ACTS OF THE APOSTLES 2:1-11
WHEN THE DAY of Pentecost had come, they were all together in one place. And suddenly a sound came from heaven like the rush of a mighty wind, and it filled all the house where they were sitting. And there appeared to them tongues as of fire, distributed and resting on each one of them. And they were all filled with the Holy Spirit and began to speak in other tongues, as the Spirit gave them utterance. Now there were dwelling in Jerusalem Jews, devout men from every nation under heaven. And at this sound the multitude came together, and they were bewildered, because each one heard them speaking in his own language. And they were amazed and wondered, saying, "Are not all these who are speaking Galileans? And how is it that we hear, each of us in his own native language? Parthians and Medes and Elamites and residents of Mesopotamia, Judea and Cappadocia, Pontos and Asia, Phrygia and Pamphylia, Egypt and the parts of Libya belonging to Cyrene, and visitors from Rome, both Jews and proselytes, Cretans and Arabians, we hear them telling in our own tongues the mighty works of God."

It feels like just a few years ago, but I think we’re heading on two decades. It just a couples years before Thomas came home. Beth and I spent a week touring Paris with Beth’s sister Becky. I have to say Paris was amazing and that I’d go back in a heartbeat, but one of the most interesting parts of our trip - something that was a bit unique - was the timing. You see, it was 2003 and we landed in Paris on the same day that President George W. Bush launched the US’s invasion of Iraq. It was the beginning of our nation’s military response to 9/11, which you could say finally ended just last year with our withdrawal from Afghanistan. The US launched that invasion with support from an international coalition that included the United Kingdom, Poland, and Australia, but we weren’t in England, Poland, or Australia. We were in France. And France had taken a stand against our invasion.

I remember seeing posters at bus stops with French headlines reading “Guerre Bush” or Bush’s War. I have photographs of the protestors outside the US Embassy and French police lining up in riot gear including bulletproof shields shields and batons, all standing at the ready, waiting to keep the peace by force if necessary. I don’t remember any personal trouble related to our presence as American tourists in Paris, but I do remember one time, as I was browsing a little gift shop, the owner of that shop had the radio playing.  It was a talk show, and I couldn’t understand a thing, of course, because the announcer and his guest were speaking French, but then in the middle of his monologue, I heard two English words and I had to laugh because I knew exactly what they were talking about. Those words were: “Freedom Fries.”

You see, in reaction to the French pushback to our invasion, some Americans had decided to shun anything French. And that included the most popular fast food side dish in America, French Fries. And so a small number of restaurants and the Congressional Cafeteria renamed French Fries as Freedom Fries. Forget the fact that French Fries were invented in America, that “French” in the name is a reference to a style of cutting, not the country. But who ever really started saying “Freedom Fries.” It was 100% a stunt. And a laughable one, at that.

But 2003 was notthe first time Americans had decided to change the names of their foods to reflect their negative feelings about other ethnicities. Have you ever heard of “Liberty Cabbage” or “Liberty Sandwiches?” Well, in 1918, as America fought Germany in World War I, anti-German sentiment here at home led to the renaming of sauerkraut as “Liberty Cabbage” and hamburgers as “Liberty Sandwiches.” Those names didn’t stick, either. But unfortunately, this anti-German sentiment during World War I went even deeper than it’s 2003 equivalent, leading to the banning of German classes in schools and the speaking of German in public. It even led to prohibiting German preaching in German-speaking churches.

Right here in Iowa, our Governor at the time, passed the “Babel Proclamation,” an executive order forbidding the use of any language other than English in public. This executive order, a gross and obvious infringement of the first amendment, was enforced by local municipalities who would fine violators. Fines were often in the $25 range, which would be the equivalent of about $450 today. Right here in Scott County four women were fined $225 (or $2,250 of today’s dollars) by the County Defense Council when they were heard speaking German to one another over their a party line. And if you’re too young to know what a party line is, when telephones were first invented they were shared by communities, not just households, and you could listen in on your neighbor. These women were fined for simply speaking to their friends and family in their native tongue.

This proclamation was made, accepted, and enforced because people were afraid. In spite of the fact that these very same German immigrants had fled to America in an attempt to escape the oppression of the government that the US now fought, Americans feared what they could not understand. Iowa’s Governor Harding argued that his proclamation would "save the lives of American boys overseas by curbing sedition at home." His rhetoric was backed by none other than President Theodore Roosevelt who said in reference to the proclamation in Iowa: “America is a nation—not a polyglot boarding house ... There can be but one loyalty—to the Stars and Stripes; one nationality—the American—and therefore only one language—the English language.”

I have to say I love the irony of the name of the “Babel Proclamation,” a reference to the biblical story of the Tower of Babel. Doubtless Governor Harding or his advisors chose this name to give the proclamation an air of Christian authority. But did Governor Harding or his advisors know that they were naming their proclamation after the bad guys in that story? That evil king Nimrod was able to gather all the people together in one place and attempt to build his sacrilegious tower specifically because all the peoples of Earth spoke one language. And did he stop to think that it was God who sent the various languages to make sure that humanity huddle together in this way again, but rather fulfill his commandment to be “fruitful, multiply, and fill the earth.” By insisting that all Americans speak only one language, Governor Harding and Teddy Roosevelt were standing on the side of King Nimrod and the Tower of Babel. And they were standing against the will of God.

I thought talking about separation caused by languages, fear of what we don’t understand, and the Tower of Babel would be a good place to start this morning, because many of our hymns see what happened at Pentecost as an answer to what happened at the Tower of Babel. For example, today’s Kontakion reads, “When the High One descended, confusing tongues, He divided the nations. And when He distributed the fiery tongues He called all to one unity.” I think it is important to remember that this miracle didn’t sudden make everyone understand Aramaic. It didn’t make everyone suddenly start speaking a single language like Hebrew or Latin. The very first miracle performed upon the descent of the Holy Spirit was to see the Church preaching and teaching in a variety of tongues.

The passage read from Acts today begins with the disciples—the very same disciples who had fallen asleep in the garden of Gethsemane, who had fled in the face of persecution, who had hidden themselves behind locked doors when their Lord was hung on a cross—all gathered together and praying. Our icons always very stylistically show the twelve disciples or the twelve disciples and Mary, which is kind of how I always pictured it, but John Chrysostum makes the point and I think he is right that we are supposed to understand from the text that this was the entire 120 mentioned a few sentences earlier. So this group included not just the 12, but also Mary the mother of Jesus, Jesus’ brothers, and about 100 other disciples, men and women gathered together in prayer. And then suddenly a wind roars through the room, and tongues of fire come to rest upon each of these 120 individuals. As the Holy Spirit rests upon all these men and women in that upper room, we are witnessing the birth of the Church. Ezekiel had described the Glory of the Lord leaving the Temple in Jerusalem, and notice here that the Holy Spirit did not simply move into some central Christian Church. Instead, just as St. Paul would later describe, every person had become the Temple of the Lord. And just as Jesus had promised the woman at the well, the time had come for every person to worship in Spirit and in truth.

After the apostles and disciples are filled with the Holy Spirit, only then are they moved to leave their silent prayer and begin proclaiming the good news of Jesus Christ. We are told that in the streets of Jerusalem that day were many devout people who had journeyed to Jerusalem from all over the world to celebrate Pentecost, the major Judean festival. The author of Acts goes out of his way to describe the very diverse audience: “Parthians and Medes and Elamites, those dwelling in Mesopotamia, Judea and Cappadocia, Pontus and Asia, Phrygia and Pamphylia, Egypt and the parts of Libya adjoining Cyrene, visitors from Rome, both Judeans and proselytes, Cretans and Arabs.” Europe, Asia, and Africa are all represented in this list of visitors. This is a mix of Judean travelers; those who are not Judean, but simply interested in the Judean religion; and those with no Judean ties at all.

And in a crowd like that, it would be most likely that all of these visitors would be trying to speak Greek, the most common language in the Greco-Roman world. And it would have probably been acceptable for the Aramaic speaking disciples to attempt to reach out to this crowd and do their best in Greek. But this was not enough for the birthday of the Church. Instead of insisting on Aramaic or Greek or Latin, the disciples miraculously begin to speak to each of these people in this crowd in their own native languages.

The first thing the Holy Spirit does on Pentecost is demonstrate the path forward for this new Christian religion destined to reach the ends of the earth, and it is not to enforce some single language like reborn King Nimrod. Instead, the Holy Spirit caused the apostles to speak the various languages of these foreigh visitors. God spoke to these men and women in their own tongues. And yes, in this story, the language is learned with miraculous speed. But when a missionary dedicates his or her life to learning the language of a people they hope to serve, it is no less the miraculous just because it takes longer. It is every bit the work of the Holy Spirit that drives this action. When Sts. Cyril and Methodius worked with the Slavs, or when St. Nicolai Kasatin evangelized the Japanese, or St. Herman ministered to the Aleuts, or St. Patrick to the Irish, or St. Olaf the Norwegians, or St. Sava the Serbs, or St Nina to the Georgians, it was no less the Holy Spirit that led them to learn, work, and write in the language of the people. It was love, patience, kindness, and faithfulness that allowed them to do their work. In fact, it is always a loving act to take the time and effort to understand the many different peoples who live around us. It is fear causes us to mistrust what we can’t understand. And perfect love drives out fear.

And “different languages” doesn’t always have to mean literal linguistics. We all know different generations can have a hard time understanding one another. Or different occupations, whether you are a teacher or a manager or a grandmother or a meteorologist or a nurse or a technician, we each speak different languages in our daily lives. But each of you were called to carry the Spirit of Christ to all of those you work with every day. We come here, like the disciples gathered in the upper room, to pray, to purify our hearts, to be filled with the Holy Spirit, so that we can carry that Spirit out into the world. Each of you was chosen specifically and on purpose to be the hands and feet and mouth of Christ, spreading his love into places that only you can reach with words that only you know.

As St. Paul wrote to the Corinthians, “To the Judeans I became as a Judean, that I might win Judeans; to those who are under the law, as under the law, that I might win those who are under the law; to those who are without law, as without law, that I might win those who are without law; to the weak I became as weak, that I might win the weak. I have become all things to all people that I might by all means save some.” We must learn to speak the languages – both literal and figurative - of all those around us.

The story of Pentecost concludes with Peter, the same Peter who had sunk in the waves when he tried to walk on the water, who had fallen on his face in fear at the Transfiguration, who had denied Jesus three times on the night of His betrayal—preaching his first sermon, witnessing to Jesus Christ’s lordship without fear—in the streets of the very same city who had so recently – only 50 days earlier - crucified his Lord. Thousands are converted by his words and a community founded in love grows up in Jerusalem. Acts tells us that this community “continued steadfastly in the apostles’ doctrine and fellowship, in the breaking of bread, and in prayers. Then awe came upon every soul, and many wonders and signs were done through the apostles. Now all who believed were together, and had all things in common, and sold their possessions and goods, and divided them among all, as anyone had need. So continuing daily with one accord in the temple, and breaking bread from house to house, they ate their food with gladness and simplicity of heart, praising God and having favor with all the people. And the Lord added to the church daily those who were being saved.”

We often come to this passage to explore the beginnings of the Eucharist, the meal that we are here today to participate in today. Or we like to emphasize the notion communal living. It is easy to admire this lifestyle, this sharing of everything in common that still happens to this day in our monastic communities. But today, I’d really just like to emphasize the spirit of unity among these new Christians as they “continued daily with one accord” - with one accord. What a miraculous witness we would be to the world if we could do just this one simple thing. In an ever increasingly polarized society where so many are willing to post on Facebook about how others are “stupid” or “evil” and how “I know better than you,” what a glory it would be if there were just one community where love, patience, and humility were the rule. Where we listen to people who we disagree with. Where we show patience with people who make mistakes. And we are able to show humility, to demonstrate an understanding the limits of our own knowledge. Just like the apostles, I have little doubt that a place that that we would find “favor with all the people.”

Love is always the truest sign of the Church. This is why the Eucharist, a shared meal, lives at the heart of our faith. We prove, or at least try to prove, every week that we are one, that we are a family, that we are indeed the Church, by our willingness to come together to share a meal. To be the Church, we must do our best to remember that within the Church there is “neither Judean nor foreigner, slave nor free, male nor female.” Indeed, St. Maximus the Confessor takes this Pauline notion even further, saying: “Men, women, and children, profoundly divided as to race, nation, language, manner of life, work, knowledge, honor, fortune…the Church recreates all of them in the Spirit. To all equally she communicates a divine aspect. All receive from her a unique nature which cannot be broken asunder, a nature which no longer permits one henceforth to take into consideration the many and profound differences which are their lot. In that way all are raised up and united in a manner which is truly universal. In her none is in the least degree separated from the community, all are grounded, so to speak, in one another, by the simple and indivisible power of faith.” This is what the Church is. It is not a place to sing the prettiest songs or display the best icons - though those things certainly can happen here. It is where humanity is called together in order to practice and grow our love. Jesus taught this to his disciples as he washed their feet. He said: “By this all will know that you are My disciples, if you have love for one another.”

I hope this is why you are here today; to love and forgive one another; to live and pray in humility. If we had thousands here with us and we couldn’t love, we would be wasting our time. But I tell you that even when there are only a few of us are here, we have the potential to change the world. “Acquire the Spirit of Peace and a thousand souls around you will be saved,” St. Seraphim of Sarov famously taught. If you are able to find peace here and carry that peace out into the world, it will not go unnoticed. People are craving peace – especially right now - and they will seek you out and ask you where you found it. I promise you that.

May we be the kind of community where we love one another in spite of our differences, where we make sacrifices for one another in spite our own needs. May the fire of the Holy Spirit burn so brightly among us that it is unmistakable. May we be instantly recognizable to any who walk through our doors as the very icon of the Church founded over 2000 years ago when the Holy Spirit rested upon each of those one hundred and twenty disciples in that upper room.

ACTS OF THE APOSTLES 16:16-34
IN THOSE DAYS, as we apostles were going to the place of prayer, we were met by a slave girl who had a spirit of divination and brought her owners much gain by soothsaying. She followed Paul and us, crying, "These men are servants of the Most High God, who proclaim to you the way of salvation." And this she did for many days. But Paul was annoyed, and turned and said to the spirit, "I charge you in the name of Jesus Christ to come out of her." And it came out that very hour. But when her owners saw that their hope of gain was gone, they seized Paul and Silas and dragged them into the market place before the rulers; and when they had brought them to the magistrates they said, "These men are Jews and they are disturbing our city. They advocate customs which it is not lawful for us Romans to accept or practice." The crowd joined in attacking them; and the magistrates tore the garments off them and gave orders to beat them with rods. And when they had inflicted many blows upon them, they threw them into prison, charging the jailer to keep them safely. Having received this charge, he put them into the inner prison and fastened their feet in the stocks. But about midnight Paul and Silas were praying and singing hymns to God, and the prisoners were listening to them, and suddenly there was a great earthquake, so that the foundations of the prison were shaken; and immediately all the doors were opened and every one's fetters were unfastened. When the jailer woke and saw that the prison doors were open, he drew his sword and was about to kill himself, supposing that the prisoners had escaped. But Paul cried with a loud voice, "Do not harm yourself, for we are all here." And he called for lights and rushed in, and trembling with fear he fell down before Paul and Silas, and brought them out and said, "Men, what must I do to be saved?" And they said, "Believe in the Lord Jesus, and you will be saved, you and your household." And they spoke the word of the Lord to him and to all that were in his house. And he took them the same hour of the night, and washed their wounds, and he was baptized at once, with all his family. Then he brought them up into his house, and set food before them; and he rejoiced with all his household that he had believed in God.

