Teachings for Sundays, as well as for Lent and moving church holidays (trans. 2005)

The sermons of Saint Demetrius of Rostov were devoted primarily not to dogmas, but to the moral Christian ideal, which was facilitated by the “Cheti-Menaion” he compiled with ready-made examples of holiness. His teachings differed from the pamphlets of his contemporaries (Metropolitan Stefan (Yavorsky), Archbishop Feofan (Prokopovich)) by the lack of a subjective assessment of private events. The saint drew a general moral lesson from the phenomena, focusing on the main teaching of the Church - love for God and man. The sermons were based on the Holy Scriptures, the lives of saints and the works of the Church Fathers. Influenced by the Kyiv school, his speech used rhetorical questions, unexpected comparisons, and references to the Hebrew text. Over time, scholastic techniques softened, speech became livelier and more accessible, and symbolism and allegories brought his words closer to the folk poetry and culture of the era of Peter I. The main idea of ​​all his sermons was the desire to make people better and kinder. At the beginning of the bishopric, the central theme was love and denunciation of social inequality. Later, especially during the Rostov period, the defense of the purity of Orthodoxy from schism came to the fore. Throughout the entire ministry of St. Demetrius of Rostov remained a defender of the weak and oppressed, faithful to the traditions of the ancient Russian shepherds. The teachings of St. Demetrius are not just conversations, but theological and literary works. In them, he calls for the fight against sin and the acquisition of virtues, for repentance, faith and piety, and not to refrain from the Sacrament of the Eucharist because of the consciousness of one’s sinfulness. He emphasizes the importance of prayer, fasting, and keeping the commandments. The presented collection contains a series of sermons for Sundays, as well as for Lent and moving church holidays (50 in total). The collection includes sermons not only of a moral, but also of a dogmatic nature. For example, in his sermon on the Ascension of the Lord, Saint Demetrius speaks about the joyful reasons for this event. He polemicizes with the Old Believers, Catholic and Protestant influences, denounces the heresy of Arius, the Lutheran opinion about fasting and other errors. The collection also contains historical sermons and words of praise. For example, in the Word on the fifth Saturday of Great Lent, the author glorifies the Mother of God and explains in what sense the Blessed Virgin is similar to the Kingdom of Heaven, and also talks about repentance. In the Word for the Annunciation of the Most Holy Theotokos and Easter Monday, the saint speaks about the significance of the coincidence of these two celebrations, calling this event “the belt with which the bride of Christ, the Holy Church, is now being girded.” He talks about spiritual death, from which the Resurrection of Christ calls to rise, and about union with God, which the Annunciation teaches. The collection includes a number of sermons, the authorship of which does not belong to St. Dimitry Rostovsky: - Metropolitan Stefan Yavorsky wrote “Teaching on the twenty-seventh week after Pentecost”; - Simeon of Polotsk wrote “The first teaching on the seventh week after Easter, that is, on the week of the holy 318 fathers who gathered in Nicaea against Arius”, “The second teaching on the day of the descent of the Holy Spirit”, “The thirty-first week after Pentecost”. Contents Teaching on the week of the tax collector and the Pharisee Teaching on the week of the Last Judgment Teaching on the week of raw foods Teaching on the first week of Lent Teaching on Saturday of the fourth week of Great Lent Teaching on the fifth Saturday, praiseworthy, of Great Lent Teaching on the fifth week of Great Lent First teaching on the entry into Jerusalem of the Lord God and our Savior Jesus Christ Second teaching on the entry into Jerusalem of the Lord God and our Savior Jesus of Christ Teaching on the Resurrection of Christ Teaching on the Annunciation of the Blessed Virgin Mary and Holy Monday of the Resurrection of Christ Teaching on the week of St. Thomas Teaching on the week of the Holy Myrrh-Bearing Women Teaching on the fourth week of Easter, about the paralytic Teaching on the sixth week of Easter, on the man born blind Teaching on the Ascension of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ First teaching on the seventh week of Easter, that is, on the week of the saints 318 fathers gathered in Nicaea against Arius. The second lesson on the seventh week after Easter. The first lesson on the day of the descent of the Holy Spirit. The second lesson on the day of the descent of the Holy Spirit. The lesson on the day of the Holy Trinity. The lesson on the Sunday of All Saints, the first after Pentecost. The lesson on prayer on Thursday of the first week after Pentecost. The lesson on the second week after Pentecost. The lesson on prayer on the week. the fourth after Pentecost The first lesson for the fifth week after Pentecost The second lesson for the fifth week after Pentecost The first lesson for the sixth week after Pentecost The first lesson for the eighth week after Pentecost The second lesson for the eighth week after Pentecost The second lesson for the ninth week after Pentecost The first lesson for the thirteenth week after Pentecost The second lesson for the thirteenth week after Pentecost. Teaching on the fourteenth week after Pentecost and on the Beheading of the Venerable Head of the Holy Glorious Prophet, Forerunner and Baptist of the Lord John, August 29. Teaching on the fifteenth week after Pentecost and on the day of the Feast of the Exaltation of the Venerable and Life-Giving Cross of the Lord. Teaching on the eighteenth week after Pentecost. First teaching on the nineteenth week after Pentecost The second lesson for the nineteenth week after Pentecost The lesson for the twentieth week after Pentecost, in which the memory of the holy Great Martyr Demetrius occurred, October 26 The lesson for Thursday of the twentieth week The lesson for the twenty-first week after Pentecost The lesson for the twenty-second week after Pentecost The lesson for the twenty-third week after Pentecost The lesson for the twenty-fourth week after Pentecost Pentecost Teaching for the twenty-seventh week about the crouched woman. Sermon for the twenty-seventh week after Pentecost Sermon for the twenty-ninth week after Pentecost Sermon for the thirty-first week after Pentecost Sermon for the thirty-second week after Pentecost Lesson for the Week of the Publican and the Pharisee “The Lord spoke this parable: Two men went into the church to pray: one was a Pharisee, and the other was a publican” (Luke 18:9–10) Let everyone interpret the current wonderful and well-known parable of the publican and the Pharisee, spoken by the mouth of the Lord, as he wishes; I want to extract only one thing from it and offer only this to your love: to whom did our Lord say it? “The Lord spoke this parable.” To whom is the “speech”? I look above in the Gospel and see that it is written that this parable is addressed to those who consider themselves righteous, and consider everyone else as nothing: “Two men are despicable,” and so on. Let's look carefully to whom the Lord spoke this parable! To those who are arrogant, who imagine themselves to be righteous, but condemn others, humiliate, revile and consider them sinners: the Lord spoke to them the parable of the publican and the Pharisee. The Pharisee considered himself righteous, and condemned the tax collector to himself as a sinner, but the tax collector, considered a sinner, came out justified, and the Pharisee, who considered himself righteous, came out condemned, for “everyone who exalts himself will humble himself, and he who humbles himself will be exalted” (Luke 18:14). Oh, how great the evil is in considering oneself good and others evil! Oh, how terrible it is to imagine yourself as a righteous person and others as sinners! To such and such, who imagine themselves to be righteous, but condemn and humiliate others, to these Pharisee-like fortune tellers and slanderers, our word will be directed, “I promote the Lord and confirm the word.” No one can please the equal Pharisees, who consider themselves righteous, because they classify even holy people as sinners, and they are ready to send imaginary sinners to hell even before the Last Judgment of God. About such and such, who consider themselves righteous, Our Lord says with pain in his heart: “To whom will I liken this generation? John came, neither eating nor drinking, and they said: have a demon. The Son of Man came, eating and drinking, and they said: “Behold, a man of food and drink of wine, a friend of the publican and the sinner” (Matthew 11:18:19). They called John, an angel in the flesh, demonic, but the Son of God, who “committed no sin and flattery was not found in His mouth,” they “imputed with the wicked.” To whom shall I liken this generation, Christ my Savior? Command me, Thy mortal creation, to find in Thy Divine Scripture to whom this obstinate and corrupt generation can be compared! The Pharisees, who imagine themselves righteous and condemn others, are like those flies of dogs that God brought upon Egypt and who were so difficult and cruel for the Egyptians that Scripture even says: “The land perished from the flies of dogs” (Ex. 8:24). He who condemns his neighbor is a barking dog. After all, the dog barks at all passers-by, both good and evil. The dog bites not only the one who irritates and offends, but also the one who has not done him any harm. In the same way, he who condemns not only those guilty of some sin, but also condemns the innocent. Like a dog, he bites and torments the honor and glory of his neighbor. Dog flies are the words of those who condemn. Just as flies, landing not only on wounds, but also on a healthy body, bit the Egyptians extremely painfully, even biting until they bled, so the reproachful words of those condemning, humiliating not only sins, but also the good deeds of men, bite, if not to the point of blood, then truly to tears and sighs. And just as the whole land of Egypt once perished, so now the Christian land is perishing: that one from dog flies, this one from dog-like people, from their cruel words. There is hardly anyone standing here who would not bite his neighbor like that. Perishing, I said; for all such will be condemned to eternal destruction. O blind Pharisee, you think that you have ascended to heaven, but you stand in the midst of destruction; you consider yourself a kind person, but in reality you are just a dog barking at your neighbor; You don’t see in yourself and don’t understand your doglike disposition. The one at whom you bark and torment is a man, but you are a dog, barking and tormenting, and the evil words coming from your mouth are like flies. After dog flies, to whom else will I liken this generation? Together with Ecclesiastes, I liken him to a small serpent, crawling in the grass and brushwood and stinging accidentally. Ecclesiastes says this: “Even if a serpent strikes not in a whisper, nothing of this differs from the secret of the diviner” (Eccl. 10:11), that is, he who condemns his neighbor in secret is in no way different from a snake that accidentally thrusts its poisonous sting into a person’s body, as the holy Apostle Paul was once stung in the hand by a viper crawling out of brushwood from the heat at the time when the apostle gathered many branches and put them in the fire. But the apostle did not suffer at all, shaking off the snake into the fire. Why is a blasphemer and condemner like a serpent? But because, just as a serpent’s sting pricks easily, barely perceptibly, but at the same time pours a terrible deadly poison into the wound and affects all human blood, so that with a light prick it completely kills a person, so the condemner, who has sharpened his tongue like a serpent’s sting, has, according to the Psalmist, the venom of a serpent in his mouth; he flatters with his tongue and at the same time seriously harms. He seems to speak kindly to everyone about others, but at the same time he pours the poison of condemnation into everyone’s heart, and through this leads to the mortal sin of condemning one’s neighbor and kills the soul. Just as a snake bites one part of the body, but fills all members with a deadly disease, so does the condemning and humiliating person harm his neighbor; he seduces those who listen, confuses peaceful living, suppresses unity, drives out love, multiplies anger and enmity, raises fights and quarrels, and sometimes destroys houses, cities and kingdoms. Like a snake’s sting, according to the natural scientist Pliny, although it seems to be one, it is nevertheless threefold: dividing into two, it causes three ulcers in one place; in the same way, the language of a detractor and condemner in one word causes threefold harm. Firstly, he harms his own conscience with an unforgivable sin, then he harms the good name and honor of the one about whom he speaks evil, and, finally, he harms the one who listens to his speeches. Thus, he kills two at once along with himself as the third, or better said, the first. Oh, damned blasphemer, slanderer, malicious condemner! What kind of torment do you deserve even for one mental murder? And about the three murders, what answer will you give, what kind of trial will you be subject to, what kind of execution will you be subject to? The people of Israel once grumbled in the desert against God and Moses, and for this God released poisonous snakes on them. In another translation it is written like this: “The Lord sent fiery serpents among His people” (Numbers 21:6). Since the ungrateful Israelites sinned by grumbling, blasphemously slandered God, insulted Moses and Aaron, unjustly reproached them in conversations with each other and condemned holy persons, for this the Lord punished them with poisonous snakes, and not even just snakes, but fiery ones: “Let the Lord let fiery snakes.” What do you think, condemners, slanderers, slanderers? Will you not be handed over to the fiery serpents in hell, to be devoured forever? But why do I liken the race of condemners and blasphemers of our neighbor to small snakes or vipers? Wouldn’t I reveal their serpentine character more clearly if I likened them to some great seven-headed serpent, whose trunk tore off a third of the stars of heaven? (Apoc. 12:3:4). Just as there is no greater serpent than the seven-headed serpent, so there is no greater sin than the sin of judging one’s neighbors; for all sins, like small snakes, have only one chapter, that is, they cause only personal destruction, but the sin of condemnation has not one, but seven chapters, seven, I will say, reasons for its destruction. The first chapter of the serpent means: to conceal and not even remember the good deeds of one’s neighbor. The second is to condemn every good deed of your neighbor. The third is not only not to recognize any virtue of your neighbor, but even to classify him as obscene. The fourth is to disclose any secret sin of your neighbor. Fifth - exaggerate the sins of one's neighbor with lengthy speeches and generate evil rumors about him among the people. The sixth is to lie about your neighbor, invent and create false rumors and misdeeds about him, which he not only did not commit, but did not even have in his thoughts. The seventh and last is to completely disgrace the good name and honor of one’s neighbor and subject him in every possible way to temporary and eternal torment. You see how terrible this seven-headed serpent is, how great is this sin of judging your neighbor! The seven-headed serpent, seen by the Theologian, was an omen of the Antichrist, and he who condemns his neighbor is in fact the Antichrist, as Saint Leontius, Bishop of Naples, says about this in the Fatherland: “He who judges his neighbor steals the dignity of Christ and is his Antichrist” (Homily 9 on non-judgment). You know what a friend of Christ the Antichrist is; such is a friend of Christ and everyone who condemns his neighbor. You know what a God-pleaser the Antichrist is like; such is the one who pleases Him and everyone who condemns his neighbor: he is not a saint, but an evildoer, not a friend, but an enemy. The theologian says this: “Children, this is the last hour: and you have heard that the Antichrist is coming, and now there are many Antichrists; From this we understand that this is the last hour” (1 John 2:18). Why is it possible to know the near end of this visible world? Because antichrists have multiplied. But, oh, holy Theologian, tell us, who is the Antichrist among us? Show us with your finger at least one thing: is he not here in the holy church among us? Is it me or who else? Oh, truly there are a lot of them! Who are they? Instead of the Theologian, we hear the blessed one. Augustine, who says: “And in our time we know many antichrists, for everyone who lives unrighteously and blasphemes the good is an antichrist, a servant of Satan.” Now we see who the Antichrist is. The one who lives unrighteously and blasphemes others; truly he is the Antichrist. Oh, how many such antichrists live among us! Aren't we all? Don't we all live in lies? Do we not all blaspheme the good? Look into your conscience, are you not the Antichrist? Oh, Christian people who have turned into antichrists! And what should we wait for more than the end of the world? From this we see that the last hour is near. Do you know what end awaits the Antichrist? He will be bound and cast into the abyss, into a lake of fiery, red-hot water. The same end awaits anyone who condemns his neighbor. We slightly deviated our conversation from the serpent to the Antichrist, although, however, we did not get lost and did not stray from the intended path, for the serpent is only an image of the Antichrist, while the Antichrist is the very thing. He who condemns his neighbor is both the serpent and the Antichrist, and you have already heard what the Antichrist and the serpent are. The serpent, seen by the Theologian, with its trunk tore away a third of the stars of heaven; the sin of condemnation destroyed, one might say, a third of the virtues that wanted to shine like the stars of heaven. There were many who, having condemned and blasphemed their neighbor, perished with all their good deeds, which is why there are many examples in book stories that I don’t have time to talk about in detail. I will only remind you of what one great elder, namely John of Savvaitsky, says about himself in the Fatherland. “They told me,” he says, “about a certain brother who has a bad reputation and is not improving, and I said: oh! And when I said “oh,” horror seized me, and I saw myself standing on Golgotha ​​with my Lord, crucified on the cross. I rushed to worship Him, but He said to the angels standing before Him: “Take him away from here, for he is My Antichrist: he condemned his brother before my judgment.” When I was expelled from there, my robe fell from me. Having come to my senses, I understood my sin and why the protection of God was taken away from me. Then I headed into the desert, where I stayed for seven years, not eating bread, not entering under a roof, and not talking with a person until I saw the Lord again, and He commanded that my mantle be returned to me.” Everyone, be horrified when you hear this. If for just one word, for one “oh” uttered with condemnation, such a great saint of God suffered so much - he was called the Antichrist by the Lord, was expelled from His presence, disgraced and deprived of the protection of God, until he appeased Christ with seven years of suffering, then what will happen to us when we condemn our neighbors every day with countless blasphemous words? What mercy of God can we hope for? Will we be cut off from God? Perhaps we have already been torn away from the heavenly life with a third of the stars of heaven, torn away by the trunk of the serpent, torn into the abyss of hell for eternal torment together with the Antichrist. Who else will I liken this kind of condemners and detractors to? I will liken him to the devil himself, and his blasphemous tongue will be likened to fiery hell. He who condemns his neighbor is like the devil, for the holy Apostle Paul, writing to Timothy and instructing husbands and wives in good morals, says: “Wives should also be honest, not slanderous” (1 Tim. 3:11). The word "not slanderous" in Greek is written "not of the devil"; therefore, the apostle says that wives should be honest, not diabolical. You see that blasphemously slandering one’s neighbor means the same thing, it is diabolism: a slanderer and a devil are one and the same thing. Saint Chrysostom teaches the same thing, saying: “He who is zealous in slander works for the devil and is himself a troublesome demon.” Do you hear this, slanderers, slanderers, defilers? Do you hear that people who condemn their neighbors turn into demons? And what is their language? This is fiery Gehenna itself. Let's listen to what St. says. Jacob: “The tongue is a fire, the deceit of unrighteousness, the tongue is established in our hearts, desecrating the whole body and scorching the stake of our birth, and being scorched by hell” (James 3:6). “The time of our birth” is this temporary life of each person, which has come from non-existence into being and again moving towards non-existence. It rolls like a rotating wheel, now rising to a height, now descending, now ascending to well-being and prosperity, now falling into misadventures and suffering, now directing its path to virtue, now changing it into corruption. This “spike”, if it falls into the fire, is destroyed, and the fire of the tongue completely burns, for whoever the fire of an evil tongue touches, everyone begins to consider him as insignificant. The tongue, the fire of which “scorches the stake of our birth,” is itself scorched by Gehenna; Gehenna is the sin of slander, blasphemy and condemnation, for this sin is truly similar to Gehenna. Many people say about fiery Gehenna that if even one spark of Gehenna fire had fallen here, then in the blink of an eye the whole of heaven would have been scorched and burned, just as Sodom and Gomorrah were burned by God's permission. In the same way, a blasphemous, condemning tongue scorches all those who live virtuously, turns them into ashes and destroys them; just as the fire of Gehenna has sinners instead of firewood, so the evil and blasphemous tongue, blazing with the fire of Gehenna of condemnation, instead of firewood seeks human sins for itself and by its nature is hotter than the fire of Gehenna. The latter, as it is said, scorches only sinners with their sins, but over the virtuous and godly he has no power, for the saint, even if he walked in the middle of the fire of hell, would not be scorched by it, just as the three Babylonian youths were not scorched in a cave. The condemning tongue scorches not only sinners with their sins, but also the virtuous, saints, righteous and godly, scorches them with all their good deeds, burns and eats. For this, he himself will be burned forever in the unquenchable fire of Gehenna, for whoever sins will be punished, and with whatever measure he measures, he himself will be measured. You, evil tongue, scorched others like the fire of Gehenna; for this, burn yourself in the endless fire of Gehenna forever. Here, to clarify what has been said, we should recall the Gospel rich man, who “lifted up his eyes in hell, and was in torment, seeing Abraham from afar and Lazarus in his bosom. And I cried out, praying: Father Abraham, have mercy on me and send Lazarus, that he may dip the tip of his finger in water and cool my tongue, as I suffer in this flame” (Luke 16:23:24). You see: he is all in torment, he is all burning in the flames of Gehenna, and he asks for joy and coolness only for one burning tongue. Why this? But because the tongue, more than anything, more than all other members, more than all the body, burns with a terrible fire. For what guilt? For the sin of condemnation. During his daily joy and abundant meals, he ate people instead of bread, that is, he slandered others, humiliated them, condemned them, blasphemed them, reproached them; That is why his blasphemous tongue especially burned with the fire of Gehenna. May we all get rid of it and may we be worthy of the heavenly kingdom through the grace and love of our Lord Jesus Christ, to whom be glory and dominion forever and ever. Amen. Lesson for the Last Judgment Week “The Son of Man will come in His glory” (Matthew 25:31) Recently we celebrated the first coming of Christ, and now, beloved listeners, we are commemorating the second coming of Christ. Recently we glorified the born Christ, but now we hear about Him wanting to come with power and much glory. Recently we rejoiced at His first coming, but now we tremble at His second coming. One and the same is the one who came the first time and wants to come the second, however, both comings are not the same. The first time He came as a meek and gentle lamb, the second time He came as a formidable and vengeful lion. The first time He came to take away the sins of the whole world and grant forgiveness to everyone, but the second time He will come to judge the sins of the whole world and reward everyone according to their deeds. The first time He came to save sinners, the second time He came to condemn and destroy them. The first time He did not come unexpectedly, but, in fulfillment of prophecies, on a certain day He was born of the Most Pure Virgin; He came quietly, without noise and rumor, as Wisdom says: “I have kept everyone in silence, and the night has flowed half way, Thy almighty Word (Lord), coming from heaven, from the throne of the kings, come” (Wis. 18:14:15). The second time He will come unexpectedly, with a terrible noise: then the earth will shake, the mountains will shake, the dead will rise from their graves, all the works of human hands will be burned, the seas will be unusually agitated, the heavens will change, the stars will fall and all the elements will be confused. At His first coming, human eyes saw Him as a baby, entwined, lying in a manger, carried in His mother’s arms and fed at the breast; at the second coming we will see Him no longer as a baby, but as a man sitting on the throne with much glory, angry with the wicked, shaking heaven and earth and destroying the whole universe. Oh, how terrible the second coming of the Lord will be! The Second Coming of the Lord is usually called the Last Judgment, and rightly so; for in it the living and the dead will be judged. This judgment is terrible, for it will frighten every creature: above and below, invisible and visible. It will be terrible for those on high, for the powers of heaven will be moved; terrible and lasting, for the earth will shake at its foundation. It will be terrible for the angels, for the holy Apostle Paul exclaims: “We want to be judged by an angel” (1 Cor. 6:3). It will be terrible for the saints and the righteous, for then “the righteous can scarcely be saved” (1 Pet. 4:18), and even more terrible for sinners, for where then will the wicked and sinner be? Since I also belong to the number of sinners and have to come to the “resurrection of judgment,” then, leaving the fear of the saints and righteous, I will turn all my attention to the fear that has to be for sinners, and I will consider in my thoughts at least the greatest guilts, because of which judgment will be especially terrible for sinners. Whoever of you considers himself a sinner and expects the Last Judgment, let him, together with me, consider the reasons for the fear that sinners have. This is important so that we fear and tremble even before the terrible judgment of God, lag behind our sins and, through true repentance, get rid of eternal punishment. “The Son of Man will come in His glory.” During the second coming to earth of Christ our God, who is to come with glory, firstly, the sound of the Archangel's trumpet will be heard preceding Him, sounding throughout the entire universe, calling everyone to judgment and raising the dead from their graves: “For the trumpet will sound, and the dead will rise incorruptible” (1 Cor. 15:52). The first great fear will be for the sinner when the trumpet commands each soul to enter its body, that body that was turned into dust, earth, and completely destroyed, but which, by the command of God, will again return to its original composition and again take all its members. Like a seed thrown onto the ground, although it decays, it nevertheless sprouts at the right time, produces first grass, then an ear of corn, and finally bears fruit, according to the word of the Lord: “Unless a grain of wheat falls on the ground and dies, it remains alone; And if he dies, he produces much fruit” (John 12:24); so the human body, having died, decayed and turned to dust, in one instant from the sound of the trumpet will receive the power of its growth, return to its previous state and be revived by its soul. At that time there will be, I say, great fear for the soul of the sinner, released from the prisons of hell and from the bonds of the dead to the body to unite with it. For when she comes to her body, she will see it no longer as it was during life, but changed. In this life it was decorated, decorated, beautifully and kindly, but then it will be ugly, absurd, stingy, vile, disgusting and terrible, like some kind of monster. The face, which was painted in this life to seduce, will be blackened with tar and burning ashes, and in those places where there were bright small patches on the face, called flies, stingy, terrible toads will sit there, unbearably and incessantly gnawing. The high-browed eyes, which were filled with fornication and deception, will then be like the eyes of a serpent emitting fire. Fornicating lips will be swarming with the never-ending worm. A fornicating tongue will then be like a brazier or iron heated in fire, all members will be filthy, vile, the whole body will be black like a burnt brand; even before being cast into hell, it will carry within itself the beginnings of hellish torment and will itself be like real hell. Seeing its body, the soul will begin to be horrified by it as a fiery tormentor, abhor it as an unbearable abomination, and tremble, not wanting to enter it; however, and not even though she will enter it. The soul, forced by God's command, will enter its vile and terrible body, which it once did not want to part with, and will unite with it not as before - with its jointly born friend, but as with a hated enemy, as with a dog eaten by stinking worms, as with a corpse full of snake venom. Then they will begin to annoy each other, curse each other and call each other damned. The soul will say to the body: damn you, accursed body, because with your sinful lust you deceived me and led me into cruel iniquities; The body will say to the soul: Cursed be you, my accursed soul, for you have ruled me badly; with your mind, given to you from God, like drags and bridles, you did not restrain me from evil deeds, but deigned to me in everything; Whenever I desired any sin, you deigned and contributed to it, and together we angered the Lord, our Creator. Then again the soul will say to its body: damn you, accursed body, for every day you were burdened with overeating and drunkenness and this plunged me into the hellish abyss. And again the body will answer: cursed be you too, my damned soul, for you ate with me from the same dish and drank with me from the same cup, but did not teach me or yourself abstinence. The soul will also say: woe to you, my accursed body, for you embittered your neighbor, robbed, stole the property of others, stole and killed. The body will say in response: woe to you, my damned soul, for you helped me in everything: you moved me into anger and rage in order to embitter, beat and kill my neighbor; you excited me to delicacy and covetousness in order to rob and steal other people’s property; you assisted me in everything, you were my mentor and friend in everything, and without you I did nothing of all that I have done. Thus, bickering with each other, angry, reproaching, cursing each other and squabbling like fierce and grappling dogs, they will enter, or, better said, will be drawn out of their graves by unmerciful angels for judgment in order to receive the condemnation due to their deeds. Then a special fear will arise from the exposure of all shameless, stingy and sinful deeds and from great shame, for as soon as the sinner emerges from the grave, all his sins will immediately be exposed, and all his stingy deeds, which he did in secret, in a hidden place, in the darkness of the night and unknown to anyone, will appear clearly before the whole universe. This is what God said to David, who had sinned by secret adultery: “Thou hast done this in secret, and I will do this word before all Israel and before this sun” (2 Samuel 12:12). You know how human nature does not like exposure of its evil deeds, how it fears and is ashamed of it. The thief is afraid that his theft will be discovered and he will be executed for his deed; Therefore, he tries in every possible way to conceal his thieving deeds, and when they ask him, he hides and even the tormented one does not quickly tell the truth. The fornicator is ashamed so that people do not become aware of his fornication, and therefore he seeks a secret and dark place for his iniquity so that the human eye does not see him sinning. Even in holy confession before his spiritual father, he does not want to tell the truth and hides it out of shame. An evildoer does not like it when someone exposes his evil deeds, which is why Scripture says: “Do not rebuke the wicked, lest they hate you” (Prov. 9:8). If someone really is a thief, and you call him a thief in front of people, will he like it? If someone is truly a murderer, call him a murderer in front of people: will he be pleased? If someone is truly a robber, predator and rapist, call him that in front of people: will he love you for it? If someone really rolls around in nasty, fornicating deeds, like a pig in feces, and commits many adulteries, call him before people a fornicator, an adulterer: won’t he be filled with shame and hate you? When the scribes and Pharisees presented to our Lord Christ a woman caught in adultery, He bowed down and wrote on the ground with his finger. What did He write? He wrote, as the interpreters of the Gospel say, denouncing the scribes and Pharisees of the same adulteries and fornications that they committed in secret. Seeing this, they were ashamed, convicted by their conscience, and afraid, so as not to be reproached by Him verbally, they began to leave one after another and then they extremely hated our Lord and attempted His death. This is how human nature fears exposure of its evil deeds. That's how ashamed he is and doesn't love him. Let us think about what fear, what shame there will be on that day when all our evil and stingy deeds will be exposed before the whole universe: theft, murder, adultery, fornication, deceit, deceit and all the offenses committed not only in deed, but also in words spoken, and in thoughts. Before the universe, I said, for not only our sinner brothers will look at this, but also the faces of all the saints: prophets, apostles, martyrs, saints, saints and righteous ones - everyone will see our evil deeds, everyone will be surprised at our shamelessness, everyone will be horrified that we dared to commit such deeds. Let's think about something else. If someone is filled with great shame when he is convicted of one sin before his equals and few, then will there not be greater shame when the conviction is committed before the most honest, the most worthy and before very many, and, moreover, not of one sin, but of many? What should we think? What shame will there be on that day and hour when not just one of our sins will be exposed and become obvious, but all our sins, committed in word, deed and thought, will be exposed not only before our equal sinners, but before all the saints and before the ranks of angels? Then, truly, the words of the Gospel will be fulfilled: “There is nothing hidden that will not be revealed, and nothing hidden that will not come to light: what you say in the ear will be preached on the housetops” (Luke 8:17; 12:3). A thief spoke in the ear of a thief, a fornicator to a fornicator, conferring about sin; and then that foul speech will sound like a thunderous trumpet in the ears of the entire universe. Oh, what a shame it will be for us sinners then! We will be especially ashamed by those who in this life were sinners like us, but who corrected themselves through true repentance and were honored with a part of the saints, while we were left without repentance. Will not adulterers and nasty fornicators be ashamed when they see those persons with whom they committed a nasty sin among the saints for the sake of their repentance, and they themselves will be driven away, reproached and condemned? Will not the thief, the robber, be ashamed when he sees his friend the robber and thief among the righteous, and himself among the condemned sinners? Will not the thief be ashamed when he sees his friend the thief led to heaven, and himself sent to hell? Will not the fornicator be ashamed when he sees the harlot with whom he defiled himself cleansed and forgiven, and sees himself condemned and consigned to eternal fire? Oh, truly we will be filled with great shame at that time. But what should we think about those who in real life consider themselves good, righteous and holy, while condemning others? Will they not also be filled with shame when they see those glorified by God like the righteous who were condemned, ridiculed and considered sinners, and they themselves will be shamed as lawless people and cast into the abyss as Antichrists? “Let everyone judge his brother, this is the Antichrist” (Rom. 2:3). Oh, what a great and unbearable shame. Many people are ready to die rather than, being exposed, suffer shame and shame before the people. We read about the Egyptian queen Cleopatra in history that she committed fornication with Antony, the son-in-law of Caesar Augustus. When Antony was sent by Caesar Augustus to Egypt, he fell in love with Cleopatra; having abandoned his wife, the daughter of Augustus, he united with her in adultery and separated from the power of his father-in-law Augustus. Having become king in Egypt and throughout the east, he began to fight against Caesar Augustus. Then Augustus, marching against him with an army, defeated him, killed him, and captured Cleopatra alive. Cleopatra, knowing that Augustus wanted to lead her to Rome for triumph tied up as a captive, and feeling what great shame she would have to endure in the face of the entire Roman people when she, such a glorious queen, would be shamefully led as a captive, decided to kill herself rather than endure such shame. First, she stabbed herself in the chest, and when she did not stab herself to death, she closed the wound, not with a medical plaster, but with a plaster dipped in poison so that it would swell with bloody pus. When, nevertheless, life did not leave her, she ordered to bring herself a reptile called an asp; She brought it, brought in a small basket, to her body and died. You see how this queen was rather ready to die, how she invented all sorts of ways of death, just so as not to endure public shame. Truly, on the day of judgment, when the Lord will triumph over His enemies, it is better for sinners to die than to be tied hand and foot alive with fiery chains and led with reproach to the triumph and judgment of Christ, led before all nations with great shame and disgrace. They will then want to die, but will not be able to do so. They will seek death, but will not find it and will remain in their eternal shame. In addition to such great fear from shame and exposure, there will be a considerable fear that sinners will see those whom in this life they hated, saddened, embittered, wounded, tortured and killed. Cain will see Abel, who was killed innocently. Herod will see St. John the Baptist, who was unjustly beheaded. Nero, Diocletian, Maximilian and other tormentors will see a great multitude of confessors of the name of Christ whom they have tortured. The Lord will see their slaves, the boyars will see their peasants, whom they have mercilessly embittered. Unrighteous judges will see those who were innocently condemned, who were unjustly subjected to death. The torturers will see everyone who was mercilessly tortured; those whom they killed. They will be seen glorified with the glory of Christ and crowned as martyrs. They will see them and hear them cry out to God: “Judge, O Lord, those who offend us; take revenge, O Lord, on those who embittered us! Righteous Judge, repay them for the evil they have done to us!” What fear will there be at that time for the embittered, the offenders, the unjust masters and judges?! For then the righteous will stand with great boldness in the face of those who have offended and embittered him. Every righteous man will say to his embitterer: Why have you made me bitter? Why did you offend me? What did you persecute for? Why did he torture and kill me without mercy? What will they answer? Nothing. They won't find anything to say in response. They will only be embarrassed by great fear and say to themselves, repenting and groaning: these are the ones whom we once reviled and laughed at. They became sons of God and their lot was among the saints. The sons of Jacob once embittered their brother Joseph: they stripped him of his robe, threw him into a ditch, and sold him into slavery to the Egyptians. When Joseph became exalted in Egypt, his brothers came to him, not knowing that he ruled; They came before him without recognizing him, and Joseph said to them: I am your brother Joseph, whom you sold into Egypt. Joseph’s brothers could not answer anything then, for they were very afraid. So it will be on that day of judgment. Every ruler, judge, predator, robber, embitterer, offender, seeing the one whom he embittered inheriting the kingdom of heaven, will be extremely afraid and will not be able to answer him. Besides all this, the greatest fear will be from the face of Christ, our Lord, the righteous Judge and terrible Avenger, from the face of the angry God, about whom the prophet Nahum says: “Who can endure His wrath, or who can resist His wrath?” (Nahum. 1; 6). The very face of Christ, which in this life was meek, humble, kind, and for those who repent even now merciful, at that hour this face will be so menacing, angry and furious that heaven and earth will begin to flee from His face. It’s not for nothing that the prophet predicted: “If you open the sky, the mountains will tremble; and if the mountains tremble, what will sinful man do?” (Isa. 64:1). The holy Theologian describes the fear that comes from the face of an angry God in the Apocalypse as follows: “The sky has departed like a scroll being rolled up, and every mountain and island has moved from its places; and the kings of the earth and the nobles, and the rich, and the thousands and the mighty, and every slave and every free man hid in caves and stones by the handful; and said to the mountains and stones, “Fall on us and cover us from the face of Him who sits on the throne, and from the wrath of the Lamb: for the great day of His wrath has come, and who can stand?” (Apoc. 6:14–17). There is little joy in being killed by a stone and crushed by a falling wall. However, at that time it will be more pleasant for the sinner to endure the stones and mountains that fell on him than to see the face of an angry God. What do we sinners expect to hear from such an angry and terrible face? Nothing other than this voice, the most terrible of all thunder and lightning: “Depart from me, cursed into eternal fire, prepared for the devil and his angel” (Matthew 25:41). Oh, how this voice will frighten all sinners! Oh, how all the unrighteous, lawless, adulterers, fornicators, thieves, robbers, extortioners, robbers, tormentors and others who now anger God will tremble. Truly they would rather be crushed by stones and mountains than to hear this furious voice of God. After all this, the merciless hands of dark-shaped demons, the mere sight of which is more terrible than all the torments, will come and abduct the sinners. They will come and drag sinners into the abyss of hell, into eternal fire, into tartarus, into the never-ending worm of eternal and endless torment, the horror of which no language can convey and no mind can comprehend. These are the reasons why the second coming of Christ, called the Last Judgment, will be so terrible for sinners. Oh, sinful people! Let us always have in our minds the fear and horror that awaits us on the day of judgment, and we will fear God. Let us fear His terrible judgment! Let us fear and abandon our sins! Let us appease the terrible Judge with tears, repentance and alms before our exodus, so that we may escape the fate of the condemned and be counted among the justified. Amen. Lesson for the week of raw food “Whenever you fast...” (Matthew 6:16) Thank God, beloved listeners, that we have already reached the threshold of Lent. Thank God that we have already stood at the door of Great Lent and, having crossed the present day like a threshold, we will enter Lent itself. Grant us, God, a safe salvation. The other person is already tired of permission for everything. Not one is already sick in his stomach from daily gluttony and groans, having tied his head, from daily drunkenness. It's time to abstain. It’s time to heal ailments not only of the body, but also of the soul through fasting. It's time to put a limit to gluttony and a barrier to guttural rage. But in order to more successfully embark on the feat of fasting, you need to reinforce yourself with something. What? Special spiritual food, special, I will say, bread, for, according to David, “bread will strengthen a person’s heart” (Ps. 103:15). And the angel, awakening the prophet Elijah, sleeping under an oak tree, says: “Arise, eat and drink, for the way is far” (1 Kings 19:7). How far? “Fourty days and forty nights to the mountain of God Horeb” (v. 8). The real holy Pentecost is a long way. God knows who will make this journey, who will reach the refuge - the Bright Resurrection of Christ? Will he do as well as he starts? Will it weaken along the way? Thus, reinforcement is greatly needed so that we do not weaken on the way. And since this path, Holy Pentecostal, is a spiritual path, then we need to be strengthened with spiritual food. I, too, who am unworthy, have thought to offer you, with God’s help, on this day fastings for your abundant and abundant last material meals, and some Lenten spiritual foods instead of snacks for your daily meals, so that with your bodily nutrition, which delights your taste, you may eat, along with your daily food, a little spiritual food, which delights your spiritual senses, the food that prepares you for Lent. Let not your love reject the food that I offer you, but taste it at least a little, so that your larynx may be satisfied and your soul will be healthy. “Always fast.” To those wishing to begin the holy fast, I first of all offer the royal meal of the most glorious and holy Israeli king, David. Look what his meal is like. In his psalms he says this: “I eat ashes like bread, and dissolve my drink with weeping” (Ps. 101:10). Please; please eat ashes like bread and drink with weeping. You will say: this meal is not tasty, but I will answer you: not tasty, but healthy. But first of all, let us analyze this Davidic meal on the basis of the Scriptures. You know that the holy David sinned before God by adultery and murder, and it is not surprising, for he was servile, like other people: even saints have their downfalls. After his falls, David came to his senses: he repents, humbles himself, confesses, prays, fasts and bears repentance not only within his conscience, but also bears the weight of repentance externally. He put on sackcloth, sprinkled ashes on his head and wept before God day and night, asking Him for forgiveness of his sins. When, in the midst of such repentance, he felt the need to strengthen his body with a small piece of bread, he ate it; and the ashes from the head and sackcloth fell on the bread; but he did not shake off the ashes from the bread - he ate them along with the bread. That is why he says: “Ashes are like bread.” In the same way, when he took a cup of water to quench his thirst, the tears flowing from his eyes and down his cheeks dripped into the drink; This is what he says: “Dissolve my drink with crying.” This meal is not tasty, but it is very useful for mental health. Didn’t David appear brighter in holiness before God after his fall and repentance than before his fall and repentance? After all, he was sprinkled with hyssop of God’s mercy, cleansed, washed by repentance, and made “whiter than snow.” Having analyzed this Davidic meal according to Scripture, I will now explain it spiritually. Interpreters of David's psalms generally call the repentance of all sinners such an ashes meal. Let us consider why the repentance of sinners is called ashes. What's worse than ashes? Who is looking for taste in it? Who wants to eat ashes? In the same way, repentance is tasteless for sin-loving people, steeped in the sweets and passions of this world. Which of these desires repentance and which of them remembers repentance? Sprinkle ashes into someone's eyes; will it be pleasant? Remember repentance to the sinner; will he like it? Just as ashes are the worst thing, but have their good use, so repentance is considered by sinners to be an extremely unpleasant thing for them, but it has its good use. In the ashes lies fire; and in repentance there is the fire of love for God. An example is the wife remembered in the Gospel, a famous sinner who approached Christ the Lord with repentance. When she sincerely repented, the fire of Divine love immediately kindled in her, and so strongly that even the Lord Christ Himself testifies to her, saying: “Love much” (Luke 7:47). Ashes are used to clean dishes and vessels, whether they are tin, copper or silver. If they have become blackened by something, then as soon as they are rubbed with ash, they again acquire their former shine. Through holy repentance, sinners are cleansed and brighten before the eyes of God like the sun. First, David was the vessel of God. The Lord Himself testifies about him: “I have found a man after My heart, and I have found David My servant” (Acts 13:22). This vessel was blackened by the sins indicated above, but when he sprinkled ashes on his head and suffered the feat of repentance, he became so enlightened and became pleasing to God that he was even honored to be the forefather of Christ, our Lord, who came to call not the righteous, but sinners to repentance. Paul was a dark vessel when he was not yet called Paul, but Saul, and he intensely persecuted the church of God. When he repented, he immediately became a bright vessel of the name of Christ. “This vessel,” said the Lord, “is chosen to bear My name before nations and kings” (Acts 9:15). That sinner whom the simple Paul saw entering the church with a darkened soul, with a face as black as that of an Ethiopian, was also a darkened and vile vessel. When that sinner, standing in the church, heard the prophetic words read in the church: “Wash yourself, and be clean,” he was touched in his soul by these words and decided to firmly repent, he immediately became white in soul, and the same Saint Paul saw him leaving the church with a face enlightened, like an angel’s, and shining with God’s grace. Black and stingy was the vessel - the Antiochian sinner Pelagia, whom St. Non, the Bishop of Ilio-Polye, saw in his vision in the form of a black dove, extremely nasty and stinking. But a few hours later, when she repented in her heart, he saw her in the form of a pure dove, white as snow and soaring in the clouds. The vessel of the Lord, the hermit Jacob, became cursed when he fell into a sin similar to David’s, into carnal sin and murder. When he repented with great repentance, he became so cleansed and enlightened that he received from God the grace of working miracles even greater than he had before the fall and repentance. We also know about the Monk Mary, the niece of the Monk Abraham, that after her life of fornication she sincerely repented and pleased God more than even in virginity, before her corruption and repentance. This is how the ashes of holy repentance cleanse defiled vessels and make them bright. Ashes dissolved in warm water make an excellent ablution. Called lye, with which people usually wash their heads, the whole body and various clothes, it perfectly washes away all kinds of dirt. Holy repentance, dissolved by warm tears of tenderness, oh, how well it washes away all sinful dirt from human souls! Was it not this washing that cleansed the soul of the ever-memorable King David, who dissolved the ashes of his repentance with warm tears? Let us also remember the gospel sinner; Was it not by this same washing that her soul was washed and made white from the filth of fornication, for, weeping at the feet of Christ and washing His holy feet with tears, she heard from the most pure lips of the Lord: “Your sins are forgiven you” (Luke 7:48). This is the power of David’s ashen meal, dissolved by warm tears. Such tears dissolved not only David’s ashy meal, but also his drinking. “My drink,” he says, “is mixed with weeping” (Ps. 102:10). Just as there must be drink with bread, so there must be tears with repentance. Such a drink not only cools spiritual thirst, but also extinguishes the most unquenchable fire. The thirst of our souls (if anyone has it) is a Divine desire, about which David speaks: “In the same way that the tree desires for springs of water, my soul desires the same for You, O God; My soul thirsts for God” (Ps. 41:2). Tears cool such a thirst, or, better said, delight it. Those who have experienced it, are filled with Divine desire and therefore cry warmly, know this well. Fire is our sins, worthy of the unquenchable fire of hell and burning all our good deeds like the fire that, tied by Sampson to the tails of foxes, burned the Philistine wheat during the harvest (Judges 15:4:5). And truly, every sin is fire. Fury and anger are fire, which is why they are called impetuousness. Carnal lust is also fire, and a strong fire, burning oak groves and mountains, for this passion burns not only ordinary people, like oak groves, but also great saints, whose merits are like mountains before God; if it engulfs, it burns them to the ground (Ps. 82:15). The apostle also calls an intemperate tongue fire: “The tongue is a fire, the babble of unrighteousness, scorched by Gehenna” (James 3:6). Robbery and theft of someone else’s property is also fire, for other people’s things, especially spiritual, church, monastic things, which, according to the testimony of the Fatherland (Paterikon) and the Prologue, if they appear anywhere, they burn everything like fire, so it is impossible for a robber to enrich himself with someone else’s. In the same way, every sin that we love and usually commit is fire in our bosom, burning us, according to the words of the Pritochnik: “If anyone binds fire into his bosom, will he not burn his garments? Or will someone who steps on a fiery coal burn his foot?” (Prov. 6:27:28). Whoever loves one sin, will he not thereby burn up all his virtues? How small this fire is, but what great things it burns! If someone exhausts his entire life with sins without repentance, will he not be condemned to eternal burning in unquenchable fire? Just as, in the words of the apostle, “unprofitable earth, which wears out thorns and thistles, its end is burning” (Heb. 6:8), so the sinner’s fate will be unquenchable fire in hell, kindled by his incessant sins. Hellfire is called unquenchable; this is what it really is, for it is eternal and cannot be extinguished by any waters. Collect all the springs you can, all the wells, lakes and all the rivers under heaven, pour them on the fire that burns in Gehenna, even pour on it all the water of the great ocean, all the elements of water, and you will not be able to extinguish even one spark of this eternal and unquenchable fire. “Their fire will not go out,” says the Lord (Mark 9:44). Think about yourself now, man. Oh, how many times have you angered God with mortal sin; but with each individual sin you have kindled an unquenchable fire within yourself. How many sins have you committed, so many tongues of fire and hell have you kindled within yourself; and they are all inextinguishable. What will you do now? How will you get rid of that eternal flame? How will you extinguish the unquenchable tongues of fire? You can extinguish them. But what? Waters of tears, which are stronger than all rivers and the sea to extinguish the unquenchable fire of hell. What the entire water element cannot do, a warm tear coming from a contrite heart accomplishes perfectly. How great do you think was the fiery hell that the holy Apostle Peter kindled within himself, having denied Christ his Lord three times? After all, this sin (rejection from Christ) is not punished by anything other than unquenchable fiery hell. When Saint Peter shed warm tears from a contrite heart and “went out weeping bitterly” (Matthew 26:75), he immediately not only extinguished the fiery hell that was kindled in him, but was even honored to have the keys of the heavenly kingdom. Oh, how great is the power of the tears of a repentant person! Oh, David's beautiful ashen meal! Oh, the wonderful drink of David, dissolved in tears! Having offered this Davidic meal to your love, I do not think that it would be tasty or pleasant to anyone. Now I will offer you. the second dish, a dough of barley bread transformed into the spear of Gideon, and a handful of water instead of vodka for your appetite between dishes. The Israelites were once extremely oppressed by the Midianites, and because of many disasters they cried out to God. Having mercy on them, God gave them as a leader a strong man named Gideon, who, gathering the strength of Israel, went against the Midianites; but the Lord God tells him not to lead a large force with him to war, but to choose only the best and most courageous warriors. How could Gideon recognize the best and the bravest? This is how he was able to do it: at the command of God, he led everyone to the water and commanded them to drink. Some, falling on their knees and bowing their heads to the water, drank water from the river like cattle, while others, scooping up water by the handful, drank water from their handful. Then Gideon divided them all into two parts. He placed those who drank water like cattle on one side, and those who drank by the handful - on the other. It turned out that there were very few people who drank water by the handful: only three hundred people; the rest all drank like beasts, plunging their faces and lips into the water. Then God commanded Gideon to return all those who drank like cattle, and to take only these three hundred to the war, and promised, saying: with three hundred men who drank water by the handful, I will save you and deliver the Midianites into your hands. Listen, ministers: a handful of water turned out to be the cause of salvation and victory over enemies; With a handful of water three hundred men became strong to defeat the enemy. What is the secret of this, let’s get into it. Water is human life on earth, according to Scripture: “Like water poured out” (Ps. 21:15). Just as river rapids flow quickly and do not return, so our life flows quickly without return. It’s better to say this: this world is water, for all the peoples living in it are called water in the Holy Scriptures. So, for example, the angel in the Apocalypse says to the Theologian: “Where you have seen the waters where the fornicator sits, they are people and peoples, and nations and nations” (Apoc. 17:15). These waters are not bitter, but sweet, for they are filled with the vain sweets of this world, for even the fornicator sits in it, the greatest sweetness of temporary sin. Midian, who rises up against us with daily warfare, is either a demon-tempter, or our flesh, which by its nature wars against our spirit. Whoever wants to overcome his enemy, drink the sweetness of this world, not like a beast, immersing both your mouth and your face in it, but by the handful, that is, observe abstinence in your life. Anyone who is bestially immersed in worldly sweets will not win, but will be defeated, will not drive away the enemy, but will be driven out. The one who abstains in everything will be a glorious winner. So, let us have a handful of water, and not a whole river, that is, little food and meager drink, on Holy Pentecost, so that we may appear as conquerors of sin. Now, having offered you a handful of water, like a glass of vodka between meals, I offer you some barley bread dough to eat with vodka. Gideon, having approached the countless Midian power at night with three hundred men, at the command of God he himself goes there with one youth; crawling into the Midian regiment and walking quietly among it, he listens. And then he hears that one warrior, having woken up, is telling his comrade a dream. I saw, he said, as if a dough of barley bread, rolling from Gideon’s regiment, moved towards the Midian tent in our Midian regiment, hit it, overturned it, and the tent fell. The comrade answered: this is not dough, but the spear of Gideon, for the Lord will deliver Midian into his hands and our entire regiment. Gideon, hearing this, worshiped the Lord and, returning to his own, began to build an army for the attack; then he attacked the Midian regiment, defeated it and dispersed it to the end. Let us now consider the mysterious meaning of this dream vision. The dough of barley bread was a spear against enemies, and barley, full of sharp shoots, is an image of cruel life. For us, the dough of barley bread is a sign of a holy fast, devoid of sweets in food, for the barley bread seen in a dream, which struck the Midian tent, was not real baked bread, but only its dough, since baked bread has a taste, but the dough does not have it. However, in barley bread, even baked bread, there is little taste, not like in rye or wheat, and even more so in barley dough there is no taste at all. The dough of barley bread is an image of fasting, for even desert-dwelling fasters ate such food as, for example, St. Hilarion the Great, who said to his body: “I, donkey, will not feed you with barley, but with worthless grass.” This tasteless dough or fasting is a strong spear against the enemy and defeats him, so in fairness we can say: this is not dough, but a spear. Fast, abstain, and your fasting, like a strong and sharp spear, will strike your enemy who has risen up against you. Christ the Lord, who Himself became an example in this, teaches us to arm ourselves against our enemy the devil by fasting. Some teachers ask: why did the Lord fast for forty days and forty nights in the desert? But because he knew about the enemy’s intention to approach Him with temptations, as it is written about this: “Come to Him, O tempter” (Matthew 4:3). Therefore, before he approached, the Lord armed himself against him with a forty-day fast in order to defeat him. Then they ask again: Couldn’t the Lord have defeated the devil even without such fasting? Of course he could; He did this in order to leave us an image and by His example to teach us to arm ourselves with fasting against the devil, for otherwise we are not able to defeat him. This is how St. talks about this. Ambrose: “Our Savior, intending to enter into a fight with the devil, first of all fasted, so that we would know that we cannot defeat the temptations of the devil unless we arm ourselves against him by fasting.” Barley dough is a weapon against Midian, fasting is a weapon against the devil, iron against passion; it is a sharpness that pierces and kills sinful sweetness. I wanted to offer an even better food to your love, namely that manna with which the Lord rained down in the desert and which has great delight, but I pity those who rush to the present holiday meals. Therefore, in order not to drag out time with my wretched treat, I will briefly advise the following: if someone on Holy Pentecost begins to fast until sunset, then dry bread will be like manna for him, for fasting sweetens even bad food, and turns bitter radish with horseradish into honey and sugar. Have we really forgotten about salt? No, we haven't forgotten. How can a meal be without salt? “Every sacrifice will be salted with salt” (Mark 9:49); and spiritual food requires spiritual salt. Spiritual salt is reasoning in all matters. When you fast, let there be the following consideration: are we not fasting hypocritically, out of vanity? do we not condemn and rebuke those who do not fast; Are we not angry with our household when we fast? After all, many, while fasting, usually get angry, rage and grumble, like a bear, which, lying in its winter lair, does not eat anything, but only sucks its paw and rumbles incessantly. So, let us fast with no other intention than to fulfill the commandment of God, apostolic and ecclesiastical, according to tradition from the holy fathers. May fasting serve us to mortify our passions, to satisfaction for our sins; yet this is for the glory of God. Finally, not only salt is included at meals, but also sbiten. At our spiritual meal, let us bring down the following verse from the Studite: “Let us fast a pleasant fast, pleasing to the Lord. True fasting is: alienation from evil, abstinence of the tongue, putting aside rage, excommunication from lusts, accusations, lies and perjury: abandonment of all this is true and favorable fasting.” We must fast not only in foods, but also abstain from all unpalatable deeds. Let us gather together at a spiritual meal, in addition to fasting in food, let there be fasting, abstinence from spiritual passions and all evil deeds. I also have other Lenten foods prepared, but now I don’t have enough time; Therefore, I will leave them for another time, if God helps, and we will live. And now I hit you with those foreheads: forgive me. Amen. Lesson for the first week of Lent “From here you will see the heavens opened...” (John 1:51) In today's Gospel we hear that heaven is open; and who would not wish to enter into it, beloved hearers? The prophet wishes, saying: “If Thy village is beloved, O Lord of hosts! My soul longs for the courts of the Lord” (Ps. 83:2:3). The apostle desires: “I have a desire,” he says, “to be allowed to live with Christ,” to whom “I was caught up to the third heaven” (Phil. 1:23; 2 Cor. 12:2). If I asked each of those standing here individually: “Do you want to be in heaven?” - then everyone would answer: “Yes, I wish,” as it is written about this: we rather want to leave the body and come to God, to that God who lives in heaven, for this is why we were created, so that from the earth we would come to heaven and replenish those idle places from which the evil angels fell; This is why the sky opens so that we can enter it. But how can we enter the sky that is open to us? After all, we do not have wings to fly to the heights of heaven. We are not angels, but people burdened with the burden of the body, and yet about angels, although they have wings, the current Holy Gospel does not say that they take off, but ascend: “And the angels of God ascend,” and not those that take flight. Here the Gospel outlines for Christians the charter of a good life - thought and deed, or, more precisely, God-mindedness and hard work. Thought of God is in the wings of angels, and diligence is in the ascension. Oh, Christian man, little less than the angels, an earthly angel, but a heavenly man! It is not enough for you, soaring on the wings of God-thinking, to fly upward; It is also necessary to ascend with the feet of diligence: “And the angels ascending.” In order for anyone who wishes to be able to more conveniently enter the open heaven, I decided in my present conversation to be a climacus, although I am very far from St. John the Climacus, for he was wise and holy, while I am weak-minded and sinful. Still, with God's help, I will try to be a ladder climber. I will place a spiritual ladder composed of virtues to the open heaven, so that anyone who wishes can ascend more comfortably. “From here on you will see the sky open.” Thank God that heaven is open for us; If only they themselves were not too lazy to enter it. At this hour, wanting to be a ladder climber, with God’s help I am looking for a place to establish a ladder on it, like Jacob’s ladder: “A ladder was established on the earth, with its top reaching to heaven” (Gen. 28:12). A real ladder has two sides, two bowstrings or beams, between which steps are installed. The spiritual and virtuous ladder also has two sides, which I will explain when I first find a place where I could establish both of its sides. Listening to the current Gospel, I hear: “From here, from here,” they say, “you will see heaven open,” and I reason: from here? Is it not from the holy Pentecost, which is a time of abstinence? After all, abstinence is considered the foundation of all virtues, as is read about this in the second prayer to the Holy Spirit: “Envelop me in the womb of generosity, and abstinence as the foundation of all virtues.” It is in this place, that is, on abstinence on Holy Pentecost, that we will establish one side of our ladder. Now let's look for another place for the other side. Again I listen to this Gospel reading; henceforth, from St. Lent, there is a time of repentance, as it is sung about this in the Triodion: “This is the time of repentance, let us put aside the works of darkness.” Here at this place, that is, at repentance, we will establish the other side of our ladder, which would reach to the sky, open above St. Pentecostal. Abstinence and repentance are truly the most solid and lasting places in the Lent, although the most difficult, for it is not desirable for everyone to abstain and show true repentance. So, let one side of our ladder be established on abstinence, which is fasting in food, and the other on repentance, which is fasting in evil deeds. These are those two bowstrings, those two beams, between which other virtuous steps are established. Let us now consider the strength and necessity of these two sides. Just as the steps cannot be established and exist if they are not established in the middle of two strings or beams, so all the virtues cannot be solid in us if they are not established in this double fast, abstinence, as I said, in food and in evil deeds. Let us propose here a question about the first fast: what is the need to fast in food? Without dragging out the conversation with many and long answers, I will say briefly. Not to mention the fact that in both the Old and New Testaments, fasting was very praiseworthy and glorious: in the Old Testament in the example of the holy prophet Daniel and the three youths, and in the New Testament in the example of Christ the Savior Himself, who fasted in the desert for forty days, and His holy apostles; not to mention the fact that fasting was legalized in the primal church, accepted and approved by the later holy fathers; not to mention the fact that fasting is very useful not only for spiritual salvation, but also for physical health - I will just bring to your attention the following. Our enemy the devil fights against us and defeats us through no other sin than through our real body, as the apostle says about this: “The flesh lusts after the spirit” (Gal. 5:17). This is explained especially well in the Revelation of St. John the Theologian: a certain radiant woman, who appeared in heaven and adorned with the sun, moon and stars, is driven by a certain seven-headed serpent, whose trunk has torn off a third of the stars of heaven. How does he drive her away? He let water like a river fall on his wife from his mouth in order to drown her in the river (Apoc. 12:1–4:13–15). Do you see what this enemy of snakes is doing? He does not try to bite this wife with his teeth, does not torment her, does not breathe on her with his terrible poison in order to harm her, does not emit the fire of his rage on her in order to scorch her, does not hit her with his trunk that rejected the stars: he only released water from his mouth, not sea water, which by nature is bitter and not tasty, but river water, not bitter, but tasty. What could be the interpretation of this vision? The wife is the image of the Church of Christ, especially the soul of every believer. The serpent is the devil, persecuting the Church of Christ. How does he drive them away? He does not bite with his teeth, for he depresses everyone with illnesses and showers them with leprosy and disasters, as sometimes, by God’s permission, he showered the long-suffering Job; does not torment them with his nails, for he does not destroy everyone’s temporary benefits and wealth, as he once destroyed all the wealth and children of Job; he does not breathe his terrible, destructive poison, for he does not push everyone to commit all sins; does not emit the fiery flame of his rage, for he cannot easily arouse rage in everyone; finally, he does not hit with his trunk, for he will not confuse everyone with his pride. But what does he do? He emits water from his damned lips. What kind of water? Not sea, bitter, that is, it does not put in the heart of a person the bitter memory of the fear of death, the threat of the Last Judgment and the horror of the torments of Gehenna, but what? He emits sweet river water on a person, that is, bodily luxury, carnal lusts and the sweets of carnal sins, about which the Apostle Paul wrote to the Galatians: “The works of the flesh have been revealed, which are adultery, fornication, uncleanness, adultery” and so on (Gal. 5:19). With these passions the devil oppresses a person; in them lies all his power and strength, for with them, like sweet waters, he easily drowns everyone, as Scripture says: “Everyone is tempted, drawn and enticed by his own lust” (James 1:14). With them he overcomes the brave soldiers of Christ and causes shame to many saints and an obstacle to others. Saint Cyprian grieves that when he was under persecution of Christians from wicked idolaters, some of the believers, who boldly confessed the name of Christ, even endured great torment for Christ, but then, released into freedom, they were at times disgraced by carnal falls and their bodies, which had previously been the temple of the Holy Spirit, became a church of sinful carnal voluptuousness. In addition, the stories about the martyrs also contain the fact that some of the passion-bearers of Christ had their tongues cut out for confessing the name of Jesus Christ, but they all continued to speak clearly by the grace of Christ. When one of them fell in carnal sin, he immediately became mute, destroying this grace of wonderful speech. We cannot help but be surprised at how great the power of the devil is over us, which is contained in our natural members, in their carnal voluptuousness. If all the power and strength of the devil is contained in that sweet water that he releases on us, that is, in the carnal voluptuousness with which he seduces us, then if someone were to dry up this sweet water, that is, carnal voluptuousness, he would tame all the power and strength of the enemy and defeat his enemy, as already weak and weak. After all, it is known that fasting and abstinence dry up our body, mortify carnal lusts and sinful passions in us, as Saint Cyprian says about this: “There is no stronger rein than fasting.” Fasting dries up the swamp of filth; from it, the disorderly movements of the flesh fade and lusts become exhausted, so that fasting tames all the power of the enemy warring against us and easily defeats the tempter. So, it is necessary to keep fasting in food precisely so that, having dried up the swamp of sinful carnal lust, we weaken and defeat the power and might of the devil, who fights against us mainly through our real body. Having considered the strength and necessity of the first string or beam, the first side of the ladder, let us consider another string or beam, the other side, which is abstinence from evil deeds; Let's consider it, like the first one, by means of a question. Why is it necessary to fast from evil deeds? Here’s why: just as a material ladder cannot be strong with one string, with one side, so a virtuous ladder cannot stand with only abstinence in food, but abstinence from evil deeds is also extremely necessary. It is therefore necessary to know which evil deeds are especially difficult. Some come from weakness, such as carnal voluptuousness; they can be tamed by abstaining from food. Other evil deeds, arising not from carnal weakness, but from some special malice, such as, for example, the sin of envy, hatred, delicacy, the sin of eating and consuming one's neighbor - these sins are much more serious than all the first; for the sins of carnal sensuality are the sins of human weakness, while the sins that come from malice are the sins of satanic enmity. It is from these, that is, from sins arising from malice, that a Christian person especially needs to abstain. Let us listen to what the Studite Triodion teaches when chanting: “Let us fast with a pleasant fast, pleasing to the Lord. True fasting is alienation of evil, abstinence of the tongue, putting aside rage, accusations, lies and perjury: abstinence from these is true and favorable fasting.” Without this second post, the first post is nothing. God Himself, in the book of His prophet Isaiah, says: “In the days of your fasts, do your will, languish your companions, fast in your fasts. If you wear your neck like a sickle, and put on sackcloth, and put on ashes, then neither will the fast be called My fasting. “I have not chosen such a fast,” says the Lord, “but resolve every alliance of unrighteousness, and correct corruption” and so on (Is. 58:3-6). In order to do this, as we see, we need to fast from evil deeds, so that the first fast, fasting in food, will be favorable before God. In addition, it is also necessary to abstain from evil deeds because with sins, with evil deeds, with morals grown old in sins, it is impossible to enter the heaven that is open to us, into which, according to the Theologian, no defilement can enter. It is very worthy of surprise that the Lord God, having brought His people out of the land of Egypt with the intention of leading them into the promised land, did not immediately bring them into it, but first led them forty years in the desert; but the journey from Egypt to the promised land of Canaan is no more than ten days, for in ten days one can freely travel by land from Egypt to Palestine. But God led His people for forty years through impassable places before He brought them into the Promised Land. What is the reason and purpose of this? The goal is for them to completely lose the habit of those evil, sinful deeds to which they were accustomed in Egypt; and before they had become unaccustomed to their sinful morals, he did not lead them into the promised land. So you, a Christian, cannot enter the heaven that is open to you until you have weaned yourself from those evil deeds to which you are accustomed. Moreover, it is also surprising that, with the exception of Joshua and Caleb, none of those who came out of Egypt entered the Promised Land, but only their children entered; all those who came out were covered with coffins in the desert, for it is written: “The Lord was angry with rage and swore, saying: If these men see him who came out of Egypt from twenty years old and above, the land which he promised them with an oath” (Numbers 32:10:11). Why did God not allow everyone who came out of Egypt to enter the promised land, but only their children were given this gift? Chrysostom explains the reason for this: “So,” he says, “so that those who will inherit the promised land not only themselves do not know the sinful Egyptian deeds to which their fathers were accustomed, but there would not even be those who would remember them. Therefore, the old Israelites fell dead in the desert, so that in Palestine they would not teach their children the atheism and filthiness that they committed in Egypt with the Egyptians.” This is what that saint says: “Why can’t I remember those who came out of Egypt? Why did everyone die? So that those who would take possession of Palestine would not know all the evil that was in Egypt, that is, all the magic and wickedness, and so that there would not be a single teacher of these evil deeds.” If those entering the promised land cannot even have the memory of sin, then all the more so for us, entering the open heaven, it is necessary to destroy not only the sinful morals to which we are accustomed, but even the memory of sins (excluding regrets about sins) must be eradicated from our minds, so that we do not fall dead in soul in the desert of our damned life and are not deprived of heavenly entry. Thus, it is now clear why one should fast from evil deeds. Because, I repeat, it is impossible to enter the sky that is open to us with them. Thus, having examined both bowstrings or beams, both sides of the ladder, having understood their strength and necessity and having established them in strong places, abstinence during fasting in food and repentance during fasting from evil deeds, let us now put between them, as it were, steps, virtuous ascents, which are very diverse, for the paths of