Paschal Reflections on Creation

The cosmic dance continues on the fourth day mirroring the blooming greenery of the earth, the herbs and trees making like seeds according to their kind with the flowering of the luminaries in the firmament. These luminaries have as their first role the illumination of the earth and to rule the days and the nights. They do not create the days or the nights, but they rule over them, therefore what we must glean from this order of Creation is as much the beauty of God’s structure as the rejection of the worship of these luminaries.

They must, and do to behold them, draw us closer to the invisible Maker of Creation, for they are seeds sown in the heavens by His Word and to His Word they hearken.

The fourth day is the day in which we are all invited to the arena, not as spectators but as combatants, as our awareness draws toward the heavens. As we now have been energized by the undercurrent of the waters and yielding fruit according to the human that has become alive in Christ we are brought into deeper relationship by the baptism of the Spirit.

The waters that were gathered unveiled on the earth unveiled the dry land demonstrating the fertile soil, likewise the waters of the firmament demonstrate a kind of fertile ground. We have mentioned before that it is this firmament that is grounded in Truth emphasized by the luminaries being brought to being by the Word of God, illuminating the earth below.

Fire and water.

The heavens and the earth.

The limitless and the limited.

We can see the firmament becoming a sort of stained-glass encasing the earth lit by the Light of God, the luminaries fixed in the cosmic expanse as receptacles for His light and, by extension, expressions of that same light. The luminaries do not create night, they do not create day, nor do they engineer their own luminosity. The true Light of God remains consistent, unchanging, yet is received and is refracted, diffracted, and reflected according to its kind.

Here, we see a continuation of Creation’s counting by division: the stars do not make their light, but express that light of Truth, sustaining all things.

These heavenly receptacles of divine inspiration mirror the blooming trees of the earth, as God’s Light seeds the world below in illumined glory.

The luminaries: the very stars of the firmament are vehicles for God’s energies to illumine, and interact, with the earth. They are aspects of the divine economy and, like the firmament being a type of Ecclesia, are icons of God, populating the expanse of God’s Church, revealing the Paschal mystery further as patterned in the liturgical life of the Church.

We enter into the uncreated energies of God, becoming receptacles of His glory, and actualizing that glory by our works.

The waters and the trees typify this relationship between God and man, for “all things work together for good for those who love God, to those who are called according to his purpose” (Romans 8:28); the waters which were empty and void become the very energizing agents for God’s work coming to fruition through those who love Him.

Furthermore, the stars are showing us this same relationship to a heightened extant. We are called to walk with God along the firmament, to be in the world, but not of it, so then the works that come to fruition through us in the world are meant to produce seeds of their kind and to prepare us, more and more, to receive His uncreated light.

This is a call to become icons of the living God, Who is Christ.

The waters are gathered and the works of the Lord bloom in a mirror the waters of the heavens, dark at Night and ablaze with His Word during the Day, are populated by His Light even illuminating the night by His Word.

The expanse of the firmament bloomed in reflection of the earth with the flowers of fire, serving God and thus serving us. These constellations that rest in the heavens point to the Maker of all things as well as serve as a guiding system for those of us who have entered into the arena, who have set sail on the waters of Life; the luminaries therefore are a type of Ecclesial structure, being prayers, Sacraments, and illuminating those who seek to walk with God.

We may wonder, was there ever a time without the Light of God, yet we understand this to not be the case. For before the heavens and the earth were created God was, God is, and God will be; the created beings of His heavenly abode were also created before the visible universe came to be.

“When the stars were made, all my angels praised me with a loud voice” (Job 38:7).

What we can glean from this telling truth is that, in some sense, from the first day on God has revealed what is to us. God’s Word spoke light and the luminaries were. These luminaries, the stars, fall under the rule of the angels, the bodiless powers. So, we can see the οἰκονομία (oikonomia) being structured in Creation with each day.

We mentioned previously that the οἰκονομία, or divine economy, refers to all dealings and interactions God has with Creation, the luminaries and the angels that rule over them point to this divine economy.

St. Gregory the Great writes, “As the goodness (or ‘love’) of God could not find satisfaction in contemplating Himself, He wished to spread this goodness ever further, so that the number of those who would enjoy it should be as great as possible (for such is the nature of the highest form of goodness) and so God first thought of the angelic heavenly powers, and thought became act, carried out by the Word and fulfilled by the Spirit.

“As His first creation was pleasing to Him, He then devised another world, material and visible, and a well-balanced unity between heaven and earth and that which is between them.”

The material and visible world is the world in which we walk, the revealed luminaries of the firmament are meant to draw our minds to a higher contemplation of that which is invisible. Their function is pointing to man’s continued μετάνοια (metanoia), that is a continued and deepening fundamental change of mind, which in turn becomes a fundamental change in one’s actions.

The luminaries and their ruling angels are aiding in our faith, our enumah, which is actionable conviction. The Apostle writes affirming this position, “Are the angels not all ministering spirits, sent out to serve for the sake of those who will inherit salvation?” (Hebrews 1:14).

