Translate
Thursday, July 20, 2006
The Church Around The World-or "Autocephalous" Isn't A Type Of Milk
Wednesday, July 19, 2006
Where Jesus "Blew It"- The Incarnation and the Body of Christ
"In the evening of the same day, the first day of the week, the doors were closed in the room where the disciples were, for fear of the Jews. Jesus came and stood among them. He said to them, 'Peace be with you,' and, after saying this, he showed them his hands and his side. The disciples were filled with joy at seeing the Lord, and he said to them again, Peace be with you.
'As the Father sent me so I am sending you.'
After saying this he BREATHED on them and said:
'Receive the Holy Spirit. If you forgive anyone's sins, they are forgiven; if you retain anyone sins, they are retained.'
So, Jesus blew it. He blew His Holy Spirit onto the Disciples. Why? He had already said He was sending the Comforter and, indeed, the Holy Spirit did come later at Pentecost. So, why did he blow it here prior to that? See what He said prior to blowing it, "As the Father sent me so send I you." To understand why He blew it, we must understand how and why the Father sent him. In this way we will understand how and why he sent the Disciples.
The Purpose
'Look, there is the Lamb of God that takes away the sin of the world. John 1:29
As Christ showed up for his baptism, an event that would launch his physical ministry on earth, John states as the purpose for Christ being sent, to "take away the sins of the world." Sin is what separates humanity from God and Christ was to take it away. Christ told the Disciples that just as God sent him so now He sends them...to take away the sins of the world.
The Preparation
There was an event of ratification at the launching of Christ's ministry.
'I saw the Spirit come down ON him like a dove from heaven and rest on him.' John 1:32-33
Christ blew ON the Disciples in John 20. Of course, the breath is the actual Spirit. As he breathed ON them, something demonstrably happened to them. Just as when the Spirit came ON Christ at his baptism, something demonstrably happened to Him. In another account of Christ's baptism Matthew recalls the voice of God,
'This is my son, the beloved: my favor rests ON him.' Matt. 3:16
"In Jewish literature a voice from heaven is a means of showing the God-given authority of a teacher.' (Page 1613 30-N note-New Jerusalem Bible) So, "as the Father has sent me, so I send you" established the Disciples in their role and mission with the provision of the Spirit resting on them. In this instance and in that room, it is the voice of Christ as fully God who bestows authority on the Disciples.
The failure to understand the incarnation of Christ and the results of that incarnation on the Body of Christ causes some to miss what happened in that room in John 20. Now Christ brings the Disciples into his dual identity. The Disciples are natural flesh yet, now they are provided with the super-natural nature of Christ. In this way His incarnation remains effective on earth as He goes back to the Father. In this way the Disciples, as a group, become Christ on earth or the "Body of Christ." The Disciples are to take away the sins of the world through the presence of the Spirit ON them as they proclaim this good news. They have become The Church and that Church is the place where the sins of men are taken away.
The Personification
"If you forgive anyone' s sins they are forgiven, If you retain anyone's sins they are retained." Yes, men are given the authority to forgive sins, but not just in their humanity is this done. Rather, man can do this because in his humanity, he has taken on the Spirit nature of Christ and become His Body. Humans make up the body of Christ. Christ decided it so. We are flesh and yet move within the supernatural. The gulf between Heaven and earth is suspended and we, as His Body, live in both just as he did-Fully God and fully man. Now, lest you misunderstand, we are not "Gods" as some assert. Christ was fully God yet was referred to as the Son of God. We are Sons of God also, joint heirs with Christ. The sons of God are gathered as ONE, as the Body of Christ, not as individuals as the Evangelical Protestant Ethos asserts. Herein lies the promise of power as we move and live in and through the Corporate Body He established. It is the Body of Christ that is given the attributes of Christ. It is the Church. Apostle Paul illustrates this union relating it to a husband and wife, "
"...and that is the way Christ treats the Church, because we are parts of his Body. This is why man leaves his father and his mother and becomes attached to his wife, and the two BECOME ONE FLESH. This mystery has great significance, but I am applying it to Christ and the Church."
