The Lives of the Saints
1. VENERABLE MAXIMUS THE CONFESSOR
Maximus was a native of Constantinople and at first a high courtier at the court of Emperor Heraclius, and afterward a monk and abbot of a monastery not far from the capital. The greatest defender of Orthodoxy against the so-called monothelite heresy, which hatched from the heresy of Eutyches. Namely: just as Eutyches asserted that in Christ there is one nature, so the monothelites asserted that in Christ there is one will. Maximus opposed this assertion and found himself as an opponent of both emperor and patriarch. But he did not become afraid, but persevered to the end in proving that in the Lord there were two wills as well as two natures. Through his efforts one council was held in Carthage and another in Rome, and both these councils anathematized the teaching of the monothelites. The suffering of Maximus for Orthodoxy cannot be described: tortured by princes, deceived by prelates, spat upon by the masses of people, beaten by soldiers, persecuted, imprisoned, until finally, with his tongue and hand cut off, he was sentenced to lifelong exile in the Scythian land, where he spent three years in prison, and gave his soul to God, in the year 666.
2. BLESSED MAXIMUS THE GREEK
Maximus was born in Greece, from where he was summoned to the court of the Russian tsar Basil Ivanovich as royal librarian and translator. He worked much, but also suffered much for the truth. He spent a long time in prison where he wrote the famous canon to the Holy Spirit, which is still used in the church. He reposed in the Lord in the year 1556.
3. HOLY MARTYR NEOPHYTUS
Neophytus was a native of Nicaea. While still a child he worked great miracles by God's grace. He brought forth water from stone, resurrected his dead mother. Led by a white dove to Mount Olympus where he drove a lion out of a cave and settled inside. Martyred for Christ in his fifteenth year, in the time of Emperor Diocletian, in Nicaea. He would not renounce Christ in any way. After beating and imprisonment he was thrown into fire, but God preserved him alive. Then they placed him before a hungry lion, but the lion fawned around Neophytus. The saint recognized in that lion the very same one in whose cave he had practiced asceticism, so he petted it and ordered it to go again to its cave. Then they pierced Neophytus with a spear and his soul departed to the Lord's mansions.
4. HOLY MARTYR AGNES
Agnes was a thirteen-year-old girl, for faith in Christ thrown into fire and then beheaded with a sword. She manifested great wonderworking power in life and after death. She suffered in the time of Diocletian, in the year 305.
Hymn of Praise
The abyss of space burst forth on all sides:
Earth like a trunk of stellar cities,
But like a black trunk with golden fruit—
Thus the black earth with the starry vault.
Invisible branches earth extends silently,
On the branches stars—golden apples.
O what wondrous fruit at what a bargain,
That God's mercy gave to the black earth!
And man too is earth, of earthly body,
On his vault are stars—these are good deeds,
His thoughts are long, to the world's end they ride—
Invisible branches—their peaks are stars!
Fruit! fruit the Lord seeks from created people.
By fruit alone does human life judge.
When death shakes the tree, may the golden apples
Of your life fall into God's hands!
Then you will be able to say: "I was not in vain—
For a beautiful reality I dreamed an ugly dream!"
“When death shakes the tree, may the golden apples of your life fall into God's hands!”
Reflection
The Christian faith alone in the world has one definite and never changing measure of value. How it measures and categorizes values, Saint Chrysostom speaks clearly about this: "There are," he says, "three kinds of things: some are good and cannot be evil, such as: chastity, almsgiving and the like; others are evil and can never be good, such as debauchery, inhumanity, cruelty; the third become now this, now that, depending on the disposition of those who use them." And then this divine teacher explains how both wealth and poverty, and freedom and slavery, and power and illness, and even death itself, belong to these middle things, which in themselves are neither good nor evil, but become this or that according to the disposition of people and according to the use which people make of them. For if, for example, wealth were good and poverty evil, then all rich people would be good and all poor people evil: however, we are daily convinced that just as there are good and evil rich people, so there are good and evil poor people. The same can be applied to the healthy and the sick, the free and the captive, the satisfied and the hungry, those who are in power and the subordinate. Even death is not evil for "the martyrs by death became happier than all."
“Even death is not evil for the martyrs by death became happier than all.”
Contemplation
Contemplate the Lord Jesus as a city on a hill, namely:
1. As a city on the hill of highest Zion, that is, above the created world, in the kingdom of eternity;
2. As a city on the hill of human history;
3. As a city on the hill of my own life, that is, at the summit of my ideals, at the zenith of my thoughts and longings.
Homily
on understanding through doing
Whosoever willeth to do His (God's) will, he shall know whether the teaching is from God (John 7:17)
Little is gained by proving with human logic and words that Christ's teaching is from God. The quickest and most reliable way to discover its truth is in doing God's will as Christ revealed and manifested it. Whoever does will also know. If you weep for God's sake, you will know what comfort God is. If you become merciful, you will know God's mercy. If you build peace, you will know how befitting it is for you to be called a son of God. If you forgive people, you will know how God forgives you.
Never can anyone know that Christ's teaching is from God except one who does God's will. For only doing God's will, that is, fulfilling God's commandments, is the key to unlocking Paradise, in which God is seen. This is the key to understanding Holy Scripture and all the mysteries of Revelation.
Saint Basil writes: "Purity of life is necessary for us to know that which is hidden in Holy Scripture."
What else does the Lord want from us when He teaches us that through doing His will we come to knowledge of the divinity of His teaching? He simply wants us to be convinced by deed of the divinity of His teaching. He does not desires that we be convinced in an easy manner, but rather a harder manner, not only by hearing but also by doing, because whoever is convinced in an easy manner is more easily shaken and unconvinced, and whoever is convinced in a harder manner is with difficulty shaken and unconvinced. Therefore, brethren, let us strive to do God's will, that we may know God and save our soul.
O Lord all-wise, help us by the power of Thy Holy Spirit to do Thy holy will. To Thee be glory and praise forever. Amen.
“Whoever does will also know.”