In the name of the Holy Spirit, amen. Glory be
to Jesus Christ. Glory be to God. In today's
epistle and gospel, there are probably, there
are many, and questions, but three fundamental
questions that can change our entire life. The
first one is that the epistle says that you may
be of one mind, one heart in Christ Jesus. If
we could be one mind and one heart in Christ
Jesus, that's paradise on earth. If we make that
our entire aim of our life, that would be a life
worthy to be lived. In the Gospel, the second
question is, how do I handle my own pain? This
is one of the most fundamental questions of life.
I see this every day as a priest. a drug addict
than the next hour I'm with a millionaire. And
the most common correlation between both of them,
those who don't even have $100 a month to spend
and those who have millions of dollars, the commonality
between them is pain. Everyone deals with their
own pain. And then the third question is, what
do we do with the pain of others? You notice
there was not one blind man, there were two blind
men that came to Christ. Now the answer is going
to answer all three of these main questions.
Again, if we got these three main questions,
how do we handle our own pain? How do we handle
the pain of our brothers and sisters? And how
can we be one in Christ? One heart, one mind,
one soul, one will, one body. Now, when we have
and experience our own pain, we can turn that
energy around. Now, what I mean by pain, we've
all experienced this. It's a universal language
for humanity. Pain of despondency, pain of despair,
pain of a loss of a job, pain of a loss of someone
that we love. pain of losing our job, pain of
stubbing our pinky toe in the middle of the night.
You name it, we each have experienced some kind
of pain. So what can we do with that energy of
pain so that it can be sanctified and that pain
can then turn into love? Not just for ourselves,
but for all mankind. Because remember, the aim
is to be one heart, one mind, one soul in Christ
Jesus. What about the pain of someone else that
we love? Someone that we heard of that got into
a car accident, or someone that we know of that
stubbed their pinky toe in the middle of the
night. What about someone that lost their job,
or someone that's going through a very difficult
time? We can feel that in our heart and in our
soul. Especially in the crazy times that we live
in now, the wars and the famines and the rumors
of wars, everything that's happening, we experience
this in our soul. What are we supposed to do
with this energy that we experience? What are
we supposed to do with the energy of our own
personal pain and then the energy of the pain
that we feel in the entire world? Saint Sophrony
says, the place to experience grace. par excellence.
And he says, even as great as when he was in
the desert on Manaphos, is in the divine liturgy.
The divine liturgy is the place where our own
personal pain, our own, the corporate pain that
we feel, can then be transformed into a divine
love for the entire world. And then the divine
liturgy is where we become one heart, one soul,
one mind. in Christ. There are two symbols in
the Divine Liturgy that I want to illustrate
this point. The first, and one of my favorite
parts of the Divine Liturgy, is when we'll experience
it in maybe ten minutes' time. It depends on
how slow we read the litanies. Thine own of thine
own, we offer unto thee on behalf of all and
for all. Thy known of thy known. Let's go through
this quickly. Thy known of thy known. Everything
you've given me is a gift. My nature is a gift.
My breath is a gift. My thinking is a gift. Thy
known of thy known. I am thine. Save me, as we
heard in the Psalms. Thy known of thy known.
We offer unto thee. That means, I am offering
my life on behalf of what? Let's keep going.
Thine own, of thine own, we offer unto thee for
what? On behalf of all and for all. So by you
being in the divine liturgy, by you offering
your life to Christ, especially in the divine
liturgy, you are offering your life on behalf
of the whole world. You are offering your life
on behalf of your whole family, of your neighbors,
of your aunts and uncles. And in fact, that pain
that you experience of theirs, when you offer
that to God in the Divine Liturgy, you are offering
them up to God on the Divine Altar. Now, whose
sacrifice is it? It's Christ's sacrifice. We
are just entering into His sacrifice. He is the
one that offered Himself perfectly to the Father.
We are just entering in by grace to His beautiful
paradise of offering and His resurrection. But
the Divine Liturgy is the transformation of pain
into love. Never forget this. We come in with
our struggles. We offer God our repentance. We
come in with our fears, our panics, our worries.
But God comes and on the altar sanctifies the
holy gifts and offers us His divine kingdom.
It's not a fair exchange. We offer Him a little
bit of our two minds and He gives us His entire
life in the divine liturgy, especially in the
chalice. Everything that is His, He gives to
you in the chalice. And when you partake, you
are partaking of the fullness of the Godhead.
Nothing, nothing short of that. So we offer our
personal pain and the pain of our neighbors to
God on behalf of all and for all. Therefore,
as it says in the Akathist of St. Olga of Alaska,
that her every step was an offering to God. You
see, every prayer, every breath that you make
in the Divine Liturgy and extend it out throughout
your entire life, is an offering not just for
yourself, but for your loved ones, for your brothers,
for your sisters in Christ, for your uncles,
your aunts, for anyone that's ever stubbed their
toe in the middle of the night. Whoever it is
that you bring into your heart, you bring them
to the altar in the Divine Liturgy, and not only
are you transformed, but they, by grace, are
transformed a little by little. This is why St.
Seraphim says, acquire the spirit of peace and
a thousand around you will be saved it's not
that you're a guru and you have this peace that
everyone's attracted to no the thousand people
are in your heart you see so then when you acquire
peace in your heart they too get to experience
that so you are participating in the greatest
work in the whole cosmos and that is the divine
liturgy because it's the place where we become
one in christ It's the place where we can transform,
by God's grace, our own personal pain into love
for others. And it's also the place where we
can bring our brother and sister's pain to the
divine altar. And there's a wonderful transformation
that occurs. Pain turns to joy. The cross turns
into the resurrection. So come to every divine
liturgy with expectation. that this is a cosmic
event, that this is not just you and God time,
but this is the time where God can, through you
and through all of us, to be one heart, one mind,
one soul, one body, and through the body to bless
and to share His grace to the whole world. To
Him be all glory, honor, and worship.