January 22, 2015

Sewing new cloth to old...

Luke 5:31-36

Jesus answered and said to them, “Those who are well have no need of a physician, but those who are sick. I have not come to call the righteous, but sinners, to repentance.”

Then they said to Him, “Why do the disciples of John fast often and make prayers, and likewise those of the Pharisees, but Yours eat and drink?”

And He said to them, “Can you make the friends of the bridegroom fast while the bridegroom is with them? But the days will come when the bridegroom will be taken away from them; then they will fast in those days.”

Then He spoke a parable to them: “No one puts a piece from a new garment on an old one; otherwise the new makes a tear, and also the piece that was taken out of the new does not match the old."

Personal Challenge...

We are often asked why we fast in the Orthodox Church. Isn't that something that went away centuries ago? Jesus Himself reminds us that while He was here on earth that it was a time to be with Him, celebrating His presence, and learning from Him. He also told us that there would be a time when He would leave and that that would be a time to start fasting again. Why do we fast? He gives us a reminder that our Lord, the Bridegroom, is not here, but is returning some day. The fasting helps us to remember that He is coming and to help us develop the discipline of waiting for Him. It also helps us to free up those things that hold us to this world and give them to those in greater need than ourselves. Glory be to God!

Is is this final paragraph, the parable of the new cloth being sown onto the old garment, that really struck me. The faith practice of Eastern Orthodoxy is much different than Western Christianity. It is much more in alignment with our early Church fathers and how they believed and what they taught. This was long before the age of logic and enlightenment that we live in today. As I am now participating in a class that is teaching how to read the scriptures the way they were read in the early days of the church I am reminded that the more that we try to bring in our modern ways into Eastern

Orthodoxy the more the garment tears and falls apart. I must truly embrace that which I have chosen to pursue and let go of that which keeps trying to draw me back to the former way of thinking. Lord, have mercy! Lord, have mercy! Lord, have mercy!