Commandments and Obedience
I have been skimming over the messages on the topic of Holy Qurbono that is not delineated in the proper way; hence I am giving a detailed accounts basing on the bible. Disobedience that goes back to the period of timelessness is the cycle which dictate the course of history that perpetually command to obey the Creator. “Behold, I set before you this day a blessing and a curse, the blessings, if you obey the commandments of the Lord your God, which I command you this day, and the curse, if you do not obey the commandments of the Lord your God, but turn aside from the way which I command you this day, to go after other gods which you have not known”, Deu.11: 26. The bible testifies that the first communication between God and Adam was the commandment of eating every tree of the garden except of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. The Commandments and infringement of the same go alongside in the course of human history that started in timelessness, making a history of misery of continual sufferings and severe punishments. The commandment to Lucifer to obey was punished by his disobedience that was repeated by Adam against his Creator, thus the pair becoming the accomplished brothers or accomplices in rebelling against the benevolent God.
Here is the compatibility of the prodigal son and his brother, one selling away his share and lived an oblivious, orchestrated agony of disobedient life for long and the elder brother absconding himself from the presence of his father. The first oblation that Adam and his children offered to God was offering a sacrifice against walking over the commandment of God; hence the law of “obedience is better than sacrifice” is a higher precept that is imbedded to embrace the total submission to the Almighty. Disobedience stands against accepting the Jesus sacrifice as a sign of deception or cheating. God being the commander and His creatures the subjects, He expects an implicit obedience from the created ones.
The Ten Commandments
Seeing that God’s vocal statutes and covenants had failed, He gave the Ten Commandments in writing in His own hand, expecting that the estranged ones may follow everything in letter and spirit. Here comes the Newton’s gravitational force in application. That which goes upward has a magnetic pull downwards because of the horizontal magnetic attraction that is remote controlled from the earth downward. The dark angels have a letter of demand, Col.2: 14-15, in harnessing the destiny of mankind and his former habitats because man was created “intricately wrought in the depths of the earth”, Ps.139: 15. This vertical gravitational magnetic pull from the depths of the earth make a horizontal human magnetism or repulsion between the created ones that exemplifies in the normal sexual appetite between the complementing partnership and also the abnormal same-sex relationship. Both the vertical and horizontal magnetic attraction and radiation make an electric circuit here which doesn’t allow man to climb upwards to the celestial planes.
The chemistry of the body that is the mother of attraction or repulsion between the created ones makes a commotion in this plane after the fall, the seat of the infernal forces, which embrace all the deadly vices, the hand of the prime mover of the same being the god of Eros. The basic tenets of the Ten Commandments are accepting the Fatherhood of God in tacit consent and obedience, the second one being cherishing the chain for the brotherhood of man. All the commandments were given to accept the Creator as the Father of everything and the duty of accomplishing the stewardship given to caring and looking after His hand-made ones that depend on the echo system. Obedience is the sign of implicit and explicit acceptance that is clothed in modesty and humility which is devoid of pride, the nucleus of Lucifer’s fall.
Creeds and Laws
Basing on the Ten Commandments, the subsequent laws were incorporated with the legal system of not only for the Israelite generations, but also for the future jurisprudence of all the races of the world. Some clans or tribes still follow the crude Mosaic system because those people who never have accepted the New Age nutrient of the Good Samaritan creed of love and sacrificing mentality of respecting others. “A new commandment I give to you, that you love one another; even as I have loved you”, Jn.13: 34. This new spirit that He saturated for the whole human race after serving Hid Body and Blood to His 12 disciples is the lifeblood of the church and the succeeding generations of believers. He washed their body first, and then served with His flesh, promising them the descending of the Holy Spirit, the third personae of the Holy Trinity, upon them during His High Priest prayers, Jn.14-17.
One Body Concept
If believers are to be ignited with the one body spirit that having electrified with the unity of mind, there must be a common denominator that implement the system. The union of bodies during the conjugal exercise is the one body nervous accomplishment, so also the one mind concept of the devotees is a product of having one body which is fulfilled by the common participation of the Holy Body of the Christ. The participants are electrified by the Spirit of the one body reality that makes a single flock of all the believers.