JOHN 9:1-38
At that time, as Jesus passed by, he saw a man blind from his birth. And his disciples asked him, "Rabbi, who sinned, this man or his parents, that he was born blind?" Jesus answered, "It was not that this man sinned, or his parents, but that the works of God might be made manifest in him. We must work the works of him who sent me, while it is day; night comes, when no one can work. As long as I am in the world, I am the light of the world." As he said this, he spat on the ground and made clay of the spittle and anointed the man's eyes with the clay, saying to him, "Go, wash in the pool of Siloam" (which means Sent). So he went and washed and came back seeing. The neighbors and those who had seen him before as a beggar, said, "Is not this the man who used to sit and beg?" Some said, "It is he"; others said, "No, but he is like him." He said, "I am the man." They said to him, "Then how were your eyes opened?" He answered, "The man called Jesus made clay and anointed my eyes and said to me, 'Go to Siloam and wash'; so I went and washed and received my sight." They said to him, "Where is he?" He said, "I do not know. They brought to the Pharisees the man who had formerly been blind. Now it was a sabbath day when Jesus made the clay and opened his eyes. The Pharisees again asked him how he had received his sight. And he said to them, "He put clay on my eyes and I washed, and I see." Some of the Pharisees said, "This man is not from God, for he does not keep the sabbath." But others said, "How can a man who is a sinner do such signs?" There was a division among them. So they again said to the blind man, "What do you say about him, since he has opened your eyes?" He said, "He is a prophet. The Jews did not believe that he had been blind and had received his sight, until they called the parents of the man who had received his sight, and asked them, "Is this your son, who you say was born blind? How then does he now see?" His parents answered, "We know that this is our son, and that he was born blind; but how he now sees we do not know, nor do we know who opened his eyes. Ask him; he is of age, he will speak for himself." His parents said this because they feared the Jews, for the Jews had already agreed that if anyone should confess him to be Christ he was to be put out of the synagogue. Therefore his parents said, "He is of age, ask him. So for the second time they called the man who had been blind, and said to him, "Give God the praise; we know that this man is a sinner." He answered, "Whether he is a sinner, I do not know; one thing I know, that though I was blind, now I see." They said to him, "What did he do to you? How did he open your eyes?" He answered them, "I have told you already and you would not listen. Why do you want to hear it again? Do you too want to become his disciples?" And they reviled him, saying, "You are his disciple, but we are disciples of Moses. We know that God has spoken to Moses, but as for this man, we do not know where he comes from." The man answered, "Why, this is a marvel! You do not know where he comes from, and yet he opened my eyes. We know that God does not listen to sinners, but if anyone is a worshiper of God and does his will, God listens to him. Never since the world began has it been heard that anyone opened the eyes of a man born blind. If this man were not from God, he could do nothing." They answered him, "You were born in utter sin, and would you teach us?" And they cast him out. Jesus heard that they had cast him out, and having found him he said, "Do you believe in the Son of man?" He answered, "And who is he, sir, that I may believe in him?" Jesus said to him, "You have seen him, and it is he who speaks to you." He said, "Lord, I believe"; and he worshiped him.

 Truths, half-truths, and lies. In this digital age, we have access to more information than the human race had ever dreamed possible, all of it lives right here in our pockets, and maybe half of it is true. Somehow we’re supposed to discern what the true from the false and make important decisions about how we live our lives base on what we learn. And while this may seem like an impossible task, it is not a new task. In fact, sorting truth from lies is something humanity has been struggling to do for ages. And today, on the sixth Sunday after Pascha, the Church offers us two stories that are themselves full up with these truths, half-truths, and lies. And in the life and actions of St. Paul and a blind beggar Jesus meets on the street, the Church will offer us two strong examples for how we might deal discern between them.

The first story we heard this morning was of St. Paul and St. Silas in Philippi. Paul and Silas are doing their work, sharing the Gospel, when they begin to be pestered by a slave girl possessed with a spirit of divination. We are told that this girl’s owners make quite some profit off her ability to prophesy. She follows Paul and Silas around for several days we are told. And did you catch what she said about them? "These men are servants of the Most High God, who proclaim to you the way of salvation." She, and the demon inside her, are proclaiming the truth.

And why? St. John Chrysostum suggests that this demon was making these true claims to legitimate himself. The idea is, of course, that Paul and Silas will accept this high praise, because why wouldn’t you, and by accepting her words as true, she could then pass other things off as true. But notice Paul and Silas don’t accept this praise. St. Paul sees right through this game. We are told he’s annoyed by the girl. And recognizing the abusive situation this girl is in, how she is being simultaneously possessed by this demon and exploited by her owners, he does the only compassionate thing there is to do, he saves this girl from her evil spirt. And, of course, this act of compassion causes all kinds of issues. Because St. Paul hit these slave owners where it hurt, in their pocket book.

In reaction, they grabbed Paul and Silas and dragged them before the town magistrates. And here we get a half-truth. These men couldn’t accuse Paul and Silas of healing their slave. That would give Paul and Silas credibility. So their accusation to the magistrates has absolutely nothing to do with the problem. They accuse Paul and Silas of being Judeans and causing the Romans to neglect their Roman duties. These are true facts, but they have nothing to do with the actual issue at hand. These particular facts were not chosen to get at the truth, but rather to stir up hate and anger. And they accomplished just that.

The magistrates rip their clothes at the horror of it all. And the mob in the marketplace begins to beat Paul and Silas. These magistrates, even though it is their job to judge in situations like this, show absolutely no discernment. They don’t even really try. They were just sitting there, waiting to get whipped up by xenophobic rhetoric of these slave owners and then watch the mob go crazy. After the mob beats Paul and Silas, they are thrown into a prison to be kept until morning. But God has something else in mind. He sends an earthquake in the middle of the night that miraculously frees all of the prisoners. When the jailer realizes that all the gates have fallen open, he presumes all the prisoners have escaped. And he is just about to kill himself when St. Paul calls out from inside his cell that they are all still there.

And this man, who moments before thought his life was over, does the most peculiar thing. He falls to the ground and asks Paul, “What must I do to be saved?” Now that’s a really odd question, if you think about it. “How can I be saved?” He had just been saved, from death, at his own hands. What kind of salvation is he asking St. Paul for? John Chrysostum writes: “Do you see how the wonder overpowered him? He wondered at Paul’s kindness; he was amazed by his boldness, in that he had not escaped when he had it in his power, and that he even hindered the jailer from killing himself.” Paul and Silas’ actions are so inexplicable, so miraculous, that the jailer recognizes something different within them.

These are not men concerned with their own power, with their own lives. Paul and Silas are not like the slave owners protecting their income, or the magistrates protecting their prestige and power. Paul and Silas are free. They saved the slave girl from her possession. And now they saved this jailer from death. And even now, when God has miraculously opened the gates and broken their shackles, Paul and Silas feel no need to try to escape and save their own necks. That is a higher level of freedom than this jailer had ever imagined possible.

Paul responds to the jailer’s inquiry with simply, “Believe in the Lord Jesus Christ and you shall be saved.” In other words, change your ruling authority. Don’t be driven by personal pride, don’t be ruled by your possessions, don’t be governed by the mood of the crowd. Do everything for Christ and you will be free. And from that very moment on, the jailer begins to do just this. We are told he takes in Paul and Silas, feeds and washes them, and even is baptized that very night.

In my memory that’s the end of the story, and that’s even where our liturgical reading cuts off today, but it’s not really the end of the story. There’s one last little detail that I love, now that it has been pointed out to me by St. John Chrysostum. To wrap up this story, St. Paul demonstrates a little civil disobedience. You see, there was one little detail that got left out of the slave owner’s accusations. It was true that Paul and Silas were foreigners and that their teachings went against Roman traditions. But they failed to mention, and maybe they didn’t even know, that Paul was a Roman citizen. And, while it was fine and dandy to beat up and imprison foreigners in a Roman colony, it is not how you were supposed to treat Roman citizens. Roman citizens held the right of appeal to a higher authority, even to the Emperor himself, so you always needed to be very cautious when prosecuting Roman citizens. And the magistrates knew they had not been cautious.

So Paul lets slip that he is a Roman citizen and this word gets to the magistrates. And early the next morning they send over the police to release the prisoners. But, just like the night before, St. Paul refuses to leave his cell. He says the magistrates beat me publicly and then threw me in here, and now they want to quietly let me go in the dark hours of the morning? No way. They can come let me out themselves. If they want to beat me publicly, they can come exonerate me publicly.

See how he leverages his Roman privilege? He doesn’t deny his privilege or abandon it, he uses it to help others. In his writings, St. John Chrysostum makes it clear that St. Paul does this for the sake of the jailer and of his fellow Christians in Philippi. By making the magistrates come apologize publicly, he is helping to ensure that a beating like his doesn’t happen to them. The magistrates ultimately come to let Paul and Silas out of prison and publicly apologize to him. And then, of course, they immediately beg them the troublemakers to leave town.

So that’s story number one. Story number two starts just with Jesus passing a man born blind on the side of the road. I think by “born blind” the text is telling us that his eyes were malformed or even unformed. This was not an old man that had developed cataracts or anything like that, where one might be more likely to expect healing. This is a man who for all intents and purposes didn’t have eyes.

And as they pass, the disciples ask a question: “Who sinned, this man or his parents, that he might be born blind.” And I want you to listen to Jesus’ answer. Jesus answered that neither of these was the cause, but rather he was made blind “so that the works of God might be made manifest in him.” That’s an odd phrase. What does it mean for the “works of God” to be “made manifest in him?” Let’s hear the rest of this story and try to answer that question.

Jesus takes dust from the ground and some of his own spittle and makes clay. I think we are here to see Jesus participating in the act of creation. Where God created humanity out of clay in the book of Genesis, here Jesus is using clay to complete His own work in creating eyes for this man. Is miracle, is this act of God, what Jesus was talking about? Are we supposed to thing that the Lord of creation made this man blind for his entire life, just so that He could heal him later to demonstrate his power? I don’t think that’s it. Or it’s at least, I don’t think that’s all of it.

Next Jesus tells the man to go wash in the pool of Siloam. John Chrysostum spends a lot of time pointing out how unnecessary all this is – Jesus could have just healed him on the spot – and concludes that all of this - the spittle, the mud, the washing - is all done to test the man’s faith. Unlike many of Jesus’ other healings, this man had not asked to be healed. He had not struggled to get to Jesus. He had in no way demonstrated his faith, and so Jesus offers him this test.

And he passes. Notice how the blind man doesn’t complain at all. How often are we prescribed some physical therapy, or a special diet in order to improve our health, and we complain about it the whole time. The doctor said I needed to eat less. The doctor said I needed to walk more. Not our blind man. Jesus spits in the mud and wipes it on his face, and then tells him to walk across town and wash it off, and he just does it. He shows a miraculous amount of faith in this man he doesn’t know. And I think it is this faith, this humility, this patience, more than the healing itself, that are “the works of God being made manifest” in this man. Those years of blindness have worked to prepare this man’s heart for this very moment in a way that little else could have. And as we’ll see, our blind man is one of the most clear sighted individuals in our story. That is not a coincidence.

When the blind man returns from the pool able to see, we have this great moment where we see the crowd react to what has happened. Human nature has not changed at all. First they’re like, “That’s impossible. How’d that happen?” And then when they get their explanation, they remain incredulous and conclude, “That’s not even really him, he just looks like him.” And then, perhaps the most ridiculous, they say, “Wait? Did you say Jesus did this to you on the Sabbath? That’s just wrong.” And they drag him to the Pharisees.

And then the Pharisees are divided among themselves over this question of working on the Sabbath and simply cannot figure out this puzzle – “This man is clearly sinful, because he works on the Sabbath. But how can a sinful man do such works?” They are completely stumped by this dilemma. They go back and forth with the man. They drag his parents out to vouch that this is actually him. I love it when his parents are like, “Yup, that’s our son, but he’s of age, so just talk to him. We don’t want to get involved.” Thanks, Mom. Thanks, Dad.

Only one man present in this whole crowd has the ability to see the obvious answer right in front of everyone. And that’s our blind man. All of this back and forth ends with this profound truth, which comes to us from the mouth of this blind man: “Why, this is an amazing thing, that you don’t know where he comes from, and he opened my eyes! We all agree that God doesn’t listen to sinners, and that he listens to those who do His will; and from the beginning of time we have never heard that anyone has ever opened the eyes of someone born blind; and you still can’t figure out where he comes from? If this man were not from God, he wouldn’t be able to do anything.”

This is a bolder and more public statement than any of Jesus’ disciples had ever made at this point. We won’t be seeing them vouching for Jesus in this way until after the crucifixion and resurrection and Pentecost. But this man, this blind beggar who literally doesn’t even know who Jesus is, was somehow able to discern the truth of the situation. And willing to proclaim it boldly, even at risk of his own wellbeing. How was he made ready for this?

Thankfully, Jesus tells us. Our reading today ended with an exchange between the blind man and Jesus where Jesus reveals to the blind man that he is indeed the promised messiah and Son of God and at this revelation, the blind man bows down before him. But our reading cuts off this ending, too, so let me read to you Jesus’ final words to the blind man: “For judgment I came into this world, that those who are blind might see, and those who see might become blind.” Think for a moment about that. We’re all good with the first half, Jesus opening our eyes, either physical or spiritual. That’s great. But what Jesus blinding people. What does that even mean? Thankfully, there are some Pharisees in proximity to this conversations and they ask this question for us: “Are you calling us blind?” Jesus answers them, “If you were blind, you would not be such sinners, but you say, ‘We see!’ and therefore your sin remains.” How about that? If you think you understand how the world works, that very thought can make you blind. Years of poverty and blindness had taught our beggar this truth. It had purified his mind so that he could see the truth when all the wise and educated Pharisees we completely unable to figure it out. Life’s hardships can be gifts. And what we like to call blessings, can often turn out to be curses.

So, those are our two stories. Both stories begin with healings that cause those involved to be dragged before those in power. And those in power refuse to even talk about the human beings and their miraculous healings. Instead of being grateful that these individual have been saved from their respective maladies, our power brokers in both situations worry about protecting cultural norms. The magistrates in Philippi worry that Paul and Silas are corrupting Roman society; and the Pharisees in Jerusalem are all worried that Jesus healed this man on the Sabbath. They are shown to be completely blind to the plight of the blind man and exploitation of the slave girl.

This is the blindness that God wants to heal us from, an inability to see those in need. And as physical blindness helped our beggar to see more clearly, it is often our own difficulties that help us to recognize the suffering found within others. After all, we must remember that God also used blindness to transform the Pharisee Saul into the Apostle Paul. So when difficulties arise in our lives, as they always will, it is left for us to accept these difficulties as tests, as opportunities to learn and to grow. It is for us to demonstrate our faith by saying, “Not my will but thine.” And in time, this patient, faithful endurance will help conform us ever more into the likeness of our Lord and God and Savior Jesus Christ, to whom be all glory and honor forever. Amen.

The Reading from the Holy Gospel according to St. Mark. (2:1-12)
At that time, when Jesus returned to Capernaum after some days, it was reported that He was at home. And many were gathered together, so that there was no longer room for them, not even about the door; and He was preaching the Word to them. And they came, bringing to Jesus a paralytic carried by four men. And when they could not get near Jesus because of the crowd, they removed the roof above Him; and when they had made an opening, they let down the pallet on which the paralytic lay. And when Jesus saw their faith, He said to the paralytic, “Son, your sins are forgiven.” Now, some of the scribes were sitting there, reasoning in their hearts, “Why does this man speak thus? It is blasphemy! Who can forgive sins but God alone?” And immediately Jesus, perceiving in His spirit that they thus reasoned within themselves, said to them, “Why do you reason thus in your hearts? Which is easier, to say to the paralytic, ‘Your sins are forgiven,’ or to say, ‘Rise, take up your pallet and walk’? But that you may know that the Son of Man has authority on earth to forgive sins” – He said to the paralytic – “I say to you, rise, take up your pallet and go home.” And he rose, and immediately took up the pallet and went out before them all. So that they were all amazed and glorified God, saying, “We never saw anything like this!”

Today we read the story of the paralyzed man who was healed in Capernaum. It is also the day we remember St. Gregory Palamas, the 14th century priest and monk remembered for defending the Orthodox practice of hesychasm, or “stillness.” In preparing this for this short homily, I spent time reading St. Gregory’s homily on this same gospel passage, delivered just like this one, on the second Sunday of Lent. There was a moment as I was reading when St. Gregory talks about hearing two weeks ago about the Last Judgement, and then last week about Adam and Eve’s expulsion from paradise, and I realized that 700 years ago these same Sundays of the Triodion and of Great Lent were already in place. Little did he know that a couple centuries later he would be remembered specifically on this day. I am not going to tell his story today, but by way of honoring his memory, I will be leaning very heavily on the sermon he delivered on this day all those 700 years ago.

