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I thank You, Most Holy and Most Blessed Mother of the Lord Most High, for You quickly heard the prayer of me, a sinner and unpeaceful, and delivered me from my sins and from their anxiety, crampedness and languor. This was before morning tea. November 2, 1864 I thank you, all-blind 54 Lady Theotokos, for through my prayer you appeared in one day many times as an intercessor and helper from the evils that befell me, as you most graciously, all-powerfully, very quickly saved me from the abominations of unclean spirits and from the abominations of my heart and calmness and steadfastness and You bestowed the greatness of the shrine and the light of reason. And before 55 help Thy servant, O Most Pure One! Conquer evil with good [Rom. 12, 21]: pride - with humility, anger - with kindness, envy - with goodwill, stinginess - with generosity, rudeness - with affection, ingratitude - with gratitude. Should you be hated or pitied when you are struck by the effects of pride or heartfelt malice on your neighbor? You say: why hate me? I myself then suffer from the womb of pride and anger, like the cruel pangs of birth. So, do you want them to take pity on you then and help you get rid of these rightly so-called passions through prayer, kind, gentle, intelligible and edifying words? Well, don’t harbor hatred for proud and evil people, but rather take pity on them and always treat them kindly and friendly, and by always treating them like this, you will make them themselves kind and humble. As you want people to do to you, do so to them [Matt. 7, 12]. Love your neighbor as yourself [Matt. 5, 43]. Oh! You have to skillfully live with people! We must cast aside sinful pride and always overcome evil with good. Without grief and, on the contrary, with joy, go to serve every layman, poor and rich, for the sake of Christ, who came to serve us and give His soul as a ransom for many [Matt. 20, 28 ]; remember that you are doing Christ’s work and will receive reward from Him. Do not spare your flesh to serve your neighbors, just as the Lord Jesus did not spare Himself for our salvation, but gave His most pure body to labor, anxiety, suffering and death. It is a grave sin to have pity on one’s sinful flesh when one should use it as an instrument of serving one’s neighbors, and this inevitably results in punishment from the Lord. God! Until now, I don’t really know the alpha 56 of Christianity – love for one’s neighbor. I condemn others for idleness, but I myself sin a hundred times worse - I become embittered at them, for what is worse than the malice of the devil? This is the evil of all evils. Cleanse me, O Savior, and make me good and meek. Give me the grace to always consider myself the first sinner. Do not sleep under a warm blanket, on down jackets or soft pillows. It is unforgiving and relaxes the flesh, and at the same time the spirit. Don’t drink very hot tea - it’s soothing and relaxes the flesh, and at the same time the soul. Do not eat very tasty foods or eat very little, for example, pies, aspic, etc., because they are tender and relax the flesh, and at the same time the soul. Do not wear delicate, soft, beautiful, expensive clothes, because they soften and relax the flesh through sight and touch, tie the heart to earthly things and fill the soul with this vanity. A person learns little by little to place his life, his pleasure, happiness, dignity and, as it were, the essence of man in them, and to look at others, poorly dressed, with contempt. Do not read secular books, newspapers, books and articles in general with light content - they are gentle and relaxing to the soul and fill it with vanity. Don’t look at rich houses, rich glass, interior decorations of rooms, rich furniture - this is unforgiving and relaxes the soul through carnal sight, encourages it to desire earthly wealth and pleasure and distracts the sight of the heart from eternal life in heaven. The holy fathers were afraid of this passion and locked themselves in cramped rooms, about two arshins, so that the space of the home would not attract the flesh to freedom, so that they would not become attached to an earthly home, while the eternal awaits them, and because of attachment to the earthly, they would not lose the eternal. This is what Christian wisdom should consist of: not to give any value to any sin and not to deign to see it as a dream, as nothing, as an absurdity. God! May Thy truth conquer this dreamer and all his dreamy accomplices! God! Protect Your creations! Virtues and vices in people are in such an incomprehensible mixture, such diversity that it is impossible for a mere mortal to fully evaluate a single person - only the Lord God alone fully knows our virtues and sins. Therefore, we cannot condemn a single person other than ourselves, and we must constantly practice this. Here is some example of the mixture of virtues and vices in a person. For example, I am pious, I pray to God daily, I give alms, but I am often filled with anger, pride and contempt, guile, hypocrisy, stinginess, envy; I am a money-lover, a glutton, obsessed with nasty and blasphemous thoughts. And the other does not pray or prays very little outwardly, does not give alms or only occasionally, but he is gentle, not proud, not wicked, not stingy, not envious, although he loves money, like the earth itself, and is not averse to eating and sleeping sweetly; he is a joker and sometimes not entirely pure in his jokes, but he is straightforward, loves to boldly speak the truth to the scientists and nobles of this world - and these are wonderful qualities. In every person there is a lot of good, unknown to us, and, perhaps, a lot of evil, but in some it is all, or almost all, outward and therefore noticeable and striking, while in others it is hidden in the heart. Therefore, one must bear in mind one’s own sins and not condemn one’s brother. There is only one... Judge, able to save and destroy [James. 4, 12]. Endure everything, all kinds of insults from your own or others: for patience there will be a reward from the Lord, for He is our Father, Judge and Provider. Remember Joseph - this persecuted innocence, rewarded with ineffable generosity from the Heavenly Father. I thank You, my wondrous victory, Lord Jesus Christ! From what evil, strong, cunning, fast enemies are You saving me! O my magnificence, Lord Jesus Christ! O fullness of being and truth, Jesus Christ! Glory to You, Lord, in the beauty of Your deeds, especially in the beauty of human members, whose most pure hands You have created and created. Eternal shame on you, disgusting and most absurd and most insignificant enemy of ours and God! Nothing, truly nothing, all your machinations, all the vile, lustful, blasphemous, doubtful, sad, desperate, malicious, envious, stingy, disdainful, malicious thoughts you entertain. Truth is the only love. Be willing to offer your guests more than what they themselves eat and drink, so that your love may be abundant, just as our Heavenly Father is the God of mercy and generosity. Give this kindness and you will reap the kindness in abundance. When you measure accordingly, it will be measured back to you [Matt. 7, 2; Mk. 4, 24]. Approach people heartily, in simplicity, and they will come closer to you. Do not insult a single beggar boy or beggar girl with a single offensive word, but always be kind to them; otherwise you will wound your soul and expose yourself to the wrath of God. Remember that their Heavenly Father protects them through His Angels and punishes them for insulting them. See that you do not despise one of these little ones... [Matt. 18, 10]. Look at the groom as truly Christ, at the bride as the Holy and Immaculate Church (Amen), and at them in general as members of Christ, for Christ is everything and in everything [Col. 3, 11]. November 4th, 1864 Do not pronounce a single church prayer in the language of doubt, lest you offend the true God who speaks through the mouth of the Church. Wonderful thing! When I defeat ethereal enemies, sitting in class, and am at peace within myself in the Lord Jesus, then all my disciples sit peacefully - so peacefully that you can hear, as they say, the flight of a fly; but when ethereal enemies overcome me and deprive me of spiritual peace, strength of spirit and light in the eyes of my heart, then my disciples are not peaceful, they begin to talk, fidget, be dissatisfied with me, and some kind of rebellious spirit enters them. A wonderful, mysterious connection between me and them: we are truly one spiritual body. How necessary it is for a teacher of the law, a shepherd, to defeat the spiritual enemies fighting within him: defeating them in himself, he defeats them both in those he teaches and in his flock; by the power of God abiding in him, he then becomes strong over everyone and for everyone. God! Help me to be a light for Your people and Your servants. November 3rd day 1864 Signs of sin: deprivation of peace, freedom, strength, light of the heart, or confusion, cramped conditions, powerlessness, spiritual darkness. Speak without doubt: the devil catches us in speech and stuns us with doubt, self-distrust and loss of spirit. Be perfect in everything: in speech and deed, or in thought, in word and deed. Go to the bathhouse as little as possible, every three months, and then only as required by bodily needs. The bathhouse is relaxing. Don't drink coffee: coffee irritates your nerves and soul. Addiction to food and stinging of food is the devil; love of money and covetousness for one's neighbor's money is the devil. Judas is a money-lover, a traitor of Christ. He who is addicted to food and money puts his neighbor down for nothing and sells him, so to speak, constantly for food and drink and money, because he is angry with him because he goes to him to eat and drink or takes his money. All the malice of the devil. The Christian faith commands us to put everything on earth into nothing and to philosophize on things above. Today the enemy stung me with his love of money in the bathhouse (he paid for his father-in-law) and at home with his love of food (brother Konstantin at evening tea). What cramped conditions, sorrow, darkness, and powerlessness he plunged me into on that and other occasions! What nets have you entangled! What shackles he imposed! So cling to earthly blessings, to these lovely, sweet fetters! But my Lord, my Savior, through the prayer of faith, saved me both times from the shackles of demons! Yes, earthly blessings are pleasant shackles of the enemy at first, and then they become heavy, heavy shackles when the enemy sends them further into the very core of the heart. How different people have different views on life! One puts life in satiety with food and drink, in dancing, in foolish songs; another takes pleasure in dressing with taste, a third in reading books indiscriminately; the fourth - in disputes, the fifth in judging and dressing everyone - and you never know who in what? But how few people live their lives in true piety, in studying the word of God, in fervent prayer, in doing good deeds! Every living man is all vanity [Ps. 38, 6 ]! The foolish priest sits and listens to the pouring from empty to empty - where to stop the empty talk. That’s why idle talk proliferates so much in our country, because there is no one to stop it, but everyone listens and reads it. Seeing the thick smoke of incense, do not be irritated by the one who burns incense or who puts a lot of incense in the censer, but remember that your body, like smoke, will disappear; Also remember the words of the church song: As the smoke disappears, let it disappear [Ps. 67, 3]. The property of smoke is impermanence, disappearance. But the smoke of incense is fragrant and healthy, like wood sulfur. Do not give room to the absurd malice of the devil, which seeks to turn all the little things in life into an excuse for malice. Through wrestling or carnal gymnastics the body is strengthened; Through spiritual struggle with passions the soul, its strength, its virtue are strengthened. Do not draw up a strict plan for your external actions in advance and do not say: this should be this way, and this should be so, but be prepared for all sorts of contingencies and visible accidents in life. Follow God’s plan, not your own: Thy will be done (not mine); obey the force of circumstances. If you persist in fulfilling your external, carnal plan, you will encounter many disappointments from the failure to fulfill your desires. Submit to circumstances, for for the most part the wise Providence of the Heavenly Father surrounds us with them, and if you see that they are not from God, courageously fight them with patience and meekness. In fact, as often happens, I would like to do something, but circumstances force me to do something else. But the plan of internal actions must always be unchanged - on the contrary: do everything thoughtfully, unhurriedly, treat everyone meekly, lovingly, edifyingly, do not get irritated with anyone. The enemies of love for God and neighbor are addiction to earthly things, pride, wickedness, contempt, hard-heartedness, malice, envy, love of money, stinginess, greed, gluttony, fornication and other passions; in order to love God and neighbor, one must fight with passion. There I am insensitive, cold, angry, disdainful, where warm compassion, kindness of heart and affection with respect for a person are needed, namely: where there is poverty, illness, misfortune. Oh, my malice! Oh, my insensibility, oh, my contempt! Can I mourn you? But what am I saying: mourn? I cannot cry for them - I have hardened my heart. Oh, what good does a spacious, clean, bright, comfortable home serve me? - Truly, to the hardening of my heart: I do not sympathize with those living in cramped, unclean, gloomy rooms, in crowded conditions. What is my wealth, or even my money, my delicacies, my daily satiation, when all this petrifies my heart! Having been full, I become a lie, insensitive, lifeless, like accepted food. You, who are now saturated, my brethren, and who deprive others of a piece of bread, will hunger [Lk. 6, 25]. Look, those living in poverty, in cramped conditions, in misfortune are dying because there is no one to look after them or give them help. They will be the heirs of the Kingdom of Heaven, and you will be cast out into utter darkness. You have turned your whole life into appearance, or your whole life has been focused on appearance: in food, drinking, dressing, trading, collecting wealth, feasting, visiting theaters, playing cards, idle talk, and you have despised the essence of the matter, Christianity, that is, love for one’s neighbor, sociability, charity. What will your shops, your stores, your money, your clothes, your feasts, your theaters, your cards, your many different vanities bring you on the Day of Judgment? Everything will disappear, all earthly vanity - and where will your soul, filled with sins, naked from good deeds? Listen to the truth and do not be upset with the herald of the truth: he does not speak on his own behalf - on the behalf of God. Where there is the greatness of the shrine and the infinity of God’s goodness to me, then due to some kind of madness and dullness of mind and heart I am often insensitive. God! Revive, have mercy and save me. I am all evil and weakness. You alone produce all the good in me. Let me put on You, Your spirit, Your strength, and perceive Your wisdom. Don't be arrogant with your father-in-law. Remember his benefit to you: his daughter (feeding, clothing her, raising her) is yours, given to you, and with his place. Now you feed him in his place, clothe him, give him peace, as he once cared for everyone. It is righteous to pay tribute to parents (1 Tim. 5:4). Cleaving to one's neighbor is clinging to God, for one's neighbor is the image of God. So, when your neighbor comes to visit you, treat him willingly, as if God Himself had come to you, and leave your stinginess, your addiction to sweets, do not spare them for your neighbor, lest you prefer sweets to your neighbor. It is good for me to cleave to God – myself and in the person of my neighbor for the sake of the Lord [Ps. 72, 28]. Amen. Never be angry with anyone for any mistake or delay, but, accepting his mistake as your own, ask the sinner for forgiveness for leading him into temptation. If your brother delayed and you had to wait for him, do not be upset about it, but say to yourself: I would have spent the same time in idleness after the task for which I was waiting for my brother; and in any case, grief or irritation, anxiety will not improve matters at all, will not correct the brother’s already committed mistake, and future mistakes can and should be prevented not by being upset with the brother, but by a meek request to be more correct in the future. In general, we should not be angry with our neighbor, even if he sinned in some way, and strongly, just as we do not want them to be angry with us for our misdeeds, but condescendingly forgive us for them. Our neighbor is a venerable image of God, a member of Christ: shall we be angry with Christ, with the image of God? Is it possible to insult and humiliate God? Anger at one's neighbor is simultaneously contempt and destruction. God forbid from being angry with anyone and for anything. Bitterness upsets the soul of the embittered one, spoils his work and outrages the guilty one. Anger is madness. Why did I rush to baptize the baby today? - So that you can eat and drink afterwards. Why did you get angry with the sexton? - For nothing, one whim and self-will to stand on your own. Great is the name of the Lord: today two classes sat victoriously in the name of the Lord and spoke well. Glory to the grace of the members of Christ. 