lawrenceville, Indiana

Thoughts on beholding the sudden darkness, with my girls, on a Monday afternoon. 

_____

And the host of fine images from Jenny Harkins also in response to the recent solar eclipse:

When you wrote of the man who was weeping uncontrollably, it made sense- the image of God in us recognizes with fresh unfamiliarized eyes the same holy image in this magnificent beauty! Something like the shock of nostalgia, catching glimpse in that transcendent splendor of true Paradise; a call to our core, an aching pleasure.

Then like the close of an epic matinee, you blink disoriented back into the light of day; the dream that clutched your core melts immaterial and wafts away leaving the softest bruise of fingerprints; a signature of Love and future dejavu.

LENTEN MEDITATION - Day XXIV — On Obedience

 

Dear Parish Faithful, The greatest offering we can present to the Lord is our self. We cannot do this without giving up our own will. We learn to do this through obedience, and obedience we learn through practice.... Besides fasting we have other teachers to whom we can show obedience. They meet us at every step in our daily life, if we only recognize their voices. Your wife wants you to take your raincoat with you: do as she wishes, to practice obedience. Your fellow-worker asks you to walk with her a little way: go with her to practice obedience. Wordlessly the infant asks for care and companionship: do as it wishes as far as you can, and thus practice obedience. A novice in a cloister could not find more opportunity for obedience than you in your own home. And likewise at your job and in your dealings with your neighbor. —Tito Colliander, Way of the Ascetics _____ Obedience - what an incredibly unpopular word! But read the Gospels and focus on just how totally obedient Christ is to His heavenly Father.