Bible Study for Tuesday, May 31, 2016

Since I was blessed to teach a Bible Study (originally LIVE STREAM via YouTube) on the Book of Acts inspired by the Homilies of Saint John Chrysostom from 400 CE, I am sharing these lessons each day during the Paschal Season which is when Chrysostom originally preached them. We eventually made substantial improvements to our sound system, so please be patient with occasional poor sound quality. Today’s Bible Study covers Acts 12.25-13.12. This Bible Study was originally streamed LIVE on Wednesday, September 2, 2015. Here is a study guide for the session.

 

Receiving Holy Communion in Non-Orthodox Churches and Blessing others

This is the first of our “Ask Father” sermons for Summer 2016. This week’s questions both deal with relationships with others, inside and outside the Church. Can I receive Holy Communion in a non-Orthodox Church? What is the proper way to bless others as a layperson? These questions are simply but serve a very practical role in our relationship with others.

COMPLETE TRANSCRIPT:

Hello. My name is Father Athanasios Haros and I'm the Pastor here at the Transfiguration of Our Savior Greek Orthodox Church in Florence, South Carolina, and I'm your host for Be Transfigured Ministries.

Here at Be Transfigured, as we say, we invite you to live a new life in Christ. We feature our sermons and our Bible studies and other special events in the life of the Church. We do it to inspire you to join us in living a new life in Christ. I hope you'll join us.

I'll be back in a moment after this video to share some information about our ministry.

In this morning's Gospel, there is an interaction, a dialogue between Christ and the Samaritan woman and the line that Christ uses which is a wonderful inspiration for our “Ask Father Series” is in this dialogue Christ says to this woman, "If you knew who it was in front of you, you would ask him for a drink." and He invites the Samaritan woman whom by the way we know is Saint Photini.

Christ invites Saint Photini into a dialogue for the salvation of our souls, our souls. Christ knew we were going to read this, and so Christ is also inviting each and every one of you my brothers and sisters, if you knew the grace of God that was in the Church, you would ask the Church any of your questions and the Church would provide the blessed answer from 2000 years of life experience. Experience living a life in a relationship with Jesus Christ.

Today's questions, there's two questions, two simple yet very practical questions. The first one is a follow up to a topic we talked about a couple of years ago. I know that many of our young children, our teenagers and children go to private schools. There's a Catholic school here in town. There's an Episcopal school here in town.

One of our children asked me if it was okay to receive Holy Communion in that other Church, and I said, "No. It is not okay for us to receive Communion in a non-Orthodox Church."

Here's the answer. It isn't because we are afraid of strangers. It isn't because somehow we think we are superior to the other Churches. It's just that, as I mentioned a couple of years ago about Holy Communion, when we share Holy Communion with another person, the expression we use in the Church is in communion with. The Greek Orthodox Church is in communion with the Russian Orthodox Church and the Romanian Orthodox Church and the Bulgarian Orthodox Church.

There's 14 Churches throughout the world, Orthodox Churches and we are all in communion with each other. We can go to anyone of these Churches and receive Holy Communion. When we do that, it is a realization of the unity that exists between our Churches. Not just in the theology about the chalice.

I remember having a question from a grown man, he was in his 60s, several, several years ago and he saw all of our little babies coming up for Holy Communion and he was not an Orthodox Christian and he said, "Can you explain to me why you will allow those little babies who do not know anything about Jesus Christ to receive Holy Communion? But I'm in my 60s, I believe Christ is in that chalice. Why can't I receive Holy Communion?" I said, "Because we don't believe the same thing about Jesus Christ."

The Lutheran Church has a particular theology about Jesus Christ. The Baptist Church has a particular theology about Jesus Christ. The Episcopalian Church has a particular theology about Jesus Christ. The Roman Catholic Church, et cetera, et cetera.

Because we do not share the same understanding about Jesus Christ, we do not share the Holy Communion. It isn't a statement of judgment. A lot of people accuse us, "Well, that's not fair. You should be able to receive Holy Communion. That's not fair."

