In the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.

The first reading at the Divine Liturgy this morning, beloved in the Lord, is from the epistle to the Hebrews, a work especially prominent in our worship around Christmastime and during the entire lenten fast of the Church. We’ll be hearing it—Lent seems to be somewhat earlier this year, so we’ll be hearing it at some length in a few weeks. The epistle to the Hebrews is prominent at Christmastime because of its treatment of the Incarnation, especially in chapter two. Humanly speaking, it seems to me difficult to say how there could have been a Council of Nicaea or Nicene Creed without the epistle to the Hebrews, because the Nicene Fathers appealed to it so consistently.

The Christology of this work is the clearest and most precise in the apostolic writings. This is the reason we read the second chapter of Hebrews each spring on March 25, the feast of the Annunciation. It seems to be one of the most important developments of Christology. It’s very early when this author of the Hebrews does this exegesis of Psalm 8 which forms the substance of that rich second chapter.

Now, today’s reading from Hebrews is from the long list of the heroes of faith in chapter eleven. This is the longest of his chapters. It’s an illustration, as it were, or an explanation of the very first verse of the book itself, which says that “God, at sundry times and in diverse manners, spake in times past unto our fathers by the prophets.” Chapter eleven spells that out. Chapter eleven provides a long list of the sundry times and diverse manners in which God spoke to our fathers.

We read some of this text today. It was an abbreviated text. It’s an abbreviated text. We read this today because we stand at the threshold of this event in which God has in these last days spoken to us by a Son whom he hath appointed heir of all things. Now, all through Advent we have been considering the saints of the Old Testament. For example, the very first days of December were the three minor prophets of the seventh century. We keep getting these feast days of the prophets during Advent. These are the saint to whom the eternal God revealed himself during the long time leading up to the Incarnation.

And now, just before taking up the themes of Christmas, we take one last look back, one last time, at the great sweep of the Old Testament history and the myriad Hebrew saints that prepared for the coming of the Messiah. In the abbreviated reading we heard this morning, it is possible, I think, to discern attention to three periods of biblical history, just as it was in the gospel. The gospel is clearly broken into three periods of biblical history; it was very clear. I think it’s just as clear from this morning’s reading from the epistle. These three periods will provide the structural points for our three reflections this morning: the promise, the process, and the price.

First, let’s speak of the promise. The promise was first made to the patriarchs about whom we read this morning. By faith, Abraham sojourned in a land of promise, as in a strange country, dwelling in tabernacles with Isaac and Jacob, the heirs with him of the same promise. For he looked for a city which hath foundations, whose builder and maker is God. Now, God promised Abraham that he would be what? The father of many nations—not just one nation. Through the promised Messiah, all nations are summoned to the inheritance of the Jews, the dignity of the Jews, as children of God.

This is why, in the New Testament, Abraham is repeatedly elevated as the model of faith, more than any other figure in the Hebrew Scriptures, Abraham is held before our eyes as the supreme exemplar of faith. For example, the author of Hebrews writes:

By faith, Abraham, when he was called to go out to a place which he should after receive for an inheritance, obeyed, and he went out, not knowing where he was going. [...] Abraham, when he was tried, offered up Isaac, and he that received the promises offered up his only-begotten son, of whom it was said, “In Isaac shall thy seed be called.” Accounting that God was able to raise up even from the dead.

That translation we heard this morning is completely wrong, by the way, on that point. On that, the translator missed it all. He doesn’t say, “Able to raise him up from the dead.” It’s a participle: He’s able to raise up from the dead! He can raise up anybody from the dead. The Church with the Apostle Paul looks upon Abraham as the father of us all insofar as we, too, share in Abraham’s faith. And his faith has to do with the hope of the resurrection and our faithful obedience to God’s governance of our lives. You see, that really is the faith of Abraham, that he can raise from the dead! Because the resurrection from the dead is the essence of the Christian Gospel.

