Then the righteous will shine forth as the sun in the kingdom of their Father

 

 Then Jesus sent the multitude away and went into the house.  And His disciples came to Him, saying, "Explain to us the parable of the tares of the field."  He answered and said to them:  "He who sows the good seed is the Son of Man.  The field is the world, the good seeds are the sons of the kingdom, but the tares are the sons of the wicked one.   The enemy who sowed them is the devil, the harvest is the end of the age, and the reapers are the angels.  Therefore as the tares are gathered and burned in the fire, so it will be at the end of this age.  The Son of Man will send out His angels, and they will gather out of His kingdom all things that offend, and those who practice lawlessness, and will cast them into the furnace of fire.  There will be wailing and gnashing of teeth.  Then the righteous will shine forth as the sun in the kingdom of their Father.  He who has ears to hear, let him hear!"

 

- Matthew 13:36-43 

 

On Saturday, we read that Jesus gave another parable to the crowds, saying:  "The kingdom of heaven is like a mustard seed, which a man took and sowed in his field, which indeed is the least of all the seeds; but when it is grown it is greater than the herbs and becomes a tree, so that the birds of the air come and nest in its branches."  Another parable He spoke to them:  "The kingdom of heaven is like leaven, which a woman took and hid in three measures of meal till it was all leavened."  All these things Jesus spoke to the multitude in parables; and without a parable He did not speak to them, that it might be fulfilled which was spoken by the prophet, saying:  "I will open My mouth in parables; I will utter things kept secret from the foundation of the world." 

 

  Then Jesus sent the multitude away and went into the house.  And His disciples came to Him, saying, "Explain to us the parable of the tares of the field."  He answered and said to them:  "He who sows the good seed is the Son of Man.  The field is the world, the good seeds are the sons of the kingdom, but the tares are the sons of the wicked one.  The enemy who sowed them is the devil, the harvest is the end of the age, and the reapers are the angels.  Therefore as the tares are gathered and burned in the fire, so it will be at the end of this age.  The Son of Man will send out His angels, and they will gather out of His kingdom all things that offend, and those who practice lawlessness, and will cast them into the furnace of fire.  There will be wailing and gnashing of teeth.  Then the righteous will shine forth as the sun in the kingdom of their Father.  He who has ears to hear, let him hear!"  Jesus gives to the disciples in private the explanation of the parable He told to the crowds, just as He had also done for the parable of the Sower, the first of the parables He began teaching.  See Matthew 13:1-23.  In today's reading, Jesus is explaining to the disciples the parable of the tares of the field, found in Friday's reading.   A note in my study Bible on this parable explains that it builds on the previous parable of the Sower, but here the focus is on the enemy who has sown his seed among the seed (or word) of Christ.  My study Bible says that as falsehood came after truth and false prophets came after the true prophets, so the Antichrist will come after Christ.  Just as the weeds in the parable appear similar to the wheat, so the devil fashions his lies to resemble the truth, as is the case in heresies.  That the devil sows while men slept indicates that heresy and lies creep in when people are apathetic. 

 

Jesus' explanation of the parable of the Wheat and Tares makes it very clear that He speaking about judgment.  As we reviewed in the commentary on the reading in which He first gave the parable (here), there is a type of weed which closely resembles wheat, but it's toxic for human beings.  So, first of all, we could think of the seed as that which grows something; there is a  clear message here about what type of crop is produced.  In the Sermon on the Mount, Jesus warned His disciples of false prophets to come, in what is a parallel teaching to this parable.  He said, "Beware of false prophets, who come to you in sheep’s clothing, but inwardly they are ravenous wolves. You will know them by their fruits. Do men gather grapes from thornbushes or figs from thistles? Even so, every good tree bears good fruit, but a bad tree bears bad fruit. A good tree cannot bear bad fruit, nor can a bad tree bear good fruit. Every tree that does not bear good fruit is cut down and thrown into the fire" (Matthew 7:15-19).  We can see the parallels, even in the allusion to the trees that don't bear good fruit being thrown into the fire.  But let's think of this important metaphor of Christ that He used so often, about the seeds that spring up into "good" or "bad" plants.  If we take this understanding of the enemy's seeds as lies that mislead and trick people (especially if, like heresies, they bear a resemblance to truth, such as in half-truths), then what we hear from Jesus is how building our lives on lies or partial truths leads to a bad outcome for us as persons, in the wholeness of who we are.  So the foundations of the soul, of real identity, also depend upon how we're nurtured, what we base on own growth upon.  Like plants, human beings are in a constant state of growth or change, one way or another.  We go in one direction or another, and it all depends upon how we're nurtured and what start we give ourselves each day.  In another way of looking at the parable, we might take it that we want to make sure we're ingesting the good wheat (as in the Eucharist), the things that nourish us for our best spiritual health in life, because this determines the growth of the soul.  In light of Christ's strong assurance here of a judgment to come, and the giving of His interpretation of the parable, He asks us yet again to take this quite seriously, because our very lives truly depend upon it.  The growth of the soul in life is something many people find it easy to forget about, given how busy modern life can be.  We find ourselves consumed with cares regarding work, family, keeping our lives and loved ones safe and in good care, our housing, and all manner of things we are constantly demanded to pay attention to.  It's so easy to lose focus on that slow growing, quiet inner life that concerns the state of the soul.  But nevertheless, there it is, and there it always is.  People notice us hardening our hearts; we can get to the place where we don't recognize what we're doing to ourselves in the face of these "necessities" of life.  But Christ has taught us that there is really one thing most needful, one thing most necessary, in the story of Martha and Mary (found here at Luke 10:38-42).  In light of all of His teachings, we can say that when we forget about this most needful thing, our lives are upside down, disordered in terms of what is most necessary for us.  At this time, many of us are gearing up for the period of the holidays, in which we will be bombarded with all the things that seem "necessary" for those holidays.  Black Friday, the time of the great sales in stores in the United States, is already being advertized -- all a part of the rush for things we "need" for the holidays.  But on the contrary, it's the time (in the Northern Hemisphere at any rate) when nature is slowing down, getting ready for the needful rest of winter, the earth's necessary Sabbath.  We should perhaps keep in mind that the holidays we celebrate are "holy days," and the very reason for celebration should not be lost. We give thanks to God for our blessings.  It may be a national holiday, but its roots are in our faith.  Of course, the same is true for the Nativity of our Lord, Christmas.  From the earliest times of the Church, the great and most celebrated holiday was Easter, the commemoration and celebration of Resurrection.  Christmas has been built up into the major holiday it is to a great extent by advertising and sales. We're all encouraged to give, but the hastening of so many things to prepare, to buy, to fix, to show, and all that goes with it, often seems to miss the entire point of the festival and the season.  The little family in Bethlehem, taking refuge in a cave used for farm animals, should serve to remind us that love, joy, grace, and God's glory in the message of the angels are in the midst of all of it, and this is in contrast to the anxieties that are stoked in the ways we celebrate.  It's also in tremendous contrast to the sense of competition and comparison it seems to create.  Many people are lonelier than ever at this time, or perhaps feeling want in the face of all the celebration that others seem to be doing.  With our social media what it is now, this is ever-increasing as studies confirm.  So let us remember, as we go into this "quiet time" toward winter that we need our Sabbath as does the earth and all of creation; and we need to remember God.  Remember the good growth Christ urges us toward, and what we need for the kind of persons He calls us to be, for nurturing that in ourselves and in our families, friends, communities.  Remember anything we have to be grateful for and give thanks to God, remember Christ the infant who would give Himself for the life of the world.   Let us put aside time for the things which are most necessary, so that we may grow into the "good trees" bearing the good fruits Christ desires.  Let us set aside time for the things which are most important and needful of all, and order our priorities His way.  For righteousness is about good order, right relations to ourselves and all else as Christ would order them.  Let us make time for the good seed He sows in us.

 

 

 

 

But he who endures to the end shall be saved

 

 Then Jesus went out and departed from the temple, and His disciples came up to show Him the buildings of the temple. And Jesus said to them, "Do you not see all these things?  Assuredly, I say to you, not one stone shall be left here upon another, that shall not be thrown down."  

Now as He sat on the Mount of Olives, the disciples came to Him privately, saying, "Tell us, when will these things be?  And what will be the sign of Your coming, and of the end of the age?"   And Jesus answered and said to them, "Take heed that no one deceives you.  For many will come in My name, saying, 'I am the Christ,' and will deceive many.  And you will hear of wars and rumors of wars.  See that you are not troubled; for all these things must come to pass, but the end is not yet.  For nation will rise against nation, and kingdom against kingdom.  And there will be famines, pestilences, and earthquakes in various places.  all these are the beginning of sorrows.  Then they will deliver you up to tribulation and kill you, and you will be hated by all nations for My name's sake.  And then many will be offended, will betray one another, and will hate one another.  Then many false prophets will rise up and deceive many.  And because lawlessness will abound, the love of many will grow cold.  But he who endures to the end shall be saved.  And this gospel of the kingdom will be preached in all the world as a witness to all the nations, and then the end will come."

