Часть 5. В среду седмицы первой Великого поста

On Wednesday of the first week of Lent (the main thing for us is the cleansing of conscience) Thanks be to the Lord, who has vouchsafed us to live long enough to see holy fasting and to begin the field of saving fasting! But, brothers, let us take care to use this mercy as it should, so that it serves us for salvation and not for condemnation. The purpose of our fasting is preparation for the non-judgmental acceptance of the Holy Mysteries of Christ, for the acceptance of the Lord Himself, Who says: “He who eats My Flesh and drinks My Blood abides in Me, and I in him” (John 6:56). Since the Lord is pure, and we are unclean, then the communion of the Holy Most Pure Mysteries of Christ is preceded by the cleansing of our conscience and the receipt of forgiveness in the Sacrament of Repentance. Whoever is pure will undoubtedly communicate with Christ the Savior. He is inquisitive, He Himself seeks communication with us, and if He does not communicate, the reason for this is our uncleanness. It has become the main thing for us to cleanse our conscience and receive forgiveness in the Sacrament of Repentance. This is where we will now turn all our care and concern. Those who repent properly will be cleared of conscience and will receive forgiveness. The question now is: who should repent? He who recognizes his sins and confesses them sincerely, having confessed, laments over them and mourns them; having lamented and mourned, he sets the firm intention of no longer offending God with his sins, and, finally, in these dispositions, humbly confesses all his sins before his confessor in order to receive permission for them and appear at the Cup of the Lord justified and pure in the eyes of God. All this is known to you and has already been done by you more than once, so it is necessary to tell you about it only to remind you that, despite the frequent passage of this path, it will still remain the same, there is no other, and if someone began to invent a new one, they would undertake useless work. So, again, take care to know your sins and confess to them. To recognize one’s sins means to say that such and such a sin has been committed by us, and to confess to them means to condemn oneself for them, to say: “I’m guilty,” without allowing any justifications or apologies. “I have sinned, I am guilty” - these two words must be said first of all, spoken sincerely. Look: in what and how did you sin? I don't think it would be difficult. The commandments are known and there is a conscience: the commandment will indicate what we should have done, and the conscience will testify whether we did it or not. The passion that must be overcome, and the sins with which we most offend the Lord, cannot hide from our attention: they stand in the foreground and are irresistibly crowded into our consciousness. This, according to the word of the Lord, is not a spoke, but “a beam... in the eye” (Matthew 7:3)! Now impose on them all the severity of self-examination and self-judgment: for there is wickedness in our sinful heart, that it is ready to judge itself strictly in everything except its main weakness - moral, while everything else, except for the main sins, is morally small. And it turns out that with weak attention to the matter, we are only able to “strain out a gnat” and “devour a camel” (Matthew 23:24) in our internal judgment. Correct this wrong in yourself, first of all, that is, recognize your main passion and your main sins and condemn yourself in them, not allowing any apologies. And then turn to the knowledge of other sins, side ones, which, in comparison with the first ones, can be called small, few, accidental, accidental. For this, look at the commandments of the Decalogue (Ex. 20:3–17, Deut. 5:7–21) and the commandments of the Beatitudes (Matthew 5:3–12) and see which commandment is broken and which virtues are lacking in the heart? Just as in a clean mirror, when one looks into it with open and unpowdered eyes, one can see small specks on the face, so all our misdeeds and sins will be revealed in words, deeds and thoughts, when we force our conscience to look in the mirror of the commandments of God, indicated in the word of God. All that remains is to add to this condemnation of ourselves, the consciousness of our guilt, and this will come when we reject any justification of ourselves by anything, we will not excuse ourselves either by temperament, or by the circumstances of life, or by the type of service and conditions of relationships, or by hobbies, or by ignorance - in a word, by nothing, but we will do so that, as soon as a sin is noticed, we sincerely say: “Guilty!” Unrequitedly guilty! Having recognized your sins, you need to mourn them, lament that they have been committed. Whoever sincerely said: “I’m guilty” is not far from saying: “Why