15th Sunday after Pentecost
In the Name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit.
Today, we have heard about the unexpected catch of fish at the command of the Lord. As a result of this, there is in the Gospel according to Luke, the first recognition of the Apostle Peter and the others that Jesus might be the Christ. The apostles trust Him, even though they had not caught any fish all night. They let their nets down again, and they catch more than they could cope with. The Lord reveals Who He is. Always, the Lord’s revelation of Himself is based on love and life. He is giving us everything. It was through Him that all these things came to be, these things that were created. He is the One who spoke them into being at the command of the Father.
The Apostle Paul, who had been a persecutor of the Church, encountered the Saviour and was filled with His love. It was because of this personal encounter of love that the Apostle was able to endure so many things as we heard described in the Epistle this morning. He endured a lot of suffering. He endured it because he knew that the Lord loves him, and he loves the Lord.
Nothing has changed between those days and now. Everything about being an Orthodox Christian always has been based on this loving relationship. People have endured unimaginable tortures, difficulties and hardships for the sake of the love of Jesus Christ. Take, for instance, those Alaskan Fathers (and the martyrs in particular) whose memory we keep today. It was not a simple thing to walk across Siberia, but that is what these monks did. They walked from Valamo Monastery, which is close to the Baltic Sea, all the way across Siberia. Most of the walking had to be in wintertime, by the way, just to make it interesting, because in the summertime (just as in northern Canada) there is muskeg, quicksand, and all sorts of mosquitoes. They walked in the wintertime about 8,000 kilometres and finally came to the east coast of Asia, to around Vladivostok, I suppose. There they took a ship, and sailed through a very stormy area of the North Pacific for a couple of months more, and then arrived on Kodiak in Alaska.
They did all this for the love of Jesus Christ. They stayed there and defended the state of life of the Aboriginals against the money-grubbing fur traders, again, for the love of Jesus Christ. They competed as to who would have what part of Alaska to evangelise, for the love of Jesus Christ. No part of their life was easy, ever. For struggles and suffering, these men were in the same league as the Apostle Paul and all the other apostles, because all the apostles had nothing but difficulties in spreading the love of Jesus Christ.
However, this love of Jesus Christ is very contagious. Glory be to God that this love is so contagious. Those of us living here at the beginning of the twenty-first century, with all our conveniences, have a tendency to become lax. The phenomenon sometimes shows itself in Canada in the fact that people have become by and large “Sunday Christians” (not everywhere by any means, but it does show itself from time to time, because the Tempter is so clever with us).
However, it is important for you and for me, always, when there is a tendency to slide in that direction, to say : “Why am I satisfied with Sunday morning only ? Why have I become so lazy, and so ungrateful to God that Sunday morning is the only thing that I am ready and prepared to give to the Lord ?” Sometimes we may say this (or words to that effect) even grudgingly because we have to get up early on a day off. If we have gotten into that condition of heart, it means that we have been listening to the Tempter, and we have forgotten about the reason for our being. It is time then to call out to the Lord, saying : “Help me, and save me from my laziness and forgetfulness”. Let us not forget that the devil is the master of making us forget all sorts of things. Let us say to the Lord : “Save me from the evil one’s traps, and help me to remember who You are to me, Lord”.
The way of the Orthodox Christian is the way of being in His Temple with joy, and worshipping Him with love and with joy. It is the way of supporting our brothers and sisters by being here together, praising the Lord together, and by interceding for our brothers and sisters all together. This is the way of the Orthodox Christian, the way of showing our love to the Lord, and our gratitude to Him for everything that we have and everything that we are. We should not be satisfied just with Sunday, but we should be grateful for the opportunity to be able to be here in His Temple many other times in a given week (as many times as work and other responsibilities will allow).
It is necessary for us to make sure, brothers and sisters, that it is this love, this commitment to Jesus Christ, that is the centre of our life, the driving force of our life, and that nothing will ever get between us and Him who loves us and gives us life. Let us ask the Lord to give us the same love that these Alaskan martyrs had (Saint Juvenaly, the priest-monk, and Saint Peter the Aleut in particular), so that we may unswervingly confess Him with every part of our life in everything that we do, everywhere we go. With these martyrs, in the wholeness of our life, let us glorify our Saviour, Jesus Christ, together with the unoriginate Father, and the all-holy, good, and life-giving Spirit, now, and ever, and unto the ages of ages.