salvation and steps are diverse, to list which in detail and talk about which is not enough not only for the present hour, but it will not be enough for the time of the whole week. Prayer, almsgiving, mercy, friendliness, love of God, humility, purity, chastity and other similar good deeds, and attentive preservation of all the commandments of God - all these are the essence of the steps of the ladder leading to heaven. Since I have established our ladder on abstinence, I will now say that the highest step, leading to the height of virtues and to perfect salvation, is satisfaction for sins, that is, works of repentance equal to previously former sins, so that whatever the former sins were, such repentance would be accomplished. The great preacher of repentance, John the Baptist, crying in the Judean wilderness, says: “Repent, produce fruits worthy of repentance” (Matthew 3:8). What are these fruits worthy of repentance? Those who, according to the interpreters, by the labors of satisfaction for sin in repentance would be equal to the severity of any great sin committed, so that as much as anyone works for sin, he also works for the Lord, as the apostle says: “For as you have turned your handmaids' lands into wickedness and iniquity, so now will you present your handmaids' lands into righteousness into holiness” (Rom. 6:19). Saint Gregory, who calls a person a tree, known by its fruits, says: “After all, it is known by its fruits, and not by leaves or roots, for the Lord God also cursed a tree that had leaves, but was barren: He does not accept confession only in words, without the labor of depressing the body.” By this he said that a tree, living and good, is known not by its roots or leaves, but by its fruits. Man is a mental tree. A repentant person has as its root repentance, the thought and intention of confessing sins; the leaves are the very verbal confession of sins to God before the spiritual father and the promise to repent and correct; The fruits are satisfaction and labor. Let's see now, from what is true repentance known? It is recognized not by the roots of intention, not by the leaves of confession and promise, but by the fruits of satisfaction. Confirm your intentions like roots, multiply words like leaves, but if you do not have fruits worthy of repentance, or do not have achievements and labors of satisfaction, then you are not a blessed tree, but subject to curse. We have already said that fruits worthy of repentance are those that are equal in their difficulty, quality and quantity to previously committed sins. The repentance of one who wants to cover repeated binge eating and drunkenness with short abstinence from food and fasting is vain. The repentance of one who, with a few sighs and blows to the chest, wants to justify many lies, thefts, murders, thefts, the bitterness of a brother and much like them, is in vain. The repentance of one who wants to cleanse long and serious mortal sins by briefly and easily killing his body is unjust. The repentance of one who wants to wash away great defilements and iniquities with small tears will pass without a trace. Christ our Lord, having taken our sins on earth upon Himself and wishing to cleanse our souls from all filth, opened on the cross a special source flowing from His side: a source of water and blood. Saint John the Theologian says the following about Him: “This is Jesus Christ who came by water and blood” (1 John 5:6), not only by water, but by water and blood, in order to cleanse the sins of others, that is, ours; The Lord brought forth not only water from His ribs, but also blood: He cleansed not only with water, but “with water and blood.” To wash away our own sins, we, like light and small waters, use light repentance without blood, that is, without labor leading to bloody sweat. Truly, our repentance is vain and similar to the work of Pilate, who, having washed his hands, betrayed Christ to death. We work only a short time, we fast a little, we cry a little; We only wash our hands, as it were, and not our whole body from the swamp, and through this we crucify Christ a second time. Not only do we not make due satisfaction for past sins, but we even extend our iniquities to greater and new ones. What benefit will such repentance bring? Judge for yourself. Can anyone cool a great red-hot furnace with a handful of water? Can anyone, with a small drop of tears, extinguish the fire of hell that is prepared for him? Can anyone, in the darkest midnight, illuminate the whole of heaven with one small lighted candle? Can anyone, with weak regret for sins, like a small candle, illuminate the pitch darkness prepared for him? Can anyone with one spoonful of honey sweeten all the bitterness of the ocean? Can anyone, through a brief act of tenderness, become sweet to God who is grieved by our sins and receive forgiveness? Many and many, like a river, shed tears before the Lord all day and night, together with the one who says: “I will wet my bed with my tears” (Ps. 6:7). If you want to extinguish the fire of hell prepared for you, transform yourself entirely from sinful darkness into light. If you want to get rid of total darkness, turn all the bitterness of sin into sweetness. If you want to become sweet to the Lord and receive forgiveness of sins, “delight yourself,” it is said, “of the Lord, and he will give you the petition of your heart” (Ps. 36:4), that is, completely mortify yourself with labors and exploits, so that the sinful passions living in you die. The Apostle says: “Let the body of sin be done away with, because we do not have to work through sin” (Rom. 6:6). Abolish your body, rooted in sins, exhaust it, depress it, and in the hope of the abolition of sins, create fruits worthy of repentance, compare your labors with your former sins or even surpass them, and then expect forgiveness and salvation. Whoever ascends to this level of satisfaction for sins will receive hope in God, as well as in the open heaven. This is what we have, beloved listeners! We have a ladder established on earth and pointed towards the open sky! Let us ascend it while we have time, so that, by postponing from day to day, we will not completely miss the time of repentance and will not perish in the end, which God will not allow us to do. May the same thing not happen to us as to Esau, about whom the apostle says: “He was rejected; for you will not find a place for repentance, even if you seek it with tears” (Heb. 12:17). God is long-suffering. If, after His long-suffering, He becomes upset with a person for not repenting, then He will accelerate His punishment, and then, O man, you cannot know whether you will have time for repentance. We have now built a spiritual ladder only with my bad conversation, but not with the deed itself. Oh, if God would give each of us to actually accomplish that useful thing that was spoken about with our lips! Now, perhaps, it would be time to end our conversation with the word “Amen,” but it would not be useless to support that ladder with something and reinforce it with something. But with what? In the end, we remembered that postponing repentance is a very bad thing, because when an unexpectedly terrible case occurs, it will not be convenient to find time for repentance. Thus, let the angel whom the Theologian saw standing on earth and on sea support and strengthen our ladder. That angel “lift up his hand to heaven, and swear by Him who lives forever and ever, who created the heaven and what is in it, the earth and what is in it, and the sea and what is in it, that time will be no more” (Apoc. 10:5:6). Oh, holy angel! Do you really contradict the Holy Gospel, which says: “Do not swear in any way, either by heaven, for the throne is God, or by earth, for His footstool is his foot”? (Matthew 5:34:35). You dare to swear by the Creator of heaven and earth himself. Are you sinning? No, the angel does not sin with such an oath, for he truly swears. It's a different matter for humans. He is forbidden to “swear in any way,” for whether he swears or does not swear, he always lies. An angel, by swearing, creates the truth, and without swearing he cannot lie, and even more so he will not lie when he swears. He swears by God so that every creature of God, especially reasonable man, all generations and all tribes, may have faith in his untruthful words. What does that angel swear about? Let us pay attention: “As if there will be no more time.” Do you hear, sinful man, wallowing in his sins like dirty feces, and postponing his repentance for another time, for old age! If you don’t repent soon, you won’t get time to repent at all. Believe the angel of God, who swears to God that there will be no more time. An unexpected mortal disease will come upon you; you want to repent, but there won’t be time. Will unexpectedly find God's punishment, fire and sword; you want to improve, but you won’t have time. You will fall into the hands of your enemies, visible and invisible; you will want to cry about your sins, but you won’t have time. The last hour of your death will come, all your sins will appear before your face; You would then want to bear every kind of repentance, even the most difficult one, but you will not find time for repentance, for there will be no more time. Now, now, while you have time, take care of your sins, repent sincerely: after that there will be no more time. So, having supported the ladder leading to heaven by the angel seen in the Apocalypse, I will end my conversation by saying: Amen. Sermon on Saturday of the fourth week of Lent “Remember your teachers” (Heb. 13:7). “Remember your last” (Sir.7:39) “Remember” and “remember”: let these two words from the Divine Scripture, beloved listeners, be the basis of our present conversation. Remember your mentors, your father and mother, for they are first of all the mentors of a person in his youth, as well as those who are your mentors in spirit and about whom the word of God speaks to you. Remember them; Looking at the end of their lives, remember their good life, godly deeds, soul-helping words and instructions that they taught you, imitate their faith and be jealous of their godly pleasing. Remembering your mentors, remember your every and last breath, death, grave, decay and transformation into dust. “Remember your last.” Both of these memories, that is, about previously deceased mentors and about one’s own death, are of great benefit. For those we ask for the joy and mercy of God, but for ourselves we ask for a good life with protection from falling into sin. “Remember,” it is said, “the last is yours, and you will never sin.” Let us preserve the memory of the blessed memory of the godly men who presented themselves, let us send our sinful prayers to God for them, and let us appease His philanthropic goodness. In memory of them, let us remember our death and offer a word about the memory of death, “I make haste to the Lord and confirm the word.” I praise the good custom of modern times, according to which many people go to other countries to study, because from across the sea they return wise. I also heard that some sages called the thought of death a special philosophy, a special wisdom. If mortal memory is philosophy, then it is inconvenient to study this wisdom while sitting at home, but one should also seek it in foreign countries. Now I will go, not with my carnal, but with my mental feet, overseas, to foreign countries, from Europe to Great Asia, from present years to ancient, long-ago ones. So David walked about, saying: “I thought about the first days, and remembered eternal years” (Ps. 77:6). This means that he brought to mind “the most ancient past times and looked prophetically at those that will come after us, for the mental legs move back and forth and are so fast that in one step they reach the ancient years, and overtake the future ones. With this mental walk I too will go to distant lands and to ancient times that have passed by. First of all, I will pass through the country bordering Europe and Asia, called Lacedaemonian. In it I see the Lacedaemonian king Pausanias, sitting on his throne with great pride, and standing before him the glorious philosopher Simonides. The king says to the philosopher: “Tell me something from your philosophy that would be useful to me and remain in my memory.” The philosopher replied: “Remember, king, that you are a mortal man.” This answer is not great, but it is full of great wisdom. In it, the philosopher proposed to the king two wise and beneficial things. First: remember, king, that you are a mortal man, not God; you have the same birth as all people, and not any special one; you have the same body as all people, and not any other; after all, your body is not made of silver, gold, or any precious stone, but from the same swamp, pus, decay and stench, like that of all people; Remembering this, do not be proud. Second thing: remember, king, that you are mortal and will not live forever. Today you sit on the throne, and in the morning you may be in the tomb. Today - in glory, and tomorrow - in stench; today - in a bright room, and in the morning - in a dark pit; today - in royal purple, and in the morning - in a funeral tunic; today - in wealth and power, and in the morning, being dead, you will have nothing and will not be able to do anything; today everything is before you, and tomorrow you will remain alone in the bowels of the earth; Today everyone listens to you, but in the morning no one, for who listens to the dead, and what can the dead command? Today you are terrible for everyone, but tomorrow who will fear you, dead? Today the eyes of all are looking at you, and in the morning the dust of the earth will hide you from the eyes of all; Today you are unapproachable, and only a few of the nobles approach you, while the common people barely see you from afar, and in the morning, lying in a coffin, you will be trampled upon by everyone. So, remember, king, that you are a man and that you are mortal. These words of that philosopher are brief, but there is a lot of wisdom in them; The answer is small, but there is great power in it. Having received benefit in Lacedaemonia, I will go to Greece. Hearing about the glorious Athenian kings and about the schools of wise philosophers, I go there and now I see in Athens a certain worthy man, distinguished by the outer clothing of a philosopher. Who is he? I'm asking. It turns out that he is the philosopher Solon, famous among philosophers. He is considered one of the seven smartest sages of Greece. He wrote good civil laws to the Athenians, and predicted an unhappy end for Croesus, the king of Lydia, happy in everything. This philosopher Solon, having come to his Hellenic church, wrote on it in large letters. I, standing from afar, read what he writes; and now I see he wrote: “Know thyself.” Why did you, philosopher, write this on the doors of your church? For this reason, he says, that many people come here every day, and therefore everyone who enters can read every day and think about the meaning of these words and what they teach. Ponder and judge them for yourself. How can we understand them? Put this question in your mind: who are you, where are you from and where are you going? Who are you? You are a perishable person, purulent, weak, subject to all sorts of illnesses, all kinds of evil incidents, all kinds of misfortune and all kinds of disasters. Where? You were created from the dust of the earth; You were conceived from carnal lust, born in maternal illnesses, came from an unclean place. Where are you going? Into the coffin; there is no other end for anyone: neither the king, nor the prince, nor the rich, nor the beggar, nor the wise, nor the ignorant; everyone - a coffin. What's in the coffin? Decay, worm, stench, pus, dust and extreme humiliation. So, each one know himself. The teaching of this philosopher is not bad either; he should be praised. Having benefited from Athens, I move on. From Athens I go to Delphi. There I see a certain Zeno, who asks the mute Apollo idol: how best to arrange his life? A fool asks a fool. What kind of teaching can there be and what advice can one get from a soulless idol? However, by God’s command, a stone can make its voice, and an idol can speak. The idol spoke. But what did he say? This is what he answered Zeno: “Ask the dead.” Apparently, at the command of God, as a lesson to people, the stone spoke miraculously against its nature, and spoke something useful, while itself being useless: “Ask the dead.” He seemed to be saying this: if you want to arrange your life well, seek useful advice and reasonable instruction from the dead. Ask them; they will teach you, just be willing to listen to them. But you will say: how can a dead person teach a living one, being soulless, voiceless, having a dumb tongue and motionless lips? Truly will teach; he will speak silently, being mute, he will cry out, he will speak without moving his lips and tongue. What will he say? He will say not in word, but in deed, not in speech, but by pointing to the thing itself. Let us listen to what the dead tell us: “Oh, people, we were once the same as you are now; you will soon be what we are now. You now live in space, eat, drink and have fun in the sweets of this world. Before we lived the same way, but now we are in the cramped conditions of the grave. Where is the food? Where's the drink? Where are the joys and worldly pleasures? Have we lost all this? Likewise, you will soon lose all this. We were once alive, just as you are now; the time will come, and you will become dead, just as we are now.” In addition to this, the dead also tell us something from the Wisdom of Solomon: “What did pride avail us, or wealth with magnificence, what did you reward us? All of it has passed like a canopy, and like a message that flows, and like a ship of passing waves on the waters, but there is no trace along the waters, and like a bird flying across the sky, there are signs of the way along it, and like an arrow shot at a deliberate place: so we were born with poverty” (Wis. 5:8-13). This is what they tell us. Let's ask them about everything. If the sinful lust of carnal impurity comes to anyone, ask the dead, namely the Sodomites who are burning in unquenchable fire. What will they tell you? They will say: if you want to come to this fiery place and suffer with us forever, go and do what you want. If anyone wants to feast solemnly every day, eat and drink, ask the dead, namely the rich man who, being in torment, lifted up his eyes from hell, asked for a drop of water from Lazarus’ finger on his tongue and did not receive it (Luke 16:23:24). If you have a desire to oppress and embitter innocent people, ask Pharaoh, who innocently oppressed the people of God and drowned in the sea (Ex. 14:28), and is now drowning in Gehenna. Do you want to rebel against your rulers and plot intrigues against them, ask Dathan and Abiron, who rebelled against Moses and Aaron and were devoured by the earth (Num. 16:1, 2, 32:33). Do you want to compete with the wicked, ask Lot’s wife, who looked at Sodom and turned into a pillar of salt (Gen. 19:26). If you want to rob church things, ask Heliodorus, the treasurer of the Syrian king Seleucus, who, having come to Jerusalem, robbed the church and was killed by angelic hands (2 Mac. 3). Do you want to be exalted, puffed up in your pride, ask Herod, about whom it is written in the Acts of the Apostles and who, magnified, sat with great pride before all the people: he was suddenly struck by an angel of the Lord because he did not give glory to God, and he died, being eaten by worms (Acts 12:23). Do you want to trust in your wealth, ask that rich man of the Gospel who said to his soul: “Soul! There are many blessings that lie ahead for the summer: rest, eat, drink, be merry. God said to him: You are crazy! This night your soul will be taken from You; and what you have prepared, for whom will they be?” (Luke 12:19:20). If you want to do something evil, sinful, or anger God, ask the sinners held in hell and condemned to eternal torment. What will they tell you? Will they advise you to anger God? So, ask the dead and you will be wise. You will learn reason from them, you will get used to wisdom. From the Greek countries I go further to Egypt. I hear King Ptolemy of Egypt having a feast. Does he not treat those seventy-two Jewish sages who translated the Bible from Hebrew into Greek for him, among whom is Saint Simeon the God-Receiver? I go there and see: they are abundantly carrying dishes with food for the royal meal. That the king is there, I do not marvel at this; but what’s amazing is that I see one large dish being carried, and on it is laid the head of a corpse, without a body, without hair, without skin - only the very bone. Why is this? Is there really? But who will eat a bare bone, and even a human bone, the bone of a long-dead person? I look further. I see that they place that head in front of the king himself, and one of the steward loudly says to the king: “Look, king, so will you be!” Seeing this, the king sighed and humbled himself in his thoughts. Then, having forgotten himself, he began to have fun again; and then again one of the servants shows the king the same head and says: “Look, king, so will you be!” And again, sighing, the king humbled himself in thought and dissolved his joy with the memory of death. Oh, wisdom! O wondrous philosophy, mortal memory! He also asked the dead what to do, how to arrange his life. Now it's time to return home. It’s as if we’ve already learned a little about that philosophy – mortal memory. Returning back, I follow the same path that Moses once led the people of Israel through the desert from Egypt. Remembering him, I mentally walk into his time and, looking as if at what is happening now, I follow the Israeli regiment. So I reached him, standing in a certain place and watching what they were doing. They make a sacrifice: at the command of the leader Moses and the bishop Aaron, the priest Eleazar slaughters a young man as a sacrifice for human sins (Numbers 19:3). I look closely at the ceremony with which they perform their sacrifice, and I see that, having released the blood from the stabbed youth into a vessel, they preserved it, and they burned the youth’s body into ashes outside the camp, they burned it not with ordinary wood, but with cedar wood, and then they also collected the ashes in a vessel. After this they brought water from the spring and with this water they dissolved the ashes. Having done this, the people went to that sacrificial shrine, and the priest Eleazar and his comrades, taking new sprinklers, dipped them in blood and ashes dissolved with water, and sprinkled them on everyone. In this way people were cleansed of their impurities. Wonderful ceremony! Since everything of the Old Testament was a shadow and prototype of the New Testament, I am looking for what that youth, the cedar, the water and the ashes foreshadowed? The Holy Apostle Paul explains that all this was a foreshadowing of Christ Himself, our Savior, who was a sacrifice to God and the Father for the cleansing of the sins of the whole world, who, having been slain, poured out blood and water for us. The Apostle says this: “If the blood of a goat and a calf and the ashes of a young adult sanctify the purity of the flesh, how much more will the blood of Christ cleanse our conscience from dead works” (Heb. 9:13:14). Now a clear interpretation is revealed. The youth is Christ; cedar firewood - cross; outside the camp the calf was burned, and outside Jerusalem Christ suffered, according to the apostle: “Even so Jesus, that He might sanctify the people with His blood, without the gates He will suffer” (Heb. 13:12). Having been slain with nails and a spear, He poured out blood and water from His most pure ribs: with that water and blood people are cleansed and sanctified. What did the ashes represent? Death and resurrection, both Christ's and ours. Just as Christ was laid in the tomb, just as the dead was counted as the dust of the earth, but like the phoenix bird He came to life from the dust and rose from the grave, so we, having turned after death into the dust of the earth, will again come to life from this dust and rise again. Have you heard, my love, about the said bird called the phoenix? In the lexicon, in the narration of Saint Epiphanius, it is written that this bird is found in Arabia and India, lives without food and drink, lives not only by the wind, but also by the air, and lives for five hundred years. Then, in his extreme old age, he collects twigs and branches from fragrant trees, from cedar and cypress and others, places them on the highest mountain and hill and, sitting in that place at the hottest time, lights up and is burned to ashes by the sun's rays. At night, from the heavenly dew in that ashes, one small worm is conceived, which, little by little, matures, turns into a small chick, and then into a large bird, and thus the phoenix appears again and lives its time. This is the image of our resurrection from the grave. Now I will return to the previously mentioned ashes of the youth. There are those who interpret that these ashes of the youth, with which the Israelites were sprinkled, taught them the memory of death, that everyone who was sprinkled with them was commanded to remember God’s words spoken to the first man Adam: “Earth you are, and to earth you will go again” (Gen. 3:19). We will pay attention to the following. The life-giving blood and water that flowed from the most pure ribs of Christ has the power to completely cleanse us from our sins. At the same time, ashes are also needed, the memory of death. There are many who often partake of the body and blood of Christ, but lead faulty lives. Why? Because they do not learn mortal memory, do not think about death, and do not like this philosophy. St. described this perfectly. David: “There is no joy in their death; For this reason, I have struck their pride to the end; clothed with unrighteousness and their wickedness, they came forth as out of the fat of their unrighteousness; transgressed into the love of the heart (that is, into adultery); I thought and spoke in wickedness, lying in the height of the verb; set your mouth in heaven, and your tongue shall not pass through the earth” (Ps. 73:4-9). This is how much evil happens because they do not learn from mortal memory and do not think about death. They have no memory of death. Having returned to our places after the wanderings of our minds and making our prayers for the repose of the souls of the blessed memory of the deceased servants of God, we have the firm hope that the sacrifice made for their souls, the blood poured out from the side of Christ and the water performed in the holy cup, sprinkles and cleanses the souls of those for whom it is offered and for whom it is poured out. If the blood and water of Christ, once shed on the cross, washed away the sins of the whole world, then now the same blood and water, and not others, will not cleanse our sins? If then the blood of Christ redeemed many, countless souls from slavery to the enemy, then now it, and no other, will not redeem these remembered souls? If the suffering of Christ then justified so many, then now the same suffering of Christ, remembered by the fulfillment of the Divine sacrifice, will it really not justify those whom we commemorate? We firmly believe in the power of the blood of Christ, which flowed with water from His side; we firmly believe that it cleanses, redeems and justifies its servants, who will have eternal memory in the kingdom of heaven and in the holy church on earth among pious people. Amen. Sermon on the fifth Saturday of commendation of Lent "Rejoice, Unbrided Bride" Recently, on the Feast of the Annunciation, the Most Pure, Most Blessed Virgin Mary was greeted by the Archangel Gabriel with the word: “Rejoice.” Now, imitating Gabriel, we repeat this angelic greeting to our Lady many times: “Rejoice, rejoice, rejoice, O unbridled Bride.” At that time, God descended to people on earth through the Mother of God, like a ladder. Rejoice, heavenly ladder along which God descended! Nowadays, people come to God through the Mother of God, like a bridge. Rejoice, bridge that leads those who live on earth to heaven! At that time, “The Word became flesh,” but now our flesh overflows with spiritual joy in words, speaking with David: “My heart and my flesh rejoiced in the living God” (Ps. 84:3) and in the Mother of God, who is the Mother of life. At that time, the Holy Spirit descended on the Mother of God and overshadowed her; now the same Holy Spirit, relentlessly living in the Mother of God, overshadows us who worship with the grace of the Theotokos, like a leafy tree. We all, falling to the throne of grace of the Blessed Virgin and repeating the joyful song with sweet-sounding voices, sing: “Rejoice, unbridled Bride.” Let us sing this song not only with our larynx and tongue, but with our mind and spirit. I, weak-minded one, also want to reflect on the meaning of the words of this song and explain in my current conversation with your love, “I make haste for the Lord and confirm the word.” “Rejoice, unbridled Bride!”... Beloved listeners! The unmarried bride, to put it more simply and clearly, is the unworn Virgin, who has not known her husband. As soon as I uttered this word “Virgin,” five more wise virgins, remembered in the Gospel, immediately came to my mind, who came out to meet their groom with burning candles, and I say to myself: is the Most Holy Virgin among those wise virgins? But my spirit says to me: both there is and there is no. There is, for church teachers, such as Andrei of Crete, call her the wise Virgin; no, because she is incomparably superior to those, as the church sings about this: “Rejoice, surpassing the wise in understanding!” Come here, five wise evangelical virgins, and worship this Wise One of all, in whom are hidden the treasures of the wisdom and mind of God. What is the wisdom of this wise Virgin? We consider wisdom to be the most noble and clearest if it not only itself knows what it knows, but also instructs others, that is, the ignorant, insane and stupid - instructs, enlightens and makes them wise. Such is the wisdom of the Most Pure Virgin, who makes wise the foolish, as can be seen from Divine Scripture. In the proverbs, often read in praise of her on the feasts of the Mother of God, a certain wondrous feast of the wisdom of God is recalled: “You have slaughtered your sacrificial offering, dissolved your wine in your cup, prepared your meal” (Proverbs 9:2). Let us look here and understand: for whom does the wisdom of God prepare this feast? Whom is he calling? Who will be the guest at that feast? Who will they treat? I thought that wisdom would call wise people, philosophers, theologians, and good-willed people to its feast; I thought that wisdom, reigning and saying: “By me kings reign” (Prov. 8:15), he will call kings, princes, and rulers to his feast, and they are all wise heads; I thought that at least those five wise evangelical virgins would be called to honor them for their virginity and wisdom. But what do I see? The intentions of the wisdom of God are completely different: it does not call upon wise virgins, kings, or princes who rule countries and cities with wisdom and reason, nor philosophers, nor theologians. The wise themselves know what is good, and they themselves will be in time for that feast if they want. Whom does she invite to that feast? We hear: “The ambassadors convened their servants with a high sermon to the cup, saying: whoever is foolish, let him turn aside to me”; whoever is stupid, whoever is mad, whoever is foolish, go to the feast; “And to those who require wisdom, I say: Come, eat my bread and drink the wine that I have mixed for you” (Prov. 9:3:4). Truly this feast of the wisdom of God is amazing, unusual and even contrary to human customs. Among people, if someone eats to the point of satiety or beyond satiety, and also gets drunk on wine, then he will lose his last mind and become stupid; then the wise man will become a fool. One elder in the Patericon tells about himself that he knew the entire Bible by heart with its interpretation; when he was filled to the extreme with bread, he forgot everything. The holy Apostle Paul does not order one to get drunk with wine, saying that there is something in it that drives one crazy. The bread and wine of the wisdom of God do not have this effect. If she feeds someone, gives him something to drink, or even makes him drunk, according to what is written: “Your house will be drunk from the abundance” (Ps. 35:9), then such a person will not go mad, but will learn even more reason and wisdom, as it is said there: “Leave madness, and you will live and reign forever” (Proverbs 9:6). She seems to be saying: just eat my bread, just drink from my cup, you will immediately leave madness, immediately learn reason and will reign over your passions. For the power of the food and drink of the wisdom of God is not the same as the dishes and cups of earthly feasts, for the latter in people turn into passionate and lustful blood, while that into a dispassionate, pure and virgin dispensation, which the holy prophet Zechariah in the Jerome translation recalls, saying: “What is good in it and what is red in it, unless the chosen wheat and the wine that gives birth virgins" (Zechariah 9:7). Let us delve into this word: “The wine that gives birth to virgins.” Where wine gives rise to impurity, but here purity itself, virginity, comes from wine. Like the mother, like the daughter. The vine of wisdom produces wise fruit and produces wine that produces wisdom. Therefore, let anyone who is mad come to her, eat her bread and drink her wine: he will truly become wise and leave madness behind. All this said about that feast befits the wise Virgin, the most pure Mother of God, for she is the friend of the wisdom of God, she is the treasure of His providence. It was she who prepared a meal for the church, composed a feast at which the Lamb born of her is slaughtered, crushed and given as food, at which the cup of salvation is drawn and the believers drink from it; and whoever was stupid gets rid of madness and receives reason and wisdom. Here we ask this: who in the world would be so insane that he could truly be called insane without sin? I think that bookish people, who study philosophy only externally, will say about the unbookish and illiterate: he is a simpleton and an ignoramus. Artists who are skilled in their craft and famous in their art will say about people who do not know the same art: he can’t do anything. People are insidious, cunning, able to make truth out of a lie, and vice versa, seeing a gentle-hearted and simple person, they will say: he is a fool. Oh people! I don't believe you. Look among yourselves: you will find enough crazy people among yourselves. About the wise the apostle says this: “To be wise is foolish” (Rom. 1:22). Someone from the Patericon says the following to artists: “Your work is a real matter for you, but God’s work is like an empty matter.” But Christ Himself, interceding before the treacherous for people who are kind and simple-hearted, calls them to Himself: “The kindly one,” it is said, “and the upright one will cling to Me” (Ps. 24:21). And you, holy truth, also respond from above, saying: “The deceitful sons of mankind do not reason well in Merilech” (Ps. 61:10). Well, what should we do? Who in the world is truly mad? One of the God-minded speaks to his friend like this: “If you know everything, but don’t know God, then you don’t know anything; if you know nothing, but you know God, then you know everything,” or, to put it more simply: if you went through all external wisdom, all science and all art, but you do not know God and are lazy to please Him, then you know nothing, you are a simpleton, you are stupid; if you do not know any of the earthly wisdoms, but you know God and please Him without laziness, then you are wise. Let us now see how wise is the one who pleases God, and how simple and ignorant is the one who does not know how to please Him. Saint Callistus according to St. Chrysostom talks like this in one week: “Every sin is madness, and every sinner is a madman.” This saint shows even more clearly who is mad. A sinner, moreover, an unrepentant sinner, who does not want to turn to God, but who falls into greater and more serious sins, according to what is written in Solomon, “when the wicked comes into the depths of evil, he is negligent,” such a sinner is truly insane. Why is he mad? Because to know about death, to know about the Last Judgment and the punishment of Gehenna and not to be afraid of all this is extreme madness. In addition, to hear about the kingdom of heaven, about the eternal reward prepared for those who love God, and not desire all this is the extreme degree of stupidity, and therefore such a sinner is truly insane. Now I will turn my conversation to the Most Holy Theotokos. Oh, Most Holy Theotokos Virgin! Whom do you invite to your feast? Really crazy? Are they really sinners? After all, you are wise and even wise: what have you to do with madmen? You are pure and even most pure: what have you to do with the defiled? You are righteous and reverent: what have you to do with sinners? Your company is with angels, archangels, cherubim and seraphim, for you are “more honorable than the cherubim and more glorious than the seraphim.” Your fellowship with the holy patriarchs, with the prophets and apostles and other saints, for “you, truly, are above all the saints, a pure Virgin.” What kind of fellowship can you have with sinners? What do you care about them? Truly there is a matter. Which one? Let's see! Christ the Lord divided His verbal flock into two flocks: sheep separately, goats separately, that is, some are righteous and others are sinners. If now sheep and goats live together, and if now, during their life on earth, it is impossible to recognize who is the sheep and who is the goat, then in God’s dispensation one is sheep and the other is goat. All constitute one flock of God, both sinners and righteous, according to what is written: “Love the righteous and have mercy on the sinners.” He loves His righteous saints, but He also spares sinners, waiting for their correction. The Lord is looking for a shepherd for both of them. Who will herd the sheep? Saint Peter, you “feed my sheep”; feed my lambs. And who will herd the goats? But we do not hear in the Gospel about a shepherd for the goats. Is this why we are going to think that the goats will go out on their own without a shepherd and perish? No, and goats have their own shepherd. Who? The Most Pure and Most Blessed Virgin Mary. Let us listen to what the Holy Spirit tells Her in the Song of Songs: “O good woman! Go out after the flocks and feed your goats by the shepherd’s tents” (Song. 1:7), that is, O Blessed One among women, go after the flock, look from above at the Christian nations, feed Your goats - sinners in the pastoral tabernacles, that is, in the holy churches of the universe, governed by pious shepherds. These goats are yours, and not anyone else’s: they are handed over to you alone for charity. Provide them with everything, protect them, drive away the wolves of hell from them, so that they do not boldly kidnap them. Guide them to salvation, accept their prayers, listen to the prayers of sinners. So we see that the goats also have their shepherd, they have the Immaculate Lamb, the Most Pure Virgin. What is She doing? How does he graze his goats? She tries to turn them from goats into sheep. Knowing that it was impossible for them to become sheep until they abandoned their madness, she prepared for them such pasture, which has wondrous power: if one of the madmen eats from it, he immediately becomes wise and from a goat becomes a sheep. She prepared her meal for them and calls on them, “with the high preaching of the verb: whoever is foolish, let him turn aside to me.” The work of the Mother of God in relation to sinners, the pure Virgin in relation to the lawless, is to make them chaste, to reason with them and guide them to salvation. Let us, sinners, have good hope, for we have a good shepherd, the Most Pure Virgin. Let us obey Her voice, let us go to Her call, to Her feast; let us taste the sweets of Her pasture and, giving thanks to Her, let us diligently repeat this joyful song: “Rejoice, unbrided Bride!” The unmarried Bride, that is, the Virgin, incorruptible and, moreover, wise, has through this no less glory, for the kingdom of heaven itself is likened to Her. “Be like,” it is said, “the kingdom of heaven to the wise virgins” (Matthew 25:1). Will we, my listeners, really sin if we say in praise of the virgins: “The Virgin has become like the kingdom of heaven”? Truly we will not sin, but we will even give Her special praise, following the example of David, who says: “I will always trust in you and will add to all your praise” (Ps. 70:14). The kingdom of heaven is like the Virgin, and the Virgin is like the kingdom of heaven. How is this possible? Let's see. In the kingdom of heaven “they neither marry nor commit violence, but as the angels of God are in heaven” (Matthew 22:30). That is why the kingdom of heaven is like a virgin without art, a bride without a bride. The Virgin, and, according to the apostle, the inviolable Virgin of the Lord, “cares for the Lord, that she may be holy in body and spirit” (1 Cor. 7:34). And therefore the Virgin is like the kingdom of heaven. If there are angels in the heavenly kingdom, then the Virgin, according to the testimony of St. Cyprian, there is an angelic part: undoubtedly, one can place the Virgin among the angels. You will not find any difference between an angel and a Virgin, only the wings alone distinguish them: angels with wings, but the Virgin without wings. Take away the wings of an angel, he will become a virgin, and give the Virgin wings, she will become an angel. Having said that the kingdom of heaven is like the Virgin, and the Virgin is like the kingdom, let us now consider the rank of the kingdom, the rank of the angels, and the rank of the Virgin. The rank of the heavenly kingdom, consisting of one God in the Trinity, is divided into three angelic hierarchies, into three wondrous faces of the holy saints of God, into three regiments, according to the number of the three most glorious heavenly crowns, called golden: into a regiment of virgins, a regiment of teachers and a regiment of martyrs, as all theologians agree on this. The spirit inside says: if the kingdom of heaven has its own regiments, its own army, then it is necessary for the Virgin, like some brave man, to put on her armor, arm herself for battle, so that there is nothing completely different in the kingdom of heaven. I will say that it is quite decent and not strange for Virgo to arm herself for battle. Let's remember the Old Testament. When one beautiful Shulammite girl was brought to Solomon's tent for inspection, then, as she entered, someone, looking closely at her from the side, said to another: “What do you see in the Shulammite?” ( Song 7:1 ). This means: what do you see beautiful and special about this maiden being taken to the king? Another answered: faces, shelves; I see an army prepared for battle, I see a wondrous thing in a girl, destined for a royal marriage, destined for the most precious things. He sees the army, the regiments, he sees the regiments arranged into faces, and the faces into regiments. Wonderful thing! Two opposite things are seen in one maiden: face and regiment. It is fitting for the face to rejoice and have fun, but the regiments should engage in warfare with their enemies. Lik and regiment together! The Virgo should be the same, so that she not only rejoices in her virginity, but also strongly advocates for the integrity of her virginity. Without wasting time on a detailed and literal interpretation of the story, which says that at Solomon’s wedding there were faces and regiments (the faces had fun with the king, while the regiments protected the king’s health), I move on to the spiritual interpretation. The Shulamite maiden was at that time an image of the heavenly kingdom, for the word “Shulamitite” is interpreted: peaceful, perfect, or rewarding. Where is the best world, where is the highest perfection, where is greater reward, if not in the kingdom of heaven? If someone asked me what I see with my spiritual eyes in that mental maiden, in that maiden-like kingdom of heaven, then I would answer: faces and regiments. I see angels in three hierarchies, and each divided into three ranks. I see under three golden crowns three wondrous faces of virgins, teachers and martyrs. They all rejoice in the Lord and they all take up arms against their adversaries for the honor of the Lord - “to take vengeance on the nations” (Ps. 149:7). The kingdom of heaven remembers a long-ago incident when a sudden struggle arose in it: “There was battle in heaven” (Apoc. 12:7). Therefore, it not only rejoices with faces, but also arms itself with regiments. Faces and regiments - these are the ranks of the heavenly kingdom. What is now the rank of the Bride of the non-bridal, immaculate Virgin? In the likeness of the heavenly kingdom, it has its own shelves and faces. When She is at rest, in peace, then she rejoices; if the adversary attacks, She arms herself for battle. In particular about the Most Pure Virgin I will say that She has her own special rejoicings and militias; She rejoices more gloriously than all the saints and together with all the saints: this is what Her rejoicing is. She takes up arms, visibly and invisibly, defending the militant church on earth: that’s what Her banditry is. So on this current holiday one can hear akathist praises brought to Her by believers throughout the universe: “Rejoice, Rejoice!” This is her jubilation. Let us also remember the victory that took place thanks to Her at Constantinople over the Kagan, let us remember how She then struck a countless army in ships with a hail of fire and sank it: here is Her militia, for by Her victory is created, by Her enemies are defeated. Therefore, She is called by the Church “The Mounted Governor,” that is, dressed in armor, armed with weapons. She is a Maiden and a commander, for she has both maiden faces and warlike regiments. She also has three golden crowns: virginity, martyrdom and teaching - virginity, for, according to the testimony of the Most Holy Theotokos, St. Epiphania, the Virgin, not only in body, but also in spirit, and in purity is much superior to the angels; teaching, for, as has already become clear, She teaches reason to the insane; martyrdom, for, standing under the cross of Christ, She had such great compassion with Her suffering Son and God that the righteous Simeon even said: “A weapon will pierce your very soul” (Luke 2:35). In addition, about all virgins (with the exception of the Mother of God) it can be said without error that strict preservation of virginity is martyrdom, although without blood. Now the rank of the Virgin has become clear to us, similar to the kingdom of heaven. May the kingdom of heaven be glorified as being like the Virgin! May every virgin also be glorified, for She is like the kingdom of heaven. Until now, we have talked about the unbrided Bride and, to the best of our ability, we have understood the power and meaning of the akathist words: “Rejoice, unbrided Bride!” Now I will finish my word. It seems to me that not everyone will remember what I said, unless he is a bookish person; simple and unlearned people will probably leave without receiving any benefit. Therefore, I will tell them something worthy of memory. Listen, all you sinners (among whom I am the first); and to you, as well as to myself, I address these words: we will repeat the angelic greeting to the Virgin - “Rejoice”, we will read akathist prayers, we will fall before our Lady and pray to Her. We do not abstain from our sins and do not come to true repentance. What should we think: will our prayers, singing and worship be pleasing to the Most Holy Virgin Mary? Let's think about this. If someone, seeing a mother holding her only begotten son in her arms, stole her son from Her hands, threw him to the ground and began to trample him underfoot; if, in front of his mother’s eyes, he pierced the child’s heart, and then approached the mother and, bowing to Her, said: “Rejoice, hello and be merciful to me!” – would the mother like such worship of a murderer? Judge for yourself. Of course it won't. We, unrepentant sinners, what grave sins we commit and how often do we cast down and trample on the Son of the Virgin, Christ our Lord, having stolen from the hands of the most immaculate Mother?! How often do we pierce Him, “secondarily crucifying the Son of God” (Heb. 6:6). The Mother of God sees all this! We, having crucified Her Son for the second time, fall down to her and say: Rejoice, be merciful to us! Do we not thereby anger Her more and renew the heart wound that she once had under the cross? Let us remember this well and first of all let us be reconciled with God; then we will propitiate the Mother of God. Only then will our singing, thanksgiving, worship and praise be pleasant to Her! Then our greeting will be pleasing to Her: “Rejoice!” Now we cry out to her: “Free us from all our troubles, let us call You: Rejoice, unmarried Bride.” Amen Sermon for the fifth week of Lent “Jesus said: Can you drink the cup that I drink? And she rested unto Him: “Perfect” (Mark 10:38:39) Beloved listeners! Two holy disciples and apostles of Christ, James and John of Zebedee, seek the glory of the closest boyars of Christ, the King of glory. They want to be the closest boyars, for they pray to Him, saying: “Grant to us, that one may sit on Your right hand and may sit on Your left in Your glory” (Mark 10:37). Jesus said to them: “I don’t know what to ask for,” after which he asked the question: “Can I drink the cup that I drink?” The holy apostles ask Christ the Lord for thrones, dominions, honor, glory, and Christ the Lord not only gives them what they ask, but commands them to drink the cup that He Himself drinks, as if saying: if you want thrones, dominions, if you want glory and honor in My eternal glory, then you must first drink My cup, and then you will receive what you ask for; Until My cup is drunk by you, you will not receive what you ask for. These two holy apostles, James and John, boldly, without doubt or reflection, immediately found themselves ready to drink the cup of Christ, saying: “Mozheva.” Oh, holy apostles! But do you know what His cup is? The cup of His temporary life is not a cup of sweetness, but of bitterness, not of honey, but of wormwood, not of sugar, but of sweetness and gall, which was put on a reed in a sponge and brought to His lips. His cup is not the cup of the royal throne, but of the cross, not of glory, but of dishonor, not of coolness, but of suffering. The Lord recalls this cup at the very beginning of this Gospel, saying: “Behold, we are ascending to Jerusalem, and the Son of Man will be betrayed by the bishop and the scribe, and they will condemn Him to death, and betray Him with the tongue; and they will mock Him, and spit on Him, and kill Him” (Mark 10:33:34). This is the cup of the Lord! Can you drink this cup of the Lord, oh holy apostles! They answered: “We can.” Truly, these holy apostles are worthy of high thrones and dominions, worthy of great honors, glory and praise, for they not only do not refuse the cup of the Lord, do not run away from it and do not move away, but even with love and zeal they promise to drink it: “It is resta: it is possible.” Here I have a word to those who move away from the cup of Christ, that is, from the Divine communion of the body and blood of Christ, and do not want to partake of them often. But what I say: they don’t want to often; they do not want to receive communion and rarely: not once a year, every two, three, as many people tell me about this. Some have not received communion for ten years, others for twenty, and others do not know what it means to receive the Divine Mysteries all their lives; unless, when they were babies, when they were baptized, they received communion, but they don’t remember that either. Oh, what negligence about your soul and lack of love for God! Oh, hearts as cold as ice, without any spiritual warmth! So, I will offer to your love in this conversation how great the gain and benefit is for those who often partake of the cup of the Lord, that is, the Divine Mysteries, the body and blood of Christ, and how great the vanity and deprivation of those who voluntarily avoid this. Let your love know first of all that the cup of the Lord is twofold. The first is the cup of the Lord’s suffering and death itself, while the second is the cup of only the memory of the Lord’s suffering and death. The cup of the suffering and death of the Lord took place on Calvary, on the cross, and the cup of remembrance of the death and suffering of the Lord is celebrated on the Divine throne in the holy cup under the guise of bread and wine, which are the true body and blood of Christ. This cup is a remembrance of the death of the Lord, according to the words of the apostle: “As often as you eat this bread and drink this cup, you proclaim the death of the Lord” (1 Cor. 11:26). And Christ Himself said: “Do this in remembrance of Me” (Luke 22:19). The apostles were commanded to drink both of these cups, that is, to partake of the body and blood of Christ and to suffer for Christ, and they drank them. The Lord does not force us to drink the cup of His very suffering and death (although this is necessary for a true Christian, if time and occasion require), does not force, I repeat, that we be crucified on a material cross, that we be pierced with a spear and nails, like Him, our Lord, and His holy apostles, and that we give ourselves up to death. The Lord knows our weakness, knows that we are weak and infirm, that we cannot bear such a burden. If we are not able to endure even the slightest insult from a friend or one blasphemous word (and all this would be pleasing to Christ if we endured this way), then how could we endure if our body were crucified on a material cross, nailed down and broken into pieces? After all, even many saints, not being able to bear all this, hid in deserts, mountains and earthly abysses, such as Gregory, the wonderworker of Neo-Caesarean, and others. So, the Lord does not force us to such an unbearable cup, but only wants us to drink the cup of remembrance of His suffering and death, that is, so that we often partake of the Divine Mysteries of the body and blood of Christ. And what is the gravity of this, what is the sorrow, what is the inconvenience? Now let's see how great is the gain and benefit from communion of the Lord's cup and, conversely, how great is the loss from non-communion? The Lord Himself, with His most pure lips, says this in the Holy Gospel: “Whoever eats My flesh and drinks My blood will have eternal life” (John 6:54) - this is the gain. On the contrary: “Unless you have eaten the flesh of the Son of Man and drunk His blood, you have not life within you” (John 6:53) - this is the deprivation. Now let everyone look and judge what is better: to gain eternal life by partaking of the cup of the Lord, or to lose eternal life by not partaking of the cup of the Lord? The cup of the Lord is life, and eternal life, for whoever eats it, according to the word of the Lord, “will live forever” (John 6:51). Without the cup of the Lord, eternal death will follow, for the mouth of the Lord says: “Have no life in you.” The cup of the Lord is the kingdom of heaven, according to the word of the Lord: “I command you, as my Father has commanded me the kingdom, that you may eat and drink at my table” (Luke 22:29:30), and the one who does not have the cup of the Lord will suffer Gehenna, devouring those expelled from the kingdom. The cup of the Lord is a community with angels. After all, if the ancient manna was called angelic bread (“the bread of angels for man” - Ps. 77:25) not because, of course, it was eaten by angels, for they, as incorporeal, do not need food, but because it was prepared and sent down from above at the command of God by the ministry of angels, then much more this One, who says about Himself: “I am the bread came down from heaven" (John 6:41). And this manna, dissolved in the cup of the Lord, should be called angel food, not because the angels eat and drink it, but because they always reverently surround it, honestly honor and worship It. Therefore, the one who partakes of it communicates with the holy angels and becomes sweet and amiable to them. So, the cup of the Lord is a community with angels, but without the cup of the Lord, who will there be a community with, except demons? Whoever is shunned by angels is kidnapped by demons. What if you asked someone this way: what do you want more—eternal life or eternal death? Should I receive the kingdom of heaven or hell? Should I be in the company of angels or demons? I don’t know if there is anyone who would say: I would rather die than live; Gehenna is better than the kingdom; better demons than angels. Not everyone will say this: life is better for me than death; better is the kingdom than hell; Better are angels than demons: for every person naturally and rationally desires the best rather than the worst. If, O man, you desire the best, then why do you neglect the cup of the Lord? If you are afraid of eternal death, then why do you turn away from the eternal life that is in the cup of the Lord? If you tremble at Gehenna, then why don’t you take hold of the kingdom that is in the cup of the Lord? If you avoid demons, why don’t you approach the angels who reverently surround the cup of the Lord? In the cup of the Lord there is life, and the kingdom, and friendship with the angels. Oh, how great is the gain of communion from her! Where the cup of the Lord is not partaken, there is no life, but death; there is no kingdom, but Gehenna; there the angels are far away, and the demons are close. Oh, how great is the deprivation that comes from not partaking of the Lord’s cup! I'll ask again. Who wants to have their sins forgiven? Who wants all the evil done from youth, all his deeds, words and thoughts to be forgiven, abandoned and consigned to eternal oblivion? I think that everyone desires such a good thing. That’s why I say: if you, a man, want remission of sins, then why are you running away from the communion of the Lord’s cup? Don’t you hear how the Lord Himself says: “Take, eat... for the remission of sins” and “Drink... for the remission of sins” (Matthew 26:26:28)? I know someone will say this: I am unworthy, I am a sinner, and therefore I do not dare to begin communion of the Divine Mysteries. You speak well, calling yourself a sinner, unworthy and lacking in courage, for who can be perfectly worthy? None of those who have bound themselves with carnal lusts and pleasures are worthy to come and approach You, King of Glory, as the Holy Liturgiar says about this. But you are doing a bad thing by moving away and avoiding communion, for in the psalms it is written like this: “He who withdraws from You will perish” (Ps. 72:27). This unworthiness of ours is of two kinds: the unworthiness of those who truly repent and the unworthiness of those who either do not sincerely repent, or do not repent at all, or even do not want to repent at all. The unworthiness of those who truly repent is rewarded with Divine communion for the remission of sins, for they, like the sick, ask for healing, according to the word of Christ: “They do not require the health of a doctor, but the sick” (Matthew 9:12). The unworthiness of those who repent falsely or who do not repent at all is not worthy of Divine Communion, for it is written: “The holy one shall not give it to a dog” (Matthew 7:6). Who is this truly repentant and who is this falsely repentant? A false penitent is one who does not sincerely confess his sins before God to his spiritual father, but hides them; even if he sincerely confesses, he does not regret the evil he has done. However, such a person sometimes partly regrets, but he does not have a firm intention in his heart and does not place in his mind a firm promise not to return to previous sins, but still has hope and desire to do the same. Such a person is not worthy of Divine communion. Let him not be bold, for if he dares to take communion, he will drink and eat to condemnation, and like Judas, Satan will enter into him after the bread. A truly repentant person is one who, confessing his sins and regretting them, believes, hoping for God’s help, a firm intention to never return to his previous deeds and to avoid them in every possible way. Such a one is worthy of both Divine communion and God’s mercy, even if he is very unworthy. An example of such meritoriousness with imperfect dignity can be the Venerable Mary of Egypt. It is written about her that she was so unworthy of God's mercy because of her sinful life that even the church did not want to let her inside, which she later told the Monk Zosima about in confession, saying: when my sinful foot touched the church threshold, the church, which received everyone, did not accept me as a cursed person, but a kind of army appeared to block the entrance, and some power of God forbade me to enter. When this sinner put in her heart true repentance, intention and a firm promise never to return to sin, then immediately not only did the church let her in, but on the same day she was granted communion of the Divine Mysteries, the body and blood of Christ in the Church of John the Baptist, which is near the Jordan, as is written about at length in the life of this saint. Let's see now. She neither made satisfaction for her sins, nor touched the sorrowful desert life and the feats of fasting: barely one day has passed after her nasty life, but the cup of the Lord is not taken away from her, a truly repentant one. A similar thing is found in the Prologue, on the 26th day of December. Two women were slandered before the bishop for adultery. The bishop, wanting to know if this was true, prayed to God that this would be revealed to him, and commanded all people to be ready to receive communion of the Divine Mysteries, the body and blood of Christ. When he served the Liturgy and began to commune his people with the Mysteries, he saw that the faces of some who were approaching were black, as if smoked, while others were white and light: the sinners had black faces, and the righteous had white faces. Those two women also began to receive communion, having white and bright faces, and as soon as they received communion, they immediately became illuminated like the sun. When the bishop marveled at this, an angel appeared to him and said: it is true that you heard about the adultery of these women, but they repented with true, honest repentance and confession and vowed never to fall into such a sin; Therefore, God forgave their sins and made them worthy of the grace that you yourself saw. Now let's reason. Those sinful adulterous women were unworthy of Divine communion. When they truly repented and set in their hearts the firm intention not to return to sin, they were granted communion and forgiveness, as well as God’s grace that shone upon them. So, no one should move away from the cup of the Lord, and only truly repent, and make a promise in your heart not to return, like a dog, to your vomit. Having such repentance, although you have not made satisfaction for your sins, although you are not worthy as one should be worthy, nevertheless, trusting in God’s mercy, insurmountable by all human sins, dare to begin communion. Dare with fear, and fear with hope, and receive communion, without doubting God’s love for mankind, and you will receive remission of your sins. If you do not believe me that for a truly repentant holy communion serves for the remission of sins, then believe the unfaithful lips of Christ Himself, our Savior, who says: “Take, eat... for the remission of sins,” “Drink... for the remission of sins.” If you believe in God, then you must believe the words of God; and if you don’t believe the words of God, then you don’t believe in God either. God says: “Participate of My cup,” but you doubt. God says: “You will receive remission of sins,” but you don’t believe and say: I’m afraid. Don't be afraid! Proceed without doubt, with faith! You are doing well to be afraid; but you do wrong by running away. God is not your enemy, but a doctor: He wants to heal, not destroy. God is not your adversary, but the Father: He seeks not to kill you, but to revive you. God is not a beast and a destroyer for you, but a merciful benefactor who desires your salvation and not your destruction. Why are you running away from His Divine cup? It is better for you to accept spiritual healing and be healed than, having run away from healing, to fall into great sinful illnesses and perish. It is better for you, having cast aside fear, to run to the Father and be satisfied with His immortal food, than, out of fear, to go to someone else’s side and there feed on the swine food of alienation, that is, sinful passions. It is better for you to flow to your merciful benefactor than to cling to the enemy and work for your destroyer, for as long as you remain in sins without repentance, as long as you work for your devil and are his slave and captive. So that it does not seem to anyone that we have moved away from the intended subject of our conversation, we will now again turn to the word about the benefits of communion and to the discussion about the disadvantages of non-communion. He who frequently partakes of the cup of the Lord is changed into Christ: this is truly a rich gain and benefit. The one who does not partake of the cup of the Lord, but has communion with the cup of demons, is transformed into a demon: this is deprivation and eternal destruction. How then is one who partakes of the cup of the Lord united with Christ? This is clear from the words of Christ Himself, our Lord, who says: “He who eats My flesh and drinks My blood abides in Me, and I in him” (John 6:56). Saint Theophylact, interpreting this passage, says: here we learn the greatness of the mystery of communion. He who eats the flesh and drinks the blood of the Lord abides in the Lord Himself, and God in him. Marvelous and beyond all words is this union by which God is in us and we remain in God. And the same Theophylact speaks on behalf of Christ: he who eats Me, united, lives with Me and is transformed into Me, who can give life to him. Let us heed this word of Christ in Theophylact’s interpretation: “he is transformed into Me.” Whoever, I say, partakes of the cup of the Lord, partakes of the body and blood of Christ, is transformed into Christ. St. also speaks in agreement with this. Cyril of Jerusalem: “In holy communion we are made Christ-bearers and even close and hidden to Christ.” Saint Cyril of Alexandria gives the following example: “Just as wax, melted and poured into another melted wax, is mixed into one wax and in all its properties is the same wax, so the one who takes into himself the body and blood of Christ is united with Him, so that Christ abides in him, and he in Christ.” Do you hear, man, the testimonies of such great teachers and even the true words of the Lord Himself? Do you not now have faith and do you not recognize the rich gain from partaking of the cup of the Lord? If you don't believe them all, then who will you believe? Listen to one more wonderful thing. Some examiners of the Divine Scripture have the following question: why did Judas, betraying our Lord to the Jews, give them a sign, saying: “If He lies, He is, receive Him” (Matthew 26:48)? Didn’t they know Christ, whom they so often heard teaching and so often saw performing miracles? Was there anyone in Jerusalem who did not know Him well? After all, even little children knew Him, for when He entered Jerusalem, they came out to meet Him and exclaimed: “Hosanna!” What was the need for this sign of Judas? Give them a sign: “If I lie to Him, He is, have Him” (Matthew 26:48). To this question, from Chrysostom’s interpretation, the following mystery is clarified: when at the last supper the holy apostles received communion from the hands of the Savior of the body and blood of Christ, their faces were all illuminated, everyone’s face became like the face of Christ, and no matter which apostle Judas looked at, he saw that his face in beauty and grace was like the face of Christ. This is how St. speaks about them. Chrysostom: “The disciples had Christ-bearing faces before communion.” Judas then thought about what sign would need to be given to Caiaphas’s servants, by which they would recognize Christ. For if they did not recognize Him, there would be a danger that they would take someone else instead of Him. Therefore, when the bishop sent a detachment of soldiers, Judas gave them a sign: “If I lie to Him, He is.” Having combined together the previously spoken word of Theophylactus: “He who eats Christ is transformed into Christ” and this of Chrysostom: “They had Christ-bearing faces when they received communion,” we can easily understand how he who partakes of the cup of the Lord changes into Christ, for as is the food, so is what is fed. Food is Christ, therefore He transforms the eater into Himself. He who eats the flesh of Christ and drinks His blood abides in Christ, and Christ in him. Oh, how great is the gain from partaking of the cup of the Lord, how great is the wealth and benefit in having Christ in oneself, in being one with Christ and uniting with Him! What could be more than this? What is more expensive and what is more honest? On the contrary, whoever does not partake of the cup of the Lord, but drinks the cup of demons, not only loses Christ, but also becomes a demon. Do you know what the demonic cup is? Let's look at the Apocalypse of St. John the Theologian. He saw a certain woman riding on a red beast, dressed in purple and adorned with precious instruments, having a golden cup in her hand, full of abominations and the filth of her fornication. Here is the cup of demons, here is the drink of the devil: this is the abomination of filth and fornication. He who lives badly, who commits fornication and adultery, who wallows in the filthiness of carnal abominations, who in a real damned life enjoys the passions and pleasures of sin, drinks the cup of demons, which is contrary to the cup of the Lord, which St. also remembers. the apostle Paul, saying: “You cannot drink the cup of the Lord and the cup of demons; You cannot partake of the Lord’s table and the table of demons” (1 Cor. 10:21). How someone who drinks the demonic cup turns into a demon can be seen from the life of St. Niphon, whose memory is celebrated on the 23rd day of the month of December. In his youth, before repentance, he lived badly and in sins, drinking the demonic cup of the vile filth of fornication. And then one day he came to a certain godly man known to him, named Nicodemus. Nicodemus, looking at Niphon’s face, was surprised and horrified, but remained silent. Then Niphon said to him: “Why do you look at me as if I were a stranger?” Nicodemus answered: “Believe me, my brother, that I have never seen you as you are now, for your face is terrible, like that of an Ethiopian.” We listen: the holy apostles, who worthily partook of the cup of the Lord, seemed to have their faces similar to the face of Christ, but that young man who partook of the cup of demons seemed to be a demon, had a terrible face, like that of an Ethiopian, similar to the appearance of the devil. Scripture truly says: “It is the devil who commits sin” (1 John 3:8). Oh, how great is the deprivation that comes from avoiding the cup of the Lord! Oh, how terrible is the death of those who drink the cup of demons, that is, live badly and without repentance in their sins! The spiritual wealth and acquisition of spiritual benefits from partaking of the cup of the Lord are innumerable, but the deprivations that come from the demonic cup cannot be expressed in words. We don’t have enough time to talk about all this in detail; Therefore, I will say briefly: the cup of the Lord is the cup of salvation, for he who partakes of it worthily, that is, with true repentance, as was said above, receives salvation. The cup of abomination and the filthiness of fornication, the cup of demons, is the cup of eternal destruction, for whoever drinks from it is condemned to eternal torment. Knowing all this, beloved, let us turn away in every possible way from the cup of demons; Let us try to approach the cup of the Lord worthily and often. Although we are unworthy, we will be worthy of God’s mercy if, according to our strength, we “cleanse ourselves from all filthiness of the flesh and spirit” (2 Cor. 7:1) and put in our hearts a firm intention and promise not to return to our former evil deeds. When the apostles wanted to be closest to Christ, the King of glory, when they wanted to be boyars and they prayed to Him for this, saying: “Give us that one may sit on Your right hand and one on Your left in Your glory,” then they were commanded to drink the cup of Christ: “Can you drink the cup that I have drunk?” And they did not refuse: “She’s a resta: mozheva.” Whoever wants to be close to Christ, whoever wants to stand at His right hand in His glory when He comes “with the holy angels,” let him not refuse to drink His cup and not avoid the Divine communion of His flesh and blood. Eat His flesh and drink His blood, and they will be for you both for the remission of sins and closeness to Christ, and for a kind union with Him. Just first of all, put true repentance in your heart and put it in, without delay, put it in this hour, in this minute, saying with David: “Reh, now I have begun” (Ps. 76:11), - without waiting I will begin, not in the morning, not tomorrow, but now, now I said and now I will begin with the hope of God’s help. God, having been expecting your repentance for a long time, will be glad to see you; He will immediately open the doors of His mercy to you, make you worthy of His cup, make you close to Him in His kingdom and make you worthy of His glory, which may we all receive. Amen. The first teaching on the entry into Jerusalem of the Lord God and our Savior Jesus Christ “Blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord: Hosanna in the highest” (Matthew 21) When our Lord Jesus Christ entered Jerusalem with glory, the people met Him with palm branches, and the youths cried out: “Hosanna!” Let us also, oh beloved, stand with our minds at the gates of Jerusalem, let us stand at the place where the glorious entry of the Lord into Jerusalem took place, let us see how this event took place, and let us look at it at least a little with our spiritual eyes. The procession of Christ, our Savior, began from the Mount of Olives, that is, Olivet, for the Greek word “oleon” is translated into our language as “oil.” That Mount of Olives was nicknamed, that is, the Mount of Olives, because many olive trees grew on it. Like a dense oak grove, that mountain abounded with an olive garden. This mountain is located on the eastern side of Jerusalem, separated from ancient Jerusalem by five stages, and this is the way of the Sabbath, as it is written about this in the Acts of the Apostles: “The apostles returned to Jerusalem from the mountain called Olivet, which is near Jerusalem, having the way of the Sabbath” (Acts 1:12). The path of the Sabbath is equal to five stages, for the Jews revered their “Sabbath”, that is, the Sabbath, so much that they did not even allow themselves to make a long journey on the Sabbath, except for five stages, that is, one mile. This is called the way of the Sabbath. The distance from that mountain to ancient Jerusalem was not great, but it was very high: from the very top to Jerusalem there were six stages, and from the foot - five, for a whole stage had to be climbed up that mountain. Olivet was separated from Jerusalem by a valley called Jehoshaphat, for Jehoshaphat, the king of Judah, in ancient times created for himself in this valley before his death a tomb, and above the tomb a pyramid, or a wondrous pillar; From that time on, this valley was nicknamed the Valley of Jehoshaphat. This valley was deep, and in the middle of it flowed the Kidron stream. This same valley was also called the Valley of Weeping, for in it were the tombs of all Jerusalem. The Jews did not bury their dead in the city, but carried them out of the city for burial in the Valley of Jehoshaphat and there, according to custom, performed their mourning over the dead: that is why the Valley of Jehoshaphat was called the Valley of Weeping. The Holy Scriptures and the Holy Fathers predict that the Last Judgment of Christ will take place in this same valley. To the east of this valley was the Mount of Olives. Christ our Lord loved this mountain very much, for it was silent like the desert. He often spent his nights there in prayer in two places: sometimes at the very top of the mountain, from where he later ascended to heaven, sometimes in the garden, which was on the slope and side of the mountain. This garden belonged to Zebedee; It was located not far from the village of Gethsemane, where Zebedee had his country house. Zebedee was a relative in the flesh of the Lord Christ, which is why our Lord entered the garden of a relative as if into his own, performing all-night prayers in it to God, His Father. In addition, He often visited this mountain also because the forefather David, typifying His innocent suffering, wept there, running away from his son Absalom, as it is written about this in the books of Kings: “David ascended the Mount of Olives, weeping, covering his head, and walking barefoot” (2 Sam. 15:30). From this Mount of Olives, or Mount of Olives, the procession of Christ to Jerusalem began; He walked through the Valley of Jehoshaphat, called the Valley of Weeping, and through the Kidron River. We, looking at all this with our minds, will judge spiritually. A Christian man who wants to enter heavenly Jerusalem must begin his procession from the Olivet, from the fruitfulness of the olive tree. You know that David says about himself this way: “I am like an olive tree that is fruitful in the house of God” (Ps. 51:10). So, let everyone be like a fruitful olive tree, bringing their spiritual fruits to God. “The fruit of the Spirit,” says the Apostle, “is love, joy, peace, long-suffering, kindness, goodness, faith, meekness, self-control” (Gal. 5:22). Let a person do something good - fasting, prayer, alms, let him leave a debt to his neighbor, forgive the sin of someone who saddened him, let him leave behind all evil deeds, repent and, turning away from evil, begin to do good. All this is spiritual fruit pleasing to God, and man himself is “a fruitful olive tree in the house of God.” In addition, it is necessary that this fruitful olive tree, that is, a Christian man who brings his good deeds to God as fruits, should be on the high mountain of God-thinking, often with his mind in humble prayer ascending from the earthly to the heavenly, seeking the heavenly, and despising the earthly, during prayer putting aside all earthly cares. It is also necessary that he begin his path of salvation from Vertograd, so that he has a clear conscience, protected on all sides by the fear of the Lord and decorated, like Vertograd flowers, with good thoughts. Starting from here, you need to go through the valley, which was the common tomb for Jerusalem, where the Last Judgment of Christ will take place, that is, you need to go through the valley of humility and memory of death and the terrible test at the trial; we need to go through the deplorable valley of lamentation about the sins we have committed and wash our cheeks with tears, like the Kidron stream. Thus we will approach the heavenly Jerusalem. But let's look again at our Lord. Our Lord is coming, riding on a donkey and casting lots. First he sat on a donkey, and then, having gone a little way, He sat on the donkey's lot. This is the next secret. The donkey, able to carry a yoke, signified the Jewish people harnessed to the yoke of the law given at Sinai; the lot, not yet accustomed to the yoke, signifies the yokeless pagans who did not have the yoke of the law of God. Having moved from a donkey to a lot, the Lord showed that the Jews would soon be torn away from Him as unbelievers and bitter, that a church would be created from the pagans and He would be glorified by the pagans. This can now be seen clearly. For God’s salvation was taken away from the Jews and given to us, the pagans, and now Christ the Savior, our true God, is glorified by us. One cannot help but be amazed at the great humility of our Master, which He showed in such a glorious entrance, for countless people met Him and followed Him. Christ was then followed not only by the twelve great apostles, not only by the seventy lesser apostles, of whom the Gospel recalls this: “The Lord revealed the seventy, and sent them two by two before Him” (Luke 10:1), but also by another people who came to Bethany in great numbers, as it is written about, we heard in the Gospel: “Knowing that there were many people from Judea, there is, they came not only for Jesus’ sake, but also for Lazarus, whom he raised from the dead” (John 12:9). All this multitude of people walked with Christ’s disciples, some walking ahead, others behind Him, and it was not possible to count those they met. Indeed, at that time, from all countries, not only Jews, but also very many pagans gathered in Jerusalem for the holiday, and the entire number of the people then reached thousands to one hundred, taken thirty times, for the