Why What's Wrong In The World Is Actually Just You

Added: 2026-05-11

[00:00:00]In the name of the father, the son and the holy spirit. Christ is risen.

[00:00:05]>> Indeed, he is risen.

[00:00:06]>> You know, I was thinking about this homaly. I was thinking about a story from the uh sayings of the desert fathers. The sayings of the desert fathers is one of the best books you can possibly read. It has all the short kind of tales and quips and sayings from those ancient fathers who lived in the holy deserts of well I can't say the deserts for holy but the deserts of Egypt and whatnot in the early first century or sorry third century uh one of these sayings there is between a disciple and uh his abba his his elder or also called his yanda but in the desert fathers they always call them abba father but it's kind of like a more familiar term. And his Abba says to him, he says, "When you look at my face, what do you see?"

[00:00:54]And the disciple says to him, "Aba, when I look at you, I see the face of an angel."

[00:01:00]A year goes by and the Abba says to him, "My my son, what do you see when you look at my face?" And he says, "I see the face of a man." And then a whole another year goes by and he's talking with him again and he says, "My son, when you look in my face, what do you see?" And then the the disciple says, "I see the fe face of a demon."

[00:01:23]What had changed with the Abba over all that time? This story is to highlight the fact that when people first encountered their elder, they would often find that they were believed them to be god-bearing, that they saw that they were angelic and all these things.

[00:01:40]And then what happened? They kind of begin to lose their spiritual zeal, their fervor. They become negligent. And then what do they think about their spiritual father? You know what? He's just a man. I used to think he was an angel, but he's just a man. And then more time goes on and what happens to the disciple in the monastery? He probably just gets tired. He gets tired of listening, of taking direction. Maybe he's tired of the monastery. Maybe he's tired of the fasting. You know, he's tired of being told what to do. And then at that point, his whole disposition changes. And he says about his elder, you know, I see in your face the face of a demon. The thing is is that the elder was consistent through it all. But what was the disciple? the disciple was riding the kind of highs and lows of the waves of whether or not he wanted to hear what his elder actually had to say and instruct him to do. And so what I think about when I hear today's gospel is not what was said between Christ and the woman at the well the the martyr Fotonyi also called Svetana.

[00:02:42]I don't think about what was said because you can see from their conversation in so many ways it's a very simple conversation fine comes to the well or comes to the well Christ is there Christ speaks to her so he breaks kind of all of the social taboo of what he's not supposed to do as a Jewish man speaking with a woman who's a Samaritan but then what's interesting is what happens he begins to reveal to her who she really is he begins to revealed to her the secret sins of her life, the things that she obviously was probably not proud of, was probably embarrassed about, didn't want to share, didn't want to be put out there, type of thing, right? None of us like our kind of sins put out there.

[00:03:27]Especially when you meet somebody for the first time and then they begin to tell you your sins. Nobody is looking forward to this. And yet, what is so interesting about Futini is what? She hears all these things. She's not discouraged.

[00:03:42]She's not upset. She doesn't beat herself up. Instead, she marvels at Christ and cannot believe the love and the compassion that he shows to her. And yet, how does he show her that love and compassion? Simply through his words?

[00:04:00]No. But through what? His eyes, his face, his disposition, the way that he relates to her. See what's so interesting when I tell you the story of the monk whose disciple sees him first as an angel and then as a man and then becomes embittered and sees him as a demon is this is the very same Christ who it says in the gospel that they sought to kill him.

[00:04:25]They sought to kill him in the midst of his preaching in the midst of his ministry. They sought to kill him. And yet this is the same Christ that people come and weep at his feet. They anoint his feet with tears. We have the martyr Fotini who becomes the first evangelist.

[00:04:45]She's considered the first evangelist.

[00:04:47]She's considered the first missionary because why? She takes exactly what she sees in Christ. Not just what she hears, but really what she encounters in him and she takes that and does what? She goes into the city and she says, "This man told me everything about my life."

[00:05:09]What's so interesting is that how many times do people become stressed or worried about coming to confession or worried about doing a life confession or worried about what the priest will see hear them say or how the priest will see them. And yet the priest has heard all these things hundreds if not thousands of times and just nothing. But what is it? There is that sense of self-preservation.

[00:05:34]If somebody else really sees me, they're going to reject me. If somebody else really knows who I am, what are they?

[00:05:42]It's going to dispel the myth of who what I want them to think that I am.

[00:05:48]That's what we're worried about. Because if you say, "Well, they're going to see me. They're going to know me for who I really am." The immediate question is, "Well, isn't that what you would expect?

[00:06:00]It wouldn't that be normal?

[00:06:03]Because secretly inside of us, what do we hope? We want people to think of us better than we are, different than who we really are. We want people to see us in a light that doesn't even correspond to reality.

