Afleveringen
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Given that we are in Holy Week, and that my parish keeps Palm Sunday Evensong through Holy Wednesday Evensong by means of Prayer Book adaptation of the Orthodox Bridegroom services, this episode is the “Holy Monday: Bridegroom Edition.”
The format is two Scripture passages, followed by my homily. The audio for all three is found above. The text of the two passages is found below.
A Lesson from the Prophet Job 1.1
There was a man in the land of Uz whose name was Job, and that man was blameless and upright, one who feared God and turned away from evil. There were born to him seven sons and three daughters. He possessed 7,000 sheep, 3,000 camels, 500 yoke of oxen, and 500 female donkeys, and very many servants, so that this man was the greatest of all the people of the east. His sons used to go and hold a feast in the house of each one on his day, and they would send and invite their three sisters to eat and drink with them. And when the days of the feast had run their course, Job would send and consecrate them, and he would rise early in the morning and offer burnt offerings according to the number of them all. For Job said, “It may be that my children have sinned, and cursed God in their hearts.” Thus Job did continually.Now there was a day when the sons of God came to present themselves before the Lord, and Satan also came among them. The Lord said to Satan, “From where have you come?” Satan answered the Lord and said, “From going to and fro on the earth, and from walking up and down on it.” And the Lord said to Satan, “Have you considered my servant Job, that there is none like him on the earth, a blameless and upright man, who fears God and turns away from evil?” Then Satan answered the Lord and said, “Does Job fear God for no reason? Have you not put a hedge around him and his house and all that he has, on every side? You have blessed the work of his hands, and his possessions have increased in the land. But stretch out your hand and touch all that he has, and he will curse you to your face.” And the Lord said to Satan, “Behold, all that he has is in your hand. Only against him do not stretch out your hand.” So Satan went out from the presence of the Lord.
A Lesson from the Gospel according to S. Matthew 24.36
Our Lord continued to teach His disciples, saying: “Concerning that day and hour no one knows, not even the angels of heaven, nor the Son, but the Father only. For as were the days of Noah, so will be the coming of the Son of Man. For as in those days before the flood they were eating and drinking, marrying and giving in marriage, until the day when Noah entered the ark, and they were unaware until the flood came and swept them all away, so will be the coming of the Son of Man. Then two men will be in the field; one will be taken and one left. Two women will be grinding at the mill; one will be taken and one left. Therefore, stay awake, for you do not know on what day your Lord is coming. But know this, that if the master of the house had known in what part of the night the thief was coming, he would have stayed awake and would not have let his house be broken into. Therefore you also must be ready, for the Son of Man is coming at an hour you do not expect. Who then is the faithful and wise servant, whom his master has set over his household, to give them their food at the proper time? Blessed is that servant whom his master will find so doing when he comes. Truly, I say to you, he will set him over all his possessions. But if that wicked servant says to himself, ‘My master is delayed,’ and begins to beat his fellow servants and eats and drinks with drunkards, the master of that servant will come on a day when he does not expect him and at an hour he does not know and will cut him in pieces and put him with the hypocrites. In that place there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth. Then the kingdom of heaven will be like ten virgins who took their lamps and went to meet the bridegroom. Five of them were foolish, and five were wise. For when the foolish took their lamps, they took no oil with them, but the wise took flasks of oil with their lamps. As the bridegroom was delayed, they all became drowsy and slept. But at midnight there was a cry, ‘Here is the bridegroom! Come out to meet him.’ Then all those virgins rose and trimmed their lamps. And the foolish said to the wise, ‘Give us some of your oil, for our lamps are going out.’ But the wise answered, saying, ‘Since there will not be enough for us and for you, go rather to the dealers and buy for yourselves.’ And while they were going to buy, the bridegroom came, and those who were ready went in with him to the marriage feast, and the door was shut. Afterward the other virgins came also, saying, ‘Lord, lord, open to us.’ But he answered, ‘Truly, I say to you, I do not know you.’ Watch therefore, for you know neither the day nor the hour.”
If you find this edifying, please consider (if you haven’t already) becoming a paid subscriber. Your support goes directly to supporting the ministry of Akenside Institute for English Spirituality, a project I started 12 years ago to help to rebuild the Anglican tradition.
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Evenings With Bede is a homily podcast. The episodes are taken from the Sunday solemn Plainsong Evensong services of Saint Paul’s, New Smyrna Beach, Fla., where I am Rector.
Given that we are in Holy Week, and that my parish keeps Palm Sunday Evensong through Holy Wednesday Evensong according to a Prayer Book adaptation of the Orthodox Bridegroom services, this episode is the “Bridegroom Edition.” We kick off the Bridegroom services through the aid of the Venerable S. Bede.
The format is a short passage from Scripture, then comes commentary from the Bede, and finally an interpretive homily by yours truly expounding upon both. The audio for all three is found above. The text of the two passages is found below.
A Lesson from the Gospel according to S. Luke 21.29
Jesus told the disciples a parable: “Look at the fig tree, and all the trees. As soon as they come out in leaf, you see for yourselves and know that the summer is already near. So also, when you see these things taking place, you know that the kingdom of God is near. Truly, I say to you, this generation will not pass away until all has taken place. Heaven and earth will pass away, but my words will not pass away. But watch yourselves lest your hearts be weighed down with dissipation and drunkenness and cares of this life, and that day come upon you suddenly like a trap. For it will come upon all who dwell on the face of the whole earth. But stay awake at all times, praying that you may have strength to escape all these things that are going to take place, and to stand before the Son of Man.”
A Lesson from his commentary on the Gospel of S. Luke by the Venerable S. Bede
He who desires to stand before the Son of Man and to serve Him day and night in His temple in accordance with Apocalypse of Saint John, which says, “Therefore they are before the throne of God, and serve him day and night in his temple; and he who sits on the throne will shelter them with his presence,” and not to be cast off from His sight, cursed, into the eternal fire, ought not only to refrain from worldly allurements, but also to pray and to watch: and he should do this not on certain fixed days, but at all times, according to what the Psalm says: “I will bless the Lord at all times, His praise will alway be in my mouth.” For truly in this way he will deserve to dwell in the house of the Lord and praise Him eternally.
If you find this edifying, please consider (if you haven’t already) becoming a paid subscriber. Your support goes directly to supporting the ministry of Akenside Institute for English Spirituality, a project I started 12 years ago to help to rebuild the Anglican tradition.
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Zijn er afleveringen die ontbreken?
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Today we have gathered to meet Christ on the Mount of Olives. Today He returns from Bethany, having raised Lazarus from the dead, and shared a meal with Saint Lazarus and Saint Martha and Saint Mary Magdalene, and been anointed by her with oil of spikenard. After this, He proceeds of His own free will toward His holy and blessed Passion, to consummate the mystery of our salvation. He who came down from heaven to raise us from the depths of sin, to raise us with Himself, we are told in Scripture, above every sovereignty, authority and power, and every other name that can be named, now comes of His own free will to make His journey to Jerusalem. He comes without pomp or ostentation. As Isaiah says: He will not cry or lift up His voice, or make it heard in the street. In His incomprehensible power, Our Lord is meek and humble; He makes His entry in simplicity.
