A HOMILY ABOUT OUR FATHER AMONG THE SAINTS NICHOLAS, ARCHBISHOP OF MYRA IN LYCIA
About How the Saint Provides a Perfect Example of the Fulfillment of One’s Obligations to God, One’s Neighbor, and Oneself
Brothers and sisters!
Today we are holding our yearly celebration in honor of the Lord’s great favorite Nicholas, Archbishop of Myra in Lycia, and later this week we shall gather again to celebrate the saint’s service. Therefore, I would like to say a word to you about our holy father Nicholas, and especially about how he perfectly fulfilled the Christian’s obligations with respect to God, one’s neighbor, and oneself. Many of you have read the saint’s Life, so you know very well that Saint Nicholas was a perfect Christian. Those of you have not read it certainly should do so, preferably this week, when we commemorate the Lord’s favorite. His Life is one of the most beautiful and spiritually elevating of all, and the version of it found in Saint Demetrius of Rostov’s Great Collection makes for the very best of spiritual reading.
Now, dear Christians, let us begin by considering how Saint Nicholas fulfilled his obligations with respect to God. To understand this, we must know that our primary responsibilities to the Lord consist of correct faith in Him and ardent love for Him. To make clear what correct faith in God entails, I will begin by pointing out the two pitfalls into which most people tumble headlong, preventing them from fulfilling these obligations as they should.
First, there are those who are enamored of their own speculations and reasonings, and regard them far too highly. They imagine that there is some sort of positive value in questioning the teachings of the Church and the Scriptures, and as a result distance themselves from the life and understanding of the Holy Church, or may even fall into heresy or schism. Then there are others who do not engage in such speculations, because they think there is no such thing as the perfection of faith or the fullness of truth, and therefore, they make no effort to believe as they ought. Two distinct but related errors, equally pernicious! If there were anything positive to be said for either, then to what purpose did He Who is the way, and the truth, and the light[1] come down from Heaven and dwell in the flesh among men? Did He not descend in order to reveal to men perfect truth, which they could never attain by their own reasonings? Did not the God-man dwell among us in order to illumine us with the light of divine knowledge; to set afire our hearts with love for virtue; and to show us how to tame our passions? If Christ is Who He says He is (meaning, the Son of God and true God), and as such can never speak ignorantly or lie, then what could possibly be gained by challenging the faith He has revealed? Such insolent questionings are vain, for they concern matters that ultimately transcend our powers of reasoning; and they are pernicious, because they not only alienate the soul of the doubter from perfect truth, but may result in the infection of others with similar illness or introduce discord among the faithful. As for the second error more particularly, to disbelieve altogether that the faith can be perfect and thus to have no concern to attain unto the fullness of faith means to be heedless of the faith. But to what end then the struggles and sufferings of the Holy Fathers on behalf of the purity and integrity of the faith? The entire history and ethos of the Orthodox Church testifies to their success in maintaining throughout the centuries this purity and integrity, as well as the perfect continuity of the Church’s faith as precisely that faith which was once delivered to the saints[2] of earliest Christian times by the apostles from the Lord Himself.
In this connection, Saint Nicholas provides us an example of the perfect “rule of faith,” as we chant in his dismissal troparion. His faith was simple, pure, steadfast, and zealous. It was entirely alien to the two errors mentioned.
Now regarding Saint Nicholas’ perfect love for God: this is a golden thread woven throughout the holy hierarch’s entire Life, as you will thoroughly convince yourself, if you set aside a half hour to read his Life. The better to help you recognize the precious thread as you read, let me remind you of a few verses from the Scriptures relating to love for the Lord such as the saint’s:
From Deuteronomy: Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thine heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy might.[3] This injunction is repeated almost verbatim by Christ in the Gospel, where He calls it the first and greatest commandment.[4]
From the Psalms: My soul longeth and fainteth for the courts of the Lord; my heart and my flesh have rejoiced in the living God.[5]
From the First Epistle of John: This is the love of God: that we keep His commandments. And His commandments are not grievous.[6]
From the Psalms: Ye that love the Lord, see to it that ye hate evil.[7]
Again from the Psalms: Let them be glad that hope in Thee; they shall ever rejoice, and Thou shalt dwell among them.[8]
And from the First Epistle of John: Herein is our love made perfect: because as He is, so are we in this world.[9]
In brief, the pursuit of love for God is the foremost, the loftiest human endeavor, and consists of warm devotion to Him, joy and hope in Him, and assiduous striving for virtue, all of which were embodied in our saint.
