Reflections on the Seventh Sunday after Trinity

“The wages of sin is death, but the gift of God is eternal life through Jesus Christ our Lord.”

Our Orthodox Faith commits us to an Apostolic and Patristic form of Christianity.  We are committed to Holy Scripture as the ultimate source of our authority for faith and life, and to the catholic consensus of the interpretation of the Scriptures of the Apostles the Fathers and the Bishops of the Church. Part of the Patristic mind has to do with the understanding of sin. For most modern Christians, sin is a matter of doing bad things, which creates a debt to God, and which somebody has to pay off.  They believe that Jesus paid the debt for our sins on the Cross – paid the Father, that is, so we would no longer bear the penalty.

The Fathers of the church have a rather different understanding of Christ’s saving work.  Continue reading “Reflections on the Seventh Sunday after Trinity”

Reflections on the Fifth Sunday after Trinity

As we examine our Gospel for this Sunday (St. Luke 5:1…), the first thing to meet us is the phrase: “the people pressed upon Jesus to hear the word of God.”

What has happened in Luke’s account up to this point?  Jesus has returned from His baptism and temptation in the wilderness to the region of Galilee, to Nazareth his old home.  He has made an astonishing statement in His hometown synagogue which caused his old neighbors to take offense: “This day is this scripture fulfilled in your ears.” Continue reading “Reflections on the Fifth Sunday after Trinity”