“The church is a representation of the intelligible and sensible realms, because she possesses the sanctuary as a symbol of the intelligible realm and the nave as a symbol of the sensible realm.”  — St. Maximus the Confessor, On the Ecclesiastical Mystagogy, p. 89 

Mystagogy is a word I first encountered in St. Maximus’s book quoted above. Mystagogy is the interpretation of mysteries.

The scope of the Christian story is cosmic. The effects of the story, if it is true, directly involves everything that exists, visible and invisible, by nature of all things being made and held together by the Logos of God. If all things are made and held together by God, then all things are part of the story of God’s redemption of the universe and the elevation of humanity to the throne of heaven in the person of Jesus Christ. To put too simply, when any creature, angel or demon, whether in heaven or on the earth or in hades, looks to see who is on God’s throne, they will see a man, and that man’s name is Jesus Christ, the eternal son of the Father. It was by the generosity and love of the Father that his son was sent to become flesh on our behalf, to taste death on our behalf, and to be resurrected and crowned with the cosmic crown of eternal life on our behalf.

If this God is this same God who created the universe, and this God is the God who gives the purpose to which all things have been ordered, and if it is that same God who revealed the heavenly pattern of worship to Moses, then surely it follows that this pattern must be found in all things. This kind of divine pattern recognition is something we see St. Maximus doing with the Divine Liturgy in the book, On the Ecclesiastical Mystagogy, where each element of the liturgy can be understood as a type of icon which reveals each element’s heavenly pattern.

I am not a scholar. In fact, I am new to St. Maximus and Orthodoxy in general, and I am very much in the beginning stages of understanding the orthodox way. Nevertheless, I feel like I can see where this pattern recognition and symbolism is going; I am beginning to see it all around, like it is “everywhere present and filling all things.” It seems to me that this pattern involves the unification of many parts into one, though not at the expense of the parts as though they don’t actually exist. To say it another way: without the unity of the parts, the revelation of the one is impossible, but since the one is revealed, so too the unity of its parts is revealed. This Cosmic Unifier behind all of these patterns is the perfectly unified Trinity.

The scope of the Christian story is indeed cosmic. When any creature looks to see who is on God’s throne, they will see a man, and that man’s name is Jesus Christ. We echo the words of the Psalter “What is man that you are mindful of him?” Thankfulness to Him hardly seems like enough to give back to a God like that. I’m convinced that everyone will be filled with bewilderment when, by the Grace of God, we recognize just how true it is that we are being united to the creator of Heaven and Earth, who patterns the universe after the very pattern of the eternal unity of Himself. The Holy Spirit is joining us to the body of the Son, who is presently the King of Kings, crowned with honor and glory forever. Here is your mystery.

More to come…