Today is Great and Holy Saturday, and we sing our resurrectional hymn: “CHRIST IS RISEN FROM THE DEAD! He trampled down death by death, and by His Resurrection, He granted life unto us.”
Today is a day for new beginnings! The good news of our Lord’s glorious Resurrection offers each of us an opportunity to see life from a fundamentally new perspective and begin life with a fresh and new start!
In the Gospel of Matthew 26:6-16, we see the unknown woman’s salvation contrasted with the chosen disciple’s tragic fall. The woman offered her precious gift to the Lord Jesus and was saved through her repentance, while the chosen apostle betrayed Christ for only thirty pieces of silver and, instead of repenting, took his own life. One received the inheritance of the Kingdom, while the other was condemned.
According to the Gospel, the apostles (possibly including the money-loving Judas) criticized the woman for wasting the precious oil by anointing Jesus; they suggested that the oil could have …
In St. Matthew’s account, Jesus, after spending the night in Bethany, returns to Jerusalem in the morning and feels hungry. On the way, he saw a fig tree and approached it but found nothing but leaves on it. Jesus then said to the fig tree, “Henceforth bear no fruit forever,” and the tree withered immediately (Matthew 21:18-22).
This fig tree with leaves but no fruit symbolizes those who outwardly pretend to be pious and religious but do not have the fruit of good deeds. Nominal and formal Christianity is unworthy of the Kingdom of God. “Faith without works is dead,” the Apostle James says (James 2:26).
Our Lord Jesus Christ, like all believers of his time, went to Jerusalem as a pilgrim to participate in the Easter celebration. However, the difference was that he went as a “New Passover Lamb” to sacrifice his life on the Cross and free humanity from the captivity of sin through the shedding of his life-giving blood. He entered Jerusalem as the “Lamb of God,” who, through the sacrifice of his person, would tear the veil of sin between man and God and open the doors of the kingdom leading to God.
We are now entering the most solemn period for Christians—Holy Week—leading us to our most sacred holiday, Easter and the Resurrection. The week before Easter marks a series of events in the life of Jesus that were ordained or prophesied.
For the first time in 25 years, St. John the Baptist Armenian Church in Greenfield held the full order of services for Holy Week. With last year’s ordination of Rev. Fr. Guregh Hambardzumyan to the priesthood, 2022 became the first year since 1994 that the parish had a resident pastor serving the community at Eastertime.
On Easter day, Christians rejoice over the resurrection of our Lord. Armenians celebrate the joyous occasion with eggs that are dyed red, with which children and adults alike play tapping contests. The Easter Bunny tradition that began in the 17th century among Protestants in Europe is now popular all over the world,
Calendar of church services for the Holy Week of 2022 at St. John Armenian Church of Milwaukee
