'I am the door...'

 

Christ the Door - Uncut Mtn Supply

I AM THE DOOR

Coffee With Sister Vassa

“I am the door; if any one enters by me, he will be saved, and will go in and out and find pasture. The thief comes only to steal and kill and destroy; I came that they may have life, and have it abundantly. I am the good shepherd. The good shepherd lays down his life for the sheep. He who is a hireling and not a shepherd, whose own the sheep are not, sees the wolf coming and leaves the sheep and flees; and the wolf snatches them and scatters them. He flees because he is a hireling and cares nothing for the sheep. I am the good shepherd; I know my own and my own know me, as the Father knows me and I know the Father; and I lay down my life for the sheep. And I have other sheep, that are not of this fold; I must bring them also, and they will heed my voice. So there shall be one flock, one shepherd.” (Jn 10: 9-16)

We all need to “belong.” Why? Because we were made that way, to share in, and be part of, God’s Oneness and God’s “abundant” Life. It is both spiritually and psychologically tormenting for us, to feel shut out from Life, like puzzle-pieces that don’t fit anywhere. Many people go through life feeling that way, or have felt that way, at some time or another. It is part of our human “fallenness” or brokenness, which cannot be put together again by merely-human means.

Christ, the Incarnate Son of God, is the “door” through Whom we, who were once outsiders and misfits, “enter” true Life, and truly become a part of God’s world. We are thus "saved," meaning, returned home, or made whole. Other, merely-human community-builders might offer us some sense of belonging, but none of these “hirelings” can “save” us, that is to say, make us “whole” within ourselves and with God’s world. Outside communion with Christ and His unifying and humbling Spirit, we will always find ourselves “scattered” and searching for a certain someone or something that we never seem to find.

Today I let myself be “found” or saved by Christ, the Good Shepherd, and take His door, of humility, patience, and self-offering love. Thank You, Lord, for laying Your life down for us, and claiming us as Your own, and nobody else’s. Today I hear Your voice, and let myself be led by Your purpose for me, rather than wander about alone, where I never really belong.

Happy Fourth of July!

A Feast of Theology

 

From Legacy Icons

 

Dear Parish Faithful,

 

Come, O people,

let us worship the Godhead in three Persons:

the Son in the Father, with the Holy Spirit.

For the Father timelessly begot the Son, co-eternal and co-enthroned with Him;

and the Holy Spirit was in the Father and is glorified with the Son.

We worship one Power, one Essence, one Godhead,

and we say: “Holy God,

Who hast created all things through Thy Son

with the cooperation of the Holy Spirit;

Holy Mighty,

through Whom we know the Father;

and through Whom the Holy Spirit came to dwell in the world;

Holy Immortal,

Comforting Spirit, 

Who proceedest from the Father and restest in the Son.//

O Holy Trinity, glory to Thee!”

[Apostikha, Vespers of Pentecost]

____

In that vast, seemingly limitless body of Orthodox hymnography accumulated over the centuries, I cannot bring to mind a hymn that is as rich as this one is, theologically. 

 The task of the theologian - and a hymnographer is a theologian - is the search for words "adequate to God." And here is a hymn that actually approximates that lofty goal of expressing in words "adequate to God" a vision of the trinitarian splendor of the living God. And it is precisely in the form of a hymn that is sung or chanted that we are able to hear of that "strange doctrine" (an expression from a different hymn) of the Holy Trinity. "Strange" because the limits of logic are transcended in the revelation of God's trinitarian nature. It was St. Dionysius the Areopagite - author of The Mystical Theology - who claimed that true theology in actually to celebrate (literally, hymnein) God. Therefore, we are simultaneously praising and worshiping God as we sing or chant a hymn of a theological nature.

This means that true theology, as practiced at its best in the Church - as in the hymn above - is meant for everyone, not just "learned experts." As such it is not dry, boring or academic; but rather lively, joyful and even exciting. It stimulates the heart as well as the mind. Now, it was at the end of a long morning yesterday that we heard this hymn being sung. Following the Liturgy, we immediately served a shortened version of the Vespers of Pentecost with kneeling prayers. As our endurance was possibly being tested, the choir sang this marvelous hymn. If our capacity to concentrate was diminished at that point, here is an opportunity to absorb this hymn by carefully studying its marvelous insights into the three Persons of the Trinity and their inner-trinitarian relationships. 