 

- Matthew 24:1-14 

 

In our recent reading, Jesus has been delivering His final public sermon, which was a scathing and multi-pronged criticism of the hypocrisy of the scribes and Pharisees.  In yesterday's reading, Jesus said, "Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites!  For you are like whitewashed tombs which indeed appear beautiful outwardly, but inside are full of dead men's bones and all uncleanness.  Even so you also outwardly appear righteous to men, but inside you are full of hypocrisy and lawlessness.  Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites!  Because you build the tombs of the prophets and adorn the monuments of the righteous, and say, 'If we had lived in the days of our fathers, we would not have been partakers with them in the blood of the prophets.'  Therefore you are witnesses against yourselves that you are sons of those who murdered the prophets.  Fill up, then, the measure of your father's guilt.  Serpents, brood of vipers!  How can you escape the condemnation of hell?  Therefore, indeed, I send you prophets, wise men, and scribes:  some of them you will kill and crucify, and some of them you will scourge in your synagogues and persecute from city to city, that on you may come all the righteous blood shed on the earth, from the blood of righteous Abel to the blood of Zechariah, son of Berechiah, whom you murdered between the temple and the altar.  Assuredly, I say to you, all these things will come upon this generation. O Jerusalem, Jerusalem, the one who kills the prophets and stones those who are sent to her!  How often I wanted to gather your children together, as a hen gathers her chicks under her wings, but you were not willing!  See!  Your house is left to you desolate; for I say to you, you shall see Me no more till you say, 'Blessed is He who comes in the name of the LORD!'"

 

Then Jesus went out and departed from the temple, and His disciples came up to show Him the buildings of the temple. And Jesus said to them, "Do you not see all these things?  Assuredly, I say to you, not one stone shall be left here upon another, that shall not be thrown down."  Here my study Bible comments that Christ's prophecy of the destruction of the temple was fulfilled in AD 70, when the temple was destroyed by the Romans.  In yesterday's reading, Jesus said to the religious leaders that they must "fill up the measure of your fathers' guilt," indicating they are the spiritual children of those who murdered the prophets before them.  He said, "Assuredly, I say to you, all these things will come upon this generation."  The destruction of Jerusalem, which was exceedingly fierce and totally decimated the city and the temple, came some forty years after Christ spoke His words, giving an entire generation time to repent.  Christ's words were literally true that not one stone was left upon another.  Only one retaining wall remained of the temple, in modern times called the Wailing Wall, or the Western Wall. 

Now as He sat on the Mount of Olives, the disciples came to Him privately, saying, "Tell us, when will these things be?  And what will be the sign of Your coming, and of the end of the age?"  The chapter we begin today entails a description of the "end times" as given by Jesus Christ.  It is interwoven with a prophecy of catastrophic and terrifying events that would happen within the lifetimes of many of those hearing Him.  My study Bible comments that the Scriptures describe the end times in a variety of ways -- so that no precise chronology can be determined (see Daniel 7 - 12; Mark 13; Luke 21; 1 Corinthians 15:51-55; 1 Thessalonians 4:13-17; 2 Thessalonians 2:1-10; and the Book of Revelation).  Christ's emphasis, my study Bible notes, is on watchfulness and the practice of virtue rather than constructing timetables of things that have not yet happened.  It's important to note that the great tribulation which Christ will describe toward the end of the chapter includes the whole of the Christian era, and isn't simply limited to the final years before Christ's return.  

 

 And Jesus answered and said to them, "Take heed that no one deceives you.  For many will come in My name, saying, 'I am the Christ,' and will deceive many."  My study Bible notes for us here that the warnings against deception are given the most emphasis by Jesus.  Of particular importance is the warning against following a false Christ, which Jesus will stress again in verses 11, 23-27.  

"And you will hear of wars and rumors of wars.  See that you are not troubled; for all these things must come to pass, but the end is not yet."  These wars, according to my study Bible, refer first of all to the Roman destruction of Jerusalem.  However, subsequent wars are also included.  Wars, it notes, are not a sign of the imminent end, but of its opposite:  that the end is not yet (see 1 Thessalonians 5:1-3).  

"For nation will rise against nation, and kingdom against kingdom.  And there will be famines, pestilences, and earthquakes in various places.  all these are the beginning of sorrows.  Then they will deliver you up to tribulation and kill you, and you will be hated by all nations for My name's sake.  And then many will be offended, will betray one another, and will hate one another.  Then many false prophets will rise up and deceive many.  And because lawlessness will abound, the love of many will grow cold.  But he who endures to the end shall be saved.  And this gospel of the kingdom will be preached in all the world as a witness to all the nations, and then the end will come."  My study Bible comments that all these calamities and all this opposition cannot stop the spread of the gospel, and clearly, persecutions against the Church have often increased the number of souls being converted.  It notes commentary by St. John Chrysostom, who marveled that while the Romans subdued countless Jews in a political uprising, they could not prevail over twelve Jews who were unarmed with anything except the gospel of Jesus Christ.

 

As this chapter opens, we can just imagine Jesus' Galilean disciples marveling at the great temple, as it had been expanded and refurbished under Herod the Great, who was also known as Herod the Builder.  Indeed its expanse and beauty rendered it one of the architectural wonders of the world at the time.   But that awe at the great skill, art and power that could create such an architectural marvel and its beauty is perhaps the perfect backdrop to Christ's prediction that "not one stone shall be left here upon another, that shall not be thrown down."   For the message here in Christ's prophecy to the disciples regarding the end of the age is clearly one that states that human expectations are not sufficient to imagine the scope of the ramifications to spiritual events of this world.  Christ stands in the center of these prophecies, the pivot point of history, and indeed He remains so.  No matter how many times it's been said or written that the Christian era has come to an end, either through new political philosophy or religious (or anti-religious) beliefs and actions, Christ continues to be an inspiring religious figure across the world, and faith continues to expand even in new places.  But Christ Himself predicts great tribulation spanning the whole of the Christian era -- that is, the whole of the time between His Incarnation and His return.  So, as my study Bible says, we should never be dissuaded by the great upheavals and terrifying events we might witness or hear about.  Jesus tells the disciples, "Then they will deliver you up to tribulation and kill you, and you will be hated by all nations for My name's sake.  And then many will be offended, will betray one another, and will hate one another.  Then many false prophets will rise up and deceive many.  And because lawlessness will abound, the love of many will grow cold.  But he who endures to the end shall be saved."  Certainly all of these things would come to pass in the lifetimes of these disciples, but the warning applies to all times that we know, and to the present.  If we see false prophets speak in the name of Christ, or  dissension and betrayal, even hate, among the faithful, neither should this dissuade us from playing our part in faithful living.  The apostles counted themselves joyful that they were worthy to suffer shame for Christ's name (Acts 5:40-41), and so we should do the same if it happens that we suffer similarly.  There is a powerful spiritual reality that is at work in such circumstances, which we can't necessarily see as immediately evident.  But we do witness types of lawlessness, and a strangeness to the love of many seeming to grow cold.  While we could view all of these things as consistent with the work of spiritual forces that oppose Christ, we need to keep in mind that He has told us all of these things beforehand -- and their resurfacing in one form or another throughout the history we know since the beginning of the Church is what we should even expect if we take Him at His word.  However, here is the important teaching:  "But he who endures to the end shall be saved."  This doesn't seem to mean the "last man standing" in some traditional military sense, or any other kind of contest or struggle we might consider.  It is directed at our faith, at living our faith, which encompasses at least as much of an internal struggle as an external struggle in any case.  This is not about running out and finding ways to become martyred or persecuted, but rather living a prayerful life, and following where our faith leads us.  To strengthen our faith and to continue in worship despite persecution and difficulty is to fight this spiritual battle that we are called to wage.  We encourage one another, we worship and pray, we read what is edifying to us, the things that teach us, we can seek out the saints of the past who left us with wise council we can read or hear -- there are many resources available to us and many ways in which we can strengthen our communion with our brothers and sisters in faith.  But even in isolation, it is remarkable what strength there is in prayer and its powerful exertion of influence over our subsequent lives and our own capacity for resilience, imagination, and overcoming difficulty.  The struggle for faith is truly one that takes place within us and among us, for His kingdom is always there awaiting our participation (Luke 17:21).  While we might be dismayed with what we see, Christ encourages us to endure to the end.  But we endure in our faith and the practice of our faith, in a prayerful life, and in doing what He has taught.  Let's note in these terms that Christ teaches us a number of times in this chapter on "end times" that we must be vigilant in terms of watching for false prophets.  We are meant to be alert and aware; we educate ourselves about our faith.  We are meant to be intelligent faithful, not blind at all but awake.  So let us understand the importance of our struggle to be the ones He has asked us to be, to know our own flaws and weaknesses, and to be aware of those who would exploit them.  Let us do the work He asks!

