The Armenian Church reminds us today that this birth is neither sentimental nor symbolic. Trees, gifts nativities, these are just trifles, things. Christmas is the turning point of history-Asdvadzahaytnutyun-Theophany, when God pours himself into his broken creation, filling and fulfilling what was lost. Before Bethlehem, humanity waited. After Bethlehem, humanity is invited.
Our altar servers, who are lovers of mixed martial arts and all things Armenian, tell me that Armenian UFC fighter Arman Tsarukyan will be wrestling Lance Palmer in Sunrise FL next Saturday night January 10th. I know very little about MMA or wrestling, but I am a big fan of one of the greatest wrestling match…
The story is indeed about us, not about the investments we make, but the investments we are. Each of us is, first and foremost, an investment by God. Our lives, our talents, our families, churches, ethnic background, health, etc. are all given to us by God. This is his investment in each of us. We…
In our culture, waiting has come to feel like missing out like weakness. And yet today’s reading for Advent and Christmas we are reminded of the opposite-that waiting is strength. ‘But they that wait upon the Lord shall renew their strength,’ says the Prophet Isaiah, ‘they shall mount up with wings as eagles; they shall…
A wise man said, ‘Wisdom is founded on memory; happiness on forgetfulness.’ We tend to think of remembering and forgetting as opposites, and remembering as the better, but really we need them both and they are complimentary. Today’s scriptures and our church tradition seems to double down on the importance of both remembering and forgetting,…
The difference between good and bad pride is in its object, what it points to. Pride is so dangerous and so often bad because-irresistibly the object of pride is ourselves, our ego. It’s like the story of the young school boy who was so meek and modest, that he was awarded the ‘most humble badge.’…
God planted us and he hopes that we will choose to grow in his garden in a certain way. The prophet Isaiah perfectly captures how we are to grow in words right after our assigned OT, “Take root downward, bear fruit upward.”