Let us strive with all our energy to accompany Him as He hastens toward His passion, and imitate those who met Him, not by covering His path with garments, olive branches or palms, but by doing all we can to open ourselves before Him in worship by humility and trying to live to please Him. Then we shall be able to receive the Word at His coming, and God, Whom no limits can contain, truly abides in us.
In His humility Christ entered the dark regions of our fallen world and He is glad that He became so humble for our sake, glad that He came and lived among us and shared in our nature in order to raise us up again to himself. And even though we are told that He has now ascended above the highest heavens – the proof of His power and divinity – His love for man will never rest until He has raised our earthbound nature from glory to glory, and made it one with His own in heaven.
So let us spread before His feet, not garments or palm branches, which delight the eye for a few hours and then wither, but ourselves, clothed in his grace, or rather, clothed completely in Him. We who have been baptized into Christ must ourselves be the garments that we spread before Him. Now that the crimson stains of our sins have been washed away in the saving waters of baptism and we have become white as pure wool, let us present the conqueror of death, not with mere branches of palms but with the real rewards of His victory: our selves, our souls and bodies, spread before Him as reasonable, holy, and living sacrifice unto Him. Let our souls take the place of the welcoming branches as we join today in the children’s holy song: Blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord. Blessed is the king of Israel.
Let us show Him honor, not with olive branches but with the splendor of merciful deeds to one another. Let us spread the thoughts and desires of our hearts under His feet like garments, so that entering us with the whole of His being, He may draw the whole of our being into Himself and place the whole of His in us. Let us say to Zion in the words of the prophet: "Have courage, daughter of Zion, do not be afraid. Behold, your king comes to you, humble and mounted on a colt, the foal of a beast of burden." He is coming Who is everywhere present and pervades all things; He is coming to achieve in us His work of salvation. He is coming Who came to call to repentance not the righteous but sinners, coming to recall those who have strayed into sin. Do not be afraid, then: "God is in the midst of you, and you shall not be shaken."
Receive Him with open, outstretched hands, for it was on His own hands that He sketched you. Receive Him who laid your foundations on the palms of His hands. Receive Him, for He took upon Himself all that belongs to us except sin, to consume what is ours in what is His. Be glad, city of Zion, our mother, and fear not. Let us celebrate our feast. Glorify Him for His mercy, Who has come to us in you. Rejoice exceedingly, daughter of Jerusalem, sing and leap for joy. "Be enlightened, be enlightened," as Isaiah trumpeted, for the light has come to us: the glory of the Lord has risen over us.
What kind of light is this? It is that which "enlightens every man coming into the world." It is the everlasting light, the light inaccessible, the timeless light revealed in time, the light manifested in the flesh although hidden by nature, the light that shone round the shepherds and guided the Magi. It is the light that was in the world from the beginning, through which the world was made, yet the world did not know it. It is that light which came to its own, and its own people did not receive it.
Brothers and sisters, the Cross of Christ is the glory of the Lord. He, the radiance of the Father’s glory, even as He said when He faced His passion: "Now is the Son of Man glorified, and God is glorified in him, and will glorify him at once." The glory of which He speaks here is His lifting up on the cross, for Christ’s glory is His cross and His exultation upon it, for He says: "When I have been lifted up, I will draw all men to myself." Let us be drawn to Him this Holy Week. Let us answer the call to watch, to wait for the Bridegroom. That when He comes He finds us awake, with our flasks of oil full. That when He calls, He admits us to the wedding banquet because, full of oil which is His mercy, Which He has given to those who are merciful, He knows and recognizes us, and wants us to live with Him forever: He Who lives and reigns with the Father in the unity of the Holy Ghost, ever one God, world without end. Amen.
(This sermon has been adapted from a homily by S. Andrew of Crete, d. 740.)
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This service, Lazarus Saturday, is very ancient, traced to the early 300s, the day immediately preceding Palm Sunday. It is the first of the “stations” that we in our liturgy follow in this time of year, the last being at Pentecost in fifty days. For the death of Lazarus, and the raising of him, happened right before Jesus entered in Jerusalem, which we call Palm Sunday, and is intricately part of the narrative of our Lord’s Passion.
We see this in the carefully crafted Gospel account from Saint John how Christ, six days before His own death, and with particular awareness of the people “standing by, that they may believe that Thou didst send me,” went to His dead friend Lazarus at Bethany outside of Jerusalem, on the Mount of Olives. He was aware of the approaching death of Lazarus but deliberately delayed His coming, saying to His disciples at the news of His friend’s death: “For your sake I am glad that I was not there, so that you may believe.” Everything Christ does is for us, for our belief.
When Jesus arrived at Bethany, Lazarus was already dead for four days. This fact is emphasized by the Gospel narrative. The four days underscores the horrible reality of death. Man, created by God in His own image and likeness, is a spiritual-material being, a unity of soul and body. Death is destruction; it is the separation of soul and body. The soul without the body is a ghost, as one theologian puts it, and the body without the soul is a decaying corpse. The Church Father Saint John of Damascus, wrote: “I weep and I wail, when I think upon death, and behold our beauty, fashioned after the image of God, lying in the tomb dishonored, disfigured, bereft of form.” The mystery of death is quite real, quite difficult, and quite awful. Death is always a tragedy.
With dramatic simplicity the Gospel records that, on coming to the scene of the horrible end of His friend, “Jesus wept.” At this moment Lazarus, the friend of Christ, stands for all men, and Bethany on the Mount of Olives is the mystical center of the world. Jesus wept as He saw the “very good” creation and its king, man, who was made through Him, to be filled with joy, life and light, now a burial ground in which man is sealed up in a tomb outside the city, removed from the fullness of life for which he was created, and decomposing in darkness, despair and death. Again as the Gospel says, the people were hesitant to open the tomb, for “by this time there will be an odor, for he has been dead four days.”
When the stone was removed from the tomb, Jesus prayed to His Father and then cried with a loud voice: “Lazarus, come out.” The iconography of the feast shows the particular moment when Lazarus appears at the entrance to the tomb. He is still wrapped in his grave clothes and his friends, who are holding their noses because of the stench of his decaying body, must unwrap him. In everything stress is laid on the audible, the visible, and the tangible. Christ presents the world with this observable fact: on the eve of His own suffering and death He raises a man dead four days! The people were astonished. Many immediately believed on Jesus and a great crowd began to assemble around Him as the news of the raising of Lazarus spread. The regal entry into Jerusalem followed. This was the miracle of miracles.
Let us understand and contemplate how in Jesus, Who is the beginning, all things were created in heaven and earth. And that Jesus through His voice raised Lazarus back to life. As He says, “My sheep hear My voice, and I know them, and they follow Me.” Lazarus heard Christ’s voice. This happened on the fourth day of Lazarus’s death, and the Church has found important symbolism in that it was the fourth day. Our Lord’s resurrection is on the third day. This is His resurrection to teach all of creation that He is the Lord of lords and King of kings; it is to reveal to the Church that it is because of Christ’s resurrection that our resurrection to eternal life is possible, and that it is because of Him that the power of death upon the disciples of Christ has been removed. And so Lazarus, representing all men as Adam represents all men in Genesis, is resurrected on the fourth day, one day after Our Lord’s resurrection. Because of Our Lord Jesus, we can have the assurance of our resurrection and the comfort of a reasonable and holy hope in the joyful expectation of eternal life in the heavenly kingdom.