Then the righteous will shine forth as the sun in the kingdom of their Father

 

 Then Jesus sent the multitude away and went into the house.  And His disciples came to Him, saying, "Explain to us the parable of the tares of the field."  He answered and said to them:  "He who sows good seed is the Son of Man.  The field is the world, the good seeds are the sons of the kingdom, but the tares are the sons of the wicked one.  The enemy sowed them is the devil, the harvest is the end of the age,  and the reapers are the angels.  Therefore as the tares are gathered and burned in the fire, so it will be at the end of this age.  The Son of Man will send out His angels, and they will gather out of His kingdom all things that offend, and those who practice lawlessness, and will cast them into the furnace of fire.  There will be wailing and gnashing of teeth.  Then the righteous will shine forth as the sun in the kingdom of their Father.  He who has ears to hear, let him hear!"

 

- Matthew 13:36-43 

 

Yesterday we read that, after telling the parable of the Wheat and the Tares, Jesus gave the people more parables:  "The kingdom of heaven is like a mustard seed, which a man took and sowed in his field, which indeed is the least of all the seeds; but when it is grown it is greater than the herbs and becomes a tree, so that the birds of the air come and nest in its branches." Another parable He spoke to them:  "The kingdom of heaven is like leaven, which a woman took and hid in three measures of meal till it was all leavened."  All these things Jesus spoke to the multitude in parables; and without a parable He did not speak to them, that it might be fulfilled which was spoken by the prophet, saying:  "I will open My mouth in parables; I will utter things kept secret from the foundation  of the world."

 

  Then Jesus sent the multitude away and went into the house.  And His disciples came to Him, saying, "Explain to us the parable of the tares of the field."  He answered and said to them:  "He who sows good seed is the Son of Man.  The field is the world, the good seeds are the sons of the kingdom, but the tares are the sons of the wicked one.  The enemy sowed them is the devil, the harvest is the end of the age,  and the reapers are the angels.  Therefore as the tares are gathered and burned in the fire, so it will be at the end of this age."  Here, as He did also with the parable of the Sower, Jesus gives an explanation in private to His disciples regarding the second parable He gave, that of the Wheat and the Tares, also known as the Wheat and the Weeds (see Thursday's reading).  Again, we note, as in the parable of the Sower, Jesus is the Sower, the Son of Man.  But the good seeds sown here are the product of His word, the sons of the kingdom.  That is, the believers that have taken in His word, and become a new people of the Lord thereby.  The enemy, who sows his own seed, is the devil.   And those who take in that seed, receive it, and are nurtured on it, are the sons of the wicked one.   But the harvest time is the end of the age -- and those sent to do the harvesting are the angels of the Lord.  

Jesus teaches, "The Son of Man will send out His angels, and they will gather out of His kingdom all things that offend, and those who practice lawlessness, and will cast them into the furnace of fire.  There will be wailing and gnashing of teeth.  Then the righteous will shine forth as the sun in the kingdom of their Father.  He who has ears to hear, let him hear!"   Note that at the end of the age, Christ's Kingdom is all in all, and it is those sons of the wicked one who are the interlopers, the ones who don't belong.  Here Jesus details what that means:  the things that offend, and those who practice lawlessness.  This is about what is done, let us note -- offenses and lawlessness.  And those who practice this will be, like the tares or weeds, cast into the furnace of fire.  Wailing and gnashing of teeth are images from Jewish Scripture (particularly the Book of Enoch) concerning descriptions of Sheol or Hades.  "Wailing" and "gnashing" indicate anguish and despair, mourning and anger, a poisonous kind of grief.  For this again is the Kingdom, a place where time as we know it does not exist.  Worldly time and and the eternal state of the Kingdom play a role in Christ's recent teachings.  In yesterday's reading, Jesus taught that His parables reveal things that have existed since "before" the creation of the world and time.  These parables reveal things kept secret from the foundation of the world, and He is the One who can do that.  He is the One who was with God before the world, who in the beginning already "was," who was with God, and through whom all things were made (John 1:1-5).  In that passage from John we also read, "in Him was life, and the life was the light of men. And the light shines in the darkness, and the darkness did not comprehend it."  But in this time of the harvest at the end of this age, there are those who are cast into the furnace of fire, and then those others, the righteous, who perhaps even in the midst of this fire will shine forth as the sun in the kingdom of their Father.   There is the patristic understanding that the fire we associate with hell and the divine energies of God are one and the same -- it all depends upon how compatible we are with those energies, with the divine reality of this Kingdom.  When it is fully manifest, in that time "when all things are made subject to Him," and when God is "all in all" (1 Corinthians 15:28) then midst that divine light that is the life of men, even then the righteous will shine forth as the sun.  For now -- and even at the time of Christ's Incarnation -- this light shines in the darkness, and the darkness cannot comprehend it.  For now is the time of seeding and growing, and all grow together as we look to the end of the age.  But the light still shines, and if we but listen and do, it shines in us nevertheless. In the Sermon on the Mount, Jesus taught, "Let your light so shine before men, that they may see your good works and glorify your Father in heaven" (Matthew 5:16).  At that time of the end of the age, all will be revealed as it truly is for all to see.  Let us be among those who will shine forth as the sun.

 

 

And because lawlessness will abound, the love of many will grow cold

 

 Then Jesus went out and departed from the temple, and His disciples came up to show Him the buildings of the temple.  And Jesus said to them, "Do you not see all these things?  Assuredly, I say to you, not one stone shall be left here upon another, that shall not be thrown down."  

Now as He sat on the Mount of Olives, the disciples came to Him privately, saying, "Tell us, when will these things be?  And what will be the sign of Your coming, and of the end of the age?"  And Jesus answered and said to them:  "Take heed that no one deceives you.  For many will come in My name, saying, 'I am the Christ,' and will deceive many.  And you will hear of wars and rumors of wars.  See that you are not troubled; for all these things must come to pass, but the end is not yet.  For nation will rise against nation, and kingdom against kingdom.  And there will be famines, pestilences, and earthquakes in various places.  All these are the beginning of sorrows.  Then they will deliver you up to tribulation and kill you, and you will be hated by all nations for My name's sake.  And then many will be offended, will betray one another, and will hate one another.  Then many false prophets will rise up and deceive many.  And because lawlessness will abound, the love of many will grow cold.  But he who endures to the end will be saved.  And this gospel of the kingdom will be preached in all the world as a witness to all the nations, and then the end will come."

 

- Matthew 24:1-14 

 

In our current readings, Jesus is in Jerusalem, and it is Holy Week, the final week of Christ's earthly life.  He has been teaching in the temple and disputing with the religious leaders.  Matthew's chapter 23 is a grand critique of the practices and hypocrisy of the scribes and Pharisees.  Yesterday we read the final part of that chapter.  Jesus said, "Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites!  For you are like whitewashed tombs which indeed appear beautiful outwardly, but inside are full of dead men's bones and all uncleanness.  Even so you also outwardly appear righteous to men, but inside you are full of hypocrisy and lawlessness.  Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites!  Because you build the tombs of the prophets and adorn the monuments of the righteous, and say, 'If we had lived in the days of our fathers, we would not have been partakers with them in the blood of the prophets.'  Therefore you are witnesses against yourselves that you are sons of those who murdered the prophets.  Fill up, then, the measure of your fathers' guilt.  Serpents, brood of vipers!  How can you escape the condemnation of hell?  Therefore, indeed, I send you prophets, wise men, and scribes:  some of them you will kill and crucify, and some of them you will scourge in your synagogues and persecute from city to city, that on you may come all the righteous blood shed on the earth, from the blood of righteous Abel to the blood of Zechariah, son of Berechiah, whom you murdered between the temple and the altar.  Assuredly, I say to you, all these things will come upon this generation.  O Jerusalem, Jerusalem, the one who kills the prophets and stones  those who are sent to her!  How often I wanted to gather your children together, as a hen gathers her chicks under her wings, but you were not willing!  See!  Your house is left to you desolate; for I say to you, you shall see Me no more till you say, 'Blessed is He who comes in the name of the LORD!'" 

 Then Jesus went out and departed from the temple, and His disciples came up to show Him the buildings of the temple.  And Jesus said to them, "Do you not see all these things?  Assuredly, I say to you, not one stone shall be left here upon another, that shall not be thrown down."   In the previous reading, Jesus mourned over Jerusalem, and said, "See!  Your house is left to you desolate. . .."  Here Christ prophesies regarding the destruction of the temple.  This prophecy was fulfilled in AD 70, when the temple was destroyed by the Romans.  

