Dear Brothers and Sisters,

Congratulations with the feast of the Resurrection of the Lord as well as the beginning of Advent!

Today we heard an excerpt from St. Paul’s Epistle to the Ephesians. Although this letter isn’t very long, it has a special place among the epistles of the Apostle Paul. When he wrote, St. Paul always wrote with a particular objective, often to give an answer to a concrete question or to decide some kind of problem. It’s easy to see the personality, character, and spiritual state of the author, to see what is troubling him, in his letters. In the Epistle to the Ephesians this is almost all missing. This letter is very general in its content. Although it is addressed to the Ephesians, according to its content it could be said that it was written not only for them, but in general for all the faithful gentiles, i. e. for all of us! St. Theophan the Recluse notes that the essence of our Christian faith is laid out so well in this epistle that it is possible to use it as an introductory text to Christianity. Therefore, perhaps it would be a good idea for us to become more familiar with this epistle!

In today’s excerpt we heard how we, thanks to the rich mercy and great love of God, are quickened, raised, and made to sit in heavenly places with Christ. It may seem to us that it is not so, since we all become ill, die, suffer, and fall into sin. But let’s remember that we are the members of the Church, one body, one spiritual organism, and that our head is Jesus Christ. He has already resurrected and sits at the right hand of the Father in the heavens. Since the Head is participating in all this goodness, it means that the body must be as well.

For the time being, we only have a foretaste of this new condition. The Apostle Paul mentions that we will fully taste this Grace-filled condition only in the future life. To better understand thus, we can compare our present and future condition to that of a house under construction. While the house is being built, it is difficult to envision how it will look in its finished state. It is surrounded by scaffolding, building material is piled up everywhere, etc. Only after its completion is all of its beauty visible to everyone. The same happens with us. We are already joined to Christ, but our earthly life continues, and therefore we don’t see, nor do we feel at all times our enlivened spiritual state. Paul continues that all of this is accomplished by God’s Grace and through our faith. This is a gift of God, for we, because of our sins, are not capable of saving ourselves.

Today’s reading finishes with St. Paul’s remark that we are created and ordained to do good works. After our conversion to Christ we are called to show through good deeds that we are in truth enlivened and resurrected. Just like with salvation, the ability to do good deeds is a grace-filled gift from God. Although these works do not save us, they, like the leaves on a tree that prove that it is alive, witness to our spiritual state.

Today, when we begin our preparations for the great feastday of the Nativity of Christ, let’s remember the rich mercy and kindness of our Creator. Let’s remember that through His earthly birth He joined Himself to us and us to Himself. He became our Head and we His body. He took upon Himself every unpleasant and awful aspect of the carnal earthly world, while we were joined to everything that is wonderful in heaven. Let’s bring thanks to Him for our salvation and spend these holy days of Lent exercising ourselves in good deeds.

priest Alexis