The conversion of Fr. Matthew Markewich

Fr. Matthew Markewich with wife Rebekah and their two children

As a child, I was raised in a household of mixed faiths. My father’s side is Jewish, though most of my relatives from this side are atheists to my knowledge; and my mother’s side is Lutheran. Because of this mixed religious upbringing, I was both baptized by a pastor and circumcised by a rabbi as a baby. At my baptism, I even had Jewish godparents. We went to a Lutheran church sporadically when I was little, but it was never an important part of my life. I believed in God, but didn’t really know about Him or care about Him.

When I turned ten years old, my parents divorced, and we moved to a new town. It was hard for me to fit in with anyone at school, so my mother had an idea. My brother had been going to an evangelical youth group and had many friends there, so she told me I had to go. I went fairly consistently, but again, church was not really a part of my life. However, I was often moved by what I heard.

After a few years, when I was 14, I started dating a girl who I was sure I was in love with. We dated for almost year, and then she broke up with me.

I was devastated, and I became depressed, and felt like my world had ended.

One night, I had a thought. I remembered that I owned a Bible given to me at the Lutheran church. I decided, “Why not try it out? What do I have to lose?” I took the Bible and I began reading the book of Genesis, but I found nothing in it to help me. However, at youth group, I had learned that there is a New Testament, so I opened to the Gospel of Matthew. Despite the long genealogy in the first chapter, the grace of God was obviously present to help me. I read half the book of Matthew that night. I remember feeling awe the whole time, but I didn’t even understand what I was reading. I knew that God was real, and I wanted to follow Him.

I began attending my youth group on a weekly basis. Then I would go twice, and even three times a week. My whole life changed within a few months. I would stay up until the sun came up, reading the Bible. I tried to convert many people. Interestingly, and regrettably now, I even once came close to converting a Greek Orthodox friend to Protestantism. I knew nothing about Orthodoxy, but the Orthodox I did know did not really seem to care about the Church. So, I had to save them (so I thought)! After a while, I even joined in helping with worship at our Church – I played the alto saxophone in a youth group band. The church was part of the charismatic/Pentecostal movement. We had “prophets” visit sometimes; I was once prophesied over by one. I knew people who said they spoke in tongues, but that wasn’t very common at our church. However, during worship, we would become extremely emotional – crying, swaying, clapping, and we believed we sensed the Holy Spirit during our most emotional times. We believed we could feel God prompting us to speak to people, especially during prayer, as if we were all prophets to some degree. In retrospect, it is obvious now that we were confusing human urges and emotions with divine inspiration.

After only two years of being a believer, I started a Bible study at my high school, and was being trained up to become a youth leader at my church. I was counseling other teenagers. I was re-baptized, because evangelicals believe that one must be baptized after repenting and mentally acknowledging Christ as Lord and Savior.

However, during this whole time, I was struggling with doubt. My atheist upbringing taught me to question everything. I would read criticisms of the Bible – alleged contradictions, evidence that Christianity was made up, and many other disturbing articles for a new convert. I would agonize for days on end over whether my religion was made up – maybe my experience of God was all in my head, and had a psychological explanation? However, fortunately, I soon found apologetics. I learned that there was a rational defense for Christianity. Very soon I noticed, that a common theme was one word: tradition. Reading Protestant books like Lee Strobel’s The Case for Christ and apologetics on the internet, I saw that we can trust the Bible because we can trust early apostolic tradition. Since we can trust Scripture because of tradition, how can the Protestant doctrine of sola scriptura, that only scripture can be trusted, make sense? This thought must have penetrated my soul over time. One day, like an epiphany, I asked myself a question: “Why do I believe the Protestant church is correct when it is only 500 years old at most?” I immediately understood that it couldn’t be true if it is so new, so I began a quest to find the early Church. I began doing research on the internet, and I knew I had to decide between Orthodoxy and Catholicism. I began visiting both churches. I wanted to keep an open mind to either tradition. During this time I was in my final year of high school, just before college.

Right away, it became obvious to me that the Orthodox Church was the correct church of the two. This happened because I learned about the monophysite/miaphysite (Coptic, Armenian, etc.) church. I saw that, even though the Orthodox and monophysite churches have been separated for 1,500 years, they still teach almost the same doctrine, while the Catholic Church teaches something else entirely. (Please note that I am not saying the monophysite church is Orthodox; however, they are undeniably closer to us than the Catholic Church.) Imagine a murder trial – you have two witnesses who are not friends, even sometimes hostile to each other, saying the same thing occurred, while one witness says something totally different. You would find the two witnesses much more reliable. I knew that the Catholic Church could not possibly explain how the Orthodox and monophysite churches could still be so similar doctrinally without showing their own doctrine is innovative. In addition, my visit to the Catholic Church was unsatisfying.

