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A
Bible Study for
Sunday of the Last Judgment
(Meatfare Sunday))
The
themes of love and judgment are often mentioned side by side in the Bible
and in Christian prayers and hymns. Read
the following as examples: 1
John 4:16-17; John 3:16-18.
How
can the Lord of love and goodness be also the Lord of judgment?
Is there consistency in the images of God as a loving Father and
God as righteous Judge? The
Church Fathers answered this perplexing difficulty by affirming that God
is always a loving Father and remains a loving Father for everyone - both
righteous and sinners. During this life, as well as in the next, people who
are open to God, who have made room for Him in their hearts, who have
developed spiritual attitudes and sensitivities, experience the radiance
of God’s love as unspeakable bliss;
but people who have separated themselves from God, who have
imprisoned themselves in their own selfishness and sinful passions, and
have not developed spiritual attitudes and sensitivities, experience the
same radiance of God’s love as fire of judgment.
God does not cause judgment at any time.
He doesn’t do something vengeful to evildoers nor does He prepare
a place of punishment (hell), GOD
IS LOVE AND BY HIS VERY NATURE HE CANNOT DO WHAT IS EVIL, HATEFUL, OR
DESTRUCTIVE TO ANYONE. Judgment and hell are spiritual conditions of sin and
darkness. Judgment results
when someone is separated from God who is the sources of light and life.
Judgment results when we willfully shut off ourselves from God’s
redeeming love.
Yes,
there is judgment, both temporary and eternal.
But we judge ourselves. We
judge ourselves by the thoughts we think, the values we hold, the
decisions we make, the things we do.
St. Paul warns us, “no one makes a fool of God.
A person will reap exactly what he plants”
(Gal. 6:7).
Read
Matthew 25:31-46, which is the reading for the Sunday of the Last
Judgment.
1.
How will the Son of Man reveal Himself in the endtime?
Who will be there? (v. 31)
2.
What will He do then? (v.
32-33)
3.
What will the King say to the righteous (v. 34)?
4.
Why will the King bestow the blessing of the Kingdom on the
righteous (vss. 35-36)?
I was hungry and
I
was thirsty and
I
was a stranger and
I
was naked and
I
was sick and
I
was in prison and
5.
How will the King reply to the righteous who ask “When did we see
you” (vs. 40)?
6.
What will He then say to those on the left (vs. 41)?
7.
What will the King reply to their perplexed questions (vs. 45)?
8.
What is the dramatic conclusion of the Last Judgment (vs. 46)?
So
through the Parable of the Last Judgment Christ teaches us that heaven and
hell have to do with the fulfillment of each other’s physical and
spiritual needs. As we seek
to serve each other in His name and by His grace, or as we fail to do so,
we experience degrees of true life or degrees of darkness - realities that
become permanent beyond the grave.
9.
So, Christ has taught us both by example and teaching that the main
virtues of Christians are
faithful obedience and loving service to whom?
10.
What are our real needs as human beings?
11.
List some of the false needs which sometimes distort or replace our
real needs.
12.
How can our real needs be fulfilled and the false needs
constructively pointed out in the home,
the parish, in society?
Fasting
The
Sunday of the Last Judgment is also known as Meatfare Sunday because it is
the last day before Easter on which the eating of meat is allowed.
On the next day the fast begins, first from meat and meat products
and a week later from fish, milk and eggs and their products as well.
The Church prepares us gradually for the stricter discipline of
Lent.
The
following prescribed fasts
have been set aside by the Orthodox Church.
-
Every Wednesday and Friday unless some important feastday takes precedence
over the fast.
-
Great Lent
-
Holy Week
-
The Christmas Fast (November 15 through December 24)
-
The Fast of the Theotokos (August 1 through August 14)
-
The Fast of the Holy Apostles (Monday after All Saints Day through June
28)
-
The Elevation of the Holy Cross (September 14)
-
The Eve of Theophany (January 5)
-
The Beheading of St. John the Baptist (August 29)
Fasting
is not an end in itself but a means to an end.
For a Christian there is no food that is ritually clean or unclean.
Read Matthew 15:17-20.
A
Greek Orthodox seminarian was once told by a monk on Mount Athos that in
order to learn to control what comes our of our mouths, we must learn to
control what goes in.
Consider well, my soul:
do you fast?
Despise not your neighbor.
Do you abstain from food?
Condemn not your brother...
May
Christ lead you without stumbling into His Kingdom.
Matin
Hymn Meatfare
Sunday
13.
So fasting from foods is a spiritual discipline which must
necessarily be accompanied by fasting
from what?
Fasting
must be undertaken willingly and not by compulsion. God doesn’t need our fasting.
We don’t fast as a kind of personal punishment for our sins.
We cannot pay God back for our sins but we can only confess them to
Him to receive forgiveness. Fasting with a willing spirit and not just with an attitude
of fulfilling a religious obligation means that we keep the purposes of
fasting always before us which is to develop self-control and to remember
God and His Kingdom.
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