Prayer, fasting, almsgiving: Our way of life now and always.
Prayer, fasting, and almsgiving. This is the concise refrain we hear through Great Lent as we sharpen our effort to walk the “narrow path” of salvation. In prayer, we direct ourselves toward God. In fasting, we direct ourselves to the control of our own passions. In almsgiving, we direct ourselves toward our brothers and sisters who are in need. Each element describes a unique relationship, yet each is not full without the others; together, and in relation to each other, they form a whole, the Orthodox Christian way of life, renewed each Lenten springtime.
This essential, dynamic relationship between the three elements of prayer, fasting, and almsgiving is expressed in the Gospel reading on this Sunday of St. John Climacus. Our Lord casts out an unclean spirit from a boy whose distraught father brought him to Jesus, after the disciples were unable to heal him. This kind, Jesus instructs the disciples, “cannot be driven out by anything but prayer and fasting” (Mk 9:29). One might ask, what of almsgiving? Truly, the importance of almsgiving is expressed not only in the disciples’ effort to help those who came to them in need, but in the very act of mercy that Christ Himself accomplishes that is itself the heart of this and every Gospel message.
In our churches, we can work with IOCC, including through its Metropolitan Committees, to serve Christ by serving those in need with “prayer and fasting,” now and throughout the year, as we walk the Way of Our Lord.
Archdeacon David Khorey
St. Nicholas Antiochian Orthodox Church
Grand Rapids, MI
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Icon from IOCC’s image library (Monastery of St. Catherine, Sinai, public domain).