Jesus Christ is the same yesterday, and today and for ever. What He has done, is what He will do, is what He is doing. To be a follower of Christ is always to be invited into the most holy ground of His being. We enter into Holy Week with the benefit of knowing how this divine narrative unfolds. This knowledge is grace, and by this grace we can engage the way of the Cross ever more intimately, ever more closely, ever more attentively, with the such knowledge of Our Savior’s sacrifice for us and for our salvation that demands our love for Him, demands our commitment to Him, and demands our adoration of Him and His power. With S. Martha, let us say, “Yes Lord: I believe that you are the Christ, the Son of God, Who is coming into the world.” This Christ, Who died for us and for our sins, and for our salvation, Who with the Father and the Holy Ghost, lives and reigns, ever one God, world without end. Amen.
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This Lent on Friday evenings I am offering a teaching series called “The Wonder of Prayer.” It explores key facets of the prayer life. This is the fifth and final session.
The audio of the talk is above. The two parts of this second session are
* Review of Prayer and its Characteristics
* Liturgical Prayer
* Personal Prayer Rule
What is Prayer?
Combining the doctrines of prayer by S. John of Damascus and Father Martin Thornton yields a composite definition of prayer:
Prayer is spiritual activity: our lifting up of the heart and mind to the living God – anything we do which is conditioned by conscious relationship with Him, a relationship which is continuous, whether or not it is recognized or articulated.
Person Prayer Rule
* Personal devotion daily, or most days.
* a personal routine of prayer, done in sequence or in some pattern
* ideally, something in the morning and something in the evening. if possible, something midday.
* according to the four characteristics of prayer
* often developed through discussion with the parish priest, within spiritual direction
* it can change and adapt according to the life and circumstances of the person
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This Lent on Friday evenings I am offering a teaching series called “The Wonder of Prayer.” It explores key facets of the prayer life. This is the fourth session.
The audio of the talk is above. The two parts of this second session are
* Review of Prayer and its Characteristics
* Types of Praying:
* Meditative
* Affective
* Contemplative
* Recollective
What is Prayer?
Combining the doctrines of prayer by S. John of Damascus and Father Martin Thornton yields a composite definition of prayer:
Prayer is spiritual activity: our lifting up of the heart and mind to the living God – anything we do which is conditioned by conscious relationship with Him, a relationship which is continuous, whether or not it is recognized or articulated.
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Evenings With Bede is a homily podcast. The episodes are taken from the Sunday solemn Plainsong Evensong services of Saint Paul’s, New Smyrna Beach, Fla., where I am Rector.
SEASON TWO is devoted to understanding the Song of Songs with the Venerable S. Bede as teacher, and yours truly as interpreter. We will go verse by verse through the entirety of the Song of Songs.
The format is a short passage from the Song of Songs, then comes commentary from the Bede, and finally an interpretive homily by yours truly expounding upon both. The audio for all three is found above. The text of the two passages is found below.
A Lesson from the Song of Songs, 1.15
Behold, you are beautiful, my friend; behold, you are beautiful; your eyes are those of doves. Behold, You are beautiful, my love, and comely. Your couch is full of flowers. The beams of our houses are of cedar, our paneled ceilings of cypress wood.
A Lesson from a Treatise by the Venerable S. Bede
When the Bride hears that a two-fold beauty has been brought together in her by the Lord, she then responds with a devout voice: “Behold, you a beautiful, my love, and comely,” as if she should say openly, “Surely whatever I possess of beauty, simplicity, and spiritual grace I have doubtless receive through Your generosity, by which I have come to possess both the remission of sins and the ability to do good. But You are truly beautiful and comely beyond compare, You Who are God, begotten of the Father before all worlds, and when the time for my redemption arrived you were conceived and born of the Holy Spirit and the Virgin Mary, not only free from every stain of sin but also full of grace and truth, and You came into the world and lived in the world, and to all those who partake of Your grace You have even granted that they might also share in the virtues of Your beauty. Therefore you are beautiful and comely, that is, admirable both in the eternity of Your divine nature and in the dignity of the humanity that You assumed.”
If you find this edifying, please consider (if you haven’t already) becoming a paid subscriber. Your support goes directly to supporting the ministry of Akenside Institute for English Spirituality, a project I started 12 years ago to help to rebuild the Anglican tradition.
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I spoke last Sunday in very high ways about the Eucharist. For example, I said that because Jesus Christ is the source and summit of our life, so the Eucharist, the blessed Sacrament of the Altar, is the source and summit of our life. The Eucharist is Christ, and Christ is Himself the Eucharist. I also said that no matter what our feelings may be on a given Sunday, or a given Liturgy of the Eucharist on a weekday, the very nature of the Eucharist is that it is Christ’s most precious Body and Blood. And I said that the Eucharist heals us because Christ heals us, and He is the Eucharist. The Eucharist strengthens us because Christ strengthens us, and the Eucharist is Christ. The Eucharist showers us with heavenly love because Christ is Love, Who became man in holy sacrifice for us.
That kind of understanding of the Eucharist and the Sacrifice of Christ is central to a right knowledge about Jesus. He took our flesh so that He could dwell among us. He became flesh to dwell among us as the Eucharist, as the Blessed Sacrament. The Eucharist is the Sacrament of His Passion, indeed the Sacrament of His Sacrifice. Yet understanding the Christ sacrificed at all took the Church time to realize. Really until Paul started writing his holy epistles–that is when the nature of Christ’s Sacrifice became widely known and widely understood.
Yet, there are hints that the disciples sensed some of this during Christ’s human life. Saint Peter said to Jesus, “To Whom shall we go? You have the words of eternal life!” Peter also said of Jesus, “You are the Christ, the Son of the living God!” Certainly the Blessed Virgin Mary had a strong sense of Who her Son was, and Who He always will be. Saint Mary Magdalene and the other holy myrrh-bearing women had a good sense, as well. Saint John the Apostle, the beloved disciple, shared this sense with the holy myrrh-bearing women.
Yet most of the disciples fled the Cross when Jesus was nailed to it; they would not have fled if they knew that the Passion of Christ was the most glorious sacrifice possible. They were confused and uncertain Who Jesus was, and uncertain of what His death meant. But somewhere, amid their confusion, there was a seed growing in them. This is how God works: He plants seeds in our heart that are intended to grow in us, so that we are able to conceive the holy Jesus in our hearts, and bear Him in our minds. It takes time, but the power of God’s seed is infinite. It always grows in good soil.
In our Gospel account from Saint Matthew,, the Mother of Saint John and Saint James, the sons of Zebedee, named by Jesus as the “sons of thunder,” speaks to Jesus. She is doing so because her sons asked her to. They had seen the Transfiguration of Jesus and it opened the eyes of their heart, and began to transform them. Seeing Jesus transfigured meant a seed of glory was planted in the hearts of James and John. In seeing Him transfigured they also witnessed Elijah and Moses appearing, one of the right of Jesus and one on the left. They heard a voice from the cloud which overshadowed them, say, “This is my beloved Son, Hear Him!” And they were told by Jesus, as they came down from the mountain after the Transfiguration, to tell no one the things they had seen, until the Son of Man had risen from the dead. What they saw left a mark on their soul. This is the seed that was planted.
