Sermons & Tracts 3 part 7/12

Let us also reckon our homeland to be paradise with them. We have already begun to have the Patriarchs as our kinsmen: why do we not make haste and run, that we may be able to see our homeland and to greet our kinsfolk? A great number of our dear ones awaits us there; a frequent and copious throng of parents, brothers, and children longs for us, already secure of their own safety, yet still solicitous for our salvation. To come to their embrace and to their sight, how great a joy is it, both for them and for us in common! What delight there is of the heavenly fellow-servants awaiting our companionship! How supreme and perpetual the felicity! There is the glorious choir of the Apostles, there the distinguished number of the exulting Prophets.

There the innumerable people of the martyrs are crowned for the victory of their contests; there the most illustrious throng of virgins rejoices; there also the fortitude of the confessors is praised. There too is reckoned the reward of those who, keeping the Lord's precepts, transferred their earthly patrimonies to the heavenly treasures. To these, most beloved, let us hasten with eager longing; that it may be granted us quickly to be with them, and quickly to come to Christ, and to have him as the leader of this journey, the author of salvation, the prince of light, the bestower of joy: who liveth and reigneth with God the Father almighty and the Holy Spirit unto the ages of ages. Amen. SERMON 210. On the Nativity of Saint Stephen the Protomartyr, I. 1. Stephen given to the whole Church as an example.

Stephen's most sincere chastity. Yesterday we kept the Nativity of the Lord and Saviour; today with the highest devotion we venerate the passion of the holy martyr Stephen: yesterday we were redeemed unto a reward, today we are called forth unto an example. Well, then, is today's festivity joined to yesterday's solemnity; that the one might raise believers unto life, this might lead confessors unto the crown. To the whole Church, therefore, blessed Stephen was given for advancement. While still a layman he deserved the choice of the diaconate, and as a Levite he obtained the primacy of martyrdom. He was still set among the common people; but already he was eminent in virtues. He was humble in station; but exalted in faith. He was a disciple in rank; but he was made a master by his example.

Those whom he followed in the devotion of faith, he preceded in the swiftness of martyrdom. For it is written of him in the Acts of the Apostles, that he was appointed by the Apostles to the ministry of the widows (Acts 6). In this too, that he was set over the women, he deserved the testimony of most sincere chastity. Blessed, therefore, will he be, dearest brethren, who has followed this man, who has imitated him: for he shall obtain both the palm of purity and the crown of martyrdom. 2. Why he testified that he saw the Son of Man, not the Son of God. And concerning him also the reading of the Acts of the Apostles, which was read to us today, dearest brethren, though it has very much in its own appearance to be admired, yet contains no less in the mystery of its dignity.

'Behold,' said blessed Stephen, 'I see the heavens opened, and the Son of Man standing on the right hand of God' (Acts 7:55). Consider more attentively, most beloved brethren, when the blessed Martyr had seen the Lord Jesus Christ standing at the right hand of God the Father, why he testified that he saw the Son of Man, and not rather the Son of God; when surely he would seem to be conferring more honour on the Lord, if he had said that he saw the Son of God rather than of man? But a sure reason demanded that this should thus both be shown in heaven and be proclaimed in the world. For the whole scandal of the Jews lay in this: why our Lord Jesus Christ, who according to the flesh was the Son of Man, should also be said to be the Son of God.

Therefore, fittingly, divine Scripture recorded that the Son of Man stands at the right hand of God the Father, so that, to confute the unbelief of the Jews, he might be shown to the Martyr in heaven, who was denied by the faithless in the world: and that heavenly Truth might give testimony to him, to whom earthly impiety would derogate. 3. If the martyrs differ among themselves, Stephen is chief. Whence, although, according to the Psalm which was read, 'precious in the sight of the Lord is the death of his saints' (Ps. 116:15), yet, if anything can differ among the martyrs, he seems to be chief who is first. For since the holy Stephen was ordained a deacon by the Apostles (Acts 6:5), he preceded the Apostles themselves by a blessed and triumphant death:

and thus he who was inferior in rank was made first in passion; and he who was a disciple in grade began to be a master by martyrdom, fulfilling that which the blessed prophet said in the Psalm that was read, 'What shall I render unto the Lord for all that he hath rendered unto me?' (Ps. 116:12). For Stephen the martyr wished to be the first to render to the Lord what, together with all mankind, he had received from the Lord. For the death which the Saviour deigned to suffer for all, this he was the first to repay to the Saviour. 4. The wondrous charity of Stephen. After these things sacred Scripture added, and said: 'And kneeling down, he cried out, saying: Lord, lay not this sin to their charge' (Acts 7:59).

