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The Meaning of Church

I want to personally thank all the parishioners who offered their gifts to God this Lenten

season and Holy Week! It is a PRIVILEGE to serve so grerat a God! As we said last

Saturday What God is so great as our God Who does wonders! But I wanted toshare a reflection as bright week ends.

A misnomer exists among Gods people. They have the idea that the physical structure

of the naos, the temple, is the temple itself. While it is a sanctified space and Gods

glory is present, for He loves those who love the beauty of His house, yet Christians

themselves are the temple of God. As Paul said, your bodies are the temple of the

Spirit of God. For indeed,the Most High dwells not in temples made with hands, as

said the prophet. He dwells within us. Lent was introduced into the church for the

purpose of cleaning the house of God, cleaning our hearts.In retrospect, I want to challenge you to reconsider church and what happens when we

do not attend.

1. When we do not attend church we miss the opportunity to RECEIVE Gods gifts.

This Lenten season was not attended as well as it could have. If you did not attend

even one service during great and Holy Lent, you deprived yourself of the grace given

in divine worship, and the sacred life giving mysteries. Often times God wants to help

us through the services, but we seek help from things that cannot help us, the tv,movies, the internet and any other outlet...but church.

2. When we do not attend church we miss the opportunity to SHARE Gods gifts.

YOU are a blessing to the church. God has given YOU gifts to serve and help those

that cannot help themselves. When we skip church we hoard the gifts God has given

us.

3. When we do not attend church we cannot hear Gods voice as clearly as we should.

The world is deafening. The Church, however, is resting in its silence in God.

Communing with God in the presence of other believers, we tend to tune into what

God says more easily. Lets face it, most will not hear the scriptures or read them for

themselves unless they attend. And this is the way God speaks to us.

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When the medicine hurts.

The Church then is a hospital, where God heals us of our selfish passions and as we

abide in Him we bear fruit, and become selfless as our Lord. However, when we are

confronted in the the divine services about our own attitudes, the old man in usbristles at the thought that we have sinned or need to change, and so we lash out

unconsciously. Change hurts. Indeed, as every physical malady hurts, so our spiritual

ones do. As everyone wants to be healed and whole, who then does not want to be

more selfless and loving? These are gifts that come only through the divine grace and

energy of the Spirit present in the assembly of the saints.

These last few weeks we saw some of this uneasiness, this spiritual illness. The

church had to learn to work as a body and submit to one another in love considering

the glory of Christ, and not our own private interests but the good of the church.

Let us not disregard the Masters medicines, His loving corrections to us to conform us

to His way of the cross. For only in the healing power of the cross of self denial with

Christ will there be the life giving resurrection power in our own lives.

CHRIST IS RISEN! LET US WALK IN THE POWER OF A PERPETUAL PASCHA!