Wednesday, April 30, 2025: Mount Tabor School
ACTS 4:13-22
JOHN 5:17-24
In the name of the Father, and the Son, and the Holy Spirit. Christ is risen!
You guys, you know Popadija? Yeah? Popadija? She’s great, huh? Popadija has this saying that she says often to our kids and she says, “Life is work, and work is good.” Life is work, and work is good.
In the Gospel today, Jesus says, “My father is working, and I am working.” The Gospel also said that the Father is the One who raises people from the dead. The Father is the One who raised Jesus from the dead.
But Jesus also is the One who gives life. He’s the One who gives abundant life. Jesus is the One. He shows us what life is supposed to look like. And you know what life is supposed to look like? Work.
So the problem is, do you know that you’re supposed to be working? Kids. You know, the work of little ones is play. Now this may seem, how does this make sense? I don’t understand it. On the one hand, Father is saying, “Life is work.” But on the other hand, you’re saying, “Our work is play.”
So which one is it? It’s both. You see, when you’re at a certain age, playing is how you learn to work. When you’re a little girl – I was never a little girl, thank God – but, you know, I have daughters, and before I had daughters, I had sisters. And I watched them play. And so back in the day, when I had sisters, they would play with things like ovens, like toy ovens, right? They’d make, like, cakes, right? I know.
They’d make cakes. They’d get their dollies dressed. Sometimes when they got older, you know, they would pick up dog poop, right? Because they had the dogs, right? But these are all the works, this is play, this is how they learned to play. They picked up their dogs. They picked up their poop, right? They made cakes, right? They had to clean the oven. They had to make sure the oven was clean, right? They had the dollies. You had to get the dolly’s arm in there. You had to put the dolly’s leg on, right?
Well, that was the work, right? And sometimes the dolly didn’t get her dress on the right way. Yeah, and sometimes you get mad because what’s the dolly doing, right? Why isn’t her dress getting on there, right? But see, when you’re playing, you’re also learning how to work. You’re learning how to do things the right way.
It’s the same thing with boys. You know, we have Legos and maybe your castle doesn’t get built the right way, right? And you just get mad. You want to break your castle all over again, right? But see, that’s what we mean by the work of children is play.
By playing, you guys learn how to work. But the problem that happens is as you get older, you maybe aren’t taught or maybe you continue to confuse the fact that playing is work. And playing teaches you how to work.
And so as you get older, maybe you don’t realize that and then you think that your whole life is about playing all the time. Right? You live every day just to play. And is that what we’re supposed to live for is to play? No.
In fact, there’s lots of people now who are like that. You know, they’re 20, 30, 40, and they spend all their time playing games on their phones or playing games in the basement. Yeah, exactly. It’s funny. It’s really funny actually, but it’s also very sad. Because these men, they’re not really men, they’re boys. Because they’re still playing video games like they’re 9 years old. Exactly. What should they be doing? They should be having jobs and building houses and building companies and building families.
And the same thing with women. You know, these women. And instead of raising their children and doing beautiful work, they’re on the phone, they’re looking at themselves, it’s like they’re playing with their toy combs and their toy mirrors, you know, and they’re 20, 30, 40, and they haven’t done anything. Why? Because they don’t realize that work is good.
Listen guys, the work that the Lord has for us, it’s the kind of work that brings life. It’s work to have a family. It’s work to pray. Anything that you might think is good, guess what? It takes work. And the only problem is when we think that work isn’t good. We think work is something we want to avoid.
Work is not something you want to avoid. Work is something that you want to embrace. Because when you embrace work, you say, “You know what? Work is good. Work is good. I want to make good things. I want to do good things.” When you do that, you know what happens? Now you’re being like Jesus.
And Jesus always does what the Father tells Him and shows Him. And when you remember that, when you’re doing your work, instead of complaining, you’ll have joy. You’ll have gratitude. And the work that you do, it’ll bring life, not just to you, but to others. Life is work. And work is good.
Christ is risen!
Sunday, April 27, 2025: Thomas Sunday
ACTS 5:12-20
JOHN 20:19-31
In the name of the Father, and the Son, and the Holy Spirit. Christ is risen!
Today in the Gospel, the disciples are gathered. And Christ comes, and John is keen to make sure that we understand that the doors were shut. The doors were shut, meaning that the Lord did not enter into the room with the Apostles in a standard way. The Lord came in, if you would, almost impossibly.
My sons and my daughters, I tell you the truth when I say to you, Christ is not threatened or scared by your sin. Christ is not threatened or scared by your doubts. Christ is not threatened or scared about your weakness.
You see, so many times we have our gates shut, not to sin. Your gates are your senses, the means by which you experience reality. When you’re chrismated, after you’ve been baptized, the gates of your soul are sealed. Your eyes, your nostrils, your mouth, your ears, they’re sealed.
