September 24 · Thekla

Today the Church keeps more than one holy name.

First she keeps the Synaxis of All Saints of Alaska. Two hundred and thirty-two years ago, on this same twenty-fourth of September, the missionaries from Valaam reached Kodiak. That arrival is why this morning belongs to the American church. Those are true names. We will not tell those whole lives this morning.

She also remembers Venerable Nikander the Wonderworker of Pskov. She remembers Venerable Silouan of Mount Athos. She remembers Monastic Martyr Galacteon of Vologda, Venerable Copres of Palestine, Venerable Abramius of Mirozh, Holy King Vladislav of Serbia, Venerable Dorothy of Kashin, Venerable Simon and Venerable David of Serbia, Holy King Stephen of Serbia, and the Mirozh and Myrtle Tree Icons of the Mother of God. Those are true days. We will not tell those whole lives this morning.

This morning she asks us to look at Thekla.

Her name is Thekla. The Church also writes Thecla, and in Greek Θέκλα. Families may hear Tekla, or Fekla. All those names are one girl. The Church calls her Protomartyr — the first among women to suffer for Christ — and Equal of the Apostles.

Do you hear what she is already singing for her? "You were enlightened by the words of Paul, O Bride of God, Thekla." "You became the first sufferer and martyr among women, by entering into the flames as into a place of gladness."

That is today's word. Not a girl who trusted a house. A girl who heard the word and would not turn back.

Long ago, in the city of Iconium, there lived a girl named Thekla. She was the daughter of rich and illustrious parents. She was eighteen. They had betrothed her to an eminent youth.

Then the holy Apostle Paul came to that city, and he preached about the Savior.

Thekla heard him.

The word went down into her the way a seed goes down into good ground. She came to love the Lord Jesus Christ with all her heart. She resolved not to marry, but to give her whole life to preaching the Gospel.

Her mother was opposed. The youth to whom they had betrothed her complained to the prefect of the city. He said the Apostle Paul had turned the girl against the marriage. The prefect locked Saint Paul in prison.

In the night Thekla left her house. She gave the prison guards her gold ornaments, and she sat at the Apostle's feet for three days, listening to his fatherly precepts. They found her there. They brought her home by force.

At his trial Saint Paul was sentenced to banishment from the city. Again they urged Thekla to consent to the marriage. She would not change her mind. Neither her mother's tears, nor her wrath, nor the threats of the prefect could separate her from the Lord Jesus Christ.

Those are the Church's words. We will not invent others. We will not turn them into a speech no one wrote down.

They sentenced her to be burned.

Without flinching, the holy martyr went into the fire and made the Sign of the Cross over herself. The Savior appeared to her, blessing the deed. Inexpressible joy filled her holy soul. The flames shot up high. A light surrounded her. The flames did not touch her. Thunder boomed. Rain and hail put the fire out. The torturers scattered. Saint Thekla, kept safe by the Lord, left the city.

We will not linger on the fire. The Church knows it, and that is enough for us this morning. We say what the Church says: she made the Sign of the Cross. The Lord kept her. She walked out.

With the help of a certain Christian youth she searched for the Apostle Paul. He and his companions, among whom was Saint Barnabas, were hidden in a cave not far from the city, praying that the Lord would strengthen her.

After this, Saint Thekla went with them, preaching the Gospel in Antioch.

In that city they condemned her for being a Christian. Twice they set hungry wild animals upon her. The animals would not touch the holy virgin. They lay down meekly.

The Providence of God preserved her unharmed through all her torments. They tied her to two oxen. The cords broke like cobwebs. The oxen ran off. Saint Thekla was unharmed.

The people began shouting, "Great is the God of the Christians!"

That shout is the Church's own word. We will not invent another.

The prefect himself became terrified. He saw that the holy martyr was being kept safe by the Almighty God, Whom she served. He gave orders to set free the servant of God Thekla.

Do you hear that? Not a girl the city could turn. A girl the Lord kept. The animals would not touch her. The people said the Name out loud.

With the blessing of the Apostle Paul, Saint Thekla settled in a desolate region of Isaurian Seleucia. She dwelt there many years, constantly preaching the Word of God and healing the sick through her prayer. She converted many pagans to Christ. The Church names her Equal-to-the-Apostles because of that work — not because she sat still, but because she went out with the word she had heard.

More than once the Enemy tried to destroy her through people blinded by sin. The power of God always preserved this faithful servant of Christ.

When Saint Thekla was already a ninety-year-old woman, men came against her. She cried out for help to Christ the Savior. A rock split open and hid the holy virgin. Thus did Saint Thekla offer up her holy soul to the Lord.

We will not linger on the men. The Church knows them, and that is enough for us this morning. We say what the Church says: she cried out. The rock opened. The Lord received her.

The Church glorifies her as "the glory of women and guide for the suffering, opening up the way through every torment." From of old many churches were dedicated to her. One of them was built at Constantinople by the holy Equal of the Apostles Constantine. She is a prayerful intercessor for ascetics. The Church invokes her when a woman is tonsured into monasticism.

The word we heard this morning is the New Martyrs word. It is not a Thekla pair. The Church did not label one for her on this Thursday. She labeled it for Alaska. And it already knows this girl.

"Who shall separate us from the love of Christ? shall tribulation, or distress, or persecution, or famine, or nakedness, or peril, or sword? … For I am persuaded, that neither death, nor life … shall be able to separate us from the love of God, which is in Christ Jesus our Lord."

Nothing separated Thekla. Not a house that wanted her to turn back. Not a fire. Not the animals. Not ninety years. The love of Christ held her.

And the Gospel says, "But there shall not an hair of your head perish. In your patience possess ye your souls." The fire did not touch her. The animals would not touch her. The cords broke. The rock opened. The Lord kept what He had been given.

The psalm we held in the hand is not a lectionary appointment. It is a word this morning already knows: "Many are the afflictions of the righteous: but out of them all the Lord will deliver them."

Out of them all. Not out of the easy ones. All.

That is why the Church will not let this Thursday stand without this girl. While she is naming Alaska, and the 1794 arrival, and the saints of this land, she also names the first among women — a girl in Iconium who heard Paul, who would not turn back, whom the Lord kept, who preached until a rock hid her, and who is praying still.

And today, so many hundreds of years later, we say her name once more, out loud, together — Holy Protomartyr and Equal of the Apostles Thekla — and she is praying for us still.