1864. November 4th. But what despondency and lethargy there was in the soul at first - the name of the Lord conquered nature. Oh, vague, blind haste! Sinful haste! Human! Where are you in a hurry during or before your work, and your sacred work? I don’t know where (unless someone or something slows down our work, then you’ll get angry at this or that). - Oh, blindness! Oh, blind haste! Wait a little or long enough - it doesn’t matter: you have time to do everything, but if you don’t have time, you still won’t be able to fix things with anger. Do not be irritated by any mistakes, any insults of your neighbors, but be complacent and calm and do not increase the general evil with your own evil - irritability. Meekness and patience conquer everything. Christian martyrs. You accepted the plunder of your property with joy, knowing that you have in heaven a better and lasting property [Heb. 10, 34]. Can you be angry with Christ? – No, because He is infinite love, infinite perfection, because He is your God, Creator, Savior. But the neighbor is a member of Christ, whose sins He bore on His body on the tree, that is, whose sins (like all of us) were executed on the tree of the Cross, for which He endured everything. After this, will you not endure and endure the mistakes of your neighbor, you, to whom Jesus Christ has so infinitely forgiven and forgives? So, if we must look with pure eyes at the beauty of all human members as at the holy beauty of the members of Christ Himself, then with the eyes of goodness and love, patience, meekness and condescension we must look at human infirmities, weaknesses, errors, rashness, forgetfulness and non-malicious inaccuracies, failures in the performance of duty. Thank you, my wisdom, Lord Jesus! Due to the action of the spirit of malice, I am often all spiritually sick, all evil, all painful, evil irritation, or unclean irritation, or blasphemous, evil. My God! What evil I can be, what abomination, wickedness, blasphemy, pride, when I am left only to myself, when grace for testing me is hidden from me! And if my Savior, especially ours, had not appeared to me to help me, if he had not constantly appeared to me at my call and had not saved me from my evils, then I would have become all terrible malice, abomination, pride, blasphemy, bearing within myself the eternal fire of punishment. I thank You, Lamb of God, who takes away the sins of the world and my transgressions and continually takes them away. Glory to Your mercy! November 4th, 1864 The mercenary... sees the wolf coming, and leaves the sheep, and runs; and the wolf plunders the sheep and scatters them [John. 10, 12]. This is what we do. Hired men - money collectors, and not shepherds - do not care about their sheep, because they care about silver pieces - therefore the mental wolf plunders the flock. But the blood of the dead will be exacted from the shepherds. It is not enough for a shepherd to be sober, chaste, abstinent, meek. He must also have an apostolic zeal for the salvation of souls, not in the least partial to earthly things, because partiality to earth cools one’s feelings towards God and one’s neighbor; one must be sociable, charitable and merciful, verbal, instructive, truth-loving, courageous, impartial, a denouncer of wickedness, compassionate, calm, majestic. All the power lies in this (and we must all remember this) that the Lord and Lord of all gave His blessed commandments to people, and Satan, with his subordinate evil spirits, inspires and forces them not to fulfill these commandments and thereby plunges them into all kinds of evil. Hence, we must constantly have God’s commandments in our hearts and try with all our might to fulfill them. What commandments? – Love God with all your heart, and not earthly things, and your neighbor as yourself [Matt. 19, 19, etc.]. All the machinations of Satan are directed against these two commandments, and he turns our love to ourselves (self-love), and not to God and neighbor, to money (love of money, stinginess), to food, drink, sweets (lust, gluttony), to the acquisition of earthly goods (covetousness), and teaches our neighbor to impute nothing (pride, contempt, hatred). With both of them there is a single oud showing conjugation. 57 If God Himself indicated a certain member for conjugation, then one cannot disdain this conjugation, for this is the determination and work of God, the work through which God Himself reproduces the human race, as in animals and plants, and even more so to pronounce these words loudly; there is nothing to be ashamed of, on the contrary, it is necessary to pronounce them like a trumpet, so that people do not look humiliatingly, slyly, disgustingly, but sublimely, simply, holyly at the well-known reproductive member and use it holyly. An evil, unclean look at this member and all unclean deeds are from the devil. Evidence of the tripartite soul in the image of the Trinity - faith, hope and love. They say that devils live in still waters, that is, in quiet people. It’s true, they do, that is, they approach a quiet person, just as enemies approach a fortress to storm it - but they should not attack places that are devoid of any fortification, because they have already, so to speak, been taken; but they will not attack people who do not fight them at all and who have given themselves up alive into captivity. You live forever, my belly Jesus Christ. You guard, protect and save me, You cleanse my sins, sanctify me, pacify me, enlighten me, revive me, lighten me, spread my insides, 58 make me bold. You, Lord, are the shield that protects me; You are my strength against powerful enemies; You are my light against their darkness; You are my purity against their abomination; You are my boldness against the evil despondency and loss of spirit that they bring upon me; You are the free, cool breath of my soul and body against their constricting, fiery, scorching breath. You are life, my joy, my lightness, my peace, my shrine, my truth, my mercy, my eternal good. May glory be to You forever, for You do not leave me, Your worm, and despite all the fury of my invisible enemies, ready to devour me every minute, You keep me safe; We know that you will preserve me to the end and save me into your kingdom. November 4th. 1864 Whatever should be neglected like rubbish, I have an addiction to, you damned one. I’m talking about food and drink and money. Sit down at the table calmly, without rushing with your heart and hands to the dishes, without greed; equally, if you receive money, receive it without greed, calmly, indifferently. Restless haste in both cases testifies to the addiction of our hearts to earthly things and a lack of love for God and neighbor; it reminds us of the words of the Savior: No one can serve two masters: for either he will hate one (the Lord) and love the other (food, drink, money); or he will be zealous for one, and not take care of the other [Matt. 6, 24]. Thus, a gluttonous priest cannot be a faithful servant of the Lord, or a good teacher of the law to children, or a good preacher of the word of God. Crucify your will and rejoice in the opportunity to crucify it. For example, you wanted to go to visit some friend this evening, and meanwhile guests came to you - do not be upset with them, but receive them with love and cordiality and treat them with what God sent. This will be the crucification of the passion for idle guests and feasts. Do not be upset by the mistakes of your neighbor and have every condescension towards him, knowing that you yourself are not alien to them and have a need for the condescension of others. Do not be irritated with your neighbor as with Christ Himself, remembering that Christ has forgiven and forgives you without number for your many and cruel sins. Be meek, condescending, and merciful to everyone, as you wish for yourself from others, as you constantly wish for yourself from God, because we all have countless weaknesses and faults. The world is nothing and the devil is nothing. Everything is God, and at every moment we are before His bright face, before His eyes, as darkness as much as the brightest of the sun. Let us remember this unceasingly and let us carry Him alone in our hearts unceasingly, let us not cleave to anything other than Him, to anything earthly, and in the church of our heart let us not commit the abomination of desolation, or the idolatry of silver and gold, food and drink and other everyday idols. The duality of our nature, consisting of soul and body, the devil intensifies by all means to use for evil: through the flesh he cleaves us to earthly things, removing the soul from God and plunging it into various carnal passions, inspiring us to use for evil through excess and illegality the most natural needs of food and drink, intercourse, housing, decorations, various everyday things - or natural impulses to multiply the race. We must also use the flesh for the glory of God, subduing rebellion and crucifying it with fasting and prayer. At the beginning of Christianity, the apostles and their successors gathered councils from their brethren and talked amicably about the affairs of the Church and church improvement. And we must imitate them. Who hasn’t noticed that our affairs are going badly because we all proudly live apart? Both the apostles and Christians did everything together, but with us everything was done separately. Without God, without the Mother of God, we cannot do anything good; we are powerless, proud, crafty, hypocritical, disobedient, unclean, fornicating, vile, blasphemous, evil, irritable, envious, gluttonous, stingy, money-loving, impatient, sad, and we cannot overcome any of these passions - so we will remain in our malice, in our abominations, unless we diligently, with all our hearts Let us pray to the Lord and the Most Pure Mother of God. Tears, warm, sincere tears, from a contrite heart, that's what we need, not tea, coffee, various sweets, tobacco, theaters, clubs, card games, dancing, playing the piano. We have loved vanity, we seek lies, but we have left the only thing we need, despised it, and treated it as nothing. We seem to have everything, but we don’t have God’s grace in our hearts, we don’t have firmness in good dispositions, we don’t have vital faith, Christian hope, or unfeigned love; We have, you see, a body, but no head. And the chambers are rich, and there are a lot of clothes (and all are rich), and an excellent table, and furniture, and tableware and tea sets, and carriages, perhaps - but there is no living faith in the heart, there is no love for God and neighbor, and this is like a body without a soul. Addiction to food, drink, sweets, and flesh is the thorn of the devil. Beware. Be zealous about fasting and abstinence, so that you will be granted the grace of the Holy Spirit. The fire of carnal torment, the fire of illness, sorrow, adversity is the good of the soul, and the fire of sweets is the sting of the devil. Pray for everyone who is mentally ill, and do not be offended, do not be angry with him, so that you do not become an accomplice of the devil. Someone who is proud and treats you arrogantly - treat him humbly, lower yourself for his good, let an example teach him better than any red word, convince him to humble himself; let him see from the courtesy of your humility all the disgustingness of pride and pompousness, its absurdity, savagery. Is it not because we are sick with pride that we see pride in others and find few examples of true humility, and that is why we walk in the blindness of mind and heart, having no examples and motivations for the will? Conquer evil with good [Rom. 12, 21]. Prayer, love and patience conquer everything, but pride and anger and impatience overthrow everything. How long will this stupid, angry and proud child die within me - my heart? How long shall I fight against his pride, hypocrisy, malice, deceit, uncleanness, greed, stinginess, love of money, addiction to food, drink, sweets, clothes, rich houses and rooms, all shiny household belongings, with his despondency, gloominess, envy and so on? Lord save me. Oh, sinful thorns! Oh, sinful flattery! Oh, sinful darkness and crampedness! Oh, sinful powerlessness! Don’t live even ten minutes in pride: sin does not sleep, the devil can now tempt you to sin. Boldness and courage in the church during all services. Doubt, confusion, cramped conditions, sorrow, darkness, [addiction] to sin, despondency are the dream of the devil, like blasphemy and other sins. The ugliness of sin. We are members of Christ, we are His body, and He is our Head; away with every sin, every sinful thought. Christ! Keep us safe. Intercede, save, have mercy and preserve us, O God, by Your grace! Thankful! Observe us! With great reverence one should read the word of God and the prayers of the church, as the words of the Spirit of God, with simplicity and boldness. Otherwise, you see, we are proud and arrogant with the most inspired words; one must always be lower than them, honor them as God Himself. Other people with certain dominant passions grow and develop because they grew up under the influence of circumstances favorable to their passions. We must have great condescension towards such people, as we wish for ourselves, although we must not leave them without admonition. For example, I am obsessed with certain passions and, willy-nilly, I am often carried away by them and servile to them. And I’m not happy, but I submit to their power, their oppression, their charm, although I pray to the Savior of everyone for deliverance from them and receive this deliverance after fervent prayer. They had everything in common [Acts. 4, 32]. Do not desire private income, desire general income, so that Satan will not seduce you with the flattery of love of money and lead you into enmity with your fellow servants. Do not envy your brother who has treasures: he has treasures, and you don’t know who will collect them for me [Ps. 38, 7]. A person's life does not depend on the abundance of his possessions [Lk. 12, 15]. Do not lose love and respect for your brother who is rich and hard-hearted because of his wealth; Do not be embittered at him for his hard-heartedness and stinginess, but remember your countless sins and weaknesses and be embittered at yourself for your anger, envy and pride, and keep praying and praying for your brother. Remember, Lord, such and such, for example, Father Matthew, and save him through his fate. It is necessary to renew affection towards your spouse from time to time, otherwise love may fade. But you have to love your wife like you love your body. Husbands, love your wives and do not be harsh with them [Col. 3, 19]. Every virtue requires exercise and is improved by exercise, but without exercise it dries up and weakens. Virtue takes practice. Don’t be irritated or angry with anyone or anything. Without number, I sinned with bitterness, repented of this sin, asked the Lord to cleanse it - He cleansed this sin, washed me, and I again, ungrateful and malicious, fell into the same sin. God! Give me the grace to never be angry with anyone and never serve my enemy. Wake up! Despise the sense of smell and all odors, fragrant and fetid, or, better yet, be neither partial nor squeamish about them; despise the beauty of flowers and the shine; despise what is soft and pleasant to the touch; do not be partial to sounds when they are good, harmoniously pleasant, and do not be irritated when they are ugly and discordant; despise taste, have no greed for delicacies and no aversion to bitter things. Crucify your flesh, with its passions and lusts. Away from all sight during worship. All flesh is hay [Isa. 40, 6]. One God is 59 and Infinite. Thank you, my God, wonderful in mercy and help! I thank You, Blessed Lady, zealous Intercessor, as you do not shame me, who calls on Your goodness, but deliver me from great misfortunes. November 8th, 1864 When performing a prayer service to the Lady, do not rush to any service because of money, and do not leave Her, the All-Blessed One, lest you offend Her. Do not rush, using the Holy Mysteries, to any need for the sake of your own interest and do not show disdain for the Lord and zeal, greed for money. Do not think about money while praying, and do not thereby demean the work of God; Freely have you received, freely give [Matt. 10, 8], it is said. If they give it, okay, if they don’t give it, don’t ask. A great thing is the word: when there is malice in the heart, then, in opposition to it, one should only speak kindly to those toward whom we feel malice, and it will immediately, like frost from heat or ice from fire, melt, and the soul will be at peace. On the contrary, if we remain silent, it will choke, bother and torment us. Our old, carnal man would only eat and drink, or indulge in gluttony, dress with taste and collect money, and generally engage in temporary, material things, and not serve God and his neighbor, although this service is extremely useful for both the soul and the body. People call you to church for prayer or home prayer—too lazy to go; they call you for lunch - you’re ready to run; also to the theater. Poor and simple people call to serve a prayer service, to confess and give communion to the sick, especially if the poor one - we are angry, irritated, reluctant, with vexation and murmur in our hearts, we go, although later we ourselves will see that to be irritated by this is madness and that serving God is good, that by serving our neighbor, we serve the Lord in his person, and not man, that we will receive reward from Him and that, therefore, we must serve to every neighbor with joy, and not sighing, that bearing each other’s burdens, brother to brother, is a duty and a matter of Christian love. The old man must be despised. We should serve the Lord with joy. Let us not be evil slaves. Our wealth is the Lord in the heart; our sweetness is the Lord in the heart; our strength is the Lord in the heart; all our good is the Lord, the rich Giver of all good, and everything earthly is earth and ashes and pus or decay. It just hurts your soul. We must rejoice in the well-being of our neighbor as if we were our own, and have no attachment to any earthly blessings, but place every good thing in the one Lord. The absurdity of sin, for example, irritability. Why be irritated, worried and irritate others who have committed any sin with knowledge or ignorance, intentionally or unintentionally? This doesn’t make things any better; on the contrary, it gets worse. This means increasing the evil that we ourselves hate, it means breaking even more the thing that we want to save, disfiguring what we ourselves want to give an attractive appearance, burning what we want to save from fire. The same must be said about envy, pride, gluttony, uncleanness, despondency, fearfulness and timidity, despair and other sins. They are all highly insane, irrational, absurd, illogical, anomalous. Every sin is well called lawlessness (that is, a deed alien to rationality, all meaning, logic, common understanding), that is, it is the same as madness. Everything that lives and exists lives and exists according to the known laws of existence and thereby proves its origin from infinite Life, which has infinite intelligence, infinite wisdom, which called them from non-existence to existence and gave everything the wise and vital laws of existence. Where there is no law, therefore, there is no life, for life and law are one and the same. Oh, how merciful You are to me, my Savior: so many times I sin before You, and I will only fall to You with a heartfelt prayer for the forgiveness of my sins, for deliverance from the opposing, and nasty, and evil, and stingy, and greedy, and money-loving, and dark forces, as You immediately give me purification, enlightenment, peace, freedom, space, lightness! Thank you, my Savior! Do not leave me, my Savior, until the end of my life on Thy earth, but after my end, protect me from them through Thy Angel and lead me to You, my life. How long, Lord, will I be in proximity to my foul flesh? God! I thank You that You granted me the opportunity to safely, victoriously, and in peace of mind spend two classes at the gymnasium - the second and third. The devil rebelled against me both through bad thoughts and through violent students, but I defeated them with calm importance and command in Your name, in Your power. So You are with us, Lord, all the days. You surround us, You look at us, You listen to us kindly, You forgive, cleanse us, have mercy on us, help us. Dear benefactor! What will we bring to You for Your mercies? What shall we repay for so many good deeds? Why do you need to ask the Lord for everything? Because we have nothing of our own, but have received and receive everything from Him, by His sole goodness, just as the beggars, for example, ask us for alms every day, and because without Him we cannot do anything good, we cannot even have a good thought, a good desire, or a good disposition. Without Me you cannot do anything [Jn. 15, 5]. So, we must pray to the Lord about everything, so that we may constantly remember our insignificance and our complete dependence on the Lord, so that all flesh may not boast before God (1 Cor. 1:29). Why is the flesh, or our