John Strain

We entered the season of Advent this week.  Both the Western and Eastern branches of Christianity observe the season, each with a different emphasis.  This brief period of time marks the beginning of the church year, offering us entrance into a centuries long journey that begins with the birth of Jesus.  The journey won’t be complete until our Lord Jesus returns, as He promised.

I invite you to join me for a series of posts that I want to call Advent Pronouncements.  Each Sunday will provide us an insight into the implications of Jesus’ arrival into our world.  It is my opinion that no other event in history, with the possible exception of the resurrection, is more important than the entrance of God into our world.

In the days leading up to Jesus’ birth, the land of Israel wasted away in a silent darkness.  No prophet had spoken in 400 years.  A rigorous, burdensome religion came in place of vibrant faith.  Pharisees and Sadducees competed for the religious loyalties of the Hebrew people.  Only a small minority awaited the Promised One; they were often called “The Quiet in the Land.”

God sent His prophet, John the Baptist, to prepare the way for the One who would come.  He called those whose religion did not satisfy to repent and prepare for the One whose coming was soon.  Many did repent and prepare.  Others chose to live in silent darkness.

Then Jesus burst into their world.  Supernatural events heralded His coming: unique stars, choirs of angels, angelic visits to the key participants in this real-world drama, and a virgin birth.  God introduced Himself to the world in human form, an infant boy born to Mary and Joseph.  Think with me about the word introduction.

In Jesus’ arrival came an introduction to God’s tangible presence in our world.  He makes Himself known to us by becoming like us.  The quiet darkness is no more.  God speaks again!  God invades our space and introduces us to new life, new light, and a new way to live in relationship with Him.

The true light, which gives light to everyone, was coming into the world. He was in the world, and the world was made through him, yet the world did not know him. He came to his own, and his own people did not receive him. But to all who did receive him, who believed in his name, he gave the right to become children of God, who were born, not of blood nor of the will of the flesh nor of the will of man, but of God.

And the Word became flesh and dwelt among us, and we have seen his glory, glory as of the only Son from the Father, full of grace and truth. (John 1:9-14 ESV)

Advent is an introduction to the ways of God for people living without Him.  The Baby Jesus introduces us to the reality of life with God.  That’s important enough to warrant our attention during this introductory season

9/11/2001.  That’s all one needs to say.  It is as clear a reminder as December 7, 1941.  Some dates just do not fade away.  They stay with us.  They haunt us.  We cannot forget.  We do not want to forget.  We should not forget.

Like many of you, I’ve been to ground zero.  I’ve walked around the site, and I’ve gone across the street to the little church that opened its doors as a place to serve those responding to the attack.  The images stir and haunt at the same time.  Bobbie and I had a neighbor at work near the Twin Towers that day.  Her sister was working in one of the towers and didn’t come home.  We cannot forget.  We do not want to forget.  We should not forget.

A man from our church had an appointment in one of the towers that morning.  Traffic on the New Jersey Turnpike kept him from getting there.  He watched the planes crash into the towers while sitting in traffic.  Traffic saved his life.  All of us have read stories of those who should have been there and weren’t.  One missed bus or train, one extra red light, some little thing saved lives that morning.  We cannot forget.  We do not want to forget.  We should not forget.

I have friends who had friends on the plane that went down in Pennsylvania.  Although I did not know him, Todd Beamer was a student at Wheaton College at the same time I studied in the Graduate School.  So many of us have connections of one sort or another that tie us to the events of New York City, Shanksville, PA, and Washington D.C.  We cannot forget.  We do not want to forget.  We should not forget.

9/11/2011.  We cannot forget.  We have not forgotten.  We should not forget.  Thousands of men and women have fought two wars since 09/01/2001.  Thousands have died, men and women with families who grieve as those who lost some one in New York, Shanksville, or Washington D.C.  The toll of human suffering continues; some husband/wife/son/daughter will probably die in Afghanistan today.  We cannot forget.  We do not want to forget.  We should not forget.

Today . . . we remember.  We remember because we cannot forget.  We remember because we do not want to forget.  We remember because we should not forget.

Lord Jesus Christ, Son of God; have mercy on us sinners.

An acquaintance of mine died Sunday morning, August 28, 2011.  I met him only twice, and he was unlike anyone else I’ve ever known.  He has been much on my mind; I have the sense that I should write about him, my meetings with him, and what I’ve come to know about him.

