The Lives of the Saints
1. THE HOLY MARTYR ISIDORE
In the time of the reign of Decius, this Isidore was taken by force from the island of Chios into the army. From his youth he held to the faith of Christ and spent his life in fasting, prayer, and good deeds. When he was discovered in the army to be a Christian, the commander took him for questioning and counseled him to renounce Christ and offer sacrifices to the idols. The saint answered: "Even if thou shouldst slay my body, thou hast no power over my soul. I have the true and living God, Jesus Christ, Who even now lives in me and after my death will be with me; and I am in Him, and I shall remain His, and I shall not cease to confess His holy name so long as the spirit is in my body." The commander ordered that Isidore first be beaten with ox sinews, and then they cut out his tongue. But even without a tongue, Isidore by the Spirit of God spoke and confessed the name of Christ. Meanwhile, the punishment of God overtook the commander, and he was suddenly struck dumb. The mute commander at last gave the sign for Isidore to be beheaded. And Isidore rejoiced at this sentence and, praising God, went out to the place of execution, where his head was cut off in the year 251. His companion Amonius buried his body, but for this he himself also suffered and received the crown of martyrdom.
2. THE VENERABLE SERAPION THE SINDONITE
Sindon means a strip of cloth. This saint was called the Sindonite because he concealed his bodily nakedness with only a strip of cloth. In his hand he carried the Gospel. Serapion lived like a bird, without a roof and without a care, passing from one place to another. He gave his sindon to a poor man who was shivering in the cold, and he himself remained completely naked. When someone asked him: "Serapion, who stripped thee?" he pointed to the Gospel and said: "This!" But afterward he gave even the Gospel to ransom a certain debtor, whom his creditor was driving into prison for debt. Once in Athens he ate nothing for four days, for he had nothing, and he began to cry out from hunger. When the Athenian philosophers asked him why he was crying out, he answered: "I was indebted to three creditors; two I have satisfied, but the third still torments me. The first creditor is bodily lust, which tormented me from my youth; the second is love of money, and the third is the stomach. The first two have left me, but this third still torments me." The philosophers gave him a gold coin to buy bread. He went to the baker, took only one loaf of bread, left the entire gold coin, and departed. In old age he peacefully reposed in the Lord in the fifth century.
3. THE BLESSED ISIDORE THE FOOL-FOR-CHRIST
A German by origin. Having come to Rostov, he fell in love with the Orthodox faith, and not only became a member of the Orthodox Church but took upon himself the difficult struggle of foolishness for Christ. He spent his nights in a hut of branches which he himself had made in a certain marsh. Great and awesome miracles this saint showed both during his life and after his death. To a certain merchant who had been cast out of his boat and was drowning in the sea, Isidore appeared walking on the water and brought him to shore. In the house of the Prince of Rostov, all the vessels of wine suddenly dried up when his servants drove Isidore from the gates and did not give him even the cup of water he had asked for. When he died on May 14, 1484, in his hut, all of Rostov was filled with a wondrous fragrance. That merchant whom the Blessed One had saved at sea built a church for him on the site where his hut had been.
“I have the true and living God, Jesus Christ, Who even now lives in me and after my death will be with me.”
Hymn of Praise
Blessed Isidore wrestled with himself
Until, passionless, he became like a dry tree,
But even a dry tree the bees fill with honey,
And from a dry rock a spring sometimes bursts forth.
The body of the blessed one, filled with the Spirit,
His heart sweetened with the honey of grace.
A fountain of God's power in a foolish body,
Hidden treasure in wretched garments.
The wondrous Isidore lay upon the dung heap,
Through the streets he cried, and leapt, and ran,
Without roof or bread or any friend,
But under the watchful eye of his Creator.
He was a lesson to vain men
And a reproach to those bound to the earth like beasts:
By his life he seemed to say:
— O people, your cares lead you to misery.
Happy is not the one who steals what is God's,
But the one who possesses God Himself as treasure.
“Happy is not the one who steals what is God's, but the one who possesses God Himself as treasure.”
Reflection
A sin that serves as a stumbling block to others is a double sin. A prudent man strives not to scandalize anyone by his sinful example or lead them into sin. Saint Ambrose praises such prudence in the early-departed Emperor Valentinian, citing these examples from his life: "When the emperor heard that it was said throughout Rome that he was a passionate hunter and a lover of wild animals — which he in fact was not — and that this passion was drawing the emperor away from affairs of state, he immediately ordered that all the wild animals in his garden be slain. When he heard again that certain malicious persons were spreading a rumor about him, that he ate lunch early (intending thereby to portray him as a glutton), he imposed upon himself a very strict fast, both privately and publicly. At public meals he was seldom seen to put a morsel into his mouth. When again his sisters quarreled with a certain man over some property, the emperor, though he had the right to decide the dispute himself, referred the matter to a public court, so that he might not be accused of partiality." — Truly this pious emperor kept the word of the Lord with great fear: Woe to him that shall scandalize one of these little ones.
Contemplation
Contemplate the action of God the Holy Spirit upon the Apostles, namely:
1. How the Holy Spirit leads the Apostles through all afflictions and torments, filling their hearts with consolation and joy,
2. How the Holy Spirit causes the seed of the Gospel, which the Apostles sow throughout the world, to grow and prosper, even where it seems to have been cast in vain.
Homily
On Christ as the Branch of David
In those days, and at that time, will I cause the Branch of righteousness to grow up unto David; and He shall execute judgment and righteousness in the land (Jer. 33:15)
With these words the holy Prophet Jeremiah foretells the coming of the Savior of the world from the tribe of David. The Branch of righteousness is the Lord Jesus Christ Himself. These words can refer to no other, since at the time of the coming of the Lord Jesus, on the throne of Jerusalem there sat no longer a prince from the tribe of David but a foreigner, Herod the Idumean. Nor from that time to the present has there been any other notable branch of David, either as a worldly ruler or as a spiritual ruler. At the time of Christ's birth there were only a few persons remaining from the tribe of David, and these were insignificant and impoverished. Among them were numbered both the Most Holy Virgin and the righteous elder Joseph the carpenter. It is clear, then, that in the thousands of years that have passed since this prophecy was uttered, no other magnificent branch from the tribe of David has appeared except the Lord Jesus Himself. This becomes still clearer from the following words: As the host of heaven cannot be numbered, neither the sand of the sea measured: so will I multiply the seed of David my servant, and the Levites that minister unto me. These words can refer only to the spiritual descendants of David through Christ the Lord, that is, to Christians, for only the number of Christians (and by no means the bodily descendants of David, of whom there are none at all) over these twenty centuries can be measured against the stars in the sky and the sand in the sea.
O my brethren, let us rejoice that we Christians too belong to this innumerable people of God, the greatest people in the history of the world, both in number and in character. Let us rejoice still more that we too belong to this divine Branch of David, Who by His Blood has redeemed us from the stranger, adopted us, and made us heirs and co-heirs of the everlasting Kingdom. O most gracious Lord, Thou hast delivered us, Thy prodigal sons, from the degradation and starvation of the swineherds, and hast made us sons of the King. To Thee be glory and praise forever. Amen.