did I do all this?”, to regret it, to be ashamed of oneself and to be sick before the Lord, to be afraid of His Judgment and the misfortune that awaits those who remain unjustified in their sins! It is not far from this, however, and this also requires work on oneself, self-government and self-compulsion, for there is a petrification of the heart, according to which, both recognizing sin and not having anything to justify it, they say: “What is this?” So it is necessary to take the hammer of the crushing truths of God with the handle of reasoning and strike with them the stony heart until it softens, breaks down and sighs. Remember the ineffable mercies of God, revealed to you in creation, Providence, and even more so in Redemption, and how you turn out to be ungrateful, remember the perfections of your nature, humiliated by you, remember the bitter fate you deserved and, perhaps, is no longer far from you, remember the former peace and the present burden of the spirit, remember how many times you said: “I won’t! I won’t!” - and you continued to sin, and even more and more stubbornly than before, remember that no one forced you, you yourself, out of your evil disposition, sinned and offended in the face of God, Who sees everything, and you pushed away His hand with which He stopped you. Remember death, Judgment, hell, remember and everything else with which you hope to crush your stubborn heart. Disturb him in every possible way, excite him and set him in motion. To these reflections, add a prayer to the Lord, so that, as the Lord of all, He will give you control over your heart and, like fire entering, will boil the stubbornness of your heart and deliver you from petrified insensibility. Use everything to reach the sighing of the heart, for this is the root of repentance. This is preceded by the knowledge of sins, followed by the determination not to sin. But the previous one is useless and do not expect the next one if there is no link connecting them - heartfelt sadness about sins. “Sadness” only, “according to Bose, unrepentant repentance (a firm determination not to sin) works towards salvation” (2 Cor. 7:10). What kind of repentance is there that does not contain this sadness, torment and contrition?! Following the disease of the heart about sins will come the intention to abandon them, not to offend the Lord with them and not to destroy oneself. And this will be followed by Confession of sins, the most sincere, and their resolution, the most effective. And Repentance will be accomplished, truly saving. Grant, Lord, that in these days all of us may be worthy of this gift of God! But what good is it if we stand at services without feelings, with boredom or distraction, annoyed that they drag on for a long time, spend the time free from services half asleep and inactive, then coldly say in spirit: “I am a sinner” - about the sins that they ask about, and without having the thought that our main goal should be the complete correction of life? What's the use? This will mean fulfilling the custom of fasting, and not fasting for salvation. “Beware how dangerously you walk” (Eph. 5:15), especially in these days, when the enemy, without tempting us with sins, manages to render useless the means given to us by the grace of God for cleansing from sins and thereby continue his dominion over us. Amen. On Wednesday of the first week of Lent (about the knowledge of sins and self-knowledge) For more than one day now we have been going through the feat of fasting and fasting: the flesh has already been humbled, thoughts have subsided, attention has been established. It is now time to begin the final preparations for Repentance and Confession. Repentance with Confession is the heart of fasting. Previous labors serve as preparation for them, and Holy Communion crowns and completes everything. Without true Repentance and Confession, deeds and deeds will remain fruitless, and Holy Communion will not be for the healing of soul and body. Let's go inside ourselves and do this properly. Confession of sins does not present great difficulties when a person manages to control himself and sets the intention to leave sin, but he will not control himself until he repents, he will not repent until he condemns himself, and he will not condemn until he recognizes his sins. So the initial thing in Repentance is the knowledge of one’s sins. Now, everyone, go inside yourself and begin, first of all, to examine your life and everything that was faulty in it. Of course, everyone is ready to talk and talk about himself that he is a sinner, and not only does he say, but often feels like such, but this sinfulness appears to us in a vague and indefinite form. This is not enough; when approaching Confession, we must definitely explain to ourselves what exactly is unclean and sinful in us and to what extent? You need to know