Homily One on the Second Sunday of Luke
19th Sunday after Pentecost
By St. Justin Popovich
(Delivered in 1964 at the Ćelije Monastery)
By St. Justin Popovich
(Delivered in 1964 at the Ćelije Monastery)
[The homily, which was transcribed from a recording, has no beginning. — Copyist’s note.]
This is achieved by living according to the gospel of the Lord Christ, by living according to His commandments, by fulfilling His commandments in this world, every day and every night of our lives. Therefore, He commands us in the Gospel: “Live as is fitting for God; live worthily of God.”1 Which God? The Lord Christ. He lived in this world as a man in order to help us human beings understand how we ought to live in this world. Behold, imitate Him. In the Gospel it is commanded: “Live as is fitting for the gospel of Christ.” And the entire gospel of the Lord Christ consists of commandments continually concerning how a person ought to live in this world.
Today’s Holy Gospel shows us in its own way how we ought to live. How? If we change our lives; if we live according to Christ, if we live in Christ; if our life is according to God and not according to sin; if we are truly Christians and not pagans in our way of life, while being Christians only in name. Through His commandments the Lord commands: “As you want people to do to you, you also do to them; if you love those who love you, what thanks have you, since sinners do the same, since pagans do the same?”2 Your love must be a new love, evangelical love, love from the other world, divine love, wholly divine. If you do good to everyone who does only good to you, what thanks do you have, since sinners do this too, pagans do this too; but your good must be divine good, it must be gospel good, it must be Christ’s good. And if you lend to those from whom you hope to receive something back, what reward do you expect, since other people, sinners and pagans, do this too. But you—you are new people in Christ; you are to have a new life.
It is said in the Holy Gospel: “If anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation; old things have passed away, behold, all things have become new.”3 All things have become new: love, too, becomes new; and the good that you do, the good also becomes new, made new through Christ, through God, through eternity; and prayer, too, is new; mercy, too, is new; everything in Christ is new. He renews man, his whole soul, his entire being, giving him new divine commandments and new divine powers through these holy commandments. For in giving commandments, what does the Lord ask of us? He asks for faith and prayer, and for this and through this He gives us divine powers so that we may fulfill His commandments in this world. Thus we stand in Him and live through Him, for it is said in the Holy Gospel: “Whoever keeps His commandments, he abides in Him.”4 He abides in the Lord Christ, and the Lord Christ lives in him. Thus our life in this world is nothing other than perfection through the fulfillment of the commandments of God, a perfection that moves toward the perfection of God—nothing less, nothing lower.
Behold, every gospel virtue leads us to blessedness, to divine powers. What are your prayer and mine? What are they? They bind us to Heaven, to God, and from Heaven God sends us His divine powers, fills us with them, and draws us to Himself, draws us toward Heaven. What is evangelical almsgiving, what is evangelical fasting, what is evangelical humility, what is evangelical meekness? All of these are virtue upon virtue through which we receive divine powers, bringing down divine powers into our soul. The Lord gave Himself, the Lord brought Himself, and brought His divine powers, and gives them to us through the Holy Mysteries and through the holy virtues in His Holy Church, and commands: “Be perfect, just as your heavenly Father is perfect.”5 No one among men, brethren, has ever asked this of man; no one dared to ask it, because no one could give man what was necessary to attain it. But the Lord gives us His divine powers and asks us to be “perfect, just as our heavenly Father is perfect.”
The holy virtue that makes us so close to God, that fills us with God, is almsgiving, mercy. “Be merciful, just as your heavenly Father is merciful.”6 Behold the virtue that leads you to [unclear] divine perfection.7 Let almsgiving be holy and evangelical when [unclear].8 Do not say: “I am weak; I cannot attain this.” You can. Behold, there are countless Saints, countless true Christians who have attained this. All the Saints, in fact, attained this divine perfection by fulfilling the gospel of the Lord Christ, by carrying out His holy commandments.
What is a Christian? A Christian is one who bears Christ within himself. Who can be saved? The one who has the Savior within himself, the Lord Christ, is saved. And all this we see in countless examples in the persons of the Saints of God, beginning with the Holy Apostles, and before them with the Holy Prophets and Patriarchs, continuing to this very day and from this day until the Last Judgment. All Christians have one and the same goal, one and the same aim: salvation from sin, death, and the devil. By means of what? By means of the divine powers with which we are filled through the Holy Mysteries and the holy virtues. Through the Holy Mystery of Baptism, through the Holy Mystery of Holy Communion, and through all the holy New Testament virtues.
May the Lord, through the prayers of all the Saints, grant us also evangelical faith, evangelical love, holy faith and holy love, and all the other holy virtues, so that, by fulfilling them in this world, we too may fill ourselves with divine powers, free ourselves from sin, death, and the devil, and inherit Eternal Life in that world, beginning to live Eternal Life already in this world, giving thanks for the mercy of the Lord Christ. Let us glorify Him because He brought Himself to earth to save us, to show us the path of perfection, and to give us every means for divine perfection, for divine advancement. Let us never cease glorifying Him in this world, so that we may be deemed worthy to glorify Him also in the heavenly world, in the Kingdom of Heaven. Therefore, to Him be glory, thanksgiving, and honor, now and ever and unto all ages. Amen.
Notes:
1. Philippians 1:27; Colossians 1:10; 1 Thessalonians 2:12.
2. Matthew 5:46.
3. 2 Corinthians 5:17.
4. John 14:15.
5. Matthew 5:48.
6. Luke 6:36.
7. The source contains an unclear word; the manuscript/copyist note likewise states that the word is unclear.
8. The source contains an omitted/unclear word; the copyist note indicates that it is likewise unclear.
Source: Translated by John Sanidopoulos.