body, called flesh? Because it is united, composed, composed of elemental principles: earth, water, air, heat and light. And what is united and folded must collapse. Do not sadden anyone who comes to you, on the contrary: comfort everyone who comes and, if he asks you for something, give it to him, if you can, even if he asks you often, for God also gives to us every day. See Christ (faith) in all pious Christians, especially the poor, and be afraid to offend any of them with anything, lest you offend Christ. If you can’t, tell him with meekness that you can’t give him, but never insult him with anything. This is crazy, it doesn’t fit with anything. How can I insult the image of God, the member of Christ, the priceless, exalted being in the world, this deified one? And because of what - because of the ashes, because of the money, which is also a gift from God to me and my brethren? Because of food and drink, because of clothing, housing? What could be crazier than this? By offending my neighbor, I offend myself first of all, for we are one body: the blow I direct at another is directed at myself. This is the law of God's truth. Let us not forget that through us the enemy insults our neighbor - the image of God, and we serve him, the all-evil, evil and unclean one, by offending others. How can I be angry with my neighbor for his sins, when the same sins that are in him are also in me, and I willingly forgive myself for them or ask God for forgiveness for them? Or do I demand people's leniency towards me? Unfaithful friends are people, money, food, drink, clothing, ranks, etc., because they do not give life; but here is our most faithful friend (forgive me, Jesus the Son of God, for this name) - our Lord, Christ Jesus, Who is always the same, unchangeable in His truth, life-giving, saving power; changes everything and everyone except Jesus Christ; everyone is unfaithful, fickle, unreliable, and most importantly, they do not give life. People are changeable and mortal; money, various jewelry, food, drink, clothing, a rich home - empty irritation of carnal feelings, to which the slightest attachment weighs down and oppresses the soul. Protect me (especially my heart), my Jesus, the renewer of my corrupted nature. The enemy robs us during prayer with drowsiness and sleep of heart and flesh: sometimes you fall asleep during prayer. This is sinful. You must have [attention] to your thoughts and heart. I thank You, Lord Jesus Christ, for You have granted me to maintain peace of mind in the third grade under two temptations: from the unpeaceful devil and from the violent disciples. Look at every person as at Christ, and at his face as at the face of Christ. Members...of Him, of His flesh and of His bones [Eph. 5, 30]. Just look at every person. You have already been taught from the Lord how to look at everyone and how to defeat the evil one who inspires evil thoughts regarding the face of your neighbor. Delicacy and satiety harden a person’s heart, make him alien to God, placing a barrier between him and the Lord and between his neighbor, produce in him contempt for [spiritual things], make him vile, impudent and self-willed. You cannot serve God and mammon [Matt. 6, 24]. The servant of God must neglect food and drink. Be kind to everyone from the heart, to every poor, beggar, wretched, subordinate. Do not be discouraged by the sorrows and anguish of your heart: they cleanse you from sins and protect you for the future. We ourselves are lazy to please God, but we want everyone to please us, and if we don’t please a subordinate, we often get irritated with him because of a trifle. If the Lord gave His priceless, pure Body and Blood for food and drink, then what will we spare for a person who needs the necessities of life or spiritual guidance? The Lord honors me with His immortal, Divine, life-giving and terrible Mysteries - why should I spare my neighbor, who is truly in need, if the Lord did not spare Himself for me? I thank Thee, Lord Jesus Christ my God, for Thou hast given me the grace to carry out the second (V) grade at the gymnasium on Tuesday with boldness and dignity; I lost my courage in front of this class; sorrow, and oppression, and humiliation, and despondency were in my soul, stemming from an unsatisfactory lesson in the first grade. Oh, how you must be careful, correct and verbal! But it is also a sin to become despondent after making a mistake: this means adding another sin to the sin, spoiling a damaged matter even more. Unreasonable, illogical! I thank you, Lady Most Holy Theotokos, for you heard the prayer of me, a sinner, and saved me from the oppression of sin! But make me holy and perfect in my own way, so that with my holiness I will glorify You, Most Holy One! Make me wise, so that with my spiritual wisdom I will glorify You, the Most Glorified One. Oh, how terribly earthly thoughts and worries paralyze our soul during worship! They don’t allow you to pray, they weaken you, they darken you, they destroy your soul! I was embarrassed today during prayer by the excessive burning of incense during the Cherubic Song, and I could not calmly serve the liturgy, the most important part of it, out of indignation; You see, the soulless ones were worried about the walls, that they would become sooty, but he didn’t take care of his church not made by hands, he neglected it. O damned flesh! O old man! Everywhere you want to excel, to reign! Get away, you damned one! Let us put aside all worldly, that is, earthly, care during the liturgy and care about stone and mortar and wood and about our very earthly bodies, focusing our minds and hearts on God. Oh, how simple my heart is! Truly, it cannot serve God and mammon, that is, the carnal and earthly. I must be one spirit with the Lord while serving Him and not be distracted by anything. Grant me this, Lord! Fight earthly cares as if you were fighting the devil himself, for through them the devil rapes us, albeit under plausible, clever pretexts. But from its fruits in the heart - from confusion, crampedness, darkness - now you will find out who is working in you, who produces such earthly thoughts and addictions, for the heart is our simple soul, and not a multi-minded and multiform mind. The heart is the sun, the mind is the rays. As is the heart, so are the rays. The heart is the sea, the mind is its vapors. As is the sea, so is the evaporation. If you notice that someone is angry with you for no apparent reason, do not be angry with him mutually, but, remembering your countless weaknesses and iniquities, internal and external, and the frequent communion of the Holy Mysteries of the Body and Blood of Christ and your uncorrectedness, despite such great grace, cover with leniency the sin of your brother or sister and pray for them immediately heartily to the Lord, saying: Lord, have mercy on him or her and cleanse his sins, enlighten him and strengthen him to keep Your commandments, and I am a bad teacher, full of self-love and many different passions. God! Forgive him his sin, for if I, a communicant of Your Holy Mysteries, am subject to all kinds of sins and cannot immediately reflect them from my heart, then how much more so my brother or my sister, who are rarely, rarely honored with communion of Your life-giving Mysteries. Why are our 61 words formed in schools? In order for us to be able to bring, first of all, our verbal sacrifice to the Hypostatic Word of God, our Lord Jesus Christ, through internal and external prayer to Him, through the word in His church or through preaching the holy truths of faith to His verbal sheep and through the word of wisdom, faith and love in mutual communication with each other. A wise, kind, simple word has a life-giving effect on our hearts. It enlightens, purifies, pacifies, delights, and revitalizes our souls, for our word is the image of the Hypostatic Word, which created the world with the word of His command. It’s a bad thing to be angry with your father: be infinitely lenient towards your father’s weaknesses, because he is a father, because he is the image of the Heavenly Father, who forgives you infinitely; because you owe an infinite amount to your father (even to your wife); because he is an old man. I thank You, Lord my Savior, for You have delivered me from such a storm of my anger and strengthened me to carry out the fifth grade with boldness. Avoid gluttony, this mental and physical disaster; run and smell many fragrances. All brotherly infirmities are my infirmities; for him, as for myself, I must pray to God, for without Him we cannot do anything [John. 15, 5]. How strongly and viciously our carnal will opposes the will of God. They appointed me as a catechist at the cathedral - a good deed, useful for me and for future listeners. But for some reason I didn’t want this, how indignant and embittered I was at my brother, who had blamed me for saying the conversations! What excuses: classes (although they should help the cause more), and lack of time, and the difficulty of compiling and corresponding, and so on. And then, as I thought calmly, all these excuses seemed like water bubbles, the matter seemed pleasant, convenient, and easy, may it be for me by the grace of my Lord Jesus Christ, who made His apostles wise to be preachers to the world. It seemed. Often the devil's mirage, the devil's punishment happens to us. Don't believe him. Sin. God! I sinned before You, like Judas, by taking pity on the spilled oil from the lamp in front of Your image. But have mercy on me, Lord, and cleanse the sin of my madness, the sin of my addiction to earthly things. If I take the ouds of Christ, I will create the ouds of the harlots [Russian: Shall I take away the members of Christ in order to make them members of a harlot?] (1 Cor. 6:15), - the ouds of Christ, that is, my own or other persons, male or female, for all Christians are members of Christ, except for obvious and persistent lawless people. Don't be deceitful, my heart! Do not, Lord, allow my heart to wander into the thoughts of wickedness, but deliver me from all those who ensnare my soul. Thank you, Lord, for delivering me from insensibility. The Son of God exhausted Himself for your salvation. Don't you want to exhaust yourself for your own salvation and the salvation of others? He fulfilled all the will of the Heavenly Father for you. Aren't you going to try to fulfill it for yourself? My flesh is fleeting smoke: if it disappears, it will no longer exist. When you see smoke near you, remember this. For our attachment to vanity, how much we scourge ourselves! The dress gets dirty - it’s a disaster. During divine services, despise the flesh and everything and cleave completely to the one God, for He is everything, and everything else is like nothing - everything that is material, except the Sacrament of the Body and Blood of Christ. Each excessive sip can become the cause of the devil’s violence, as serving him: it can strengthen the flesh at the expense of the spirit, harden the heart and increase the attachment of the flesh to the world and remove the soul from God, cool it towards God, especially sweetness, while every day we must weaken this sinful attachment to the world and leave it and strengthen the attachment to God, despising sweets. Anyone who is surprised or does not believe this must remember that our soul, like a spirit, is as simple as a thought, and that through the slightest, barely noticeable particle of Flesh and Blood, Christ the Lord dwells in us in communion. Likewise, the devil can enter us through an extra sip, and through an extra glass, the more, and the more powerfully he can take possession of us and give us bitterness and stubborn struggle. Do not have partial pity on your flesh or anything material: this is treason in the love of God. God! Help me break this attachment of my heart to my flesh and to earthly things. (I felt sorry for the spilled wooden oil - and found that my heart changed through this to God, for it showed pity for the oil and some obstinacy and bitterness.) Every day, everyone either increases their sinful burden or decreases it; Therefore, everyone must constantly pay the greatest attention to himself, because he is doing a job of the greatest importance: saving his soul for eternity and fighting the spirits of evil. You must always pray with a reflective heart, with a feeling of love for those for whom you are praying, and with a sincere desire for them to benefit from the Lord, for example, the royal family, the deceased, everyone remembered by the living and the dead. An extra glass of tea, an extra piece of bread can cool our hearts towards God, towards His saints and towards our neighbors, because it will strengthen the [sinful] flesh at the expense of the spirit. But tea is so pleasant, tempting, and so easy to drink. Treat with meekness and love those who call you to do something, or ask for your help, or have committed some offense against God or against you - and you yourself will be fed with righteousness, with your meekness, and the sheep will be safe. Otherwise, where did you get your madness, the madness to be irritated with your neighbors who have dependent, subordinate contact with us? We forget that they are our brothers, who have equal rights and dignity with us - human and Christian, that they are images of God, members of Christ; that we are all one body; that anger and irritability never improve, but rather upset the matter, and most importantly, the souls of both the one being irritated and those with whom we are irritated; that through this we serve the devil, a murderer and murderer of God, for he killed Christ, although, without knowing it, for our eternal good, but for his own eternal destruction. Learn from Me, for I am meek and lowly in heart, and you will find rest for your souls [Matt. 11, 29]. This means that there is no peace in the souls of those people who have not learned meekness and humility: the thorns of pride, contempt and anger prick them and constantly bother, outrage, and irritate them. In any speech, especially in a sermon, order, harmony, and consistency are necessary. Look at the order in the world of the Lord the All-Creator! And you are a small world, you are the image of God. A little, but in order and simply - and it will turn out well. Addiction to earthly things robs our soul, leaving it poor, but the flesh supplies, enriches and strengthens. Every day the Lord builds the salvation of our soul, and every day we, through addiction to earthly things, resist our good God. True love, a true friend, is known in misfortune: he sympathizes with the misfortune of his neighbor, accepts it as his own, helps him get rid of it or alleviates it in any way he can. Otherwise, it is a sure sign of dislike for our neighbor and unfriendliness when we remain indifferent to his misfortune or even secretly rejoice at him, saying: this is what he needs, this is for him for this and that, he will not be like that in the future! This is how we deal especially with those who - a terrible thing - are our own or strangers, but have bothered us with their frequent presence with us, our hospitality, or the fact that they are generally unfavorable to us. But in the misfortune of a neighbor, we must forget all his troubles caused to us, and sympathize with his grief as if it were our own, help in grief, as if it were ours, console the sad, give good advice in the difficulty or unnoticed danger of a neighbor (brother Alexei lost eight places (barrels) from a ship), and we will also meet the same from our neighbors when something similar happens to us. Love your enemies and do good [Lk. 6, 35]. We must despise the sins of our neighbor and impute them for nothing, just as we ourselves want God to despise all our sins. Crucify self-love. And sometimes we also gloat. Some people give large alms to the poor of others, but spare a piece of sugar, a pie, or generally bread and salt for their own. This is hypocrisy. If anyone does not provide for his own, and especially for those at home, he has renounced the faith and is worse than an infidel (1 Tim. 5:8). My God! How proud and stingy I am. In order not to regret God's gifts, sweets for my neighbor, even for my father, I must sincerely ask the Lord for this, otherwise my heart will shrink for my father, and he will feel sorry for the sweets! I myself am stingy and proud! I would only like to grab all the good things for myself, and leave for others what is worse; sometimes, however, it’s as if I’m competing with myself and giving an equal and equally good share to my neighbor. In the same way, so that I do not be proud, contemptuous, evil, envious, a glutton, an overeater, a drunkard, a vile fornicator, sad and desperate, I must ask the Lord for this, but I cannot do it on my own. That's how sinful I am! Infirm! Glory to Your goodness, glory to Your love for mankind, glory to Your bounty, Lord! Thank you, my victory, Lord Jesus Christ! Behold, every day I boast in Your name, in Your power. November 13, 1864 One wonderful master cut and sewed beautiful clothes and dressed his living image and likeness with it; but one evil man, who was a friend of this master and was deprived of his friendship and all his gifts for his insolence and disobedience, he, being angry with him and envious of his glory, but not being able to do him any harm, desecrated and mocked these clothes in every possible way and spat on them with his filthy saliva, so that he terribly soiled them all and desecrated and disfigured his very image. The master endured everything - and he himself was wise, powerful, noble, pure. He made the same clothes for himself, but his friend, go ahead and don’t care about him, about his clothes; but his nasty saliva could no longer dirty the clothes of the master himself: the dirty tricker’s saliva returned to himself and fell on him like bitter poison. Since then, the dirty trickster has fallen a lot in his arrogance, audacity and strength, because the master clothed his living images and likenesses with his clothes, and although at times the dirty trickster continued to spit on them, his foul saliva that fell on them was soon cleansed by the cleansing composition of this master, prepared from his clothes. The Master is Jesus Christ. Clothing is the human body; his living image is a man. The master’s former friend is Dennitsa, 63 who later became Satan; mocking clothes and spitting on them by an enemy means the devil’s mocking of man and his flesh through various unclean and nasty thoughts and passions. In order to cleanse his defiled images and their clothes, the master sewed clothes for himself and clothed his images with them - this means that the Son of God took upon himself the soul and body of man and clothed us with Himself in the Sacrament of Baptism, for those who were baptized in Christ have put on Christ [Gal. 3, 27]. The master’s cleansing composition is His most pure Body and Blood, taken in the form of bread and wine by believers and cleansing their souls and bodies. Moral teaching: even if God has cleansed it, do not defile it [Acts. 10, 15 ] and do not act in concert with the dirty trickster. Remember what a wise and pure Master the clothing of the human body is, and look at it with all purity and respect. God! Help. Master, my wondrous Master, I thank You that You surround me with the joys of deliverance. (In the apartment of the customs manager Evgraf Andreevich Vsevolzhsky.) Against the strength and malice and abomination of demons and his simplicity - colic 64 Your strength, goodness, holiness, colic Your simplicity! Smoking in my rooms is worse than getting dirty in my home, in front of my eyes. Those who smoke tobacco are not worthy to breathe air, because out of madness they have chosen to breathe smoke, which no animal breathes, which every animal, every bird, every insect, abhors. Is it not from you, damned smokers, is it not from your all-consuming carnal pride that so many beggars have spread? Is it not because of you, who devour the gifts of God, that many have nothing to eat, nothing to drink, nothing to wear, nothing to pay the rent with? Is it not because you burn the gifts of God for nothing, for the empty pleasure of your flesh, and do not want to share them with your poor brothers, and even scold and persecute them? Your smoking makes you pagans, worse than pagans - neither food nor drink, but the most absurd whim - smoking tobacco. You don’t want to know the commandments of Christ our Savior about love for your neighbors: love one another [Jn. 13, 34, etc.], for you consider it necessary to love only yourself and despise the poor. You will be required to pay for these cigars, your cigarettes, your pipes; Look, beware, you wouldn’t have to burn with eternal fire, as you now burn your cigarettes in your teeth. Is this why you are given the gifts of God? Oh, the wisdom of this age, completely fooled! 