Second, let’s speak of the process. I hope you don’t mind that I had the three Ps this morning. I don’t do that very often. The second is the process. You see, God’s promise must be worked out. It is a matter of record that this working-out is not always smooth. Indeed, the process of salvation history is notoriously messy. You know, the Old Testament is a messy book, but so is Church history. It’s a messy story. I think that’s why, when I taught seminary, they let me teach Old Testament and Church history: I seem to know more about messiness than most people.

You see, some Christians rebel at this. Some Christians believe somehow that it’s not supposed to be messy. Well, it’s not supposed to be messy, but it is messy. I have lost count of the number of Orthodox believers who refuse to accept this messiness. They want it clean, and any time you get out your brush or broom and want it clean, you’re going to—expect schism! Expect it. We’re supposed to be having—some time in the near future, we’re supposed to be having a meeting of all the Orthodox bishops, so they can sort of clean up the canons. Expect a schism! If schisms were produced by each of the Ecumenical Councils, what are we going to do in the modern time? Expect a schism! There’s some Christians unwilling to accept the messiness of the life in Christ.

Some members of the Orthodox Church decline to read the Old Testament because there’s so many messy people in the Old Testament. I’ve lost count in my 26 years as an Orthodox of the number of Orthodox Christians who’ve said, “I can’t read that book! It’s a messy book. There’s a lot of bloodshed and violence!” Of course, there’s none in your life, is there? Because you’ve really got your own life together… But the Old Testament has so many mess people and so many messy situations.

All right, then, let them read the New Testament. Indeed, let them simply listen closely to today’s reading from Hebrews. I quote it to you once again.

And what more shall I say? For the time would fail me to tell of Gideon, or Barak, of Samson, of Jephthah, David also, and Samuel, and of the prophets.

Do you hear those names? Samson? It’s not Victor Mature. It’s Samson! [Laughter] The author of Hebrews regards Samson as a role model for Christians? Now, if Samson could be held up as a model for the Christian faith, the process of salvation must be very messy indeed, yet there you have it. The New Testament tells us: Imitate Samson.

But to imitate Samson, it is surely necessary to know something about Samson. That is to say, God expects his children to read these terribly messy stories from the book of Judges, the stories about Samson and Jephthah and Barak. Usually when Christians refuse to read the Old Testament, they start with Joshua and Judges, and that should end it: since you can’t read those, you can’t read any of it. Joshua and Judges are messy books, but notice that the heroes of faith mentioned this morning, the Sunday before Christmas, are from the book of Judges.

But one of the great values of a familiarity with these stories is the recognition that those who adhere to the divine promise can expect to experience the messiness of the divine process. If we’re going to be faithful to God, we must learn, as did Samson, Jephthah, and Barak, to let God deal with the messiness in our lives.

Over the past half-century of ordained ministry to the people of God, I have often called on parishioners who’ve failed to gather with the congregation for the weekly worship. The answer I’ve gotten on several occasions is: “Father, I cannot come to church right now. My life is a mess.” I always have a standard answer for that. “You’re right. Stay home. We don’t want anybody in church whose life is a mess.” [Laughter] “We don’t you coming to church until you’ve got your act together. In fact, we prefer that you be perfect. The Church has been around for 2,000 years and we have never tolerated messiness. And after all there’s no messiness in the Bible.”

Third this morning, let us speak of the price. The price associated with God’s promise is illustrated in the experience of the Maccabees. As it happens, this morning’s reading from Hebrews 11 describes the experience of the Maccabees. In fact, that’s the climax of that chapter eleven, where Subdeacon Stephen was reaching these high notes. That’s the experience of the Maccabees.

It is highly appropriate, moreover, to be reading of the Maccabees today, during the festival of Hanukkah. Hanukkah means dedication, and this festival celebrates the restoration and the rededication of the Temple in Jerusalem on December 14, 164 BC. This event is described in the fourth chapter of 1 Maccabees. I urge all of you to open your copy of the Orthodox Study Bible and read that chapter over the next few days, as an appropriate preparation for Christmas. It’s really very hard for me to think of the Maccabees without thinking of that icon over there, the icon of the Presentation of the Messiah in his Temple. The Maccabees purified that Temple so that it could receive the Messiah, and that’s what our Jewish brothers and sisters are celebrating right now, is this feast of the Hanukkah.