His given name was Robert Royster, and he was born and raised in Texas.  At the time of his death he was 87 years old, and he had been in poor health for several months.  None of that is particularly unusual, but there is more to the story.

Raised in a Southern Baptist Church, he and his sister both converted to Orthodoxy in their early twenties.  He went on to become an Archbishop in the Orthodox Church of America.  When I met him about five years ago, he was the Archbishop for the Diocese of the South and all of Mexico.  Upon his conversion to Orthodoxy he took the name Dimitri, and I knew him as Archbishop Dimitri.

My sister, ten years older than I, converted to Orthodoxy many years ago.  Dorcas took me to Sunday School when I was still a toddler.  The earliest seeds of faith were planted in my soul through her loving faithfulness.  She is now an active member of St. Seraphim Cathedral in Dallas, the church from which Archbishop Dimitri led his diocese.  On a trip to Dallas for another sister’s funeral, I had the opportunity to attend Divine Liturgy with Dorcas.  It’s a three-hour service, and I’ve never seen anything like it!  I was moved by the reverence I observed as people worshiped the Lord Jesus in ways completely new to me.

After the service, I got to meet the Archbishop.  He treated me as though he’d known me all my life.  He invited me to come back for Wednesday evening vespers after which he would have time to visit with me.  My sister and I went back on Wednesday, and I enjoyed a lengthy conversation with Dimitri.

After all these years, I recall that conversation as though it were yesterday.  Words come to mind that describe the Archbishop:  Saintly.  Humble.  Wise.  Caring.  Godly.  Joyful.  Hospitable.  I was sitting with one called “His Eminence” in the Orthodox tradition, but he didn’t convey an air of “eminence.”  He asked me about my walk with Jesus and answered my questions about Orthodoxy, insisting that I drink some of his coffee . . . coffee strong enough to get up and walk out of the cup!  I later learned that he was famous for his coffee.

Both during the liturgy and in conversation, I sensed the Archbishop to be a man in love with Jesus.  His theology doesn’t fit mine in many ways.  I somehow knew, though, that our hearts were set on the same person.  In fact, those who wrote of his life after his death are consistent in saying that his ministry as a bishop was marked by a single-minded devotion to the person and work of Jesus Christ.  This man with the long white beard, dressed in the traditional black cassock conveyed to me a likeness to Christ that I’ve seen far too seldom in my Christian journey.  I left his presence believing that I had encountered a holy man.

Archbishop Dimitri lived frugally and invested most of his resources in the ministry God gave him.  He was, according to all I’ve read, generous to a fault.  During his time as Bishop of the South, he saw Orthodox churches established from Mexico to Florida.  He traveled mostly by car (to save money), investing his life and resources in the churches started under his ministry.

I don’t anticipate becoming an Orthodox Christian; I’m comfortable as a follower of Jesus in the evangelical tradition.  But having met the Archbishop, I have gained respect for the Orthodox tradition and for those in the tradition who love Jesus and seek to follow him.  A simple, brilliant, godly man stepped into my life for just a short while.  He touched my life with his grace and love and compassion.  I look forward to seeing him in heaven!

Last week I invited any who read these posts to consider the long journey from earth to heaven.  The Bible verses that remind us to stay focused on eternal things are many, and most who read this know those verses.  The knowing about that focus is the easy part.  The doing seems to get complicated.

I’ve been thinking the last week or so about Paul’s prayer for the Philippian church.  In that prayer, he reminds them to stay focused on the journey’s end, but he also gives them a process—a set of practices—that prepare them for the journey and the arrival.

And it is my prayer that your love may abound more and more, with knowledge and all discernment, so that you may approve what is excellent, and so be pure and blameless for the day of Christ, filled with the fruit of righteousness that comes through Jesus Christ, to the glory and praise of God. (Philippians 1:9-11 ESV)

These words remind me that everything hangs on love.  The whole process that prepares us for journey’s end begins with a growing love, an abounding love.  The Apostle, as he writes these words, may well hear in his mind Jesus’ words from Matthew 22:  “You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind. This is the great and first commandment. And a second is like it: You shall love your neighbor as yourself. On these two commandments depend all the Law and the Prophets.” (Matthew 22:37-40 ESV)

Paul continues the process with a growing knowledge of truth that produces discernment.  That discernment enables the reader to approve what is excellent.  And the result of those approvals is purity and blamelessness.  Paul’s prayer for the Philippians is that the process will prepare them for the goal: readiness for the day of Christ.