The firmament is so placed to become a means for us to contemplate the things that are higher (Colossians 3:2).

“The heavens declare the glory of God; and the firmament proclaims the work of his hands.

Day to day utters speech, and night to night proclaims knowledge.

There are no speeches or words, in which their voices are not heard.

Their voice is gone out into all the earth, and their words to the ends of the world.

In the sun he has set his tabernacle; and he comes forth as a bridegroom out of his chamber: he will exult as a giant to run his course” (Psalms 18:1-5, LXX).

The Day is His Word speaking light and the night proclaims His knowledge by the luminaries, ruled by the angles, praising God drawing us to the patterns of knowing God ourselves via prayer and His Ecclesia. We are called to become receptacles of His knowledge by knowing Him and Him knowing us, glorified all the more and likened to His image as Christ’s icons in the world.

In the sun he has set his tabernacle…

The big luminary to have authority over the day.

The sun he has set as his tabernacle…

The luminaries are all pointing us to God, drawing us near to Him in contemplation and making us earthly luminaries ourselves. The expanse of the stars imprints in our hearts that we are not home in this world but have a destination that we are returning to after our sojourn on the earth.

We are meant to prepare ourselves to receive Christ as receptacles here, but also to be received by Christ in eternity.

This is the movement that the gathering of the waters suggests, a corporal movement we are meant to undertake in this life to ascend the heights of heaven and enter into eternal well-being, which is movement in the next life, too.

We are called to become like these luminaries, reflecting the light of God, through the works that God brings forth through us. It is all meant to prepare us for something more, being brought from darkness to light, being more and more illumined in that light.

Additionally, the big luminary of the sun, rising and setting, fixed in the firmament is preparing Creation for the coming Sun Who is the Second Person of the Trinity. He is coming to take flesh and by His Incarnation He is crafting a new pattern which is typified by the stars in the firmament, by the Sun, by the moon.

These heavenly objects declaring the glory of God and proclaiming the works of His Hands are but a shadow of His coming corporal form.

The sun is set as his tabernacle, becoming a type of Virgin Mary, the Holy Theotokos, who carries God, as a champion running a course. She is our great model for how we must also carry Christ within us, running the course as athletes and combatants in the arena, with our eyes fixed on the heavenly prize.

The Theotokos is become the firmament, “a woman clothed with the sun! The moon was under her feet and on her head was a crown of twelve stars” (Revelation 12:1). The Theotokos is the Queen of Heaven, yet before she is crowned, she becomes the tabernacle, the very firmament, the vessel in which Truth enters the world. She is the firmament because she represents the Church of Christ.

The Theotokos, in relation to the salvific nature of the Incarnation, is the first human being to realize the purpose of the Incarnation, being the first human being to be deified.

The luminaries rule over the day and rule over the night, being signs for seasons, for coming weather, for the days, months, and years. The moon’s cycle suggests the liturgical pattern already established in the heavens, the rising, setting sun uttering the glory of God and pointing to the Incarnate Word taking flesh through the Panagia, and the stars proclaiming the unfathomable Presence of God, Maker of all things visible and invisible.

Creation can be seen as a reflection of the essence of the Trinity: distinct persons yet inseparable. What we must apply to our own lives by the contemplation of this cosmic canopy of angelic bodiless powers and the icon of the Theotokos is to not simply see the stars as like a stained-glass in a church, but to see ourselves as a glass that, moving from the darkness into the light by God’s grace we, too, can become reflective of His eternal glory.

Fire and water.

The stars, the sun, the moon.

The seas, the dry land, the herbs and trees.

All of these are producing seeds according to their kind, that which we can call the energies of God interacting with the world within His divine economy. While we are called to trust in God’s ordering of Creation as recorded by the prophet Moses we are called, also, to enter into a dialogue as patterned by the creation of the heavens and the earth.

 The salvation of mankind is an event and on-going, mirroring Creation, and as such we are taking part in a New Creation by becoming illumined by the light and glory of Christ, Who restores what has been corrupted. He is the One Who we walk with in the firmament, in the world but not of it.

This firmament is established as an icon glorifying God, demonstrating that which we will become through the salvific nature of the Incarnation, entering into the cosmic reality of His Church, His mother, the blessed Theotokos.

The unfolding Paschal mystery is demonstrated: the eternal Presence of God and His Church; the deification of man (and Creation) by His glory, and passage from darkness to light, and more light, by His energies at work through the constellation of prayer, Sacrament, and Liturgy.

The fourth day.

Tomorrow we will be setting our sights on the fifth day where the Paschal mystery continues…

Ο ΧΡΙΣΤΟΣ ΕΝ ΤΩ ΜΕΣΩ ΗΜΩΝ! ΚΑΙ ΗΝ ΚΑΙ ΕΣΤΙ ΚΑΙ ΕΣΤΑΙ