The Deacon

Homily by St. John of Kronstadt on the Parable: Sower and the Seed – (Luke 8: 5-15)

October 27, 2019 By The Deacon

On the Varying Effects of God’s Word Upon Man’s Heart, Owing to Differences Among Hearts

Today, beloved, the Gospel parable was read about the sower and the seed, about the unequal quality of the land upon which the seed fell, and about the varying fates of the seed. At the end of the Gospel reading the Lord Himself, at the request of His disciples, explained the parable (Luke 8:5-15).

Pitiful man! Poor man! How many obstacles he has in this most important matter, that of saving his soul! In that he himself treads upon the saving seed of the word of God, which can make him wise unto salvation, treading upon it either intentionally, consciously, and sneeringly, or out of frivolity, neglect, and ignorance; in that the universal malefactor and blighter of the human race, the devil, snatches away the saving word; in that his hardened and obdurate heart does not permit him to be saved; in that thorns – or the various cares, passions, and pleasures of life, along with riches – set before him insurmountable barriers to salvation. Only a few, who with honest and goods hearts and true reason value their salvation as they should, patiently making use of the means for salvation that have been given us, are saved. Many are called, but few are chosen. Astonishing! What is ultimately happening here? Who is to blame for this absurdity, for this voluntary perdition of men? Man himself is to blame, for treading upon – and often learning to tread upon daily – the wondrous, great, and countless gifts of God. The Lord God, Who created him in His image and likeness, in righteousness and holiness, granted him every opportunity, every means and strength, for life and piety. Man, in his laziness and ignorance, his negligence and obstinancy, his unreasonable predilection for the here and now, is like a shadow passing through life, rushing headlong towards perdition while pushing aside the saving hand of God. Who is to blame for this perdition, if not man himself? You will say: it is impossible, or at least difficult, to be saved! But, in fact, countless multitudes of men like you have been saved; they are even now being saved, though not many. “Being saved is difficult!” But do you really want to obtain eternal life – in blessed union with God, the Mother of God, the Angels, and all the Saints – without labor? Without the labor of self-purification, assisted by grace, without the labor of prayer and vigilance, without almsgiving, without meekness, without humility, without abstinence? In the acquisition of earthly goods we do not judge labor to be superfluous, and we often work at this with all our strength; but when it comes to obtaining eternal blessedness, we throw up our hands. It is not as though the matter of salvation were extremely difficult: “For My yoke is easy, and My burden is light,” says the Saviour (Matthew 11:30). Yes, with God’s help it gradually becomes easy, though at first it is hampered by the persistent warfare with sin. But is not sin itself a matter of extreme difficulty, since it is unnatural and alien to our divine nature? Is sin not torturous? If we labor in sin, how then can we not labor in righteousness, in saving our soul from sin? There, the end is death; but here, eternal life. “For the wages of sin is death; but the gift of God is eternal life” (Romans 6:23).

The present parable of the sower and the seeds was given not only to encourage listeners with honest and goods hearts to fulfill the word of God more zealously or unto greater perfection in virtue, but also so that people who are dissolute, neglectful, hard-hearted, and filled with passions might be prompted to take heed, listen attentively to the word of God, and work out their salvation with fear. The grace of God can change any heart for the better, accomplishing the miracle of salvation in any man, if only he would believe, desire to be saved, seek salvation, and admit the abyss of his sins, as well as the abyss that his sins have created between wanton sinners and God; if only he would submit himself to God’s saving grace and not push aside the saving hand of God. There were, and are, thousands of examples of men being saved who were previously dissolute, frivolous, hard-hearted, and subject to all manner of passion. They heeded the word of God, did not resist it, followed it – and they were saved, and are now in the blessedness of the Heavenly Kingdom. Nothing is impossible for God: He can save an inveterate sinner; He can raise him from the pit of hell to the height of His Kingdom and eternal blessedness – like the wise thief, like Mary of Egypt, who was drowning in the abyss of sin. Man himself must simply desire, ask for, and earnestly seek salvation; for the Lord does not desire to draw us unto salvation forcibly, so that salvation, like something forced upon us, would not become repellent to him: for we hold dear and pleasing to us only that which we ourselves have come to love and to which we have grown akin, which has become our treasure and, as it were, our nature. And such precisely is Christian virtue, such is the Kingdom of God: one must come to know it, to love it with one’s whole heart, to assimilate it here on earth, to root it in one’s heart in such a way that it wholly penetrates one’s entire soul, leaving no place in the heart for pernicious and insidious sin.