They wanted to be at the right hand and at left hand of Jesus as He entered His kingdom. Why? Because they saw Moses at the right hand and Elijah at the left hand of Jesus as He appeared to them in His transfigured glory. That seed which was planted started to grow. They were filled with zeal, they were filled with strong desire to be with Jesus. They wanted to imitate Moses and Elijah, two Saints of the Church, and to be able to speak with Jesus in His glory as Moses and Elijah spoke with Jesus. James and John, in other words, wanted what we should all want. They had zeal which we should all have. They were filled with desire that we all should be filled with. And even us more so than them, because unlike them, we have the benefit of the New Testament writings and two thousand years of the prayer of Holy Church, and they did not. We have the Eucharist, and at that time, they did not.
And because of this, we know something very important, that had yet to be revealed to John and James: to enter into the glory of Christ and be with Him requires that we be with Christ in His Passion. We must be with Christ as He offers His Body and Blood in holy sacrifice: doing so both as the Sacrifice and the High Priest Who offers the Sacrifice which is Himself. The new covenant is the covenant made with Christ’s Body and Blood shed in His Passion, which is the beginning of all creation.
As Paul says, everytime we receive the Eucharist, we proclaim Christ’s death. When we receive the Eucharist, we proclaim the Gospel, for Christ’s death means forgiveness of sins, salvation, and eternal life. Christ’s death, His Passion, is the source of all new creation, and the summit of earthly existences: for Christ is the Light of the world, through Whom all things are made, and all things through Him are remade. This is why the Eucharist, which is Christ, heals us, strengthens us, and showers us with heavenly benediction. Because of the Passion of Christ, He is able to live in us, and we are able to live in Him, Christ the King of all Creation, Who lives and reigns with the Father, in the unity of the Holy Ghost: ever one God, world without end. Amen.
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In addition to speaking about how Jerusalem above is our mother, Saint Paul in our Epistle today speaks of our freedom. He speaks of our freedom in Christ, because Christ has set us free. In speaking of freedom, Paul means freedom from sin. He means freedom from sinful ways, sinful habits which are called passions. Paul means freedom from being a slave to sin, or a slave to the world. In Christ we are a new creation. In Christ the eyes of our heart see above the firmament into the heavenly places. In Christ the dry land of our sinful existence, the dry land of spiritual darkness becomes earth, becomes capable of growth because of God’s grace. Dry land cannot grow grass which bears seed; dry land cannot grow fruit trees bearing seeds in the fruit. When we are slaves to sin, we swim in the waters of darkness, of the abyss. Christ brings us out of the darkness, because Christ is our light. And God parts the sea, He gathers together the waters so that dry land appears. And He calls us earth: this is the freedom we have in Christ, that being free, we can spiritually grow, that on the earth, which is to say in our heart, we can bear fruit and have seeds within ourselves, indeed that our heart can contain the seeds of all good works and virtues, that we can perform works of love and works of mercy, which are brought forth from the good treasure of our heart.
Our Collect invites us to be comforted by the grace of Christ, that in our suffering we may be relieved by the mercy of Christ. And what can comfort us more than Christ Himself? Who can provide grace to us but Christ Himself? Who may bestow mercy upon us to relieve us from our suffering, our wounds, our hurts but He Whose very nature is mercy, Jesus Christ Himself? Our Lord Jesus gives us the peace which passes all understanding, and He does so by His presence. He does so personally for each one of His children. He does so personally for each of his parish churches as a Body, because we are His Body.
And to His Body the Church He gives His Body and Blood in the Blessed Sacrament, in the most holy Sacrament of the Altar, the Eucharist. Saint John teaches us that Jesus Christ distributes Himself to those who were seated. The image of being seated most powerfully is given us in the image of Saint Mary Magdalene, seated at the feet of Jesus. In being seated at the feet of Jesus, she offers herself as a living sacrifice to God. In being seated at the feet of Jesus, she adores Christ, listens to Christ, and puts all of her focus on Christ. In being seated at the feet of Jesus, her heart is centered on Christ and His Sacred Humanity. In being seated, she is fed by Christ, as He fed the five thousand who were seated.
In feeding us within Himself, Christ transforms us. We are transformed because the Sacrament of Christ’s Love, which is the Eucharist, fulfills its purpose in us. Receiving into our bodies Christ’s Body and Blood, we are drawn to become that which we receive: and we receive He Who is Love, so that we are drawn out of darkness, out of being merely dry land, to become fertile earth upon which the seeds of the Gospel grow. Christ’s Gospel seeds grow in our heart and transform our heart. Christ’s love envelops us and covers us and protects us. Christ’s love heals us, cleans us, and feeds us. Freedom in Christ means the ability to grow up to the fullness of the stature of Christ. Christ’s love perfects us.
Because Jesus Christ is the source and summit of our life, so the Eucharist, the blessed Sacrament of the Altar, is the source and summit of our life. The Eucharist is Christ, and Christ is Himself the Eucharist. Thus the Eucharist is itself the surest tradition, the one tradition on which we always can safely rely. Thus we adore the Blessed Sacrament. Thus we always allow the Blessed Sacrament to shower upon us heavenly benediction. No matter what our feelings may be on a given Sunday, the very nature of the Eucharist is that it is Christ’s most precious Body and Blood. The Eucharist heals us because Christ heals us, and He is the Eucharist. The Eucharist strengthens us because Christ strengthens us, and the Eucharist is Christ. The Eucharist showers us with heavenly love because Christ is Love incarnate, Who became man in holy sacrifice for us, and Who always lives and reigns with the Father in the unity of the Holy Ghost, ever one God, world without end. Amen.
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We hear Saint Paul today teaching us to be imitators of God, as beloved children. If we takes that the slightest bit seriously, then we are immediately drawn to a great pause. Paul wants us to imitate God?!? That’s quite a big ask. Usually we are urged to imitate the Saints. And as difficult sounding as that might be, the Saints are at least human! They are like us, and we are like them. But we are not like God.
We can go right down the list: God is Eternal, and we are not. God is Incomprehensible, and we are not. God is outside the conditions of time and space. God is Perfect, and perfect in all attributes with which we speak of Him: perfect beauty, perfect truth, perfect goodness. God is not merely holy – He is Himself Holiness. God is not merely loving – He is Himself Love. He is the source of all, the lover of all, the sustainer of all. So, sure, let’s imitate Him.
Let us bear in mind words I preached last Sunday: Lent is the season especially to focus on holy lives, and the holiness which must be part of every Christian’s experience, because as Saint Paul teaches in his epistle to the Hebrews, “Strive for peace with all men, and for the holiness without which no one will see the Lord.” This is what Saint Paul is after: imitating the holiness of God. Or simply: that we are to walk in holiness. Walk in love, holy love, the holy love of Christ’s sacrifice on the cross: walk as Christ loved us, and gave Himself up for us, a fragrant offering and sacrifice to God.
