November 30 - Saint Andrew the First-Called (Part II)
Stratocles took Maximilla to the prison, where the holy one was kept under the guard of Aegeates' sentries. They entered St. Andrew's cell and fell at the Saint's feet, imploring the Apostle to strengthen and support them in the True Faith of Christ. The holy Andrew exhorted them at length, and, afterward, he ordained Stratocles as Bishop of Old Patras. He then blessed them and sent them on their way to peace. He then sat down, patiently awaiting the judgment of the ungodly Aegeates. The Proconsul, meanwhile, realized that it was impossible to share living quarters with Maximilla, despite his pleadings and threats; and Satan entered his heart and blinded him with anger.
November 30 - Saint Andrew the First-Called
Andrew, the First-called holy Apostle of Christ, was the son of a Jew named Jonah and the brother of the holy preeminent Apostle Peter. He was a native of the Galilean town of Bethsaida. Disdaining the vanity of this world and preferring virginity to matrimony, he declined to enter into wedlock; and, hearing that the holy Forerunner John was preaching repentance by the Jordan River, he left everything, went to him, and became his disciple.
The Essentials of Orthodox Christian Spirituality
The aim of man's life is union (henosis) with God and deification (theosis).
The Greek Fathers have used the term "deification" ("theosis") to a greater extent than the Latins. What is meant is not, of course, a pantheistic identity, but a sharing, through grace, in the Divine life: "...Whereby are given unto us exceeding great and precious promises: that by these ye might be partakers of the Divine nature..." (2 Peter 1:4).
November 27 - Holy Martyr James the Persian
Born in the Persian town of Elapa, or Vilat, of Christian parents, he was brought up in the Christian faith and married a Christian wife. The Persian king, Yezdegeherd, loved James for his skill and made him a noble at his court. Flattered by the king, James was deluded and offered sacrifice to idols, which the king also worshiped. His mother and wife, hearing of this, wrote him a reproachful letter in which they grieved over him as an apostate and one spiritually dead, begging him at the end of the letter to repent and return to Christ.
"Giving thanks always for all things to God the Father..." (Ephesians 5:20)
"For Christians, it is the Holy Spirit (v.18), and the joy is New Covenant worship of the Holy Trinity, the Eucharist (giving thanks, v. 20): to the Father through the Son incarnate (Lord in v. 19; "Lord Jesus Christ" in v. 20), in the Spirit (v. 18). He who is made drunk with wine totters and sways, but he who is inebriated with the Holy Spirit is rooted in Christ, and gloriously sober."
God and Salvation
Being perfect God, Christ the Savior is at the same time also perfect Man.