So in the southern colloquial, "you" are not the Church, "you all" are the Church and that Church is united in flesh and Spirit. That means there is a tangible and there is a spiritual. The spiritual is seen when Christ blows it in John 20, but so is the tangible, because the result of Him blowing it is the creation of an authoritative, spirit empowered, physical entity. The physical part of the Church is the reason the Disciples had to replace Judas. "...Let another take his episcopacy." The Disciples were 12 in number. Do you recall seeing that number elsewhere? There were also 12 tribes of Israel. So the Trinity was in the midst of the Old Covenant and now in the midst of the New Covenant. It is within the those covenants that we "live and move and and have our being." It is in that physical structure that the Church exists and individuals are kept in the faith through the governance of their souls. The Old Covenant had Priests and the New Covenant has Priests, those who guard the souls of God's people and hold men accountable to God's standard of righteousness. So, from early on the Church has strived to maintain the "faith of the Apostles" because they were the authoritative initiators and presenters of all that Christ taught. If you will look at the revelation of John you will see the names of the original 12 etched with the original 12 tribes in the gates of the heavenly Jerusalem.
The Perpetuation
Ah, but did Christ really blow it, or was he short winded? He really should have thought further ahead, blown it a little harder. If only he had know that the Disciples were to die martyr's deaths. Such a tragedy. The Purpose was great, the Preparation was powerful, and the Personification was unprecedented but, after just a few hopeful years, the Disciples were dead and gone and the Church was dissolved. THE END...or was it...
"So I now say to you: You are Peter and on this rock I will build my community. And the gates of the underworld can never overpower it." (Matthew 16:18)
So much energy has been spent discussing the words "Peter" and "rock" that we often overlook the most relevant word in this scripture-COMMUNITY. The word here is qahal (hebrew) or ekklesia (greek) which means "an assembly called together." Each and every time this word is used it has as it's meaning an actual physical group with specific characteristics. It is never an ethereal, undefined, ungathered, disconnected group of people whose only connection on earth is an intangible spiritual philosophy or belief. This community is the community of the end times and is to "have its beginning here on earth in the form of an organized society whose leader he now appoints." (page 1637 16g note New Jerusalem Bible)
So the Disciples spread out taking the gospel into all the world. The Community established local communities all in harmony and communion with one another. After a while there was a local community in Jerusalem where it all started, then Antioch, Constantinople, Alexandria, and Rome. These were the five sees of the community or the five original Churches established by the Disciples. Now, if Jesus hadn't really blown it, it all would have stopped as each Disciple died off. But what happened? The Church continued in continuity and unity and does so to this day. It is called the Orthodox Church whose Bishops still guard our souls and still preserve the Faith of our Fathers. All because Jesus blew it.
Tuesday, July 18, 2006
The Mother of God?
ORTHO: Theotokos is greek for " Mother of God".
PROTEST: I have a problem with calling her "Mother of God".
ORTHO: Then, who was she the mother of?
PROTEST: She gave birth to Jesus.
ORTHO: And giving birth makes you a...
PROTEST: Mother.
OTHRO: Then Mary was the mother of...
PROTEST: Jesus.
ORTHO: And Jesus is...
PROTEST: God.
ORTHO: Then Mary is the Mother of God.
PROTEST: I have a problem with calling her that.
ORTHO: Apparently.
In my Protestant years which included being raised in a Baptist Pastor's home and a BA in Religion from a Baptist University all I knew about Mary, the mother of Jesus, was what I saw in the pages of the Gospels. I also never heard a sermon about the Mother of our Lord although she was mentioned at Christmas time. Even referring to her as "the Mother of our Lord" was frowned upon even though the phrase is directly from scripture. The fear, it seems in the Protestant world, is that Mary might be given due belonging only to God. It is this mindset that allows for inaccurate accusations toward the Orthodox faith concerning Mary. Three things have helped me gain a balanced perspective concerning this matter. One, is that there is a difference between "venerating" and "worshiping." You do not worship the photo of your Mother that may hang on your wall, but you do venerate it.