The flock of sheep that move and live together is the personification of all the Christian believers. While the flock lives together amicably, the goats fight one another and go astray in search of its own food in the forests or among the clusteres of shrubs. Despite Jesus institutionalized the Holy Qurbana while alive, He served His own Body to the small flock of apostles and asked them to continue serving His Body till His coming again, not by cutting His own flesh and asking them to eat it. When He blessed the bread, it was metamorphosised as His own flesh by the working of the Holy Spirit. “It is the spirit that gives life, the flesh is of no avail”, Jn.6: 63. The early church believers were punished by the persecutors, owing to the crime of cannibalism, as they claimed that they were eating the Body of Christ. It might have been due to the fact that the torturers couldn’t find the body of Jesus in the sepulchre, and they could attribute that His body must have been stolen and embalmed by some anonymous devilish cults that worshiped Him under the influence of evil spirits.
How could Jesus give His Body while alive?
Christ’s Body is live eternally because of the third personae’s presence; the Triune God is inseparable. “Do not labour for the food which perishes, but the food which endures to eternal life, which the Son of man will give to you, for on whom has God the Father set his seal. …For the bread of God is that which comes down from heaven, and gives life to the world. They said to him, Lord give us this bread always”, Jn.6: 27-34. These verses are replete with number of mysteries. The Father had set a mark on the Son’s body that is the everlasting food, a new covenant, till His coming again. Secondly, the food that we eat daily perishes. Thirdly, the Son’s food came down from Heaven and gives life to the whole world perpetually from then on to the close of the age. There was show bread in the OT time, Mt.12: 4; it was only shown as a witness or sign, but here is the eternal bread that gives enduring life for ever.
This bread feeds us always, the reason for saying “give us this day our daily bread”, ‘appam’, not ‘aharam’. The word ‘lahamo’ in Syriac has double meanings as ‘appam’ and ‘aharam’. But daily bread is His Body, not ‘aharam’. Just as Elijah was not hungry for 40 days after eating the celestial food, we don’t have to take the Holy Body everyday, but it gives life daily and always till we sin. God’s ambassadors who accepted or received the laying of hand has the apostolic authority to continue giving His body till the end of the age, the reason for setting apart the 12 apostles for His work. The Son of Man’s Body is the holy covenant of the New Age that continues till His second coming. There is only one “body and one Spirit, just as you were called to the one hope that belongs to your call, one Lord, one faith, one baptism, one God and Father of us all….”, Epe.4: 4-7.
Those who don’t have the genuine apostolic succession don’t have the authority to do this sacrament and claim that they are obeying God and carving out salvation for their devotees. There can’t have many Brides for the Lord; only one that is set apart. Christ’s Body is provided through that chaste faith and Bride; one-body uniqueness completes there, having the Saviour as the head and the body that suckles the believers with life-giving drink. We are indebted to work for that bread that endures for eternal life, not for the food that perishes, Jn.6: 27. This faith in believing that Jesus’ Body is the eternal food of man is the true work for God, Jn.6: 29. Believing is the faith. “He who believes has eternal life”, Jn.6: 47. “Unless you eat the flesh of the Son of man and drink his blood, you have no life in you…”, Jn.6: 53. Jesus explained this mystery when they tried to grab Him and make Him as their king, Jn.6: 15, hence He proved that His kingship is imbedded in His Body that even many of His true followers found it very difficult to construe with, and left forever from Him, Jn.6: 66. Thus the Body of Christ’s kingship last for ever.
Jesus asked the 12 at that juncture, “Do you also wish to go away? You have the words of eternal life; and we have believed, and have come to know, that you are the Holy One of God”, St.peter believed. “Jesus answered, “Did I not choose you, the 12, and one of you is a devil”, Jn.6: 66-71. We don’t have to worry about those who walked away from Him, but those who stay within the fold shouldn’t play a double role like Judas who sold the body of Jesus for 30 silver coins prior, and ate His body without any compunction by having that money in his pocket. This is the real treachery that cost our salvation unless repented. “Whoever, therefore, eats the bread or drinks the cup of the Lord in an unworthy manner will be guilty of profaning the body and blood of the Lord. Let a man examine himself, and so eat of the bread and drink of the cup. For anyone who eats and drinks without discerning the body eats and drinks judgement upon himself. That is why many of you are weak and ill, and some have died….condemned”, 1.Cor.11: 27-32.
