In the name of the Father, and of the Son, and
of the Holy Spirit. Amen. Since we are justified
by faith, we have peace with God through our
Lord Jesus Christ. Every time we gather as the
Church on the Lord's Day to hear the divine words
of the Gospel and to celebrate the Eucharist,
by which Christ is present in our midst, we remember
and celebrate the mystery of our salvation. of
every one of us. St. Paul, in his epistle to
the Romans we were hearing today, unpacks for
us this ineffable mystery. While we were still
weak, at the right time, Christ died for the
ungodly. Indeed, rarely will anyone die for a
righteous person, though perhaps for a good person
someone might actually dare to die. But God shows
his love for us, in that while we still were
sinners, Christ died for us, says Holy Apostle
Paul. The mystery that we celebrate and remember
as a church every Sunday, every time we call
upon the Holy Spirit to descend upon us and upon
the gifts and to make us the partakers of the
mystical supper, whenever we gather as a church,
This is the mystery of the Lord's Pascha, his
passion, death, burial, and resurrection. We
remember the marvelous work of God fulfilled
in Christ. We, creatures of God, were alienated
from him, were foreigners to him, our creator
and the source of our life. But God did not abandon
us in our fallen state and came and saved us,
not by a voice of a prophet, nor an example of
a righteous life, but by the blood of his own
immortal Son, who came to find us, the weak,
the sinners, and to destroy the wall of enmity
between us and God, and to meet us at the lowest
point of our fallen existence, our death. This
is the mystery of our redemption. Our God ascended
the cross for us to reconcile us to himself.
to transform our death into the victory over
death, corruption and sin, the reality of our
fallen existence, and to bestow upon us the gift
of the true life which is in the knowledge of
Him. Because of his love for us, the immortal
and eternal Son and Word of God came to be in
the flesh, clothed himself in our human nature,
the body like ours, the soul and mind like ours,
in all things except sin. And he made his body,
his humanity, the source of healing, restoration,
sanctification, and salvation of mankind. St.
Paul says, if while we were enemies, We were
reconciled to God through the death of His Son.
Much more surely, having been reconciled, we
will be saved by His life. We who were called
into existence by God have become alienated from
God through our fall, through our sin, and consequently
through our enslavement to death. We have become
alienated from God and from ourselves. Through
our weak and corrupted thoughts, through our
guilt and unholy despair, when we thought and
we still think sometimes that we are lost, we
are done for, there is no one to help us. Who
will save us from death? But God himself came
in order to help us, to forgive us, to set us
free, and to restore us to the dignity of his
beloved children. the adopted sons and daughters
of God, the dignity that we receive through holy
baptism. Christ, our high priest, offered his
humanity on the cross as the sacrifice, as liturgical
sacrifice, and we partake of his humanity every
time we partake of the Eucharist. We partake
of the source of our healing and reconciliation.
There is no man who lives and does not sin. It
is impossible for human beings not to fail. Only
Christ is truly perfect. Even St. Paul says about
himself, what I want to do I do not do, but what
I hate I do. But for us, this thought of our
past and present alienation, our imperfection,
is not meant to throw us into guilt and despair,
but to encourage us, to give us hope, to remind
us that our freedom lies in God and not in ourselves,
that we are saved by communion with Him through
the gift of true life, the inexhaustible fountain
of God's grace and mercy. And when we look at
the saints whom we honor and celebrate in our
church, such as the fathers of the six ecumenical
councils whom we remember today, for example,
we tend to perceive them as the epitome of Christian
perfection, a perfect assembly, spotless examples
of Christian faith and piety. And this assessment
bears a degree of truth and reality. We praise
the fathers of the six councils. First in Nicaea,
second in Constantinople, third in Ephesus, fourth
in Alcedon, fifth in Constantinople, sixth in
Constantinople again. Between fourth and seventh
centuries, as those who, as we sing in the hymns,
in the midst of the church sang the harmonious
hymn of theology, who as if with one voice proclaimed
the same truth about God, true theology, true
Orthodox doctrine. But our look into the details
of the history of the church show us a more complicated
reality. The fathers of the councils assembled
and agreed with each other and sometimes disagreed,
sometimes compromised. The historical narratives
of the councils are filled with details of intrigues,
quarrels, controversial decisions. While the
acceptance of the councils, the work of these
fathers as ecumenical and binding was far from
immediate and far from universal at first. At
the same time, in the theological statements
pronounced by the councils, the genius of the
fathers was revealed. The light of truth shone
through the mess and complexity of church's historical
life. And the language of theology endorsed and
mandated by these councils summarized, encapsulated
the truth of the revelation, the one Christ,
of one essence with the Father and the Spirit,
perfect God and perfect man, from two natures
and into natures, two operations, two wills.
But this is the true God who was one of the Trinity.
who ascended the cross. He is true God of true
God. He is God in the flesh, God with us, God
who is truly God and truly and fully became man
in order to save us through his humanity, to
enable our nature, mortal nature, to conquer
evil and death. This is how the fathers speak
with one voice. We venerate the Fathers for their
work through the nuance and complexity of the
earthly history and their own lives and actions.
They continued to gaze upon the mystery, to look
upon the cross, to look at Christ as crucified
God and Lord of glory. And through the inspiration
of grace, they found the precise language which
reveals as much as possible of that which cannot
be revealed to man, the life of God who loved
and saved mankind. As Christ said to Peter on
the road to Caesarea Philippi, when Peter confessed
Christ as a son of the living God, the only one
of the apostles at the time, Christ said to him,
Blessed are you, for this was not revealed to
you by flesh and blood, but this truth was revealed
to you by my Father in heaven. And thus we also
bless and glorify the Fathers of the Church,
who spoke at her councils. For what was spoken
by them was not an accidental product of an earthly
mind, but the eternal truth revealed through
human earthly language. They affirm through the
language of theology what we know to be true
about us as humans and especially us as Christians.
And we do not need to have theological and philosophical
training to comprehend it with all our being.
God has brought us from nothing into being to
make us the objects of his love. God did not
abandon us when we fell into sin and corruption,
but raised us up and made us the sons of the
kingdom. As St. Gregory the Theologian, one of
the fathers of these councils, said, We needed
God made flesh and made dead so that we might
live. We were made dead with him. in baptism,
that we might be purified. We have reason with
Him since we were made dead with Him. We were
glorified with Him since we rose with Him. To
be a Christian is not to fall into pride thinking
that we are perfect or can be perfect in this
life, but to recognize our need for God. and
to gaze upon him, upon his cross, and try to
love him and one another by his grace. May we
now stand before him in his church, in his body,
as his children, as his disciples and servants,
and give praise and thanks to him for his great
mystery of redemption, by which he gave us salvation
and hope. Amen.