church leaders of Jerusalem every year counted all the people who gathered in Jerusalem for the holiday. In no other year, neither before nor after, was there such a gathering of people as in that one year when Christ had to suffer. Thirty hundred thousand from all over the universe then gathered in Jerusalem. This happened according to God’s will, so that the whole world could see the dishonorable and innocent suffering of the Son of God. All these people came out to meet Christ with palm branches, as it is written about this in the Gospel: “Many people came to the feast, having heard that Jesus was coming to Jerusalem, and they received palms from the dates and came out to meet Him, and they called, saying: “Hosanna” (John 12:12:13). Then the mouths of the children, suckling their mothers’ breasts, were miraculously opened, according to what was written: “Out of the mouth of the baby and the pissing thou hast wrought praise; and crying: Hosanna, blessed is he who comes” (Matthew 21:16). They say that there were thirty thousand of those babies and youths. This is the glory and reverence in which our Lord will come, this is the multitude of people who preceded, followed, met Him and exclaimed “Hosanna, King of Israel.” How is it coming? Is it royal? Is it on a golden royal chariot with magnificent royal horses? No, but on the foal of a donkey, as the prophet predicted about Him: “Cry to the daughter of Zion, behold, your gentle King is coming to you, always on a donkey and a lot” (Zechariah 9:9), teaching everyone humility and meekness, not only common people, but also those who have ascended to the high royal steps, so that they, even if they acquire the whole world, all honor and glory, but did not forget meekness and humbleness of mind. “Do not boast,” it is said, “and do not speak high in pride, and let not great talk come from your mouth.” Teaching humility, our Lord, sitting on a donkey, clearly condemns the glory and pride of this world and shows the impermanence of proud worldly exaltation, as if saying: “Oh, people! Just as a reed is shaken by the wind, so you are shaken by impermanence. Now you show Me honors with palm branches, but in a few days, oh, how you will dishonor Me! Now you are cutting branches from trees, and in a few days you will cut down and hew these very trees for My cross. Now you are laying branches under My feet, and in a few days you will lay sticks, rods and whips on My backbone, beating, wounding and causing Me many wounds. Now you cry: “Hosanna,” and in a few days you will shout: “Crucify, crucify!” Now you meet Me with glory, and in a few days you will lead Me to crucifixion with curses. Oh, human fickleness! Oh, the fragility and quick abolition of the honor and glory of this world! Let us here learn from our Lord both humility and meekness, and not to desire or seek temporary honors, dignities and glory; If God gives this to someone without searching, then not to be proud of them, not to rely on them, but rather to wait for a quick change and, after happiness, to be afraid of misfortune. “Every hill will humble itself” (Luke 3:5), says the Forerunner of Christ, that is, every proud height will have to fall. But I, a sinner, diligently looking with spiritual eyes at my Lord and at the donkey on which the Lord sits, I think this way: if the Lord in His glorious procession to Jerusalem wanted to show us an example of humility, then He, perhaps, would have shown this better if He had walked or rode in a simple cart. Why did He deign to travel no other way than sitting on a donkey? Here the above interpretation comes to mind, namely that the donkey signified the Jews, and the donkey’s lot signified the pagans. What were the Jews at that time? They were sinful, evil people, conferring about the murder of Christ, as David says about them: “They learned in vain, and the rulers gathered together against the Lord and against His Christ” (Ps. 2:1:2). And the pagans, what were they then? They were all the more sinners, for they did not know the true God at all. Therefore, if our Lord Jesus Christ sat on a donkey and on a lot, then He sat on the image of a sinner, for the donkey signified the sinful Jews, and the lot after the donkey - the godless and lawless pagans. And indeed, a donkey is a completely decent image for sinners, for a sinner is like a donkey with all his morals. The donkey is lazy, slothful and a sinner. You can hardly force a donkey into a yoke with many blows, and even with many punishments it is impossible to turn a depraved sinner to correction. Just as a donkey, although beaten, does not walk quickly, but barely drags along the way, and cannot run quickly at all, so the sinner does not rush to salvation, although sometimes he is amazed by various allowances from God. Since our Lord, in His triumph, celebrated today, sat on the image of a sinner, sat on a donkey, it is clear that He who rests in heaven on cherubim wants to rest on sinners on earth, for for their sake He came down from heaven. “I did not come,” He says, “to call the righteous, but sinners to repentance” (Matthew 9:13). Therefore, His true peace lies in this: to saddle a sinner like a donkey, that is, to impose on him the law of the fear of God, to sit on him, that is, to subjugate him to His will of the Lord, and to ride him as he wants and where he wants, that is, to instruct him on the path of the commandments leading to heaven. The rest of the Lord is to make sinners righteous by forgiving their sins. Saint Ambrose, discussing the words from the book of Genesis: “God rest on the seventh day,” says this: “God created the heavens; but I do not read further that He rested after the creation of heaven; He created the earth, but did not rest here either; He created the sun, the moon and the stars, but even here I do not read that He should rest; When He created man, then He only rested, having someone to forgive sins to.” Let us delve into the last words of this teacher: “Then he rested, having someone to forgive sins.” God wants to be carried on the sinner and rest on him like on a donkey. When does God begin to rest on a sinner? At the time when the sinner begins to turn to God with true repentance, then he becomes sweet and amiable to God, like that prodigal son who once said: “I rise up and go to my father and say to him: Father, those who have sinned; When his father saw him from afar, he was kind to him and fell upon his neck” (Luke 15:18:20). If you are an ass in disposition, oh, sinful man, submit to God, bow your neck into His yoke, and immediately from an ass you will become for Him a cherubic throne and bearer. For this reason He now sat on a donkey, the image of the Jewish people, and on the donkey’s lot, a sign of the pagan nations, so that from the Jewish race some, and from the pagan race very many, would become cherubim and seraphim, by whom He would be glorified. What should we call you, saints? Cherubim? For Christ rested on you. Seraphim? For you continually glorify Him. This is now the true triumph of Christ, that He transforms donkeys into cherubim, that is, He makes sinners into cherub-like saints. The beginning of Christ's current triumph was that He raised the four-day-old Lazarus. This is what is written about this in the Gospel: “Your people, who were first with Him, bear witness when you called Lazarus from the grave and raised him from the dead. For this reason you will honor His people, because they heard Him and did this sign” (John 12:17:18). So, people, glorifying Christ’s victory over bodily death in the resurrection of Lazarus, arrange a triumph for Him, “because they heard Him do this sign,” and the Lord Himself begins to triumph over the spiritual death of people, defeating sin and the devil, who inclines a person to sin. The truly great and great miracle is that the Lord Christ raised a four-day-old man who had already begun to rot, but an even greater miracle of Christ is that He resurrects a great sinner, dead in soul and already rotting for a long time in an evil custom, as in a tomb, from death and brings him to eternal life in heaven. To resurrect a dead body is a property of God’s omnipotence, but to resurrect a soul, that is, to raise a sinner to repentance from mortal sins and lead him to righteousness, is a property not only of God’s omnipotence, but also of great mercy and great wisdom. However, neither the wisdom of God, nor the mercy of God, nor the omnipotence of God will be able to resurrect the soul of a sinner, unless the sinner himself wants it. It is not in vain that God says to the sinner in one place: I could create you without you; but I can’t save you without you. I didn’t ask anyone how to create you: I wanted and created you. How to save you, I ask you myself, as I asked the paralytic. Do you want to be healthy? Do you want to be saved? If you yourself want, then My wisdom will guide you, My mercy will have mercy on you, and My omnipotence will help you and save you. If you yourself do not want salvation, if you yourself are running away from eternal life, if you love your destruction more than salvation, then neither My wisdom, nor My mercy, nor My omnipotence will help you. Can warm wax stick to ice? No way! So My mercy, My wisdom and My omnipotence cannot stick to you if your heart is cold as ice and has no warmth of saving desire. When you just want to be saved, then I will gladly help you. Then My angels will rejoice and triumph over you: “For there is joy in heaven for the angels who repent of a sinner” (Luke 15:10). So, now it is clearly visible how much greater the triumph and miracle of Christ is to resurrect the soul of a sinner who has died in his sins than the miracle of resurrecting a four-day-old dead man. Our Lord Jesus Christ raised Lazarus from bodily death, but Lazarus died again, although many years later. When He resurrected the soul of a sinful woman who was crying at His feet, this soul was already immortal. She who, like cattle, worked for dumb lusts, became an accomplice of angels. Perhaps the Lord who now sits on a donkey and who is to come triumphs over this? Let us firmly remember that he rejoices and triumphs not so much over the resurrection of Lazarus from the dead, but rather because he foresaw the salvation of many sinners whom He, by His grace, would resurrect from spiritual death. Here it would also be necessary to consider the mysterious meaning of the vestments and branches, both date and olive, laid along the way and held in the hands, and all kinds of branches like our willows, but I do not want to burden you, my listeners, with a long conversation. I will leave this for the future, if God allows and we are alive. Now I will end by worshiping my Lord and crying to Him: “Blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord: Hosanna in the highest!” Amen. Second lesson on the entry into Jerusalem of the Lord God and our Savior Jesus Christ “Fear not, daughters of Zion: behold, your King is coming on the foal of a donkey” (John 12:15) My beloved brothers, Orthodox listeners! In this century there are two daughters: one is the daughter of Zion, whom St. remembers. John the Theologian, saying: “Fear not, daughters of Zion: behold, your King is coming”; the second is the daughter of Babylon, whom the reigning prophet David recalls, saying: “Daughter of Babylon, accursed! Blessed is he who will reward you with your reward, which you have rewarded us; Blessed is he who has and will dash your babies against the stone” (Ps. 137:8:9). The words “behold your King is coming” mean the following: The King is Christ God, our Savior, for that is what the Holy One calls Him. John the Theologian in the Apocalypse, saying: “The King is the king and the Lord is the Lord” (Apoc. 17:14). Now, Orthodox listeners, I promise to show your love in this verbal teaching what those two daughters are: Zion and Babylon. Then I will explain why the daughter of Zion was commanded not to fear when Christ God, the King of glory, comes to her. I ask Him, Christ my Savior, for help, and your love for attention. Firstly, the Jewish synagogue was called the Daughter of Zion, for the Jews lived on Mount Zion, which King David took and built a fortress there, that is, a strong reigning city. In the books of Kings it is written like this: “David welcomed the whole country of Zion,” and in another place it is said: “And he built a city around him” (2 Sam. 5:7:9). When Christ our Savior came to the Jewish capital, at this hour it was said to the Jewish synagogue: “Fear not, daughters of Zion: behold, your King is coming.” Then the holy church of the Catholic faith is called the Daughter of Zion, for Christians who believe in our true God Christ will live in heaven. The psalmist says this about Christ, the Son of God: “The Lord will send a rod of power from Zion, and you will rule in the midst of your enemies” (Ps. 109:2). Therefore, when Christ ascends into the holy Christian church, at that hour he says to her: “Fear not, daughters of Zion: behold, your King is coming.” Further, every soul that contains the Orthodox Christian faith is called a daughter of Zion, for the Holy Spirit in the Song of Songs speaks to all believers like this: “Daughters of Zion! Come out and see King Solomon in a crown,” that is, our God in human flesh, “in which His mother was crowned on the day of His marriage” (Song. 3:11), that is, on the day of His incarnation, on which Christ, the Son of God, took upon Himself human flesh and united with it. Therefore, if any person in the most holy mystery of the Eucharist takes into himself the body of Christ our God and His most pure blood under the guise of bread and wine, then at that hour it is said to His soul: “Fear not, daughters of Zion: behold, your King is coming.” Finally, the most pure Virgin Mother of God is also called the Daughter of Zion, for just as the Lord dwelt on Mount Zion, according to the words of the Psalmist: “This is Mount Zion, in it you dwelt” (Ps. 74:2), and in the womb of the most pure Mother of God Christ our God dwelt for nine months, when He descended into her most pure womb. Therefore, when He descended into her womb, then it was said to her: “Rejoice, daughters of Zion: behold, your King is coming.” Now I have already told you, Orthodox listeners, about the daughter of Zion, now it is fitting for me to speak about the daughter of Babylon. Firstly, the great city of the land of the Chaldeans, Babylon, is called the daughter of Babylon. In this city there was King Nebuchadnezzar, who for his pride was turned by God into an ox and who ate grass in the desert for seven years. In the same Babylon, God punished King Belshazzar with the fall of the kingdom for drunkenness and for dishonoring church vessels, from which he ate and drank wine with his entourage in desecration of our God. While he was feasting, at that hour a human hand appeared in his chamber, writing on the wall and writing the following: “mani fekel fares” (Dan. 5:25), that is, God will take away your kingdom. These Babylonians often ravaged Jerusalem, devastated the entire land of Israel with fire and sword, and took the Israelites captive to Babylon. That is why King David says the following with anger about Babylon: “Daughter of Babylon, accursed! Blessed is he who will reward you with your reward, which you have rewarded us; Blessed is he who has and will dash your babies against the stone.” Secondly, this age is also called the daughter of Babylon, for just as wild beasts and Hippocentaurs or Sirens lived in Babylon, so in this age there are evil people, unrighteous and sinners, who for their evil deeds are called wild beasts. God Himself called idolaters and sinners who wanted to come to the knowledge of the true God beasts, saying: “Blessed shall be the wild beasts, the Syrians, and the daughters of the birds, for he gave water in the desert” (Is. 43:20). In Babylon they suffered all kinds of oppression and torment; So in this century, Christians suffer persecution and torment from unbelieving heretics. Christ spoke to His disciples about this patience: “You will mourn and lament, but the world will rejoice” (John 16:20). Therefore, if in this age we too endure some kind of persecution for the sake of righteousness and raise adversity, then we must respond to this age and say to it: “Daughters of Babylon, accursed! Blessed is he who will reward you with your reward, which you have rewarded us; Blessed is he who has and will dash your babies against the stone.” In addition to this, I would like to show you, Orthodox listeners, other wonderful reasons why the daughter of Zion is not commanded to fear when Christ, the King of Glory, comes to her, if only you were willing to understand and know this. The Most High God often appeared to people. However, if He appeared to anyone, no one was without fear. To Noah, for example, God appeared in a terrible pillar with great waters and rain, which produced a great flood and drowned everyone living on the earth: people, animals, livestock, birds and reptiles. About this we read in the book of Genesis the following: “The fountains of the deep burst open and the abysses of the heavens were opened, and there was rain on the earth forty days and fourty nights” (Gen. 7:11:12). In another place it is said this way: “And all flesh that dwells on the earth, birds, and cattle, and beasts, and everything that moves on the earth, and all men, and everything that has the breath of animals” (Genesis 7:21-22). Moses was also afraid when God appeared to Him on Mount Sinai in lightning, thunder and a terrible sound of a trumpet, in great fire and smoke. About this we read in the books of Exodus of Moses the following: “In the morning there was a voice and lightning, and a cloud of lightning on Mount Sinai, and the sound of a trumpet sounded loudly”; in another place the following is said: “Mount Sinai was all smoking, descending into fire for the sake of God: and smoke came out, like the smoke of a cave; and all the people were greatly afraid” (Ex. 19:16:18). The prophet Elijah was also afraid when God appeared to him in fire and a great whirlwind. The angel of the Lord said to him: “Go out in the morning and stand before the Lord in the mountain; Behold, the Lord passes by, and behold, a great and mighty spirit, ravaging mountains and crushing stones! And the Lord will go before; and the Lord is not in the mood. And by nature he is a coward, and the Lord is not a coward. And fire is for a coward, and the Lord is not for fire. And through the fire there was a thin voice of cold, and there was the Lord” (1 Kings 19:11:12). The prophet Ezekiel was also afraid when God appeared to him on a chariot in which four cherubim were harnessed, and each cherub had four faces: the first face was human, the second was that of a calf, the third that of a lion, and the fourth that of an eagle. This is what the prophet Ezekiel says: “There are four faces to one” (Ezek. 10:14). The prophet Daniel was also afraid when God appeared to him in the darkness and in the thousands of thousands of heavenly armies. The prophet Daniel himself speaks about this: “Thousands of thousands serve Him, and ten of them stand before Him” (Dan. 6:10). Sinful people will also be afraid on the last day, when Christ, our Savior, comes to judge the living and the dead, for at that hour He will send them to hell to suffer forever; there they will suffer different torments for different sins. There they will endure an unquenchable fire, for Christ, our Savior, said: “Their fire does not go out” (Mark 9:44). Unclean people, fornicators, adulterers and angry people will burn in this fire because they were inflamed either with anger or with lust. There will be a severe winter there, and sinners, enduring the cold, will gnash their teeth. Christ, our Savior, spoke about this: “There will be weeping and gnashing of teeth” (Luke 13:28). This fierce winter will be endured by those people who are unmerciful to the wretched, who do not accept into their homes strangers who lie homeless in rotting places and endure snow and severe frost; such people themselves will have partnership with the devil and his angels, for Christ God said to them: “Depart from Me, cursed, into eternal fire, prepared for the devil and his angel” (Matthew 25:41). Proud people who now despise the poor, abhor them and pass them by with their eyes will also have this partnership with the devil. There will be a constant movement of worms, which will incessantly torment and eat sinful people, and they will never die, for it is said: “Their worm does not die” (Mark 9:44). These worms will torment and eat those people who here take away something from others through covetousness. There will also be an unbearable stench there from the brimstone fire, for it is written: “Fire and a bogeyman, and a stormy spirit are part of their cup” (Ps. 10:6). This stench will be endured by those people who are concerned about making themselves happy with all sorts of fragrant, mastic perfumes and with intense diligence are looking for all sorts of fragrant potions for themselves. There will be great anguish there and so terrible that if it were possible to die, they would be glad to accept death as sweetness, but they will never die there, for it is written: “Men will seek death and will not find it; and they desire to die, and death flees from them” (Apoc. 9:6). Those people who are now constantly in joy, drunkenness and great luxury, with music and dancing, and who never think about God, will endure such melancholy. In addition, there will be total darkness there, for it is written: “Binding his hand and nose, throw him into total darkness” (Matthew 22:13). Those thrown into this darkness will sit in it forever; they will never see the face of God. This darkness is inherited by those who do not allow the poor to come to them. There will be famine there, for Christ Himself said: “Woe to you, now that you are filled, for you will hunger” (Luke 6:25), and this hunger will be suffered by those people who in this age do not feed the poor and wretched. There will also be thirst there, for Christ Himself said: “As you thirst.” This thirst will be endured by those people who will not give drink to thirsty strangers and the poor here. There will also be great crowding there, for hell will be full of sinful people: some at the top, others in the middle, and others at the very bottom of hell. Just as someone fills a bag full of pennies and ties it, or like someone puts a barrel full of fish and seals it, so God will fill all hell with sinful people and ban it so that sinners cannot get out of there. At the Last Judgment, when Christ our God will say to sinners: “Depart from me, cursed, into everlasting fire,” at that hour the earth will give way under the sinners, as it once gave way under Korah, Dathan and Abiron, and then all sinners will fall into hell. After this, the earth will again close in its original place, and sinners will remain underground in hell, as if locked in a tight and iron vessel, and will not come out of there forever, as the Lord Himself says: “These go into eternal torment” (Matthew 25:46). Those who here take away something from others by violence, for example, estates, chambers or houses, and oppress the poor and orphans will be thrown into this hellish crampedness; and whoever has sinned in any way will suffer. This is exactly what Solomon said: “Those who sin are the ones who are tormented” (Wis. 11:17). Now, Orthodox listeners, I will explain to you why the daughter of Zion is not commanded to fear when Christ, the King of glory, comes to her. The first reason why it is said: “Fear not, daughters of Zion: behold, your King is coming,” is that the Lord and Lord God, the King of all, does not come to us with a terrible flood and not with great waters and many rains, but comes to us with merciful tears, for three times He shed tears from His eyes for sin. For the first time, Christ cried over the dead Lazarus; another time He wept over Jerusalem because He had to suffer there, and, finally, He wept even at that hour when He was nailed to the cross. The second reason why it was said: “Fear not, daughters of Zion: behold, your King is coming,” is that Christ, our King and God, does not come to us with fire, smoke, terrible thunder and the sound of a trumpet, as on Mount Sinai, but came to us with a childish chant: “Hosanna to the Son of David: blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord! Hosanna in the highest! The third reason why it was said: “Fear not, daughters of Zion: behold, your King is coming,” is that Christ, our King and God, is coming to us now not in a whirlwind and not with a great wind, as in the time of Elijah, but with flowering and fragrant date branches. The fourth reason why it is said: “Do not be afraid, daughters of Zion: behold, your King is coming,” is that now He does not come with a thousand thousand and so on, not with twelve legions of heavenly angels, but goes only with twelve of His disciples, meek and humble. The fifth reason why it is said: “Fear not, O children of Zion: behold, your King is coming,” is because our King and God is not coming to us in a chariot driven by four-faced cherubim, as Ezekiel saw, but is coming to us on a humble donkey. The sixth and final reason why it is said: “Fear not, daughters of Zion: behold, your King is coming,” is that the King, our Lord and God is coming to us not to judge the living and the dead, but to be judged by people; He comes not in order to throw sinful people into hell to eternal torment and execute them with eternal death, but in order to personally suffer torment and accept a shameful death on the cross for our sins. Christ did not come to Jerusalem with glory so that the Jews would not accept Him as the King, for afterward they themselves said: “They are not the imams of the king, only Caesar” (John 19:15). We, brothers, will try to accept Christ, our King and God. After all, He is already knocking on the door of our hearts and awakening us to repent of our sins. “Repent,” it is said, “for the kingdom of heaven is drawing near” (Matthew 4:17). He who does not confess his sins has the doors of his heart locked; Christ will not come in to him and will not live with him. The one who confesses his sins, with which he angered his Creator, and at the same time decides never to do this in the future, opens the door to his Savior Christ; The Savior will enter his heart and will live in him, for Christ Himself said: “Behold, I stand at the door and understand; and if anyone hears My voice and opens My door, I will come down to him and dine with him, and he with Me” (Apoc. 3:20). Therefore, if we, my brothers, confess our sins, with which we angered our Creator, and make satisfaction for them, then we will open the doors of our hearts, then He will come to us to live like a King in beautiful chambers. When Christ entered the house of Zacchaeus, He forgave him all his sins, saying: “Today salvation has come to this house” (Luke 19:9). Likewise, if we cleanse our spiritual house with repentance and prayers, then Christ our God will come to us in the house of our soul and will also say: “Today salvation has come to this house”; then He will forgive us all our sins with His grace and love for mankind. Amen. Teaching on the Resurrection of Christ “We see Jesus crowned with glory and honor for accepting death” (Heb. 2:9) In the past days of the Lord’s free suffering, we saw Christ, our Savior, inglorious and dishonored, as Isaiah said about Him: “We saw Him, and not in the name of the vision of kindness, but the vision of Him was dishonored, begged for more than the sons of men” (Is. 53:2). On this present bright feast of His Resurrection, we, beloved listeners, together with Saint John the Theologian, see “His glory, the glory as the only begotten from the Father, full of grace and truth” (John 1:14). At that time, our Lord Jesus Christ was crowned with thorns for reproach, but now for glorification He receives unfading flowers and praise on His head. At that time He was “imputed with the lawless,” and now He is God in the midst of His people, redeemed with honest blood and freed from hell; Now the Lord has appeared in the company of His saints, saying: “I am with you.” At that time, many passing by laughed at Him, but now in His holy name “every tribe of heaven, earth and hell bows down.” At that time, He was beaten on the shoulders and cheeks, beaten to death, hung on a tree, and then completely killed, and now He killed death and the devil: “Where is the sting, O death?! Where the hell is victory?!” At that time our Life-Giver was dead, but now “the Lord lives and blessed is God.” At that time, the sun darkened at noon, and now “from the red tomb of righteousness the Sun has risen for us,” and together with the apostle we “see Jesus, crowned with glory and honor for accepting death.” Let us briefly consider here that the path to eternal glory and honor is no other than through much suffering, for it was fitting for Christ, the very head of our life, to accomplish it through suffering. “We see Jesus” and so on. Let us raise our minds to heaven, even for a short time, put aside all “worldly cares” and look through the Revelation of St. John the Theologian. Now we hear what is happening there. I hear some kind of rumor there, “like the voice of many people, like the voice of many waters and like the voice of strong thunders” (Apoc. 19:7), as if the voice of many angels around the throne and animals, elders, and their number was a thousand thousand. What are they saying? They command every creature in heaven, on earth, under the earth and in the sea, so that they all prepare to greet and slavishly worship a certain royal person sitting on the throne of God. Let us also see who reigns on the throne of God. I thought that the lion received the kingdom as the winner: “Behold, the Lion who is from the tribe of Judah has overcome” (Apoc. 5:5), and “to him who overcomes,” says the Lord, “I will give to sit on My throne” (Apoc. 3:21), but I do not see a lion on the throne of God. Then I thought that the kingdom was accepted by an eagle who covered its nest, which, having loved its chicks, spread its wings, received them and lifted them onto its shoulders, but I don’t see the eagle on the throne either. Who is this who could receive the royal Divine honor and whom every creature above and below would worship? I look again and now I see the Lamb enthroned, the Lamb slain, and I hear a thousand thousand speaking in a great voice: “The Lamb who was slain is worthy to receive power and wealth, and strength, and wisdom, and honor, and glory, and blessing” (Apoc. 5:12). Here we note that one and the same Christ is a lion, an eagle, and a lamb: He is a lion, for He conquered the world, death and destroyed hell; He is an eagle, for He raised the souls of the saints, like chicks, on His wings, on His shoulders, and carried them out of hell; lamb - for He suffered for all. However, when He wanted to reign, He reigned not in the form of a lion or an eagle, but in the form of a slain lamb, to show that to the crown of the heavenly kingdom and to eternal glory there can be no other path than the path of wounds, slaughter and suffering. If anyone on earth wants to receive a crown there, then let him prick his heart with tenderness, let him kill his passions by mortification, let him suffer in the labors of repentance. Having looked at heaven, let us now look at the paradise described in the Revelation of the Theologian. In addition to its various wondrous and indescribable decorations, it also has that no less decoration, like “the gates, of which there are twelve in number, each of them from a single bead” (Apoc. 21:21). Beads, pearls, margaritas or pearls are so great there that the whole great gates of heaven are made from one pearl. Pearl, margaritas, pearls and beads: all of them Beads or pearls signify a tear in Pierius, and according to him, Suida says that when he sees that pearl in a dream, St. Chrysostom also says with them: “David’s eyes, decorated with rain of tears, were like Margaritas or pearls.” I was very surprised that if pearls are an image of tears and a sign of crying, then why are the pearl gates located where nothing sad is visible, no crying is heard, but everything is filled with indescribable joy? Having reasoned, I realized that all this was so that those who wanted to enter heavenly joy would try to enter it through no other gate than the tearful one. You see that the gates of heaven are made of pearl, and pearls signify tears; know that it is proper to enter heaven through tears, and there is no other entrance to heaven except tear pearls. With tears, I say, it is proper to enter heaven; tears come from heartbreak; contrition of heart - from sadness and labor; and sadness and labors come from grief over sins and suffering for God. This is the path to heavenly coolness. Let us remember the life of Blessed Joseph. God, having arranged the beautiful Joseph for the crown and power in Egypt, what path did he send him to this honor and glory? Truly thorny, cramped and sorrowful. He sent him an unexpected attack, a dark prison, heavy chains, nakedness, hunger and poverty of the most necessary things. This path was long and the shackles were long-lasting: “Having crushed his nose in shackles, iron has pierced his soul” (Ps. 104:18). Only after long-term suffering did the king free him, make him lord of his house and make him master of his wealth. The path to royal honors was cruel! This Joseph was a type of the sufferings of our Lord. There is no need to say much about what and how our Lord suffered before receiving the kingdom, for everyone knows this well. Now I will go to the heliport of King Solomon for some coolness and see what is happening there. And now I see the heavenly Bridegroom chilling there. He became engaged to an earthly bride, that is, to His Church, redeemed with holy blood, and, in particular, to the soul of every Christian person. Loving this bride more than His own soul, for He laid down His life for her, He called it “krin”: “Like a krin among thorns, so is my bride” (Song 2:2). So I look where the heavenly Bridegroom will plant that “krin”, that is, His beloved bride. I thought that He planted it in a spacious place among other fragrant flowers, and He planted His “krin” between the sharp thorns: “As the krin is among the thorns, so is My sincere one among the daughters.” Here, prudent listeners, we will think about why the heavenly Bridegroom wants to plant His “krin”, His bride, in a hedge of thorns: “Krin in thorns.” After all, having planted paradise in the east, He planted fruitful and shady trees everywhere in it. The New Jerusalem, shown to the Theologian in Revelation (Apoc. 21:10), is decorated with precious stones - sapphire, emerald, jacinthos and topaz. On its sides He built pearly gates, moreover, from a single precious stone. The Gospel fruitful vineyard, described by St. Matthew, He protected him with a strong bulwark: “And protect him with a bulwark” (Matthew 21:33). But He places His dear bride, for whom He did not spare His soul on the cross, on earth and preserves her not in a paradise garden fence, not among a beautifully fruitful paradise, but in one thorny, prickly fence: “Krin in thorns.” The fence of thorns must be better than those we remembered, for Adam was soon expelled from the heavenly fence for a beautiful and tasty fruit; Lucifer stood a little between the pearly walls of the Apocalypse: “the day has fallen,” and the heir of the vineyard himself was killed by the workers, taking him out of the vineyard. Be you, my neighbor, not in the vain sweets of paradise, not in the splendor of precious jewelry, not in the vineyard of temporary joy, but in thorns, in the endurance of disasters, sorrows and mortification, always bearing the death of Christ Jesus on your body! Why this? And so that for accepting those sharp thorns and for being patient in those disasters, you would receive a crown of glory in My palace. Let the bride of Christ have for herself a true image of such a life. Here is the image for her of her heavenly Bridegroom Himself, Christ, who died and rose again, suffered and reigned, accepted dishonor and became glorified. She, together with the apostle, sees Jesus, and is crowned with glory and honor for accepting death. One should be surprised that the King of glory was not ashamed to endure such dishonorable suffering and death in order to put on His former glory. But it is not surprising that the glory of the Lord appeared like the dawn in those very sufferings, for He who came in free passion said: “Now is the Son of Man glorified.” If someone there said: Lord, You are going to suffer and dishonor, but you say that You are glorified; will you be glorified later? - then this would be incorrect, for suffering itself is already glory, as one of the fathers says about this: “The cross is the glory of the Son, just as the Son is the glory of the Father.” The cross, death - this is the glory of the Son, for it is the root, the beginning and the mother of His glorification. Dishonor gives birth to honor, the cross gives birth to glory, and glory not only for the Lord Himself, but also for us, His servants, the sons of the Eastern Church. We too are glorified by His free suffering, as our mother the Holy Church sings: “Even though you were, O Christ, from lawless men, yet You are my God, and I will not be ashamed; I was beaten by the splash, and I am not swept away; You were nailed to the cross, and I will not hide it; I boast in Your resurrection, for Your death is my life.” But not only people, but also disembodied angels show off and are glorified by the Lord’s suffering. Here we hear an angel telling the myrrh-bearers: “You are looking for Jesus the Nazarene crucified: he is not here.” If it were possible to correct the angel in his words, then I would tell him: “Holy angel, do not remember the dishonor of the crucifixion of the Lord - “you seek him crucified”; but it’s better for me to say to those wives: “You are looking for Jesus, our Lord, your teacher, and at the same time our Creator, and Master, and King of glory.” However, even now, during the resurrection, the angel mentions the cross instead of royal titles, dishonor instead of royal glory, and this clearly shows that his very suffering served him as glory and was the subject of special praise for the angels. St. speaks beautifully about this. Cyril of Jerusalem: “Let us not be ashamed to confess the cross of the Lord. The angels are glorified, saying: “You seek Jesus crucified.” Could you not, O angel, say: to all whom you seek, my Jesus; but you boldly say: as you seek Him crucified. The crown is the cross, and not dishonor” (Catechism, 13). We heed the fact that suffering is glory not only for Christ, but also for people and angels. Let us also remember here that ancient fable, written in the books of the Judges of Israel, which tells how all the trees, forests, gardens and vineyards, having gathered into one society, chose a king for themselves. When many refused, then they decided to choose the thorn to reign over them, and therefore they said to the thorn: “Come and reign over us.” What if someone said to the trees: “Listen, trees! What are you doing?! Who do you choose?! Are there not among you glorious cedars, tall dates, fruitful olives and other wonderful and useful trees? What benefit do you get from thorns, what benefit? The Gospel will never praise this, but will say: “Are grapes gathered from thorns to eat?” (Matthew 7:16). But let not the consenting council of trees be humiliated. I commend their good intention and reasoning. They did well when they chose thorns as their king, for although it is a thorn, yet in its branches it has a ready-made crown for itself and in its thorny prickliness and cruelty has its natural glory and adornment. By nature it will give birth to red flowers. When the thorns grow around the gardens and vineyards, then a ready-made fence and protection from insults is obtained, for no one will dare to step over its thorns, like a sharp weapon. So, reign, O thorn, over the trees; and you, beautiful and tall trees, bow your tops before the thorns and worship it. Come and enter under his shadow. Different trees represent different saints. Cedar and date signify the righteous: “The righteous, like the date, will prosper” (Ps. 91:13). The fruitful olive tree means church teachers who saturate the souls of believers with the spiritual fruits of the word of God. Grapes mean all people in general who live according to God. The vineyard of the Lord of hosts is the house of Israel. What does the thorn mean? It signifies suffering: “I returned,” it is said, “to passion, when the thorns struck me” (Ps. 31:4); also marks martyrdom, for disasters are like sharp thorns, and sorrows are like wounds of thorns. He who endures for the sake of God, in the midst of everything, appears like a crop among thorns, and already in the midst of the suffering itself begins to receive the firstfruits of eternal glory; for just as the property of thorns is to produce red flowers, so the property of suffering and sorrow is to produce glory, and just as all the trees chose thorns as their king, so all the faces of the saints perfected themselves with suffering and earned the crown of the kingdom of heaven through many sorrows. High is the face of the apostles, high is the face of the prophets; not the low rank of teachers, saints, virgins, hermits and other saints; however, they all achieved their perfection not without a little suffering. Our Lord Jesus Christ was an example for all of them. He was a prophet, for he predicted the future - the destruction of Jerusalem and the day of the Last Judgment. He was also an apostle, for, having been sent from God the Father, he went preaching everywhere. He was also a free doctor, and all the people sought to touch Him and be healed of their ailments. He was both a faster and a hermit, for “he was caught up in the spirit into the wilderness and fasted for forty days.” He was also a great miracle worker who raised the dead. But it was not here that He established the crown of His kingdom, the crown of His glory. Where? In suffering, in the crown of thorns, in the outpouring of His blood: “For it is fitting that Christ should suffer and be brought into His glory.” So you see how thorns reign, how suffering gives birth to glory. You see that for the Lord Himself there was no other way to eternal glory than through suffering. So, “we see Jesus crowned with glory and honor for accepting death.” But in order not to seem burdensome to my listener by continuing my conversation, I will now end it. Hear, O beloved, that even Christ our Lord, who wanted to enter His real, personal glory, had to suffer so much. What can we say about us? What kind of work, what kind of exploits do we need, who want to enter not into our own, but into someone else’s glory? Into someone else’s, for we have alienated ourselves from it with our sins: “We alienated the sinner from falsehood.” But on this joyful day I do not want to confuse your love with sad words; I do not want to confuse those for whom I only wish to rejoice in the risen Christ, and therefore, together with David, I advise: “This day, which the Lord has made, let us rejoice and be glad on it.” Amen. Sermon on the Annunciation of the Blessed Virgin Mary and Holy Monday of the Resurrection of Christ “Christ is risen from the dead”; “The Word became flesh and dwelt in us” (John 1:14) Beloved listeners! Today we celebrate together two bright holidays: the Resurrection of Christ and the Annunciation of the Most Holy Theotokos - two bright holidays, concordant and different: different in name and consonant in power, different in action and consonant in sacrament, different in time and consonant in the accomplishment of our salvation. They differ in church singing, but are equal in joyfulness, for in both celebrations the holy church calls its children to joy. In the Annunciation she sings: “Teach, O earth, great joy; praise, O heavens, the glory of God”; in the Resurrection he says: “This day which the Lord has made, let us rejoice and be glad on it.” Do you know, beloved, how the current special celebration can be called in one word? Let everyone call it what he wants; I will call it the belt with which the bride of Christ, the holy Church, is now girded. Just as a belt has two ends, far apart from one another, but if someone girds it, then both ends converge in one place and are tied into one union, so in the sacrament of our salvation there are, as it were, two ends; These are two holidays: Annunciation and Resurrection. In the Annunciation, our salvation begins, as it is read about in the troparion: “The day of our salvation is the firstfruits and the eternal mysteries revealed.” In the Resurrection, our salvation receives its prosperous end, as Christ said on the cross: “It is finished” (John 19:30). This belt is long (I mean the mystery of our salvation), for thirty-four years passed from its beginning to its end; when the bride of Christ, the Holy Church, redeemed by His blood, girded herself with that belt of salvation, then both ends, that is, both holidays, the Annunciation and the Resurrection, the beginning of our salvation and its completion, came together in one place, in one union, for, having suffered, He who was first incarnated in the womb of the Most Pure Virgin was resurrected from the dead, and He was incarnated in order to rise from the dead. And we, celebrating both of these events in one union, sing: “Christ is risen,” and glorify His incarnation: “Christ is risen from the dead” and “The Word became flesh.” The discrepancy between the church singing of both of these holidays is brought into agreement by Mark’s chapters, laid down in the church charter; Allow me, your love, to harmonize the actions of these holidays and show how the Annunciation of the Most Holy Theotokos and the Resurrection of Christ have great agreement with each other in their actions. Not only in the current year 1706, which has the Easter letter “B”, the feast of the Resurrection of Christ was united on Bright Monday with the feast of the Annunciation of the Most Holy Theotokos, but in all years the Resurrection of Christ is celebrated not without the Annunciation, for every year when we celebrate Easter of Christ, then on the very first, week-long day of Easter we hear in the Gospel and the Annunciation, preached in the following words: “And the Word became flesh.” What do these words tell us? Are they not preaching the Annunciation, in which, according to the voice of the Archangel, through the overshadowing of the Holy Spirit, God the Word became incarnate in the womb of the Most Pure Virgin Mary and “the Word became flesh?” You see that the Resurrection never lives without incarnation. Let us now consider the agreement in the actions of both holidays and begin with the Annunciation, since it is the beginning of our salvation, and then we will move on to the Resurrection, since it is the perfect end of our salvation. In the Annunciation of the Most Holy Theotokos, the incarnation of God the Word was accomplished by the favor of God the Father, by the overshadowing and action of the Holy Spirit and by the will of the Word Himself. The Resurrection of Christ from the dead occurred through the good will and action of God the Father, together with the Holy Spirit and the will of Christ Himself. When St. Peter healed the lame man at the church door, then he said to the bishop and the princes of the Jews this way: “Be wise to all of you and to all the people of Israel, for in the name of Jesus Christ of Nazareth, whom you crucified, whom God raised from the dead, for this reason this one stands before you in good health” (Acts 4:10). With the words: “God raised Him from the dead,” the apostle clearly shows that Christ was resurrected by the favor of God the Father with the assistance of the Holy Spirit, according to the following writing of Ezekiel: “Come upon Me the Spirit and set Me upon My foot” (Ezek. 3:24), and by the consent of Christ Himself, as having this authority, for He Himself says: “Imam has the power to lay down My soul and the imam will accept the power again” (John 10:18). Just as, dying on the cross, He entrusted His spirit to His Father, saying: “Father, in Your hand I commend My spirit,” so when He rose from the grave and resurrected from the dead, He also received His spirit from the hands of the Father. At the Annunciation, the angel Gabriel was the minister of the miracle: “A representative angel was sent from heaven and quickly said to the Mother of God: “Rejoice”; and the Resurrection of Christ was not without an angelic service: “The angel of the Lord descended, roll away the stone,” and after that two angels were visible in the tomb. The Church announces the angel who came to the Mother of God and announced the Resurrection of Christ to Her, singing like this: “The angel cried out with more grace: pure Virgin, rejoice! Your Son is risen three days from the grave.” At the Annunciation, the Blessed Virgin expressed to the angel Her chaste innocence, non-involvement with her husband and innocence in carnal marriage, saying: “How will this be, since I don’t know my husband?” (Luke 1:34). Likewise, in the Lord’s suffering before the resurrection, Pilate testified to Jesus’ innocence, saying: “I find no guilt in this Man; innocent of death” (John 19:6). At the Annunciation, the Most Pure Virgin consented to the will of the Lord, for She answered the Angel: “Behold the handmaid of the Lord, be unto me this day according to thy word” (Luke 1:38). Likewise, in accepting the cup of suffering, which would end in resurrection, there was Christ’s permission, for He said to the Father: “If it is Your will, let me drink” (Matthew 26:42). At the Annunciation, God the Word, the only begotten Word of the Father, took on human flesh, as is preached about this in the Gospel: “And the Word became flesh, and dwelt in us” (John 1:14); in the Resurrection, the flesh put on the Divinity, “the Lord reigned, He was clothed with beauty,” in the “blindness” of the Divinity, for Christ suffered as a man, and rose with glory as God, as evidenced by His beloved disciple the Evangelist John: “We have seen His glory, the glory of the only begotten from the Father, filled with grace and truth” (John 1:14). At the Annunciation, at first Christ was known only by the Mother, in whose womb He was incarnated, He was known before Elizabeth the prophetess, John carried in the womb, Joseph the doubter and others knew Him. Likewise, in the Resurrection, first of all, the Most Pure Virgin knew Christ, who had risen from the tomb, for He first of all appeared after His resurrection to His Most Blessed Mother, according to the testimony of St. Ambrose, which is confirmed by the church in the old Triodion, on Great Saturday in the canon at Compline. The Annunciation of the Most Holy Theotokos was followed by reproach and disgrace, for Joseph, having within himself a storm of untrue thoughts and suspicions, reviled Her, saying: “Mary, what is this thing that I see in You? Instead of honor, shame, instead of joy, sadness, instead of boasting, you brought reproaches.” The Resurrection of Christ was preceded by reproach and disgrace, when the Lord was on the cross “imputed with the lawless” and “crucified among two thiefs.” Both of these holidays are not without a martyr. Just as Christ on the cross was a martyr, so it was truly torment for the Most Pure and Chaste Virgin Mary to endure innocent reproach from Joseph and from others suspicion of lawlessness, as if She had known her husband. But for both, reproach turned into glory, for Christ, after His suffering, entered into His glory, and the Most Pure Mother of God, after Her reproach, became glorified more honorably than the Cherubim and more glorious than the Seraphim. At the Annunciation, Christ betrothed human nature to Himself, but in the Resurrection He glorified it, having clothed the corruptible with the incorruptible and the mortal with immortality. At the Annunciation, the Most Pure Virgin crushed the head of the serpent, trampling the poison of original sin, but at the Resurrection, Her Son, our Lord, crushed hell, defeated the devil and destroyed his kingdom. In the Annunciation, sinful death was put to death, and in the Resurrection, bodily death was also trampled underfoot: “Our Lord trampled down death by death and gave life to those in the tombs.” At the Annunciation, a den was designated in which Christ was to be born, and the same Christ, who was to rise from the dead, was received by a cave and a tomb: there was a den at birth, a den also at resurrection. At the Annunciation the virginity of the Most Pure Mother of God was preserved intact, and the tomb seals were preserved intact at the Resurrection of Christ. The Lord came out of the sealed tomb in the same way as He was born from the Mother of God, “sealed with purity and preserved by virginity.” In the Incarnation, Christ was like a blameless lamb, fallen in Mary’s womb, but in the Resurrection, this Lamb grew into a lion: “Behold, the Lion of the tribe of Judah has overcome,” and, triumphant, he says to all of His: “Be of good cheer, I am victorious” (Apoc. 5:5; John 16:33). After the Annunciation, the Most Pure Virgin “went to the mountain”; after the Resurrection, Christ went to Galilee on the mountain, where he commanded His disciples to come: “Cry, both disciples and Petrov, as you cook in Galilee” (Mark 16:7). At the Annunciation, the Most Pure Virgin, filled with great joy, sang: “My soul magnifies the Lord, and my spirit rejoices in God my Savior” (Luke 1:46:47), after the Resurrection of Her Son and God, oh, who can convey! What joy She was filled with when she saw alive the One about whose death She wept inconsolably. Rejoicing with Her, the Holy Church remembers Her joy, singing: “But You, Pure One, rejoice, O Mother of God, at the rise of Your Nativity.” You see, my listeners, that the Annunciation of the Most Pure Virgin Mary and the Resurrection of Christ have a lot of agreement in their actions, and therefore it is fitting that the Feast of the Annunciation now happened on the Feast of the Resurrection of Christ. So, let us celebrate, filled with deep spiritual joy; may our soul magnify the Lord, and may our spirit rejoice in God, our Savior, who rose three days from the grave. Let our souls also exalt the Lady Most Pure Virgin Mary, by whom we received salvation, for “Christ our God saved the world through the Mother of God.” To Christ, our Savior and Lord, who was incarnated in the most pure virgin womb and was born incorruptibly from her, and who suffered for the sake of our salvation, and who rose from the grave, may He and His Mother of God be honoured, from us, His servants, honor, glory, thanksgiving and worship now and always, and to endless ages! But this is not the end of my conversation; I will also say something for the benefit of ordinary people. What I have already said was said for the bookish, but I don’t want to let the unlearned go without benefit. Do you know, your love, what these two holidays teach us: the Resurrection of Christ, which began yesterday, and the Annunciation of the Most Holy Theotokos, which is now celebrated? They teach us to rise from a dead life to a virtuous one, to unite with God in a union as strong and inseparable as God the Word united with the flesh of human nature in the womb of the Most Pure Virgin. The Resurrection of Christ teaches us to rise from spiritual death to a virtuous life, according to the apostolic word: “For as Christ has risen from the dead in the glory of the Father, so let us also walk in newness of life” (Rom. 6:4). Do you know what spiritual death is? Mental death is a grave, mortal sin, for which a person will suffer forever in hell. Why is grave sin death for the soul? But because it takes God away from the soul, by whom only it can live, for just as the life of the body is the soul, so the life of the soul is God, and just as a body without a soul is dead, so a soul without God is also dead. And although a sinful person walks, being alive in the body, his soul, which does not have God, its life, is dead. That's why St. Callistus, Patriarch of Constantinople, says: “Many in a living body have a dead soul, buried as if in a tomb. The coffin is the body, and the dead is the soul. The coffin moves, but the soul in it is lifeless, that is, godless, as if it does not have God in itself. Thus, a living body carries within itself a dead soul.” If anyone does not believe what I have said, let him listen to the words of the Lord Himself. He once appeared to His beloved disciple John and said to him: “Write to the angel of the Sardinian church: we know your deeds, like the name of the Lord, that you are alive and yet dead” (Apoc. 3:1). Let us heed the words of the Lord: He calls a worthy, holy man, with the rank of an angel, “Angel of the Sardinian Church,” alive, but considers him dead: “Imash’s name is that you are alive, but you are dead.” He is alive in name, but dead in deeds; holy in name, but dead in deeds; in name an angel, but in deeds he is not like an angel, but an adversary. He is alive in body, but dead in soul. Why? The reason for this is explained by the Lord Himself, saying: “Your works that were perfect before your God were not found” (Apoc. 3:2). Oh, what fear and horror this thing is filled with! That earthly angel had some good deeds, apparently had a holy life, was considered and called by people an angel, and even the Lord Himself does not take away his angelic titles and calls him an angel, but since he was not completely virtuous, not completely holy, not completely an angel in the flesh, but only by name and opinion an angel, holy and virtuous, but in deeds it is completely different, that is why God considers him dead. What can we, sinners, think about ourselves, not having a single good deed, but wallowing in incessant sins, like pigs in a swamp? How will we appear before God if not dead? Will not the Lord also say to us these words: “The name of the Lord is that you are alive and yet dead?” O unrepentant sinner! You are only alive in your body, but your soul is dead. Why? Because God has been taken away from your soul because of your stingy and sinful deeds. And how grave, mortal and great sin takes God from the soul, by whom it should live, and makes the soul dead, this is clearly seen in the example of the prodigal son, who is told about in the Gospel parable. When this one returned to his father, the father said about him: “This one was dead and alive” (Luke 15:24). “A certain man had two sons,” says the Gospel (Luke 15:11). Likewise, God, who became man out of His love for mankind, also has two rational creatures, an angel and a man, like two sons. The angel is His eldest son, created before man and placed above man both in place and by grace; man is the youngest son and was created after; however, if he is made less than an angel, then he is made less than a little: “Thou hast made him a little less than an angel” (Ps. 8:6). The youngest son lived with his father for the time being and was not a prodigal, but a stepfather’s son, he was a worthy heir; but when he “went into a far country and squandered his substance, living fornication” (Luke 15:13), then he was called the prodigal son, and at the same time dead. Likewise, man, as long as he holds on to God, his Creator and Life-Giver, by whom he lives and moves and exists, until then he does not appear before God as a dead soul, until then God lives in his soul, until then his soul is revived by God’s grace. But as soon as a person turns away from God and from the virtuous life befitting a true Christian, as soon as he deviates towards nasty iniquities, then God immediately separates from his soul, departs from him with His life-giving grace, departs like a bee driven away by smoke, driven away by the stench of sin, and that soul becomes dead. About such a person we can say that he is dead: “He has only a name, for he is alive, but he is dead.” “Just as the rod cannot produce fruit for itself unless it is in the vine, so neither can you unless you abide in Me” (John 15:4). “The foundation of repentance is laid on dead works” (Heb. 6:1); and Judas was a miracle worker until he fell into the sin of love of money. Jacob the Hermit was a miracle worker until he fell into carnal sin with a girl, whom he freed from demonic possession. The Saprik priest was a martyr, and as soon as he became hardened with anger and did not forgive his brother, he was immediately rejected from Christ. Likewise, the soul is alive and active until it is torn away from God for sins; when she is cut off from God for the fall, she is immediately made dead and ineffective. Is it not appropriate for such a dead person, that is, a soul killed by sins, to be resurrected? It is appropriate, and not even once, but often. The resurrection of dead bodies will happen only once, which we expect on the last day, according to the Symbol: “I hope for the resurrection of the dead and the life of the next century”; the resurrection of the soul is repeated often. What is the resurrection of the soul? Holy repentance; for just as sin is death for the soul, so repentance is resurrection for the soul. After all, about the prodigal son, when he turned to his father in repentance, it was said: “He was dead and alive again.” While he was away from his father, in a sinful land, he was dead; when he returned, having repented, he was immediately resurrected in soul: “I was dead and alive again.” We said that this resurrection is often repeated with the soul, for when a person sins, he dies in soul, and when he repents, he is resurrected, according to this word: “As often as you fall, only rise again and be saved.” So, the real holiday of the Resurrection of Christ teaches us to rise from spiritual death, that is, to repent of sins; teaches not just to be resurrected, but to be resurrected according to the example of Christ, as the Apostle teaches: “Christ has risen from the dead, whoever dies no more, and death has no power over Him” (Rom. 6:9). Likewise, let us “walk in newness of life.” Just as Christ, after His resurrection, no longer dies, so we will not return after our repentance to our former mortal sins; for what is the use, having washed yourself from the swamp, to climb into it again? What is the use, having come out of the abyss, to plunge oneself into it again? What is the use, having been healed of ulcers, to wound yourself again and even worse? What is the benefit, having been resurrected from spiritual death by repentance, to again kill your soul with sins. The true resurrection of the soul is to, having once risen with Christ, never return to death and never die again. Another real holiday is the Annunciation, in which God the Word was firmly and inseparably united with the flesh, teaches us to unite with God, for it is not enough just to rise from spiritual death, but it is also necessary to unite firmly with God. If we do not unite with Him, we will again fall into death and die again in sins; but he who is firmly united with God will remain immortal, without stumbling, and not returning to his former evil deeds. How should you connect with God? Just as God in His incarnation united with human flesh. God has so united himself with human flesh that he will never leave it, but will abide and reign with it in heaven for endless ages. Likewise, a person resurrected from sins must unite with God, his Creator and Redeemer, so as to never again be separated from Him, not only in deed, but also in thought, and so as never to leave Him, for the psalms say: “He who departs from You will perish” (Ps. 72:27). But on these joyful holidays I no longer want to burden your love with long listening to the word, for I know that everyone is drawn by the thought of either going home to eat food or visiting for a feast. So, I congratulate you on this special holiday, the Resurrection and the Annunciation, and on both of these holidays I wish you both mental benefit and physical health, and I say: Amen. “Show them His hand and nose and His side” (John 20:20) My beloved listeners! Now Christ the Lord has revealed to us all His treasures, when He showed His hands, feet and ribs to the apostles, and with them to all of us. He showed his hands, those hands that were pierced through and through by a nail wound; They contain priceless and countless treasures. Even if the Lord wanted to withhold any of His rich gifts so as not to give them to us, then through the ulcers perforated through and through it would pass to the other side and fall into our hands, and the Lord would no longer be able to withhold anything from us in His hands, both because He is generous and merciful, and because He has perforated hands. If we don’t take something from His palm, then on the other hand we will reach through the wounds, as through a window, and take what we want. He showed His feet, which were also pierced by nails, so that His entire foot was drenched in blood. The Lord, who commanded us to follow in His footsteps, marked these His footsteps with His blood, flowing from His most pure feet, so that we would not lose our way from His footsteps, but, following them, would reach those eternal treasures, “which no eye has seen and no ear has heard” (1 Cor. 2:9). The Lord also showed His ribs, those ribs that were pierced to the very heart with a long, sharp and wide spear, and the ulcer formed in them so large that one could put a hand into it. “Bring,” said the Lord, “bring your hand and place it in my side” (John 20:27). This plague has opened for us like a door to an inexhaustible treasure. The Lord Himself called Himself doors: “I am the door”; “Press and it will be opened” (John 10:9; Matt. 7:7). We no longer need to knock on those doors, for they are open: a certain warrior pushed with a spear and opened them: “One of the soldiers pierced His side with a spear” (John 19:34). Therefore, everyone who wants to enter through these doors to the treasures of the heart of Christ “let him go in and out and find pasture” (John 10:9). Our Lord showed His hands, feet and ribs precisely so that we, together with Saint Thomas, could touch His wounds, and at the same time not only touch them, but also take everything we want from there, as from an open treasury. How we can touch and what we can take, we will learn this with God’s help in my sermon today. “Show them His hand and nose and His ribs.” Although we have St. as an example of touching the wounds of Christ. Thomas, however, we must perceive them in a different way. He felt them materially, but we, beloved listeners, must feel them not materially, but spiritually. How did Thomas feel? Here we hear the Lord commanding him: “Bring this finger to me and see my hand, and bring your hand and place it in my side.” Thomas touched the smaller ulcers with his finger, and the larger one with his whole hand. This sense of touch was actually, material. But we, seeing our Lord Jesus Christ already glorified in heaven, sitting at the right hand of the Father and preserving intact these ulcers, which He has to show everyone at the second coming, according to what is written: “They will see the one who has broken” (John 19:37), we will also touch these ulcers with our fingers and hand, only not material, carnal, but spiritual. We have faith - it is one finger. We have hope - this is another finger. We also have love - this is already a whole hand, for according to the Apostle: “Now remain faith, hope, love, these three; more beloved than all" (1 Cor. 13:13). Just as a whole hand is larger than each finger, so love is greater than faith and hope: for faith and hope remain only as long as we live here on earth, but love will endure forever, even after our departure from earthly things. When the worthy come to God, then there will be no need for faith, for face to face they will see Him in whom they, while living on earth, believed without seeing Him. There will be no need for hope, for they will receive and have in their hands what they hoped for. With love that never falls away, they will forever love the Lord their God, with the sight of whom they will never be satisfied. That is why love stands above everything. So, with faith and hope let us touch the wounds of Christ as with fingers, and with love as with the whole hand. First, let us touch His hand wounds with faith, like fingers. She, as the apostle teaches, is “a message of hope, a revelation of things unseen” (Heb. 11:1), that is, what we do not see with our bodily eyes, we are undoubtedly convinced of by faith and see as if it were an existing thing. Bodily we do not see Christ the Lord, but by faith we undoubtedly see Him everywhere: both with the Father sitting in heaven, and dwelling on earth in His holy church, according to the words of David: “The Lord is in His holy church” (Ps. 10:4), and living among His faithful servants - “God in the midst of His people”, and present in each of us especially: “I have foreseen,” it is said, “the Lord before I will take it out, as it is at my right hand" (Ps. 15:8). So, by faith let us touch the hand-scouring marks of the Lord. To touch the wounds of the Lord means: your mind and heart, having abandoned all worldly cares for that time, must be inserted into the wounds: “Like the eyes of a servant in the hand of his masters, and like the eyes of a servant in the hand of her mistress, so let our eyes be towards the Lord our God” (Ps. 122:2). To penetrate them with your mind and heart means to reflect on them with long and diligent divine thinking, saying within yourself: these are the hands that stretched out the hands of the withered, enlightened with a touch the eyes of the blind, opened the ears of the deaf and gave tongue to the dumb. They brought to Him a deaf, humming man, and He put His finger in his ears, saying: “Ephphatha was opened, and his ears were opened, and the bond of his tongue was loosed, and the words that were right” (Mark 7:34:35). These are the hands from whose touch death flees and the dead rise: “I touch the bed and the dead rise.” These are the hands that hold up the whole creation in a handful, rule the universe, cast down the proud, lift up the humble, and which are blessed by all the ends of the world. These are the hands that cooled the fire of illness in Peter’s mother-in-law: “I will touch her hand and leave the fire.” These are the hands that, wanting to heal Adam’s hands, stretched out to the commanded tree, stretched out on the cross, brought salvation to the world and signed eternal life for the human race with blood, like cinnabar, and nails, like a reed. These are the hands that embrace the prodigal sons turning to Him with a paternal embrace, take the lost sheep on their shoulders and gather all nations into one church: “On the cross, the Most Pure One stretched out His hand, gathering all the tongues.” And such and such hands were pierced through and through by such a terrible nail wound! Oh, most merciful and generous hands of our Lord Jesus Christ! Oh, sweet tame ulcers! We bow to you with gratitude, kiss you with our heartfelt lips and stretch out our hands to you so that you may be generous to us. Having touched the hands of the Lord with such divine thinking, we will take from them whoever wants what and how much he wants. Let us take it by faith: “Those who doubt are like the turbulence of the sea, tossed and tossed by the winds” (James 1:6), and let such a person not think that he will receive anything from God. Faith determines for itself what it wants, according to the words of St. Ambrose: “He has faith insofar as (a person) believes.” He who believes little receives little, and he who believes more receives more. Whoever believes that God’s providence will be accomplished in him, it will happen; whoever does not believe will not. If someone, praying earnestly and diligently, believes that God hears his prayers, then He really does, and whoever does not believe does not hear him. If someone believes that he will receive what he asks for, then he will receive it, but if he does not believe, he will not receive it. “Faith is as great as (a person) believes.” So, choose for yourself whatever you want to receive from the hands of the Lord, for everything that is good, everything that is dear, everything that is most desirable: everything is in His hands. If anyone wants to live long in this life, “behold, the length of days is in His right hand.” Do you want to be rich and famous, “behold in His glory is wealth and glory.” Do you want great power and great authority, “the right hand of the Lord will create strength, the right hand of the Lord will exalt you” (Ps. 118:15:16). But all this is temporary blessings; It is better to seek eternal than temporary blessings; for in one place it is said about those who are temporary: “You ask and do not receive; you ask evilly, but depend on your pleasures” (James 4:3). Here I will recall an incident that once happened to Saint Peter. Saint Peter once wanted to be a miracle worker ahead of time, he wanted to walk on water at a time when his faith was still meager. He prayed to the Lord: “If You are, command me to come to You on the waters” (Matthew 14:28). Let us listen to what Peter asks. He asks for something objectionable, temporary, which can only last until he reaches Jesus. But the Lord, in accordance with his request, commands him and allows this: “Peter came out of the ship and walked on the waters” (Matthew 14:28). Saint Peter! Do not look for measures higher than yourself: it is better to stick to the boat with the other apostles. What is the need to walk on water if you have a boat and on it you can approach Jesus. If you have dared and established your feet on the water, then do not doubt and do not be afraid, but go with faith, like those about whom St. speaks. Paul: “By faith I crossed the Red Sea as if on dry land” (Heb. I: 29). St. doubted Peter, his faith became weak, he became of little faith: seeing the strong excitement, he was afraid and began to drown. Do you see, Peter, what your desire, your request for an unnecessary, short-term and small thing brought you? Do not want to be better, higher and more holy than others, do not be proud of yourself: these people are sitting in a boat, and I am walking on the waters. What does Peter do when that misfortune happened to him? He calls out to Christ: “Cry out, saying: Lord, save me!” You're doing well, St. Peter, that in your misfortune you seek no other help, but only God’s. Jesus immediately stretched out His hand, took it and said: “Faith of little faith! Why did you doubt?” Let's see now what Peter received from the hands of Jesus? Previously, he asked for temporary happiness, asked to walk on water and received this; since this happiness was temporary, it soon left him, leaving him to drown. There is no temporary happiness in which one could not drown. Afterwards Peter corrected himself, being punished by misfortune; he then asked the Lord for salvation, and salvation is an extremely necessary and eternal thing. He cried out: “Lord, save me!” and received the salvation he asked for, that is, quick deliverance from drowning. He was saved by the hand of Jesus not only from drowning by water, but also from drowning in unbelief, and after that he was already the firmest in faith. This is what Peter received from the hands of the Lord. Let us also imitate St. Peter, but not in the first request, but in the second. First of all, we look around: where are we and where are we walking? We walk or swim in the boat of our body, on the sea of ​​this world, for this world truly is a sea. What is our swimming or walking on this stormy sea? Truly in drowning, for no matter what wave of any temptation comes upon us, we immediately plunge with the cry: “I sank into the depths of the sea, and the storm of my many sins drowned me” (Ps. 68:3). In such evil cases of sinful immersion, we will flow to the wounded hands of Christ, crying out: “Lord, save us, we are perishing!” (Matthew 8:25). How will we arrive? Here's how. When any sinful struggle happens to us, we will immediately turn our bodily eyes to the icon of the crucifixion of Christ, and our mental eyes to Christ Himself, sitting in heaven, present in us and preserving His wounds intact, and first of all within ourselves we will say this: behold, our Lord was nailed to the cross for this sin, for this lawlessness, for this insolence; How dare I commit this evil deed and crucify the Son of God a second time! Let this not happen! In addition, if the Fall approaches us, then, quickly raising our minds to the cross and looking at His outstretched, ulcerated hands, stretched out as if already above us, we will think: why did our Lord stretch out his hands? And for this purpose he stretched out to save me from sinful drowning. Here He speaks with a mysterious appeal to the heart: “Stop, man, do not decide to commit iniquity, leave behind sin. Do you not see My wounds, which I, being God, suffered for you? Do you really want to hurt Me even more? Are you really still trying to torment Me? Enough of your past sins. Stop, don’t dare anymore.” Having thus introduced our mind into the wounds of Christ, we will truly soon receive from them deliverance from sinful destruction, according to the words of one of the divinely inspired: “He does not fall easily, for whom the wounds of the Lord never leave his mind.” When we add to this prayer with firm faith, we will recognize what a treasure, what gifts flow from the hands of the Lord into our hands. But the time has already passed from the hands of the Lord to the feet of the Lord, also pierced through and through with nails. How will we touch them? Let us touch them, as it were, with another finger, with another virtue—hope. Hope is the anchor of Christians sailing on the sea of ​​this world in the ship of the body, and we will lower this anchor deep to the wounds of Christ’s feet, as if into the deep sea of ​​mercy. But first of all, let us consider why the Lord’s feet were so wounded? I thought that this world did not want to let Christ go from itself and was about to chain His feet with nails to the tree of the cross so that it would not leave him, but I heard otherwise on the day of Passion Heel. I heard that the Jewish synagogue shouted at Christ, as Shimei once did at David: “Go away, go away, man of blood, lawless man, poisoner and wine drinker, friend of tax collectors and sinners, go away!” - and they brought Him out to be crucified. The accursed world did not want to see Christ walking through the world, through the world, for He “passed through cities and villages, teaching and preaching the gospel of the kingdom” (Matthew 9:35). For this he nailed Him to one place. But it is impossible to keep the unstoppable and strengthen the omnipresent in one place. What is the real reason for nailing the feet of Christ? The truth is that Adam’s feet went to the wicked council, to the council of the serpent, to the council of Eve, in order to transgress the commandment of God and fall away from God. That is why our Lord, the second Adam, endured such severe wounding with His feet. What else do you think, O sinners (of whom I am the first)? Are we not guilty of wounding the feet of Christ, are we not the ones who always walk the path of lawlessness and unrighteousness, hastening to evil as to a feast, but not knowing the ways of the Lord and despising them? Let each of us consider and judge for himself. Oh, the most pure feet of the Lord! We worship you; We kiss you and your nail sores, we kiss you with our hearts and lips, thanking you for this free suffering for us. What will we take for ourselves from this opened treasure, from the foot wounds of Christ? Let us take what the sinner took, who fell at the feet of Christ and washed His feet with her tears, and wiped them with the hair of her head. What did she get? Forgiveness of sins: “Her many sins are forgiven” (Luke 7:47). In addition, this wife received from the feet of Christ not only the forgiveness of sins, but also the holiness of the virgin brides of Christ, as St. Chrysostom: “Formerly the wife was a harlot, but now she is a maiden, a sister of Christ, the bride of the Word.” Listen, people! Who has ever seen or heard of a harlot becoming a virgin again? Here she is: this is the sinner wife who wept at the feet of Christ. She was given the honor of being a virgin, a sister of Christ and the bride of the Word. We, sinners, oh, how many sins we have! Let us imitate the sinner: let us fall at the feet of Christ and wash them with tears. “Come, let us worship and fall down and weep before the Lord who created us” (Ps. 94:6), and we will wipe away the thoughts of repentance coming from a contrite heart like hair, and then we will receive forgiveness of many of our sins and the holiness of righteousness. How shall we receive this? Repentance with hope, for “hope does not put to shame.” We have many examples of how great sinners, having received forgiveness for repentance, achieved great holiness. Let's listen to what St. says. Chrysostom: “If you are unrighteous, think about the publican. If you are unclean, remember the sinner who cried at the feet of Christ. If you are a thief, look at the thief hanging on the cross with Jesus Christ. If you are a lawless person, remember the blasphemer, look at Paul, who was first a persecutor and then an evangelist. I don’t want you to say to me: I am a blasphemer, I am a persecutor, I am unclean; after all, you have examples of the repentance of all sinners both in the new grace and in the Old Testament. Which shore do you want to