Behold, most beloved brethren, the affection of the blessed man; behold his great and wondrous charity. He was set in the midst of persecution, and yet he prayed on behalf of his persecutors; and in that hail of stones, when another man might have forgotten even his dearest friends, he commended his enemies to the Lord. For what did he say while he was being stoned? 'Lord, lay not this sin to their charge.' And so he grieved then more for their sins than for his own wounds; more for their impiety than for his own death. And rightly did he grieve the more: for in their impiety there was much that called for lamentation, whereas in his own death there was nothing that ought to be mourned. Their impiety was followed by eternal death; but his death, by everlasting life.

Let us therefore imitate in some measure, most beloved brethren, the faith of so great a master and the charity of so illustrious a martyr. Let us love our brethren in the Church with that same spirit with which he then loved his enemies. But — and this is worse — sometimes we not only fail to love our enemies, but do not even keep unbroken faith with our friends. To be indulgent toward enemies. Yet someone will say: I cannot love my enemy, whom day by day I endure as a most cruel foe. O whoever you are, you weigh what a man has done to you, and you do not consider what you have done to God. For since you have committed far graver sins against God, why do you not forgive a man his little, that God may deign to forgive you your much?

Recall what Truth itself has promised you in the Gospel, and what agreement it has in a manner made with you, or what covenant it has entered into with you: 'For if,' he says, 'you forgive men their sins, your heavenly Father will also forgive you your sins. But if you do not forgive, neither will your Father forgive your debts' (Matt. VI, 14 and 15). You see, brethren, that by God's grace it has been placed within our own power in what manner we shall be judged by the Lord. 'If,' he says, 'you forgive, it shall be forgiven you.' For often have I said, brethren, and more frequently ought I to say it: let no one deceive himself, let no one lead himself astray. Whoever holds even one man in this world in hatred, whatever he has offered to God in good works, he loses it all;

for the apostle Paul does not lie when he says: 'If I bestow all my goods to feed the poor, and if I deliver my body to be burned, but have not charity, it profits me nothing.' The blessed John confirms this same truth, saying: 'For everyone who does not love his brother abides in death'; and again: 'He who hates his brother is a murderer' (1 John III, 14, 15). In this passage by 'brother' we must understand every man: for in Christ we are all brethren. Therefore let no one presume upon virginity apart from charity, let no one trust in almsgiving, no one in fastings, no one in prayers:

for so long as he holds enmity in his heart, he will be able to appease the Lord neither by these nor by any other good works whatsoever. But if he wishes to have the Lord favorable to himself, let him not disdain to hear good counsel. Let him hear, not me, but the Lord himself: 'If,' he says, 'you offer your gift at the altar, and there remember that your brother has something against you, leave there your gift before the altar, and go first to be reconciled to your brother; and then coming you shall offer your gift' (Matt. V, 23, 24).

And we, having strife within and harboring guile in our heart, as though we possessed a good conscience, presume to approach the altar, not fearing what is written: 'He who eats and drinks unworthily, eats and drinks judgment to himself' (1 Cor. XI, 29). It has difficulty indeed, but also an immense reward. It is observed for the sake of earthly hope, or on account of fear; how much more should it be done through love. But someone says: It is a great labor to love enemies, to pray on behalf of persecutors. Nor do we deny it, brethren; it is no small labor in this age: but the reward will be great in the age to come. For through the love of an enemy you become the friend of God: nay, not only his friend, but even his son;

as the Lord himself said: 'Love your enemies, do good to those who hate you; that you may be sons of your Father who is in heaven' (Matt. V, 44, 45). If some rich man in this age wished to make you his adopted son, how you would serve him! What indignities even from his slaves, what most harsh servitude, and sometimes even most disgraceful insults, would you endure, that you might come into his fleeting and fragile inheritance! What therefore another endures for the sake of earthly substance, do you endure for the sake of life eternal. For we are convinced by most certain reasoning that for God's sake we are indeed able, but unwilling, to endure injuries.

In short, if some powerful person does us an injury, if he even reviles us to our face, we do not dare to answer anything harsh — I will not say to return like for like. Why is this? Lest from that powerful person we should suffer things still greater than what we have already borne. What the fear of man wrings from us, the love of Christ ought to have required of us. If therefore a powerful person rages against us, we keep silence and dare say nothing: but if an equal, or perhaps an inferior, offers us even a slight affront, then, like wild beasts, without any patience and without any contemplation of God, we rise up; and either in the present moment we avenge our injury, or at least we prepare our mind to return an even greater retaliation.

