Kingdom Struggles

Kingdom Struggles In the name of the Father and of the Son and of
the Holy Spirit. God is one. Amen. On this Meatfare Sunday we are
urged by the Church not to eat meat for the next week, as we
prepare ourselves for Lent that begins on Monday, the 2nd of March.
The challenge is to practise self-discipline, to experience that we
“eat to live,” not “live to eat.” Yet in the Gospel today from the
25th chapter of St Matthew, Jesus Christ praises those righteous
people who gave Him food when he was hungry and drink when He was
thirsty. The righteous are puzzled, because they have not seen
Jesus Christ. However, He explains to them that when you gave food
and drink to those in need, you gave that nourishment “to Me.” It
appears that possibly the Gospel and the theme for Meatfare Sunday
might be in conflict about what attitude to take to food. However,
in fact, the Gospel and Meatfare Sunday strongly support each
other, because what is being considered is not our attitude to
food, but our relationship to Jesus Christ. Meatfare Sunday urges
us to become more self-disciplined so that we can draw closer to
Christ. The Gospel today urges us to help those in need, to seek
social justice, so that we can draw closer to Christ. In brief,
both Meatfare Sunday and this Gospel are urging us to draw closer
to Christ. In this Gospel “the shepherd separates the sheep from
the goats.” Later, in the Gospel of St John, Jesus Christ states:
“I am the good shepherd; [and] the good shepherd lays down His life
for the sheep.” So, why are the sheep praised so much and the goats
so rejected? The correct translation of this Gospel verse is “As
the shepherd separates the sheep from the young kids.” St John
Chrysostom points out that “indeed from sheep great is the
profit—as from the milk, as from the wool, and from the young, of
all which things the young kid [does not have]” [cited by The
Orthodox New Testament: The Holy Gospels, Volume 1, Holy Apostles
Convent, Buena Vista, Colorado, p. 123]. To put it bluntly, the
sheep have grown up and reached spiritual maturity, but the young
kids have only begun their lives and are not yet spiritually
mature. The division between sheep and young kids in this Gospel
passage from St Matthew is linked to judgment on our lives, both
God’s judgment of us and our own judgment of ourselves.
Metropolitan Antony Bloom has written, and I quote, of how: “the
day will come when we shall stand before God and [we will] be
judged, but as long as our pilgrimage [on earth] continues, as long
as we live in the process of becoming [that is, of growing closer
to Christ], as long as there is ahead of us this road that leads to
the full measure of the stature of Christ [that is, the importance
of following Christ in our lives] which is our vocation [our
calling], judgment must be [given on ourselves] by ourselves…. On
[this] road [that leads to Christ] judgment is something which is
happening all the time with[in] us; there is a dialogue, a …
tension between [on the one hand,] our thoughts, emotions,
feelings, actions and [on the other hand,] our conscience, which
stands in judgment upon us…. There is a continuing dialogue
with[in] us through our life,” concluded Metropolitan Antony
[Meditations: A Spiritual Journey, Dimension Books, pp. 3-4]. In
the reflection that Metropolitan Antony has set out, the sheep
could be viewed as our consciences—our awareness of what is
right—in conflict with many of “our thoughts, emotions, feelings
[and] actions,” that represent the young kids. If Metropolitan
Antony is right that “judgment is something which is happening all
the time with[in] us”—and that is certainly an Orthodox Christian
approach—then this separation between sheep and young kids is
happening within us throughout our lives, as well as on the Final
Day of Judgment. Essentially, we are trying now to rid ourselves of
sin, through sinning less and less, as well as confessing whenever
appropriate. However, we can’t rid ourselves of sin through
willpower, but rather through prayer and listening to our
consciences and listening to the Lord. In our lifelong battle with
the tendency to sin, Metropolitan Antony points out; and I quote:
“We very often walk in darkness, and this darkness is the result of
our darkened mind, of our darkened heart, of our darkened eye; and
it is only if the Lord Himself sheds His light into our soul, upon
our life, that we can begin to see what is wrong and what is right
in [our souls].” Metropolitan Antony then draws upon the writings
of the Russian Orthodox priest, St John of Kronstadt, who boldly
and rightly claimed that “God does not reveal to us the ugliness of
our souls unless He can [observe] in us sufficient faith and
sufficient hope for us not to be broken by the vision of our sins.
In other words,” continues Metropolitan Antony, “whenever we see
ourselves with our dark side, this knowledge increases, as we can
understand ourselves [better and better,] more [and more,] in the
light of God, that is, in the light of the Divine Judgement…. This
means two things: it means, indeed that we sadly discover our own
ugliness, but also that we can rejoice at the same time, because
God has granted us His trust. He has entrusted to us a new
knowledge of ourselves as we are, as He always saw us … [but in His
mercy] He did not allow us to see ourselves [earlier] because we
could not [yet] bear the sight of truth….[Thus] judgement becomes
joy, because although we discover what is wrong [with our thoughts
and our actions], this discovery is [given to us with] the
knowledge that God has seen enough faith, enough hope and enough
[courage in the face of pain and suffering] in us to allow us to
see, because He knows that now we can act,” concludes Metropolitan
Antony [Meditations, pp. 4-5]. I find those insights from
Metropolitan Antony and St John of Kronstadt quite inspiring. When
we seek to draw closer to Christ’s unique will for each of us, we
still face problems and challenges in our lives However, we can be
confident that as we see our sins more clearly this is itself a
beautiful sign that God trusts us and is telling us that we are now
ready to face and remove those sins from our lives. We are all in
the midst of the pilgrimage on earth to draw closer to Christ, with
the support of the Theotokos, the Mother of God, and the angels and
the saints. This is not a mystic journey reserved for a few holy
and sinless souls. On the contrary, precisely as Metropolitan
Antony says: on this journey of drawing closer and closer to
Christ, “the first step is to get to know ourselves”—our strengths
and weaknesses, our hopes and our fears—both within ourselves and
with regard to others. “The first step … in our evaluation of
ourselves will be to measure this state of disruption [caused by
the sin that presently exists within us].” To encourage us to
evaluate ourselves, Metropolitan Antony sets out a number of tough
questions that each of us, whatever our age, must answer for
ourselves: “How much are my heart and my mind at variance [that is,
not consistent] with one another? Is my will directed to one unique
goal [of drawing closer and closer to Christ] or is [my will
continually] wavering? How far are my [thoughts and my] actions
directed by my [conscience and by my] convictions [or] how far are
[my thoughts and my actions] under the [influence] of unruly
impulses [that is, the sudden desire to do something without
thinking of the consequences]? Is there any wholeness within me? …
How separated am I from God and my neighbour?” [Meditations, p. 5].
These are tough questions that Metropolitan Antony poses to each of
us. However, the very fact that we are asking ourselves these
questions now is a sign that God is with us and that He will guide
us to face our sins and draw closer to Him. Meatfare Sunday and
this Gospel about the sheep and the young kids offer us encouraging
guidelines for how to prepare for the season of Lent that will soon
be upon us. Let us each face our sins, bring them to Confession,
and get to know ourselves, so that we will then come to know Christ
in His full, resurrected Glory. And so, we ascribe as is justly due
all might, majesty, dominion, power and praise to God, Father, Son
and Holy Spirit, always now and ever and unto the ages of ages.
Father Emmanuel Kahn