3 creation

What is Aim of Orthodox Life?

Thursday, October 29, 2009

Can can we actually LIVE the Word of God?

Nature of our Creation

Theosis - Our Purpose


Relax Imagine Jesus is about to give the sermon in the Cathedral.


“You are the light of the world. Let your light shine before all men.” (Matt 5:14, 16)


Do not lay up for yourself treasures on earth... but lay up for yourselves treasures in heaven... (Matt 6: 19-20)


Ask and it will be given to you; seek and you will find; knock and it will be open to you. (Matt 7)


“Do not worry about your life, what you will eat... what you will put on... Consider the lilies, how they grow: They neither toil nor spin, but I tell you, not even Solomon in all his glory clothed himself like one of these... Seek the Kingdom of God and all these things shall be added to you.” (Luke 12: 22, 24, 27, 31)


Love your enemies, do good to those who hate you, bless those who curse you, and pray for those who spiteful use you. “Whoever hits you on the cheek, offer him the other also.”


Can we really live by these words? What did he really mean?


He intended to make us uncomfortableWe cant turn his words into other meaningsHe wants to transform us.


Clearly we need some kind of transformation to follow the teachings of Christ.

More than just reading the Gospels

What kind of transformation is He seeking for us?


God Dwells Within

TransfigurationHis face shone like the sun, and his clothes became as white as the light.(Matt. 17:2)


God Dwells Within

• For you are the temple of the living God. As God has said: “I wi! dwe! in them and walk among them.… (IICorintians 6:16)

• Jesus says about Himself: I stand at the door and knock. If anyone hears My voice and opens the door, I wi! come in to him and dine with him, and he with Me. (Revelations 3:20)

• Do you not know that you are the temple of God and that the Spirit of God dwe!s in you? (1 Cor 3:16)


A Living Unity

• This indwelling is not mental but a living and enlivening thing.

Mental efforts are only a means.

• Paul says: work out your own salvation with fear and trembling; for it is God who works in you both to wi! and to do for His good pleasure. (Phil 2:12-13)


What is our Purpose as Orthodox Christians?Thursday, October 29, 2009

Creation


GenesisProvides the basis for what we know about Creation


Disclaimers

Bible uses rational language to explain things that are not totally explainable.

Bible is not a history book or a scientific text.

We are not talking about science but spirit.

We are not looking for the What but the Why. What gives meaning to life.


God Created Everything

In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth. (Gen 1:1)

This is how the Creed begins“I believe in one God the Father Almighty,

Maker of heaven and earth”


Discussion

Do you think there is a conflict between Science and Religion?


How are we to Interpret Genesis?Church Fathers all wrote extensively.• Saint John Chrysostom (347 - 407)

• Homilies on Genesis • On the Creation of Life

• Saint Ephraim the Syrian (306 - 373)• Interpretation of the Books of the Bible

• Saint Basil the Great (330 -379)• Hexaemeron (Six Days)• On the Origin of Man

• Saint Ambrose of Milan (340 - 397)• Hexaemeron

• Saint Gregory of Nyssa (335 - 394)• On the Making of Man

• Saint John of Damascas (676 - 749)• On the Orthodox Faith

• Saint Symeon the New Theologian (949 - 1022)• The Sin of Adam

Reference: Genesis, Creation, and Early Man by Seraphim Rose


How are we to Interpret Genesis?

• Respect the text to recognize that it contains truth.

• Scripture is Divine inspiration.

• Resist making own interpretation. Familiarize with what the Holy Fathers have said about it.

• Resist taking an isolated quote out of context.

• Holy Fathers had a limited scientific background. They were Theologians.

• Be humble in making own interpretations or judgments about Biblical texts.


How are we to Interpret Genesis?

• Human nature cannot fully comprehend the creation of God.

• With great gratitude let us accept what is related (by Moses), not stepping out of our own limitations, and not testing what is above us as the enemies of truth did when, wishing to comprehend everything with their minds, they did not realize that Human nature cannot comprehend the creation of God. Saint John Chrysostom

Beyond our Comprehension


Creation is not a Natural Process

• The Six Days of Creation came before all the world’s natural processes began. They are God’s work alone; they are miraculous and do not fit the natural law which governs the world we now see. Fr. Seraphim Rose

• They reflect that the voice of God makes nature, and the command given at that time to creation provided the future course of action for the creatures. Saint Basil the Great

• Time is not a factor in the actions of God. A day of Creation cannot be the same as we think of as 24 hours.“But do not ignore this one fact, beloved, that with the Lord one day is as a thousand years, and a thousand years as one day.” 2 Peter 3:8

Sun wasn’t created until the 4th day.

• Natural laws are the result of the process of God’s creation.

• Do not be distracted by the evolution vs. Intelligent design debate. Can’t mix Science and Religion.


•How was the World Created?

• Christ is the Creator

• In the beginning was the Word... all things were made through Him and without Him was made nothing that was made (John 1:1, 3)

• God ...Created all things by Jesus Christ (Eph 3:9)

• Holy Spirit Sustains.

• “And the Spirit of God moved over the waters (Gen 1:1)Like in baptism?


• The Creation is out of nothing.Not a development out of some preexisting material.

• God is other

• Established the foundation of Creation and the beginning of all that is to come after.

What follows is a “shaping” of Creation.

1. Creation was out of Nothing

First Day.


Saint Gregory the Theologian:There is a certain firstness, secondness, thridness, and so on to the seventh day of rest from works, ...by these days is divided all that is created, being brought into order by unutterable laws, but not produced in an instant.... ...man appeared in the world last, honored by the handiwork and image of God,... like for a king, the royal dwelling had to be prepared and only then was the king to be led in, accompanied by all creatures.

