Sunday, November 21, 2004 Fish, Wine, & Oil (Tone 8)
Presentation of the Theotokos
3rd Vesp Presentation: Ezekiel 43:27-44:4
Epistle: Hebrews 9:1-7
Gospel: St. Luke 10:38-42; 11:27-28
Ezekiel 43:27-44:4, especially vs. 2: "And He said to me, "This gate shall remain shut; it shall not be opened, and no one shall enter by it; for the Lord, the God of Israel, has entered by it; therefore it shall remain shut."
At the heart of Christian life is the mystery of the Incarnation of God the Son. Uncreated from before time, being eternally begotten of God the Father - without mother - He condescended to enter time as a man and here to be born of a human mother, the most holy Theotokos, the Birthgiver of God. How such a temporal entry was effected by the Eternal Word Himself is ineffable.
That is, how "He humbled Himself" (Phil. 2:8), and "was seen with our [human] eyes...and [how] our hands have handled...the Word of life" (1 Jn. 1:1) is a reality incapable of being explained in any human language. In Metropolitan Hierotheos' words, the Incarnation is inexpressible in human terms, "just because there is an enormous difference between the uncreated and the created." Hence, "the union of created human nature with uncreated nature in the Person of the Word is...where the mystery is seen, as well as the impossibility of man's reason to interpret it."
Without doubt, to speak of the birth of God the Word in time was what led St. John of Damaskos to say, "Without abasement He humbled His unhumiliated height." St. John's thought helps us consider the particulars - the cave, the manger, and gestation in a woman's womb - which, in turn, permits consideration of the ecstatic vision of St. Andrew of Crete: "O strange wonder! God in a woman's womb, He Whose throne is heaven and Whose footstool is the earth. God in the womb, the supracelestial Sharer of the everlasting throne of the Father." As Metropolitan Hierotheos says of the Virgin, "The Son and Word of God became a full man, assumed the whole human flesh in order to deify it. But this took place outside the laws of nature. Therefore in a troparion of the Church we are told: 'Having conceived God in ways past understanding, O Maiden, thou hast escaped from the ordinances of nature.'" Here is another mystery, not just the Incarnation, but a related mystery - the person of the Theotokos herself.
Ezekiel the Prophet was permitted to foresee this mystery of the Theotokos in the midst of the entire, sweeping, Divine vision of the Messianic age, including the perfect Temple and its new worship (Ezk. 40:1-48:35). In symbolic language, the Prophet foretells the mystery inherent specifically in the Theotokos whose name, as St. John of Damaskos notes, "constitutes the entire mystery of the economy" of God for the salvation and deification of man. She is the "sanctuary" (Ezk. 44:1), "which the Lord, the God of Israel, has entered" (vs. 2), and the "temple" which "the glory of the Lord filled" with His ineffable presence.
Listen to Metropolitan Hierotheos: "For just this reason the holy Fathers insist on the theology concerning the person of the Theotokos and sing her praises and glorify her. She is the 'key' to the experience of the Incarnation of the Word of God, as well as the deification of man....All that has been said should help us to our personal annunciation. The good news is that after the Incarnation of Christ there is the possibility of our becoming members of the deified Body of Christ." Let us seek the prayers of the Theotokos; for God also offers us the grace of Christ's indwelling, the hope of attaining that for which Eve grasped sinfully by her own will.
The Holy Virgin, without blemish, revealed deification. Her entry into the earthly Temple was the beginning of her deification and permitted her to serve as the gate of entry for the Lord, which "shall remain shut; it shall not be opened, and no one shall enter by it" (vs. 2).
Today the Virgin...is led to the temple, to become the habitation of God the King of all, Who sustains our life. Today...the most pure Sanctuary is led into the Holy of Holies.