In the name of the Father, and of the Son, and
of the Holy Spirit, I greet you, brothers and
sisters, on this day of the resurrection and
the continuation of the celebration of the Feast
of the Exaltation of the Precious Cross. That's
why we're singing all these hymns today. Normally,
the leave -taking of the cross would be tomorrow.
but we're doing it today because you're all gathered.
We're all together. The elder and saint Perferius,
the recent saint, said to somebody once, the
great medicine is for us to devote ourselves
to the worship of Christ. Everything is healed.
Everything functions normally. The love of God
transforms everything. It sanctifies, it amends,
and changes the nature of everything. This is
the cross. This is the medicine of the cross.
Last year, I had the great blessing in October
to go to the Holy Mountain, Mount Athos, and
I went to the monastery of Vatopedi, and I stayed
there. And I had the great blessing to serve
Divine Liturgy twice with the other fathers in
this magnificent, beautiful church where St.
Gregory Palamas was at one time and many other
saints. And at the great entrance, you know,
we usually come out with the chalice and the
discos. And the deacon does that, and the main
priest holds the chalice. And all the other priests
in our practice, we come out with a spoon and
a spear and a cross or whatever is left over
that we're going to need. But there at Vatupedi,
each priest that is serving at the great entrance
is given one of the relics, one of the reliquaries.
And the second liturgy that I served at, I was
given this box about this big. About 30 pounds.
And it was covered with jewels and gold. And
it opens up. And what is it? But a large piece
of the true cross, which had been in that monastery
for a long time and had worked so many miracles
and healings for people. And my reaction was
I was completely... dumbfounded for a moment.
I couldn't remember what I was supposed to even
do next. And I carry this holy relic out. We
go out, all the priests go out, commemorations,
and we go back in. And I realized, I don't know
anything about the cross. To me, I would hear
that verse that we just heard. In the Gospel
of Mark, pick up your cross, follow me. And I
thought, well, what are those crosses? Dramatic,
difficult things, usually caring for somebody
else, or a problem in your life, you know. This
is my cross, Father, have to carry it. But I
realized that day, after I gave this precious
relic back, to the sacristan and he put it away.
I never heard the first part of that verse which
tells you what it means to pick up the cross.
The Lord says an invitation. It's an invitation
that our precious, loving, merciful creator offers
to each person. He says, if you want to follow
me, deny yourself. That's the basic first step
of a Christian. Deny yourself. I'm not making
that up, and I don't like it any more than you.
There's plenty of things I don't want to deny
about myself, especially myself. But if I'm concerned
about myself, then how am I concerned about the
will of God? If I'm concerned about my own will,
how can I ever do God's will? How can I ever
do the will of somebody else, much less my wife,
who might say, please take out the trash, but
I don't want to. Deny yourself. This is the first
step of the Christian life. And I only saw...
this precious relic until I gave it away as that
cross that we all have to carry, the difficult
thing in our life, rather than the life preserver
that our Lord himself throws to us. You know,
if you're sinking in the water off the side of
a ship, they're not going to throw you a brick
or the anchor. They're going to throw you something
that floats. The cross isn't going to drown us.
No. In fact, our own will, if you seek your own
life, you will lose it. If we seek to lose our
life, that is, to give it to Christ, then that
cross won't drown us, but we'll hang on to it
for dear life, and it will pull us up. It will
pull us up. Father Nicholas quoted Tito Coleander
last night at Vespers. I'll do him one better.
I'll also quote Tito Coleander. He says, as long
as our selfish desires rule. And none of us thinks
we're selfish. Most of us think we're quite magnanimous.
We're generous. We're good. But the gauge, the
criterion, the bar is Jesus Christ. who made
himself of no reputation, but became a servant
to slave, even to death on the cross. As long
as our selfish will rules, he says as long as
your selfish will rules, but I'm including myself,
you cannot pray to the Lord with a pure heart,
thy will be done. If you cannot get rid of your
own greatness, neither can you lay yourself open
for real greatness. If you cling to your own
freedom, you cannot share in true freedom, where
only one will remains. It is the life of our
will that is destroyed. Since the fall in the
Garden of Eden with Adam and Eve, our will has
been running errands exclusively for its own
ego. For this reason, our warfare is directed
against the life of self -will as such. And it
should be undertaken without delay or wearying.
How? How to do that? Oh, so simple. If you have
the urge to talk, don't. If you have the urge
to drink two cups of coffee, drink only one.
If you have the urge to look at the clock, don't
look. If you wish to smoke a cigarette, refrain,
especially refrain. If you want to go visiting,
stay at home. This is self -persecution. And
with God's help, our will is quieted. The Holy
Fathers say this, Do you really think that you
can fill a jar with clean water, that's our soul,
before the old dirty water has been emptied out?
Let us purify the heart. And if we move out of
ourself towards Christ, who do we see? We see
Christ, and we see our neighbor. It is for this
reason that denying oneself is a stipulation
and the chief one for the person who seeks salvation
in Christ. Only so that the center of our being,
our attention, our understanding, who we are,
who we think we are, can be moved from self to
Christ. Both God and neighbor. And then we hear
Jesus say, Pick up the cross. His listeners didn't
think it was some kind of problem in their life
that their cross consisted of. They knew what
Golgotha looked like when the Roman contingent
went up there to crucify people. When Jesus says
pick up your cross, he's being as graphic as
he can about putting that which is opposed to
God to death. Why? Well, you heard from Tito
Coleander, but there's one more thing that I'd
like to share with you. It's so that we can then
be bearers of the light. The Christian faith
is not about keeping a bunch of rules and doing
good things. It's about bearing the light of
Christ. For it is God who commanded the light
to shine out of darkness. When it says in the
beginning, let there be light, the same has shined
in our hearts. Is it shining? Let it shine to
give the light of the knowledge of the glory
of God in the face of Jesus Christ. But we have
this treasure in clay vessels. That the excellence
of the power may be of God, not of us. We're
troubled on every side. We're not distressed.
We're perplexed. We're not in despair. We're
persecuted, but we're not forsaken. We're cast
down, but we're not destroyed. We always bear
in our body The dying of the Lord Jesus. This
is the cross. So that the life of Jesus may be
made manifest in our body. All things are possible
with Christ. Where is the pain and effort for
you to become good? Elder Porphyria says, it's
simple. You will call upon God. And he will take
things from you. And make them good. If you give
your heart to them, he says, there's no room
for the other things. When you put on Christ
in baptism, then you put on the resurrection,
the garment of light, and you become a bearer
of Christ. And you will not need any effort,
he says, this is surprising, to attain the godly
virtues. They will be given to you. Are you engulfed
in fear? Are you disenchanted? Turn to Christ.
Love him simply and humbly, without any demand,
and he himself will free you. Turn to Christ,
and with humility and with hope. Like St. Paul
says, Who shall deliver me from this body of
death? Turn to Christ, and he will come immediately.
His grace will act at once. Amen.