(проповед на о. Николай***ПОКЛОН***, в катедр. храм „Успение Богородично“, София)
December 11, 2011, Sunday 26-th after Pentecost
(a sermon by Fr. Nicholas***BOW***, at the “Dormition of the Most Holy Theotokos” cathedral Church, Sofia)
We heard the words of the Apostle Paul to Timothy: “Be not thou therefore ashamed of the testimony
[sufferings] of our Lord ” [2 Tim. 1:8] Jesus Christ. This message of the apostle is filled both with general Christian and particularly pastoral instructions, most of which – clear[-cut] and specific. Such is the content of his first epistle to Timothy. The former persecutor of Christ, called by the Grace to be an apostle of the Gentiles, as he writes, “ordained a preacher, … a teacher of the Gentiles in faith and verity” [1 Tim. 2:7] tutors one of these Gentiles who has became for him his “own son in the faith” [1 Tim. 1:2]. This faith in the One who has redeemed the entire human race – the Son of God, [this faith] which after Christ’s birth has been leading the new God-chosen people, both Hebrews and Gentiles. This faith is revealed and established not by the vague Old Testament promises and expectations, but - through the light of enlightenment for every soul - by the truth of God. This is the human nature resurrecting action of the Grace, of the soul’s living connection with God through the condescending to it regenerating power of God. But this is only valid when faith has turned into a center, the contents and the meaning of life; when the soul has started living and has come to know Christ in itself. When the evidence and the confirmations of this faith are born on their own, without being sought after. And this takes place in the presence of newly acquired awareness, of the enlightened thinking through the new capabilities for understanding, which give the faithful the inbuilt in their minds “nous of Christ”. This applies to those who not only believe in Him, but also carry their cross, which consists in taking off the old man of sin and vesting oneself in the Grace. Can one really make a distinction between the life of an ordinary Christian and of the Christian pastor? – This is possible only within the specifics of the sacral ministry of the pastorate through the particular Grace by succession in the ordination. As well as [within] the higher moral demands on the priesthood. But the contents of life – both layman’s and pastor’s, depends on the degree of their internal communion with the Lord, on the acquisition of and the life in Grace.
This is why the mission of Christ’s preaching, of the evangelical gospel [good tidings] is on its own becoming a duty of each and every one to have believed and come to know the Saviour from one’s personal spiritual experience. As an Incorporated partaker in the light of truth, one turns into its vehicle for those who do not know it. It is by no chance that the power of preaching the presented [shown, handed down] “life and immortality” [2 Tim. 1:10] in the words of the Apostle, i.e. of the ones who have – through Grace – come to know the Divine nature of the New Testament preaching from personal experience, is not in eloquence, in the ability to speak impressively and convincingly by human measure but in the filled with power words of truth, which are born by the Grace of God in an enlightened mind. This is clearly expressed by the Apostle in his epistle to the Corinthians: “And my speech and my preaching was not with enticing words of man's wisdom, but in demonstration of the Spirit and of power” [1 Cor. 2:4]. Weren’t just the same almost all words professing the faith in the Savior of the countless martyrs and confessors, evidenced by the simultaneous action of the power of God both in them and in the amazing, visible to all miracles when doing their exploit. They all bore the stamp of complete selflessness, of denial from oneself because of the self-identification with the Christ living in one’s soul. We know that when they asked them, they would not even say their first names, for them these had vanished and their proper name was [a] Christian – a living imprint of Christ and of part of Christ. All this is the inner circle of that feeling and conviction, which self imposes itself as the only possible consciousness and behavior. Therefore in no way should it be mixed for the external posturing, for the religious hypocrisy that we so often see in the lives of modern Christians in their desire to appear pious, without actually being such. And they are not such because they are not – fully and firmly – dedicated to Christ in implementing His commandments, which are suffering – that suffering in the name of salvation, of the faithfulness – at any moment and in everything – to Christ, in denial from everything He detests and prohibits. Because they do not wish to part with this world’s comforts but most often they only limit these somewhat – according to their own measure and understanding. While at the same time they expect – completely unrealistically – to acquire the properties of and the life in Grace. (In holiness).
All who – just like Him – wished – because of the life with Him, because of the acquisition of the grace-filled light of renewal, – to be poor were not ashamed of the testimony [sufferings] of our Lord Jesus Christ. Some of them were poor and remained so, another part voluntarily wished to become impoverished, they gave up earthly power and wealth for life with Christ. They were not ashamed to become in the eyes of people – from well-known and honored – nobodies, humiliated and scorned. They all were content with the bare essentials in life such as food, clothing and amenities. This abstinence and self-restraint was imposed by their inner sense because of the danger of the everyday well-being and contentment slackening the will, as well as their full satisfaction through the comforts and the joys of the sense of the full value of life in union with Christ. Subsequently this was also what all the experienced in the spiritual life righteous taught, whatever the outward lifestyle of theirs. The unity among all was in the enlightening grace-filled knowledge of the truth by living in Christ and through Christ, an ascetic life, which always has some suffering, in the likeness of Christ's testimony (sufferings).
If a person – regardless of the specifics of one’s life, regardless of the time and of the duration of one’s life as a Christian – has not yet come to know from personal experience the power and grace-filled communion, which implies a certain degree of moral purification and growth – to such one the Personality of Christ remains actually unknown from Its most important aspect – as the eternally living and communicating with us Person of God Who not only created us from some distance, but suffered for us and redeemed us for the blissful life in His kingdom of eternity. He brought us out of the ubiquitous for the postlapsarian humanity gloom and gave us an opportunity to begin to see the Truth, to see not ghost-like and unintelligibly, but with the eyes of “the sound words” [2 Tim. 1:13] – the common sense as worded by the Apostle. This is the new, enlightened understanding and reason of the grace-filled renewal of the soul by the God’s – appeared[handed down] to us through Christ – Truth. When one comes to know this truth by realizing the power of God within it, then one is logically isolated from fraud and deception, by which the all-undoing spirit of the prince of this world keeps captive and dependent those who have not come to believe. The norms of the world that has not come to know and has not accepted its Creator and Redeemer cease to be norms, criteria and values for those who have come to know Christ. Then a person stops to be ashamed of the testimony sufferings of our Lord Jesus Christ, because one only sees in them the inexpressible Sacrifice of the God-man for the redemption, for the true happiness of the mankind He created. One feels of that trepidation benevolence that enlightens even the deepest heart-felt experiences, and the latter tend to change the heart, the mind and all our nature. This is a touch of the soul with the Very Source of Truth and Life, which gives birth to new life of Grace. This is the great secret of communion with God that can be fully realized only when experienced. This deep God-revelation into the human soul can be kept by ongoing efforts for life (in) and proximity with Christ. A man thus redeemed becomes attached to all the powers of one’s whole nature to one’s Creator. And this bondage gives impulse and strength to progress in one’s cleansing (of) the sinful inclinations of the old man in oneself that are “enmity against God”. [Rom. 8:7]
Let us – after the example and the prayer intercession of – the Apostle of the Gentiles and [of] his axion disciple and own son in the faith, – exert efforts for zealous Christian life, that is inconceivable without the sufferings of self-denial from earthly comforts and pleasures, from the fight against sin. This will internally bring us closer to Christ and to His testimony [sufferings], which by the Grace shall bring their divine cleansing power unto our souls, as well. Amen.
*** I may have erred – referring to the Father as Archemandrite... BOW
*** Може би по грешка нарекох отеца архимандрит... ПОКЛОН