Holiness is the life we are called to live. Our lives must not be polluted by sexual immortality, or impurity of any kind. There ought be no filthiness, foolish talk, or crude joking, Paul says. Rather, let us always offer our thanks to the God we adore. We are to walk as children of the light, always seeking to discern what is pleasing to the Lord, and then doing those things as a habit. And we are to expose works of darkness around us, works of darkness we come upon, we are to expose, but bringing in the light of Christ. We are to follow God’s commandments – to love God with everything that we are, and to love our neighbor as ourself, that and all the other commandments of God. We are to pray daily, worship regularly, study Scripture as we are able, and perform works of mercy. All of these sorts of things come up when the subject is a life of holiness.
Yet holiness is also an attitude, a disposition, a posture or stance before God. We develop this attitude through being in right relationship with God, and here I mean having the right understanding of our relationship with God. Our relationship with God, from His side, is continuous. He is always keeping us in existence, moment to moment. And because He is Creator and we are creature, and He is perfect Creator, then He always has a perfect love for His creatures, a perfect love for us at all times. And as I said before, God is Eternal, God is Incomprehensible, God is perfect. He dwells in Light inaccessible, and dwells outside the conditions of time and space. When we think of Him, acknowledging Who He is ought to take our breath away. Our God is an awesome God.
This is where holiness emerges. We adore God, we behold Him, and then we look at ourselves. The sight of God comes first, then the sight of self, and all holiness springs from these two sights. To see God clearly and to see self clearly, we are drawn into holiness through the true vision of both God and self, and God and His people. We perceive the difference between God and us, and this difference is immense: He is Creator, we are creature, and each of us is one of countless creatures all created by the Divine Maker. Yet being like nothing, we are loved by God Who is the Maker, Creator, and Sustainer of all.
And holiness springs from knowing how prone to temptation we can be: temptation from the flesh, the world, and the Devil and his demons. Jesus provides us with necessary caution and wisdom in the spiritual life. Yes, by the grace of Christ unclean spirits go out of a person, and they are the better – the much better – for it. Yet rather than celebrate good times, we must have caution, our Lord insists. We must have caution and not let our guard down, because the demon is surely to return, and return with more unholy demons. The unseen warfare of the spiritual life requires constant vigilance.
And so we ask our Almighty and awesome God to stretch forth the right hand of His Majesty. We ask Him to be our defence against all our enemies. We ask His protection, we ask the protection of our Guardian Angel – that by His grace we are able to avoid immortality, impurity, filthiness, and foolishness. We ask the strength to reject the invitations of those walking in darkness – invitations to join them in seemingly benign revelry. We ask that by God’s grace our house is guarded by the blood of the Lamb – the blood of Jesus Christ, Who gives Himself to us always as holy Sacrifice that we are drawn to participate in His ever-living Sacrifice as He lives and reigns with the Father in the unity of the Holy Ghost, ever one God, world without end. Amen.
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This Lent on Friday evenings I am offering a teaching series called “The Wonder of Prayer.” It explores key facets of the prayer life. Last night was the third session.
The audio of the talk is above. The two parts of this second session are
* What is Prayer? (a review)
* The Threefold Regula — the Rule of the Church
* Penitence and Petition
We review prayer as such as well as the threefold Regula (the Rule of the Church). Then we look at the four characteristics of true prayer—reviewing Adoration and Thanksgiving and introducing Penitence and Petition.
What is Prayer?
Combining the doctrines of prayer by S. John of Damascus and Father Martin Thornton yields a composite definition of prayer:
Prayer is spiritual activity: our lifting up of the heart and mind to the living God – anything we do which is conditioned by conscious relationship with Him, a relationship which is continuous, whether or not it is recognized or articulated.
PENITENCE AND PETITION
1. Julian of NorwichRevelations of Divine Love, chapter 5
We need to have in our knowing the littleness of creatures and to hold as naught (“nothing”) all-things that are made, so that we can love our God Who is unmade. For this is the cause as to why we are not at east in our heart and soul: that we seek here rest in those things that are so little, in which there is no rest, and do not know that our God is Almighty, all-wise, and all-good. For He is the true Rest. God wills Himself to be known, and it pleases Him that we rest in Him. This is the cause why no soul can rest: it cannot rest until it is made nought as to all things that are made. When we willingly see ourselves as nought, and that this is how we love God and see Him as all in all, and we are able to receive true spiritual rest from God and in God.
2. Julian of Norwich
God, of Thy goodness, give me Thyself:for Thou art enough to me,and I may ask nothing that is lessthat may be full worship to Thee;and if I ask anything that is less,ever me be in want – for only in Thee I have all.
3. Confession of Sin from the Book of Common Prayer
Let us humbly confess our sins unto Almighty God.
Silence may be kept.
Almighty God,Father of our Lord Jesus Christ,maker of all things, judge of all men:We acknowledge and bewail our manifold sins and wickedness,which we from time to time most grievously have committed,by thought, word, and deed, against thy divine Majesty,provoking most justly thy wrath and indignation against us.We do earnestly repent,and are heartily sorry for these our misdoings;the remembrance of them is grievous unto us,the burden of them is intolerable.Have mercy upon us,have mercy upon us, most merciful Father;for thy Son our Lord Jesus Christ's sake,forgive us all that is past;and grant that we may ever hereafter serve and please thee in newness of life,to the honor and glory of thy Name;through Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.
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Evenings With Bede is a homily podcast. The episodes are taken from the Sunday solemn Plainsong Evensong services of Saint Paul’s, New Smyrna Beach, Fla., where I am Rector.
SEASON TWO is devoted to understanding the Song of Songs with the Venerable S. Bede as teacher, and yours truly as interpreter. We will go verse by verse through the entirety of the Song of Songs.
The format is a short passage from the Song of Songs, then comes commentary from the Bede, and finally an interpretive homily by yours truly expounding upon both. The audio for all three is found above. The text of the two passages is found below.
A Lesson from the Song of Songs, 1.15
Behold, you are beautiful, my friend; behold, you are beautiful; your eyes are those of doves. Behold, You are beautiful, my love, and comely. Your couch is full of flowers. The beams of our houses are of cedar, our paneled ceilings of cypress wood.
A Lesson from a Treatise by the Venerable S. Bede
Thus far, the Church has been receiving from her Redeemer gifts that she invokes as tokens of love. Then He responds to her by way of reward: “Behold, you are beautiful, my friend; behold, you are beautiful; your eyes are those of doves.” It is as if He said, “Behold, you are beautiful in the pure works with which you live soberly and justly and piously in this world; behold, you are beautiful in the simplicity of heart with which you apply yourself to good deeds for the purpose of eternity alone, awaiting the blessed hope and coming of the glory of the great God. Your eyes are those of doves, the eyes of your heart are simple and pure and utterly free from all duplicity of deceiving or pretending; behold, they are greatly blessed because such eyes as these will see God.” And again as if He said, “Your eyes are as those of doves because your spiritual senses are endowed with understanding”; for since the Holy Spirit descended upon the Lord in the form of a dove, rightly are the spiritual senses and gifts signified by the terms “doves” or “those of doves.” Again, Christ’s friend has the eyes of a dove because every soul that truly loves Him inwardly in not like a bird of prey aroused by any craving for external things, nor does she contemplate any harm that she might inflict upon living things; for they say that the dove is gentle by nature and contemplates everything that happens with a heart that is simple, meek, and humble.
