This is Life!: Revolutions Around the Cruciform Axis

The Living Continuity of the Church

From today's Dynamis:

Living Continuity: 2 Timothy 1:1-2, 8-18, especially vss. 13, 14: "Hold fast the pattern of sound words which you have heard from me, in faith and love which are in Christ Jesus. That good thing which was committed to you, keep by the Holy Spirit Who dwells in us." Bishop Kallistos Ware echoes St. Paul's counsel to "hold fast the pattern of sound words" (vs. 13) when he speaks of Orthodoxy's living continuity with the Lord Jesus, the Apostles, and the Holy Fathers: "Orthodox are always talking about Tradition...the faith and practice which Jesus Christ imparted to the Apostles, and which since the Apostles' time has been handed down from generation to generation in the Church." Like the Apostles, Bishop Kallistos links Holy Tradition to the activity of the Spirit of God: "In order to live within Tradition, it is not enough simply to give intellectual assent to a system of doctrine; for Tradition...is a life, a personal encounter with Christ in the Holy Spirit....it is the life of the Holy Spirit in the Church."

Orthodoxy is able to hold fast to "the pattern of sound words" from the Apostles successfully because of the Holy Spirit Who dwells within the Church, a continuity that often astonishes those from the denominations. St. Paul would not be surprised at this, however, as today's reading shows. He expected and counseled constancy of doctrine and practice in the Church even in the early decades during which he served: "...I know Whom I have believed and am persuaded that He is able to keep what I have committed to Him until that Day" (vs. 12).