Let's have divine fun!

My joy will be in you and your joy will be fulfilled (John 15:11). Come... divine joy... let us partake of the Kingdom of Christ (Easter. Canon. 8, trop. 1st). On Easter night, when the procession of the cross, having gone around the church, stops in front of the closed doors, a temporally elusive, but spiritually significant moment of a certain perplexed, questioning silence passes through the souls: “who will roll away the stone for us from the door of the tomb” (Mark 16:3)? and will the tomb appear empty, for Christ has risen? And when the doors open before the sign of the cross and we enter the church sparkling with lights while singing the jubilant Easter hymn, our hearts are filled with joy, for Christ has risen from the dead. And then the Easter miracle takes place in our souls. For we “see the resurrection of Christ.” “Having purified our senses,” we see “the shining Christ” and “let us approach the coming Christ from the tomb like a bridegroom.” We then lose consciousness of where we are, come out of ourselves in stopped time, enter into the Sabbath “rest of the people of God” (Heb. 4:9-10). In the radiance of the white ray of Easter, the earthly colors fade, and the soul sees only the unapproachable light of resurrection: now everything is filled with light, heaven and earth and the underworld. On Easter night it is given to a person in anticipation of experiencing the life of the next century, entering the kingdom of Glory, the kingdom of God. The language of our world does not have words to express in them the revelation of Easter night, for it is the secret of the future age, whose “language is silence.” The perfect joy given on this night according to the promise of the Lord is the Holy Spirit, revealing to us, by the will of the Father, the risen Christ. The Holy Spirit is the real joy in the Holy Trinity, the Father in the Son and the Son in the Father, and He is the joy in us about the resurrection of Christ. Through them we see the risen Christ, He is the Light of Christ’s resurrection in us. Easter is not for us one of the holidays, but “a holiday of holidays, a triumph of celebrations.” All twelve great holidays give us knowledge of the Kingdom of God in the works of God, as the events of this century, but Easter is not a memory of such an event, for it is addressed to the century to come. Easter is on earth the threshold of the appearance of glory, for which Christ prayed to the Father in His high-sanctification prayer - the heavenly Jerusalem, which at the consummation of times, according to a prophetic vision, descends from heaven to earth: shine, shine, new Jerusalem, for the glory of the Lord has risen upon you. Easter is eternal life, consisting in knowledge of God and communion with God. She is truth, peace and joy in the Holy Spirit. There was the first word of the risen Lord in his appearance to the myrrh-bearing women: rejoice (Matthew 28:9), and His word in his appearance to the apostles: peace to you (Luke 21:36; John 20:19.29). The life of the future century is not a simple negation of this century with its destruction, but the perpetuation of everything that is worthy of it, just as eternity is not the oblivion or abolition of time, but the stopping of its meandering run. The glorification of the creature in the resurrection is accomplished by the power of God, but in its own life through the feat of self-denial. For the Resurrection of Christ occurs by the power of His voluntary suffering and death on the cross: trampling down death by death. Victory over death is accomplished from within, by death itself. The life of this world is completely exhausted in the exhaustion of the death of Christ, just as death, fully known and experienced, is already powerless to hold Him (Acts 2:29), for it itself is exhausted in Him: where is your sting, O death? (1 Cor. 15:55), death is swallowed up in victory (1 Cor. 15:54). Resurrection is not the creation of new life, but victory over death in death itself, eternal life rising from death, coming to Christ from the tomb, like a bridegroom. The Resurrection of Christ is therefore also the perpetuation of His saving death, which crowns His redemptive passion and the entire path of incarnation. The Resurrection of Christ is the Cross, for it is accomplished by the Cross, by the power of the sacrificial act of love and obedience. We worship Your Cross, Master, and we sing and glorify Your holy resurrection. In the trampling of death, in the victory of resurrection, the cross is the foundation and power of resurrection joy. The bliss of paradise preserves the memory of enlightened and overcome suffering, just as light is victory over the “darkness at the top of the abyss,” just as God’s world envelops “empty and formless land” with beauty and structure. This age, while being preserved, passes into the future and is transformed into it, just as the earthly body