Enjoy this "feast of theology!"

Pentecostal Renewal or the Summertime Blues?

 

 

Icon of All Saints

Dear Parish Faithful & Friends in Christ,

This last Sunday was the First Sunday After Pentecost. All of the subsequent Sundays of the liturgical year until the pre-lenten Sunday of the Publican and the Pharisee sometime next year will be so numbered. We have thus completed the long and integrated cycle of the pre-lenten Sundays, Great Lent, Pascha and Pentecost for this year. This was a full nineteen weeks during which the Church drew on both The Triodion and The Pentecostarion. This coming Sunday will be the Second Sunday After Pentecost. This is not intended to help us count better. 

The purpose is to keep before our spiritual sight the overwhelming significance of Pentecost in the divine economy. 

The New Testament era of the Church began its existence on the Day of Pentecost with the Spirit’s descent as a mighty rushing wind that took on the form of fiery tongues alighting upon the heads of the future apostles (ACTS 2:1-13). The Church has always existed, but the Church as a remnant of Israel that would flourish and grow with the addition of the Gentiles began its final phase of existence with the Death, Resurrection and Ascension of God’s Messiah, Jesus Christ, Who, seated at the right hand of the Father, would send the Holy Spirit into the world and upon “all flesh” on the Day of Pentecost. As St. Epiphanius of Cyprus wrote in the fourth century: 

“The Catholic Church, which exists from the ages, is revealed most clearly in the incarnate advent of Christ.”

 

The simple calendar rubric of numbering the Sundays after Pentecost is one way of reminding us of this essential truth of the Christian Faith. The Church is the Temple of the Holy Spirit, and in and through the sacramental life of the Church we experience something like a permanent pentecostal outpouring of the Holy Spirit. It is this outpouring of the Spirit "on all flesh" that offers the possibility and the promise of human holiness. The fact that so many men, women and children throughout the centuries of the Church's existence received this gift with joy and gladness is revealed to us in the lives of the saints. It is these "holy persons" that we commemorated this last Sunday on the Sunday of All Saints.

However, as we embark upon the Sundays of Pentecost we immediately encounter a prevailing tension between the "rhythm" of the Church and the "rhythm" of our personal lives. We begin these Pentecostal Sundays just when summer is also beginning - and our summer schedules often minimize our participation in the Church. 

So, as we receive the Spirit of renewal and re-commitment to the Church as the source of authentic life; as we pray to the Heavenly King and Spirit of Truth to "come and abide in us;" we more-or-less settle into our church summer schedules that have something of a lazy-hazy approach to the Church. There seems to exist an Orthodox version of "the summertime blues!" 

This can especially afflict Orthodox parents who equate "summer vacation" from school and summer vacation from church school. The notion of "we're off until the Fall!" can translate into sporadic attendance at the Lord's Day Liturgy, let alone any other services or events in the church. Fortunately for us, God's providential care for us is not seasonal.

Thus, the tension between Pentecostal renewal and the beginning of summer. If anyone gets the urge to just stay home on Sunday for leisure purposes or for no particular reason at all, my pastoral response is: that is a temptation that must be resisted. It was recorded that St. Seraphim of Sarov (+1833) once said that if were too ill or infirm to walk to the Liturgy, then he would crawl there on his hands and knees!

Be present in the church as often as possible: "The Church is the presence of the Most Trinity in the midst of us and in us. It is the action of the Life-giving Trinity in his creatures." (Metropolitan Anthony of Sourozh).

The Lord's Day cycle for the Second Sunday of Pentecost - when we commemorate the Saints of North America - begins with Great Vespers on Saturday at 6:00 p.m. and culminates with the Hours and Liturgy on Sunday morning at 9:10 and 9:30 a.m. respectively. 

Pentecostal renewal or the summertime blues?