SSCORRE!
Saint Sophia Cathedral
Online Resources for our Religious Edification
You have probably heard about the “the Great Reset” and it might be worrying you. What is an Orthodox Christian perspective about this concept?
“There is and has been a Great Reset… and it belongs to God. It doesn’t belong to politicians, it doesn’t belong to rich elites who think they know what’s best for the world and who never talk about God.
There has been a Great Reset in the world and there will be a Great Reset to come.
Let me speak a little bit about that…”
Adult/Family:
“…First you might remember the original Great Reset at the fall of man when the entire cosmos collapsed in response to Adam and Eve’s sin and their act of cosmic treason.
It set the human race on a course of corruption that reaches its pinnacle in Genesis Chapter 6, where Moses writes that the intents of the thoughts of man’s heart were only evil continually. The whole human race had been corrupted. It’s as though what happened to Eve had now spread like the ultimate crisis to every human being and we had reached the climax of our sinfulness and the result of that was a Great Reset for sure and it’s called the great deluge, the flood which is described in Genesis Chapters 7-9. God sent a flood on the earth and literally pruned back the vine of the human race down to one family, starting again as a second Adam and he was the patriarch Noah and his family.
In fact God repeated to Noah the same words that he gave to Adam and Eve: be fruitful and multiply and fill the earth. This was a Great Reset. The Lord God did not, or rather after that Great Reset, set a rainbow in the sky as a covenantal promise that he would not do this again, but that he would provide stability and consistency of the seasons so that mankind could prosper with some confidence and invest in his life. But that was a massive Great Reset for the human race.
From that moment, all of history coursed towards the fullness of times when God reset the human destiny by, in the fullness of time, sending forth his son the Lord Jesus Christ from heaven to become incarnate of the most pure Virgin Mary in Bethlehem. God becoming man, heaven and earth joining together, the almighty bowing low to take up the human race in our misery and reset our possibilities and our realities. This is the Great Reset. The gospel, the incarnation, the joining of heaven and earth in the God-Man, Theanthropos, our Lord Jesus Christ. He came, He conquered the greatest threat to humankind which is not a virus! It is in fact sin, death, the devil, Satan himself.
Our Lord Jesus Christ, our great champion, vanquished them all, plundered hell and then took humanity up into the heavens and planted it at the right hand of His Father and set forth His Holy Spirit commissioning the church to bring the good news of his Great Reset, of his triumph over the dominance of death and sin to the whole world so that man and woman could hear the incredible news that they were not going to be trampled by death for all eternity, that they did not need to remain under the dominion of Satan and the corruption of life-dominating sin and the depression and despair that comes from that. But in fact they could become joined as a part of the body of the glorified God-Man Jesus Christ, our Savior, and be illumined. That their darkness could be replaced by his light, their sinfulness could be covered over by his gracious forgiveness and the atonement of his precious cross.
And that Great Reset we have been promoting to the ends of the earth by his commission. To announce this Great Reset of God, the triumph of the good news over the bad news, this is what’s been going on for the last 2000 years in anticipation of the final Great Reset of God which is the great judgment. At that moment every man, woman and child who has ever lived will stand before the great throne of God and will make an accounting for their life for every thought, word and deed that they ever thought and ever have thought, conceived or done. And then those who have done good will enter into a resurrection of life and those who have done evil into a resurrection of judgment and God will be all in all and evil will be no more.
THIS is the final Great Reset that we look for, brothers and sisters. It’s the one that really counts. So whatever happens now, whatever might be in the minds of these or those political leaders or global elites, for us Christians no matter, no matter, we know what the Great Reset really is, God’s Great Reset, and we have put our hope in the Lord. We’ve experienced the Great Reset in our own lives and we’re anticipating the final Great Reset which is to come and may it come soon to the glory of His name. Amen!”
The Mystical Icon of Our Holy Orthodox Church,
depicting the persecutors and heretics through the ages
who fight against her and prevail not.
The transcript above starts at the 10:51 minute mark. Listen to the entire 17 minute video here.
Preschool/Elementary:
Middle School:
Read A Story About the Fear of God.
What was the man doing that was inappropriate? Why was he doing it? Wasn’t he afraid of getting caught? What event happened that made him stop? What idea was behind it that made him stop?
Are there things you are doing that you know are wrong, but like the man in the story, you just cannot stop yourself? The next time you find that you are going to say, do, or think something you should not be, try to look up and remember God like the man in the story did for it is true that “no one can hide from the heavenly eye.”
Like the man, we can also go to confession to receive mercy from God for what we have done. There, the priest can help us with advice on how to stop saying, doing, or thinking inappropriate things for our situation and to live a more God-pleasing life so that we will arrive at the final judgment well prepared to account for our lives.
The Path to Confession: A Book for Family Reading Presented to Orthodox Children
High School
“Christ …came, He conquered the greatest threat to humankind which is not a virus!”
Read the transcript of the Great Reset above.
What are God’s Great Resets which humankind has already experienced and continues to proclaim? What is God’s Great Reset in the future that we are anticipating? If this upcoming one is the one ‘that really counts’, how are we living our lives in order to prepare ourselves for it?
Let us keep our hope in the Lord and not in ‘princes and sons of men’!
Consider reading these books to learn how to live so that you are preparing yourself for God’s final Great Reset.
How to Live a Holy Life
Available here
Journey to Heaven: Counsels on the Particular Duties of Every Christian
Available here
___________________________________________________________________________________________A Message from Maria Spanos
I am passionate about our Orthodox Christian faith and seek to help others learn as much as they can about it. My purpose here is to share online resources that help strengthen our relationship with Christ and bind us closer to His Church. I believe they are invaluable in learning about our precious Orthodox Tradition, and are a great aid for teaching family members, friends and others about Orthodoxy. ~Maria
Two of my favorite quotes:
“A true Christian behaves in this life so that it may be a preparation for the future one and not only a life here below. In his actions, he does not think what will be said of him here but of what will be said there in heaven; he represents to himself that he is always in the presence of God, of the angels and all the saints, and remembers that someday they will bear witness of his thoughts, words, and deeds.” — Saint John of Kronstadt
__________________________________________________________
“Of all the holy works, the education of children is the most holy.”
— St. Theophan the Recluse
