451. Слово на день обретения мощей Преподобного Сергия

“Thy light shall shine in the darkness, and thy darkness shall be as the noonday: and thy God shall be with thee continually: and thou shalt be satisfied as thy soul desireth, and thy bones shall grow fat, and shall be like a heap of water, and like a spring whose water faileth not: and thy bones shall languish like grass, and grow weary, and inherit generations of generations. And your everlasting deserts will be built, and your everlasting foundations will be a generation of generations.” (Isa.58:10-12). Thus spoke the Lord through the mouth of Isaiah. Who is this verb for? Who are these blessings for? Friend of God! Didn’t faith prophesy this to you when it accompanied you to these once wild and uninhabited places? A great event gives the right to apply a great prediction to you. You hid yourself from the light, left in him a vice that you hated, but the light of your virtues penetrated into him from the darkness of your solitude; you were a lamp of the Church in holiness, although with unshakable determination you denied being such in status. Your soul sought and thirsted for the mighty and living God, and it ever tasted the sweetness of His presence. Irrigated by streams of grace, you were “like a watered hill, and like a spring whose water never failed,” sprinkled others with spiritual dew. Finally, so that the passage of time could not remove your example from us, you, ascending the mountain, left here some shadow of immortality, which belongs to you there. “Are your bones frozen,” and the remains of the flesh, still mortified in your belly, seem to us to be alive after your death; and the desert huts you created turned into a huge building, disgracing the cities with their splendor. Centuries passed by these monuments and did not dare to touch them, except to increase their splendor. So famous, so abundant, so immutable, so eternal in time itself are the promises given by faith! She is the only one who promises and does not change her promises. She only prophesies the truth when many different promising voices shake our hearts with false hope to make us content and happy. “Be satisfied as your soul desires,” let us explain this. “Be satisfied”: says carnality, but do not extend your gaze beyond appearances; mental bliss is an imaginary bliss, the essential one belongs to the senses. If we were created for happiness, then we must look for it near ourselves. “Rest, eat, drink, be merry” (Luke 12:19): this is the science of being content. How dangerous it is to listen to such lessons! When the insidious serpent, giving us the fruit of forbidden pleasures, promises to make us almost gods, then the disastrous definition for us has already been signed: thorns, labors, illnesses, death are placed in it. In the field of voluptuousness and luxury, only roses grow that, after delighting the senses, leave sharp thorns in the soul, sooner or later stinging it; you have to sweat on it for a long time for a short-term harvest. In the midst of tears, more exhausting than satisfying worries, or the decrepit overtakes old age, or poverty and infirmity, which follow even closer to it in the wake of intemperance. And the land demands all its debt the more quickly, the more you try to borrow from it. Oh! Isn’t this what our light minds call a cheeky, cheerful life! My God! these imaginary joys are nothing more than the seed of sorrows; They are not food, but poison for a weak heart. If there were no completely different means of satisfying hungry desires, even then it would be foolish to use this; It’s better to languish in endless hunger. “Be satisfied”: promises covetousness. Just know how to reap where you did not sow, gather where you did not waste; and when you can count thousands in your hands, call on pomp, show others your blessings, and please your beneficial fate. Woe to the one who believes these prophecies of the golden idol! What is the bliss of a person addicted to wealth? What is his existence? – Put your heart as cold as this metal into a pile of metal; to collect together with precious trinkets the curses of poverty, the tears of widows and the sighs of orphans; tremble in anticipation of the fateful moment when either tatie from the treasuries, or death from the body, will steal his soul; to be an arbitrary sufferer and in a sea of ​​abundance, like those possessed by fireweed, with every breath emit a groan or repeat in the insides: thirst! “Be satisfied”: ambition repeats. When you rise from the circle of the people, when everything is at your service, when respect accompanies you, what kind of lack can you feel? Can someone be unhappy, from whom many expect happiness? The very envy aroused by the nobles in the lowly ones testifies to the advantage of their condition. Oh, that these reflections would be as true as they are attractive! Unfortunately, they only flatter with hopes that are no less dangerous than false. The enviable happiness of disposing of the lot of others is a heavy burden, and the desire for exaltation is an indomitable force, which, when indulged in its attraction, knows so few limits that the possession of the universe seems to be still a small destiny. And should we be surprised at this? If once this hellish hunger in heaven could not be satisfied, then will there ever be enough food on this wretched earth? “Be satisfied”: the glory cries out. There is no perfect well-being other than always striving for great things, earning the attention of your contemporaries and immortalizing your name in posterity. The love of praise is a divine impulse, its pleasure is angelic. These are thoughts that are usually considered noble feelings! Whatever, however, may be said in favor of this noble passion, even if it were not a source of enmity and rivalry, did not plunge into danger, did not disturb public silence, did not shake thrones, its fruit would still be doubtful, its pleasure dreamy. Isn’t it reckless to place the foundations of one’s well-being in the opinions of others, who, either due to ignorance or due to their special views, often do not give us justice? Isn’t it frenzy to not have peace throughout your life in order to give a few idle people something to talk about? To console a mortal being with the immortality of a name - doesn’t it mean today to deprive oneself of food in anticipation of the morning? “Be satisfied”: teaches the wisdom of the world. Dare to lift the veil that hides the truth from the eyes of the unenlightened, love its beauty; Then you will know the pleasure of a rational being, you will feel the harmony of nature, you will prescribe laws to the stars, you will kiss the traces of Creative goodness, you will understand your worth, you will become a citizen of the whole world. What a great plan! What a vast path to salvation! Yes, wise men of the world! your exercises would be the most pleasant, your fate the happiest, if passions never covered the bright face of truth with a single cloud, if, instead of love for it, vanity, competition and hatred never ruled you; if the pen could never act like a sword. But when the bulk of your knowledge consists of useless questions and unsatisfactory answers, doubts and the disastrous art of turning the most sacred truths into verbal debates: then can your imaginary enlightenment bring peace to the heart? How long, sons of humanity, will you love vanity? How long will you listen to these deceptive harbingers of happiness that the evil world sends to you? - How long will you listen to the cold prophets? “There is a lying spirit in their mouth” (1 Kings 22:22), until your insatiable desires wander aimlessly and ask: “Who will show us good” (Ps. 4:7). Faith! Divine faith! you are given the opportunity to put an end to human suffering, you alone allow us to see the “good”; You alone call upon blessings from above, and they descend upon us. “God... will be with you always, and you will be satisfied as your soul desires.” Behold the sweetest promise, the center of all desires, the height of bliss, the only food of the spirit! “I will be satisfied,” Lord! “Your glory will always appear” (Ps. 16:15)! I will be satisfied when You come to a troubled heart, create an abode for Yourself in it and reveal Yourself only in a mirror and fortune-telling. What happiness should I demand after this bliss? What benefit is there after this priceless gift? Is it enlightenment? – “You are the light, ...to enlighten every man” (John 1:9). Is it immortality? “The fountain of life is with You” (Ps. 36:10). Is it wealth? But he who gave to the faithful soul “the beloved Son” (Matthew 3:17, 17:5; Mark 1:11, 9:7; Luke 3:22, 9:35), as a pledge of His bounties: “how shall he not also with him give all things” (Rom. 8:32)? Honor? greatness? But what differences, what brilliant titles can be compared with these lofty titles: “chosen race, royal priesthood, holy tongue, people of renewal” (1 Pet. 2:9), “heirs... God, and heirs of Christ” (Rom. 8:17)? Let us bless, listeners, the merciful King of kings, who was only pleased to honor His indecent servants; Let us glorify God, who has given us faith to restore the fallen, to heal the afflicted, to feed the hungry, to make happy the unfortunate, to revive the dead, to glorify not so much with praise and song, not so much with tympanum and psalms, but with spirit and heart, zeal for faith and virtue, and not receive this grace in vain. Amen. You might be interested in: