Word on the day of the Epiphany of the Lord

God is omnipresent. He is the Spirit and fills everything with Himself. Both faith and reason agree on this. What does it mean that faith so often tells us about theophany? What does it mean that the Christian Church has called this day primarily the day of Epiphany? God is omnipresent. Nevertheless, He can manifest His special power, in a certain place, for certain people. He is “Spirit; He breathes where he wants” (John 3:8) and as he wants, he breathes: then in thunder and lightning - in the terrible power of strength; then in the gentle breeze of the wind - in the power of its goodness. In heaven is His throne, His city is heavenly Jerusalem; in heaven are the abodes of many many servants, revelation tells us: this means that we are pointed to the position in which God appears more clearly than to us earthly inhabitants, and makes his holy servants blessed; this means that the Spirit is a zealot of holiness, filling everything with itself, and is especially close to pure spirits. And on earth He reveals Himself with His special goodness for the good, and with terrible greatness for the sinful; and on earth He manifests His great and wondrous care wherever He wants, according to His wise and good will. Our God is a self-existent, omnipotent God - He is not subject to inevitable immobility, or immovable necessity. And the created spirit, ruling over the body connected with it, reveals its special presence - now in this, now in another member it commands - now this, now the other part of the bodily composition entrusted to it. Moreover, the omnipotent and supremely free Spirit can carry out its thoughts where it pleases and how it pleases. God is Spirit: but He acts in the visible, material world. The created spirit is subtle, immaterial, but acts in a rough, complex body. The manifestations of God the Spirit in material images are as accessible to understanding as the actions of the same Spirit on the material world are undoubted. Both phenomena are manifestations of the power of God in material things. God is an omnipresent Spirit. But that is why the spirit is limited and embraces Him only in appearances, only in limited images. How does a creature embrace the immensity? Only in parts, only to the extent that He deigns to reveal Himself, does man come to know Him. God is good. He has demonstrated His good will in understandable signs at all times; The history of times is proof of this. The man is a sinner! when did the Lord not show you His special love in visible forms? You fell for the first time; God searched and found you. Even after that, you did not stop deviating from God through new sins, and you did not stop alienating yourself from Him through everyday crimes; but eternal love pursued you on all your paths, kept you from the paths of error, and returned you to the path of salvation. How often, how diversely, God showed you the power of His goodness: sometimes in saving words, sometimes in mysterious images! What does the history of God’s people mean if not the history of theophany, if not the conversation of God with sinner man, incomprehensible to the soul and ear? Only those for whom the voice of true history is incomprehensible can only imagine the thought of theophany as incomprehensible. When could a person say that he has no need for conversation with God, for the manifestations of the good Divine? Even when he was not yet a sinner, even then he thirsted for a higher revelation, as a weak creature, as a limited being: - all the more so, when he became a sinner, he must bless the goodness of God, which appears to him in visible signs. To what extent would people have reached in their fall into sin if the all-wise and all-good had not enlightened their eyes darkened by sin, and had not strengthened their weak will for good with his appearances? Christian! Never has God revealed Himself on earth in such abundant light, in such lofty images as He appeared to you in Christ. Christianity is the complete revelation of the Divine, as complete as it can be on earth; it is the most spiritual, the purest revelation of the deity, as much as a spiritual revelation can be, appointed for the sons of the earth. There was a time when God talked to people like children. In Christ He revealed what was to be revealed to men. For people-children, He appeared and revealed His truth in tangible-sensual images, revealed the original truths in a language understandable to the imagination and feelings. How abundant and how pure is God’s light shed on you, Christian! Imagine living as a pagan; imagine everything that you could think, what you could do, remaining with pagan thoughts, with a pagan soul. You should be horrified by those gross superstitions, those disgusting vices that would burden you as a pagan. Remaining a Jew, you would sigh under the weak and weak elements of the world, under material rituals. The