A blind man sat by the road near Jericho begging (Luke 18:35). What do you think he was begging for? Money, right? Or food. Or clothing. Or perhaps a place to stay. He was not begging for his sight, surely. That would be a strange sight, no? A blind beggar by the road begging for sight? Whereas most of us have encountered beggars begging for money and food, I expect. People tend to ask for something they think they can get. And who could expect to get sight or healing of any real and lasting kind from random passersby. The gospel doesn’t tell us what the blind beggar is begging for before he hears that Jesus is passing by, but I think we can infer.

Begging is rather like prayer. In fact, the Latin word meaning “to pray” – orare – also means “to beg.” In archaic English also, you might hear someone say, for example, “Please, I pray you, give me something to eat.” We don’t really talk that way anymore, but it shows the relationship between these ideas.

So, this gospel passage is about prayer, from the very beginning. And the prayer of the beggar at the beginning – his begging – has a lot in common with the prayers that we sometimes pray. We ask God for what we want, and for what we think we need, and for what we think we can get.

The prayers of our liturgy are not so timid. For example, at every Divine Liturgy, and also at Vespers and Matins, we pray for peace in the whole world. When has there ever been peace in the whole world? And yet we go on boldly praying for it every day. And we’re right to do so. It is the earnest desire of our hearts, which we are to express to the Lord in prayer.

Sometimes, we don’t get the thing we explicitly pray for. Whether it is peace on Earth or winning the lottery or a Hail Mary for a football pass. Sometimes, we don’t even get the healing we ask for. My father asked God to heal my mother of cancer, and yet, she died anyway at the age of 52. And believe you me, he was explicit in what he God asked for in prayer. And this is good. I maintain, this is good to express the earnest desires of our hearts to the Lord in prayer. To beg him for healing.

The blind beggar raised his begging to a higher caliber when he heard that Jesus was passing by. He began to beg, not for mere money or food, but for mercy, crying out “Jesus, Son of David, have mercy on me!” Crying this out ceaselessly, even when those around him tried to make him stop. Do we go on with our prayer, even when those around us discourage it? How long is it been now since we began to tuck our tails and cease our prayers in schools and public places? Have we internalized the heresy that religion is a private affair? The gospel and the faith are to be proclaimed in every nation, even this one, believe it or not. So let us cry out all the more when we are asked to be silent, “Jesus, have mercy on us.” Let us move, from the stage of timid begging, which represents a less mature prayer, to boldly crying out for mercy with faith.

In response to his bold crying out, Jesus then asks the beggar, what do you want me to do for you? And the beggar asks for sight. “Lord, let me receive my sight.” Now this is a prayer offered in faith. We continue to beg for what we think we can get, so a prayer for something as great as sight indicates faith that Jesus is a giver of good things that not just anyone can give. Surely the beggar didn’t ask the random passersby for his sight, but he knows he’s now speaking to someone who can make him see.

That takes faith, which is the ability to see things as they really are. By faith, the beggar could see who he was talking to, even while he could not yet see with the eyes of his body. When we come to appreciate something of the majesty the power and the glory of the one to whom we pray, we can get a little bolder in the things we pray for. There’s nothing wrong with that asking God for little things, but let’s remember who we’re talking to, to the one who gives us life, who can deliver us from oppression, who can heal our diseases and drive out demons, who can give us everlasting life. Let’s ask him for the healing we seek and all the true desires of our hearts. Just as this blind beggar did outside of Jericho. And also just as my father did for my mother. And also, just as Jesus did himself in Gethsemane, when he prayed to his Father, “Let this cup pass from me.”

To our eyes, the outcome for the beggar looks different than the outcome my father got. The beggar received his sight but my mother died of cancer. But also remember that first petition of Jesus in the Garden of Gethsemane. The outcome of that prayer looks more like the one my father got.

Here’s the thing: we pray for what we want, for the healing our heart desires, and our Lord God is listening to the true desires of our true hearts, which he knows better than we do ourselves. He’s the one that made your heart. He knows what it really is – unclouded by the passions. And he made it to desire one thing.

