Homoly on the 15th Sunday after Pentecost
2 Corinthians 4: 6-15; Matthew 22: 35-46.
To love is at the heart of the Gospel – there is no way around it. The rich young man in today’s Gospel thought that he was being virtuous by following all of the 613 commandments of the old Levitical Law. Not a mean feat, if you think about it! Yet it is clear that mindlessly following laws, because one is commanded to cannot fulfil the Commandment to love. We know from the Gospel that the Pharisees, like the rich young man, mistook blind obedience to the old Law, as a form of righteousness (Matthew 23: 13-36).
Yet blindly following laws and traditions leads one nowhere, this is why Christ made it clear that the Pharisees where blind. These supposed leaders, willfully chose to ignore their Lord and Saviour; like the tenants in the parable of the vineyard, they killed Him, and the messengers sent before His incarnation - the Holy Prophets (Mark 12).
Thus, Christ makes it plain to the young man that the Two Commandments which underpin the Ten Commandments are the Two Commandments – Love the Lord your God and Love one another (Matthrew 23: 37-40).
These Two Commandments, which sum up the Ten Commandments, are the fulfillment of the Ten Commandments meaning that if we follow these Commandments, we will never transgress any of the Ten Commandments.
Saint John Chrysostom has this to say in relation to love and its important place in our Christian life:
“Where there is love, there is great security and God’s great blessing. Love is the mother of all blessings, their root and source; it is the end of wars and the extermination of strife. Indeed, just as dissent and strife cause death and demise prematurely, so love and harmony produce peace and unanimity, and where there is peace and unanimity, all in life is safe and secure. Why speak of the present only? Love brings us heaven and unspeakable goods; it is the queen of virtues.”
Therefore, if any action is not done out of love, then it cannot be of God. Unfortunately, today, many have forgotten this Commandment to love for they seek not to create unity but division via their own self-interest. Self-interest by its very nature, whilst arguably stemming from a sort of ‘self-love’, cannot fulfill this Commandment to love.
Unchecked self-interest leads to the object of one’s love being the self which is the very reason the evil one rebelled against his creator in the first place. Whilst it is good to have some self-love, if you are the only thing that you care about then you truly cannot love others. Think of all the narcissists you know; do they truly love?
This is why it is vital as Christians, that we seek to do that which will bring others into the loving unity of Christ’s Body the Church. This is what the Body of Christ is – a unity with Christ brought about through the Holy Mysteries of His Orthodox Church. This is why Love humbled Himself to die on the wood of the Cross (2 Philippians: 8-11). Through this great sacrifice Christ has enabled us to have the possibility of being united to the Father through Him and the possibility entering into heaven one day should we have lived a Christ centred life in the imitation of our Lord and Saviour.
Gone are the days of our spiritual exile in the desert of old (Exodus 1-12). Gone are the days of our spiritual orphanage. We have the possibility, like Adam and Eve, through the worthy reception of the Holy Mysteries of His Church, to be united to our loving God. What a joyful thought to be able to know that our God wants a deep loving relationship with each and every one of us. The choice is ours; the invitation has been sent and our seat at the table is there should we want to put on the wedding garment, which we received at our Baptism, and come to the feast.
This image of a wedding garment, mentioned by Christ in the parable of the wedding feast is in fact why we symbolically dress the newly baptised in a special white garment. This garment not only signifies putting on Christ – becoming an icon of Him in the world- this garment also is the symbolic representation of the mystical garment we will wear at the heavenly marriage feast between Christ and His Bride the Church (Matthew 22: 1-22).
Christ talks about heaven as a marriage feast because, at its heart, those in heaven are United to the All-Holy Trinity because through their baptism they joined the Bride of Christ – His Church. This nuptial language is used to remind us of the unfathomable love that the All-Holy Trinity has for mankind. This is why the Holy Church has rightly seen the Song of Solomon as an allegory of God’s love for his people – a Love who opened His arms on the Holy Cross for our salvation!
Moreover, God chose to reveal His plan of salvation for His people in the form of two Covenants the Old and the New. This is why the Holy Mystery of Marriage takes the form of a covenant between the Bride and the Groom which is sealed by the blessing of the priest. This Mystery imitates the New Covenant between Christ and His Bride the Holy Church.
So, in much the same way, at our Baptisms, we enter into a Holy covenant with our Lord and Saviour where we make promises to faithfully live by His Commandments and He promises to look after us as his newly enlightened child giving us everything we need to grow spiritually through the Holy Mysteries of His Church.
Saint John Chrysostom puts it this way in relation to this Mystical Marriage Feast in his Homily 69 on Saint Matthew:
“What then could be more ungrateful than they, when being bidden to a marriage they rush away? For who would not choose to come to a marriage, and that a King's marriage, and of a King making a marriage for a Son?
And wherefore is it called a marriage? One may say. That you might learn God's tender care, His yearning towards us, the cheerfulness of the state of things, that there is nothing sorrowful there, nor sad, but all things are full of spiritual joy. Therefore, also John calls Him a bridegroom, therefore Paul again says, For I have espoused you to one husband; 2 Corinthians 11:2 and, this is a great mystery, but I speak concerning Christ and the Church. Ephesians 5:32
Why then is not the bride said to be espoused to Him, but to the Son? Because she that is espoused to the Son, is espoused to the Father. For it is indifferent in Scripture that the one or the other should be said, because of the identity of the substance.”
What this means is that out of love the All-Holy Trinity invites us to the Wedding Feast which is not only a reference to heaven but also a reference to the Holy Mystery of the Eucharist. For it is through the worthy reception of the Holy Mystery of the Eucharist that one is brought into a deep union with the All-Holy Trinity. Do not forget that when the priest intones, ‘blessed is the kingdom of the Father, the Son and the All-Holy Spirit’, that we are all made to mystically stand in heaven for the duration of the Divine Liturgy.
Again, this offering of the Holy Sacrifice of the Eucharist being a reminder of the profound love which the Bridegroom has for His Bride the Church – even to the point of death on a cross. Here in this Holy Mystery of the Eucharist we are united to Christ’s death and resurrection for worthily partaking of this Holy Mystery connects us to the source of our spiritual life - the All-Holy Trinity.
Finally, ask the Lord how you can truly love Him and your neighbour for it is by exercising this love that we are perfected and made into icons of Christ which shine to the world the love He has for all.
Christ our God, teach us how to love so that we may be worthy of entering the heavenly banquet. Amen.
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