Life's not about being fair. It's about being in communion with God. When we go and visit other Churches or if we're in private schools and our schools have communion services, we sit back politely and we do not participate in the Holy Communion.

I know this is also not just private schools, but I know sometimes wedding services have Holy Communion as part of them in the other Christian Churches. Our responsibility as Orthodox Christians is to very respectfully sit in our pew or in our chair and allow the others to do what they do in their faith. If someone says, "Why didn't you come for Holy Communion? Don't you believe in Jesus?" "Yes, I believe in Jesus." "Well then why didn't you receive?"

That, just like this morning's Gospel, if we are knowledgeable enough about our faith, can open up a dialogue about what we believe about Jesus Christ.

I want to remind you as of 2012, that's four years ago, so it's probably higher now than it was then. As of 2012, Gordon-Conwell Seminary discovered there were 43,000 denominations of Christianity. 43,000 answers to the same question.

For those of you who are teachers, can you imagine answering a test with 43,000 different possible answers? It's impossible. Every question has only one answer. It is not possible if there's 43,000 different answers to the question, "Who is Jesus Christ?"

When the Church says, "We cannot receive Holy Communion." It is simply being honest. It's not being judgmental. It's simply being honest that we do not believe the same thing about Jesus Christ as the Roman Catholic Church, as the Episcopalian Church, as the Lutheran Church, et cetera, et cetera, et cetera.

I hope that understands that question. That is for when we visit other Churches and when other Churches visit us. It isn't judgment. It's just being honest.

Unfortunately, honesty is not a very widely spread practice in our society today. Everyone wants to say whatever the other person wants to hear rather than simply being honest.

Our second question is a little bit even more practical. Someone asked me to clarify how we as Orthodox Christians can bless each other. I know it's very common especially down here in the south to say, "God bless you." When we see each other. When we sneeze, "God bless you." Right? I was asked to clarify how we as Orthodox Christians can properly bless each other more than just the habitual saying, "God bless you."

I as Priest of course have a unique gift from the Church. Through the laying out of hands. Through the ordination. Through the ancient tradition of the Church. I have received the grace of the Holy Spirit to bless you and to bestow Christ's blessings upon people. You'll notice that I as the Priest or any Priest or Bishop, when we bless, we hold our hands in a particular way. It is an icon of the name of Jesus Christ, Ιησούς Χριστός , because that's not my blessing. It is God's blessings.

The clergy through ordination have received a special grace from the Holy Spirit to bestow the grace of God and to bless the people, and so during the various services of the Church, I come out, I bless the people and I say, "Peace be with you." What do you say? Oh! See. That was a pop quiz. What do you say? "And also with you." Right? Και το πνεύματί σου in the Greek. That is your way to ask God to bless me. As laypeople, you don't go like this like the Priest does. You simply ask God to bless.

The question is and part of the question that I was asked to answer this morning, "How do we bless our friends?" What is the appropriate Orthodox way to bless our friends?

For those of you who are not Priests, just like we bless ourselves. We hold our hand like this when we bless ourselves, "Father, Son, Holy Spirit, one God, fully God, fully man." We bless ourselves like this, "In the name of the Father, and the Son, and the Holy Spirit." That's what we do when we bless ourselves. Correct?

For you, the laity, when you want to bless other people, that's how you hold your hand and you say, "God bless you." or your food when you're sitting there at the table, "God bless our food."

Here is a unique thing now. When you see a Priest or a Bishop, it is not appropriate to say to a Priest or a Bishop, "God bless you." because the Priest and the Bishop, we have a responsibility to bless you. The appropriate interaction when we see a Priest or a Bishop is to ask to receive the blessing from the Priest or the Bishop because that is our unique responsibility in our relationship as a Church.