All our pure desires are reflections of the one true desire of our hearts. They are like rays of light bursting through the clouds of our passions. And they are to be venerated as glimpses of that one true desire, which burns as bright and hot as the sun behind the clouds. And that one true desire of our hearts is God himself.

You want healing – he is healing. You want life – he is life. Even the small things, the seemingly petty things we want, he is the true fulfillment of all that represents. You want wealth – the wealth of this world is garbage next to the mansion he has prepared for you in his house. You want food – he is your food. He becomes your food and drink today.

He is the true desire of your heart. And he will answer your prayer the same as he did for the blind man in Jericho – the same as he did for his own son Jesus in Gethsemane. If we see the outcome for Jesus and for the blind beggar as different, it’s because we are blind and do not yet see with the eyes of faith.

When we look at our suffering, our poverty, or our illnesses from which we desire to be healed – when we look at the cross, we see death. And we rightly abhor death, which is our enemy. That is a glimpse of our true desire. Our true desire is life, which is Christ. So when we pray for a way around the cross, as Jesus did, that is like a shadow of our hope for life. And God is going to give you life. He is giving you life right now. And he is giving you life unto the ages of Ages. And he is giving it to you – through the cross.  Through your cross and his. Not around it but through it, the true desire of your heart will be fulfilled.

May the Lord give us sight to see it, the faith to know it, and thanking him for it as already received, let us glorify God and give him praise.

In the West, and even among us Byzantines living in the West, we have a tendency to treat the time from Christmas until Theophany rather like a diminuendo – which, in music, is a gradual softening and decrease in intensity, which is a wonderful way to end a lullaby intended to put us to sleep, but maybe not the best way to regard the great feast of Theophany. What I mean is, we treat Christmas as the climax of the season and Theophany or Epiphany as an addendum, when, in fact, this is backwards. In history and in liturgy this time is actually more of a crescendo – a gradual increase in excitement and intensity until it reaches Theophany – which is its climax – in which worship of the Trinity is revealed.

Look how softly we begin – with the birth of a baby in humble circumstance. His mother lays him not in a bed, but in a manger, not in some royal palace but in a cave. He is attended not by courtiers but by shepherds and later by wise men from the East. These were some of the few who knew who he was at all – and they were able to see it only with the eyes of faith overlooking the humility of his circumstance.

So, yes, the Lord is revealed at his nativity, but his revelation begins in obscurity. He is revealed quietly and to few. For many years, the mystery is contemplated in silence in the hearts of those who know before any part of it is revealed to the world. The prophets prophesied his coming long before his birth, but the true meaning of their prophecy was known to but few.

Eight days after his birth, as we remembered on January 1st, he humbly undergoes the circumcision that all Jewish boys undergo. To all appearances, he is in this like any other Jewish baby boy.

The feasts of the Nativity and the Circumcision emphasize, I think, his humanity – but the feast of Theophany reveals Christ to all to be the Son of the Father and reveals the Holy Spirit, who descends upon him like a dove.

Some knew from the beginning, of course, that Jesus is Lord – Mary knew and Joseph knew – having been told by an angel of the Lord. Christ’s divinity is present at every moment of his human existence, but sometimes it seems obscured to those without ears to hear – like a subtle musical theme underneath larger movements, which builds and builds throughout the piece until it is played loudly and clearly at times such as his baptism and his transfiguration and his resurrection.

One who reveals from the beginning that Jesus is Lord is John. Though John admits that he himself did not know Jesus as the Son of God until he saw the Spirit descend upon him like a dove (John 1:32-34), yet at the same time he reveals to his mother Elizabeth that Jesus is Lord even while both he and Jesus are in the wombs of their mothers. Jesus first approached John while they were both unborn in their mothers’ wombs and John, being a prophet of God most high, leapt in his mother Elizabeth’s womb, thus proclaiming to her that the unborn Jesus Christ is Lord (Luke 1:41-43).

You see, prophecy is God speaking to us through his prophets, but not always with the prophets’ own understanding. The unborn John prophesies, but did not yet know himself.