your sins clearly and separately, as if numerically. For this, do this: put the Law of God on one side, and your own life on the other, and see in what ways they are similar and in what ways they are not similar? Take either your affairs and bring them under the Law to see whether they are legal, or take the Law and see whether it was fulfilled as it should in your life or not? For example, you were insulted and took revenge: is this what the Christian Law commands? I saw the mistakes of others and condemned them: is this what follows the commandments of Christ? He did something good and stood tall or trumpeted before himself: is it permissible for a Christian to do this? Or the Law commands to go to the Church of God without laziness and to stand in it reverently, in attention and prayer: was this fulfilled? The Law commands not to lust, not to be angry, not to envy, not to appropriate someone else’s property, and so on: is our behavior consistent with these rules?.. So go through both the entire Law and your entire life. But in order not to omit anything in this important matter of self-test, it is good to maintain some order in it. Imagine more clearly all our responsibilities in relation to God, our neighbor and ourselves, and then review your life more accurately and in more detail in all these relations. Or go over the commandments of the Decalogue, one after another, with all the particular instructions contained in them, and see if you have fulfilled everything they require? Read also, whoever can, the Savior’s Discourse on the Mount, where He explains the ancient Law, filling it with the Christian spirit, or read the Apostolic Epistles in the last chapters, where deeds and orders obligatory for Christians are set out in general overviews: for example, from the 12th chapter of the Epistle to the Romans or from the 4th Epistle to the Ephesians, the Epistle of the Apostle James and St. John the Evangelist First and so on. Look at all this as if in a mirror, and you will see where there is any stain or ugliness in you. As a result of such a review of life, in the number of our deeds, words, feelings, thoughts and desires, a multitude of either directly illegal or semi-legal ones will be revealed, that is, in which the intentions were not entirely pure, even though they are outwardly in accordance with the law, a whole lot of things will gather together, and perhaps the whole life will turn out to be made up of only bad deeds, like an unbroken chain or a continuous series of ugly and disgusting products. But this is only the beginning of self-knowledge and should not stop there. You need to go further in the knowledge of your sinfulness, or go deeper into your sinful heart. Beneath deeds and words, beneath private thoughts, desires and feelings, lie permanent dispositions of the heart that serve as their source; the totality of these dispositions constitutes a person’s personality and determines his character: that is why they especially need to be recognized. There is little work here: our conscientiousness before ourselves will not allow us to hide what our heart possesses and what rulers live in it? And even a tangible witness can be pointed out about this, namely: which evil actions more often break out, and with such force that we cannot control ourselves, for those we must place in the heart a corresponding inclination, or passion, which serves as their constant producer. If, for example, someone, pointing at another, in one case says: “Look what he’s doing!”, in another repeats with annoyance: “What an incongruity!”, And that person shows a mocking face and generally speaks more willingly and more about other people’s affairs from an unfavorable angle, it is not difficult to guess that he is suffering from a godless passion for condemnation. Such consideration will lead us to the knowledge of the passions that dominate us, or one that prevails over all. You know that the root of all evil in us is self-love. From self-love come pride, selfishness and passion for pleasure, and from them come all other passions. Everyone who sins has them all, but not everyone has them to the same degree: in one person pride predominates, in another selfishness prevails, in a third the passion for pleasure prevails. And the proud is not alien to selfish views and pleasures, but easily overcomes them when satisfaction with them can humiliate him, and the selfish is ready to console himself if it costs him nothing, and so on. Thus, in everyone one passion dominates, while others stand, as it were, in the shadow and subordinate to it. It is this dominant one that must be seen and determined, so that later it can be acted upon more decisively. One holy father says: “The Lord demands from you the restoration of chastity, and you are building almshouses and chapels: first correct the first, and the