The goal remains constant.  A day is coming, a day unlike any other.  We fix our eyes on that day.  The process, however, continues daily.  God’s Spirit at work in us makes us more and more the image bearers of Christ.  Our love for Christ creates in us a passion for His likeness.

We live for the goal.  We live in the process.

Did you experience the “after-Easter letdown” that so many encounter following the Holy Week climax we call Resurrection Day?  I don’t know if I would use the word “letdown,” but I was worn out yesterday, the Monday after Easter.  Sunday was a celebration like no other, but I didn’t have the energy to celebrate anything yesterday.

It brings to mind the question I shared with you in my last post.  How do we go forward? Many Christians spent the forty days of Lent preparing for the Resurrection Celebration.  We came to church.  We sang wonderful songs that lifted our hearts.  Many of us heard choir anthems that enhanced our celebration.  Preachers did their best to exalt the risen Lord and encourage people to live in the power of that resurrection.  Then came Monday.

How do we continue the growth that came through the Lenten practices?  We have seven months until Advent, another preparation time for Jesus-followers.  Do we just float along, waiting for another focused time of intense preparation?  I don’t think Jesus’ teachings allow us to float.  Floating is similar to drifting, and we learned the danger of drifting during the Lenten journey.  (Hebrews 2:1)

Choosing to continue some of the disciplines that prepared us for Resurrection Sunday offers us a better option.  Remember, the practices of prayer, Scripture reading, self-denial, and doing acts of compassion are rooted in Scripture.  They aren’t seasonal activities; they provide a way of life for Jesus’ disciples.

I’ve been thinking about Paul’s words in Philippians: that I may know him and the power of his resurrection, and may share his sufferings, becoming like him in his death, (Philippians 3:10 ESV).   I want to share Paul’s consuming passion to know Jesus.  I desperately need the power of Jesus’ resurrection.  Some of what I need only comes through sharing in Jesus’ sufferings.

What do I do?  What do you do?  We choose the path of Jesus.  We choose the path of joyful discipline.  We choose the way of expectant self-denial.  We choose to focus on that which is eternal.  During the forty days that brought us to Resurrection Sunday, our focus was rather short-term.  Our after-Easter practices call us to a longer journey—the journey from earth to heaven.

We’re still preparing.  We’re still anticipating.  We’ll still practice reflection.  We’ll still choose repentance.  We’ll still pursue renewal.  Until we get to heaven.

I used “we” six times in that last paragraph, and I did so with intent.  I don’t want to take the journey from earth to heaven alone.  I hope you don’t, either.

Many of you have shared the last forty days of Lenten Journey with me.  Thank you for that!  We’ve arrived; this is Resurrection Day!  For forty days, we’ve reflected, repented and pursued renewal. Everything has pointed to this day.  He is risen!  Hallelujah!

The early Christians pursuing baptism and church membership had long waited for Resurrection Sunday.  The rigors of self-denial, prayer, scripture reading, and works of gracious compassion prepared their hearts and proved their faith.  They were ready to enter the fellowship of the committed.  They were ready to say with brothers and sisters in Christ, “He is risen!  Hallelujah!”

Like them, we’ve lived through forty days of preparation and anticipation.  Most of us will gather with other Jesus-followers in a few hours.  We’ll sing resurrection songs.  We will read resurrection sections of Scripture.  We’ll say with fellow pilgrims on the journey, “He is risen!  Hallelujah!”

A long-time friend of mine joined me for this journey.  A couple of days ago he sent me an email and finished it with these words: So after Sunday we enter the tough season, the long road.  How do we keep this spiritual renewal and many new found disciplines intact and growing until the next season?  Leave that one to Monday morning!

I haven’t answered the email, but I think God has shown me an appropriate response.  The journey is over . . . let the journey begin! We’ll celebrate today.  We’ve looked forward to it for forty days.  It’s Resurrection Day; we should celebrate!  Tomorrow, however, is Monday.  A new journey begins.  My friend’s questions are valid.  How do we keep the renewal growing?