65 What can you expect from God’s mercy in the next century? You have exhausted this mercy in the present age: in the future the inexorable truth of God awaits you if you do not turn from your foolish deeds and do not correct yourself. You do not know what to do from satiety, and your brethren - the poor whom you despise - are melting away from hunger and cold. The first exemplary Christians had everything in common, just as they all had one soul and one heart, and there was not a single beggar among them, but with us everyone is the complete master of his property, although often, of course, insane, because he keeps it in his chests and uses it only for himself; This is why we have so many beggars, because everyone lives only for himself, for his own pleasure, pampering his sinful flesh in every possible way. Produce, brethren, fruits worthy of repentance [Lk. 3, 8], or the righteous judgment of God will befall you, for judgment is without mercy to him who has not shown mercy [Jas. 2, 13]. Wonderful Lyubov Alexandrovna Vsevolzhskaya: how even and calm she is in her courtesy. How talkative! How calmly and smoothly her speech flows! How simple and naive! In the wrong hands, a piece or a cup, a dish, a glass of sweetness seems large, and I feel sorry for it, this sweetness; But at home, no matter how big the piece, the bowl, the dish, the glass, everything is of no importance, everything seems small and we don’t feel sorry for anything, we value everything for nothing, just to please ourselves, our taste, our greed. We ourselves are voluptuous, but as others who live with us, especially our servants or strangers, sweetly eat and drink from ours, more than God’s good, they feel sorry for sweets: the heart, addicted to sweets, is embarrassed and compressed and thus deprived of true life through its greed for earthly pleasures and through dislike for its brother, who is the priceless image of God, to whom the universe with everything is subjugated, what is on it, with sheep and oxen, cattle of the field, birds of the air and fish, and with all fruits [Ps. 8, 7 – 9]. But we are all one body (1 Cor. 10:17). There is no need to pay attention to the whims and cunning and self-love of the flesh, because it is absurd; Here is another example of her pride, greed and absurdity: when others give us generously, for example, money, or treat us with delicious food and drinks generously and with cordiality, we rejoice at this and cannot boast enough about the love and generosity of others, affection, cordiality, simplicity, we are surprised by them, are ready to cry with joy, pour out the feeling of our gratitude in eloquent, sincere expressions; But when we ourselves happen to give generously to others out of need or by mistake, or invite them to visit us, we grieve about this in our hearts and regret that we generously gave or invited such and such that we do not need. Oh, the deceit, selfishness and malice of the flesh! Oh, the absurdity, the nonsense, the madness of the carnal man! Why don’t we ourselves do what we praise in others, what we like in others, when we have the means to do it? As it is said that people should do to you, do the same to them [Lk. 6, 31]. If we do not get rid of our pride and stinginess and greed, we will not enter the Kingdom of Heaven; if we do not stop clinging to the vanity of this world, we will not enter the Kingdom of Heaven; If we do not stop idolatry in our hearts, we will not enter the Kingdom of Heaven. If we do not cleave with all our hearts to Christ the Savior, despising carnal pleasures, we will not enter the Kingdom of Heaven. You have learned that sweets distract you, tear you away from Christ the Giver of Life and from love for your neighbor and chain your heart to earthly things, depriving it of peace, light, freedom, space, lightness and instilling in it sorrow, crampedness, darkness, heaviness and shameful slavery - and this is enough to despise them and not care about them, to place them below all dust as causing the greatest harm to you, and consider dust as your destiny and humbly cast yourself into dust and be covered with dust, as one who has no time to turn to dust. So, it is time to rise from sleep and despise all sweets as the cause of spiritual corruption, the corruption of sin and death, as they plunge Judas into sin. Lord, help me! November 14th day 1864. Is it a matter of living in the simplicity of Christ (even in the heart) and clinging to Him alone! What freedom, what peace! But the heart is simple: clinging to some kind of sweetness, it has become detached from Christ and from His life, His world, His light. I sing of the wondrous intercession of the Mother of God, revealed to me, unworthy. Through a vile thought, the devil entered my heart and brought terrible dishonor upon me, sorrow, oppression, darkness, fire, despondency, powerlessness, and these dirty tricks increased more and more; but then I entered the sixth grade (Saturday), the students read a prayer - and in my soul there was still the same dishonor and despondency, the same sorrow and crampedness; students smile; Some (Slavin and Murash.) I send out from behind their desks, to the wall - and they smiled because they saw my face strange and that I baptized my heart with my hand. But then, in cramped conditions, I called out to the Lady, as if she were close to me, as if in Her very ears, and a wondrous miracle: the very swift Intercessor immediately showed me Her great help: the ethereal villains who oppressed and humiliated me crumbled like dust, sin was cleansed, silence and majestic calm and triumph of the spirit reigned in my soul. To the chosen Voivode, victorious, as having been delivered from the evil, I will write thanks to Thy servant, the Mother of God, but as having an invincible power, free us from all troubles, let us call Thee: Rejoice, Unmarried Bride. 66 It was clearly a miracle of my salvation. Do not have an addiction to money under any plausible pretext, for example, under the pretext of giving alms to the poor - this is the devil’s trick, but work with trust in God, completely complacently, without complaint, and the Lord, who also provides for the birds, will send you what you need, as He puts it in your hand. If you have worked somewhere and for some reason your work has remained without reward, do not grieve about it: God is testing you, wants to show you to yourself, whether you have an addiction to money, so that because of it you do not care about God and about your neighbor and about your soul, and if you do, then you would immediately try to correct yourself, cling to the one God, the giver of all good things, our only life. Your Heavenly Father knows that you need all this [Matt. 6, 32]. Leave it to the Lord, the common Father and Provider of all, to take care of you. His business was to create you, His concern is to support you created. Be content with your daily needs. Also, do not have partiality for beautiful persons, male and female, but look at them as beautiful members of Christ, as at Christ Himself, redder in kindness 67 than the sons of men [Ps. 44:3], and marvel at the wisdom of God in them. Extensive gates – extensive evil, and small good; the narrow gate is wide good, and small is evil. The great game is real life: either we win the future life, which has no end, or we lose it. We must be especially attentive to what we hear [Heb. 2, 1]. And you, addicted to the card game, what do you think? Gamblers should not be allowed to take communion unless they promise to throw away their cards and read the Gospel instead. Oh, how the enemy robs us! Laughs at us. And it robs me of gluttony. What are we doing as Christians? Jesus Christ came to save us from our sins, so that we could begin to live a new life, but we, as if in defiance of the Lord, add sins to sins, and fall more and more into the old life, filled with many different passions. What fads have we not invented? How do we not please the flesh? How can we not serve our common enemy? How do we not grieve our Savior? What can we expect in such a life? It's scary to think about. The anticipation of judgment and... fire ready to devour opponents is terrible [Heb. 10, 27]. How honored are you, man, from God, where does God want to take you - and what are you doing, what are you doing with yourself? God wants to raise you from corruption to incorruption and His eternal Kingdom, into union with Himself, but you voluntarily plunge yourself into corruption, cling to corruption, to earthly goods, and not to God. The Lord wants to make you a god, but you make yourself a devil. You learn mathematics - you must weigh, measure your actions by number, measure and weight. When we cast out demons from ourselves through heartfelt prayer, they, not tolerating this, snap and shoot at wooden things out of anger, ready to gnaw them down for us. They enter into us through our excess in food and drink. Remember while speaking or praying that the Hypostatic Word, being the World Itself, is eternally united with the Spirit of sanctity, peace, freedom, and pronounce the words calmly, freely, with heartfelt sanctity. Pronounce the names of the royal family with reverence, like the royal house, like the tsar himself. With what cordiality and reverence would you pronounce their names if you stood before them and asked them for something? So in church, with reverence and love, pronounce their names in prayer, as images of God, as representatives of the King of kings, the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit. A short-term, lasting only the sweetness of food and drink for a few minutes - and then how much torment the sensualist, and especially me, have to endure: many hours, and sometimes, perhaps, more than one day! What dire consequences of sweets, and yet I eat and drink sweets and sweets and cleave to them, and because of them I turn away from the Lord in my heart, and from my neighbor, and from my soul. Oh madness! (Semolina porridge is a huge evil for me, and milk and meat are fornication.) When in some sin, that is, in the oppression of sin, you become hardened, then refrain internally from insolence and blasphemy against God; do not say: if You still have mercy for me, then have mercy on me, if not, punish me completely; the devil wants to show God that you only love Him in happiness, thank Him, glorify Him, but in misfortune you deny Him, and God tests your patience, whether you have it, for it is said: with your patience save your souls [Lk. 21, 19]. And one more thing: will we really accept good from God, but not accept evil? [Job. 2, 10]. Why am I silent and not thanking my Lord, my Lady, the Most Holy Theotokos? What he asked for, he received: he served the liturgy peacefully and spoke the royal family without stumbling, saying to himself: there is no hurry, no one is chasing me. Oh! How fearfully and greatly the sweets slow down my spiritual steps and how they complicate and stop my journey to Christ in heaven! Sweets are my heart disease! Reason and the word of God demand that I despise them, and consider simple, daily bread, which strengthens the human heart, above all sweets. It is remarkable that the higher, better, more pleasant the sweetness, the more the heart becomes attached to it, and the more others feel sorry for it, and the more we are hurt by the enemy when we feel sorry for it for our neighbor. All sweets must be counted as [drop] for the sake of Christ - not because they are bad, for every creation of God is good, and nothing is reprehensible if it is received with thanksgiving (1 Tim. 4:4), but because through them our enemy greatly deceives us. They are strong networks of the enemy. My sweetness, Lord Jesus Christ! Grant me to cleave to You alone with all my heart and despise everything earthly, for it is impossible for two masters to work, God and Mammon [Matt. 6, 24]. Lord, let me be above all earthly things, especially above all earthly sweets. God! All earthly and material wisdom may rest in me. God! Give me the grace to consider all sweets not as my own, but as Yours and those of people. I regretted the jam and couldn’t prepare for class. Although a priest lives on earth with his body, with his thoughts and heart and desires he must live in heaven with Christ and on earth live for heaven, for the benefit of his neighbors and the glory of God. A Christian must correspond to the intentions of his Christ about him - this is his indispensable duty, otherwise he is not a true Christian. And priests must teach this conformity both in their lives and in their words. The vows of baptism should be recalled more often, the Sacrament of Baptism should be conveyed in detail, so that the duties of a Christian can be seen in detail. Let this mind be in you which was also in Christ Jesus [Phil. 2, 5]. Do not wish... [Ex. 20:17 ] nothing that your neighbor has, because our desire is Christ, the ultimate desire of all and the hope and wealth of all. If the devil and his angels are so close to us, then, of course, the Lord, the Lady, the holy Angels and saints are closer to us. Let us call upon them, let us honor them, and let us imitate them. We despise all the abominations of the devil and regard them as nothing, just as they are nothing, a mirage. Love to pray, that is, to serve prayer services to the Lady in church and in homes. She is a wonderful, vigilant, all-powerful, good shepherd to the Lord's people and your verbal sheep. And at home, love to pray to Her. Without haste, without fuss, calmly begin to think about and write a sermon, having chosen in advance the subject, topic (position) about which [you will] speak; lead the listeners step by step, exactly to the understanding of the known truth. Shepherding the sheep of the Lord, teaching the verbal sheep of the Lord, working for the Lord Himself - what happiness! How willingly one must do this holy work. Simone Jonin, do you love Me?.. feed My lambs [Jn. 21, 15 – 17]. How long should I place my life in eating and drinking, how long should I love this gross pleasure of food and drink and not consider it on a par with excrement, that is, as nothing? How long will I think that both life and the pleasure of life consist in eating and drinking more? O pagan man, although a believer in the Lord! Oh, rude, carnal, earthly, demonic man! But turn me, Lord! How long should I not base my life on practicing prayer, the word of God, diligently serving my neighbors and, finally, what? - In the sorrows and misfortunes of the Kingdom for the sake of Heaven, for the salvation of my soul, for sorrows and misfortunes, like fire for the purification of gold and silver, are necessary for the purification of my heart, to which the aphids of passions stick. How long can I not be firmly convinced that everything is for me the Lord, my Creator, that He constantly penetrates me and knows all my needs? The Lord provided to man himself, as a free man, the work of eternal salvation, with the free (that is, not in the least constraining) assistance of His grace, in order to make the crown of his glory brighter, so that his bliss would be all the higher. Oh, endless goodness! How the Lord Himself honors His image – man! Only we ourselves do not know how to give ourselves a true price! More often we need to reflect on the following words of the Creed: For our sake, man and our salvation came down from heaven and became incarnate from the Holy Spirit and the Virgin Mary, and became human. Crucified... suffering... buried. And risen... And ascended into heaven, and sits at the right hand of the Father. And again the future... judge... My heart is darkened by all the demonic changes (changes). Demons in their malice and in their abomination are extremely changeable and varied, and they also subject me to their insane changeability through varied passions. But I, as the image of God, must be unchanging and adamant in my faith, hope and love! My flesh is the dwelling and network of the evil and unclean Belial. 