All three synoptic Gospels contain this story and place it near the beginning of Jesus’ ministry. Jesus has come to Capernaum, a major city near the sea of Galilee. Capernaum functioned in many ways as Jesus’ home base. Matthew goes so far, when he tells this story, as to call Capernaum Jesus’ “own city.” So when Jesus arrives he is a known entity. He has already taught and healed in the streets and synagogues of Capernaum and almost immediately a crowd begins to form around him. Why? Why did the crowd form around Jesus?

For exactly the same reason a crowd forms when a circus comes to town. For exactly the same reason there are lines around the block whenever the next Star Wars movie hits the theater. They want to see the show! For most of this crowd, Jesus is a performer. He tells stories, gives little lessons, and sometimes does magic tricks. Word of Jesus has begun to spread and the masses have gathered from far and wide to see the show.

But now, for the first time in the Gospel story, we begin see a second tier form within the crowd. Before this point in all the Gospels, Jesus has only ever spoken about the scribes and Pharisees. He is not yet leveling his harshest criticisms, but he is calling upon his listeners to “exceed” their righteousness.

And his growing audience also sees a difference between him and these prominent men. We are told they notice that Jesus speaks “as one with authority, not like the scribes and the Pharisees.” So, before this story, there has been talk of the scribes and the Pharisees, but this is the episode where they make their first appearance on stage.

And with this entrance I’d like to pause for a moment to help translate this story for our modern ears. Because the scribes and the Pharisees really get a bad rap and we need to be careful not to target the wrong people with this smear. It must be remembered that Christianity really grew out of the religion of the Pharisees. From their understanding of the Old Testament to their understanding of the end times, especially the idea of a bodily resurrection, Jesus and his disciples had more in common with the scribes and Pharisees than any other sect of their day. The synagogues that Jesus and St. Paul taught in were run by the Pharisees. Men like Nicodemus are shown as converting within the Gospels and Pharisees like Gamaliel are shown as sympathetic. So when Jesus blasts off in the Gospel of John with his famous, “Scribes, Pharisees, hypocrites!” you must understand that he is saving his harshest criticisms for his own people. The Pharisees are not hypocrites because they disagree with Jesus, but because they essentially believe the same thing, but they do not act on it.

And so, when Orthodox Christians read “scribes and Pharisees” in the Gospel, they should mentally translate it into something like “our Orthodox Priests and professors.” These were not the bad guys. These were not the occupying Romans or aristocratic Sadducees. To most in Jesus’ day, these were the good guys, the leaders, the people who should have known better. It would be as if I heard there was a new guy in town. He was Orthodox, he was one of us, but he didn’t even go to seminary, he just started talking as if he knew everything. And he was filling up the Tax Slayer Center. And then he started criticizing the Church and the Church leaders, he started criticizing me, calling on me and my colleagues to do more and to be more. Even if I agreed with him, I’d feel a little threatened. I’d want to go see what was going on. I’d be curious what this man had to say. I’d be curious what it was that the people loved so much. I’d be curious if he was the real deal, or if he was leading my people astray.

So this is the context for our story. A huge crowd has formed around Jesus. And the crowd is full of Jesus’ super fans, but it has also now begun to attract some that might be a little more critical. And the crowd is so thick that a paralyzed man, a man who needs and wants Jesus’ help, is stuck outside.

You get the irony, right? So many people just love to hear Jesus talk about loving God and neighbor that they can’t make room for this neighbor in need. How many of our Church’s are just like this, so wrapped up in our flowers and our festivals, our liturgies and our services, our fasts and our feasts, that the hungry and the poor can’t find a moment to get our attention. How many times do I have to hurry past the beggar on the street so I can make it to Church on time? And just as the Gospel’s critique of the Judean religious leaders needs to be read as a critique of our religious leaders, so to this critique of Jesus’ super-fans needs to be accepted as a critique of us. And we all need to hear these critiques, so we can learn from them.

So the paralyzed man is stuck outside, but luckily he has some fantastic friends who decide to help him out. These four faithful friends go to extraordinary lengths to help this paralyzed man make it to Jesus. They climb up on the roof of the house and make their way over the crowd. They have to create a hole in the roof to get inside and then lower the man on his pallet into the midst of the room.

And when this happens, I hope you can feel the anticipation and the excitement of this room. This is the moment the scribes and the Pharisees had been waiting for; the moment where Jesus will be shown to be the charlatan they already suspect he is. The crowd is excited. The faithful few are expectant.

And Jesus sets out to perform his greatest miracle to date. He has cured the sick, he’s healed lepers, he’s exorcized the demon possessed, but in this moment h edoes something bigger than any of that. With every eye in the place focused on him, he looks at the man and says: “Son, your sins are forgiven.”

Really? That’s it? Can you imagine what the people thought? Could there have been anything more disappointing to the crowds than that? Could there be anything more infuriating to the Pharisees? Reconciliation with God was their business! That is what the sacrifices and the temple were for. If this man can just come along out of nowhere and say, “Your sins are forgiven,” what does their role become? In a modern context, you need to hear them saying – “But he hasn’t been baptized!?! He hasn’t been chrismated!?! He hasn’t been to confession!?! Who are you to say that his sins have been forgiven? Who do you think you are? Do you think you’re God?!?”

When describing the reaction of the crowd, St. Gregory Palamas says, “It seemed to the scribes that the Lord was unable to heal the paralysed man, so He had resorted to something obscure, forgiving him his sins. Just to pronounce words of forgiveness, especially in such an authoritative and commanding way, was of course blasphemy; but it was also something anyone could do.”

And how about the paralyzed man and his friends. The Gospels don’t say, but I doubt he came out that day to have his sins forgiven. I think it’s pretty obvious they came that day in hope that he would be healed, that he would walk.

But I also don’t think in this moment that he was disappointed. I suspect he accepted this gift. St. Gregory makes a point of calling out the particularly endearing term, “Son,” that Jesus uses. “What a blessed way to be addressed!” he writes. “He hears himself called ‘son’ and is adopted as the child of the heavenly Father. He is joined to God who is without sin, having immediately become sinless himself through the forgiveness of his sins.” Jesus doesn’t just recognize him, he adopts him as his own. And I’m just guessing, that a paralyzed man in the first century often felt a little ostracized and outcast, and that to be embraced in this way in front of a huge crowd would have been unbelievably emotional. I imagine he felt healed, in many ways, in all the most important ways, long before anything else happened.

St. Gregory Palamas reminds us that each of us are paralytics in need of healing: “Anyone addicted to sensual pleasures is paralysed in their soul, and is lying sick on the bed of voluptuousness with its deceptive bodily ease. Once, however, they have been won over by the exhortations in the Gospel, they confess their sins and triumph over them and the paralysis they have brought upon their soul.” And we all know that when we realize our shortcomings, when we make our way to the Lord, and lay them bare in confession and the Lord offers us his forgiveness, we know the feeling of so many of those other pressures in our life melting away. In the end the heaviest burdens in our lives are often not our physical ailments, but the many burdens we bear within our minds and our hearts and the many obstacles that stand between ourselves and our brothers or sisters. And so, having felt that relief myself, I suspect that this man was happy with what he got. He was happy with the crumbs from the Lord’s table. Happy with his adoption by such a man as Jesus. It may not have been what he came for, but I believe he was satisfied nonetheless.

But regardless of his feelings, Jesus was not done. Jesus senses the tenseness in the crowd. The text says he perceived how they were reasoning within their hearts. And so, looking at the disappointed and critical crowd, he cut immediately to the heart of the matter: “Which is easier? For me to say, ‘Your sins are forgiven.’ Or for me to say, ‘Get up and walk?’” That’s it. That’s the whole Gospel story in one single question. Jesus came to reconcile humanity with God and with one another, he came to solve the single greatest problem that ails the entirety of creation, and when he does it, it’s not what the crowd wants. They don’t want it and the religious leaders won’t stand for it. And neither has the time of day for the God who stands in their midst, or for the neglected needy neighbor who had to climb over their heads to get someone to help him.

And so Jesus, in a move of great grace and condescension gives this man - and the crowd - what they came out for. He says to the man, “Rise, take up your pallet, and go home.” And the man does just that. In St. John Chrysostum’s commentary he says that the healing of this man’s soul was actually the greater miracle, but that Jesus, because the greater miracle is unseen, throws in “that which although an inferior thing, is yet more open to the sense; that the greater and also the unseen may receive its proof.” So Jesus gave this man a cure to the illness that had been plaguing all of humanity from the beginning of time and the crowd went “ho, hum.”  But he gave him the ability to walk and we’re told “that they were all amazed and glorified God, saying, ‘We never saw anything like this!’”

I’d like to end by talking a little bit about the faith of our five men. We might get caught up in whether the healing occurred as a result of the faith of the paralyzed man or the faith of the friends, but the truth is the healing occurred so that the works of God might be revealed. St. Gregory points out that Jesus was not concerned with the faith of the servant of the Centurion, or the daughters of Jairus or the Canaanite woman. He was satisfied with the faith of those who pleaded on their behalf. But he also points out that the paralyzed man was present and there was no way the four men could have accomplished what they did without his cooperation. To St. Gregory it is clear that, “being racked with paralysis had not broken down this man’s reasoning, but instead it had broken down all the barriers and obstacles to his faith.” The paralyzed man’s trials, his illness, rather than breaking him down, had grown his faith.

St. Gregory Palamas explains that so many of us have been prevented from drawing near to the Lord, “by lands, by weddings, by worries about the affairs of this life, but the paralysed man’s physical weakness put an end to such things and removed them from his thoughts. There are times when illness is better for us than good health, because it helps us towards salvation and blunts our sinful impulses.”

St. Gregory ends by pointing out that the path taken by the paralyzed man and his friends, the path of faith, is always open to each of us. And that just as all those who witnessed the healing of the paralyzed man glorified God when they saw the miracle, so to the fruits of repentance can garner that same astonishment. “For they see that yesterday’s publican is today’s evangelist, the persecutor an apostle, the thief a theologian. Even the man who used to live among pigs, if you please, is now the son of the heavenly Father. Having decided in their hearts to ascend, they advanced from glory to glory, progressing from day to day towards excellence. The Lord says to his disciples, ‘Let your light so shine before men, that they may see your good works, and glorify your Father which is in heaven.’ He does not say this to urge them to show off, but to urge them to organize their lives as is pleasing to God. For just as light effortlessly attracts people’s gaze, so a way of life pleasing to God draws their minds along with their eyes. We do not praise the air which shares in the brilliance of the sunlight, but the sun which is the source of this brilliance and bestows it on us. And even if we do praise the air, we praise the sun so much more.”

Our faith attracts the attention of others, and ultimately it draws their gaze and reverence to its source, to Christ. It is not our invisible faith that draws this attention, not the faith that lives only in our hearts or in our minds, but rather faith made manifest by our hands and our feet, our words and our actions. Sharing your faith with your friends, with your family, your neighbors, your co-workers, your enemies, doesn’t mean you have to teach them something. It means you have to serve them, you have to love them, just like these four men loved and served their paralyzed friend.

As I pointed out at the beginning, St. Gregory Palamas gave his sermon on this same day during Lent 700 years ago. He gave this encouragement and I close by sharing it with you: “Solomon wrote, ‘To everything there is a season and a time to every purpose.’ If anyone is looking for the right season to practice virtue, it is now, in these forty days. Our whole life is intended as a suitable means of attaining salvation, but this season of  fasting is more especially so. Christ the author and giver of our salvation began by fasting.” And so, this Lent, may we all strive to reflect ever more perfectly to all who enter our lives the love and glory of our Lord and God and Savior Jesus Christ, to whom be all glory, might, honor, and worship, together with his Father who is without beginning and the all-holy, good and life-giving Spirit, now and forever. Amen.

LUKE 18:35-43
At that time, as Jesus drew near to Jericho, a blind man was sitting by the roadside begging; and hearing a multitude going by, he inquired what this meant. They told him, "Jesus of Nazareth is passing by." And he cried, "Jesus, Son of David, have mercy on me!" And those who were in front rebuked him, telling him to be silent; but he cried out all the more, "Son of David, have mercy on me!" And Jesus stopped, and commanded him to be brought to him; and when he came near, he asked him, "What do you want me to do for you?" He said, "Lord, let me receive my sight." And Jesus said to him, "Receive your sight; your faith has made you well." And immediately he received his sight and followed him, glorifying God; and all the people, when they saw it, gave praise to God.

Let me tell you the story of a blind man. Not a physically blind man, but a spiritually blind man. The man I would like to tell you about was born in 1725 and his name was John Newton. I don’t want to judge him too harshly, but using his own words, John Newton described himself as a wretch. And if you listen to the stories I am about share with you, I think you’ll be prone to agree.

Now, I must say, that John Newton was not born a wretch. In fact he had been born to a kind, Christian woman in London who did her very best to love and provide for her boy and to give him religious instruction. Newton remembered her fondly, but unfortunately she passed away when he was just seven and his step-mother was not the same kind of woman. And then after some time with his step-mother, and some more time at a boarding school, finally, at the young age of eleven, John Newton joined his father at sea.

As you could probably guess, growing up among the sailors was not work out well for John. He picked up many of the habits that sailors of his day were renowned for, drinking, gambling, and boy did that man have a mouth. And after about six years at his father’s side, the elder John Newton retired from the sea and the younger John Newton began his own career. He spent a short time as a merchant sailor, but his bad behavior got him into trouble and he was pressed into the service of the British Royal Navy. And then after attempting to desert his first ship, he was flogged, demoted, and transferred to a second ship, a slave ship. Even aboard this ship his behavior remained remarkably despicable. Martin Bernard writes that, “In a culture where sailors habitually swore, Newton was admonished several times for not only using the worst words the captain had ever heard, but creating new ones to exceed the limits of verbal debauchery.” At one point Newton even plotted to kill the captain and was chained up amongst the slaves that they were carrying.

Eventually Newton was abandoned by his shipmates in West Africa and for three years he himself served as a slave West Africa, at the service of Amos Clowe and his wife, the Princess Peye of the Sherbro people. John Newton would later write about his life in Africa, and specifically about slavery in West Africa, an institution he experienced firsthand. He describes a civilization organized into districts, governed by a council with representatives from each district, all maintaining a set of laws that prevented theft, fraud, and other crimes, and specifically included a prohibition on drawing blood, even from a slave.

Slavery itself was generally penal in nature, saved for those who had broken laws too big to be satisfied in other ways, significant theft, murder or assault, the stealing of another man’s wife. Most of those who went into slavery could expect to come out some day, when the offended party had been satisfied or the debts had been worked off. Slavery in Africa was slavery as it had been practiced throughout most of human history.

After a few years serving as a slave in West Africa, John was himself freed by another ship captain who had been sent by his father to find him. In one of his personal letters, he writes that he had grown so accustomed to Sierra Leon that he contemplated staying and only left on account of his childhood sweetheart Polly. It was on the return journey that his ship was caught up in a great storm and nearly sank. A crew member died in the storm that day and the rest worked for hours to keep the ship afloat. In this desperate moment, John Newton, a man whose foul mouth could literally make a sailor blush, exclaimed these words, “Lord have mercy on us!”

Eventually the storm died down and John Newton took the helm, steering the ship for the next eleven hours, alone with his thoughts. That night, and then on into the tired and hungry days that followed, John Newton kept asking himself, “Why?” Why would the Lord save him? Why would the Lord save this man who had denounced God? And more than just denounce God, he had ridiculed the piety of those around him? Why, in that moment of desperation, would he call out to God, of all things? And why, why oh why, would God care to save a wretch like him.

This event marked a turning point in John Newton’s life, though it would take a long time to bear fruit. A really long time. More than a decade, in fact. Newton made it home, married his lifelong sweet heart, and continued his work in the slave trade. Seven years later, at age 30, Newton suffered a rather serious stroke and decided that life at sea had become too difficult for him. He took a position at port and never sailed again.

During those seven years at sea and then in his port work, Newton began to study the bible and read theology. By all accounts he began to watch his mouth and control his temper. Over time he quit the drinking and the gambling. He studied Latin and Greek and Syraic. Eventually his friends and acquaintances began to encourage him to join the clergy, which he eventually did, becoming an Anglican Priest. It was here that John Newton enjoyed his second life.