second will be favorable!” But we must go even further in knowing ourselves. After all, we need to determine the general spirit of our life, or its distinctive feature, namely: who do we serve? To the Lord or to yourself and sin? What do we mean? Yourself or the Lord – His glory and pleasing Him? Who do we always stand for? For God's name or for your own? This trait determines what we are in ourselves and what should we therefore expect for ourselves? Self-knowledge is headed by the knowledge of this. This is a general conclusion from the previous one, which will express itself in the conscience, be clearly determined in the consciousness and confessed before the face of the Omniscient Lord. So, finally, the whole picture of our sinfulness and the whole history of our sinful life will be imagined: deeds, feelings and dispositions and the main spirit of life! Following this, you need to grieve for yourself and mourn your sins. Having recognized your sinfulness, do not be a cold spectator of it. Do not mentally pass through it with the same indifference as one walks through someone else’s field, neglected and overgrown with bad grass. Bring this knowledge closer to your conscience and, together with it, begin to arouse saving repentant feelings in your heart. These feelings naturally should naturally occur in us, but this does not always happen. The heart is hardened by sin. Just as a laborer becomes coarser from the nature of his work, so the heart of a person who gives himself up to menial work to sin and passions, digs rozz (olive fruit pomace that was fed to pigs) and feeds on them, becomes coarser. Therefore, it is not easy to soften it when it is necessary to lead it to repentance. Here is more work, and more significant work, for in the matter of repentance everything comes from the feelings of the heart! When starting to do this, first of all, force yourself to reach the point of self-accusation, try to arouse in yourself a feeling of guilt, so that in the depths of your heart it says: “I’m guilty!” There will be a struggle with self-justification, or apologies for one’s falls and sins. To drive them away, remove everything from your attention, leave yourself alone and God the Judge and reproach yourself without concealment: you knew that there was no need to sin - and you sinned, you could have abstained and avoided infatuation - and you did not use your autocracy for your good, and your conscience disgusted you, and you with contempt (disdain) drowned out this voice of God in you. Then consider the places, times and circumstances of your sinful deeds and extract from everything information that would make your heart and conscience feel guilty and cry out: “Guilty! I have nothing to justify it!” So move from one sin and from one unclean disposition to another and to everything, as a signature, attach: “Guilty!” By conscientiously performing this action of reproof, you will heartily confirm all your sins, you will admit that you are guilty of this, and the other, and the third - you are guilty of everything, you will clothe yourself, as it were, with your sins and feel that they lie on you with all their weight, you will recognize yourself as unrequited in them and cry out: “I am damned!” (Rom. 7:24). After this happens in your heart, hasten to arouse or remove from your heart, already predisposed to it, the painful feelings that make up the content of true repentance, namely: sadness that you offended God, shame that you brought yourself to such a fault, regret that you could have refrained and did not refrain, and annoyance at your sinful arbitrariness, which did not heed any suggestions of reason and conscience. These feelings will naturally be ready to be reborn from the heart after the consciousness of sins and one’s guilt, but you yourself help them develop and irritate them more and more. Let the soul burn in them as if on fire: the more it burns and the stronger the burning, the more salutary it will be. The limit to which this pain about sins must be brought is disgust towards sins and aversion from them. In this disgust is the support of the determination not to sin and the hope of self-correction. Whoever has an aversion to sin has become outside of it, or has cast it out of himself and now has complete freedom to act without feeling its attractions. This is the moment when you can boldly begin to make a vow not to sin, which will be pronounced in your heart before the face of the Lord. Then fall down before Him and say: “I will not!” I will never sin, even if I have to die, just save and have mercy!” This heartfelt vow should crown feelings of repentance and testify to their sincerity. It is not in words, but in feelings, and makes an inner covenant of the heart with God, restores the religion of the heart. Until now I had only the intention of bringing your