If only every soul that confesses the name of Christ would unfailingly follow Saint Nicholas’ example with regard to fulfilling the Christian’s obligations to God! Then all scandals would vanish from the Church of Christ, and the Church would not be sundered or sullied by its own members. Peace and harmony would reign within and among the Churches, as well as within the souls of the Christians.
Now let us turn to how the holy hierarch Nicholas was full of love and compassion for others and how he perfectly fulfilled the Christian responsibility to love one’s neighbor as oneself, as the Lord teaches. The saint possessed the gift of working miracles to the highest degree, and despite their great number and variety, the purpose of all of them was to benefit others. Here Saint Nicholas delivers someone from a bitter captivity and slavery; there he feeds the starving. Here he restores to life a dead infant and returns him to a grieving mother; there he saves an innocent condemned man from the sentence of death!
Perhaps even more touching and instructive than Saint Nicholas’ miracles themselves is the way in which he performs deeds of compassion, miraculous or not. Because of our many sins, you and I cannot imitate Saint Nicholas in performing miracles, but we can emulate the Lord’s favorite in his manner of doing good deeds. Following Saint Nicholas’ example, we should learn to do them, whenever possible, in such a way that our left hand knows not what our right hand[10] does. Frequently, Saint Nicholas hid what he had done even from the person who benefited from it. Likewise, we learn from the saint to defend the innocent, no matter who is condemning or persecuting them. The great Nicholas stood up even against the Emperor Constantine’s wrath, not to say that of prefects and governors, when the innocent were being unjustly condemned. Similarly, we learn whom we should seek to benefit by our almsgiving and other compassionate deeds. Most, but by no means all, of the holy hierarch’s miracles and other compassionate endeavors benefited Orthodox Christians. We too should seek first of all to do good to our brethren in the faith; however, we must not forget to help those ignorant of Christ, for they are our neighbors, no less than the Orthodox.
This brings us to our final point. Those who wish to love God and their neighbor as they should must before all else master themselves. In other words, they must concern themselves with their obligations to their own soul. As Christ our Lord put it: What is a man profited, if he shall gain the whole world, and lose his own soul?[11] Here Saint Nicholas is again a guiding star.
How, dear brothers and sisters, does a man gain his soul? And what constitute a person’s obligations to himself? As a being inclined to evil and surrounded by temptation, man has a special need for abstinence, for self-denial; as a being made to attain perfection – which cannot be achieved or even approached solely by our own exertions, but only with the assistance of the grace of God – man must acquire humility. Abstinence quiets the passions and cleanses the spirit; humility attracts divine grace, which establishes every virtue.
However you define abstinence or self-denial, Saint Nicholas remains a master of it. If you equate it with disciplining of the body, you will find him to be a man seemingly without a body, a man like unto an angel. Fasting, keeping of vigils, standing, prostrations: the holy hierarch practiced these from his earliest age, and they were his occupations every day of his life. If you consider non-acquisitiveness and generosity to be the essence of self-denial, then you will discover Saint Nicholas to be the very summit of virtue. What delight in earthly gain or pleasures could be found in a man who regarded nothing more enjoyable than giving everything, down to his last penny, to the poor?
As for humility, it was chiefly for this virtue that the Lord’s favorite was chosen to be archpastor of the Church of Myra. Also, at the First Oecumenical Council, which may be called the “Synod of Humility” because of the humble-mindedness evident in so many of the renowned fathers in attendance, Saint Nicholas stands out as the humblest of all, for he hid his wonderworking, virtues, and eloquence to such a degree that his presence there would almost have been forgotten, had it not been that he was compelled to stop Arius’ blaspheming mouth by striking it. For this the holy hierarch was deposed by the scandalized bishops; but the Lord Himself and the Queen of Heaven intervened, appearing to one of the most respected fathers and making it known that Nicholas’ action was pleasing to them. As a result, the saint’s rank was restored, and he, the humblest of men, was greatly glorified on earth, as in heaven.
Thus as regards Christian obligation to oneself, we again find in our saint a perfect model.
O holy hierarch of Christ Nicholas! Thou art an unfailing spring of miracles and a bottomless sea of compassion. Thou grantest every benefaction to those who ask, but we beg thee only for three gifts: that by thy prayers thou enablest us to keep to the rule of faith once delivered unto thee and to love God as we ought; that we succeed in imitating thee by always showing love for others; and that we never forget the lessons in self-denial and humility which thou teachest by thy perfect example. Amen.
[1] John 14:6
[2] Jude 3
[3] Deut. 6:5; Matt. 22:37
[4] Matt. 22:38
[5] Ps. 83:1-2
[6] I John 5:3
[7] Ps. 96:10
[8] Ps. 5:11-12
[9] I John 4:17
[10] Matt. 6:3
[11] Matt. 17:27; Mark 8:37