Christian! Cast aside your perilous dissipation, your unbelief, negligence, and sloth, your laziness for salvation; do not trample upon the wondrous gifts of grace; earnestly read or listen to the word of God, which opens unto you the path to salvation; accomplish it with the utmost understanding and strength; conquer your hard-heartedness and obdurateness; soften your heart like wax with the flame of the grace of the Holy Spirit and with tears of repentance; cast from your heart the thorns of sin, even though this be grievous and painful, for they have become second nature to you. You cannot, you say; but God’s grace is omnipotent: it will help you easily accomplish the whole work of your salvation.

Speaking of the seeds of the word of God that nourish the soul of man, I call to mind also that earthly, perishable seed: the seed of bread, the present bad harvest of bread crops, and the high cost of bread, its unprecedentedly high cost. The bad harvest came about from the destruction of wheat by insects and worms, or from drought. Where do these afflictions come from? From our sins. We did not offer the Lord God the fruits of our repentance and the correction of our wretched life; the Lord takes away our earthly goods, for which we did not know how to be, and were unwilling to be, thankful to Him; we did not want to do His will, and we became evil, crafty, proud, untruthful, unrestrained, idle-talking and foul-mouthed, avaricious, cruel, stingy, merciless, and unclean. Obviously, a rod of paternal justice hangs over us. God punishes us with crop failures, fires, floods, grueling wars, and destructive hardships and diseases. But do we come to our senses, do we repent, do we correct ourselves? Have we not become obdurate, have not our hearts turned wholly to stone? Deliver us, O God! Where then will the Kingdom of God be on earth, if not in Christians that call themselves Orthodox, in an Orthodox land, where there are so many precious Orthodox shrines dedicated to God, so many holy relics of God-pleasers, so many wonder-working icons, so many magnificent churches, in which there are such heavenly services on earth? “The Kingdom of God shall be taken from you, and given to a nation bringing forth the fruits thereof” (Matthew 21:43). Yes, may we not forever be put to shame; may the Lord correct us with the rod of punishment, and may He not deprive us of His mercy and His Kingdom. Amen.

Translation Copyright Holy Transfiguration Monastery, Brookline, MA.

The Divine Appearance of the Honoured Cross

September 27, 2019 By The Deacon

Appearance-Cross-St. Nicholas Orthodox Church Scarborough, English Language Orthodox Church Toronto The first appearance of the honored Cross occurred in the year 312, in October, during the time of St. Constantine the Great. It appeared in the sky at noontime and was composed of radiant stars, with the words, “By This, Conquer”. Thus, by this first manifestation, the honored Cross became the labarum, the standard, of the first Christian empire, which served the purpose of proclaiming and conveying our Orthodox Christian faith and piety throughout the known world.

The second majestic appearance of the Cross took place during the reign of Emperor Constantius, the son of St. Constantine the Great, in the holy city of Jerusalem on May 7th, 351, the day of Pentecost, when St. Cyril was bishop of Jerusalem. The honored Cross was comprised entirely of a certain divine light visible to everyone for a week, and in magnitude it stretched from Golgotha and the Church of the Resurrection all the way to the Mount of Olives.

In this pamphlet, we have eye-witness descriptions of the third appearance of the Cross. These descriptions are provided by individuals still living in 1975, when the first edition of this pamphlet appeared in Greek.

In the early 1900s and especially in the 1920s, there were strong anti-Church and secularist forces in power in Greece and in the Ecumenical Patriarchate. These forces introduced the Gregorian calendar. The Gregorian calendar is adequate for the functions of business, the stock exchange, and other worldly, secular activities. Liturgically, however, it is in no way possible to reconcile the Gregorian calendar with our canonical , Orthodox Christian Paschalion. Moreover, the introduction of a Church calendar change by a local church created an unacceptable liturgical disunity within the Church Itself.

Vast numbers of the people of Greece refused to accept these anti-canonical, anti-Church changes being forced upon them by state police power. Such people suffered persecution, imprisonment, and deprivation at the hands of secular police powers. But the spiritual eyes of true Orthodox Christians saw clearly even if, at the time, they did not completely comprehend the evil of the new calendar. It was a forerunner and a sign of the greatest heresy in the history of the world—Ecumenism. Many people, however, became confused. Some began to waver. Just as the Arians were in control of the worldly power in 351 and were able to force their heresy upon the empire, so at this time, the calendar innovators controlled the worldly power of Greece. In such a troubled and dangerous time, the All-Merciful God heeded the needs of His people. Again, as in 351, God sent a wondrous apparition of the sign of the All-Honourable Cross to seal the truth and put the false teachers to shame.

