In the Name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit.
Today, we hear the Lord saying : “‘Do not labour for the food which perishes, but for the food which endures to eternal life’”. Already Jesus had been feeding this crowd on Himself, the Word. He gave them the words of hope and eternal life. Then He nourished their bodies. In all this He was busy trying to show them where their priorities ought to be. Of course, He withdrew to pray, and we know that the apostles went ahead of Him by boat. The Lord caught up to them by walking on the water. No-one ever expected such a thing. He did this not to demonstrate how fantastic and wonderful He is and what wonders He can accomplish. They had already seen that. Certainly He gave His disciples a scare when He walked up to them on the water, but as soon as they knew who it was, they willingly received Him.
The fact is that the whole world is looking for Jesus all the time. They are looking for Him and His love. They are busy trying to find that fulfilment which in their hearts they know they must have. They are looking for that food which gives eternal life. They are striving to be fed, but no-one feeds them. We feed enough people nowadays with regular bread, as we send all sorts of food to places such as Ethiopia (although certainly we do not do enough). However, on the other hand, what are we doing about giving people what they are actually looking for, especially here at home ? Very often the things that we do are equivalent to that question that Jesus asked : “‘If a son asks for bread from any father among you, will he give him a stone?’” (Luke 11:11) That seems to be more or less what we do. For instance, when people are looking for Jesus Christ, very often we give them “Orthodoxy” instead. We give them the rules of our Fathers. We give them tradition with a small “t”. It is not the tradition of Jesus Christ. We very often speak to people about whether we should stand up or sit down, whether we should cover our heads or not cover our heads, but we generally do not give them the love of Jesus Christ. The love of Jesus Christ comes first. That is what we must give first, and that is what people are looking for. How do we live out this love of Jesus Christ ? Do we do it by making pysanky at Pascha ? by cracking eggs ? by how we do our poklons ? by how we cover our heads or how we do not cover our heads or by whatever else we might do ? In fact, it is not in externals alone that we live out our love for Jesus Christ. The first thing we have to be ready to do is to reveal to others through our lives Who Jesus Christ is. He wants to give them this Bread that is eternal life. The Bread that gives eternal life is Himself.
Since the whole world is hungering for the Lord, let us be like Saint Seraphim of Sarov, who, every day of his life, after he finally was certain that he knew Who Jesus Christ is, went around always saying : “Christ is risen”. Every day of his life, to every person that he ever met, he said : “Christ is risen”. We should be like that. We should be people who reveal Jesus Christ to each other in such a way that no-one can doubt that we know Him and no-one can fail to meet Him through us. It should be that when you and I are going around, people are always aware that they are somehow involved with Jesus Christ. When we are with our friends, our family, at work, it is not necessary that we mention His Name (or rarely, if we do). We can help the Lord to touch them and reach them through expressing in practical ways this renewing, life-giving love, and this support that love gives. Even when we criticise, we still support in our love. When we criticise something that is wrong, we do not slash with our swords and chop someone in half. We support. We say : “Brother or sister, such-and-such a thing is wrong, and we have to do something about it”. We do not have to say aggressively : “You are wrong !” We have to be careful how we approach each other. We have to approach each other in love so that every time we speak to each other, the power of Jesus Christ’s love is meeting the people we are with. They are being fed. They are being introduced to Him, and they are learning how they should live, and why, by observing how we live.
A huge amount of our lives is filled with words : talk, talk, talk, all the time. The fundamental way for Christians to preach Christ (even when someone wants to know about Orthodox Christianity), is to be just like the Apostle Philip and say : “‘Come and see’” (John 1:46). The only way people can understand anything about us as Orthodox Christians or about Jesus Christ is to come and see ; to come and experience ; to come and be. We do not have to talk to people about Jesus Christ all the time. We just have to live Him. We just have to be Him for other people. We do not have to speak and explain and explain and explain : we just do. If someone is sick, we go to visit him or her. If someone needs something, we provide it. We do not have to talk ; we just do. One fundamental characteristic about Orthodox Christians and their prayer life is silence. We learn after a while that in our prayers we do not have to talk, talk, and talk to the Lord and wear Him out by our gabbing. All we have to do is look at Him and love Him. We adore Him. We hold our hands up to Him like this and worship Him. We do not have to blather forever and ever. It is the same thing about preaching the Gospel of Jesus Christ. Sometimes we have to speak, but mostly we have to be and do. There is a saying : “Preach the Gospel incessantly ; if necessary, use a few words”.
Let us ask the Lord this morning as we come to receive Him, to help us to be like our spiritual Fathers and Mothers who are not all known so much by their words. Of course, Saint Basil the Great is known for his writings, and Saint John Chrysostom and Saint Gregory the Theologian are known for their words, too. They had a special service to provide from the Lord. However, Saint Seraphim of Sarov is not so well known for his words, and neither are Saint Nicholas, Saint Vladimir or Saint Barbara, for example. All these persons were recognised quite soon after their repose for their actions. Just by their lives, they proclaimed that they loved Jesus Christ first before anything else. We do not have big books left by most of these holy people but we do have the testimony of their lives. All we have to do is to be Christians who live our lives in Christ. We practise. We do. We do not have to babble on ; we just do. We show that we are Orthodox Christians not by how much we talk about it, but by how much we live His love and by how much we bring Jesus Christ to people around us. By that, by our silence even, just by our being, we proclaim that Christ is risen. May our lives in the love of Jesus Christ, just as Saint Seraphim, proclaim the Resurrection of Christ and glorify Him, together with the unoriginate Father, and the all-holy, good, and life-giving Spirit, now, and ever, and unto the ages of ages.