Again witness how quietly the theophany of the Lord begins when Jesus and John are babies – and yet it grows and grows – builds and builds like a musical motif in a complex composition, until it is revealed and known to more and more – to John himself, and then, through John, to his disciples, and now, through the apostles, to the whole Church and to all of us.

John, the Forerunner and Baptist of the Lord, is a prophet. Among those born of women, there is no greater prophet than John the Baptist (Luke 7:28). He is a prophet of prophets – a prophet whose prophecy was prophesied (Matt 3:3). John was a prophet even before he was born.

And when Jesus comes to him again when they are both men, he prophecies again, “Behold the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world” (John 1:29). Now, this proclamation is heard by all. Whereas before, only his mother Elizabeth could feel and understand John’s hidden prophetic leap. Now, God is manifest to all. It is theophany! It is like the climax or culmination of a musical composition. What was building up quietly is now fully and loudly expressed to all.

John is the prophet through whom this revelation takes place. It is John who sees the Spirit descend upon Jesus like a dove (John 1:32). And John thereby recognizes Jesus as the Son of God (John 1:34), for he hears the voice from heaven saying “This is my beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased” (Matt 3:17). It is a prophet who can hear the word of God. A prophet recognizes the melody of the Lord in the midst of the cacophony of the world.

Many reduce prophecy in their understanding to the foretelling of future events, but this is not even half of what prophecy is.

There’s a popular expression with a long history and many variations that one hears from time to time, which is better: “The prophet comforts the afflicted and afflicts the comfortable.” This certainly holds true if we examine the effect that prophecy has on people. John’s baptism was a comfort to those who repented of that which had been afflicting them. And his preaching afflicted, for example, the all-too-comfortable Herod who was unwilling to repent of his incestuous relationship (Mark 6:17-18). John was not afraid to point out that the fact of Herod’s transgression, even though it ultimately cost him his life to do so. A prophet always speaks the truth, which does often afflict the comfortable and comfort the afflicted, because a prophet is one who speaks for God – who speaks God’s words to each time and place as God intends them to be heard and understood.

Prophecy is speaking the word of God. For example, the Lord touches Jeremiah’s mouth and says, “I have put my words in your mouth” (Jer 1:9). And to Ezekiel he says, “You shall speak my words to them” (Ezek. 2:7). We are lost without prophecy, for our faith comes by hearing the word of God (Rom 10:17), which we can only hear through prophecy.

So, let us hear the word of God. We have now already heard the climax of the composition – we have celebrated Theophany and witnessed the revelation of the Trinity – the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit.

Now it is time to ask, “What now? What next? What can follow this greatest of revelations?” Well, let us continue listen to word of God – to the preaching of Jesus, who Theophany teaches us is himself the Word of God:

Today, “Jesus began to preach and say, “Repent, for the kingdom of heaven is at hand.” These are the first words of Christ’s preaching and with them, he pays homage to John, his baptizer, the greatest of the prophets, his forerunner, who made straight his way. The words that Jesus preaches directly quote the preaching of John, who went before him to prepare his way. Jerome points out that, by quoting John in this way, Jesus shows that he is the Son of the same God whose prophet John was. There is one God and one word of God, known to us by prophecy, who now preaches to us one word: repent. This one word will comfort us if we are afflicted and afflict us if we are comfortable.

Theophany is coming.

The liturgical prayer of our Church is preparing us for the coming of this great feast. Last night at Vespers we sang:

“Resplendent is the feast which is passed, but more glorious is the present day. On that day, the Magi adored the savior; on this, the glorious servant baptizes the Master. There the shepherds sang in amazement; here, the voice of the Father proclaims Him to be the Only-begotten Son.” (Doxastichon of the Pre-feast).

It is partly to learn from these hymns of the Church that it is good for us to pray Vespers and Matins – especially for Sundays and feasts. Even when we’re unable to come to church, we can learn to pray Vespers in our homes. Eastern Christian Publications has a free daily subscription service (Byzantine Daily Office) that sends an email to you every day with that day’s prayers. This makes it so simple. You don’t even have to look up the prayers. One of my former rectors at the seminary, Fr. John Petro, always used to say that if you want to know what we believe as Byzantine Catholics, pray our liturgies. These are our best catechesis. We pray our faith. These hymns teach us our faith.

