Fourth Sunday after Pentecost/ Father's Day

Title

Love for Fathers

Outline

Love is a decision, a decision enabled by God’s favor

The world around us thinks that love is an emotion, a response to stimuli in the context of an emotional system

That is why people can fall into and out of love; that is why people recreate in their marriages and in their families a similar dysfunction to their families of origin

But emotions just are, and they are hard to control, while the love that Scripture talks about is a decision, an act, a long obedience in the same direction

So there is this centurion in Capernaum, a gentile (he is not in Israel), who has heard about Jesus and responds thoughtfully

He has a need: “my servant is lying paralyzed at home, in terrible distress.”

He realizes that Jesus can help, because he has helped others, but he also realizes that he is a gentile and Jesus a Jew, so says, “I am not worthy to have you come under my roof” In other words, love for his slave makes him humble himself

He also realizes that Jewish purity rules do not shorten Jesus’ reach: “only say the word, and my servant will be healed” - perhaps he thinks of him as a divine being - and he humbles himself by not asking that Jesus honor him by his presence

Jesus sees the decision of trust in the man and notes that he is, so to speak, the firstfruit of the gentiles, that his is greater trust than he finds in Israel

And Jesus says simply, “Go; let it be done for you as you have believed.”

When one realizes that such a centurion was the “father” of his family and century, then you see the decision of love - I have thought it through and will humbly seek help from Jesus out of love for my slave

Then, there is Paul telling us to make the choice of love

The fact is that we will be controlled by the forces that we choose to give ourselves to - parallel to the choice made in marriage to give ourselves to a man or woman

You can make the wrong choice, the wrong love, and you yield “your members to impurity and to greater and greater iniquity”

You can make the right choice, the right love, and you “yield your members to righteousness for sanctification”

The fact is that God opens our eyes and sets us free so that we can change our choice - but will we do it?

Will we return to the false love and discover that “the wages of sin is death”? Or will we give ourselves fully to the new love and experience that “the free gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord.”?

Brothers and sisters, God’s type of love thinks of the good of others

It is willing to humble oneself before God for the sake of others - and certainly feelings came in the risk and in the healing

it is willing to weigh the outcomes, to accept the choice God gives, and to make the best choice, the loving one, the choice for the good of God, self, and others

True fathers before God are those who do that, whether they be fathers in a physical family, fathers in a spiritual family, or fathers in a structural family.

They are not driven by emotions, but they make the choices love calls them to, and then, in all likelihood, emotions will flow

Readings

Byzantine Lectionary (Revised Julian) 7-10-2022: Fourth Sunday after Pentecost

EPISTLE

Romans 6:18–23

18  and, having been set free from sin, have become slaves of righteousness. 19  I am speaking in human terms, because of your natural limitations. For just as you once yielded your members to impurity and to greater and greater iniquity, so now yield your members to righteousness for sanctification.

20  When you were slaves of sin, you were free in regard to righteousness. 21  But then what return did you get from the things of which you are now ashamed? The end of those things is death. 22 But now that you have been set free from sin and have become slaves of God, the return you get is sanctification and its end, eternal life. 23  For the wages of sin is death, but the free gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord.

Byzantine Lectionary (Revised Julian) 7-10-2022: Fourth Sunday after Pentecost

GOSPEL

Matthew 8:5–13

5  As he entered Caperna-um, a centurion came forward to him, begging him 6 and saying, “Lord, my servant is lying paralyzed at home, in terrible distress.” 7 And he said to him, “I will come and heal him.” 8 But the centurion answered him, “Lord, I am not worthy to have you come under my roof; but only say the word, and my servant will be healed. 9 For I am a man under authority, with soldiers under me; and I say to one, ‘Go,’ and he goes, and to another, ‘Come,’ and he comes, and to my slave, ‘Do this,’ and he does it.” 10 When Jesus heard him, he marveled, and said to those who followed him, “Truly, I say to you, not even in Israel have I found such faith. 11  I tell you, many will come from east and west and sit at table with Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob in the kingdom of heaven, 12  while the sons of the kingdom will be thrown into the outer darkness; there men will weep and gnash their teeth.” 13 And to the centurion Jesus said, “Go; let it be done for you as you have believed.” And the servant was healed at that very moment.

Notes

Byzantine Lectionary (Revised Julian) (7-10-2022: Fourth Sunday after Pentecost)

SUNDAY, JUNE 20, 2021 | OCTOECHOS FOURTH SUNDAY AFTER PENTECOST

Bright Vestments

Matins Gospel Luke 24:1–12

Epistle Romans 6:18–23

Gospel Matthew 8:5–13

GREEN

St Methodius, Priest-Martyr (m. 275)