The laity have what they have to do. The Priests have what we have to do. These different roles have been established. These are nothing new. Saint Clement of Rome wrote 1,900 years ago. It's a long time ago. Saint Clement of Rome was writing to the Church in Corinth and he said that the clergy have their responsibilities and the laypeople have their responsibilities.

Unfortunately, I think there's a tendency in our society that we are so preoccupied with what we think is equality. That we seem to think that everyone is interchangeable in our society. I touched on this a little bit last week just with the gender question. It's not just about bathrooms. It's not just about marriage. It's about the family.

We are living in times where we are mislead to believe that individual people can be interchanged like they're not of any consequence. That has found its way even into our Churches. We have a relationship, clergy and laity together. We are not all laity. We are not all clergy. We are not all men. We are not all women. We are not all fathers. We are not all mothers. We all have our unique responsibility in the life of the Church.

I would suggest that anything in our society that encourages that there is no longer anything that distinguishes between men and women or anybody else in our society. It's a very dangerous thing, because equality has nothing to do with diversity.

God created man and woman in the world and he established in the Church clergy and laity. Different does not mean not equal. Just as a reminder, I cannot celebrate liturgy by myself. You cannot have liturgy without a Priest. Does that make us one more important than the other or does that make us equal in importance in the Church?

Do you see what I'm trying to express? Every time we see something that distracts from the truth of God's creation, we have to be careful. We have different roles to play in life, in our families, at work, among our society and here in the Church.

During the Divine Liturgy, we bless each other and that's built in to the worship of the Church and just as you bow to receive the blessing, I bow to receive the blessing when you ask God to bless me. Then we'll go out into the world, let's all bless our friends, in the name of the Father, and the Son, and you're going to bless your friends, in the name of the Father, and the Son, and the Holy Spirit. They are going to think, "What are you doing?" "I'm blessing you." "Wow! Thank you."

Our senior citizens were at the Swan Lake the other day for the Iris Festival. Two complete strangers came up to me, "Are you a Priest?" "Yeah." "Can you bless me?" and I said, "Of course, I can." What a beautiful opportunity that God's grace can come upon a complete stranger just because he saw me walking through the boardwalk there at the lake with the senior citizens.

Don't forget to turn in your questions, and we're going to spend our summer answering whether they are simple and practical. Whether they are deep theology. Whatever questions that are lingering in your minds about our faith. Turn them in so we can answer throughout the summertime. Christ is Risen!

I'm back and I hope this video was an inspiration to you. I hope it helps you live a new life in Christ. Please share our message of hope with your friends and family and invite others to live a new live in Christ.

Find more information about Be Transfigured Ministries by joining us on our website at liveanewlifeinchrist.org. You can also find many of our videos at the Orthodox Christian Network, our partners at myocn.com.

As we say at Be Transfigured, until next week, God bless you and don't forget to live a new life in Christ.

Be Transfigured is a production of the Transfiguration of Our Savior Greek Orthodox Church in Florence, South Carolina and presented by the Orthodox Christian Network. Contributions and support of this ministry may be sent to Be Transfigured 2990 South Cashua Drive Florence, South Carolina 29501 or online at our website at www.liveanewlifeinchrist.org.

It's time again for Questions and Answers!

Again this summer we will spend time answering questions submitted by parishioners (they get first choice) and friends of our ministry. We have dedicated an entire page to this annual series. Check out "Questions and Answers" in the menu above!

Bible Study for Monday, May 30, 2016

Since I was blessed to teach a Bible Study (originally LIVE STREAM via YouTube) on the Book of Acts inspired by the Homilies of Saint John Chrysostom from 400 CE, I am sharing these lessons each day during the Paschal Season which is when Chrysostom originally preached them. We eventually made substantial improvements to our sound system, so please be patient with occasional poor sound quality. Today’s Bible Study covers Acts 12.12-17. This Bible Study was originally streamed LIVE on Wednesday, May 27, 2015. Here is a study guide for the session.

