And one more important detail. This manuscript has come down to us thanks to works of mercy. It was carefully kept by the nun Elizabeth, who was vouchsafed not only to be personally acquainted with St. Luke, but also to become a patient of the outstanding surgeon Voino-Yasenetsky. He saved her life by operating on her for purulent appendicitis. The nun lived to a ripe old age in a squalid hut without amenities, and for the winter she was usually taken to live in her comfortable apartment by the servant of God Tamara, who sang with her in the choir of the Holy Trinity Cathedral in Simferopol, where the relics of St. Luke have rested since 1996. In gratitude for the shelter, the nun left Tamara the most precious thing she had before her death – the typewritten volume of the VI Sermons of Archbishop Luke in Simferopol, 1949-1952. Tamara, who is still a parishioner of Holy Trinity Cathedral, gave our diocesan publishing house the opportunity to reprint the manuscript and publish it in the form of a book, which can now be read by thousands of people.

The lively voice of our dear hierarch, blessing his faithful flock, resounds from the pages of this wonderful book. We were given the opportunity, as it were, to be present at the sermons that he, like everything he did in his great life, read with boundless love for our All-Merciful Savior Jesus Christ and for the people who are so in need of the Word of God.

Glory and thanks to the Lord for everything!

METROPOLITAN OF SIMFEROPOL AND CRIMEA

In the week of fronds

We are now celebrating one of the greatest events in the earthly life of our Lord Jesus Christ – His triumphal entry into Jerusalem.

It is necessary that all of you understand what the meaning of this feast is, that you understand what is the meaning of the Lord's entry into Jerusalem, for when someone first becomes acquainted with the Gospel, his thought stops at the chapter that tells about the Lord's entry into Jerusalem, stops with surprise, even with bewilderment, for they have read in many other places of the Gospel that our Lord Jesus Christ always and unfailingly rejected all honors from Himself, all exaltation, for He was meek and lowly in heart.

He forbade the demons, whom he cast out from those possessed by them, to divulge that they knew who He was, that they knew that He was the Son of God. Almost always He also forbade those healed by Him to divulge about the miracle.

When Saint Peter confessed Him as Christ, the Son of God – the Messiah, then Christ said to him: "Blessed art thou, Simon son of Jonah, for flesh and blood hath not revealed these things unto thee, but My Father which is in heaven." The Apostles knew, but the Apostles were also commanded not to divulge to anyone that He was the Christ, the Messiah, the Son of God.

Thus, everything that had existed before, as it were, stood in some contradiction with the Lord's entry into Jerusalem. Never before had we seen the Lord except walking on foot; here they saw Him sitting on an ass for the first time. He had never been seen to shy away from all honors, but now He accepted them.

What did it mean? Why has the way the Lord Jesus Christ acted changed now? Why had He never before, in three and a half years of His preaching, allowed anyone to divulge that He was the Messiah, the Savior of the world? Why did He Himself never speak about this?

Why? Because the time had not yet come to reveal it to the people, because it was not the right time for Him to reveal Himself as the Messiah.

What would have happened if He had rushed to reveal His messianic dignity? You know how fiercely the chief priests, the scribes, and the Pharisees fought against Him. Could they have tolerated then, at the beginning of the Savior's earthly activity, that He proclaimed Himself the Messiah?

No, by no means! This would only increase their hatred and enmity against Him, and would lead to an early, untimely death at their evil hand. Then, before the Lord's entry into Jerusalem, the time had not yet come to declare Him to be Christ, the Son of God, the Messiah.