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Our patron, Saint Paul, has a word today about true holiness. And we also hear the curious story Jesus and the Canaanite woman, about which we will speak about in a moment. Paul teaches that God called us to a lift of holiness. That holiness is characteristic of our prayer life, indeed how we walk, so as to please God. Indeed, as David says in our Psalm: that we lift up our soul to God, in Whom we put our trust. Our lives ought be different than regular lives of non-Christians. So we will get into that more.
I completed my sermon last Sunday with these words: Let us say unto the Lord: Lord, Thou art my hope, and my stronghold. And how do we say this but in prayer? Prayer is the lifting up of the heart and mind to God, taught S. John of Damascus, 8th century Church Father. Let us truly pray, by lifting our heart and mind to God this whole season of Lent. This is what makes Lent a holy season: that our prayer is more intense, that our prayer is more robust, that our prayer is regular, which is to say, daily. End of those words.
So Lent is the season especially to focus on holy lives, and the holiness which must be part of every Christian’s experience, because as Saint Paul teaches in his epistle to the Hebrews, “Strive for peace with all men, and for the holiness without which no one will see the Lord.”
This is one of the lessons our Lord seeks to teach us through the Gospel account from Saint Matthew. The thing to immediately notice in passage is the tension evident between the disciples and Our Lord Jesus. “Send her away, for she is crying after us,” they implore Jesus. But Jesus does not send her away, but rather listens to her, talks with her, and eventually praises her great faith, so much so that we are left with the impression that it was her great faith that healed her daughter from the demon, indeed exorcised her of the demon.
The next thing to notice is the dialogue between Jesus and the Canaanite woman. After the disciples attempted unsuccessfully to command Jesus to send her away, He says “I was sent only to the lost sheep of the house of Israel.” But she came and knelt before Him – she knelt, that is, she worshiped – and she said, “Lord, help me. And He answered, “It is not fair to take the children’s bread and throw it to the dogs.” And she said, “Yes, Lord, yet even the dogs eat the crumbs that fall from their master’s table.” Then Jesus answers, great is your faith! Be it done for you as you desire.” It sounds on a plain reading that Jesus is being unloving at first and is trying to exclude the woman. But if that we the case, it would violate basic doctrine about Jesus, that His very nature is love and that His Mission from the beginning is always for the salvation of all peoples. So what is going on here?
It is not Our Lord who is being taught about compassion and love, but rather the disciples and their hardened hearts, and by extension, us and our hardened hearts. Both of the seemingly inflammatory statements by Jesus—the first, “I was sent only to the lost sheep of the house of Israel,” and the second, “It is not fair to take the children’s bread and throw it to the dogs”—reflect the exclusionary attitude of the Jewish religion of Jesus’s day, as well as the centuries prior. The Jews had been looking for a political messiah to restore political power to them and allow them to complete the rebuilding of the Temple and thereby overthrow their occupiers, the Romans. The last thing they wanted was a Messiah for all peoples Whose very showing of divine power was to die on the tree of the Cross—and be a voluntary failure according not to the illumined eyes of the heart, but rather according to the closed and blind eyes of the world. But it was always the plan of Jesus to show the world what it means to be God by the way He died as a human being.
In other words, Jesus used this moment with the Canaanite woman to teach not her but the disciples words He had taught to Isaiah centuries before: “Foreigners who join themselves to the Lord, to minister to Him, to love the Name of the Lord, and to be His servants, every one who keeps the Sabbath, and does not profane it, and hold fast My covenant—these I will bring to My holy mountain, and make them joyful in My house of prayer.”
And this is what holiness means: God is at work in all people, with no exceptions. He was at work in the prostitute Rahab in our first reading, so much so that through her faith, Joshua led the sons of Israel through the Jordan into the promised land. He was at work in the Canaanite woman, so much so that through her faith not only was her daughter healed, but it was used by Jesus to teach all Christians about real faith. Recognizing that God is at work in all people mean our heart and mind are holy, that they are partaking of the living water springing up into life eternal, indeed participating in the celestial water which is above the heavens. Such a heart and mind have been applied to lofty and exalted things, and able, as Saint Paul teaches, to regard no one from a human point of view, even to put on the mind of Christ, which we all are called to do – to love as Christ loves. Through the grace of Jesus Christ, Who lives and reigns with the Father in the unity of the Holy Ghost, ever one God, world without end. Amen.
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This Lent on Friday evenings I am offering a teaching series called “The Wonder of Prayer.” It will explore the many facets of the prayer life. Last night was the first session.
The audio of the talk is above. The two parts of this second session are
* What is Prayer? (a review)
* The Rule (Pattern) of Prayer
* Adoration and Thanksgiving
The first part reviews the basic definitions of prayer from S. John of Damascus and Father Martin Thornton. The second part looks at two characteristics of true prayer: Adoration and Thanksgiving.
What is Prayer?
1. “Prayer is the lifting up of the heart and mind to God.”
(S. John of Damascus, d. 749, Greek Church Father)
2. Prayer is our spiritual activity: anything we do which is conditioned by relationship with the living God.
Prayer is continuous relationship with God, whether or not that relationship is recognized or articulated.
(Martin Thornton, d. 1986, Anglican priest and confessor)
Putting those two together yields:
Prayer is spiritual activity: our lifting up of the heart and mind to the living God – anything we do which is conditioned by conscious relationship with Him, a relationship which is continuous, whether or not it is recognized or articulated.
ADORATION AND THANKSGIVING
From the Anaphora of Saint Basil the Great(Eucharistic Prayer D from the 1979 Book of Common Prayer, in traditional idiom)
All remain standing for the SURSUM CORDA
Celebrant The Lord be with you.
People And with thy spirit.
Celebrant Lift up your hearts.
People We lift them up unto the Lord.
Celebrant Let us give thanks unto our Lord God.
People It is meet and right so to do.
The Celebrant continues
O Master, the One Who Is, Lord God, Father Almighty, Who Art to be worshiped, it is very meet, right, and our bounden duty, to glorify Thee, O Father, and to give thanks unto Thee, for Thou alone art God, living and true, dwelling in Light inaccessible from before all time and for ever. Fountain of life and Source of all goodness, Thou hast made all things and didst fill them with Thy blessing, creating them to rejoice in the splendor of Thy radiance. Countless throngs of angels stand before Thee to serve Thee night and day; and, beholding the glory of Thy presence, they offer Thee unceasing praise. Joining with them, and giving voice to every creature under heaven, we praise Thee, and glorify Thy Name, saying,
Celebrant and People say or sing the SANCTUS
Holy, holy, holy, Lord God of hosts: Heaven and earth are full of Thy glory.Glory be to Thee, O Lord Most High.Blessed ✠ is he that cometh in the Name of the Lord. Hosanna in the highest.
All kneel. The Celebrant continues
We acclaim Thee, holy Lord, glorious in power, Whose mighty works reveal Thy wisdom and love. Thou hast formed us in thine own image, giving the whole world into our care, that in obedience unto Thee, our Maker, we might rule and serve all Thy creatures. When our disobedience took us far from Thee, Thou didst not abandon us to the power of death, but in Thy mercy Thou didst come to our help, that in seeking Thee we might find Thee. Again and again Thou didst call us into covenant with Thee, and through the prophets Thou didst teach us to hope for salvation.