What is this — that when a powerful person inflicts an injury upon us, we accept it patiently; but when an inferior does, we are kindled with excessive fury? Because in the former case we feared man; in the latter we are unwilling to fear God. Wherefore I beseech you, brethren, so far as we can, let us with God's help prepare our heart for patience, and let us strive to play the part of physicians toward all evil men, and to hate, not the men themselves, but their malice. For the good let us pray, that they may always ascend to better things; for the wicked, that they may swiftly flee to amendment through the medicine of penitence. And may He himself deign to grant this while you pray — He who lives and reigns with the Father and the Holy Spirit unto the ages of ages. Amen. Sermon 211.

On the Nativity of Saint Stephen. Stephen the crown. After yesterday's most festive day, on which the nativity of our Saviour Christ shone forth, this day also is made illustrious by the crown of the blessed martyr Stephen. No part of the world is ignorant of that martyr's merits: for he suffered at the very beginning of the Church, in the very city of Jerusalem. There he both ministered as a deacon, and in the very flower of his youth empurpled the beauty of his age with his own blood. His passion is remarkable, and exceedingly wondrous. This passion, just now, as it was read from the book of the Acts of the Apostles (Acts VII), we have not only heard, but have also beheld with the eyes of faith.

Christ therefore, the head of the martyrs, suffered first for us, 'leaving us an example that we should follow his footsteps' (1 Pet. II, 21). Following first the footsteps of that passion, the most blessed Stephen, by confessing Christ, was stoned by the Jews and merited a crown, as though one imposed upon him by his very name. For 'Stephen' in Greek is called 'Crown' in Latin. He already bore the name of a crown; and therefore by his very name he bore before him the palm of martyrdom. And when he was being stoned, he not only did not seek to carry off vengeance upon his persecutors, but rather asked pardon for them from God. For he remembered that the Lord had said: 'Vengeance is mine, I will repay, says the Lord' (Deut. XXXII, 35); and again: 'Say not, I will avenge myself on my enemies;'

but wait for the Lord, that He may be your help' (Prov. XX, 22). God bids us wait, that on the future day of retribution we may be avenged together with the holy martyrs. 'For blessed are they who wait for the Lord, for they shall possess the land by inheritance' (Ps. XXXVI, 9) — that land, namely, which is without doubt prepared for the just. He who is greedy for vengeance, let us be restrained. Stephen both rages and loves. But you, O Christian, seek to be avenged upon your adversary who perhaps has done you an injury; you seethe, you rave, you pant, you hasten to be avenged. Attend to Christ the physician of your sickness, attend to the redeemer of your soul. For your sake He hung upon the wood, and He has not yet been avenged:

and you wish to be avenged, and you are unwilling to imitate so great and such a master? For this reason He willed to suffer, that He might show you the example of His patience. Behold Him hanging, and preparing for you in your languor a medicine from His own blood. Behold Him hanging, and instructing you from the wood as from a tribunal. Hear Him praying: 'Father,' He says, 'forgive them; for they know not what they do' (Luke XXIII, 34). But 'Christ could do this,' you say to me; 'I cannot: for I am a man, He is God-man.' Then why did God become man, if man is not corrected? But behold, I speak to you, O man. It is too much for you to imitate your Lord: attend to Stephen your fellow-servant. Surely was Stephen a holy man, or was he God? Plainly he was a man, he was that which you are:

but what he did, he would not have done, save by the gift of Him whom you also entreat. Yet see what he did: he was speaking to the Jews, he both raged and loved. I must demonstrate both — both the one raging and the one loving. Hear him raging: 'Stiff-necked' — these are the words of holy Stephen when he was speaking to the Jews: 'Stiff-necked and uncircumcised in heart and ears, you have always resisted the Holy Spirit. Which of the prophets did your fathers not slay?' (Acts VII, 51). You have heard him raging; hear him also loving. Those men, made angry and more grievously inflamed, and rendering evil for good, ran to the stones and began to stone the servant of God. Here let us prove the patience and the love of holy Stephen:

here let us behold the conqueror and triumpher over the devil. We have heard him raging against those who were silent; let us see whether he loves those who rage. He raged against those who were silent; let us see whether he loves those who stone him. He prayed standing for himself; for his enemies, on bended knee. Behold, Stephen is stoned, set thus as it were before our very eyes. Behold a member of Christ, behold an athlete of Christ. Look upon Him who first hung upon the wood. That One was crucified; this one was stoned. That One said: 'Father, forgive them, for they know not what they do' (Luke XXIII, 34): what does this one say? Let us hear him, if perhaps we may be able to imitate even him. First the blessed Stephen, standing, prayed for himself, and said: 'Lord Jesus, receive my spirit.'

