In the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit!
Christ is Risen! Dear brothers and sisters, we continue to celebrate the Radiant Resurrection of Christ. And this great festival is “the feast of feasts and triumph of triumphs.”
And, of course, as we continue to celebrate it, we always keep in mind that for each one of us, and for Christ first of all, the path to Pascha always passes through Golgotha.
“It is impossible to please God without sacrifice,” Orthodoxy proclaims. This is what God says, this is how He shows us and guides us into a blessed future, the Heavenly Kingdom, which we all desire and long to be partakers of both in this life and in the age to come.
Christ came to this world through sacrifice, and He calls on all of us to follow Him through self-denial and sacrifice. If any man serve Me, let him follow Me (Jn. 12:26), He teaches. And also, He that loveth his life shall lose it; and he that hateth his life in this world shall keep it unto life eternal (Jn. 12:25).
All service of God and the pleasing of Him is based on sacrifice and without sacrifice it is impossible. Any Christian virtue is nothing but sacrifice. St. Gregory the Theologian says: “The greatest benefit of life is to die every day.” If someone sacrifices himself for God or dedicates his life to God, then, like a seed cast into the earth, he acquires immeasurably greater blessings and fruits.
Our Lord Jesus Christ instructs the holy apostles, and through them those who have believed in Him and allowed the law of love and the Beatitudes into their hearts. He said to His little flock: If ye were of the world, the world would love his own: but because ye are not of the world, but I have chosen you out of the world, therefore the world hateth you… If they have persecuted Me, they will also persecute you; if they have kept My saying, they will keep yours also (Jn. 15:19-20).
And in this chosen little flock the holy martyrs shine like bright stars—they serve for us as the greatest example of deep faith, self-denial in suffering and torment, boundless love for Christ and, at the same time, the all-conquering power of God.
St. John Chrysostom writes in praise of the martyrs: “Their bodies are precious because they have received wounds for their Lord and because they bear sores for Christ. And just as a royal crown, decorated on all sides with various stones, produces a diverse brilliance, so the bodies of the holy martyrs, studded with wounds for Christ as with precious gems, are of greater value than a royal diadem.”
St. Basil the Great also writes about the benefits for the soul that come from praising the martyrs: “Undoubtedly, those who praise glorious men will not fail to imitate them in similar circumstances. Sincerely praise those who have been tormented, so that you too may become a martyr by choice without persecution, fire and scourges, and be vouchsafed the same rewards with them.”
Having a weak nature, like us, the martyrs had the grace-filled love for God—the love which neither death, nor life…, nor things present, nor things to come, nor height, nor depth, nor any other creature can shake (Rom. 8:38, 39).
Only love guided them this way. By their blood and immeasurable love for the Lord, the holy martyrs were essential to the establishment of the Christian faith in the apostolic age.
The preaching of Christianity had a great all-conquering power, thanks to the multitude of holy martyrs who laid down their lives for their faith in the Resurrection of the Crucified Lord. Fearless and silent suffering, sometimes even with gratitude for the horrific tortures, had a deep and ineffable impression on the pagan witnesses of those events and even on the executioners themselves; and some of them, with God’s help, became Christians.
By their striking example the feats of the holy martyrs teach us unshakeable faith in Christ and drive out of our souls the cowardice of which the holy King and Prophet David spoke: There were they in great fear, where no fear was (Ps. 52:6).
May God grant us not to commit the shameful and grave sin of renouncing the Lord in our trials when we need to confess our faith, even though for this we may lose the temporary blessings of this world and even be tormented. For Christ said, Whosoever shall deny Me before men, him will I also deny before My Father which is in Heaven (Mt. 10:32).
Among a whole host of holy martyrs shine forth particularly the holy great-martyrs, who endured especially terrible sufferings for Christ and whose victory is of great importance for all Christendom. Today the Holy Church celebrates and honors the memory of Great-Martyr George the Victorious.
The image of St. George on horseback symbolizes victory over all the evil that the devil, the old serpent (Rev. 12:9), does. And The saint vanquished a dragon-like serpent, liberating the city and saving the life of a maiden, the king’s daughter. When we look at his icon, we see a valiant warrior who had the courage to fight evil for the sake of saving many.
All of us have something that the maiden symbolizes on the icon and that we must strive to preserve with all our might—chastity, purity of soul and body, honesty, integrity and everything that makes us partakers of the Living God. But at all times, the forces of evil have been opposed to all this, like the serpent on the icon, ready to tear apart beauty and holiness, leaving behind only destruction and death.
And all of us, having Christ’s protection and the desire for our souls’ salvation from perdition, can rise up to fight for all that is pure, noble and holy in our souls, which is given by the Lord to every immortal soul, which like a bride belongs to Christ the Bridegroom.
Let us learn to overcome evil and sin in ourselves, and by this victory we will free our souls from the shackles of temptations and passions into which the evil one often puts them. Then the Lord will give us strength and wisdom, so that, like Great-Martyr George, we can help our neighbors in this difficult, continual warfare.
Through prayers to St. George, let us protect our souls from every trick of the devil, so that keeping them bright and untainted, we may enter the mansions of the Heavenly Kingdom of love and beauty! Let us bow before the memory of the holy Greatmartyr George the Victorious, who strengthens our faith with his ascetic labors and miracles.
It is no coincidence that the image of the holy warrior George is featured on the coat of arms of Moscow, of the Moscow region, and of the Russian State, as he has been venerated by our people since the establishment of St. George Day and even earlier.
It is no coincidence that one of the Moscow Kremlin’s reception halls, the grandest one, is called St. George Hall.
It is no coincidence that we wear the St. George Ribbon (usually in the lead-up to Victory Day on May 9), which is a symbol of the spiritual heritage of all our generations, in a sense—a symbol of our Motherland, which has carried love for God, faithfulness to our Fatherland and neighbor through the crucible of temptations.
Brothers and sisters! The sublime labors of Greatmartyr George and other martyrs teach us to love the Lord Jesus Christ even unto death (Phil. 2:8); to preserve the precious gift of faith, hoping for eternal life; to fear nothing but the wrath and judgment of God; to live on earth for Heaven and eternity; to despise earthly treasures and count them as nothing; and to be ready to sacrifice even our own bodies and lives in order to preserve our souls for eternity, for it is said: For whosoever will save his life shall lose it; but whosoever shall lose his life for my sake and the Gospel’s, the same shall save it. For what shall it profit a man, if he shall gain the whole world, and lose his own soul? (Mk. 8:35–36).
We once again greet you on this wonderful feast! May the Lord help us, through the prayers and intercessions of the holy Greatmartyr George the Victorious, so that we may always be partakers of His everlasting blessedness and always remain Christians in this life, living in love for God and for people. Christ is Risen! Amen.