Hanukkah is not just a nice Jewish holiday. In fact, if people actually read what it’s all about, most people would not be the least bit disposed to celebrate it, because they’re not the least bit disposed to purify the Temple and the price that it takes to purify the Temple. Hanukkah is an important day in the history—biblical history, which is our history. We know from the gospel of John that Jesus made it a point to be in Jerusalem for the feast of Hanukkah.

Before Judas Maccabeus and his brothers could consecrate the Temple, they first had to consecrate themselves. This was the price for their freedom. A major thing to remember about freedom—any freedom, any kind of freedom—is that it’s not free. You don’t have freedom by asserting it. You don’t just declare it. Freedom must be paid for.

The Maccabees were obliged to adopt a life of great hardship and struggle, which is described in the various books of Maccabees. These hardships included exile. We read, for instance, of the father of the Maccabean brothers.

Mattathias cried out in the city with a loud voice, saying, “Everyone who has zeal for the Torah and maintains the testament, let him follow me!” So he and his sons fled to the mountains and left all that they had in the city. Then many that sought after judgment and justice went down into the desert. And they abode there, they and their children and their wives and their cattle, because afflictions increased upon them.

These are the Maccabees, of whom this world was not worthy. The experience of the Maccabees included martyrdom. For example, we read in 2 Maccabees:

Eleazar, one of the principal scribes, an aged man, and of a well-favored countenance, was constrained to open his mouth and eat swine’s flesh. But he, choosing rather to die gloriously than live stained with such an abomination, spit it forth and came of his own accord to the torment. But when he was ready to die with stripes, he groaned and said, “It is manifest unto the Lord that hath knowledge, the holy knowledge, that whereas I might have been delivered from death, I now endure sore pains in body by being beaten; but in soul I am well content to suffer these things, because I fear him.” And thus this man died, leaving his death for an example of noble courage, and a memorial of virtue, not only unto young men, but unto all his nation.

Those men who irresponsibly removed the books of Maccabees from the Scriptures on the basis of a hang-up impoverished the Bible—impoverished it! The books of Maccabees are in Christian manuscripts of the Old Testament from the very beginning.

The story of Eleazar is followed by an account of the mother who watched the torture and death of her seven sons, following which she herself was put to death. Our reading from Hebrews 11 this morning holds up these Maccabean saints as heroes for the Christian people. Let us listen once more to the description.

They were tortured, not accepting deliverance, that they might obtain a better resurrection.

Now, the mother of the seven Maccabean martyrs speaks of that better resurrection when she addresses the government.

And others had trial of cruel mockings and scourgings, yea, moreover, in bonds and inprisonment. They were stoned, they were sawn asunder, were tempted, were slain with the sword. They wandered about in sheepskins and goatskins, being destitute, afflicted, tormented, of whom the world was not worthy. They wandered in deserts and in mountains and in dens and caves of the earth. And all these having obtained a good report through faith, receive not the promise. God, having provided something better for us, that they, without us, should not be made perfect.

So what, sweet people, does Hanukkah have to do with us? It had everything to do with us. The Hanukkah saints are our saints. They are held up for our emulation in the Christian Scriptures. The Orthodox Church celebrates the feastday of all the Maccabean saints every year on August 1, and we read of their exploits every year on the Sunday before Christmas. The Maccabean revolt, the Maccabean reformation, was the final preparation of the chosen people for the arrival of the Messiah. The Messiah is taken to the Temple that the Maccabees purified and dedicated, and the Hebrew word for dedication is hanukkah.

It is amazing that the Hanukkah is in our Scriptures even though it’s not in the Hebrew Scriptures. It’s our book. It’s our story, because it tells the price of what it means to be faithful to God, to receive the promises of God, and to work out and redeem the messiness that is often the case in our lives. Amen.