of the Lord Jesus was transformed in the resurrection. The body of the risen Lord retains the nail wounds and the pierced rib, as evidence of its self-identity; in this unity of life of this and the next century, the power of Christ’s resurrection is revealed. The image of resurrection is inscribed in nature, and its seal is in its spring resurrection. From the ground after the winter torpor, spring rises living sprouts, new shoots emerge from it with sharp needles, and they are filled with the juices of life. Spring dresses itself in the colorful clothes of resurrection under the life-giving rays of the sun. And every spring of nature prophesies about the coming spring of the whole world. The death of nature is overcome by the warmth of life, and the Easter of nature naturally gives way to the Christian Easter. And just as winter leads to spring along its difficult path, so in Christian life the days of Lent and Holy Week are introduced into the Holy Week. Easter. Sometimes people want to avoid this path without experiencing or experiencing Holy Week. But their feelings remain unopened, there is no candle in their soul to light the Easter light. For “yesterday I was buried with You today, I am resurrected with You, I was crucified with You yesterday.” Blessed is he who can repeat in his heart these words of the Easter song. Joy is the crown of sorrow, a great light shines in darkness and the shadow of death, death is conquered by death, and Easter triumph is the spiritual fruit of sorrow and Lenten feat. After winter sadness, the Groom calls his soul-bride: arise, my beloved, my beautiful, come out (Song. 2:10). The rays of light of Christ's resurrection penetrate the entire universe. In it the dead are alive for us; we send them Easter greetings, like the news of the resurrection, which they know in their own way. It is not just the animate and rational creature that receives the power of resurrection, but the entire universe is resurrected in the body of Christ, rejoicing in the joy of Easter. “Let the heavens rejoice with dignity, let the earth rejoice, and let the whole world, visible and invisible, celebrate.” To the prophetic eye, the leaping joy of Easter is clearly in nature: the “playing” sun, the air, the waters, and the plants are illuminated by the rays of divine joy. The resurrecting human spirit cannot find outside itself a dead nature that has not risen with it, and it calls it to Christ’s resurrection. Easter is Eucharistic joy. The Lord did not separate from us at the Ascension, but left us a connection with Him in St. communion. Eating the bread of heaven and the cup of life, we perceive the appearing Christ and then glorify Him with the hymn of resurrection. Oh, great and most sacred Easter of Christ, oh, wisdom and word of God, and power! grant us the opportunity to partake of You in the unfading days of Your kingdom. The Easter celebration is already this non-evening day, and the joy of Easter is related to the joy of communion. Believers are filled with Christ, the Lord is close to us, He appears to us as He appeared to the apostles before the Ascension. Easter is a deliberate sacrament given to the Church by the Holy Spirit for the knowledge of the risen Lord: having seen the resurrection of Christ, let us worship the Lord Jesus. Easter is joy in the Church; by its power we find ourselves in the Church, in the one life of one body, the body of Christ. What usually remains only a call and a promise now appears as the highest reality. Church joy allows us to see each other in God and through this rejoice in our neighbor, as is characteristic of a lover about his beloved. Easter fills us with the Holy Spirit, who is the joy of love. This gift is given to spirit-bearing men as a reward for their deeds. In the soul of the Rev. Seraphim always shone with Easter, and with the Easter greeting: Christ is risen, my joy, he greeted those who came. And in us, gloomy and gloomy and stingy with affection, on this night the heart opens to the jubilation of love, in the Easter kiss and the welcoming gospel: Christ is risen! In this light, personal grievances fade away and bad feelings disappear. Is it possible not to forgive those who love, and isn’t forgiveness the highest joy of love? It likens us to God forgiving the prodigal son and crowning him at the wedding feast. Easter is common forgiveness in the joy of love. In Easter love we comprehend the love of God, which surpasses all understanding. In this light there is no place for darkness and shadow. In the fire everything melts and unites. Resurrection day, and let us be enlightened by triumph, and embrace each other. Rtsem, brethren, and we will forgive all those who hate us through the resurrection. The heart burns with the joy of love, with which it burned in the two disciples when they saw and heard Him walking with them on the way. Even now He is among us, invisibly visible. Amen.