Homily on the Day of Theophany
By Righteous Alexei Mechev
(Delivered on January 6, 1915)*
By Righteous Alexei Mechev
(Delivered on January 6, 1915)*
Let us, dear ones, transport ourselves in thought to that sacred place where the Baptism of our Lord Jesus Christ took place. And behold, before our gaze there appears a profoundly instructive, wondrous scene, full of divine majesty — the event at the Jordan. When Jesus Christ had reached the age of thirty, He came to the Jordan, where John was baptizing the people, and said that He too had come to be baptized. God revealed to John who it was that had come to him, and he cried out: “I need to be baptized by You” (Matt. 3:14). But Jesus answered: “Do not hinder Me, for thus it is fitting for us to fulfill the will of God.” At these words He went down into the water, and when He was immersed, the heavens were opened, and the Holy Spirit descended upon Him in the form of a dove, and there was heard: “This is My beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased” (Matt. 3:17).
John baptized the people with a baptism of repentance. But did the Sinless, Most Holy God-man Jesus Christ have sins, or such habits? Of course not. He had no sins. He had nothing of His own to repent of... Yes, He had no personal sins, but upon His divine conscience lay the burden of the sin of the world. The Founder of the New Kingdom, whose foundation is self-sacrificing love — by which the members of this Kingdom are recognized — gives the world an example of this love from the very beginning of His ministry. Just as a shepherd, when a sinner — his spiritual child — repents before him, takes upon himself the heartfelt pains of repentance and lifts these cries up to the Lord as though they were his own, so Christ, the Divine Shepherd, when Palestine groaned with penitential cries, seeing with His all-seeing eye the entire abyss of the sinful world, bowed His Head beneath the hand of the Forerunner, placing under it His prayer for this repentance and for the cleansing of the sinful world.
Thus, dear ones, this is how we must love our neighbors: we must suffer their sorrows and feel their illnesses as our own. A wondrous sight! The King of the universe is baptized by a servant; the Creator of seas and waters has need of the water of baptism; He who holds all creation in His hand bows beneath the hand of the Forerunner. And all this for our sake, O man! God humbles Himself more than all the sons of men. Such is Christ’s love. Herein is the law, herein is the truth of this love.
One cannot love one’s neighbor otherwise, nor before trampling down in one’s heart all self-love and all pride. He who does not know how to humble himself even before his servant for the salvation of his neighbor, who does not know how to forget himself when the good of his neighbor is at stake, does not have within himself the spirit of true humility; and where there is no humility, there can be no virtue at all. And here, as if to intensify the sufferings of Jesus Christ, God the Father Himself proclaims from heaven: “This is My beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased” (Matt. 3:17), and the Holy Spirit descends in the form of a Dove. And this very True Son of God, the fullness of the Holy Spirit, humbles Himself, teaching all of us this humility.
Come, dear ones, let us behold Christ the Deliverer being baptized by the Forerunner in the streams of the Jordan; come, let us meet the Master who has appeared. Amen.
Notes:
* Published from the "Typewritten copy" from the archive of E. V. Apushkina. First published by: Father Alexei Mechev.
Source: Translated by John Sanidopoulos.
