Beginning and End of Faith…

Passages: Is. 66:1-24; Col. 2:8-3:17; Matt. 22:34-23:39
Ընթերցուածքներ՝ Եսայ. ԾԶ 1-24; Կող. Բ 8- Գ 17; Մատթ. ԻԲ 34- ԻԳ 39

In the name of the Father, Son and Holy Spirit, Amen!

In 2025, 20-year-old James Clarkson who worked as a gas engineer trainee in Northern England learned that he had won the lottery jackpot worth approx. $9 million. Not realizing the life changing news, James went to bed after misreading his ticket and only later was he informed he had won. “News spread fast, and we all ended up celebrating later at my grandma’s and Grandad’s with a roast beef dinner and Champagne,” he said. So, what do you think happened next my dear brothers and sisters? How would we react if we learned we had won the lottery and our financial situation approved? Many of us, when we gauge how successful we are in life, we also include our financial situation. If we have money, through hard work or perhaps through the lottery, we would agree we have a successful life. So, what would we do if we gained this level of success? James Clarkson woke up on Monday morning and went back to work. When asked why, he responded, “I need to have a purpose in life…”

My dears, we are almost at the end of our Great Lenten journey. Was it a success? Did this season of Great Lent bring forth fruitfulness of faith? During Lent we are taught to read our Scriptures, to pray and to fast, act mercifully through alms-giving, charity, and forgiveness, all to strengthen our faith. If we gained faith, then we are successful. Yet, what does this really mean? St. Evagrius of Ponitcus teaches us, “Faith is the beginning of Love, Knowledge of God is the end of love.” To have faith is to have love. Love not defined or limited by today’s worldly standards because today’s culture says that love should be transactional, to give when we have something to gain; Love should be self-satisfying, gratifying, self-serving and protective, guarded and cautious and tangible. As Freudian psychology would suggest, love is the conscious and unconscious connect of mind to create wholeness and protect from self-destruction. In other words, love must complete me by serving me, myself and I. Yet, Scripture teaches us something very different.

If we want faith, be successful as Christian’s by gaining knowledge of God, of His Will, of our purpose in this world beyond just our careers, and external characteristics, we need to recognize that faith is not an end goal or a barometer of knowing God – of being a Christian. In the same way, we don’t go to work just to gain money, nor was gaining a lot of money through the lottery the end goal of life for James Clarkson who chose to go back to work. Continual work and purpose was his desire; our work and purpose as true Christian’s never ends. The work of a Christian is what? To grow in the likeness of God, to be an imitator of Christ, to be the presence of the Holy Spirit in this world. In other words, our purpose, the Will of God, is not for us to have faith but to live faith daily and continually in the same way Christ did – through love. And the work of love never ends. Love doesn’t end when we receive satisfaction, or pleasure. A parent never stops loving their child, regardless how successful they are or how hurt they could be. God never stops loving us, regardless of how saintly we are or how sinful we chose to live. And so, to truly be a follower of Christ, to have faith means to always strive for love. The moment we think we have faith, we already know what God teaches, that is the end of love.

We’ve read our Bibles, we know Church history, we know the Badarak music or other liturgical services, there is nothing more to learn – that is the end for us. The end of our growth, the end of love, the end of compassion, mercy and wisdom and the beginning of our ego, our arrogance, of our justification to sin, to look down upon others, to condemn and be full of pride. To have faith is to love and love cannot be separate from God. Today’s Gospel, Christ repeatedly condemns the Pharisees because they believed they were following the laws, the commandments of Moses. He prefaced it by saying that the greatest commandment is to love the Lord God and love your neighbor. Yet, they had abandoned God who gave those commandments for our benefit. They had “gained” knowledge of God and lost the love. For which Christ says, “do what they say, not what they do” – do what the commandments say not how others “Christian” or not, live it. This is because my dears, our faith is not determined by what people say, how people act, or by those who call themselves believers – clergy or laity. Our faith is the continued love of God which we begin to recognize from our baptisms. A Love of God which is what brings us into Communion with Him through His Body and Blood, the bread and wine we consume for the forgiveness of our sins. A Love of God which continually breathes through us, from the words of the Holy Scriptures, and which guides our daily lives. A Love that never ends!

Yes, we are at the end of Great Lent. Many of us have fasted, started to pray more, perhaps attended Bible Studies, or started the practice of private confession. These are wonderful. But if come Monday morning after Lent, we go back to our regular lives from before Lent then where is our faith? What was our purpose? My dears, success for James Clarkson was not the money he gained, it was that he could keep working and have a purpose in life. Our success as Christian’s, as children of God, is not “faith” and the ability to say I believe or know about God, but rather it is to recognize the grace and love of God and to keep working, to keep living our faith daily. To pick up our Cross, to follow Christ, to love and live and hope and grow in our likeness of God. That is the purpose of our Christian faith – the reason for Lent. To remind us that though we are broken, though we are hurt, though we may misunderstand or be misunderstood – God loves us. Though this world might say we are successful, though we might have money, power, knowledge, etc. these don’t give us value or purpose – God’s love does. This love is given to us freely not because we deserve but because God is love.

A love by which Christ came into this world, suffered for us, died for us and was buried for us. A love that brings us out of the graves through His Glorious Resurrection. A love that never ends, that is not for personal gain but for the growing in the true image and likeness of God. That is our purpose. I pray that this final week of Great Lent, as we enter Holy Week, be for us a time of recognition and reflection of our Christian purpose. Let us pray together for one another, let us pray for our Holy Church, for our clergy, for those in need, for those we get along with and those we don’t get along with. Let us pray for love in all our decisions and by the grace of God, that love with strengthen our faith and our lives will perpetually grow revealing to us the image and likeness of God which we were created in, Amen!