In the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit, One God. Amen.
My beloved, today, let us take a moment to be able to contemplate and to think about the events that happened on the day of Tuesday of Pascha. Let's take a moment and try to think what it is the Church is trying to teach us with the readings that it has placed for us today in the hourly prayers of the Holy Pascha that we pray in the morning and in the evening.
Today is typically seen as the day where the Lord is assigned the title of the Great Teacher, the Instructor, if you will. Today is the last time that we hear about how it is that He enters the temple and He preaches to the people publicly. Today, what we see is a Lord who sits among His people and who educates them. And when He educates them, there is some of His teachings that utter reproach towards those that are hypocritical. There is some of His teaching that prepares the way for the kingdom of God. And in the way that He speaks of the kingdom, He makes it accessible to so many people, so many people who have been told by others above them that they have no chance of entering into the kingdom. He makes it accessible to those who believe that, in their sinful state, they are unrighteous and incapable of approaching God.
And so, the Lord comes in His teachings and He almost flips the tables around in some sorts. When He tells those that are self-righteous, thinking that they are somehow... that they have a right, a birthright of some sorts towards the kingdom, that they cannot be reproached, because they fulfill all of the laws. And they think that they have first standings when it comes to entering into the kingdom of God. And yet He comes and tells them that they are the ones who are hypocritical. They are the brood of vipers. They are the ones who have lorded their authority over the people. They are truly unrighteous, because they mask themselves with the law, where in reality, they bear no fruits of mercy. But He tells the regular person who sits in the crowd, who has been told for years now that they are sinful, that they have access to the kingdom.
In the readings of today, we hear about how it is that the Lord mourns over Jerusalem, how He looks at Jerusalem and says: O Jerusalem, Jerusalem! How often, how often have I desired to visit you! How often have I desired to gather you together to make you one, to make you whole! How often have I desired to be able to restore you back to your former state!
This same cry is heard today by my very soul, where the Creator of my soul turns to me and says: How often have I desired to pursue you! How often have I desired to make you whole! How often have I desired to heal you, to restore you, to raise you back to a level of dignity!
But you have refused. He tells Jerusalem: You have killed the prophets. And I myself have done the same in my own sinfulness, where I have neglected... I have neglected the words of the Holy Spirit in Scripture. I have turned a blind eye to the commandments of God. I have turned down the volume of His voice so that I can hear, rather, the noise of my own desires and not be troubled with the voice of conviction that is heard within me that the Holy Spirit tries to speak to me.
And today also, we hear the Lord teaching and instructing the people by telling them that He is the light of the world and whoever follows Him shall not walk in darkness but have light of life. He tells them that He is the one who has come to get rid of the darkness; that in the process of shining of His light, that all would be able to come to Him; that those who walk in the light will not stumble.
But the light has two separate effects, my beloved. When you shine a light in a very dark room and someone is sitting in that room, you'll have two very different reactions. There are those who will see the light and be bothered by it. There are those who will see the light and say: Turn that off, that’s bothering me, it's aggressive, it's hurting me eyes. I don't want it. Leave me in the comfort of my darkness. Leave me sit here and do not disturb my peacefulness. Just let me be and turn off that light.
But there are others also who, when they see a light in a very dark room, they are intrigued by it. They haven’t seen a light in a very long time. And so, what they do is that they turn to that light. They question where it is from and they want to approach it with intrigue. And so, they follow the light, hoping that it leads to somewhere that is outside of that darkness. And the closer they get to that light, the more the darkness evades them. The more they approach the source of light, the more there is no more darkness surrounding them. They are felt with the warmth of that light that embraces them.
They pursue it, and so, in the process, they themselves begin to see themselves in a way that they have not seen themselves before. Their appearance becomes more evident before them. They become more and more aware of the source of the light and they become more aware of who it is they are and of the stains that have taken on them. They begin to see themselves in a way that they had not seen themselves before.
Today, the Lord presents Himself as that Great Instructor, the Teacher, the priest of some sorts; the one who... the one who has loved and has cherished His people; the shepherd who has run after the sheep; the Instructor and the Teacher; the one who wants to be able to bring back the lost of Israel; the one who wants to make sure that we forget the things of the past and focus on the hope of the future; the one who calls out our hypocrisy and gives us the dose of tough love that we need and deserve.
And beloved, today, the prayer of the Church, as we see Him instructing, as we see Him mourning over us, as we see His holy and zealous anger manifested towards the evil that has
overtaken us in the form of hypocrisy, as we behold Him as He is, our response should be to turn to Him and to tell Him:
Lord, as You instructed and as You taught back then, we ask you to come now again, o Lord. We ask to come now and in Your Holy Spirit, convict me and teach me. With Your Holy Spirit, let me hear the voice of your teaching. Let me turn back to You. Bring me back and cover me. Let me sit in the shadow of Your wings. Build me up. Raise me up. Shine your light in me. Show me who I am, that I may also, in the process, see all that You are.
To God be all glory now and forever and unto the ages of all ages. Amen.