Anchor of the Soul

Sermon on the Epistle of St. Paul to the Hebrews (6: 13-20), Fourth Sunday of the Great Fast, Sunday of St. John of the Ladder

by Father James Thornton

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In ancient times especially, sailing the high seas was a perilous undertaking, when even the largest ships were tiny, slow, and awkwardly shaped by our modern standards. And yet they sailed about the Mediterranean, and sometimes into the Atlantic, along the edges of the Iberian Peninsula (modern Spain) and on up the coast a few hundred miles. The greatest danger in those days was unexpected bad weather. Huge waves and violent wind could toss these small vessels about, overturning them, swamping them, or driving them straight onto a rocky shoreline where they would be smashed to pieces. Countless numbers of them perished over the centuries, and with them countless lives were lost. Everyone knew of the dangers of sea travel in those days. That was the reason early Christian writers so often used nautical metaphors when discussing the Church, or man's struggle through this life. The Church is an "Ark of Salvation on the storm-tossed ocean of life," they would say, and everyone knew exactly what was meant, since the sea represented the ultimate in hazardous travel.

In today's Epistle reading, St. Paul uses a nautical metaphor, that of "an anchor of the soul," to drive home his point about the necessity of hope. He exhorts his readers to have hope in the promises of God. As God made promises to the Holy Patriarch Abraham when establishing the Old Covenant, so He has augmented these promises with new promises to the followers of the New Covenant, the Covenant of Christ Jesus. As Saint Abraham was patient in awaiting the fulfillment of God's promises, so too must we be patient. God will always fulfill His promises since, as the Holy Apostle says, it is not possible for God to lie. It is in that hope, and in holding firmly to that hope, that the Christian finds his refuge. Moreover, for the faithful Christian hope becomes "an anchor of the soul" throughout his life, whatever difficulties he may encounter, however rough the sea of life may become.

An anchor holds a ship firmly in place and prevents it from being carried away by the wind or by ocean currents onto the rocks of the shoreline. That is what Christian hope does for us, it holds us firmly where we should be, according to God's wishes, and prevents us from being swept away towards shipwreck by every gust of wind or current.

What precisely is Christian hope? Metropolitan Philaret of New York, the First Hierarch of the Russian Orthodox Church Abroad until his repose in 1985, spoke of Christian hope in the following words: "Christian hope can be defined as a sincere, vivid remembrance of God, inseparably tied with the assurance of His Fatherly love and help. A man who has such hope always and everywhere feels himself under the Father's protection just as he everywhere and always sees the infinite vault of Heaven above him in the physical world. Therefore, an Orthodox Christian having hope in God will never come to despair, will never feel himself hopelessly alone."[3] The Metropolitan goes on to say that, "A situation can seem hopeless only to an unbeliever. A believer, one who hopes in God, knows His nearness to the sorrowing human heart and will find comfort, courage and help in Him."[4]

Now, let us be clear that the promises of God in which we put our hope have much more to do with the life to come than with our lives here on earth. We are not promised lives of painless bliss on earth. We are not promised great earthly riches and power, as some sectarian preachers have averred, sectarian preachers who brazenly parade their own hedonistic lifestyles before the eyes of their followers and blasphemously ridicule God's promises as "pie in the sky." The truth is that we cannot finally avoid some measure, usually a goodly measure, of pain and sorrow and disappointment in this life. Our spiritual ancestors, of both ancient times and modern times, who went to their deaths for Christ plainly understood what God's promises meant. In fact, pain and sorrow and disappointment are necessary if we are successfully to allow our spiritual characters to be shaped by God, so that we become spiritually stronger and more resilient. So, despite the worst that this world may give us, we must keep our hope in God strong. We must keep that "vivid remembrance of God" and of His love and of His promises strong, like a huge anchor.

Metropolitan Philaret relates that "the crown and summit of Christian hope is in the future. We Orthodox Christians know that our Symbol of Faith [the Creed], in which all the basic truths of Christianity are gathered, ends with the words, 'I look for (expect and earnestly long for) the resurrection of the dead and the life of the world to come. Amen.' So a full realization of the bright Christian hope will arrive when life finally triumphs over death and God's truth over worldly untruth. Then every woe will be healed, for 'God will wipe away every tear from their eyes and death shall be no more, neither shall there be anguish nor grief nor pain anymore...' 'And eternal joy will be in their hands' (Revelation 21:4; Isaiah 35:10)."[5]

Like ships, men need anchors. Some men's lives are "all sail and no anchor," to borrow a phrase from the British historian, Macaulay. With each passing craze or vogue they are blown in a new direction. One day they wear their hair down to their shoulders, but soon afterwards they have it standing straight up on end, like someone who has been frightened by a specter. One day they wear very masculine attire, almost in the austere style of the military, and another day they wear earrings, in the style of women, and tattoos all over their bodies, in the style of barbarians. One day they dabble in astrology, another day in Buddhism, another in socialism, and another in Darwinism or some other atheistic philosophy. One day they are devoted to their wives and children, and another day they "fall in love" with someone else and thus bring their families to calamity and tragedy. These men have no anchor and so never find a place of refuge from the fierce winds of the world. And, at the end of it all, such men look back and see that they have spent the whole of their lives chasing one witless delusion after another; they look back and survey a life that is a field of ruins.

By way of contrast, the Christian possesses his anchor of hope, an anchor which holds him firm, an anchor which averts shipwreck, and an anchor which instills confidence in the future, a strong sense of duty, a strong sense of the dignity of the Christian calling, and a manly sobriety when dealing with silly fads of the body and of the mind that try to rob us of that dignity.

Hope is one of the triad of foundational Christian virtues, the other two being faith and love. Foster that virtue of hope, because it requires constant attention. Just as an anchor on a ship becomes rusty and will deteriorate in the salty conditions on or near the sea, so too will our anchor of hope deteriorate in the corrosive atmosphere of this world if it is neglected. Strengthen hope through prayer and strengthen it through the reading of spiritual works, most particularly the Holy Scripture and the writings of the Holy Church Fathers.

Saint Bede of Wearmouth-Jarrow, an Orthodox English Saint of the eighth century, writes that the Faithful, "strive amid the tears and pain of this present life to reach eternal joy. With reason do they lament and weep and are sorrowful during this present life, for they are not yet able to see Him Whom they love. For they know that as long as they are in the body they are wanderers from their own people and from their own true country, for they doubt not that it is through toil and struggle they are to reach their crown. Their sorrow shall be changed into joy when...they shall receive the reward of eternal life, of whom the Psalmist sings: 'They that sow in tears, shall reap in joy.'"[6]

From Quickened with Christ (Etna, CA: Center for Traditionalist Orthodox Studies, 2004), pp. 74-78. This superb book of homilies is highly recommended! Posted on 10 March, 2006 (n.s.).