Archives for December 2016

This title is not mine, but Evangelist Luke’s, who conveys to us the view of the ancient Greeks about how they first heard the apostle Paul in ancient Athens.

And it is obvious that the apostle’s appearance in Athens not only did not go unnoticed, but also determined, to a significant extent, the developments of spreading the Gospel and placed – for the first time – the bar of expectations. The things the apostle said were characterized by our ancestors as “new teaching” (“new” in comparison to what they had previously heard in the capital of civilization).

The presence of the Jewish synagogue in ancient Athens is mentioned in the Acts of the Apostles, so the Athenians at that time knew the Hebrew teaching. The view, therefore, that this is a new teaching, is of considerable importance, because it determines precisely and clearly how the ancient Athenians received the teaching of the apostle.

It was a new teaching, a new spirit, which had as its center the resurrection of Christ, but in terms that could be accepted and understood even by our ancient wise ancestors.

Topical are called the modern events; those that are happening today or this time period.

These are events that start and end today or are in progress today, but have begun from the past; yesterday or even before that. And of course, the events of the past may affect us today, but we are judged on the basis of today’s reality and not the past.

Each one of us usually takes a salary not based on the past of our ancestors but on the basis of our present contribution in our work. This is healthy and effective for our personal and everyday life. And that is precisely the aspect of life Christ wants us to understand and apply, that is, life that responds to the actual reality and not to the imaginative one, so that the knowledge of the Scriptures can have a real effect and the presence of the living God can have measurable results in our everyday life.

Desire is the favorable disposition in one direction; the inner tendency to acquire something or to achieve something. I desire, I turn my heart, my inner mood towards a direction, an object; the object of my desire and my craving.

There is no desire without an object to be desired. And if my desire is about a natural subject, a handsome man, a luxury car, an expensive electronic game, etc., then the subject is delineated and concerns only me and the way I get it. But there are desires far beyond these simple human issues of everyday life, and these are obviously much stronger and harder to detect ourselves and even more so by an external judge.

Neither the object of desire nor the method I will obtain it with can be distinguished, when the object is not a natural or artificial object, but an inner desire to cause a disaster to a third person or to groups of people. And this is a crucial part of our modern, complex society.

Time and money are two very familiar concepts for us all and we often hear the phrase “time is money”.

Of course, it doesn’t mean that time by itself is money (no one is going to get rich because they grew up in age and it’s been many years since they were born!) but that the proper use of time – even better, the right and wise use of the 24-hour – undoubtedly yields better profits to the worker, to the one who is working, in opposition to the inactive citizen who has not earned anything or even lost something, because they had to spend their existing stocks.

The concept of the utilization of our time is not only of commercial significance, but also of importance to the issues of active faith in the living God, elements which the first Christians had discovered and left behind in the Holy Texts of the Old and New Testaments.

In order to be executed, each project requires not only an adequate design and a good mood, but appropriate tools and means as well. Without these tools, the project can never be completed.

However, the predominant issue in every good human work is the fact that no work is reproduced; multiplied by itself. While we complete our work, it remains in the situation we left it at, and over time, our work begins to get older, begins to ruin, and in a few years it starts needing repairs, otherwise it is destroyed and disappears. Our work does not have the capacity to self-reproduce, to create new similar works.

In contrast, our Creator’s works have this feature. God’s works are self-reproducing, multiplying, and not only are not damaged by the years, but they are also given the ability to renew, with whatever this implies for our everyday life. Human works are static, they get old and death takes them over. The works of our Creator are dynamic, they do not age, they are renewed, and death cannot eliminate them, although it may temporarily seem that death is there.