Don't Take Orthodoxy for Granted!

A purposeful and lived Faith is the key to seeing the Faith shared from generation to generation.

My daughter and I take morning walks. She’s preparing to go off to college, and I want these moments to encourage her and prepare her for the challenges of college life.

I’m a typical “girl dad,” she tells me!

But the older I get, the more I discover a truth about living life that seems to be foundational for a life that flourishes and grows. You must proactively be attentive to disciplined choices.

I don’t like to exercise, but I must. I don’t like to fast, but I must. I don’t like to tidy up my office, but I must.

There is a powerful insight into the reason why our Normal Orthodox Faioth is designed and behaves the way it does. The Faith, practiced, enables you to do your everyday life in such a focused way that you become “like Christ.”

And make no mistake, that vast and cosmic vision and purpose is the ONLY vision and purpose that justifies living this Orthodox life to the fullest. Proper motivation and purpose enable consistent living as a serious follower of Jesus Christ.

Look at our lesson today in Matthew 10:1, 5-8:

At that time, Jesus called to him his twelve disciples and gave them authority over unclean spirits, to cast them out, and to heal every disease and every infirmity. These twelve Jesus sent out, charging them, “Go nowhere among the Gentiles, and enter no town of the Samaritans, but go rather to the lost sheep of the house of Israel. And preach as you go, saying, ‘The kingdom of heaven is at hand.’ Heal the sick, raise the dead, cleanse lepers, cast out demons. You received without paying, give without pay.”

OK, let me set the scene for you. Jesus’ public ministry has just begun. He was baptized by St. John the Forerunner, and He gathered His disciples, which included both the 12 Apostles and the 70 disciples who surrounded them.

The Lord is sending these out “two by two” to spread the word of the coming Kingdom of God.

They are to preach, heal, and cast out demons. In other words, they are to be the first wave of attack against the kingdom of darkness and the reign of death in the world.

And Jesus gives them specific instructions. He tells them to go “nowhere among the Gentiles, and enter no town of the Samaritans, but go rather to the lost sheep of the house of Israel.”

Really?

The Lord will use Samaritans and Gentiles as His ministry grows, as examples of great faith and extraordinary belief. However, He instructs His disciples to steer clear of these groups for now. The Gentiles were anyone not born in the lineage of St. Abraham and under the covenant that God made with Abraham and his descendants. The Samaritans were “half-breeds.” They represent the people in history who were once part of the lineage of Abraham but had intermarried with pagans, becoming influenced by these foreign religions and mixing their faith with paganism.

But why avoid them?

Because the first group that needed tending to was the “lost sheep of the house of Israel!” God wanted the people of the First Covenant to hear of the Messiah first, since they were blessed by the revelation of the Law first.

They were the ones who had been formed by 6000 years of Temple worship, stories, wisdom, scripture, preaching, prayers, prophets, and even times of exile for breaking the covenant with God. They should have known better. They had all the advantages of wisdom, scripture, and prayer, and they still wandered away from the Lord.

They get to hear the Good News first because they had been prepared, and they should have been ready.

And many Jews did believe! The 120 followers of the Lord in the Upper Room on the Feast of Pentecost, as recorded in Acts 1, grew to over 3,000 believers by Acts 2.

The vast number of converts to the Faith of Christ in the first few years of the Church were Jewish believers!

In fact, Rome considered the nascent Christian Church a sect of Judaism until the events after 70 AD and the destruction of the Jewish Temple in Jerusalem. The Children of Abraham should have been ready.

Sadly, too many were not, and they missed the fulfillment of all they had in the Faith of Abraham.

But that’s such a familiar story. If we are honest, it’s true of us humans in general.

All the benefits, all the advantages. And still we humans squander opportunities.

It happens in all our lives.

What’s the missing piece that makes us so susceptible to “not being ready?”