So, what does this hymn teach us?

Theophany is coming.

And it is more glorious than Christmas. But surely not? Everyone knows that Christmas and Easter are the two biggest feasts, right? Certainly, these are the only two times per year that many Catholics deem it at all necessary to enter a church. Yet, here we are singing, “Resplendent is the feast [of the Nativity] which is passed, but more glorious is [Theophany].” Maybe this is hyperbole. Or maybe we mean what we pray.

With Christmas so recent, it is striking that today we turn to the gospel of Mark. Because Mark contains no infancy narrative – no nativity – no Christmas. He begins his Gospel not with Christmas, but with Theophany – with John and the baptism of Jesus. And he has the boldness to tell us – in Mark 1:1 – that this is “the beginning of the Gospel of Jesus Christ, the Son of God.” Here is where it all begins, according to Mark.  Doesn’t he know that the gospel begins with the baby in the manger? That is, according to Luke and Matthew. While John the Theologian begins his gospel before the beginning of time. But Mark – Mark places it here in the river Jordan with John the baptizer, the forerunner, the messenger, the angel, the voice crying out in the wilderness, “prepare the way of the Lord.”

But just a moment. This figure of John the Baptist represents enormous things. These words about him belong not to Mark but to the prophets Malachi and Isaiah.

Interestingly, if we read the beginning of Mark without the punctuation (and you should know that it was written without punctuation), it could be read like this: “The beginning of the gospel of Jesus Christ the Son of God as it is written in the prophet Isaiah.” I’m just playing with words here, but this reveals a truth: Mark is not writing the beginning of the gospel, he’s reading it – he’s seeing it where God planted it long ago. Long before Christ’s birth and encompassing all in between, his gospel begins. And still, it begins with Theophany.

Theophany is coming.

And it is so great in part because here stands this figure of John the Forerunner, standing between the two Testaments, the last of the Old Testament prophets and the first of the New, himself prophesied by the Old and now proclaiming the all-powerfulness of the one who comes after him – of Jesus the Christ, the Son of God.

Let’s consider a moment the two prophets Mark cites as foretelling John the Forerunner – Malachi and Isaiah.

It was Isaiah who said, “A voice cries in the wilderness prepare the way of the Lord – make straight his path” (Is 40:3). Isaiah may have had in mind the road back to Judah from the Babylonian captivity, but the Holy Spirit who inspires Isaiah also knew of the spiritual meaning Mark would later find – that in the desert wilderness of repentance we will find a way out of our captivity to sin. There we will prepare a way for the Lord to enter into our hearts.

Yet by what strange means comes this grace of repentance. How unexpectedly our Lord finds a way into our hearts. That is, he comes in flesh. He comes in the flesh on Christmas and is baptized in the flesh on Theophany. By word and sacrament, by baptism with water and with fire, in the Spirit and in the flesh, our Lord joins with us. In the same passage, Isaiah goes on to observe that “all flesh is grass” (Is 40:6). “The grass withers, the flower fades” he writes, “but the word of our God will stand forever” (Is 40:7,8). Yet, the word of our God is become the grass. That is, the word, the logos, became flesh and dwelt among us. That is, God has become man. Which was more than even the prophets could foretell.

It was Malachi who said, “Behold, I send my messenger [or, my angel] to prepare the way before me” (Mal 3:1). Malachi may have had in mind a messenger who would purify Israel so that they could again offer temple sacrifice in righteousness. Indeed, he may have had himself in mind – Malachi means “my messenger.” But the Holy Spirit who inspires Malachi also knew that a new messenger – John – was coming who would prepare the way for the coming of Christ, the high priest and the final and perfect sacrifice.

Malachi goes on to say that when the Lord comes, he will be like a refiner’s fire (3:2). “Who can endure the day of his coming?” he asks, “and who can stand when he appears?” (Mal 3:2). Can you? Can I? John the forerunner himself was not so sure he could do so.