Now as He sat on the Mount of Olives, the disciples came to Him privately, saying, "Tell us, when will these things be?  And what will be the sign of Your coming, and of the end of the age?"  My study Bible comments that the Scriptures describe the end times in a variety of ways.  So, therefore, there is no precise chronology that can be determined from it (see Daniel 7-12; Mark 13; Luke 21; 1 Corinthians 15;51-55; 1 Thessalonians 4:13-17; 2 Thessalonians 2:1-10; and The Book of Revelation).  Christ's emphasis is on watchfulness and the practice of virtue -- not on constructing timetables for things that haven't yet happened.  My study Bible says that Matthew's account describes the end times as involving (1) initial sorrows (verses 4-14, contained in today's reading); (2) the great tribulation (verses 15-28); and (3) the coming of the Son of Man (verses 29-31).  It notes, importantly, that the period of the great tribulation includes the entire Christian era.  It is not limited to the final years before Christ returns.

And Jesus answered and said to them:  "Take heed that no one deceives you.  For many will come in My name, saying, 'I am the Christ,' and will deceive many."  These warnings against deception are given first emphasis in Jesus' response to the question about end times.  My study Bible says that of particular importance is the warning against following a false Christ, which Jesus will repeatedly stress (see also verses 11, 23-27).  

"And you will hear of wars and rumors of wars.  See that you are not troubled; for all these things must come to pass, but the end is not yet."  My study Bible comments that the wars here are references first and foremost to the Roman destruction of Jerusalem; however, this warning certainly also includes subsequent wars.  It notes that wars are not a sign of the imminent end, but rather of the opposite.  That is, as Jesus says, the end is not yet (see 1 Thessalonians 5:1-3).

"For nation will rise against nation, and kingdom against kingdom.  And there will be famines, pestilences, and earthquakes in various places.  All these are the beginning of sorrows.  Then they will deliver you up to tribulation and kill you, and you will be hated by all nations for My name's sake.  And then many will be offended, will betray one another, and will hate one another.  Then many false prophets will rise up and deceive many.  And because lawlessness will abound, the love of many will grow cold.  But he who endures to the end will be saved.  And this gospel of the kingdom will be preached in all the world as a witness to all the nations, and then the end will come."  My study Bible says here that all these calamities and all this opposition nonetheless cannot stop the spread of the gospel.  In fact, persecutions against the Church, it says, often increase the number of souls who are being converted.  It notes that St. John Chrysostom marvels that while the Romans subdued countless Jews in a political uprising, they could not prevail over twelve Jews who were not armed with anything but the gospel of Jesus Christ.

In His prophesy of the time to come following His death and Resurrection, Jesus says, "Then many false prophets will rise up and deceive many.  And because lawlessness will abound, the love of many will grow cold."   We should remember that, for the Church, this entire period of the Church's history is understood as "end times."  That is, the end times are this entire period in which we await Christ's return, His Second Coming.  So, as my study Bible points out, all the warnings in Christ's summary of the period of the end apply to all times in which we live, although His warning about the destruction of Jerusalem and the temple are certainly prominent -- and this did indeed happen within a generation of His prophecy.  But it seems that there are many sorts of false prophets that are alarming to people today, many varieties of what might pass for religion.  People offer theories about extraterrestrial visitations as spiritual events, or ideas regarding psychedelic drugs as a spiritual practice; even social theories may be followed as if one were worshiping the theory while rejecting God or any concept of a deity.  Some treat politicians as if they were deities, and public figures themselves can indeed serve as false prophets of one type or another.  Social media makes such things proliferate, to the point where social contagion is no longer simply a theory but studied and correlated with mass movements and trends, even of sobering trends among children (especially young women) such as anorexia several years ago, and more recently gender dysphoria.  Possibly even more worrisome is Christ's prophesy that "because lawlessness will abound, the love of many will grow cold."  Lawlessness can certainly take on many forms, and Jesus here is undoubtedly speaking of those who care nothing for traditional moral and spiritual teachings, which are meant to preserve, protect, and build good community under teachings of God traced through the entirety of the Bible.  We may recall here that Jesus, in His dispute with the scribes and Pharisees, gave two great commandments.  He said, "'You shall love the LORD your God with all your heart, with all your soul, and with all your mind.'  This is the first and great commandment.  And the second is like it:  'You shall love your neighbor as yourself.'  On these two commandments hang all the Law and the Prophets."  (See this reading.)   How many seem to have given up on the practice of both of these commandments?  Popular political and social theories teach ideas entirely contrary to Jesus' teaching in the parable of the Good Samaritan (Luke 10:25-37) in which we learn that to act as a neighbor is to be a neighbor, regardless of tribe, group, race, or other affiliation of any kind.  Instead, we find popular refuge for an emphasis on the opposite, that those of a particular group or ethnicity or race may be simply evil in some ontological sense connected to their physical characteristics.  Lawlessness can indeed mean that we no longer approach people as if they were of our same nature, as created in God's image and likeness, but rather our behavior differentiates on an entirely different, physical basis.  Jesus prophesies that because lawlessness will abound, the love of many will grow cold.  Certainly there are many who feel that kind of alienation and an existential sense of loneliness has grown.  We can see it among young people who feel extremely isolated.  This is correlated, of course, with the effect of lockdowns on school age young people, but more recently between social media use and what seems to be a significant rise in depression levels in young people.  We should be entirely aware of this correlation between "lawlessness" and the coldness that signifies a lack of love among people, within communities, families, institutions.  We should give great care to consider that it is in the practice of our faith that love can be maintained, grown, and deliberately cultivated.  For Christ always calls us to compassion, to acts of compassion.  The story of the Good Samaritan is a case indeed for active love, crossing all boundaries, creating neighbors where there were none before, building community where none was thought to exist.  Let us consider Christ's words carefully, and see where they might apply in our lives, and where we can observe this element of His prophesy around ourselves.  Let us consider the importance, then, of living our faith, living His guidance for ourselves and for our world.  Because if love itself depends upon this, then how essential is that faith to human life and the quality of our lives within the whole of our communities?   In another important passage, Jesus stretches His hand toward His disciples, and says, "Here are My mother and My brothers! For whoever does the will of My Father in heaven is My brother and sister and mother" (Matthew 12:48-50).  What He is revealing to us is the powerful force for love that is present in hearing the will of God and doing it, living it.  Let us practice the love He teaches to us.

Then the righteous will shine forth as the sun in the kingdom of their Father

 

 Then Jesus sent the multitude away and went into the house.  And His disciples came to Him, saying, "Explain to us the parable of the tares of the field."  He answered and said to them:  "He who sows the good seed is the Son of Man.  The field is the world, the good seeds are the sons of the kingdom, but the tares are the sons of the wicked one.  The enemy who sowed them is the devil, the harvest is the end of the age, and the reapers are the angels.  Therefore as the tares are gathered and burned in the fire, so it will be at the end of this age.  The Son of Man will send out His angels, and they will gather out of His kingdom all things that offend, and those who practice lawlessness, and will cast them into the furnace of fire.  There will be wailing and gnashing of teeth.  Then the righteous will shine forth as the sun in the kingdom of their Father.  He who has ears to hear, let him hear!"

 

- Matthew 13:36-43 

 

On Saturday, we read that Jesus taught another parable to the crowds, saying:  "The kingdom of heaven is like a mustard seed, which a man took and sowed in his field, which indeed is the least of all the seeds; but when it is grown it is greater than the herbs and becomes a tree, so that the birds of the air come and nest in its branches." Another parable He spoke to them:  "The kingdom of heaven is like leaven, which a woman took and hid in three measures of meal till it was all leavened.  All these things Jesus spoke to the multitude in parables; and without a parable He did not speak to them, that it might be fulfilled which was spoken by the prophet, saying:  "I will open My mouth in parables; I will utter things kept secret from the foundation of the world." 

