Январь

After early mass on Sunday (at home). I thank You, Lord, for You heard me when I cried out to You in my heart. But take away from Me, Lord, the charm of sweets. God! May the gifts of Your goodness not be wasted in vain - do not allow vain luxury to be in my house, but in my house there will be only everything necessary for the decorum of the home and for health and vigor and decent clothing and adornment of the body, and not for voluptuousness and relaxation of souls and bodies or for vain splendor and beauty, so that corruptible earthly pleasures will not drive us away from You. True and eternal sweets and earthly splendor and beauty will not deprive us of seeing You, the undull and intelligent 7 Light and ineffable kindness 8 of Your Divine image. God! Give me the grace to cleave to You alone with all my heart until my last breath and then. Amen. God! Give me the grace not to attach my heart to anything perishable. Amen. God! Give me all the hope of life to rest in You alone. The crafty and all-evil enemy unites with our soul through its addiction to earthly goods - hence the need to despise earthly goods, counting them as rubbish and dust and dung for the sake of God and for the sake of demonic flattery, although earthly goods in themselves, as the creation of God, are good and beautiful and useful. Read church prayers in front of a large crowd of people, as if there were one person or several ordinary people in the church, whom you are not at all afraid of. About sugar consumed by your own or guests, say: it is the dust of the earth; about tea, coffee and sweets say: this [...]. Man, as the image of the All-Creator God, has authority over all earthly things - everything is for him, as a king, and every person has the right of dominion over earthly things and beings, and not just anyone. Anyone who expresses dominance alone is proud – a child of the devil and a self-lover. Food [Russian: as if] dwell alone on the earth [Isa. 5, 8 ] and will you destroy all the good things of the earth? Why are you persecuting your inner 9 [father]? You are unworthy of earthly blessings, while others are all worthy of them; you should not be on the earth, but others should be on it. What you don’t wish for yourself, for example, you don’t wish for illness, misfortune, death or dishonor, poverty, don’t wish for this or that, don’t wish for anyone, especially for your father or mother, brother or sister, uncle or aunt, father-in-law or mother-in-law - for no one at all, for everyone is God’s, not their own and not of their own, according to God’s will, they were born and live. Thank the Lord that He will not mercifully take your life away from you, and by loving Him and your neighbor, try to earn His favor. Don’t expand: you don’t need much space in the world, especially in a coffin; there’s enough food and drink for everyone. We surrender ourselves and each other, and with all our weaknesses, sins, passions, mutual insults or good deeds, and our whole life to Christ God, our Head. Let us not ourselves, with our carnal mind, with our carnal importance or pride and worldly power, correct those who sin or seek retribution for insults to ourselves, even for insulting the Lord God and His saints, but let us pray in our hearts and outwardly to the Lord God for those who sin and offend us, not harboring the slightest malice or pride towards them in our hearts, for in this case we ourselves sin worse than them; Let us leave everything to the Lord God - admonition, punishment, and correction, being content only in cases of need with a meek, reasonable, sometimes strict, but loving remark, from which, if it does not improve, we leave it to God and His grace. Thus, we will always surrender ourselves, each other and our entire life to Christ our God, our Trustee and Savior, without self-government in anything, that is, doing something according to our own will, and not according to His holy, good and perfect will. Let us surrender ourselves to Him with all our weaknesses, mental and physical shortcomings, with all deprivations, sorrows, illnesses, misfortunes, for we all belong entirely to Him as members of His body, redeemed by His blood. Bless the poor as the rich, who asks you for alms every day, as well as the one who never demands - bless equally willingly, may God be with you, impartial Father, Lord and Judge. Where would there be a place for struggle, for exploits, for virtue, if we were not harmed by our neighbors, if we were not offended, where would there be a place for patience with insults, meekness and humility? You see that we need to experience many different evils in order to demonstrate our virtue. We are ready to sing or speak, to read with our lips the words of Christ’s commandments, but often we don’t even think about fulfilling them: we praise with our lips, we blaspheme God with our deeds; We give thanks with our lips, but in reality we are ungrateful and hard-hearted; We ask with our lips, but in reality we do not desire what we ask. What disagreement, contradictions! Learn to treat every person humbly - and then you will serve God worthily; begin to sincerely please Him in His image for good, for the salvation of your neighbor and for the glory of God; start small, like a small person, and then you will reach something bigger, to please God. Do not be irritated by those who sin, by those who insult you, do not have the passion to notice all sorts of sins in your neighbor and condemn him, as is usual for us; everyone will give an answer to God for himself, everyone has a conscience, everyone hears God’s word or knows the will of God from books and from conversations with others; especially do not look maliciously at the sins of your elders, about which you do not care: everyone stands or falls for his Lord [Rom. 14, 14 ], you correct your sins, correct your heart. Oh, my all-evil flesh! She’s full and still asks for food, she’s drunk and still asks for something to drink; quite refreshed by sleep, and still wants to sleep; well dressed - and still asks for new clothes; has money, and also collects it greedily, and the more he has, the more he wants and covets. Do not clothe your heart with overeating - do not eat when you feel that nature does not require it; love abstinence and fasting. Our birth into real life is accompanied by our mother’s illnesses and our crying; Our birth into eternal life - and it takes place throughout our entire present life - is accompanied by many sorrows and temptations, for with many sorrows we must enter the Kingdom of God [Acts. 14, 22]. Let us remember the holy apostles, the first Christians, martyrs, holy hierarchs, saints and all the saints, let us remember the Old Testament righteous people, about whom the Apostle Paul speaks in the Epistle to the Hebrews (11, 33 - 38): they all endured many sorrows and sufferings. Therefore, let the pious not be troubled and discouraged, visited by the Lord with many different sorrows. Clever (Church Slav.) – spiritual, intelligible, understood in a spiritual sense. Kindness (church glory) – beauty. Prisny (Church Slavic) is always a close person. You might be interested in: