19th Sunday after Pentecost – Orthodox Homily on St. Innocent the Elightener

Saturday we commemorated in the Church St. Innocent, the Enlightener of North America, the first bishop in this land, a lover of the native American peoples of Alaska, planter of the True Faith on these shores, and example to us in our own day of the courage that comes from a life lived for the glory of God and witness to His truth.

Christ, our Great High Priest, has left us through His Church the Apostles and through the Apostles, their successors, the bishops of the Church to carry on the Apostolic work through the ages. St. Innocent embodies so well the meaning of the word, “Apostle” (Apostolos), which in the Greek means, “sent.” He was sent out of love by the Church in Russia to pour out God’s love and the truth of Christ that liberates all people to the natives of Alaska.

Some of you may have seen the television show, “Deadliest Catch,” that depicts the harrowing exploits of Alaska’s commercial fishermen, who have access to all the modern technology and conveniences and still risk peril every time they are on the sea. Picture for a moment Alaska in St. Innocent’s day in the mid 19th-century: there were few roads and almost all transportation had to be accomplished by boat. Imagine the cold of Alaska winters and the infinite darkness.

St. Innocent undertook all such perils, visiting remote villages and all the habited Aleutian Islands on those deadly seas, often in no more than a canoe. He faced severe conditions and served at great risk to life. But listen to the fruit of his work: he baptized ten thousand people, he built numerous churches—many with his own hands and those of his spiritual children, he founded schools and he himself taught the fundamentals of the Christian life. He learned six dialects of the native languages of Alaska and translated the Gospels, the divine services, and much of the hymnody of the Church into those native languages and dialects.

What motivated St. Innocent? What drove him to risk his own life and limb countless times? St. Innocent was driven on by the love of Christ for his flock. He desired more than anything that they would embrace the Gospel and the fullness of the life in Christ found in the Church Christ founded. He didn’t come to make them good Russians, he came to make them Christians, followers of Christ. This is evidenced by the fact that he didn’t let them stay worshiping in Russian, but rather, undertook the daunting task of learning their native languages and translating the divine services into their native languages.

In other words, St. Innocent followed the pattern that had been handed down to him through 2,000 years of generations in the Church. Through him, we get to see a true model of the Orthodox Church’s missiology in keeping with what we read in the New Testament and see throughout her history: He came to baptize the culture with the truth of Christ, not to obliterate it or bring 19th century Russian culture into it.

St. Innocent’s example is a good one for us to follow as well as the Church in America today. We do not seek to become like the culture, nor do we seek to obliterate the culture; instead, we seek to baptize this culture, to transfigure this culture with the light and truth of Christ found in the fullness of His Church of which we are a part.

We may not face the physical perils that St. Innocent did: we may never have to endure an Alaskan winter without electricity or travel by canoe on deadly ice-cold sees, or travel by land weary of Grizzlies, in order to preach the Gospel and share our Orthodox Faith, but what do we do to live out the Gospel and the Orthodox Faith for those around us?

Do we love those around us, our co-workers, are fellow students, the people we know in town or who we run into time and again at the post office or the grocery store? We often prefer to remain quiet about our faith out of fear or preoccupied with our own problems to such an extent that we are inward focused and not outward focused on the needs around us.

Many are the struggles with our culture today and those who taste of its nihilism. The calling of Christ to deny ourselves and live for Him is a challenge in our culture. But listen to these words of truth from St. John Chrysostom: “As we endure His dying now, and choose while living to die for His sake: so also He will choose, when we are dead, to beget us then into life. For if we come from life into death, He will also lead us by the hand from death into life.”

Likewise, God in His love for us is always bent on our growing in humility and trust in Him. We read of St. Paul’s “thorn in the flesh” in today’s Epistle. Likely, it was some physical malady. The great St. Paul, so close to God in His communion with Him who is Life and the Great Physician besought the Lord three times, we read, but the Lord did not heal him of this thorn. Instead, the Lord replied, “My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness.” The sicknesses, both of soul and body, the trials and ‘thorns in the flesh’ God allows us to endure get our attention, shake us from our inclinations to become complacent in our relationship and communion with God, our very life. When we learn to bring Christ God into them, they become a means for growth in humility, patience, perseverance, greater dependence on God as our Savior. When we are weak, His power is made perfect in us. God loves us too much to leave us to our own devises. One way or another, He will strive to have us attend to our souls and our communion with Him who is the Life of all.

Nothing is too great for God; no temptation, no spiritual or physical sickness, no ‘thorn,’ nothing that this world can do to us, can rob us of the love of God and our communion with Him if we are willing to struggle, to die to self, in order to live for God. His grace is truly sufficient for us for His power is made perfect in weakness.

In His love for us, God gives us all the tools we need through His Church: divine worship, opportunities to come outside ourselves to serve others and learn to love Him and others more. He gives us the Sacraments, the disciplines, the prayers, accountability, and authority—all of which save us from this or any adulterous generation.

As we die to the world and live for Christ, we give others hope that they too can overcome this world. As we live out our baptism, we give others hope that they too can be baptized and put on Christ, as we too make God’s grace sufficient for us, we show others how to see Christ God’s power perfected in our weaknesses and infirmities. And step by step, following in the footsteps and example of St. Innocent as his spiritual descendents, we baptize the culture around us with the light and life and truth of Jesus Christ. Holy St. Innocent, pray for us sinners before the throne of Christ God in whose near presence you now worship for our healing and salvation.

Fr. Robert Miclean
Holy Archangels Orthodox Church
Sunday, 7 October 2018
St. Innocent, Enlightener of North America, St. Paul’s Thorn

Epistle: II Cor. 11:31-12:9
Gospel: Luke 7:11-16