After all, if “all flesh is grass,” as Isaiah writes, and if the Lord is like “a refiner’s fire” as Malachi writes, then it is no wonder that John shrank from the Lord’s request for baptism. Because, what happens when you bring withered grass against a flame? A hymn from last night’s Vespers puts these ideas together, having John say to Jesus: “I do not dare to put straw to the fire.” You see, though not everyone understood who Jesus was – especially at the beginning – John recognized him. If he didn’t, he would not have said, as we will hear on Theophany, “I need to be baptized by you, and do you come to me?” (Matt 3:14). John was a prophet, like Isaiah and Malachi before him. He knew to whom he spoke. And how can you baptize with water the one who separated the waters?

Prophets are not – as some suppose – mere fortune tellers. They’re not among us simply to foretell future events. Rather – they speak to us with the voice of God. They are a means of God’s self-revelation. And on Theophany John reveals for all time something of who Christ is. He sees and bears witness that the Spirit descends upon Jesus like a dove and he hears and bears witness that Jesus is the Son of God who baptizes with the Holy Spirit and with fire (John 1:32-34). He hears not angels, as did the shepherds in Bethlehem, but by the Jordan he hears the Father’s own voice proclaiming Jesus to be his beloved Son. This is Theophany. The manifestation of God. And this is what makes it glorious and more glorious.

Theophany is coming.

Therefore, Repent. “Repent” will be the first word that Jesus preaches after his baptism (Matt 4:17). Let us do so, and prepare the way of the Lord in our own hearts.

The sermon on the Sunday after the Nativity was preached by Bishop Milan, who was with us to celebrate the subdiaconal ordination of our seminarian, Michael Kunitz. Axios!

Here are some photos of the ordination on Facebook. 

https://saintstephenbyzantine.church/1203-2/

Our Lord and God Jesus, for whom and by whom all things exist – through whom the Father brings us out of nonexistence into being – is not ashamed to call us his brothers and sisters. He partakes of our nature. He has a full share of our flesh and blood – just the way it is, even in that it is subjected to death. Through our fear of this death, we have been enslaved to our passions and sins our whole life long. So, he becomes like us even in this mortality so as to free us from our enslavement. (Heb 2:10,11,14). If we are in Christ, we no longer fear death.

The book of the generation of Jesus Christ – the beginning of the Gospel according to Matthew – profoundly underscores the extent to which Jesus Christ identifies himself with us – even with our weakness and enslavement. Behold the type of ancestors through whom he becomes a man.

He takes the form of a slave – of a man doomed to die. The one who makes man in his likeness is born in the likeness of man – and not some deathless prelapsarian man – but one who suffers the effects of our sins and even one who dies – “a slave… obedient unto death, even death on a cross” (Phil 2:7-8). He is the new Adam, subjecting himself to the world as we’ve made it and thereby making it all anew. He is not the old Adam before his fall. Paul goes so far as to say that Jesus becomes sin for us. “For our sake, he made him to be sin who knew no sin, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God” (2 Cor 5:21).

St. Ambrose writes that he who takes on the sins of all was born in the flesh, was subject to wrongs and pain, and he did not refuse the further humiliation of a sinful parentage – because this did not detract from his holiness in any way. Now, it should not shame us – the Church – to be gathered from among sinners, because the Lord himself was born of sinners. The benefits of redemption in the Lord begin with his own forefathers. Let none imagine that a stain in the blood is any hindrance to virtue, nor again any pride themselves insolently on nobility of birth (paraphrased).

How clear Matthew makes this for us today – with his survey of Jesus Christ’s ancestors on this Sunday of his Holy Fathers, so many of whom show forth for us what it is to be mortal, impassioned, corruptible, and sinful, even as they also exemplify for us what it is to be faithful and hopeful, repentant and righteous.

St. Jerome points out that, interestingly, many holy ones are passed over in Matthew’s genealogy of Jesus while many “taken into the Savior’s genealogy [are] such as Scripture has condemned, that He who came for sinners being born of sinners might so put away the sins of all.”