68 You don’t really need to nourish it and warm it and calm it down: if it gets stronger, it’s a disaster! The devil teaches us to think, feel, speak and do insolence to people and God. God! Strengthen me in the fight against my flesh and the demonic regiments nesting in it. The Lord says: love your neighbor as yourself [Matt. 19, 19, etc.], and God’s and our enemy, the devil, instills in us hatred, pride, contempt, stinginess towards each other, especially towards the poor, envy towards the rich and in general those living in contentment and abundance. The commandment of the Lord says: love God with all your heart [Matt. 22, 37, etc.], and the devil teaches us to love ourselves with all our hearts, our old man, which must be put aside with all his sweetness, malice, pride, idleness and [addiction to luxurious] delicacies. Glory to Thee, Lord, my simplicity! (The Lord delivered me by His simplicity.) Through eating the forbidden fruit, the devil entered the human heart, and that is why we all gravitate towards the earth, we love earthly things more than heavenly and spiritual things. Why do I say unsteadily the royal house? Because, 1) I’m afraid of some demonic ghosts, fears: I’m afraid of the people, I’m afraid of my sheep; and secondly, from habit of them, to their names and from little respect for them, as for example from habit of beggars, we neglect them. We must reverence the royal family - the image of the house of the Heavenly King and breathe love for it. This is the surname of the house of our earthly father of the fatherland. Many preachers are averse to preaching because it’s not a meal, it’s not a ball, it’s not the kind of thing for which they will give a rich payment, and, perhaps, they will also be reprimanded. But how much benefit there is from preaching both for the preacher himself and for the flock! Let us hand over our entire life, with all its temptations, falls, sorrows, joys, illnesses, sorrows, and shortcomings, to Christ our God. Sorrows bring us back to ourselves from everyday, vain distraction and force us to think seriously about our soul, about its purpose, about its spiritual needs, about the source of its life - God, about the vanity, insignificance of everything earthly. They tear the heart away from earthly vanity, make it bitter, murderous, empty in the eyes of a person, which he could not see if sorrows did not enlighten him. We have everything from God: soul, body and all the blessings that surround us [...] and sacrifice it to God if He demands it. Good children sacrifice to their parents not only earthly treasures (which are dear to them), but also their will, their lives. Apostles, martyrs. I thank You, Lord, for You have granted me the grace to overcome anger towards my neighbor, towards my brother, and to show him love and friendliness. And then the brother archpriest came to the church - and let the devil incite anger. That's what he always does. Humble yourself before your brethren, you, the least, the worst and the most sinful of all; my brother is the image of God, the image of the Trinity: Father, Son and Holy Spirit. Sincerely ask for blessings from your brother and father, as from Christ Himself, and you will not be embarrassed or stumble in your words, otherwise you are flattering with your tongue, which is why the enemy is trembling you. I thank you, all-holy Mother of God, for you stood up for me, evil-tempered, proud and unclean, and, while the enemy greatly outraged me and did not allow me to say the litany for my lack of faith and pride, you pacified my heart, strengthened and enlightened it and granted me to peacefully say the great litany and perform the entire subsequent service. November 17th, 1864 To the chosen Voivode, victorious, as having been delivered from the evil ones, I will write thanks to Thy servant, the Mother of God. I called upon the Lady in my extreme cramped conditions, as if alive, and now I received wonderful and quick help: the vile and arrogant and ferocious demons came out, instead of cramped conditions it became spacious and light. (Fourth grade on Saturday.) Thank You, Lord and Lady! Oddball, stupid! Treat those who are unkind, cold, and proud towards you kindly, from the heart. Conquer evil with good [Rom. 12, 21]. This is the essence of Christianity. If you love those who love you, what will be your reward? Don't publicans do the same? And if you greet only your brothers, what are you doing special?.. But you love your enemies and do good... and you will have a great reward, and you will be sons of the Most High... [Matt. 5, 46 – 47; OK. 6, 35]. Prove by your deeds that you are a disciple of Christ, meek, humble, and kind; prove that you are a new creation, and not an old, sinful one; prove that you are above evil, that you despise it. Obeying each other, acquire humility (1 Pet. 5:5), if the flesh says: I myself am a priest; the priesthood is a gift of God, the grace of God, and I am an insignificant sinner. How can I prove the grace of the priesthood if not through humility? Teach others by example of meekness and humility and unfeigned love: let them see in your face the attractiveness and beauty of virtue and the ugliness of their passions. What do you have that you wouldn't get? (1 Cor. 4:7). Everything we have, our entire being, is from God: soul, body, every part of the body is from God. Our ouds are the ouds of Christ (1 Cor. 6:15). The real Lord! Glory to Thee, all glory to Thee in all! Master! Shame the unclean, proud, evil enemy in me, so that I will give glory to You. Remember this, that it only seems to you that there is something evil in others, and not in reality it exists; The devil, the deceiver, the leader of pride, malice and deceit, deceives you. There is no neighbor present - nothing, someone has come, someone has approached - and let’s kindle anger against him, contrary to the commandment of the Savior: I command you this, that you love one another. By this everyone will know that you are My disciples, if you have love for one another [Jn. 15, 17; 13:35], or lustful passion, evil fire of prodigalism, contrary to the commandment of God: Thou shalt not commit adultery [Exod. 20, 14, etc.]... don’t be pedantic 69... don’t be sodomy... We must pay attention to ourselves. We must ask the Lord for help in the temptations of the passions. And the Lord is near: he will help immediately, if only we had our determination for good. The apostles are bound by a union of love. 70 And so should we. And the devil is trying to create enmity among us priests. Man is the most beautiful plant, and the most honorable because the immortal spirit lives in him, created in the image of God, and in general the whole man is the image of God. Man is the great shrine of the Lord. Be holy, for holy am I the Lord your God [Lev. 19, 2]. God is love (1 John 4:8), and we must live in love. As soon as I descend with my heart into earthly things through gluttony, satiety, covetousness, immediately it becomes extremely difficult for me, and when I live without my heart descending to earthly things, it becomes very easy for me. We cling to this or that, but God sees it here; One must cleave to Him alone with the heart. The heart of a glutton is coarse and cannot accept the subtle movements of the Spirit of life. During the priestly service, do not be entertained by anything: neither by worldly thoughts, nor by surrounding objects, but completely despise the flesh and be all in God. God-fearing, pious people bring with their judgments and deeds a true view of things, for example, wealth: they prove by their deeds that wealth is a gift from God and the property not only of ours, but also of our poor brothers. Sweets, in general food, drink, money, clothes, evenings, dances, theaters, magazines - brushwood, firewood, fire, with which the devil kindles the furnace of our flesh, the furnace of unclean carnal passions. Our hearts, like the hearts of children, must incessantly be attached to the Heavenly Father, Who is ever with us, and not to visible things - the gifts of His goodness and generosity. The stingy is afraid that by treating others or giving alms his property will be depleted, and therefore he trembles over his sweets and rubles, forgetting that the Heavenly Father will not leave him and, with what measure he measures, he Himself measures to him according to His righteousness. Obviously, this is a dreamy fear - the kind of fear that a priest undergoes during a service, fearing that he will not utter certain words of prayer or exclamation, or the kind of fear that a person who has not been in society experiences when he goes to speak with some important person. This fear is empty. You have to be brave, and everything will work out great. Where there is a stinking passage, Satan climbs there, because this is his place, here he teaches people to do dirty tricks. That is why he is called unclean. The sting is a snake. What is a person? - Seed. So shall your seed be, God said to Abraham. 71 We are Abraham's seed [John. 8, 33]. What is a person? - Fruit. Of the fruit of your womb I will set you on your throne [Ps. 131, 11]. Blessed is the fruit of Your womb [Lk. 1, 42]. As Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness, so must the Son of Man be lifted up, so that everyone who believes in Him will not perish, but have eternal life [Jn. 3, 14–15]. This means that if Jesus Christ had not ascended to the cross, we would have died from spiritual serpents - demons. You already know that this is the devil, and there is no need to think about it. Just speak and live according to God, considering yourself lower and worse than everyone else. Remember from the canon the words to the Savior: From Adam... all who sinned... surpassed passions... 72. Don't listen to the whispers of the enemy. Oh, wild and absurd, insane, wordless, blind stinginess and with it greed! She does not know kinship and spares sweets or money for her wife, father, mother! The stingy person aches in his heart and gets irritated with his relatives when they generously use his sweets or money; he hurts his heart when he has a lot of changes on the table, knowing more about food supplies than necessary. Oh, into what humiliation passions plunge us, how through them we anger God, who created us in His image and likeness! They make us into the image of Satan. And how absurd is prodigal passion! The enraged fornicator also does not know the relationship of either his mother or his sister; he rages against the male and female sex. He is seduced by the unclean eyes of his heart, he looks slyly at what should be an object of reverence, at what must be looked at with pure, bright eyes. He is seduced by the beautiful work of the most pure hands of the Creator; he, like the devil, looks at everything slyly, contemptuously, uncleanly! And how we defile with our passions, especially fornication, the church of our body, the temple of the Holy Spirit! After this, have an addiction to earthly goods, especially sweets and money. Yes, they directly turn away from God. The Lord said to the first people: if you eat the fruit of the forbidden tree, you will die [Gen. 2, 17], and fulfilled His threat. Now it is said that sinners will go into eternal fire, and the righteous into eternal life [Matt. 25, 34, 41], - and it will be fulfilled, for the Truth Itself speaks. I thank You, Most Holy Theotokos, the strong and swift Deliverer of those who trust in You, for You delivered me from the fierce demon of malice, contempt and love of money, which stunned me during Matins with thoughts: I spared money for the freely visiting reader Tsvetkov. We must value man and despise silver. I cried out to You in the simplicity of my heart on the local icon 73 of Yours - and soon I received peace, freedom of spirit, coolness. My God! How demons scurry about: now demons of love of money, now of malice, pride and contempt, now of doubt, blasphemy, embarrassment, despondency, now of fornication, now of gluttony, greed and stinginess, now of wickedness, insensibility to God’s blessings and to the misfortunes of one’s neighbor—so they scurry about and crawl into the soul to burn it, to confuse it, to oppress it, to make it worse. crazy and remove her from the Lord God. Stranger readers are a disaster, as if we are not all children of the Heavenly Father and not all of us read the first and greatest, most important prayer: Our Father... Mutual love, condescending to the infirmities of our neighbor, is what is dear to the Heavenly Father. We all have many weaknesses of the flesh and spirit. We wish that they would condescend to us, and we will also condescend ourselves. Let's not forget. Whatever plausible pretexts the devil leads to sin, but its fruits in the heart show that these pretexts are from him. Oh, how he worries and confuses us! But how the Lord pacifies us! One must cleave to the Heavenly Father and love His children, His images, and not to His material gifts and forget their Giver or hate and despise others because of the consumption of these goods. The Lord has ennobled us so much, leading us to the communion of the Divine nature through mutual love and communion of the Divine Mysteries of His Body and Blood, but we cleave to decay, dust, pus, the devil, for attachment to earthly things is the spirit of the devil, obedience to the devil. Set your mind on things above, it is said, and not on earthly things... where Christ sits at the right hand of God [Col. 3, 2, 1]. Everything is for everyone now, but especially in the next century, there will be God, and not money, not food, not drink, not housing, not friends, not father and mother, not a boss, not princes, not rich people. Spiritual serpents bite me, but the name of Jesus Christ crucified saves me from their stings; I just need to carry it in my heart with faith and love. We would have perished from snakes, like the Jews in the desert, if not for Christ. Act and read calmly, thinking with your heart. Everything that I see is the work of the hands and gifts of my God: to Him alone may I cleave. For you, I left heaven, says the Lord, I exhausted myself, humbled myself to the form of a human being, to a den, to a manger, to circumcision, to baptism, to temptation, to walking, to fatigue, to sleep, to various hardships, to the enduring of human malice, wickedness, abuse or blasphemy, spitting, strangulation, beating, cross and death - but for me you do not want to leave your whims, your evil, depraved will, one's pride, malice, love of money, covetousness, pleasing a blind and unsatisfied belly, nasty fornication, drunkenness, theft, slander, addiction to clothing; I spent my whole life for you in prayers and labors, I laid down my whole life for you, but you, for Me, or especially for yourself, do not want to live according to My saving commandments, spend your time in vain games and amusements. Is your life fun when through it you gain eternal bliss or eternal torment? I want to raise you to heaven and unite you with Me, but instead of Me you have cleaved to the earth and to My enemy the devil, serve him, not Me. So I will send you to the devil and his angels into eternal fire [Matt. 25, 41]. How not to hurt, not to scorch, not to soften with suffering, the tightness of my crafty, cold, insensitive heart: otherwise it will completely harden and petrify. May I surrender my entire life to the faithful creator of the salvation of my soul, Christ God, with all its misfortunes, temptations and sorrows! What kind of love does a bishop, priest and deacon need for God and their neighbors in order to pray for the entire heritage of Christ, for the entire Church: for the emperor and his house, for the Synod, the entire priesthood, the army, for all Orthodox Christians, for the whole world. What a great soul is needed, alien to any attachment to earthly things, what sublimity of the spirit! And after this, should we cleave to earthly things! The Kingdom of Heaven is a gift of God's love and mercy - I must earn it through the gifts of mercy towards my neighbor. Morning of November 22nd. Sunday, six o'clock. Glory to the power of Your Cross and Your omnipresence, Lord! When I woke up, I felt that there was no peace in my bones because of my sins [Ps. 37:4], there was some kind of aching and sorrow in my sides, but I just crossed one side and the other with my hand, saying the words: your faith will save you: go in peace [Mk. 5:34], - and immediately my sorrow disappeared, as the Lord took it away with His hand, for truly the cross is His hand, and I felt a deep, sweet peace in my soul. Glory to Thee, Lord, glory to Thee. I thank You, Lord, for You have granted me to cover my pride and ask Father Matthew and my brother (and Father Paul the Archpriest) for blessings in the church and from Your people for forgiveness. I thank You, Lady, my most swift Intercessor: I prayed to You in my heart and bowed to Your local image, and You saved me from embarrassment and stumbling in the service and, after the storm and demonic confusion, established Divine silence in my heart throughout Matins. I thank You, Lord, for you have granted me to trample my pride and call a poor woman a mother without guile and bless her [simply], like others. Thank You for the certainty and quickness of the heart against the quickness and malice and doubt of the demons. Confirm, O God, this which you have done in me. Today I served the Liturgy, by the grace of God, without stumbling with my heart and lips, with loudness, and received Holy Communion with boldness. But after the funeral service, standing before the life-giving Mysteries, I regretted the brotherly money for the cab, which the deacon took. And after that, heaviness, sorrow, darkness, and crampedness overwhelmed me. How painful it was for me to part with the peace of God that ruled in me after communion of the Holy Mysteries! But I did not despair and asked the Lord to take away from me the disease of love of money and to return to me again His peace and His truth, and soon I felt as if some scales had fallen off from my insides, and I felt so peaceful and at ease. I thank the Lord for this. I spent the whole day with this world. When you feel the attraction of your heart to anger towards your brother, then immediately turn with a heartfelt prayer to the Savior like this: Lord! Grant me to love my brother as myself: behold, without You I cannot do anything. There is nothing worse than anger: it is hell on earth. Never drink more than three glasses of liquid, or even less: two and one. Do not be defeated by evil - from your brother’s pride or malice, imaginary or real, but overcome evil with good [Rom. 12, 21]. Love your enemies... [Matt. 5, 44]. Other people, to which I belong, despise those people, are embittered at those who have small talents and, however, seek to be known in the world on a par with great figures or at least less than them - meanwhile, having perhaps better talents, due to their inactivity and entertainment or multi-passion, they do nothing. Why become embittered and despise your neighbor, especially your high father, for his weakness? We have different gifts by the grace of God: one, for example, composes well, writes freely, sublimely, smoothly, harmoniously, and the other - not freely, with difficulty, because he has lesser talents; but maybe he leads a good life. Judge no one before the time, until the day dawns (1 Cor. 4:5). Oh, evil heart! He despises those who write badly or weakly, that is, those who compose, and often envy good writers. O ugly, beliar heart! The main thing is our life, zeal for good! Consider every sin as a dream of the devil, as the stench of the devil, and do not allow any sin to nest in your heart, and when you see it clearly in others, then pray to God that God will enlighten the mental eyes of their hearts and cleanse their sins and give them the strength not to sin. But the devil often slanders people and accuses them of sins that do not exist in them. But from his heavy foot in the heart one can recognize his intrigues. God! Teach me to revere the works of Your hands, especially Your image, man! God! I revere the work of Your hands - man! God! He is all Yours. God! May I be all Yours. God! May they all be Yours. God! May I not belong to the devil in even a single thought! Until now I have preached according to a ready-made image. Now I will talk with my speech [...]