Thou didst so love the world, O Father, that in the fullness of time Thou didst send Thine Only-Begotten Son to be our Savior. Incarnate by the Holy Spirit, born of the Virgin Mary, He lived as one of us, yet without sin. To the poor He proclaimed the good news of salvation; to prisoners, freedom; to the sorrowful, joy. That Thy purpose might be fulfilled, He gave himself up unto death; and rising from the grave He destroyed death and made the whole creation new.
And that we might live no longer unto ourselves, but unto Him who died for us and rose again, He sent the Holy Spirit, His own first gift for those who believe, to complete His work in the world, bringing to fulfillment the sanctification of all.
[INSTITUTION NARRATIVE, and then]. . . And now, O Father, we celebrate this memorial of our redemption. Recalling Christ’s Death and His Descent among the dead, proclaiming His Resurrection and Ascension to Thy Right Hand, awaiting His Coming in glory, and offering unto Thee, from the gifts which Thou hast given us, this Bread and this Cup, we praise Thee and we bless Thee.
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The conclusion of my sermon for last Sunday had these words: In the profound account given us of love in the example of Jesus Christ, we may well feel overwhelmed at our great lack of it, as we come to fathom the depths of our need, and measure ourselves by Our Lord’s perfect pattern. Our great relief now, in Lent, and all our days is to look to Christ in prayer; in prayer with regard to every particular of our daily short-comings; and what we derive from dwelling on the fact of our vices and sins, and thus our falling short of Christ’s expectation of us, is the assurance, that if we are faithful in Him and genuine in our desire to follow Him, to put off our old man and put on the new garments of Christ, if we are like the blind man who simply cried out to Jesus and said, “Lord Jesus Christ, Son of God, have mercy on me,” He will hear us.
This is why Jesus entered into the wilderness for forty days and forty nights. He did this not for Himself, for He is the Sinless One. He did this for us, that we would always know that He hears us in prayer. After all, Jesus is God. And in being God, He made a clear-cut decision to go into the wilderness for a very definite purpose. Jesus took on the Devil in the wilderness because He sought the Devil out. There was no question as to who would win this battle. Christ had already won the war, because He is God and the Devil is not. The Devil had lost long ago, had lost to Archangel Michael and his holy Angels fighting under their general, Jesus Christ. The Devil and his angels were thrown down, that ancient serpent who is called the Devil and Satan, the deceiver of the whole world – he was thrown down to the earth, and his angels were thrown down with him.
This is what Moses described in Genesis chapter 1, verse 4: “God separated the light from the darkness,” the darkness that was over the face of the deep abyss of hell. The word “darkness” in Genesis 1 refers to the unholy angels of the Devil, and the Devil himself. They were separated from God’s grace by their own demonic pride, and now cover the face of the deep abyss of hell. Hence the Devil appears already in Genesis 2 to Eve and Adam, already the face of darkness, of temptation. Christ had already won the battle against the Devil, and so His entering into the wilderness was to show His disciples, to show us, that Jesus Christ conquers. And so do we, if we imitate the Archangel Michael and fight the devil under the banner of Jesus Christ.
We do this in our prayer. The battle is unseen warfare in our heart. Our weapons are the weapons of righteousness as Saint Paul teaches in the Epistle: purity, knowledge, patience, kindness, the Holy Spirit, genuine love, truthful speech, and the power of God. We must have these weapons of Christ. Without them, we stand no chance against the temptations of the Devil. These weapons of righteousness are weapons of Christ’s light. With these weapons, the darkness of the unseen warfare is brought into the light of Christ. These weapons of righteousness are Christ’s grace, by which we are able to triumph over every evil. We are able to wield these weapons if we no longer live to ourselves, but unto Him Who died for us and rose again. Without Christ, the weapons are too heavy for our frail bodies of little strength. With Christ, He lifts them, He wields them, because Christ is our strength and our shield.
We possess these weapons as the fruit of faith in Christ. We know He will use them through us because we know that Christ always hears us if we call to Him in faith, in love, in zeal, out of our yearning for Him: His presence, His peace, His power. We know He hears us because in keeping His words and keeping His commandments, Christ dwells in us – for He taught this very thing, and taught it many times. And because He dwells in us, we dwell in His defense, under the defense of the Most High, under the shadow of the Almighty.
Let us say unto the Lord: Lord, Thou art my hope, and my stronghold. And how do we say this but in prayer? Prayer is the lifting up of the heart and mind to God, taught S. John of Damascus, 8th century Church Father. Let us truly pray, by lifting our heart and mind to God this whole season of Lent. This is what makes Lent a holy season: that our prayer is more intense, that our prayer is more robust, that our prayer is regular, which is to say, daily. Let us this Lent read and meditate upon God’s holy Word more than we usually do. Let us this Lent worship in the Liturgy more often than we usually do. By increasing the intensity of our prayer and the frequency of our prayer, we allow Jesus Christ to join us in our hearts, and to win the battle against the Devil and his dragon-like angels: because our God is an awesome God, He is Jesus Christ, Who lives and reigns with the Father in the unity of the Holy Ghost, ever one God, world without end. Amen.
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This Lent on Friday evenings I am offering a teaching series called “The Wonder of Prayer.” It will explore the many facets of the prayer life. Last night was the first session.
The audio of the talk is above. The two parts of the first session are
* Images of Prayer
* What is Prayer?
The first part is an exploration of various icons that illustrate dimensions or kinds of prayer, and in the second part I share basic definitions of prayer from S. John of Damascus and Father Martin Thornton.
Images of Prayer
What is Prayer?
1. “Prayer is the lifting up of the heart and mind to God.”
(S. John of Damascus, d. 749, Greek Church Father)
2. Prayer is continuous relationship with God, whether or not that relationship is recognized or articulated.
Prayer is spiritual activity: anything we do which is conditioned by our relationship with the living God.
(Martin Thornton, d. 1986, Anglican priest and confessor)
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The Liturgy for Ash Wednesday, the first day of Lent in the western Church, happens in a unique way in my parish. We only celebrate Matins and Evensong, and do not celebrate a Eucharist.
There are two reasons for this. The first is that the absense of Holy Communion helps to create a sense of stark relief and contrast. This is very helpful to bring about and induce a shift to Lent which is experiential.
The second is that the appointed Scripture readings for Ash Wednesday in the 1979 Book of Common Prayer are excellent, and fit together perfectly for not only Ash Wednesday but for the whole of Lent. These readings are:
* Jonah 3-4:11 — Jonah’s proclaiming to the Ninevites
* Hebrews 12:1-14 — S. Paul’s teaching on Christ’s perserverance and discipline
* Luke 18:9-14 — Our Lord’s Parable of the Pharisee and the Tax Collector
The audio above includes the three readings and is followed by my my sermon. The sermon was offered extemporaneously, and thus there is no prepared text for you to read.
If you want to skip the readings and go straightway to the preaching, that starts just after the 9-minute mark.
May your Lent be blessed and holy, my friends!
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Evenings With Bede is a homily podcast. The episodes are taken from the Sunday solemn Plainsong Evensong services of Saint Paul’s, New Smyrna Beach, Fla., where I am Rector.
SEASON TWO is devoted to understanding the Song of Songs with the Venerable S. Bede as teacher, and yours truly as interpreter. We will go verse by verse through the entirety of the Song of Songs.