 Then Jesus sent the multitude away and went into the house.  And His disciples came to Him, saying, "Explain to us the parable of the tares of the field."  He answered and said to them:  "He who sows the good seed is the Son of Man.  The field is the world, the good seeds are the sons of the kingdom, but the tares are the sons of the wicked one.  The enemy who sowed them is the devil, the harvest is the end of the age, and the reapers are the angels.  Therefore as the tares are gathered and burned in the fire, so it will be at the end of this age.  The Son of Man will send out His angels, and they will gather out of His kingdom all things that offend, and those who practice lawlessness, and will cast them into the furnace of fire.  There will be wailing and gnashing of teeth.  Then the righteous will shine forth as the sun in the kingdom of their Father.  He who has ears to hear, let him hear!"  Here Jesus is explaining the parable taught in Friday's reading, as the disciples request in private to "explain to us the parable of the tares of the field."  It's important to understand that tares are a type of plant that resembles wheat, but is considered a weed that is indigestible for human beings.  This parable of the tares of the field is one Jesus told immediately following the parable of the Sower, and it builds upon that parable.  The attention here is focused on the enemy who has sown his seed among the seed of Christ.  My study Bible comments that, as falsehood came after truth and false prophets came after the true prophets, so the Antichrist will come after Christ.  In the similarity of the weeds (tares) and wheat, we see how lies, falsehoods, and half-truths can bear resemblance to truth.  Those who follow become sons of the wicked one through participation and living the life of the falsehoods, just as sons of the kingdom are those who live the life of His word.

Clearly, this parable of the "tares of the field" is a parable of judgment, and it expresses Christ's pronouncement and prophecy of a judgment to come.  We should remember that Jesus taught in the original parable that both wheat and tares should grow together, so as not to uproot any of the "good seed" -- and that both should grow together until the time of the harvest has come.  So, clearly, the harvest is the time of judgment, at the end of the age.  Many people today seemingly reject notions of judgment, but that's not what Christ is teaching here -- and He's being very clear about it.  One thing we can be certain of is that this time of the harvest (the time of judgment) will come at the end of this age.  We simply have idea when that is.  In fact, when questioned about it, Jesus refused to give fodder to speculate.  See Matthew 24:36-44.   The only things He did tell His disciples (and therefore the Church) is that "of that day and hour no one knows, not even the angels of heaven, but My Father only," and that "the Son of Man is coming at an hour you do not expect."  Moreover, what we can come to understand as well is that there seem to be two kinds of time in the picture that we're given of worldly life and heavenly life.  Here in this world, we follow a linear kind of experience of time.  But the time of the life after this one seems to be different, and so the rules about change and the experience of whatever that life is like are different.  Moreover, Christ has said that that next life offers a complete transformation of life.  When quizzed by the Sadducees regarding a woman married successively to seven brothers (Matthew 22:23-33), Jesus responded:  "You are mistaken, not knowing the Scriptures nor the power of God. 30 For in the resurrection they neither marry nor are given in marriage, but are like angels of God in heaven. But concerning the resurrection of the dead, have you not read what was spoken to you by God, saying, 'I am the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob'? God is not the God of the dead, but of the living."  So, from Christ's words, we may conclude that a complete transformation of life takes place, and also that time is experienced differently, as Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob all live to God, although their lives did not overlap in worldly time.  We simply cannot calculate the complete understanding of what kind of changes these mean for us, nor how judgment is enacted considering such things.  What we do now is that what we choose in our worldly lives -- and whether or not we pay attention to Christ's words and seek to live by them -- does make a difference.  We're repeatedly told in different places in the Scriptures that our compassion and capacity for mercy makes a great deal of difference to our ultimate disposition and the judgment at the end of the age (for example, Matthew 25:31-46; Luke 16:19-31).  From Christ's teaching today, we may conclude that we grow spiritually, in some sense, like plants grow -- and it depends upon the seeds from which we grow.  In the parable of the Sower, Jesus emphasized what kind of soil His word can take root in, and grow and produce spiritual fruits.  Here, to be either sons of the kingdom or sons of the wicked one depends on what we choose to grow upon and cultivate; without the seed of Christ, people commit things that offend, and practice lawlessness.  Ultimately these will result in judgment.  There is a clear distinguishing here between what is cast into the furnace of fire, and the righteous who shine forth as the sun in the kingdom of their Father.  But of that time we don't know, and we are all given the time of our lives to repent, to turn around and follow Him.  Let us at least take this parable, and His certain warnings about judgment, seriously while we live in the world.  

Therefore whoever hears these sayings of Mine, and does them, I will liken him to a wise man who built his house on the rock

 

 "Many will say to Me in that day, 'Lord, Lord, have we not prophesied in Your name, cast out demons in Your name, and done many wonders in Your name?'  And then I will declare to them, 'I never knew you; depart from Me, you who practice lawlessness!'

"Therefore whoever hears these sayings of Mine, and does them, I will liken him to a wise man who built his house on the rock:  and the rain descended, the floods came, and the winds blew and beat on that house; and it did not fall, for it was founded on the rock.  But everyone who hears these sayings of Mine, and does not do them, will be like a foolish man who built his house on the sand:  and the rain descended, the floods came, and the winds blew and beat on that house; and it fell.  And great was its fall."  And so it was, when Jesus had ended these sayings, that the people were astonished at His teaching, for He taught them as one having authority, and not as the scribes.

 

- Matthew 7:22–29 

 

We have been reading through the Sermon on the Mount in our recent lectionary readings.  In yesterday's reading, Jesus taught,  "Enter by the narrow gate; for wide is the gate and broad is the way that leads to destruction, and there are many who go in by it.  Because narrow is the gate and difficult is the way which leads to life, and there are few who find it.  Beware of false prophets, who come to you in sheep's clothing, but inwardly they are ravenous wolves.  You will know them by their fruits.  Do men gather grapes from thornbushes or figs from thistles?  Even so, every good tree bears good fruit, but a bad tree bears bad fruit.  A good tree cannot bear bad fruit, nor can a bad tree bear good fruit.  Every tree that does not bear good fruit is cut down and thrown into the fire.  Therefore by their fruits you will know them.  Not everyone who says to Me, 'Lord, Lord,' shall enter the kingdom of heaven, but he who does the will of My Father in heaven."

 

  "Many will say to Me in that day, 'Lord, Lord, have we not prophesied in Your name, cast out demons in Your name, and done many wonders in Your name?'  And then I will declare to them, 'I never knew you; depart from Me, you who practice lawlessness!'"  This statement should be taken in conjunction with the final verse from yesterday's reading (above):  "Not everyone who says to Me, 'Lord, Lord,' shall enter the kingdom of heaven, but he who does the will of My Father in heaven."   My study Bible comments that this is a threefold testimony to the deity of Jesus Christ:  He calls Himself Lord (referring to the divine name of "Yahweh" in the Old Testament); He speaks of the will of My Father, which He fully knows and shares; and finally, as judge, He's revealed as God, for only God can execute true judgment.  In that day is a reference to the final judgment.  We should also note that here, He's addressing religious leaders who have done works in His name, as those would be ones who prophesied, cast out demons, and performed many wonders.

"Therefore whoever hears these sayings of Mine, and does them, I will liken him to a wise man who built his house on the rock:  and the rain descended, the floods came, and the winds blew and beat on that house; and it did not fall, for it was founded on the rock.  But everyone who hears these sayings of Mine, and does not do them, will be like a foolish man who built his house on the sand:  and the rain descended, the floods came, and the winds blew and beat on that house; and it fell.  And great was its fall."  And so it was, when Jesus had ended these sayings, that the people were astonished at His teaching, for He taught them as one having authority, and not as the scribes.  My study Bible comments that hearing the gospel alone is not enough.  Salvation is not based on hearing alone, nor even on faith alone, but also on doing these sayings of Mine, the things spoken by Christ.   See James 2:24.

Jesus' analogy about building one's house on the rock is an apt one.  It gives us a vivid metaphor to keep in mind about how we structure our lives, and what is important for our own sense of security in life, our choices that we make.  These images of the rain descending and floods coming are those of forces of chaos and upheaval sweeping through our lives.  Winds blowing and beating on the house suggest the tempests that sweep through the world, giving rise to all kinds of movements and turns of history, changes such as both personal and political upheavals.  But the house built upon the rock is the house founded and situated upon Christ's teachings for us, which save us from chaos and upheavel, changes that shake up our lives, and keep us rooted and firmly on the solid ground where we need to place our faith.  The rain and flood imagery suggests to us tribulation and persecution, the things that uproot the good seed in the Parable of the Sower (Matthew 13:1-23).  The winds that sweep in and beat on the house can be doubts that shake us, the particular sway of ideologies in the world, or even the forces that urge us toward "the cares of this world and the deceitfulness of riches" (see again the parable of the Sower) that drive our lives, our concerns and care.  Life will always be offering to us ways to persuade us to abandon our faith, the sweep us off of our solid ground, to distract us from the path that Christ gives.  But Jesus teaches us about remaining in a firm place, finding ourselves where we need to be -- no matter how much external matters may threaten our peace of mind.  It's important to consider Christ's teachings as those which give us firm steps to take in life, and precautions against the things that cause chaos or lead us down a bad path.  Security comes from an internal sense of remaining within guidelines that give us truth, and not risky behaviors that look like shortcuts, but rather take us into a circuitous route from which we'll need to find our way back again to a road we can trust.  The life we want has to be one in which we take the perspective of the long haul, and not a temporary vision.   The only way to do this is by placing our faith in what is trustworthy and has stood the test of time, in the wisdom that Christ offers to us.  For unlike the winds that blow through our lives and beat on our houses occasionally, or the rains that come and threaten us with floods, Christ is the same yesterday, today, and forever (Hebrews 13:8).  In the Revelation we read, "I am the Alpha and the Omega, the Beginning and the End," says the Lord, "who is and who was and who is to come, the Almighty" (Revelation 1:8).  When Jesus prophesies about the end times to the disciples, He declares, "Heaven and earth will pass away, but My words will by no means pass away" (Matthew 24:35).  These everlasting words, that outlive everything else -- even heaven and earth -- are the rock upon which to build one's house, our lives.

