We’ve all heard of the Golden Rule as found in Luke 6.31-36, “As you wish that men should do to you, do so to them.” This perspective of doing good, so that others do good to us, is ultimately of no credit to us. It is when we do good when others do NOT do good that we are living as Christ desires. Christ commands, “Be merciful as your Father is merciful.” I call this the Platinum Rule, and it the only real way to live as a Christian.
Forget about heaven! Hey! Who needs heaven when you can have greatness right here on Earth? In this environment, it can be very tempting to believe Christ wants us to be comfortable. We are surrounded by the ‘Prosperity Gospel’ which teaches that if you believe in Christ ‘enough’ then you will achieve greatness on earth. You will be wealthy and comfortable. If you are suffering, that can only be true because you don’t believe ‘enough’ in Christ.
The other day I was having a conversation with someone about why we don’t have bibles in the pews of our Churches. As part of the conversation, it was noted that in the churches this person had visited, the pews had lots of liturgy books, but no bibles. “Shouldn’t we be encouraging people to read their bibles when they come to Church?” May answer may surprise you.
Today is the Feast of St Ananias, one of the Seventy Apostles, who we hear about in Act 9. God sent him to meet with St Paul, bless him, and remind him that God had a plan for His Church. St Ananias was hesitant at first, because he knew that St Paul (when he was known as Saul) was a killer of Christians. He had gained a reputation to be feared by anyone in the Church.
Many people ‘work well under pressure’ to accomplish their tasks waiting for the fast-approaching deadline before getting down to business. One of the reasons committee meetings are effective is because people tend to work based on deadlines. It may even get our juices flowing, and jump start our creativity. That may work well in the secular world, but when it comes to salvation, waiting for deadline is worst thing we can do.
Each of us has a past, some of which we are proud of, and some of which we pray never sees the light of day again. We may not be able to deny it, but we can escape it. The motto for Be Transfigured Ministries is, “Live A New Life In Christ.” This is our goal, not to live in the past, but to live for the future with God in Heaven. That doesn’t mean we pretend the past never was, but that we are blessed with a NEW life in Christ.
We all know the struggle. Our alarm goes off just moments after we have fallen asleep. We hit the snooze button as many times as we are ‘allowed’ before begrudgingly getting out of bed to begin our hectic day. The last thing on our minds is stopping everything and doing our prayers. God will understand, we think to ourselves, as we walk past our home altar with barely an acknowledgment in our hearts.
The question of ‘Who is Jesus Christ?” has been answered with more than 45,000 different answers. If Jesus is our Savior, Who He is, matters. We call that, theology, and on the Feast of Saint John the Theologian, the Church reminds us that we have known the answer to this question for more than 1700 years. The testimony of Saint John the Theologian, and the testimony of the Church can be trusted, because it is the truth of God.
It can be difficult to live your Orthodox Christian life among different groups. That is especially true with those outside the Church since nonbelievers do not share our way of life, nor our faith in God. Inside the Church, it should be easier to live as an Orthodox Christian. So, why is it, that within the Church we are more judged by our brothers and sisters than from those outside the Church?
We live in a 24-hour society. Because we no longer depend upon the natural order of day and night, it can be a bit overwhelming just trying to remain focused on God. Before we realize it, another hour has gone by, and we have not finished the important project for work. We’ve been scrolling through the newsfeed on our phones clicking random links only to find out it was another case of clickbait. Hour by hour and day by day, we feel fortunate just to catch our breath.