I don’t have all the answers to his questions, but I think I know where to start.  The writer of Hebrews tells us how to begin the new and longer journey: Therefore, since we are surrounded by so great a cloud of witnesses, let us also lay aside every weight, and sin which clings so closely, and let us run with endurance the race that is set before us, looking to Jesus, the founder and perfecter of our faith, who for the joy that was set before him endured the cross, despising the shame, and is seated at the right hand of the throne of God. (Hebrews 12:1&2 ESV)

The disciplines we’ve learned on the journey to Resurrection Sunday prepare us for the longer journey.  Perhaps we can share the continuing journey.  Traveling together is always better than traveling alone.  Have a glorious Resurrection Day.  He is risen!  Hallelujah!

Today is a day of waiting.  Like the disciples we rest, we wonder, and we wait.  The disciples, in fear, waited and wondered in hiding.  All of them rested on the Sabbath.  We know from their responses on Sunday that they weren’t ready for, nor were they anticipating the resurrection.

It is in that readiness and anticipation that we differ from the eleven men who rested on that Sabbath.  Hindsight is a wonderful thing!  We know Jesus didn’t stay in the grave!  We know God raised Him from the dead!  We know He lives!  Instead of the dread and grief of the first disciples, we share the anticipation the early church catechumens experienced just before Resurrection Sunday.

We look forward to the celebration.  We anticipate the joy.  Our hearts are ready after forty days of preparation.  In context, though, today is the Sabbath.  It’s a day for reflection.  The eleven men and the other followers of Jesus who were with them had nothing but questions the day after Friday—the day when they rested.

What happened yesterday?  Why did it happen?  What comes next?  We really believed He was the Messiah; how could our hopes be destroyed so completely? They were full of questions and fear.  They were full of doubt and dismay.  Saturday wasn’t as bad as Friday, but no one was calling it “Good Saturday!”

I invite you to let today bring rest and reflection to you.  Many of us have had a full week; we may be just a bit tired.  Rest will help us prepare for the joyous tumult of Resurrection Day.  Reflection will remind us that Resurrection Day can’t come without Good Friday.  Our questions differ from the first disciples, but we have good questions for this day in between.

How does Jesus’ death change my life?  How do I respond to Jesus’ sacrifice for my sins?  How do I live with focus and purpose in the post-Lenten journey? We don’t share the doubt and dismay of the eleven men and their friends.  We do share their need for rest and reflection.

Resurrection Sunday requires the rest and reflection of the Sabbath.  It prepares us for celebration and keeps us connected to Jesus’ suffering and sacrifice.  This is the day when the reflection of the Lenten journey and the anticipation of celebration come together.  Let’s follow the example of the disciples: On the Sabbath they rested according to the commandment. (Luke 23:56b ESV)

(I forgot to give credit for the title of yesterday’s post: Six Hours One Friday.  It’s the title of one of Max Lucado’s best book.  I apologize for the oversight.)

Our Lenten journey brings us to this day.  We’ve known it was coming; it comes every year.  The Gospel writer’s descriptions tell me about the day, but I struggle to grasp the images.  Why would people do something like this?  How could people do something like this?  Where would I have been had I been there?

Jesus experienced betrayal.  He experienced injustice.  He suffered indescribable pain.  The grief He saw in His mother’s eyes was enough to break His heart.  As hard as it is to believe, however, those were the less difficult experiences of six hours one Friday.

The eternal Son of God, for three of those six hours, experienced sin on that cross.  My sin.  Your sin.  Jesus took upon Himself every unspeakable act done by fallen, broken men and women.  Every thought, word, and act that violates the holiness of God fell on Jesus that Friday.  Hear the words from the Word: For our sake he made him to be sin who knew no sin, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God. (2 Corinthians 5:21 ESV)

We can’t imagine how awful sin felt as Jesus bore it for us that day.  Perhaps you, like me, have experienced grief and sorrow during our journey.  Times of reflection have helped us see sin we didn’t know existed when we began the journey.  It has brought us to a place of repentance, and we’ve experienced forgiveness and renewal.

