Homily for the Sunday After Theophany
Divine Grace and Repentance
By Metropolitan Hierotheos of Nafpaktos and Agiou Vlasiou
Divine Grace and Repentance
By Metropolitan Hierotheos of Nafpaktos and Agiou Vlasiou
"Repent, for the kingdom of heaven is at hand" (Matt. 4:17).
Today’s Gospel refers to the beginning of the public activity of the God-man and the content of His message, which was “Repent, for the kingdom of heaven is at hand.” With this invitation, God continues the dialogue He had with Adam in Paradise. The Prophets of the Old Testament preached repentance, and in particular the greatest of the Prophets, John the Baptist. With the message on repentance, the Lord began His teaching, His world-saving work. The Apostles also preached this: “Repent therefore and be converted, that your sins may be blotted out” (Acts 3:19). Therefore, repentance is an essential element of spiritual life, since it is closely linked to Divine Grace. We can see this connection between repentance and Divine Grace in three ways.
Repentance Is the Secure Path That Leads to the Kingdom of Heaven
“The Kingdom of Heaven is at hand,” said the Lord, therefore “repent.” When Holy Scripture mentions the Kingdom of Heaven, it means the Lord and communion with Him, because where the king is, there is also the kingdom, since there is no kingdom without a king. The God-man Lord is not separated from His uncreated Grace, which is kept in the Holy Church and is granted by the All-Holy Spirit to those who repent.
We all know from the teaching of the Holy Fathers that through sin we are separated from Life, which is Christ, whence comes the fall from divine Grace and subsequently blindness and death. This means that according to Orthodox teaching, sin is not a mistake, for which a formal apology is sufficient to correct it, but it is a move contrary to God and for this a complete conversion is required. We are required to experience repentance, which gives life and grace. Salvation does not come from anywhere else “unless we strive for it (salvation) through perpetual repentance” (Saint Gregory Palamas).
That is why we said that repentance is the secure path that leads to the Kingdom of Heaven. And of course there is no end to repentance, because this would mean perfect likeness to Christ. Since throughout our lives we are seeking the Kingdom of Heaven, for this reason repentance is a permanent state. This is the “beginning, middle and end of our state according to Christ.”
Repentance Is a Time of Grace
Man, living in the hopeless and gloomy darkness of sin and ignoring the beauty of divine life, cannot understand his horrible situation and the difference between human life and God-human life. Only when divine Grace sows the seed of divine love in his heart can he see his spiritual desolation. The light of the sun when it enters a dark room reveals everything. Thus, when the light-creating and life-giving Grace illuminates our soul, then we see the passions, the inner desolation and we begin to weep.
One must have a lot of Grace to understand that he is a sinner. For the carnal man, repentance is not easy. Therefore, the one living in its atmosphere shows that he is permeated by the uncreated energy of divine Grace. That is why many Fathers emphasize that the experience of repentance is the first stage of the theoria of God. And as the fire of repentance burns the soul and sins, so this fire is transformed into uncreated Light. Therefore, repentance is not of human origin, but is a gift offered by Heaven. “For there is clearly a divine seed in godly sorrow. The ripe fruit is the joy of eternal goods” (Saint Maximus the Confessor).
John of Kronstadt formulates this truth: “What would we do if the Grace of God had not strengthened us in advance? What fate would we reach if He did not suddenly embrace us without expecting it after sin and did not prepare us for repentance and for tears?… Rarely, very rarely could one be freed from the yoke of sin.”
Also, Repentance Preserves Grace in our Soul
In Orthodox teaching we say that there is no dialectical difference between praxis and theoria. Nor are these two situations tightly separated. Praxis is the nurturer and co-worker of theoria, and theoria is the guardian and co-worker of praxis. That is, man, with the help of divine Grace, strives to keep the commandments of God, and therefore to experience repentance. When he reaches communion with God and feels within himself the fullness of God's Grace and love, he keeps God's commandments out of love for Him and in order to maintain love.
Therefore, repentance is not a formal confession, which one might have made under harsh psychological conditions, but a complete change of life. With this change, one lives the life in Christ, and by living the life in Christ, one sees one’s wretchedness more and increases repentance.
All the saints know from their experience that divine Grace remains in our soul through striving, watchfulness, prayer, and especially through humility, which is the “garment of divinity.” The impure heart, which is full of passions, cannot retain divine Grace, no matter how richly it was previously granted.
All this is incomprehensible to the person who has learned not to live in the spiritual climate of Orthodoxy and is nourished by his self-sufficiency and self-satisfaction. They seem a little confusing, because we live in a world that feels complete, mature, and accomplished. But it is an experience and life of the Church. Preaching without repentance, with all its content, ceases to be authentic. The value of repentance, which opens the way to the Kingdom of God, ceases to be emphasized, but it must be clearly emphasized that man does not change himself with the works of repentance, but offers himself to divine Grace, which transforms the unworthy into worthy. ll
Source: From the book Όσοι Πιστοί. Translated by John Sanidopoulos.