But we do this inversion and we seal our senses against God. And so when we find ourselves seeking to escape, or in this case, in the fear of the Jews, we find ourselves in fear, running away from the pressures of life. In whichever way we find our escape, and we think that God doesn’t see us. We think that when we’re hiding away, and the doors are shut, that God is not there, that God cannot see us, and that God is not with us.
But I tell you that God is with us. God is bigger than the algorithm. And even trying to hide in the deluge of images, in the deluge of sensory overload, in whichever way you’re doing it, whether it’s through this, too much drink, too much food, too many loud and lewd sounds, too many pixels coming through your eyes, whichever way it is, it’s shocking because if you are willing to see, Christ will appear to you even in that temptation. There is no one here that if they were paying attention could say, “Well, where was Christ?” Christ is with us even in our very moments of doubt, just like Thomas.
And in fact, Christ wants us to look for him in those very moments of doubt. You see, for so many of us, we think that our struggle day in and day out is where we’re defeated. And yes, we hold on and we keep going, but there’s this piece of us deep down inside that’s like, “Well, is God really there? Well, does it really matter?” And the Gospel tells us it does matter because the Lord says, here, Thomas, put your hand in My side. Put your hand in the nail prints in My hand. My pain is very real. In fact, My pain is more real than your pain. In My pain, your pain can become real.
You see, when you’re running from your pain, whether it’s through the algorithm, whether it’s through the bottle, whether it’s through the cheeseburger, whether it’s through whatever. When you’re running from your pain, your pain is not real. It’s a ghost and a specter that’s haunting you. It’s a phantom of hell.
But when you take your pain and you meld it, you mash it, you marry it to the pain of Christ, guess what? Your pain now becomes real. Real in the sense that it now produces something salvific. You doubt because you’ve allowed your pain to haunt you. But if you embrace Christ, pain and all, doubt and all, He will reveal something to you.
And when that revelation comes, when you’re able to put your pain, your hand in His, put your hand in His side, give Him your pain, you’re able to recognize that even though you’ve shut the doors to Him, seeking to hide from Him, that He appears. And He’s – here I am. It’s amazing because just instinctually out of you will come worship.
Instinctually will come out, “My Lord and my God.” This is the true response to a true encounter with Christ. A true encounter with Christ is not one in which you have curated perfectly. You’ve manicured it nicely. You’re able to present it to everyone, your family, your friends, your priest, to yourself and say, “Look, I am an Orthodox Christian.”
That is not an encounter with Christ. An encounter of Christ happens just like Thomas. When we say, “Unless I’m moved, unless I see that the pain is real, I can’t believe.” So the problem is you don’t have the eyes to see.
And so now I tell you, if you’ve been baptized, if you’ve been chrismated, you’ve been given the two eyes to see. And now I’m telling you, you need to look for him in those moments of doubt. I know it’s paradoxical, but it’s a paradox, which means you don’t understand it, but it’s true.
He is in those moments of doubt. We all experienced it during Bright Week. Oh, the struggles of Bright Week. Too much cheese, too much wine, too much meat, too much rest. He was there even in that.
So now that we’ve come out of a brilliant Bright Week and now we have however many more days of Paschal joy, I encourage you, my sons and my daughters, God is not scared of your doubt. God is not scared of our weakness. Don’t waste your pain.
And a little side note, a little sidebar, don’t turn your pleasure into pain. This is a feasting season. We should be feasting. Do you know the secret to feasting? It’s Thanksgiving. You see, when you give thanks for the feast, when you enjoy the cheese and the meat and the wine and all the other stuff, when you enjoy it with thanksgiving, it’s a feast. But the second you stop giving thanks and you’re doing it to what? To hide? To run from the pain? It’s no longer a feast. And now you’re taking the pleasure and turning it into pain.
So rejoice with thanksgiving. But remember, not if, but when you falter, look for Him now. Right before that last minute we were about to give up, right before that last minute that wrong thing’s about to pop up, I guarantee you, something, somehow, someway, He will come to you.
The question is, will you answer His beckoning? Will you say, “Okay, Lord, I see You.” Remember, remember, a true encounter, the fruit of it is a true act of worship. My Lord and my God.
Christ is risen!
Thursday, April 24, 2025: Bright Thursday
ACTS 2:38-43
JOHN 3:1-15
In the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit. Christ is risen!
It’s very difficult to drink without a vessel. It’s very difficult. It can be done, but it’s difficult. It’s hard. And it’s all but impossible, especially if one is to draw from a well. The water, the vessel in which the water is to be held, it must be designed in such a way that the purpose is served. And when that is not in place, it’s very difficult. Can you imagine drawing water from a deep well? Cool, sweet water, but yet not having the proper vessel. Not having the ladle, not having the bucket, not having the means to bring that sweet, cool water to drink.
