In the name of the Father and of the Son and the Holy Spirit. Amen. Glory to Jesus Christ. Glory forever.

Brothers and sisters, we are here on the eve of Great Lent. And one of the most important things about this fast that is set before us is that we do it together. We're not comparing with our neighbor what we're giving up. Don't talk about it. Don't make it into a matter of curiosity. "Who's taking on the greater challenge?" Like you're looking at some kind of baseball card collection or whose muscles are bigger or something like that.

No, we're not supposed to make a show of our fasting. The Lord told us that very explicitly in the Gospel that we just heard. Rather, we do our efforts in secret as best we can so that no one else is seeing what we're doing, so that our Father who sees in secret will reward us openly.

And so instead, we're just given marching orders. We're just doing what we do together because that's what we do as Orthodox Christians. And the orders were given to put on the armor of light, to walk properly, putting on Jesus Christ, living according to his ways, according to his life that we make our own. And we're given a clear path to walk.

It's nothing mysterious. Anyone can figure it out—to fast and pray, go to church more, to think less of ourselves and to think much more of our God and our neighbor. And both of these parts, thinking less of ourselves and more of others, they are equally important. We need both.

To think less of ourselves means not listening to our cravings. Of course, that's obvious. That's what fasting is all about. But also resisting envy and resentments, division against one another.

And to think more of others demands charity and generosity towards the needs of others, practicing loving self-sacrifice. But it also means practicing forgiveness—forgiving others so that our heavenly Father will forgive us, bearing one another's burdens—not observing while someone struggles in front of us and collapses under a weight that is too great for them when we might reach out a hand in brotherly love to lift them up.

All of that, all of this pilgrimage toward the kingdom of God is either done together or not at all. And as we do this, we encourage one another. We build one another up, especially the ones with whom we have a hard time, those ones we're tempted to avoid and neglect or worse.

As St. Paul says in the epistle that we've heard today, "Who are you to judge another man's servant?" You know: "What exactly are you eating or not eating? Are you following every little detail of the fasting rules?" Or: "Look at that. Oh, I see something that doesn't belong on your plate," or any other part of our lives. "Who are you to judge another man's servant? To his own master he will stand or fall, and God will make him stand," St. Paul says.

And so it is to his own master that servant is accountable, not to you and me. It's not for us to know what is going on in each person's secret heart. We cannot know. And we must not judge by outward appearances what we think we understand is going on in somebody's life.

But rather we look on one another with forbearance, with loving responsibility, as fellow servants of the same master, and knowing that none of us are quite getting the job right, but we're still trying.

And so we begin today as we truly enter into the beginning of Lent with Forgiveness Vespers. We will complete it today with the rite of forgiveness, confronting one another awkwardly, not quite sure of what we're doing, knowing we haven't quite got it right yet. We don't imagine that we already know exactly how it is to reconcile with one another, how to make everything right with one another, as if we're already at peace, already completely at one with one another. But we're trying, we're working at it.

And so as fellow servants, we commend one another to the hard work—the hard work, but the good work—of pursuing forgiveness and reconciliation and repentance, learning righteousness and love, that we may grow up into our true identity in Christ and may all find the place where we belong in his heavenly kingdom.

Amen. Glory to Jesus Christ. Glory forever.