Today’s Gospel refers to the beginning of the public activity of the God-man and the content of His message, which was “Repent, for the kingdom of heaven is at hand.” With this invitation, God continues the dialogue He had with Adam in Paradise. The Prophets of the Old Testament preached repentance, and in particular the greatest of the Prophets, John the Baptist. With the message on repentance, the Lord began His teaching, His world-saving work. The Apostles also preached this: “Repent therefore and be converted, that your sins may be blotted out” (Acts 3:19). Therefore, repentance is an essential element of spiritual life, since it is closely linked to Divine Grace. We can see this connection between repentance and Divine Grace in three ways.
Repentance Is the Secure Path That Leads to the Kingdom of Heaven
“The Kingdom of Heaven is at hand,” said the Lord, therefore “repent.” When Holy Scripture mentions the Kingdom of Heaven, it means the Lord and communion with Him, because where the king is, there is also the kingdom, since there is no kingdom without a king. The God-man Lord is not separated from His uncreated Grace, which is kept in the Holy Church and is granted by the All-Holy Spirit to those who repent.
We all know from the teaching of the Holy Fathers that through sin we are separated from Life, which is Christ, whence comes the fall from divine Grace and subsequently blindness and death. This means that according to Orthodox teaching, sin is not a mistake, for which a formal apology is sufficient to correct it, but it is a move contrary to God and for this a complete conversion is required. We are required to experience repentance, which gives life and grace. Salvation does not come from anywhere else “unless we strive for it (salvation) through perpetual repentance” (Saint Gregory Palamas).
That is why we said that repentance is the secure path that leads to the Kingdom of Heaven. And of course there is no end to repentance, because this would mean perfect likeness to Christ. Since throughout our lives we are seeking the Kingdom of Heaven, for this reason repentance is a permanent state. This is the “beginning, middle and end of our state according to Christ.”
Repentance Is a Time of Grace
Man, living in the hopeless and gloomy darkness of sin and ignoring the beauty of divine life, cannot understand his horrible situation and the difference between human life and God-human life. Only when divine Grace sows the seed of divine love in his heart can he see his spiritual desolation. The light of the sun when it enters a dark room reveals everything. Thus, when the light-creating and life-giving Grace illuminates our soul, then we see the passions, the inner desolation and we begin to weep.
One must have a lot of Grace to understand that he is a sinner. For the carnal man, repentance is not easy. Therefore, the one living in its atmosphere shows that he is permeated by the uncreated energy of divine Grace. That is why many Fathers emphasize that the experience of repentance is the first stage of the theoria of God. And as the fire of repentance burns the soul and sins, so this fire is transformed into uncreated Light. Therefore, repentance is not of human origin, but is a gift offered by Heaven. “For there is clearly a divine seed in godly sorrow. The ripe fruit is the joy of eternal goods” (Saint Maximus the Confessor).
John of Kronstadt formulates this truth: “What would we do if the Grace of God had not strengthened us in advance? What fate would we reach if He did not suddenly embrace us without expecting it after sin and did not prepare us for repentance and for tears?… Rarely, very rarely could one be freed from the yoke of sin.”
Also, Repentance Preserves Grace in our Soul
In Orthodox teaching we say that there is no dialectical difference between praxis and theoria. Nor are these two situations tightly separated. Praxis is the nurturer and co-worker of theoria, and theoria is the guardian and co-worker of praxis. That is, man, with the help of divine Grace, strives to keep the commandments of God, and therefore to experience repentance. When he reaches communion with God and feels within himself the fullness of God's Grace and love, he keeps God's commandments out of love for Him and in order to maintain love.
Therefore, repentance is not a formal confession, which one might have made under harsh psychological conditions, but a complete change of life. With this change, one lives the life in Christ, and by living the life in Christ, one sees one’s wretchedness more and increases repentance.
All the saints know from their experience that divine Grace remains in our soul through striving, watchfulness, prayer, and especially through humility, which is the “garment of divinity.” The impure heart, which is full of passions, cannot retain divine Grace, no matter how richly it was previously granted.
All this is incomprehensible to the person who has learned not to live in the spiritual climate of Orthodoxy and is nourished by his self-sufficiency and self-satisfaction. They seem a little confusing, because we live in a world that feels complete, mature, and accomplished. But it is an experience and life of the Church. Preaching without repentance, with all its content, ceases to be authentic. The value of repentance, which opens the way to the Kingdom of God, ceases to be emphasized, but it must be clearly emphasized that man does not change himself with the works of repentance, but offers himself to divine Grace, which transforms the unworthy into worthy. ll
Source: From the book Όσοι Πιστοί. Translated by John Sanidopoulos.
