Orthodixie

Houston is known for its hospitals. Like, say, Texas Medical Center. Hospitals have elevators. Houston has lots of — many, many, many — elevators.

In the past year, I have become a quick study of elevator-ology. Assuming it’s all spiritual warfare, please pardon my diversion to and fro a few floors of logic here — perhaps even a good word or two — while I speak of elevators.

Push the button, up or down. And wait. Sometimes you wait a long

long

Long

time …

to go a couple floors.

That’s if you’re lucky.

Actually, if you’re lucky …

You might even know WHERE you’re going — And get there in good time.

LADIES AND GENTLEMEN! WE HAVE A WINNER!

Many times, if you’re like me, you’re just winging your way through most of this chaos and, thank God and an over-worked Guardian Angel, you eventually make your destination.

Diversion …

Back in North Carolina, for 8 years, I volunteered at a local Roman Catholic hospital. This meant that once a month I called on the new, critical, and recommended patients for eight hours. It was a small enough place that I got to know my way around. But, every now and then, I’d have a seemingly long and panic-laden dream wherein I was lost in the bowels of an infinitely large hospital … and no matter my mapping, moving, and moping … I was hopelessly lost.

Till I awoke, that is. That’s the way the dream always ended, with me waking. That hospital wasn’t that big so, hey, just a bad dream.

Aha!

Come back with me to the present moment; a few days ago.
The dream, cleaned up and real, was — well — real.

I thought I was on a certain floor and I pushed the elevator car’s button accordingly. This took me to a very nice floor, which was wrong nonetheless. Not knowing of my error I wondered around for a few minutes, muttering to myself and looking for a friendly face — any face — to no avail. I finally twisted my way back to the elevator and there met a man who, upon inquiry, drove home the fact that I was on the WRONG floor. Well … yeah! Of course! (It was all so bizarre I wondered if HE were an angel.)

When I finally arrived at the correct one, I hit the floor running. No probs, mate.

But, I remembered the dream. And, upon entering my destination — the room of a young parishioner — I related my experience, and the dream, to the parishioner’s mom. Which led to her telling me of one of her dreams — which also involved elevators and hospitals.

Friends, this brings us back, full circle, to the point where you started reading this poor blog post titled, “Elevator-ology.”

[One more diversion … As you probably know, I rarely turn on the TV. But, the other night I did. I poked around to T. D. Jakes (who really can be fine entertainment) and my 4-year old princess, Helen, said: “Dad, he said ‘God’ — this is a show about God!” Affirming her, she and I watched for about 5 minutes till she suddenly hopped up and said, “Sorry, Dad … I’ve got to get away from all this yelling.” Ha! ]

Anyway.

Elevators.

Sometimes, you push the button (let’s say the DOWN button) and you wait. You stare. You speak to passers-by. You move out of the way when the UP car releases passengers …

Now, friends, here is where you might make your first mistake. The elevator may change from UP to DOWN in the same instant. And, if not paying attention, you may miss your flight. Worse still, others may decide to jump on it at the last minute thereby doubling your discomfort about yourself and your place in this, oh, planet.

Fools.

You, of course, hate fools. Those are the ones that hop on the elevator — whichever, UP or DOWN, direction it’s heading — deciding any direction is better than none. You know the ones, they beckon you to join them justifying it by saying, “Oh, we’ll just ride it down and it’ll come back up!” (Yes. Well, duh!)

Then again, even fools are right every now and then.

(Don’t that make you mad?)

So, anyway, you stand there and wait for the LIGHT or the DING or BOTH. (I’ve even waited so long that the LIGHT and DING didn’t register, among multiple doors, and therefore, missing BOTH, I was the fool who missed the car either way! It’s really bad when those who rode it down come back up and stare at you missing the car again. Anyway …)

The theology part.

Sometimes we are tempted to get on the full car, much like the one pictured above, knowing full well that we should wait and be patient. Sometimes we, foolishly, decide to go DOWN a while assuming we’ll be going UP again soon. This is a waste of time. At other times, we miss our opportunity to get on board due to lack of attention, distractions. Then there’s the awful mistake of relying on others … “Fourth floor, please” … to do the right thing (punch the button) for us. Gee, can that ever be frustrating! Etc.

If you read the above paragraph within the context of our spiritual quest, you get the picture.

Till this point I’ve failed to mention one scenario that happens:

You — even a group of people — stand there waiting on an elevator car only to realize, after 5-10 minutes, that no one has even pushed a button.

In short, when it comes to salvation, it’s best to plan your destination, ask assistance of qualified guides, don’t waste time, prepare accordingly and …

well …

just take the stairs.