 

 

 

 

And this gospel of the kingdom will be preached in all the world as a witness to all the nations, and then the end will come

 

 Then Jesus went out and departed from the temple, and His disciples came up to show Him the buildings of the temple.  And Jesus said to them, "Do you not see all these things?  Assuredly, I say to you, not one stone shall be left here upon another, that shall not be thrown down."

Now as He sat on the Mount of Olives, the disciples came to Him privately, saying, "Tell us, when will these things be?  And what will be the sign of Your coming, and of the end of the age?"  And Jesus answered and said to them:  "Take heed that no one deceives you.  For may will come in My name, saying, 'I am the Christ,' and will deceive many.  And you will hear of wars and rumors of wars.  See that you are not troubled; for all these things must come to pass, but the end is not yet.  For nation will rise against nation, and kingdom against kingdom.  And there will be famines, pestilences, and earthquakes in various places.  All these are the beginning of sorrows.  Then they will deliver you up to tribulation and kill you, and you will be hated by all nations for My name's sake.  And then many will be offended, will betray one another, and will hate one another.  Then many false prophets will rise up and deceive many.  And because lawlessness will abound, the love of many will grow cold.  But he who endures to the end shall be saved.  And this gospel of the kingdom will be preached in all the world as a witness to all the nations, and then the end will come."

 

- Matthew 24:1-14 

 

In yesterday's reading, we were given the last part of Christ's final sermon, a great indictment of the corruption in the temple and among the scribes and Pharisees:   "Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites!  For you are like whitewashed tombs which indeed appear beautiful outwardly, but inside are full of dead men's bones and all uncleanness.  Even so you also outwardly appear righteous to men, but inside you are full of hypocrisy and lawlessness.  Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites!  Because you build the tombs of the prophets and adorn the monuments of the righteous, and say, 'If we had lived in the days of our fathers, we would not have been partakers with them in the blood of the prophets.'  Therefore you are witnesses against yourselves that you are sons of those who murdered the prophets.  Fill up, then, the measure of your father's guilt.  Serpents, brood of vipers!  How can you escape the condemnation of hell?  Therefore, indeed, I send you prophets, wise men, and scribes:  some of them you will kill and crucify, and some of them you will scourge in your synagogues and persecute from city to city, that on you may come all the righteous blood shed on the earth, from the blood of righteous Abel to the blood of Zechariah, son of Berechiah, whom you murdered between the temple and the altar.  Assuredly, I say to you, all these things will come upon this generation.  O Jerusalem, Jerusalem, the one who kills the prophets and stones those who are sent to her!  How often I wanted to gather your children together, as a hen gathers her chicks under her wings, but you were not willing!  See!  Your house is left to you desolate; for I say to you, you shall see Me no more till you say, 'Blessed is He who comes in the name of the LORD!'" 

 

Then Jesus went out and departed from the temple, and His disciples came up to show Him the buildings of the temple.  And Jesus said to them, "Do you not see all these things?  Assuredly, I say to you, not one stone shall be left here upon another, that shall not be thrown down."  My study Bible notes that Christ's prophecy of the destruction of the temple was fulfilled in AD 70, when the temple was destroyed by the Romans.   This prophesy proved vividly true, as Roman soldiers believed there was gold between the stones of the temple.  All that remained was one retaining wall, long known as the Wailing Wall, today more commonly called the Western Wall.

 

 Now as He sat on the Mount of Olives, the disciples came to Him privately, saying, "Tell us, when will these things be?  And what will be the sign of Your coming, and of the end of the age?"  My study Bible notes here that the Scriptures describe the end times in a variety of ways, so that no precise chronology can be determined (see Daniel 7 - 12; Mark 13; Luke 21; 1 Corinthians 15:51-55; 1 Thessalonians 4:13-17; 2 Thessalonians 2:1-10; and the Revelation).  Christ's great emphasis in His response to the disciples is on watchfulness and the practice of virtue -- rather than on the construction of timetables of things that have not yet happened.  Here in Matthew's account, the end is described as encompassing first the initial sorrows, then the great tribulation, and finally the coming of the Son of Man.  The period of the great tribulation, my study Bible remarks, includes the entire Christian era.  It is not limited only to the final years before Christ's return.

 

And Jesus answered and said to them:  "Take heed that no one deceives you.  For may will come in My name, saying, 'I am the Christ,' and will deceive many."  Christ gives the greatest priority to warnings against deception.  Of particular significance is His warning against following a false Christ.  Jesus will stress this repeatedly; see also verses 11, 23-27.  

"And you will hear of wars and rumors of wars.  See that you are not troubled; for all these things must come to pass, but the end is not yet."  My study Bible says that the wars here refer first and foremost to the Roman destruction of Jerusalem, but in the verses that follow we understand He includes subsequent wars also.  My study Bible comments that wars are not a sign of the imminent end, but rather of the opposite:  that the end is not yet (see 1 Thessalonians 5:1-3). 

"For nation will rise against nation, and kingdom against kingdom.  And there will be famines, pestilences, and earthquakes in various places.  All these are the beginning of sorrows.  Then they will deliver you up to tribulation and kill you, and you will be hated by all nations for My name's sake.  And then many will be offended, will betray one another, and will hate one another.  Then many false prophets will rise up and deceive many.  And because lawlessness will abound, the love of many will grow cold.  But he who endures to the end shall be saved.  And this gospel of the kingdom will be preached in all the world as a witness to all the nations, and then the end will come."  Here is a virtual list of things that characterize the period of history since Christ's Incarnation; let us understand that it is borne out in the history of the Church and the faithful.   But note that Christ's warnings are given in order to convey the message of endurance in faith through difficulties and disasters, that "he who endures to the end shall be saved."  My study Bible comments that all these calamities and all this opposition cannot stop the spread of the gospel.  Indeed, it says, persecutions against the Church often increase the number of souls being converted.  St. John Chrysostom marvels that while the Romans subdued countless Jews in a political uprising (in the Siege of Jerusalem, AD 70), they could not prevail over twelve Jews unarmed with anything except the gospel of Jesus Christ.  

Jesus names many disasters that befall humankind, most of which any one of us has likely seen in our lifetimes.  There are human, man-made disasters and also natural disasters.  But even the natural disasters such as famines, and in some cases even earthquakes, can be the result of human action.  But these are just "the beginning of sorrows" in Jesus' prophesy of the times in which we live.  But then He speaks of tribulation, in which the faithful will be killed, and hated for His name's sake.   There are those in the Church who will be offended, betray one another, and hate one another.  He speaks again of false prophets and deceit -- and of the lawlessness that will abound, with the result that the love of many will grow cold.  All of these things we may think we see or have seen.  But the key, to my way of thinking, in Christ's warning is that "he who endures to the end will be saved."  He preaches to us watchfulness and endurance, which amount to virtually the same thing, because our endurance is not possible without watchfulness.  We need to be alert to deception and alert to when the disasters and myriad distractions around us start to veer us off our course,  taking away the love of God in our hearts so that we grow cold to the things on which we must build our lives.  He virtually assures the disciples that into the life of the Church and of the faithful all of these things will come, but we are to watch and know what we are to be about.  We are, above all, to endure through it.  That is, to endure in our faith and the practice of our faith, the carrying out of His commands, of love of God and love of neighbor, as best we can.  These are the things in which we must endure and which we must pursue.  We are to remember what is the "blessed life" He teaches us in the Beatitudes (Matthew 5:1-12), and all the ways He teaches us to be His disciples.  We have to hold fast to what it is that makes us salt and light, and reflect that light and God's glory back into the world (Matthew 5:13-16).  Throughout the difficulties, for over so many centuries since Christ's Incarnation, this is what the saints and the faithful of the Church have done, under any and all circumstances.  There is one saint I will take as an example who is inspirational to me.  She is St. Philothei of Athens, a woman who lived in the 16th century in Athens, Greece.  She lived in a time of oppressive Ottoman rule over Greece's mostly Christian citizens.   At a young age she became a very wealthy widow and devoted herself to monastic life.  She established on her property a women's monastery, where young women were taught various crafts and skills with which they could work.  She was active in philanthropy and charity, extended outside her immediate environment.  Among other things, she was active in buying the freedom of Greeks who'd been taken as Ottoman slaves, especially women taken to harems.  She took in and hid fleeing slaves, many of them women who were pregnant.  She spent extensive monies for bribes and ransoms for such people, and was heavily taxed and fined.  Her monasteries were plundered and agricultural lands destroyed.  For her work in hiding and smuggling out women who sought refuge in her monasteries, her fame grew and so did animosity against her.  She was beaten and imprisoned and eventually released.  Finally, four mercenaries broke into her monastery during an evening vigil and beat her severely; after a lengthy attempt at recuperation she died of her injuries, a martyr for faith.  Today much of central Athens remains a part of her legacy, and her bones are enshrined in the Metropolitan cathedral.  There, too, one may also find remnants of the chains of St. Paul, another reminder that in the endurance of our faith, we are free even in the face of the tribulations of the world and all the things that would enslave us.  Let us set these extraordinary examples before us, and understand that to endure is to truly live our faith and hang on to its priceless, matchless value, its love and light.  Notice that Jesus finishes by saying that "this gospel of the kingdom will be preached in all the world as a witness to all the nations."  Let us remember, also, that we witness by living our faith every day, and enduring in so doing.

