Second Sunday after Pentecost

Peter H. Davids

Byzantine Catholic Homilies • Sermon • Submitted 2 years ago

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Our texts tell us that our obedience to God, to Jesus, is more critical than what we believe about him. Believing that may be subjective without results, but believing in results in obedience, with or without full knowledge. And that is what God sees and declares us righteous.

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The Holy Apostle Jude, Brother of the Lord

Ambon Prayer 69

Title

Obedience is better than Worship

Outline

We use the term “believe” (or “faith”) too easily

It is usually “believe that” or “faith that” meaning a rational commitment to something as true

But typically it is true without evidence, without argument that it accords to objective reality - it is subjective truth, true for me, and how dare anyone negate me by questioning it.

And since it is true for me how it effects my life is up to me. In fact, I may be passionate about it, but it may make no practical difference to how I live my life.

Often religion is put into this category. I believe that this or that religious idea is true. But how I actualize that in my life is up to me. I may be happy just to enjoy a good feeling or to enjoy a certain ritual.

That is not what belief means in the Scriptures - it means believe in, commit to a person and to accept his teaching as an objective description of reality and thus to pattern one’s life by obedience to that teaching, that person’s word.

Romans - and the Letter of Jude - refers to the teaching of the Torah

This narrative is the narrative of a people who are God’s people and these obedient actions place one in and keep one in that people. It starts with circumcision, continues with Sabbath observance and the rules of Kashrut (which makes time and food sacred), and comes to a pinnacle in making God one’s highest good (“loving God”). Some specific rules of behavior describe what this meant in practice. Jews were people who had made the narrative their narrative by following the practices described in the teaching.

Paul tosses in a twist: it is not the hearers who are righteous or just before God, not even hearers who agree that it is all true, but those who actually obey, who are committed enough to do it. What is more, one’s ethnic identity does not matter so long as one lives according to God’s Torah. It does not even matter if one consciously knows the Torah, so long as one lives it, since God has “carved it on a person’s heart.”

It will all show up “on that day when, according to my gospel, God judges the secrets of men by Christ Jesus.”

Jesus brings it down to brass tacks

He is walking on the seashore, sees two men using cast nets, calls them to follow him - be in his company, go where he went, lived as he lived, and absorb his teaching, whether spoken or lived. I am not sure that they even understood the “fishers of men” saying at this point. They drop their nets on the shore and follow. How do we know that they believed in not just believed that? They obeyed.

Likewise Jesus, walking along, sees two more men in a boat with their father cleaning nets. “Follow me.” They say, “See you later, Dad.” They climb out of the boat. They follow. This in a culture in which family was everything. They commit to a new family.

And as they follow Jesus around Galilee they hear and see his teaching: “teaching in their synagogues and preaching the gospel of the kingdom and healing every disease and every infirmity among the people.” They also experience how he eats and sleeps and trusts God for provision and whether he is ever irritable.

Brothers and sisters, this is what Jude is calling us to

The angels who fell had a much deep knowledge of God than we and the Israelites who died in the wilderness had witnessed more miracles. They had the right ideas, but the wrong practice.

Our passages continually call us, as do the venerable holy fathers of the Church, to right practice: God as our highest good, living like Jesus, living a life of trust in God, etc. They do this on the basis of the narrative which Jesus is living out and the truths about him that we have heard which result in commitment to him - we believe in.

That is what makes us righteous before God: a commitment to obedience based on the objective truths that we know. Often we obey first and later grasp the truths - and some people never do or are not able in this life.

I love to worship, I love the Divine Liturgy, I love devotions, for they express my commitment to Jesus as my God and the highest good. But the bottom line is what he would say to me: “Do you love me? Keep my commandments.” Or, as in our narrative, “Let’s see if you really believe: drop everything and follow me.”

Readings

Byzantine Lectionary (Revised Julian) 6-26-2022: Second Sunday after Pentecost

EPISTLE

Romans 2:10–16

10 but glory and honor and peace for every one who does good, the Jew first and also the Greek. 11 For God shows no partiality.

12 All who have sinned without the law will also perish without the law, and all who have sinned under the law will be judged by the law. 13 For it is not the hearers of the law who are righteous before God, but the doers of the law who will be justified. 14 When Gentiles who have not the law do by nature what the law requires, they are a law to themselves, even though they do not have the law. 15 They show that what the law requires is written on their hearts, while their conscience also bears witness and their conflicting thoughts accuse or perhaps excuse them 16 on that day when, according to my gospel, God judges the secrets of men by Christ Jesus.

Byzantine Lectionary (Revised Julian) 6-26-2022: Second Sunday after Pentecost

GOSPEL

Matthew 4:18–23

18 As he walked by the Sea of Galilee, he saw two brothers, Simon who is called Peter and Andrew his brother, casting a net into the sea; for they were fishermen. 19 And he said to them, “Follow me, and I will make you fishers of men.” 20 Immediately they left their nets and followed him. 21 And going on from there he saw two other brothers, James the son of Zebedee and John his brother, in the boat with Zebedee their father, mending their nets, and he called them. 22 Immediately they left the boat and their father, and followed him.

23 And he went about all Galilee, teaching in their synagogues and preaching the gospel of the kingdom and healing every disease and every infirmity among the people.

Notes

Byzantine Lectionary (Revised Julian) (6-19-2022: Second Sunday after Pentecost)

SUNDAY, JUNE 19, 2022 | OCTOECHOS

Byzantine Lectionary (Revised Julian) 6-26-2022: Second Sunday after Pentecost

SECOND SUNDAY AFTER PENTECOST

Bright Vestments

Matins Gospel Mark 16:1–8

Epistle Romans 2:10–16

Gospel Matthew 4:18–23

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