Christ is risen. Christ is risen. Christ is risen.
Christ is risen. Christ is risen. In the name
of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy
Spirit. Amen. Just as the apostles gathered on
the first day, That is the day when Jesus rose.
We gather. And he says to us, peace be to you.
Just as the apostles again gathered eight days
later. So we've gathered eight days later after
Pascha. And we hear the words of the Lord, peace
be to you. And just as there are some, many,
who struggle with doubt. So the Lord comes to
each of us and says, peace, just as he said to
Thomas. And all those words that we heard in
the gospel today, St. John says, are written
so that you may believe and believing you may
have life. We think we have life because we have
biological life. That's not really life. So let's
talk about life. Rather, let's talk about death.
We Christians don't regard death as the end of
this life. Death as commonly understood, the
breakdown of the body, stopping of the heartbeat,
stopping of breathing. And for us, the separation
of the soul from the body. That's not, for us,
death. Not really. We call the separation of
the soul and the body, we call rest, the body's
resting. We call it a falling asleep in the Lord,
because the body is laid aside as a garment.
Here's how St. John Chrysostom says it, and I've
quoted this to you. probably every single year
on Thomas Sunday for the last five years. So
if it sounds familiar, that's why. If it doesn't
sound familiar, you haven't been listening. St.
John Chrysostom says, it is true, we still do
die, as before, but we do not remain in death.
And this is not to die. The power and the very
harshness of death is that a dead man has no
possibility of returning to life. This is what
Thomas understood. Never happened. Why should
I believe what you say? You haven't changed enough
for me to know it. And St. John goes on to say,
but if after death a person is to be bodily quickened
and moreover to be given a better bodily life,
without death and sickness and suffering and
sorrow and tears, then this is no longer death.
This is a falling asleep. And St. Paul wrote,
he said these words, We also eagerly wait for
the Savior. We wait for the Savior, the Lord
Jesus Christ, who will transform our lowly body
that it may be conformed to his glorious body.
It's Philippians 3. And to the congregation at
Corinth, he wrote these words. Now, Christ, risen
from the dead, has become the first fruits of
those who have fallen asleep. First fruits. For
since by man came death, by man also came the
resurrection of the dead. For as in Adam, the
first man, all die, even so in Christ, all shall
be made alive. And he says in another place about
death and about our bodies. When we see a body
here in the church, in the coffin, and then we
go to the cemetery and we're going to lower it
in the ground, we must think of this. What is
sown in corruption, that's breakdown, decay.
What is sown in corruption is raised in incorruption.
What is sown in dishonor is raised in glory.
What is sown in weakness is raised in power.
So then, what is death? Death is separation from
Christ. Death is separation from Jesus Christ.
And we call Christ our Savior because without
Him, this separation, we are perishing. I want
to quote to you some words of St. Theophan the
Reckless from just his daily entry. Thoughts
for every day. Thoughts for Thomas Sunday. The
feeling of salvation, he says, is closely related
to the feeling of perishing. Do you know what
it means to perish? Have any of you, before you
met Christ, felt as if you were perishing and
God saved you and you'd be dead without him?
Have any of you felt that? I know many of you
have. The feeling of salvation is closely related
to the feeling of perishing, out of which the
Savior pulls whomever he saves. For a man who
is life -loving by nature and who knows that
he cannot save himself, the feeling that he is
perishing forces him to seek the Savior. When
he finds him and feels the power of salvation
proceeding from Jesus Christ, the resurrected
one. He grasps him tightly and does not want
to be torn from him, though he be deprived of
life itself for this. In the spiritual life of
a Christian, such events are not only imagined
in the mind, but experienced in actuality. Then
both his faith and his union with Christ become
firm like life and death. Only such a person
can sincerely cry, who shall separate me from
Christ? Perishing, salvation, resurrection, death.
Our Orthodox faith isn't about accepting someone's
teaching about a spiritual afterlife. Our Orthodox
faith isn't about someone's teaching about some
sort of heavenly reward if we are good people.
Our Orthodox faith does not come from someone's
vision or someone's book of what religion ought
to be. Our faith is founded on one thing. Jesus
rose bodily from death after being beaten, crucified
by professional executioners who knew he was
dead for sure. They did it all the time and buried.
And his body, after rising, was the same in a
way. To say, he ate and he drank in Emmaus with
disciples. He made a fish breakfast for the apostles
on the shore. But he was totally and utterly
different. right because of that, that St. Thomas
was hesitant to simply accept someone's word
about something that had never happened before
in history that he knew of. He wanted to encounter,
if it's real, the real Jesus, just as we do.
St. John the Evangelist records at the end of
the Gospel account that he wrote, that Jesus
came to the disciples. This is John 20, verses
19 to the end of that. He wrote that Jesus came
to the disciples on the first day, and they believed.
Thomas was not there. But when he came at the
end of the week, and Jesus came and said, Peace
be unto you, Thomas' confession was, My Lord
and my God. Now, it's taken 20 chapters for St.
John to tell us of the things that happened to
Jesus and what he said and what he did. 20 chapters
from the time we heard last Sunday. In the beginning
was the Word, and the Word was God, and the Word
was with God. And that this is Jesus. 20 chapters.
If you remember how we celebrated last week.
And now we hear St. Thomas saying finally. My
Lord and my God. Isn't this what we're all supposed
to experience? Isn't Lent, Holy Week, and Pascha
not religious holidays that we keep somehow with
kulich and cheese pascha and Easter eggs? Those
things are great, but that's not what it is.
The fasting, the prayers, this is all a walk.
with St. Thomas and the apostles, so we can hear
the Savior say, blessed are you that have not
seen, yet believed. Because belief does not come
from signs and wonders. It seems like that's
going to work, and that's what we want. And many
people say, if I had been there, I would have
believed. But that's just not true. The scribes
and the Pharisees knew all about the miracles
of Christ. And every time they were faced with
the divine work of forgiving, of healing, of
raising, they became more rooted in blasphemy.
Having found that Christ had healed the blind
man, instead of praising, they cursed. This man
is a sinner. And you'd know it, but you are in
your sin altogether. Having heard that Christ
had resurrected a four -day stinking dead man,
they decided they wanted to kill him, kill Christ
and Lazarus. You see, these aren't proofs that
enter the heart and the soul. They are signs
of God's power in this world. The disciples themselves
did not believe the report of the women who came
from the grave. Belief in Christ comes from knowing
you're perishing. That's why people who are rich,
for the most part, and Jesus says, a rich man,
it's very hard to enter the kingdom of heaven.
For the most part, they don't feel they are perishing.
Belief comes from suffering. And realizing that
sickness, ignorance, sin, and death are killing
us and that only Christ can save us. And encountering
Jesus Christ can come at a moment when we understand
that we are perishing. It's a different kind
of proof and it's a different kind of experience
than signs and wonders. We come. As the prayer,
the hymn that the choir sang last week. We come
to church for Holy Week. For all of Lent, for
Holy Week and Pascha. So we can say these words
and mean them. Let us purify our senses and we
shall see Christ. Shining in the unapproachable
light of the resurrection. We shall clearly hear
him say rejoice as we sing the song of victory.
But we must purify our senses to see Christ.
And then when we gather together and we hear
peace be unto you, we know it's the words of
the risen Lord that has changed us and saved
us from perishing. To our Lord who is risen and
glorified and sits at the right hand of the Father
be glory and dominion together with his Father
and the Holy Spirit now and ever. And to ages
and ages.