Praying in the Rain

On October 8, we commemorate two Sts. Pelagia of Antioch. The first is a virgin martyr, and the second is a repentant harlot, sometimes referred to as St. Pelagia the former courtesan of Antioch.

Most of the time, caring for our inner garden is more a matter of attention than of effort. The weeds of sinful and passionate thoughts can be pulled out pretty easily by merely recognizing them as sinful and turning your attention to Christ in prayer. The Jesus Prayer is probably the most common, or at least the most famous, form of prayer used by Orthodox Christians to turn their attention to Christ and away from sinful thoughts. However, sometimes the weeds get out of control. Sometimes weeds grow in the back corners of our garden where we don’t pay a lot of attention—until it is too late. Suddenly we realize that a pattern of thought that we had not looked at very carefully turns out to be harboring some pretty nasty sinful passions.

It seems whenever there is a crisis, people begin to see possible predictions and warnings about such times in the scripture. And certainly Christ does warn us to be prepared for the End, and to recognize that various tribulations and “wars and rumours of wars” would be the ongoing signs that the End is near. However, the scriptures themselves also tell us that we are already in the Last Days. That is, from the time of the Apostles we have been in the “last hour,” and already “many antichrists have come” (1John 2: 18). For just as the Kingdom of Heaven is near (at hand) at all times, so too, the End is always near.

When we celebrate the Cross, we are not so much remembering the Crucifixion of Christ, as much as we are remembering the salvation that Christ’s Crucifixion has brought us and all the ways that we too are crucified with Christ. You see Christ did not suffer so that we would not have to suffer. Rather, Christ suffered on the Cross to be with us in our suffering, to lead us to the Resurrection through our suffering.

In Orthodox Christian marriage, the wife is the queen, crowned and exalted at the head of the household; however, she is also the intercessor, standing submissively behind her husband, receiving his full attention and quietly interceding on behalf of the household. In this image is revealed the mystery of Christ and the Church, the mystery of the miraculous transformation of water into wine, of what is natural into what is above nature, of what is merely human into what is divine.

Repentance is a matter of saying, that’s not me, that’s not who I am—even while all I can see is my failure and darkness. This is because who I am, who I am becoming, is hidden in Christ. When I turn my attention to my failure and darkness, all seems to become failure and darkness because guilt makes me want to hide from God, driving me back to sin. In turning to Christ (rather than hiding behind the fig leaves of the knowledge of good and evil–the guilt and sin dynamic), the Light cleanses me from all darkness. We only turn to sin when we turn from the Light, and it is only in turning to the Light that we start to experience real victory over sin.

Sinners are thrown utterly upon the mercy of God. For Sinners, “Lord, have mercy” means Lord, have mercy. For those who merely admit that they have sinned, “Lord, have mercy” may have very little meaning at all.

Even as we strive to please God by disciplining ourselves and obeying His commands, we know that God loves us. We know that God will accept our striving for righteousness, even if we don’t do it very well, even if we fail. God is able to fix our mistakes. Therefore, like children striving to please a parent whom we know loves us completely, we offer what we have, what we can do, in a carefree way, knowing that 100% will never be enough to succeed completely all of the time, but it is enough to please God.

Waiting involves attention. We have to pay attention to our thoughts. We have to notice what is happening in our minds and thoughts and feelings leading up to and when and after we sin. And learning to pay attention to our thoughts takes time. It’s something that we have to practice. It is, the Fathers tell us, an important part of prayer. When we practice prayer with attention (attention to what we are praying, to being present and not allowing our mind to wander), then we develop this ability to pay attention to our thoughts at other times too.

Fr. Michael Gillis reads a blog post from 2010, entitled "Choices and God's Will". "For the overwhelming majority of the people in the world throughout history, what they would eat, where they would live, what work they would do and even whom they would marry was not a matter of their choice. As far as such matters were concerned, God’s will for their life was determined for them. The choice was not whether or not to harvest the grain on the master’s estate; the choice was whether or not to entrust yourself to God, not grumble against your master, work with your whole heart, and love your fellow laborers. The only real choice for a Christian has always only been: “Will I be a Christian right now, today?”"

I have found that it is usually better for me to say nothing at the beginning, at the moment I feel like saying something. At that moment, it is usually best not to say anything because if I say something the very moment I feel like saying it, the juice is not sweet. It’s sour. And no matter how true or right what I have to say is, all the hearer notices is the sour, bitter, angry or judgemental note hidden in my words.

We have to remember the mighty things God has already done in our life. We have to remember that whatever good we may have done is also a mercy. We could have just as easily done wrong, just as easily gone the wrong way, just as easily said the wrong thing. It is God’s mercy that has saved us, and it is God’s mercy that will save us again, not our ability to figure it out.

For all that Christ accomplished for our salvation at Pascha, it remains still for us to receive it. And for us to receive the resurrected Life, we have to thirst for it. All of the blessings and gifts and graces of heaven are ours through Christ, but God will not force them on us. God will only give us the heavenly gifts if we thirst for them.

All suffering, however, regardless of its apparent immediate source, can be understood as the wrath of God. But we must never forget that we call it God’s wrath because of how we feel and how we experience it, not because God is at all angry or vengeful. Rather, God both allows and brings about suffering in our lives as a doctor treating a patient. What patient after major surgery has not experienced the wrath of the physical therapist? Healing the body is often painful.

Fr. Michael Gillis builds off of last week's talk about the Great Reset on not getting attached to the comforts of this world. Someone asked about how to balance living in this world without getting attached to it. Fr. Michael talks about three things we can do to help us live as sojourners in this world, waiting for a City whose foundation and builder is God.