flow to: the new or the old? In the old - David, in the new - Paul. What is sin before God's mercy? It’s like a spider’s net that is torn apart by a strong wind.” So, let us firmly hope that we will receive forgiveness at the wounded feet of Christ, but first we need to show fruits worthy of repentance. Now, perhaps, is the time to dare both to the side of Christ and to the deep ulcer of Christ, opened in them with a spear: “One of the soldiers pierced His side with a spear” (John 19:34). How will we touch this most pure wound of Christ? Truly it is fitting to touch it with your whole hand, as the Lord said to Thomas: “Bring your hand and place it in My side.” Earlier I told you that by hand spiritually we mean the love of God, for just as a hand holds what it has taken, so the love of God, who contains everything, is strong to hold everything. “God is loving,” says the Theologian, “and he who abides in love abides in God, and He in him” (1 John 4:16). We must touch the wound of Christ’s side with our whole hand, that is, with whole love we must cleave to the heart of Christ; not just a part of some kind of love for God, not dividing our love into the love of God and the love of the world, into love for the Creator and love for creation, but with our entire heartfelt love we must love God, “with all our soul, with all our heart, with all our strength and with all our mind.” The warning and teaching about the commandment of God’s love is that in the heart, which is the source and beginning of love for everything, so that the creature in it is not equal to the Creator, so that it does not love the creature in the same way as the Creator Himself. It would not be inappropriate to recall here again St. Petra. There is a question about him: why St. Did Peter reject Christ during His free and saving suffering? “I don’t know,” he said, “the man” (Matthew 26:74). Some see the reason for this in the fact that he entered into a conversation with the female sex: the slave asked him, and he answered her. Not every question, especially a woman’s, needs to be answered, and Peter remembered this evil incident so well that even later he did not want to talk with the holy wife, with Magdalene, preaching the gospel of the resurrection of Christ, but ran away from her: “Peter rose up and ran away” (Luke 24:12). Others consider the reason for Peter’s rejection to be that he made friends with the soldiers and with Caiaphas’s servants, evil, depraved and inhuman. And this is the truth, for who will not be corrupted by an evil community with the evil? “With the obstinate,” it is said, “you become corrupt” (Ps. 17:27). I, leading my speech in my goal, will find a special reason for Peter’s rejection and will follow it even to Mount Tabor. Saint Peter, during the Transfiguration of the Lord, seeing the glory of the Lord, said: “Lord, it is good for us to be here; Let us create three canopies, one for You, one for Moses, one for Elijah”; Saint Luke adds about Peter also: “I do not know what he said” (Luke 9:39). Why “not knowledgeable”? Because, being a fisherman, he wanted to be a carpenter. Your job, Peter, is to weave nets, not to build churches. Timothy, Archbishop of Antioch, says this: “What came into your mind, Peter? You want to do something that you haven’t studied at all. You learned to weave nets, and now you want to build churches.” That is why ignorance was attributed to him: “not knowing.” But soon the reason for his rejection will become completely clear. He did not know or did not follow the rules about the love of God: he honored the creation on an equal basis with the Creator, he compared Moses and Elijah with Christ the Savior. Therefore, as punishment for this sin, his Lord allowed him to fall, to be rejected from Christ: “I do not know the man,” said Peter (Matthew 26:72), “so that with this sin he would mourn the previous one committed at Tabor. This wisdom is not mine, but that of the great teacher of the church, Saint Chrysostom, who says: “Didn’t you sin against Me on the Mount of Transfiguration, Peter, when you wanted to create three things and placed Me in the same rank with others?” With this he seemed to say: “Do you remember, Peter, when we were on Tabor and you saw My glory, what did you do then? You have equated Me, God, with people, with Moses and Elijah, You have equated Me, the Creator, with creation. Do you really honor people in the same way as God, a creature, like the Creator? So, you will fall into the sin of threefold rejection for the inappropriate creation of three tabernacles and you will pay for this in no other way than with a threefold exclamation of love after bitter weeping: “By the Lord, know You, because I love You” (John 21:15). This is the undoubted reason for Peter’s rejection and the sin that occurred in the court of Caiaphas, when he said three times: “I don’t know the man.” It consists, as we see, in the fact that at Tabor he did not observe the rites and rules about the love of God: he honored the Creator on an equal basis with the creature. So, whoever wants to truly love God must observe the boundaries and correct order of love, so that in his heart his creation is not equal to the Creator. How can we now, sinners, not be ashamed if in our hearts we not only compare God with creation, or with sin, but even put creation in the highest place, and not the Creator, preferring sin before God? We love our passion, our evil habits; we love them incomparably more than God, for by leaving God we turn to our sins; All our lives we work at sin, and we barely ever remember God. Oh, if only we loved God as much as we love sins! But the Lord our God is unhappy in us and does not have in us the happiness that our sin, our passion, our evil lust have. Oh, our damnation! If it was not easy for Saint Peter that at Tabor he honored God on an equal basis with the saints, and committed this sin out of ignorance, then what will happen to us, the damned and sinners, when we, not out of ignorance, but consciously and voluntarily, prefer our sins to God? But let us now turn our face again to the wound of Christ. What then? Do we want, as it should be, to feel the wound of Christ in His most pure ribs and sweet heart? Let us touch it with our whole hand, that is, let us cleave to it entirely with love with our mind, always looking at it and tasting the sweetness flowing from there. Much could be said about Divine love, true and perfect, but I don’t have enough time to talk about it, and besides, my listeners may become exhausted listening to me, and I, weak, preaching. Therefore, I will shorten my conversation by recalling only what we wanted to receive from the opened dearest treasure, from the wound in the ribs and heart of Christ. If we completely love God, then we will receive from Him perfect love, covering our sins, for He says: “I love Me, and those who seek Me will find grace” (Prov. 8:17); and again: “If anyone loves Me, he will be loved by My Father, and I will come to him and appear to him Myself” (John 14:21). And what could be more valuable than this gift, this treasure? So, here we, beloved, have learned a little, according to our strength, how to feel the stripes of Christ and what can be obtained from them; as if from an open treasury. Let us remember this teaching and from now on we will begin, we will touch, we will take whatever we want, and together with Saint Thomas we will exclaim: “My Lord and my God!” (John 20:28). Amen. Sermon on the Sunday of the Holy Myrrh-Bearing Women “You are looking for Jesus of Nazareth, crucified: He is not here” (Mark 16:6) Beloved listeners! To the holy myrrh-bearers, looking for Christ in the tomb, the angel said that He was not among the dead: “He has risen, he is not here.” Do not seek, he says, in the tomb who exhausted the graves, do not try the Life-Giver among the dead, do not seek the incorruptible in ashes: God did not allow His Son to see corruption. “Vost, not here.” "Not here"! But where is He? Who will tell us? Last week, Saint Thomas was curious, wanting to know something and be confident in the resurrection of Christ, saying: “If I do not see, if I do not touch, I have no faith” (John 20:25). This week, I, a sinner, want to be curious, to search and find out where Christ is now found after His rise from the grave? Where? Where can it be said of Him that He is here? Someone will say: Christ, after His resurrection, ascended into heaven and sat down at the right hand of God the Father. This is the truth. However, those words of His in which He promised, saying: “I am with you always, even to the end of the age” (Matthew 28:20) are not false. Then where is He with us? Where? Between what persons and ranks? How can we recognize His presence? Who can truly say: He is here? I want to look for You, my Lord: “My heart speaks to You, I seek Your face, I will seek Your face, Lord” (Ps. 27:8). Only You Yourself help me find You. “Teacher, where do you live?” (John 1:38). Tell us! Show Your face, and we will be saved. May your love help my unworthiness to seek Christ with God-thought seeking. When starting to look for where Christ, our God, is now found after His resurrection, first of all, it is necessary to be very careful not to find a false Christ, and not the true one, for the true Christ Himself, our Lord, warns us in the Holy Gospel, saying: “If anyone says to you: Here is Christ, or here, do not have faith. For false Christs and false prophets will arise and show great signs and wonders, as if it were possible to deceive even the elect” (Matthew 24:23–24). So I predicted to you that if they say to you: Christ is in the desert, then do not go out to Him; or: Christ is in the hidden place, then do not have faith. I heard that many, leaving their home, property and relatives, fled into the desert, the Bryn forests, looking for Christ and the right faith there, as if Christ were in the desert. It’s as if Christ and the right faith in Him are sitting somewhere in the forest behind a log. I won't follow them. I will obey the words of the true Christ Himself, my Lord: “If they say to you, Behold, there is Christ in the desert, do not go out.” I have heard that the schismatics secretly already have Christs, but I do not believe in those Christs: I obey the words of the true Christ Himself, my Lord: “If they say to you: Christ; have no faith." I know that these are false Christs or antichrists, as the Theologian says: “Children, this is the last hour; and as you heard that the Antichrist was coming, and now there were many Antichrists” (John 2:18). Until the Antichrist himself comes, many antichrists have already spawned, or, more accurately, forerunners of the antichrist. But there is no true Christ among them: “He is not here.” Where is Christ found after His resurrection? Someone will say theologically: Christ is everywhere, for He is “God who is everywhere and fulfills everything,” which the church recently said in one troparion: “In the grave carnally, in hell with the soul, like God. You were in paradise with the thief and on the throne, O Christ, with the Father and the Spirit, fulfilling everything indescribable.” The heavens cannot contain Christ our God; the whole of heaven does not embrace Him, and all the ends of the earth do not limit Him. Therefore, the Psalmist says: “Where shall I go from Thy Spirit, and where shall I flee from Thy presence? Even if I ascend to heaven, You are there; If I go down to hell, there you are; If I take up my wings early and dwell in the last of the seas, and there is Thy hand” (Ps. 139:7:10). Christ God, with His omnipotent power, is everywhere: in heaven he reigns with the Father, in hell he torments demons, in heavenly places he preserves and organizes human life. “In Him we live and move, and we are” (Acts 17:28). In the entire universe He contains everything and governs all His creation, both visible and invisible. If Christ our God is everywhere with His omnipotent and all-containing power, then with His blessing and grace He is not present everywhere: in one place He is, in another He does not exist at all, and in another He was, but left, saying: “Behold, your house is left empty.” “Vost, not here.” Where can one find out for certain where He lives? The psalmist says: “The Lord is in His holy church”; therefore, Christ our Lord, after His resurrection, dwells in the holy churches built in His honor. One could hope for this, but this is not known for certain, for the holy First Martyr Stephen says this: “Solomon built a church for Him. But the Most High does not live in churches made by hands; He says: Heaven is My throne, and earth is My footstool. What church will you build for Me, says the Lord, or what place will I make My resting place? Was it not My hand that created all these things?” (Acts 7:47–50). Saint Stephen! You confuse us when you say that “The Most High does not live in churches made with hands.” After all, pious people will not build churches to God if God does not dwell in them. After all, in holy churches only God can live, as in His true homes. For Saint Stephen, the interpreters answer as follows: God is not displeased with the creation of holy churches and the decoration of them, for David also praises them with the Holy Spirit, saying: “I have loved the beauty of Your house and the dwelling place of Your glory” (Ps. 25:8). It cannot be said that the Lord did not dwell in His churches, for Ezekiel the prophet also says: “And I saw, and behold, the church of the Lord was filled with glory” (Ezekiel 43:5). But why did Saint Stephen the First Martyr say these words: “The Most High does not live in churches made with hands”? He said them for two reasons. On the one hand, he wanted to strike the pride of the Jews, who immensely boasted of their Jerusalem Solomon's Temple and thought of it as if God lived in it more than even in heaven; on the other hand, he wanted to show that God does not love to live in churches made with hands, built in honor of Him, as He loves and desires to live in churches not made by hands. And speaking in God’s truth, sometimes God does not want to dwell in churches made with hands, if irreverent and fearless people turn His holy house into a den of thieves, just as He Himself says: “My house is a house of prayer, but you will make it a den of thieves” (Matthew 21:13). People will gather in church as if for prayer, and among themselves they talk and idly talk about strangers: either about buying or selling, or about feasts, or about quarrels, then they condemn someone or scold and slander, or destroy the good glory of their neighbor with various blasphemous words, so that the church of God is no longer the church of God, but a den of thieves. Others, standing in the holy church, seem to be praying with their lips, but in their minds they dream about household things: about a wife, about children, about wealth, about chests, about money or something else. Another, standing, dozes, and another thinks about filth and evil: one - about theft, another - about murder, a third - about adultery and fornication, and a fourth thinks about anger and revenge on his neighbor in the church. All of them make the church of prayer not a church of prayer, but some kind of nativity scene. Sometimes it happens that even clergymen, being drunk, swear, use foul language, fight, and not only in the church, but also in the holy altar. Then truly the church of God is no longer the church of God, but a den of thieves. Then the grace of God is driven away from the holy place, desecrated by outrage and foul words, like a bee driven away by smoke. Then we can say that Christ is not there: “He is not here.” There was a time when our Lord made a scourge out of ropes and drove out all those buying and selling in the church. What if even now He apparently came to His holy church with that scourge? Wouldn't He drive everyone out, those who talk, use foul language, think about bad things and do not listen to reading and singing? But, O Lord, the time has already passed when You drove out the rioters from Your holy church. Now our damned time has come. Now we are driving You out, and turning Your church into a den of thieves. Now one can sometimes say about the church of the Lord: there is no God here; was there, but went away: “Vosta is not here.” “The Most High does not live in churches made with hands,” says Saint Stephen (Acts 7:48). Where then is the church of the Most High, not made by hands? Every person, inspired, enlightened and enlightened by holy baptism, is the church of God, as the apostle testifies to this: “The church of God is holy, as you are” (1 Cor. 3:17); and again: “Your body is a temple to the Holy Spirit who lives in you” (1 Cor. 6:19). If every righteous person is the church of God, then it means that in every person one can look for Christ, who dwells after the resurrection, and then one can say: “He is here,” but this is also in doubt and not known for certain. There are many who are enlightened by baptism and true believers, but there are few in whom Christ dwells as in His true church. After all, the thief, the robber, and the adulterer are baptized; after all, every villain is enlightened by faith. But don’t ask Christ in them: “There is no here.” Has it ever been long ago; unless only when the thief was still in his infancy. When he came of age and began to steal, Christ immediately departed from him: “He is gone, he is not here.” Some may seem virtuous in appearance, but God knows what is in his secrets; for in one place the apostle says: “Whoever is kept away from them is ashamed to eat and speak” (Eph. 5:12). It will not be long before Christ is found in these people: “There is no here.” Another is considered a faithful servant of God and a true worshiper of God, but in reality he honors God only with his lips, but his heart is far from Him; and in it do not ask Christ: “There is nothing here.” Some are a pilgrim, some an ascetic, some a faster, some a lover of the poor, and some are known for some other good deed. But if they hypocritically do all this, out of vanity, to show off to people, then don’t look for Christ here either: “There is nothing here.” It happens that someone pretends to be humble, but in his mind he is proud, he pretends to be chaste, but in his thoughts he is unclean, he pretends to be loving, but in his heart he is angry, he speaks peaceably with his lips, he kisses, but at the same time he is deceitful and creates flattery, like Judas. Don’t expect to find Christ here either: “He is not here.” It is not easy to find precious beads in the depths of the sea, nor gold and silver in the depths of the earth; It is just as difficult to find Christ in people in whom He could dwell, for in the words of David: “All have turned aside and become indecent; do not do goodness, not even one” (Ps. 13:3). "Not here." The psalm words: “The Lord is in His holy church” in the old printed Psalter, as well as in the Kyiv Psalter, read like this: “The Lord is in His holy church,” and this is much more correct, for one thing is a church, and another is a church. The church was built with hands, has stone or wooden walls, it was established and created standing in one place, like this holy stone church. The Church was not created by hands; It also does not have stone walls, for the church is considered to be a collection of believers located not in one place, but throughout the entire universe. That is why it is called, and is, a cathedral, apostolic church. It extends from the beginning to the end of the universe and is found in every nation and tribe that truly glorifies Christ God. The foundation of this church is Christ Himself; walls are the law of God; pillars - apostles, evangelists and teachers; cover - the Holy Spirit. It is about this church that the apostle writes: “You are the churches of the living God,” as God said: “I will dwell in them and walk around, and I will be their God, and they will be my people” (2 Cor. 6:16; Ps. 10:3). Therefore, if the psalm scripture says: “The Lord is in His holy church,” then this must be understood to mean that the Lord dwells in the multitude of His believers; and if, according to the previously stated words of Saint Stephen, “he does not live in churches made with hands,” then without a doubt He lives in His church not made with hands, which He loved to the end, which He redeemed with His blood and for which He laid down His soul. So, in the church, in the assembly of believers, one must look for Christ, who dwells after His resurrection, for He said to them: “I am with you always, even to the end of the age” (Matthew 28:20). But, oh, how damned are our last times, for now this holy church is extremely oppressed and diminished: on the one hand, by external persecutors, on the other, by internal schismatics, who, according to the Apostle, “came out from us, but was not from us; If they had been from us, they would have remained with us” (1 John 2:19). They are not sons of the church, but adulterers, tormenting the interior of the church, their mother, blaspheming her with many obscene words and, having separated from her, they drag along many others with them, pushing them to error and destruction. Now the true conciliar and apostolic church itself has become so diminished that one can hardly find a true son of the church anywhere. In almost every city there is now some kind of special faith, and now both simple men and women talk about faith, completely ignorant of the true path; they talk about dogmas, teach about the addition of three fingers and preach a new irregular cross. They stand damned in their stubbornness, despising and rejecting the true teachers of the church. Others, although they seem to be inside the church, are just deceit: they only have the appearance of piety, “but its powers are swept away.” There truly is no Christ in such people, there is no God in them: “There is no here.” But I’ll leave it to talk about these in detail now. I’d rather go further on my journey, wanting to find Christ. I said, according to the Psalmist, that “The Lord is in His holy church,” in the holy, apostolic, orthodox church, stretching throughout the entire universe, although oppressed, embittered, and tormented, yet overcoming, which even the gates of hell cannot overcome. I said that the Lord is in her, therefore there is no salvation for those who move away from her. But still, I will look for Christ in another place, especially in the sons of the church, for many contain the Orthodox true faith, and are inside the church, and seem to cling to their mother, and do not even think of breaking away from her, and yet they are alien to Christ. The Holy Church is like a field of wheat: it has both wheat and tares, but both only until the harvest. In a holy church, it means that there are both good and evil, there are both righteous and sinners, there are both sheep and goats; The church is like a mother: it nourishes and warms not only its good children, but also its evil ones - loving the good ones, and tolerating the evil ones and being merciful towards them. I am looking for Christ only in the true children of the church, where He is after His resurrection: “Where is it?” Again I will ask the Psalmist, where to look for our Lord? The psalmist says: “The Lord is in the midst of His people,” and again: “The Lord will give strength to His people, the Lord will bless His people with peace” (Ps. 124:2; 28:11). But I will also ask: who are these people of Christ our God? Truly, everyone will say that Christ’s people are Christians. So, let us look for Christ among Christians and say: “He is here.” But again we have to ache in our hearts, for many of us are Christians only in name, but in deeds we are worse than the filthy; Only the name is Christian, but the life is bestial, swinish. We are protected by the cross of Christ and crucify Christ a second time as deicides - we crucify Him with nasty, vile and unclean deeds. We worship the icon of Christ, and trample on His dearest blood, shed for us, making His free suffering for us purposeless and ineffective. We boast in the Christian name, and we make this same holy name given to us blasphemous. Being Christians, we do not live like Christians. What then? Can we say that Christ is here? Never! “Vost, not here!” Before every such Christian, a guardian angel stands invisibly and cries, saying: do not look for Christ here - he was once here, but has long since departed. “Vost, not here.” But not all Christians are like this. There are evil ones, but there are also good ones. Just as among the wheat there are tares, so among the tares there is sometimes wheat. Among the evil, you can find many good ones who have Christ in them, and sometimes you can say: here He is. So, let's watch and search. Now we are frightened by the words of our Lord, although they were not spoken to us, but reach us. The Lord said: “You will seek Me, and you will not find,” and “In your sins you will die” (John 7:34; 8:21). But why, oh our Lord! we can't find you? Because, He says, you do not give Me room to dwell in you; if they ever accepted Me with your small appeal to Me, they soon expelled Me again dishonestly, again returning to your evil deeds. But still we will seek You, Lord. Let us look for Him in spiritual order. After all, it would be fitting for Christ to be in him, as in His true servants, bearing the image of Christ. But you will rarely find Christ in them, for even among them each seeks his own, desires good for himself and not for others, shepherds himself and not Christ’s flock. What if someone, looking first of all at the highest spiritual rank, asked someone (but only so that he answered truthfully): “With what intention, with what desire did you come to the heights of this most honorable spiritual rank? Is it for the glory of God alone, or for the sake of your honor and glory? Is it for the acquisition of salvation for human souls, or for one’s own enrichment? Should I feed Christ’s sheep, or just to feed myself better?” Truly, there is not one who came not so much for the glory and honor of God, but for his own glorification and honor, who accepted this dignity not so much for human benefit, but because of his own self-interest. Such a one came not to serve the salvation of human souls, but so that all his subordinates would serve his power. He came not to be a father and a shepherd, but a lord and ruler. Forgive me, highest spiritual authorities, for saying this. I am not talking about everyone, but only about some, and among them, perhaps, I, a sinner, am found. I know that persons of the highest spiritual rank are angels in the flesh, as it is written about this in the Apocalypse: “Write to the angel of the Ephesian church... Write to the angel of the Smyrna church... Write to the angel of the Pergamon church” and so on (Apoc. 2:1,8:12). However, among those angels there may also be a person subject to infirmities. The blameless angels are given honor and a crown by the Chief Shepherd, but the defiled angels (like me, a sinner), who have fallen into human weakness, the Lord says to one like this: “I have little for you,” to another this: “I know your deeds, the name of Imashi is alive and you are dead,” and to another this: “Thou art neither cold nor warm,” “Imam will vomit thee from My mouth” ( Rev. 2:14; 3:1, 15:16). Let us now look at the next spiritual order, that is, at the worldly priests and deacons, and let us look for Christ in them, who truly dwells here. What if we also asked each of them separately: “What brought you to priesthood? Is it to save yourself and others? What will everyone answer? “No, not for that, but to feed my wife, children and household.” Indeed, those who serve the altar should also be fed from the altar, however, if they go to this dignity more for the sake of food itself than for the glory of God or for the salvation of themselves and the souls of men, then it is difficult to find Christ in them. Consider yourself, every sanctified person! What did you think when you came to priesthood? Did you come for salvation, or for the sake of food with which you saturate your body? You “sought Jesus not for Jesus, but for the sake of the bread.” Others serve not only not for the building up of Christ’s sheep, but not even for their own benefit, but only to tempt people and to their own destruction. Another, having taken the key of understanding, does not enter himself and forbids those who enter; others do not even have the key of understanding, remain inactive in their rank, and not only do not lead the sheep entrusted to them to salvation, but they themselves do not even know the way to salvation. Here the blind man leads the blind, so together they will fall into the pit. It will not be long before we find Christ in them: “There is no here.” We went to look for Christ in the monasteries, but even in them everything has now deteriorated; there is nothing, and there is no order, barely even Christ remains; now there is only trouble and murmur, sadness and sighs. In extreme poverty and poverty, perhaps, Christ would have been found, if only this poverty and poverty had been endured with gratitude. But can everyone endure their misfortune with gratitude? Reason advises to be generous, but human weakness and cowardly murmurs. Is it possible to look for Christ among the people? But where is there more theft, if not among the people? There is theft, there is murder, there is noise and riots. It is not in vain that Scripture says: “Get out from among this people and do not touch their uncleanness” (2 Cor. 6:17). If anywhere there were God-fearing and good people among the people, then at the present time they, in their affairs and troubles, have forgotten God and have fallen behind from prayer. Perhaps we will find Christ among the great people, among the boyars and judges appointed to uphold the truth? After all, they are appointed to see to justice and do the truth. We went, it was, to them to look for Christ, but it was inaccessible there. They told us: it’s not time, come another time. But there is no need to go to them, for the Scripture says: “Iniquity came out from the judges and the old man” (Dan. 13:5). Christ was hardly ever among them, for in the present evil time they too have become evil; the truth in them is scanty, and there is no mercy at all. Where there is no truth and mercy, do not look for Christ: “There is no here.” However, I am not saying this about all judges and rulers: not about those who fear God and do the truth, and maintain laudable mercy in the courts, but about those to whom the prophet Micah appealed, denouncing the insults that they did to poor people, exposing their untruths, thefts and insults. “Hear,” he says, “the rulers who hate good, but seek evil; Is it not given to you to understand and execute righteous judgment among people? You are so embittering the poor and wretched innocent people, as if you grow their skin, and their bones are thick, and their flesh is so sharp, as if you put food into a cauldron for the purpose of dispensing food. Hear, elders of the house of Jacob, you who corrupt what is right, you repay Zion with blood, and Jerusalem with iniquity” (Micah 3:1–3, 9:10). No, you cannot find Christ in such judges and rulers: “There is no here.” Where then can He be found, God knows. Is the only thing left to do is to complain with Magdalene, who says: “I have taken my Lord from the tomb, and we do not know where I laid Him” (John 20:13). Our sins have taken our Lord from us, and we do not know where to look for Him now. Someone will say in his mind: “My Lord is with me, and I with Him, for I believe in Him, I pray to Him and I worship Him.” Oh, if God would grant that this would be so! Oh, that our Lord would be with every Christian who believes in Him, prays to Him and worships Him! But it is not yet known whether He is with every Christian, for for salvation it is not enough for a person to just believe in Christ, for, according to the words of the holy Apostle James, “even demons believe and tremble” (James 2:19), but they are demons. What is the benefit for a Christian to only believe in Christ, but not to do Christian deeds? What is the benefit of just praying to Christ and breaking His commandments? What good is it to bow to Christ God and at the same time grieve Him with lawless deeds, like those who, during His free suffering, bowed their knees and worshiped Him and at the same time, taking a cane, beat Him on the head? You bow down, man, to Christ, but at the same time you beat Christ, embittering and torturing your neighbor, raping and robbing him, and unjustly taking away his property. You pray to Christ, but you spit in His face, emitting foul language from your lips, reproaching and condemning your neighbor. You believe in Christ, but by your ungodly deeds you are driven away from Him. If you say that Christ is with you, and you with Christ, then show me this in your life, as the apostle says: “Show me by your works your faith” (James 2:18). Show me a sign by which I can know that Christ dwells in you and say: “Here He is.” Wouldn’t I rather show you something from which it will be clear that Christ is not in you, and then it will be possible to say: “There is no here.” Listen to how and what I will show. Do you know which saint is celebrated by the church on the current seventh day of April? The memory of our venerable father George the Confessor, bishop of the city of Meletin, on the island of Blades, is revered. What is written in the life of this saint? Remember who read it. If anyone has not read it and does not know what is written there, then I will tell you. When God’s mercy had to be taken away for human sins, when the Lord God was angry, then the Church of God was ready to suffer disasters and persecution. Until now, not many people have been shown such signs in the Meletian church. During the evening singing, when the people sang “Kyrie, eleison!” ["Lord, have mercy!"], the holy cross, which was on the Divine throne, was suddenly snatched from its place by some force with a great noise, rose up under the rafters and then, bowing its top down, fell to the ground. The people who saw this were seized with great fear and horror; Raising his hands up, he cried out loudly and for a long time: “Kyrie, eleison!” The second sign of coming disasters was the following. A few days after what was described, when the church doors were accidentally unlocked, some great boar, terrible and stinking (not a ghost, but actually a boar), having cut off ears and tail, entered the church, then into the altar and lay down on the high seat. The church servants, seeing this immediately, began to drive out the boar, but could not drive him out, for he was very fierce and rushed at everyone, and drove away everyone who wanted to drive him out of the altar. Then they brought large drekoli, beat him for a long time until he bled, and, having become tired, with great difficulty they were finally able to drive him out. At that time there was a certain perspicacious old man named Simeon, who with tears told the people that this sign was not good. Believe me, children, he said, the fall of the cross foreshadows that some kind of crusader heresy and persecution of the Church of God will come; the stinking boar foreshadows that this throne will be accepted by God’s permission by some bishop with a swinish disposition and life. This soon came true. Leo the Armenian, having received the Greek kingdom, raised the iconoclastic heresy and launched a great persecution against the church. At that time, from King Leo the Armenian and from the false patriarch Theodotus, called Cassiter, these heretics sent a like-minded heretic to the island of Lezviysky, to the city of Meletin. He, like a boar emerging from the steppes, devoured and stained the grapes of Christ, trampling and crushing holy icons and brutally confusing the verbal sheep. Both of these signs that happened in those days, remembering on the occasion of the memory of the saint now celebrated, I attach to our present conversation and again say with the apostle: “You are the churches of the living God” (2 Cor. 6:16). Every Christian pious person is the Church of Christ our God. There is also a cross in this church. This includes both constant remembrance of the sufferings of Christ, according to the words of the Apostle Paul: “Do not judge what is in you, even Jesus Christ was crucified” (1 Cor. 2:2), as well as the daily mortification of one’s sinful passions, as well as patiently enduring everything sorrowful that happens by God’s permission. The highest seat in this spiritual church, that is, in a Christian person, is the heart in which the Bishop of future blessings, Christ, loves to rest, saying to man: “Give Me, son, your heart” (Proverbs 23:26). Listen here and consider within yourself, Christian man, who, according to the Apostle, is “the church of the living God”: has not the cross fallen within you, has not a boar and a pig reclined on the high seat of your heart? If you have left the constant memory of the suffering of Christ, if you have stopped the daily mortification of your sinful passions, if you do not have grateful patience in the sorrows that happen to you, then know: this is a sure sign that Christ is not in you. "Not here." If in your heart instead of your beloved Christ lies a boar or a pig, love for some fornicating person, if your disposition is like that of a boar and your life is swinish, then know: this is a sure sign that Christ is not in you. "Not here." If you show me that you are crucified with Christ in the mortification of your passions, if you show me not a swinish, but a holy and righteous life, then I will say without any doubt that Christ dwells in you, I will say: He is here. But as long as I see that you, like a pig in feces, wallow in sinful passions and pleasures, until then I will say without a doubt: there is no Christ in us, unrepentant sinners. "Not here." So where will we find our Lord? Now I will also remember those poor people about whom the holy prophet Micah once spoke, whose skin was flayed by unrighteous judges, whose bones were crushed and whose body was crushed like edible meat. O people who suffer such calamities! Christ now dwells in you as His members, if only you endure with thanksgiving. You are the new martyrs of the last times. This is how the holy Great Martyr George suffered, who was killed by the wicked king for Christ. Heavenly crowns are woven for you, just do not faint in patience, but look at the suffering of your Lord, who suffered even more for us, thank Him for everything and rely in everything on His holy will, saying: “Thy will be done, Lord,” and the Lord with His love, although invisibly, will always be among you. So that's where He is. The Lord loves those who cry; you are always in tears. So He lives in you: “Here He is.” The Lord loves the hungry and thirsty, but you have little to drink and eat, and some do not have even half of the bread; it means He dwells in you. "Here He is." The Lord also loves those who suffer innocently, but your sufferings are difficult to count: some are beaten until they bleed, others are so tortured by the massacre that in others they can barely even keep their soul in their body. This means that the Lord dwells in you. He, seeing your suffering, prepares eternal joy for them. "Here He is." Oh, new sufferers, passion-bearers and martyrs! I pray and exhort you, do not grow weary of patience, but give thanks to your Christ. After His resurrection He will come to visit you; and not only to visit, but even to stay with you inseparably, for the Gospel says about each of you: “I and the Father will come and make our abode with him” (John 14:23). Christ both is and will be in you, and you say: Amen. Sermon for the fourth week of Easter, about the paralytic “Behold, you are healthy: do not sin, lest anything worse happen to you” (John 5:14) My beloved listeners! Looking with my sinful eyes at your piety, I have no doubt in my mind that, if not all, then very many of you, during the past Lent, reconciled with God through abstinence, fasting and warm prayers from a contrite heart, confession of your sins and holy repentance, and through this you rose healthy from mental weakness. God bless! But I doubt: has anyone returned to their former sinful deeds? I am afraid that someone has become like an animal that, after washing, returns to the Kaltinny. I am afraid that someone is already ready to fall into the same spiritual weakness again or, in fact, has already fallen. I warn such a person from falling into sin with the words of Christ: “Behold, you are healthy: do not sin.” In my current simple conversation, which I begin in honor of God, and for our spiritual benefit, we will consider how terrible the evil is in returning to previous sins and iniquities after repentance. “Behold, you are healthy: do not sin, lest anything worse happen to you.” The words “nothing worse will happen to you”, carrying in our minds with reasoning, we will think what “evil” can be and what is “worse”? Evil is that which harms a person; The worst thing is that which not only harms, but also completely destroys a person and destroys him from among those living on earth. Evil means lying on a sick bed for a long time, like the Gospel paralytic who lay for thirty-eight years; the worst thing is to die. Evil is falling into a hole, and the worst thing is never getting out of the hole and being buried in it with earth forever. Evil means to receive some kind of wound on the body, and worst means to be killed. Evil means sinning once or twice, and worst means sinning always and doing the same after repentance, for sin, often repeated, not only weakens the soul, but also mortifies it, not only plunges it into a fierce pit of fall, but also covers it with the ashes of despair, not only hurts, but also kills, not only harms, but also completely destroys. Let us first consider the harm of sin to which someone returns after repentance. A serious illness lives in people, which harms a person and torments him: one is external, and the other is internal. External disease is a disease on the body, when, for example, someone receives a wound from some blow, from a sword, an arrow, or when someone’s face is damaged by leprosy, which makes the person ugly, having neither appearance nor beauty. Internal disease occurs in the stomach, in the veins, in the bones. Everyone sees the external wound, but no one can see the internal one. Only the sufferer feels it, or only a skilled doctor recognizes it. An external illness can be cured more quickly and easily, but an internal illness can be cured more slowly and difficultly, but only by a skilled physician. It is a great evil to suffer from one disease, either external or internal; but an even greater and bitter evil is to suffer from both diseases at once, both external and internal. Our soul also has its own appearance and its own interior. Reason is, as it were, the face of the soul, which is visible to everyone: “The wisdom of a man shines on his face” (Eccl. 8:1), and everyone recognizes an intelligent person by conversation, by character, by deeds; All this is a spiritual appearance. Conscience in the soul is its interior, inaccessible to anyone’s eyes. A person will begin to repent; his heart is both deep and pure. If, after repentance, he returns to his previous iniquities, then he falls into such great evil that he harms both the outer appearance of his soul and the inside, that is, both the mind and the conscience. But let's first talk about the mind. Just as a person’s face becomes disfigured from receiving some kind of wound or leprosy, so the mind becomes insane through a return to sin after repentance, and a person then becomes no longer a rational person, but a senseless beast, to which he is likened, according to what is written: “Be like the foolish cattle and become like them” (Ps. 48:13). But in order to understand this more clearly, let us look at the church of Dagon, which was in Azoth. Foreigners once fought against the Israelites in the days of the great priest Elijah. By God's permission, having overcome the Israelites, they took the ark of God captive, brought it to their city of Azoth, brought it into the church of Dagon and placed it near Dagon. Let's see what happened then in Dagon's church (1 Samuel 5:1-4). The Azotians, waking up in the morning, immediately came to the church and saw that Dagon had fallen face down to the ground before the ark of God. It’s not entirely bad for you, Dagon, for although you fell, you were not yet broken, remained intact and were able to take your former high place. “I raised up Dagon and put him in his place.” Stop, Dagon, don’t fall again, for after the second fall you will no longer get up whole, but will be completely broken. And so it happened. Again in the morning the Azotians saw: Dagon was lying on the ground, Dagon’s head and both his hands were thrown to the threshold, and only Dagon’s ridge remained intact. It is not marvelous, Dagon, this; If you didn’t fall a second time, then you would be safe. You repeated your fall, and that’s why you crashed. It is not surprising that Dagon fell, overthrown a second time by the power of God; The amazing thing is that people willfully repeat their sinful falls. The words of Scripture: “Only the ridge of Dagon is left,” the Hebrew Bible reads like this: “Only Dagon is left.” What does it mean: “Only Dagon osta”? Dagon, according to the interpretation of some, is the same as a fish, for the idol was like a fish. It had a human head and hands; therefore, when after the second fall the head and arms broke off, only the likeness of a fish remained. Now let's clarify our conversation. When a person once falls into any sin, he is not yet completely contrite, there is still hope for an uprising, the hand of the Lord can still lift and strengthen him, according to what is written: “Even if he falls, he will not be broken, for the Lord strengthens his hand”; “For God is mighty to establish Him” (Ps. 37:24; Rom. 14:4). He who was later placed in his place through holy repentance, as with the ark under the former grace of God, if he falls a second time, if he again returns to his former lawlessness, then his fall is incomparably more terrible, for then he destroys both the head, that is, the sound mind, and the hands, that is, the deeds of reason; then his spiritual face is disfigured both before God and before people. Then he not only angers God more bitterly, but is also a subject of temptation, condemnation, laughter and reproach for people. He is then without his former virtuous beauty, as without the beauty of his face, as without a God-thought mind, as without a head, without good deeds, as without hands. He then cannot give up the sinful habit, but is completely enslaved by it and no longer does what he wants, but what he does not want, for it is not he who does it, but the sin that lives in him: “For whoever is overcome, he is the slave of sin,” says the Scripture, “and he who commits sin is the slave of sin” (2 Pet. 2:19; John 8:34). Without a head, a mind, and without hands - the actions of reason - only Dagon remains, that is, a mindless fish or, better said, an insensitive and ineffective idol; and such a broken idol cannot soon be placed in its original place. It takes a skilled craftsman, an artist, to attach that missing head and those missing hands to him again, and this requires a lot of work, time and effort. I will say that a lot of work is needed in repentance and deeds, a lot of time to satisfy for sins and a lot of effort to mortify oneself and overcome one’s evil disposition. This is harm to the soul, as if external, which many can see and heal, according to the word of the Lord: “If you see a brother sinning, rebuke him between you and him alone” (Matthew 18:15), for a ruler can teach, a good friend can rebuke, and reprove an enemy, and from reproof a person often experiences great correction. Having spoken about the damage to the spiritual appearance and mind, we will not remain silent about the damage to the spiritual interior, about the harm and serious illness of the conscience, which is not visible to anyone and is not easily healed. What is it? But this is this: in an uncertain hope, especially a false one, in the hope of rising from the fall, of repentance and of receiving new blessings. Many, after repentance, return to their previous iniquities with such hope, saying to themselves: I sinned and repented; I will still sin and still repent, for it is written: “As soon as you fall, only then rise and be saved.” Oh, false hope! O vague hope, founded not on solid rock, but on sand! It is not you, not you who return to your previous atrocity voluntarily and deliberately, this Scripture does not serve you: “How often have you fallen, how many times have you arise and been saved,” but to those who accidentally fall into some sin, and not by deliberate will and intention. You need to hear the loud church teacher, St. John Chrysostom, crying out like this: “He who, after receiving communion, sins again, is unworthy of forgiveness; The one who, after healing, again inflicts wounds on himself, is unworthy of health; He is unworthy of purification who, after purification, defiles himself again.” Such people who return to their previous sins after repentance and say to themselves: “I will repent again,” - such people’s hope is similar to Sampson’s hope. You know with what temptations the strong Sampson was tempted by the insidious charmer Delilah so that only he would tell her what his strength was, but he deceived with various inventions, telling her that he would faint then if he was bound with seven wet bowstrings, or as if then if he were bound with new ropes (Judges 16:11-15). In fact, he easily escaped from all this, as if from a spider’s net. Then, even seeing the treachery of the flattering woman seeking his head, he did not want to save himself from obvious misfortune when he was defeated by lustful and sinful love for that woman. He told her the whole truth and revealed to her the secret of his heart, that then his strength would depart from him when the hair on his head was cut off. After this, put to sleep in Dalidin’s bosom, he was shorn, and the charming woman shouted to him: “Sampson, the foreigners are coming at you!” Waking up from sleep, he said to himself: “Now I will go out, as before, and break free.” Oh, how false is your hope, Sampson! For now you will no longer escape from the hands of your enemies, as you have often escaped before, for your strength has already departed from you. But Sampson did not realize that the Lord had departed from him: and the foreigners took him and gouged out his eyes. Let us pay attention to two things here. Firstly, Sampson did not know that the Lord had departed from him, his strength was gone, and, secondly, in his ignorance he harbored false hope for the previous victory over his enemies. “I’ll go out,” he said, “as before.” Likewise, a person who returns to his previous sins after repentance calms himself with hope, saying: I will sin, and then I will repent again, as I repented before; I will anger God, and then I will ask Him for forgiveness, as I asked before; I will become defiled and wash myself again with repentance, as I washed myself before. O blinded hope of the sinner! Oh, stupid mind! Oh, futile waiting! The Lord has already retreated from you, the power of God’s grace, which previously helped you, has retreated. The hands of foreigners are already on you, the hands of your hellish enemies are already on you. They have already grabbed you, gouged out your rational eyes, shackled you with evil sinful habits, and now it is no longer known whether you will free yourself, whether you will escape from their hands. It is not known whether you will be given time to repent. It is not known whether you will receive a prosperous moment when the power of God’s grace will again return to you and lift you up from your fierce fall, for it left you, shaking off the dust from its feet and saying: “Behold, your house is left to you empty”; and seven terrible sinful demons will enter you, and your last sins will be worse than your first. Gorshe; for, having come to the depths of evil, you will become negligent and despair, and what follows despair, you yourself know. It is much better, having reconciled with God after the first sinful enmity, to live with Him in unbroken peace, and not to again raise a fight against Him in order to later be reconciled. It is better, having once found God, to always hold on to Him, than to lose Him again in order to seek Him again, for by seeking God by repentance after the first fall, you can be sure that you will find Him: “Seek,” it is said, “God, and your soul will live” (Ps. 69:33); “He who seeks finds” (Matthew 7:8). If, having sinned willfully another time, you want to find Him again, then next time it is no longer known whether you will find Him. Mary, the sister of Lazarus, sought her Lord twice: the first time, when her brother Lazarus was sick, she sent to Him, saying: “The Lord, whom you love, is in pain” (John 11:3); the second time she sought the Lord, when He rose from the tomb. The first search was accompanied by confidence, for she knew where the Lord was. “It was then on the floor of the Jordan, in the place where John had first baptized” (John 10:40). The second search was full of uncertainty and very painful, for she said: “I have taken my Lord, and I do not know where I have laid Him” (John 20:2). Likewise, a person who has returned to his former evil has to grieve heavily, for he does not know where to find the Lord. “They have taken away,” he will say, “the sins of my Lord from my heart, and I do not know where they have laid Him; I don’t know where I’ll find Him; I don’t know if I can even find Him anywhere.” It is not in vain that Scripture says that “God is Spirit” also attributes to Him the following property: “The Spirit breathes where it wills, and you hear His voice, but do not consider where it comes from or where it goes” (John 3:8). Reasoning about this, one of the prudent people says this: “You don’t know where it comes from, then if you are not sure whether you are worthy of love or hatred, whether He will show you mercy or anger, whether He will give you a reward or is preparing a cruel judgment. You don’t know where he is leaving you, then if you are not sure whether He will stand nearby somewhere for a little while, wanting to return to you again in a short time, or He has gone far and will return only after a long time, or, finally, offended by you, He leaves forever, never wanting to return to you.” So, do not say to yourself: I will sin again on purpose and repent again; I will die a sinful death again and will live again in repentance. Listen to Saint Nazianzus, who likened the repentant sinner to the resurrected Lazarus, saying: “Beware, O man, lest you die again and be bound by the chains of sin, for it is not known whether you will be restored to life again.” Another harm to the soul is now clear - internal, conscientious harm, not easily visible and not easily healed; this is an indefinite, especially false, hope and expectation of a new uprising from sins, to which a person returns after repentance. Such a person suffers from both of these damages together, both with the mind - the outer surface of the soul, and with the conscience - the inside of the soul; He humiliates himself with reason, and completely ruins himself with hope. Oh, how terrible the evil is that after repentance they return to their former sins and iniquities! What evil can be found more bitter when the Lord says: “Let it not be more bitter than that”? The most bitter thing is that which completely destroys a person from among the living and destroys him, and destroys him for centuries, for endless centuries. What is it that destroys a person? And just one grief, the anger of God, is disastrous for such a person, for God then rises to righteous and inexorable judgment and unexpectedly betrays such a person to eternal punishment. What moves God to inexorable judgment? Nothing moves more than the fact that after repentance a person returns to evil deeds, consoles himself with the hope of new repentance and forgiveness, and fearlessly sins in the hope of God’s mercy. Let us listen to what the Scripture says in the book of Jesus, son of Sirach: “For two my heart was sorrowful, and for the third I was filled with wrath: a man who is a fighter exhausted by poverty, and a man of understanding who is humbled, and a man who returns from righteousness to sin: the Lord will prepare him for the sword” (Sir. 26:24-26). Here we hear: he who returns from the truth, that is, repentance, which justifies a person, who returns to sin brings upon himself the wrath of God and surrenders to the sword of eternal punishment. A person who returns to sin crucifies the Son of God a second time and tramples on His dearest blood, shed for the salvation of the world. In this way we become like the evil Saul, the first king of Israel; for God departed from Saul because of his grave sin: “The Spirit of the Lord depart, and the evil spirit presseth upon him” (1 Chronicles 16:14). Saul is tormented by an unclean spirit, and the young man David plays the harp for him; and this music had such an effect on Saul that his torment ceased, as Scripture says about this: “And when the unclean spirit was in Saul, David took the harp with his hand and his belt; and Saul will rest, and it will be good for him, and the unclean spirit will depart from him” (cf. 1 Sam. 19:9-10). What does Saul do to David for this good deed? After some time, when David was playing the harp, Saul, having rested and come to his senses, saw him in front of him with the harp and, remembering his former envy and anger, grabbed a spear and threw it at David, wanting to kill him; and would have killed if David had not quickly turned aside and ran away from Saul, whose spear smashed into the wall. Surprised by this, Basil of Seleucia says: “For healing, Saul brought David murder; as if he came to his right mind in order to work with envy again.” We, sinners, will say this to ourselves: for the forgiveness of our previous sins, we, accursed and evil-tempered, returning to our previous sins, instead of retribution or thanksgiving to Christ our God, again bring Him crucifixion, again murder, as if only for this reason we were freed from our previous sins, so that with the same and even the gravest sins we would again anger our God. What's worse than that? What's more bitter? What's worse? Did Saul repent of his sin, did he receive forgiveness? We don’t read about that, but we know that he was completely abandoned by God and died soul and body, piercing himself with a sword. Will we also be able to come to true repentance, will we again receive forgiveness of sins: we don’t know about this; God knows if He has left us forever? Has he not prepared for us the sword of eternal punishment? Let us also, brothers, be afraid to return to our previous evil deeds; we will not even think about them, lest we be subjected to even more terrible torment. Let each of us say to his soul: “Behold, you are in health” by the grace of God through holy repentance, “whoever sins not, the worse for it will be!” Oh my God! You Yourself give us what you command! You Yourself protect us from terrible falls into sin all the days of our life. Amen. Sermon for the sixth week of Easter on the man born blind “(Jesus) made clay from spitting and anointed the eyes of the blind with clay, and said to him: Go and wash in the pool of Siloam” (John 9:6:7) My dear listeners! The miracle of Christ our Savior that took place on the man born blind was great, and it was filled with great surprise. Since all the works of Christ are filled not only with surprise, but also with benefit, for everything He did was for our benefit, then let us look for some benefit in the current Gospel story about the sight of the man born blind: let us introduce in our discussion the above Gospel words and interpret them briefly, “I promote the Lord and confirm the word.” “Make clay from spitting.” This is not surprising for the saliva of the Lord, which came from His most pure lips, for it had the power to heal the eyes of one born blind. What is amazing is that clay, dust, earth, mixed and combined with the saliva of the Lord, received the same healing power. This means that if the miraculous grace of God is united with any thing, then the thing united with it imparts the same miraculous property that it itself possesses. Once upon a time the Divine fire united with a bush at Sinai, and the bush did not burn. Why? Because the brushwood of the bush received that wondrous power from that wonderful fire, so as not to be scorched by the fiery flame. The Lord's grace also united with the Old Testament Ark of the Covenant, and you yourself know what power it received from it and how it worked miracles. In the same way, the saliva of the Lord, combining with the dust of the earth, gave it the same miraculous power to heal blind eyes. Here we will learn what a great significance it is if someone unites with God. We are amazed at the great saints of God, who, while living in this world, performed great miracles. They enlightened the blind, corrected the lame, raised many who were already on the threshold of death to life, healed every disease and every ulcer in people, and raised many dead. Where did they get the power of such miracles? Why? But because they were firmly united with God, and, moreover, so firmly that nothing could separate them from God, according to the words of the apostle: “Who will separate us from the love of Christ? Is it tribulation, or distress, or persecution, or famine, or sword? Neither fire nor sword” (Rom. 8:35). Oh, if only we could learn to unite with God! We would then enlighten our spiritual blindness, correct our lameness of heart, get rid of our sinful illnesses, return from the gates of hell to the heavenly gates of life, and resurrect from sinful death to a virtuous life. What and how can we connect with God? How? Love, according to what is written: “He who abides in love abides in God, and God abides in him” (1 John 4:16). How? Here's how: you need to love what God loves, and never love what God does not love; do what pleases God and diligently avoid what does not please God; strive diligently for what He rejoices and what He commands, and never think about what He forbids and for which He is angry. But what is most surprising is that the love of God, being in itself so sweet, surpassing all sensual and mental sweets (for God is all desire, all sweetness), does not soon seem sweet to the human heart, but to some it always seems bitter, and it turns out that the same God is both sweet and bitter: for one it is sweet, and for another it is bitter. And that this is true, we can see from the example of that book that the holy Theologian does not read with his eyes, but eats with his teeth. Here the holy Theologian sees in Revelation a certain great angel descending from heaven; and he set his feet like pillars of fire: one on the earth, the other on the sea. In his hand he had an open book, which he handed to the Theologian, saying: “Take also the snow” (Apoc. 10:9). Oh, angel of God! Do not tell the Theologian to eat that heavenly book; please let us read it, so that we will know what is written in it and learn something from it for our benefit; or, perhaps, verbally tell us what is written in it! But the angel does not listen to us: he does not allow us to read the book, he does not verbally tell us what is written in it, but persistently commands the Theologian: “Take this snow.” Holy Theologian! Answer the angel: “I have never eaten books, and books are not written to be eaten, but to be read. If I eat a book and eat it without reading it, what good will it do me when I don’t know what is written in it?” The holy theologian is silent. He does not contradict the angel, but stretches out his hands to that book, takes it, puts it in his mouth, eats and swallows. Tell us, holy Theologian, at least this: is there any taste in the book that you ate? Is it bitter or sweet? Here the holy Theologian answers us that the taste of this book is both sweet and bitter. “I ate it,” he says, “and it was like honey in my mouth, but bitter in my belly” (Apoc. 10:10). All these things are so wondrous that our mind does not comprehend them, and only interpreters of the Divine Scripture tell us something about them. Many understand a lot by this book, but time does not allow us to talk about everything in detail, because our word may then be too long. Others say something suitable for our conversation. According to their interpretation, this book signified the words of God, who came down to earth for the sake of love for people and wants to live lovingly in human souls. It is not given to the beloved disciple to read, for the Lord had already revealed to him His “unknown and secret wisdom”: he already knows what is written in it. It is given to be eaten like bread, for the word of God is spiritual bread, and like honey, for in its sweetness it is higher than honey and honeycombs. Just as the food eaten is transformed into human nature, so the word of God and the love of God, as if departing from their essence, desire to be in the human being, for God loved man so much, “For He did not spare even His only begotten Son”: “God so love the world” (John 3:16). By John the Theologian we mean not only his one person, but also the entire Church of Christ on earth, in which there is both a mouth and a belly. Righteous people and saints of God are the essence of the church’s mouth, according to what is written: “If anyone turns a sinner from his error, he will be like My mouth” (cf. James 5:19:20). And who is the womb? The belly is the sinners who work in the belly, about whom it is written: “God has a belly, and their glory is in cold” (Phil. 3:19). Let us see to whom the word of God is sweet and to whom it is bitter. It is sweet to the lips, but bitter to the belly, that is, it is sweet to the good, and it is bitter to the evil: they have grieved God. The Lord said to the apostles Andrew and Peter: follow Me, “and you have left all that follow Him” (Luke 5:11). You see how sweet the Lord was to them. Christ also said to the rich young man: “Sell everything and distribute it to the poor, and come and follow Me; but he departed sorrowing, having had much gain” (Matthew 19:21:22). Oh, womb! Insatiable womb! Isn't it better for you to have God in you than to have a lot of wealth? But for the belly, wealth is better than God. The troubles and worries of life are sweeter to him than the sweetest Jesus. Oh, blessed lips, for whom the kind word of God is sweet! O accursed womb, for which God is bitterness! Everyone know that only through love can one unite with God. Try to be the mouth and not the belly, and then you will truly enjoy the love of God. At the same time, you must especially take care that, having once united with Him, you no longer leave Him, but attach yourself to Him like skin to a body, so as never to be separated from Him in any way. Just as the skin cannot separate from the body, so the lover of God does not want to be separated from God. But alas for our woe! Neither sword nor fire separated the holy saints of God from the love of Christ; But we, sinners, are separated from Christ not by the fire burning in the wood, but by sin, which consumes all our members; It is not the sword that cuts for Christ that separates us from Christ, but our sinful habits remove us from God. Every passion of ours, to which we are accustomed and which we love, especially contributes to separating us from God - more than fire and a material sword. There is no need for anyone to frighten us with fire or threaten us with a sword in order to separate us far from God and grieve Him; One sinful passion easily does this to us: “Everyone (according to the apostle) from his own lust is tempted by attraction and deception” (James 1:14). O sin-loving dust! Oh, frozen earth! Oh, dust that does not have the moisture of God’s grace in it, dry dust and scattered by the wind! You are moving away from God, but God is moving away from You, and you are going to destruction, according to what is written: “Whoever departs from You will perish” (Ps. 73:27). Happy and blessed was that clay that was united with the saliva from the mouth of Christ; but incomparably happy and blessed is that mortal man who unites with Christ Himself. Then he is no longer a swamp, but gold: “Like gold,” it is said, “tempt it and find it worthy of yourself” (Wis. 3:5:6). Such is no longer earthly, but heavenly, not mortal, but gifted with incorruptibility. Just as the dust that was united with the saliva from the mouth of Christ became no longer dust, but a medicine for the blind, so a person united with God is a medicine not only for his soul, but also for all others. If anyone makes friends with someone like this, his soul will truly be enlightened: “You will be reverent with the venerable one” (Ps. 17:26). Let us turn to the words of the Gospel: “Anointing the eyes of the blind with clay.” Our Lord, wanting not only to heal bodily blindness, but also to heal spiritual vision, put clay on man’s eyes, so that he would always have before his eyes the earth from which he was created, and so that he would not ascend to heaven with a proud mind, but would always remember the ancient saying of the Lord to the forefathers: “Thou art earth, and unto earth shalt thou go again” (Gen. 3:19). Many people in this world, in their prosperity, forget that their nature is perishable. Those who have a lot of gold in their treasuries consider themselves gold; those rich in silver consider themselves silver; those who have many precious stones consider themselves a precious stone; those who have power and might consider themselves gods, like Herod, to whom the people exclaimed: “The voice of God, not man!” So, the Lord, wanting to heal the blind, puts clay on his eyes and thus, as it were, says: “He who was born blind! You have not yet seen the light of day from your shrouds, but you have not seen the vanity of the world. Today you will see all this: gold, silver and precious stones will be before your eyes: do not covet them, but have this clay before your eyes. If you see the pride of this world, do not covet it, but remember the decay, remember that you are dust and ashes. If you see the beauty of worldly faces, do not envy them, but look at the earth from which you were taken and into which you will be transformed again. Shield your eyes with clay, that is, with the memory of death, so as not to see vanity.” The people of Israel, who came out of Egypt, came to the land of Moab, to a people extremely mired in the vanity of the world and spending their lives in many abominations. God's servant Moses died there, and by God's command they buried him near the house of Fagor, that is, near the church of the idol Fagor. It was the idol Tagor who was the god of carnal lust among the Moabites, and in his church unclean deeds were committed, by which many of the Israelites were seduced. So, the Lord commanded that Moses’ tomb should be located near the church of Thagor. This is so that he would always say to the Israelis, seduced by pagan defilement: “Listen, my people! Do not enter the church of Fagor, do not commit lawlessness. Here before your eyes is the coffin of your leader. Soon you too will die, and your body will turn to dust, and your lust to corruption.” Here lies instruction for everyone. Listen, man: if you feel Fagor in your heart - carnal, sinful lust, immediately imagine before your eyes your grave, your coffin, in which you will turn into dust and dust, and in this way you will expel the nasty Fagor from your heart, for the memory of death, true and perfect, whom cannot it correct? If someone in his evil deeds were even similar to the devil himself, then by imagining before his intelligent eyes the earth, that is, the memory of death, he can completely correct himself. One cannot, of course, help but be surprised, and even very much surprised, that the proud, devilish disposition after some time can turn into humility. But listen and heed what I say: there was a time when the proud devil humbled himself. We know how daring and shameless his pride is. She is so impudent and shameless that she even demanded worship from the Son of God Himself, saying: “Let them bow down” (Matthew 4:9). O proud devil! God the Father commands all His angels to bow to His Son: “And let all the angels of God worship Him” (Ps. 97:7); “In the name of Jesus every tribe bows, in heaven and on earth and under the earth” (Phil. 2:10); and you want the Son of God to worship you. Well, wait a little: something will teach you humility. At one time, an incident occurred that the devil, who demanded worship from the Son of God, himself humbly bowed to Him. From the holy evangelist Mark we read the following: “When Jesus came into the country of the Gadarenes, a man found him in unclean spirit, having his dwelling in tombs. That one (that is, the unclean spirit in a person), seeing Jesus from afar, flowed and worshiped Him, and, crying out with a great voice, said: what do I and You, Jesus, Son of the Most High God? I adjure You by God, do not torment me” (Mark 5:1–3:6–7). O proud devil! What taught you such humility? Why do you now bow to the One from whom you previously demanded worship? Tell us the reason: why did you develop such humility? But the devil is silent. I think that, being a deceitful person, he is afraid to confess the truth. Interpreters of the Divine Scripture say that the proud devil was humbled, tamed and forced to bow to the Son of God by the fact that he lived in tombs. Likewise, if a person, having come to his senses, sees coffins in front of him, has in his mind the memory of death, by which even the indomitable devilish pride was tamed, then he immediately humbles himself and, as it were, comes to some correction. This is how powerful and effective the remembrance of death is! That is why our Lord puts clay on the eyes of the blind, in order to teach him both humility and the memory of death. “Anointing the eyes of the blind with clay.” Just as the Lord our God is marvelous in all His deeds, so He is marvelous in enlightening the blind. One thing cures something completely different, the opposite: clay enlightens the eyes. After all, clay is harmful to healthy eyes, because it blinds them, and even more so it is not useful for the blind. But this is not the case with our Lord: His clay not only does not harm, but even opens and enlightens the eyes of those born blind. O born blind! Speak with gratitude to the Lord along with David: “You enlighten my lamp, O Lord my God, you enlighten my darkness” (Ps. 17:29), and we, the listeners, what can we learn from this? We will learn to know that the servants of God, or rather those who work for their Lord, even the opposite things help a lot, even what is considered harmful brings benefit: for them even evil turns into good. I hear that St. Chrysostom calls the present blind man of the Gospel both faithful and obedient to Christ, for he says: “The faith of the blind man was manifested in the fact that he did not contradict, did not think to himself like this: after all, clay blinds the eyes, and does not enlighten; I washed myself a lot already in Siloam and did not benefit; If Christ had power, He Himself would have healed me. The blind man did not think this, but simply listened to Christ.” If the blind man was a believer and obedient to Christ, then we will not hesitate to call him a true servant of God and say: to a true servant of God, a nasty thing helps, and a harmful thing brings benefit, and what seems evil is transformed into good. Now let's get to our benefit. Our Lord allows for those His servants whom He loves many unpleasant things in this world, like dirt on the eyes, for He said to His disciples: “If you have sorrow in the world, you will weep and lament, but the world will rejoice; but you will be sorrowful” (John 16:20:22). Isn’t this unpleasant, isn’t it painful, isn’t it sorrowful? However, He dissolves these very sorrows, as if with the saliva of His holy lips, with joyful consolation, saying: “But your sorrow will be your joy, and no one will take your joy from you.” This is how the unpleasant helps, the temporarily harmful benefits forever, the evil on earth is the cause of heavenly blessings. Don’t we read in books, don’t we hear in stories, don’t we see how it actually happens that everything that happens by God’s permission from the world, the flesh and the devil to God’s servants: all disasters, sorrows, persecutions, insults and even bitter death, are transformed for them into eternal glory, praise, endless life and heavenly crowns? Are we not now in the militant church magnifying, pleasing and exalting with many praises those who have suffered the most bitter calamities on earth? Oh, how much unpleasant things have helped the saints of God! And what did the opponents, saboteurs and enemies themselves get? What they gained was that their sickness turned upon their heads, and their weapons pierced their own hearts. Let us remember the fight between David and Goliath (1 Chronicles 17). From his youth, David was the servant of the Lord, and Goliath was the enemy of God and the people of God. Two countries took up arms against each other: foreigners and the people of Israel; and then a strong man, a foreigner, came out of the regiments, all in strong armor and girded with a sword. David also came out against him, but how did he come out? Here we hear what Scripture says about this: “And there was no weapon in his hand.” Anyone then could say to David: “Brave young man! Who are you going for? What are you going with? You go small against giant, unarmed against armed. Do you not see the great sword in his hands, which he has prepared for your head? Go back, hide and come out armed the same way.” But David doesn't listen. He walked, and not slowly, not fearfully, but quickly. And so he stood over this foreigner, drew his sword and beheaded him. So we see that God’s servant benefited from the opposing thing, that the sword, prepared and sharpened against David, turned out to be a useful weapon for him against the same enemy. Likewise, the weapons of mental enemies, aimed at the servants of God, turn out to be useful for the same servants of the Lord in defeating and defeating their enemies. If we now remember the exodus of the Israelites, then among the many wondrous events that took place then one cannot help but be surprised by the remarkable event that, having passed through the Red Sea as if on dry land, they immediately fought with Amalek (Ex. 17). Here we ask: how did the Israelites fight Amalek? What weapon? Where did they get swords, spears, arrows, shields and armor? After all, we do not read in Scripture that they came out of Egypt with any weapons, but only with gold and silver vessels begged from the Egyptians. Where did the Israelites get weapons against Amalek? Let's listen to what Theodoret says about this: “The Egyptians, having pursued Israel, who had left them, armed themselves against them as against their enemies, and wanted to destroy them, every single one, wherever they overtook them. And they chased after them with all their army. And so when the Israelites, by the miraculous power of God, crossed the sea on dry land, and the Egyptians drowned in the sea, and then the sea threw their corpses onto the land with the weapons that were on them - then the Israelites took all these weapons from the Egyptian corpses: all the spears, shields, swords, etc. - and with these weapons they fought against Amalek.” Here we see again that the resistant things prepared for the destruction of the Israelites served them such a great service that they even defeated their adversaries with them. Oh, wonderful destinies of God! Oh, ineffable providence! The nasty, cruel and sorrowful serve His servants for help, benefit and joy! So, do not be overcome by sorrow, servant of Christ, when something unpleasant happens to you, for your sorrow will turn into joy, the opposite into help, and the sorrow into sweetness. But let us turn again to the words of the Gospel: “Jesus said to him: go and wash in the pool of Siloam.” The font of Siloam, according to interpreters, for a believer is a prototype of either holy baptism, or tears of repentance, or the flow of blood and water from the side of Christ. Siloam is holy baptism; in it the swamp of original sin is washed away and spiritual blindness is enlightened. Tears of repentance are also Siloam, in which sins committed after baptism are cleansed, according to the words of St. Chrysostom: “You sinned, you cried and washed away your sin.” That's why St. Climacus calls tears of repentance a baptism stronger than even the first, sacramental baptism. Finally, Siloam is also the source that flowed from the ribs of Christ, according to the words of St. Andrew of Crete, who sings in the Great Canon: “Let the font be Siloam, the blood from Your ribs, together with the drink that flowed out the water of abandonment, so that I may cleanse myself with both, anointing and drinking: like anointing and drink, Thy living Word words" (Song 4). I also wonder why the Lord, who can heal the eyes of a blind man with a word or a touch, sends him to the pool of Siloam? They say that, firstly, to test his faith and obedience, so that it can be seen whether he believes and whether he is obedient; secondly, to honor His glorious prophet Elijah, who with his prayer brought out that water of Siloam, and thirdly, so that this