John took to this life as a parish priest. His mouth, which had once made him the scourge of the southern seas, now brought him attention from the pulpit. But was not until 1788, 34 years after his work in the African Slave Trade, that John Newton finally began to speak about his own experiences. He wrote a pamphlet entitled, “Thoughts on the African Slave Trade.” In his introduction, he writes this:

“If my testimony should not be necessary, or serviceable, yet, perhaps, I am bound, in conscience, to take shame to myself by a public confession, which, however sincere, comes too late to prevent, or repair, the misery and mischief to which I have, formerly, been accessary. I hope it will always be a subject of humiliating reflection to me, that I was, once, an active instrument, in a business at which my heart now shudders.” As much as this pamphlet advocated for Abolition, it also served as John Newton’s public confession.

His writings are difficult. I read his pamphlet this week and worried about how much to share. He describes humans being treated like cargo, stacked up on shelves just a few feet high, often stuck below decks for weeks at a time, hundreds of them, left to sit and live and lay and sleep in their own waste, chained together. Chained, as he describes, not left hand to right hand and left foot to right hand as would make the most sense, but right hand to right hand and right foot to right foot, so as to make most natural movements, even rolling over on your shelf, impossible. He describes living human cargo being thrown overboard when water ran scarce. He describes the regular, shall I say mistreating, of the slave women by the crew.

And then, let me read one last passage from this pamphlet for you:

“When the ships make the land, (usually the West-India islands,) and have their port in view after having been four, five, six weeks or a longer time, at sea…then, and not before, they venture to release the Men Slaves from their irons. And then, the sight of the land, and their freedom from long and painful confinement, usually excite in them a degree of alacrity, and a transient feeling of joy—The prisoner leaps to lose his chains. But, this joy is short lived indeed. The condition of the unhappy Slaves is in a continual progress from bad to worse. Their case is truly pitiable, from the moment they are in a state of slavery, in their own country; but it may be deemed a state of ease and liberty, compared with their situation on board our ships. Yet, perhaps, they would wish to spend the remainder of their days on ship board, could they know, before-hand, the nature of the servitude which awaits them, on shore; and that the dreadful hardships and sufferings they have already endured, would, to the most of them, only terminate in excessive toil, hunger, and the excruciating tortures of the cart-whip, inflicted at the caprice of an unfeeling Overseer, proud of the power allowed him of punishing whom, and when, and how he pleases.”

In John Newton’s personal experience, slavery in Africa was pitiable, but could be considered “ease and liberty” when compared with what happened on the boats. And then, from what he saw and learned in the British Colonies, what happened to the slaves once they reached land was bad enough to make most of them want to get back onto the boats.

At this point I should probably beg your forgiveness. This story of John Newton was really meant to be a short introduction to my sermon, a paragraph or two at most. But the more I learned about him, the more I was personally inspired. I am not sure if I was ever the kind of wretch that John Newton was, but I have plenty to repent for. And the more I learned about him and his life, the more I wanted to share. I think I was inspired mostly by his ability to truly repent, to completely change his ways in the middle of his life. It was hard to imagine a more radical transformation than this one, from an active slave trader to a vocal Abolitionist.

Just as Jesus Christ once chose Paul, a Pharisee of Pharisees, a murderer of Christians, to spread his Gospel to the larger Roman Empire, so here also the Lord chose this foul-mouthed slave trader to speak on behalf of the Abolitionist cause. And it was his confession, specifically his confession, that helped pave the way for Britain to abolish the Atlantic Slave Trade in 1807. And it was in that same year, at age 82, that John Newton reposed in the Lord.

I tell you this story today, not just because I find it personally inspirational, but because of one other little detail from the life of John Newton. It was pretty normal for ministers of his day to compose little hymns and write verses to be used in services, and on New Year’s Day in 1773, John Newton debuted a little hymn that he would later describe as his autobiography set to verse. The first verse of his hymn reads like this:

“Amazing Grace! How sweet the sound
that saved a wretch like me.
I once was lost, but now am found
was blind, but now I see.”

Amazing Grace. In this beautiful, well known verse, John Newton describes himself as a blind man who by God’s Grace is now able to see. That was the parallel with our Gospel story today that I was going for. But as I dug into John Newton’s story, I was surprised how many additional parallels I encountered.

Today’s story begins with a bustling crowd entering into Jericho and passing by a blind man begging on the side of the road. This man asks the crowd what all the excitement is about and hears that Jesus is coming to town. To the blind man, this is, of course, very exciting news. And as the crowd continues to flow past him, the blind man begins to cry out, “Jesus, Son of David, have mercy on me!” Notice these are the same words that John Newton cried out in the midst of the storm, “Lord, have mercy!”

And then Luke is careful to tell us that the man is turned away by those at the front of the crowd. This is not just a random detail in our Gospel story, but a regular theme seen throughout the Gospels. Think of the woman at the well being called out for her marital status or the Jesus telling the Canaanite woman that he came first to serve the Judeans. In fact, it is in this exact same chapter of Luke that Jesus tells the story of the tenacious widow who continues to pester the judge for justice until he finally relents and does as she wishes. God is not a genie waiting to grant our wishes. And even when he intends to say, “Yes,” he does it in his own time. And the wait can be a test of your faith. Will you remain diligent in your prayers, will you be faithful in your work, or will you walk away upset and unwilling to change like the Rich Young Ruler.

Ultimately, our blind man’s persistence is rewarded and Jesus asks for the man to be brought before him, inquiring, “What do you want me to do for you?” The blind man immediately asks that he might receive his sight and Jesus heals him, saying that it was “his faith” that made him well. It wasn’t just the blind man’s belief that Jesus was a great healer, or even the crying out for mercy, but it was his faithful perseverance, together with God’s grace, that had saved him.

Growing up as an Evangelical Christian, where that first moment of faith is given so much weight, I had always heard the line, “Was blind but now I see,” as if it were some sort of instantaneous transformation. But this week, digging deeper into John Newton’s actual story, I discovered that it was in truth a much more gradual healing. In Orthodox teaching, “spiritual blindness” is very real malady. It is a malfunctioning of the mind, in Greek called the nous, which can be thought of as the eye of the heart. It is the nous that St. Paul is talking about in Romans when he teaches, “Do not be conformed to the pattern of this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind.” John Newton’s mind had been conformed to the pattern of the world during his years at sea, and it took time and effort for his mind to be renewed.

The Church teaches that a healthy mind, a renewed mind, both guards what enters into the heart and guides what comes out of the heart. The elders of our Church call this practice nepsis or watchfulness. In the decade between John Newton’s conversion and his eventual ministry, John Newton began to consume the Bible and other spiritual literature, and to watch his mouth and his temper. He cut out the drinking and the gambling. He guarded what went in, and he guided what came out.

And then the parable of the blind man ends this way, “And immediately he received his sight and followed Jesus, glorifying God; and all the people, when they saw it, gave praise to God.” Again, we see this in the life of John Newton. His faithful tending to his heart and mind was ultimately rewarded by God when his blindness was transformed into sight. “And all the people, when they saw it, gave praise to God.”

John Climacus teaches that, “it is the understanding which is obtained through divine illumination that can brighten the darkness present in others.” St. Saraphim of Sarov teaches, “Acquire a spirit of peace and a thousand around you will be saved.” The Lord himself proclaims, “Let your light shine before humanity, that they may see your good works, and glorify your Father who is in heaven.” We must nurture the light of Christ in our own hearts before we can ever hope to spread His light to those around us.

Like David’s Psalms of confession that have been read in our Church for millennia, John Newton’s little hymn of confession has brought comfort to men and women all across our nation. It was sung by soldiers as they buried their companions in the Civil War. It brought comfort to the hearts of the Cherokee people as they walked westward along the trail of tears. It was sung by Civil Rights demonstrators as they struggled in our streets for equal rights. And it was sung in the little Baptist Church where I was raised and in Churches of all stripes and denominations, all across this land.

And all of this goes back to the day when a wretch of a man named John Newton, scared for his life, cried out in fear, “Lord have mercy on us!” And then went on to do the long hard work of truly repenting. I do not need to tell you that these words, “Jesus Christ, Son of God, have mercy on me,” live at the heart of Orthodox piety. Each one of us is that man tossed at sea. Each one of us is that blind man sitting by the side of the road. We need to keep these simple words, “Lord, have mercy,” forever in our hearts as we work at our own personal repentance and even more so if we ever hope to work toward any kind of national repentance.

But if we do this hard work, if we are faithful stewards of these lives God has given us, I believe we can be assured that our Lord who is also faithful, will one day call us to himself and say, “Receive your sight. Your faith has made you well.” Amen.

The Reading from the Epistle of St. Paul to the Galatians. (3:23-4:5)
Brethren, before faith came, we were confined under the Law, kept under restraint until faith should be revealed. So that the Law was our custodian until Christ came, that we might be justified by faith. But now that faith has come, we are no longer under a custodian; for in Christ Jesus you are all sons of God, through faith. For as many of you as were baptized into Christ have put on Christ. There is neither Jew nor Greek, there is neither slave nor free, there is neither male nor female; for you are all one in Christ Jesus. And if you are Christ’s, then you are Abraham’s offspring, heirs according to promise. I mean that the heir, as long as he is a child, is no better than a slave, though he is the owner of all the estate; but he is under guardians and trustees until the date set by the father. So with us; when we were children, we were slaves to the elemental spirits of the universe. But when the time had fully come, God sent forth His Son, to redeem those who were under the Law, so that we might receive adoption as sons.

Today’s epistle reading is taken from the third and fourth chapters of Galatians. I am not going to speak on that passage today, but there is a link which I would like to highlight between these chapters and the story I will be sharing today. In Galatians chapter 4, actually in the portion of the chapter we would have read yesterday on the liturgical calendar, Paul makes a comparison between Ishmael and Isaac, turning them into an allegory of the law and of faith. He specifically looks at the mode in which they were begotten. The first, Ishmael, was begotten by Abraham and an enslaved woman Hagar, because Abraham’s wife could not conceive. But Isaac was begotten by a miracle in his barren wife Sarah’s old age. For Paul this story presents a contrast between the law and faith; between humanity seeking to fulfill God’s plan in a worldly manner, and God fulfilling his own plan in the way He sees fit. Paul then quotes this passage from Isaiah: “Rejoice, thou barren that bearest not; break forth and cry, thou that travailest not: for the desolate hath many more children than she which has a husband.”

This passage from Isaiah would have been well known in Christian circles because it comes immediately after the suffering servant passages that are seen as prefiguring or prophesying Christ’s humiliation and death on the cross and they also speak to God’s mission to the entire world. I’ll read the full passage from Isaiah here: “Sing, O barren, thou that didst not bear; break forth into singing, and cry aloud, thou that didst not travail with child: for more are the children of the desolate than the children of she that has a husband, saith the Lord. Enlarge the place of thy tent, and let them stretch forth the curtains of thine habitations: spare not, lengthen thy cords, and strengthen thy stakes; For thou shalt break forth on the right hand and on the left; and thy seed shall inherit the Gentiles, and make the desolate cities to be inhabited. Fear not; for thou shalt not be ashamed: neither be thou confounded; for thou shalt not be put to shame: for thou shalt forget the shame of thy youth, and shalt not remember the reproach of thy widowhood any more. For thy Maker is thine husband; the Lord of hosts is his name; and thy Redeemer the Holy One of Israel; The God of the whole earth shall he be called.”

Pay attention to the phrases here: “More are the children of the desolate than the children of she that has a husband” and “you will forget the shame of your youth and will not remember the reproach of your widowhood for your Maker is your husband.” For the non-Christian world, the way to power was always through begetting more children. Whether it was someone to inherit your wealth, someone to help in the field, or soldiers to fill your army – fertility and children meant wealth and power. The world told women to seek salvation in finding a husband, and told men to find salvation in their wife. But for Christianity, salvation was not to be found in hearth and home.

And this is a notion that you will find front and center in the life of St. Paraskeva of Rome, who we remember today. She lived in the Roman Empire during the second century, at a time when the empire was at its largest and most powerful. The Nerva-Antoinine dynasty, which began in the late first century and extended into the late second century, was in control and that particular dynasty includes such figures as Trajan, Hadrian, and Marcus Aurelius. Outside of the early emperors like Julius Caesar and Augustus, and maybe some of the classically evil emperors like Nero or Domitian, these remain some of the most well-known emperors of all time. And this is because they ruled Rome at its height and for the most part they ruled it well.

I think it is also important to share that there was some unrest during this time. Interestingly the seed for this unrest was planted much earlier, within reign of Augustus Caesar, in Judea, when the provincial governor Pilate had put to death that trouble maker Jesus who was called by his followers the Christ. Jesus the Christ was honestly little more than a blip on the radar screen of the Roman Empire, and his crucifixion had appeared to end the problem. And really, it wasn’t a Roman problem, it was a Judean problem, a squabble between two sects of Judeans. But since the squabble had been about which leader was going to supplant the Roman emperor, Pilate had needed to deal with it. None of their leaders should be thinking about supplanting the Roman emperor. Best to put a quick end to the whole thing.

But then a generation later, there began to pop up groups of Christians in cities all over the empire. This un-nerved the Romans a bit. These Christians were no longer just Judeans, but many others had joined them, including some Roman citizens. They still referred to Jesus as the Messiah or the Christ, but they had added to this Lord and Savior and even God. To Romans, words like these are reserved for the emperor and the imperial line, and they are certainly not for agitators and dissidents. These Christians had come on the scene with sedition in Judea and now continued in their treachery by refusing to offer prayers and burn incense before the image of the emperor. Even though they did not participate in the Jewish Revolt, they were associated with it, and besides their behavior was clearly unpatriotic.

The Romans threw all kinds of slurs at the Christians, including calling them atheists and cannibals and incestuous. The first was because of their refusal to recognize the Roman pantheon of gods, which included the emperor. The second was a slightly absurd and possibly intentional misunderstanding of the language surrounding the Eucharist. And while the third slander fell into that same category, a misunderstanding of Christian language where they recognized one another as brother and sister even as they married amongst themselves. But this last slur was exacerbated by the fact that Christians did not follow Roman social norms, often allowed master to sit at table with slave, men and women to speak with one another, and wives – who were largely considered the property of their husbands –to participate in their prayers without their husbands. All of this left a bad taste in the mouth of the Romans. It was clear something odd was going on. And this unease left Christians open to much scapegoating, with Nero and Domitian leading some of the more spectacular persecutions. This was all in the first century of the Christian era.

But now we are in the second century and Christianity appears to be here to stay. It remains unpopular, even illegal, but it can no longer be disregarded. By some historical miracle we have a lengthy collection of letters from a provincial governor name Pliny the Younger to the Emperor Trajan. It is really an amazing collection and offers more insight into the day-to-day work of governing the Roman Empire than is available for almost any other period. There are literally letters about everything from the building of aqueducts to the redirecting of sewers. And then there is one very famous letter where Pliny is just very confused about what to do with the Christians.

His letter is a little humorous, if it is at all proper to find humor in such things. Pliny is like, “I had some Christians turned into me and when they refused to offer incense to your image I killed them like I was supposed to. And then some more were brought in. These recanted and worshiped your image, so I let them go. And then there were more brought in, and I was like, ‘How many of these Christians are there?’ So I did some investigating, arrested a couple of the women that appeared to be officiating in their services, and tortured them until they told me what they were up to. They told me everything about their prayer services and their common meals and that crazy superstition about Jesus the Christ, but other than that, I couldn’t really find any actual crime.” He adds the detail here that ever since he had started arresting and killing these Christians, there has been a lot more traffic in the pagan temples. You think? “But the real trouble is that these Christians appear to be everywhere, in the city and in the country side, and so before I go about killing so many that live my province, I thought I should check in with you.”

Trajan replies that if a Christian is brought in to you and refuses to renounce his faith, then of course you need to kill them. But you are also right not to trouble yourself with hunting them down and arresting all of them. They’re just not worth the trouble. In this, Trajan instituted a kind of a don’t-ask-don’t-tell policy on Christians.

