January 07, 2020
The carnal and Jewish-minded man, says St. John of the Ladder, prepares for Feasts by arranging what foods he can enjoy on them; but the spiritual Israelite, the true Christian, seeks the spiritual recompenses which are bestowed on the Feast Days. The Jewish-minded man paints within his mind with great expectation all the dishes he can glut himself with and all the dainties he can gulp down; but the spiritual man seeks how he can slake his spiritual thirst and sate his spiritual starvation.
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January 05, 2020
Last week, we commemorated the ancestors of Christ which helps us to understand the earthly lineage from which Christ came and through which it was prophesied that He would come. Today, they are included along with those others who have found favor in the eyes of the Lord, showing that grace overflows the bounds of the lineage of the Messiah to engulf not only the Jews but the Gentiles also. Soon that grace will flood the earth, and we will hear the angels speak to the shepherds, and say, “I bring you good tidings of great joy, which shall be to all people (Luke 2.10) and understand that the love of God was and is, not only for Christ’s ancestors or the righteous of the Old Testament, but for all people.
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December 29, 2019
Even as we are falling into sin, cutting ourselves off from God, slaying ourselves with spiritual death; even amidst this, God speaks hope into our heart, reassuring us that there is a Savior for those who repent. This is proved to us by our Fore-Parents, Adam and Eve. For, after they sinned, they heard the Lord’s words of condemnation of the serpent-devil, but mixed with this there was the first prophecy of the coming Messiah, Christ, the Savior of the world.
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December 08, 2019
The account, which we have just heard, is found only in the Gospel of Luke. It speaks of Jesus, being in the Temple on the Sabbath and encountering a woman who was bent over forwards for eighteen years. This ailment is described as a “spirit of infirmity”(vs. 11) under which she was unable to straighten herself up.
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November 24, 2019
God is not a monster; He is not a tyrant; He is not unjust. Instead, He is a father; He is a mother; He deals mercifully with His creation, and acts with love towards us who are created in His image. This is the picture that the Apostle Paul paints in today’s Epistle reading; that God is not abusive, nor does he exact justice upon us, but instead He conducts Himself with compassion and mercy.
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November 21, 2019
We celebrate today the Synaxis of the Honorable Heavenly Bodiless Hosts. While each of their nine ranks has its own appointed tasks and role in the celestial realm, for us human beings they typically play one role in particular, which is reflected in the name commonly given by us to all of them alike: angels, from the Greek angelos meaning “messenger.”
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November 17, 2019
Today’s Gospel shows us that not all faith is the same faith. Some have little faith, weak faith, easily shaken by outward setbacks and adversities; others have strong faith, great faith, faith that can move mountains, faith that soon obtains all its requests from God. No sooner had the Lord returned over the sea of Galilee to Bethsaida, than the ruler of the local synagogue, Jairus, approached him, and asked him to come and lay hands on his dying daughter, so that she might be healed. He indeed showed faith, but as we know, his faith was not perfect.
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November 06, 2019
Let’s ask ourselves how this can be: how are Moses and the Prophets more apt to impart the wisdom of God and true repentance into the souls of men than one risen from the dead?
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