The meaning of the Intercession?
Intercession simply means that someone is praying for the other out of his love, So we believe as Coptic Orthodox Christians, that St Mary’s is interceding for us and all the angels, all the saints, all the martyrs, all the apostles, all the prophets and this based upon the belief of having one body of the Lord Christ, he is the head of the body and we all member in the same body.
All generations, the saints of all generations are members in the same body. So these two hands are working together. They feel each other, they help each other, being in the same body.
So when we believe that many people now are in heaven, in the paradise of joy and they are still living because there is no one die, according to the Christian faith, those who believed in Christ the source of life, they will never die. They slept here, but their spirits are living there in the paradise of joy.
They are enjoying a better life than our life. So these people, because of their love, they pray for us. They intercede for us. They are always asking God to help us in order to catch the same faith in order to be with them in the paradise of joy and then the kingdom of heaven.
Stories about intercession from the bible
So when we believe in the membership of the body of Christ, we can easily accept the belief in intercession. And also it happened in the Bible in many stories that the good people, the people of God, and the men of God were interceding for their people.
Moses was interceding for the Jew people. Abraham interceded for Sodom and Gomorrah, and Job interceded for his friends.
And when someone asked that these people were living Moses, Abraham, and Job, again and again, we do not believe in death. Death is related only to the physical body, but for the souls of men, never die.
So having this belief, they are still functioning. They still praying and they are praying more strongly than when they were here in the flesh because now they are closer to God. And also God himself were recording the names of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob many years after their death.
The Lord himself mentioned the name of the king, David, many, many generations after his departure, because for David Abraham, Isaac, Jacob Moses for God, they were there. They were always living and they were enjoying praying to God all the time.
Again, when you read the letters written by St. Paul, you can see that Paul is speaking about the family of God, and having this idea of the family of God.
Saint Mary, Our Mother
So we are not talking to God only. We are also speaking to our mother, saint Mary because she became the mother of everyone because she gave birth to our savior the Lord Jesus Christ.
And because of this, we consider her the mother of all humanity. So she is interceding for us. And we are asking for her intercession for her prayers and St. Paul also spoke about that cloud of saints that surrounds the church all the time and supports the needs of everyone.
So they felt that the members of the church are always feeling the guidance and the gardens of the saints and the angels around the church. When we move to the book of Revelation, we can find out that some of the souls the saints there in heaven are praying for us, for the tribulations and problems and persecution happening against the church.
One Church for One God
So being one church for one God, and now this cannot stand against us , You know, we are living here , they are living there, but we all pray together. We all having the same faith, the same spirit, the same fate. We all are directed toward the kingdom of heaven because of all this meaning we are enjoying the intercession up to the level, having friends from. Afterlife, you all know that there was a great friendship relationship between pope Cyril the six and saint Mina. And many of the saints in history had this kind of strong friendship relations. You know, living on earth and these saints were living there, but because of the spiritual strengths, they could enjoy feeling the support and they could have spiritual fellowship together.
So let’s enjoy the intercession and believe in the family of God and ask continuously for the help and intercession of St. Mary and all the saints. My God bless you all. Amen