miracle of God would serve for the greater glory of God, for then everyone could see that the blind man walked through Jerusalem blind and with clay in his eyes, and then they could see him already receiving his sight, seeing everything clearly and glorifying God. All these speak well; I think that he was also sent by Jesus to Siloam for this purpose, so that he could do great work, walking through Jerusalem, for good deeds are earned through labor and corrected by illness; The gifts of God are not given freely, but as a result of labor. The Lord calls “those who work and are heavy laden” to His peace, but the apostle does not order those who do not work and are lazy to give even a piece of bread: “Let not the idle eat.” The Lord looks for our labors in us and only for them does He give us His grace. In the Song of Songs, two loving persons, the Bride and Groom, once came to a disagreement over the fact that one of them wanted peace, and the other wanted to work. The bride says: “On my bed of desires, my soul will love the bed,” and the Bridegroom replies: “I am the full flower and the valley of the valley” (Song. 3:1). To touch the bed means to seek peace, but to go into the field, into the valley means to go out to work and do: “A man went out,” it is said, “to his work and to his work until the evening” (Ps. 103:23). O bride of Christ! Seek your Bridegroom not on a soft bed, but on a bed of thorns and nails, which is on the cross! Look for Him in the fields, in the valleys, in labors and work, where He accomplishes the salvation of the world in the midst of the earth. Let us also go outside the camp to Him, bearing His reproach. The Lord sends the blind man to Siloam for this purpose, so that we know that only through labor and much sweat can we reach the font of salvation. Amen. Teaching on the Ascension of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ “The Lord, according to the verb. Him to them, ascended into heaven and sat at the right hand of God" (Mark 16:19) My beloved listeners! I don’t know what to call the current holiday of the Ascension of the Lord: a joyful holiday, or a mournful one? I would call it a joyful holiday, but now I see the holy apostles weeping and lamenting, as evidenced by the church, singing in the stichera on “Lord, I cried” the following: “Lord, the apostles, as they saw You on the clouds, were lifted up with sobs of tears, Life-Giver Christ, filled with sorrow with the sobbing verb: Master, do not forsake us the orphans whom You have loved for Your mercy, Your servants.” I would call it a sad holiday, but I see the same apostles rejoicing, as evidenced by the current troparion, saying: “Thou art exalted in glory, O Christ our God, who brought joy as a disciple through the promise of the Holy Spirit.” I would call it a joyful holiday, but I see the most pure and blessed Virgin Mary, shedding from her eyes the greatest and warmest tears about her separation from her dear Son and saying: “Do not leave me, my Son!” I would call it a sad holiday, but I see the same Most Pure Virgin Mother of God rejoicing greatly at such a Divine glorification of her Son and God, as evidenced by the Church Slavnik, singing: “The disciples and the Mother of God who gave birth to You were filled with countless joys at Your ascension.” I would call this holiday joyful, but what joy can there be for children when their father leaves them; what a joy it is for the sheep when the shepherd leaves them; What joy can there be for the bride - the church, when her Bridegroom, Christ, is separated from her, although not forever, for he says: “I am with you always, even to the end of the age” (Matthew 28:20), but after that He will no longer be invisible: carnal eyes will no longer see Him, but only intelligent eyes? I would call it a sad holiday, but now I see my Lord bright, joyful, walking with joy to the Father, I see all the heavenly powers indescribably rejoicing. I also hear the church calling everyone who lives on earth to joy and saying: “All nations clasp their hands, for Christ has come forth, where he was first.” Truly this is perfect joy, this is complete joy for the powers above; For us, the earthly, it is joy with tears, joy with tears, consolation with lamentation. You, holy two angels, our comforters, who appeared to the apostles on the Mount of Olives in bright robes, console those who mourn, rejoice those who cry, say something joyful. And so they say: “Men of Galilee, why stand gazing at heaven? This Jesus, who was taken up from you into heaven, will come in the same way as you saw Him going into heaven” (Acts 1:11). Cheers to you for joy, but only for us sinners, this is not joy, but great sadness, for you remind us of the second, terrible coming of Christ, in which He will judge and punish sinners. Isn’t it enough for us to complain that the Lord has left us? And you still terrify us with a terrible judgment and add new sadness to the old sadness. Let us ourselves, my beloved listeners, seek some consolation in the Holy Scriptures, and we will find it if we consider some of the joyful reasons for which our Lord ascended from us into heaven. Our Lord ascended from us into heaven, not in order to sadden us with His departure, but in order to arrange the most useful things for us. After all, His whole life, all His deeds were arranged for our benefit; This means that His ascension took place for our good. Just as, loving us, He came down from heaven, lived among people and laid His soul on the cross: “God so loved the world,” so, loving us and doing good to us, He ascended to heaven, for He said to His disciples: “Unless you have, but I go: if I do not go, the Comforter will not come to you; If I go, I will send Him to you” (John 16:7). He said the following: Listen wisely, O my dear disciples! Each of you has a special path ahead of you in order to preach the word of God to the whole world, “But in the world you will have sorrow, you will weep and lament, and the world will rejoice, but you will mourn” (John 16:20); in that grief, in those sorrows and sobs, you will need someone to console, strengthen and confirm you; and now I am going to the Father and will send you the Comforter, the Holy Spirit, who comes from the Father, so that He will comfort you in all your sorrows and sorrows. Therefore, it is better for you that I leave. “They will take you, Peter, even if you don’t want to,” they will put you in prison and entrust four quartets of soldiers to guard you, and in Rome the tree for your cross is already ready. And you, Jacob, will be the first to see the sword on your neck for My name’s sake. You, John, will be sent into exile, to distant lands, to the island of Patmos. The cross awaits you, Andrei, in Achaia, and for you, Philip, in Hierapolis; you, Bartholomew, are destined to be crucified in Armenia, where your skin will be torn off. Thomas is destined to be pierced by spears in India. Ethiopia awaits Matthew in torment, and other countries await others: each has his own cup of suffering ready. In all these sufferings and sorrows, you need some kind of joy, pleasure and consolation. So, I will go to the Father and send you the Comforter, the Holy Spirit, who, being present with you, will make you fearless and joyfully enduring all kinds of torment and even death. Therefore, “you have no food, but I am coming.” After you, many others like you will have to endure various torments and death for My name: they will be stoned, cut with the sword, burned with fire, thrown to beasts to be devoured, and broken into pieces. Others, not without torment, will turn out to be voluntary martyrs for My name out of love for Me, despising the world and all its sweets, denying themselves and killing their body with passions and lusts: some will go into the desert, others into monastery retreats - for suffering and exploits; these too will all need Divine help and consolation. So, I will go to the Father and send them the Comforter, for without this He will not come; and therefore “I am not there, but I am going.” “Many who believe” in Me and “whosoever desire to live godly will suffer persecution” (2 Tim. 3:12); many innocent people will suffer; many righteous people will endure adversity and bitterness; many of My servants will be subjected to terrible disasters: hunger, thirst, cold, nakedness, bonds, prisons, wounds and death; they will all need to be consoled in their persecution, suffering, bitterness and distress. So I will go to the Father and send them a Comforter from the Father. “If I don’t go, the Comforter will not come; For this reason, I don’t eat, but I’m going.” Oh, how blessed is the reason for the Lord’s Ascension from us into heaven: a joyful reason, encouraging us with joyful hope, announcing the coming of the Comforter to us. Come, Lord, come and send us the Comforter! Our Lord ascended from us to heaven in order to look down on us from on high, like a father on his children, like a shepherd on his sheep, like an eagle on his chicks, like a commander on his warriors - in order to see everyone, to know the needs and demands of everyone and to give help to everyone. Like some king, having gathered many of his warriors into an army and wanting to see all his regiments, he ascends to a high place, a mountain or some building, in order to see and arrange everything from above; so our Lord, the King of Kings, gathers a church militant on earth, in which there are as many ranks as there are regiments, and ascended into the high heavens to see from above the exploits of each. He weaves crowns for those who struggle well, He extends His helping hand to those who are weary, He lifts up those who fall and makes them stronger to fight the adversary, and He creates obstacles for those who persecute us. For example, the holy Protomartyr Stephen struggles in his suffering, being stoned by the Jews, and our Lord, from the height of His glory, having opened the sky, looks at him, so that the sufferer cries out: “I see the heavens opened, Jesus standing at the right hand of power” (Acts 7:56). So Saul, breathing threat and murder, hurries to Damascus to persecute the Church of God, and the Lord, seeing this from the heights of heaven, places an obstacle on him, illuminating him with heavenly light, blinding his carnal eyes and frightening him with a voice: “Savle, Savle, why are you persecuting Me?!” (Acts 9:4). More than one of the passion-bearers in his terrible sufferings either became exhausted or completely fell, being defeated by them, such as, for example, Jacob the Persian; The Lord, looking upon the weak, strengthened them, raised the fallen, so that the Scripture was fulfilled, which says: “Even if he falls, he is not broken, for the Lord strengthens his hand” (Ps. 36:24). Likewise, looking down from the heights of heaven, He helps us, His servants. Our Lord ascended from us into heaven in order to shine like the sun on us all with His grace from the heights of heaven. When the sun lingers somewhere after its setting, then the whole of heaven is covered with darkness; when it rises and begins to ascend to the heights, then the darkness of the night runs away from the entire sky, and the rays of the sun illuminate the entire universe. While our mental sun Christ remained, as in the west, on earth in the non-revelation of Himself to people and was darkened by free suffering, until then throughout the entire earth there was darkness of ignorance of God. When He, having risen from the west of the grave, ascended into heaven, immediately “His lightning illuminated the world,” immediately “From the east of the sun to the west, His name is made glorious” (Ps. 112:3; 76:19), and “By the knowledge of God the world was enlightened” (Hab. 2:14). “The sun shines from heaven on good and evil” (Matthew 5:45). Likewise, our Lord ascended into heaven in order to look down on the righteous and sinners from the heights of heaven: “Love the righteous and have mercy on the sinners.” The sun from heaven with its rays melts winter and ice, warms the earth and makes it fruitful; Likewise, our Lord ascended to heaven, so that from there, with the rays of His grace, he could melt the ice of our frozen souls, warm our hearts and make them fruitful, like the earth, so that we would not be barren before Him, but would grow spiritual fruits in ourselves. The Lord ascended from us into heaven in order to arrange our way to heaven and to be our guide to the mountainous countries. Before the Lord's ascension into heaven, none of the people had a way to heaven: “No one ascends into heaven,” says the apostle, “only he who descended from heaven,” “He who descended is also the one who ascended above all the heavens” (John 3:13; Eph. 4:10). Previously, no one could ascend to heaven, even if he was righteous and holy. Noah was pleasing to God; Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob were righteous, about whom it is said that they were righteous before God, as King Manasseh preaches to God: “Bring repentance to Your righteous Abraham, Isaac and Jacob, who have not sinned before You” (2 Chronicles 36); Joseph the Beautiful and Moses, who led Israel through the Red Sea on dry land, were blameless and chaste; Joshua, who kept the sun from moving, was also holy; Other saints of God in the Old Testament were not unholy, such as Daniel, the man of spiritual desires who stopped the mouths of the lions, the three youths who quenched the cave of Babylon with prayer, and other great prophets; however, none of them before Christ could ascend to heaven, and no one even heard whether there is or will be a way for people to heaven. When our Lord, clothed in human nature, ascended to heaven, he immediately revealed the path to heaven for the entire human race. The souls of the holy forefathers and prophets, brought out of hell, followed Christ along it; apostles, saints, martyrs and confessors ascended to them; worthy and righteous people still ascend to them, following in the footsteps of Christ; the path to heaven is now known to everyone, which was never heard of before, just, oh people, don’t be lazy about ascending it. Our Lord ascended from Us into heaven in order to open the doors of heaven for us and so that we could enter heaven without restraint. Our forefather Adam closed the door of heaven for the entire human race, made it impassable for all earthly creatures, and a cherub with a flaming weapon stood at the door of heaven; Adam closed paradise and the path to life, and opened only the entrances to death and hell. Our Lord did the opposite: He closed the entrances to death and hell, and opened heaven: first to the thief, to whom he said: “Today you will be with Me in heaven” (Luke 23:43), and then to everyone after His Ascension He opened heaven itself. I said that our Lord closed the entrances to death and hell, and opened the doors of heaven. As for the fact that the doors of heaven were opened by the Ascension of the Lord into heaven, then this you, your love, believe: for at the Ascension of the Lord the angels who preceded Him cried out to the heavenly ranks of angels: “Lift up your gates, O princes, and lift up the everlasting gates, and the King of glory will come in” (Ps. 23:9). As for the fact that the entrances to hell and death were closed, it seems to me that you doubt it; Therefore, I will cite the words of the Apocalypse of John as confirmation. At one time our Lord appeared to His beloved disciple John and said: “Do not be afraid: I am the first and the last, the living one who is dead, the imam of the keys of death and hell” (Apoc. 1:17:18). The following thing deserves special consideration here. Why does Christ the Lord not Himself bear the keys of eternal life and the kingdom of heaven, but gave them to St. Petru: “I will give you the keys of the kingdom” (Matthew 16:19); He began to carry the same keys with which hell and death are opened and closed: “Imam,” He said, “the keys of death and hell”? Is our Lord really so cruel and unmerciful that he is rather ready to destroy a person than to save him, rather ready to open the gates of hell and death for people rather than life and the kingdom? But this cannot only be said about Him, but also thought about, for He is our gracious and most merciful Creator: “As He is good, for His mercy endures forever” (Ps. 117:2). He exclusively “wants everyone to be saved,” but He does not want death for any sinner, for He says: “I want the sinner to die by will, so that he may turn from the path of evil and live” (Ezek. 18:23). Why doesn’t the Lord say: “Imam are the keys of life and the kingdom of heaven,” but: “Imam are the keys of death and hell”? Our Lord was pleased to do this for the same reason that some owners do this. If any gentleman sees that his treasurer is too wasteful, that he often opens the doors of his storehouses too much and drains his treasury, then he takes the keys from him and keeps them for himself. Likewise, our Lord knew the human character, knew that people are very quick to open death and hell both for themselves and for each other. They open themselves up to frequent falls into sin, to which they are very prone, for a person does not incline to anything so easily as to sin, to which he has long been accustomed; People open the doors of death and hell to each other with anger, rage and rancor, for each, if something angers him, becomes so enraged in anger that he is ready to send the other to hell and to death. Isn't this true? Our Lord, seeing such an unkind human disposition, takes the keys of death and hell for Himself, carries them Himself, and for this reason says: “Imam has the keys of death and hell.” With these words He says the following: “Sinful man! Because of your cruelty and your unrepentant heart, you have long since gathered up wrath for the day of wrath, the mortal scythe is already above your neck, hell is already opening its mouth to devour you; however, I am still waiting for your conversion and repentance, I do not allow death to suddenly kill you and hell to devour you: I keep hell prisoner so that it does not kidnap you, so that it does not devour you: “Imam is the key of death and hell.” Oh man! I also see that you are at enmity with your neighbor and wish him harm, not good; you would like to immediately put him to death and hell, you curse him, anathematize him; however, you do not have such power over him: the keys have not been given to you, and I will not give them to you. I carry them myself and don’t give them to anyone: “Imams have the keys of death and hell.” We thank You, our Lord, for such Your providence, for the fact that You did not give us those keys, like a knife to a little child. Oh, that we had these keys, the keys of death and hell! Long ago we destroyed our neighbors, giving them over to death and hell, and we ourselves would have perished, being devoured by death and hell. Let us now consider in more detail why the Lord carries the keys of death and hell, but does not carry the keys of life and the kingdom. Previously, we remembered the angels who, during the Lord’s ascension into heaven, preceded Him and called out to the heavenly angelic ranks like this: “Lift up your gates, O princes, and lift up the everlasting gates, and the King of glory will come in” (Ps. 23:9). Now let us pay attention to why the angels preceding the Lord do not say to the angels on high: “Open your gates, princes,” but say: “Take up your gates, princes,” that is, set them completely aside, completely break them: “Take them up.” Wasn’t it enough for the Lord’s entry to open the gates, but it was absolutely necessary to break them down completely, set them aside and take them away? What is the reason for this? Saint John Chrysostom, reflecting on the reason for this, says this: “The angels saw that the heavens would never again be closed and that gates would no longer be needed for the heavenly city; That is why they do not say: “Open the gates,” but: “Take up.” Now it is clear to us why our Lord does not carry the keys of the kingdom and life, just as he carries the keys of death and hell: where there are no gates, there are no need for keys, for at the Ascension of the Lord the heavenly gates were completely taken away and will never be closed again, as it is written about this in Revelation: “The gates thereof shall not be shut during the days: for there shall be no night” (Apoc. 21:25). That's why keys are not needed there. The Lord himself does not wear them, but gave them to Peter and the other apostles, as if saying: “I don’t need them; you wear them and without difficulty open what is open, open what is not closed, unlock what is not closed; if only someone by his own will has blocked the heavenly entrance for himself, you can help him with these keys, but those who follow Me have free entry without a key, for the gates are not closed for them and, as if taken away, cannot be closed.” Oh, how joyful is this reason for the Ascension of the Lord! He ascended into heaven in order to open wide the doors of heaven for us, to set them aside for our unrestricted entry into heaven. Open to us, O Lord, open the doors of Your mercy! Our Lord ascended from us into heaven to intercede for us before God the Father. This is what the Theologian says: “If anyone sins, the imams will intercede with God the Father, Jesus Christ the righteous, and He is the cleanser for our sins” (1 John 2:1:2). The Apostle Paul says in his letter to the Hebrews: “Christ did not enter into a holy place made with hands, but into heaven itself, now let the face of God appear for us” (Heb. 9:24), and in the Epistle to the Romans: “Christ Jesus died, and much more also rose again, who is at the right hand of God, who also makes intercession for us” (Rom. 8:34). So, let us not be afraid, and we, sinful people, will not despair about our salvation, but we will be trustworthy, for we have a good intercessor before God the Father - Christ our Savior, who intercedes for us, showing Him the wounds received for us; If only we were not too lazy to send up warm prayers with Him to the Father, so that the Lord and God Christ would intercede before the Father, showing Him His wounds and propitiating them with them as prayerful lips. But for whom does Christ intercede? About sinners. And about what sinners? About the penitents. For them He propitiates His Father, but for unrepentant sinners He does not propitiate. Convincing proof of this can be seen in the very suffering of the Lord. Being nailed to the cross, Our Lord prayed to God the Father for His murderers, saying: “Father, let them go, for they do not know what they are doing” (Luke 23:34). With this prayer of His, performed in bitter agony, did He beg the Father for His murderers? Did the Father forgive the sins of the evil bishop Annas, Caiaphas, Pilate and other scribes, Sadducees and Pharisees who betrayed Jesus to death? No. He prayed only for those for whom He, as the Omniscient, foresaw that they would repent and turn to Him. For the unrepentant sinners who crucified Him, He not only did not beg, but even moved the Father to revenge, so that He would take out His blood on the crucifiers, which was done by the hand of the Romans who ravaged Jerusalem. Sinful man crucifies Christ the Son of God a second time with his grave sins; he, being in negligence, unrepentance and adding sins to sins, tramples with his unrepentance the blood of the Son of God shed for us. Does the Son of God pray to the Father for such a sinner and will He appease the Father with His intercession? Wouldn't He rather raise up the Father to anger and vengeance, so that He would avenge the blood of His Son? Indeed, it is so. Be afraid, sinner who remains unrepentant, lest God’s vengeance suddenly overtake you, and you will be exterminated from among those living on earth and condemned along with the murderers who crucified the Son of God. But I’ll leave talking about this now and look again at the ascended Lord. Our Lord ascended from us into heaven in order to prepare a place in heaven for us where we could live forever and reign with Him, our Lord. He Himself says: “I go to prepare a place for you. If I go, I will prepare a place for you, and then I will come and take you to Myself, so that where I am, you also may be” (John 14:2:3). This reason is good and full of joy. The Lord ascended from us into heaven to prepare a place in heaven for everyone: for people who love God, a place among the seraphim; to the godly - between the cherubim; God-bearing - between God-bearing thrones; to good masters - among dominions; to the brave warriors fighting for the fatherland - between the forces; to different authorities - between authorities; to all leaders who govern their region in a Divine way - they have a place among the authorities; those who console friends and beggars and help them in disasters and misfortunes - their place is among the archangels; finally, those living in the flesh on earth like angels have a place in heaven with the angels. God! Where have you prepared a place for us sinners? Will there be even a small place for us in heaven? Your beloved disciple John the Theologian frightens us, saying: “Do not bring into it anything that is unclean and that creates abomination and lies; but only written in the lower belly of the Lamb” (Apoc. 21:27). He not only threatens us, but is already driving us out. We haven’t even entered yet, and he is already threateningly driving us away, saying: “Outside are the sorcerers, the fornicators, the murderers, the idolaters, and everyone who loves and commits lies” (Apoc. 22:15). Is there really no place for us in heaven? Will they really not let us in there and expel us from there? But our Lord, turning to us with a bright and merciful face, says: “I did not come to call the righteous, but sinners”; just repent, and then you will be granted equal honor with the saints and righteous. Where is the place for Peter, who rejected Me and then wept bitterly? Where is the place for the harlot woman who wept at My feet, where is her place in My kingdom? where is the prodigal son, where is the publican, where is the thief? That's where your place will be; just weep bitterly for your sins, like Peter, fall at My feet with repentance, like a harlot, turn to Me, like the prodigal son, humble yourself, like a publican, be crucified with Me, like a prudent thief: just repent, and you will be saved. I have already prepared a place for you in heaven; it will not be crowded, and you will fit into the bosom of My mercy. O Divine, O dear, O sweetest Jesus! You, sinners, Lord, do not falsely promise Your kingdom, if only we repent! Our Lord ascended into heaven in order to draw us there with Him. “I,” He says, “when I am exalted, I will draw everyone to Himself.” First of all, we will direct our mind and heart so as to think on things above and seek those on high, where with our God our life is hidden: He is our treasure; may our heart be there too. Having considered all these joyful reasons for the Ascension of the Lord from us into heaven, anyone who thinks of God can extract sufficient joy for himself, rejoice in spirit about the Lord his God, who ascended into heaven for the sake of our common good, and call this holiday a joyful holiday, and not a sad one. May our Lord vouchsafe us all to be partakers of that festival about which David predicted: “I will go to a wonderful place of shelter, even to the house of God, with a voice of joy and confession, the noise of celebration” (Ps. 42:5). Amen. First lesson on the seventh week of Easter, that is, on the week of the holy 318 fathers who gathered in Nicaea against Arius Orthodox listeners, faithful children of the Eastern Church! Warfare is human life on earth (Job 7:1), a constant war that does not stop until the end of the world, and, to tell the truth, this whole world cannot be called peace, for in it not only creature fights against creation: verbal against wordless, wordless against wordless and wordless against verbal, but even - oh horror! - and the creature against its Creator and Maker. The first such evil warrior was in a good place, manifested himself in the land of heaven - this is Satan with all his like-minded people. He, having become proud in his mind about the gifts freely given to him by the Creator, wished to be equal to his Creator and Benefactor and said in his heart: I will ascend to heaven, I will exalt my throne above the stars of God and I will sit on the mountain in the host of gods, at the edge of the north; I will ascend above the heights of the clouds, I will be like the Most High (Isa. 14:13–14). O damned pride! The creature dares to be equal to the Creator, the one created for service plans to command the Throne of Dominion, the created one wants to sit on the Throne, on the high mountains. But the Lord, Who opposes the proud (James 4:6), appointed the Archangel Michael to oppose him, who humbled his pride when he cast him with all his damned army into the vale of tears, from the heights of heaven into the underworld, from a place of light into hopeless darkness. He, hardened by anger and unable to fight with Almighty God, turned his rage on His holy Church and, starting with the first Adam and even until the Second Adam, did not cease to destroy, captivate and torment the people of God, and only the Second Adam, the Lord from heaven (1 Cor. 15:47), tamed his power, freed those captives from prison and bound him himself with strong bonds, as Saint John saw Theologian in revelation: And I saw an angel descending from heaven, who had the key of the abyss and a great chain in his hand. He took the dragon, the ancient serpent, who is the devil and Satan, and bound him for a thousand years, and cast him into the abyss, and shut him up, and put a seal over him, so that he would no longer deceive the nations (Rev. 20:1-3). This is interpreted by the Holy Fathers as applied to the Great Council Angel (Isa. 9:6), to Christ the Lord, who defeated the devil. However, a hard-hearted demon, even bound, does not stop his evil enterprise, but sends his slaves and saints, pagans and heretics, to fight the Church. The divine Paul, seeing such an evil desire for warfare, commands us to arm ourselves: Finally, my brethren, be strong in the Lord and in the might of His might. Put on the whole armor of God, so that you can stand against the wiles of the devil, because our struggle is not against flesh and blood, but against the principalities, against the powers, against the rulers of the darkness of this world, against the spirits of wickedness in high places. For this purpose take on the whole armor of God, so that you may be able to withstand on the evil day and, having done everything, to stand (Eph. 6:10–13). These messengers, demonic warriors, ministers of hell and enemies of the Church of God, having strongly armed themselves against it, emit blasphemous words from their vile hearts like arrows from their vile lips, as if with tense bows, to the heights of the Divine. Their hearts became like the hordes of the wicked, fighting against God, their tongue was sharpened like a serpent, but their morals were defiled, and their cruel iniquity became against God. They also have harmful arrows, words directed against the truth, which come from their minds and hurt the souls and conscience of ordinary people. Such, for example, is the leader of the damned heresies, the evil blasphemer, the lawless Arius, who by his very name means abuse. This devilish warrior raised a great war against the Church of God and from his vile lips, as from a bow, fired blasphemous arrows at its Head, Christ the Lord, calling Him a creature, and not essentially God. O mad warrior, shooting arrows at the Sun! O impudent demonic warrior who dared to fight with God! O great Philistine Goliath, who belched blasphemies against Heavenly David! He not only shot an arrow full of snake venom, but, having embellished the Divine Scripture, he thus, under the guise of Divine Scripture, served the poison of a soul-destroying heresy, just as someone in a cup of sweet wine would serve a deadly poison, for he brings this real word of Christ, God the Word: I go to the Father, for My Father is greater than I (John 14:28), - but brings out from them that false blasphemy that Christ is not God, since God cannot have anyone greater than Himself. But the Holy Fathers broke this soul-destroying arrow when those words of Christ wisely explained this: Christ, our True God, spoke the truth, that the Father is greater than Him in humanity; however, the Father is not greater than Him in Divinity, for in Divinity He is entirely equal to the Father. They also cut off the immaterial shaft of his arrow when they denied that He was a creature and affirmed that He is “True God from True God, begotten, not made.” Saint John Chrysostom, clearly seeing the crafty deceits of the evil-cunning Arius, convinces believers to be valiant, and likens the heretic in the machinations of the devil, saying this: “Open, Arius, the tomb of your larynx (Ps. 5:10), filled with dead words, for you do not have a life-giving word, but you create it with your inventions.” He responds immediately from Scripture, but you, listener, as a believer, do not be afraid when you see him speaking from Scripture, for the devil, when he came to Christ, tempting Him, also talked with Him, speaking from Scripture: If You are the Son of God, throw yourself down, for it is written: “He will command His angels concerning You, and in their hands they will bear You up, lest You dash Your foot against a stone” ( Matthew 4:6). He kept silent about the other words that followed, because he knew that they spoke against him. What words are these? You will tread on the asp and the basilisk, and you will trample on the lion and the serpent (Ps. 91:13). Listen diligently, beloved! From the same trick as that of the devil came what his servants say, who call the Son of God a creature. The devil borrowed words from Scripture to open his mouth to blasphemous speech. Arius speaks similarly. You will find that he also speaks on the basis of Divine Scripture, on it he bases the beginning, but he keeps silent about the rest so as not to be exposed. The Lord says in the Gospel: I came down from heaven, not to do My will, but the will of the Father who sent Me (John 6:38). “Do you see,” says Arius, that He is the servant of the Father? Do you see that He is subordinate to the Father? He Himself confesses this, saying: “I came down from heaven, not to do My will, but the will of the Father who sent Me.” O Arius! Why are you keeping silent? Speak and what follows! Do not imitate the devil, your teacher, so that this serves your cause! If you remain silent, then I will cry out with the Gospel: I do not intend to steal with you the Divine speeches and words of the Lord, for I fear the judgment of Him who says: If I saw a thief, I went with him, and with the adulterer I participated in his deeds (Ps. 49:18). You say: I came down from heaven not to do My will, but the will of the Father who sent Me, but also say the following: This is the will of Him who sent Me, that everyone who sees the Son and believes in Him may have eternal life; and I will raise him up at the last day (John 6:40). These words show the Divinity of Christ more clearly than the sun, for in whom can one believe except God, and who can raise the dead with his power except God? So, in vain, evil Arius, you do not subdue your neck before the yoke of Christ’s service, but, recklessly fornicating, you plow a furrow that is contrary to piety. The wicked Arius, using cunning like this and in other places of Divine Scripture, wounded countless souls, cut them off from unity with the body of the Church of Christ and, with worldly wisdom, like nets, made a successful catch for the demon. Regretting this, the pious King Constantine became like the forefather Abraham, who once gathered 318 of his household members, and with their help defeated Sodom and Gomora and took away the stolen goods, for he, having gathered 318 household members in the city of Nicaea, the Holy Fathers of the Church, with their illustrious teaching and the words of God, as with a sharp sword, beheaded Arius and his wicked warriors and freed simple and innocent souls from captivity. Our Mother Church now solemnly remembers this victory. She pleases the pious King, and she solemnly decorates the Holy Fathers who labored in that battle as victors over the enemy with crowns of praise. She also pleases our great father Peter among the saints, the cheerful shepherd of the flock of the Alexandrian Church, who first of all initiated the fight against the predatory wolf Arius, for when the latter had just begun to turn from a sheep into a wolf, he fatherly admonished him and used teacher’s instructions so that he would stop tormenting the Only Begotten Son of God with the teeth of terrible blasphemies. When he did not obey him, he cut him off with the sword of spiritual power from the body of the Church of God, like a rotten member, cut off his branches like a withered branch, expelled him like a scabbed goat from the society of Christ’s sheep, cast him out of the regiment of the new Israel as damaged by mortal leprosy, so that he would not harm others. He did this at the admonition of Saint Paul, who said this: Turn away from the heretic, after the first and second admonition, knowing that such a one has become corrupted and sins, being self-condemned (Tit. 3:10-11). To this holy hierarch, as an ardent champion, Christ the Lord of glory appeared in a vision in the form of a youth dressed in a robe torn in half. When Saint Peter asked: “Who, my Savior, tore your robe?” - then He answered: “Aryan.” This wolf tore the robe of the Lamb of God when he denied His Divinity, tore it when he called the Creator of all creation a creature, tore His robe when he destroyed the unity of faith and love in believers acquired by the Blood of Christ, tore His robe when he called the Lord of all, the Consubstantial Son of the Father, slave and servant. Therefore, he received a reward for his deeds for such tearing of the robe, for the Lord tore his womb open, like the second Judas, when all his entrails fell out. At the same time, the Lord tore his soul, cursed from his bad body, as a lesson to others, so that they would not dare to do such a thing. Blessed Jerome talks about this godless blasphemer like this: “Arius was one spark, but he almost burned the whole universe.” O damned spark, particle of eternal fire! Oh, the nasty spark that burned countless temples of the Holy Spirit! O stinking and gloomy spark that fell from the fire of hell! The Holy Fathers were barely able to quench it with the pure source of the word of God, like the water of life, with which may you all fill the cups of your hearts. Here I will offer you several testimonies from Divine Scripture regarding the truth of the Divinity of Christ. First of all, Saint John in chapter 12 writes about Him that Christ is the God of Israel, and Isaiah saw His glory (John 12:41), and he also says: And the Word became flesh and dwelt among us, full of grace and truth; and we saw His glory, glory as of the only begotten of the Father (John 1:14). St. Paul in his Epistle to the Hebrews says that Christ our Lord is the God of Israel, for He founded the earth, and the heavens are the work of His hands (Heb. 1:10). He says, Christ the Lord is God, whom the Jews tempted in the desert. The Lord Himself, the Eternal Truth, speaks of Himself like this: the Father is in Me, and I in Him; and again: Truly, truly, I say to you, before Abraham was, I am (John 10:38; 8:58). All these testimonies found in the Holy Scriptures clearly prove to us that Christ the Lord is our True God. With all of them, the Holy Fathers, as with the water of life, not only extinguished the evil spark, but also, as with a sharp sword, cut off Arius’ blasphemy with the word of God; he himself and all his like-minded people were cursed, and they left us the holy Symbol, as the true rule of the Christian faith, in which we confess this: “I believe in One God, the Father Almighty...” and so on up to: “To whom all things were.” Holding this rule, like a bright candle in the darkness of this world, we will follow the path of the commandments of the Lord, so that we can reach a place of light and peace. We will clearly confess Jesus Christ as the True God and at the same time a perfect Man, and He confesses us as His true servants and confessors, for He says: Whoever confesses Me before men, the Son of Man will also confess before the Angels of God (Luke 12:8). Let us try to glorify His sweet name “Jesus,” whom every tribe of heaven and earth and under the earth worships (Phil. 2:10); then He will glorify us with heavenly glory, for He says: He who glorifies Me will I glorify (1 Sam. 2:30). Let us sing to Him together with the prophet, as to the True God: Bless the Lord, my soul, and bless His holy name throughout my being. Bless the Lord, my soul (Ps. 102:1-2), and again: I will bless the Lord at all times; His praise is always in my mouth (Ps. 34:1). He will bless us in this temporary life with the sending of His grace, and for the praise of our lips He will fill all members of our body and soul with the glory of eternal life in His heavenly kingdom, where in unapproachable glory He reigns with His beginningless Father, with the Ever-existing and Life-giving Spirit for endless ages of ages. Amen. Second sermon on the seventh week of Easter “Behold, there is an eternal life, that they may know Thee the one true God” (John 17:3) Orthodox listener! To know God is the happiness of a Christian person, all spiritual joy, all hope for salvation and even salvation itself; this is the aspiration of eternal life and even eternal life itself! Let everyone, as he wants, invent ways to achieve consolation and eternal heavenly riches, but he will not find the best and most perfect, except to know God: “Behold, this is the eternal life, that they may know Thee the one true God” (John 17:3). Oh, how unhappy is he who either knows little of his God, his Creator, his Savior, or does not know him at all, or does not try to know Him. But you will say: we Orthodox Christians know God, believe in Him and worship the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit, one God in the Trinity. I praise this Christian and pious knowledge of God, faith and reverence for God, however, I will unmistakably say that not all of us know God well. There are many among us who only consider themselves to know God, but in fact they do not know Him at all. To clarify these words, in this conversation I propose two points: the first is that not everyone knows God well, who knows Him only through faith, and therefore not every Christian believer achieves eternal life; and the second is that only the one who knows God well is the one who believes in Him and loves Him, and at the same time loves Him truly - only such a person achieves eternal life. Finally, I will analyze the true signs of God’s true love. I ask your love to listen to this with open ears; I will begin my conversation, “I make haste for the Lord and confirm the word.” There are two ways to know God, Orthodox listeners! This is faith and love. By faith God is known through the apostle: “By faith we understand that the word of God will be perfected forever” (Heb. 11:3), and Chrysostom, interpreting this, says: “The work of faith is knowledge.” Faith, he says, consists in the knowledge of God, in the knowledge that by His almighty power the eyelids were created. God is also known through love, as the Lord Himself speaks about this in the Gospel: “He who loves Me will be loved by My Father, and I will love him and appear to him Myself” (John 14:21). Whoever, He says here, loves Me, I will show Myself to him, so that he knows Me well: “I will appear to him Myself.” Both of these ways of knowing God and achieving eternal life are very good; but while the first way, that is, faith, is sometimes perfect, sometimes imperfect, the second way, that is, love, is completely perfect. Faith is the true way, for “without faith it is impossible to please God” (Heb. 11:6) and to be saved: “Whoever has faith and is baptized will be saved” (Mark 16:16). By faith a man will be justified; It is not the true way because “even demons believe,” but still remain demons, although they believe and tremble. There are many of us Christian believers in this holy church, but only the elect are devout, and God knows which of us achieves eternal life: very few are saved. Love truly is the right way, for “love ceases to exist,” says the apostle (1 Cor. 13:8). Faith knows God, knows that there is a God in heaven, that the whole earth is filled with Him: “He was everywhere and filled everything.” Likewise, demons believe: they know that there is a God above them, executing them with eternal execution. Love not only knows that God exists, but also knows well what God is like: “How good is the God of Israel” (Ps. 72:1). Starting to explain my first position, namely that not everyone knows God well who knows Him through faith, I will cite here from the Old Testament the story of the exodus of Israel from Egypt. The Lord God, bringing His people out of Egyptian captivity, deigned to appear twice in flames: the first time in a bush above Mount Horeb, and the second time at the top of Mount Sinai. In the bush He appeared only to Moses, and on the mountain - to the entire Israeli people, so that all people would know Him. God did both of these phenomena for no other purpose than to make Himself known to His people, so that “God would be known to Israel.” If we look closely at both of these phenomena, we will see a great and wondrous difference. How did God appear to Moses in the bush? History writes: “Moses saw the bush burning and not burning.” How did He appear to all the people at Sinai? About this the same book of Exodus writes: “Mount Sinai was all smoking, descending into flames for the sake of God; and smoke came up like the smoke of a cave, and all the people were greatly terrified” (Ex. 19:18). Here let us pay attention to the fact that in the bush there was only one fire, without smoke; on the mountain there was more smoke than fire: “The whole mountain was smoking.” It was more appropriate for the smoke to be in the bush, where there were brushwood, straw and hay, than on that mountain, where at the immeasurable height and rocky, hard soil there could not even be any stem. Meanwhile, Divine fire creates the opposite: in brushwood there is a flame without the slightest smoke, and on bare, stone hardness there is smoke, “like the smoke of a cave.” Why is this so? What is the reason for this? Whoever reasons from a natural point of view will say: smoke is always where fire burns something; Where the fire does not burn and does not burn anything, there cannot be smoke. The divine fire did not burn the bush of Moses: “The bush is hot and not consumed”; here the Divine fire only illuminated this bush, but did not burn it; therefore there was fire without smoke. At Sinai, the Divine fire was burning and scorching. The mountain was burning there from the face of God, according to what was written by David: “A fire burns up the mountains” (Ps. 82:15), which is also evident from the letter of the Apostle to the Hebrews, who, describing that descent of God in fire on Sinai, ends with these words: “Our God is a consuming fire” (Heb. 12:29). There the fire ate and burned, devouring both the stone and the mountain, like brushwood and straw; there was “fire that eats,” therefore there should have been a lot of smoke there: “Smoke came out like the smoke of a cave.” Such a proof is good for natural reasoning. But whoever reasons spiritually will say this: in both of His appearances the Lord God wanted to be equal and to be similar to those persons to whom He intended to appear. He wanted to appear to Moses. And so He looks at him and sees that he is a kind, meek, kindly man, having a pure heart and right reasoning. Then God said to Himself like this: I will appear to Moses meekly, in a friendly, friendly manner, and I will talk with him face to face, as someone says to his friend - and I appeared to Moses in fire that did not scorch the bush, so that when Moses approached Him, the smoke would not get into his eyes and would not interfere with the conversation: that is why the fire in the bush was without smoke. God also wanted to appear to all the Jewish people on Mount Sinai. He looks at this people and sees in them a disorder due to rebellion. Some grumble against Moses, others think about widows, others remember pork meat and Egyptian dishes boiled in cauldrons, and even want to return back to Egypt. In addition, God foresees their future malice, foresees that they will beat the prophets, sacrifice their children to demons and rebel against Moses. Then God said to Himself: these people are evil; I will appear to them threateningly, so that they know Me, know that I will not tolerate all this. That is why God appeared to them in consuming and burning fire. Now I come to the second point, namely, that only those who believe in Him and love Him know God well, and love Him sincerely, and not falsely; and just as I did in the first case, here too I will cite a story from the Gospel for clarification. St. Matthew writes the following. At one time, when envious Jewry, certain Sadducees and Pharisees approached our Lord with their cunning questions, challenging Him to a verbal debate, they all approached at once. The Pharisees, having heard that Jesus had shamed the Sadducees, gathered together, probably so that if they could not argue somewhere, they would drown them out with a cry. At that time, one of them, a lawyer, asked the Lord, tempting Him and saying: “Teacher, what is the great commandment in the law?” The Lord answered: “Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy mind: this is the first and great commandment” (Matthew 22:36–38). If I, a sinner, had been there at that time and stood there listening to this dispute, I would have fallen at the feet of my Lord and prayed: Lord, first teach this crazy Jewry to know You, so that they first know You, their Lord, and believe in You, and then You will teach them the love of God, so that, having known You, their Lord, and having believed, they will love You. Who could ever love an unknown thing? Every good thing is first recognized as good, and then becomes amiable, and whoever does not know something does not desire it. Tell them, Lord, that the first commandment is to know the Lord God, and then to love Him. But the Lord would not have bowed to my foolish request, for He knows well that the first commandment is nothing other than to love God. I, surprised that the Lord does not mention anything to the Jews about the knowledge of God, but first of all offers them instruction in the love of God, I say to myself: perhaps the Jews already knew God and only love was not enough for them, and therefore the Lord, without mentioning the knowledge of God, teaches them first of all love? But the apostle says: “Unless they had known it, they had not crucified the Lord of glory” (1 Cor. 2:8). And in another place the Lord Himself complains: “Israel does not know Me, and My people do not understand Me” (Isaiah 1:3). Why doesn’t the Lord tell them: the first commandment is to know God, and then to love? I will go to learn about this from the great church teacher, St. John Chrysostom, who teaches this: “Christ did not say: know your God, but “love Him,” for it is impossible for anyone who loves God with all his heart not to come to the knowledge of His Son. The Divine love itself, living in him, enlightens him.” For this teaching we thank you, holy Chrysostomed teacher. Now we know why the first commandment is the commandment of love, why love, compared with knowledge, is the first and most perfect for salvation. The reason is that love is followed by knowledge of God rather than knowledge by love. The Jews knew God: “God is known in Judah, His great name is known in Israel,” but they did not love Him and therefore did not seem to know: “Israel does not know Me, and people do not understand.” Here I will also remember David. This lover of God, wishing one day to give people the knowledge of God and to attract them to Him with His special perfections, says: “Taste and see that the Lord is good” (Ps. 33:9). Taste, he says, and then you will know how good the Lord is. Apparently, one could argue with David, warning him that he was speaking incorrectly. He does not say: first you will see, and then you will taste, but: “taste and see.” But here one of the great church teachers stands up for him, saying: “Stop reproaching David for these words; he says well: it is more proper to say first “taste” and then “see” - taste with love and see with knowledge. If you do not first taste His love, then you cannot come to know Him, for no one knows God until he tastes Him.” That is why it is clear to us that only he who knows God well is the one who loves Him. I think that here not one of the Christian believers will respond even in his thoughts, saying: I love the Lord my God: God forbid otherwise! If I asked everyone individually: do you love God? - then, undoubtedly, everyone will say: I love you. But I will say this without any fear: not everyone loves God who responds that he loves; but only he loves God who actually truly loves Him. Why is it possible to know whether someone truly or untruly loves God? The true sign of true love was described by the beloved disciple of the Lord, Saint John the Theologian, who says: “If anyone says that I love God, but hates his brother, it is a lie; For if you do not love your brother, whom you have seen, God, whom you have not seen, how can you love? (1 John 4:20). But for now I will leave this sign alone and, without dwelling on it, I will only talk about its application to love for one’s neighbor, both because of the shortness of time and because of its infidelity, for dishonest or hypocritical love, or feigned love, or because of some kind of profit often creeps into love for one’s neighbor. Having left this sign alone, I find another. The unrighteous love of a Christian person for God is visible where the creature is equated with the Creator or even the creature is revered more than the Creator; righteous love appears where they love and prefer only one Creator above every creature. This true sign was also described by the aforementioned holy Theologian, saying: “Do not love the world, nor anyone else in the world: if anyone loves the world, the Father’s love is not in him” (1 John 2:15). If, he says, someone has drowned his heart in this seductive light and its luxury, do not seek the love of God in him, even if he were a Christian: “There is no love of the Fathers in him.” God's love is very jealous; she does not tolerate anyone's heart loving God and the world, dividing both Creator and creation in half. The Philistines placed the ark of the covenant of the Lord in the same church along with the idol Dagon and, coming the next day, they saw that Dagon was lying crushed on the threshold: apparently, the demon was running away from the grace of God that was in the ark, and when he ran, he tripped and broke his neck. But if Dagon had not lamented and moved from his place, then what would have happened? Then what would happen is that the ark of God, moving by itself, would come out of that church. The love of God does the same. If she settles in someone’s heart, she will either drive out idols and vain worldly passions, or she will go away on her own, saying: “Behold, your house is left to you empty.” For this purpose, one of the divinely inspired men convinces the Christian person, saying: “Run away from the creation if you want to have a Creator.” Let every creature become evil for you, if you want the Creator to delight in your heart. Love does not like to be divided in two. She does not like anyone to love God with one half of his heart and love worldly vanity with the other: “You cannot work for God and mammon” (Matthew 6:24). The love of God requires a whole human heart: “Son, give Me your heart, so that you may love Me with all your heart.” Truly, this saying is wise: love is not divided, and it cannot be torn apart. Those who divide it and crush it, seem to me, Lord, worse than even the soldiers who crucified You, who did not want to tear Your tunic. The love of God is so jealous that even, enduring the cross and crucifixion, if it sees someone tearing it in two or ten and drawing it to a created thing, it still wants to be unique in the human heart, wants to dominate and reign in it without any comrade. This is the true sign of true love. Therefore, only one who truly loves God is one who either has little or no attachment to temporary worldly luxuries and does not delight in dissolute carnality, uses the world not for pleasure, but out of the need to preserve temporary life, and prefers one God to everything, speaking with David: “What do I have in heaven, and what do I want from You on earth?” (Ps. 72:25). Saint Ambrose, explaining these words, says: “God, the hidden Witness! You know that You are dearer, dearer and more desirable to me than not only the earth and everything that is on it, but even the sky and everything that is on it. I love You more than heaven and earth and everything that is in them.” A true sign of the true love of God is also the fact that God should be loved only for the sake of God Himself, and not for one’s own sake, that is, not for the sake of one’s personality, one’s profit, and not for the sake of that reward that the Apostle described, saying: “Eye has not seen, nor ear has heard, nor has the heart of man breathed what God has prepared for those who love Him” (1 Cor. 2:9). I do not blame that love when someone loves God for the sake of eternal reward, however, I cannot call it true and perfect. After all, even a mercenary would not serve his master if he did not hope to receive payment from him. Likewise, such a person would not love God if he did not expect reward. True love is that which, according to the Apostle, “does not seek its own,” does not care about any reward and desires only to delight itself in Divine love. Let us remember here two sinners described in the Holy Scriptures: the first is Rahab in Jericho, and the second is in Bethany, in the house of Simon the leper. They both turned to God and both came to know Him through love. The first tries and takes care of the integrity of her home; She asks and obliges the Israeli spies with an oath: “Swear to me by the Lord your God that as I show mercy to you, so you will show mercy to the house of my father.” The other, having learned that the Savior is in Simon’s house at a feast, enters there and falls at His feet. She washes His pure feet with her tears, wipes them with the hair of her head, but does not say a word, does not care about anything, does not ask for anything and does not even beg for the forgiveness of her sins. Oh, how different is the warmth and zeal in God for both! The first cared about her property, about keeping her family and property intact, but this one only wants to delight her heart with Divine love, “for you love much” (Luke 7:47). This is true love. She loves not for herself, that is, not for any of her own benefit or profit, but solely for the sake of God Himself and to delight the heart with His Divine love. The Lord God divided His blessings for His faithful servants. He gave the kingdom of heaven to the poor, appointed a special joy for those who mourn, promised the inheritance of the earth to the meek, prepared a rich meal for the hungry in the kingdom of heaven, “for they shall be satisfied” (Matthew 5:6), and appointed various other true rewards for the rest, to each according to his merits. What has He prepared for those who love Him? Nothing other than that “My Father will love him, and we will come to him and make our abode with him.” He does not say: I will give to those who love Me a kingdom, I will seat them on a throne, I will put a scepter in their hands, I will place a crown on their head, I will prepare for them a heavenly feast; He offers nothing of the kind to His dear lover. But what? All he promises is that “we will come to him and make our abode with him.” By this He shows us so that we know that whoever has true love for God desires nothing but God Himself: neither heaven, nor heavenly crowns, nor the sweets of heaven. He desires only one God, and he desires more than heaven and more than all the luxuries of heaven. So, let everyone seek from God what he wants; love seeks only God Himself, seeks more than all, even eternal, goods and more than any creature: “But it is good for me to cleave to God” (Ps. 72:28). Finally, I will also point out that true sign of God’s true love, that he who loves God for his beloved Lord avoids with all his might falling into any mortal sin; He is careful not to anger Him whom he loves with anything or anything, and diligently tries to fulfill His will and His command in everything, as the Lord Himself says about this: “If anyone loves Me, he will keep My word; but if you do not love Me, you will not keep My words” (John 14:23–24). And so, when someone has true love for God in his heart, he truly knows God well, he tastes His love and by the sweetness of his heart knows “that the Lord is good.” Such a one, without a doubt, will achieve eternal life, will achieve it through the knowledge of God, according to the word of Christ: “Behold, there is eternal life, that they may know Thee the only true God” (John 17:3). Amen. First lesson on the day of the descent of the Holy Spirit “The Spirit of the Lord fill the world” (Wis. 1:7) God once promised to send His Holy Spirit to people, saying through the prophet Joel: “I will pour out My Spirit on all flesh” (Joel 2:28). Then, through the prophet Isaiah, He spoke to the Israelites: “I will put My Spirit on your descendants” (Isaiah 44:3). Now this promise has already been fulfilled, for He has already sent His Holy Spirit into the world more than once, but has revealed Him in the most diverse ways. For the first time, the Holy Spirit appeared in the form of a dove, when Jesus was baptized in the waters of the Jordan, as the holy evangelist Matthew testifies to this: “And Jesus was baptized, and went up from the water, and behold, the heavens were opened to him, and he saw the Spirit of God descending like a dove” (Matthew 3:16). The second time the Holy Spirit appeared in a cloud, when Christ was transfigured, which is narrated by the same evangelist Matthew: “And the cloud brightened their autumn” (Matthew 17:5). The third time the Holy Spirit showed Himself in the wind, when it filled the house in which the apostles were staying. St. speaks about this. the Apostle Luke in Acts like this: “Suddenly there came from heaven a sound like a storm of breath, and it filled the whole house where it sat” (Acts 2:2). The fourth time He appeared in tongues of fire was when He descended on the apostles. About this in the Acts of the Apostles we read the following: “The nations appeared to them divided like fire, sitting on one of them, and they were all filled with the Holy Spirit” (Acts 2:3:4). In this teaching, I want to offer your piety: why did the Holy Spirit show itself to the world in different forms: sometimes in the form of a dove, sometimes in the clouds, sometimes in the wind, sometimes in tongues of fire? First of all, I pray to You, Holy Spirit! I know that You are truly a good Teacher, for Christ the Savior Himself announced You to His disciples, saying: “The Holy Spirit is the Comforter, and Him the Father will send in My name; by Him you will teach all things” (John 14:26). Come now, the Holy Spirit, into my heart, all my sins have fallen with immaterial fire and teach me, an ignoramus, to speak the truth, and “I will tell Your name to my brethren and in the midst of the church I will sing to You.” I ask you, beloved listeners, to listen diligently. The Holy Spirit appeared in the form of a dove for many reasons: firstly, because the holy church, that is, Christian believers, is called a dove, as the Holy Spirit speaks about it in the Song of Songs. “Arise and come, my neighbor, my good one, my dove” (Song. 2:10); secondly, because the dove is not a bird of prey, but a simple one and without flattery in it. Christ Himself, our Savior, instructing His disciples, says: “Be ye wise as a serpent, and purposeful as doves” (Matthew 10:16). Therefore, the Holy Spirit usually dwells in those who have a simple and humble heart, and not an evil and treacherous one. Augustine says: “The Holy Spirit appeared as a dove, so that he who would be sanctified by the spirit might be like a dove, without flattery. In addition, the Holy Spirit appeared in the form of a dove because through the thought of God we fly to heights, as the Psalmist once cried out: “Who will give me a wing like a dove, and flight and rest?” (Ps. 54:7). I’ll ask you, blessed David! Tell me where do you want to fly on these dove wings? “In the dwellings of heaven,” he answers, “to dwell with God.” About these courts the same David says in another place: “How beloved is Your village, O Lord of hosts! My soul longs and ends for the courts of the Lord. My heart and my flesh rejoiced in the living God” (Ps. 83:2:3). Finally, the Holy Spirit appeared in the form of a dove also because on His wings He carries those who wish to settle in the dwellings of heaven. Metaphrastus in the life of the holy martyr Mary writes: “When she suffered for Christ, then a dove with a golden crown appeared flying above her.” This means that the Holy Spirit appeared in the form of a dove for this purpose, in order to give to every believer the crown of eternal life, which Christ promised to give to every believer, saying: “Be faithful until death, and I will give you the crown of life” (Apoc. 2:10). The Holy Spirit appeared in a cloud on Tabor because God Himself once in ancient times appeared to Moses in a cloud, as it is written about this in Exodus: “The Lord came down in a cloud” (Ex. 34:5), and the Holy Spirit is the same God who once appeared to Moses. Before the end of the world, Elijah and Enoch will come to earth; The Antichrist will kill them, and after killing them their bodies will lie unburied for three days, but then God will resurrect them, and they will ascend to heaven as a cloud, as St. John the Theologian in the Apocalypse: “I ascended into heaven on clouds” (Apoc. 11:12). Therefore, it means that the Holy Spirit appeared in a cloud, so that on this cloud we could ascend to heaven. The cloud pours out rain from itself and sprinkles the earth, for the wet vapor that rises on the earth from the water remains a wet and watery cloud above, about which the Psalmist says: “The water is dark in the clouds of the air” (Ps. 17:12); this water subsequently turns into rain and falls to the ground. Likewise, the Holy Spirit appeared in the cloud to pour out the rain of His grace into our hearts, as the Apostle Paul says: “The love of God will be poured out into your hearts through the Holy Spirit who has been given to you” (Rom. 5:5). Thunder and lightning are born in the cloud, for when a wet and cold cloud embraces dry and warm air, the latter looks for a place where it could escape from the cloud that is contrary to it; he fights with the cloud, and that is why thunder occurs; then this dry steam is ignited, and that is why lightning is produced; finally, the same dry steam, having ignited, falls from the cloud to the ground, causing a crackling sound, lightning arrows and fires. In an allegorical sense, church teachers are called thunder and lightning, for just as lightning with its brilliance drives away darkness and just as thunder frightens people, so church teachers with their preaching disperse the darkness of human sins and frighten sinful people, reminding them of the eternal torment that awaits sinners for their sins. So, for example, the Psalmist calls teachers lightning, saying: “The lightning illuminated His universe” (Ps. 77:19), and in the Apocalypse Saint John the Theologian calls teachers thunder: “He spoke seven thunders with his voices” (Apoc. 10:3), for all shepherds and teachers kill the evil and disobedient with their curse, just as thunder frightens and kills. This was the apostle Paul when he said: “If anyone loves not our Lord Jesus Christ, let him be cursed: maranatha” (1 Cor. 16:22). Therefore, the Holy Spirit appeared in a cloud, for just as a cloud makes thunder and lightning, so the Holy Spirit makes shepherds and teachers. The Holy Spirit appeared in the wind, for the wind is such a phenomenon that develops tares from pure wheat. Sinners are called tares, and all the righteous are called wheat and good seed, as in one place it was said to Christ: “Lord, did you not sow good seed in your village? Where do we get the tares from?” (Matthew 13:27). The Holy Spirit separates the tares from the pure wheat, that is, sinners from the righteous. Noah and his wife were good wheat, for they lived godly; the rest were all tares, for they lived lawlessly. Therefore, the Holy Spirit separated the tares from the wheat, that is, He saved Noah, his wife, sons and his sons’ wives from the flood; The rest were all tares, that is, sinners, He drowned with a universal flood. Good wheat was Lot, his wife and his two daughters, who lived godly; yet the fellow Dominionites were tares, for they did not have the fear of God in their hearts. Therefore, the Holy Spirit separated the tares from the good seed. He brought Lot with his wife and two daughters out of Sodom, and destroyed all the Sodomites with stinking fire. Beloved listeners! So you see how, for the sake of fatherly piety, that is, Noah and Lot, sons and daughters were saved; and now, if anyone honors his parents, he receives great benefits from God, namely: abundance in the home, and subsequently eternal, heavenly abundance, as Jesus of Sirach says about this: “As she treasures, glorify your mother” (Sir. 3:4). Further, such a person will have honor from his sons, according to the word of the same Sirach: “Honor your father and rejoice in your children” (Sir. 3:5). Then, if he prays to God for anything, whether for health or happiness, his prayers will be heard by God, according to this: “On the day their prayers will be heard.” In addition, such a person will be happy and long-lived in this life, as God’s commandment says about this: “Honor your father and your mother, that good may come to you, and that you may live long on earth,” and again: “Glorify your father and you will live long” (Sir. 3:6). Such a one will also be glorious before everyone, both on earth and in heaven, according to the following words: “Glory to a man is from the honor of his father” (Sir. 3:11). His lineage will also be long-lasting, for “The Father’s blessing establishes the homes of children” (Sir. 3:9). If he falls into any misfortune or sadness happens to him, he will soon be freed from them, as Scripture says about this: “The Father’s mercy will not be forgotten, and in the day of your tribulation it will be remembered” (Sir. 3:14). He will also be worthy of cleansing from sins, for he who honors his father will cleanse his sins: just as ice melts from the heat, so will his sins melt away” (Sir. 3:15). Finally, he will not only be blessed by God on earth while he lives, but after death at the Last Judgment of Christ he will hear this sweet voice: “Come, you blessed of My Father, inherit the kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world” (Matthew 25:34). But it’s time to return again to our situation. The wind also has the power that it not only blows away the tares, but also uproots tall trees: flowering dates, incense cypresses, Wassan oaks and cedars of Lebanon. Likewise, the Holy Spirit uproots and overthrows pompous, proud and arrogant people, whom the prophet David likens to a tall tree, saying: “I have seen the wicked exalt themselves and stand tall like the cedars of Lebanon” (Ps. 37:35). But the Holy Spirit immediately uproots this tree, as David adds: “And I passed by, and behold, I was not there, and I sought him, and his place was not found” (Ps. 37:36). The prophet Daniel also called the proud king of Babylon Nebuchadnezzar a tall tree, for he says: “Behold, an oak tree in the midst of the earth, and its height grew great, and reached to heaven.” But the Holy Spirit also uprooted this tree: “And a voice came from heaven: Sow the oak, and beat its branches, and shake off its leaves, and scatter its fruit” (Dan. 4:7, 8, I). The wind also destroys churches, as we read about Job. Likewise, every person is likened to a church, according to the words of Blessed Paul: “If our earthly church of the body is destroyed, a creation from God, imams, a church not made by hands, eternal in heaven” (2 Cor. 5:1). That is why the Holy Spirit appeared in the wind, for He destroys human churches, and they die. Psalm Nick says: “Who is the man who will live and not see death?” (Ps. 89:49). He does not destroy these churches equally. If anyone keeps the commandments of God, he will live long, as Solomon says: “In this way you will live many years, and the years of your life will be added to you” (Proverbs 9:18). Those who live lawlessly disappear like grass, according to the words of the Psalmist: “Do not be jealous of those who are wicked, nor be jealous of those who do iniquity: before the grass is dried up, and like the herbs quickly fall away” (Ps. 36:1:2). Finally, the wind also has such strength that sometimes it shakes the earth if it enters underground crevices and caves. If he does not find a place to get out of there, then he walks through the caves with great desire, and from this desire the earth shakes. Look at yourself, every man, are you not earth? For this is what God said to Adam: “You are earth, and to earth you will go.” When the Holy Spirit comes into the human heart like a wind rushing into an earthly cave and shakes that earth, that is, a person, it instructs him to repentance, contrition of heart and to all piety. The Psalmist also prayed to God about this, saying: “Renew a right spirit in my womb” (Ps. 50:12). God once placed a cherub with a flaming weapon near Paradise so that he would guard the path to the tree of life. The Church, our mother, is also called Paradise, for in the book of Genesis we read the following: “For God has planted paradise in the east” (Gen. 2:8). The same can be said about the holy true Eastern Church, which the Holy Spirit protects as the Psalmist says: “The guardian of Israel will not slumber, nor will he fall asleep” (Ps. 120:4). In tongues of fire, the Holy Spirit descended in order to give the apostles fiery speech, since the word of God is called fire, as it is written in the Apocalypse about Enoch and Elijah: “Fire comes out of their mouths, and their enemies will be consumed” (Apocalypse 11:5). When Basil the Great preached the word of God, then Saint Ephraim saw fire coming from the mouth of Saint Basil. It is with such fiery words that the thorns of sin are caught. Love is also called fire, for our Lord is a “consuming fire,” and this fire is all-perfect love, according to the words of Saint John the Theologian: “God is loving, and he who abides in love abides in God, and God abides in him” (Heb. 12:29; 1 John 4:16). The Holy Spirit descended in fire in order to confirm the holy apostles in love. That is why blessed Paul says to all of us: “Walk in love, as Christ also loved us and gave Himself for us” (Eph. 5:2). In the Old Testament, God often appeared in fire: He appeared to Moses in a bush of fire; Israel was led out of Egypt into the promised land in the form of a pillar of fire at night; He gave the law to Israel on Mount Sinai in smoking fire; God appeared to Daniel on a throne of fire. Therefore, the Holy Spirit also appeared in the form of tongues of fire, for He is the same God who in ancient times appeared in fire. Finally, we can say that Christ will come with fire to judge the living and the dead, for the Psalmist says: “A fire will burn before Him, and a green storm will surround Him; He will call the heavens from above and the earth to judge His people” (Ps. 49:3:4). Before the coming of Christ, the whole universe will be tempted by fire; Then the sky, the earth, and all the elements will burn, as the Apostle Peter says: “The earth and the works on it will burn up”; in another place he says that “the heavens will be destroyed, and the elements will be scorched” (2 Pet. 3:10:12). And then the earth will be as pure as glass, the waters as crystal, and the heavens will then be even more beautiful and majestic than now. This is what Saint John the Theologian says in the Apocalypse: “I saw a new sky and a new earth; For the first heaven and earth passed away first, and there is no sea” (Apoc. 21:1). Therefore, the Holy Spirit appeared in tongues of fire, as having one Divinity with Christ, the Son of God. Beloved listeners! You also need to know why our mother, the Holy Church, does not have the custom of bringing green trees to churches on any other holidays, except for the descent of the Holy Spirit. By this she makes it clear that the Holy Spirit descends only on those who flourish in virtue as well as trees in leaves, according to the words of the Psalmist: “The righteous will flourish like a date tree” (Ps. 92:3). Christ our Savior Himself admonishes us, saying: “If anyone loves Me, he will keep My word, and My Father will love him, and we will come to him and make our abode with him” (John 14:23). The Holy Spirit does not descend on those who remain in sins, since God Himself told us: “My Spirit shall not abide in these men who are but flesh” (Gen. 6:3). This is the first reason. Then this is done in order to show that no one is worthy of receiving the grace of God, except those who humbly liken themselves to the leaves falling from the trees, which is why the Psalmist says: “Who is the Lord our God who lives on high and looks down on the lowly?” (Ps. 112:5:6). Further, this is done so that we know that thanks to the descent of the Holy Spirit, the holy church, our mother, like a tree, blossomed with various leaves, that is, with different faces of the righteous, such as: virgins, teachers, martyrs, confessors, saints and hermits, about which Hosea had long prophesied: “They will flourish like a flower, and they will spread their root like an oak grove, and they will be fruitful like an olive tree” (Hos. 14:6:7). When St. The Apostle Peter preached the word to the nations of Jerusalem, then the Holy Spirit descended on all those listening to his teaching, as we read about this in the Acts of the Apostles: “When I spoke these words to Peter, the Holy Spirit attacked all who heard his word” (Acts 10:44). O Christ our God! Give us Your grace too; Now send down Your All-Holy Spirit upon us and upon all Your people who are present, so that, having received Him into our hearts, we all sing with one accord: “We have seen the true light, we have received the heavenly Spirit,” to whom, together with the Father and the Son, belongs honor and worship forever and ever. Amen. Second lesson on the day of the descent of the Holy Spirit Your Good Spirit will guide me to the right land (Ps. 142:10). The Holy Spirit, the Good Spirit, the Source of all mercy, one in essence with God the Father and the Son - how is He sent to creation from the Father and the Son, if He proceeds eternally from the Father? The Father sends Him, according to the words of Christ the Lord spoken to the apostles: But the Comforter, the Holy Spirit, whom the Father will send in My name, will teach you all things (John 14:24). The Son also sends Him, according to the promise: When the Comforter comes, whom I will send to you from the Father, He will testify about Me (John 15:26). Therefore, this prayer: Thy Good Spirit will guide me to the right of the earth, we must send equally to both God the Father and God the Son, so that from both one source of grace flows upon us, just as Saint John the Theologian in revelation saw it flowing from the Throne of God and from the Lamb, when he says this: And he showed me a pure river of the water of life, bright as crystal, emanating from the Throne of God and Lamb (Rev. 22:1). The Holy Spirit is called the Good Spirit not only because He is good by His nature, like God, according to what is written: No one is good but God alone (Matthew 19:17), but also because His Divine Hypostasis is especially assigned goodness, just as the Father is omnipotent, and the Son is wisdom, for He is the Cause of all mercy, the Source of love, and from Him come to us all kinds of gifts. From Him are all the gifts that shine in the Church, and in the prophets, and in the martyrs, and in all other members. He is the Spirit of wisdom in Solomon, the Spirit of knowledge in Bezaleel, the Spirit of counsel in Moses and the seventy judges, the Spirit of might in Joshua, Gideon and Sampson, the Spirit of godliness in Tobiah, the Spirit of understanding in Daniel, the Spirit of the fear of God in the righteous and God-fearing Simeon, for all the gifts of grace come from Him. Why is He, the Good Spirit, also called the right Spirit and the ruling Spirit? By Him the Church is governed and instructed, and not only so that the apostles and martyrs can give an answer, according to this Lord’s promise: But when they bring you into the synagogues, to the rulers and authorities, do not worry how or what to answer, or what to say, for the Holy Spirit will teach you at that hour what you should say, but also for every good work, according to this unfaithful word: Comforter, Spirit The Holy One, whom the Father will send in My name, will teach you all things (John 14:26). This