. To believe in God means to see Him always before you, to call on Him, to trust in Him, to love Him, to feel in prayer that He is with you, to see and hear that He is with you in all your affairs, to believe in every word of God’s Church as in Him Himself, as if He Himself stands and teaches. Show the essence of the Christian Orthodox faith, what it requires, how Christians should live, how they should be right in faith and in life. How to exercise faith daily in life, faith in the Trinity, faith in the merits of the Savior, in the intercession, merits and power of the Mother of God, the saints. To teach catechetical teaching is closer to the point, to nature. I thank You, Lord, that You have granted me to [overcome] the storm of demons when assigning conversations to me and to overcome reluctance and aversion to necessary and soul-saving work and anger towards my brother. Oh, sinful flesh! I wish I could eat and drink everything. Grant me, Lord, a saving thirst, a zeal to speak Your word to Your people and offer them everything with which You have enriched me as the wealth of Your light, Your mercy, Your strength, Your unsleeping Providence, Your truth. About the thorns of sin and the ease of inner virtue, about the ugliness of sin and the naturalness of virtue. About the simplicity of God, about the simplicity of soul and virtue; about the simplicity of the devil and all sin: sin enters the soul in an instant. We must please God one and all, but the majority think little about this; many don't think at all. Life is all opposed to God, in a pagan way, and they think that they live well, in a Christian way. Expose life: they are concerned with ranks and distinctions, they spend time playing cards, in eating and drinking and delicacies, in smoking tobacco, in theatrical acting and watching the play, in collecting money, in buying, selling, building houses and furnishing rooms, in taking portraits. In order to please Christ, one must resist the devil (without this it is impossible), the customs of the age or the world, and one’s own flesh. The ideas of the sermon have its main sections, sides, parts. Otherwise, an incompetent, inexperienced preacher often wanders as if in an impenetrable forest, confused in the multitude of his thoughts, and does not find the road to the outcome. Why? Because I didn’t lay out the mental paths—the sections of the sermon—I didn’t create a plan in my head. An essay is a mental home. But before building a house, a house plan is made and then laid out with bricks or logs according to the plan. How well the work is going according to plan! How stupid and difficult it is without a plan! General thoughts, from which excellent sections could be composed, are placed by an inexperienced preacher as private thoughts, without explanation, between other general or particular thoughts. To pave a new, lively, simple, short path for conversation. To begin with: [here] we are called Christians, what responsibilities this name imposes on us. Clarify the idea and duties of a Christian. Explain the Creed briefly in two or three conversations. You will not hear about pleasing God and saving your soul in the world, because the adulterous and sinful world does not like to talk about it. Let us deal with this matter here, which is most necessary, and listen with great attention to the word about it. How to please God? For example, an unclean, prodigal, blasphemous thought approaches and invades your soul - cut it off, tear it out, do not allow it to nest in your heart. And you will please God. For an unrighteous thought is an abomination to the Lord. Stinginess invades, pity for your neighbor's earthly blessings - do not allow it to become the mistress of your heart, and you will please God: give out alms generously, if you can, treat strangers and guests. Laziness in prayer, in social work, wants to take over your heart - do not let it take over you, raise yourself to action, and you will please God. It is necessary to please God. We obey physical laws willingly and without thinking: we want to eat - and we eat, to drink - and we drink, to sleep - and we sleep. Why don’t we submit to the spiritual with the same willingness, without reflection, with complete trust in the Lawgiver, namely: why don’t we love God with all our hearts and our neighbor as ourselves, while we know that this is life-giving, just as eating and drinking is life-giving for the body? The absurdity and destruction of our passions for soul and body. If you love only yourself biasedly, then you cannot love God and your neighbor; you must love yourself in God and your neighbor, for God and your neighbor: you are a member of the body - you must love the whole body, not just one member, just as God extends His love and providence to all creatures. The word Christian presupposes, firstly, living faith in our Lord Jesus Christ, the Head of the Church, in God the Father and the Holy Spirit, prayer, as a conversation between children and their father; secondly, the desire to please Him in everything, as the Lord, who redeemed us with His blood from eternal death, from slavery to sin and the devil, or complete obedience to Him, that is, the fulfillment of His commandments; thirdly, our struggle against carnal passions, the adulterous and sinful world (so that we would no longer be slaves to sin [Rom. 6:6]) and the devil, the prince of this world; fourthly, the search for the Heavenly Fatherland, to which we are called and for which we have been redeemed: set your mind on things above... where is Christ [Col. 3, 2, 1 ]; expectation from heaven of our Lord Jesus Christ and impartiality to earthly life, to one’s flesh and to all the sweets and treasures of this world. A Christian is a member of Christ: he must have the spirit of Christ, the meekness and quietness of Christ, the gentleness of Christ; to bear the cross of Christ, the cross of sorrows, [crucifixion] of one’s flesh, deprivation, persecution; to be renewed in spirit, to strive for things above, not to cling to earthly things, to wait for Christ, to look forward to the resurrection of the dead, Judgment and reward, eternal life. To believe in Christ, to trust in Christ as God and the Almighty Savior, to love Him more than everyone and everything, to obey Him, to keep His commandments, to betray one’s life to Him, to save one’s soul in every possible way - this is the first desire of our Savior and our most important task. For this, the Son of God became incarnate, wandered, taught, worked miracles, prophesied, suffered, died and rose again, and ascended into heaven. We are called Orthodox Christians. What does it mean? What does Orthodox mean? What does Christian mean? – A member of Christ who [carries] Christ in his heart. This means that we rightly believe and trust, we live in a Christian way, according to Christ’s commandments. But how many of you not only do not live like Christians, but also do not know your Christian faith and Christian hope! Therefore, by the grace of God, I will first teach you what the Orthodox Christian faith and our Christian hope consist of, and then we will talk with you about our Christian responsibilities. For with the title of a Christian there are very important and indispensable duties that must be fulfilled by everyone. A Christian is one who prepares for eternal union with God. In conversations, look at the teaching of faith and morality as a new teaching for you and the people, with all liveliness. Incorporate conversations into practice. For example, when explaining the third member, 74 one can point to the icons of the Lady in the church and at home with the image of the Eternal Child. Show the dignity of human nature; how to value yourself, in what purity and holiness to live. People from a low state, accepted into a noble society, try to behave worthy of this society, show nobility in all their actions and are afraid to stain themselves with even one dishonorable deed. How should Christians behave when accepted into communion and union with the Son of God Himself and the entire Holy Trinity, with the Most Pure Mother of God, with the Angels and all the saints? How, how? Truly heavenly: heavenly morals must show spirituality, holiness, love, meekness, humility, kindness and obedience, hard work, patience, courage and other virtues. Before the face of God, before the Mother of God, before the Angels, the saints, walk as if you saw them with your own eyes, with reverence, love, meekness and humility. Having the priceless, should I treasure the worthless? Having the eternal, should I value the temporary; having heavenly things - earthly ones? Having the priceless Christ, God Himself, for what should I consider all the corruptible blessings of the world? Is it not for pus, is it not for rubbish? - So. What am I doing? Madman, I act contrary to common sense, contrary to my own good. I infinitely value the insignificant and despise the priceless; I value the temporary and do not value the eternal; I value earthly things and despise heavenly things; Considering as great the blessings of the corruptible world, I - it’s scary to say - neglect the King of Glory, my Creator and Lord; I constantly break His commandments, I drive Him out of my heart through addiction to earthly pleasures. Why would you want to go to those who reject you, do not love you, and for whom, for the sake of their pride, you yourself do not feel a cordial disposition? And are you really worthy of being with them? Do you have the wedding garment—heartfelt love for them? If not, then why be there: it will only be a burden to yourself and the wedding guests. Tell me, would you be indignant if the Lord God did not invite you to His supper, if He closed His Heavenly palace for you? - Of course not: you would consider yourself unworthy of this palace, for the Heavenly Father is all-good and righteous. So it is here: your brother did not invite you to the wedding feast - consider yourself unworthy to be at it. The words of the Church are the words of the Spirit of truth, which is why they enliven, enlighten and purify the soul. During war, are soldiers interested in fun, games, or delicacies? This present life is in its proper and primary sense a war with the principalities and powers and the rulers of the darkness of this world, with the spirits of wickedness in high places [Eph. 6, 12]. So, are we interested in theaters, or card games, or delicacies? Is it fun with houses, furniture, rich clothes, delicacies, money, books and other things? Oh, truly there is no time for fun, otherwise the enemies will easily, easily take us prisoner. Look, man, what is your axis on which the chariot of your being, that is, your heart, rotates? Throw away everything that prevents her from moving freely, that is, all addictions to earthly things: addiction to food, drink, money, amusements, etc. Dream. Evgeny Bogorodsky; gun; how he drilled it into the wall, hung near it and started spinning: spun, spun, spun and broke it. And Anna Konstantinovna looks and laughs. So we watch and almost laugh as the devil drills into our hearts and breaks our heart axis. Polyeating leads to relaxation of body and soul; it produces melancholy, despondency, unclean movements in the heart, and gives the devil an easy victory over us. A true Christian has many sorrows, because he is a warrior, because he is in constant war with the flesh, the world and the devil; oh how much his flesh is hurt, which he tries to crucify, how it is raging with passions that he wants to pluck from it! How the world is arming itself against him with its temptations, its deceit, ridicule, contempt, persecution! How especially the devil arms himself against him with his minions 75 - the spirits of evil, how many fiery arrows he shoots into his heart! Now the devil strikes our souls with guile, doubt, coldness and pretense when serving God and in everyday life, now with some kind of cowardly fear, despondency and despair, now with some kind of frivolous relaxation and laughter - but all these are dreams, trifles, water bubbles, ghosts. A voluptuous addiction to the flesh and to the sweets of food and drink, as well as to money, is the work of one complainer - the tempter of the devil. In order not to have an unclean addiction to the flesh, we must arm ourselves with fasting, we must reject sweets and overeating. You yourself don’t invite someone to visit - it’s nothing, in your opinion, it should be so, and when you are not invited, you are offended: why, you say, was I not invited when others were invited, because I am a comrade or an acquaintance like others? But look, my friend, impartially at your relationship to the person who did not invite you to his family celebration: what kind of heart are you towards him, are you sincerely disposed towards him, do you not have disgust for him or at least coldness, which you may have often noticed, did you wish him harm, did you show contempt, did you say rudeness, annoying reproaches? Was he stingy with him? If so, then there is no point in complaining about why you were not invited. When you measure according to measure, it will be measured to you [Matt. 7, 2]. Add to this his other [genus], condition and title, upbringing or education, another character that does not agree with yours, and other circumstances, and willingly excuse your brother, without losing your love and affection for him because of these little things in life. Remember that love covers everything, is not irritated and does not think evil (1 Cor. 13: 4 - 7). You willingly excuse yourself for mistakes against your neighbors—excuse your neighbor’s mistakes against you, don’t count any grievances, don’t offend yourself by remembering grievances. Remember the great words of the Savior: we forgive our debtors [Matt. 6, 12], - and fulfill them. Remember how much without number God in Christ has forgiven and forgives you. Forgive one another, just as God in Christ forgave you [Eph. 4, 32]. Remember that as you treat people, so will people treat you: according to what measure... [Matt. 7, 2]. Therefore, how you want people to treat you, be the same way towards them. As you want them to do to you... [Matt. 7, 12]. When you show affection and generosity to others, you show it more to yourself than to them. Force yourself to be kind to your neighbor in every way. If you yourself are cold towards others, do not be offended if others are cold towards you. People are not blind, they immediately comprehend your heartfelt disposition or disposition with their inner instinct. Fornication, malice, impatience, irritability of the flesh, envy, love of money, stinginess, addiction to food, greed, laziness, darkness (dullness), despondency and cowardice, fire, oppression, murmuring, insolence, blasphemy, deceit and double-mindedness, doubt, unbelief, coldness and insensibility of one’s sins or the mercies of God, the glory of God, lies, deception, theft and so on or the like are like birds of a feather: everything comes from the devil. Lord, have mercy! Sleepy dreams, sleepy dreams are all the devil’s machinations, that is, they have no reality and truth, but one dream of a fallen spirit or fallen spirits, alien to all truth, who in their darkness are busy with only dreams, pathetic ghosts and seduce people who are still inexperienced in spiritual warfare. What is weaker than an evil spirit for a strong Christian believer? Nothing, for the devil, strictly speaking, is nothing, like a complete lie, a dreamy force; and our Lord, our Head, our God is truth, power, life, holiness and purification. I eat a lot myself, and greedily - nothing; another eats the same with me - it’s a disaster: I look at him with hostility, contempt: why do you eat so much, why are you such a carnal person. Oh, damned me! But when will I change my heart! When will I no longer have the evil eye? How long will I see a knot in my brother's eye, but not see a log in myself? Remember that the brother whom you do not love and whom you hate for some sins or in vain is loved by God, the Lover of Mankind, and that Christ died for him, so that he stands or falls to his Lord [Rom. 14, 4]. Do not condemn him and do not admire God’s judgment for yourself. Remember that both you and your neighbor always have with you an evil, inexorable enemy - your flesh, fiercely enraged by passions 76 and just as you wish to have leniency towards you when internal dishonor and reproach of the passions come upon you, when, like a captive, they drag you into their shameful captivity, so have, certainly have leniency towards your brother, your sister and not get annoyed with them. We are all often in captivity and darkness and great inner malice and dishonor. If the Lord had not been patient about our own sins, we would not have been on the face of the earth long ago, we would have been in hell long ago. How my wife, my God-given lifelong friend, always loves, appreciates, respects and caresses me! Do I really love, respect, caress her? There is so much vanity in the flesh, self-indulgence in one’s external merits, one’s face, hands, while the inner is lost sight of, there is no zeal for virtue, for the inner beauty of the soul. I must have self-confidence, firmness, courage in judgment! How many infirmities I have! Save! Give me a helping hand! God Himself worked for us, showing us an example of life, an example of abstinence, fasting, meekness, gentleness - how should we value this? What will happen to us if we neglect Christian living? For inattention to the affairs of the Lord? All sweets, beautiful clothes, housing, money, things made of gold and silver and precious stones and wood are rubbish and thorns: they are the same earth and dust and, in addition, they butt the soul that clings to them. Look at the end of all things for what they are, and do not use anything except what is necessary. How much insincerity and hypocrisy we have in our very condemnation of sin! We condemn in words, but in our hearts we sympathize with sin, we extend our hand to it, so to speak. For example, I condemn luxury - and I sympathize, I am surprised at luxury, I admire it. I condemn gluttony - and I myself willingly please the stomach, I am captivated by delicious dishes and drinks. But about all this, if I don’t repent, God will bring me to judgment. I do not offer sincere repentance, with correction of heart and life, to my Creator, I do not become like Him, I do not please Him by strictly fulfilling His commandments. What answer will I give Him? I repent of gluttony, but not sincerely, because afterwards I again willingly please my stomach. I repent of intemperance, but afterwards I again eat and drink beyond my needs. There is an old man in me, and in my neighbor there is the same old man - condescension, forgiveness of mistakes. Our old man is a great rapist, a darker, and even untouchable. The celestial Angels are amazed at our audacity and say: they drink the Blood of their God and ours, and what are they doing? They indulge in carnal affairs: hatred, pride, envy, stinginess, love of money, gluttony, food hopes, passion for clothing. The infidels, seeing our carnal life, are surprised at us and say: here they believe, according to them, in Christ, the Son of God, Who bequeathed to them the Kingdom of Heaven, filled with spiritual blessings, and not to cleave to anything on earth, not to love the world and what is in the world - but what are they doing? They love the world more than we do, they drown in the pleasures of the world, in luxury, in gluttony, more than we do. He bequeathed them to love each other, and who has more envy, hatred, pride, if not Christians? To despise not only sweets, money, clothes, housing, but also to oppress, exhaust, trample the flesh itself, but to love your neighbor and not for a moment [to] hate for anything. Hatred is the madness of madness, the absurdity of absurdities. Be afraid of satiety, lest you corrupt your heart and lest it depart from God: any excess leads to a departure from God and weakens the soul and body. This is in food, and in clothing, and in housing. Woe to the saturated: they will hunger [Lk. 6, 25]. If you are a single person and do not have a lot of mechanical work that exhausts your strength, then you need very little food, and you remember this and be content with a small amount of it every day. God forbid you from turning food into pleasure and making it the desired object of your heart. Look at food, and even at the body itself, as sand and clay, and at all sweets as simple earthly mucus. Let all your attention be directed to your faith, to the future blessings that lie in the hope of a Christian. Man was created in the image and likeness of God and adorned with every gift from God. Therefore, every person must be honored and his