attention. Start by recognizing your sinfulness, go through self-conviction and painful feelings of repentance, and end with a determination not to sin, securing it with a vow before the Lord - to be correct in life the rest of the time. Whoever goes through the whole series of these actions will not have any difficulty at Confession to sincerely reveal all his impurity, he will bring a full, sincere, merciless Confession to himself and for this will receive all-effective permission from the Lord, through the lips of his spiritual father, which will fill his entire being with deep peace and joy. The grace of the All-Holy Spirit, which could not dwell in a sin-loving heart, will again dwell in it, and it will appear renewed, just as it first emerged from the baptismal font. May our Lord and Savior vouchsafe this great and ineffable mercy to all of us! Amen. On Wednesday of the first week of Lent (the spiritual father is the face of all humanity, do not be ashamed to expose yourself in confession) Our Lord and Savior calls everyone to Himself, saying: “Repent, the Kingdom of God is at hand!” (Matthew 4:17). Let us listen to this comforting voice and hasten to the Lord. The Kingdom of God - what a great blessing! And Repentance - what an easy, ready-to-hand and quick-acting remedy! Especially in these days, when the order of life, and the common voice, and the example, and this touching, contrite service penetrating against one’s will, attracts one to tears and repentance! Correctly, the holy Apostle, before the beginning of Lent, on Cheese Sunday, announced to everyone: “Behold, now is the time favorable! Behold, now is the day of salvation!” (2 Cor. 6:2). It is favorable because a sinner who has been put to sleep never hears so many stimulating appeals: “Arise, sleep... and Christ will sanctify you” (Eph. 5:14) as now. And you are doing well that, having heeded this invitation, you flow with such zeal to the doors of repentance. Proceed more boldly, push (knock) more relentlessly! The Most Merciful will open, stretch out His hands to you and accept you into His arms. The work of Repentance is simple - one sigh and the word: “I have sinned, I will not!” But this sigh must pass through Heaven in order to become an intercessor at the Throne of Truth, and this word must erase from the Book of Life all the writings that signify our sins there. Where will they get such strength? In merciless self-condemnation and ardent contrition. This is where all our repentant zeal will be directed: soften and contrite your heart, and then, at the hour of Confession, do not be ashamed to reveal everything that shames you before the face of God and people. In the matter of fasting, it seems to us that the most difficult thing is to go to the spirit and open up to our spiritual father, but in reality this should be the most gratifying action. Isn’t it a joy for one covered with wounds to receive healing? Stained with all uncleanness, be washed? Bound by bonds to get freedom? But this is the power of priestly permission for Confession. We come wounded and leave healed, we come unclean and we leave whitened, we come in chains and we leave free. This is the promise of God: “Speak your iniquities first, that you may be justified!” (Is.43, 26). “You will be justified” undoubtedly, but first “you will speak out your iniquities” without concealment. Know that only an open wound is healed, only exposed uncleanness is washed, only the indicated bond is resolved. Take care that you do not leave unhealed, unwhitened and unfreed! The one who acts here is the Lord. The spiritual father represents His face and speaks His word. The Lord knows your sin, and you mentally cannot help but acknowledge it before the Lord, but the Lord wants to know whether you would expose yourself to sins before Him if He Himself stood before you, or if He would hide yourself like your ancestors. That is why He decided to show you His face in the spiritual father who confesses you, commanding you to speak to him from His face a word of permission, which, therefore, being pronounced on earth by a weak creature, is imprinted in Heaven by the power of God. And another face is represented by the spiritual father - the face of all humanity. Whoever is ashamed to expose himself at Confession, let this shame be driven away by the thought that here shame is for shame: lesser shame for greater shame, saving shame for joyless and useless shame! In the face of all mankind, all our bad deeds will once be exposed and cover us with such shame that we would rather agree to be buried under the mountains than to be subjected to it. So the Lord instituted shame before one, in order to thereby free us from shame before the whole of humanity. There is one destructive deceit in our hearts: sometimes all sins are revealed willingly, excluding our main one - the one that