 

Bible Study for Sunday, May 29, 2016

Since I was blessed to teach a Bible Study (originally LIVE STREAM via YouTube) on the Book of Acts inspired by the Homilies of Saint John Chrysostom from 400 CE, I am sharing these lessons each day during the Paschal Season which is when Chrysostom originally preached them. We eventually made substantial improvements to our sound system, so please be patient with occasional poor sound quality. Today’s Bible Study covers Acts 11.19-30. This Bible Study was originally streamed LIVE on Wednesday, April 29, 2015. Here is a study guide for the session.

 

Bible Study for Saturday, May 28, 2016

Since I was blessed to teach a Bible Study (originally LIVE STREAM via YouTube) on the Book of Acts inspired by the Homilies of Saint John Chrysostom from 400 CE, I am sharing these lessons each day during the Paschal Season which is when Chrysostom originally preached them. We eventually made substantial improvements to our sound system, so please be patient with occasional poor sound quality. Today’s Bible Study covers Acts 12.1-11. This Bible Study was originally streamed LIVE on Wednesday, May 20, 2015. Here is a study guide for the session.

 

Bible Study for Friday, May 27, 2016

Since I was blessed to teach a Bible Study (originally LIVE STREAM via YouTube) on the Book of Acts inspired by the Homilies of Saint John Chrysostom from 400 CE, I am sharing these lessons each day during the Paschal Season which is when Chrysostom originally preached them. We eventually made substantial improvements to our sound system, so please be patient with occasional poor sound quality. Today’s Bible Study covers Acts 10.44-11.10. This Bible Study was originally streamed LIVE on Wednesday, April 22, 2015. Here is a study guide for the session.

 

Bible Study for Thursday, May 26, 2016

Since I was blessed to teach a Bible Study (originally LIVE STREAM via YouTube) on the Book of Acts inspired by the Homilies of Saint John Chrysostom from 400 CE, I am sharing these lessons each day during the Paschal Season which is when Chrysostom originally preached them. We eventually made substantial improvements to our sound system, so please be patient with occasional poor sound quality. Today’s Bible Study covers Acts 10.34-43. This Bible Study was originally streamed LIVE on Wednesday, April 15, 2015. Here is a study guide for the session.

Bible Study for Tuesday, May 24, 2016

Since I was blessed to teach a Bible Study (originally LIVE STREAM via YouTube) on the Book of Acts inspired by the Homilies of Saint John Chrysostom from 400 CE, I am sharing these lessons each day during the Paschal Season which is when Chrysostom originally preached them. We eventually made substantial improvements to our sound system, so please be patient with occasional poor sound quality. Today’s Bible Study covers Acts 10.21-33. This Bible Study was originally streamed LIVE on Wednesday, April 15, 2015. Here is a study guide for the session.

 

It is about time we start listening to the Church and ignore the world

When it comes to our physical health we would never tolerate a doctor not being honest about a serious illness. But when it comes to our spiritual health, many would rather ignore or deny that our soul is suffering with serious illness. Like the paralytic found in John 5.1-15 who says, “I have no man to put me into the pool,” many of us try to go it alone by dragging ourselves along while the healing is right in front of our face. Christ healed the paralytic and He can heal our soul when we take full advantage of the life of the Church He has given to us. Just as a medical doctor prescribes treatment, the Church has a treatment available to heal our soul. One problem seems to stand in the way. The world continues to lie to us about how sick our soul really is. We wouldn’t allow our friends to convince us to ignore our doctor; why do we allow society to convince us to ignore the Church?

 

COMPLETE TRANSCRIPT:

Hello, my name is Father Athanasios Haros, and I'm the Pastor here at the Transfiguration of Our Savior Greek Orthodox Church in Florence, South Carolina, and I'm your host for Be Transfigured Ministries. Here at Be Transfigured, as we say, we invite you to live a new life in Christ. We feature our sermons and our Bible studies and other special events in the life of the Church. We do it to inspire you to join us living a new life in Christ. I'll hope you'll join us. I'll be back in a moment after this video to share some information about our ministry.