Take, for example, Judah and Tamar. St. John Chrysostom points out their sin of incest but, to my mind, that’s like the tip of the iceberg. Read their story in Genesis 38, to see what I’m talking about. Only, maybe don’t read it to your children. To incest may be added the sins of injustice, deception, and harlotry. These are the ancestors of Jesus Christ.

And then there is David – one of the primary ancestors to whom – as to Abraham – the Lord made promises that are finally and ultimately fulfilled in Jesus Christ. Yet, even this great and all-important ancestor was also great at sinning, just like us.

“David conceived Solomon with a woman with whom he had committed adultery,” says John Chrysostom. To adultery may be added the murder of Uriah, Bathsheba’s husband (2 Sam 11).

Notice too that not only are sinners mentioned here, but also specifically sinners whose sins resulted in the conception of the ancestors of Christ. Sinful actions themselves result ultimately in the conception of Christ, by the grace of God.

This is how God works. He turns all things around to the good. He works through us when we strive for the good and also even when we vainly strive against the good. He brings greater good out of good – and even good out of evil – and even the greatest good out the greatest evil. Incarnation out of adultery and incest. Resurrection out of crucifixion and death.

If we could all see our own complete genealogies, I am sure we would all find many examples of holiness and virtue, but I’m also quite sure we would all soon discover that somewhere along the line, all of our own conceptions – like that of Jesus Christ – are the result of others’ sins. Yet, despite any sin, every conception is holy. And no stain in the blood hinders virtue, as Ambrose says. Every conception is an act of God, despite any human or sinful actions that lead to it. God does his work amongst us as we are. God is with us. He overshadows us. He overcomes us. He overcomes any bad intentions of ours with his great holiness. He even becomes us – a man like us in all things but sin.

As a man, Jesus Christ is generated. He has genealogy, just like us. Bearing that in mind, listen to this: Isaiah prophesies about the suffering servant, the coming Divine Messiah, who we know is Jesus Christ. He prophesies, “Who shall declare his generation?” (53:8). God is not generated, you see. He has no beginning. None, therefore, can declare his generation. So, what is Matthew doing beginning his gospel with the book of the generation of Jesus Christ? St. Jerome says that Isaiah shows us that there is no generation of the divine nature but that St. Matthew shows us the generation of his human nature. Jesus Christ is both God and Man. In Christ, God has ancestors and Matthew declares his human generation.

Now, as a man and through all his ancestors, God is with us!

Jesus Christ is flesh and blood. He’s not a phantasm. In the early centuries of the Church, there were many who denied the reality of Christ’s human nature. These heretics were called Docetists – because they believed that Jesus only seemed to be human. We still often encounter a kind of soft-Docetism these days when we hear people speak dismissively of Christ’s faithfulness and holiness and sinlessness and miracle-working saying things like, “Well, of course, Jesus can do these things – he’s God.”

It’s true that Jesus is God. Yet, it is also true that Jesus is Man. We must not pretend to have mastered this mystery, to comprehend the incomprehensible, to speak knowingly of the ineffable, to conceive the inconceivable, to fully grasp the paradox of the incarnation. That would cheapen it – subjecting God and His workings to our own understanding – as if his being were subject to us and not beyond us.

Jesus Christ is fully human. The goodness of his humanity is fully human. He shows forth and makes possible the possibility of us being good and true and beautiful in him. We must not say, “Oh, goodness is for Jesus but not for me – I cannot be held to his standard, he is God and I am not.” We must not say this because what he is by nature – divine – we are to become by grace. Our theosis is the whole point of his incarnation. He partakes of our human nature so that we may become partakers of his divine nature (Heb 2:14; 2 Peter 1:4).

He became like us just as we are in all things but sin, and, even though he is no sinner, he became even sin. He is able to sympathize with our weaknesses and in every respect has been tempted as we are, yet without sinning (Heb 4:15). No matter what depravity we have sunk to, we are not without hope in Christ. If we have hit bottom, he will lift us up. Even if we have died, in him we will rise again. “Let us then with confidence draw near to the throne of grace, that we may receive mercy and find grace to help in time of need” (Heb 4:16).