Venerate: to regard with reverential respect or admiring deference.
So, if the Archangel can say Mary is Blessed and that all men shall call her so, then I can and should venerate her as the whole church has done for 2000 years. She was and is the greatest example of holiness and servitude to God and was the first to receive the Christ for who he was and in quite a demonstrative way.
Secondly, I had to be honest about this question: "Where is Mary right now?" She isn't dead. She is in heaven. Is she lost in some corner somewhere because she is "just another person and no more important than any other" as some have suggested or is she with her son worshiping around the throne? If she is there with Jesus, can I ask her to pray for me? It has always been common of the church to ask the saints, the "great cloud of witnesses", to pray for us and this includes the Mother of God. Most Protestants believe there are some measures of crowns or rewards in heaven. Wouldn't Mary receive a special place or reward, or focus? The church has always held this to be true.
Thirdly, I like how my priest Father Steven Rogers put it: "We don't get to God through Mary, he came to us through her." It is in this way that she is the "mediator." Christ became incarnate by choosing a purified and holy human vessel.
Let's see how the Early Church Father's referred to Mary:
Irenaeus
"The Virgin Mary, being obedient to his word, received from an angel the glad tidings that she would bear God" (Against Heresies, 5:19:1 [A.D. 189]).
Hippolytus
"[T]o all generations they [the prophets] have pictured forth the grandest subjects for contemplation and for action. Thus, too, they preached of the advent of God in the flesh to the world, his advent by the spotless and God-bearing (theotokos) Mary in the way of birth and growth, and the manner of his life and conversation with men, and his manifestation by baptism, and the new birth that was to be to all men, and the regeneration by the laver [of baptism]" (Discourse on the End of the World 1 [A.D. 217]).
Gregory the Wonderworker
"For Luke, in the inspired Gospel narratives, delivers a testimony not to Joseph only, but also to Mary, the Mother of God, and gives this account with reference to the very family and house of David" (Four Homilies 1 [A.D. 262]).
"It is our duty to present to God, like sacrifices, all the festivals and hymnal celebrations; and first of all, [the feast of] the Annunciation to the holy Mother of God, to wit, the salutation made to her by the angel, ‘Hail, full of grace!’" (ibid., 2).
Peter of Alexandria
"They came to the church of the most blessed Mother of God, and ever-virgin Mary, which, as we began to say, he had constructed in the western quarter, in a suburb, for a cemetery of the martyrs" (The Genuine Acts of Peter of Alexandria [A.D. 305]).
"We acknowledge the resurrection of the dead, of which Jesus Christ our Lord became the firstling; he bore a body not in appearance but in truth derived from Mary the Mother of God" (Letter to All Non-Egyptian Bishops 12 [A.D. 324]).
Methodius
"While the old man [Simeon] was thus exultant, and rejoicing with exceeding great and holy joy, that which had before been spoken of in a figure by the prophet Isaiah, the holy Mother of God now manifestly fulfilled" (Oration on Simeon and Anna 7 [A.D. 305]).
"Hail to you forever, you virgin Mother of God, our unceasing joy, for unto you do I again return. . . . Hail, you fount of the Son’s love for man. . . . Wherefore, we pray you, the most excellent among women, who boast in the confidence of your maternal honors, that you would unceasingly keep us in remembrance. O holy Mother of God, remember us, I say, who make our boast in you, and who in august hymns celebrate your memory, which will ever live, and never fade away" (ibid., 14).
Cyril of Jerusalem
"The Father bears witness from heaven to his Son. The Holy Spirit bears witness, coming down bodily in the form of a dove. The archangel Gabriel bears witness, bringing the good tidings to Mary. The Virgin Mother of God bears witness" (Catechetical Lectures 10:19 [A.D. 350]).