Just as if we were going to the doctor's office and we had done all of our blood work and we have gone through all of these different tests, and we're sitting and we're waiting in the doctor's office, and we're waiting to hear the detailed report from the doctor. Is our blood work okay? Is our heart okay? Is this okay? Is that okay? We sit there in the doctor's office paying very close attention to the doctor. That's the kind of attention I want you to give today to the Gospel, because just as we go to the doctor to hear about our physical illness, we come to the Church to hear about our spiritual illness. I'm going to say that again. Just as we go to the doctor to hear about our physical illness, we come to the Church to hear about our spiritual illness.

The reality is my brothers and sisters we are all sick. We are all very sick, and if we had gone to our physical doctor and we were very sick, and we went in and we sat in the office, and the doctor came and he sat down next to us, "Hello, how are you doing? How was your morning? How was your garden?" We would say, "Fine, thank you. Now, get to the important things." The doctor said, "Good to see you. Okay, I'll see you next time." We would want our money back, or at least maybe our insurance company would want their money back, but we wouldn't tolerate that kind of behavior from our doctor. We would not stand for it one moment. We would go find another doctor, because what doctor in his good reputation would sit us down in his office just to say hello and to send us on our way. We want to know what's wrong with us inside.

That's the kind of attention we have to give to this morning's Gospel and to the Church. We are here to hear about our souls. We are not here this morning my brothers and sisters simply to have a nice conversation, "Hello, how are you? How is your garden? We'll see you next week." The reality is we are sick. Our souls are very sick, and I would hope that you would want the Church to be as honest with you as you would want your doctors to be. I would hope for the glory of God that if the Church came to us and listed the various spiritual sicknesses that are affecting us, we would want the Church to be honest. We wouldn't want the Church to lie to us, just like we wouldn't want to go to the doctor and have the doctor know that we have a terminal disease. We don't want to go to the doctor and have the doctor not tell us that we're dying of cancer. We want to know what's wrong with us.

So my brothers and sisters, this morning I'm here to tell you our souls are very sick. I'm sorry, but that's the truth. We are not like the man in this morning's Gospel. For 38 years, he was sick and had no one to help him. The cure was there waiting for him. All he had to do was get into the Pool of Bethesda. At certain times of the year, the Holy Spirit would go and he would turn up the waters, and according to the tradition, the first person in the pool would be healed from whatever disease he had, and so for this man, for 38 years, the cure was right in front of him, but he said to the Lord, "I have no man to put me into the pool."

He was all alone. We are not alone. We have the Church. We don't have the excuse any longer to say, "We don't have anyone to help us get better," so I am going to work on the understanding that we want to get better. I am going to work on the understanding that we are here today to hear how our soul can be healed by God, deal? You don't have to answer because that's the understanding I'm going to have anyway.

Here's the deal, our soul is suffering, and the world around us is playing games with it. The world around us my brothers and sisters continues to tell us that our soul doesn't matter. The world around us continues to tell us that there's no relationship between our body and our soul. The world here to tell us that men can interchange with women and women could become men. This is a lie. It is an absolute lie my brothers and sisters that these things don't matter to our eternal soul. It's about time we start listening to the Church and ignoring what the world has to say.

We wouldn't go to our doctor who tells us and shows us the Cat Scans and shows us the MRIs and shows us the blood work, and he says, "Look, you have cancer of the liver, you have to do something," and then we go outside and we have a cup of coffee with our friends, "Don't worry about your liver. You don't need your liver." We wouldn't do that, but that's exactly what we do when we're talking about our soul. We ignore the advice of the Church. We ignore the diagnosis of the Church, and I understand, none of us wants to be sick. You go to your doctor's office on a regular visit, and you hope that the checkup is okay. You hope to hear everything is just fine, but as we get older, we know that more and more things are going to go wrong with us. Our bodies begin to wear out.

