On the evening of Palm Sunday at the beginning of Holy Week, following the Bridegroom Matins for Holy Monday, Fr. Matthew Howell gives a short reflection using as a basis a passage from The Eternal Today by Archimandrite Zacharias Zacharou of St. John the Baptist Monastery in Essex, England. He highlights the epistle from Philippians 4:4-9 that was read at the Palm Sunday liturgy as the key to meeting the Bridegroom, Christ, at the Bridal Chamber.
Gospel: Matthew 21: 18-43
Holy and Great Monday
"'Behold the Bridegroom cometh' (Mt. 25:6), and blessed is the servant who will be found worthy to receive His saving visitation and put on an incorruptible crown.
The Church prays in these days that no one remain outside of the Bridal Chamber of Christ, where the awesome union of the heart of man with the Spirit of God takes place.
Saint Paul gives us the key to the Bridal Chamber, saying that the Lord is night: we must fill our mind and heart with all those things which are true, honest, just, pure, lovely, of good report, virtue and praise (cf. Phil. 4:8). Such care with regard to the things we allow to exist in our hearts is befitting in view of the One Whom we are encountering there, namely, Him Who for the sake of our salvation went up to Golgotha to undergo suffering unto death.
Only His undying love is able to heal the wretched desolation of our ingratitude."
--The Eternal Today, by Archimandrite Zacharias Zacharou, page 87