is why He is sent, to guide us on the path of eternity, to teach us His justifications (Ps. 119:135) and to lead us to a better fate. Without His Divine guidance, the human spirit does not know how to walk the right path and lead us into the land of righteousness, for the human spirit is vain, fickle and weak, and often we do not even know what kind of spirit we are. We are carried away now by the spirit of vanity, now by the spirit of impatience, now by the spirit of pride, now by the spirit of the love of money, now by the spirit of the love of power, and led through various rapids of destruction, we do not know the evil leader. Having in our path such and similar dirty tricks with which the evil demon repeatedly deceives us under the guise of goodness, we will ask in every possible way that the Good Spirit will guide us and help us, according to what the apostle said: The Spirit strengthens us in our weaknesses (Rom. 8:26). He is our merciful Helper and helps us in a variety of ways. Firstly, He helps in our weakness when He makes it so that we gratefully accept from the hands of God all kinds of mental and physical sorrows and glorify our God for them. He also helps us by driving away ignorance from our minds and teaching us what to do and what to avoid. In addition, He strengthens our will to love what is good, constant and eternal and to neglect the corruptible, the present, which forces and seduces the senses, and never saturates the soul sufficiently with pleasure. He also provides help to memory, so that with it we may contain all God’s blessings with gratitude, so that we remember His commandments, do not transgress them, and mourn our sins in our hearts, so that we do not forget the righteous and terrible judgment of God, who brings good retribution to the righteous and brings worthy punishment to the wicked. Finally, He gives a helping hand to our spirit against carnal lusts, gives strength to begin divine works and confirms us to always remain in the service of God, in zeal and grace. The Holy Spirit helps us in every state, whether we are in grace or in sins: if in grace, then he helps us so that we do not suffer as a result of falling away from it; It gives affirmation to those who come from sin, so that they do not fall away from it again. He leads us from strength to virtue until we see the God of gods in Zion (Ps. 83:8). He gives help to those who are in sins to get up, so that they would not perish from them, but would leave their power, according to the words of the Psalmist: If the Lord had not helped me, my soul would soon have entered hell (Ps. 93:17). For this purpose, the Holy Spirit was sent to the holy apostles and other believing people, so that without temptation he would guide them on the present path, a slippery path with hidden demonic snares, according to the words of King David: In the path that I walked, they hid a snare for me (Ps. 141:4) - so that he would mercifully guide them in it, revealing Himself as a Comforter in sorrows, a light in darkness, a Patron in misfortunes, in troubles as a Liberator, in doubt as a Counselor, in sorrows as delight, in labor as rest, in exhaustion as strength, in error as a Corrector, in ignorance as a Mentor. The Holy Spirit mercifully did all these good deeds to believers, to each according to need, and does not cease to do to this day, if only we try to wash the vessels of our souls from sinful defilements with a source of tears. We have an example of such grace of the Holy Spirit in the divine apostles, who were previously ignorant, but when they were sent throughout the universe with the gospel, they were filled with reason, eloquence and wisdom. With their teaching, they caught everyone like fish for Christ, and Isaiah’s prophecy came true on them: And all your sons will be taught by the Lord (Isa. 54:11-13). Previously they were fearful, but the Holy Spirit clothed them with power from above and strengthened them against all kinds of disasters, according to the following words: I established its pillars. Previously, they were ill-born and did not enjoy honor, but the Holy Spirit, endowing them with the power of miracles, made them marvelous for the whole world: the Lord made His saints marvelous (Ps. 4:4). Previously, they were barely warm, but when the Holy Spirit descended on them in the form of tongues of fire, they were inflamed with love and clothed with jealousy, so that they could speak with the prophet Jeremiah: He sent fire from above into our bones, and it took possession of them (Lamentations 1:13). That is why their words, like fire, could penetrate into petrified hearts. That is why the supreme apostle, Saint Peter, converted three thousand souls to the Lord with one teaching, and on another day another five thousand. Having previously been weak, they were so strengthened by the Holy Spirit that neither torment, nor languor, nor any hellish power could crush their heart. On the contrary, they themselves brought the entire universe under the yoke of Christ, abolished idols and even the prince of the world, and they subjected and subdued the entire universe to the Crucified One. This is the power of the Holy Spirit in guiding them and helping us in our weaknesses. By the same Holy Spirit the holy martyrs were strengthened for various torments. Children and young girls, of whom there were a lot, when they crushed their ribs, set fire to their sides, cut off their breasts, prepared tormenting wheels for them and boiling cauldrons filled with tar and sulfur, heated frying pans - they accepted all this as some kind of sweetness and consolation, with wisdom they defeated the tormentors themselves and reproached their violence. So they were guided by the Holy Spirit to the land of righteousness, in which everything is righteous and there is nothing contrary: there are no temptations, no sin, no disasters, no illnesses, sadness and sighing, but always joy, joy, health, poverty, grace and glory. Just as the people of Israel were led to the promised land by a pillar of fire that illuminated the way at night, and a cloud that overshadowed them during the day, so we are led by the Holy Spirit, Who illuminates the darkness of adversity with His light and covers us with His coolness on the day of prosperity. He does not leave us throughout our journey until we enter the promised land, the land of righteousness. The grace of the Holy Spirit for us is either a shining fire or a cooling cloud. With His prevenient grace He leads on the good path, with His accompanying grace He leads, He introduces with the gift of patience, and crowns those led with perfect grace. So, no one can enter the land of righteousness without the help and guidance of the Holy Spirit, for just as a ship on the sea, if it has everything ready for sailing, but lacks only the necessary wind, it cannot safely cross the depths of the sea, so we, sailing to eternity through the sea of ​​this world, need the wind of the Holy Spirit, without which all our efforts, all preparations are all in vain and ineffective. Therefore, it is fitting for us to send up diligent prayers with warm tears to God the Father and to God the Son, and constantly cry out along with the Psalmist: Thy Good Spirit will guide me to the right of the earth. Thy Spirit, God the Father, Consubstantial, Thy Spirit, God the Son, co-essential, Thy Spirit, Father, proceeding from You eternally, Thy Spirit, Son, given from You to the world temporarily, Your Spirit, Father and Son, Consubstantial, Consubstantial and Consubstantial, May Your Good Spirit bless and fertilize our souls! May He make the evil ones good because of the multiplication of iniquities, without changing their nature, but renewing the old man from an evil quality into a good one. May You, O God, send Your Spirit, and our souls will be created, and you will renew the face of the earth (Ps. 103:30), that land that once heard: You are earth and to earth you will return (Gen. 3:19); May the Holy Spirit renew the face of this earth with His grace, so that it becomes a dwelling place for You Yourself, and not for the evil one. In the same way, it is necessary to send up diligent and warm prayers to God the Holy Spirit and, together with our Mother Church, to constantly chant: “O Heavenly King, Comforter, Soul of Truth, Who is everywhere and fulfills all things, Treasure of good things and Giver of life, come and dwell in us, and cleanse us from all filth, and save, O Good One, our souls.” Purify us as fire purifies gold and silver. You are an immaterial Fire, according to the words of Scripture: Our God is a giving Fire (Heb. 12:29). You are a perfecting Fire, not a crushing one. You are Fire, turning a person not into ashes, but into god. You are the Fire that burns sinful thorns and enlightens our souls. You are the Fire that cleanses the vessels of our souls from godless defilements and prepares them for honor. Our souls and bodies disintegrated so that we would burn without burning. Burn us now with You, with Heavenly Fire, so that we may escape the fire of Gehenna and eternal scorching! By You - Fire - let the lamps of our souls burn, so that we, together with the wise virgins, may be admitted into the palace of the Heavenly Bridegroom. O Holy Fire! How sweetly You burn! How mysteriously you shine! How desirable is your burning! Woe to those who do not burn with You and do not shine with You! They will subsequently be enveloped in pitch darkness and plunged into the fire of eternal torment. Holy Spirit, Divine Spirit, Life-Giving Spirit! Burn with the strong flame of Your Divinity all the thorns and tares of our sins, cut off every useless branch growing inside us, destroy dry branches that do not bear fruit, completely eradicate from the fields of our hearts every seed of malice, so that none of us will be burned in eternal fire! O Life-Giving and Divine Trinity, Father, Son and Holy Spirit, One True God! Eternal Father, who created us, Co-Eternal Son, who redeemed us, the Holy Spirit, Consubstantial with the Father and the Son, who sanctified us with Your grace - expand the Orthodox faith, keep the Church from heresies, establish a pious King, strengthen his power, multiply Your people, create an abundance of the fruits of the earth, establish the desired world, plant everywhere piety, plant hope in our hearts, kindle the flame of love, establish good morals, and at the end of temporary life, grant us eternal life, as the only perfect Lover of Humanity! Amen. Sermon on the Day of the Holy Trinity “Let us worship the Father and His Sons, and the Holy Spirit, the Holy Trinity” My dear listener! On the current feast of the most holy, consubstantial, life-giving and indivisible Trinity, bowing and kissing the holy icon, on which the Holy Trinity is depicted in three angelic faces, I seem to see the Holy Trinity not on the cherub throne in heaven, but at the table of Abraham sitting on the ground under the green oak of Mamre; I also see the elder Abraham with Sarah, who had been tired in their days, diligently and willingly busying themselves around the table, serving the Holy Trinity and drinking, and I think (I speak humanly) that now with a good thought we have the most appropriate time to come and worship the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit. High to the sky; not every mind can ascend there even with intelligent, god-thought legs, but with carnal legs this is completely impossible. It is much closer to the Mamvrian tract and Abram’s dwelling. On earth we can travel, if not with our bodily legs, then with our fleeting mind, traversing the entire universe in an instant. God in heaven has unceasing glory in the unapproachable praise of the spirits of angels and the souls of saints, but on earth He is comforted under the shadow by conversation with Abraham and Abraham’s girlfriend. There, thousands of thousands and darkness surround him, but here, as if in solitude, you can’t see anyone except Abraham’s family. It is here that we have a convenient time to worship on this holiday the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit, the Holy Trinity, sitting at the feast at Abraham’s table. How or in what way will we worship? What gift should we bring to bow? Truly, it is not enough to bow to the master with just the head; it is necessary to throw the head and body at the feet of the master, and bring a gift to the master. Nowadays, a bow is more precisely what is called if you offer something to the master, and not just bow your head before him. And gentlemen pay more attention to such a bow when you present something to them, rather than just bowing with your head. Likewise, God the Creator, although there is no delicacy in Him, nevertheless loves that people should not worship Him with anything, that people should not come to Him with bare hands, for the Holy Scripture says: “Let you not appear empty before the Lord” (Sir. 35:4). Let us take out some gift for worship that is pleasing to the Holy Trinity, and put it on Abraham’s table before the Holy Trinity. In heaven, when respectable and important persons bow to God, they lay down their crowns before Him, as the Theologian saw it: “Twenty and four elders fell before Him who sat on the throne and bowed down to Him who lives forever and ever, and laid down their crowns before the throne, saying: You are worthy, O Lord, to receive glory and honor” (Apoc. 4:10, 11). We are not capable of such a bow, for we do not yet have crowns and crowns of heavenly glory, we are not yet crowned with heaven; and God knows who will be worthy of this. So what? Let us act according to the earthly, according to the custom of present offerings! In modern times, when younger people, subjects of the master, bow to their elders, they bring him money - a silver or gold coin, instead of round crowns - large, round gold ducats, some of which are called coronats. The Lord God does not despise such bows, for he accepted and praised even the small two pennies, two mites of the widow. What if that widow had put in a couple of gold pieces? What kind of praise would she receive from church collectors? Truly, when they accepted them, they would say: “This wretched widow has invested more than anyone else.” But not every poor person has enough for such a bow. The rich are stingy, but the poor have nothing. Therefore, I, unworthy and wretched, thought with God’s help to take, as a spiritual (albeit sinful) person, from the spiritual, rich and inexhaustible storehouse three mysterious ducats, forged in the Holy Scriptures from the faith in the Holy Trinity, and bring them to worship the Holy Trinity from the three parts of man - from the soul, from the body and from the spirit: from the soul - to God the Father, from the body - to God the Son, from the spirit - God the Holy Spirit. The Holy Scriptures, which teach faith, are like gold ore, like gold itself, even better than gold and topazes, which is why the great teachers of the faith were called Chrysostomists, gold-tongues and gold-talkers. Let it be permitted to make ducats out of this gold, according to the words of David, who says: “The law of Your mouth is better to me than thousands of gold and silver” (Ps. 119:72), that is, better than thousands of gold and silver coins. To put it simply, the word of God, which assures a person of God and teaches him to please God, is better than a thousand gold chervonets and a thousand minted thalers: “More than a thousand gold and silver.” That king was who counted in thousands; for us, poor slaves, it is enough if we ring before the Lord at least three ducats. For this purpose, I will go first of all to the treasury of St. Jerome, although poor in spirit and things, as a lawyer who swore to preserve poverty, but not poor in spiritual wealth and not the last teacher in the Church of Christ; I will go to his treasury and say from his book, in which he writes that “in ancient times the name of God was held in such esteem that it was not allowed to be written on anything other than pure gold: neither on paper, nor on parchment, nor on wood, nor on stone, nor on silver, but exclusively on a gold tablet.” Let this board be our first ducats, on which we will write the name of God not simply, but symbolically, and bring it as a gift to the first person of the Holy Trinity. Chervonets, like any coin, are not smooth, but always have different images on them: sometimes the faces of some of the monarchs, sometimes their coats of arms, sometimes signs and symbols. And Christ the Savior, having once commanded to show Him the golden kinson, asked the Pharisees: “Whose image and writing is this?” (for there was someone's image and writing there). “I say to Him: Caesar. Then say to them: Render unto Caesar the things that are Caesar's, and the things that are God's to Gods" (Matthew 22:20:21). On the first piece of gold of our faith, I put the following image: Elder Noah holds a dove with an olive branch in his hands, and below I signed: “Salvation of the world.” Ask me, your piety: whose image and writing is this? I will answer you: this is the image of the “Old Day” of God the Father, for from Him, as from an olive root, the Son was born, like an olive branch, and the Holy Spirit proceeds like a dove. Say also, holy obedience: render the Father to the Father. This will be a bow to God the Father, and this bow will come from our soul. But it seems to me that this chervonets has darkened a little; Not everyone sees it, not everyone understands it. So I'll clean it up a little and explain it with interpretation. I call the holy faith chervonets or gold, not by my own invention, but on the basis of church hymns, on the basis of the place where the church, singing in the pre-festive hymns to the Nativity of Christ the three kings who came to Christ with three gifts, compares the holy faith with gold in the following words: “Faith is like gold, love is like myrrh, like Lebanon we will bring deeds to the Creator.” “I believe,” he says, “like gold”: faith is gold, for just as gold is purified by fire, so holy faith is purified by disasters and persecution: “Test them like gold in a furnace” (Wis. 3:6). This gold was cleaned with a stone: “With the stone of the slaying of the bysh,” sawn with saws: “Train the bysh,” cut with iron: “By killing the sword of the dead,” tried in different ways: “Temptation of the Bysh.” It was placed and tested either in fire or in water: “Walking through fire and water.” All this was done to the holy faith (Heb. 11:37). This gold is worthy to be in the heavenly storehouse: “You will find them worthy of Yourself” (Wis. 3:5). It depicts the image of the mental Noah, the King of heaven, God, for the apostle says this: “Children, I am sick, until Christ is imagined in you” (Gal. 4:19). On this golden tree of faith the dove of the Holy Spirit acting in the sacraments is depicted, and an olive knot is also depicted - the olive fruit of the inalienable grace of Christ. Gold buys expensive things, and for a chervonet of faith you can’t buy anything! If you had that spiritual gold of faith as much as a mustard seed, then you would buy yourself such strength that you could move mountains: “If you have faith like the seed of a mustard seed, you say to this mountain: move and be cast into the sea, and so it will be” (Matthew 21:21). Our ancestors bought whatever they wanted with this gold. They wanted to conquer the monarchies of the whole world: “by faith you will conquer the kingdom.” They wanted to grow in virtues and, having risen to the heights of virtue, earn the title of righteous people: “by faith they did righteousness.” They wanted to receive from God what was promised: “by faith you received the promises.” They wanted to tame the fierce beasts, lions and leopards: “by faith you stopped the mouths of the lions.” They wanted to be brave knights in order to defeat their enemies: “by faith I was made strong from weakness, I was strong in battle, I turned the regiments of strangers to flight.” They finally wanted to see the dead rising from their graves, and this is what they got: “He received his dead from the resurrection by faith” (Heb. 11:33, 34:35). These are the expensive things they bought with the gold of faith! Just as holy faith is gold, so God the Trinity, in whom we believe, is also gold. However, this must be understood not in the sense that gold is the Divinity Itself, which is not created, immaterial, not as if God has in Himself mountains of material, created gold, not like the god or idol of Nebuchadnezzar, who had a golden body, but in the sense that through likening to gold the Divine power can be cognized by us. Holy Scripture and teachers often have the habit of likening the Creator to created things and ascribing to God the names of created things, calling Him fire, sun, sea, or gold. This is not because God would truly be like that, but solely for the purpose that a reasonable person, walking as if by steps in considering created things and reflecting on the various perfections of many created things, would realize how infinite the perfections are in God the Creator. This is why David says: “We have learned in all Your works; in all your creations we have learned Your hand” (Ps. 142:5). From Thy creation, O God, he says, I have learned to know You, God. If the sky and the sun, moon and stars visible in the sky are beautiful, then, oh, how more beautiful is He who created all these beautiful things! If the earth is good and there are views that please us, mountains, hills, forests, oak groves, gardens, vineyards, fields, flowers, and besides this, expensive things, silver, gold, precious stones and, finally, beautiful people with faces like angels, then how much better, more expensive and more necessary is He who created all this with His power and wisdom! Learning in this way to recognize the Creator from creation, at this hour we take gold for likeness. Gold will be born in the deep, hidden depths of the earth, and it will not be found soon, but to whom is the Divinity of the Holy Trinity revealed? Who can find and know it? Isaiah says it well: “Truly you are the hidden God, the God of Israel” (Isaiah 45:15). Polished gold shines with a beautiful shine, and sometimes gives off like sparkles of the sun. Similar to this is the Divinity of the Most Holy Trinity, oh, how filled with the radiant rays of indescribable radiance! - that radiance, which even the small particle shown on Tabor could not be seen by the eyes of the saints, and even the gaze of the fast-eyed evangelical eagle, Saint John the Theologian, was supposed to be dulled, not being able to see the invisible. Just as gold enriches people, so the Divinity of the Holy Trinity fills the whole world with the wealth of His gifts. Therefore, Saint Damascus sings in antiphons: “For every creature is rich, let us serve him.” Just as gold is dear to everyone, so is God, oh, how dear He is to those who have a right opinion about Him: “How good is the God of Israel with a right heart!” (Ps. 73:1). Just as different coins are made from the same gold, so in the one Godhead there are three distinct persons: the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit. Just as a gold coin is round, so the Divinity has Its roundness, for, like in a circle, there is neither beginning nor end in Him: He is God without beginning; He is also infinite. I said that on the gold piece of our faith, offered as a gift to God the Father, the Father is symbolically represented by the person of Noah, holding a dove with an olive knot, for both the Son and the Spirit in the Father are inseparable from the Father and with the Father. The Son is like the branch of oil from the root of the oil plant, that is, the olive, and as is the root, so is the branch from it: “As is the Father, like is the Son.” The olive, or olive, is the sign of wisdom in the five wise virgins; it is a sign of mercy in the Samaritan who poured oil on a man wounded by the Jericho robbers; it is a sign of the kingdom in the anointing of David from Samuel; it is also a sign of joy in the psalm of David, which says: “Anoint You, O God, Your God with the oil of joy” (Ps. 42:8). It is a sign of peace and tranquility in those olive branches with which they met Christ at the gates of Jerusalem and sang: “Hosanna, blessed is he who comes, peace in heaven” (Luke 19:38). God the Father is the root of all wisdom, all mercy, all royal power, all peace; He is the King of peace, the Father of the coming age and of all joy, according to the apostle: “Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who comforts us in all our affliction” (1 Cor. 1:3:4). What is God the Son? As a branch born from the root, from the Father, He is one Wisdom with Him, according to what is written: “But we preach Christ, the power of God and the wisdom of God” (1 Cor. 1:23:24); He is mercy itself: “And His mercy from generation to generation is upon those who fear Him” (Ps. 102:17); He is the King of all creation: “His kingdom will have no end”; He is our joy, for he says: “I will come to you, and your heart will rejoice, and no one will take your joy from you” (John 16:22); He is our rest, according to what is written: “This is our peace, making both one” (Eph. 2:14). The same olive knot that was brought by a dove from Heavenly Noah, God the Father, is the Holy Spirit sent down in the form of a dove. He brought, as it were, an olive branch into the womb of the most pure and blessed Virgin, fulfilling in her the incarnation of the Word: “and the Word became flesh,” and thereby bestowing salvation on the world, which is also affirmed by the troparion of the Annunciation Feast, saying: “The day of our salvation is chief.” The waters of the national oath, which fell on the human race for Adam’s crime and in which our nature was drowned, receded from the earth; the flood of God's wrath receded, and dry land appeared; the oath, sinful swamp has dried up: “The oath will be required.” Having explained that little piece of gold with this interpretation, we will place it on Abraham’s table, that is, we will worship following the example of the believer Abraham, about whom the Scripture says: “Abraham believed, and it was counted to him as righteousness” (Rom. 4:3). May this bow to God the Father be from the heart! To bow from the heart means, with faith, to offer our soul to Him, for He gave it to us with the Divine and life-giving breath; and the bow of our faith to God the Father will only be worthy of acceptance when, with our bow, we sacrifice our soul, like some expensive chervonets. Our soul will be like gold to God, and even more precious than gold, for He did not spare His beloved Son to give for it: “Thou shalt love this, as He gave His only begotten Son to eat” (John 3:16). On this precious soul, like on a gold coin, there is also the image of the Divine, for it is known that it was created in the image of God, honored by reason and free will, and is, as it were, a small god, leading good and evil and freely creating both good and evil. This is what it says: “Az rekh, you are gods and sons of the Most High” (Ps. 82:6). God is depicted on this gold coin, that is, in the human soul, so that the image of God the Father is in memory, God the Son is in the mind, God the Holy Spirit is in the will. This coin has the image or likeness of Noah because it sits in the body, like Noah in the ark, and floats on the great and spacious sea of ​​this world. She has the image of an olive tree because she is likened to her by the abundance of spiritual fruits, saying: “I am like an olive tree that is fruitful in the house of God” (Ps. 51:10). Finally, it has the image of a dove because in some places in church histories it is said that human souls (especially the souls of saints) were sometimes visible in the form of a white dove to testify to their purity. Let us bring this golden coin, our soul, to worship God the Father, believing in Him and loving Him from our soul. Now, beloved, I will go to the treasury of the beloved of heaven, hidden in the Song of Songs, I will go for another coin for another person of the Holy Trinity. She, having deeply loved her dear Bridegroom, the heavenly Son of God, and desiring to always have Him before her eyes, depicts His appearance on the table of her heart, depicting it not with simple paints, but with gold itself. Having first outlined His head, he says: “His head, the head of gold”; Having outlined His hands, he says: “There is gold around His hand” (Song 5). I take this golden drawing for the mysterious chervonets of our faith in God the Son and put on it the following symbol: Isaac bears the burden just as He bore ours. If any of you, your piety, asks me: whose image and writing is this? - then I will answer: God the Son, for He, truly, having become the mental Isaac, bore the burden of our sins; You, holy obedience, know this. So, give the Son the Son, and this will be our worship to God the Son. Faith in God the Son, or rather, God the Son Himself, in whom we piously believe, is like a kind of gold, albeit immaterial. One of the historical interpreters, discussing the above words from the Song of Songs, concludes this: it is true that the Son of God Himself wanted to be gold. And what is this for? The Son of God, seeing that there are few people in the world who love Him, and everyone loves gold so much that another would give an eye to gouge out, or even give his soul for gold - seeing this, the Son of God thought in Himself: I too will be gold; then people will love Me like gold. This interpreter, developing his conclusion, cites Christ Himself, as if saying this: I was truly a grape: “I am the vine, you are the birth” (John 15:5), and like a vine to a stake, so I was tied to the cross with iron nails; but no one will look at My red grapes, at my bloody wounds, as Augustine says: “Many want to reign, but no one wants to suffer.” I was and am crying out, calling like this: “Let him be thirsty and let him come to Me and drink; But whoever drinks of the water I will give him will never thirst” (John 4:14). But who came to draw this water? Only one Samaritan woman came to draw, but she, leaving her waterpot, ran into the city. I was a grape, but none were found to take Our grapes; was a river, but there was no one who drew Our waters. He was, He says, a tree ["Christ is an animal tree"], spreading out My hands like branches: "He stretched out His most pure hand on the cross," but who sat under the shadow of that tree? Who loves to rest under the cross, under suffering? I was, he says, a leader, and even in the very way: “I am the way; come after Me” (John 14:6); But how many were there who followed Me? There were more of those about whom it is written in the Gospel: “Many have left Him, who did not walk with Him.” I was a tree, but no one sat in Our shadow. He was a leader, but no one could follow Our path. I was, He says, also the sun: “I am the light of the world” (John 8:12), come to Me and be enlightened. But everyone turned away into darkness, no one wanted to be illuminated by My light: “Everyone who does evil hates the light and does not come to the light, lest his deeds be exposed.” I was also a shepherd of sheep, he says: “I am the good shepherd, I lay down my life for the sheep” (John 10:11), but how many of these sheep are there? There were few chosen ones, and even those dispersed: “I will strike the shepherd, and the sheep will be scattered.” “Leave Him and run away.” I was the sun, but no one shone with My light; I was a shepherd, but no one wanted to follow Me. What should I do, says the Lord? But I know what to do. People all over the world now love gold, so I will become gold so that all people will love Me. That is why it is said that “His head is gold,” “His hand is around gold.” This gold has redeemed us from the eternal destruction of hell: “You were not redeemed with corruptible gold,” says the apostle, “but with the honest blood of the Lamb, the unblemished and undefiled Christ” (1 Pet. 1:18:19). This gold has prepared for us an eternal feast in heaven: “I bequeath to you, as My Father has bequeathed, a kingdom, that you may eat and drink at My table in the kingdom of My Father” (Luke 22:29:30). This gold has crowned and will forever crown our heads. The crown is Christ; This crown is golden: “On His head are many crowns.” The image of God the Father is depicted on this gold, according to what is written: “The radiance of the Father’s glory and the image of His person” (Heb. 1:3). The Father is depicted in Him so that whoever sees Him sees the Father: “He who has seen Me has seen the Father” (John 14:9). I said that on the gold piece of our faith in God the Son is His Divine, Filial Person—Isaac, carrying the burden of firewood on his shoulder. This is because Christ, the Son of God, gathered into one burden all our sins, like firewood: the crime of Adam, like a great and grievous log, cut from a forbidden tree; fratricide of Cainovo; Ham's curse; idolatry, infanticide and fornication of the Israelites. All this collected together became such a heavy burden that He was even forced to complain: “Like a heavy burden is heavy on Me” (Ps. 37:5). Having lifted this burden of human sins onto His shoulder, as Isaac once did with firewood, He carried it along with the heavy cross, carried it to Golgotha, there to become a sacrifice for us: “He bore our sins on His body, He lifted them up on the tree,” says the Apostle Peter (1 Pet. 2:24). For such His good deed, for His free suffering for us, we should be grateful not only in this life, but also in endless centuries, in blessed eternity. In this life, we must bow before Him with a bow as a sign of gratitude, this ducat of remembrance of His suffering and our redemption. May this bow from our body be worthy and pleasing to God the Son. This is only possible if we combine this bow with the chervonets, that is, with grateful remembrance of the suffering of Christ and our redemption; if we mortify our bodies and offer them, as it were, as a sacrifice to God, like Abraham Isaac, laying aside the burden of sin through true repentance, quenching sinful lusts with the knife of the fear of God, not sparing or sparing ourselves for God, for God did not spare His Son for us. Only he is a true admirer who does not regret the gift brought to bow to the master. Likewise, a true worshiper of God will only be the one who mortifies himself not with sorrow, but willingly, sacrifices himself for God and gives everything he has to Him. In the present case, I will also add the following reasoning based on Holy Scripture. The Holy Scriptures indicate two people who sacrificed their children to God: Abraham and Jephthah, the leader of the army of Israel and the judge of Israel. One sacrificed his son, and the other sacrificed his daughter. The latter, going to war against the Ammonites, promised God this way: when you, Lord, he said, give me victory over the enemy and I return home healthy, then I will sacrifice to you what comes out to meet me from the gates of my house: “Be it unto the Lord, and I will offer it up as a burnt offering” (Judges 11:31). When the Lord gave him to conquer the enemy and he was returning in triumph to his home, his only daughter came out of the gate to meet him, whom he loved very much, for he had no other offspring: “Behold, his daughters came out to meet him with tympanums and faces.” It was with considerable regret that he offered it as a sacrifice to God. This is an event worthy of surprise and respect. When Abraham offered up his son Isaac on the altar, and had already raised his hand to slaughter him, the Lord God immediately sent His angel, who restrained Abraham’s hand with the knife, saying: “Do not lay your hand on the youth”; and did not allow Isaac to be slaughtered (Gen. 22:12). When Jephthah sacrificed his daughter to the same Lord God, then in this case God did not send an angel, did not restrain Jephthah’s hand and did not deliver that lady from death. Why, in one case, did the angel deliver the baby Isaac from slaughter, but not the maiden? Perhaps the reason for this is that Jephthah, although he was a brave man, a military man, as it is written about him: “He was a man of war, mighty in strength,” but he had a reproach at his birth, for he came from an unblessed bed, he was the son of a harlot’s wife, and Abraham was a noble man of noble family? Perhaps the angel spared his descendant Isaac, and delivered him from death as a son from a noble family, so that the good would multiply more; and did not save Jephtha’s daughter from death, not wanting to spare the evil generation, so that this lady, when she came of age, would not want to become the same as her grandmother - a harlot’s wife? But the Lord God does not disdain the offspring and the unblessed bed, does not turn away from it, for in the race of Christ many such can be found. Then, perhaps, the reason is that Isaac was a man, and she was a woman? Perhaps a man is held in higher esteem by God than a woman, and therefore He delivers a man from death, but does not deliver a woman? But with the Lord God all souls, both male and female, are of the same value and dignity: He created both equally, which is why the apostle says: “There is neither male nor female” (Gal. 3:28). God does not have special respect for men over women; everyone is equal with Him. If we don’t figure it out ourselves, then Saint Ambrose will tell us this reason, who reasons as follows: “Since both did not have the same degree of zeal for God, then the protection was not the same. And since the merit is not the same, then the reward is not the same. How different is their merit? The parent Jephthah grieved in his heart and wept for his daughter, but the parent Abraham did not grieve or weep.” This is the clear reason why the angel delivered Isaac, but did not protect Jephtha’s daughter. Jephthah felt sorry for his daughter, grieved and cried; Abraham did not spare his son, did not grieve and did not cry. Abraham willingly lifted up Isaac, but Jephthah lifted up his daughter not willingly, but as if under compulsion. For this you, Isaac Abraham, live, and you, daughter of Jephtha, die. The degree of zeal was not the same for both, and therefore the defense was not the same. Likewise, the gift that is offered without regret is favorable to God; and the one who is spared when giving is less pleasing to Him. Therefore, our worship, offered from our body to God the Son, is pleasant or unpleasant, depending on whether we spare ourselves or do not spare ourselves, pity or do not regret, grieve or offer ourselves to Him willingly, slaying our body as a sacrifice by mortification and abstinence from sinful inclinations. For the third ducat for the third person of the Holy Trinity, for God the Holy Spirit, I go to the royal treasury, to the treasures of King David, where among various royal precious things I see a dove with silver wings and golden ribs: “The dove’s wing is covered with silver, and its interior is the glitter of gold” (Ps. 67:14). I take this gold for our piece of faith in God the Holy Spirit and put on it the following symbol: a fire that always burns in the church on the altar at the command of God, who said to Moses: “Let the fire on the altar be taken out and not go out” (Lev. 16:13); above the fire I will write a sign and the inscription: “In my teaching (that is, in the thought of God) a fire will flare up.” If you ask me: whose image and writing is this? - then I will answer: God the Holy Spirit, for He descends both in the form of a dove and in the form of fire. Say, holy obedience: “Render unto the spiritual Spirit.” Now I am first of all amazed at the divine power of the Holy Spirit. The same Spirit appears in the form of different things. One day He appeared in the form of a dove over Christ the Savior, who was baptized in the Jordan. Another time He appeared in the likeness of fire, as, for example, yesterday, when He descended on the apostles in tongues of fire. Sometimes He appears in a watery substance, as in the dew that descended on the fleece of Gideon. Yes, yesterday in the Gospel at the Divine Liturgy the Holy Spirit was called water and river: “Believe in Me, out of His belly will flow rivers of living water” (John 7:38), which is said about the Spirit. All these things are very different from each other and even opposite to each other. Fire does not unite with water, and the dove does not make friends with fire, for one harms the other: water extinguishes fire, and fire scorches the bird. How then do all these things agree in the Holy Spirit? How does one not harm the other: water does not extinguish fire, and fire does not scorch a bird? Perhaps these things, coming down from above, from heaven, do not have the same power as those on earth? Perhaps this water has the property that it does not extinguish fire, and fire acts in such a way that it does not scorch a bird’s feather? But this is not the case, for the Divine fire has such strength and power that if it even touched mountains and stones, they too would burn like dry firewood: “Touch the mountains, and they will rise up” (Ps. 103:32). Divine fire once descended on the victims of Saint Elijah the Prophet and burned not only wood, but also stones and water, and the Divine water of the Holy Spirit has such power that even if one drop of it had dropped into the whole Gehenna, it would truly have completely extinguished the Gehenna fire. Why, then, in the Holy Spirit does not one thing damage another, water - fire, and fire - a dove? The reason for this is nothing other than the fact that the Holy Spirit is the Spirit of love, the Spirit of peace, and even truly love itself and peace itself. And who will not love and peace bring to agreement, will not humble, will not unite even hostile things into a strong friendly unity, will not merge into close friendship and love? As proof of this, one can cite the fiery bush at Sinai. When the Lord God wanted to enter into close love with man, into inextricable reconciliation and friendship, he gave as a sign of this that “the bush burns with fire and is not consumed” (Ex. 3:2). The bush contained brushwood, hay, and reeds; and the fire that burns mountains and stones like straw, this fire did not scorch a single stalk in the bush; He treated the bush so kindly, amicably and amicably: “The bush is hot and not burnt.” This fire foreshadowed the love of God and peace with man, it foreshadowed that the Divinity, united with humanity, as fire united in the bush with straw and hay, would not scorch humanity and humanity would not be scorched by the Divinity. The Holy Spirit also produces something similar to this, He is the Spirit of peace and love, therefore He agrees, reconciles, unites opposite things with each other, so that neither water extinguishes fire, nor fire dries up water and does not scorch a bird’s feather. From this we learn peace and love for our neighbors. If we are peace-loving and kind, then we are able to endure all kinds of misfortunes and, by reasoning about them in the Holy Spirit, we learn to know how a dove is not scorched by fire. After all, purity is not afraid of fire, and the dove is a symbol of purity, proof of which can be seen in the Babylonian cave, where fire did not harm the three pure youths. I will also ask why the Holy Spirit descended on Christ in the form of a dove, and on the apostles not in the form of a dove, but in a fiery form? Why also did He not descend on Christ the Savior in fire, as on the apostles? Until anyone comes to any conclusion, I will go to the canon for the reason. In one irmos regarding the apostles the following words are sung: “Deliverance and purification, receive the fire-inspired dew, O radiant children.” Since the apostles needed deliverance from sins and cleansing, since they still had sinful thorns then, it was necessary for the Holy Spirit to descend on them in fire in order to burn up these thorns. He descended on them not just in fire, but also in dew, as it is sung: “Receive the fire-inspired dew” so that the fire would burn the thorns of sins, and the dew would wash away these ashes. The incarnate Son of God did not need thorn fire and cleansing dew, for He was sinless, there was nothing to scorch or cleanse: “Like God, he does not require cleansing.” So, the Holy Spirit descended on Him not in fire, but in the likeness of a pure bird - a dove, as a sign of the purity and sinlessness of Christ. In addition, although the holy apostles had love for God, it was not yet perfect, like lovers of mankind; Therefore, it was necessary for the Holy Spirit to descend on them in fire in order to inflame their hearts into the perfect love of God. Christ the Savior did not need such fire, for He was never without love, without the Holy Spirit, which, being love itself, mediates between the Father and the Son and connects the Father with the Son in an inseparable union. Further, the apostles demanded enlightenment, for until that time they were still, as it were, in darkness and had imperfect knowledge of the Holy Trinity, and enlightenment is usually accomplished by fire. But Christ the Savior did not need any enlightenment, for He Himself was, even in the human body, light, sufficiently knowing the Father: “No one knows the Father but the Son” (Matthew 11:27). That is why the Holy Spirit did not descend on Him in fire. Now, leaving this alone, we will say that our faith in the Holy Spirit should be like “the space between doves in the glitter of gold.” Just as ramen connects both wings, so our faith should connect, like two wings, love for God and love for neighbor. Just as a bird cannot fly with one wing, love cannot fly to the sky with one wing of love. Both wings must be plated with the silver about which the same David speaks: “The word of the Lord is pure, the silver is kindled” (Ps. 17:31). Divine science, which teaches love of God and love of others, is this pure silver, and silver kindled by ardor for God and neighbor. The Holy Spirit unites both of these silvered wings, that is, love for God and love for neighbor, so that neither love can be without the other, for He is the very love of God the Father and God the Son, pouring out to the human race like molten silver or gold ore: “The love of God was overflowing in your hearts through the Holy Spirit who was given to you” (Rom. 5:5). These dove frames, connecting dual love like two wings, should also be gilded: “its inter-frame is in the glitter of gold,” for just as gold adorns every thing, so love is the most beautiful, the most perfect and the most praiseworthy, which is for both God and neighbor, and merges both into one. Having thus called the Holy Spirit gold, we will now move on to the symbol depicted on it, and proceed to the fire burning on the altar. In the church of God, in the Old Testament tabernacle built by Moses, there were two fires. One of them was inside on the altar. This was the fire that had previously come down from heaven to burn the sacrifices made by Aaron. By the command of God, this fire was watched very carefully, so that it would never go out, but would constantly shine both day and night. The care of it lay with the priests assigned to it, who called it Divine fire and used it only for some sacrifices and burnt offerings, while using it for other needs was forbidden under threat. Another fire was located in front of the doors of the church of meeting. This fire was not descended from heaven, but earthly, ordinary, and it was called alien fire. It was not allowed to be used for sacrifices offered to God, and it was also not allowed to be brought inside the church. When the two sons of Aaron, Nadav and Abihu, having taken alien fire, ordinary fire, and putting it in their censers, dared to bring it inside the church, then fire appeared from the Lord and burned them to ashes. The fire of our love for God must also always burn in the heart, fueled and always supported by the thought of God: “In my teaching (that is, in the thought of God) it will flare up.” Alien fire, that is, worldly, sinful, should not be brought inside the heart under threat, that is, under the fear of eternal death, so that the fire of hell does not burn us forever. Let us bow to the Holy Spirit from our spirit, that is, by working with the spirit of grief and working for the Lord; Let us bring it with a right spirit, renewed, with a spirit of tenderness. The witness of my words is God, whom I serve with my spirit. Amen. Sermon on the Sunday of All Saints, the first after Pentecost “Rejoice and be glad, for your reward is abundant in heaven” (Matthew 5:12) Pious listener! On this week of All Saints, our mother, the holy church, counting the faces of all the saints and celebrating their memory, calls us, her children, to spiritual joy, singing: “Come, all of you, let us rejoice spiritually in the memory of the saints.” There is something for faithful Christians to rejoice and rejoice in about the memory of the saints, for in them they have many defenders, helpers, patrons and intercessors to God. Sinful people, “from whom I am first,” it seems to me, cannot have much joy in this, for they are deprived of communion with the saints. Sinners with the joy of the saints will grieve their hearts even more when they see them in heaven, crowned with an eternal kingdom, and themselves rejected from them, as the Lord says through the mouth of His prophet Isaiah: “Behold, those who work for Me will be satisfied, but you will be hungry; All who work will get drunk, but you will thirst; All who work will rejoice, but you will be put to shame; All who work for Me will rejoice with gladness of heart, but you will cry out in the pain of your heart and weep from contrition of spirit” (Isaiah 65:13:14). I dare say that even for the saints of God there is now not complete joy, both because their holy souls have not yet united with their honest relics, and because they see us sinners willfully deprived of their society, their faces, their eternal joy because of the small and vain sinful sweetness that exists in this world. For for the saints of God, together with the angels of God, just as there is joy in heaven for every repentant sinner, so there is sorrow for every unrepentant sinner, and through this there is, as it were, some kind of obstacle to their joy. What do we need to do so that the saints can completely rejoice in us, just as we do in the saints? Let's do this: let's turn to God with true repentance, so that with our good deeds we prepare for ourselves places in the ranks of the saints, into which we could move after temporary life. By this we will bring both ourselves and the saints complete joy. Whoever of the sinners listens to what is said, whoever hears this, whoever wants to please the saints with his repentance and to be a saint himself, begin true repentance from here. I, unworthy, will begin to attribute repentant sinners to the saints and call them new saints. I will begin this not from myself, not from my own foolishness, but from Divine Scripture, “I make haste for the Lord and confirm the word” (Mark 16:20). But before I begin the intended task, before I begin to attribute sinners to the ranks of saints, I will first ask myself the following question: is it possible for a sinful person to immediately become a saint and have a place with the saints? After all, David says: “Far from the sinner is salvation” (Ps. 119:125). While I search for an answer to this question, I will offer here to your love the letter of the Apostle Paul to the Hebrews. He, pouring out in chapter eleven all his divinely inspired and prudent goodwill to the praise of the holy faith, calls her first of all a priest, a priest, for for her sake God accepted Abel’s sacrifices. Faith is youth without old age, for Enoch, delighted with it, still lives and has not grown old. Faith is the ark in which Noah was saved. Faith is motherhood, for by faith Sarah gave birth to Isaac. Faith is also a living, bloodless sacrifice, for by faith Abraham offered his son Isaac as a living sacrifice, without shedding his blood, and for him faith was a sheath for the knife with which he wanted to kill his son. Faith is an intelligent eye, for it knows how to bless Jacob and how to bless Esau. Faith is a prophet, for with it Joseph predicted the liberation of the Israelites from Egypt. Moses had faith in the fear and scourge of Pharaoh and all of Egypt. Faith is the bottom of the sea that led Israel through dry land. In Joshua, faith is an assault that breaks down the walls of Jericho. Oh, how many great praises of the holy faith the apostle wrote! Let us also look carefully at how the apostle ends his praises: “By faith Rahab the harlot did not perish” (Heb. 11:31). Faith, he says, is the only salvation for a sinner or a sinner: “By faith Rahab the harlot did not perish.” Someone here could say to Saint Paul: Saint Paul! Have you not become exhausted by writing praises of faith? Look, do you write and speak well when you equate the accursed unclean harlot with the faithful Abel, with the pure Enoch, with the godly Noah, with the worthy patriarchs Abraham, Isaac and Jacob and with other holy forefathers? Couldn't you really miss her, not remember her, not compare her with such great saints, and put the harlot and God's saints in the same person, in the same number? Saint Paul, who said that “By faith Rahab the harlot did not perish,” now as if wondering, now rejoicing and triumphing over the salvation of the sinner, he adds the following words: “And what else is the river?” (Heb. 11:32), that is, what more can be said? What could be more amazing and more glorious than the fact that the harlot is among the saints, the unclean is numbered among the pure, the enemy of God is among the saints of God? Discussing this, Theodoret says: “Truly amazing is this apostolic word, with which he added a foreign prodigal wife to Moses, Abraham and other saints in order to show the power of faith. “It is very wonderful,” he says, “that a harlot should have equal praise with the saints.” Hear this, every sinner, and trust! Here is the sure hope of God’s mercy for a sinner who rises from his sins! Throw away sin immediately, break your evil custom, spit out sinful passions, trample them underfoot, rise with repentance, turn to God, begin to repent, begin immediately, without delay, and say: “Reh, now I have begun.” Then the Apostle Paul himself will place you on an equal footing with the great saints, just as Rahab placed the harlot with Moses, Abraham and others. Now, my listener, I have already answered and am answering the proposed question: is it possible for a sinner to be a saint and have a place with saints? “Far from the sinner is salvation,” but only from unrepentant sinners, and from those who truly repent, salvation is near from them: “The Lord is near to all who call on Him” (Ps. 145:18), to all who truly call. We can boldly write such people among the saints and call them new saints. There are two types of sinners. Some soon turn to repentance, fall again and get up again. Others do not quickly or easily get up after falling, although they desire repentance. Here I am leaving out the third sinners who completely despaired, petrified their hearts and, abandoning God, surrendered to the enemy, and through this have already written themselves down in the perilous book of those condemned to hell. I will only speak about those now who are already repenting or want to repent. What should we think about the first sinners, who often fall and after each fall immediately rise with a broken heart and many tears? Where should I write them? It is impossible to write them down among complete sinners, for they have their protection in the Divine Scripture, which are the following words spoken to them: “Once you fall, only rise up and be saved.” If salvation is not lost for them, if they can expect and hope for it, then, undoubtedly, they must be added to the ranks of the saved and placed among the saints. To what kind of person will I attribute them? I will add them to the ranks of the righteous; I will attribute it not from my own imagination, but on the basis of Holy Scripture. The Holy Spirit at the Pritochnik says: “The righteous fall sevenfold” (Proverbs 24:16). Here, everyone listen and be amazed at the fact that he who fell into sin seven times remained righteous: “The righteous fell seven times.” Saint Gregory reads this passage in another translation as follows: “The righteous fall seven times a day.” This is even more amazing, because it was enough for a righteous man to fall seven times in his entire life, but he falls into sin seven times every day. If he falls, and so often - seven times a day, then what kind of righteous man is he? O wise Provider, write down the sinner, and not the righteous, for the sinner falls seven times a day, and not the righteous. If he is righteous, how does he fall? Surely it is proper for a righteous man to stand, and not to fall? Saint Gregory answers this: “Sometimes even the righteous are allowed to fall, so that they learn to stand stronger; They are allowed to deviate towards evil, so that they do not ever fall into pride and destroy the great gifts of virtues.” Excellently, Saint Gregory, you explained the reason for the falls that happen to saints; This is precisely why the righteous are allowed to fall into sin, so that they do not become proud and destroy their virtues, their merits before God. But still I am not yet satisfied with this interpretation of yours, for I want to know why Scripture does not call a sinner a sinner, but a righteous one, and, moreover, one who sins so often: seven times a day? If a righteous man falls seven times a day, then how does he not destroy his righteousness by his frequent falls? There is no need to ask Saint Gregory about this. Let us read the further lines of the Pritochnik, and then we will understand what we want to understand: how it is “seven times a day the righteous fall and rise.” The word “and rises” clearly shows us why the righteous, when he falls, does not destroy his righteousness; because, it turns out, it “rises up.” This is confirmed by Blessed Jerome, who says: “When a righteous person sins, he does not destroy his righteous name, for he always quickly rises up in repentance.” So, if someone has sinned and immediately sincerely repented, then do not dare to call him a sinner. He is a righteous man, for he “rises up”, rises up immediately after the fall, rises up with weeping and sobbing before God, rises up and again expels sin from his soul, like an indecent guest. Saint Chrysostom says about this: “If sin comes to your soul, then let it be your guest, and not a resident.” Such a sinner, who after a fall immediately rises up in repentance, is no longer a sinner, but a righteous one, even if he happened to fall often. This is how David’s words come true: “When he falls, he is not broken, for the Lord strengthens his hand” (Ps. 37:24). May we all be quick in rising from sins and included among the righteous! About other sinners, about those who do not quickly and easily rebel, what can be said about them? First of all, let’s find out who these sinners are? These are those who have fallen into sinful habits, who are completely entangled in the networks of carnal deeds, and about whom the apostle says: “The essence of the deeds of the flesh has been revealed, which are adultery, fornication, uncleanness,” and so on (Gal. 5:19). Those who are entangled in all these carnal passions and sinful pleasures do not quickly rise up, even if they have the thought and intention to repent, even if they say to David: “Oh, that our ways may be corrected!” (Ps. 119:5). Already their habit has turned into second nature and even necessity; they already “They do not want to do this, but they do not want to do this, not they, but the sin that dwells in them, which reigns in their lands” (Rom. 7:19:20). And the fact that such people do not rise quickly and easily can be seen in the example of David. Do you know how David sinned against God during the days of his reign? Remember the beautiful-faced Bathsheba and her husband Uriah. David became entangled in adultery in carnal sinful passion and had already become so accustomed to it that he could not leave it behind. Consumed by conscience about the sin he is committing, thinking about repentance and sighing to God, he says: “Leave the path of unrighteousness from Me and have mercy on me with Your law.” Holy David! Did you weep so much over your sin that you almost went into a frenzy of mind? Do you know what you're saying? If you don't speak well, people will judge you. So Saint Ambrose judges you, saying: “David does not say: leave me from the path of unrighteousness,” but “leave the path of unrighteousness from Me.” Correct yourself, Saint David, and say: “Lord, leave me from the path of unrighteousness.” But David doesn't listen to us. Sighing, he tells God his previous words: “Leave the path of unrighteousness from Me.” Holy David! Where does every reasonable person go if he finds out that there is great robbery on some path? After all, he bypasses him and bypasses him far, and does not ask that the path with the robbers be moved to another place. But will anyone follow the path on which, as he knows, there are robbers? Wouldn't he be crazy then? Will he himself be to blame for his misfortune? Natural reason teaches man: do not walk in the path of unrighteousness, do not walk; if you go, you will act unreasonably: you will fall into the hands of robbers. But David, without bypassing or bypassing the evil path, cries out to God: do not leave me from the path of unrighteousness, but leave the path of unrighteousness from me. Consider, Saint David! What is better: to bypass the evil path further, or to ask that this path, along with the robbers, be moved to another place? Truly, it is better to avoid the evil place. But David says the same: “Leave the way of unrighteousness from Me.” By this, he seems to make us understand the following: I, Lord, cannot lag behind the path of unrighteousness, I cannot change my evil, sinful custom, which has become second nature; It is better that You Yourself, Lord, not me, but somehow leave that evil way from me and raise me to repentance. Here Saint David expresses the idea that just as it is not easy to transfer the people’s path to another place, so it is difficult to change and correct a person who has fallen into carnal and sinful pleasures, about which someone says: “It seems more convenient to leave the path aside (that is, move it to another place) than to change ordinary human passion.” What if such a sinner, although not soon, comes to his senses and, with the help of God, commits true repentance, if his sinful custom, once broken, is cast down and spat upon, and after that never returns to it, but is entirely directed towards cleansing himself through repentance from all filth of the flesh and spirit, and until his death he lives in the purity acquired by repentance? What place in the ranks of saints would such a sinner be worthy of? Let him judge as he pleases; I am not ashamed to put it in the guise of virgins and to write it with virgins, for I have the holy prophet Jeremiah supporting and instructing my hand, in whose book I read the following: “The God of Israel has chosen for Himself, like a husband a bride for love.” However, Israel, not long living in harmony with God, became corrupted, committed adultery and worshiped pagan gods. God admonishes Israel, and at the same time every sinner today, with these words: “The forehead of a prodigal woman was created for you to eat; you did not want to be ashamed; therefore from now on call upon Me: My Father, Thou art the leader of my virginity” (Jer. 3:3). Here let us pay attention to the fact that the same sinful person is called both a harlot and a maiden: “The forehead of a prodigal woman was created for you to eat” - this is a harlot; “Call Me: My Father, the leader of my virginity” - this is a maiden. First a harlot, then a maiden. Why this? But because through true and long-term repentance the honesty of virginity is renewed. If you want to know this more clearly, then listen. Do you know who follows Christ our Lord closest? Those who follow Christ closest are either the apostles or the virgins. First, the apostles follow Christ, to whom He said: “Come after Me”; Next come the virgins behind Christ, as the holy virgin Theologian saw them, who says: “These will follow the Lamb, even if he comes” (Apoc. 14:4). So, behind Christ there is an apostolic and virginal place. Let us remember here the sinner’s wife in the Gospel, who, standing behind at the feet of Christ, “He began to wash His nose with tears” (Luke 7:38). Holy and Supreme Apostle Peter! Warm zealot of Christ! Push the prodigal wife from the feet of Christ, push her away from the place where you, followers of Christ, stand, push away the sinful stench from the Source of purity! But Saint Peter does not forbid her to stand in the apostolic place and touch the feet of Christ. Saint John the Theologian, virgin! At least you drove the harlot out of the virgin place, behind Christ. Let not the evil one stand where the feet of the virgins stand! But the holy Theologian also gives up his virginal place to her. For a long time I was amazed at this and perplexed why a sinner was allowed to fearlessly stand in the apostolic and virginal place, even boldly stand and touch the feet of Christ, until, finally, I learned the reason for this from Saint Chrysostom, who spoke about that wife like this: “Before the wife was a harlot, but now she is a maiden, a sister of Christ, the bride of the Word.” Stay, O woman, truly repentant; Stand boldly in your apostolic and virginal place, for after a long unclean life, through your sudden change and true repentance, you have become a maiden, a sister of Christ, the bride of the Word. This means that all of you, other sinners, although not soon, have nevertheless sincerely and irrevocably turned to repentance, which means you, I say, will be among the virgins with the holy apostles themselves. What else can I say after this? What can I say more wondrous, lofty and glorious than the fact that sinners, through true repentance, become saints? Let the saints rejoice, for sinners are also numbered among them, and the deficiency in their faces is replenished! Let sinners rejoice, for they have a place among the saints! You, Orthodox listeners, listening to what has been said, understand that all this was said for your spiritual consolation. Do not despair of your salvation, even if you commit many sins; quickly, as if from sleep, perk up in spirit from your sins, and, having truly repented, you will be worthy of company with all the saints, which may we all also receive. Amen. Teaching on prayer on Thursday of the first week of Pentecost “Ask, and it will be given to you” (Matthew 7:7) Many of today's politicians or false politicians, or better yet, heretics, say that we should not pray. If, they say, the Lord has already predetermined what to give to whom, and if His predestination is unchangeable, then prayer is completely in vain: for if God predetermined to give, then he will give to the one who does not pray, and if he predetermined not to give, then he will not give to the one who prays. Our Savior rejects us from these blasphemous and insane speeches, saying: “Ask, and it will be given to you” (Matthew 7:7). Many people encourage us to pray: prophets, apostles, the primacy of the Church, the holy fathers of the Old and New Testaments, and, finally, even all the most rude pagans who, being enlightened only by the light of their minds, prayed to their God. And what the false politicians say: “What is predetermined cannot change,” St. Gregory the Dvoeslov answers this: “What the saints do through prayers is so predetermined that without prayer it is impossible to obtain anything of this; for those who pray deserve to receive what Almighty God has first ordained to be given to them.” With these words, he seemed to say the following: God determined what to give to whom, but only through prayer, as through some kind of instrument; for example, he determined to give someone a long life, but not without food; determined to give the sick person health, but not without medicine; determined the abundance of the fruits of the earth, but not without the labors of the peasant; in the same way, God determined to give other things to everyone at His discretion, but not without prayer. Some lazy people who do not want to pray say: God would do better if he gave everyone everything they need without work or prayer. These, besides blaspheming God, do not even know what they are saying. They do not see the ineffable mercy of God towards people in the fact that He deigned to be prayed and supplicated, so that we would have great joy in the gifts of God when we receive them, as if not in vain and not for nothing. Just as sometimes a father, in order to please his child more, deliberately throws a coin on the ground in front of the child, and does not give it directly into his hands, so that, having searched and found, he would rejoice and boast before his father, so the Lord God commands us through prayer and labor to earn the gifts He has prepared for us, so that, having searched, we will gain great joy and glory. Further, it must be said that God has given man great honor by giving him the right to pray to Him. After all, in what honor does a person consider himself when he speaks with great persons: a subject with his master, a slave with a ruler or king, and so on?! And when we pray, we talk with God Himself. What an honor to a man! Saint John Chrysostom says that by praying, we become equal to the angels and even surpass the angels, for when they pray, they cover their faces because of the majesty of God, while we reveal before God our wounds, our poverty, and our wretchedness, with great boldness we stand before Him, as His close family, and, finally, we receive what we ask. “Ask, and it will be given to you,” He tells us. But since people do not talk about this, but seek benefit and profit in every thing, it is appropriate to show what the benefit and power of prayer is, what is the significance of glorifying God and begging Him for our needs, and what is its benefit for the body and soul. There is no such thing that it would be impossible to ask from God, if only we ask for what is in itself good, and if we ask as we should. The words of our Savior are not false: “Ask, and it will be given to you; seek and you will find; push, and the door will be opened to you; everyone who asks will receive it, and everyone who seeks will find it, and it will be opened to the one who asks” (Matthew 7:7:8). What cannot a son ask his father for if he asks him for something useful and necessary? Moreover, a person can ask God. After all, a natural father may be evil, may not love his son, may lie and not give what he promised. But that is not at all the case with God, “the Father of mercies and all comfort.” No one can deceive Him, nor can He lie to anyone. He loves people as His children and does everything he promises. “Who,” He says, “is a man from you, who, if his son asks for bread, will give him a stone for food? Or if he asks for fish, will he give him food for a snake? If you, who are evil, know how to give good things to your children, how much more will your heavenly Father give good things to those who ask Him” (Matthew 7:9-11). You see, He also convinces us and assures us with similarities and His Divine goodness. He brings here a father from whom his children ask for something, and this sufficiently shows the power of prayer. But in order to further show its power and benefit, He also brings in a certain stern judge, not afraid of God and not ashamed of people; even if he brought a merciful one, it would be enough and this would show the power of prayer. After all, God is incomparably more merciful and meek than any most merciful person, and yet He brings even an inhuman judge, whom nothing could incline to mercy and truth - neither the fear of God, nor the fear of people. However, he was persuaded by the prayers and petitions of a widow who was suffering insults. When the widow complained to him and asked him to take revenge on her offender, the unjust judge after a long time said: “Even though I do not fear God, and I do not put man to shame, but this widow does my labors with petitions and tears, I will take vengeance on her” (Luke 18:4:5). After this, what should we think about God, who is infinitely merciful to man, who is always ready to have mercy and always encourages him to ask? “Do you hear,” says the Lord Himself, “what the judge of unrighteousness says? Shouldn’t God take vengeance on His chosen ones who cry out to Him day and night, and be patient for them? I tell you that he will take their vengeance quickly” (Luke 18:6–8). “Prayer conquers nature with its power,” says John Chrysostom. Prayer without weapons defeats enemies visible and invisible. Prayer restrains the hand of even the Almighty Himself, who raises it to take vengeance on sinners. Prayer removed the iron bonds from the feet and hands of Saint Apostle Peter, opened the prison gates and led him safely through all the guards of the soldiers, as Saint Luke tells about this. Through prayer, Saint Paul’s feet weakened in the block, and the inner prison was opened: “When at midnight Paul and the Power of God prayed, suddenly a great coward became, because the foundation of the prison was shaken; And all the doors were opened, and the bonds of all were loosed” (Acts 16:25:26). Through prayer, Joshua kept the sun in its movement until the people of Israel defeated their enemies with the help of God, who heard the voice of man. By prayer, Hezekiah, king of Israel, turned the sun back ten degrees. Elijah closed the sky with prayer and opened it when he wanted; He, through prayer, brought fire down from heaven onto the sacrifice. Through prayer, the three youths remained unscorched in the middle of the fire. And how the Israelites defeated their many and strong enemies: the Canaanites, Hittites, Jebusites, Ammorites, Girgashites, Midianites, Assyrians - after all, not so much with weapons, which they didn’t even have upon leaving Egypt, but with prayer: “It came to pass, when Moses lifted up his hand, that he prevailed over the Amalekites” (Ex. 17:11). How did David defeat the proud and strong Goliath and other enemies? “By prayer, and not by any other weapon,” says Saint Chrysostom. How were the walls of Jericho destroyed during the time of Joshua? By prayer; for the Divine Scripture says: “And the priests sounded the trumpet, as when the people heard the voice of the trumpet, all the people shouted with a great and strong voice, and the city walls fell, and all the people went into the city, and received the city” (Joshua 6:19). Prayer is a shield and weapon in the battle against enemies. She not only arms weak men against strong men, but also takes up weak vessels against very brave men, which God showed especially clearly in Judith, who entered the Assyrian regiments unarmed and three days later, strengthened by prayer, cut off the head of Holofernes with his own sword. Devorah defeated the Midianites. Jael killed the leader Sisera. And who can count the power and effect of holy prayer, revealed and manifested against visible enemies? For this alone, not even a day is enough. The invisible enemies attacking our soul are much stronger, but they too are overcome by prayer. Our Savior Himself testified to this when He said: “This generation proceeds by nothing but prayer and fasting” (Matthew 17:21). By this He seemed to say: this cannot be defeated by any other weapon except the weapon of holy fasting and prayer. To show the power of prayer, I will say the following. Prayer not only defeats the laws of nature, not only is it an insurmountable shield against visible and invisible enemies, but it even holds back the hand of the omnipotent God Himself, raised to defeat sinners. It is difficult to believe these words, but truly they are in the history of Divine Scripture. When the people of Israel left their Lord, made themselves a calf and worshiped him, the Lord was angry with them with great rage and wanted to destroy them. Then Moses fell at the feet of the Lord and began to pray to God for the people. So what happened? Through prayer, Moses restrained the strong hand of the Lord, which had already raised the sword and prepared thunder and thunder to beat the apostates. God wanted to strike and could not. That is why the Lord asked Moses to stop praying, saying: “Do not tread Me (that is, let me go, do not hold Me), lest I be enraged with anger and consume Me” (Ex. 32:10). You see; prayer is so strong that it binds and tames even the wrath of the Almighty, restrains hands raised for vengeance, and protects us from the wrath of God like a shield. But perhaps one of the lazy prayer-goers will say: if prayer is so powerful, then why doesn’t everyone receive what they ask for? To this Saint James gives the following answer: “You ask and do not receive, you ask evilly” (James 9:3). He who wants to receive must ask well. If those who ask do not always receive, then it is not prayer that is to blame, but those who do not pray well. Just as someone who does not know how to manage a good ship well does not sail to the intended destination, but is repeatedly broken on the rocks, and it is not the ship that is to blame, but poor management of it, so prayer, when the one praying does not receive what he asks for, is not to blame for this, but the one who does not pray well. The only people who do not receive what they ask for are those who are either evil themselves and do not want to evade evil in order to do good, or who ask God for an evil thing, or, finally, although they ask for a good thing, they do not ask well, not as they should. An evil person who does not want to leave his iniquity cannot beg God. About Antiochus, the persecutor and tormentor of the people of God, it is written: “The wicked man once prayed, but the Master had mercy on him” (2 Mac. 9:13). St. Paul advises lifting up your hands to God; and what kind of hands should there be? Clean, not stained with blood, theft or retention of someone else’s property, not touched by any uncleanness and washed with tears of repentance. “I want,” he said, “that men should pray, lifting up their holy hands in every place, without anger or reflection” (1 Tim. 2:8). Others do not ask because they do not know what they are asking, like, for example, the sons of Zebedee. The Lord does not give to such people for their own good, just as a father does not give a knife to his begging son. “Those who ask evilly” are those who pray either like a Pharisee, or without diligence, with their thoughts scattered and wandering about their affairs and temporary gains. And what should be said about those who, instead of praying, talk among themselves, condemn some with laughter, and do not allow others to pray? For such and others, about whom there is no time to speak in detail now, prayer turns into sin. Prayer is powerful, but not just any prayer, but perfect prayer, the prayer of those who pray well. What kind of prayer is this? Talking about this requires more than one day, and therefore I will briefly remember at least something. The prayer of one who obeys the Lord is heard and pleasing to God. Who obeys the words of the Lord, as the Lord Himself told us: “Not everyone who says to Me: Lord, Lord, will enter the kingdom of heaven, but do the will of My Father who is in heaven” (Matthew 7:21), who “walks in the law of the Lord” (Ps. 144:19) and does His will, the Lord will fulfill his desire and hear the prayer of those who obey Him. Humble prayer, not pharisaical, rises high, “even to the third heaven,” to the very throne of the Most High: “The prayer of the humble will pass through the clouds” (Sir. 25:3). Such, for example, was the prayer of the humble publican, who said: “God, be merciful to me, a sinner” (Luke 18:13), and to Manasseh, king of Jerusalem. The wings of prayer, on which it flies to the Most High, sitting on six-winged seraphim, are all sorts of virtues, especially humility, fasting and alms, as the archangel Raphael, who flew from heaven, told Tobias about this: “It is better to pray with fasting and alms than to gather up a treasure of gold with interest” (Tov. 12:8). As in any virtue, so especially in prayer, diligence and zeal are necessary: ​​“For the prayer of a righteous man can make much progress” (James 5:16). It was not in vain that our Savior said: “Ask, and it will be given to you; seek and ye shall find; push, and the door will be opened to you.” For example, a poor man begs under someone’s window. If no one hears his voice, then he looks for a way in which he could be heard, looking for a gap through which his voice could reach the master of the house. When this does not have any success, then he comes to the door, knocks on them and wakes up the owner of the house so that he answers his request. The same should be done by one who prays to God. He must with great diligence and zeal ask in faith, seek in hope, knock in love. And you all ask by prayer, seek by good conduct, and knock with great diligence. Saint John Climacus says: “Ask with tears, seek with obedience, knock with patience.” Perhaps someone else will ask: when is it especially appropriate to pray? The Divine Paul answers this. “With all prayer and supplication,” he says, “praying continually in the Spirit, persevering with all patience and prayer” (Eph. 6:18). One should always pray, imitating these heavenly disembodied spirits, especially in times of need, during any difficult undertaking, such as military work. Here you need strength, you need a heart, you