disgraces us the most and covers our face with shame. Most often this is a carnal sin, but anyone else can fall into this category. Whoever has such an illness is ready to undertake all kinds of feats and perform all sorts of virtues, if only his favorite disease remains inviolable. And the Lord has this law: “Do not give Me alms when you suffer from unchastity, do not give Me fasting when you are burdened with covetousness, do not give me prayerful work when you are suffering from vanity. Open your wound so that you can be healed and be adorned with the opposite virtue.” Be inspired, every soul, to overcome yourself especially in that which resists overcoming. This unworthy fruit of Repentance is a consequence of inadequate preparation for Confession. Confession is preceded by fasting through fasting, solitude, vigil and prayer. This part of strict life, embittering and crushing the flesh, was established so that under this external feat, contritely repentant movements of the heart would be conceived and accomplished. It is necessary as a benefit, but without repentant feelings it has no purpose and loses its meaning. Whoever crushes himself only externally, it cannot yet be said that he already has the strength for a full, shameless Confession, but whoever at the same time crushes himself internally, his Confession is pure, complete, undisguised. He who recognized his sin, recognized himself as guilty of it, mourned it and began to abhor it, already internally, with the mood of his heart, said before God: “Guilty! I won’t!” Such a person is ready to confess before the whole world, and not only before his spiritual father. And this is where the root of the healing power of repentance is - in heartfelt contrition for sins with disgust for them! “God will not despise a contrite and humble heart” (Ps. 50:19). Soften your heart, melt it with contrition, and it will throw out everything unclean from itself, and Confession will burn it all with the fire of shame and God’s permission. A tearful and painful heart is attracted by wisdom, which teaches the repentant to act in such a way in Repentance, both internally and externally, in order to fully reap its fruits, which include not only mercy and forgiveness, but also a complete change of heart for the better, from which comes the correction of life. He who is deeply contrite confesses fully and, according to Confession, is completely new. Remember the examples of Mary of Egypt, Taisia, Evdokia, Moses Murin, David, the robber and others. Let everyone fasting and preparing for Confession now be jealous of such a change! Contrition and Confession, through resolution, produce a combination of the Divine and human elements in Repentance, from which a new creation emerges, as in the beginning, from the font of Baptism. With this, may the most merciful Lord vouchsafe all of you, so that you may emerge from the hospital of Repentance, all healed and completely renewed, in all the feelings and dispositions of your heart, so that you can now love what you were previously cold to, and hate what you were previously addicted to, so that you can love meekness instead of anger, humility instead of pride, sobriety instead of drunkenness, chastity instead of fornication, instead of instead of envy, kindness, instead of hatred, affection, instead of stinginess, generosity, instead of voluptuousness, abstinence, instead of laziness, hard work, instead of absent-mindedness, sedateness, instead of scolding, peacefulness, instead of gossip and slander, good speech and respect for the honor of one's neighbor - in a word, instead of any vice and passion, the opposite virtue and goodwill. One good repentant, when after confession the comrades of his former bad life invited him to ordinary pleasures, answered firmly: “I’m not the same!” This is the mood in which we need to appear at the end of the field of fasting, so that when ordinary passions arise demanding satisfaction, all our bones shout back to them: “We are no longer the same!” And it will be so if we recognize our sins, recognize their guilt and pay for them, and we have disgust for them, and without concealment we confess them to our spiritual father, setting the firm intention not to repeat them again, for then the power of God will descend into us and we will appear created “in Christ Jesus for good works... that we may walk in them” (Eph. 2:10), turning away from all evil. Amen. On Wednesday of the first week of Lent (grief for sins and a decisive change for the better constitute the heart of the fast) Having entered into the feat of fasting, we humble ourselves by fasting, vigil, going to church, standing for long services, bowing, praying at home, and reading soul-saving books. Blessed are these labors, usually lifted up by all who fast! They are so necessary that without them fasting is not fasting, but