Then he knelt down, and having bent his knee, said: 'Lord, lay not this sin to their charge': and having said this, he fell asleep (Acts VII, 59, 60). O happy sleep and true rest! Behold what it is to rest: to pray for one's enemies. But a little, I beseech you, holy Stephen, expound to us this I-know-not-what: why you prayed standing for yourself, and bent your knee for your enemies. Perhaps he would answer what we understand: 'Standing I prayed for myself, because for myself, who rightly served God, I did not labor in praying and obtaining. For he who prays for a just man does not labor; and therefore he prayed standing for himself.' It came to pass that he should pray for the Jews, for the slayers of Christ, for the slayers of the saints, for his own stoners;

he perceived that their impiety was so great that it could scarcely be pardoned: he bent his knee, and said, 'Lord, lay not this sin to their charge.' Therefore, most beloved, if you cannot imitate the Lord, imitate the fellow-servant, imitate holy Stephen, imitate all the holy martyrs. They were men, they were your fellow-servants, they were born as you were born; born as you, but crowned by Christ. Sermon 212. On the Nativity of Saint Stephen. The priest's joy and crown is the salvation of the people. It belongs to the priest to dispense the things of God, to the people to receive them. May the Lord grant me to say a little wholesomely, who granted holy Stephen to say so much bravely, etc.

He saw Christ, confessing Christ, about to die for Christ, about to go forth to Christ. The Lord, hanging on the cross, said for his enemies: 'Father, forgive them; for they know not what they do.' Stephen, etc. How could that man not be there, where was He whom he followed, where was He whom he imitated? He triumphed, he was crowned. There follows on the same theme. Truly, our crown is your edification, and our joy your salvation — salvation both temporal and everlasting. For we have the promise, as the Apostle said, of the life 'that now is, and of that which is to come' (1 Tim. IV, 8): but present salvation God grants both to men and to cattle, God grants both to good and to evil.

But this temporal salvation the martyrs despised, for the sake of eternal salvation. You rejoice without doubt, because you see us safe; and we in Christ rejoice over your salvation: but strive that on that day also we may rejoice over you; because what the Apostle said, concerning his own stewardship so great and so ample that we scarcely trace its vestiges, he was saying this to us — what he said to the people of God whom he was edifying: 'My joy and my crown' (Phil. IV, 1). Whoever therefore advance in Christ through our labors are our joy and crown: because it is ours faithfully to dispense not our own money, but the Lord's; it is yours to receive it with care and solicitude. For I can be a giver, not an exactor:

and a giver not as of my own possession, but of God's, from whom I too live; because we all belong to one great household, we have one Lord as father of the family. He has an ample storeroom, from which both we and you may live. Only let us entreat Him to wipe away loathing; let Him first grant hunger, and so hold out bread. From whence I live, from thence I speak; from whence I am fed, this I minister. For with you I am poor. Our common riches are our God; the life of us all is blessed and eternal. Therefore 'he who glories, let him glory in the Lord' (1 Cor. I, 31), who lives and reigns through all the ages of ages. Amen. Sermon 213. On the Nativity of Saint Stephen. What the martyrs win for themselves, and what for others.

If anyone should carefully run through the deeds of the holy martyrs, he will always find in them something more to wonder at. For their blessed passions bring forth heavenly kingdoms for those who endure them, and show us as a hereditary good that which we may imitate. For what worthy service does the obedience of servants render to so devout a Lord, if it is agreed that the Lord bore greater things for His servants than the servants bore for their Lord? We ought therefore to relate with all veneration with what devotion the blessed martyr Stephen, whose Nativity we celebrate today, followed the examples of the Lord, with what patience he endured death. Who is not held by great astonishment and exceeding admiration that he had such sweet assaults of stones, and such gentle torments of the rebounding rocks;

so that, his head battered and his blood flowing, all the members of his body, drenched, grew numb? Then he, bearing in his heart a trophy through devotion to Christ, reckoned it a medicine for his wounds. For he desired to be taken away from this light, that at the Lord's command he might pass over to those bright dwellings of eternity, where by the passing of a single hour there was prepared for him a joy everlasting and destined to perish through no length of age: because our Lord Jesus Christ is eternal, who deigned to crown the martyrs with the glory of the eternity of His kingdom. Sermon 214. On the Nativity of Saint Stephen. The Lord mingles sheep among wolves, and why.