weaknesses must be tolerated. The world was brought into existence from nothing by God and exists by Him; so I too am brought into being from nothing and exist by God, like the world, and not by food, not by drink, not by money, not by anything else, for all this is God-given and given means for my bodily life. Man is the image and likeness of God, but the devil, in defiance of the Creator, wants to make man his own image and likeness through various passions. Portrait of the king. Moral teaching. You are living portraits of the King of kings - God. Overeating and delicacy relax the soul and body, producing melancholy, despondency, cowardice, and spiritual impotence in the soul. Insane overeating and delicacy, that is, constant gluttony. Sorrows awaken us from sinful sleep and awaken our dormant faith, hope and love and, in addition, cleanse the soul from sins, for the mourner sincerely repents of his sins, prays, and sometimes cries. If opposite phenomena occur from sorrows, then this already occurs from the evil heart of a person. Remember, every person, that your nature is corrupted by sin, unclean, vile, alien to God - the source of life, subject to unceasing death, and that it is renewed and renewed by our Divine Savior Lord Jesus Christ through the holy Sacraments of the Church, through divine services and teachings and church administrations. The duty of every Christian is to take care of putting aside everything old, sinful in his nature, namely, passions and lusts of many different kinds, and of renewing himself, his heart in the image of Christ or in the image of the apostles, saints, martyrs, saints and other saints. This should not be forgotten. Otherwise, a Christian can soon become a pagan in his life, as is the case. It’s time for us to rise from sleep [Rom. 13, 11]. From what dishonor, the shame of sin, hidden within us, do You deliver us tuna, 77 sweetest Jesus, and cover our shame with Your most pure, most radiant spiritual robe, the robe of Your righteousness! What the highest nobility You give to all of us! Now we have no one low and dishonest except voluntary sinners, there is nothing low and dishonest except sin. Oh, how good You are, Almighty Jesus! We must show what the greatest, priceless treasure is our Christian faith, which we do not know how to use for our eternal good; what great benefits, surpassing all understanding, can be derived from it by man. All the good is ecu, my neighbor, and there is no blemish in you [Russian: You are all beautiful, my beloved, and there is no spot on you!] [Song. 4, 7]. This is about Our Lady and the Church. The Lady is adorned with Divine beauties; The Church, that is, the society of chosen saints, also. All good ecu, my neighbor, - this is said about both divine services and the Sacraments of the Church; all prayers, rites are good and immaculate, the entire content of prayers and services in general is the breath of the Divine Spirit. It is impossible, you say, to defeat sin - it is not true, it is possible: only we do not have the desire, the determination to enter into a decisive struggle with it; we are sorry to part with it, we spare and caress sin like a dear child, and that is why it always overpowers us. The Word of God assures us that all things are possible to him who believes [Mk. 9, 23]. If we cannot overcome sin with the help of God’s grace, then it means that we are unbelievers or [little faith]. But what kind of Christian is he who does not enter into a decisive struggle with sin? A Christian is an avowed enemy of sin and a friend of virtue. Having cleansed the heart with prayers and the Sacraments, one must not remain inactive for the future, but must certainly watch over one’s heart and, since it will often be defiled willy-nilly, through weakness, inattention, addiction to earthly things and persons, then adhere to unceasing prayer, repentance and abstinence. This is the duty of a Christian]. As soon as you fall, arise. The purpose of your earthly life and all God’s gifts to you is preparation for eternity, your turning to God and correction. Every day God waits for you to come to Himself. I am the earth. But to me, an earthling, the Artist - the Word of God - gave me a beautiful, artistic form, like an amazing plant. Glory to the divine beauty of my members. Glory to the Artist Word! Word! Keep all my members sacred, especially my heart. Single people or married people who are jealous of a chaste life should leave off sweets or use them as little as possible to avoid carnal impurity or voluptuousness and especially night dreams. Otherwise, we ourselves will arouse the fire of voluptuousness within ourselves. Give sweets to married people and children of early age. But they should also know when to stop. The works of God: the branch of God and the cup of God; revere the works of the hands of the Creator; say: For Thy works are magnified, O Lord: with wisdom I have done all things [Ps. 103, 24 ]! The whole person is God’s most beautiful work, a wonderfully artistic thing, holy, since 78 the image of God, living, immortal in spirit, rationally free. And the word is a simple spiritual thing - an image of the simple Hypostatic Word; we must value it, we must be truthful in the word, we must revere the word. The word is truth, deed, being. The Word is the seed of the world, the seed of all beings, the basis of all beings. Speech and bysha [Ps. 32, 9]. I despise all carnal laws, that is, the laws of the old man, as stupid, not worth any attention, for example, pity for sweets and enmity against one’s neighbor because of sweets and others; I count everything on earth as rubbish and ashes, just as everything becomes rubbish and ashes after a short time; and my very flesh, nourished and fattened by varied food and drink, will in a short time become a litter worse than any litter. I want to work for the Lord, and not for the adulterous flesh, with whom hitherto I have mostly worked and reaped the bitter fruits of death. O flesh, unclean and foul net of Belial! I do not condemn God’s beautiful creation, but the uncleanness and abominations that live in the flesh and flow from the flesh, but Belial, who lives, speaks and acts in it, having dissolved with my flesh. Oh, how vain, empty and insignificant are all carnal thoughts! And the truth of God, the truth of the Gospel and the Church is a living and life-giving reality, it is our heart, our life, our peace, our joy. The Lord God is all in all, all is His manifold grace, and we are nothing. We firmly remember a promise made to some rich or noble person and try to fulfill it at the first opportunity; How much more must we remember the vows to our Lord Jesus Christ given at baptism, and urgently fulfill them: after all, He is our Lord. And we must fulfill our vows for our own good. What causes the carnal life of Christians? – From forgetting vows and not keeping the vows given at baptism. Oh, that we all remembered our vows! Oh, if only they cared to fulfill them! This is all (earthly) - rubbish, smoke; but here is the infinite importance of the matter: faith, hope and love, or the atonement of Christ, or His incarnation, teaching, prophecies, miracles, suffering, death, resurrection and ascension into heaven and the second coming. When you walk in uprightness, you also stand in breadth. Our heart is like a barometer. Ah, the important thing is the heart! Out of satiety with earthly blessings, do not throw them away, but use them with gratitude and a spirit of meekness, otherwise the generous Giver will deprive you of them, and then you will be glad to use them with gratitude, but it will be too late. Appreciate all the gifts of God that are with you, great and small, and do not neglect anything, but do not become attached to anything. What have all the sweets and greed for them and, in general, the extensive nourishment of my flesh served me so far? All this empty work, this greed for sweets and extensive nutrition was the greatest disaster for my soul; How cowardly, timid, gloomy, constrained, and dishonest I was because of my greed! Daily bread strengthens the body, and a little too much bread or an unnecessary delicacy - then food turns into relaxation of the soul and body. But during prayer, food becomes no good - one must resort to the only God. He alone strengthens. There is no one and nothing to help the poor, even in the villages. Why? - From luxury. Do you hear? And luxury [started] in the villages. Paint Avtonom Leopardov, write on him the features of social life, careless, absurd. When we need to show mutual love commanded by the Savior, then the enemy of peace and love usually tries to divide us through the passions operating in us: anger, pride, contempt, deceit, suspicion and distrust, and we do not fulfill the commandment of our Savior, but the will of the common enemy. But why do you look, man, at the speck in your brother’s eye, but don’t feel the beam in your own eye? [ OK. 6, 41]. Why do you dream about your brother that he is money-loving, stingy, proud, pompous, crafty, vain, and you yourself harbor envy, contempt and ill will toward him? Why do you forget the commandment of the Savior: love one another [Jn. 13, 34; 15, 12, 17 ]? Why do you forget that your brother is the image of God, a member of Christ, washed and washed by the Blood of Christ, a child of God, the heir of God, the heir of the Kingdom of Heaven, and you listen to the dreams of your evil heart: he is so-and-so, and you almost consider him a devil, almost worse than dirt? Humble your proud heart and admit that you are the most vile of sinners; know, condemn yourself and constantly repent of your sins, for everyone will bear his own burden [Gal. 6, 5], and leave your brother to the judgment of God; let God act in him according to His discretion and will, as He acts in you, let Him work out his salvation, and you work out your own salvation with fear and trembling and do not put a stumbling block or temptation to your brother. We waste all our precious time on condemnation and gossip and dislike of our neighbors, on entertainment, attachment to earthly things, in a word - on living outside ourselves, whereas we should be carefully engaged in correcting our insides, our hearts. Flattering chatter, compliments go on for hours, but not half an hour is devoted to the word of God, nor to attending divine services. He who loves his neighbor as himself does not humiliate himself before him, does not servile him, no matter how tall, or noble and noble, or rich, or gifted he may be, because he sees in him another self, destined by God for another, well-known service in society. He who loves the image of God in himself and in his neighbor will not indulge in other people’s vices: caresses, idleness, absent-mindedness, pride, envy, malice, drunkenness, debauchery, theft or other vices, but will carefully expose them and, if possible, correct them. He who respects the Christian in himself and in others will not allow the anti-Christian trend to dominate in himself or others in life, in literature, in customs, but will zealously denounce the anti-Christian trend of the spirit of the time, namely: absent-mindedness, running after pleasures, and others. More humane! I thank You, for You have had mercy on me again! In prayer and outside of it, always remember that the Lord is one and the same and never changes, is always holy, most good, most generous, wise and always with the same love and kindness listens to our prayers and vigilantly looks down on us from the heights of the heavens of centuries; only we are changeable and fickle: now faithful to Him, now unfaithful, now good, now evil, now grateful, now murmuring, now generous and cheerful and joyful, now cowardly, sad, gloomy and sad, now pure by the grace of God, now stinking sinners, now grateful, now ungrateful, now cold, now hot, now material-loving, now lovers of God, then they are more self-loving than God-loving. We must willingly replace our brother when he asks us to do so, either in case of illness, or because dear guests have arrived at his place, or because he needs to go somewhere on business or to receive some benefit. We must wish him every good, every direct benefit, as well as ourselves, and bear his burden as if it were our own, as if it were not my brother, but I who had to bear it, as if he did not exist at all. Remember that we are one body - a body of love. Don't give room to hostility. Having God always before you, even alone, and in front of people, do not dare to have a nasty, or evil, or evil, or envious, or blasphemous thought, do not dare to turn a sidelong or malicious and angry glance at anyone, have an arrogant and angry and vindictive heart towards anyone, but with everyone and to everyone, be simple, meek, humble, good and kind, affectionate and condescending. I love the Lady as a shrine, as a good force, as light, as a breath of light and truth. A person with an unkind and evil heart often attributes a suspicious, evil, envious, stingy, proud and disdainful meaning to the ordinary, simple words and actions of other people, especially his colleagues, and thus touches his own heart and irritates others for nothing when he expresses his heartfelt, suspicious thoughts to others. We must correct our hearts with the help of God and look at everything simply, try not to notice the evil itself, which from this itself will pass without consequences and, as it were, freeze, for evil is mostly strengthened by the fact that we ourselves give [it] meaning, strength, while unnoticed, neglected, it would sometimes pass away. God! Create in me a pure heart... and renew a right spirit in my womb [Ps. 50, 12]. Be kind to one another, compassionate, forgiving one another, just as God in Christ forgave you [Eph. 4, 32]. The servant of the Lord should not take care of money, not about money, but about the church of his heart, so that earthly love and hope in earthly things do not creep into it and drive out love for the Lord and hope in Him; the heart is mental heaven, the church of the Divine: nothing earthly should live in it, no attachment to earthly things, much less anything bad or sinful. A great thing is the inner, spiritual church, that is, the heart: from it are the sources of life, therefore guard your heart above all else [Prov. 4, 23]. But another person stands in prayer in church or at home and thinks with passion and anxiety about the preservation of his corruptible treasures, but his spiritual, heavenly treasure - his heart - has long been plundered by enemies: and he did not help that treasure with his thoughts, worries, and lost it. This is how we are robbed by our greed for earthly things, our addiction to the blessings of the earth, which cannot give life to the heart; So, foolish and blind, we leave the source of living waters - the Lord, with Whom there is joy and peace with the least, and without Whom there is no joy and peace for the soul, even if we have the greatest wealth. The soul is simple, like spirit, and it needs living water - the Lord; she is not there - and she is restless, she is not alive. And everything else, that is, material things, is given from the Lord. Everything is the Lord, just as everything is Lord for the world, as everything is Lord for animals, for their souls and bodies. Oh, how our addiction to worldly pleasures brings us down in the eyes of others and our own! What indecent rubbish they turn out to be then, unable to give in the least bit of life and peace to the heart and throwing away bodily life itself, for when the soul has fallen, the heart has died, then the body falls, and the body is weak, sluggish, trembling, as we see very often. Oh, how necessary (and everyday prudence demands) to be above all earthly passions! How necessary it is to be generous without regret to others! We must remember the measure of good; I will be woven and shaken and overflowing [Russian: shaken down, pressed and overflowing] [Lk. 6, 38]. We must remember that God is the Father of bounties and all sweets, and His gifts are for everyone: we are the sheep of His pasture and the sheep of His hand [Ps. 99, 3]. The earth is the Lord's, and its fulfillment [Ps. 23, 1]. We brought nothing into the world; It is clear that we cannot take anything out of it (1 Tim. 6:7). All excesses must be cut off and all sweets must be counted as nothing, as not being a necessary part of life. Oh, accursed me: I respond to the love of the poor with heartfelt malice, to their respect with contempt, to their cordiality with heartlessness, to their affection with rudeness, to their grinning 79 with sullenness. Why are you in a hurry to get rid of them, to teach them the blessing of God - not yours? Don't you have time to do anything at home or outside? But blessing takes too little time; Yes, even if enough was required due to a sufficient number of beggars, then this time is free for you and you would also spend it in idleness. But, moreover, it is your direct duty to bless others. What kind of priest are you if you don’t teach people God’s blessings, for which you received the right and authority from the bishop? You want to be just a shadow of a priest, and not the priest himself. The words: Your blessing, with which you are called, are they just an empty sound or do they mean business? Oh, how absurd is my heart! But if the rich, the noble, and the good come under blessing, then the heart rejoices, the face grins; If those who previously approached the blessing do not now approach the blessing, then we mourn this as if it were some kind of loss! Oh, hypocrisy, hypocrisy, ambition, madness! Are we not all brothers and sisters, fathers and mothers, noble and humble, rich and poor, simple and educated - aren’t the Lord Jesus Christ ashamed to call all of them brothers, as it is said: I am not ashamed to call them brethren, saying: I will proclaim Your name to My brethren [Heb. 2, 11 – 12 ]? Does not the Lord of hosts call everyone sons and daughters: you will be my sons and daughters, says the Lord Almighty (2 Cor. 6:18)? Doesn’t our faith require us all not to look at faces? Do not have the faith of our Lord Jesus Christ outwardly [Jas. 2, 1]. Rank, distinctions, education, beauty, wealth, nobility of the family - these are all our accidental, temporary differences, and not significant and permanent; in the main thing we are all alike: we are all human, we all have one soul, created in the image and likeness of God, all members of Christ, temples of the Holy Spirit, all members of the body of the Church. So, run away from madness, run away from absurdity, run away from pride, contempt, and malice; crucify your evil and proud heart, this snake, this madness, this darkness; I don’t know you, say, I deny you, I crucify you with all your wisdom. Love simplicity in everything: in food, drink, clothing, housing - then you will not shun the simplicity of the poor. We must rejoice over every embitterment of the flesh, serve our neighbors in some way at every opportunity, despise the peace and bliss of the flesh; Because of the restlessness of the flesh, do not become embittered towards those who ask for our service to them; in general, to cut off our will, our desires (as our own), assumptions and carnal intentions, knowing how sinful our heart is, how corrupt our will is. Walk in simplicity and kindness of heart, treating everyone with respect, kindness, condescension, and peace. Remember the constant treachery of the evil dog of hell over you and your loved ones and