And that’s the second century Roman Empire. Christianity has gone from a threat to power that must be stamped out, to a pesky sect that is too big to kill but we are hoping it goes away if we just ignore it. There are no great persecutions of Christians in the second century like those of Nero and Domitian in the first century or like that of Decius in the third century. There is one brief persecution that comes up under Marcus Aurelius that will have some bearing on our story, but overall Christians were allowed to exist. I mean, of course you should kill them, if someone turns them in. But we can’t kill them all. And really, they don’t seem to be hurting anyone.

This is the context into which St. Paraskeva was born. Paraskeva is born right in the heart of this great empire, right in Rome itself. And her parents are remembered as pious Christians. They have not been able to have children and late in life, after much prayer, are gifted an only daughter. I think it is worth here saying just a little about her name Paraskeva.

The first thing to know is that in many languages St. Paraskeva is known as St. Friday, because Paraskeva is the Greek word for Friday. Paraskeva is actually the Greek word for preparation, but that is the word they use for Friday because the Christians of Paraskeva’s day referred to Friday as the day of Preparation, which was followed by Sabbat or the Sabbath, and then Kyriaki or the Lord’s Day. So Paraskeva, who was indeed born on the day of preparation, is named after that day and in honor of the death of the Friday crucifixion of our Lord and Savior.

Why do I think it is important to know that she is St. Friday? Well, because our days have meanings. And while we Christians remember the Lord’s passion on Friday – this is why we fast on nearly every Friday – the Greco-Roman world remembered something else on Friday. In Rome, Friday was called Dies Veneris or the Day of Venus. Venus was the God of love and fertility and prosperity. In fact, we can still find this meaning in our own word Friday, which comes from the Germanic and Norse mythology as Freyja’s Day or Frigg’s Day. Freyja in particular was used on Friday because she fulfilled a role similar to Venus in Roman pantheon, including governance of the realm of romance, beauty, wealth, and fertility. So in the Christian story of St. Paraskeva or St. Friday, I think we should not be surprised to see some Christian commentary on non-Christian notions of love, fertility, and prosperity.

So with that in mind, let us return to our barren couple who have miraculously born a child in their old age. See already here there is an echo of the Abraham and Sarah story. Think of Paul and Isaiah’s words, “Rejoice O Barren One, for your children are more that she who has a husband.” It is not marriage and a husband that provide children, it is the Lord.

This couple doted on their daughter and being of some means they gave her the best education they could afford. This included teaching in philosophy and in the Scriptures. As she grew into a beautiful young woman, many local families wanted to bring this educated and wealthy Paraskeva into their households through marriage to their sons. But Paraskeva had higher goals for her life than being a wife and her parents supported her in this choice, rejecting all of these suitors. Again, hear the words of Isaiah, “For your Maker will be your Husband.” We see here that Paraskeva is not seeking security in a traditional family life, but instead seeking a Christian life of sacrifice and service. We see this beautiful Venus living in the heart of Rome rejecting the pagan path to security and instead choosing the much narrower Christian path.

And then, at age 20, we are told that Paraskeva’s aged parents die. When this happens, rather than seeking refuge in one of those many households who would have surely still accepted her, Paraskeva sells most of her property and gives it to the poor, and with the remainder she opens a commune where single women can live together, pray, and serve those in need. Just as Christians held Jesus Christ to be their Lord and would worship no other, so too did Paraskeva feel herself to be the bride of Christ and would accept no other.

In this place she served for ten years. And then, at the age of 30, the age our Lord was when he began his ministry, Paraskeva left Rome and began to travel across the empire as a missionary. Now remember the world in which she lived. It was fine to be a Christian in second century Rome, as long as you kept it to yourself. Even starting a commune in the heart of Rome where women worked with the poor appears to have been taken in stride. I mean, that’s just crazy kind of thing Christians do. It’s ridiculous, but whatever. Let them do it if they want. But when Paraskeva chose to go out into the world preaching the Gospel, that was something completely different. That was just asking for it. And indeed it was only a matter of time before somebody turned her over to the Emperor Antoninus Pius.

We are told that Antoninus was taken by Paraskeva’s beauty and intelligence and tried first to tempt her with an offer to become empress and rule at his side. But it was a short courtship, because when she refused, he instead chose torture her. Antoninus’ final torture was to put Paraskeva into a boiling cauldron of water. Like the three youth in the fiery furnace, the Lord protected his bride. Infuriated that Paraskeva was not burning, the emperor approached the cauldron. In some versions he is blinded by the steam, but in one version that I particularly liked it says that Paraskeva splashed some of the boiling water on him. “You don’t think this is hot? Here, why don’t you try some?” In either case, the emperor is blinded, pleas for help, and then at Paraskeva’s word he is healed. At this miracle, the emperor allows Paraskeva to go free.

Now free, Paraskeva does not retreat to her commune, but returns to her preaching and travels. As she preaches, Antoninus dies and a great plague begins to trouble the land. The new Emperor Marcus Aurelius decides to use an old trick and blame the Christians and their impiety. Paraskeva is again arrested by a regional governor and again released when the Lord protects her, this time from a pit of snakes. And then at last a third governor arrests her, and after a short time gives up on the torture and instead has her beheaded.

Paraskeva died the faithful bride of Christ in the year 140 and at her gravesite the lame have been made to walk, the blind have been made to see, and barren women have been made fertile. Even in the tomb this woman who had rejected worldly love and wealth has continued to give of her great bounty. “Rejoice, O barren one, for more are the children of the desolate than the children of she that has a husband. Forget the shame of thy youth, for your Maker is your husband.” The world teaches us that fulfillment and even salvation is to be found in romantic love, in a family and children, in a wife or a husband, in all that ancient Venus promised, but this is not the teaching of the Church. To God, it does not matter if you are married or single, true fertility, spiritual fertility, is found in service and in sacrifice and in each of our personal vocations. This is the lesson we should all take away from the life of St. Paraskeva. May St. Paraskeva pray to God for us as each of us strive to live the life our Lord and God and Savior Jesus Christ has granted us.

Amen.

The Reading from the Holy Gospel according to St. Mark. (10:32-45)
At that time, Jesus took His twelve Disciples, and began to tell them what was to happen to Him, saying, “Behold, we are going up to Jerusalem. And the Son of man will be delivered to the chief priests and the scribes, and they will condemn Him to death, and deliver Him to the Gentiles. And they will mock Him, and scourge Him, and spit upon Him, and kill Him; and after three days He will rise.” And James and John, the sons of Zebedee, came forward to Him, and said to Him, “Teacher, we would that thou shouldest do for us whatsoever we shall desire” And Jesus said to them, “What do you want Me to do for you?” And they said to Him, “Grant us to sit, one at Thy right hand and one at Thy left, in Thy glory.” But Jesus said to them, “You do not know what you are asking. Are you able to drink the cup that I drink, or to be baptized with the baptism with which I am baptized?” And they said to Him, “We are able.” And Jesus said to them, “The cup that I drink you will drink; and with the baptism with which I am baptized, you will be baptized. But to sit at My right hand or at My left is not Mine to grant, but it is for those for whom it has been prepared.” And when the ten heard it, they began to be indignant at James and John. And Jesus called them to Him and said to them, “You know that those who are supposed to rule over the Gentiles lord it over them, and their great men exercise authority over them. But it shall not be so among you; but whoever would be great among you must be your servant, and whoever would be first among you must be servant of all. For the Son of man also came not to be served but to serve, and to give His life as a ransom for many.”

“O Lord and Master of my life, give me not the spirit of sloth, meddling, lust for power and idle talk. But grant unto me, Thy servant, a spirit of integrity, humility, patience and love. Yea, O Lord and King, grant me to see mine own faults and not to condemn my brother or sister. For blessed art Thou unto the ages of ages. Amen.” This is the prayer, attributed to St. Ephrem, that we Orthodox pray all of Lent. And today, on the last Sunday of Lent, we are offered two different stories, both about people who struggled with lust for power and idle talk, and who eventually learned humility and love.

Let me begin with the story from our Gospel reading. In today’s reading from St. Mark Jesus tells his disciples, “Behold, we are going up to Jerusalem. And the Son of man will be delivered to the chief priests and the scribes, and they will condemn Him to death, and deliver Him to the Gentiles. And they will mock Him, and scourge Him, and spit upon Him, and kill Him; and after three days He will rise.” Now, as regularly happened, the disciples hear what they want to hear. Two weeks ago, Jesus began to teach these same things to the disciples, and we heard Peter rebuke his master, unable to accept that Jesus’ path to glory lead through suffering and death.

Today we get to hear two disciples make the opposite mistake. James and John hear these same teachings and seem miss the suffering and death part. They hear Jesus claim to be the Son of Man, the promised Messiah, and want to get some special reward for following him all the way. They figure they got in early, they were loyal, and they should end up in a special position. With this in mind, James and John approach Jesus and  ask to be seated with him in His glory, “one on Your right hand and the other on Your left.” Interestingly, when Matthew tells this same story, he places their request in the mouth of their mother. St. John Chrysostum suggests that “the request was theirs, and being ashamed, they put forward their mother.” I like this suggestion that James and John kind of knew they shouldn’t be asking this, but went ahead anyway. Or had their mom do it for them.

Jesus doesn’t say no right away, but being the good and patient teacher, he responds by asking if they can “drink the cup” that He will drink. This is their test. It’s like he’s asking, “Have you been listening? Have you heard what I’m telling you is just about to happen to me? Do you think you can do that with me?” And they fail this test, saying, “Sure we can, no problem.” The cup of which he speaks, of course, is the cross. It’s not that many days from now when Jesus will pray that his might Father this cup from him. We are told this cup makes “his soul very sorrowful, even unto death.” That which grieves the Son of God, James and John take here very lightly.

Jesus doesn’t even really scold them. Maybe the request is just so over the top that Jesus just decides its best to move on. Instead of scolding them for their pride, he in some way consoles them, telling them that they indeed will eventually drink the same cup, but it is not their time yet. “To sit at My right hand or at My left is not Mine to grant,” he says, “but it is for those for whom it has been prepared.” Of course, Jesus’ glory is the cross and the seats on his right and on his left will be taken by a pair of thieves. Neither James nor John are ready to drink of this cup. John will make it close, standing at the foot of the cross; James will flee and hide.

Perhaps to assure us that James and John were not alone in their misunderstanding, that all of the disciples were equally foolhardy, Mark tells us that the disciples “began to be greatly displeased with James and John.” So if James and John are displaying lust for power, then here we have a clear display of idle talk among the disciples.

It is not a pretty picture that is painted for us in this reading, so thank God the Church has another story to tell us this morning. This is the story of Fr. Zosimas and St. Mary of Egypt, quite simply one of the most compelling stories in the Orthodox Church.

The story begins with Fr. Zosimas in a place not completely unlike that of James, John, and the other disciples. Fr. Zosimas has been living the life of a monastic since his youth and he doesn’t hesitate to tell people about it. His biographer, St. Sophronius, tells us that: “Zosimas used to relate how, as soon as he was taken from his mother's breast, he was handed over to the monastery where he went through his training as an ascetic till he reached the age of 53.” He would go around telling people this about himself. And more than that, we are told that, “he began to be tormented with the thought that he was perfect in everything and needed no instruction from anyone, saying to himself mentally, ‘Is there a monk on earth who can be of use to me and show me a kind of asceticism that I have not accomplished? Is there a man to be found in the desert who has surpassed me?’” Notice, his biographer is not telling us that he is accomplished. His biographer is telling us that Fr. Zosimas thinks that he very accomplished. And he spends his time telling people about his accomplishments and thinking to himself about how perfect he is.

But an angel is sent to answer his seemingly rhetorical question, and tells him that indeed there is a monastery near the River Jordan where Fr. Zosimas might learn a thing or two. And to his credit, Fr. Zosimas listened to the angel and headed off to find this monastery.

It turned out that the monks at this new monastery were indeed “proficient in both action and contemplation” and Fr. Zosima was greatly inspired. When it came time for Lent, he learned the monks of this monastery spent their Lenten season alone in the wilderness. Their rule demanded that they take whatever they felt they might need for the journey and then spend their days alone in the wilderness. They were told that if they even caught sight of one another, they should move to a different part of the country. And then, when they would return, they we banned from talking about their experience. Their struggle was to be judged by God alone and they were not to “please men and fast before the eyes of all.” Fr. Sophronius tells us that it is for this practice that Fr. Zosima was sent to this particular monastery. And see how it so perfectly fit Fr. Zosima’s sins, his own lust for personal glory and idle talk were futile in this situation.

And so, it is not suprising that Fr. Zosimas struggles with this rule. We are told that in spite of the specific rule to speak with no one, Fr. Zosimas harbored in his heart a secret desire “of finding some father who might be living there and who might be able to satisfy his thirst and longing.” And so he sets out looking for this ideal teacher. And after 20 days alone in the desert, Fr. Zosimas finds a woman living alone in the desert, old, naked, skin burnt dark. He does not know what to think of her, but when she greets him by name he instantly recognizes her sanctity. He throws himself on the ground and begs for her blessing. He gives her his cloak and the two begin to talk. Fr. Zosima asks St. Mary to tell him her story. But where Fr. Zosima had always been so quick to tell people his life story, St. Mary is humble and resists for quite some time. But she finally relents, and it is then that Fr. Zosimas is granted the spirit of humility.

Mary had spent her early life as a true slave to sin. She would labor and beg alms in order to support her sinful lifestyle. On a whim, she fell in with a group of religious pilgrims heading to Jerusalem to celebrate the Feast of the Exaltation of the Precious and Life Giving Cross. She joined their pilgrimage with the specific intention of leading the pilgrims into sin for her own amusement. When they arrived at their destination, the pilgrims all went to enter the Church of the Holy Cross. It was there a mysterious force refused her entrance. At that moment, when she was told no, she found herself suddenly seized by a desire to see the True Cross. Seeing an icon of the Mother of God hanging outside the Church, she prayed in earnest for the first time in her life. She related to Fr. Zosima: “And so it was I saw the lifegiving Cross. I saw too the Mysteries of God and how the Lord accepts repentance. Throwing myself on the ground, I worshipped that holy earth and kissed it with trembling. Then I came out of the church and went to her who had promised to be my security, to the place where I had sealed my vow. And bending my knees before the Virgin Mother of God, I addressed to her such words as these: ‘O loving Lady, thou hast shown me thy great love for all men. Glory to God Who receives the repentance of sinners through thee. What more can I recollect or say, I who am so sinful? It is time for me, O Lady to fulfill my vow, according to thy witness. Now lead me by the hand along the path of repentance!’” The Virgin Mary had instructed St. Mary to go here and live beyond the Jordan. And here she had stayed for 47 years.

As they spent time together St. Mary continued to amaze Fr. Zosimas. She cited scripture even though she had never read it; she floated above the ground as she prayed; she knew the rules of Fr. Zosimas’ monastery even though she had never visited it. Fr. Zosimas considered it a strict rule that he and his fellow monks spent forty days in the wilderness alone; St. Mary had lived alone in this desert for 47 years. As he finally departed, St. Mary made one request. On the following year, would Fr. Zosimas bring her communion? He agrees and does this the following year. And shortly thereafter she dies. When Fr. Zosimas goes to bury her, he does not have tools with him and is unable. A desert lion comes and helps him dig the grave.

Fr. Zosimas had lived a life of strict asceticism, but this unlearned lay woman proved herself worthy of becoming his teacher. In many details, St. Mary is described as having returned to the Edenic state. She is living naked in the wilderness, sustaining herself on fruits and herbs. As she leaves after their first meeting, Fr. Zosimas witnesses her speaking directly with the Lord. And when she passes away, it is a lion that comes to dig her grave. Thus, we begin Lent with the story of a man and a woman, Adam and Eve, cast out of a garden because of their pride. And then we end Lent with this story of another man and woman, this time Sts. Zosimas and Mary, showing us the path back to paradise, the path of repentance, repentance that teaches us humility and love.