That on you may come all the righteous blood shed on the earth

 

 "Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites!  For you are like whitewashed tombs which indeed appear beautiful outwardly, but inside are full of dead men's bones and all uncleanness.  Even so you also outwardly appear righteous to men, but inside you are full of hypocrisy and lawlessness.  Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites!  Because you build the tombs of the prophets and adorn the monuments of the righteous, and say, 'If we had lived in the days of our fathers, we would not have been partakers with them in the blood of the prophets.'  Therefore you are witnesses against yourselves that you are sons of those who murdered the prophets.  Fill up, then, the measure of your father's guilt.  Serpents, brood of vipers!  How can you escape the condemnation of hell?  Therefore, indeed, I send you prophets, wise men, and scribes:  some of them you will kill and crucify, and some of them you will scourge in your synagogues and persecute from city to city, that on you may come all the righteous blood shed on the earth, from the blood of righteous Abel to the blood of Zechariah, son of Berechiah, whom you murdered between the temple and the altar.  Assuredly, I say to you, all these things will come upon this generation.

"O Jerusalem, Jerusalem, the one who kills the prophets and stones those who are sent to her!  How often I wanted to gather your children together, as a hen gathers her chicks under her wings, but you were not willing!  See!  Your house is left to you desolate; for I say to you, you shall see Me no more till you say, 'Blessed is He who comes in the name of the LORD!'"

 

- Matthew 23:27-39 

 

In yesterday's reading, Jesus continued His final sermon of His earthly life, preaching in the temple at Jerusalem:   "But woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites!  For you shut up the kingdom of heaven against men; for you neither go in yourselves, nor do you allow those who are entering to go in.  Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites!  For you devour widows' houses, and for a pretense make long prayers.  Therefore you will receive greater condemnation.  Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites!  For you travel land and sea to win one proselyte, and when he is won, you make him twice as much a son of hell as yourselves.  Woe to you, blind guides, who say, 'Whoever swears by the temple, it is nothing; but whoever swears by the gold of the temple, he is obliged to perform it.'  Fools and blind!  For which is greater, the gold or the temple that sanctifies the gold?  And, 'Whoever swears by the altar, it is nothing; but whoever swears by the gift that is on it, he is obliged to perform it.'  Fools and blind!  For which is greater, the gift or the altar that sanctifies the gift?  Therefore he who swears by the altar, swears by it and by all things on it.  He who swears by the temple, swears by it and by Him who dwells on it.  And he who swears by heaven, swears by the throne of God and by Him who sits on it.  Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites!  For you pay tithe of mint and anise and cummin, and have neglected the weightier matters of the law:  justice and mercy and faith.  These you ought to have done, without leaving the others undone.  Blind guides, who strain out a gnat and swallow a camel!  Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites!  For you cleanse the outside of the cup and dish, but inside they are full of extortion and self-indulgence.  Blind Pharisee, first cleanse the inside of the cup and dish, that the outside of them may be clean also." 

 "Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites!  For you are like whitewashed tombs which indeed appear beautiful outwardly, but inside are full of dead men's bones and all uncleanness.  Even so you also outwardly appear righteous to men, but inside you are full of hypocrisy and lawlessness."  Here Jesus continues the theme we read in yesterday's reading (above), as His sermon focused on the hypocrisy of the religious leaders.  In the beginning of His sermon, as we read on Monday, He said of them that "all their works they do to be seen by men" and so this comment that they appear beautiful outwardly applies in that sense.  They have external signs of holiness (and "cleanliness" in this sense of religious purification) but internally are anything but. 

 

"Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites!  Because you build the tombs of the prophets and adorn the monuments of the righteous, and say, 'If we had lived in the days of our fathers, we would not have been partakers with them in the blood of the prophets.'  Therefore you are witnesses against yourselves that you are sons of those who murdered the prophets.  Fill up, then, the measure of your father's guilt.  Serpents, brood of vipers!  How can you escape the condemnation of hell?  Therefore, indeed, I send you prophets, wise men, and scribes:  some of them you will kill and crucify, and some of them you will scourge in your synagogues and persecute from city to city, that on you may come all the righteous blood shed on the earth, from the blood of righteous Abel to the blood of Zechariah, son of Berechiah, whom you murdered between the temple and the altar.  Assuredly, I say to you, all these things will come upon this generation."  Here is Jesus' theme elaborated that these religious leaders "are full of dead men's bones and all unrighteousness" -- He says they are the same, the very sons of those who murdered the prophets, for they continue in the same behavior.  Jesus gives His own prophecy here of those whom He will send to them, some of whom they will kill and crucify, scourge in their synagogues, and persecute from city to city.  In Greek, the verb that is translated as "I send" is ἀποστέλλω/apostello, the root from which we derive the word "apostle."  So while even now He sends them out (present tense), He speaks of the future when His apostles (prophets, wise men, and scribes) will be crucified, scourged, and persecuted from city to city.  Jesus speaks of those from the beginning, righteous Abel (who was killed by his brother Cain in Genesis 4:1-15)  to Zechariah, son of Berechiah, whom you murdered between the temple and the altar.  While some patristic commentary indicates this was the prophet at the time of Joash the king (2 Chronicles 24:20-22), others as well as modern scholars say it refers to the father of St. John the Baptist, making the contemporary "whom you murdered" make sense.  According to tradition, Zechariah the father of John the Baptist was also murdered in the temple.  In Luke's Gospel, he is referred to in the Greek version of his name, Zacharias (see Luke 1:5-25, 57-80).

"O Jerusalem, Jerusalem, the one who kills the prophets and stones those who are sent to her!  How often I wanted to gather your children together, as a hen gathers her chicks under her wings, but you were not willing!  See!  Your house is left to you desolate; for I say to you, you shall see Me no more till you say, 'Blessed is He who comes in the name of the LORD!'"  My study Bible comments that God's deepest desire is the reconciliation of God's people, yet most do not want God.  The house which is desolate refers both to the temple in Jerusalem and to the nation itself, for "house" can be used to mean also family or tribe (see Psalms 115:12, 135:19).  Both the temple and the nation will be without God's protective presence once Christ departs.