As Greeks we say, γεράμετα. We have old age. We have the things that are simply part of getting old, but when the doctor gives us advice, we listen to it. If the doctor says, "You have to start going to the gym," we go to the gym. If the doctor says, "You have to stop eating sugar," we stop eating sugar. If the doctor says, "You have to stop eating red meat," we stop eating red meat. We do everything the doctor tells us to do, and we do almost nothing the Church tells us to do. Why is that? Is it simply because we don't believe that we are sick? Okay, but sometimes we go to the doctor thinking we're healthy, and this is the case especially with women who have been blessed in their annual exams to discover very early that they might have cancer. The doctors will tell us even before the symptoms are there, if we can catch certain illnesses early enough, we can be cured from them.

There are even times we go to the doctor thinking we're not sick, and the doctor finds something hidden in there. The doctor says, "Thankfully we found it early, and we can go and get it taken care of." The same is true with our soul. Even though we may not think our soul is sick, my brothers and sisters, it is in a terminal condition. If we do not begin taking seriously the life that God has given us in the Church, and that is the therapy, that is the way of life, that is the medicine of our soul. If the doctor tells us to take pills, we take pills. The doctor says, "Get exercise," we get exercise. The doctor says, "Change your way of life," we change our way of life.

The Church is telling us this morning my brothers and sisters all those same things. The first question that Christ asked the paralyzed man, 38 years he had been sick, Jesus says, "Well, do you want to be healed?" As if Christ is challenging the man. 38 years, you haven't done anything about this. Are you sure you want to be healed? Then once he is healed, Christ says, "Go sin no more, lest something even worse happens to you," and so we merely reiterate Christ's question this morning. My brothers and sisters, do you want your soul to be healed?

If you do, it's time to listen to the Church, and this is what the Church has to say. The way of life that has been going on for 2,000 years in the Church, fasting every Wednesday and Friday. If we're not even trying this, my brothers and sisters, we are ignoring the medicine and the therapy of the Church. The Sacramental Life, Holy Confession, Holy Communion, this is the therapy and medicine of the Church. If we are not participating, if we are not taking advantage of the Sacramental Life of the Church, we are ignoring the therapy and our soul continues to get more and more sick, the way of life of the Church, taking care of the poor, living a holy life.

Unfortunately, many of us struggle with greed and selfishness. The poor can take care of themselves. I did it, they can do it. Nobody helped me, why should I help them? Those lazy good-for-nothings, let them get up their feet and get a job. All of these answers my brothers and sisters is ignoring the therapy of the Church. Those answers are not helping our soul. Ultimately, coming to Church as often as we can, participating in all of the services of the Church not just Divine Liturgy once a month or once every couple months, but Divine Liturgy every Sunday, Orthros, Paraklesis, Great Vespers, the Blessing of the Waters that we celebrate most months on the First of the month.

The services of the Church my brothers and sisters is the therapy for our soul, and we wonder sometimes why we struggle with depression. We wonder why we struggle with anxiety. We wonder why we struggle with these struggles, because God is not a real part of our life. We are like this man thinking that we can simply drag ourselves along and we're thinking we're going to get better, but we need God, and God has given us His Church, and so brothers and sisters, we are in this wonderful Pascha season and we are greeting each other with Christos Anesti, Christ is Risen! In this greeting, it's supposed to bring us joy and hope that the sickness and the struggles of the world have been conquered once and for all.

We don't have to sit by the pool and drag ourselves along. We can be made better by God, but we have to cooperate with him. We have to take advantage of the tools that he has given us in his Church, and so my challenge for you this morning my brothers and sisters, summer is coming, I know some of you are planning to travel to Greece. I know when you're there, you're going to have Churches there to go to, but for those of us who are still here, don't take the summer off from Church. If it's Sunday morning, be in Church on time, and if you just start there, making a commitment to God and to yourself, if it is Sunday morning, I am going to be in Church unless I am physically ill or unless something is completely beyond my control.

