SOURCE: Arab Orthodoxy
In the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit, amen.
You heard, beloved, the parable from the Gospel known as "the parable of the rich man and Lazarus." The Lord Jesus often speaks in parables and very often does not speak directly because he wants the hearer to think about the words he hears. The person who does not think cannot benefit from what he hears! This is something that is well-known among psychologists. The person who does not listen and accept within himself what he hears doesn't understand the words and does not apply them. And so the Lord Jesus very often speaks in parables, in stories, and hence the story of the rich man and Lazarus.
I think you all know this story, and so there is no need for us to recount it in detail. What calls for attention in this story from the Gospel is that the Lord gives a name to one of its characters and calls him "Lazarus". The word Lazarus literally means in Hebrew "God is my help". Lazarus is that poor man who is cast at the door of the rich, who has no "my help". He has no money and no possessions to rely on. He only had God as a help. He wanted to eat the crumbs that fell from the rich man's table. But the rich man was enjoying his money and his food every day! This situation is reversed after death, as it is shown in the story, because when Lazarus dies the angels take him and bring him up to the bosom of Abraham, that is to heaven, while when the rich man dies the Gospel says that he was buried in the ground and went to hell.
One might wonder what that rich man did to go to torment. Did he do something evil to Lazarus? He did not harm Lazarus and did not do or say anything to him. You know that the rich enjoy things in their homes, and very often they do not hurt others. So what is the mistake that the rich man made?
The great mistake or sin that the rich man committed and
for which he went to torment is that there was near him,
next to him, a poor man and he did not notice him. He did
not see him. He took no interest in him! This is what our
saints say is our great sin, that we do not notice our
brother in need, that we have no feeling for others! One
of the great saints, Saint Isaac the Syrian, says that
"the great sin is the lack of sensitivity to
sin." How many people commit sins and do not feel
that they are sinning! In this parable, the rich man did
not sense the presence of the poor man "Lazarus"
near him. This was his sin: a lack of sensitivity. This is
the great sin. If you read this week the article about
spiritual insensitivity in al-Nashra, you will know that
when a person reaches the point of insensitivity, this
means that this person has stopped being human.
That is the situation with the rich man and Lazarus. The
parable says that after Lazarus went to the bosom of
Abraham, to heaven, and was enjoying pleasure and the rich
man went to hell and was tormented, there was a great gap
between the two, between heaven and hell! What is this
gap? Can it be bridged? The rich man asked Abraham to come
and wet his tongue with a little bit of water, but this
was impossible. He also asked him to send Lazarus to earth
to tell his brothers and his family how he was tormented
and Abraham responded that that too is impossible because,
beloved, after death we have no repentance. Here on this
earth the Lord gives us the opportunity to repent and to
confess our sins and if we do not confess we will be held
accountable for the actions we have done on this earth. We
must listen to the Lord and do what the Lord commands us
and we will not be in need of miracles in order to
believe! Faith comes from the heart! When a person is
raised in a Christian family and comes to church with a
Christian family and hears the words of the Gospel, and
then goes and tries to live according to the word of God,
he will be saved and will have peace in this world and the
next, amen.