Despite Jesus gave them His real Body while He was alive, His Body was cut into pieces by the whipping with hooked whips and with the monster nails and pierce and other multiple wounds and bruises that fulfilled the institution of the sacrament of sacrifice, Holy Qurbana, in word, deed and spirit. The Mother of God and st.John were the first participant of the live Qurbana, a protocol representation of the church and the clergy.
The Sacrament of Confession and ‘Husoyo’
In spite of being Jesus sinless or guiltless, as a role model He washed the sinful disciples’ feet. Jn.13: 21, then started the real confession scene of the disciples. “After saying this Jesus was troubled in spirit, and declared, ‘Very truly, I tell you, one of you will betray me.’ 22The disciples looked at one another, uncertain of whom he was speaking. ….26Jesus answered, ‘It is the one to whom I give this piece of bread when I have dipped it in the dish.’* So when he had dipped the piece of bread, he gave it to Judas son of Simon Iscariot.* 27; Mt. 26:22And they became greatly distressed and began to say to him one after another, ‘Surely not I, Lord?’ After he received the piece of bread,* Satan entered into him”.
The apostles were not free from all infirmities, hence they were demanded to confess their sins for vying and infighting for the highest position in His Kingdom and also for hatching the plan of betraying and denying the sinless to the adversaries. Instead of St.peter confessing his scheming of grabbing the highest position among the equals, he vowed to lay his life for the Lamb, yet ended up in denying Him thrice. When the question of betraying the Lord to the foxes, everyone, including Judas who was having the blood money with him, confessed that he wouldn’t betray the unblemished one to the wicked, a blatant lie that finished him off after taking part in the Holy Qurbana that was first time institutionalized.
As the food from the tree of Life, Holy Body, has everlasting impact upon our inner being, sin in the betrayer was made immortal that made him a puppet of Satan. Satan entered into him while he took the Holy Body, and he was converted as a toy of the immortal animal. Thus the sacrament of confession is an inner cleansing agent that prepares us to be a participant of the Heavenly food, whereas ‘husoyo’ is only a blessing that has no room for unlocking our mind to the agent of God on earth and get clemency and human sympathy for our frailties of the flesh. The continuous Husoyo has become a parasite that likely may corrode our soul that needs cleansing from time to time.
Husoyo, a License
The present scenario of one -time compulsory confession a year is a license for attending the Parish General Body meeting. It has become a test like business license renewal every year. The recent discussion of this topic in an internet site has made the issue so complicated and changed the seriousness mundanely cheap, a product of commonsense spirituality that makes everything profane and misleads the faithful. One or two members of the spiritual hierarchy make few deviating opinions for grabbing the attention of some vibrant mediocrities or groundlings who give support to such innovators and become heroes at the expense of the sacrosanct faith elements. We used to teach that the holy Body will have to be swallowed, not even touching our teeth, but the new teaching is that it shouldn’t be swallowed but chewed, may be because Science teaches that starch, wheat and other grains and potatoes, etc get digestion only in the mouth. When we give our valid opinion, they would find explanations by saying that the root meaning in Greek or Syriac or Hebrew is in this way. The sub-cultural theologians who grab attention by stirring up the cauldron of the theology of convenience come to the surface like such techniques, the reasons for multiplying the Bride into fractions and sects. The sheep that tries to seek some oasis during its apocalyptic high-tech journey through the wasteland of materialism find their refuge under such egoistic dunes. What a spiritual world of commotion.
Sin becomes immortal, provided we participate the Mystery without unloading our sins, the reasons for evicting our first parents prior to plucking and eating the Tree of Life. Instead of confessing their own sins they started accusing each other and led the way for their detour track. If they had confessed their sins individually, God could have taken another option of redeeming them instantly. However, driving out the first humans was a blow for the infernal guard because he thought that they could be imprisoned after the eating the forbidden fruit, then making the sin immortal by inducing them tasting the tree of Life, then exporting the handicrafts of God straight from Eden into the Hades at a blow, so that God had no second chance of redeeming them. Therefore, Husoyo in the long run has become as a subservient recipe that is compatible to the forbidden fruit that nullify the fruit of the Holy Qurbana.
