The Holy Great Rulers Constantine and Helen, Equals-to-the-Apostles.
Polyeleos Feast.
Acts 25:13-19; Galatians 1:11-19; John 16:23-33; John 10:1-8
Read Acts 25:13-19
Two Sundays ago, the Gospel was about the man born blind from birth. Draw your attention to his comment he made to the Pharisees to confront their wilful blindness as seen in John 9:32, “… since the world began it has been unheard of that anyone opened the eyes of one who was born blind.” It’s very telling that throughout the Old Testment, that was drawn upon for the basis of this statement, despite all the many miracles that were performed, the healing of blindness wasn’t one of them! That miracle has been reserved for Jesus alone.
In both of today’s epistle readings, the path to the opening of the spiritual eyes is revealed in Jesus. In the Acts of the Apostles, we see this comment by ‘Festus’ who was the Roman governor of Judea at the time who said“…they did not charge him with any crimes that I was expecting. Instead they had certain points of disagreement with him about a certain Jesus, who had died, but whom Paul asserted to be alive.” Recall at the time of Christ’s crucifixion, the one criminal on the cross who said to the other in defence of, and out of a true understanding of who Jesus is, said, “Do you not even fear God, seeing you are under the same condemnation? And we indeed justly, for we receive the due reward of our deeds; but this man has done nothing wrong.” (Luke 23:40,41) Turning to Jesus, he asks Him to remember him when He comes into His Kingdom, to which Jesus replies, “Today you will be with me in Paradise.”
In Galatians we see Paul illustrated how he so violently “persecuted the church of God and was trying to destroy it.” Paul’s encounter with the risen Jesus opened his eyes so he, like the criminal at the time of Christ’s crucifixion, could truly see Jesus as the Son of God, His Christ.
Today, The Holy Rulers Constantine and Helen, Equals-to-the-Apostles are commemorated. Constantine saw a brilliant cross in the sky with the words written on it, “By this Sign Conquer.” He then achieved a glorious victory over his enemies. Through this victory he halted all persecution of Christians in 313 A.D. This lead to the entire nation becoming Christian. (From the Prologue of Ohrid)
Finally, last Sunday was the commemoration of the Holy Fathers of the Council of Nicaea where it was definitively established that Jesus is fully man and fully God.
The constant theme that runs through the readings of past weeks is “seeing” correctly. Is it ever even possible to have this vision without the accurate understanding of the person of Jesus? “Mountains are moved” when we do! Glory to Jesus Christ!