The appearance of the Cross took place in this manner: In 1925, on the eve of the feast of the Exaltation of the All-Honourable and Life-giving Cross of Our Saviour, September 14 according to the Orthodox Church calendar (September 27, new style), the all-night vigil was served at the Church of St. John the Theologian in suburban Athens. By nine o’clock that evening, more than two thousand of the Orthodox faithful had gathered in and around the church for the service, since very few true-Orthodox churches had been accidentally left open by the civil authorities. Such a large gathering of people could not, however, go unnoticed by the authorities. Around eleven P. M. the authorities dispatched a platoon of police to the church “to prevent any disorders which might arise from such a large gathering.” The gathering was too large for the police to take any direct action or to arrest the priest at that time and so they joined the crowd of worshippers in the already over-flowing courtyard of the church.

Then, regardless of the true motives for their presence, against their own will, but according to the Will which exceeds all human power, they became participants in the miraculous experience of the crowd of believers.

At 11:30 P.M., there began to appear in the heavens above the church, in the direction of northeast, a bright, radiant Cross of light. The light not only illuminated the church and the faithful but, in its rays, the stars of the clear, cloudless sky became dim and the church-yard was filled with an almost tangible light. The form of the Cross itself was an especially dense light and it could be clearly seen as a Byzantine cross with a crossbar toward the bottom. This heavenly miracle lasted for half an hour, until midnight, and then the Cross began slowly to rise up vertically, as the cross in the hands of the priest does in the ceremony of the Elevation of the Cross in church. Having come straight up, the Cross began gradually to fade away.

Human language is not adequate to convey what took place during the apparition. The entire crowd fell prostrate upon the ground with tears and began to sing prayers, praising the Lord with one heart and one mouth. The police were among those who wept, suddenly discovering, in the depths of their hearts, a childlike faith. The crowd of believers and the platoon of police were transformed into one, unified flock of faithful. All were seized with a holy ecstasy. The vigil continued until 4:00 A.M., when all this human torrent streamed back into the city, carrying the news of the miracle because of which they were still trembling and weeping.

Many of the unbelievers, sophists, and innovators, realizing their sin and guilt, but unwilling to repent, tried by every means to explain away or deny this miracle. The fact that the form of the cross had been so sharply and clearly that of the Byzantine Cross, with a crossbar at the bottom for a foot-rest, completely negated any arguments of accidental physical phenomena.

The fact that such an apparition of the Cross had also occurred during the height of the first great heresy must impress the Orthodox with the importance of the calendar question and of all that is connected with it. No sensible person can discuss this issue lightly, with secular reasoning or with worldly arguments. Innovators, like the Arians in 351, are left without extenuation or mitigation.

By this third appearance, our Lord and Saviour has confirmed from on high that we are to remain faithful to the heritage we have received from our Holy Fathers, and which was codified by the First Ecumenical Council and sealed by almost two thousand years of usage by the subsequent Ecumenical, Local and Pan-Orthodox Councils of our Church.

The Exaltation of the Life-Giving Cross

September 27, 2019 By The Deacon

Saint Helen, the mother of Saint Constantine the Great, when she was already advanced in years, undertook, in her great piety, the hardships of a journey to Jerusalem in search of the Cross, about the year 325. A temple to Aphrodite had been raised up by the Emperor Hadrian upon Golgotha, to defile and cover with oblivion the place where the saving Passion had been suffered. The venerable Helen had the statue of Aphrodite destroyed, and the earth removed, revealing the Tomb of our Lord, and three crosses. Of these, it was believed that one must be that of our Lord, the other two of the thieves crucified with Him; but Saint Helen was at a loss which one might be the Wood of our salvation.

At the inspiration of Saint Macarius, Archbishop of Jerusalem, a lady of Jerusalem, who was already at the point of death from a certain disease, was brought to touch the crosses, and as soon as she came near to the Cross of our Lord, she was made perfectly whole. Consequently, the precious Cross was lifted on high by Archbishop Macarius of Jerusalem; as he stood on the ambo, and when the people beheld it, they cried out, “Lord, have mercy.”

It should be noted that after its discovery, a portion of the venerable Cross was taken to Constantinople as a blessing. The rest was left in Jerusalem in the magnificent church built by Saint Helen, until the year 614. At that time, the Persians plundered Palestine and took the Cross to their own country (see Jan. 22, Saint Anastasius the Persian). Later, in the year 628, Emperor Heraclius set out on a military campaign, retrieved the Cross, and after bringing it to Constantinople, himself escorted it back to Jerusalem, where he restored it to its place.

