The Knowledge of God

The knowledge of God in the Old Testament, and the knowledge of God as revealed in Christ

We converts have to be careful that we do not allow ourselves to carry into our Orthodoxy, baggage from our protestant past. Those from a protestant background often miss the subtleties and nuances of our faith by taking everything literally, missing entirely the mystical truths as revealed in our Orthodox faith.

Many stories and accounts of the Bible are not necessarily to be taken literally, but were meant to impart spiritual truths. Yet sometimes a fundamentalist past predisposes us to a literalistic interpretation of biblical truths that are meant to transport us into a mystical encounter with the Living God. This encounter with God is meant to help us transcend this fallen world, and be made whole.

The Orthodox East gives us a vision of a faith that transforms us, not by legalistic rules, but by a mystical encounter with the living God, Who changes us interiorly. The canons and traditions, according to the Mind of the Church, are meant to bring about healing, not simply covering over our sin and fallen nature, but by transforming us into God’s image and likeness.

In ancient times there was a sense of evil that dominated everyday life that was the result of the Israelites enemies murdering their women and children. Because the Israelites were under constant threat from their pagan neighbors, their perception was that God was ordering them to respond in like manner, instructing them to dash the infants of their enemies against the rocks. Yet the full revelation of who God really is was revealed by Christ, who required us to love our enemies, and to do good to those who would persecute us.

The Church Fathers recognized this historical fact, and were less interested in taking literally the Psalmists suggesting God told His people to dash the heads of the enemies of Israel’s babies against the rocks, as literally an historic fact. What they did look for in these accounts was the truth that the Old Testament people were encountering God, and getting to know him for the first time. With each step in this encounter they were learning more about God’s love and mercy. The Old Testament people were just learning to know this God, but the complete knowledge of God would only come with the entrance of the Messiah into the world. It was this Messiah, the Christ, Who first told them they should address this God as Father. Those of the Old Testament would never dare to even speak the name of God, let alone call him Father.

We know more about sin, redemption, and God’s love and mercy for us, than did the people of the Old Testament. This is the very reason God chose to incarnate as the Second Person of the Holy Trinity, taking on the flesh of His creation, and joining Himself to us. It was this very Christ Who said to His disciples that He and the Father were one, and that whose who looked upon Him saw the Father. That was a very different image of God than the ancients saw depicted in the Old Testament, yet this God was the very same God that was worshiped in the Temple in Jerusalem.

We should worry less about taking literally the images of God as depicted in the Old Testament narrative, and seek to embrace the God of love and mercy that we’ve encountered in our relationship with the Co-Suffering Saviour of the world, Jesus Christ. The God who revealed Himself throughout the Old Testament was non other than the preincarnate Word, Jesus Christ.

With love in Christ,
Abbot Tryphon

Saturday April 1, 2017 / March 19, 2017
Fifth Saturday of the Great Lent: Laudation of the Mother of God. Tone seven.
Great Lent. Food with Oil
Martyrs Chrysanthus and Daria, and those with them at Rome: Claudius, Hilaria, Jason, Maurus, Diodorus presbyter, and Marianusdeacon (283).
St. Sophia of Slutsk and Minsk (1612).
St. John confessor (1932).
St. Matrona (1938).
Venerable Innocent of Komel (Vologda), disciple of St. Nilus of Sora (1521).
Martyr Pancharius at Nicomedia (302).
Venerable Bassa, nun, of Pskov (1473).
The Smolensk “Tenderness” Icon of the Mother of God (1103).
Martyr Dimitri of Tornada (564).
New Martyr Demetrius at Constantinople (1564) (Greek).
Righteous Mary, wife of Vsevelod III (1206).
New Martyr Nicholas of Karamanos in Smyrna (1657).
Martyr Alcmund, prince of Northumbria.

The Scripture Readings

Hebrews 9:24-28

24 For Christ has not entered the holy places made with hands, which are copies of the true, but into heaven itself, now to appear in the presence of God for us; 25 not that He should offer Himself often, as the high priest enters the Most Holy Place every year with blood of another— 26 He then would have had to suffer often since the foundation of the world; but now, once at the end of the ages, He has appeared to put away sin by the sacrifice of Himself. 27 And as it is appointed for men to die once, but after this the judgment, 28 so Christ was offered once to bear the sins of many. To those who eagerly wait for Him He will appear a second time, apart from sin, for salvation.

Mark 8:27-31

Peter Confesses Jesus as the Christ

27 Now Jesus and His disciples went out to the towns of Caesarea Philippi; and on the road He asked His disciples, saying to them, “Who do men say that I am?”

28 So they answered, “John the Baptist; but some say, Elijah; and others, one of the prophets.”

29 He said to them, “But who do you say that I am?”

Peter answered and said to Him, “You are the Christ.”

30 Then He strictly warned them that they should tell no one about Him.

Jesus Predicts His Death and Resurrection

31 And He began to teach them that the Son of Man must suffer many things, and be rejected by the elders and chief priests and scribes, and be killed, and after three days rise again.