The priest gave me pamphlets written by Catholics on how we should enjoy all religions of the world by practicing their methods of prayer and meditation! Everything I was learning about Orthodoxy made sense of Christianity.

However, it was a real struggle getting my mind and heart to accept Orthodoxy. For example: I used to believe everything that came out of my Protestant pastor’s mouth was as if God were speaking. After I started thinking about becoming Orthodox, he began preaching against infant baptism, and the veneration of the Theotokos. I knew that God couldn’t be in the Orthodox Church and at the same time speak through my pastor. (In retrospect, it is obvious – within a few years, this pastor divorced and ended up with a woman who attended our youth group as a volunteer.) Protestants are always on a quest to rediscover the early Church. Yet, only very few of them read any of the Fathers; they read mainly the Bible and modern inspirational books. Yet, as an Orthodox Christian, I can pick up St. Ignatius of Antioch’s letters and see the Eucharist described as Christ’s literal Body and Blood. I can also read The Catechetical Lectures by St. Cyril of Jerusalem and see the Orthodox faith being preached in the 4th century.

Protestants also claim that we can only trust the Bible because tradition can be corrupted. Yet, their own Bible is the product of tradition. The Bible did not drop down from heaven, but was assembled, over time, by holy bishops gathered in council, who were inspired by the Holy Spirit. Only by the time of St. Athanasius the Great was the New Testament finally defined as the books we have today. So, if the Bible comes from tradition, why do Protestants condemn tradition? Another common argument Protestants make is that the veneration of icons is idolatry, and that the Jews never had icons. However, in the Old Testament, God commands the Jews to make curtains for the temple embroidered with images of cherubim (Exodus 36:8), and to create the Ark of the Covenant, which had images of cherubim (Hebrews 9:5). In addition, throughout the Old Testament, it is obvious that the Jews showed great honor to the Ark.

Obviously, the Jews themselves knew that honoring the Ark was conveying honor to God, just as we do when we honor icons.

Finally, there is a great irony that many Protestants are not aware of – sola scriptura is not found in the Bible. Where in the Bible can you a find a verse saying the Bible alone can be trusted as inspired? There is none.

Also, where in the Bible can you find a verse saying what books make up the Bible? It doesn’t exist. Without realizing it, Protestants have not rejected tradition; they have simply traded the Orthodox tradition for a new, man-made tradition.

At the beginning of my second year of college, I was received by chrismation into the Church. I attended an evangelical group at my college and led a Bible study associated with them, where I openly taught Orthodoxy. Thank God, because of this some of my closest friends converted – one is a former Pentecostal, and now a subdeacon in the Russian church, and one is an evangelical pastor’s child, just baptized. I began an Orthodox Christian Fellowship student group at my college. I started debating with a Pentecostal girl who was the president of another Protestant group. She started attending the Orthodox group, was chrismated, and now she is my wife.

Fr. Matthew serving in the church of St. Tikhon Monastery, South Canaan, Pennsylvania

Right after college I came to St. Tikhon’s Orthodox Seminary in South Canaan, Pennsylvania, and was ordained a deacon in 2011 and a priest in 2013. I actually managed the monastery’s bookstore for two years after graduating from seminary. I am now assigned acting rector of “Christ the Savior” Orthodox Church in Ballston Lake, NY.

Rebekah Markewich

If someone told me ten years ago that one day I would not only be Orthodox, but also married to an Orthodox priest, I would have thought it was crazy. For most of my life, I knew almost nothing of Orthodoxy and when I learned more about it, I still had many misconceptions. Now that Orthodoxy is growing in America, a lot of Protestants are learning about it for the first time.

I was raised in a very religious home. My parents were actively involved in their church, becoming pastors when I was a teenager. My grandparents were also both pastors. I was Pentecostal and loved it. I was very active myself. In college I led a youth group, was one of the worship leaders at my church and helped run a Protestant group at my college. I was planning on attending a Pentecostal ministry school after finishing my Master’s degree in history.

The church of St. Tikhon Monastery, South Canaan, Pennsylvania

One of the catalysts for my conversion was, ironically, attending a Pentecostal conference. It was more of an event- one day where thousands of people packed into a hot football stadium, fasted and prayed for our country. All college students were given a book about starting campus ministries. I happily took the book to read. The book was Pentecostal – not even remotely Orthodox. However, it talked of the Early Church with such passion – after reading it, I very much wanted to know how the first Christians worshiped and what they believed.