In the Gospel today, the Lord speaks to us. He speaks to Nicodemus. And Nicodemus is besides himself, wondering, what is this madness that He speaks of? How is it that a man has been born again? What is it? The Lord is speaking to him of the mystery of the renewed life. That in fact, even before His resurrection, before His death, the Lord is speaking to this teacher of Israel about what God had intended. That man would become these vessels by which pure Spirit, His Spirit would dwell within man.
But the vessel must be made ready. Because the gift of the Spirit and the gifts that come from baptism, they must be given to vessels that are prepared. This is so important to us because in the Paschaltide, we rejoice because Christ has resurrected from the dead and all mortal flesh will now taste of this glorious resurrection, this victory over death.
But let us not forget, the Paschaltide is ushering us into another tide. So soon we will begin to enter into Ascension. Ascension is where God has enthroned human nature. Next to the Father is a man, the God-man, Christ. But He has enthroned human nature. He has made that vessel of human nature able to bear the Spirit.
And then from Ascension, we’ll move into Pentecost. Pentecost is the pouring out of the Holy Spirit on all flesh. But if you remember how we heard in the Epistle today in Acts, the power of baptism, the preaching of Peter, and 3,000 souls. Can you imagine? Can you imagine being compelled? 3,000 souls baptized. 3,000 souls in a day made ready vessels. This is the prefiguring of which we have entered into.
And let us not think that Pascha and the Paschaltide is separate from Ascension or from Pentecost. Because the resurrection of the dead, the earthly vessels made perfect in Christ, is for what purpose? So they could receive the Holy Spirit and know the gifts of the Spirit. And it’s in having the gifts of the Holy Spirit that eternal life begins.
Because my dear sons and daughters, my brothers and my sisters, the Christian life is not about simply the struggle against sin. No. The Christian life is about living in the Spirit. The Christian life is about learning to be born from above. The Christian life is about walking with God and having God walk with you. The Christian life is about manifesting the life of the Spirit here in this world and now.
And you can only do that through the gifts of the Spirit. And you only get to the gifts of the Spirit through baptism. Because baptism is the prefiguring of the death and the resurrection of our Lord.
You see, if you want to be with Him, you must be like Him. Christ has risen from the dead, trampling down death by death, and upon those in the tombs, bestowing life.
Tuesday, April 22, 2025: Bright Tuesday
ACTS 2:14-21
LUKE 24:12-35
In the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit. Christ is risen!
Glory to God. There are moments in which we could say, in some sense, the objective and the narrative come together. In the life of a Christian, we have these narratives, this dialogue in which we are processing life. We’re seeing certain events, and we’re trying to understand them, process them, integrate them into our being. And then there are these moments in which the objective, things that are outside of us, things that are immovable, things that we cannot change, these things begin to intersect, these two worlds, our inner world and the objective. Today is one of those days.
On this Bright Week, on this Bright Tuesday, do we not experience the fullness of prophecy? On this Bright Tuesday, do we not experience the very reality of what is spoken, not just in the Epistle and Acts, but also in the Gospel today? The Lord prophesied through Joel that “I would pour out My Spirit upon all flesh.”
Do we not recognize it, even here in this community? We look out upon the people who have come to the Temple of the Lord, to Zion, to become part of Israel. People whose family, whose bloodlines are descendants from all nations. Africans, Japanese, Filipinos, Hispanics, Norwegians, English, Irish, French. All people have gathered, and all people prophesied.
What is prophecy? Prophecy is the speaking of the Word of God. To proclaim the Word of God, that is what it means to prophesy. The Scriptures themselves, every single one of them, are prophecy. The Scriptures contain God’s will, God’s desire, God’s hope, God’s plan.
And those Scriptures come out of the objective, and they enter into the narrative. They become a part of our lives, they become a part of the very way that we begin to perceive reality, personally. And in those moments, do we not recognize Christ amongst us, like Luke and Cleopas? Do we not recognize that, in fact, we weren’t recognizing Him in our midst?
How many times – yesterday, the last few days – have we been in fellowship? Discussing the things of God, discussing not just simply the objective of Scripture, but discussing the joy. Discussing what God is doing in our lives, doing in the lives of others. Our hearts burning within us. Forsake not the gathering of the brethren, as St. Paul said in the Epistles of Hebrews.
The gathering of the brethren, and the breaking of the bread. Yes, we gather in the temple, we read the Epistle, we read the Gospel, we hear the hymnography of the church, we hear the hagiography of the church, yes. But do we not also share our lives with each other? Do we not also share the witness in which God has changed us? Do we not share how God has helped us and given us hope? Are we not the book of Acts continued? The breaking of the bread.
Of course, there’s no higher fellowship than around the great Eucharist. The offering of Christ Himself in bread and wine, of course. But can we not also understand that in the breaking of the bread, the fellowship between believers, where we become actually His body, is this not prophecy fulfilled? The objective and the narrative coming together.
True symbol. Reality. God Himself imbuing us with Himself. Every means possible. The spiritual, the psychological, the physical. God filling all things, all of us with Himself.