[00:06:17]And yet, and yet with Fotini, she encounters Christ. She looks into his face. She hears his words and immediately is transfixed and transformed by encountering Christ.

[00:06:33]She does not run away. She does not become defensive. She doesn't justify herself. She gives no excuses in today's gospel. She doesn't explain why she's doing what she's doing in her life.

[00:06:47]Neither does she try to pretend like it isn't true or that he has the wrong person or any other number of things.

[00:06:55]She simply listens.

[00:06:58]And through that listening and encountering Christ, the interesting thing is this is the same Christ that when those Jews were confronted by him sought to kill him.

[00:07:11]See, when they encountered Christ and his face and his look, his disposition, his interaction with them, they felt condemned. They felt judged.

[00:07:23]They hated. They despised him even to the point not just of wanting to putting him to death. They sought to put him to death and eventually accomplish putting him to death.

[00:07:35]The interesting thing was with them, they were what? What does Christ say today? Do we do do we not know salvation comes from the Jews?

[00:07:46]They were the ones who were religious.

[00:07:48]They were the ones who had it all together. They were following all the law and all the precepts. They were following all the instructions. But what did Christ say to them? They were like a whitewash supplicer. They were like a tomb. On the outside, they could appear very good and very religious. But on the inside, they had no love for God. They had no devotion to him. So much so that what does Christ say to them? If Moses and Elijah were here, right, they would acknowledge me. They would know me. No, he says Abraham, if Abraham was here, forgive me. He says if Abraham was here, he would acknowledge me. They because they say what Abraham is our father and he says no he's not your real father because if Abraham was here he would see and he would know me by what?

[00:08:43]Simply by seeing and encountering Christ.

[00:08:48]That is what's so interesting about today's gospel. It's not the dialogue cuz the dialogue is very straightforward and it's very simple and yet the effect that it has upon the woman is what?

[00:09:01]Profound and transformative. So much so that she takes that encounter with Christ and goes out and begins to preach that Christ is the Messiah. And what we don't read in today's gospel, what we know from holy tradition is that her sons convert. She goes out. She's a missionary and they're all martyed.

[00:09:23]That one encounter, that one encounter with Christ set her on that path to martyrdom.

[00:09:31]Brothers and sisters, we should not be surprised when people encounter Christ and they seek to kill him with their mind, with their thoughts, with their anger, with all of those things that are going on inside of them. So many times today, people think that you can argue people into the Orthodox church or you can somehow kind of convince them as if belief is a byproduct of rationality or only the intellect. No. So much of belief is of what? The heart, the core.

[00:10:06]Because all of the different people within the gospels who encountered Christ heard something, but they all responded to it differently.

[00:10:17]And so it is brothers and sisters with us in our own life. In our own life, we must ask ourselves a question. Have we become like the martyr Fotonyi?

[00:10:31]Have we had a genuine encounter with Christ? Have all of our sins been revealed, but not in a way where we feel ashamed or we want to hide it or we want to think that we're somebody that we're not.

[00:10:46]But are we overjoyed?

[00:10:48]Because that's what we see in her life today. She is not just okay with it. In a sense, she's like overjoyed. Christ has revealed everything that is broken within her life. Her behavior is atrocious.

[00:11:04]And she doesn't shrink away from it. She does not become discouraged. She does not become angry with Christ. She does not argue. She doesn't do any of those things. She has this deep sense of acceptance of exactly who she is. But with what the corresponding reality that she has a deep acceptance of Christ in that moment she forges this love and this bond with Christ. This this beginning of this relationship with him.

[00:11:36]But the beginning of that relationship is predicated on the fact that he sees and knows her exactly as she is.

[00:11:46]And she didn't even ask him. She didn't even tell him. He just knew. But she never ran away from that. So many times when people are confronted with their sins or their sinfulness or the state of their soul, they want to run. They want to hide. They don't want to see it. So many times people encounter the Orthodox faith and they think, "I'm never going to confession. I'm never doing that."

[00:12:13]Why?

[00:12:15]Why?

[00:12:17]Because we become full of our pride and our egotism. We become full of self-love. We don't want to take an honest look and evaluation at ourselves.

[00:12:29]Not ironically because of God, but we don't want to do it because of ourselves.

[00:12:38]We don't want to see who we really are.

[00:12:40]We know that it's out there, but we don't want to look. We don't want to examine it. See, it has nothing to do with God whatsoever. It doesn't because God loves and forgives us. In fact, we see it in today's gospel. We see it in every encounter that Christ has with people. people living atrocious sinful lives, demon-possessed people, harlots.

[00:13:05]We see what he's just very accepting.

[00:13:08]He doesn't leave them where they are. He doesn't expect them to continue on in their life. But there is no they have no sense that he is ready to reject them at all.

