Lazarus & the Rich Man

I spent a few minutes looking for a fitting icon or image to illustrate the topic of the Sunday of Lazarus & the Rich Man, but I couldn't find any, so this graphic from "Holy Ghost Zapped Comix" from my early Jesus Freak days will have to do. (Yes, I was, and still am, a Jesus Freak.) Today is another rainy late fall day in Portland. This is what happened at the Orthodox temple this morning…

This morning, Fr. Nick Triantafillou, the president of the Greek Orthodox seminary in Boston, was visiting Holy Trinity to give a seminar on Christian education or something, and to promote the Agia Sophia Academy, the Orthodox day school in Portland. Strangely enough, our scripture for this morning was the story of Lazarus and the Rich Man (Luke 16:19-31), and the epistle was the famous "man is not justified by works of the Law but through faith in Jesus Christ" passage (Galatians 2:16-20). What could have been a better combination? The Word of God warns us NOT to emulate the nameless "rich man" by ignoring the poor yet, while helping the poor man at OUR door, NOT to think that even our works of mercy can purchase our salvation! Very evangelical, yes! I thought, very appropriate, as I was planning to join Brock downtown to do whatever the Lord put before us.
Anyway, Fr. Nick started his sermon, bypassing (it seemed) the scriptures, and began to "preach" an entertaining sermon, or so I thought. After listening for a few seconds, I unzipped my Bible, lay it open on my knees at Isaiah 42, stuck my thumb into my right ear (the left is about 50% deaf), slipped my glasses up onto the ridge in my forehead and, crouching over the Word, began quietly whispering the verses of the prophet, pushing Fr. Nick's loud preaching into the mindless periphery of my consciousness. This is what I do when (it appears that) the Word of God is not being preached at sermon time. I always keep an ear out, though, for a change in the prevailing winds, in case the Holy Spirit starts to move—He can fill even windbags with His anointed God-breathed messages, if they only let Him!
Well, after a bit, Fr. Nick's friendly, down-to-earth style began to get filled up with more worthy content, and he even got to the point where, over and above praising the Ladies' Philóptochos Society (Greek women's charity orgs) for their philanthropic work, he began pushing the gospel message in our direction. Even though I didn't take my eyes off the text of Isaiah (I read up through 44:8), at the point where my reading changed direction, Fr. Nick's preaching did too, and that's exactly when I reconnected. He put it quite simply, that we should go out and minister to the "Lazaruses" of our city, the homeless, etc., and that it was the people's job to do this, not just the clergy. Well, of course, I couldn't agree more. Though I'm not able to recount Fr. Nick's words beyond that, it was good to hear him say the things he did. It made me want to touch him, and let him know that I want to do these things, and that I have, by God's permission, in the recent past. After his sermon was over, I left the temple, went out to my van and got a couple of copies of "The Freeing of Mickey Landry" into an envelope, wrote a short note on it, and returned to the service. Maybe later I would have a chance to give it to him.
After the service, Fr. Nick disappeared. I tried calling Brock, but there was no answer, so I stayed at church, hoping Brock would return my call (to Jacob's cell phone), and let me know where he was, downtown, so I could join him. This didn't happen. Instead, the Lord opened up an opportunity to "help Lazarus" right there in the temple!
At the coffee fellowship after the services were over, I visited with some of the brothers, while Anastasía went to talk to the women. I saw her sitting at a table with an older woman and some children. Meanwhile, I found Fr. Nick again, talked with him a little, and gave him the booklets. I hoped he would read them and, God willing, share them with others.
As I was getting ready to leave, Anastasía said she had to help load food into someone's car with Fr. Jerry. She then also disappeared, and I found myself (instead of Anastasía) loading grocery items from the narthex into a lady's car—the lady Anastasía had been talking to. Fr. Jerry and I gave this lady everything we had collected for Oregon Food Bank over the past couple of weeks. She and her grandchildren were kicked out of her home, I don't know why, but are living one day at a time in a motel. She is a member of the Greek community, and was a person of some means a few years back, at least I think so. (I don't know her personally.) So, the Lord keeps sending them to us… and in ways, at times, in places we would never expect them. We just do what Jesus tells us, if we are able and willing, one day at a time.
"The life I now live in this body I live in faith: faith in the Son of God who love me and sacrificed Himself for my sake." (Galatians 2:20b, Jerusalem Bible)