“By This, Conquer” – Read more on the three Divine Appearances of the Honoured Cross

The Dormition of the Mother of God, and Ever-Virgin Mary

August 27, 2019 By The Deacon

“O Strange Wonder, great and marvellous! For the fount of life is laid within a sepulchre; a ladder to Heaven’s heights doth the small grave become. Be glad, O Gethsemane, the sanctuary of her that gave birth to God. Ye faithful, let us cry out, possessing as our commander great Gabriel: Maiden Full of Grace, rejoice thou, with thee is the Lord our God, Who abundantly granteth His great mercy to the world through thee.”

—From the Vespers of the Holy Dormition

Concerning the Dormition of the Theotokos, this is what the Church has received from ancient times from the tradition of the Fathers. When the time drew nigh that our Saviour was well-pleased to take His Mother to Himself, He declared unto her through an Angel that three days hence, He would translate her from this temporal life to eternity and bliss. On hearing this, she went up with haste to the Mount of Olives, where she prayed continuously. Giving thanks to God, she returned to her house and prepared whatever was necessary for her burial. While these things were taking place, clouds caught up the Apostles from the ends of the earth, where each one happened to be preaching, and brought them at once to the house of the Mother of God, who informed them of the cause of their sudden gathering. As a mother, she consoled them in their affliction as was meet, and then raised her hands to Heaven and prayed for the peace of the world. She blessed the Apostles, and, reclining upon her bed with seemliness, gave up her all-holy spirit into the hands of her Son and God.

With reverence and many lights, and chanting burial hymns, the Apostles took up that God-receiving body and brought it to the sepulchre, while the Angels from Heaven chanted with them, and sent forth her who is higher than the Cherubim. But a certain Jew, moved by malice, audaciously stretched forth his hand upon the bed and immediately received from divine judgment the wages of his audacity. Those daring hands were severed by an invisible blow. But when he repented and asked forgiveness, his hands were restored. When they had reached the place called Gethsemane, they buried there with honor the all-immaculate body of the Theotokos, which was the source of Life. But on the third day after the burial, when they were eating together, and raised up the artos (bread) in Jesus’ Name, as was their custom, the Theotokos appeared in the air, saying “Rejoice” to them. From this they learned concerning the bodily translation of the Theotokos into the Heavens.

Holy Transfiguration

August 19, 2019 By The Deacon

“Shining faintly upon Mount Tabor today, Christ laid bare before the disciples the image of His divine brightness as he promised; and they, filled with light-bearing and divine splendour, stand in jubilation: Let us sing unto our God, for He is glorified.”

—Holy Transfiguration Matins, First Canon by Cosmas the Monk, Ode One

Our Lord had spoken to His disciples many times not only concerning His Passion, Cross, and death, but also concerning the coming persecutions and afflictions that they themselves would endure. Since all these evils were near at hand, but the enjoyment of good things which they hoped to receive in their stead was yet to come, our Saviour desired to give them full assurance, evidently and openly, concerning that glory which is prepared for those who endure to the end. Therefore, fulfilling that which He had promised shortly before, that “there be some standing here which shall not taste of death, till they see the Son of man coming in His Kingdom” (Matt. 16:28), He took His three foremost disciples and ascended Mount Tabor, where He was transfigured before them. His face shone like the sun, and His clothes became white as the light. Suddenly, together with this dread and marvellous effulgence of light, there appeared those pinnacles of the Prophets, Moses and Elias, who spoke with the Lord Jesus concerning His saving Passion which was about to take place. Standing before Him as reverent servants, they showed that He is the Lord of both the living and the dead, for Moses came forth from Hades, having died many centuries before, and Elias, as it were from heaven, whither he had been taken up while yet alive. After a little while a radiant cloud overshadowed them and out of the cloud they heard that same voice which had been heard at the Jordan at the Baptism of Christ, testifying to the Divinity of Jesus and saying: “This is My beloved Son, in Whom I am well-pleased; hear ye Him” (Matt. 17:5).

Such are the marvels, truly worthy of God, celebrated in this present feast, which is an image and prefiguring of the future state of the righteous, whose splendor the Lord spoke of, saying: “Then shall the righteous shine forth as the sun” (Matt. 13:43). It is because of this that the Kontakion of this Feast is said daily (when there is not a great feast) in the Service of the Typica in perpetual commemoration of the glory that will be the lot of the Saints. According to tradition, the Lord’s Transfiguration came to pass forty days before His Crucifixion; this is why the Transfiguration is celebrated forty days before the Exaltation of the Cross.

(The above text is taken from the Great Horologion, Copyright © 1997, Holy Transfiguration Monastery, Brookline, MA, all rights reserved. All reproduction of texts or icons on this website in any form without prior written permission is forbidden.)