Confessional Hindrances
One of my acquaintances told me that the majority put their marks as a sinner, if one goes for intermittent confession. Secondly, there are enough evidences that the confessional secrets are divulged out to others who make gossips and character assassinations. Thirdly, one can’t confess the irregularities and feuding of the parish internal politics, for which the Vicar also is involved directly or indirectly. As everyone is a separate satellite in these days of Mammon, head weight that is the net result of high-tech money-culture doesn’t allow us to come down to the level of a normal repenting man. People don’t realize that everyone is mad in his own version, and, therefore, is carrying the mantle of Lucifer who fell to the abysmal deep for his ego-centric uprising against the Lord of all things. As mad music is his language, the sub-cultural lifestyle that has electrified the whole globe together, is the mantra of this age. Confession or openness is a lurid word that has become an anachronism during this lifestyle of consumerism and profiteering, whereas that which is apostatic and erotic has become adorable and loudly spoken.
Worshiping Venues-Altar and Sanctuary
Holy of the Holies that is a synonym of fire does either purify the righteous ones or consume the wicked because it is engulfed by the Heavenly fire. The altar is the venue where the Heavenly food or divine Body is concocted. It is holy on account of the Lord’s presence. Everything that is in the Sanctuary and the House of the Lord should be treated and honoured as holy. The celebrant and the worshippers should have the unity of mind and dedication towards the fiery place of the Divine visit. Because it is the source and treasury of the Heavenly food, everything is considered as holy and pure. The whole venue is sanctified by the Spirit of God. It is not proper to sit in the presence of the Heavenly king. It is not allowed to speak anything inside the church, other than the hymns, chanting and prayers.
The clergy and his cronies take it as a fortress to conduct the parish meetings that entertain all sort of gossips, slander, arguments and partying -spirit concoctions are displayed in violent manners. People are not hesitant to twist the truth or saying lies and present the manipulated details in the church. The ballot paper voting system has converted the church as a political booth, identifying the church as a political club. There are individuals who become the accomplice of Judas who grabbed money from the charity box. Auditing and giving false Accounts reports also has become a farce that exhibit the spiritual charlatanism that weave the head weight for one’s doom. Such characters become the second in command of the parish by trying to convert the church as a political booth for practicing political spirituality by falsifying anything that make them survive, despite there is a vast parish hall/Auditorium that is within the parish complex for most of the churches. This sort of desecrating the church is an obvious sign of the doomsday spirituality. Our body has become more prominently important than the Body of Christ that earns our Eternity. O what a fall of Lucifer!
New Testament Commandment
The creative fear that hides underneath the intrinsic love is the new tenet of the Age. Love one another that electrifies the circuit is the language of the second period covenant of obedience. Obedience that invites a sort of conditioned reflex which emanate from the Lord who is the Creator of all and everything is the lifeblood of our existence. This sort of manifestations of love is deep-rooted in the pure love of the Lord who gave the new commandment to love another. This Heavenly treasure of love that was given by the Lord exclusive to His chosen apostles should flow downward from the spiritual hierarchy to their devotees. ‘Love your God’ commandment which is replete in the first Mosaic Law is nothing but to follow the Creator in the sterling faith that the Fathers and prophets of the Old and New testaments have handed down to us. The latter part of the Mosaic commandments that focus on the brotherhood of man upon which the Last Judgement is based is paramount to help and share the talents that the Lord has given to us with our fellow beings. Love is the common ingredient in both sections of the commandments.
