My beloved spiritual children in Christ Our Only True God and Our Only True Savior,
CHRIST IS IN OUR MIDST! HE WAS, IS, AND EVER SHALL BE.
+++
THE DAY OF THE LORD IS NEAR (Part II)
By Saint Gregory the Great
The world is oppressed by new and ever-increasing miseries. How many survive of the innumerable multitude of men you may see, yet each day new scourges beset them, sudden disasters fall on them, new and unheard-of-disasters arise. Just as the body in youth is vigorous, the heart strong and steady, the shoulders upright, and the lungs vigorous, but in old age the figure is no longer upright, the shrunken neck is bowed, the chest labors with frequent sighs, strength fails us, and the speaker is impeded by a faltering breath. Although feebleness is yet absent, yet infirmity in our bodily senses is now our normal state of health. So in its early years, the world flourished as in its pristine strength, vigorous to propagate the offspring of mankind, blooming in the health of its bodies, far with the richness of life. Now it is falling into its own old age, and, as if near to death, is oppressed with growing miseries.
Do not then, my brethren, love that which you know cannot endure. Keep before your minds the Apostolic counsels wherein we are admonished" "love not the world, nor the things which are in the world. If any man love the world, the love of the Father is not in him" (I John 2:15). The day before yesterday, brethren, you heard that an ancient plantation was uprooted by a sudden storm, that houses were destroyed, churches razed to their foundations. How many were there, safe and well on the previous evening, who believed that in the morning they would fulfill some task, yet that very night they were suddenly overtaken, caught in the trap of this disaster? But, we must carefully keep in mind that in the doing of these things it is the Invisible Judge that moves the breath of the faintest breeze, that awakens the storm from even one small cloud, or razes the foundations of so many buildings. But what shall happen when the Judge shall visibly appear, and when His anger burns against the wicked if we cannot now endure His wrath when He inflicts upon us the least tempest? Before the face of His wrath what flesh shall stand if He is the one who moves the wind, and shakes the earth, incites the storms, and lays low so many buildings? Saint Paul reflecting on this severity of the Judge to come, says to us: "it is a fearful thing to fall into the hands of the living God" (Hebrews 10:31). The Psalmist gives voice to the same reflection: "God, our God, shall come openly and shall not keep silence: a fire shall be kindled before Him, and round about Him there shall be a very great tempest" (Psalm 49:3). Tempest and fire shall accompany the severity of this justice because the tempest shall search out those whom the fire will burn.
Beloved brethren, keep that day before your eyes, and then whatsoever may seem burdensome will become light in comparison. Of that day it is said by the mouth of the Prophet: "The great day of the Lord is near, it is near, and hasteth greatly, even the voice of the day of the Lord; the mighty man shall cry there bitterly. That day is a day of wrath, a day of trouble and distress, a day of wasteness and desolation, a day of darkness and gloominess, a day of clouds and thick darkness. A day of the trumpet and alarm against the fenced cities, and against the high towers" (Zeph 1:14-16). Of this day the Lord has spoken by the mouth of the Prophet Haggai: "I shall shake the heavens and the earth, and the sea, and the dry land" (Hab. 2:22).
Behold, as we have said, He moves the tempest, and the earth cannot endure it. What will it do when He moves the heavens? What can we say of the terrors we now see, except that they are but heralds of the wrath to come? And let us keep in mind that these present afflictions are as far below the last tribulations, as is the person of the herald below the majesty of the judge he precedes. Reflect with all your mind upon this day, my dearest brethren. Remedy what is not defective in your present life. Amend your ways. Conquer evil temptations by standing firm against them. Repent with tears of the sins you have committed. For the more you make ready against the severity of His justice by serving Him in fear, the more serenely shall you behold the Coming of that Eternal Judge, Who with the Father, and the Holy Spirit, liveth and reigneth, world without end. Amen.
______________________
+
"It is good to be at peace with all, but [only] when they are of one mind with us as regards piety; for peace with that which is just and proper is a most excellent and profitable possession; but when it is with that which is evil or enslaving, then it is most disgraceful, and of all things the most shameful and harmful. For there is an evil concord and a good discord; there are a good severance and an evil concurrence. And if friendship becomes a cause of perdition for some, then hatred becomes a virtue for them. Better is a division for dispassion's sake than concord effected for the passions' sake" (Joseph Bryennios).
[The teacher of Saint Mark Evgenicos, head of the Patriarchal Academy and its professor of Scriptural interpretation--rigidly Orthodox and with no sympathy for the humanistic tendencies of Western thought.]
+
____________________
"Glory Be To GOD For All Things!"--Saint John Chrysostom
+++
With sincere agape in His Holy Diakonia (Ministry),
The sinner and unworthy servant of God
+Father George