2. Creation was Sequential


Saint Gregory of NyssaScripture shows the vital forces blended with the world of matter according to a gradation: first, it infused itself into insensate nature (elements); then advanced into the sentient world (life); then ascended to intelligent and rational beings.... The creation of man is related to coming last, who took up into himself every single form of life, both that of plants and that which is seen in animals.

Creation Was Sequential


• Saint Gregory of Nyssa (con)

...what is perfect comes last, according to a certain necessary sequence in the order of things... Thus we may suppose that nature makes an ascent as it were by steps--I mean the various properties of life--from the lower to the perfect form.

Creation Was Sequential


• Distinct in essence from God.

• World has appeared in time.• Did not form itself but is dependent on God.• Not created out of necessity, but by the free desire of

God - created so that other beings, glorifying Him, might be participants in His goodness.

What is the Nature of the World?


Saint Basil the Great

• The world was not conceived by chance and without reason,

• but for an useful end and for the great advantage of all beings,

• it is really the school where reasonable souls exercise themselves, the training ground where they learn to know God;

• by sight of visible and sensible things the mind is led, as by a hand, to the contemplation of invisible things.


What are the Consequences of Creation?

• There is NOTHING UNCREATED in the world apart from God Himself.

• “God Saw everything He had made, and indeed, it was VERY GOOD.” (Gen 1:31)


• God formed man of the dust of the earth, and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life; and man became a living soul (Gen 2:7)

• Created from already existing elements by Godʼs own direct action.

• The soul is the breath of God, and while being heavenly, it endures being mixed with what is of the dust. Saint Gregory the Theologian

• What are the implications of this?

How Was Man Created ?


• Saint Theodorete:God created all other creatures with His word but Man He created with His own hands... Showing the greater care God had for man than other creatures.

• Saint Basil the Great:If you consider nature alone, man is nothing and has no value; but if you regard the honor with which he has been created, man is something great...

What is special about the Creation of Man?


• Genesis:God said, Let us make man in our image, after our likeness; and let him have dominion over the fish of the sea and over the fowl of the air… and over all the earth… So God created man in His own image, in the image of God created He him. (Gen. 1:26-27)

Man Made in Image of God.


• Man was a distinct creation with a higher purpose on earth than the rest of creation. To perfect himself in God’s likeness

• Presence of God’s image in man testifies to a reflection of the very attributes of God in our spiritual nature.

Man Made in Image of God.


• Soul is created with the body. The embryo is endowed with a soul at conception.As the body grows the soul increasingly manifests its energies.

• Gregory of NyssaThe Soul is an essence created, living, and noetic, transmitting from itself to an organized and sentient body the power of living and of grasping objects of sense, as long as a natural constitution capable of this holds together.

What is the Nature of the Soul?


• The soul is to govern the strivings of the body, and the body is to accept this governance.

• It possesses reason, self-awareness, and free will.

• The body is a tool or instrument of an artist, the soul is the artist - not in a dualistic sense.

• The soul is a power which brings all the members of the organism into full harmony and full unity.

What is the Nature of the Soul?

Church Fathers Show:


Soul(Mind)

God

Our Natural Condition

Created in Image and Likeness of God

Body(Brain)


• How the soul originates has not been fully revealed to man. It is a mystery.

• The Church rejected the view that the soul preexisted as in the philosophy of Plato.

How Did the Soul Originate?


• Immortality of the soul is fundamental in the Christian faith. Predated the New Testament. Then sha! the dust return to the earth as it was, and the spirit sha! return to God Who gave it. (Eccl. 12:7)

• Jesus often pointed to the immortality of the soul as the foundation for pious life, and He accused the Sadducees, who denied immortality.

• Paul writes, For me …to die is gain...having a desire to depart, and to be with Christ (Phil 1:21,23). For we know that, if our earthly house of this tabernacle were dissolved, we have a building of God, a house not made with hands, eternal in the heavens. For in this we groan, earnestly desiring to be clothed upon with our house which is 'om heaven. (II Cor 5:1-2)

Is the Soul Immortal?


• Most Holy Fathers teach that there is a difference between the image of God and His likeness.

• The image of God is in the very nature of the soul,

• and the likeness comes in the moral perfecting of humankind in virtue and sanctity, in the acquirement of the gifts of the Holy Spirit.

• We receive the image of God with our existence, but we must acquire the likeness having been given this possibility from God.

• To become in the likeness of God depends on our free will.

What does it mean, created in the image and likeness of God?


PotentialSalvation -

Theosis

Soul

God

Our Natural Condition

Body

Spiritual Growth

Likeness of God

Grace

Soul

Our Present Condition

Free Will

Body

God

Image of God


• Aim is perfection to attain union with God.

• Requires our effort but depends on grace

• We gain understanding, knowledge and capability to carry out His teachings.

• Our spiritual energies and powers are intensified to help others.

• As we approach His likeness we may experience the uncreated light Christ refers to.

Theosis is AimSoul

God

Body


Creation - Summary

• What was the World created from?

• What is the inherent nature of all God created?

• Will the World exist eternally?

• What is God’s highest creation?

• What is the nature of the human soul?

• What is the Soul’s natural State compared to its current condition?

• What is our potential?


Bishop Nikolai Velimirovic (1881 - 1956)

• A man may know the number of the stars in the heavens, and the names of all the fish in the sea.....

• A man may know all the thoughts of men and foretell their destinies and reveal every mystery that the earth holds in its inner recesses......

• If he has not the fear (awe) of God, his knowledge is of as much use as a water in a sieve.


3 creation

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