Is this not why we’re here? Is this not what we experience? And is this not why our hearts burn within us? Of course it is. And we should expect nothing less. Christ is risen!
Thursday, April 17, 2025: Holy Thursday
In the name of the Father, and the Son, and the Holy Spirit. Glory to Jesus Christ.
In my hand, here, you see this icon of the Lord, and it’s the Bridegroom. It’s the Lord in the royal robe, plated with His royal crown of thorns. His royal scepter, the reed.
This icon sits in the high place, in the altar. The high place is the place where, in the cathedral, traditionally, the bishop would be seated. And Christ is a bishop. Christ is our high priest. But I personally have had this icon in the place, sitting there, of the bishop, of our high priest. This particular one. In other churches, you’ll see different icons of Christ, but I’ve always had this one for a reason. And the reason is, is because this is the glory of Christ.
I have this icon here to remind me, every Liturgy, of why I love Christ. Of why I worship Christ. Of why Christ is my bishop. Of why Christ is my king. Because Christ did, for all of us, the one thing that no one else would or could do. He humbled himself to the utmost extreme.
He humbled himself to the utmost extreme. And this humility, no one could stand. Peter, so many times, boasting in his love and his devotion for Christ. Thinking that, “Yes, you are the Christ, but the Christ must surely come to avenge all of our embarrassment. I’m tired of being a filthy Jew. Being put down and humiliated by Rome. I can’t wait for you to stick it to them.”
All the disciples, no different, boasting. And could we not speculate, beyond the fact that Judas was a thief, did he not give up? Did he not say, “This cannot be the Messiah? He isn’t striking Rome. He isn’t doing all the things that we expected. He’s humble. And it sickens me.”
The vanity of Peter. The vanity of Judas. The one thing, though, that Peter saw that allowed him to repent, was the one thing that Judas could not see. And Peter saw Christ’s love for him. It was in that gaze that He gave him in the courtyard as Peter denied Him. And Christ looked at him, not with rage. Not with vengeance. Not with the condescending of, “I told you so.” But rather, “I’ve always loved you.” That humility is what broke Peter. And that humility is what caused him to be broken as opposed to being crushed like Judas. Judas was crushed. Ground to powder. Nothing left. Because all that he had had was self-will and vanity. And that came to its culmination in his avarice.
But Peter was broken. And he was left with nothing but his bitter weeping. But in that, he remembered. Through his bleary eyes, filled with tears, he remembered that look of Christ across the courtyard. And that forgiveness, that acceptance, and that love. This is what I see every Liturgy.
The Liturgy is where we are in the Gethsemane garden. The liturgy is where, instead of sleeping, we watch. The Liturgy is that place where we now take up the Apostles’ mantle and we repent.
And we say, “Yea Lord, it’s in Your extreme humility that I worship You. It’s in Your extreme humility that I see You as king. It’s in Your extreme humility that I see You as God.”
And that humility, that extreme humility, comes to its culmination in the Eucharist. And so today, yes, we are remembering the betrayal of Christ. Yes, we’re remembering the betrayal of Peter and the apostles. Yes, we’re remembering the Lord being brought forward before Caiaphas. But, the key thing we’re remembering is the Lord gave us Himself in the Mystical Supper. This extreme humility, taken to its utmost depth.
God comes to us as bread and wine. And as I’ve spoken to you before, he does not come to us as grapes and wheat. But bread and wine. He says, “Work with me. I need you. You need Me.”
We cannot grow wheat and God cannot make bread. We cannot grow grapes and God cannot make wine. Man takes the grapes that God brings forth from the earth and he makes wine. Man takes the wheat from the earth and he makes bread. And those two things God reveals to us and says, “This is My body, this is My blood. This is how you will know Me and this is more importantly how I will know you.”
This is theosis. This is us coming together and being unified with Christ, literally. My sons and my daughters, if you only knew. If you only knew your fears, your complaints, your indignance before God, all of it’s in vain. Do you remember longing for Holy Communion? Do you remember waiting for the days that you would be baptized and be able to have Communion? “I would do anything to have Communion.” And now how many years have passed? How many times have we been like Peter? He said, “I’d never deny you, Lord.”
But here we are. We couldn’t wait. We couldn’t stand and watch with him.
I have this icon to remind me. And I pray that my tears will always be the tears of Peter and never of Judas. I pray that I’ll always be able to be willing to be crushed so I would never be ground to powder.
We know Christ in His crucifixion. And we know Christ in His humility. And in our humility, in our crucifixion, we can now have the work of Peter not be in vain. We can now say also, “Lord, I will watch with You. And now truly, Lord, I’ll go with You to the very end.”
May we continue to watch. And may we recognize always our Lord as He comes to us. Never on a war horse. That time will come. But until then, it will always be in the robes of humility.
In the name of the Father, and the Son, and the Holy Spirit.
Sunday, April 13, 2025: Palm Sunday
PHILIPPIANS 4:4-9
JOHN 12:1-18
In the name of the Father, and the Son, and the Holy Spirit. Blessed is He that comes in the name of the Lord!