need protection and cover. Where can we look for all this if not from God, the Lord of hosts, the Lord of hosts? How can you search if not through prayer? When the children of Israel took up arms against the Ammalekites, Moses went up the mountain to pray. Likewise, the army setting out on a campaign should pray with Moses, for both weapons need the help of prayer, and the prayer of the army strengthens their hands against their adversaries. And all other ranks should raise their reverend hands to God and pray to Him that good warriors will overcome the walls of enemy cities held by untruth. But you, Orthodox listeners, “ask, and it will be given to you,” “press” the heavens with prayer, so that the gates to your inheritance will be opened for you. Brave men are shedding their sweat for you and, if God pleases, they are ready to shed blood; we must shed tears so that the Lord turns the weapons of our enemies into their own hearts and so that their bows are broken. A widow's wife, who had suffered an insult from her rival, came to ask for mercy and judgment from an unrighteous judge who did not fear God and was not ashamed of people, and she begged him for revenge. You, Orthodox Russia, who have suffered insult from your enemy for so long, fall with tears before the merciful and righteous Judge, so that He will avenge you. You are already sufficiently convinced of His mercy and truth. Now just fall to Him with tears and zeal, and He will avenge you and fill you with great joy. After all, He Himself promises, saying: “What does the judge of wickedness say? Shouldn’t God take vengeance on His chosen ones, who cry out to Him day and night, and endure long-suffering for them? I tell you that he will take their vengeance soon.” The clouds and thunder that we see and hear in the sky, according to philosophical wisdom, come from nothing other than moisture, vapor and gases that the sun draws from earthly bodies and lifts them upward. Likewise, we, if we want “the Lord to thunder from heaven, and the Most High to give His voice,” so that He would send down arrows and disperse the enemies, so that He would multiply the lightning and bring the enemies into confusion, and for this we must let out the moisture of tears from our eyes. It does not fall to the ground, but soon ascends to heaven, as David says: “Thou hast laid down my tears before Thee” (Ps. 55:9). From these tears thunder and lightning will come upon the enemies and throw them into confusion. When the cannons thunder on the earth, then the sky will emit these thunders and confuse our enemies. “Ask, and it will be given to you; seek and you will find; push, and the door will be opened to you.” Amen. Sermon for the second week of Pentecost “As Jesus walked by the sea in Galilee, he saw two brothers, Simon, the verb Peter, and Andrew his brother, and the verb they said: He is coming after Me; And having come from there, I saw two brothers, James Zebedee and John his brother, and I called” (Matthew next) Godly listeners! Christ our Lord calls not only the apostles, but together with them all people to Himself, so that the whole world will follow Him. In this Gospel, the Lord called four apostles, and with them all four parts of the universe: in Andrew he called the east, for Saint Andrew subsequently preached in the east; in Peter he called the west, for Saint Peter later worked in the west; in John he called the south, for Saint John later preached the gospel in the south; in Jacob he called upon the north, for he later enlightened the northern countries with the holy faith. So, the Lord, now calling in the Gospel Andrew, Peter, John and James, calls the east, west, south and north. Calling the apostles, He seems to say: come after Me, you who are in the east, and you who are in the west, and you who are in the south, and you who are in the north; all of you come after Me. Perhaps one of those standing here will think and say to himself this: this call was written and spoken not to us, worldly people, but to the spiritual ranks, who were commanded to leave everything, take up their cross and follow in the footsteps of Christ, and who were made fishers of men. To this I will answer by asking this question: Are you a Christian, O man? You answer me: I am a Christian by the grace of Christ. Why are you a Christian? Because you say that I believe in Him and am His servant. If you believe in Him and are His servant, then you must follow Him in every possible way, like a servant following his master, for the Lord says in the Gospel: “Whoever serves Me, let him follow Me” (John 12:26). If you do not follow Him, then what kind of servant will you be? You bear the name of a Christian in vain. Listen to what the Western teacher Augustine says: “He who does not follow Christ is called a Christian in vain.” So, every Christian must follow Christ, although on a thorny path, as those who reject the world walk, but at the same time on an easy, joyful one, as befits a true Christian; must go, and at the same time without any guile, without refusing or deviating from anything, for the apostle writes: “He who says to abide in Him must eat, just as He went to eat, and let him also walk in the same way” (1 John 2:6). In what ways will we follow Christ our Lord? We will consult about this in my current conversation, “I make haste in the Lord.” There are many and different paths that lead to Christ and after Christ. It is impossible to count them, and it is also impossible to go through all of them at once. We, having counted the two pairs of apostles now called by Christ, will invent right paths based on the number and from the names of the apostles. The first two of the now called apostles are called: Peter and Andrew, his brother. “As Jesus walked by the sea in Galilee, he saw two brothers: Simon, who is called Peter, and Andrew, his brother.” Peter in translation means “stone”, and Andrey means “strongest”. Peter is called the stone of faith, and Andrew, if he is called the strongest, then this means that he was the strongest in love for God, which he witnessed by his death for Christ. The three stewards of King Darius judged poorly when they reflected on the question of what or who was the strongest and strongest in all the heavens: one of them considered the king to be the strongest, another - wine, and the third - a woman. I say with Solomon, or, better to say, with the Holy Spirit, who spoke through Solomon’s mouth, that love is above all, and Divine love is both the strongest, and the most durable, strong, for he says in the Song of Songs: “Strong as the death of love, water cannot quench much love, and rivers cannot drown it” (Song 8:6:7). The stone of faith on which the Church of Christ is founded is solid, but the cover of love with which the church is covered is not weak; love covers all the multitude of sins. Peter had his own cross, and Andrey had his own cross. And faith with love also have their crosses, on which those who believe in Him and those who love Him with all the strength of their souls are crucified with Christ. Peter and Andrey were brothers; We consider faith as sisters with love. This is the race of those who seek the Lord, these are the paths that lead to Christ: this is firm faith, like Peter, and the strongest love, like Andrew - this is the first two brothers who follow Christ together. So, first of all, by faith and love, as the right path, all of us Christians will follow Christ, we will follow by faith, and at the same time with good deeds. Somewhere the following story is told about faith. Once upon a time, all the virtues gathered in one place and made a council on how to divide a good person among themselves, like no wealth, so that each virtue had a special part in a person and a place in which it would sit, as in its own home. Prudence and wisdom took their head and settled in the brain. Godly silence settled in the lips: “O Lord, set a guardianship for my mouth” (Ps. 140:3). Repentance took her hair so that together with Magdalene she could wipe Christ’s feet. Obedience was given legs, but patience was given a backbone. Fasting will settle in my stomach, and sighing to God will settle in my chest. Honesty was given a place in the human face, and chaste shame - in the eyes. Divine love embraced the heart: “Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart” (Mark 12:30), and holy faith, as the primary virtue, has taken for itself two parts in man: ears and hands. She took her ears so that she could be heard, and her hands so that she could be performed and accomplished. The place of faith is in hearing, according to the words of the Apostle Paul, who says: “Also, faith comes from hearing, and hearing is by the word of God. How can they believe if they haven’t heard it?” (Rom. 10:17), and the fact that the place of faith is also in the hands, this means that it is manifested in deeds: “Show me,” it is said, “your faith by your works; For faith without works is dead” (James 2:18:20). So, by faith, as the primary virtue and the primary path, we will follow Christ along with good deeds. Having called holy faith the first virtue and the first path, I doubted a little; for the holy fathers also have some doubts regarding Peter and Andrew. Others consider Andrei to be the elder brother, but Peter was supposedly born after Andrei; for it was Andrew who was called first-called, not Peter. That is why I, a sinner, am perplexed, which is the first path, which is the first virtue: faith or love? After all, both without faith and without love it is impossible to be saved, for love has its own all-surpassing height, according to what is written: “Love is above all” (1 Cor. 13:13). Here I will remind you of the following gospel story. One day, envious Jews, Sadducees and Pharisees surrounded Our Lord with their insidious questions, challenging Him to argument, to debates, and at the same time they surrounded Him with a whole crowd, a crowd. The Pharisees, having heard that Jesus had put the Sadducees to shame, all gathered together, and this, it seems to me, was for the purpose that where they could not overcome by force of evidence, they would overcome it with shouts, screams and noise: “gathering together.” “At that time, only one of them, a lawyer, asked the Lord, tempting Him and saying: Teacher! Which commandment is greatest in the law? To this the Lord replied: “Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart,” and so on; “This is the first and great commandment” (Matthew 22ff.). If I, a sinner, had been at that time and looked at it, listening to such words, then I would have fallen at the feet of my Lord and prayed to Him, saying: Lord, first teach these foolish Jews to know You, so that first they know You, their Lord, and believe in You, and then You will teach them Divine love, so that, having known and believed, they will love You. After all, can anyone love an unknown thing? He who does not know something does not want or love it. So, tell them, Lord: the first commandment is to know God, and then to love. But the Lord would not have listened to my foolish advice. The second and tenth time He would still say that the first commandment is nothing other than to love God. I, surprised by this, say to myself: perhaps this is why the Lord teaches the Jews first of all love, because they already knew God and believed in Him, and only love for God was lacking for them. But the apostle says: “If they had known, they had not crucified the Lord of glory” (2 Cor. 2:8), and in another place the Lord Himself complains like this: “Israel did not know Me, and My people did not understand Me” (Is. 1:3). Why then doesn’t the Lord say that the first commandment is to know God and believe in Him, and then to love? I will go to teach this to the great church teacher, Saint John Chrysostom. He teaches this: “Christ did not say, ‘Know the Lord your God and believe in Him,’ but, ‘Thou shalt love Him,’ because it is impossible for anyone who loves God with all his heart not to come to the knowledge of His Son.” Thank you, holy teacher, for your teaching. Now I already know why the first commandment is to love God. It is the very first and most effective for salvation compared to knowledge, because it is more likely that knowledge and faith follow the love of God than love follows knowledge and faith. The Jews knew God and believed in Him, according to what is written: “God is known to Judah, and His great name is known to Israel” (Ps. 75:1), but since they did not love Him, it was as if they did not know Him and did not believe in Him. If faith and love are superior to each other, then we would rather not argue about which virtue is greater - faith or love; We will walk together by faith and love; we only need to truly love God with firm faith. How to truly love God? We will learn this from the book of St. John the Theologian, that book which he does not read with his eyes and tongue, but eats with his teeth. Here the Theologian sees a certain great angel descending from heaven. This angel set his feet like pillars of fire, one on the earth, the other on the sea. In his hand he has an open book, which he gives to the Theologian, saying: “Take this snow.” Oh, angel of God! Do not order the Theologian to eat that heavenly book; deign to first let us read it, so that we know what is written in it. May we learn something from it for our benefit. At the very least, at least say with your own lips what is written in it. But the angel does not listen to us: he does not let us read the book, nor does he verbally tell us what is written in it. He again commands the Theologian: “Take this snow.” Holy Theologian! Answer the angel that you have never eaten books, for books are not written in order to eat them, but in order to read them. Tell him: if I eat a book, and eat it without reading it, then what good will it do, since I don’t know what is written in it? But the Theologian is silent. He will not contradict the angel; he reaches out to that book, takes it, puts it in his mouth, eats it and swallows it. Tell us, holy Theologian, at least this: is there any taste in the book that you ate? Is this book bitter or sweet? Here the Theologian answers us that in that book there is both sweet and bitter taste: “I ate it,” he says, “and it was like honey in my mouth, but bitter in my belly” (Apoc. 10 et seq.). Everything in this case is very surprising, and our mind could not comprehend anything if the interpreters of the Divine Scripture had not told us something about this. Many understand a lot by this book, but time does not allow us to talk about everything in detail, because our conversation would drag on beyond measure. Others give us something suitable for our conversation. That book signified the word of God, which came to earth out of love for people and wanted to lovingly dwell in human souls. This book is not given to the beloved disciple for reading, for “the unknown and secret wisdom of His” the Lord has already revealed to him; he already knows what is written in it. The book is given to be eaten like bread, for the word of God and the love of God are spiritual bread, and like honey, for it surpasses both honey and honeycomb in sweetness; is given so that just as food swallowed is transformed into human nature, so the word of God would be transformed into human nature. This is how much the Lord loved man: “God so love the world!” By John the Theologian we mean not only his person, but also the entire Church of Christ existing on earth, in which there is both a mouth and a belly. God's saints and righteous people are the mouth of the church, according to what is written: “If anyone turns a sinner from his error, he will be like My mouth.” And who is the womb? These are the sinners who work in the belly, about whom it is written: “Whose God is the belly, and their glory is in the cold.” So, we see to whom the word of God is sweet and to whom it is bitter. Sweet to the lips, but bitter to the belly, that is, sweet to the good, and bitter to the evil: “God is very bitter” (James 5:20). The Lord said. Andrey and Peter: “He will come after Me, and all will leave behind Him” (Phil. 3:19). You see how sweet the Lord was to them. But then Christ says to the rich young man: “Sell everything and give it to the poor, and come and follow Me; but he departed sorrowing, for he had gained much” (Matthew 19:21:22). Oh, womb, womb, insatiable womb! Isn't it better to have God than to have many riches? But this is not better for the belly: riches are better for it than God; for him the troubles and cares of life are sweeter than the sweetest Jesus. Oh, blessed lips, for whom the kind word of God is sweet! O accursed womb, to which God is bitterness! So, let everyone know how love can unite with God. Try to be the mouth and not the belly, then truly you will enjoy Divine love and love God sweetly and strongly. But it’s time to move on to the other apostolic duo and from them learn the right paths leading to Christ. Another pair of apostles called by Christ are James and John: “Coming from there, I saw two brothers, James Zebedee and John his brother, and I called.” James is interpreted as a “fighter,” and John as “the grace of God.” From here, everyone who wants to follow Christ, let him learn that for this it is necessary to be a fighter and to have God’s grace with him, it is necessary to fight strongly, and this is possible with the help of God’s grace. Who will you have to fight and in what place? Before we know where and with whom to fight, let's look at ourselves: what path are we on now? I say this not to the righteous, but to sinners, “of whom I am the first.” It seems to me that few of us will boast of the path of our righteousness; Rather, everyone will be sick in their hearts about the path of their sinfulness, according to what is written: “The Lord from heaven will see the sons of men, if they understand or seek God. “They all went astray together,” that is, they all went a sinful, depraved path (Ps. 13:2:3), and Moses says in the book of God: “All flesh defile the way of the earth” (Gen. 6:17). Therefore, the Lord, having mercy on us, came to us and showed us the path of repentance. Before the beginning of the current Gospel, Matthew writes in chapter four: “From then on Jesus began to preach and say: repent, the kingdom of heaven is drawing near. Walking around Galileistem, he saw two brothers” and so on. For this purpose, He first showed the path of repentance, and then called: “Follow Me,” so that we would follow Him along the path of repentance. On this path, you need to be a fighter, like Jacob, and have God’s grace, like John, so that you can steadily and invincibly walk the path of repentance. What do you need to fight on this path of repentance? “With passions and lusts” (James 1:14), for the fierce thieves on it are both demons and their own passions and lusts, according to what is written: “Everyone is tempted, through his own lust he is drawn and deceived.” But the worst thief on this path is sinful habits; it cannot be overcome and overcome quickly, not easily, but only with great difficulty; for if sinful habits take root in someone, they become, as it were, a second nature and even a necessity; then a person “does this not even if he wants, but even if he does not want, he does this. Not he, but the sin living in him, which reigns in his lands.” Holy David! Did you weep so much over your sin that you almost went into a frenzy of mind? Do you know what you're saying? If you don't speak well, people will judge you. So Saint Ambrose judges you, saying: “David does not say: leave me from the path of unrighteousness,” but “leave the path of unrighteousness from Me.” Correct yourself, Saint David, and say: “Lord, leave me from the path of unrighteousness.” Holy David! Where does every reasonable person go if he finds out that there is great robbery on any path? After all, he bypasses him and bypasses him far, and does not ask that the path with the robbers be moved to another place. But will anyone follow the path on which, as he knows, there are robbers? Wouldn't he be crazy then? Will he himself be to blame for his misfortune? Natural reason teaches man: do not walk in the path of unrighteousness, do not walk; if you go, you will act unreasonably: you will fall into the hands of robbers. But David, without bypassing or bypassing the evil path, cries out to God: not me from the path of unrighteousness, but “leave the path of unrighteousness from Me.” Consider, Saint David! What is better: to bypass the evil path further, or to ask that this path, along with the robbers, be moved to another place? Truly, it is better to avoid the evil place. But David says the same: “Leave the path of unrighteousness behind me” and by this he makes us understand the following: I, Lord, cannot leave the path of unrighteousness, I cannot change my evil, sinful custom, which has become second nature; It is better that You Yourself, Lord, not me, but somehow leave that evil way from me and raise me to repentance. Here Saint David expresses the idea that just as it is not easy to transfer the people’s path to another place, so it is difficult to change and correct a person who has fallen into carnal and sinful pleasures, about which someone says: “It seems more convenient to leave the path aside (that is, to move it to another place) than to change ordinary human passion.” What if such a sinner, although not soon, comes to his senses and, with the help of God, commits true repentance, if his sinful custom, once broken, overthrows and spits on him, and after that never returns to him, but is completely directed towards cleansing himself through repentance from all filth of the flesh and spirit, and until his death he lives in the purity acquired by repentance? What place in the ranks of saints would such a sinner be worthy of? Let him judge as he pleases; I am not ashamed to put it in the ranks of the virgins and to write it with the virgins, for I have the holy prophet Jeremiah supporting and instructing my hand, in whose book I read the following: “The God of Israel has chosen for Himself, like a husband a bride for love.” However, Israel, not long living in harmony with God, became corrupted, committed adultery and worshiped pagan gods. God admonishes Israel, and at the same time every sinner today, and admonishes with these words: “The forehead of a prodigal woman was created for you to eat; you did not want to be ashamed; therefore from now on call upon Me: My Father, Thou art the leader of my virginity” (Jer. 3:3). Here let us pay attention to the fact that the same sinful person is called both a harlot and a maiden: “The forehead of a prodigal woman was created for you to eat” - this is a harlot; “Call Me: My Father and the leader of my virginity” - this is a maiden. First a harlot, then a maiden. Why this? But because through true and long-term repentance the honesty of virginity is renewed. If you want to know this more clearly, then listen. Do you know who follows Christ our Lord closest? The apostles and virgins follow Christ closest. First, the apostles follow Christ, to whom He said: “Come after Me”; Next come the virgins behind Christ, as the holy virgin Theologian saw, who says: “These will follow the Lamb, even if the lamb goes” (Apoc. 14:4). So, behind Christ there is an apostolic and virginal place. Let us remember here the sinner wife of the Gospel, who, standing at the feet of Christ, behind, Holy Supreme Apostle Peter! Warm zealot of Christ! Push away the prodigal wife from the feet of Christ; push her away from the place where you, followers of Christ, stand; push away the sinful stench from the Source of life! But the holy Apostle Peter does not forbid her to stand in the apostolic place and touch the feet of Christ. Saint John the Theologian, virgin! At least you drove the harlot out of the virgin place, from behind Christ. Let not the evil one stand where the feet of the virgins stand! But the holy Theologian also gives up his virginal place to her. For a long time I was amazed at this and perplexed why a sinner was allowed to fearlessly stand in the apostolic and virginal place, even boldly stand and touch the feet of Christ, until, finally, I learned the reason for this from Saint Chrysostom, who spoke about that wife like this: “Before the wife was a harlot, but now she is a maiden, a sister of Christ, the bride of the Word.” Stay, O woman, truly repentant; stand boldly in the apostolic place. For after a long and unclean life, through your sudden change and true repentance, you became a maiden, a sister of Christ, the bride of the Word. This means that all of you, other sinners, although not soon, have nevertheless sincerely and irrevocably turned to repentance, which means you too, I say, will be among the virgins and with the holy apostles themselves. What else can I say after this? What can I say more wondrous, lofty and beautiful than the fact that sinners, through true repentance, become saints? Anyone who follows Christ along the path of repentance and fights hard against thieves, that is, with his passions and sinful lusts, needs God’s grace for help, without which we usually cannot do anything. It must be inherent in a person so that, having repented, he does not return to his previous sins. About how one must adhere to the presence of Divine grace and how it helps a person, all this would need to be discussed and studied for a very long time. But in order not to drag out my conversation too long and not burden those listening, I will finish my word. So, listener, we have found good ways leading to Christ and after Christ; they were found according to the number of two pairs of apostles now called by Christ. Let us walk with faith and love, and through strong and true repentance we will adhere to God’s grace. And may Christ Himself, our Lord, who is the true way and life, lead us to true and eternal life in His eternal kingdom. Amen. Teaching on prayer on the fourth week after Pentecost “Many people will come from the east and the west and will lie down with Abraham, Isaac and Jacob in the kingdom of God: but the sons of the kingdom will be driven out into outer darkness” (Matthew 7:11:12) Beloved listeners! Should we speak or silently weep with our hearts about the expulsion of the sons of the kingdom into utter darkness? It is scary to remain silent, for the apostle says: “Woe to me if I do not preach the good news” (1 Cor. 9:16), but talking about this is painful, for who would not be heartbroken when he hears that the sons of the kingdom and their fatherland are dishonorably driven out of their inheritance, from the kingdom, are fiercely drawn and thrown into utter darkness, and in their place some are erected and crowned unknown, alien faces, collected from distant countries of the East and West. It is scary to remain silent, for God commanded: “Cry out loudly, like a trumpet, lift up your voice and proclaim it to My people.” It’s a terrible thing to say, for who wouldn’t be horrified to see the sons of the kingdom bound hand and foot, and the dark dungeon open, filled with unspeakable horrors and bitter torments, accepting the prisoners being thrown inside and closing them in a bottomless abyss for endless centuries. It is very unhelpful to remain silent about the torments prepared for unrepentant sinners, for Scripture says to everyone: “Remember your last” (Sir. 7:39). Talking about pitch darkness, about eternal death penalty is bitter, as Sirach testifies to this: “Oh, death, how bitter is your memory for a man who lives peacefully in his estate!” Oh, pitch darkness! How bitter it is to remember you for a sinner who remains in his sins without repentance! But still, I’d rather speak, even if it’s with pain in my heart. I will speak, firstly, to intimidate my accursed and bitter soul, and secondly, to admonish other sinners like me. I will speak by discussing the following. Who will be driven out? Why will he be expelled? From where and where will he be expelled? First of all, let us consider with our minds who will be cast out. "The sons of the kingdom will be driven out." In the Old Testament, the sons of the kingdom were the Israelites, descended from Abraham, Isaac and Jacob. Because they did not believe in Christ, they were expelled and deprived of the benefits promised to them, and in their place a church of pagans was brought in, gathered from the east and west. But I will leave the Old Testament sons of the kingdom and look for the same sons of the kingdom in the new grace. Who are the sons of the kingdom in the new grace? These are those who in holy baptism are marked to reign with Christ in His eternal kingdom, for whom God has prepared ineffable blessings, for whom the crowns of incorruption are woven, for whom paradise is called, for whom the sky is opened, for whom the faces of disembodied spirits and the souls of the righteous joyfully await - these are the sons of the kingdom. But, oh, horror! These sons of the kingdom, already having the kingdom promised by God, already holding it as if in their hands, they are suddenly deprived of it, fall away and are cast out. Sons of the kingdom are often also considered to be those who, for their worthy life, visible to human eyes, consider themselves great saints and righteous people, and people consider them the same; in the eyes of God they are nothing, according to the word of the apostle: “If anyone imagines that he is worthless, he flatters himself” (Gal. 6:3). To put it briefly and clearly, whoever considers himself to be something is actually nothing. These pretended sons of the kingdom will truly be cast out. A lot of evidence of this can be found in the Divine Scripture. Isn’t virginity, for example, great and sacred for people? Do not those who guard it consider themselves heirs of the heavenly kingdom? And yet even pure virgins are refused at the doors of the heavenly palace: “We know you not” (Matthew 25:12), and in their place they bring into the kingdom harlots who have come to repentance, as if from the West, from their sinful fall, which the Lord Himself speaks of in the Gospel: “Publicans and fornicators boil you in the kingdom of God” (Matthew 21:31). Wasn’t that sinner who wept at the feet of Christ an adulterer? But she received the kingdom of heaven, for the Lord said to her: “Your sins are forgiven” (Luke 7:42). Who expected that the harlot would enter the palaces of the kingdom of heaven, and who expected that the other five gospel virgins would not enter the palaces of the kingdom of heaven? And yet the virgins did not enter, but the harlot entered; these the Heavenly Bridegroom hated, but this he loved; Those were rejected, but this one was accepted. Isn’t it considered great among people for someone to fast, as, for example, the Pharisee said: “I fast twice on the Sabbath” (Luke 18:12). Isn’t it great for someone to be an abstinent person, not to eat fish during Lent, or not only not to eat fish during Lent, but even not to eat meat on fasting days, and not to drink wine? Aren't such people considered sons of the heavenly kingdom? However, sometimes the Lord angrily refuses them: “I did not choose this fast; If you wear your neck like a sickle, and put on sackcloth, and put on ashes, then I will be called a pleasant fast” (Isaiah 58:5). Isn’t it great to give alms, as the previously mentioned Pharisee did, who says: “I give tithes of everything, as much as I can get” (Luke 18:12)? Aren’t such people considered sons of the kingdom of heaven, as even the Lord Himself testifies to in the Gospel: “Sell your possessions and give to the poor, and have treasure in heaven” (Matthew 19:21)? Do you hear the word of the Lord? Those who give alms are promised a place in heaven. However, sometimes even alms do not receive the kingdom of heaven. Was it not the Pharisee with his alms who was rejected by God, and the publican, who was a covetous man, turned out to be the best? “Izade was justified more than onago” (Luke 18:14). It is not for nothing that the apostle says: “Even if I give away all my possessions, there is nothing” (1 Cor. 13:3). Isn’t it considered great to be religious and constantly spend time in prayer? Isn’t such a person considered the heir to the kingdom of heaven? But the Psalmist speaks about this in one place as follows: “Let his prayer become sin” (Ps. 109:7). Oh, damned is your prayer, if it is more a sin than a prayer, if it does not beg, but moves God to anger! Isn't it great to have the gift of prophecy, to foresee the future and predict? Doesn't everyone consider such a saint? Is he not called the son and heir of the heavenly kingdom? However, the Lord says in the Gospel: “Many people said to Me in that day: Lord, Lord, is not Thy name prophesied? And then we will confess to them that I have known you no more” (Matthew 7:22:23). In addition, the apostle says: “Even though I have prophecy and all mysteries, and all understanding, I am nothing” (2 Cor. 13:2). Isn't it considered great among people if someone casts out demons? Don't we call such a saint? Do we not consider him the son of the kingdom? Meanwhile, in the Gospel it is written about them: “Many people will say on that day: Lord, Lord, is it not in Your name that we cast out demons?” He will say: “We do not know you” (Matthew 7:22). Isn’t it considered great among people to be a miracle worker, to move mountains and perform other signs and wonders? Shouldn't these be called the sons of the kingdom of heaven? However, it is written about them in the Gospel that they will say: “Lord, Lord, have we not created in Your name many mighty powers?” But the Lord will answer them: “No one who knows you, get away from Me.” But the apostle also says: “Even though I have removed all the faith, even as I have removed the mountains, I am nothing” (2 Cor. 13:2). I don’t know who those people are to whom the gospel of St. Luke says the following: “The Lord will stand in the house and close the doors, and you will begin to stand outside and knock on the doors, saying: Lord, Lord, open to us! And he answered and said to them: We do not know you. Then you will begin to say: before You we ate and pushed, and You taught on our haystacks. And he says: I tell you, we don’t know where you come from; Depart from Me, all you workers of iniquity” (Luke 13:25–28). In our opinion, it would seem that they should be in the kingdom of heaven. After all, they were acquaintances of Christ on earth, ate and drank with Him in the same company and listened to His teaching. However, the judgment of Christ is not like this: “I don’t know you,” He says, “depart from Me, I don’t know you.” Shouldn't we, Orthodox Christians, be afraid of the same thing, we, who in this life were, as it were, acquaintances of Christ on earth, were baptized in His name, bore His holy name, ate and drank the most pure Divine Mysteries of His body and blood and listened to His teaching from books and from teachers? Truly we must be afraid that he will say the same to us: “We do not know you; I don’t know you anymore; get away from Me! There has already been such an example. When His beloved Israel angered Him with their sins, He, angry, said to them: “You are not My people, and I am not your God” (Hos. 1:9). Previously, God said: “Hear, O Israel! “I am the Lord your God, who brought you out of the land of Egypt, and you are My people,” and then, angry, he says something else: “Neither you are My people, nor I am your God.” What should we think, Christians, who always anger Him with our sins? Will he not say the same to us: “Neither you are My people, nor I am your God”? Isn't it great to be righteous? Is not the kingdom of heaven prepared for those who are righteous? Isn’t it written about them: “Then the righteous will shine like the sun in the kingdom of their Father” (Matthew 13:43)? And yet, not all of them receive salvation and the inheritance of the heavenly kingdom, for the Lord says: “When the time comes, I will judge what is right” (Ps. 74:3). It is not surprising that the Lord will come to judge sinners, but it is wonderful and terrible that He wants to judge the righteous as well, as the Apostle says about this: “We want to judge by an angel, not only by an angel who has fallen away, incorporeal, but also existing in the flesh, having the imaginary life of an angel”; and those, he says, we will judge (1 Cor. 6:3). Isn't it great to be a sheep of Christ? Is it not for them that the land of the right hand has been prepared at the judgment of Christ? “He will place,” it is said, “the sheep at the right hand.” Was it not said to them: “Come, you blessed of My Father, inherit the kingdom prepared for you” (Matthew 25:33:34)? However, not all the sheep will go beyond the heavenly fence, for David says that there will be some sheep in hell: “Like sheep are in hell; death will preserve them” (Ps. 48:15). It is not surprising that there will be goats in hell, for which a place has been prepared there, but it is wonderful and terrible that there will also be sheep in hell: “Sheep are in hell; death will save them.” No wonder the Lord says in prophecies: “If you set your throne in the midst of the stars of heaven, and from there I will overthrow you” (Is. 14:13), that is, if you live so holy that you think that you are already sitting in heaven and already have a ready place there, then I will overthrow you from there, and at the same time I will overthrow you into hell: “Sheep in hell.” These are the kind and how many we have remembered of the sons of the kingdom, of whom many, or rather, very many, will perish, and very few will be saved. Very many of those who should reign in heaven, inherit heavenly blessings, dwell with the angels, endlessly rejoice with the faces of the saints, shine with the glory of the heavenly kingdom and will forever be called sons of the kingdom will be expelled from the inheritance of heaven: all of them will be expelled with shame, according to the word of the Lord: “But the sons of the kingdom will be expelled.” Oh, vanity! Oh, misfortune! Oh, the eternal lamentation of the sons of the kingdom, driven away from their inheritance! It would not be surprising if they were expelled for evil and lawless life, like those whom John’s Apocalypse expels, saying: “Outside are the sorcerers, and the fornicators, and the murderers, and the idolaters, and everyone who loves and commits lies” (Apoc. 22:15). It would not be surprising, I say, if they were expelled for the life of a dog, for witchcraft, for adultery, for murder, for idolatry, and for all lies and untruths; but it is wondrous, terrible, terrible and filled with many tears and sobs that are driven out for a virtuous life. Why? But because they practiced their virtue either hypocritically, or highly intelligent and proudly. So, they will be expelled either for hypocrisy or for arrogance. For hypocrisy, those who practiced virtue in the Pharisee way will be expelled, so that people will appear to be virtuous, pure and immaculately living, giving alms, praying to God, saints, righteous and reverend, sheep, and not goats, sons and heirs of the heavenly kingdom. This is what they will be expelled for: for hypocritically showing their virtue in front of people. Even if we must be virtuous, be a light to the world and an example for others, so that through us the Heavenly Father can be glorified, however, it is appropriate to do good not with the intention of just appearing to people, so that we will be praised, and thereby gain some vain glory, like the hypocritical Pharisees, but solely out of love for God and for the salvation of our soul. If God himself deigns to make our virtue known to everyone, then this is only so that His most holy name is glorified and there would be benefit for others, but not at all for our glorification: “Not to us, Lord, not to us, but to Your name give glory” (Ps. 113:9), for without You we can do nothing good. For arrogance, those sons of the kingdom will be expelled who, although they do not do good in order to appear to people, although they secretly perform their virtue, and only God alone knows about it, but in their minds they are proud, consider themselves holy, perfect, virtuous and righteous; They condemn the weak, that is, sinners, but, considering themselves good, they already consider themselves sons of the kingdom. So, why will they be expelled? Only for having a high opinion of yourself. Let us now remember others whom we previously called sons of the kingdom. Let us consider their unpleasing virtues, for which they will be expelled. Virgins or those who again chose a pure life after losing their virginity will be expelled. They will be expelled because, despite their bodily purity, they did not acquire spiritual purity, - because although they kept their body pure, they defiled their soul with dirty thoughts, in which they eagerly enjoyed and which they did not even consider to be sins - because they were proud of their purity, and laughed at the life of others, condemned it, not even knowing well who they were, but simply because they will seem like a sinner. The purity of such people on the day of judgment will be unclean and unworthy of the heavenly kingdom. Blessed Jerome speaks beautifully about this: “Oh, how many are virgins, whose apparent purity will be dishonored on the day of judgment! But how many are there whose imaginary uncleanness will be crowned by God, the Righteous Judge! Let us heed here that the imaginary purity of some will be dishonestly condemned by the Righteous Judge as uncleanness, and the imaginary impurity of others will be glorified with glory in the kingdom of heaven, as true purity. The fasters will also be expelled (I am not saying this about all fasters, but only about those who turn out to be displeasing to God). Why will they be expelled? Because they either fasted like a Pharisaic, for show to people, or, although they didn’t fast like a Pharisaic, they became proud in their minds that they were practicing virtue. Saint Chrysostom, speaking about such fasters, in Margarita, in word 12, on page 151, says this: “If someone does not drink wine and does not eat meat, then let him not be proud of it, for he has done this no more than cattle. After all, all livestock: ox, donkey, and sheep do not eat meat and do not drink wine.” Another, although he does not fast like a Pharisee, although in his mind he does not become proud of his fast, he has some other deeds that are not pleasing to God, recalled by God Himself in Isaiah’s prophecy: “In the days,” he says, “of your fasts, you do your evil will, your assistants languish (torment, become angry, become malicious, fast in judgments and quarrels); This is not the fast I have chosen, says the Lord Almighty” (Isa. 58:3–5). Saint Chrysostom reasons as follows: “If I abstain from bread, but cannot restrain myself from anger, then I am no longer a man, but a beast; for the beast does not eat bread, but eats the body.” And again: “It is not good and commendable not to eat bread and not drink wine, but not to have malice against one’s neighbors.” So, now it is clear that a faster, if he is either hypocritical, or proud, or has anger towards his neighbor, will be expelled from the kingdom of heaven. Some of those who give alms, build holy churches and decorate them with all splendor will also be expelled. They will be expelled because they do this out of vanity, or because they give alms to the poor, offending their neighbors, robbing and kidnapping, or, finally, because they build churches and decorate them from unrighteous wealth, from human tears and blood, and not from their own righteous labors. The alms of one who takes from one by force and gives to another is no longer alms, but robbery. Create a church to God, and completely destroy your neighbor - it will be robbery. Make a few beggars and churchmen pray for you, and countless others will cry because of you - this will be robbery, not alms. Such people will be driven away from the kingdom of heaven. But you, my listeners, listening to what has been said, understand that all this was said for your spiritual consolation; It is said so that you, although you are in many of your sins, do not despair of your salvation, but so that you will quickly arise, as if from sleep, from your sins. By truly repenting, you will be worthy to receive the kingdom of heaven, which may we all also receive. Amen. First sermon on the fifth week of Pentecost “The whole city went out to meet Jesus; and when they saw Him, they prayed that He would depart from their borders” (Matthew 8:34) The people who drive out the Lord Jesus from themselves are foolish. Those people are unreasonable who are not happy about Christ Jesus coming to them and pray to Him to leave them: “I pray that He may depart from their borders.” People who do not want to see God among themselves are stupid and foolish. You have heard, my love, the story of the Gospel now read at the liturgy, how our Lord, having come to a certain Gergesinian or Gadarene country, healed two demon-possessed people, such demon-possessed people who were bothering that entire country. Being extremely evil, they settled among the tombs, ran through the mountains, through deserts, along roads and attacked the people they met as bandits, so that out of fear no one could go that way (Matthew 8:28). The merciful Lord, having come there, expelled demons from these people and freed the whole country from such demonic monsters, and did not forbid the expelled demons to enter the pigs, for the demons themselves prayed to the Lord, saying: “If you had cast us out, command us to go into the herd of swine,” and the Lord did not forbid them to enter (Matthew 8:31), on the one hand, showing that demons cannot even have power over pigs unless it is allowed to them by God, and on the other hand, revealing their cruelty and torment, for they do not spare the one over whom they have power. The demons, having entered into the pigs, drowned them in the sea, and the people of that country, instead of rejoicing at the coming of the Lord to them and the expulsion of the much-harmful demonic legion from them, became sad about their pigs and began to pray to the Lord Jesus so that He would not remain with them. Don’t live among us, don’t drive demons away from us, don’t drown our pigs; get away from us! “Prayer, that he may pass from their borders” (Matthew 8:34). Oh, stupid ones! Oh, crazy people! Are demons better for you than God? Are pigs dearer to you than Christ? Is it really better for you to see your people mad than healthy? O Gadarenes, more foolish than the Galatians! Oh, those who do not know what is more harmful and what is more beneficial, and who perish in their ignorance! For this reason, I decided to talk to you, your love, about how great the misfortune is to be deprived of the presence of God, not to have God before your eyes, to drive Him away from yourself, not to desire Him and not to look at Him. Oh, how great is the madness and destructiveness of this! But you, your love, incline your ear with attention to the words of my mouth. Where there is God, everything is good, and where there is no God, everything is evil. The person who has God in him does everything good, and everything good happens to him, but the person who does not have God in him does only evil, and only evil happens to him. “If God is with us, no one is against us” (Rom. 8:31), but if God is not with us, then all our enemies attack us and overcome us. If God is with us, then the web will be a stone wall for us, but if God is not with us, then solid stone walls will be a web and will not protect us. It is good for those with whom God is, and for those without God, it is bad for them. So, with whom is God and with whom is God not? Everyone answers this question very easily: whoever is virtuous and pleasing to God, God abides in him, but whoever does evil, who angers God, has no God. God is only with a good person, but He is not with an evil person. It is true that God, with His omnipotent, all-containing and all-controlling power, is with every person, with evil and with good, as “Go everywhere and do everything. Just as His sun shines on the evil and on the good, and rains on the righteous and on the unjust” (Matthew 5:54), so does the life of everyone: good and evil, righteous and sinners. “For in Him we all live and move” (Acts 17:28). But with His special grace, merciful, saving, helping, covering and preserving, He is not with every person, but only with the one who, turning his eyes to Him with fear and heartfelt love, always sees Him present near him, according to the word of David: “I have seen my Lord before me,” and everything that for the sake of His presence, fear and love for Him he does or says or thinks, then He does all this in a manner pleasing to God, speaks honestly, thinks about what is useful, and spends his entire life, which is, as it were, before the eyes of God, virtuously and soul-savingly, often repeating within himself with fear the following words of the holy prophet Elijah and Elisha: “As the Lord lives, to Him I stand” (1 Kings. 17:1), or, I say this more expansively: the Lord lives, before whose all-seeing eyes I walk, stand, sit, do, eat, drink, talk, talk, think, and everything that I do, I do for Him, looking at me, and I do not even dare, before His eyes, looking at me, to do anything bad, or to say, or to think, so that He, being angry at me, did not strike me suddenly for my iniquities. If a person looks at God in this way with his intelligent eyes, then God is present with him, for He approaches those who approach Him, is present with those present around Him, and looks at those who see Him. He is like a mirror. If someone looks into a mirror, then he also looks at the face visible in the mirror, and if someone turns away from the mirror, then the face visible in the mirror also turns away. Likewise, the Lord our God turns to those who turn to Him, and looks at those who look at Him; He turns His face away from those who turn away from Him, and does not look at those who do not look at Him and do not want to see His presence in themselves. But it’s time to consider how great the evil and misfortune is in being deprived of the presence of God. The Gergesinian or Gadarene country, until it had within itself Christ who came there, was rich only in demons and pigs, for in one demoniac there was a whole legion of demons. What is a legion? The Kiev-Pechersk lexicon estimates it at 5000, and interpreters of the Gospel estimate it differently: some at 6666, others at 12000, but it is best to simply say that the legion contains an infinitely large number. Here's what we'll think about here. If one demon can (by God’s permission) do a lot of evil, then what can’t such a countless number of them do? Truly, woe came to that country from many demons. How big was the herd of pigs there? Some reliable narrators say that there were only 2000 pigs, which the demons drowned in the waters. There were quite a few pigs, and there were even more demons, and if there were 12,000 demons in the legion, then for each pig there were 6 demons. If the other demoniac had a legion of demons, then in two legions there were a total of 24,000 demons, and then for each pig there were 12 demons. After all, even one demon could drown the entire herd of pigs; and what could such a multitude of demons do if they were allowed by God? Now, returning our reasoning to the intended purpose of our conversation, let's say: where there is no presence of the Lord, where people do not have God before their eyes, where they do not look at God, there nothing else can multiply, except demons and pigs, that is, demonic malice and swine living; there people are not like people, but like demons and possessed pigs, drowning in the abyss of destruction. Judas lost the presence of the Lord in himself, destroyed his love for Him in his heart, God did not appear before his eyes; although with simple, carnal eyes he looked at Christ; but his intelligent eyes had already turned away from Christ, they began to look at the Jewish host and deliberate about the price: “What will you give me, and I will betray Him to you?” (Matthew 26:15). He completely stopped looking at God and fearing Him. And what happened to Judas? Satan entered into him, and Judas became like a demon, for just as “he who cleaves to the Lord is one spirit with the Lord” (1 Cor. 6:17), so he who cleaves to the demon has one spirit with the demon. An evil person is the same as a demon, for, clinging to the demon, he has one spirit with him. If a person stops looking at God, stops fearing God and does not even think about God in his mind, as if He does not exist at all, then he begins to live godlessly. Forgetting the fear of God, he will go to unrighteous trade and for unjust profit; he will stretch out his hand to what is foreign and to what is holy, he will stretch it out to theft and robbery; will encroach upon his neighbor and begin to seek his head. At that time, such a person is nothing more than a demon, for Satan enters into him, like Judas, and after that he has one spirit with Satan. Oh, how great the evil is in not having God before your eyes! The prodigal son separated from his father, went far from his eyes, and what did he get? He ended up among the pigs, he tended the pigs and ate pig food, “he wanted to be satisfied with the mugs of the pig, which he ate” (Luke 15:16). Likewise, every person, if he begins to be separated from God by his evil deeds, begins to separate his mind from the presence of God, begins to move away from him to a sinful “country far away”; if, I say, he begins to acquire a swinish disposition and the name of a fornicator, then he becomes nothing more than a pig wallowing in the stinking swamp of bad deeds, a demon-possessed pig, arbitrarily rushing to eternal destruction and perishing. So, I repeat: where there is no Lord present, where people do not have the Lord before their eyes, there are only pigs and demons, there is a swine and demonic life, the end of which is drowning, and drowning not in simple waters, but in a river of fire. Pharaoh became enraged, not wanting to listen to God, like a demon, he did not want to let Israel go. And what was the end of Pharaoh? He drowned his body with all his strength in the Red Sea, and his soul in hell. The Sodomites gave themselves over to the life of swine, they raged in a frenzy of vile carnal sins; and what befell them? They were drowned, like the Gergesin pigs, but the drowning was more terrible, for they drowned both soul and body in the flames sent down on them from heaven. What was the reason for such death of Pharaoh and the Sodomites? Truly, only this is that they did not have the presence of God, that is, they did not have God before their eyes, did not look at Him and did not fear Him. Pharaoh said: “I do not know your God, and I will not let Israel go” (Ex. 5:2). He was blind and insane. He did not see God before him and did not know Him above him. The Sodomites also did not have the fear of God. They did not expect God's judgment and terrible vengeance. Their mind, clouded by sinful passions, did not see God, which is clear from the words of God Himself, who spoke to Abraham like this: “The cry of Sodom and Gomorrah has multiplied against Me, and their sins have been many and great; So I came down, that I might see” (Gen. 18:20:21). Let us listen to what God says. “I have come down and see,” as if He, the All-Seer, had never seen them. With His all-seeing eyes He saw them before and always, for before Him “nothing is hidden.” He said this in order to show their guilt, to show the reason for their destruction, which was that they did not look at God, did not have God before their eyes, they were alien to the presence of God. That is why God, as if he had never seen them, says: “I came down and saw them,” and with this He said, as it were, the following: the Sodomites did not remember Me, did not want to know Me and fear Me; for this reason they will now know Me and see Me: they will know Me as executing, if they did not want to know Me as long-suffering; they will see God’s terrible execution if they did not want to see and know God’s mercy; Hitherto I have been patient, but from now on I will begin to execute them; let sinners and all who forget God return to hell. Oh, how great is the evil and misfortune of not being in the sight of God! It is not known which sinner David is talking about: “There is no God before him, his ways are defiled forever” (Ps. 9:25:26); all that is known is why the ways of sinful man are “defiled forever.” Therefore they are defiled because God is not before them. Why does a person transgress the good, holy and soul-saving commandments of God? Because God is not before him. Why does anyone dare to offend their neighbors, rob, kidnap, rape, insult? Because God is not before him. Why does a thief steal and a robber kill? Because God is not in front of them. Why does a shameless person curse, a liar deceive, a perjurer break his oath and swear, and an offender harass? Why does a person, being full of sins himself, condemn others? Because there is no God before them. Why does a bribery judge judge unjustly, a deceitful witness bear false witness, and an evil one deceive? Because God is not in front of them. Why does a drunkard get drunk, a sinner commit fornication and adultery, not be content with a lawful marriage, defile many and be defiled with many? Because there is no God before them, there is no fear of God, they do not have before their eyes, they do not remember God, they do not fear Him, they do not fear eternal torment and do not expect the heavenly kingdom: “There is no God before them.” Oh, if God were before the eyes of the sinner, if he remembered the future judgment and punishment, then he would not have dared to sin and anger God, his Judge and Rewarder. Do you remember, your love, the story of the chaste Susanna and the two lawless elders, the judges of Israel, who wanted to forcibly desecrate a pure woman in Babylon? What pushed them to such a nasty deed and what saved the righteous Susanna from the nasty lawlessness? The only thing that pushed the lawless elders to sin was that they did not have God before their eyes, for they said: “Behold, the fence doors are shut, and no one sees us” (Dan. 13:20). See what they say: "No one can see us." O lawless judges! Oh, lascivious old men! What do you say: “No one can see us”? Doesn't God see you? You have hidden yourself from the eyes of men, but can you hide from the eyes of God? You have closed your doors from people, but how will you close yourself from God? What gardens, what many-leaved trees, what dense forests, deserts, wilds, dens and abysses of the earth will hide you from the all-seeing God? Don't you know what the Scripture says? “The eyes of the Lord are the brightest shadows of the sun, seeing through all the paths of man and looking in secret places” (Sir. 23:27:28). And again: “No matter is hidden from God, and nothing can be hidden from His sight” (Sir. 39:25). And you, damned ones, say: “No one sees us.” This is what pushed them to sin. Did they not have the presence of God before their intelligent eyes? They did not have God before their eyes. They said: “Nobody can see us.” What saved the chaste Susanna from their permission and from the fall? Only one thing that she had in the eyes of her God. Listen to what she said to those nasty elders: “It is better for me, who have not committed a sin, to fall into oblivion than to sin before God.” Oh, wonderful wife! But God is high. You do not see Him with sensual eyes. Why are you afraid of Him? Why do you think that you will sin in His sight? You say, “Sin against God” (Dan. 13:23). Because, he answers, I remember the word of the prophet and king David, who says: “I have seen the Lord before me, as he is at my right hand, that I may not move” (Ps. 15:8). If I do not see Him with my carnal eyes, I see Him with my inner, spiritual, heartfelt eyes; I see Him standing before me and I fear Him, for He sees, knows, tests and judges all my deeds, all my words and thoughts. Therefore, it is better for me, without committing a sin, to fall into the hands of unrighteous judges who conspire to kill me, than to sin before God. Oh, beautiful image of the eternal vision of God! O good cause of everlasting safety from sins! Truly, he who thus has the always present God with him, who always sees his Lord before him in this way, will never stumble and will never anger God. If he, as a man, stumbles in anything, then immediately, having God before his eyes, he will get up, correct himself, and the word of the psalm will come true on him: “Even if he falls, he is not broken, for the Lord strengthens his hand” (Ps. 37:24). But let us turn again to those who do not have God before their eyes. “Molisha (Jesus’s Gergesites), so that he may pass from their borders.” The Gergesians were not yet completely evil people, for, not wanting to see Christ the Lord among themselves, they asked Him through prayer to leave them, and not by force, nor dishonestly drove Him away from them. And we, damned sinners, do incomparably worse: we force and dishonestly drive away Christ our Lord from ourselves. Perhaps someone will say: I have never driven Christ, my Light, away from me, and I do not dishonor Him. To anyone who wants to say this, I will answer: you persecute and dishonor Him in every possible way: you persecute Him in your neighbor and dishonor yourself. How then do you persecute your Christ in your neighbor? Listen. After all, every thing, good or evil, although done to one’s neighbor, is poured out on Christ Himself, as He Himself says in the Gospel: “If you have made one from the least of these brothers of Mine, you have made one with Me” (Matthew 25:40). If you gave alms to a beggar, then you gave it to Christ; and if he did not give to the beggar, then he did not give to Christ: “Unless you made the least of these alone, neither did you make them to Me” (Matthew 25:40). If you did good to your neighbor, then you did good to Christ, and if you did not do good to your neighbor, then you did not do good to Christ. Remember, man, how often you not only failed to do good, but even embittered and offended your neighbor. Not only do you not give alms yourself, but you also forbid others to give it. Not only are you not merciful, but you also encourage others to be unmerciful. All those unmerciful and cruel deeds that you do to your neighbor, are you not doing them to Christ Himself? How many times have you persecuted and offended the innocent, so many times have you persecuted and offended Christ Himself. How many times have you annoyed your neighbor and cursed him, so many times have you annoyed and cursed Christ Himself. As much evil as you have done to your neighbor, so much evil have you done to Christ Himself, according to His word: “As much as you have done to one of the least of these, you have done to Me.” This is how you persecute Christ in your neighbor, man! How then do you dishonor Christ in yourself? Listen! Do you remember what the apostle wrote in his letter to the Corinthians? “Do you not know that your bodies are the delight of Christ” (1 Cor. 6:15)? Will I, having received the hooks of Christ, turn them into the hooks of fornication? Let this not happen! Do you understand, man, what was said? Your ouds are no longer yours, but Christ’s, for by Him they were created, quickened and redeemed by His holy blood; and how many times have you defiled your ouds with unclean carnal sin, so many times have you dishonored Christ, creating the ouds of Christ with the ouds of fornication. Think, man, how often you have defiled yourself with fornication, adultery and other stingy, nasty and godless fornication, just as often you have dishonored Christ, brought the filth of fornication onto Christ and made the hooks of Christ the hooks of a fornicator. But I don’t want to talk too much about it; I am ashamed not only to speak, but also to think. I will leave everything to your own conscience, for everyone knows himself best. Now, be content with this convincing example that you act in relation to Christ worse than the Gergesenes or Gadarenes: they prayed for Him to leave them, and you, by coercion and violence, dishonestly drive away your Christ from yourself among your neighbors, insulting Him in yourself and dishonoring Him with your nasty deeds. Do you know what happened subsequently to the Gadarenes for this? I don't think you know. Listen! When Christ was resurrected and ascended into heaven, soon after this the Jerusalemites betrayed the Roman Caesar, to whom they were subordinate; Nero reigned at this time. Having changed and rebelled, they first attacked with armed force this Gergesinian or Gadarene country, in which many Romans lived, and killed a large number of Gergeseneans. This is retribution for you, Gergesin country, for driving Christ away from you, not wanting to give Him shelter in your place. But this revenge was not enough. Soon something else happened to them. The military leader of Caesar Vespasian, who reigned after Nero, named Annius, intending to pacify the rebels, came with an army to Judea and first of all attacked the Gergesin country, where he completed those murders that the Jerusalemites had not committed, for there he cut with the sword a thousand of the chosen youths, but he gave everything else to his army for captivity and plunder and, devastated by fire and with the sword the city and the whole country, went home. After that, this country was empty until the year one thousand and hundred. This was the second revenge on the Gergesians. After the year one thousand and hundred, the Saracen king from Damascus, who had all the Palestinian countries under his rule, renovated the city of Gergesin, surrounding it with strong stone walls and populating the entire country with people. But after some time, Baldwin, the famous commander, came to the Palestinian countries from Western countries, with great forces of Western Christianity, defeated and drove out the Saracen force, took Jerusalem and became the king of Jerusalem, again destroyed the Gergesin city to the ground, killed all the Saracens in it and finally devastated that entire country, so that it is still empty, except that the Turks partly inhabited it in lately. This is the third revenge on the Gergesin country. But won't there be a fourth one on the last day of judgment? You have heard how many times and how it was avenged. The Gergesenians did this only because they had survived Christ from themselves; they begged Him with prayers to leave them. We, by coercion and dishonor, drive Christ away from us. What can we hope for after this? What kind of revenge can we expect? Judge for yourself! At the beginning I said that where there is God, there is all good, and where there is no God, there is all evil. How can we know if God lives in us? The holy books speak about this truthfully: where there is love, there is God; where there is mercy, there is God; where there is a pure, chaste, holy and sober life, there is God; Where the fear of God is, there is God. To put it briefly, where right faith is located along with good deeds, God also dwells there. Let's see if we haven't driven all this away from ourselves, and at the same time God? There is no true, Christian love in us, but there is only hypocritical love. We flatter each other in our eyes, and turn malice into deceit in our hearts. An ancient prophecy is now coming true for us: “Because iniquity will increase, the love of many will fail” (Matthew 24:12). Our true love has already dried up: we have driven love away from ourselves, which means we have driven Christ God Himself away from us. Don't ask the truth now. Now such lies and insults are being made that it is impossible to say anything about them. We have expelled the truth from ourselves, which means we have also expelled God. Don’t even remember mercy now. People have already forgotten what mercy is. Unmerciful and inhumane insults are being committed among gentlemen everywhere. We have expelled mercy from ourselves, which means we have also expelled God. Don’t even think about a clean, chaste and sober life; In this we are not much different from Sodom and Gomorrah, but there is no end to our drunkenness. Where will you find the fear of God in us today? We have expelled everything from ourselves, and that means we have also expelled God. I don’t dare say anything about faith leading to disagreement, unless I remember one Gospel saying written by St. Luke: “When the Son of Man comes, will he bring faith to the earth?” (Luke 18:8). As for good deeds, we can safely say that we have driven them away from ourselves, and with them we have driven out God. Being without God, without His goodness and mercy, without His protection and protection, what can we hope for? Guess for yourself! I, citing the Gergesene people as an example, will say in conclusion: oh, how great the evil is in being deprived of the presence of God, not having God before your eyes and driving God away from yourself with evil, godless and inhuman deeds! This is extreme stupidity; This is extreme madness, from which may Christ Himself, our Lord, deliver us! Amen. Second sermon on the fifth week of Pentecost “The demons of Jesus prayed, saying: If you drive us out, command us to go into the swine herd. And he said to them: Go" (Matthew 8:31:32) Not only did I not want to talk about demons and pigs, my beloved listeners, but I didn’t even want to think about them. It’s scary to talk about demons, but it’s shameful to talk about pigs. Even the mere memory of dark-shaped demons, the sight of which is more terrible than any torment, is terrifying. It is a shame to talk about pigs with worthy people, because even the Old Testament abhorred them, like nasty animals. Since the current Holy Gospel, read at the Divine Liturgy, offered this story about demons and pigs, we who listened to the Holy Gospel cannot ignore it. Let's talk briefly with God's help. Why do demons ask to enter the pigs and why does the Lord not only not forbid us to comply with their request, but even command it? In this conversation, You Yourself, Lord, act in my mouth and in the ears of my listeners, so that Your action may bring benefit to us sinners, and may glory come to You through us! “I pray to the demons of Jesus” and so on. Beloved listeners! Two things are marvelous here: firstly, the fact that the demons ask Christ our Lord for the command to enter the pigs; secondly, that Christ the Lord does not forbid them. The amazing thing is that demons, being very proud, do not ask to enter into any great and glorious animals: lions, elephants, deer and others, but into dishonorable pigs. It is also amazing that the Lord not only did not refuse them, but even allowed them, while before He did not want to listen to a single request of theirs. They asked that the stones become bread, that He Himself would throw himself down from the roof of the church, that He would allow them to destroy His followers, as the Savior Himself testifies to this: “Simon, Simon, behold, Satan asks you to sow like wheat,” but Christ the Lord never listened to them. He allows the pigs to enter without objection and commands them, saying to them: “Go.” But first, let's talk about the first thing: the demons ask to enter the pigs, for they love their own kind, just as every thing loves a thing similar to itself. Demons are unclean, as the Lord says to one of them in the Holy Evangelist Mark: “Depart, you unclean soul, from man” (Mark 5:8); Pigs are also unclean: they wallow in mud, and in the Old Testament it was forbidden to eat their unclean meat. That’s why demons ask to enter into pigs, unclean into unclean, bad into bad, because likes love their likes, as one of the interpreters says about this: “Do you see,” he says, “where Satan wants to live? In unclean and abominable animals, for he loves uncleanness.” Holy teachers, interpreting the Gospel, by a pig mean a person wallowing in sinful, carnal uncleanness, like a pig in the mud. For example, we hear Saint Chrysostom who says: “What evil does carnal sinful voluptuousness do! It makes a pig out of a person, and even something worse than a pig, for a pig rolls around in the mud and eats dung, while a fornicator eats even more vile food, thinking about nasty mixtures and unclean fornications.” A carnal sinner is like a pig, for just as he is in the mud, so he plunges into uncleanness, which the one who said: “The coal miner is in the depths of the deep” (Ps. 68:3) experienced. The pig looks down and cannot even raise his head up. Likewise, the sinner looks down and does not want to raise his inner eyes to heaven, as Saint Daniel writes about the prodigal elders who attempted the life of the chaste and beautiful Susanna: “Your mind is depraved and your eyes are slanted, so as not to look at heaven” (Dan. 13:9). The pig moans as he walks; The sinner also groans, having no consolation. These groans make the life of a sinner accursed, for as soon as he looks into his conscience, he will immediately groan, seeing himself perishing and every day drawn by his evil habits into the deepest abyss of destruction. Demons ask to enter the pigs, which represent sinners. They express here their desire that they are very pleased to live in prodigal people who lead a swine life, as in creatures most suitable for them, for someone who lives prodigal and intemperate is like not only a pig, but even the demon himself, as St. Chrysostom says about this: “Such a person is no different from a demoniac or even from the demon himself, for he is just as shameless, just as furious, just as evil as and a demon." Just as a pig stinks, so does a demon stink; the sinner is just as stinking. Smart people say about the devil that wherever he goes, he carries the fire of Gehenna within himself, and just as he is from the fire, so the fire is not separated from him: everywhere he is burned and tormented by punishment. Likewise, the intemperate fornicator carries the fire of the flesh with him everywhere and is kindled by fire everywhere. The eternal execution of God for demons is darkness, stench and fire; the same punishment will befall bad people: they are destined for total darkness in the underworld, stench, never-ending worms and unquenchable fire of Gehenna. For the most disgusting iniquities, God once executed Sodom and the surrounding cities. How did he execute? Scripture says: “The Lord will rain upon Sodom the burning stone.” In another translation it reads like this: “The Lord will rain brimstone and fire on Sodom” (Gen. 19:24), and interpreters explain that the stones sent down on the lawless cities were burning brimstone. And what could be stinkier than burning sulfur? Why did the Lord execute those sinners with brimstone and fire? Saint Gregory explains this, saying: “What does sulfur mean if not the stench of prodigal flesh? What does fire signify and execute, if not carnal kindling? Therefore, when the Lord wanted to execute the Sodomites and Gomorrites for their heinous carnal sins, then in the very nature of the execution He revealed the nature of their sins.” As were the sins, such was the execution: therefore it is clear that the unclean defiler of his body is similar in his deeds to the devil and is dear to him, like a pig to a wolf. Demons love to live in pig-like fornicators, for they are their true homes. Just as a wanderer wants to reach his home and live in it, so demons, moving from place to place, want to live in fornicators as in their true homes. The narratives say that such an incident occurred in Carthage. In one place there stood an idol of the pagan goddess Venus. Venus is a prodigal wife, whom the wicked Greeks depicted extremely shamelessly, in a naked form, as a temptation to everyone passing by. One day, one of the virgins, walking by, saw the shameless nakedness of this female idol, and then a nasty thought appeared in his heart: he began to enjoy unclean thoughts and become inflamed with lust. And so, when he held that sinful thought within himself for a long time, enjoyed it and desired the deed itself, he immediately became the dwelling place of a demon: the unclean spirit entered him and began to torment him. You see how deliberate impurity makes a person a den for the robber—the devil. What can be said about prodigal uncleanness, which is fulfilled by the act itself? Will the devil settle in it, as in his true home? Do you hear this, you most vile fornicator? Don't you know that there is a demon living in you? Don't you feel it within yourself? Or perhaps you don’t believe what was said? The Monk Hilarion once cast out a demon from a girl, which a prodigal youth had sent into her through sorcery. Casting him out, he asked: “Why didn’t you enter into the young man who settled you here?” The demon answered: “That young man has in himself another friend of mine, the lustful fornicator demon.” Let us heed this: a prodigal demon lives in a fornicator, who torments him with prodigal inflammation. So, now we know why demons ask to enter pigs, which signify sinners. They express by this that they love to live among prodigal people, like pigs. Next, we will explore something else: why does the Lord not only not forbid the fulfillment of their request, but even commands and says to them: “Go”? This is in order, on the one hand, to show the tormenting dominance of demons over fornicators, as Augustine says about it: “Christ allows demons to enter pigs in order to show that the devil rules over those who lead a swine’s life,” on the other hand, in order to show His power, vengeance and righteous judgment over fornicators, which punishes all fornication undertakings, according to what is written: “But God judges the fornicator and the adulterer” (Heb. 13:4). The devil dominates and even reigns over fornicators as over his own people and his slaves, for, according to the apostle, “It is the devil who commits sin” (John 3:8); such a one does not work for Christ, but for the devil. We know that the devil once reigned over idolaters: they were his true slaves. People who live in bodily uncleanness are the second idolaters; therefore, they too are his true slaves. And that fornicators are precisely idolaters, this is clear from the words of the holy Apostle, who says this: “There are no men who turn the grace of our God into defilement and reject the only Master God and our Lord Jesus Christ” (Jude 1:4). Who is this “who turns the grace of our God into defilement”? Truly, none other than Christians who accepted the grace of Christianity in baptism. They, having fallen into prodigal defilement, turn the received grace of God into defilement and renounce Christ, if not in word before the tormentor, then in deed before their master - the devil. And the one who renounces Christ through prodigal acts, is he not an idolater? His idol is his passion, and in it, as in an idol, he has a demon, his master, to whom he presents his heart, which gives rise to bad thoughts, as an altar; on this altar he places the fire of sinful lust, sacrifices the very act of immorality, by which the whole is desecrated, and becomes like and pleasing to the demon. The devil rules over such baptized idolaters as over his slaves, and he rules tormentingly; for wherever he succeeds, he breaks it, casts it into fire and into water, and destroys it. It breaks, taking away the spiritual strength to repent and depriving the sinner of God’s grace; plunges into the fire of carnal decay or intemperance and into the water of unclean voluptuousness; destroys him, drowning him in the hellish abyss, like a pig in the sea, tormenting and depressing him forever. This is the kind of reward the devil gives to his servant, who faithfully and diligently works for him through carnal filthiness! This is the tormenting dominance of a demon over a sinner! Showing this, the Lord in this Gospel commands the demons to go into pigs, which signify prodigal people: “And the herd of swine rushed along the shore into the sea, and drowned in the waters” (Matthew 8:22). Finally, for this reason, the Lord commanded the demons to enter into the pigs and drown them, in order to clearly show His immediate and immediate execution on sinners. Christ God, born of the most pure and immaculate Virgin and who is the source of all purity, is disgusted with every fornicator, and therefore He takes arms against him as against His enemy. Carnal wisdom, according to the apostle, “There is enmity against God” (Rom. 8:7). This means that a person who has immersed his mind in carnal defilements and no longer thinks about anything else, that is, dreams and desires only carnal, sinful pleasure, is a great enemy of God. Therefore, the Lord arms himself against him as against His enemy: He needs to avenge his enmity. Here we hear in the Scriptures of the wise Solomon how Wisdom wants to prepare for battle: “His zeal will take up all the weapons, and the creature will make the creature armed for vengeance on the enemy, and will put on the armor of righteousness, and will put on the helmet of unfeigned judgment, will take on an invincible shield of honor, but in vain will anger sharpen in weapons,” that is, He will sharpen His anger like a sword. (Prem. 5 et seq.). Here, first of all, we will be surprised how the Wisdom of God, being, according to the Apostle, peaceful, meek, full of mercy, “in vain,” that is, suddenly, accidentally turning into rage, wants to raise a war, sharpen His sword and anger; Then we will consider on whom She sharpens Her sword and with whom She wants to enter into battle. Scripture says that She wants to wage war against the insane and gathers for Herself great strength from all over the world for this