high, spiritual truth appeared to you in Jesus, in its spiritual form. How high is your destiny, arranged in Christ! Unfortunately, corruption has corrupted both our minds and hearts, and we feel too little of the dignity of the Christian theophany. What are the thoughts, what are the hearts of most of us busy with? What do you think about with pleasure? What do people admire? Is it the truth of Christ, the highest, the purest, the truth of God that fills souls? Oh no! People's hearts often pour out in joy and joy, in the sweetest raptures, but it is not the light of Christ that delights them. Their thoughts and hearts are occupied with earthly, often insignificant, often harmful things: they love darkness more than light. What is given to man to know for earthly life is recognized with all zeal; and what is open to eternal life is recognized as unnecessary, or superfluous; the science of living on earth for the earth is divided into branches, taken apart in parts, reviewed with a simple and artificial eye, they try to notice all sides with distinct accuracy; and the best science - the science of living for heaven - is left aside, or they are engaged in it, but rather coldly. Concerns about the earth have suppressed the activity of the Christian - that same Christian who must live primarily for heaven alone, whom the heavenly Father has so favored and is pleased to seek for himself alone, wants to fulfill with himself alone, in which he wants to reveal His glory. The mystery, the highest mystery, is revealed to the Christian at the baptism of Christ Jesus. According to the unanimous testimony of the holy evangelists, “When Jesus was baptized, he rose up from the water, and behold, the heavens were opened to Him, and in the sight of the Spirit of God descending like a dove, and coming on Him. And behold a voice from heaven, saying: This is my beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased” (Matthew 3:16-17). The heavenly Father testifies of Himself with a voice from heaven that He is the Father of the beloved Son. Reverence, Christian, and worship God the Father! The Son is immersed in the water of baptism, and a voice from heaven calls Him the Son of the Heavenly Father. The Baptist of the Son testifies that until that time he did not know the Son, but in baptism he knew that He was the Son of God; that He is the one who, being born after him, preceded him, since he was before him, since he is the first of all, eternal (John 1:30-34). Reverence, Christian, and worship the baptized God the Son! The Holy Spirit is not a human spirit, not a created Spirit, but the Spirit of the Divinity itself, the Spirit with the glory and power of the Divine: but He appears separate from both the Father and the Son, in bodily form. Be reverent, Christian, and worship God the Holy Spirit! Thus, the Church sacredly sings: “In the Jordan, being baptized by You, O Lord, the adoration of the Trinity appeared to us.” If we imagine that the mystery of the Holy Trinity was not revealed with such clarity and certainty to the patriarchs themselves, to the prophets themselves, to all the righteous people of the Old Testament; If we imagine that it was revealed in full light for the first time only at the baptism of Christ Jesus: then with what deep reverence should our hearts be filled with this mystery? Everything else that a person can know about God, about His properties, is far below this secret: this is the deepest, most inner secret of God’s being, which man on his own could never and cannot know. That is why the Church rightly calls this day the day of theophany: for the incomprehensible God has now appeared to people. Christian brothers! Do we understand, do we feel the richness of God’s goodness, illuminating us with such a wonderful light? The thought of the Trinity Divinity is a distinctive feature of Christian revelation; but does it constitute a necessary thought for our thoughts? Or, do we have so many thoughts in our souls that even such a lofty thought hardly ever finds a place in us? How many wonder who this Son is for us, who is baptized in the Jordan? Who is the Holy Spirit for us, who descended on the baptized Jesus? (Matthew 3:16). Entering into the true faith, we were baptized in the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit; this means that, according to the faith of the Church and the Word of God, without faith in the Holy Trinity, one cannot be a true Christian faith, one cannot be considered a true believer in God: but is this how we now think about this mystery? Beloved brother! Do you and I really not have enough love for truth to remember the name that you and I bear on ourselves - the name of a Christian, and the duty assigned to us by this name at our baptism? Father, Son and Holy Soul! Enlighten us with Your light, - darkened by negligence about our salvation and - about Your secrets. Amen. You might be interested in: