All Saint’s of North America
2nd Sun. after Pent. July 4, 2021, Matt 4: 18-23;
Glory to Jesus Christ! Today is the 2nd Sunday after Pentecost, and the Sunday of All Saints of North America. Today the more than 250 million worldwide members of the Holy Orthodox Church that we are part of, are celebrating the saints on their home soil. Russia, Greece, Ukraine, Ethiopia, Romania, Serbia, Georgia…are celebrating thousands of their local saints today. Saints that have lived over the last 2000 years, as compared to our 200-year saint history. Here in North America we have 18 officially glorified, with only 2 born here. We are truly a toddler Orthodox mission church.
Our mission has not changed from the start. We are to reach out to the thirsting people around us and share the love of Christ and the fullness of the Orthodox Church. The East Kootenay knows almost nothing about the Orthodox Church, and most of what people think they know about the Christian Church, is based on their encounters with the Roman Catholic or Protestant church, or even the horrible TV aberrations such as the prosperity gospel and other complete heresies. This often has little resemblance to what the Orthodox Church teaches. Our view of original sin, of the wrathful God and hell, of missionary outreach, prayer and union with God, and much else, is radically different. Yes, we are a mission of a mission Church here in Cranbrook and the East Kootenay Valley.
The Orthodox Church has existed and has been creating saints continuously from its beginning, from when Christ first called Peter and his brother Andrew, along with James and John the sons of Zebedee. “Follow Me, and I will make you fishers of men.” They immediately left their nets and their entire previous life, James and John even leaving their Father behind in the boat. This was a heart response by these first four disciples. They had no idea what the plan was, and though they spent the next three years witnessing incredible miracles, they remained almost completely clueless as to where this was all leading. It was enough just to trust and follow. To simply walk with Christ in faith. They had this faith to simply follow Christ right from the beginning, and when the Holy Spirit came upon them in fullness, our Church was born in power and strength.
When Christ talked about what seemed to be crazy ideas, which were incomprehensible, the apostles remained secure in their faith in Christ. In John we hear (John 6: 53,54) “…Most assuredly, I say to you, unless you eat the flesh of the Son of Man and drink His blood, you have no life in you. Whoever eats My flesh and drinks My blood has eternal life, and I will raise him up on the last day.” Many who were following Christ reacted poorly, (John 6:60) “Therefore many of His disciples, when they heard this said, ‘this is a hard saying; who can understand it?” (John 6: 66) “From that time many of His disciples went back and walked with Him no more.” When asked if they too wanted to leave, Peter replied (John 6:68,69) “Lord to whom shall we go? You have the words of eternal life. Also we have come to believe and know that You are the Christ, the Son of the living God.”
Our calling into Christ and His Church, being re-born into the kingdom of heaven in our baptism, and our cooperation with this re-birth, all rest on following Christ no matter the circumstances. When we are being persecuted, when others treat us disrespectfully and even tell lies and seem to look for ways to hurt us, we are told to deny ourselves, to pick up our cross and to follow Christ. In today’s gospel for the saints of North America we hear (Matt.4:11,12) “Blessed are you when men revile and persecute you, and say all kinds of evil against you falsely for My sake. Rejoice and be exceedingly glad, for great is your reward in heaven.” Our faith rests completely on the person of Christ.
When things are not going particularly well in our lives, God doesn’t promise to make it all better. He does promise to give us His peace and even a particular joy as we turn to Him in the middle of the problems of our lives. We live our lives in an environment that allows us to grow in maturity in Christ. This does not happen by having everything go as we think it should! All of the Apostles except John were martyred and joined the heavenly host with great joy as they died. This is always the goal, to turn to Christ in all our struggles. As St. Paul says (1 Cor. 10: 13) “No temptation has overtaken you except as is common to man; but God is faithful and will not allow you to be temped beyond what you are able, but with the temptation will also make the way of escape, that you may be able to bear it.” What is this way of escape? To turn and follow our Lord. To give thanks for all things – even the present miserable circumstance and the hurtful people we encounter, at work and school and even here at church! For He is with us always, unto the end of the ages! Of course, we may need to vent a little, to tell Him what a particularity rotten plan this seems to be before we can then sigh and tell Him “however, not my will and desires be done but Yours” as we begin to force ourselves to thank Him for all things – even this mess. As we deliberately say out loud “Thank you Lord,” we find our grumbling and reluctant heart will start to join in, and the light will softly return.
The Liturgy teaches us to how to pray and worship and give proper thanksgiving unto God. We gather to eat and drink of the very body and blood of our Lord Jesus Christ, and we are mystically transformed and united into the body of Christ – together with the saints. We pray in the Anaphora prayer “we ask You, and pray You, and supplicate You: Send down Your Holy Spirit upon us and upon these Gifts here offered” Our Liturgy is God-given, to lead us into communion with God. We may not always feel the joy and comprehend the eternal mystery that without exception takes place when we gather to celebrate the Divine Liturgy; but this is due to the dullness of our own God-receptors, not because anything is absent from the throne of God. The more fully and with effort we participate in the Liturgy, worshiping with the angels and with the saints gone before us, the more our contaminated God -receptors are cleansed. We become more consciously aware of God being present and filling all things. God has been faithfully present for 20 centuries, in every Liturgy, transforming hearts and bringing His people to union with Himself. He continues today here at St. Aidan’s!
Our liturgical prayers have passed the test of centuries of use and are well proven to help lead us into union with Christ. The struggle of Liturgical prayer is to unite our hearts with the prayers and make these prayers our own. Asking that our hearts be transformed, becoming infused with the wisdom and purity being expressed by the saint who wrote the prayer. If we are having difficulty, we can ask the saint who gave us the prayer to intercede for us, that our minds and hearts may follow our lips.
So what has all this to do with the saints of North America whom we are celebrating today? Everything. They were all formed within the bosom of the Church. They too prayed these very prayers. You will find reading the lives of the saints that they immersed themselves in the cycles of the Church. They availed themselves of every opportunity to be present at Church, especially at Liturgy, to receive communion and to pray, eagerly cooperating with the transforming grace of God.
We too are all called to be saints of God, this is our very purpose in life. Today is also our feast day! We all have but one thing to contribute to God to this end, our free will. In today’s epistle we are given instructions about what is required. “Be not hearers of the law but doers.” Let us try to commit at least as much time to Church, payer and our spiritual life as we do to our phones and social media. May we learn from the saints, asking for their intercessions before the very throne of God, and imitating them as best we are able. Pray for us St. Herman, St. Tikhon, St. Peter, St. John, St. Nicolai, Blessed Olga and all the rest of our beloved North American saints, that we too may join you in answering Christ’s call to simply “follow Him.” Glory to Jesus Christ!