Our Venerable Father Theodore the Sanctified, Disciple of Saint Pachomius; Blessed Hieromartyrs Severian Baranyk, Yakym Senkivskyi, Vitalii Bairak.
Abstention from meat and foods that contain meat.
Acts 10:44-11:10; John 8:21-30.
Read John 8:21-30
An important theme that appears in this text is the relationship between God the Father and God the Son. Jesus is attempting to explain to His listeners that the reason they cannot understand Him is because they do not know God. He wants to teach them about God but they are unwilling to accept His explanation and we even detect a hint of frustration on the part of Jesus. How is He supposed to help them if they refuse to accept his teaching. Jesus knows that when He fulfills His act of redemption by dying on the Cross it will be possible for some of them to understand that He truly is the Son of God and that there is in fact a Father in the Godhead. This distinction in persons in the Godhead is the reason why it was so difficult for them to accept Jesus and His teaching since this teaching was never taught by anyone before Jesus. Thus we can begin to detect some of the unique understandings that Jesus was trying to impart to His listeners and why it was so difficult for many to accept His teaching. Jesus was speaking to them of a reality that no human being had ever experienced and it is only because Jesus is God and knows God intimately that He can say the things He says. May we also come to a greater appreciation of the uniqueness of Jesus’ teachings among all that have ever lived in this world.