Scripture
in Service

Dear Reader,

If you have been a participant in the St. Nektarios Adult Religious Education Bible Study in the past, you will find our gathering times and the existence of a study guide (this document) familiar. Everything else changes this year.

Prayerfully, and in consultation with Fr. Panayiotis Steele and Maryann Zitsos, I decided to take us on what might appear to be a detour from our familiar route through the pages of Holy Scripture. It is my hope, however, that by the time we have completed the study before us, we will not feel that we have left that sacred (and, perhaps, deceptively comfortable) place, but rather that we will have experienced it exceedingly deeply.

The Word of God is, after all, not a book but a person: the person of our Lord and God and Savior, Jesus the Christ, the Word-made-flesh, who is made known to us in the breaking of the bread (cf. Luke 24). Like his disciples, Luke and Cleopas, who walked dejectedly with the freshly-risen Christ toward Emmaus, we are no doubt familiar to some degree with Scripture, but we are beset by anxieties and temptations, and expectations of God that are ill-informed and keep us from recognizing him.

In this study, we set out on a road by which we will be led deep into the mystery of Christ—the word for this is mystagogy—and will sit at table with him. Our subject is no less than the Divine Liturgy—the breaking of bread and the prayers (Acts 2:42)—and we will see in it not only how Scripture informs worship, but how worship helps us properly relate to Scripture. More importantly, it stands to enrich our love and communion with God.

It is my distinct honor to once more welcome you and offer to you this study guide, prepared and presented by our team of clergy and devoted parishioners:

I also thank our parish’s administrative staff for help with printing and facilities support.