Glory to Jesus Christ! Glory forever!

In the Name of the Father, and of the + Son, and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.

In his prayer before reading Sacred Scripture, St. John Chrysostom asks to be enlightened in order to hear and do the Word of God – something that is vitally important, even for us – to be enlightened by the grace of God in order to both understand and to do the will of God as revealed in His Word. Moreover, our beloved father among the saints acknowledges that he is but a mere sojourner upon this earth and confesses his total reliance upon God. “On Thee do I set my hope, O my God,” he prays, “that Thou shalt enlighten my mind and understanding with the light of Thy knowledge, not only to cherish those things which are written, but to do them.” He, then, asks for this,

that in reading the lives and sayings of the saints I may not sin, but that such may serve for my restoration, enlightenment, and sanctification, for the salvation of my soul, and the inheritance of Life Everlasting (Prayer of St. John Chrysostom before Reading or Listening to the Word of God).

I find it both curious as well as interesting, if not enlightening, that in a prayer by someone so exalted as the Golden Mouth seeking for enlightenment to understand and obey the Word of God, that he would likewise beseech the grace of God, found in reading the lives and sayings of the saints themselves, to direct his steps away from sin and to his “restoration, enlightenment, and sanctification, for the salvation of [his] soul, and the inheritance of Life Everlasting.”

Now, in my non-Orthodox days, I might have taken issue with what appears to be his confusion because somehow he seems to place the Sacred Scriptures and the saints of God on equal footing. Why not instead ask God to use those sacred words from Scripture to keep us from sin and to restore us to the right path? But, he doesn’t. He believes the saints canonized in the Church to be effective witnesses to the saving and sanctifying Truth enough so that by partaking of their wisdom gleaned from their lives and sayings, we would be on solid ground. Why? Because a saint who is truly a saint, that is, one whose life has been so recognized by the Church as godly, perfected by the love of God and humility, is imbued with the grace of the Holy Spirit and is a living icon – even after death! – of the enfleshment of the Word of God! In my seminary days, we would have said that they were “living documents” of the Word of God whose lives were as inspired and God-breathed as Sacred Scripture itself (2 Tm. 3:16).

Now, just in case you think this a tad farfetched, I submit to you this morning, that this is what St. Paul is alluding to, if not directly saying, in the reading from his Epistle to Bishop Timothy. First, he says, anyone who desires to be a Christian and to live a God-like life in conjunction with the Lord Jesus can expect to be, should expect to be, persecuted. Sacred Scripture, by way of our Lord and of His saints’ lives, assures us of this reality. “’Remember the word that I said to you, “A servant is not greater than his master.” If they have persecuted Me,’” Jesus says, “’they will also persecute you’” (Jn. 15:20; 16:33) while the Apostles, by way of St. Paul, have said, “’We must through many tribulations enter the Kingdom of God’” (Ac. 14:22). “[A]ll who desire to live godly in Christ Jesus will suffer persecution.” Even the Old Testament in the Wisdom of Sirach [Ecclesiasticus] confesses this reality! “My son, if you draw near to serve the Lord, prepare your soul for temptation” (Sr. 2:1). Such persecution, trial, temptation, and tribulation does not have to be solely at the hands of others – flesh and blood persons like us – but it will come from those spiritual forces who vehemently oppose God and His Church. When we draw near to God, the demons get riled up! This is where our real spiritual warfare lies, according to the apostolic Word of God (Ep. 6:10-20) – with the fallen angels who incite and influence our passions.

Expect to wrestle with your passions. Expect to do battle with the devil and his minions if you are at all serious about the Kingdom of God and the inheritance to Life Everlasting. None of us should be caught off guard! Look around you at the great cloud of witnesses lining the walls of our Temple. Would any of these saints of God say otherwise? Did they experience anything other than persecution, trial, temptation, and tribulation because they loved the Lord so deeply and desired to be wholly God’s?

Yet, what are we to do when faced with such severity? Here’s where it gets interesting in today’s lection. As a former Protestant, my natural inclination due to my training would have been to direct souls to look into the Word of God, to read and inwardly digest Sacred Scripture because

all Scripture is given by inspiration of God, and is profitable for doctrine, for reproof, for correction, for instruction in righteousness, that the man of God may be complete, thoroughly equipped for every good work (2 Tm. 3:16-17).

