Reading Scripture in Lent with the Church Fathers: Tuesday of the Fifth Week of Lent

Today’s Scripture Readings in the Orthodox Church
Isaiah 40:18-31; Genesis 15:1-15; Proverbs 15:7-19

Isaiah 40:19. For if we consider the different nations in all the world, from ocean to ocean, that is, from the Indian Sea to Brittania, and from the Atlantic up to the northern ice cap where the waters congeal and fine amber is frozen, we see that every race of human being lives like locusts within it.… Are we not amazed at the relative smallness of human beings whose bodies are like locusts when you consider their minute movements in the grand scheme of things?… Greek and Roman history tells of so many kings. Where is that uncountable army of Xerxes? Where is the Israelite host in the desert? Where is the incredible power of kings? What shall I say about those long ago? For present examples teach us that leaders are next to nothing, and the rulers of the earth are considered empty. The princes and judges of the earth … are neither sown nor planted nor fixed with a stable root. They are carried off at the command of God in an instant and perish like the blade of grass taken by the wind and storm, just as it is written, “And I crossed over, and he was not there; I sought him, and his place was not found.
St Jerome (4th century)

Isaiah 40:26. Lift up your eyes (John 4:35) occurs in many places in Scripture when the divine Word invites us to lift up and elevate our thoughts, to turn our sight from its fixation on things below to higher things, as is written in Isaiah, Lift up your eyes on high and see. Who has made all these things known? (40:26). The Savior, when he was about to speak the Beatitudes, lifted up his eyes to the disciples and said, Blessed are such and such (Matt 5:2–12). No true disciple of Jesus, nor one who rests in Abraham’s bosom, has his sight fixed on things below. The rich man in torment lifted up his eyes (Luke 16:23) and saw Abraham and Lazarus in his bosom. Further, after Jesus restored the health of the woman who was bent over and completely incapable of looking up (Luke 13:11), she was no longer bent over and incapable of looking up and was able to lift up her eyes. On the other hand, anyone who is overcome by passions, dominated by the flesh and preoccupied by material things, has not obeyed the command to Lift up your eyes. As a consequence such a person will not see the fields, even if they be already white for harvest (John 4:35). In truth, no one who does the works of the flesh has lifted up his eyes.
Origen (3rd century)

Genesis 15:1. God said to him, “Don’t be afraid, Abram.” Notice the extraordinary degree of his care. Why did he say, “Don’t be afraid”? Since Abraham had scorned so much wealth by giving little importance to the offerings of the king, God said to him, Have no fear for despising gifts of such value. Do not be distressed on the score of your diminished prosperity. “Don’t be afraid.” Then to cheer his spirit further, he adds his name to the encouragement by saying, “Don’t be afraid, Abram.” It proves to be no little help in encouraging a person to invoke the name of the person we are addressing. Then he said, “I am your shield.” This phrase is also rich in meaning: I summoned you from the Chaldeans. I led you to this point. I rescued you from the perils of Egypt. I promised once and again to give this land to your descendants. It is I who will be your shield. After daily making you acclaimed by all, I will be your shield—that is, I will struggle in your place. I will be your shield. “Your reward will be exceedingly great.” You refused to accept reward for the troubles you suffered in exposing yourself to such risks. You scorned the king and what he offered you. I will provide you with a reward, not to the degree that you would have received but wonderfully, exceedingly great. “Your reward,” the text says, remember, “will be exceedingly great.”
St John Chrysostom (4th century)

Genesis 15:4. If the words of Abraham are not enough to correct, consider the word of God, who condemns such a mode of transmitting inheritance. “This man shall not be your heir,” he says, “but the other who will come out from you, he will be your heir.” Who is this other of whom he speaks? In fact Hagar too bore a son, Ishmael, but he is not speaking of him. Instead, he is speaking of holy Isaac. For this reason he added “who will come out from you.” In fact, the one who truly came out of Abraham is the one who was born of a legitimate marriage. But in Isaac, the legitimate son, we can see the One who is the true legitimate son, the Lord Jesus, of whom at the beginning of the Gospel according to Matthew we read that he is the son of Abraham. He was the true heir of Abraham, bringing renown to the descendants of the progenitor. Through him Abraham looked up to heaven and understood that the splendor of his posterity would be no less luminous than the radiance of the stars of heaven. As “one star differs from another in brightness, so it is also for the resurrection of the dead,” said the apostle. The Lord, in joining to his resurrection people whom death was accustomed to hide in the ground, made them sharers in the heavenly kingdom. 
St Ambrose (4th century)

Genesis 15:6. Accordingly let us learn, I beseech you, a lesson for ourselves as well from the patriarch: Let us believe in the words of God and trust in his promise. Let us not apply the yardstick of our own reasoning but give evidence of deep gratitude. This, you see, will succeed in making us also be seen to be righteous and will quickly cause us to attain to the promise made by him. In Abraham’s case, however, the promise was made that a complete multitude would develop from his descendants. The effect of the promise was beyond the limits of nature and human logic. Hence faith in God won righteousness for him. In our case, … if we are alert enough to see it, he promised much more. We are able in great measure to transcend human reasoning, provided we believe in the power of the One who promises, in order that we may gain also righteousness from faith and attain to the good things promised. 
St John Chrysostom