What a blessed, joyful day. What a bright, victorious day. Today, on this Palm Sunday, not only do we remember, but we too find ourselves on the road, casting down the palms, casting down our garments before the Lord, proclaiming His victory.
We don’t just remember those saying, “Hosanna in the highest.” We say, “Hosanna in the highest.” Why? We witnessed it today, this very day. These souls that were baptized – babies, adults, young children – they’re all bearing witness to the victory of Christ. The devil has not conquered them, although he has tried. The devil has sought to sully and spoil each one of those souls in a very unique and personal way.
And yet, we all bear witness to the fact that Christ has conquered. They have been sealed, and they belong to God. Their actions, their hands, their feet, their eyes were sealed with Holy Chrism. Their thoughts, their hearts.
Their very inner being now is being and has been infused with God. And very soon, they will partake of Holy Communion, and the act of marriage will be consummated. They will be fully brought into the life, and they will be fully Christians.
Because a Christian isn’t someone who simply holds an idea or an ideology or morality. No. A Christian is someone who has been brought into life. Holy Baptism, Holy Chrismation, and the Holy Eucharist. Our faith is incarnational. We don’t just think about saying, “Hosanna in the highest.” We don’t just think and remember throwing down the palm branches and our clothes for the glory of God. We actually do it. Because God, Christ, Jesus, is not a figment of our imagination.
He’s truly our Humble King. We recognize that He comes into our lives riding on an ass, not a war horse. Why? Because God wants our love. He doesn’t want to come and make us slaves. He wants to come and make us sons and daughters. Several times during the service, the word of blessing is pronounced over them, that they would be sons and daughters, heirs of the kingdom, not slaves.
Slaves operate out of fear. Slaves have no love. Sons and daughters, they have love. Sons and daughters, they know that their father is not a figment of imagination. Sons and daughters, they feel the blood. They feel the bone.
They feel the touch. They know that Christ is ruling and reigning truly in the very members of their bodies. The casting down of our crowns, of our pride, our folly, the things that we think we have in control, these are the garments that we must take off.
Just like so many centuries ago, they took those garments off and laid them before the Lord, we too, we must take off our garments, the things that we think are covering ourselves, but in fact, they’re covering nothing. We must be bare before the Lord. We must take everything off.
We must cast it down before Him. Everything that we think is a victory and every shame that we think we’re hiding from Him, we must lay it before him. He must walk upon it. It is in this that we say, “Hosanna.” It is in this that we recognize that He is the one who conquers. It is this that we recognize it’s His humility and His love that we worship Him.
Christ could have done it any other way. You look at all the false religions of the world, not one of them come in love, not one of them come in humility, not the love of God, not the humility of God, but vanity, niceness, politeness. No.
Christ comes in humility and love, bearing the weapon of truth, speaking truth to our hearts, that we must lay everything down before Him. And then once we’ve done that, we can say, “Hosanna in the highest! Blessed is He that comes in the name of the Lord!”
Saturday, April 12, 2025: Lazarus Saturday
HEBREWS 12:28-13:8
JOHN 11:1-45
In the name of the Father, and the Son, and the Holy Spirit. Glory to Jesus Christ!
The Lord is not cruel. The Lord is not cruel. He loves us, and He understands our weakness. And because of this, He realizes the means in which we are healed have to be such that pain and a death is involved. Why?
St. John Climacus, of the Ladder, who we’re also commemorating this day, he teaches that the way the wound goes in is the way that the wound comes out. The way the wound goes in is the way that the wound comes out. So what that means is, in the way in which your soul has been damaged, or the way in which you have been damaged, this is also the same way in which you must be healed. It’s like an antivenom. When someone is bit by a poisonous snake, the doctors, the healer, they must make an antivenom which has a little bit of the venom that, unchecked, will kill you.
You need an anti-venom to deal with venom. And the way the wound goes in is the way that the wound goes out. So this is very important, because today in the Gospel, we see many things that are fascinating.
Number one, Jesus gets word that Lazarus, whom He loves, Mary, Martha, whom He loves, Lazarus is dying. And if you pay attention, it says that after He hears this, He waits two days. Most, including the Apostles, were wondering, why weren’t You hurrying quickly to Bethany? Why did You wait two more days? Why? The way the wound goes in is the way the wound goes out.
The Lord knew that there was something much bigger at stake. And so, He waits. He waits the two days. And in that time, Lazarus passes. Now, the Lord says very clearly that this is all for the sake of the disciples, the Apostles. And if you understand, this also means this is for our sake also. This is for our sake also. That we would know that He is not cruel. That we would know that He has a plan. That we would know that He has the antivenom. He moves on to Bethany.
And then, lo and behold, He sees Martha. He sees Mary. He sees the people weeping. And what does Jesus do? He weeps. The Lord weeps. Because the Lord knows that the death of Lazarus is a real death. Yes, He also knows that He’s going to raise him from the dead. But He knows, nevertheless, it’s a real death.