If we're not willing to make that level of a commitment for our soul, then it's like telling the doctor, "Don't worry doc, I think I know how to deal with this cancer thing myself. I don't have to worry about your therapy." We wouldn't do it with our bodies, and I'm asking you that we don't do it any longer with our soul. We owe it to our soul to give it the attention that it needs so we can be cured by God as well. Christos Anesti! Christ is Risen! Christos Voskrese! Christos a Inviat! Chistos Anesti!

Well, I'm back, and I hope this video was an inspiration to you. I hope it helps you live a new life in Christ. Please share our message of hope with your friends and family, and invite others to live a new life in Christ. Find more information about Be Transfigured Ministries by joining us on our website at LiveANewLifeInChrist.org. You can also find many of our videos on the Orthodox Christian Network, our partners at MyOCN.net. As we say at Be Transfigured, until next week, God bless you and don't forget a new life in Christ.

Be Transfigured is a production of the Transfiguration of Our Savior Greek Orthodox Church in Florence, South Carolina and presented by the Orthodox Christian Network. Contributions in support of this ministry may be sent to Be Transfigured 2990 South Cashua Drive, Florence, South Carolina 29501 or online at our website at www.LiveANewLifeInChrist.org.

Bible Study for Monday, May 23, 2016

Since I was blessed to teach a Bible Study (originally LIVE STREAM via YouTube) on the Book of Acts inspired by the Homilies of Saint John Chrysostom from 400 CE, I am sharing these lessons each day during the Paschal Season which is when Chrysostom originally preached them. We eventually made substantial improvements to our sound system, so please be patient with occasional poor sound quality. Today’s Bible Study covers Acts 10.1-16. This Bible Study was originally streamed LIVE on Wednesday, April 1, 2015. Here is a study guide for the session.

 

The Most Dangerous Illness is a Hidden Illness

When we visit the doctor for our regular check-up we expect to hear the doctor tell us about our blood results and any other possible problems that might indicate some sort of illness. But what if our doctor hid our illness from us? What if our doctor knew there were serious complications with our blood work, but refused to share this information with us? Or worse....What if our doctor knew there were serious complications with our blood work, but told us it was normal and we shouldn’t bother trying to change our eating habits and lifestyle? If this happened to us in our doctor’s office, we would be furious!

But this is exactly what is happening in our contemporary society, not physically but spiritually. Every day we go about our routine with spiritual illnesses, but when many either hide our illnesses from us or try to make us believe our illness is normal and there is nothing to worry about, instead of being furious we are thankful. Yet, when we are unaware of a serious physical illness our anger is a result of admitting we would have been willing to change our behavior if someone had only told us before it was too late. But when we find out too late to change, and the illness has overtaken us, we are filled with regret and anger that someone should have told us!

On this Fourth Sunday of Pascha, the Church calls our attention to the healing of the paralytic. “Sir I have no man,” was the voice of regret in the face of illness. Unlike the paralytic we are not alone in our illness. We have the Church to help diagnose our illness, and then to help find the cure. But there remains one final obstacle....many of us listen to the society which is telling us we are not sick, and keeps our spiritual illness hidden from us. Christ was able to heal the paralytic because his illness was not hidden. We cannot be healed if our illness remains hidden, or worse......ignored.

Bible Study for Sunday, May 22, 2016

Since I was blessed to teach a Bible Study (originally LIVE STREAM via YouTube) on the Book of Acts inspired by the Homilies of Saint John Chrysostom from 400 CE, I am sharing these lessons each day during the Paschal Season which is when Chrysostom originally preached them. We eventually made substantial improvements to our sound system, so please be patient with occasional poor sound quality. Today’s Bible Study covers Acts 9.32-42. This Bible Study was originally streamed LIVE on Wednesday, March 25, 2015. Here is a study guide for the session.