Our renewed sense of the awfulness of our sin may help us get a glimpse of Jesus’ experience, but only a glimpse.  Our journey only takes us so far.  Jesus’ real anguish came from something much worse than bearing our sin.  We can’t understand those six hours one Friday without considering Jesus’ separation from His Father.  Again, consider the Scriptures: And about the ninth hour Jesus cried out with a loud voice, saying, “Eli, Eli, lema sabachthani?” that is, “My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?” (Matthew 27:46 ESV)

For three of those six hours one Friday, God covered that awful hill with darkness.  Jesus experienced “aloneness” beyond our comprehension while hanging in the darkness.  Worse than the scourging.  Worse than being spit on.  Worse than the crown of thorns.  Worse than the nails.  Worse than death.  Jesus lived “aloneness” from His Father.  He lived the agony of being forsaken . . . for me, for you.

Six hours one Friday.  I invite you to experience them with me today as we near the end of our journey.

We are coming to the end of the journey.  One last supper tonight.  The garden overnight.  The most awful of days tomorrow.  A day to reflect on all that happened.  Then the morning that changes everything!  It’s almost over!

The season brings us to see our need for death to ourselves.  We die to our old false self.  Jesus lives in us and through us.  Reflection and repentance bring us to that place where Jesus’ image is renewed in us.  We become the person God always intended us to be.  John the Baptist understood this before anyone thought of Lent.  He had the Lentent intent figured out.  “He must increase, but I must decrease.” (John 3:30 ESV)

Paul, the Apostle, understood, too.  His words to the Galatians help us understand: I have been crucified with Christ. It is no longer I who live, but Christ who lives in me. And the life I now live in the flesh I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave himself for me. (Galatians 2:20 ESV)

The rigor and discipline of Lent helps us slay the dragon of self.  Prayer, scripture, self-denial, humble works of compassion and mercy all help us put to death the selfishness of our flesh.  We decrease.  Jesus increases.  The catechumens of the early church experienced forty days of training that helped them decrease so that Jesus could increase.  The disciplines helped them destroy what a friend of mine calls “the residue of the flesh.”  The dragon needed slaying!

Most of us involved in this journey aren’t catechumens.  We’re just Christians who know that the dragon sometimes rears its ugly head.  The old false self just doesn’t want to die!  That makes the cycle of the church year so important; Lent comes every year.  We take the journey again, reflecting, repenting, and experiencing renewal.  We hear the words of Paul: So you also must consider yourselves dead to sin and alive to God in Christ Jesus. (Romans 6:11 ESV)

In these last days of the Lenten journey, we contemplate our need to live as our true selves.  We believe what God says about us.  In the words of the King James Version, we “reckon” ourselves dead to sin and “alive to God.” Jesus increases.  We decrease.

The journey to celebration is almost over.  But first, we have to get through Friday.  May God give us grace!

One thing remains constant in my mind from one Holy Week to the next.  The Gospel accounts of that week remind me each year of the incredible amount of teaching Jesus did during the last week of His life.  We know the Olivet and Upper Room Discourses; we associate them with the week unlike any other.  The Scriptures call us to a broader focus, however, if we want to grasp all of Jesus’ Holy Week teaching.

Consider these words from Jesus: “Teacher, which is the great commandment in the Law?” And he said to him, “You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind.  This is the great and first commandment.  And a second is like it: You shall love your neighbor as yourself.  On these two commandments depend all the Law and the Prophets.” (Matthew 22:36-40 ESV)

We don’t talk a lot about love during Lent.  That may be a mistake.  If our focus is only on the disciplines, the rigorous effort of Lent, we miss the point.  If we think only of getting from the Ash Wednesday to Resurrection Sunday, we miss the point.  If we engage only in the “doing” of Lent without catching the “becoming,” we miss the point.

The common goals of Lent, preparation and transformation, call us to reflect the image of Christ.  We are to become like Him.  He tells us in this teaching that love is the key to that transformation.  We can wrap all of His teaching in two statements.  Love God.  Love people.  The transformation from the old false self to the new true self is all about love.  Love for God.  Love for people.

In all of our reflection, repentance, and renewal, we must remember: it’s all about love.  Love for God.  Love for people.  When we read the scriptures, we must remember: it’s all about love.  When we deny ourselves, we must remember: it’s all about love.  When we practice acts of mercy and compassion, we must remember: it’s all about love.

Love God.  Love people.

Love is the key.

Thanks for sharing the loving journey with me today.