Of course, Christian tradition understands Christ's prophecy of the destruction of the temple (and of Jerusalem) as fulfilled in AD 70, when the temple was destroyed by the Romans at the Siege of Jerusalem.  The prophecy of Jesus is seen in this light.  So, we might ask ourselves, how is it possible for "all the righteous blood shed on the earth" to come to one generation?  For that, we must ask ourselves about spiritual awareness and knowledge and the weight they carry in human lives.  These men to whom Christ speaks in today's reading are the experts in the Scriptures, the keepers of Jewish spiritual and religious history and tradition.  Moreover, these men are the ones responsible for the instruction of Israel, the carrying forward of the spiritual tradition of Judaism, and they have failed, in Christ's eyes, through their hypocrisy and corruption.  Even so, we might ask, how can the full weight of all the righteous blood shed come upon one generation?  First we must understand the responsibility that spiritual knowledge and experience carries.  When one "knows better" there is far more responsibility involved than something done in ignorance.  Second, Jesus gives us a very close hint when He tells them (in yesterday's reading, above), "For you travel land and sea to win one proselyte, and when he is won, you make him twice as much a son of hell as yourselves."   Bad habits and practices become extended from one person to another, and from one generation to another, when they are successively taught through practices and ways of thinking and being.  Righteousness is a question of how we relate to the world and all beings and things in the world; therefore unrighteousness can be acquired and learned as well through the imitation of those who fail to live righteousness.  Indeed, in the Orthodox tradition, the world is in a "fallen" state primarily due to the fact that we inherit the conditions created and, in a sense, "descended" from the first sin.  We don't inherit guilt, but we do acquire the habits of the world around us, the conditions into which we're born.  So these religious leaders are responsible for their own behavior, as they know the teachings of righteousness and yet simply accept corruption and its practices, even extended to unrighteous bloodshed and violence.  Jesus speaks of their hypocrisy when He tells them that "you build the tombs of the prophets and adorn the monuments of the righteous, and say, 'If we had lived in the days of our fathers, we would not have been partakers with them in the blood of the prophets.'  Therefore you are witnesses against yourselves that you are sons of those who murdered the prophets.  Fill up, then, the measure of your father's guilt.  Serpents, brood of vipers!  How can you escape the condemnation of hell?"   And He prophesies what they themselves will do, including His own crucifixion:   "Therefore, indeed, I send you prophets, wise men, and scribes:  some of them you will kill and crucify, and some of them you will scourge in your synagogues and persecute from city to city, that on you may come all the righteous blood shed on the earth, from the blood of righteous Abel to the blood of Zechariah, son of Berechiah, whom you murdered between the temple and the altar.  Assuredly, I say to you, all these things will come upon this generation."  Christ ties them in to an extended history of what they know to be blameworthy behavior ("you build the tombs of the prophets and adorn the monuments of the righteous, and say, 'If we had lived in the days of our fathers, we would not have been partakers with them in the blood of the prophets'"), and prophesies that they will continue to do the same nonetheless.   Therefore Jesus speaks of the power of spiritual reality at work in our world, which is not only the power of God which sanctifies and brings holiness, enables prophesy and all the varied fruit of the Spirit in our world.  But that same power of sanctification and righteousness is also at work when we fail to uphold what we know to be the good, when we know better, when holiness is standing before us and testifying.  Jesus indicates this when He sends out the apostles and tells them, "And whoever will not receive you nor hear your words, when you depart from that house or city, shake off the dust from your feet. Assuredly, I say to you, it will be more tolerable for the land of Sodom and Gomorrah in the day of judgment than for that city!" (Matthew 10:14-15).  Note also that what we might call this destructive spiritual power (in response to unrighteous denial or rejection of holiness) comes in time; it will be forty years before the fulfillment of this prophecy.  This is understood as merciful, for there is time for people to repent.  Therefore to those who would be blind to it, cause and effect are not necessarily understood; only those capable of repentance could see or sense the spiritual effects of their actions.  So we today who "know better," who are recipients of the spiritual teachings of Christ and the traditions of holiness that are handed to us, bear responsibility for the spiritual treasures and wisdom we have been given through prophets, wise men, and scribes.  For God's holy power is still at work.  Let us consider when we pray the power of holiness and the reality of Christ's words and teachings.  For righteousness and compassion always remain essential to our understanding of the people He calls us to be.

Therefore whoever hears these sayings of Mine, and does them, I will liken him to a wise man who built his house on the rock

 

 "Many will say to Me in that day, 'Lord, Lord, have we not prophesied in Your name, cast out demons in Your name, and done many wonders in Your name?'  And then I will declare to them, 'I never knew you; depart from Me, you who practice lawlessness!'

"Therefore whoever hears these sayings of Mine, and does them, I will liken him to a wise man who built his house on the rock:  and the rain descended, the floods came, and the winds blew and beat on that house; and it did not fall, for it was founded on the rock.  But everyone who hears these sayings of Mine, and does not do them, will be like a foolish man who built his house on the sand:  and the rain descended, the floods came, and the winds blew and beat on that house; and it fell.  And great was its fall." 

 

- Matthew 7:22-27 

 

Yesterday we read about Christ's Ascension, as in the West it was the celebration the Feast of our Lord's Ascension (next Thursday for the Eastern Churches), which takes place forty days after Christ's Resurrection (Easter or Pascha).  At that time the eleven disciples went away into Galilee, to the mountain which Jesus had appointed for them.  When they saw Him, they worshiped Him; but some doubted.  And Jesus came and spoke to them, saying, "All authority has been given to Me in heaven and on earth.  Go therefore and make disciples of all the nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, teaching them to observe all things that I have commanded you; and lo, I am with you always, even to the end of the age."  Amen.

 

  "Many will say to Me in that day, 'Lord, Lord, have we not prophesied in Your name, cast out demons in Your name, and done many wonders in Your name?'  And then I will declare to them, 'I never knew you; depart from Me, you who practice lawlessness!'"  In today's reading, we pick up where we left off in Saturday's reading (the interim readings were preparation and celebration of the Feast of our Lord's Ascension).   We recall that we had been reading through the Sermon on the Mount (Matthew 5 - 7), and today we are given Christ's closing words to that Sermon.  Here, my study Bible comments that Jesus testifies to His own deity:  He calls Himself Lord, which refers to the divine name "Yahweh" of the Old Testament.   His words indicate His authority as judge, and only God can execute true judgment.  In that day refers to the final judgment.  In the verse just previous to these, He taught, "Not everyone who says to Me, 'Lord, Lord,' shall enter the kingdom of heaven, but he who does the will of My Father in heaven."  To speak of the will of My Father also affirms His deity, as He fully knows and shares the Father's will.  

"Therefore whoever hears these sayings of Mine, and does them, I will liken him to a wise man who built his house on the rock:  and the rain descended, the floods came, and the winds blew and beat on that house; and it did not fall, for it was founded on the rock.  But everyone who hears these sayings of Mine, and does not do them, will be like a foolish man who built his house on the sand:  and the rain descended, the floods came, and the winds blew and beat on that house; and it fell.  And great was its fall." My study Bible comments that hearing the gospel alone is not enough, for salvation is based not on hearing alone, nor on faith alone, but also on doing the things spoken of by Christ in "these sayings of Mine" (see James 2:24).  

Jesus contrasts "whoever hears these sayings of Mine, and does them" to "everyone who hears these sayings of Mine, and does not do them."  The first has the security of a wise person who builds his house on a rock, a solid foundation that does not get shaken by storms, floods, winds, and other natural disasters.  The second is like one who is foolish, and builds a home on sands that shift with rain and flood and wind.  I once found myself in the midst of a very serious earthquake, and I can testify to what happens to homes built on landfill that mostly turned to sand in the shifting, shaking terrain along a coastline.  Jesus' images, as usual, are quite apt, even for modern construction techniques in a known earthquake zone.  Ultimately, what Jesus is saying is borne out throughout the course of our lives.  We might think that one wrong decision or another from time to time won't have much effect.  But decision-making, our patterns of thinking, are built over time.  We tend not necessarily to simply make a bad decision every once in a while, but rather build our lives on patterns.  We go down a road of a way of thinking and choosing, and we don't just stand still, or go backwards and forwards.  We tend to build upon whatever it is we build upon.  We rely on assumptions or decisions of the past to set the pattern, until something prompts us to reconsider, and to turn that thinking around.  This is why Jesus' teachings and sayings are so important, and so profound.  If we are vigilant, and if we recall His words and teachings, we can build our lives on something solid, something -- if one will pardon an oft-used expression -- that civilization, or what we understand of it, is based on.  If we have faith in having compassion for one another, if we have faith and are willing to live that faith in terms of our capacity for building something honestly in our lives, trying to establish righteous relations, then we will find ourselves capable of building up a pattern that leads to a life that gives us what is desirable:  staying away from bad habits, or from taking shortcuts in terms of how we treat others, from not caring about lies or insults in our ways of dealing with others.  Our own integrity becomes essential to us, and a resonance within which we can serve God, a highest good.  We will find that this forms a basis for good and safe choices in terms of what we build with our lives, how we conduct ourselves.  Most of all, I would say that Jesus teachings on prayer, almsgiving, and fasting -- about how God who sees in secret and is in the secret place will reward us openly (see this reading) -- are grounds for eventual outcomes which we can look upon with respect in our lives.  Living His way produces results that we can look back on and describe as things we feel good about, midst whatever tribulation and difficulties we might have through no fault of our own, or even midst our own mistakes we'll inevitably make.  But in Jesus' viewpoint, even those mistakes and even the tribulations become occasions for God's grace, for a learning curve, for prayer and mercy (see, for example, John 9:3; or the healing of one who was possessed by a Legion of demons  and is then sent out as a bearer of good news (Luke 8:38-39).  To hear these sayings and do them is truly to build a good life, despite the problems in our world and the difficulties that may befall us, for this is the way of Christ, and with God we know that all things are possible (Matthew 19:26).  Christ gives us His wisdom; it is the foolish who do not seek to follow it.