His Eminence Metropolitan JOSEPH has been inspired by the story of St. Mary of Egypt when thinking and writing about how we should deal with the coronavirus outbreak. Two of his recent letters remind us that these monks so long ago separated themselves from the Eucharist for all of Lent, leaving behind a few clergy in the monastery to conduct the services. This is an exact image of what we are doing today, except we are not experienced ascetics. And so we need our crutches – we are praying together on Zoom and on Facebook live. Experienced ascetics might be able to go into the desert and pray for days on end by themselves, but we need the help of the choirs and icons and candles and incense and most of all our communities. I’m really enjoying checking in with everybody in our little community and hearing about all the different services we’ve attended during our weekly Zoom coffee hours.

This is a great labor we are being called to take on, but we aren’t the only ones being asked to go above and beyond the call of duty. We are all so grateful for the hard work that our nurses and doctors and other first responders are doing to combat this new and strange foe. And how about the workers at your local carry-out restaurants, grocery stores, hardware stores, pharmacies, and delivery workers. Did any of them know when they signed up that they would one day be serving on the front lines of what is likely the most defining battle of this decade? Please remember to be patient with them, offer them a smile – or maybe a wink or a thumbs up if you’re wearing a mask – and most of all thank them for being there to provide you those essential services.

Like Sts. Mary and Zosimas we find ourselves in a desert. You might call it a social desert. And I am so proud of our little community here in Davenport as, like St. Mary, I watch you work to transform this strange new desert into a paradise. Earlier this Lent - it seems like ages ago, now - we helped a local friend pay his bills so that his family’s water would not be shut off on him and his family. This friend has since lost some of his work during this crisis, one of his jobs was at a sit down restaurant that has closed, but when I last checked he repeated his gratitude to you and thinks he is currently is in a good place.

We have also raised money to buy water for Humility Homes and Services, who are currently seeing an increased need for their services. Additionally, their work has been made more complicated because they are unable to use their normal facilities with the increased CDC and HUD requirements. This show of love and support from our little community is very welcome in this difficult time.

What a wonder it is to see this fruit springing up in this desert! We have always been a community concerned with the care of our neighbors, but to see such an increased fervor from you in this time of increased trial is truly inspiring to me. Your love is actively transforming this desert into a paradise.

We are told that after his experience with St. Mary in the desert, Fr. Zosimas returned to the monastery, instituted many of the reforms she had suggested, and is remembered today as St. Zosimas. And St. James and St. John may not have ended up at the right and left hand of Jesus on that terrible day, but they did ultimately follow their Lord. We are told that St. James spread the Gospel as far as Spain before returning home to Jerusalem and his own martyrdom. And St. John went on to write the fourth Gospel and multiple epistles before he was ultimately exiled to die on the island of Patmos.

Next week, our Lenten journey will be over and Holy Week will begin. Most of us will be physically standing in our homes, but our hearts will nonetheless arrive along with the other disciples in Bethany, just a couple miles from Jerusalem, at the graveside of our Lord’s beloved friend Lazarus. And with the cry of “Lazarus come forth!” Jesus will show himself to Lord and Master of all, even of Death and Hades. May that same Lord and King grant us the humility, patience, and love we need to survive the coming weeks and months, and most of all to help us not to judge our brothers and sisters, for he alone is blessed unto the ages of ages. Amen.

ST. PAUL'S LETTER TO THE HEBREWS 4:14-16; 5:1-6
BRETHREN, since we have a high priest who has passed through the heavens, Jesus, the Son of God, let us hold fast our confession. For we have not a high priest who is unable to sympathize with our weaknesses, but one who in every respect has been tempted as we are, yet without sin. Let us then with confidence draw near to the throne of grace, that we may receive mercy and find grace to help in time of need. For every high priest chosen from among men is appointed to act on behalf of men in relation to God, to offer gifts and sacrifices for sin. He can deal gently with the ignorant and wayward, since he himself is beset with weakness. Because of this he is bound to offer sacrifice for his own sins as well as for those of the people. And one does not take the honor upon himself, but he is called by God, just as Aaron was. So also Christ did not exalt himself to be made a high priest, but was appointed by him who said to him, "Thou art my Son, today I have begotten thee"; as he says also in another place, "Thou art a priest for ever, after the order of Melchizedek."

MARK 8:34-38; 9:1
The Lord said: "If anyone wishes to come after me, let him deny himself and take up his cross and follow me. For whoever would save his life will lose it; and whoever loses his life for my sake and the gospel's will save it. For what does it profit a man, to gain the whole world and forfeit his life? For what can a man give in return for his life? For whoever is ashamed of me and my words in this adulterous and sinful generation, of him will the Son of man also be ashamed, when he comes in the glory of his Father with the holy angels." And he said to them, "Truly, I say to you, there are some standing here who will not taste death before they see the kingdom of God come with power.”

Today is a remarkably appropriate time to be asked to say something about the cross. Right now, in the middle of this COVID-19 crisis we have all been enduring a very difficult few weeks with many more likely to come. Any time you venture from your home, things just feel off. Businesses are shut down; the road traffic and foot traffic are sparse; events are cancelled; grocery store shelves are empty. And heaven forbid that you or someone in your family is sick, with COVID-19 or with anything else. The medical system is under great duress at this time. These are all very real crosses. And so it is pertinent that right here, in the middle of this COVID-19 crisis, the Church presents with this, the Sunday of the Holy Cross.

Today we hear Christ say to the multitudes, “If anyone wishes to come after me, let him deny himself and take up his cross and follow me.” If you want to call yourself a Christian, these are Jesus’ instructions – deny yourself, take up your cross, and follow Him. These are very difficult instructions. Jesus is not telling you to wear your cross necklace. He is saying that to follow him will mean to bear some very real crosses. I would like to talk right now about what this might mean for us today. I will start by offering a little context for these instructions from the Gospel of St. Mark.

These instructions are set in the Gospel of Mark immediately following two of Peter’s most famous interactions with Jesus. The first is likely remembered as St. Peter’s proudest moment. Jesus asks his disciples who people are saying that he is, and they answer that people seem to think he is the second coming of John the Baptist, or Elijah, or one of the great prophets of old. He then asks his disciples who they say that he is and Peter blurts out, “You are the Christ!” Peter says here what all the disciples are thinking, or at least what they were likely hoping: “You are the long promised Messiah, the Christ, the Annointed One of God, sent to save Israel from her oppressors!” Jesus tells his disciples that they should keep this information to themselves, but at this time begins to explain to them what being the messiah is really all about. Mark says that Jesus explains that the Messiah, “must suffer many things, and be rejected of the elders, and the chief priests, and scribes, and be killed, and after three days rise again.”

This teaching, of course, leads to one of Peter’s lowest moments. Not his very lowest, but close. This messiah Jesus is talking about is not the messiah Peter had been hoping for. Suffering? Rejection? Death? These were the things the messiah was supposed to end, not endure! And so Peter pulls Jesus aside to tell him just this.  We are told he rebukes Jesus. Imagine the disciple so bold as to rebuke his master. And Jesus reacts to this quite strongly, saying, “Get behind me, Satan.” He adds that Peter is not setting his mind “on the things of God, but on the things of humanity!”

We are told that Jesus then goes further, not just rebuking Peter, but gathering a crowd and telling them, “If anyone wishes to come after me, let him deny himself and take up his cross and follow me. For whoever would save his life will lose it; and whoever loses his life for my sake and the gospel's will save it.” This great teaching he offers to the masses, because Peter is clearly not ready to accept it.

None of the disciples understood that the way of the Christ would be the way of the cross, at least not yet. It would much later before they began to fully understand this mystery. In the Revelation of St. John, Christ is envisioned as “the lamb slain before time.” Take a moment to consider this image. Christ is not the lamb slain in the year 33. He is the lamb slain before time. For the Church, the crucifixion is not simply an event that happened to the Son of God on a day 2000 years ago, it is the final and full revelation of who the Son of God was, is, and always will be.

St. Peter was not ready to let Jesus take up his cross, and he was certainly not ready to take up his own alongside him. And none of us should stand in judgement. How many of us would be ready to take on such a challenge? Right now so many in our country are so very afraid. What we face today is a very real cross, both the virus itself and the many hardships coming in its wake. So what does this notion of denying ourselves look like for us today? What does it mean for our interactions with our neighbors? With our co-workers? With complete strangers in the grocery stores?

It would be pretty normal at this point, especially since the Sunday of the Holy Cross always falls right here in the middle of Lent, for me to discuss some of those crosses we voluntarily take upon ourselves during this season. By this I refer to the ascetic endeavors prescribed by the Church for our benefit – prayer, fasting, alms giving. The founders of our faith often refer to these in association with the notion of voluntarily picking up our crosses. In each of these acts we intentionally turn our backs to the things of this world and take the extra time, energy, and resources to strive for the world to come.

But, of course, we know all too well right now that not all crosses are chosen. In fact, the founders of our faith suggest that it is the unbidden crosses that can be even more beneficial to us. I would like to talk a little bit today about what they mean.

There is a quote from St. Mark the Ascetic that has always meant a lot to me: “Distress reminds the wise of God, but crushes those who forget Him. Let all involuntary suffering teach you to remember God, and you will not lack occasion for repentance.” I find this true in myself. It often takes distress for me to remember God. It is easy for me to forget God when life is good. So what will we do in the face of this crisis? Will we let this involuntary suffering help us to remember God? Will we transform this COVID-19 crisis into an occasion for repentance?

St. Mark wrote in another place: “The mercy of God is hidden in sufferings that are not of our choice, and if we accept such sufferings patiently, they bring us to repentance.” Again we hear sufferings are a call to repentance, this time with an emphasis on the virtue of patience in the face of trial. St. Isaac the Syrian also wrote of the importance of virtue in the face of trial: “In proportion to your humility you are given patience in your woes; and in proportion to your patience the burden of your afflictions is made lighter and you will find consolation; in proportion to your consolation, your love of God increases; and in proportion to your love, your joy in the Holy Spirit is magnified.” I can’t help but think of Yoda in the Phantom Menace when I read this passage, “Fear leads to anger, anger leads to hate, hate leads to suffering.” St. Isaac is here offering up the opposite path: Humility leads to patience, patience leads to love, love leads to joy. This path to “joy in the Holy Spirit” begins with humility.

In Paul’s letter to the Hebrews, the assigned epistle reading for today, Paul talks about Jesus’ humility. He suggests that Jesus, the son of God, is particularly qualified to act as priest on our behalf, not because he is God, but specifically because he became human. He explains that when priests are chosen it is their weaknesses that allow them to function properly. He wrote, “Every high priest who is chosen from among the people…can deal gently with the ignorant and the wayward, since they themselves are beset with weakness. Because of this they are bound to offer sacrifice for their own sins as well as for those of the people.” Priests function properly, in Paul’s estimation, not because they are better than other people, but because they share the same weaknesses of those they represent. Thus, Paul says, in Christ “we have a high priest who is able to sympathize with our weaknesses, one who in every respect has been tempted as we are, yet without sin.” Christ is showing us the way of the cross, the way that begins in humility.

Jesus was born in humble circumstances and died in the most despicable of ways. He lived his life without a place to lay his head, taking nothing, giving everything. This is the humble messiah that Peter, when he was yet the disciple, when he was yet learning, was not ready to accept. What transformed Peter the unready disciple into St. Peter the Apostle who ultimately embraced his own very real cross?

We discussed Jesus’ rebuke of Peter and you might think that such a stern rebuke from your Master, from that man you thought was the messiah, would be enough, but it was not. In just a few weeks we will hear of Peter at the last supper proclaiming, “Even if I should die with you, I will not deny you.” There is Peter the disciple, still so proud. And then, in spite of his boasting, we will learn that he denies Jesus three times. Peter is humiliated by this. We are told that he weeps when he realized what he has done.

And it is after this ultimate humiliation, in the last chapter of the last Gospel, the Gospel of St. John, we are given a beautiful scene of Peter, the failed disciple, coming face to face with his master. Peter has returned to fishing. He is right back where we first met him at the beginning of the Gospels, but he is not unchanged. Jesus calls to the disciples from the shore. Peter doesn’t even recognize him. He needs to be told by another disciple who it is. But the moment he is told, he leaps into the sea and wades to shore.

There Jesus asks Peter to profess his love. Peter does so, and Jesus asks him to do it again. He does, and then Jesus asks him to do it a third time. We are told that on the third questioning Peter’s heart was grieved. He was embarrassed. But in this moment St. Peter the Apostle is revealed. This St.Peter is not too proud to learn his lesson. He professes his love a third time. Jesus blesses this humble response with a prophesy: “Truly, truly I say unto you, when you were young, thou dressed yourself, and walked wherever you wanted: but when you are old, you will stretch forth your hands, and another shall dress you, and carry you where you won’t want to go.” Jesus is prophesying how Peter will ultimately die in the same way as his master. In his humility, Peter has shown that he is finally ready to walk the way of the cross. And what prepared him for this? Failure. Grief. Suffering. It is these difficult experiences that gave Peter his broken and contrite heart, a heart prepared for the Holy Spirit to enter on Pentecost.

So our country, at this moment, is facing a cross. For some of us, tragically, this will indeed mean sickness and death. Let us pray that through our vigilance this number remains small. For the rest of us this will hours of worry, fear, isolation, financial hardship, anxiety, loneliness. So many crosses needing to be borne. What we do with them is our choice. We can meet these crosses with pride, thinking we know more than the authorities and the specialists; we can meet these crosses with selfishness and impatience, thinking our wants and needs are more important than those of our neighbors; we can meet them with callousness, thinking that the inconveniences of the many outweigh the sickness and death of the few. Or, we can pick up those crosses. We can make these extra hours in isolation a time for prayer and meditation. We can fast by hoarding less for ourselves and leaving a little more food on the grocery store shelves for those who come after. We can see the suffering and needs of our neighbors and take up those opportunities to give of ourselves and to show love. Isaiah tells us that this is always the fast that is pleasing to God – to feed the hungry, to shelter the poor, to clothe the naked – and this Lenten season is no different.

2020 can be remembered as the year that COVID-19 ruined Lent. Or, with effort, this can become the Lent that transformed our lives, our communities, and perhaps even our nation. The choice is set before us. The same choice that was set before those men and women so many years ago: the choice to deny ourselves, to take up our crosses, and to follow our Lord and God and Savior Jesus Christ, to who be all glory, honor, and worship forever. Amen.

LUKE 19:1-10
At that time, Jesus was passing through Jericho. And there was a man named Zacchaios; he was a chief collector, and rich. And he sought to see who Jesus was, but could not, on account of the crowd, because he was small of stature. So he ran on ahead and climbed up into a sycamore tree to see him, for he was to pass that way. And when Jesus came to the place, he looked up and said to him, "Zacchaios, make haste and come down; for I must stay at your house today." So he made haste and came down, and received him joyfully. And when they saw it they all murmured, "He has gone in to be the guest of a man who is a sinner." And Zacchaios stood and said to the Lord, "Behold, Lord, the half of my goods I give to the poor; and if I have defrauded any one of anything, I restore it fourfold." And Jesus said to him, "Today salvation has come to this house, since he also is a son of Abraham. For the Son of man came to seek and to save the lost."

I was very into the Lord of the Rings as a kid, long before most people even knew what it was. Only the real geeks read that stuff, those strange books about the dwarves, the elves, and the hobbits. And it felt a little odd when they finally made the books into a series of blockbuster movies, and suddenly most people, even those who never bothered to watch them, knew what a hobbit was. Those books, especially the main three, were never really children’s literature, but I think if found them so approachable when I was young because of the hobbits. As a child, it is easy to see yourself in their shoes. Well, in their furry feet – because hobbits don’t wear shoes.

I remember reading in an interview with Tolkien that he got much of his inspiration for the hobbits – those pint-sized people who liked to eat, drink, and get into all kinds of mischief – from his own children. And as a fellow parent of four, I can see where he was coming from. I sometimes feel like I’ve been living in the Shire for the past 15 years.

Those stories of Middle Earth are full of elven warriors, powerful princes, trolls, dwarves, dragons, and myriad other creatures ever more strange and dangerous. But none of those great warriors and princes are ultimately able to save Middle Earth. Rather all the machinations of these great and evil powers are ultimately undone by the work of this little, childlike race of hobbits. There is something very wonderful about that narrative, the small and the weak overcoming the large and powerful. And that’s likely why it’s a relatively common literary device. Think of the spider in Charlotte’s Web, the little tailor, jack and the beanstalk, the mouse and the lion; there is something that makes our hearts swell when we hear about the lowly, the innocent, the childlike, overcoming the great, the evil, and the powerful.