The format is a short passage from the Song of Songs, then comes commentary from the Bede, and finally an interpretive homily by yours truly expounding upon both. The audio for all three is found above. The text of the two passages is found below.
A Lesson from the Song of Songs, 1.12
While the King was on His dining couch, my nard gave forth its fragrance. My Beloved is to me a bundle of myrrh that shall lie between my breasts. My Bloved is to me a grape-cluster from Cyprus in the vineyards of Engaddi.
A Lesson from a Treatise by the Venerable S. Bede
Because after the death of our Mediator and Saviour there soon follows the glory of the Resurrection, the Bride rightly says, “My Beloved is to me a grape-cluster from Cyprus in the vineyards of Engaddi.” Surely the meaning of this little verse according to the surface of the letter is this: “Just as the island of Cyprus produces grape-clusters that are larger than those from other lands, and just as those that grow in the Judean city that is called Engaddi are nobler than those from other vineyards, inasmuch as the liquid that comes from them is not wine but balsam, that much dearer to me is my Beloved than all those to whom I am joined in love, so that no creature can separate me from His affection.” But typologically, in the same way that myrrh on account of its bitterness signifies the sorrow of the Lord’s Passion, in which He took both myrrh and wine to drink from the soldiers and was anointed with myrrh by the disciples when they laid Him in the tomb, just so, as we have already said, it is not unseemly for a grape-cluster to indicate the joy of His Resurrection. For wine gladdens the human heart (Ps. 104:15). Therefore the Lord, Who had been a bundle of myrrh in His Passion, became a grape-cluster of Cyprus at the Resurrection. Accordingly, He lies between the Bride’s breasts because He has turned into a grape-cluster of the vineyard, which is the reason that holy Church never puts the memory of the Lord’s death away from her heart, since the One Who died for her trespasses also rose from death for her justification (Rom 4:25) and gave her an example of being raised after the anguish of death, so that she might follow in His footsteps.
If you find this edifying, please consider (if you haven’t already) becoming a paid subscriber. Your support goes directly to supporting the ministry of Akenside Institute for English Spirituality, a project I started 12 years ago to help to rebuild the Anglican tradition.
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Last Sunday’s sermon finished with these words: In addition to the liturgical life and the Sacraments, the Church has always taught of the necessity of examining our conscience, and doing so regularly. Preparing for Lent is a time to examine our conscience. It is a time to take inventory about ourselves. It is a time to take inventory about our habits, and whether we have unholy habits, unholy vices, that keep us from being good soil. To borrow from Saint John: If we say we have no vices, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us. But if we confess our vices, God who is faithful and just will forgive us our vices, and cleanse us from the unrighteousness of our vices.
Today, on the Sunday before Lent, the Church sets before us the subject of charity, the older translation of the more modern word “love.” “Charity” is the English translation of the Latin word, caritas, which means “love,” that is, the sacrificial love demonstrated by Christ and embodied by Him. The Church brings before the subject of charity, or love, to remind us that all works of repentance, of turning to God, can be of no avail unless they begin and end in the love of God. On Sunday last we had the account of St. Paul’s apostolic labours, but in the Epistle for today, he tells us of how little avail all our works and labours must be without charity.
It has been said that the thirteenth chapter of Saint Paul’s First Epistle to the Corinthians is the most important chapter of the Bible. The reason such a high claim is made about this chapter, which is our Epistle reading today, is that it teaches us two fundamental things. The first is that it teaches profoundly about Jesus Christ and Him Crucified. And the second is that it teaches us how to respond to Christ’s blessed Passion and precious Death. In understanding Paul’s holy doctrine of love, we know more about Christ and we know more about ourselves – more about our Saviour and about being His disciples—more about our King and about what it means to be crowned—about the Perfect Love of Jesus to which we aspire to imitate in our lives every day.
We know that Paul’s doctrine of love teaches about Jesus Christ and Him crucified because, as Paul says of love, “Love bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things. Love never ends.” This describes perfectly our Lord, Who bore all our sins on the Cross, believed all that His Father had given Him, hoped for the salvation of all, and endured spitting, mocking, torture, and disbelief in Him all while keeping in Himself the peace which passes all understanding. In support of this, we have Saint John, who said, “God is love.” The Father is love, the Son is love, the Holy Ghost is love. And we know that Jesus is Himself the perfect pattern of love again from Saint John, who records our Lord says, “Greater love has no man than this, that a man lay down his life for his friends.” We are His friends, because all that Jesus heard from His Father He has made known to us.
As Paul’s doctrine teaches us about Jesus, his doctrine teaches us about ourselves as disciples of Jesus. How easily this is seen by remembering our Lord’s commandment: “Thou shalt love the Lord Thy God with all thy heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy mind, and … that Thou shalt love thy neighbor as thyself.” We are to love the Father and we are to love our neighbor. In both cases we are to imitate our Lord’s love for the Father and our Lord’s love for every human being. No matter what words we say, without love we are nothing. No matter what wisdom and knowledge we might have, without love we are nothing. No matter what we do, even if we give our body to be burned, if we do not have love, are nothing. This is simply to say with with love we have life in the Holy Spirit, but without love we are spiritually dead, as if we never knew of Jesus, nor He us. Jesus told the five foolish virgins “I do not know you” and shut the door to them because they did not have love and perform acts of mercy, acts of love, in their life.
It is true that with the profound account given us of love in the example of Jesus Christ, we may well feel overwhelmed at our great lack of it, as we come to fathom the depths of our need, and measure ourselves by Our Lord’s perfect pattern. Our great relief now, in Lent, and all our days is to look to Christ in prayer; in prayer with regard to every particular of our daily short-comings; and what we derive from dwelling on the fact of our vices and sins, and thus our falling short of Christ’s expectation of us, is the assurance, that if we are faithful in Him and genuine in our desire to follow Him, to put off our old man and put on the new garments of Christ, if we are like the blind man who simply cried out to Jesus and said, “Jesus, Son of David, have mercy on me,” He will hear us. Jesus Christ has taught us that all our doings without love, without charity, are worth nothing; hence we ask God to send His Holy Ghost, and pour into our hearts the gift of Christ’s mercy, the gift of divine love, which is the true bond of peace and all virtues—indeed that the Holy Ghost give us the gift of Christ in our hearts, that we may continue to conceive in our hearts the Eternal Word of the Father, Jesus Christ, Who lives and reigns with the same Father and the same Holy Ghost, ever one God, world without end. Amen.
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Today I was a visiting lecturer at Wheaton College in Illinois. I gave my lecture via Zoom at the invitation of Dr Matthew Milliner. I entitled the lecture: “An Introduction to the Venerable S. Bede’s Commentary on the Song of Songs.”
After the lecture, Dr Milliner (a friend whom have known for about ten years) tweeted:
… which made me laugh. Dr. Milliner also called me afterward and indicated that the lecture went over very well with his students. I hope to do this again sometime!
I offer the audio of the lecture above for you to hear. I hope it helps you understand how important the Venerable Bede is, and that he is misunderstood as the “historian of the Church,” as he is sometimes called. To rightly understand this important Church Father is to see him primarily as an interpreter of Holy Scripture.
In the lecture I reference this icon of S. Bede, painted by Aidan Hart (my daughter’s icon teacher):
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