Days of Vengeance - The Preterist Archive

19:10
Church admitted its members to the Eucharist only
once a year. 7 Ironically, the practice of the Roman
Church now excels that of most “Protestant” churches;
on the issue of frequent communion at least, it is Rome
which has “reformed.”
Commenting on the dictum of the German materialistic
philosopher Ludwig Feuerbach that “man is what
he eats,” the great Orthodox theologian Alexander
Schmemann wrote: “With this statement . . .
Feuerbach thought he had put an end to all ‘idealistic’
speculations about human nature. In fact, however, he
was expressing, without knowing it, the most religious
idea of man. For long before Feuerbach the same
definition of man was given by the Bible. In the biblical
story of creation man is presented, first of all, as a
hungry being, and the whole world as his food. Second
only to the direction to propagate and have dominion
over the earth, according to the author of the first
chapter of Genesis, is God’s instruction to men to eat of
the earth: ‘Behold I have given you every herb bearing
seed . . . and every tree, which is the fruit of a tree
yielding seed; to you it shall be for meat . . .’ Man must
eat in order to live; he must take the world into his
body and transform it into himself, into flesh and
blood. He is indeed that which he eats, and the whole
world is presented as one all-embracing banquet table
for man. And this image of the banquet remains,
throughout the whole Bible, the central image of life. It
is the image of life at its creation and also the image of
life at its end and fulfillment: . . . that you eat and drink
at my table in my Kingdom.’” 8
The Eucharist is at the center of our life, and all of life
flows out of this central liturgy. The “shape” of the
Eucharistic liturgy, therefore, gives shape to the rest of
life, the daily liturgy we follow as we pursue our calling
to exercise dominion over the earth. The “rite of life” is
patterned after the central ritual of communion, which
is itself patterned after the liturgy of creation set forth
in Genesis 1: God took hold of the creation, separated
it, distributed it, evaluated the work, and enjoyed it in
sabbath rest. And this is the pattern of Holy
Communion, as James B. Jordan observes: “When we
perform this rite on the Lord’s Day, we are becoming
readjusted, rehabituated, retrained in the right way to
use the world. For Jesus Christ, on the night of His
betrayal, (1) took bread and wine, (2) gave thanks, (3)
broke the bread, (4) distributed the bread and wine,
naming it His body and blood; then the disciples (5)
tasted and evaluated it, eleven approving of it, and one
rejecting it; and finally (6) the faithful rested and
enjoyed it.
“It is because the act of thanksgiving is the central
difference between the Christian and the non-
Christian that the liturgy of the Christian churches is
called ‘Holy Eucharist.’ Eucharist means Thanksgiving.
It is the restoration of true worship (thanksgiving) that
restores the work of man (the six-fold action in all of
life). This explains why the restoration of true worship
takes primacy over cultural endeavors.” 9
10 St. John falls at the angel’s feet to worship him, and
the angel tersely replies: Don’t do that! Why is this
incident (repeated in 22:8-9) recorded in the Book of
Revelation? While it might seem to be unrelated to the
great, cosmic issues of the prophecy, it actually comes
close to the heart of St. John’s message. At first glance,
it appears to be a polemic against idolatry, certainly a
central concern of the Book of Revelation. On closer
inspection, however, such an interpretation presents
serious difficulties. In the first place, we must remember
that it is an inspired Apostle who performs this act of
worship, in the course of receiving divine revelation;
while it is not absolutely impossible that St. John would
commit the crime of idolatry in such a situation, it
seems highly unlikely. In the second place, the angel’s
reason for refusing worship seems strange. Why does he
not simply quote the commandment against having
false gods, as Jesus did (Matt. 4:10) when the devil
demanded that He worship him? Instead of this, he
launches into a brief explanation of the nature of
prophecy: I am a fellow servant of yours and your
brethren who hold the Testimony of Jesus; worship
God! For the Testimony of Jesus is the Spirit of
prophecy.
The solution is to be found, first, in the fact that the
term worship (in Greek, proskuneo – ) simply means “the
custom of prostrating oneself before a person and
kissing his feet, the hem of his garment, the ground,
etc.,” 10 and can be used not only for the homage paid to
God (or, sinfully, to a false god), but also for the proper
reverence due superiors (see, e.g., the LXX usage in
Gen. 18:2; 19:1; 23:7, 12; 27:29; 33:3, 6-7; 37:7, 9-10;
42:6; 43:26, 28; 49:8). It was completely appropriate for
Lot to “worship” the angels who visited him, and for
the sons of Israel to “worship” Joseph. Matthew uses the
word to describe a slave’s obeisance before his master
(Matt. 18:26), and St. John employs it to record
Christ’s promise to the faithful Philadelphians, that the
Jews would be forced “to come and bow down
[proskuneo – ]” at their feet (Rev. 3:9).
Assuming, therefore, that St. John was not offering
divine worship to the angel, but rather reverence to a
superior, the angel’s reply can be more clearly
understood. A common theme throughout the Book of
Revelation is that “all the LORD’s people are prophets”
(cf. Num. 11:29). All have ascended into the Lord’s
presence, taking their places at the heavenly Council
7. See John Calvin, Institutes of the Christian Religion, iv.xvii.43-46; cf. idem., Selected Works: Tracts and Letters, ed. by Henry Beveridge and Jules Bonnet, seven vols.
(Grand Rapids: Baker Book House, reprinted 1983), Vol. 2, p. 188.
8. Alexander Schmemann, For the Life of the World: Sacraments and Orthodoxy (New York: St. Vladimir’s Seminary Press, 1973), p. 11.
9. James B. Jordan, “Studies in Genesis One: God’s Rite for Life,” in The Geneva Review, No. 21 (August 1985), p. 3; cf. idem, “Christian Piety: Deformed and
Reformed,” Geneva Papers (New Series), No. 1 (September 1985); on the centrality of worship, see idem, The Law of the Covenant: An Exposition of Exodus 21-23
(Tyler, TX: Institute for Christian Economics, 1984), pp. 10f. , 41f. , 217f .
10. William F. Arndt and F. Wilbur Gingrich, A Greek-English Lexicon of the New Testament and Other Early Christian Literature (Chicago: University of Chicago Press,
1957), p. 723.
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