Ephraim the Syrian
"Though still a virgin she carried a child in her womb, and the handmaid and work of his wisdom became the Mother of God" (Songs of Praise 1:20 [A.D. 351]).
Athanasius
"The Word begotten of the Father from on high, inexpressibly, inexplicably, incomprehensibly, and eternally, is he that is born in time here below of the Virgin Mary, the Mother of God" (The Incarnation of the Word of God 8 [A.D. 365]).
Epiphanius of Salamis
"Being perfect at the side of the Father and incarnate among us, not in appearance but in truth, he [the Son] reshaped man to perfection in himself from Mary the Mother of God through the Holy Spirit" (The Man Well-Anchored 75 [A.D. 374]).
Ambrose of Milan
"The first thing which kindles ardor in learning is the greatness of the teacher. What is greater than the Mother of God? What more glorious than she whom Glory Itself chose?" (The Virgins 2:2[7] [A.D. 377]).
Gregory of Nazianz
"If anyone does not agree that holy Mary is Mother of God, he is at odds with the Godhead" (Letter to Cledonius the Priest 101 [A.D. 382]).
Jerome
"As to how a virgin became the Mother of God, he [Rufinus] has full knowledge; as to how he himself was born, he knows nothing" (Against Rufinus 2:10 [A.D. 401]).
"Do not marvel at the novelty of the thing, if a Virgin gives birth to God" (Commentaries on Isaiah 3:7:15 [A.D. 409]).
Theodore of Mopsuestia
"When, therefore, they ask, ‘Is Mary mother of man or Mother of God?’ we answer, ‘Both!’ The one by the very nature of what was done and the other by relation" (The Incarnation 15 [A.D. 405]).
Cyril of Alexandria
"I have been amazed that some are utterly in doubt as to whether or not the holy Virgin is able to be called the Mother of God. For if our Lord Jesus Christ is God, how should the holy Virgin who bore him not be the Mother of God?" (Letter to the Monks of Egypt 1 [A.D. 427]).
"This expression, however, ‘the Word was made flesh’ [John 1:14], can mean nothing else but that he partook of flesh and blood like to us; he made our body his own, and came forth man from a woman, not casting off his existence as God, or his generation of God the Father, but even in taking to himself flesh remaining what he was. This the declaration of the correct faith proclaims everywhere. This was the sentiment of the holy Fathers; therefore they ventured to call the holy Virgin ‘the Mother of God,’ not as if the nature of the Word or his divinity had its beginning from the holy Virgin, but because of her was born that holy body with a rational soul, to which the Word, being personally united, is said to be born according to the flesh" (First Letter to Nestorius [A.D. 430]).
"And since the holy Virgin corporeally brought forth God made one with flesh according to nature, for this reason we also call her Mother of God, not as if the nature of the Word had the beginning of its existence from the flesh" (Third Letter to Nestorius [A.D. 430]).
"If anyone will not confess that the Emmanuel is very God, and that therefore the holy Virgin is the Mother of God, inasmuch as in the flesh she bore the Word of God made flesh [John 1:14]: let him be anathema" (ibid.).
John Cassian
"Now, you heretic, you say (whoever you are who deny that God was born of the Virgin), that Mary, the Mother of our Lord Jesus Christ, cannot be called the Mother of God, but the Mother only of Christ and not of God—for no one, you say, gives birth to one older than herself. And concerning this utterly stupid argument . . . let us prove by divine testimonies both that Christ is God and that Mary is the Mother of God" (On the Incarnation of Christ Against Nestorius 2:2 [A.D. 429]).
"You cannot then help admitting that the grace comes from God. It is God, then, who has given it. But it has been given by our Lord Jesus Christ. Therefore the Lord Jesus Christ is God. But if he is God, as he certainly is, then she who bore God is the Mother of God" (ibid., 2:5).