The bible loves to use this device as well. We think immediately of the young David overcoming the giant Goliath; of Gideon’s small army standing up to the Midianites; we think of the slave-born Moses standing up to the Pharaoh. And because of this, I think when Zacchaeus is introduced to us in today’s story as being small in stature, we might be excused if we are a bit pre-disposed to recognize a potential protagonist. But other than single this note regarding his diminutive size, the initial description of Zacchaeus actually pushes us in the opposite direction. Zacchaeus is described as a chief tax collector and very wealthy. It was just one chapter earlier in the Gospel of Luke that Jesus had confronted the rich prince and had lamented to his disciples that it is harder for a camel to squeeze through the eye of a needle than for the wealthy to enter into the kingdom of heaven. So, sure, he’s a little guy. But there is a lot wrong with him.

So, if we start with a bit of mixed image, the behavior of this rich and powerful little man doesn’t help clear it up. Because as we are introduced to Zacchaeus, he is scrambling around just trying to get a look at Jesus. We immediately ask ourselves what is this chief of the sinners doing trying to get a glimpse of Jesus? And then his behavior becomes even more inexplicable. When he can’t see, because the crowd is too tall, he scrambles up a nearby tree. Why would this wealthy man behave like this?

And here’s where I’d like to suggest that Zacchaeus may share more than a little of the hobbits’ literary DNA. Luke describes Zacchaeus as mikros which was translated this morning as short, but it is exactly the same word Jesus uses when he instructs his disciples to “allow the littles ones to come unto me.” Luke is not saying Zacchaeus is a child, but I think his word choice here allows us to see something child-like in Zacchaeus’ behavior. After all, climbing trees is also a very childlike behavior.

So, why is Zacchaeus climbing that tree? Why do children climb trees? They climb trees for no reason at all, right? They climb trees for the love of the tree, for the excitement of the height, and because the sky is always so much more beautiful when seen through the topmost branches of a good climbing tree. Kids climb trees for the wonder of what they might find. And that is exactly why Zacchaeus climbed his tree – for the wonder of seeing Jesus. He had nothing to ask of Jesus, he just wanted to see him. And it is this simple act, performed with a pure heart, that catches Jesus’ attention. Blessed are the pure in heart for they shall see God.

Thus, out of all the people swarming Jesus that day as he came into Jericho, Jesus choose this man, this little Zacchaeus, this chief of sinners, to lodge with. And notice Jesus doesn’t ask if it’s okay, he demands a place to stay. Jesus speaks to Zacchaeus like a parent would to his child, or like a lord to his servant – “Get down here immediately! I will be staying in your house today.” And Zacchaeus did not demand to be recognized as the powerful man that he was. He was not offended. Instead Zacchaeus responded just like a child, like a servant. He scrambles down the tree just as he was told and receives Jesus into his home with joy.

This story is the last one Luke tells before he tells us of Jesus’ entrance into Jerusalem. Jerusalem will also welcome Jesus with great joy, receive him as their king. But that joy will not remain for long as Jerusalem and those who are in power there turn against their Lord and ultimately shout, “Crucify him!” Even here in Jericho we see foreshadowing of humanity’s looming betrayal. Luke tells us that, “when they saw this they all murmured, ‘He has gone in to be the guest of a man who is a sinner.’”

But if we suspect that Zacchaeus may also be offering a superficial reception, the story shows us right away that this is not the case. Jesus was not mistaken when he had recognized great potential in Zacchaeus. Almost as if to prove the murmurers wrong, Zacchaeus immediately proclaims his repentance for all he has ever done. And this is not a lip service repentance, but the real deal. In front of all, Zacchaeus leaves everything behind.

“Wait!” the bean counters among you are saying. I was paying attention! He only gave half of his stuff away. And if that is what you heard, you are listening with modern ears. And I’ll admit that I heard it that way until I was preparing for today’s sermon. And I ran into many sermons trying to figure out this dilemma, of why Jesus tells the rich prince to give away everything and then seems so pleased when Zacchaeus gives away half. So don’t feel bad, you’re not alone. Today being a tax collector is a legitimate occupation. You can work for the IRS and make a decent wage without stealing from anyone. It’s like being an accountant. There is nothing inherently sinful about being a tax collector.

But when you start to read pre-modern sources, they have a very different view of tax collecting. Tax collectors were given a territory and an amount by their lord. They then went household to household collecting as much as they could. The only way a tax collector earned money was by collecting more than he needed. So by ancient standards, any money Zacchaeus had, and certainly any wealth he had accumulated, was considered ill-gotten gain. St. Theophylact, writing in the 11th century, reflects this older understanding when he writes: “Publicans get their livelihood from the tears of the poor.” So when these readers hear Zacchaeus offer to pay back four times what he had stolen, they immediately realize that he is offering to pay back his entire estate four times over.

The other detail worth noting is that when Zacchaeus is offering to pay back at a rate of four-to-one, he is intentionally citing the Old Testament law. For instance, in Exodus, if you were caught stealing one of your neighbor’s sheep, you owed him four sheep in return. So what we should also recognize in this proclamation is a two-step declaration. Zacchaeus is both proclaiming his intention to fulfill the law of Moses by paying back anyone he cheated four times over. And then he is also recognizing the law of Christ, in fact placing it first, by taking half his estate and giving it to the poor.

St. Theophylact describes it this way, “Even if we consider this with exactness, we will see how he has nothing left of his estate. For he gives half of his estate to the poor, and only half remains with him. Of this remaining half, he again gives four times to those he offended. Therefore, if the life of this elder of the tax collectors consisted of untruths, and he returns four times for everything that he acquired by untruth, then look how he lost everything. In this respect, he turns out to be philosophically above the Law, a disciple of the Gospel, since he loved his neighbor more than himself.”

This promise to give away his entire estate four times over was not, of course, the work of a moment. This would be the work of a lifetime. And it was. Indeed, the Church tells us that Zacchaeus went on to be a disciple, an apostolic traveling companion of Peter, and eventually bishop of Caesarea in Palestine. This is doubtless why his name is remembered by the Church, and that of the rich prince is long forgotten.

I think this is the point. When Luke tells the story of the rich prince in chapter 18 and then Zacchaeus in chapter 19, I think it is so we might compare the two. See how the wealthy prince approaches Jesus in an attempt to justify himself. And how different he is from Zacchaeus, who approached Jesus just to see Jesus! The prince tells us that he has kept the law from his youth up, but when Jesus tells him that to inherit the heavenly kingdom he must give all that he has to the poor, the rich prince leaves sorrowful because he finds this task too much to bear. But Zacchaeus, that miraculous Zacchaeus, even though he had flaunted the law his entire life, chooses in a moment to abandon all without a single instruction from Christ. Luke begins this literary diptych by making it absolutely clear that the burden of wealth can make it nearly impossible for the rich to inherit the kingdom of heaven, and then he concludes it by showing us that nothing – absolutely nothing – is impossible with God!

St. John Chrysostum has a very descriptive passage talking about how Zacchaeus prepares for Jesus’ visit. I think it will help us figure out what we are to make of this story. If you’re like me, you don’t spend your days worrying about what to do with your overabundant wealth. But Chrysostum makes this story pertinent to all of us when he writes: “Zacchaeus did not run to his neighbors asking to borrow curtains, and extra seats, and chairs made of ivory, he didn’t bring out luxurious hangings from his closets; but instead he adorned his home with adornments suitable to Christ. With what? Giving half his goods to the poor and restoring fourfold to those he had robbed.  In this way let us too adorn our houses, so that Christ may enter into us also. These acts are the fair curtains wrought in heaven, they are woven there. And where these curtains are, there also is the King of Heaven.”

For St. John Chrysostum, we must prepare for Jesus as if he is coming to our house today, for indeed he already stands at the door knocking. Have you set a place for him? Readied his room? He’s not concerned with the age of your couch or the size of your TV or the quality of your food. None of these things are how he will judge you or your home. He is inviting you to join him for a spiritual banquet. And Zacchaeus shows us just how to prepare for such a feast. Acts of charity, mercy, and justice are the decorations that Jesus is hoping to see laid out on our table and adorning the walls of our hearts. It is the contrite heart that is the sacrifice acceptable to God.

Are these the items we have prepared? Or are we secretly hoping to have our cake and eat it too, to have pleasure on this earth and in heaven as well? This is not the feast Jesus is hoping to find, it is just the opposite – “He who saves their own life,” Jesus taught, “will lose it; while they who lose their life for my sake, will gain it.” And it is with this question that I will leave you. Are we going to be like the rich prince, keeping the law in hopes that the Lord will in the end allow us to keep our lives? Or will we be like the little Zacchaeus? Will we be brave enough to offer up the entirety of our heart and our soul and our mind to our neighbors, just as if it is to our Lord and God and Savior Jesus Christ, to whom be all glory, honor, and worship forever. Amen.

Permalink

ST. PAUL'S LETTER TO THE EPHESIANS 4:7-13
BRETHREN, grace was given to each of us according to the measure of Christ's gift. Therefore it is said, "When he ascended on high he led a host of captives, and he gave gifts to men." (in saying, "He ascended," what does it mean but that he had also descended into the lower parts of the earth? He who descended is he who also ascended far above all the heavens, that he might fill all things.) And his gifts were that some should be apostles, some prophets, some evangelists, some pastors and teachers, to equip the saints for the work of ministry, for building up the body of Christ, until we all attain to the unity of the faith and of the knowledge of the Son of God, to mature manhood, to the measure of the stature of the fullness of Christ.

As most of you know, I’m the father of four. The youngest of them is ten now, so I don’t have babies in my home anymore, but babies are definitely something I am very familiar with. In fact, there was a time when a few of them were babies all at once. That was a really special time in our home. I remember setting them up in high chairs, Beth being to patient with them, begging them to open their mouths and to eat, working to diligently to get just a single spoonful of food into their mouths. I, on the other hand, would just plop the bowl of food down in front of them, figuring, “Hey, if they’re hungry, they’ll eat.”  And if you’ve spent any time with babies at all, you know what happened next. My kids, like babies everywhere, proceeded to smear their food all over their high chairs, their clothes, their faces, the walls, and just about everywhere they could, everywhere except for the one place it was intended to go – into their mouths. I suspect that even to this day, a decade or more later, if you took a scraper to our dining room ceiling, you’d still find traces of sweet potato puree up there.

That’s the kind of craziness that we expect from babies, but we would never expect that behavior from adults. So it should be shocking when Christ tells someone like Nicodemus that he must be reborn in order to see the kingdom of God. Or when Jesus tells his disciples that “except you convert and become as little children, you will not enter into the kingdom of heaven.” We have heard these phrases so often that perhaps the shock value has worn off. But if we read closely, we can still hear the confusion in Nicodemus’ reply – “How can an old man be born again? Can he enter his mother’s womb a second time?”

Interestingly, when we hear phrases like “repent,” “convert,” “be born again,” we tend to think of these ideas as synonymous with salvation. But that’s not the case. All of these phrases simply describe a part of salvation, the very first steps. Baby steps, if you will. Salvation is meant to be understood as much more than this.

You begin to see this when writers such as St. Paul and St. Peter take up this metaphor of spiritual babies. For instance, both of them suggest in different places that their followers are being nursed on “milk” like babies and are not yet ready for the “strong meat” that would be fed to spiritual adults. To give an example, Paul says to the Corinthians, “And I spoke unto you as babes in Christ. I have fed you with milk, and not with meat: for you were not able to bear it, and you are still not able.” There are similar passages in Hebrews and 1 Peter. There are also many passages where Paul refers to his followers as children, for instance in Galatians 4 or in Ephesians 4, the source of today’s epistle reading. Today’s reading from Paul’s letter to the Ephesians ended with, “till we all attain unto the unity of the faith, and of the knowledge of the Son of God, as unto a full grown man, unto the measure of the stature of the fullness of Christ.” If we would have read just a few more words, those words would have been, “so that we may no longer be like children.” Paul is calling on the Ephesians to stop acting like spiritual children and grow into the full stature of Jesus Christ.

In these passages Paul and Peter are instructing those who are like children to grow up, while Jesus seems to be telling those around him to become like children. Are Jesus and his Apostles contradicting one another? Not at all. There is actually a great synergy between their teaching, though it can be a bit obscured by the translation. The truth is Jesus tells people to grow up all the time, it’s just not translated that way.

The Greek word that is a bit difficult to translate here is teleios. It is the word in today’s epistle translated as “full grown” – where Paul calls on his readers to become “full grown” adults. “Full grown” is a reasonable translation of the word, especially here with it is juxtaposed with the instruction not to be “like a child.” But because of this word choice, it can be difficult for us to associate it with Jesus’ teachings. It is hard to call to mind any famous sayings of Jesus that talk about growing up. But in truth Jesus uses the word teleios all the time. It’s just normally translated as “perfect.”

So, when the rich young ruler says to Jesus that he has kept all the commandments from his youth up, and Jesus challenges him to go farther, he tells him, “If you would be perfect, sell all that you have and give it to the poor, take up your cross, and follow me.” We hear “be perfect” and think that Jesus is giving him more rules to follow, that following the law is not quite perfect enough, but if he follows a few more rules, then he will be perfect. In truth, Jesus is saying that if he has indeed already been keeping the commandments, then by doing this he has been taking his first baby steps. But if he would like to become full grown, if he would like to be teleios, he should take on the ascetic behaviors of selling all that he has and giving it to the poor. By doing this, he would be taking up his cross and beginning to mature toward the full stature of Jesus Christ.

We find another example where Jesus tells his disciples to be “full grown” in the instruction to “be perfect as your Father in heaven is perfect.” In this case, you can see where “full grown” is a difficult translation. How could you think of God, who is eternally the same, as being “full grown.” So, is “perfect” the better translation? Maybe Paul in Ephesians is just calling us to become a perfect man, and the translation “full grown” is what is off.

Well, first, I must say that many translations actually do make that choice, but this in some ways also misleading. This is because the English word “perfect” is not really spot on, either. Teleios is a very specific kind of perfection. Teleios is the kind of perfection that an object achieves by reaching its telos, its goal, purpose, or end. Thus when a fruit is teleios, it is ripe; a child is teleios when it becomes an adult; the construction of a building is teleios when it is complete. If the Greek hamartia, which we translate as sin, actually means something like missing the mark, then to be teleios is its opposite, it means to hit the mark. And this is the message that Jesus and his apostles are driving at: We have strayed from the path, we are missing the mark, we need to turn around, get back on the path, and make our way toward our telos, that perfect purpose for which we were each created.

With this in mind, the idea of becoming “perfect as your Father in heaven is perfect” becomes much more approachable. We tend to hear in this pharse that “you need to be just as perfect as God,” but that is obviously impossible. A better understanding of the phrase would be something like “grow up to be like your Father, who is perfect, because you were created in his image.” Indeed, this is the Orthodox teaching on the goal of humanity. Humanity was created for unity with God. St. John of Damascus wrote that man was created in such a way that “in the present life, his life is ordered like an animal’s, but in the age to come, he is changed…and becomes deified.” St. Basil also succinctly captures this idea when he described humanity as “a creature who has been given a commandment to become God.”

St. Markarios has a longer passage on this thought, that even references today’s epistle. He writes: “As the new-born child is the image of the full-grown man, so the soul is in a certain sense the image of God who created it. The child, upon growing up, begins gradually to recognize its father, and when it reaches maturity, they manage things mutually and equally, father with the son and son with the father, and the father’s wealth is disclosed to the son. Something similar should have happened to the soul. Before the fall, the soul was to have progressed and so as to have attained full manhood. But through the fall the soul was plunged into a sea of forgetfulness, into an abyss of delusion, and dwelt within the gates of hell….If you want to return to yourself and to recover your original glory, which you lost through your disobedience…then you must now have done with the devil whom you obeyed and turn towards the Lord.” We hear in that passage how Adam, and then each one of us, was created to grow up into the image of our Father, but that we have each of us strayed in our own way. St. Markarios then calls on us to repent if we wish to return to our original glory.

