December: Day 13: Holy Martyrs Eustratios, Auxentios, Eugenios, Mardarios and Orestes

December: Day 13:
Holy Martyrs Eustratios, Auxentios, Eugenios, Mardarios and Orestes
 
(What is the Blessedness of the Righteous?)

By Archpriest Grigory Dyachenko

I. The Holy Martyrs Eustratios, Auxentios, Eugenios, Mardarios and Orestes, now being glorified, suffered martyrdom during the reign of Diocletian. In the suburbs of the city of Constantinople there was a monastery called Olynthos; in it a church was built in honor of the Five Martyrs. During the singing of Matins it was customary to read the history of the Five Martyrs, but one day the monks said: "Let us leave the reading; for whom shall we read? There is no one from the city." Then two unknown men entered the church, one of them opened the book and began to read. When he had read to the place where it was said: "Eustratios was shod in boots with iron nails," he turned to the monks and said: "My sufferings are insignificant in comparison with the reward which I have received from God," and after this he became invisible. Evidently this was the Holy Martyr Eustratios, who had appeared to admonish the monks. The emperor and patriarch, informed of this miracle, glorified God.

II. God generously rewards His faithful servants: for the temporary and fleeting sufferings of the Holy Martyrs, He rewards them with eternal and greatest blessedness in heaven.

Let us consider, brethren, what this blessedness of the Holy Martyrs, the true servants of Christ, and in general of all righteous people who lived on earth virtuously, holy, purely, loving God and their neighbors, consists of.

a) The righteous inherit the kingdom prepared for them from the foundation of the world (Matt. 25:34), a kingdom which is also called the Kingdom of Heaven (Matt. 5:3, 10), the Kingdom of God (Mark 9:47), the Kingdom of the Father (Matt. 13:43), the Kingdom of the Lord Jesus Christ (2 Peter 1:11); it is also called the City of the Living God (Heb. 12:22), the House of the Father (John 14:2).

b) In this kingdom, city, house of God, the first source of blessedness for the righteous will be their constant coexistence, cohabitation with God Himself and the Lord Jesus Christ, and constant participation in Divine glory, as much as is possible for a creature. “I go,” said the Savior to His disciples before His departure from the world, “to prepare a place for you. And if I prepare a place for you, I will come again and receive you unto Myself, that where I am, you shall be also” (John 14:1-3). In Revelation the Lord testified: “To him that overcomes will I grant to sit with Me on My throne, even as I overcame, and sit down with My Father on His throne” (John 3:21). Then the righteous will truly appear as “heirs of God, and heirs of Christ” (Rom. 8:17).

c) Being constantly with the Lord in the Kingdom of Heaven, the righteous will be deemed worthy to see the Triune One face to face: “Blessed are the pure in heart, for they shall see God” (Matt. 5:8). And in this vision of the All-Perfect One they will continually find:

1) Full satisfaction for one’s mind, thirsting for truth: "Now we see,” says the Holy Apostle, “in a mirror, dimly, but then face to face. Now I know in part, but then I shall know just as I also am known” (1 Cor. 13:12). Then will "faith" be abolished, and there will only be direct "vision" (2 Cor. 5:7).

2) Full satisfaction for one’s own will, thirsting for good: "Blessed are they which hunger and thirst for righteousness, for they shall be filled” (Matt. 5:6). As the righteous more and more contemplate and comprehend with their minds the perfection of the All-Perfect One, they will be more and more inflamed with love for Him, which, in the words of the Apostle, “never fails” (1 Cor . 13:8), and will be more and more perfected in unconditional obedience to His most holy will and in moral likeness to Him: “Beloved,” said Saint John the Theologian, “now we are children of God, and what we shall be has not appeared, but we know that when He shall appear, we shall be like Him, for we shall see Him as He is” (1 John 3:2, 3).

3) Full satisfaction for one’s heart, thirsting for blessedness. For through their very love they will be deemed worthy of the closest communion and union with God, the source of blessedness: “God is love, and he who abides in love abides in God, and God abides in him” (1 John 4:16). Then the words of the Savior will be fulfilled in all their power: “That they all may be one, as You, Father, are in Me, and I in You, that they also may be one in Us... I in them, and You in Me, that they may be perfect as one” (John 17:21, 23).

4) The blessed state of the righteous in soul will correspond in the Kingdom of Heaven to their state in body. In addition to the fact that their bodies will rise for the future life "incorruptible, glorious" or light-bearing, "strong, spiritual," they will be removed from all the needs of this life. "They shall no longer hunger," says the Seer of the saints in heaven, "nor thirst, neither shall the sun beat upon them, nor any heat" (Rev. 7:16). "And God will wipe away every tear from their eyes, and there shall be no more death, neither sorrow, nor crying, neither shall there be pain any more" (Rev. 21:4).

St. Tikhon of Zadonsk thus depicts the state of blessed life . “In the heavenly Jerusalem,” he says, “there is no fear from foreigners, no fear from enemies, no danger from illness, death, hunger, cold, poverty, enmity, hatred, malice and other evils; no complaints are heard there, weeping, sorrow and sighing have departed from here, there is no concern for food, drink, clothing, for home and household; there are no storms and bad weather, but always a favorable bucket; no morning, evening, night, but always day; no autumn and winter, but always beautiful and well-disposed spring and summer; nothing is heard, seen or felt there, except what is favorable, cheerful and kind. The inhabitants there are always vigilant, but never weary, always living, but do not expect death. There life is without labor, joy without sorrow, health without infirmity, wealth without loss, honor without danger and fear, pleasure without depletion, blessedness without calamity; there is day without night, fair weather without foul weather, sun without clouds, light without darkness, radiance without gloom; there is no old man, blind, lame, paralytic, ugly, but all in blooming youth, red goodness and the age of a perfect man, in the measure of the age of the fulfillment of Christ; there no one offends, nor is offended, nor hates, nor is hated, nor gets angry, nor annoys, nor is embittered, nor is exasperated; no one envies another; everyone is content with what he has, because he does not desire more than what he has; he is consoled with that blessedness which does not rise higher; he is crowned with that glory and honor which he no longer seeks."

d) To all this will be added the closest, most blessed relationship of the righteous among themselves and with the angels. For all will not only approach, but will actually partake “of the city of the living God, the Heavenly Jerusalem, to an innumerable company of angels, to the general assembly and church of the firstborn who are registered in heaven” (Heb. 12:22, 23); all “will sit down with Abraham, and Isaac, and Jacob in the Kingdom of Heaven” ( Matt. 8:11 ); all “will be one” (John 17:21), being united among themselves by the bonds of the purest mutual love, as children of one common Father, Who will be “all in all” (1 Cor. 15:25).

“In that most glorious and blessed citizenship," teaches Saint Tikhon of Zadonsk, "there is the most perfect silence, peace, love, among the blessed citizens, joy, consolation and gladness for each other: because they love each other as themselves, and rejoice in each other as in themselves: for they see each other in blessedness, as they see themselves.”

e) In general, the blessed state of the righteous in heaven will be such that now we can neither imagine nor depict it: “of whom eye has not seen, nor ear heard, nor have entered into the heart of man the things which God has prepared for those who love Him” (1 Cor. 2:9; cf. 1 John 3:2).

III. May the Lord grant us, through the prayers of the Mother of God, the Holy Apostles and all His Saints, to inherit this blessedness of the righteous!

Source: A Complete Annual Cycle of Short Teachings, Composed for Each Day of the Year. Translated by John Sanidopoulos.