beware of it at every moment, so as not to become embittered towards someone, someone to despise, someone to envy, someone to be stingy with, or so as not to fall into gluttony, drunkenness, fornication, insolence, unbelief, despondency, cowardice, embarrassment, vain fear, doubt, lies, deception, love of money and other passions. When meeting people, with their passionate outbursts, one must take into account their natural disposition, received from their parents, 2) the character formed by their upbringing or the environment in which they spent their youth, 3) their natural mentality, 4) the passions that dominate them, 5) the way they view the world and life and mutual relationships or the decency of the world, received at school or in some houses in which they were received as close or only acquaintances. people - and not to blame them strictly for their character, for their tempers, outbursts, techniques, way of speech, but, if possible, cover everything with love, correcting kindly and with meekness what is in them that is contrary to truth, faith and morality and the Christian way of life. When worshiping, preaching the word of God and teaching children, be courageous, exalted, bold, like a trumpet, raise your voice. Do not be afraid of false fear of demons. I thank the Lady Theotokos, who heard me motherly and strengthened me to serve God’s service perfectly. Oh, that it were so for me all the days of my life. Again and again I thank the Most Pure and Most Blessed Mother of God, who ever hears my simple and humble prayer to her and corrects my steps during the divine service, cleansing my heart, enlightening, pacifying, spreading, imbuing and affirming with boldness. In proportion to your sweetness, the bitterness of illness will come to your body. Yet this is constructed by the all-wise and all-good Providence, which arranges the salvation of our souls. The Spirit of truth, the Holy Spirit, breathes in us peacefully, freely, with goodness, purity, light, and the spirit of lies and malice - vaguely, forcibly, with malice, abomination, darkness You will recognize them by their fruits [Matt. 7, 16, 20]. Since man is the image of God, infinitely exalted above everything earthly, not to mention above the material and soulless, but also above animate beings, such as animals, birds, fish, reptiles, insects, reptiles, then everything is subjugated (the whole earth) under his feet, and therefore it would be crazy and impudent if anyone began to spare for a person from the gifts of God something that he needs for his life, for example a guest, a beggar, or a neighbor in general. There is no need to regret anything. On the other hand, since man is the image of God, but he bears the wounds of sins that invisible robbers inflicted and are inflicting on him, then for the sake of precisely the fact that he is the image of God, it is necessary to forgive his sins, forgive these infirmities, the weaknesses of his damaged nature, if he is aware of them, feels and repents; honor is given to the King when His image is treated favorably. Because of mercy... they will receive mercy [Matt. 5, 7]. You, priest, consider everyone equal and do not look at their faces, for all people, all images of God, all members of Christ, temples of the Holy Spirit (and the poor and orphaned even more, as sufferers in this world, which means they must be respected and loved even more); accept everyone in simplicity, without doubt, without guile, without pride and contempt. Do not be averse to lack of education and coarseness of speech, a coarse face, coarse clothing, foul breath, but remember that you yourself are the stench, the very pus, the earth and the ashes, the very stench of passions. See, do not be dual, do not serve the world, that is, the concepts and customs of the world, and Christ, but serve Christ alone. Christ and the world should have been one, for the world was the same, but the world and Christ diverged in different directions long, long ago, and the rules of the world are completely different from the rules of Christ. The rules of the world are the rules of the devil. In the world was not the Son of God, and the world was by Him, and the world did not know Him: He came to its own (to the Jews), and did not receive Him among its own [Jn. 1, 10–11]. So, for example, the worldly business is to despise the poor, honor the rich, respect the noble and educated, and consider the simple and ignorant as nothing. There is satiety with love, satiety with knowledge, food, drink, clothes, money, housing, books, people. Nature itself indicates time to everything, to all natural activities, like the time to eat, drink, sleep, copulate for the propagation of the race - and there is no point in thinking about this, it is sinful, for it will irritate the flesh and delight the sensual and impure heart, distracting it from God. What the time is set for at night should not be thought about during the day. Whatever is true, whatever is honorable... whatever is pure, whatever is lovely... if there is any virtue or praiseworthy, think about these things [Phil. 4, 8]. Oh, womb, womb, oh, my damned flesh! When I want to pray, it draws me to sleep; when I want to be kind and condescending, it attracts me to anger and exactingness; when I want to humble myself, it forces me to be proud - and so on in everything. Will someone reproach you for one sin - and you convict yourself of all sins and say: what sin have I not committed, what evil have I not imagined in my soul? I have committed every sin, I have brought every uncleanness into my soul; it would be indecent for You, my God, and for man, 80 - this will be the truth, this will be unflattering, unhypocritical, unfeigned. How does it happen with us? - someone reproached us for one particular sin, now we are offended as if we did not have it, as if we were perfect in our own way. My Father! if possible, let this cup pass from Me; however, not as I want, but as You want [Matt. 26, 39]. The Savior here teaches us wisdom in suffering, in adversity, illness and sorrow, shows here our human weakness and teaches us submission to the will of God and patience in adversity, sorrow and illness. Having promised something to a strong, rich and noble person or a friend, a respected acquaintance, we remember our promise and try to fulfill it as soon as possible, fearing to fall into some kind of disfavor, disfavor or to lose friendship, his disposition, although nothing will come from non-fulfillment; but we promised to the Lord God at Baptism, we now promise at Repentance - and we forget our vows and do not fulfill them. And when we pray to God, we work with most of our own flesh, for we are in a hurry to pray in order to quickly give rest to the flesh, and we pray carnally, not from the heart, without strength. Cherish every occasion to show love to your neighbor: a guest or guest has come - be glad to see them and talk with them cordially and treat them; a beggar asks for alms - give alms kindly and do not offend him with either a look or a word; If anyone asks for anything, serve them willingly. Do not look at faces and do not be a spectator and a hypocrite; look at everyone with love and respect, in the simplicity of your heart, whether beggar or rich, simple or noble, small or adult, for all, on the one hand, are equally images of God, children of God, members of Christ, purchased by the blood of Christ, all people gifted with a rationally free, immortal soul, on the other hand, all are sinners, all with an unclean heart, all are filthy before By God: noble or ignoble, noble and simple, rich and poor, kings and subjects, superiors and subordinates, warriors and farmers, merchants and townspeople. There is no difference, because all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God [Rom. 3, 22 – 23]. Renewer of our corrupted nature, Lord Jesus! Correct my evil, corrupt heart. Oh, how weak I am, how sinful I am! Money, food, drink, air, light, warmth are the means of life, and the Holy Mysteries, the Body and Blood of Christ, are life itself, and eternal life! Oh, what wealth, what honor, glory! Love your neighbor without a doubt - everyone and in every case. Be obedient to your superior or superior without doubt, bitterness, contradiction and murmuring, willingly, subordinating your will to his will in everything that is not contrary to God, for your will needs the medicine of obedience, as it is corrupt, disobedient, wayward, carnal. She wants to flaunt herself under the pretext of the splendor of worship, without caring about internal decoration: meekness, humility, obedience, abstinence, fasting, chastity and other virtues. Be zealous for obedience, revere this virtue, and be obedient in small things, not only in great things; for example, if they tell you to stand straight or in a different place, stand as they tell you and don’t disobey. Pay attention to your heart, lest you repay anyone inwardly, not only outwardly, evil for evil, glance for glance, word for word, that is, unkind, mockery for mockery, untruth for untruth, persecution for persecution, but be sure to overcome evil with good [Rom. 12:21] and because of the dreams of the devil, do not violate the commandment of God, which says: love your neighbor as yourself [Matt. 19, 19 ]; and all sins are really the dream of the devil, for he is a liar and the father of lies... and there is no truth in him, according to Spasov [John. 8, 44]. It also often happens that we inwardly do not love and hate our brother because of some internal suspicion of evil in him against us: we see something crafty in his eyes, disrespectful in his manners, in his gait, while most of this turns out to be a lie. To avoid this, we must make it a rule: to love our neighbor, despite his sins and weaknesses, for we ourselves are weak, and true love consists in being long-suffering, being merciful and forgiving our brother’s sins and loving our very enemies; to love everyone sincerely, from the heart, so that otherwise the enemy would not be undermined and would not launch his sting of anger, envy, stinginess, pride, contempt and other sins; to love in simplicity, not paying attention to appearances, for example, the fact that he is poor or rich, humble or noble, male or female - these are all appearances that will pass away; we must love in everyone the person, the image of God, the member of Christ, the servant of Christ, purchased at the price of the blood of the Son of God, love his soul. Let no brother’s sins, as the product of demonic daydreaming, turn you away from loving your neighbor, but hate the sins in him, despise him, but love him himself, pray for him, instruct him, [comfort] him, for sins are a dream, but man, and the image of God, is the truth; Only a person who is a heretic should deny the first and second punishment [Tit. 3, 10]. Do not dare to despise not only your father or mother, but also every person for any sin, for every sinner must be pitied and prayed for, as Christian love requires, and not add evil to evil, not, so to speak, plunge a person into great trouble. And to avoid this, you must diligently consider your sins, especially internal ones: vision and consciousness of your extreme uncleanness and poverty will not allow you to condemn your neighbor and be disgusted by the sins of others. You will hate yourself, but you will forgive your brother or pray for him. What if the Lord acted with us as we act with our neighbors, if He punished us according to His truth for every sin? Long ago we would have been in eternal fire and in the most severe torment. But He is patient with us and has mercy on us, sparing us with fatherly love. Why do we get irritated with our neighbor? Because we don’t respect him as we should, we don’t love him as we love ourselves. Those whom we respect and love, we willingly and joyfully forgive everything or try not to notice their mistakes. A sure sign of disrespect for your neighbor is irritability towards him. But who is the neighbor? - Image of God. I am sinful by looking at the poor and the rich, the beautiful and the ugly, the noble and the ignorant, the familiar and the unfamiliar, while the priest must be equal to everyone, like a servant of God who has no sight on his face. Sinful with impatience, irritability, embitterment, embarrassment, despondency. The heart is an angry, capricious child. Do not pay attention to him, to his whims, quirks. I am guilty of laziness and sleepiness during prayer. Don’t greedily and mercilessly feast on other people’s goods, other people’s bread and salt, tea and sugar, and don’t say to yourself: now I’ve reached the point of giving, now I’ll eat and drink, because he also eats and drinks from me. Believe me, soon you yourself will call this carnal prudence and greed madness, you will see for yourself that these are the snares of the flesh and the devil, through which he draws you into intemperance; You will see for yourself that eating and drinking a lot, especially from someone else, is not gain for a person. Be constantly self-controlled and do not betray your virtue, which, however, you do not have; do not be satiated with other people's food and drinks, for all this is delightful; be content with your daily bread and stew. Remember also that with the measure you use, it will be measured to you [Matt. 7, 2]: you yourself do not spare someone else’s goods, and they will not spare yours, but with your own hand you will have to give to another as much and more than what you took from your neighbor, so that you will soon learn for yourself how bad it is to widen your mouth and belly for someone else’s goods. What you do not wish for yourself, do not wish for another; If you want this and that not to be done to you, don’t do it to others. Traveling with guests is a disaster for the soul and body: you just eat and drink. Glory to Your prayer, Lord: how it enlivens, calms, cheers, strengthens, facilitates, enlightens! And food and drink, taken even a little beyond measure, burden, darken, and plunge you into despondency! Do not arrogantly reject the affection of a neighbor who has offended you, but rejoice in it: it means that he is aware of the insult he has inflicted on you, repents of his action and ingratiates himself with your favor. Don’t break over him - this is the devil’s breaking. The Lord is in the brother: rejoice, treating your brother; rejoice, giving alms to your brother. A brother is the image of God, a brother is a member of Christ, a temple of the Holy Spirit. And the Lamb of God, who suffered, died and rose again for us all, will take upon Himself his sins. You do not judge him - there is only one Judge who can save and destroy. Know your sins, and love your neighbor as yourself, in all cases and circumstances of life. A strange, absurd phenomenon: at others I treat myself generously, with pleasure - when my brother treats himself generously, he feels sorry for the sweets. Enlighten, Lord, correct, Lord! Establish, Lord! Life, and strength, and sweetness, and other properties contained in bread, vegetables, fruits, wine, oils, are the life and strength of God, that is, communicated by God to revive and strengthen our bodies and the souls connected to them. But this life is spontaneous, rough, secondary, transitory. And the main life and strength of our souls and bodies lies in the communion of the Holy Mysteries, in prayers, in reading the word of God and the writings of the holy fathers, and most of all - in love for God and neighbor. They still remember me! Thank you, Lord, eternal memory! I thank You that You did not forget to call me into existence! And through me, Lord, do you please or not? Thy will be done! But we know that you can do everything, but you can do nothing! Remember that the one beginning of existence and life of all is God: cleave to Him alone, trust in Him alone. Be simple, don’t be double-hearted; Do not be partly devoted to earthly blessings and partly to God: this is an anomaly, absurdity, lawlessness. Surrender yourself completely to God. Give me, O Son, your heart [Prov. 23, 26]. The Lord for me is the fullness of all good. What do we have in heaven? and from You what did I desire on earth; my heart and my flesh, O God of my heart, and my portion, O God, are gone forever [Ps. 72, 25 – 26]. Just as you think both of them are evil and unkind about your neighbor, so others seem to think evil about you. But this is all done by Satan the slanderer. Despise his slander and slander. Listen to yourself. Your adversary the devil walks around like a roaring lion, looking for someone to devour (1 Pet. 5:8). Or: devil means slanderer - taken from the case itself. You will now recognize him by the confusion, fire, grief and cramped conditions. Therefore, knowing the machinations of the enemy over people, do not be angry with your neighbors when you see that they are at enmity with you for no reason: the devil is at enmity with them. All-blind (church glory) – all-worthy. In the foreground (Church glory) - in the future. Alpha is the first letter of the Greek alphabet; in a figurative sense - the basics, the very beginning of any teaching. That is, strong in speech, possessing the gift of speech. That is, you give spiritual space. Sy (Church Glorious) – the same as Existing – one of the names of God, that is, truly (really) existing, abiding, eternal. Tolikie (Church Glorious) – so many. That is, they process it, improve it (give it the desired image). Dennitsa - lit.: morning star or dawn; the chief of the fallen angels, so named for his brilliant perfections with which he was gifted from God, overthrown for pride and exaltation before God. Colic (Church Glav.) – how big it is. Foolish (Church Slavic) – distraught. Kontakion of the Feast of the Annunciation of the Blessed Virgin Mary, tone 8. Red with kindness (church glory) - most beautiful. Belial (Heb.) – lit.: insignificant, worthless. In the Bible this word is applied to all depraved, wicked and evil people, but especially to Satan, as the main culprit of all wickedness and evil. Malakia (Church Glorious) - handjob. On Holy and Great Thursday at Matins, the canon, irmos of the 5th canto: “Bound by the union of love, the apostles, who laid upon Christ, who rules over all, purified their red feet, preaching peace to all.” (“The apostles, united by the bonds of love, having given themselves up to the Lord of the world, Christ, received from Him the washing of their beautiful feet in order to go preach peace to all”). And he brought him [Abraham] out and said to him, Look at the sky and count the stars, if you can count them. And he said to him: You will have so many descendants (Gen. 15:5). Canon of the Contrite to Our Lord Jesus Christ, canto 9: “From Adam, my Jesus, all who have sinned, before the law and in the law, Jesus, and according to the law, the accursed, and by grace, my Jesus, I have overcome the passions of the accursed; but You, my Jesus, save me with Your destinies.” That is, to the icon standing in the first, that is, local row of the iconostasis. Third member of the Creed: For our sake, man and our salvation came down from heaven and became incarnate from the Holy Spirit and the Virgin Mary, and became human. Minion - minion, follower. Akathist to the Sweetest Jesus, Kontakion 11. Tune (Church Glav.) - for free. Pokoliku (Church Glav.) – because. Smiling (church glory) - smile. The prayer of Simeon Metaphrast “As in Thy terrible...” from the follow-up to Holy Communion. You might be interested in: