FILLING OUR HEART AND LIFE WITH CHRIST
Fr. George Tsahakis, Chancellor, ST. CHRISTOPHER, Peachtree City, GA

Once there was a woman who had a terrible problem – no matter how hard she tried, she just couldn’t stop worrying. Her constant agonizing made life very difficult not only for her, but for her long-suffering husband, and their children as well. She even became an insomniac from worrying that a burglar might come into the house in the dark of the night. One night, as she lay tossing and turning, she heard a noise in the living room. She sent her husband to investigate, and he discovered an intruder. Upon seeing the burglar, he said, “Thank goodness you’re finally here; please come upstairs because my wife has been waiting for ten years to meet you!”
Many times, we are very much like that woman. We spend endless amounts of time worrying about the things that might happen, or could happen to us. So much energy is spent in anxious concern for the future, that we are unable to enjoy the gift of the present. Of course, that does not mean that we should live with reckless abandon. We are called by God to be stewards of the wonderful gift of life, and to use judgment and prudence.
We have been promised that nothing can separate us from the love of God, and that even in death, we remain secure in His providential care. Endless worry gnaws away at the joy of life, and demonstrates that we have little faith indeed in God and His promises. In His loving kindness, God has sought to give us reassurance. Our experience teaches us that most of the things that worry us never come to pass; the things which do befall us, we endure and finally overcome. Throughout Holy Scripture, God encourages us to not be anxious, but rather to trust in His love and mercy. This wonderful advice allows us to live and enjoy the present without the agony of having to meet the “burglar” in our life unless he actually arrives at our house for a visit! In fact, persistent anxiety over the things of this world demonstrates internal insecurity and a weak or superficial faith. Our contemporary delusions about laying up earthly treasures cause us to lose our way towards the Kingdom of God, which is the central theme of Jesus’ teaching. Calling us to be set free from anxiety about earthly things, Jesus directs us to look to Heaven,to the greater reward which will be received at the Day of the Lord, and be secure in the faith that God will provide needed earthly blessings.
Matthew 6:21, “For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also.” In other words, by endless worry towards attaching ourselves to treasures on earth, we cut ourselves off from heavenly treasures. We become slaves, not free in Christ. The heart of our Christian discipleship lies in disentangling ourselves from the chains of earthly things,and attaching ourselves to God, the true treasure. While we have need for certain material things, we are instructed to use them according to God’s will and purposes.
As slaves serving two masters, people attempt to maintain an attachment both to earthly and to heavenly things. But this is impossible, for both demand full allegiance. Jesus calls “wealth” a master, not because it is by nature evil, but because of the absolute and wretched servility it
exacts in humans obsessed and preoccupied with its accumulation.
If we do not live our faith as a daily personal communion with God, we are not yet true Christians,united into one Body, the Church, with one Head, our Lord Jesus Christ. Religion is a basic element in life. If we overlook it, we lose the peace of our soul, and are led to destruction, both as individuals and as societies. Religion does
not hold us back from progress in life but rather, enriches, ennobles and beautifies our life. Without faith in God and eternity, our life as human beings remains poor, imperfect and without its full meaning. Our religious faith gives us the full meaning of life, a life in the present, with roots in the past, in God, and with hope for a better future.
The greatness of humankind is derived from being a co-worker with God. We are not masters of the world, but co-workers with God in building His Kingdom, which has been prepared for us from the beginning of the world. In short, all things come from God; they exist with His help and
proceed toward Him as their final goal.
All of us are constantly being tempted to go about our lives with our heads down, hurrying, running to and fro, keeping our eyes on the ground to keep from stumbling and bruising ourselves, or bumping into somebody. We become busy, and our lives are choked on endless “to do” lists amidst this empty mechanical living and frenetic activity. If somehow we lift our heads unexpectedly,suddenly, we see the boundless deep blue of the sky, the sunlight all around, the majestic white clouds, and sense that the world is having some kind of celebration that we have not had time to go to or take part in. We sense that this celebration is totally unlike our normal life, and yet we
sense also that all the brightness of this celebration and all its joy are meant for us. Faith, then,is above all a penetration into that celebration, into that other world so difficult to describe in everyday speech, yet which fills the whole heart and all of life with unexpected festal joy.
As Christians, we see God especially in our heart. We are created in His image, and in a pure heart one can see the image of the invisible God. Our heart is the altar where God meets humankind and enters into a dialogue with us. God speaks to our heart and our heart answers back to God. True faith is not the knowledge and the confession of certain religious thoughts. God is not a subject to be studied and to be known by our mind. We need to speak to Him as “Our Father,” and to listen to Him as His children. If we have not reached this level of a conscious personal relationship with our God, the Creator and Father, we are not yet believers. God desires a personal father-child relationship.
We all live our Christian faith together, as a community, not as individuals, but as members of the one Church, people of God, the Body of Christ. There, in the community of faith,as brothers and sisters in God, we are called to help each other, and together draw strength and grace from God to continue the struggles of our daily life. All of us must be dedicated to our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. Each one must contribute his or her talent. In our worship, and particularly in the Divine Liturgy, we live together with the saints, with our family and friends who have preceded us, and with Christ. We partake of His heavenly gifts of divine grace. Thus, we experience the Kingdom of God upon earth, and we anticipate its fulfillment at the Second Coming of the Lord. This is the reason why Christ came into the world to call us back to God, to His eternal Kingdom.
Finally, all of us need to recognize and accept the fact that life is going to place us in situations that are very difficult. When we encounter disappointment, face the unknown, and endure the sorrows and losses that inevitably are a part of everyone’s experience, our sense of anxiety and futility is always heightened by the feeling we have that somehow, in our suffering, we are alone and abandoned. Our pain is sharpened by the perception we have that others cannot help us, or do not care enough to make the effort. St. Paul encourages followers of Christ in Romans 5:3-5 to “boast in our sufferings, knowing that suffering produces endurance, and endurance produces character, and character produces hope, and hope does not disappoint us, because God’s love has been poured into our hearts through the Holy Spirit that has been given to us.”