That semester, I began a reading intensive class about the Early Church. I read books on dogmatic theology and Patristics. I also became friends with another history student who was Orthodox. We started to debate theology which led me to start my own personal study to prove that Orthodoxy was not as correct as Pentecostalism. Interestingly, the more I studied, the more I realized that I couldn’t prove Pentecostalism was correct. Once I learned about Apostolic Succession and the Holy Eucharist being taught by the earliest Christians, I knew I had to be Orthodox. How could I continue being a Christian without receiving the Body and Blood of Christ?

Still, one of my biggest hold-ups was about the spiritual life. I had seen and heard of many miracles in the Pentecostal church. I had often spoken in tongues and was learning how to prophesy. To me, the Orthodox church looked spiritually lacking. However, I couldn’t get past the doctrinal disparity of the Pentecostal church compared to what the Early Church believed. The Pentecostals do not believe that the Eucharist is the Body and Blood of Christ- they believe it is just a symbol, something that is done in memory of Christ. I couldn’t believe that anymore. As I learned more about Orthodoxy, I found that there were miracles in the Orthodox church. Some people were clairvoyant. More importantly, I also learned that other groups – ones that I didn’t even consider Christian also had their own miracles. This taught me that once cannot judge a Church simply by its miracles. In addition, I also saw many cases of people who thought they had a miracle really still have the same ailment. If you really want God to heal you, and you are expecting it to happen during a church service, is there any surprise that it might have a placebo effect?

I also read the work of Fr. Seraphim Rose on Pentecostalism. While a hard message, it made many good points on how you cannot judge a church based on the miracles that it has. It also explained that Pentecostal spiritual experiences could come from demons. I also found other people who converted to Orthodoxy from Pentecostalism and listened to their stories. They were very encouraging.

I decided to become a Catechumen. It was very difficult for my family because they were (and are) still Pentecostal. It was difficult for me because though I was extremely grateful for being raised Pentecostal, I knew that I had to become Orthodox. My parents love the Pentecostal very much- as I had. Leaving it was very hard. What made it more challenging is that by the time I decided to convert, I also began a relationship with the Orthodox student that I used to debate theology with. Of course, many people then thought I was converting so that we could be together. It wasn’t true, but it certainly made it complicated to explain.

Time passed – since those difficult days in college, I have been Orthodox now for over five years. I married the Orthodox student who is now a priest. We moved to another state for him to go to seminary. He graduated a couple of years ago, but since then has been working for St Tikhon’s Monastery. We live on the monastery grounds with our two small children. While living here I have found that where before I thought that the Orthodox spiritual life was rather weak compared to the Pentecostals, I couldn’t have been more wrong.

People are encouraged to talk about their own spiritual experiences in Pentecostalism. Since the faith is driven primarily by spiritual acts and miracles, discussing them openly builds everyone’s faith. However, in Orthodoxy, one’s spiritual life is private. The longer I am Orthodox, the more I begin to slowly understand the Orthodox spiritual life. It is so much deeper than I ever realized. In Pentecostal churches, anyone can be “used” to receive a miracle. Anyone can prophesy and anyone can heal the sick. It makes everyone feel good about themselves being so important. However, in Orthodoxy, it is the people truly close to God who do those things. We aspire to be like the saints, but do not believe we are saints ourselves. Humility and seeing one’s self as the worst of sinners is more important than one’s ability to “receive miracles.”

Also, Pentecostals often focus on how they feel. There is a lot of emotion in the worship services. After being Orthodox, I learned that one cannot base one’s faith on emotions. Emotions are fleeting – gone in a moment. Emotions are often just spiritual temptations – not something on which you should base your spiritual life.

Another interesting difference is how Pentecostals and Orthodox view God. For Pentecostals, God is the father who loves you so much but will condemn you to an eternity of painful, fiery Hell if you don’t accept Christianity. This makes a rather bi-polar God. In Orthodoxy, of course, we believe that God loves us all. Our view of Hell is separation from God, where we chose to go, not where God sends us because he is angry with our sins.

While living at seminary, we have met many people with similar stories. At least half of the students are usually converts from Protestantism. The Orthodox Church is growing among Protestants because people are searching for a fuller faith. The doctrinal differences between Protestants are confusing, but explained in Orthodoxy.

I am so glad that I found Orthodoxy. I love it so much. It feels so much more fulfilling and real compared to my previous experiences.

(This is the final version of the text we first published in August 2014. The request for revision and the revision were made by Fr. Matthew Markewich, whom we are greatly indebted for his approval to publish the story here)