All of these teachers are in their own way describing the Orthodox understanding of “be perfect as your Father in heaven is perfect.” God, or likeness to God, is the purpose for which humanity was created. Our soul reaches maturity when it becomes like God. God is humanities telos. Adam failed at that purpose, he disobeyed, he missed the mark, and each of us has done the same ever since. But Jesus Christ did not miss the mark. He was able to say, “I and my Father are one,” and that, “He who has seen me has seen the Father.” He was in every way the image of His Father. In his humanity, he is that which Adam was intended to be and that which we are called to become.

So we are each of us is called to be born again, to become spiritual babies and children. But this conversion is just the beginning of our salvation. In converting and becoming like children we able to re-start the journey of Adam in the Garden, and rather than following the example of our forefather, we are called on to follow in the footsteps of Jesus Christ. This is the teaching of Jesus and of Paul and of Peter and John, and of all those Orthodox writers who follow them like St. John of Damascus, St. Markarios, St. Basil, and so many others.

There are two more points I would like to draw from today’s epistle reading. With this shift in our understanding of what is meant by “perfect,” we can begin to see that perfect is not a one-size-fits-all concept. This is why Jesus tells the rich man that he needs to sell all he has, while he tells the lawyer that he needs to expand his definition of neighbor. They have left the path in different ways and need different directions if they are to make it back. Not only do we hear in scripture of diversity in failures, we also hear about diversity in gifts. For instance in today’s epistle reading we heard: “And his gifts were that some should be apostles, some prophets, some evangelists, some pastors and teachers, to equip the saints for the work of ministry, for building up the body of Christ.” Each one of us has a different telos, a different purpose or goal, and thus a different perfection. For the body has not just one member, but many. Paul takes this metaphor of the body even further in his first letter to the Corinthians, asking, “If the foot shall say, Because I am not the hand, I am not part of the body; is it therefore not part of the body? And if the ear shall say, Because I am not the eye, I am not part of the body; is it therefore not part of the body? If the whole body were an eye, where would be the hearing? If the whole were hearing, where would be the smelling? But now God has set the members every one of them in the body, as it has pleased him….That there should be no schism in the body; but that the members should have the same care one for another. And when one member suffers, all the members suffer; and when one member is honored, all the members rejoice with it.” We are each of us given different roles, and to fulfill those many, various roles is our path to perfection. We are indeed called to return to our “original glory,” but that does not mean that this “original glory” is identical in each of us.

This illustration of the body also subtly suggests the final point I would like to highlight. Growing into “the stature of the fullness of Christ” is not something we can do alone. This was also hinted at in today’s letter to the Ephesians. St. Paul says we “must attain to the unity of the faith and of the knowledge of the Son of God” in order to achieve “mature manhood, to the measure of the stature of the fullness of Christ.” It is in faithful unity that we will best represent the fullness of Christ. As Paul writes in Hebrews, all those saints who have gone before us “did not receive what was promised, because God had provided something better for us, so that they would not be made perfect without us.” We are an integral part of the perfection of the saints. Being perfect, as only Christ Himself is perfect, as His Father in heaven is perfect, is not something we can achieve alone. This perfection is only attainable together. Thus, I stand in need of each and every one of you for my own salvation. And each of you need one another. And the entire world stands in need of us.

I often refer to the Church as a hospital for those whose souls are sick. We talk about being spiritually lame or blind, but in a similar way we can also be said to be spiritually young and weak. And thus it is also appropriate to speak of the Church acting as a nursery, a school, and a mother. We emerge from the waters of baptism spiritual infants, born anew. We come here each week to sit at our mother’s feet and learn her stories, to hear her songs. We do our best to obey her as she reminds us to be kind, not just to our brothers and sisters but to everyone we meet; to share both our toys and our talents; to find comfort in our home; and to see beauty in the world around us.

The Church shelters us under her wing. She mixes bread and wine on a spoon and begs us to open our mouths and to eat. She feeds each and every one of us as if we were babies, sitting in our high chairs with our mouths wide open. We come here this Sunday asking for enough grace to help us through just one more week, “give us this day our daily bread.” May these gifts here offered become for each one of us the light and life and love of Christ, the very body and blood of our Lord and God and Savior, descending into our hearts to give us the nourishment necessary to make our way toward our own perfection in Christ Jesus, to whom be all glory, honor, and worship forever. Amen.

Luke 18:35-43
And it came to pass, that as he was come nigh unto Jericho, a certain blind man sat by the way side begging: And hearing the multitude pass by, he asked what it meant. And they told him, that Jesus of Nazareth was passing by. And he cried, saying, Jesus, thou Son of David, have mercy on me. And they which went before rebuked him, that he should hold his peace: but he cried so much the more, Thou Son of David, have mercy on me. And Jesus stood, and commanded him to be brought unto him: and when he was come near, he asked him, saying, What wilt thou that I shall do unto thee? And he said, Lord, that I may receive my sight. And Jesus said unto him, “Receive thy sight: thy faith hath saved thee.” And immediately he received his sight, and followed him, glorifying God: and all the people, when they saw it, gave praise unto God.

Today’s Gospel begins with what might truly be called a “Gospel” message. The English word Gospel, a contraction of the phrase “Good Spell” which in Old English meant a “Good Tale,” would be more literally translated today as “Good News.” And that is precisely what today’s story begins with, a bustling crowd entering into Jericho as they discuss the good news of their day. The crowd passes by a blind man begging beside the side of the road, and this man asks the crowd what all the excitement is about. They reply that Jesus of Nazareth is on his way. This would be exciting news to anybody, but to the blind man, it is very good news.

As the crowd continues to flow past him, the blind man cries out, “Jesus, Son of David, have mercy on me!” Those at the front of the crowd try to turn the blind man away, but he perseveres, repeating again, “Jesus, Son of David, have mercy on me!” This time Jesus hears him and asks for the man to be brought before him. “What do you want me to do for you?” Jesus inquires. The blind man does not hesitate, but immediately asks that he might receive his sight. Jesus grants this man his sight, saying that it was “his faith” that had made him well. It wasn’t just the blind man’s belief that Jesus was a great healer, or even the action of crying out to Jesus, but it was his faithful perseverance that had saved him.

Why does Luke include this story in his Gospel? Why does the Church read it to us today? Is it simply a miracle story, meant as one more proof that Jesus was indeed God and therefore worthy of our worship? Or is there a more practical message to be found in this story? With this story, more than many others, I think the latter is true. As we prepare right now for the coming of the Light into the world at Christmas, the Church is reminding us that we all live in darkness, that each one of us is blind. Not metaphorically blind, but really blind. We are surrounded by a spiritual reality that we in fact cannot see. We cannot see this spiritual reality because our spirit has become darkened, our heart has become blind. For the Eastern Orthodox Church, the promise that “the pure in heart shall see God” is very real, and thus spiritual blindness is a very real malady. In fact, it is one of the more serious maladies faced by humanity.

So what is this “Spiritual Blindness” the Church is reminding us of today? In Orthodox teaching, “spiritual blindness” is a malfunctioning of what in Greek is called the nous and is generally translated into English as “the mind” or “the intellect.” It is the nous St. Paul is talking about in Romans when he teaches, “Do not be conformed to the pattern of this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind.” In modern culture we tend to think of the mind as the source of our person. We say things like, “I think therefore I am.” We think of the mind’s role is to tell our body what to do. But this is not the Orthodox teaching at all. And increasingly, it is not the scientific understanding either.

Indeed medical science has become much better in recent decades about understanding the effect of the mind on the body, and the effect of body on the mind. And while science has been a little slower to recognize how spirituality might play into creating a truly healthy person, even here we have had a bit of a renaissance with doctors recommending spiritual practices like meditation or yoga.

It is interesting that Christian spirituality almost never enters into the conversation. And this is not science’s fault nearly as much as it is Christianity’s. To a great extent Christianity has offered little to the conversation. Practices such as confession, fasting, prayer, and meditation, once regular practices for Christians, have slowly disappeared from among the faithful. I think this is because the Western Church, along with Western culture, bought into the notion of the human person is a being made up of a body, a mind, and a spirit, three separate parts. And with this in mind, they’ve relegated themselves to saving the spirit and left the body and the mind to the doctors.

But for Orthodox Christians, the human person is a unity. The body, mind, and spirit are aspects of the single human person, not parts that can be separated. When God came to save humanity, he came to save us body, mind, and spirit alike. This is why we believe is a bodily resurrection. And just as much as Jesus came to save both the physical and the spiritual, this is also the mission of the Church. We are here to help people both physically and spiritually, and in fact these acts are often deeply connected.

So, from the Orthodox perspective, the proper role of the mind is not to direct human action, but rather to function as the gateway or “eye” of the heart. The heart or the soul is where the Orthodox Church seats the person. The Church teaches that a healthy mind both guards what enters into the heart and guides what comes out of the heart. A darkened nous - what the Church describes as “spiritual blindness” – is a nous that accepts evil thoughts and directs us toward evil words and actions.

Now most of us think of these evil words and actions as “sins.” But the meaning of the word translated as “sin” would be more properly be translated as something like “missing the mark” or “falling short.” Thus, when these evil words and actions happen, they are not themselves “sin” but rather evidence that sin has corrupted our heart. As Jesus taught, “Every good tree brings forth good fruit; but a corrupt tree brings forth evil fruit.” When the Church teaches that humanity has inherited their sin from generation to generation, it is this corruption of the heart she is talking about.

Evagrius Ponticus, and St. John Cassian after him, codified a list of eight categories of evil thoughts or logismoi in the fourth and early fifth centuries. These are thoughts which the nous must try to keep from taking root in the heart, thoughts which would work to conform us “to the pattern of this world.” The list includes gluttony, lust, avarice, anger, dejection, listlessness, vanity, and pride. You will most likely recognize some of these from the Western list of the “Seven Deadly Sins.” This is because Pope Gregory I adapted his list from that of Sts. Evagrius and John in the sixth century. Now when we hear about the “Seven Deadly Sins,” again, we think of a list of seven “very bad things we must not do.” But this is again to confuse the symptoms with the disease. Listen to how St. John Cassian describes a condition like dejection: “When [dejection] seizes our soul and darkens it completely, it prevents us from praying gladly, from reading Holy Scripture with profit and perseverance, and from being gentle and compassionate with our brethren.” He is clearly describing here a spiritual state of being, not a specific wrongdoing.

Sins like anger, greed, gluttony, and vanity are every bit as much symptoms of a spiritual illness, symptoms of a heart corrupted by sin. When we begin to understand this, we can see why Jesus taught that to harbor anger in our heart is the same as to murder; to lust in our heart is the same as to practice infidelity; to hoard our wealth is the same as to steal. Realizing this truth can also help us to have compassion for our neighbors. In a legal system that conceives of behaviors as the problem, it is easy to punish or shun of the offender. But when we realize that many of the most offensive behaviors flow from sick hearts, hearts sick with a disease shared by all of us, this realization can help us find compassion as we strive to show love.

So if the problem facing the mind is the onslaught of evil thoughts, is it safe to say that the mind is in some serious danger these days? Modern culture has created so many new and stunning ways to spread thoughts across the globe at a faster and faster rate. Life has become a constant barrage of headlines, tweets, and status updates. Some of the ideas we hear are good, some of them are bad, but when we get so many all at once, the task of discernment becomes difficult. And if our mind becomes overwhelmed, even the good ideas can become bad for us.

I ran across a great passage, again by St. John Cassian, describing vanity, and illustrating how even seemingly good ideas can become damaging to the soul. “The vice of vanity is difficult to fight against, because it has many forms and appears in all of our activities – in our way of speaking, in what we say as well as in our silence, at work, in vigils and fasting, in prayer and reading, in stillness and in long-suffering. Through all of these it seeks to strike down the soldier of Christ. When it cannot seduce one with extravagant clothes, it tries to tempt them by means of shabby ones.” Here we see that even a seemingly good act like avoiding fancy clothes can become itself a temptation from the Evil One.

And not all of these poisonous ideas, these evil logismoi, originate in our culture. The Church teaches that some logismoi, logismoi that seem to originate within us, are like arrows shot at us by the devil and his demons. These logismoi are often temptations to judge others, elevate ourselves, or to act out in anger. These tests often occur suddenly, and the Church suggests we to swat them away just as swiftly. For it is not when these temptations arise, but when they are allowed to settle into our hearts, that they become our responsibility. As John Climacus writes, “When [the demons] take control of the soul and darken the light of the mind, then there is no longer within our miserable souls either temperance, or discernment, or self-understanding, or humility, but instead there is an apathy, a lack of discernment, and spiritual blindness.”

So with so many attacks coming from within and without, how are we expected to keep guard over our hearts? What advice does the Church give us? One thing suggested by the Church, is avoiding undue concern for this world. In the version of Unseen Warfare compiled and edited by Theophan the Recluse we are warned to guard our mind from “too much knowledge and curiosity. For if we fill it up with a quantity of information, ideas, and thoughts, without excluding those that are vain, unsuitable, and harmful…it is no longer able to understand clearly what is useful for our true self-correction and perfection. Let tales of the past and news of the present pass you by, and let all the changes in the world and its kingdoms pass before you as though they did not exist at all.” Living in today’s 24/7 news cycle, it is hard to imagine the strength of will that would be necessary to let “the news of the present pass you by.” But this is the recommendation of the Church.

And to be clear, this is not about being uninformed, but rather about avoiding indiscriminate consumption of the news, spending hours consuming what often amounts to little more than gossip. The Church is suggesting that you take control of your news consumption, just as you would your food consumption, including even occasional fasts.

Also just like food, it is not simply about consuming less, but we should also look at what we consume and work to consume more of the healthy stuff. We are encouraged to seek out and surround ourselves with the good thoughts, or good news. Our written prayers are bathed in beautiful and poetic thoughts, in true thoughts. We should be consuming these daily. And if words are occasionally hard for us to focus on, our Church is well aware of the power of images. Our Church is filled with them. Fill your house, your car, your desk with them as well.

Beyond all of this, beyond guarding against the bad thoughts and seeking out the good thoughts, we are ultimately called to free ourselves from thoughts or logismoi altogether. The Church describes a state of the heart where we may attain a true inner peace. This state is called hesychia, often translated as stillness. This does not mean that we stop thinking, but rather that our heart is no longer besieged by invading thoughts and is therefore free to see and to think clearly. St. Maximus teaches that a purified heart will be “wise, good, powerful, compassionate, merciful, and long-suffering; in short, it includes within itself almost all the divine qualities.” Again we hear an echo of that beatitude, “Blessed are the pure in heart, for they shall see God.”

The work of acquiring hesychia is where prayer and vigils and fasting can be helpful. St. Thalassios teaches, “Tire your body with fasting and vigils, and you will be able to repulse the lethal thoughts of pleasure.” And this is where our little Church, this little sanctuary in middle of Davenport, can be of great service to the community. This little mission has the power to become an oasis of peace and a place of healing. If people are able to come in and for an hour or two “lay aside all earthly cares” and focus on their Lord and God and Savior, can you imagine a better gift than that. John Climacus taught that, “it is the understanding which is obtained through divine illumination that can brighten the darkness present in others.” We must work to bring that peace and light into our own souls, so that we will be able to share that light with the souls of others.

It is not just vigils that assist in the pursuit of hesychia, but this is also where the Jesus Prayer is held in such high esteem by the Eastern Church. She knows it is so difficult for the mind to be silent, so the Church gives us good words to use when we struggle to silence the mind. These words are good for every occasion – “Lord Jesus Christ, son of God, have mercy on me.” If repeated in earnest and in faith, Jesus is sure to calm that stormy sea within our heart, just as he once calmed the stormy sea at the cries of his disciples.

These words, “Jesus Christ, Son of God, have mercy on me,” also bring us back to where we began today, for these are the words of the faithful blind man – “Jesus, son of David, have mercy on me!” So I hope you can now see how the story of the blind man is not the story of a single miracle in the past, but rather a story selected to encourage each of us to faithfully seek out that same miracle. Each one of us is the blind man sitting on the side of the road. We must be like the blind man and cry out continually, “Jesus Christ, Son of God, have mercy on me!” Even when we are distracted by the assaults of the Evil One, we must continue to faithfully cry, “Lord have mercy!” And if we do this, we can be assured that our Lord who is always faithful, will call us to himself and say, “Receive your sight. Your faith has made you well.” Amen.