 

Bible Study for Saturday, May 21, 2016

Since I was blessed to teach a Bible Study (originally LIVE STREAM via YouTube) on the Book of Acts inspired by the Homilies of Saint John Chrysostom from 400 CE, I am sharing these lessons each day during the Paschal Season which is when Chrysostom originally preached them. We eventually made substantial improvements to our sound system, so please be patient with occasional poor sound quality. Today’s Bible Study covers Acts 12.1, 12-20. This Bible Study was originally streamed LIVE on Wednesday, May 4, 2016. Here is a study guide for the session.

 

Bible Study for Friday, May 20, 2016

Since I was blessed to teach a Bible Study (originally LIVE STREAM via YouTube) on the Book of Acts inspired by the Homilies of Saint John Chrysostom from 400 CE, I am sharing these lessons each day during the Paschal Season which is when Chrysostom originally preached them. We eventually made substantial improvements to our sound system, so please be patient with occasional poor sound quality. Today’s Bible Study covers Acts 9.1-19. This Bible Study is covered in TWO sessions originally streamed LIVE on Wednesday, March 4, 2015, and Wednesday, March 18, 2015. Here is a study guide for the March 4th session. Here is a study guide for the March 18th session.

Bible Study for Thursday, May 19, 2016

Since I was blessed to teach a Bible Study (originally LIVE STREAM via YouTube) on the Book of Acts inspired by the Homilies of Saint John Chrysostom from 400 CE, I am sharing these lessons each day during the Paschal Season which is when Chrysostom originally preached them. We eventually made substantial improvements to our sound system, so please be patient with occasional poor sound quality. Today’s Bible Study covers Acts 8.26-39. This Bible Study originally streamed LIVE on Wednesday, March 4, 2015. Here is a study guide for the session.

 

Bible Study for Wednesday, May 18, 2016

Since I was blessed to teach a Bible Study (originally LIVE STREAM via YouTube) on the Book of Acts inspired by the Homilies of Saint John Chrysostom from 400 CE, I am sharing these lessons each day during the Paschal Season which is when Chrysostom originally preached them. We eventually made substantial improvements to our sound system, so please be patient with occasional poor sound quality. Today’s Bible Study covers Acts 8.18-24. This Bible Study originally streamed LIVE on Wednesday, February 11, 2015. Here is a study guide for the session. (This is a repeat from yesterday’s post) 

Bible Study for Tuesday, May 17, 2016

Since I was blessed to teach a Bible Study (originally LIVE STREAM via YouTube) on the Book of Acts inspired by the Homilies of Saint John Chrysostom from 400 CE, I am sharing these lessons each day during the Paschal Season which is when Chrysostom originally preached them. We eventually made substantial improvements to our sound system, so please be patient with occasional poor sound quality. Today’s Bible Study covers Acts 8.5-17. This Bible Study originally streamed LIVE on Wednesday, February 11, 2015. Here is a study guide for the session.

 

Bible Study for Monday, May 16, 2016

Since I was blessed to teach a Bible Study (originally LIVE STREAM via YouTube) on the Book of Acts inspired by the Homilies of Saint John Chrysostom from 400 CE, I am sharing these lessons each day during the Paschal Season which is when Chrysostom originally preached them. We eventually made substantial improvements to our sound system, so please be patient with occasional poor sound quality. Today’s Bible Study covers Acts 6.8-7.5. This Bible Study originally streamed LIVE on Wednesday, January 21, 2015. Here is a study guide for the session.

 

Bible Study for Sunday, May 15, 2016

Since I was blessed to teach a Bible Study (originally LIVE STREAM via YouTube) on the Book of Acts inspired by the Homilies of Saint John Chrysostom from 400 CE, I am sharing these lessons each day during the Paschal Season which is when Chrysostom originally preached them. We eventually made substantial improvements to our sound system, so please be patient with occasional poor sound quality. Today’s Bible Study covers Acts 6.1-7. This Bible Study originally streamed LIVE on Wednesday, January 14, 2015. Here is a study guide for the session.