Oftentimes in life we are encountered with situations which cause us to reach deep inside ourselves and bring something perhaps up to the surface that we never thought was even possible. So often ordinary people seem to find themselves in situations that call for extraordinary things. Certainly that is the case with many of the fathers and mothers and martyrs of the Church throughout the ages. One can only think of Fr. John Kochurov, for instance, who spent some time here in America as a seminary teacher in the Midwest early on, only to return to his beloved Russia and become the first martyr of the Russian revolution. Surely when he returned there he wasn’t thinking that anything like that was going to happen, but yet it did, and he rose to the occasion.

On February 12, the holy Church celebrates the memory of a man named Christos. Christos the Gardener he is called. He was born in Albania and early on decided to go to what was then the Queen of Cities, Constantinople, and he did so for economic reasons, wanting to become a gardener, and actually ply his trade in the great city.

Well, of course at the time Constantinople was controlled by the Turks, and a certain Turk came up to Christos one day and wanted to negotiate a price for some apples. Well, it wasn’t going to be so easy apparently for the Turk, because he was trying to get a really great deal which would have deprived Christos of some income, and there was some bantering going back and forth. Finally the Turk became upset about this and so he went to the local prefect and accused Christos, basically, of saying that he wanted to become a Muslim. He even brought in a number of false witnesses to testify against Christos, saying that they, too, had heard that Christos had decided to become a Muslim.

Christos, of course, being fervent in faith and all of a sudden being put on the spot for something he probably never anticipated, rose up and said, “That’s not true. I’ve never ever expressed a desire to become a member of the Islamic faith. I could never ever deny Christ my Savior.” Well, we know how these things go in those particular days, and so Christos was taken and he was beaten severely and hit on the head so hard that it caused a lot of bleeding. Then they took him and threw him into a prison and put his feet in stocks.

Well, he was lying there and suffering when another man who happened to be in the prison—in fact, he was the one who recorded this incident—asked if Christos wished to be freed, because he thought that he could free him. And indeed, he tried to get the vise off of his legs and succeeded. But Christos said, “I don’t really expect to recover from all of this, and I don’t really desire for you to bring me any food or drink or anything like that, because I know how this is going to end, and if it is going to end this way then I should like to be hungered and thirsty for Christ my God, in the same way that he hungered and thirsted many, many times.”

So Christos, after about one day, was taken out of the prison and slain by beheading. It would seem a terrible end for a man who was simply trying to sell apples, for someone who was simply trying to earn a living, and yet because of one obnoxious person who felt that they could take care of someone by accusing them—well, look what happened. He had to reach deep, deep down also because of something that happened to him out of nowhere. It wasn’t expected. He probably did not even think that he was prepared for such a thing, but in the end the Lord gave him the strength, and he testified as a witness to our Lord Jesus Christ in front of all the Muslims there who were seeking his death.

It only shows us that, as we go through our own lives, which are for the most part something that [is] perhaps calm and predictable, but yet sometimes things do happen according to the will of God, and we have to be prepared spiritually always to testify to the faith of our Lord Jesus Christ, for this is what he requires of us; it is not optional. Perhaps for most of us, we will go through life, and we will never encounter such a situation where we feel that we are in a lot of trouble and that it’s time for us to reach down deep, find out who we really are in the Lord’s eyes. But at the same time, preparedness is everything in the spiritual life.

So if we love the Lord now, when things are calm and peaceful, and can make a good testimony of him, then if that day comes when he calls upon us to give the ultimate testimony, we will all be prepared. So let’s mark this February 12 as the day of St. Christos the Gardener, who died in the mid-1700s, and ask for his holy prayers, that we, too, may also be prepared for whatever comes our way.