Bow Your Heads!

Being willing to acknowledge the Lordship of Jesus is to be humble enough to live in the light of His wisdom and not be "stiff necked!"

Christ is Risen!

“Don’t bother me with the facts; my mind is made up!”Admit it. You’ve been guilty, like I have, of having that stubborn attitude about your opinions. I remember a Congressional hearing where the witness confronted a politician with this retort; “You can have your own opinions, but you are not able to have your own facts.”

Sadly, our society has been infected with the notion of “my truth” as if Truth was some subjective reality that my personal delusions can fashion.

On the other hand, since all of us are free, unique, and unrepeatable persons created in God’s image, it makes perfect sense that we would have varied perspectives and insights.

I will go so far as to say that this is a feature rather than a bug in that the greatest virtue we can aspire to as mature humans is humility. Humility is the very opposite of stubborn and “stiffnecked” hardheadedness.

The key to navigating this balanced and sober attitude towards differing opinions and perspectives is a virtuous combination of humility and faithfulness. But how do we develop such maturity? We do that by admitting and submitting to the Lordship of Jesus Christ!

Look at our lesson today from Acts 6:8-15; 7:1-5, 47-60. We’ll quote St. Stephen’s speech:

And Stephen said: “Brethren and fathers, hear me. The God of glory appeared to our father Abraham, when he was in Mesopotamia, before he lived in Haran, and said to him, ‘Depart from your land and from your kindred and go into the land which I will show you.’ Then he departed from the land of the Chaldeans, and lived in Haran. And after his father died, God removed him from there into this land in which you are now living; yet he gave him no inheritance in it, not even a foot’s length, but promised to give it to him in possession and to his posterity after him, though he had no child.

“But it was Solomon who built a house for him. Yet the Most High does not dwell in houses made with hands; as the prophet says, ‘Heaven is my throne, and earth my footstool. What house will you build for me, says the Lord, or what is the place of my rest? Did not my hand make all these things?’

“You stiff-necked people, uncircumcised in heart and ears, you always resist the Holy Spirit. As your fathers did, so do you. Which of the prophets did not your fathers persecute? And they killed those who announced beforehand the coming of the Righteous One, whom you have now betrayed and murdered, you who received the law as delivered by angels and did not keep it.”

Now when they heard these things they were enraged, and they ground their teeth against him. But he, full of the Holy Spirit, gazed into heaven and saw the glory of God, and Jesus standing at the right hand of God; and he said, “Behold, I see the heavens opened, and the Son of man standing at the right hand of God.” But they cried out with a loud voice and stopped their ears and rushed together upon him. Then they cast him out of the city and stoned him; and the witnesses laid down their garments at the feet of a young man named Saul. And as they were stoning Stephen, he prayed, “Lord Jesus, receive my spirit.” And he knelt down and cried with a loud voice, “Lord, do not hold this sin against them.” And when he had said this, he fell asleep.

Of course, this is early in the Church's existence, and St. Stephen is the first deacon and the Church’s first martyr for the Faith. But notice what he calls these religious leaders: stiff-necked!

There is a prayer that we often say, even during the Divine Liturgy ‘ “Let us bow our heads to the Lord,” and the people respond, “To You, O Lord.” Someone who is stiff-necked can’t or won’t bow their head. What a powerful description of the prideful insistence that what I want and what I believe is true no matter what the evidence or even God Himself says.

First, because they think so highly of their own righteousness that they see no need to make such a show of humility and obedience. Second, to do such a thing as bow their heads will communicate their own insufficiency to those around them. And finally, because to bow the head would be to confess they don’t know everything. And for someone who is stiff-necked, they can’t allow for that impression even in their own hearts. This spiritual illness of being stiff-necked meant the death of Stephen, but that was only physical death. The real consequence was that those stiff-necked people were already spiritually dead and didn’t even know it!

Are you willing to apply this wisdom to your own life and not fall into the temptation of thinking, “Yeah, THOSE PEOPLE need to learn that and do this!”

Saint Thalelios was from Lebanon in the 3rd Century AD. He was the son of a bishop (there were married bishops in the earliest centuries of the Church), and his mother’s name was Romula. He was raised to be a serious and Normal Orthodox Christian and was trained as a physician. Persecution of the Christians drove him to Cilicia. But, while he was hiding in an olive grove, he was discovered and arrested for being a follower of Jesus. He was beheaded for his faith in 284 AD. He was also one of the “Unmercenary” physicians, so-called because these Christian doctors treated and cured anyone and everyone regardless of their ability to pay. His humility and gifted piety made him not just a hero of the Faith but a true example for us in this self-centered age.

Today, are you stiff-necked? Where in your life have you “got it all figured out” to the point that you are deaf to God’s gentle voice of correction? Where is there a deficit of humility that would not allow you to “bow” your head to the Lord? It’s time to keep those neck muscles limber and able to bow by living an attentive life and a Normal Orthodox life focused on humility and obedience to God, no matter the cost!

P.S. With the Martyrs of the Lord, you contested and were shown forth as a valiant soldier of the King of Glory, Who crowned you for the harsh and bitter tortures that you suffered, trampling down the pride of them that worshipped the idols. O Thalelios, we therefore praise your august and blessed remembrance today.