one must not lose sight of the fact that they are all only means, the goal is outside of them, and if they are not directed towards this goal, then one can work in vain in them. We will bear the burden, but we will not taste the fruit. “Beware, brethren, how dangerously you walk!” (Eph.5:15). We fast in order to confess and partake of the Holy Mysteries, but Holy Confession and Holy Communion complete the work of fasting, graciously sealing those heart changes that must arise, mature and be established during fasting. When we confess, we usually say: “I have sinned, I will not.” This external word must be an expression of internal dispositions and feelings that must first form in the heart. In order to sincerely say: “I have sinned, I will not,” one must vividly recognize one’s sins and make a firm intention not to succumb to their infatuation anymore. Only with this contrition for sins and with this firm intention not to sin is Confession red, only with this does it reveal its grace-filled power, only with this condition is it a healing medicine for mental illnesses and a bath that washes away the defilements of the heart. And this decisive change for the better, produced by deep pain over sins, is the goal of all the feats of fasting that we are now undertaking. Then fasting, then standing in prayer, then withdrawal from ordinary activities, bows, etc., in order to soften your soul and help it ascend into “sorrow... even for God” and to “unrepentant repentance for salvation” (2 Cor. 7:10). Since only with this is proper Confession, and with proper only Confession and Holy Communion reveals all its saving effect, this means that this sorrow for sins and this decisive change for the better constitute the heart of fasting. All our attention and all our zeal and self-effort should be directed here. Illness about sins, annoyance at them and aversion to them, it seems, should be so natural in the soul that there should be no mention of it. Sin is a wound to the soul. If there is a wound on the body, we feel pain and rush to heal the wound: this should be the case in the soul, in relation to sin! What happens, however, is not at all the same: sin, wounding the soul, also brings with it some kind of stupefaction, in which the one enslaved to sin does not see his misfortune, does not feel it and has no concern to get rid of it. Blindness, insensibility and carelessness are the inheritance of love of sin, which then keeps sin lovers in the area of ​​sin in a hopeless situation. The sinner is rightly likened to one immersed in a deep sleep, and he must loudly shout: “Arise, sleep” (Eph. 5:14) so ​​that he gets up. And this is what we must now do with our soul: awaken it from the sleep of sin, bring it to the point where it sees the danger of sin, feels this danger and takes care to get rid of it. How to do this, you ask? I will answer: no one can do this for you except yourself. You yourself need to go inside yourself and, standing in front of a soul sleepy with sin, awaken it from this sleep, as best you can and as best you can. No outsider can penetrate into this sanctuary of yours, and what is to happen there cannot be accomplished by any external deed or feat: everything there is accomplished by your innermost discourse with your soul, before the face of the One Lord, from Whom nothing is hidden. Talking to oneself, persuading the soul is the main technique for awakening it from a sinful sleep. Come within yourself and start acting in good faith! You know everything about yourself: your passions and sins are known. All this is known to the Lord, Whom you cannot help but contemplate from your heart. There is nothing to hide. We can hide from people who are outside of us, but where can we hide from ourselves and from the Lord? Take this clear vision of yourself before the Lord as your starting point when arguing with your soul. Tell her: “There’s no point in lying, my soul, and that passion is bad, and this fall into sin is terrible, and such and such a habit is bad! Clear and definite commandments have been violated, and the judgment for violating them is clear and definite. Behold, before our consciousness is the Lord, who gave the commandments and determined the judgment! There is nowhere to dodge: you can either die with the condemned, or you must hurry to get out of this disastrous state.” By conscientiously accepting this ranting before the face of the Lord, you will put yourself in a hopeless situation for salvation, as opposed to the hopeless situation in which your love of sin holds you to your destruction. Fear for yourself, for your eternal fate, will be in your hands a lever with which you will turn everything inside you and make a saving change there. I repeat again that you must do this within yourself: no one else can do this for you. The soul of each is dark to the other. It