Wise AND Innocent
The Apostles Fast beginning today is less about what you give up and more about what you are being prepared to carry!
The world has always been hostile to the message of the Gospel. That is not a modern discovery. It is not a recent development. It is the baseline condition that the Lord described to His disciples before He ever sent them out.
And notice: He is not surprised by it. He is not anxious about it. He simply names it clearly and equips His disciples to navigate it faithfully.
“Be wise as serpents and innocent as doves.”
Not “I hope you’ll be okay.” Not “Watch out, this might be dangerous.” But a clear-eyed, sovereign declaration from the One who holds all things in His hands. The wolves are real. The sending is deliberate. And the equipment He gives His disciples is exactly sufficient for what lies ahead.
Today is Monday of the second week after Pentecost. And today the Church also begins the Apostles Fast, a season of preparation leading us to the Feast of the Holy Apostles Peter and Paul on June 29th. Just as the Apostles fasted and prayed before being sent out to preach the Gospel to the world, we fast with them now, preparing our hearts to carry that same witness in our own day.
Today’s Lesson: Matthew 10:16-22
The Lord said to his disciples, “Behold, I send you out as sheep in the midst of wolves; so be wise as serpents and innocent as doves. Beware of men; for they will deliver you up to councils, and flog you in their synagogues, and you will be dragged before governors and kings for my sake, to bear testimony before them and the Gentiles. When they deliver you up, do not be anxious how you are to speak or what you are to say; for what you are to say will be given to you in that hour; for it is not you who speak, but the Spirit of your Father speaking through you. Brother will deliver up brother to death, and the father his child, and children will rise against parents and have them put to death; and you will be hated by all for my name’s sake. But he who endures to the end will be saved.”
The Lord does not soften this. We are sheep among wolves. We will be delivered to councils. Flogged. Dragged before governors. Hated by all. Betrayed even by family. He is not offering His disciples a comfortable path. He is offering them the truth about what faithfulness will cost, and then equipping them for it.
What Can We Take From This?
First, the Christian life requires both wisdom and innocence, and neither one alone is sufficient.
“Be wise as serpents and innocent as doves.”
Two qualities.
Both necessary. Both are easily lost when separated from the other.
Wisdom without innocence becomes cunning.
The shrewd believer who has learned to navigate the world on its own terms eventually starts to look more like the world than like Christ.
He protects himself so well that there is nothing left worth protecting. (Yes, I shuddered a bit writing that)
Innocence without wisdom becomes naivety.
The earnest believer who refuses to understand how the world actually works gets devoured, not because he was faithful but because he was unprepared.
The Lord calls us to hold both together.
Know how the world works. Understand the dangers. Read the room. Deal with reality! And do all of this without becoming what you are navigating. Stay loving. Stay honest. Stay recognizably Christian in your motivations even when your methods must be sophisticated.
This balance is one of the great challenges of the Apostles Fast. The fast is meant to sharpen us, to cut away the spiritual dullness that lets the world’s values seep into us unnoticed, so that the innocence of genuine love for Christ is preserved inside the wisdom of long experience.
Next, the Holy Spirit will speak through us in the moments that matter most, but only if we have been faithful in the ordinary moments.
“Do not be anxious how you are to speak or what you are to say; for what you are to say will be given to you in that hour; for it is not you who speak, but the Spirit of your Father speaking through you.”
This is one of the most comforting promises in all of Scripture. And it is also one of the most misunderstood.
It is not a promise to the unprepared. (Please underline this.)
It is a promise to those who have been faithfully formed.
The disciples had been with Jesus. They had listened, questioned, watched, and prayed. The Spirit does not bypass formation. He works through it. The words given “in that hour” come to souls that have been cultivated, disciplined, and opened to God through the ordinary practices of the Faith.
This is why the Apostles Fast matters. We are not fasting to earn the Spirit’s help. We are fasting to clear away the noise so we can actually hear Him when He speaks!
The fast creates the interior silence that lets the Spirit work when the moment comes.
Finally, endurance is the quality that carries the faithful to the end.
“You will be hated by all for my name’s sake. But he who endures to the end will be saved.”
Not he who starts well. Not he who has the most impressive beginning. He who endures. It’s a marathon, not a sprint.
The Lord is perfectly honest. Spiritual sobriety always leads to both wisdom AND innocence.
The opposition will be real. Some of it will come from the world. Some of it, heartbreakingly, will come from within your own families. “Brother will deliver up brother to death, and the father his child.” There is no persecution more disorienting than the one that comes from those closest to you.
And yet the Lord does not say, “Endure, and everything will get easier.” He says, “Endure, and you will be saved.” Endurance is the path.
The Apostles Fast trains our endurance.
Every day of fasting, when we would rather not fast. Every prayer offered when we would rather sleep. Every small, faithful act of self-denial is a training of the will toward endurance.
The body and soul that learn to say “not my will but Yours” in small things are the body and soul that can say it when the cost is enormous.
St. Melania the Righteous
Today, we commemorate St. Melania the Righteous, who lived in the fourth and fifth centuries. Born into one of the wealthiest families in the Roman Empire, she renounced her vast fortune to live as an ascetic and serve the poor. With her husband Pinian, she freed eight thousand slaves, distributed her wealth to monasteries and churches throughout the Empire, and eventually settled in Jerusalem, where she founded a monastery and spent her final years in prayer and fasting.
St. Melania models precisely the wisdom and innocence the Lord describes in today’s Gospel. She was wise enough to know that her wealth, left unrenounced, would consume her. And she was innocent enough, pure enough in her love for Christ, to actually let it go. She did not theorize about detachment. She practiced it at enormous personal cost.
She endured to the end, and the Church calls her Righteous.
Your Response Today
Today we begin the Apostles’ Fast. Twenty days from now, we will celebrate the great Feast of the Holy Apostles Peter and Paul on June 29th.
Choose today how you will observe this fast. Not as an obligation to be barely discharged, but as a preparation for a witness. You are being sent out just as the disciples were. The world you are being sent into needs exactly what you carry.
Then pray simply:
“Lord Jesus Christ, make me wise as a serpent and innocent as a dove. Let Your Holy Spirit speak through me in the moments that matter. And give me the endurance to follow You faithfully to the end.”
Being Orthodox on Purpose means entering the Apostles Fast as the disciples entered their mission, prepared, wise, innocent, and trusting the Holy Spirit to speak through a life faithfully formed!
P.S. Scorning riches that perish and worldly dignity, thou soughtest heavenly glory through self-denial and toils, making noble rank more noble by humility; and thou didst build a holy house in Jerusalem, where thou didst guide souls unto salvation. And now, O Mother Melania, grant us the alms of thy rich prayers to God.
Fr. Barnabas Powell is the parish priest at Sts. Raphael, Nicholas, and Irene Greek Orthodox Church in Cumming, GA. He is also the founder of Faith Encouraged Ministries and produces the Faith Encouraged Daily Devotional on Substack. Watch the Faith Encouraged YouTube Channel here - https://www.youtube.com/@FaithEncouragedTV
Father please bless! 🙏
This sentence in the "Your Response" section seems to be a miscalculation? 40 days from today is not June 29th: "Forty days from now, we will celebrate the great Feast of the Holy Apostles Peter and Paul on June 29th."