we became orthodox

“For from the rising of the sun even to its going down, My name has been glorified among the Gentiles; and in every place incense shall be offered to my name, and a pure offering, for My name shall be great among the Gentiles,” says the Lord Almighty. (Malachi 1:11)

The first time we met with our now-priest, Father Michael, he pointed to John’s chest and said, “In your heart, you are already Orthodox. Your head just has to catch up.”

These are very bold words to say to someone you’ve just met, but his tone wasn’t arrogant. He was simply stating something that he knew to be true.

It was true. It’s hard to put this miracle into words, but as we discovered Orthodoxy, we found that it already lived within us. Christ had planted His Church in our hearts; we had only to cultivate it.

What a humbling and life-giving journey it has been. We’ve become children again, sitting at the feet of our teachers, having to admit when we don’t know something. We look to the wisdom of the ancient Church, and to the witness of those who have finished the race & kept the faith before us, rather than to our own understandings. Every liturgy, we join with heaven to praise and glorify our triune God, who is both more intimately near to us than even ourselves, yet more profoundly sovereign and holy than we can wrap our minds around.

I wanted to write something about this journey, but in all honesty, there is so much about Orthodoxy that can’t be captured in words. How do I explain the experience of stepping outside of time and into the Kingdom of God every liturgy? How do I explain the “immortal and life-creating” mysteries of the sacramental life? How do I articulate the ways the Lord has changed me through His Church, the ways He has formed my mind and my heart? (The wise advice given to those of us who are unaccustomed to the ways of the Church, or perhaps even uncomfortable with them, is this: You don’t change the Church; the Church changes you.)

There are moments in the liturgy where time slips away from me. As I sing—Holy, Holy, Holy Lord of Hosts, heaven and earth are full of your glory, hosanna in the highest—I’m aware that my feeble voice joins the resplendent chorus of angels and saints before the throne of God, that my prayers rise before Him as fragrant incense, and that He invites me to partake of His divine nature.

I find myself wishing I would never leave that moment, and then I realize that’s what heaven is: a joyful, beautiful, dynamic liturgy in the presence of God, where every moment is rich with beauty and significance, where there is no boredom or suffering or discontentment or distraction, where our hearts overflow with love toward all creation and its Creator. Heaven will be beyond anything our minds can imagine, yet it will not be foreign to us. God has hidden it in our hearts, and we taste and see its glory every liturgy.

This is the invitation of Psalm 34: to taste and see that the Lord is good. This faith is meant to be experienced, not merely studied or spoken about. And so I find that my words fall short, and I turn to words that have endured the ages.

In the first chapter of St. John’s gospel, eager-eyed disciples of St. John the Baptist come to Christ. This man, the Baptist has declared, is the Lamb of God who takes away the sins of the world. This man is the one whom they have been eagerly anticipating: God in the flesh, savior of the world, Love incarnate.

“Teacher,” they ask him. “Where are you staying?”

Where do you live, God? Under what roof have you chosen to abide?

“Come and see,” he says.

 

  

 a final note

While this post is not an apologetic, but rather a joyful sharing of this life John & I have entered, I do feel the need to address one question. When I shared the news of our becoming Orthodox with a friend over coffee, she asked, “What do you think of Christians in other churches, like me? Are we just wrong?”

There’s much wisdom in the Church regarding this question, and I won’t seek to encapsulate it all here—again, this isn’t an apologetic. But in love, as a relative and friend to many in other Christian traditions, I’ll say this:

I believe that the Orthodox Church is the Church of the apostles, born at Pentecost, the “pillar and ground of the truth” that St. Paul refers to in his first letter to Timothy. In humbleness of heart, with great gratitude, I receive the rich inheritance of this Church’s ancient wisdom and seek to live my life in accordance with this two-thousand year legacy: a oneness of heart, mind, belief, and worship. This oneness was clearly important to the early Church, and Christ himself prayed for it. I pray for this unity, too, and I can’t in good conscience say that it’s good for so much division and disagreement to exist within the body of Christ.

The Holy Spirit is present wherever the Holy Spirit wishes to be present, and it’s not our place to put constraints around God’s work in the lives of others. For John & I, the question was not whether God was working in other places—for He certainly was—but whether He intended for His Church to function a certain way. Not because He’s a dictator, nor because He enjoys setting arbitrary standards, but because He knows what is best and most healing for our souls and bodies.

I treasure the many graces and medicines found in the fullness of the Church. I’m not scornful, but rather saddened, that Christians in other traditions do not have many of these medicines. The Church is a hospital for the sick, a place where the Great Physician reaches out in mercy and love to heal and strengthen us. This healing is real; our good and loving God always offers it to us, and while we can find it in many places, we are sure to find it in His Church.

I feel a bit like a child that’s just discovered something wondrous. I know my paltry descriptions will fall short, and so I always find myself at the same endpoint, tugging at my loved ones’ sleeves and saying, quite simply: Come and see.