Council of Ephesus
"We confess, then, our Lord Jesus Christ, the only begotten Son of God, perfect God and perfect man, of a rational soul and a body, begotten before all ages from the Father in his Godhead, the same in the last days, for us and for our salvation, born of Mary the Virgin according to his humanity, one and the same consubstantial with the Father in Godhead and consubstantial with us in humanity, for a union of two natures took place. Therefore we confess one Christ, one Son, one Lord. According to this understanding of the unconfused union, we confess the holy Virgin to be the Mother of God because God the Word took flesh and became man and from his very conception united to himself the temple he took from her" (Formula of Union [A.D. 431]).
Okay. So maybe she is the Mother of God.
Saturday, July 15, 2006
The Journey of a Hobbit Priest
Father Denny, as he is most often called, celebrated his 10th year in the Charismatic Episcopal Church July 1, 2006. On that day, at his own request, he was released from his Holy Orders as a priest in the CEC to pursue Holy Orders with the Antiochian Orthodox Church. Little did I know or even dream possible that when we, two years ago, asked him to release us from his pastorate in the CEC Church so that we might become Orthodox, he too would soon step over into the One Holy, Catholic, and Apostolic Church which is the Orthodox Church.
I am humbled and amazed at the work of God in the life of Father Denny. I am especially expectant for the Bishop of the Orthodox Diocese in which we serve, to know Father Denzil Roland as I have known him. The Church has been blessed this year by his entrance into the undivided faith of our fathers. I long for the day when I attend Father Denny's Chrismation service and am able to utter the words, "Welcome home Father. You have reached the destination and now the real Journey To Orthodoxy begins."
Thursday, July 13, 2006
What Heaven Looks Like!
Sunday, July 09, 2006
"Freedom In Worship" or Is Orthodoxy Charismatic?
WHERE IS THE VALIDITY?
COMPARE THE ORTHODOX AND CHARISMATIC WORSHIP ETHOS
What a drastic contrast to the noisy self-promoting environment of the Evangelical Charismatic ethos where the criteria for spirituality is how well one can prophecy or how "anointed" the music set was!
So, does the worship in the Orthodox Church look Charismatic as we have discussed? The answer is "no". But I would not trade one Liturgy for all the Charismatic "freedom" in the world. One of the greatest spiritual moments I have had since becoming Orthodox was during the Liturgy. As we were all singing, suddenly my propensity for individual desires, personal tastes and preferences in worship based on my own cultural passions fell away and I became part of the whole. We were all singing with one voice. Let me say it again: it was as if one person was singing. I didn't lose my own identity and yet it was melded with the others present and the Saints of the ages who were also present just as the Church has maintained for 2000 years. The Charismatic world has many catch-phrases, one of them being "open heaven". You might hear someone say, "We are praying for an open heaven," or, in reference to the newest Charismatic movement, "There is an open heaven over there." Heaven is truly open every time the Orthodox Liturgy ("work" or "glory" of the people) takes place and we have, not just some ethereal move of the Holy Spirit, but the fullness of the Holy Trinity in our midst and we actually take the Presence of Christ into our bodies by way of the Eucharist.
Tuesday, June 06, 2006
It's All Relative
* UPDATE 7/21/14: This article was originally written on 6/6/06. I subsequently learned that, although the reception of my Baptist baptism may have been a sign of "love and inclusion" by the Antiochians, that practice is highly irregular and is not in keeping with the canons of the church. For more on this read Why We Left, Where We Went.
Monday, June 05, 2006
My Beloved Priest
Sunday, June 04, 2006
In Their Own Words- "Baptism Saves You"
"[N]o one can enter into the kingdom of heaven except he be regenerated through water and the Spirit, and he who does not eat the flesh of the Lord and drink his blood is excluded from eternal life, and if all these things are accomplished only by means of those holy hands, I mean the hands of the priest, how will any one, without these, be able to escape the fire of hell, or to win those crowns which are reserved for the victorious? These [priests] truly are they who are entrusted with the pangs of spiritual travail and the birth which comes through baptism: by their means we put on Christ, and are buried with the Son of God, and become members of that blessed head [the Mystical Body of Christ]" (The Priesthood 3:5-6 [A.D. 387]).