And in the same sense, the Lord is not cruel. He sees the cross that you must bear. The Lord sees all the ways in which you must die. These things are not illusions. These aren’t simulations. These are real things that you must endure. Real loss. Real pain. Real death. But the comfort is also real. And so the Lord weeps with us. He sees us bearing death. In the body. In the mind. In the soul. He sees us bearing death. And He weeps with us.
Because the Lord is not cruel. If the Lord were cruel, He would leave us in our darkness. If the Lord was cruel, He would leave us to be consumed by our sins. If the Lord was cruel, He would be indifferent. He wouldn’t weep with us. He wouldn’t guide us to a place where we could have resurrection.
And so this is what He does. He leads us to a place in which He calls us forth out of the tomb. Just like Lazarus. But different. Why? The bodily resurrection of Lazarus was only for a few more years. And as many of you know, as tradition holds us, Lazarus never smiled again. Lazarus never laughed again.
There is one account of Lazarus laughing after his resurrection when he saw a young boy playing with some mud. And he laughed. He said, “Clay playing with clay.” Why? Because Lazarus saw the other side. And he saw the love, the beauty, and the wonder that God has prepared for those who love Him. And when he was brought back to this world of death, he mourned forever. He wept the same tears that Jesus wept. Because this life is filled with death. But it’s by death that Christ tramples down death. That is the antivenom. By tasting of death here and now, you will have eternal life. But only if you take the antivenom.
Today, for many of us, is our anniversary of our resurrection into eternal life. For many of us, we were baptized on this day. And we say to you, those of you who are to be baptized tomorrow, we say to those of you who will be baptized at Pentecost, we say to those of you who will be baptized in the future, eternal life awaits you. You have no idea. Those of us who are standing here, 20 plus years, we know, we would have never dreamed what God had for us.
But you can’t know unless you taste that death. You can’t know unless you bend your knee. You can’t know unless you say truly from your heart, I will be your servant, Lord. I will bear my cross. I will die to myself because I believe your promise of eternal life. You will never know it.
So I encourage all of you to be baptized. Make the resolve in your heart now. Don’t just go through the outward motions. Don’t just learn to bow and to scrape, to make the side of the cross like a monkey. Be a human.
With your whole heart, make a commitment to God. Not for the externals, but for eternal life. It is only through death will you see life. And that life is the life of the consuming fire. God will consume everything that you have. And purify it. And in that purification, you will find true gold.
Through the prayers of St. Lazarus, the friend of Christ, Lord, grant us the remembrance of our own resurrections. Amen.
Monday, April 7, 2025: Annunciation
HEBREWS 2:11-18
LUKE 1:24-38
In the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit. Glory to Jesus Christ!
Today on this joyous day, we are commemorating, experiencing the Annunciation of the Mother of God, the Angel Gabriel coming and bringing such wonderful news, fearful news.
Mary, the Mother of God, she shows us something very interesting. She shows us a humility. She shows us this word, sobriety.
Mary hears this word, she sees an angel, but if we pay attention, she’s not quick to believe it necessarily, not because she didn’t have faith, but because in her humility she wonders, “How is it that I would be worthy of a visitation like this? How is it that I would be worthy to hear from God in such a direct way?”
We, looking back, knowing the Mother of God, we being her children, the children of the Church, we’re amazed at this because the Church instructs us in how holy and how loving the Mother of God is, and even more so, we personally in our prayers and our devotion to her, we know how holy she is, we know how loving she is, and yet, the Theotokos, Mary, she was not quick to accept this.
How is it that one of the, if not the most holiest woman to ever walk the earth was not quick to believe that God would speak to her directly, and yet, we sometimes are not so quick to assume that, “Well, perhaps, maybe God wouldn’t speak to me.” We very quickly think, “Well, of course God would speak to me. Of course this thing that I want to do is from God. Why wouldn’t it? Why wouldn’t God speak to me directly? Why wouldn’t God give me everything I want?”
And it’s sad because the sobriety and the humility of Mary is something that we need these days because we are too quick to think that the desires of our hearts and the thoughts of our minds are from God.
We need to learn to be like Mary. We need to learn to stop and to slow down and to question ourselves – not question God. Mary didn’t question the goodness of God. Mary questioned herself. We need to learn to do this more often. We need to learn to say, “Maybe I’m getting things confused.”
Now, Mary, she did something very interesting. She obviously said, “Hold on, is this really – how am I worthy to hear this? How am I worthy to receive this?”
But also, too, there was a confirmation. She used to go and see her cousin, Elizabeth. This is important because all of us will have people in our lives. Yes, your priest, but sometimes your godfather, your godmother, sometimes an older sister, somebody that you know, who you know is also faithful, and you can go to them and you can question yourself.
