Homily

If we look over the scene of events in our country, it’s actually quite shocking to see what has happened in such a very short period of time. What was once considered a Christian nation is devolving into a state of decay. We simply wait to see what old sin is now going to be called a new virtue. We wait to see what new divisive agenda will be hailed as a victory for justice. We wait to hear what new indoctrination our child will have picked up from school, or their friends or the internet. We wait to see what new laws will be enacted by people who believe they know better than we do, no matter what the polls say.

As many of you know who watch Netflix, at the beginning of every movie they have a little warning line at the top of the screen with a few words about elements in the movie that you might want to be warned about. These warnings might read, “violence, nudity, language, gore, substance abuse.” I think it’s a good thing we’re told these things are in the movie, so if you don’t want to see these things don’t watch this movie. It’s a good thing. But who determines what you should be warned about? You will never see warnings like, “adultery, fornication, greed, idolatry, suicide, abortion, abusive behavior, blasphemy.” You never see those words in the warnings. But you will be told if the movie contains “smoking” and “alcohol use” and I suspect the next new warning that will be posted will be “plastic straws.”

I think it’s natural for us to point the finger and accuse those who are responsible for permitting or even for promoting sinful and damaging behaviors. And certainly, there are people who have pointed those fingers, and those who have done those things and are doing those things. But as time goes on it seems that the biggest group of people who have aided and abetted and practiced sinful and damaging behavior in our country are the people who call themselves Christians. The Christian people may not be the primary source of the moral decay of our country, but they certainly have been, all too many times, accepting of sin, and regarding what used to be considered evil as now acceptable, in our modern liberating times. And even when there are opportunities to object to immorality many Christian people think there is nothing they can do about it. Fearing criticism, rejection or even the loss of their jobs, today, perhaps, Christian people keep fairly quiet and evil marches on.

There are Christian people who are working to establish laws that uphold the moral good in our nation, and to repeal laws that work against it. And certainly politics is one area where Christians can work to make changes for the better, for ourselves and for our country. But as one person recently wrote, “Working for political change is an important part of Christian activity. But it is much more important to work at changing the hearts of men and women.”

How can we then work to change the hearts of other people, if I am not working to change my own heart? How can I show Christ’s loving truth to other people if I am not seeking to live more faithfully in that loving truth myself? How shall we work to live more faithfully in Christ’s love and in His truth? One of the most important elements is prayer.

The older I get the more I see the need for more prayer in my life. It’s not that easy. It’s a struggle many times. Bishop Benedict writes that “we often don’t want to come before God in prayer because we’re afraid He might demand something of us. Or we’re afraid He’s going to take something away from us that we don’t want to give up. Or we might be afraid to come before God in prayer because prayer is like looking in a mirror and we don’t always like what we see in that mirror.” So, Bishop did some math. He said that if you go to church for an hour and a half on Sunday, and you pray 5-7 minutes in the morning and in the evening, that add up to about three hours of prayer per week. He writes, “According to this measure we only give about 2% of our time to God, and 98% of our time to earthly cares and life, which, sooner or later, we’re going to have to leave behind anyhow.” He writes that devout Muslims pray 5-7 times a day and each prayer time lasts between 10 and 30 minutes, depending on how the prayers are done. So the total prayer time for each devout Muslim is one hour every day, but there are options that can be done which make it up to three hours a day in prayer. In a 2017 poll 42% of Muslims said they observe all five prayer times every day.

We cannot change the hearts of others unless we work to change our own hearts and we cannot change our own hearts unless we pray. Here’s another quote from Bishop: “When we rediscover the value of personal prayer and the true meaning and the power of prayer in our liturgical services; when our prayer life finds that God is the foundation of our world viewpoint, only then do we discover the way to resist secularism. And I add it’s not only a resistance against secularism, but also a resistance against sin. If we want to live good lives, we must pray. We’re here today to pray. If we want to raise children to be good and successful in life, we must pray, and we must teach them how to pray. If we wish to live in peace of mind, if we wish to discover how to make our faith a more integrated, firm foundation for our daily lives, we must pray. In times of trouble and in times of happiness, we must pray, because we are heading toward our final goal, which is God. And we must pray so that we know how we will come before Him today and how we will come before Him at the end of our days. To sincerely spend that time with Him so that He can help us, He can guide us into a life that is truly worthy of living, no matter what the crowds at Tic Toc, Facebook and Instagram have to say. Chatter, chatter but not enough words in prayer. Yesterday on the Feast of the Circumcision we had a few empty seats here at church. People will celebrate Christmas and New Year, but not so much the sacrifice of Christ who sheds His first blood eight days after His birth – for our sake. And I say this not to scold you or shame you. If you need to be scolded or shamed, you can do that yourselves. But I say it because you need to think about your priorities, and I need to think about mine as well. I encourage you to reconsider those priorities regarding the need to pray, the need to worship, the need to come before the Lord. And it’s crossed my mind that maybe if the pastor was more prayerful his people would be too.

So Wednesday morning we have Royal Hours in preparation for Theophany, in the evening Great Vespers and the blessing of water. Thursday morning we have Divine Liturgy for that feast of the Baptism of the Lord. Three great times to come and serve the Lord. Of course, I realize there are legitimate reasons for why people can’t come at this time or that time, on this day or that day. But even so…will you come? I realize it’s not easy many times to gather up our desire; it’s not easy many times to gather up our family; it’s not easy many times to gather up our willingness to come before the Lord and worship, to come before Him in daily prayer. But I think we can quickly forget how much more difficult and burdensome our lives can be when we do not worship, when we do not pray.

We may consider that, as many people do, to simply be “normal life.” But avoiding God shouldn’t be considered normal. It’s tragic, it’s dangerous, it’s unworthy of us as followers of Christ.

The people ran to John the Baptist to repent of their sins and to be washed in the water. Let’s make a renewed resolution to pray and to worship because we are the people who have been baptized in the Holy Spirit.