“I solemnly urge you: proclaim the message; be persistent whether the time is favorable or
unfavorable; convince, rebuke, and encourage, with the utmost patience in teaching. For the
time is coming when people will not put up with sound doctrine, but having itching ears, they will accumulate for themselves teachers to suit their own desires, and will turn away from listening to the truth and wander away in myths” (II Timothy 4:2-4).
Today is the time when many have forsaken “sound doctrine” and find new teachers who will “suit their own desires.” It’s always been like that. In these days, however, religion faces new challenges. The prestige of the altar and its servants is long lost, and the authority that goes with it has disappeared. Here’s what a contemporary writer has to say about the subject:
“Part of the loss of prestige, social and intellectual, of the American clergy is to be found in the loss of authority of religion itself, despite all the talk about religious revival. Religion has had to become flexible, to unbend, to meet its audience more than halfway, and in doing so has begun to seem as if it is selling itself. Retaining dignity—not to speak of assuming grandeur—while selling is not an easy trick, and contemporary religion has not come anywhere close to mastering it. One result of this is that its cadre of clergy for the most part no longer retains the admired position among the professions or in the greater society that it once held.” [Joseph Epstein, Snobbery: American Version]
That may be true; nevertheless, “Jesus Christ is the same yesterday, today and forever” (Hebrews 13:8). Christ doesn’t change, the Holy Trinity remains ever as always, and the message of salvation resounds through the centuries to and beyond the new millennium. Confused are those who would insist that the gospel bends and twists to meet their vaunted needs. Foolish are the pastors and churches that cater to the whims of those who haven’t an idea what life in Christ is all about.
Some would say that the Orthodox Church is too rigid and inflexible. It doesn’t appear to care about the lost souls outside its walls, nor for their children within who go elsewhere or nowhere. But it would be too expensive a price to pay if it were to forsake all the treasures entrusted to it by the Lord, in order to conform to the fleeting, incoherent expectations of a generation that is lost—worst than lost, it hasn’t realized that it is adrift on the sea of life. Like its Lord, God and Savior, the Orthodox Church is also the same yesterday, today and forever. The Church is not only the summary of memberships worldwide in 2003. The Church remembers its birth on the first Pentecost, and it reflects on its life until and beyond the return of its Master.
The perennial problem of the Church’s clergy is to raise up those who want to be elevated beyond the limits of time and space, granting them another perspective that transcends their momentary concerns. No, not a problem for clergy alone—we are all priests to God who are called upon to offer the sacrifices of our souls, minds and bodies to the Father, Son and Holy Spirit.
The temptation for the ordained priest is to find some way to hold onto those who are about to forsake their Church and spiritual commitment. Hold onto them, you think. Discover the secret that will make them again part of the inner community of committed believers. And then you recall the story of the Prodigal Son—how the loving father, having done everything beyond what was normal to express his love, never left his own home in pursuit of his son. When the son returned, he was elated and showed how much. The story is about our heavenly Father and the way many of us forsake Him. The home is the Church. That doesn’t change. Nor does the Father. And neither should we.