Faith
Faith in the Lord “is the assurance of things hoped for, the conviction of things not seen. For by it the men of old received divine approval. By faith we understand that the world was created by the word of god, so that what is seen was made out of things which do not appear”, Heb.11: 1-3. What we have to do is to believe that which sees is an image of what is unseen, Heb.8: 5; 9: 23. St.Paul gives a list of the martyrs who sacrificed their lives that start from the sacrifice which Abel began in the beginning of time, Heb.11to 12. “Since we are surrounded by so great a cloud of witnesses” statement testifies that the real worship is given by a congregation of the living and the departed together. “But you have come to Mount Zion and to the city of the living God, the Heavenly Jerusalem, and to innumerable angels in festal gathering, and to the assembly of the first-born who are enrolled in Heaven, and to a judge who is God of all, and to the spirit5s of just men made perfect, and to Jesus, the mediator of a new covenant, and to the sprinkled blood that speak more graciously than the blood of Abel “, Heb.12: 18-24. The true faith that is an all-embracing collection of what is seen and unseen in spiritual dimension is the real religion. The cycle of faith that includes both the living and departed is not complete because “apart from us they should not be made perfect”, Heb.11: 39-40.
The general second coming signs are given in Mt.24, followed by meticulous concrete signs in the next chapter. The five wise virgins represent for the sterling faith of the church and its devotees. They have both lamps and enough oil for the blazing light of their souls, whereas the five foolish virgins have the lamps and a small quantity of oil. These foolish virgins consumed all their oil due to the delay of the arrival of the Groom. The Kaliyuga period that make them exhausting their oil, faith, disqualified them with the Groom on His arrival. There are three categories of people who are entrusted with sufficient talents, the second parable in the chapter, for trading and earning the required quantity of oil. The last category of people didn’t bother about trading it with and earning their oil for the reception of the Lord. Such people will be cast out into the fiery furnace at the consummation of time.
That separation between the sheep and goats will be done by the Groom for the works done by everybody, whereas the separation between the wise and the foolish virgins is likely to be done by the apostles, Lk.22: 30; Rev.20: 4. That which relates to the faith, Jesus and His redeeming passions, is apparently to be judged by His apostles and the judgement of the good works done to one’s fellow beings may be done by the Lord who came down and tasted the vexations of the spirit on this earth. The parable of the Talents illustrates that the third servant is destined to the eternal fire. Even if one passes through the hurdle of the second parable, earning of the consuming fire is apparently sure, if one fails the test for good works. The common denominator for salvation is the consecutive passing results of both tests together.
The means of passing the Tests
The only means of passing these tests is to follow the Redeemer.1.Pet. 2: 21-24,21For to this you have been called, because Christ also suffered for you, leaving you an example, so that you should follow in his steps. 22‘He committed no sin, and no deceit was found in his mouth.’ 23When he was abused, he did not return abuse; when he suffered, he did not threaten; but he entrusted himself to the one who judges justly. 24He himself bore our sins in his body on the cross,* so that, free from sins, we might live for righteousness; by his wounds* you have been healed”. Unless we live this lifestyle of sacrificing for others and obeying the commandments that honouring God, we don’t have any right to share His Body that guarantee salvation in the land of the living. Our life as a role model in the family, worshipping place and in our social, private and public life is to be moulded in tune with the life of the Redeemer.
The new covenant of receiving the food, Jesus’ Holy Body, for the spirit of man is inevitable for avoiding the spiritual dehydration that hinders the journey of the soul, just like food and breathing for the sustenance of our physical body is indispensable. Love and the unity of mind among the brethren is the basic demand for accepting the Heavenly bread, together with it goes the sterling faith in the Lord who created and bridles everything in the universe and our life. This new covenant of accepting the spiritual food, the mother and the queen of all the sacraments, is the New Age commandment that is a prerequisite for our spiritual and earthly life. This is the fire that prophet Isaiah and Elijah received from the seraphim. As we don’t have enough room to explain further the application of the life of the Saviour, I am forced to conclude that we are obliged to be synchronized with this sort of the life that is compatible with the rules of conduct of one’s life, the universal governing laws of Nature and above all being a silent and obedient servant practicing the rules of the conduct of the Heavenly modus-operandi by obeying all His commandments that are given through the prophets, apostles and Church Fathers. “Thy word is a lamp to my feet and a light to my path. I have sworn an oath and confirmed it, to observe thy righteous ordinances”, Ps.119: 105-06.
By:
Prof E.S.John, Australia (Contributing Author-OBL)