[00:13:19]Christ is like the father in the story of the prodigal son. The father is waiting for the prodigal son to return.

[00:13:28]And then when the prodigal son returns, he runs out to meet him. So none of this has to do with God. All of this has to do with ourselves.

[00:13:38]Have we made an honest evaluation of ourselves? Are we ready to look at who we really are? Are we ready to take accountability for who we are and to see what is going on inside of us?

[00:13:53]One of my favorite quotes is from ironic father Turbo. He says, you know, so many people they leave the world to come to the Orthodox church because there is something wrong in the world. There's something terribly wrong in the world.

[00:14:08]And then when they come to the Orthodox church, they find out what's wrong in the world is actually just me.

[00:14:15]See, that's the part of the equation that we don't want to look at. We want to look at all the politics and all the people and all this. And maybe it's your kids or maybe it's your husband or maybe it's your boss or maybe it's your co-workers or the person who who cut you off this week. Maybe it's everybody else. Maybe.

[00:14:35]But if it's everybody else, then you're the only saint.

[00:14:40]The reality is, brothers and sisters, we need to have the disposition of this great martyr Fotonyi. We need to understand that when Christ encounters us, he is going to shine his light within our souls. He is going to reveal all of the sinful things that are wrong with us. All the things that are broken in our attitude, our approach to life, our thoughts, our judgment, our pride, our egotism. But he shines this light into our heart in order to eradicate and to remove these things in order to cleanse us. He is shining this light into us in order to heal us.

[00:15:22]It is this it is this power of light that it is the most powerful uh what do they say the most powerful bacteria killer or antiseptic or something in the whole world. Right? The power of light, UV light, is that it can destroy all the bacteria. But with Christ, he is what?

[00:15:41]He's shining into our souls in order to eradicate all of that darkness that is dwelling within us. But our attitude, our attitude has to be one that we want this and that we accept it and that we're okay with it, that we welcome it, that we welcome what is being revealed about us in our souls, that we are excited to encounter Christ.

[00:16:10]Because it's so easy, it's so easy to say, you know, these are parts of my personality or my character or my life.

[00:16:18]These are the things I don't want to look at. I don't want anybody else to look at. I don't want anybody else to see or to know about me. I don't want to be the person that I am. And then what do we do? It's not just that we run from ourselves. We end up running from Christ. We run from Christ because we don't want to see who we really are. And yet here is Christ with the woman at the well. And what is he saying? I give you eternal life. I'm here to heal you.

[00:16:48]I'm here to heal you.

[00:16:51]You know, when we see the doctor in the operating room, we should not be afraid of the doctor.

[00:16:57]We should be afraid of whatever is troubling us because it will kill us.

[00:17:01]And so too, likewise in our spiritual life, we have things that get rooted deep within our souls and we have to have the light of Christ to illumin them and to eradicate them and to remove them from us. We need Christ's healing.

[00:17:20]You know, Fotonyi when she encountered Christ did not think that her life was going to go on the same way that it always had because that encounter was transformative.

[00:17:30]So much so that she goes out and begins to preach Christ. She starts preaching Christ. She wants people to know him.

[00:17:39]Why? Because she has been in a sense she has been seen by him. But also what? She has seen him.

[00:17:48]He has seen all of her. And yet at the same moment she sees him with his love, with his mercy, with with his compassion, with his lack of judgmentalness.

[00:18:02]In all of those ways, when she encounters Christ, she realizes that her life needs to change dramatically. But she welcomes it. She welcomes it. She's not afraid of what's revealed and she's not afraid of who Christ wants her to become. And she embraces all of those things in the moment that she encounters Christ, looks into his face, and hears the words about her own life. Brothers and sisters, this is the most perfect spiritual disposition.

[00:18:36]This is exactly how we should feel when we go to confession. This is exactly how we should feel when we confess, when we read the scriptures, when we pray and encounter Christ. Christ knows everything about me, but he never wants to leave me as I am. His desire is to change and to transform and to cut out those dark parts of my soul that are only leading to more sinfulness, are only leading to more delusion, are only leading to more pain and problems in my life.

[00:19:16]That is what we should be welcoming.

[00:19:19]That is what this great martyr today welcomed. She welcomed the healing to be freed from her life. She welcomed the fact that even though she had lived tremendously sinfully, she was okay in understanding that God had a new plan for her life and that she could embrace Christ and move ahead in holy repentance.

[00:19:41]What a tremendous gospel today. So few words and yet so much transpired.

[00:19:49]And this spiritual disposition that we see of Fotonyi is something that we should absolutely seek to emulate and be encouraged by and not be afraid of. We should never be afraid of God seeing us for who we really are. Because within that is also the hope and the joy that Christ will transform us like he transformed this very weward woman living this very sinful life into the first evangelist and a holy martyr of his church. Amen.