And how did Abraham’s progeny spread? Only through the inheritance he transmitted in virtue of faith. On this basis the faithful are assimilated to heaven, made comparable to the angels, equal to the stars. This is why he said, “So will your descendants be. And Abraham,” the text says, “believed in God.” What exactly did he believe? Prefiguratively he believed that Christ through the incarnation would become his heir. In order that you may know that this was what he believed, the Lord says, “Abraham saw my day and rejoiced.” For this reason “he reckoned it to him as righteousness,” because he did not seek the rational explanation but believed with great promptness of spirit.
St Ambrose

Genesis 15:12. As he contemplated the wonderful things of God, Abraham was struck with fear, the fear that belongs to the perfect. It will be noted … that the ecstasy came upon him “toward sunset” … not the ecstasy that resembles a loss of reason but that of wonder, the thrill of passing from visible to invisible things. The apostle even says, “Indeed, if we are beside ourselves, it is for God; if we are in our right mind, it is for you.” By this he means not “we are out of our minds for God” but “even if we are transported through contemplation beyond the realm of human things, we do this for God.” David likewise declares, “I said in my ecstasy: every man is a liar.” It was indeed because he was transported out of himself to participate in the divine that he said of people that they are liars, because he was no longer merely a man, by reason of his communion with the Holy Spirit. He was quite different from those of whom it is said, “While there is jealousy and strife among you, are you not of the flesh and behaving like ordinary men?” When Abraham then had been transported out of himself, a “dark fear” fell upon him, dark not by participation in darkness but in the sense of obscurity, of something whose meaning is not immediately evident. Being a “great” fear, it is not the kind that happens to the mediocre. Remember “darkness” is often used for “obscurity,” as according to this saying: “He made darkness around him his canopy.” It is indeed true that the contemplation and grasp of supernatural truths produce, even among great people, a divine vertigo and fear, and it is with some trepidation that they apply themselves to such things.
St Didymus the Blind (4th century)

Genesis 15:15. Anyone can see that God is here announcing Abraham’s departure from this life. As for the anagogical [mystical] sense, one could say the following: The wise person leaves this life in peace, while the sinner does so with troubled thoughts and an agitated soul. And the way death takes one, so is one judged. One who has already attained peace here below takes leave also in peace. But one who has nothing but disturbance and agitation in his or her thoughts will be judged also in this way. This is clear from the saying in Ecclesiastes: “In the place where the tree falls, there it will lie.” Things do not occur this way in historical reality, because a tree does not necessarily always lie where it falls. Often it is cleared away. But it is evidently humankind who is symbolically represented by the tree, namely, a person who will be judged as he is found. In peace, then, as is fitting, Abraham will depart to his fathers. Being pleasing to God, he shares in their promise: “First Christ, then those who are of Christ.” And for the just themselves, there are different promises and different dwellings, because “there are many mansions” with the Father. The person full of zeal will go to be with his spiritual fathers, whose son he is through a moral likeness, even if, according to the flesh, he had fathers who were bad men.
St Didymus the Blind

Proverbs 15:17 (15:18 in LXX & OSB). Better is the hospitality of vegetables served with friendship and grace than a fatted calf served with enmity. Often we accept simpler, more frugal hospitality offered in good conscience—as guests at the table of those who are unable to furnish us with more—in preference to elevated words “lifted up against the knowledge of God” and proclaiming with ample plausibility a sentiment alien to the Father of our Lord Jesus who has given the law and the prophets.
Origen

When one invites to supper guests that are hungry and have an appetite, even if he lays a meager table it seems abundant owing to the anticipation of the guests who fall upon the dishes with great relish. In just the same way we too have confidence in your spiritual appetite and do not hang back, even if we have a poor and meager table, before laying it in customary manner before your good selves. This is what a certain sage also remarked: “Better a meal of vegetables with love than a beast from the manger with enmity,” suggesting that love has a different view of what is set forth, and to its eyes ordinary things appear rich and scraps seem generous. 
St John Chrysostom

Proverbs 15:19 (15:21 in LXX & OSB). There are those who are called the slothful in the book of Wisdom, who strew their path with thorns, who consider harmful to the soul a zeal for deeds in keeping with the commandments of God, the demurrers against the apostolic injunctions, who do not eat their own bread with dignity, but, fawning on others, make idleness the art of life. Then, there are the dreamers who consider the deceits of dreams more trustworthy than the teachings of the Gospels, calling fantasies revelations. Apart from these, there are those who stay in their own houses, and still others who consider being unsociable and brutish a virtue without recognizing the command to love and without knowing the fruit of long-suffering and humility.
St Gregory of Nyssa (4th century)