Sacred Scripture is “able to make you wise for salvation through faith which is in Christ Jesus.” This is what St. Paul tells St. Timothy. But, notice, beloved, the order in which the Apostle says these things and what he says. After assuring Timothy of persecution that will surely be his because of his desire to live a goldy life in Jesus Christ, St. Paul then warns him of imposters and those who will come deceiving and being deceived. What is Bishop Timothy to do? Paul says, even before he comments on the inspiration of Sacred Scripture and its value for the Christian, Paul tells Timothy – and us – “But you must continue in the things which you have learned and been assured of, knowing from whom [not what] you have learned them, . . . .” Earlier, St. Paul had pointed Timothy to carefully consider his spiritual father’s apostolic living: Paul’s doctrine (what we believe must be critical enough for the Apostle to point this out), his manner of life, purpose, faith, longsuffering, love perseverance, persecutions, [and] afflictions.”

Before St. Paul points Timothy to the Sacred Scriptures, which the Apostle neither denigrates nor de-values, he points him to one whose life was devoted to God and to His Word, whose life by the grace of the Holy Spirit was inspired by the breath of God living in him, whose life by this divine grace became a living document and testament to God, the embodiment of Scripture itself. The Apostle was full of the Word of God and lived Sacred Scripture. Do we want to know what Sacred Scripture says, what it means, and the power it has in all who pray the Scriptures, who “hear, read, mark, learn, and inwardly digest them” (BCP)? Then, look to the saints, Paul tells Timothy. When you are confused and uncertain because of the powers of Hell, when you are battered about by the fierce spiritual enemies of your soul, tempted to doubt and fall into despair; when you feel like walking away because the Cross is too hard and the Saviour seems distant, when the darkness consumes you like Jonah’s whale and the light fades, look to the saints who in like flesh and blood existence suffered the same. The difference is, they clung to Jesus Christ because they were full of the Word of God (Hb. 11:1-12:2). “Let the word of Christ dwell in you richly in all wisdom,” says the Apostle (Co. 3:16). And being full of the Word of God, they were imbued with His saving and sanctifying grace! The saints, full of the Holy Spirit, are living documents, walking Scriptures, inspired, infused, and sustained by the living Word and the holy words of God! They believed, they trusted, they devoted themselves to the God of the Church and placed all their hope in Him. These saints are what we are called to be in Christ God, what we are to become in the grace of God. They are, for us, our companions and our intercessors in the Way and markers of godliness, whose goal is Everlasting Life (Hb. 11:1-12:3; The Pursuit of Godliness 1.97).

This is what sets them apart from us. This is why the Apostle points us first to gaze upon those who embody and enflesh the Faith of Jesus Christ, crucified and risen. Timothy can trust the readings and the lives of the saints and use them as milestones and markers along the path to Heaven because they are the Sacred Scriptures come to life! And just to be clear about this: before the Church had a book called Sacred Scripture, She had the bodies and the lives of the saints who worked out their salvation in Jesus Christ with fear and trembling, bearing witness to the faithfulness of God and the trustworthiness of His words. The reality is this: before we have read a book – The Book of books – we have “read” the lives of those who love The Book of Life and its Author (2 Tm. 1:3-5, 13). Sacred Scripture bears witness to these saints and the saints bear witness to the Scriptures that they do indeed make us wise unto salvation through faith in Jesus Christ. And the one who loves the Scriptures will be complete and “thoroughly equipped for every good work” (2 Tm. 3:16-17).

This Great and Holy Lent, beloved, let us unite in our commitment and devotion “to live godly in Christ Jesus,” to “grow in the grace and knowledge of our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ” (2 Pe. 3:18), to grow up into the likeness of God (Ep. 4:13-16, 24; Co. 3:10) by reading and cherishing the wisdom and the words of Sacred Scripture – and to do them – and by reading the lives and the sayings of the saints that we may not sin, “but that such may serve for [our] restoration, enlightenment, and sanctification, for the salvation of [our souls], and the inheritance of Life Everlasting.”

Through the prayers of our holy Fathers, O Lord Jesus Christ our God, have mercy on us and save us. Amen.

Glory to Jesus Christ! Glory forever!

PROPERS:

2 Tm. 3:10-15

Lk. 18:10-14