Homily On The Resurrection Of The Daughter Of Jairus

A Christian Understanding of Suffering

The 24th Sunday after Pentecost and the Fifth Saturday after Pentecost

Father Basil Musin-Pushkin

Today we heard about how the Lord resurrected and returned a dead girl, the daughter of Jairus, to her parents and also healed the sick woman who suffered for many years.

Hearing this touching story, it is natural for us to ask why there is so much affliction and suffering among mankind.

Was the Lord really good and merciful to the people only while living among them on earth? No, the Lord Jesus Christ is the same now, as He was then, all good and merciful: and today continually performs miracles and cures.

But it was not for the purpose of granting people temporary relief by healing the ill and by resurrecting the dead that the Lord came down to earth, but to teach the people to live according to will of God and to reveal to them the way into His Heavenly Kingdom. And as the Lord did not relieve those closest to Him and most beloved of Him from earthly sufferings and torments, so He also does not relieve us.

Let us remember the grief and torment of the Mother of God at the cross of her Son. Let us remember the Holy Apostles, friends of Christ, who were persecuted as evildoers and tortured to death."

In the world you will have tribulation, but stand firm (John 16:33)", i.e. do not give in to your troubles, but pass through it. Do not let them oppress us and do not be discouraged.

Not by their deeds are they converted, but you are called to the highest, steadfast eternity. Through tribulations the Lord tears us off from the earthly, preparing us for the heavenly, allows the shaking of our earthly well-being, to continually remind us, that we here on earth are only pilgrims and foreigners, that our true Fatherland is not here, but in the Heavenly Dwelling place, where under the wings of the Heavenly Father and the intercessions of the Mother of God and of all the saints we shall abide, forever reuniting us with graciousness in spirit and nearness of heart.

But as in the time of the gospels, in reply to the prayer of the suffering the merciful Lord could answer with His wonderful miracles and cures, and in our time, to us, who live in tribulation and who fervently turn to Him, the Lord always sends His beneficial help.

V. Musin-Pushkin, Christianskaya Zhiznj i Smertj (Christian Life and Death), from the sermons of Father Basil Musin-Pushkin, New York, 1965, 44 pages. Page 11-12.
Translated by Archpriest Eugene D. Tarris 7/12/01. All Rights Reserved.
Posted with permission.