And this is important because that kind of accountability, it’s important because we need to be more like the Mother of God, and we need to learn to not necessarily trust ourselves, but to trust God and the people that He’s put around us. That accountability will help us to stay in a sober place, will help us to not be carried away with ideas and feelings that maybe not be from God, but they feel good.
The Mother of God was humble. She loved God. The Mother of God is the idea, the ideal for all of us to follow, especially now. There’s so many things that want to puff us up and get us excited, but really, we need to stay humble, and we need to wait on God. And when we do that, God will send us even greater blessings.
So on this day of the Annunciation, let us remember that Christ wants to live in our hearts, but in order for Him to live in our hearts, we have to keep our heart clean, clean from any pride, clean from any delusion, clean from anything that would seek itself to be above God.
In the name of the Father, and the Son, and the Holy Spirit. Amen.
Sunday, April 6, 2025: St. Mary of Egypt
HEBREWS 9:11-14
MARK 10:32-45
In the name of the Father, and the Son, and the Holy Spirit, Christ is in our midst.
Well, on this glorious day, this Fifth Sunday in Lent, we are commemorating our patron, St. Mary of Egypt. And we are all very familiar with the life of St. Mary, obviously. St. Mary leaving the love of her parents, rebelling from her parents at a young age, running away, running to the world, giving over her soul, her body, to the lusts of the world. And St. Mary finding herself many years lost, many years struggling with sin.
St. Mary finds herself in the church, desires to enter in, cannot enter in. She looks upon the icon of the Mother of God and makes a vow, that if the Mother of God would allow her to enter into the church to venerate the cross, to venerate the cross of her Son, then Mary would dedicate her life and forevermore serve Christ.
Then from there, St. Mary is allowed to enter into the church. The Mother of God does her portion; now what is left is for St. Mary to do her part, to fulfill her vow. From there, she flees to the church of St. John the Baptist. She then gets a boat and goes across the Jordan into the deserts. And for decades, she struggles alone, with no distractions, with no comforts, and seemingly no help.
This aspect of St. Mary’s life, I think, is very often overlooked. This aspect I’m talking about is the endurance that she shows, why we really should honor her, for so many reasons, repentance, all these things. But there’s something about St. Mary that is often overlooked, and it’s because we fear her.
We all fear that thing. We all fear to look and to be left alone with our thoughts, with our memories. And this is why St. Mary is so courageous. This is why she is so brave. Because for decades, there was no food to distract her. For decades, there was no wine to distract her. For decades, there was no songs, there was no conversations, there was no jokes. There was no YouTube. There was nothing to distract her from the ghosts, from the demons that haunted her. Her memories haunted her without fail. St. Mary of Egypt was assaulted day and night with her thoughts. She had no rest.
And it’s in this that we see the vow being fulfilled. St. Mary made a vow to the Mother of God. And as St. Mary went to the desert to fulfill that vow, what wonder, the Mother of God was faithful to her. The Mother of God, as she says, where she would be on the ground sometimes a whole night into the day, unable to move, not just simply out of physical exhaustion, but the spiritual and psychological exhaustion of dealing with her memories, dealing with her thoughts, dealing with her sins.
Your sins stay with you long after you’ve committed them. And they haunt us, and they taunt us, and they torture us. And we’re left thinking, how are we to get out of this? How do we find rest?
St. Mary heard a voice, and it said to her, “Cross the Jordan, and you will find rest.” But if you look at her life, she crossed the Jordan, and what did she find? War. She found war with her thoughts. She found war with her feelings. She found war with her sins. So now we say, where is the rest? How did she find rest?
In the other Gospel today, the woman who was caught in adultery – the accusers, the Pharisees, they came, and they said, look, this woman is caught in the very act. And Christ, He comes, He writes on the ground. He says, “Which one of you was without sin, cast the first stone.” He writes on the ground again, and then they begin to drop their stones and leave.
What did the Lord write on the ground? Well, St. Nikolai Velimirovich, he tells us in tradition that the Lord began to write the sins of the Pharisees who were getting ready to stone St. Mary of Egypt. He wrote every single one of their sins, that they thought were hidden. And when they began to see their sins, they realized, “Who am I to judge?”
Now, the Lord says to the woman caught in adultery, “Does anyone condemn you?” And she says, “None, Lord.” He says, “Then neither do I. Go and sin no more.”
So how is it that St. Mary of Egypt found rest in the desert? Because she faced God. I want you to hear me very clearly. I didn’t say she faced her sins. I didn’t say she faced her sins. She faced God. She turned towards God. In that silence, and in that absence of distraction, she found God. She found the One that she had sinned against.
It wasn’t the body count. It wasn’t the hundreds of men and women she had fornicated with. The One she really sinned against was God. And that’s Who she had to face. And that’s Who you are running from when you distract yourself.
