SACRAMENTAL LIVING

Understanding Christianity as a Way of Life

Michael Serves as Retreat Speaker at St. Haralambros in Niles, IL

Theosis/Union with God

“Our quest for communion with the everlasting God reorients our vision, directing it toward the eternal destiny of all mankind. We understand history and each person’s life from the perspective of our ultimate goal of union with Him.” (Dynamis 4/11/2014) “Our surrender to the Lord must include our whole heart, soul, and mind (Mt 22:37), if we are to unite our spirits to Christ our God. When we are truly joined to Him, He gives us the grace to obey Him. We are to strive to be

God's Ways

“God’s ways always exceed our comprehension and our capacity to predict…God’s ways ultimately defy our human reasoning and calculations… God can overcome impossible conditions…God overcomes what we cannot defeat, attains what we cannot achieve, and provides what we lack.” (Dynamis 3/29/2018) “God’s ways are not our ways. God has a way of turning things upside down. He has a way of bringing us to Himself even when things don’t turn out the way we expect.” (Father John Zeyack)

Reveal/Revelation

“When we read Scripture as a whole, we discover that God is engaged in a building process: he first reveals, then allows time to elapse, then reveals more details before ultimately fulfilling his revelation…God reveals Himself to us a little at a time, as we are able to bear it.” (Dynamis 3/20/2018, 3/28/2018) “In prayer, we speak to God. In the Scriptures, God speaks to us. Yes, there are many ways to hear God’s voice, but the best way is through reading the Scriptures. One

God's Will and Obedience

“Only an obedient heart can truly pray, for the end of prayer is not speaking to God, but hearing and heeding what He is saying back to us…It is in obedience that we find the means of destroying the ego, which separates us from Christ...obedience is our way of surrendering to the will of Christ…Following Christ means total submission to Him…” (Archimandrite Vassilios Papavassiliou, Abbot Tryphon, Life Application Bible, Luke 14:27) “God responds to His obedient children…When

Simplicity

“The primary reason to pursue simplicity in our spirituality is to maintain “the simplicity and purity of devotion to Christ.” (Donald Whitney) “One of the rewards of following Christ is the simplicity and wonder it brings to life.” (Joseph Stowell) “ We ought to act with God in the greatest simplicity, speaking to Him frankly and plainly, and imploring His assistance in our affairs, just as they happen.” (Brother Lawrence) "We must be confident in our faith in God; we must b

Questioning

""Independent thinking is an important goal of our education system. We want our children to grow up thinking for themselves so that they can make rational judgements and not be led by the impulses of emotion. We want them to question the information placed before them and weigh up evidence in order to reach conclusions. This applies to the Christian faith as much as to anything else. We do not want what is sometimes called “blind faith” from our congregations, where anything

Faith (as an Adventure)

“…an open-ended obedience to God’s call constitutes the nature of true faith. First, we obey. Only afterward do we grasp what God intended all along. Faith is stepping forth into the unknown so that we may learn to experience directly the mind of God. Genuine faith…consists in trusting God over the course of many years of seeming contradictions. True faith waits on God for the outcomes that He promises… To have faith means acting obediently, with open-ended trust in God, neve

St. George Lenten Lecture Series

Time

“I would suggest that it is a mistake to describe Christianity as a “historical” religion, despite the space-time reality of its central events. It is more correct to describe Christianity as an “eschatological” religion – a belief that the end of all things – the fulfillment of time and history – has entered space and time and inaugurated a different mode of existence. To put it in the simple terms of the Gospel: the Kingdom of God is at hand.” (Father Stephen Freeman) “In M

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