Part One
Part Two
Part Three

In this, our final model on the nature of the Church, we visit the Fourth Gospel, that of St John the Evangelist. This Gospel, due to its doctrinal teachings, is considered the First Gospel (in honour) by the Orthodox Church. Herein we read:

Now Thomas, called the Twin, one of the twelve, was not with them when Jesus came. The other disciples therefore said to him, “We have seen the Lord.” So he said to them, “Unless I see in His hands the print of the nails, and put my finger into the print of the nails, and put my hand in His side, I will not believe.” And after eight days His disciples were again inside, and Thomas with them. Jesus came, the doors being shut, and stood in the midst, and said, “Peace to you!” Then He said to Thomas, “Reach your finger here, and look at My hands and reach your hand here, and put it into My side. Do not be unbelieving, but believing.” And Thomas answered and said to Him, “My Lord and my God!” Jesus said to him, “Thomas, because you have seen Me, you have believed. Blessed are those who have not seen and yet have believed.” [John 20:24-29]

Why did Thomas not see the Risen Lord when the others did? Because he was not part of the assembly — the Church! We must be part of the Church to experience the Risen Lord. It is in the Church that we not only see, but partake of the Lord’s Body. By partaking of the Body, we grow in the likeness of the Body. How do we see God? Our Lord Himself, in the Beatitudes, says “Blessed are the pure in heart for they shall see God.” Our hearts are purified by the Sacrament of Confession which culminates in the partaking of the Lord’s precious Body and Blood. We long to experience the Risen Lord in our lives. At times we, like Thomas, are perhaps cut off from seeing God in our lives by our hardness of heart. The remedy, as Thomas found out, is to be (re)united with the Body of believers through participation in the life of the Church. The Church is the Lord’s Body. For us to experience the Body, we must be part of it. For us to experience the Resurrection, we must be part of it! We are part of the Body and the Resurrection of Christ through Repentance (Confession), Baptism & Communion.

We find this definition in the Orthodox Study Bible:

CHURCH: The faithful are called out of the world to be the Church the body of Christ, the Bride of Christ, the New Israel, the ark of salvation, the assembly of the faithful. Through the Church, Christians are united to Christ and to each other. In this community, the believer receives the grace of God through the sacraments and hears the truth of the gospel. This mystical transformation of people into one body in Christ takes place in the Eucharist. Because Christ is the Head of the Church, the Church is a reflection of the Incarnation, with both human and divine qualities [(see 1 Corinthians 1016, 17; Galatians 616; Ephesians 412; 522-32) p.795].

Back when I was a kid, an old announcer used to end his radio program saying, “Don’t stay home from church talking about all the hypocrites who are there … there’s always room for one more.”

God willing, see you in church!

Under the new rules, you can be called a hypocrite for upholding old standards of virtue that you don’t exemplify perfectly; but you can’t be called a hypocrite for sinking into utter moral squalor, as long as you profess to believe there’s nothing wrong with it. So the defender of traditional morality is kept constantly on the defensive, since only he can be accused of hypocrisy.

MORE.

Thanks to FWD from Fr. Miguel Grave de Peralta.

Come, ye faithful, let us bow down before the life-creating Tree, whereon of His own will Christ, the King of glory, stretching forth His hands, hath raised us up to our former blessed state, of which the enemy of old deprived us through pleasure, causing us to be driven out of paradise by God! Come, ye faithful, let us bow down before that by which we have been vouchsafed to crush the heads of the invisible foe! Come, all ye peoples of our fatherland, let us honour the Cross of the Lord with hymns, crying Rejoice, O Cross, thou perfect deliverance of fallen Adam; for in thee do most faithful rulers boast, for through thy power are the Moslem hordes mightily subdued! And now, venerating with fear thee upon whom God was nailed, we Christians render glory, saying O Lord Who wast nailed thereto, have mercy upon us, in that Thou art good and lovest mankind!
— Hymn from Orthros, Elevation of the Holy Cross

We truly have but one enemy; that is, the enemy of our salvation, the Devil. And, in spiritual warfare, there is no greater weapon than the sign of the Life Giving Cross of Christ. It is the Cross that subdues the enemy! It is the Cross that delivers fallen mankind! It is the Cross that is victorious!

O Lord, save Thy people, and bless Thine inheritance. Grant victory to Orthodox Christians over their adversaries. And by Thy Cross, preserve Thy habitation.
— Troparion of the Cross

The image above is of St Nicholas Greek Orthodox Church with the Twin Towers in the background. The church building was crushed with the collapse of the towers five years ago.