Homily on the Sunday of the Holy Fathers*
By Righteous Alexei Mechev
(Delivered on May 18, 1914)
By Righteous Alexei Mechev
(Delivered on May 18, 1914)
On this Sunday, my friends, the Holy Orthodox Church, remembering the Holy Fathers of the First Ecumenical Synod, who affirmed the true teaching on the divinity of the Son of God, on the consubstantiality of the Son with God the Father against the heretic Arius, has established the reading of the Gospel today, which contains the High Priestly prayer of Jesus Christ to God His Father before His suffering. With this prayer, Jesus Christ assured of His Divine mission, saying that His words and commands are the words and commands of His Heavenly Father, from Whom He came, Who sent Him and to Whom He must return after earthly life. At the same time, with this prayer, Jesus Christ glorified, thanked and implored His Heavenly Father, in order to teach us, firstly, that we, full of reverence, must glorify the Most High in prayer, seeing the great and wondrous deeds which He accomplished with His omnipotence; secondly, that we, too, full of love and gratitude, should thank the All-Good One in prayer for such blessings which He pours out on each of us; and thirdly, that we, too, full of faith and hope, should implore the All-Wise and All-Merciful One in our prayer that He would strengthen, enlighten and preserve us by His Divine grace. “I have glorified You on earth, I have finished the work which You gave Me to do” (John 17:4), said Jesus Christ in His prayer. His entire earthly life, from Bethlehem to Golgotha, was dedicated to the glorification of the Heavenly Father. Everything that He did, taught and suffered, He did with the thought of God and for the glory of God.
Friends, our example in everything is the Savior, let us follow Him! All our deeds and undertakings must be done by us with the thought of God and for the glory of God. In everything that we do and undertake, the thought of God must be dominant in our soul before all other thoughts. This thought must be a light illuminating our mind to the knowledge and choice of the best work - a force motivating us to duty-consistent activity - a source of hope and courage, if we are forced to struggle with obstacles, difficulties, dangers and sufferings. Then this thought will fill us in all our deeds with gratitude to the Omniscient and All-Righteous God, love for His law, trust in His help and blessing.
But do not think that our soul, except for this thought, should not occupy itself with anything else, should not care about the duties of the calling and other necessities of life; do not think that you should only pray and completely abandon all earthly needs. No, the thought of God should only be inherent in your heart and, in all your labors and activities, constantly remind you of the Omniscient and Almighty God. It should dwell in you as a guardian spirit, protecting you from all evil and directing you on the path of virtue and duty. This is how our Lord Jesus Christ acted. He did all His deeds for the glory of God. Throughout His entire life, He was constantly guided by the thought of God, the fulfillment of Whose will was food and drink. This is how holy people acted.
One time, monks came to the elder Lucius. These monks belonged to the so-called Euchites or prayer-makers (they were followers of a sect that rejected all virtues, even the power of the Mysteries, in terms of our salvation, and ascribed all importance to prayers alone.) “What kind of handicrafts do you do?” Lucius asked them. “We do not do manual work,” they answered, “but, according to the commandment of the Apostle, we pray without ceasing.” “Do you eat?” the elder asked again. “We eat,” they answered. “So when you eat, who prays for you?” Lucius objected. "Moreover, do you sleep?” “How can you not sleep?” said the Euchaites. “So when you sleep, who prays for you then?” the elder then objected again. The strangers could not give any answer. Then Abba Lucius said to them: “Forgive my frankness: you contradict yourself. On the contrary, I will prove to you that even while doing handicrafts, I pray unceasingly. For example, I weave baskets from reeds and say: Have mercy on me, O God, according to Your great mercy, and according to the multitude of Your mercies blot out my iniquity... Is this not a prayer?” “Of course,” answered the monks. “Thus, having spent the whole day in work and prayer,” continued the elder, “I earn some money, half of which I give to the poor, and the other half I use for my own needs. When I eat or sleep, then those who have received alms pray for me. Do you not see that, with God’s help, I fulfill the rule of the Apostle and pray unceasingly?”
Let us, my friends, do all our deeds with God. Let the thought of Him, love for Him, trust in Him penetrate and enliven our souls, so that we would not wish to do anything else but what He commands, and so that we could, at the end of our days, like the Savior, say: “I have glorified You on earth, I have accomplished the work that You gave Me to do” (John 17:4).
Notes:
* Delivered on 18 May 1914, on the 7th Sunday after Pascha, for the Holy Fathers of the First Ecumenical Synod. Published for the first time according to the “Speech Plans” from the archive of E. V. Apushkina, a spiritual daughter of Righteous Alexei Mechev.
Source: Translated by John Sanidopoulos.