becomes clear only to the person himself when he enters into himself and begins to consult with himself about how to act and what to do. Now go inside yourself and there, with your soul, in your innermost counsel, say: “Why, soul, should we all wallow in sin? Let us stand up and walk with a firm foot towards the Lord, who is ready to receive us!” In order to act on yourself more successfully in this regard, surround yourself with stimulating thoughts about how vile sin is, how much it offends the Lord, who is so merciful to us, how much it humiliates us, destined for the likeness of God, and into what misfortune it plunges us, depriving us of peace here and preparing eternal torment there. Add to this the idea that you are dying or have already died and are appearing at an impartial Judgment, at which not a single unmourned sin will be forgotten. Having imagined all this, as much as you can, talk more vividly with your soul: “Well, what will we do, soul, and how will we decide? You know that all this is true. Indeed, sin is vile before God and all the saints, as well as before our conscience, and exactly the same bitter fate in eternity awaits it if we do not give up on it. Why are you and I going to destroy ourselves? The sweetness of sin is small and momentary, but its bitterness is immeasurable and eternal: let us abandon it! Are we worse than others or deprived of anything? Or is the Lord of all not also our Lord? Or are His saving institutions in the Holy Church closed to us? Why should we throw ourselves into shame before everyone and for the joy of our and God’s evil enemies? Let's give up sin! At Confession we will receive permission, in Holy Communion we will receive the Lord to ourselves, and then we will begin to live with Him according to His commandments, enjoying spiritual peace here and preparing eternal bliss for ourselves there.” So rant and persuade your soul, maybe it will come to its senses, come to its senses and be inspired to finally change your bad life and your displeasing disposition to God. Take heart! The Lord is near! He watches over the movements of your innermost work and is ready to help you. As soon as He sees that you are inclined towards good, He will immediately secure it in you with His grace. We cannot do anything without the Lord, but He always expects our own effort for good, and only then, when He notices it, is He immediately ready to come to us with His help. Why, conferring with your soul and straining to make good movements in it, constantly turn to the Lord in prayer - all the same, in the hidden chamber of your heart. Speak to your soul and fall to the Lord with a painful cry to soften your soul and influence its change. Then again begin to speak to your soul and turn to the Lord again. Call for help to the Lady Theotokos, your Guardian Angel, the saint of the same name and all the saints. Do this every minute, whether you are standing in church or at home, praying and reasoning, all with one thought in mind, how to finally break your soul and direct it to the best. Work hard! Help is coming! You will arise from the devil’s snare and say with boldness, like the prodigal son: “I have risen, I am coming!” (Luke 15:18). And already go, without looking around and without listening to any suggestions that the evil one will instill in you then. He will begin to incite self-pity or instill in you either fear for life, or fear for the disruption of everyday life, or the insurmountability of obstacles to the introduction of new orders of a new life, in order to turn you away from your good intentions. Don’t listen and resolutely pronounce within yourself the following definition: “I sacrifice everything to the Lord: my fortune, all my labors, and life itself. I will not deviate from my decision, even if my life were like walking on needles.” Such a ruthless decision will immediately disperse the entire cloud of confusing thoughts and put an end to all the enemy’s attempts. He is powerless to fight those who dedicate themselves to death to follow the Lord, who was crucified for us. In this decision one can see the shadow of death on the cross, which destroyed his region, and he flees from it like from fire. Here is death for death: destructive death in sin is replaced by readiness to die in the fight against sin for salvation, and here is the seed of new life in Christ Jesus our Lord! This is what must happen within you, brothers, among these visible labors and exploits of your fasting! And only then, when this is accomplished, will your fasting be a real fasting. Then, having received full permission at Confession, you will unite pure with the Lord in Holy Communion and then begin to live in renewal of life. What may the Lord grant to you, who “all” want to “be saved and come into true understanding” (1 Tim. 2:4)! Amen. You might be interested in: