The Christian life is not easy, but it actually is simple. When we clearly understand what sin and holiness are, then our choice to turn away from sin and be holy becomes clear, too.
Ten years ago, I was present at a sermon on the Sunday of the Triumph of Orthodoxy given by the late Fr. Thomas Hopko, three years before he died. The title he gave the sermon was “What Triumph of Orthodoxy?” And he said that there never really was such a thing.
Why not just ask to enter into the Great Feast of Pascha, into the Kingdom of God, without having to go through this purification? Why won’t God just open the door and say, “Come on in” to everyone?
Real love for God is when we can begin to pray without expectations, without conditions that we lay down for God, willing to accept whatever God is going to give us. A true child of God will fall down at the Master’s feet and say, “Lord, help me.” It doesn’t matter what then happens.
We don’t get caught up in the endless controversies and pursuits of this world. Let such dead ways of living bury themselves, because death is their aim. Here we have no lasting city. We seek the City which is to come.
Pagans did get some things right. Salvation does mean rescue from Hades, and it does mean being seated together with the Most High God. But they were wrong when they thought you could get it by impressing the gods.
In the baptism and chrismation that we are given, and in the Eucharist with which we are strengthened and divinized, we are given all that we need in order to become members of the hosts of heaven.
Faithfulness to justice, to righteousness, is what it means to be Christian and what is required to stay within the kingdom of God, both in this life and into the age to come.