Our Lord Jesus Christ, the good shepherd, gentle and merciful, mingles His sheep among wolves in this age, that He may help them from His throne. Do you wish to see, whoever you are that are a Christian, the Lord Jesus Christ mingling His sheep among wolves? He Himself, in the present reading of the Gospel, cried out, saying: 'Behold, I send you as sheep in the midst of wolves' (Matt. X, 16). Do you wish again to see the Lord Jesus Christ leading His sheep out from the hands of wolves? He Himself cries out and says: 'I am the good shepherd. The good shepherd lays down his life for his sheep' (John X, 11). The wolf is destroyed when the shepherd is slain: the sheep is redeemed when the shepherd is crucified. For the sheep ought not to fear being mingled in the midst of wolves:

for they are mingled among wolves for this purpose, not that they may be changed into the wolves' malice, but that the wolves may be converted into the innocence of the sheep. But if they wish to become lambs, let not the sheep fail in following 'the Lamb who takes away the sin of the world' (John I, 29). Stephen the first sheep. He appears as an angel. On account of the seal of the Trinity. By the keys of whose faith heaven is opened. For behold, holy Stephen, the first sheep — how by the testimony of faith does he shake off the wolves that cry out against him, and with his own eyes behold the heavens lying open? O first sheep fighting in the midst of wolves, following, not yet arrived at the Lord; and already he is the friend of the Angels! How manifestly was he, familiar to the Angels, their friend, he who in the midst of wolves appeared as an angel.

For when the heavens were opened, the countenance of the confessor was changed: and he began to shine, as though illumined by the sun of righteousness, so that he did not have a human aspect, the heavens themselves lying open, the enemies themselves bearing witness. For he stood in the midst of wolves, and his face was as the face of an angel standing in the midst of the Jews (Acts VI, 15). What are you doing, O Jews? Do you not fear the first follower-sheep of Christ, who bears on her forehead the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit? This is the sign that shone on Stephen's forehead. This sign the heavens beheld, and were laid open: and as though at the display of the seal, the gates of heaven were laid open in the semblance of the Angels. For holy Stephen came with the keys of faith:

and he himself opened for himself that which he faithfully believed, and gladly beheld. What therefore he saw, he did not keep silent. 'Behold,' he says, 'I see the heavens opened, and the Son of Man standing at the right hand of God' (Acts VII, 56). There he sees Christ and the Angels. But what remained, when the heavens were laid open, that he should see, save Him who had ascended into the heavens, the Lord Saviour? For all these heavens we behold; but closed, not laid open; shining with stars, not glittering with Angels: but this man now was not a man, but an angel. A man does not behold the seat of the palace of his Lord unclosed, but laid open: he does not see the Angels, but the Archangels; since he beholds these also: but he proclaims Him whose witness he was; he heralds Him whose servant he was, perfected in the contest.

For how great was the grace bestowed upon holy Stephen? He saw the army of the heavenly host standing, he saw the Son of Man sitting at the right hand of the Father. Behold, he sees God, who was already migrating to God; and by the merit of his confession he beholds the congregation of the heavenly Powers, he who was already about to migrate to the province of the dead. But among the dead he cried out, he who among them shone forth: 'Behold,' he says, 'I see the heavens opened, and the Son of Man standing at the right hand of God.' As Christ, so Stephen. Confessing God, he is condemned. Nor yet then is he silent; but he is not heard. Let the friends rejoice, if the enemies blaspheme. Let not the sheep be silent in bearing witness, even though the wolves cry out in blaspheming.

For they closed up their minds and said, 'He has blasphemed' (Acts VI, 11). This Caiaphas also, the chief of the priests, said of the Son of Man suffering and enduring all things. For when our Lord Jesus Christ, hung upon the cross, said: 'Amen I say to you, henceforth you shall see the heavens opened, and the Son of Man standing at the right hand of the Father'; Caiaphas cried out, saying: 'He has blasphemed' (Matt. XXVI, 64, 65)! Caiaphas rent his garments; these men closed up their very minds: Caiaphas, that he might remain naked; these, that they might persist in their hardness. O great marvel! The gates of heaven are opened; and the Jews closed up their impious minds: but holy Stephen was not silent, did not fail, nor yield to those who blasphemed.

There he fixed his gaze, where he opened the eyes of his heart. 'Behold,' he says, 'I see the heavens opened, and the Son of Man standing at the right hand of God.' Stephen's address to the Jews. But why are you angry with me for so great a testimony, O Jews? Was it by my command or power that the heavens were laid open? They were laid open, not to display my glory, but to demonstrate my shepherd showing forth in me His help. Consider therefore and see how far I am from the heavens, set with you upon the earth. Could I perhaps have reached them, and opened the gates of the heavens? The Lord of the Angels Himself opened His palace to me. In some manner I deservedly see; and what I see, I do not keep silent. For I did not despise Him hanging on the cross;