You’re not running from your sins. If you have a spiritual father, if you have a confessor, if you confessed, you’re forgiven. But the ghosts that are haunting you, how do you get rid of them? Those ghosts are distraction. They’re trying to keep you from seeing God. And that’s why we drowned out the silence. That’s why we need to find distraction in food, frivolous talk, entertainment, because we don’t want to face God. St. Mary of Egypt, she faced God.
And this is something for all of us converts that we began to realize. For many of us, we came into the Church. We were excited. We found the true faith. We found a place where we could, you know, become holy or something like that. And very quickly, you realized, “Lord have mercy, I have to face God.” And then you run. You run. You may even find yourself becoming distracted, going back to old sins.
But let’s just be clear. God has dealt with your accusers. What’s left is for you to deal with God yourself. You must face God. And in facing God, we realize the shame. But it’s in that shame, we begin to say, I need You.
And this is what St. Mary was able to do. She’s able to say, finally, “I need You. I thought I needed the wine. I thought I needed the fornication. I thought I needed the distractions. I thought I needed the food. I didn’t need any of those things. I needed You the whole time. And this is why I’m ashamed, because I ran from You.”
St. Mary of Egypt is our patron. And we bear her grace here because of repentance. But let’s be clear, what are we repenting of? We’re repenting of not loving God.
Through the prayers of St. Mary of Egypt, may we all learn to love God. Amen.
Saturday, April 5, 2025: Laudation of the Mother of God
HEBREWS 9:1-7
LUKE 10:38-42; 11:27-28
In the name of the Father, and the Son, and the Holy Spirit. O Theotokos and Virgin, rejoice! O Mary, full of grace, the Lord is with thee. Blessed art thou among women and blessed is the fruit of thy womb, for thou gavest birth to the Savior of our souls. Amen.
We honor the Mother of God. We honor her, especially today, but we honor her at all times, in all things. Because the Mother of God, she is the icon of the Church. The Mother of God is the bride unwedded. The Mother of God is the adorned vessel, the ark, in which the tablets were carried.
She is the chalice, in which the Holy Body of Blood is found. She is the golden censer, in which the fiery coal, which is Christ, is found. The Mother of God is the icon of love for us.
How is it that she was able to avoid the pitfalls of the passions? How is it that she was able to avoid sin, in such a way that she was able to receive God in her womb? It was love. It was inspiration.
We lack love. We lack inspiration, because we lack love. There is no real inspiration without love. Inspiration without love is ambition.
But with love, we can be inspired to do the impossible. The Mother of God was not distracted by the advantages of this world. She was tested from being a young child, even until the time of her maidenhood. And she had to be tested. She had to be purified. Not just as an individual woman, but as a child of Israel.
All of the failed trials and temptations of the Israelites, all of their giving themselves over to vanity. Why did the nation of Israel always fall into idolatry over and over and over again? It was vanity. They wanted to be like the other nations. They wanted the other things that the other people had.
They were not content with the pillar of fire. They were not content with the manna from heaven. They were not content with being delivered from Pharaoh and slavery. It was vanity. So they chased after foreign gods. They chased after the food on the table of demons. They fed on rage and sorcery.
But the Mother of God, she avoided these traps. The Mother of God redeemed all of Israel. The Mother of God was the truest Israelite. She was the one who was undistracted. She was the one who kept her temple clean. She was the one who watched day and night without fail. She was the one who actually loved the Lord.
And because she loved the Lord, she was watchful. Because she loved the Lord, she was waiting. Because she loved the Lord, He visited her. And because she loved the Lord, He loved her. And in looking upon her, He looked upon all of Israel and all of mankind.
And in her, the fallen one, the enemy of our race, was undone. Because in her, his vanities and his poisons were now forced upon himself. He now eats the poison of his own vanities. He now is rebuked through her.
The Mother of God pays no attention to the devil. The Mother of God pays no attention to the vanity of this world. The Mother of God has given full, unadulterated, unquestioned attention to God.
And because of this, she now gives to us a pathway by which we too can be indwelled by God. How? Attention. Love. Inspiration.
God has so many good things for every single one of you here. He knows the desires of your hearts. But do not be deceived. You lack your desires because of your vanity. If you would just look to the Mother of God and renounce your vanity, become a true Israelite, God would grant you more than you could ever imagine. Your hearts will sing.
This is the promise of eternal life. And as St. Symeon the New Theologian says, we are to kiss of that eternal life here and now. And if we don’t, then we have a problem. We’re not watching. We’re allowing vanity to blind us.
So much more than the dancing candlelight upon the icons, may the glimmer and the hope of the Mother of God, may this be the true beauty in our eyes this morning. May we enter and receive Holy Communion, not out of rote obligation, but out of true adoration.
May we take inside of us the Holy One, not too different than how the Mother of God, so many centuries ago, took the Holy One inside of her.
O Theotokos and Virgin, rejoice! O Mary, full of grace, the Lord is with thee. Blessed art thou among women and blessed is the fruit of thy womb, for thou gavest birth to the Savior of our souls. Amen.