war. “He will move,” it is said, “to fight with Him against the foolish.” According to interpretations, this means that all four elements, of which the whole world consists, will raise a battle against the foolish, together with the Wisdom of God. Who is it that is so mad that it provokes and irritates God’s Wisdom to attack itself? Truly, none other than a man immersed in evil, fornication, for he is called foolish by the Scripture, which says: “An adulterer, through poverty of mind, brings about the destruction of his soul” (Sir. 25:4). Against such and such, as against His enemy, Christ, the incarnate Wisdom of God, will rise up for battle. Look at the rage and anger that prodigal sin arouses in God! Truly, all sins are unpleasant for God, they all irritate Him and move Him to wrathful vengeance, but not all are the same. One day the holy Theologian saw the Lord walking between seven lamps, and from His mouth came a two-edged sword. The sword does not have its usual place in the mouth: it belongs in human hands. But with the Lord this has a special meaning, for He says: “Write to the angel of the church of Pergamon: this says: He has a sharp two-edged sword” (Apoc. 2:12), and that sword is no longer in the mouth, but in the hands, according to what is written elsewhere: “The sword is drawn in His hand.” This means that our Lord has two swords, according to the word of Petrov: “Behold, here are two swords” (Luke 22:38): a sword in the mouth and a sword in the hand, both sharp. Who are these swords for? For those who sin: against little sinners the sword is in the mouth, not to kill them, but only to admonish them with a word and teach them; the sword in the hand is for great sinners, to take revenge on them. “Swords,” it is said, “are two-edged in their hands; take vengeance and kill them” (Ps. 149:6:7). “In the morning,” it is also said, “you have slain all the sinners of the earth; you have consumed from the city of the Lord all those who practice iniquity” (Ps. 100:8). But I, a sinner, want to know exactly what was said in the Revelation of the Theologian; I want to make sure that the sword in the mouth is intended specifically for lesser sinners, and the sword in the hands is for the greater. For whom exactly is the double-edged sword held in the hands prepared? Truly, against none other than the prodigals, which is clear from the words of the Lord Himself, saying to the Pergamon angel: “It is not enough for the Imam, since he imashed the teaching of Balaam, who taught Balak to lay a temptation before the children of Israel to eat food sacrificed to idols and to commit fornication” (Apoc. 2:14). Now it is clear for whom the Lord has a two-edged and subtle sword in His hand: against fornicators. Just as there an angel appeared against Balaam to Balaam’s donkey with a drawn sword, so here the “angel of great counsel,” Christ the Lord, draws His sword against the vile fornicators. But someone, perhaps, will say: what offense does Christ God have because someone defiles his body with prodigal sin? Truly, a great offense, for the body of a Christian person is not his body, but Christ’s, according to what is written: “You are the body of Christ and part of it,” and again: “You are yours, bought with natural price, but with the price of the blood of Christ, not redeemed with corruptible things with gold and silver, but with the honest blood of the Lamb, without blemish and the most pure of Christ” (1 Cor. 12:27; 6:20). O Christian! The head with which you think about carnal things is not yours, but Christ’s, and it is not fitting for you to think about stingy things with Christ’s head; the feet with which you rush towards iniquity are not yours, but Christ’s, and it is not fitting for you to go towards iniquity; The hands with which you do evil are not yours, but Christ’s, and it is not fitting for you to do evil with the hands of Christ. Your whole body, which you make foul and stinking through prodigal sin, is not yours, but Christ’s: “You are the body of Christ,” and it is not fitting for you to defile and stink the body of Christ with carnal voluptuous deeds, apart from legal marriage, for you are the house of Christ, according to the word of the Apostle: “The church of God is holy, just as you are” (1 Cor. 3:17). If someone wanted to drive his master out of his own house, would he not cause him great offense? Of course, he would, and the master being expelled from his home would certainly take a sword or something else and begin to fight against the expeller. Likewise, Christ the Lord, whom we ourselves drive out through our nasty carnal deeds from His own house, purchased with His blood, will take the sword into His hands to take revenge on us His insult. So, we now know why the Lord allowed demons to enter the pigs. By this He shows His terrible vengeance on sinners. As if with a sharp sword, He will punish sinners by handing them over to cruel demons for terrible, eternal torment. May the Lord give us, sinners, repentance and conversion and, out of His love for mankind, may He turn away all His righteous anger directed at us. Amen. Sermon for the sixth week of Pentecost “When Jesus entered the ship, he went away and came to his city” (Matthew 9:1). “Jesus appeared in a certain place” (Luke 10:38) Beloved listeners! This Sunday and the current feast of the Most Pure Virgin Mary, we heard two gospel stories read at the Divine Liturgy, and in both we heard something unknown to us. The Sunday Gospel of Matthew begins: “Jesus entered the ship, went away, and came to His city”; the festive Gospel of Luke has the following beginning: “Jesus came into a certain place.” “City” and “whole” are both names, and it is not known which city exactly is the city of our Lord Jesus Christ into which He came, and which exactly that whole city into which He entered. You cannot ask the holy evangelists Matthew and Luke, who described the walk and miracles of Christ, about this: you cannot be angry with them for not mentioning the name of the city and the village, for they are our intercessors before God. In addition, they must be revered for the fact that Saint Matthew was the first to write in the Gospel the blessed name of the Most Holy Virgin Mary, from whom Jesus, called Christ, was born, and Saint Luke was the first to write the most pure and miraculous icon of the Most Pure Virgin Mary, now called the Vladimir, the meeting of which we now celebrate. Let us thank the holy evangelists for this! And as for the hail and light, which are remembered in the current Gospels, but are not indicated by name, then allow me, your love, to preach about them; let me tell you exactly what is the name of the city into which Jesus came, and all that He entered; let me try some of their secrets, find out who lives in them, and offer all this, with God’s help, to your love for the honor of this holiday and for our common benefit. First let's talk about hail. “Jesus entered the ship, went away and came to His city.” Better at home than away. Our Lord was visiting in the country of Gergesin, which we heard about in the Gospel last week; I was there with a gift, with healing grace, healed two demoniacs there and also wanted to do a lot of good there, but the inhospitable residents there did not accept our Lord, they were not happy with Him: “When you saw Him, you prayed that He would depart from their borders. “When you entered the ship, you went away and came to your city” (Matthew 8:34). Better at home! What city was the Lord's own? Perhaps someone will think that His city was Jerusalem, in which His forefather David had the throne and in which a church was specially created for Him - the Holy of Holies: “Solomon built a church for Him” (Acts 7:47). And how much Christ the Lord cared for the inhabitants of this city can be seen from His words in the Gospel: “Jerusalem, Jerusalem! Since your fellow children have so much desire, as their chicks gather kokosh under their wings” (Luke 13:34). One would think that Jerusalem is the city of Christ. However, the Lord does not consider it His city and even shuns it, for He says to the Jerusalemites: “Behold, your house is left empty. Do not see Me from here” (Matthew 23:38:39). Perhaps someone will think that His city is Nazareth, in which He was conceived in the womb of the Most Pure Virgin, or Bethlehem, in which He was born. Indeed, they were once His cities, but He left them long ago. Herod, the child killer, drove Him out of Bethlehem, and righteous Joseph, His imaginary father, brought Him out of Nazareth. What kind of city is His own? The interpreter of the Gospels, Saint Theophylact, considers Capernaum, which was the capital in the country of Galilee, to be the city of Christ. He says this: “I was born in Bethlehem and raised in Nazareth.” What is surprising to me is why Christ the Lord did not deign to live in Jerusalem, where His forefathers lived and reigned, where all the pious people who knew the one God lived and acted, where sacrifices and offerings were made to God, but in Capernaum, which was a pagan city and in which there were few Jews, few pious people, but more filthy idolaters and pagans: “Galilean tongue.” From the historical legend, the reason why Capernaum was called His city for Christ is clearly visible. The point is this. When Joseph returned from Etiptos, he first settled in Nazareth, which was located in the country of Galilee and lay not far from the main city of the country - Capernaum. Nazareth was a small town and not convenient for Joseph, who lived by carpentry work and ate only the labor of his hands. In Nazareth, as in a village, there was nothing to do as a carpenter, and therefore he moved to Capernaum. After all, in a big city, where fires happen more often, there is a great need for carpenters. Having bought himself a small house in Capernaum, he himself lived from woodworking and nourished the Most Pure Virgin and the Divine Youth. After some time, Joseph died, and in his house the most pure Virgin remained with her Son, our Lord, and she lived there until the age of thirty of Christ, and even more, for Christ sometimes visited His fatherland Nazareth, going to His relatives. When Christ was thirty years old and He wanted to reveal Himself to the world, then He left Capernaum to the surrounding cities, villages and countries, preaching the gospel, working miracles and healing diseases in people. He visited Jerusalem and other surrounding cities, but He again returned to Capernaum, to His home, to His Most Pure Mother, and in general stayed in Capernaum more than in other cities. That is why Capernaum is called the city of Christ, as we heard in the Gospel: “When Jesus entered the ship, he went away and came to His city,” that is, to Capernaum. This is how things stand historically. Reasoning spiritually, we will see the wondrous providence and mystery of our Lord in the fact that He deigned to live in Capernaum and call it His city. The word "Capernaum" is interpreted as "repentance." Capernaum in its name contains both repentance and consolation, for where there is repentance, there is consolation, and spiritual consolation, because even angels, disembodied spirits, rejoice at the sinner’s repentance: “Great joy comes in heaven through an angel for one sinner who repents” (Luke 15:10). Let us now see why our Lord deigned to remain in Capernaum, and not in Jerusalem, until the age of thirty, and to call Capernaum, not Jerusalem, His city? The reason is that in Jerusalem everyone was proud and hypocritically righteous, everyone only considered themselves righteous and holy. Bishops Anna and Caiaphas are the saints in it; the scribes and Pharisees are the righteous. Don’t say a word to them, otherwise they will immediately answer: “Thou art born entirely in sins, and is it Thou who teach us?” (John 9:34). And do not call Pilate unrighteous, for he washes his hands. “I am pure from the blood of the Righteous One,” he says (Matthew 27:34). And who is in Capernaum? All who lived there were sinners, pagans, unrighteous people, publicans, and among them was Matthew, who sat at the tollhouse in Capernaum. Our Lord looked at Jerusalem with His all-seeing eyes and, seeing those hypocritical imaginary saints and righteous people, said to Himself: I will not go to live with them, for all of these are empty saints, “the graves are melted down, inside are full of stinking bones,” only holy on the outside, but lawless on the inside, and proud at that; But anyone with a high heart is an abomination to God (Matthew 23:27). I will not live with them; I’d rather go to Capernaum to the sinners, I’ll start living there, waiting for their conversion: “For I came not to call the righteous, but sinners to repentance” (Mark 2:17). So, Capernaum is the village of repentance, the city of Christ, repentance. Do not judge, O holy Jerusalem, sinful Capernaum; Do not judge, I say, an empty-minded person whom you see sinning; for in Capernaum there is Christ, and in Jerusalem there is Pilate. Rather, God will be with the sinner, as “love the righteous and have mercy on sinners,” waiting for the conversion of sinners. It is more likely that the mercy of God will be with a sinner than with an empty saint, proud and highly intelligent. Saint John Climacus says well: “Before God, a humble sinner is better than one who does good but is proud.” God is always with the sinner, waiting for an opportunity to save him. Pilate of hell is looking for an opportunity to destroy those who consider themselves righteous. The Lord deigned to live in Capernaum, the capital city of Galilee, so that Isaiah’s prophecy would come true: “The tongue of Galilee, the people sitting in darkness, saw the great light” (Is. 9:2), which was a prototype of the church of the pagans. Israel was about to be rejected, and the pagans called: “I will call,” it is said, “My tongues, and they will glorify Me.” The fact that our Lord, who came to save Israel, settled not in Jerusalem, the capital city of the Kingdom of Israel, but in Capernaum, was the foreshadowing of what was said. Settling in Capernaum, He seemed to have already begun to create a church for Himself from the pagans, which is why Isaiah’s prophecy came true: “The language of Galilee, the people who sat in darkness, saw the great light.” Galilee was in darkness, in pagan error, in ignorance of the true God; when she was honored to have the Light of our Christ God and His Most Pure Mother living with her and to see His miracles, shining with a glory brighter than the sun, then she saw “a great light.” We will reason like this: as long as a sinful person remains in sins without repentance, as long as he remains in darkness and does not have the light of God’s grace; when, having come to his senses, he begins to repent, God’s grace immediately begins to shine in his heart: “Where sin abounds, there grace abounds all the more” (Rom. 5:20). There was a robber in darkness, but through repentance he saw paradise; the thief's repentance opened paradise. In the darkness there was the persecutor Saul, later called Paul, and when he repented, he was honored with heavenly lordships, being “caught up to the third heaven.” There was a prodigal son in darkness, and through repentance he received better clothing and an inheritance from his father. There was also a harlot in the darkness, who was later cleansed by repentance: “Her sins are forgiven, many.” “People who sit in darkness,” through repentance, “will see the great light.” But let us return again to the interpretation of Capernaum. Capernaum is a village of repentance: that’s what’s wonderful. Capernaum in its interpretation is the village of repentance. Why this? I don’t know how anyone understands this; I, a sinner, think because there were more sinners than repenters. Looking at it, it was something to call a hail, for it was crowded; and if all sinners were taken out of it and only those who repented were left, then the city would immediately become a village, for there would be few who would bring repentance to God. Capernaum is both a city and a village: because of sins it is a crowded city, but because of repentance it is a sparsely populated village: “Few are chosen” (Matthew 22:14). But let’s not judge Capernaum: we ourselves are no better. This reigning city is great, and there are countless people in it; and if someone were to look in it for people who had already repented of their sins and who were pleasing to God in repentance, then I don’t think that he would find many of them, unless he found a small number, from which a small village could hardly be formed. The Greek Constantinople was also great, but there were not always many kind people in it; for, after the exile of Saint John Chrysostom, a certain bishop named Sisinius had such a vision. He saw that he was in the church of St. Stephen the First Martyr. Here he saw some worthy man with an angelic face, shining with heavenly light, standing before the Divine altar and as if wondering and crying. And so he hears this man say: I deliberately went around the whole city, looking for virtuous people, and among such a multitude of people I could not find a single good man except the blessed Eutropius. Eutropius was a reader for Saint Chrysostom; John's haters innocently kept him in prison and tortured him. You see: in such a famous and populous city there was barely one kind person. Ancient Nineveh was also a large city, but only the house of Saint Tobias, who lived there in captivity, was righteous before God. And Sodom, they say, was not a small city, and in it there was only one righteous man - Lot. Everywhere there are more evil than good, more sinners than righteous. Capernaum was a city of sins, but a village of repentance. Is it not for this that our Lord was angry with Capernaum when he began to revile it: “And you, Capernaum, who were exalted to heaven, were brought down even to hell” (Matthew 11:23)? How was Capernaum raised to heaven? Was he really standing on such a high mountain that reached the sky? No. Although he was on a mountain, it was not high, but moderate; he stood by the Sea of ​​Galilee, at the very mouth where the Jordan River flowed into the sea. Why did Capernaum rise to heaven? Pride, pompousness! It is very possible that the inhabitants of Capernaum, as residents of a large, glorious and capital city throughout Galilee, boasted about themselves, as residents of large cities usually do. Even the Apostle Paul once boasted: “I am a Roman; should you fly and beat a Roman?” (Acts 22:25:26). Theophylact of Bulgaria says that Capernaum was exalted to heaven because it was the city of Jesus, the fatherland of Jesus, and became famous for the miracles of Jesus that took place in it. Finally, and for this reason Capernaum was exalted to heaven, because it was known both to heaven and to the angels. Known to heaven, for God the Father always looked from heaven at His Son, who lived in Capernaum, sent God the Holy Spirit to Him, as, for example, He sent down at the time when He was baptized in the Jordan River, which was also in Galilee, and at the same time looked down on His dear daughter, the most pure Virgin Mary, whom He chose to be the Mother of His Son. Capernaum was known to the angels because during the Lord’s life there, the sky was opened over Him and the angels of God descended and ascended over Him, as it is written about this in the Gospel: “Heaven is opened, and the angels of God ascending and descending on the Son of Man” (John 1:51). Truly, at that time Capernaum was high, ascending to heaven with the glory and honor of the Lord who lived in it! But, oh, misfortune, oh, fierce change! Capernaum was condemned “to hell”! For what? Because he did not believe in the Lord, seeing so many of His miracles. You will descend into hell, Capernaum, for even if the signs that were in you had been in Sodom, it would have remained to this day: sitting in rags and ashes, it would have repented, but you did not repent; for this you will be “descended to hell.” We heed that Capernaum perished for non-repentance, although its name signifies repentance. Capernaum is a village of repentance in name, but not in reality; in fact, it contains sins and iniquities. What should we think about ourselves? Have we not also ascended to heaven with the honor of Christianity? Do we not also have the Lord dwelling among us? In Capernaum there was only one house of Christ, and even that was small and poor. But don’t we have many beautiful and decorated houses of the Lord, holy churches; don’t the Lord and His Most Pure Mother dwell among us? If there is no repentance in us, then, like Capernaum, we will be reduced to hell, for we are like Capernaum. Just as in Capernaum only the name spoke of repentance, but the deeds were lawless, so in us the name of repentance is barely found, but true repentance is not even asked; You can’t even count lawless deeds: “Multiplying more than the number of the sand of the sea, more than the hair of the head.” What can we hope for? Can we really expect the same condemnation that befell Capernaum? Will we also be reduced to hell? God save us from this! But let's leave it at that. It's time to see what our Lord is doing in Capernaum. When our Lord came to Capernaum, they brought to Him a paralytic lying on a bed, and He healed Him (Matthew 9:2). I’m looking at where this miracle was performed? Saint Mark says that in the house: “It was heard that there was something in the house” (Mark 2:1), that is, in Christ’s own house, which was bought by Joseph, in which the most pure Virgin lived. When Jesus was sitting in this house, they brought to Him a paralytic lying on a bed, to whom He first forgave his sins, then denounced and shamed the blasphemous thoughts of evil people, and finally commanded the paralytic to get up and walk. All this happened in the house of Christ, in the presence of the most pure Virgin Mary, or, better to say, through the intercession and prayer of the most pure Virgin Mother of God: for her sake the sins of the paralytic were forgiven; For her sake, health was given to the sick: “When the people saw them, they marveled and glorified God” (v. 8). If I had lived at that time, I would have said: “Happy are you, Capernaumites, that you have the house of Christ and the Most Pure Virgin Mary living in it! Happy are you, the paralytic, that you were brought to this house in which the Most Pure Mother of God dwells! Even if Christ did not want to heal you, then she, like a merciful Mother, would beg Him and seek healing for you from Him.” Oh people! Our souls are also relaxed! Let us flow to the house of Christ and the Mother of God - not to the one that was in Capernaum, but to this holy church and others. Let us, sinners, turn to Christ and the Mother of God and humbly fall to Them in repentance. Now, perhaps, it is time to go from the city of Capernaum to all of which our Lord entered: “Jesus came into all of it.” This “certain” one, remembered in the Gospel on all the feasts of the Mother of God, according to the interpreters of the Gospel, was Bethany, in which Christ’s friend Lazarus and Lazarus’ sisters, Martha and Mary, lived. The name Bethany is interpreted as a house of obedience and a house of grace of the Lord - and rightly so, for there Mary listened to the teaching of Christ: “Mary, sitting at the foot of Jesus, heard His word” (Luke 10:39). Likewise, the grace of God was accomplished in no small way, for the four-day-old Lazarus was raised from the dead. Let us now compare the miracles of Christ that took place in Capernaum and Bethany. In Capernaum, the Lord healed a paralytic carried by four people, and in Bethany He raised four-day-old Lazarus from the dead. In Capernaum He denounced His blasphemers: “Nezi the scribe decided: This one blasphemes; and when Jesus saw their thoughts, he said, “You think all evil things in your hearts”; in Bethany, with a very miraculous deed, He shamed those who doubted the possibility of a miracle, for there were those who said: “Could not this one, who opened the eyes of the blind, do it, so that Lazarus would not die?” (Matt. 9:3, 4; John 11:37). In Capernaum, He absolved the sick man of his sins: “Be of good cheer, child, your sins are forgiven; Arise, take up your bed and go to your house”; in Bethany, he ordered Lazarus, who came out of the tomb and was bound on his hands and feet with burial shrouds, to be untied, which was a prototype of the resolution of human sins. Having glorified the omnipotent God for all this, I turn to the interpretation of Bethany. Bethany, as we have said, signifies the house of obedience and the house of the Lord's grace; and when I thought about why the Gospel of Bethany Ves and the Lazarus sisters is read on all the feasts of the Theotokos, I understood it this way: because this Gospel is read on the feasts of the Theotokos, because the Most Pure Virgin had the virtue of obedience, was filled with the grace of God and received and treated Christ better than the Lazarus sisters. She showed obedience when God the Father called her with a secret message to her heart, speaking in the words of the Holy Spirit: “Hear, O daughter, and see, and incline your ear, and forget your people and your father’s house” (Ps. 44:11). And she answered this with the words of her forefather David: “My heart is ready, O God, my heart is ready” (Ps. 57:8). When the Archangel Gabriel announced to her the conception of the Son of God, she answered with humility: “Behold the handmaid of the Lord: be unto me according to thy word” (Luke 1:38). And who can express in words what grace of God she was filled with? She had grace in herself more than all the prophets, all the apostles, all the saints, all the martyrs, all the saints, and not only more than all the saints, but more than all the angels and archangels, cherubim and seraphim, which is why St. Herman, Patriarch of Constantinople, calls her the sea of grace, for just as no one can measure the depth of the sea or ocean, so no one is able to express the greatness of grace of God, who was in the Most Pure Mother of God. The church sings her beautifully: “Rejoice, depths beyond comprehension and angelic eyes!” So, she is the mental Bethany, the house of obedience and the house of God’s grace. In Bethany, Christ was received and treated to the Lazarus sisters; but who could receive and treat Him like the most pure Virgin, who carried Christ for nine months in her most pure virgin womb, gave birth to Him, carried Him in her mother’s arms throughout His infancy, nourished and nurtured Him with her most pure milk from her virgin breasts! Mary of Bethany, “sitting at the foot of Jesus, heard His word,” which happened perhaps once, twice or thrice, and the most blessed Virgin Mary always listened to Him until she was thirty years old and beyond, always with insatiable love and sweetness of heart she listened to the sweet words of her Son and composed them in her heart, as the Gospel says about her: “Mary kept all these words which I wrote in my heart” (Luke 2:19). And to whom the Lord revealed so many of His Divine secrets, unknown even to the angels, as His most pure Mother, in whom He Himself completely dwelt - the treasure of the wisdom and mind of God. In Bethany, the Lord raised the four-day-old Lazarus from the dead, and in the Most Pure Virgin He raised the entire human race from eternal sinful death, for through it we were delivered from eternal death and through it we expect to receive eternal life. Truly, in connection with the Ves of Bethany and the Lazarev sisters, the Church honored the Feasts of the Mother of God with the Gospel. Having thus examined the question about the city of Jesus into which He came, and about the village into which He entered, having learned their names and inhabitants, having understood through interpretation in part their mysterious meaning, let us pray to our Lord that He would come to us with His most pure Matter, as to His true city and to His true village, so that He would dwell in us without origin, heal our spiritual relaxation and forgive us our sins through the prayers of His Mother. Let us perform true repentance, so that not in Capernaum - only in name, but also in deed we are penitents, let us accept Christ like Bethany, let us place Him within us through love and listening to the word of God, let us turn to His most immaculate Mother, so that she may be our intercessor before Him, let us diligently resort to her and entrust ourselves to her intercession now and always, and all the days of our life. Amen. First sermon on the eighth week after Pentecost Beloved listeners! This week the Gospel is read about the five loaves with which our Lord fed five thousand people. These five loaves, which were then in their present substance and multiplied by the miraculous power and effect of God’s blessing, were a prototype of spiritual, soul-nourishing food, abundantly satiating everyone who wanted it. Spiritual breadwinners, dividing it into many parts, understand different things by the five spiritual breads. Some see in them the five great wounds of Christ received on the cross, the memory of which so nourishes the soul, as only those who always have the crucified Lord before their eyes can know. Others call the five senses five breads, the careful guarding of which from evil and their inclination towards good will never kill the soul that hungers for good. Others, by the five loaves, understand the five apostolic words that Saint Paul wants to speak with his mind, and they reason like this: the first bread is true faith, the second is good deeds, the third is avoidance of evil, the fourth is the fear of eternal fire prepared for barren trees, and the fifth is the expectation of eternal reward in the kingdom of heaven for good deeds. The Creator of the spiritual dinner counted the five loaves like this: the first bread is abstinence from bodily food, the second is repentance, the third is the Divine Mysteries of the body and blood of Christ, the fourth bread is the word of God and the fifth is eternal satiation in heaven. This is how many breads have already been found, and a non-lazy person can invent even more of them, however, so as not to tire the taste by eating many and different breads (for usually with a lot of food after tasty food, another, although no less tasty, may still seem tasteless), therefore, for spiritual saturation, we will choose one bread appropriate for the present time, but we will put off the rest until another future time, so that after that we will have something to eat. eat by taking one of them when needed. Which bread will we now choose for ourselves? Let's look at the present time. The present time is a time of fasting, and during fasting people who are abstinent usually eat dry food. Let us also offer ourselves a fast food. In dry eating, dry bread is offered, and water is given for drinking. What do you, listeners, think, what mental spiritual bread can be called dry bread? In my feeble-minded opinion, holy repentance should be called dry bread, for what can be so firm as the harshness of repentance, which, like a stone, no one can soon taste? It dries up the receptivity of both the flesh and the spirit, which have grown fat in love of sin. Eating this spiritual bread, that is, tasting holy repentance, Saint David says: “My strength has dried up, and my bones have dried up” (Ps. 21:16). This bread is completely appropriate for the Lenten season, for God-fearing Christians, who care about their salvation, especially during Lent, correct their lives by repentance. So, let us offer ourselves holy repentance for our spiritual saturation, like dry Lenten bread, and for drinking we will add tears to it, so that dry eating becomes perfect. Holy repentance is dry bread; however, it is fitting that this bread should be clean, and should not have any chaff; this means that our repentance must be true, and not hypocritical. True repentance is that which is accomplished not only in words, but also in reality, which is dissolved in warm tears and comes from a humble, God-loving heart. First of all, it must be said that the bread of repentance can only be pure if the words of confession and prayer are joined by deeds and labors of satisfaction for sins. Christ the Lord, having said in the Divine Gospel that both a tree and a person are known by their fruits and, like a fruitless tree, will be executed by cutting and burning, added the following words: “Not everyone who says to Me: Lord, Lord, will enter the kingdom of heaven” (Matthew 7:16-21). But, oh, Lord Lover of Mankind! Are You not more merciful than Your prophet Joel, who said: “Whoever calls on the name of the Lord will be saved” (Joel 2:32)? But You, Lord and Master, call the double invocation of Your name: “Lord, Lord,” insufficient for our salvation: “Not everyone who says to Me: Lord, Lord, will enter the kingdom of heaven.” But let us not be surprised at this disagreement between Christ and the prophet, for the prophet spoke of the virtuous and righteous, filled with the Spirit of God and the Spirit of prophecy, as can be seen from his own book: “Your sons and your daughters will prophesy” (Joel 2:28). Such, truly, even if they cry to the Lord just once, saying: “Lord,” they will immediately be heard by God and saved. “The righteous cried, and the Lord heard them” (Ps. 33:18), for their prayer was preceded by righteous works and their good deeds. In the Gospel, the Lord speaks about barren trees: good deeds cannot be seen from them either before prayer or after prayer. Such, even if they call twice: “Lord, Lord,” still will not enter the kingdom of heaven. But who will go there? “Do the will of My Father,” says the Lord (Matthew 7:21). By this He said the following: he will enter the kingdom of heaven who adds the third “Lord” to the two “Lord, Lord,” that is, fulfilling the will of the Lord. “Lord,” which means faith in the Lord, is not enough; Another “Lord”, meaning prayer, is not enough; the third “Lord” is also necessary, that is, it is necessary to work in fulfilling the will of the Lord, it is necessary for them to say: “Lord, Lord, Lord,” that is, for there to be faith, prayer and righteous works. God! I firmly believe in You. God! I pray to You with hope. God! I work hard for You. You see all my labors of repentance in satisfaction for sin, you see my humility and my work, forgive all my sins! Prayer and repentance without labor are unclean bread, full of chaff. He is not brought into the heavenly granary, he does not enter the kingdom of heaven, but is swept out, thrown out and trampled underfoot. This is what we read in the books of Kings. Once two Israeli monarchs sinned before the Lord God: King Saul and King David, each in his own time, and both repented. Saul lifts up his repentant prayer to God in the face of the prophet Samuel, saying: “I have sinned because I have transgressed the word of the Lord and your word: for I feared men and obeyed their voice. And Samuel said to Saul, “Thou hast despised the word of the Lord; the Lord will despise thee, that thou shalt not be king in Israel” (1 Sam. 15:25:26). David also repents, saying to the prophet Nathan: “Those who have sinned against the Lord. And Nathan said to David: “The Lord has taken away your sin from you” (2 Sam. 12:13). Let us consider both of these repentances. Here Saul repents: he makes a long prayer and multiplies his words before Samuel, but is not granted forgiveness, even condemned to destruction: “The Lord will humiliate you.” David also repents; a little, only two words he utters: “those who have sinned against the Lord,” but immediately the Lord forgives his sin. What does this mean? What is the secret of this? Both sinned, both repent, but only David’s repentance is accepted, while Saul’s repentance is rejected. If we want to know the reason for this, then we will read in Scripture about the lives of both David and Saul. After the fall, David put on sackcloth, but Saul is proud of the soft royal robes; David humbles his soul by fasting, eats ashes like bread, and dissolves his drink with weeping, and Saul eats from rich meals, drinks and is merry; David gets up at midnight to pray, and Saul, drunk, sleeps on a soft bed; David weeps over his sin, and Saul despises him; David works, but Saul is lazy. Do not be surprised, Saul, that your repentance is unpleasant to God and your prayer is rejected, for you have not shown labors and exploits. Do not be surprised, David, at being forgiven, for you have shown many deeds in your repentance: “The Lord will take away your sins.” So, we see and understand now that repentance is easily rejected, like chaff bread: it is not accepted, but is thrown out and trampled under foot. The great preacher of repentance, John the Baptist, who cried out for repentance in the Judean desert, says: “Produce fruits worthy of repentance” (Matthew 3:8). What is this “fruits worthy of repentance”? According to the explanation of the interpreters, this means that the work of satisfaction for sin should be compared in repentance with the severity of any great sin committed, so that as much as someone previously worked for sin, then he would later work for God, according to the words of the Apostle: “Just as you have presented your servants to uncleanness and lawlessness for iniquity, so now present your servants to righteousness as holy things” (Rom. 6:19); and Saint Gregory, calling a person a tree, known by its fruits, says: “It is by the fruits, and not by the leaves and roots, that repentance should be known. After all, the Lord also cursed the tree, which had only leaves on it, but was barren, for He does not accept confession only in words, confession without the fruits of dejection of the body.” By this he said the following: a good living tree is known by its roots, leaves and fruits; similarly, the mental tree, a person, and a repentant person, has a root, leaves and fruits; the root of repentance is the thought and intention to confess one’s sins; leaves are the very verbal confession of sins, offered to God before the spiritual father, and a promise to correct oneself; the fruits are labors of satisfaction for sins. Let's see how true repentance is known? It is known not by the root of intention, not by the leaves of confession and promise, but by the fruits of satisfaction. Strengthen your intentions like roots, multiply words like leaves, but if you do not have “fruits worthy of repentance,” that is, deeds and labors in satisfaction for sins, then you are not a blessed tree, but subject to curse. Fruits worthy of repentance, as we have already said, are those whose labors are equal to the quality and quantity of previously committed sins. The repentance of one who wants to cover up frequent bingeing with short-term abstinence from food and fasting is vain. The repentance of one who, with a short sigh and emphasis on the chest, wants to justify many lies, thefts, murders, thefts, insults and the like, is in vain. The repentance of one who wants to cleanse long and serious mortal sins by briefly and some easy killing of the body is unjust. Repentance and justification are hopeless for those who want to wash away great defilements and iniquities with small tears. But perhaps someone will say: the sinful wife did not cry for long at the feet of Jesus, but her many sins were forgiven; and the publican was justified only by heartfelt sighing; and the thief entered heaven, having uttered only a few words on the cross; and the Apostle Peter, having cried a little, received Christ’s first mercy. Oh man! Can you be sure that you will receive the same mercy of God that they received, if you do not have the same contrition of heart that they showed? Look at their subsequent deeds. Was it not the sinner who was called Equal-to-the-Apostles, for she subsequently bore the labors of Equal-to-the-Apostles, traveling around many countries and preaching about Christ? Doesn’t the Gospel say about the publican that he gave half of his property to the poor, and if he offended anyone with anything, he returned it in quadruple? Didn't the thief end his life on the cross? But don’t you know how Saint Peter worked later and what he suffered? What did you show by repenting of your sins? Let us not flatter ourselves, sinner, let us not flatter ourselves: if the labors of our repentance are not compared with the magnitude of our sins, then we cannot be sure of our salvation. Christ the Lord, having taken upon Himself our sins on earth and wishing to wash away all the filthiness of our souls, opened on the cross a special source emanating from His most pure ribs, a source of water and blood, as Saint John the Theologian says about Him: “This is Jesus Christ who came by water and blood, not by water only, but by water and blood” (1 John 5:6), in order to cleanse those who are strangers, then there are our sins. He brought out from His ribs not only water, but also blood: “Not with water only, but with water and blood.” To wash away our sins, we bring, as it were, small, light waters - our light repentance, repentance without blood, that is, without labor leading to bloody sweat. Truly, our repentance is vain; it is similar to the case of Pilate, who, having washed his hands, betrayed Christ to death. We will work for a short time, fast a little, weep a little, washing only our hands from defilement, as it were, and not the whole body, and again we crucify Christ by not only not making due satisfaction for previous sins, but even committing even greater iniquities. What benefit can such repentance bring? Judge for yourself. Can anyone put out a huge red-hot furnace with one handful of water? Can anyone, with a small tear, like a drop, extinguish the fire of hell that is prepared for him? Can anyone, in the darkest midnight, illuminate the whole of heaven with one small lighted candle? Can anyone, with a little repentance for sins, like a small candle, illuminate the pitch darkness prepared for him? Can anyone with one drop of honey sweeten all the bitterness of the ocean? Can anyone, grieved by our sins, rejoice before God with a brief moment of tenderness and receive forgiveness? Pour out many, many tears like a river before the Lord, together with the one who says: “I will wet my bed with my tears” (Ps. 7:6). If you want to quench the fire of hell prepared for you, then turn all the bitterness of sin into sweetness. If you want to delight yourself before the Lord and receive forgiveness of sins, “Delight yourself,” as it is said, “in the Lord, and he will give you the request of your heart” (Ps. 37:4). Completely mortify yourself through labors and exploits, so that the sinful passions living in you die, according to the word of the Apostle: “Let the body of sin be abolished, for sin is not our work” (Rom. 6:6). Abolish your body, which has become white in sins, make it emaciated, depressing, and then hope for the abolition of sins; create fruits worthy of repentance, compare your labors with your previous sins, even surpass them, and then expect forgiveness and salvation. In addition to this, in our true repentance we must carefully preserve the following: if someone through weakness happens to fall into any sin again, then immediately, without delay, get up. “As soon as you fall,” it is said, “only when you rise.” It is necessary to quickly rise from the fall, so that our sins, having multiplied, do not reach God and move Him to anger and vengeance. The amazing thing is that not only good deeds, but also human sins ascend to heaven to God. It is not surprising that good deeds ascended by angels; The amazing thing is that evil deeds also ascend, which no one can take to heaven: an angel will not carry our evil deed to heaven, and the devil will not dare. Good deeds ascend to heaven, according to the words of the angel Cornelius: “Your prayer was heard, and your alms were remembered before God” (Acts 10:4). And the angel says to Tobiah: “When you prayed with tears and buried the dead, I offered your prayer to the Lord God” (Tov. 12:12). Evil deeds also rise. For example, God says when sending His prophet Jonah to Nineveh to preach: “The cry of their (Ninevites) wickedness comes up to Me” (Jonah 1:2). He also said to Abraham: “The cry of Sodom and Gomorrah is multiplied to me” (Gen. 18:20). David says: “Thou hast laid down our iniquities before Thee” (Ps. 89:8). If I, a sinner, had boldness before the Lord my God, then I would say to Him: Lord! You appointed a cherubim with a weapon of fire to guard the heavenly gates of Eden, so that no one would enter there; why didn’t You place at least some lesser angel at the doors of heaven, so that our evil deeds would not enter You? I would also say to the saints: Saint Peter, who has the keys of the kingdom of heaven! Are you really commanded by God to let into heaven all the evil that is happening on earth? O holy Theologian, who spoke of the heavenly Jerusalem: “Let no evil enter into him!” (Rev. 21:26). Why do you, when our sins ascend there, place them at the doors of heaven, and do not cry out loudly: “Outside are dogs, and sorcerers, and fornicators, and murderers, and everyone who creates and loves lies is not included in this” (Apoc. 22:15)? But the saints do not listen to me, a sinner, and allow my sins to appear before God. The cry of my anger ascends to Him, for just as it is impossible for adamant and a magnet to lose the power that attracts iron, so it is impossible for the all-seeing eye of God to be deprived of the ability to see all human affairs, according to the word of Sirach: “The eyes of the Lord are like the brightest shadows of the sun, seeing through all the paths of man and looking into secret places” (Sir. 23:27:28). Everything that happens in the universe, even in the deepest abysses of the earth, is so obvious to Him, as if it were happening before His face. This is why it is said that our evil deeds ascend to heaven to God. What do good and evil human deeds do when they ascend to heaven? But this is what it is: the good intercede for their worker all the good things from the Lord, while the evil incite Him to anger and vengeance. Good deeds intercede for their doer, saying: Lord, forgive him! The evil ones complain about their workman, saying: Lord, take vengeance on Him! So, after each fall, it is necessary to cleanse sins with true, unfeigned repentance, so that they, having multiplied and reached God, do not move God to such great anger that we will no longer have the opportunity to receive time for repentance. God is long-suffering; but if, after His long-suffering, He becomes angry with a person for unrepentance, then, O man, wait no longer for time to repent, as the Apostle says about Esau: “You are rejected, you will not find room for repentance, even if you seek it with tears” (Heb. 12:17). Let us remember here that angel whom the Theologian saw standing on the earth and on the sea and who raised his hand to heaven and swore by the One who lives forever and ever, swore by the One who created the sky and everything that is in it, the earth and everything that is on it, the sea and everything that is in it; he swore that there would be no more time (Apoc. 10:5:6). Oh holy angel! Do you really contradict the Gospel, which says: “Do not swear by anything, neither by heaven, for the throne is God, nor by earth, for His footstool” (Matthew 6:34:35); You dare to swear by the Creator of heaven and earth Himself! Are you sinning? No, the angel does not sin, for he truly swears. It’s a different matter for a person to whom a prohibition has been written; for even if he swears, he lies; if he does not swear, he also lies. An angel, even without an oath, testifies to the truth and cannot even lie; Moreover, he will not lie when he swears. He swears by God so that all of God’s creation, especially reasonable man, so that all peoples and tribes have faith in his true words. What does that angel swear about? Let's listen: “For time will be no more” (Apoc. 5:6). Do you hear, a sinful person, wallowing without repentance in his sins, as if in sewage, but putting off repentance for another time, for old age, you hear that if you do not repent soon, you will not get time for repentance. Believe the angel who swears to God: “For time will be no more.” An unexpectedly fatal illness will strike you: you will then want to repent, but there will be no time. God's punishment, fire and sword will unexpectedly come upon you: you will want to improve, but there will be no time. You will fall into the hands of your enemies, visible and invisible: you will want to cry about your sins, but there will be no time. The last minute of your life will come, all your sins will appear before you: then you would want to take upon yourself any, even the most difficult, repentance, but you will not find time for repentance, “for there will be no more time.” Now, now, without delay, while there is time, take care of your sin, repent truly, and after that there will be no more time. Behold, my listener, what kind of bread, one of the five loaves, we offer in our conversation; bread appropriate for the Lenten season, the bread of holy, laborious repentance, for bread is not made without labor. I know: this bread is not sweet for everyone; otherwise he is bitter. But this is not surprising: those who are immersed in the vain sweets of this world do not understand the sweetness of the manna from heaven. If he wants to accept this bread without bitterness, then let him add the sweet honey of Divine love: “All things work for good to him who loves God” (Rom. 8:28); For him, hard things will be easy, and bitter things will be sweet. But You, sweetest Jesus, are all desire, all joy, all sweetness - sweeten our hearts with Your desire, give us our daily bread and satisfy us with daily repentance! After this bread, give us a stream of sweetness to drink in Your kingdom, where we would forever be satisfied with Your glory with all the saints who have pleased You through repentance. Amen. Second Sermon on the Eighth Week of Pentecost The current Gospel, read at the Divine Liturgy, is truly a spiritual meal, for it contains five loaves of bread with two fish, with which our Lord Christ miraculously fed five thousand people, and, moreover, so richly and abundantly that everyone ate and were satisfied, and, in addition, there were twelve full baskets of excess pieces (Matthew 14:20). The holy apostles collected an excess of large pieces after that meal, and I, a sinner, decided from this Gospel, as from a spiritual meal, to select some small grains of the word of God and put them in your ears, like in baskets, “At the time Jesus saw many people and showed mercy to them” (Matthew 14:14). What time? At the time when it was announced to Him, our Lord, that John had been killed by Herod. “And when Jesus heard” about this unjust murder, “he departed into an empty place alone,” for the time of His free suffering for us had not yet come. “And when the nations heard, they walked after him from the cities. And when Jesus saw many people, he had mercy on them” (Matthew 14:13:14). Truly worthy of Christ's mercy were those peoples who sought Him with great zeal, who, leaving their cities on foot, followed Him into the desert. He who seeks Christ finds Him. He who follows Christ is also worthy of His mercy. He who keeps near Christ is filled with His blessings, like bread, in abundance. Many of us also want to find Christ, but are too lazy to look for Him. We want to be worthy of His mercy, but we want to receive His benefits freely and without labor: being lazy, we want to be glorified; without working, we want to get rich; lying in laziness, we want to reach the sky; when we sin, we want to be righteous; while committing lawlessness, we wish to be at peace with the saints; reveling in the temporary sweetness of sin, we expect to receive eternal pleasure in heaven. Oh, vain hopes! Vain waiting! This is not how you get what you want, not this way! The people now remembered in the Gospel were honored with the mercy of Christ: “Jesus saw many people and was merciful towards them”; I was worthy, I say, but I was worthy by working, and not by being lazy: they satisfied their flesh with nutritious bread, miraculously multiplied in the hands of Christ, but before that they abundantly enjoyed spiritual food, that is, the word of God coming from the mouth of Christ, and the bread that satiates their belly was given to them no earlier than they had satisfied their souls with the word of God. It is beautifully said: “Seek first the kingdom of God and His righteousness, and all these things will be added to you” (Matthew 6:33). Just work with zeal for Christ, and you will not be poor and hungry: “This is good news from the Heavenly Father, that you require all of these.” “There are no imams here, only five loaves of bread” (Matthew 14:17). One cannot help but be surprised, taking into account the fact that among such a multitude of people, in which there were up to five thousand husbands alone, besides their wives and children, among such, I say, a multitude of people, no one had a single piece of bread, except for a certain one youth, as it is written about this in John’s Gospel: “There is one youth here who has five loaves of bread” (John 6:9). Why was everyone so thrifty? Why didn’t they carry bread with them if they walked in such a large crowd? However, it must be said that they carried it, but they had already spent it: everyone, going from their home, took some bread for themselves, but already ate it. However, even without bread they did not separate from Christ and, being hungry, followed Him, more desiring to fill their soul with the words of Christ than their body with bread. Scripture says it well: “Man shall not live on bread alone, but on every word of God that proceeds from the mouth of God” (Matthew 4:4). Oh, how great was the zeal for listening to the word of God among those ancient people! Leave household chores; they go to Christ far into the desert with their wives and children; they fast not only until midday, but also until the evening; they forget their hunger and do not care about food, just to hear the word of God. This is how great is the zeal and concern for the benefit of the soul! It is impossible not to be ashamed of us now, who neglect the words of God and do not care about the benefit of our souls. Truly, these ancient people will condemn us at the Last Judgment of God. They spent whole days listening to the teachings of Christ, but we are too lazy to stand for an hour or two in the church of the Lord. They, starving, did not care about their food, but we, even while standing in prayer, worry in our minds about what we will eat and drink. They came to Christ from afar and even followed Him far into the desert, but we, having the churches of the Lord close by, are too lazy to go to them to praise God. They went to Christ when no one called them, but even great bells cannot call us. They loved Christ so much and strove for Him with such a strong desire, not even knowing that Christ is God, and considering Him only to be a prophet; We, knowing full well that Christ is the true God and believing in Him, do not show any zeal towards Him. Truly, we Christians are ashamed. The following is also worthy of reflection: a large people, simple people, come to Christ and follow Him - but where are their leaders? The scribes, Pharisees, and princes of the people remained in their homes in Jerusalem. Princes do not believe in Christ, as it is written about in the Gospel: “Food from princes, who believes in Him?” (John 7:48). Scribes and Pharisees learn vain things, and the rich exercise themselves in their crafts: some destroy their barns and build larger ones, others save from covetousness and unrighteousness and fill their coffers, and others joyfully rejoice every day - all of these have no time to go to Christ and listen to His teaching; only the poor follow Him and listen to Him with pleasure. This is why entry into the kingdom of heaven is difficult for the rich: “It is easier for me to pass through the ear of a needle than for a rich man to enter into the kingdom of God” (Matthew 19:24). It is also necessary to judge who carries the loaves. The youth wears them, as is recalled in the Gospel of John: “There is one youth here who had five loaves of bread.” Many men do not carry bread, but one boy does, and those loaves must not have been large if one boy could carry five loaves. Taking the loaves from the hands of this youth, Christ fed the numerous people. Here you can see the mystery. That one youth was the prototype of the monastic order: monasticism in Greek is expressed by the word “monos,” which means alone, solitary. The pure youth, the virgin, was a prototype of monastic purity, the preservation of which is relied upon in monasticism and the vow. The loaves were a prototype of monastic prayers performed both day and night. Just as the Lord satisfied the people with the bread of adolescence, so with the prayers of monks the Lord supports this world. Although the boy’s bread was small, it satisfied many thousands of people; Likewise, monastic prayers, although they seem small to someone, nevertheless strengthen the whole world. The Christian world in the Holy Scriptures is likened to grapes, just as the prophet Isaiah said about the ancient Israelites: “The vine of the Lord of hosts is the house of Israel” (Isa. 5:7). Who doesn’t know how beautiful a grape garden is? Its branches are wonderful, its leaves are beautiful, its clusters are pleasant, pleasing to the eye and delighting the taste. Who doesn’t see how beautiful the Christian world is, how wonderful and pleasant it is? With riches he is adorned like leaves, and with noble children, like with hefty grapes, he is exalted and glorified, expanded and multiplied, according to the word of David, which he said to God: “The mountains are covered with the shade of it, and the cedars of God cover its stalks; spread his rod to the sea, and even to the rivers of his branches” (Ps. 79:11:12). Let's see what the vine branch rests on and how it lives. It exists on nothing but dry and barren cola. Take away the stake from the grape, and the branch will fall to the ground and be trampled under foot. Take away the monastic order from the Christian world, like a dry and fruitless stake from a grape, what then will become of the world? Judge for yourself! Just as the boy’s bread, although not much, satisfied many, so the monastic prayers, although they seem small, are beneficial for many. But in order to prevent my own fabrications, praising the monastic rite beyond measure, I again turn to the Gospel bread. “There are no imams here, only five loaves of bread” (Matthew 14:17). What kind of bread were they: rye, wheat or any other? Who knows? The Holy Evangelist John says that these were barley loaves: “There is here,” he says, “one youth who had five barley loaves.” We will pay attention to what kind of bread those who followed Christ eat: not wheat or pure rye, but barley. Let this barley bread be for us an image of abstinence, fasting and a sharp life, just as barley has sharp ears; for nothing strengthens a follower of Christ and makes him strong against an invisible enemy, like barley bread, that is, holy fasting and abstinence. Let us remember here the story of Holy Scripture about the struggle of Gideon with the Midianites. The Israelites of old were extremely oppressed by the Midianites; because of many calamities they cried out to God. God had mercy on them and gave them a leader - a strong man named Gideon, who, gathering the strength of Israel, went against Midian. The Lord God told him not to bring with him a large force for battle, but to choose only the best and bravest warriors. How could Gideon recognize the best and the bravest? Here's how he was able to do it. At the command of God, he led them all to the water and ordered them to drink; and so some, falling on their knees and bending their faces to the water, drank water from the river like cattle, while others, scooping up water by the handful, drank from their own handful. After this, Gideon divided everyone in two: he placed those who drank water like cattle separately, and those who drank water by the handful - separately. There were few who drank water by the handful - only three hundred people, while the rest of the warriors drank like animals, plunging their faces and lips into the water. And the Lord commanded Gideon to bring back all those who drank water like cattle, and to take with him to the war only those three hundred, and promised him, saying: “With three hundred men who drank a handful of water, I will save you and deliver Midian into your hands.” Approaching the countless strength of Midian at night with three hundred men, Gideon, at the command of God, with only one youth, crawled into the camp of Midian and, walking quietly in it, listened; and then he hears how one warrior, awakening from sleep, tells his dream to his friend: “It was as if the dough of barley bread rolled from Gideon’s regiment and, rolling into our Midian camp to the Midian tent, beat it, overturned it, and the tent fell.” To this his friend replied: “This is not dough, but the spear of Gideon: the Lord will deliver Midian and our entire army into his hands.” Hearing this, Gideon bowed to the Lord, returned to his own, prepared for battle and, attacking the Midian regiment, defeated it and dispersed it to the end. Let us consider the mysterious meaning of this sleepy vision. The barley bread dough was a spear against the adversaries. This means that barley, full of sharp shoots, is a way of harsh life. The dough of barley bread is a sign of holy fasting, which has no weaknesses in food, for unbaked barley bread overturned the tent of Midian, but only its dough, since baked bread has taste, but dough does not. However, barley bread and baked bread have little taste - not like rye or wheat bread; Moreover, there is no taste in barley dough. The dough of barley bread is an image of fasting, for the desert-dwelling fasters also ate such food. Saint Hilarion the Great, for example, says this to his body: “I will not feed you, donkey, with barley, but with rubbish.” This dough, I mean fasting, is not tasty, but soon it becomes an iron spear against the adversary and defeats him, so in fairness we can say: this is not dough, but a spear against the adversary. Fast, abstain, and your fasting, like a strong, sharp spear, will pierce your enemy who has risen up against you. We marvel at Sampson's strength; We are surprised that he alone killed a thousand Philistine men, killing not with a sword or a spear, but with one bone, a donkey’s jawbone. We are also amazed at how he, having stolen the gates of the city of Gaza and carrying them on his shoulders, carried them up a high mountain. We marvel at his other deeds, in which his great strength was manifested. But let's see where such strength came from in him? From the abstinence of the one who gave birth to him, to whom the angel said: “When you conceive and give birth to a son, provide for this; do not drink wine, anything unclean” (Judges 13:3:4). Saint Basil the Great, discussing this in the word “On Fasting,” says: “What made the strong Sampson invincible? Is it not the fast in which he was conceived in his mother’s womb? Abstinence will give birth to strength to defeat the enemy." We are surprised at the former saints of God; Are we surprised at how they were able to defeat the great nasty enemy force? What created such strength and action in them? Was it not fasting and abstinence with which they killed “their lives that were on the earth”? On the contrary, nothing makes one so weak and incapable of heroic deeds, nothing makes one more vulnerable to victory over an invisible enemy than satiety, delicious food and gluttony. In the Holy Scripture we read how the Babylonian king Nebuchadnezzar, having taken Jerusalem with God's permission, captivated the Jerusalem king Zedekiah with many people and returned home, after some time sent Nebuzaradan, the archmagir, that is, the prince or senior over his cooks, so that he would destroy the Jerusalem buildings. The archmagir, having come to Jerusalem, burned the church of the Lord and the royal house, he burned all the houses of the citizens and all the large buildings with fire, and all the walls of Jerusalem were destroyed by the Chaldean force that was with the archmagir. Here we should think about why Nebuchadnezzar, having captured Jerusalem, did not destroy it to the ground himself, but sent a prince, and, moreover, no other, but precisely the prince over his cooks, whose service and duties were to prepare delicious food for the royal meal? What is the reason for this? This is answered with the following interpretation: this happened according to the providence of God, who with His righteous judgment punished the Jerusalemites according to their sins. The Jerusalemites sinned many before God, therefore the Lord sent them many punishments, and at the same time He brought the appropriate punishment for each sin. They sinned by idolatry, which is why the Lord punished them with the idolater Nebuchadnezzar, who, having placed his golden idol on the field of Deire, ordered to worship him as a god. The Jerusalemites sinned by beating the prophets, therefore the Lord punished them with the sword of the Chaldeans. They sinned by unrighteously robbing and stealing someone else’s property, and therefore he punished them by depriving them of everything, for everything was robbed by those who captivated them. They sinned with pride, for which he punished them with enslavement and finally humbled them with captivity. They sinned quite a bit with indulgence, satiety, and gluttony, and therefore God, the righteous Judge, punished them with the prince of cooks Nebuzaradan, so that whatever they sinned with, they would be punished. Jerusalem cared a lot about the kitchen, about sweet dishes, about gluttony, and therefore the destruction of Jerusalem was carried out by the senior cook, the archmagir. Let us now see how that archmagir ravages Jerusalem. He destroys it with fire and by tearing down the walls to the ground. From this we should see that in the end nothing ruins the soul that wants to work for God, like the beautiful Jerusalem, like the archmagir, that is, satiety, indulgence and gluttony. He also destroys with fire, that is, with sinful decay, inflaming the voluptuous and passionate flesh into nasty sin, for truly, carnal passions follow after voluptuousness, sinful decay, which if in someone multiplies and intensifies like a fire, then all his virtues with which he decorated his soul will turn into ashes, just as the fire of the archmagisters burned all the beauty of Jerusalem. No wonder Saint Chrysostom says: “Where there is drunkenness, there is the devil, there are bad words; and where there is satiety, there the demons rejoice.” Well, this means that the Lord fed those who followed Him and listened to His words not with any other sweet bread, but with hard, barley bread. By this He teaches us not about indulgence, but about abstinence. “There are no imams here, just five bread.” The interpreters of Divine Scripture, interpreting this spiritually, mean various spiritual things by those little breads. Some call the word of God bread, meaning the words of God from the prophecy of Amos: “I will send,” He said, “a famine on the earth, not a famine of bread, but a famine of hearing the word of God” (Amos 8:11). Others call holy repentance bread, based on the words of David, repenting of his sins and saying: “I eat ashes like bread, and dissolve my drink with weeping” (Ps. 101:10). Some call alms given to the poor spiritual bread, eternally rewarded by God, as can be seen from the words of Ecclesiastes, who says: “Send your bread on the face of water, and in many days you will find it” (Eccl. 11:30). Eternal pleasure in heaven, which will come from seeing God, is also spiritual bread: “I will be satisfied,” it is said, “to never be revealed to Your glory” (Ps. 16:15). Others, finally, call the body of Christ spiritual bread, which, under the guise of material bread that nourishes the flesh, is consecrated on the Divine Throne, for it nourishes and revives our souls and unites them both with Christ Himself and with each other, according to the words of the holy Apostle Paul, who says this: “The bread that we break, is not the fellowship of the body of Christ? For we are one bread, and one body we are many: for we all partake of one bread (the body of Christ)” (2 Cor. 10:16:17). All those spiritual breads, five in number according to the number of the five gospel loaves, are very good, and much should be said about the taste and strength of each of them, but there is not enough time for us, the narrator, or for you, the listeners. Is it really necessary to speak only about the bread of the body of Christ against those who do not often partake of communion, while others do not even partake of the body and blood of Christ at all? But this is stated in the teaching for the fifth week of Lent. In order not to drag out the words and not to embarrass the listeners, I will end my conversation by advising everyone to eat that spiritual bread and be satisfied with them and wishing that our souls would not be exhausted from eternal hunger, but that they would be honored in heaven with eternal satiation with all the saints. Amen. Sermon for the ninth week after Pentecost “The ship was in the middle of the sea, tossing with waves; for the wind was against it” (Matthew 14:24) In today's Gospel, read at the Divine Liturgy, we heard about a stormy sea, about an opposing wind, about a ship covered by waves, about the drowning of Peter and about the disciples crying out in fear. All of these, beloved listeners, are bad events. Did all this happen by chance, or by deliberate providence and arrangement of God - that’s what I ask. Suppose that by chance, why then did the Lord, foreseeing that all this would happen, and advising not to expose ourselves to disasters, why did He force (as the Gospel says) His disciples to enter the ship, as if precisely so that they would endure such fear and such distress from excitement? Wouldn't it be better if He, as one who wishes everyone good and not evil, silence and not excitement and troubles, forbade them to sail in the ship? If this happened according to God’s deliberate providence and dispensation, as the interpreters of Divine Scripture think about it, then for what reason did He allow, or, better to say, deliberately raised and brought upon His disciples such a disaster at sea, such fear that the disciples were in distress in the ship from the excitement and storm, despaired of their salvation and screamed and shouted out of fear: “You cried out for fear”? Among the teachers there are those who talk about the following two reasons for such God’s providence and dispensation: Christ the Lord arranged for there to be winds and waves on the sea and the apostolic ship to be distressed by the pressure of the waves in order to show Himself as the Lord and Master of all, possessing heaven and earth, the sea and the winds: “For both the winds and the sea will listen to Him.” On the one hand, He wanted to punish the lack of faith and doubt of His disciples: “And he said to them: Why are you fearful, you of little faith?”; “And to Peter: You of little faith, why did you doubt?”; wanted to teach them to hope in God in all kinds of disasters, for he says: “Be bold, I am, do not be afraid,” thereby expressing the following: I am with you everywhere, in every place, in good, in evil, I am present with you everywhere and help, I delivered you from disasters: dare, do not be afraid! On the other hand, He wanted to assure them of His Divinity, for in the silence that followed they bowed to Him, saying: “Truly you are the Son of God” (Matthew 8:26; 14:31, 27:33). However, the Mediolan leader and no less church teacher, Saint Ambrose, finds another reason for the sea disturbance and the ship’s distress. This reason is as follows: since Judas the traitor was in the ship along with the holy apostles, therefore a contrary wind arose on the sea, and the ship was tossed by the waves. This is how this teacher says: “Although many good deeds of Christ’s disciples were floating in the ship, the unbelief of the traitor troubled the ship with waves; that is, because of the unbelieving Judas, the sea was indignant, unable to bear to see him floating on itself. If Judas did not yet have the intention of betraying Christ, he already had a common reliquary, carried what was put in it and stole. Because of whom the whole meal of Christ at the Last Supper was then able to be indignant, because of whom the sea was now indignant, and the ship was tossed by the waves.” We will begin here with the Gospel interpretation. This world is a sea; the ship is the Church of Christ or the entire Christian fatherland, such as, generally speaking, the Russian kingdom. In particular, every person in the world is a ship. Our life is a swim in the sea of ​​the world; swimmers in the common ship of the church and kingdom are believers, great and small, dignified and common people. In every ship of every person, that is, in the body, the swimmers are the soul and its companions, which are memory, reason and will. Opposite winds, storms, waves - these are many different and varied disasters in the world, with which that sea is agitated, confused, shaken and destroys many: it drowns some, keeps others near drowning, others in confusion and great fear, and drives others to despair. At the present time, as we ourselves clearly see, in particular, many waves have risen and are rising, by God’s permission, against the whole ship of the Church of Christ and the entire Christian Fatherland: now famine, now fiery punishments, the burning of beautiful houses, cities and churches of the Lord, now constant wars and uprisings of foreigners. How many Christians were cruelly swallowed up in these deplorable years by the sword of enemies, and taken into captivity by the enemy’s hand, not to mention internal internecine uprisings, about everyone persecuting each other and eating and destroying each other! All this is the essence of the turbulence and storms of the sea of ​​this world, so that our ship is covered with waves and breaks into pieces, weakens in its strength from the pressure of the waves, and an opposing wind blows on us from everywhere. Let us look for the reason why the Lord allows such a storm and excitement to happen to us: why does He punish us like this, why does He leave us to be poor among such evils? From Saint Ambrose we borrowed one reason why the Lord allowed the apostolic ship to be tossed by the waves, namely, that Judas was in the ship between the apostles. Who is Judas in the ship of the Christian Fatherland? Truly, every unrepentant sinner is a Judas, and that is why waves of such disasters rise upon us. Judas was a thief and a traitor, a flatterer and a suicide: “She hanged herself” (Matthew 27:5). A sinful, unrepentant person is like Judas in everything. He is a thief, for he thinks with his sins to hide from the all-seeing eye of God: “The Lord will not see, but God will understand Jacob” (Ps. 93:7). The time given to him for repentance, he steals for his iniquities. He is also a traitor, for, preferring the temporal to the eternal, he betrays the great sweetness above for a small sweetness below; for brief earthly joy he betrays endless heavenly joy; for the daily satiation of his belly, he betrays that spiritual saturation about which David speaks: “Your glory will always appear” (Ps. 16:15). For sinful sensuality, he betrays the glorification of his flesh, which is to happen for the righteous at the general resurrection, “when this corruptible has put on incorruption, and this dead thing has put on immortality” (1 Cor. 15:53). For his pride he betrays the exaltation prepared by God for the humble. For anger, rage and hatred of others, he betrays loving communication with the angels and all the saints: in a word, for sin he betrays God and is a Judas traitor. He is also a flatterer, for sometimes he comes as if to repentance, confesses his sins with his lips, but in fact does not even think about creating fruits worthy of repentance. He “prays with his lips, but his heart is far from God” (Isa. 29:13); with his foul lips he kisses Christ, unworthily partaking of the most pure Mysteries, and then again returns to his sinful deeds. He only flatters, saying “I repent,” he only promises to be kind, but Judas, the slave and flatterer, remains incorrigible, and then kills his soul with despair. So, such a sinner is like Judas in everything and is the second Judas. And how many such Judases there are among Christians! If because of one Judas the waves abandoned the apostolic ship, then how will the ship of the Christian Fatherland not be in trouble in the turmoil because of so many Judases existing among us?! In the life of Saint Porphyry, Bishop of Gaza, we read that when this saint was returning by water along with another - Blessed Jerome - and was near the island of Rhodes; Then a storm and excitement arose on the sea, and everyone was in great fear, fearing drowning. This happened all day and all night. When the morning dawn rose, Saint Porphyry dozed off a little and saw the Monk Procopius the hermit, who informed him that among them on the ship there was one secret heretic of the Aryan error, that because of this heretic the sea was troubled and that it would not calm down until he was inclined towards Orthodoxy. And so it turned out: the captain of the ship was a secret heretic; As soon as he confessed the Orthodox faith, the storm immediately stopped and there was silence on the sea. So we see that because of one secret heretic, the saints were in misery at sea. What should we think? How many among us there are wolves in sheep's clothing, who, under the name of an Orthodox Christian, do ignominious things and by their deeds surpass the wicked pagans and the filthy! And how will the ship of the Church of Christ and the entire Fatherland not be tossed around by the waves of great disasters unleashed on us by God according to His righteous judgment?! Let's look into ancient times. Beautiful was the ship of the people of Israel, which passed through the dry Red Sea and inherited the holy mountain of Jerusalem: “And its place was in peace, and its dwelling was in Zion” (Ps. 76:3). When iniquities multiplied among them and they “angered God on high and did not keep His testimonies” (Ps. 75 et seq.), when they turned into “a corrupted bow,” then God, angry with their evil deeds, severely punished Israel. About exactly how he punished, we hear the following: “You delivered their strength and their kindness into captivity into the hands of enemies and locked up your people in weapons, and despised your property. Their young men were consumed by fire, and their virgins were not mourned, their priests fell with the sword, and their widows were not mourned.” The ship of the autocracy of Greek Christianity was beautiful throughout the whole sky: it surpassed all monarchs in splendor and dignity. And how did he suffer for the multiplication of sins? How did you crash? Who does not see that even to this day he cannot obtain peace? The Lord God, once talking with His servant the prophet Ezekiel about Samaria and Jerusalem with the parable of two sisters - Olya and Olive - and saying that Samaria, for the sins that had multiplied in it by the Assyrians, was devastated by fire and sword, which the vengeful hand of God brought on them, commands the prophet to admonish Jerusalem so that it does not suffer in the same way. Therefore, the prophet says to the Jerusalemites: “Look at your sister Samaria, how desolate Samaria is: you have not sinned half your sins, but you have multiplied your iniquities more than these. Behold, the Lord says to Adonai: “Thou shalt drink the cup of thy sister, deep and wide” (Ezek. 16:51), that is, the cup of God’s punishment. “The cup,” he says, “of consumption and destruction, the cup of your sister Samaria.” What should we think, beloved?! Are not the iniquities of our country equal to the iniquities of those Samaritans, Jerusalemites and, moreover, the Greeks? Isn’t that cup of God’s vengeance prepared for us too, about which David says: “The cup of wine in the hand of the Lord is not dissolved; full of dissolution, turn away from this sowing; Otherwise, His thirst will not be exhausted, and all the sinners of the earth will drink” (Ps. 75:9). Oh, our terrible misfortune and misfortune! Indeed, for the increase in the grave iniquities of unrepentant sinners, the ship of the church and the entire Christian fatherland suffers in the sea of ​​this world from waves of disasters, and, day by day, exhausted in its strength, it is already close to destruction and sinking; unless the Lord Himself, walking on the sea, will come to the rescue, rebuke the winds and the sea and create silence, for He reassured His holy church that “the gates of hell will not prevail against it” (Matthew 16:18). He is our “helper in the sorrows that have come upon us greatly” (Ps. 45:3), for when human strength is completely exhausted, then God’s help suddenly appears. God saved Isaac, Abraham's son, from slaughter not before Abraham had already taken out his knife to kill his son, but he delivered Susanna from death by sending Daniel only at the moment when she was already taken out to be stoned. He saved Daniel already among the lions who were hungry and had their mouths open. He saved three youths who had already been thrown into the burning furnace. To Peter, who was already drowning, He extended a helping hand and brought him out of prison, having already been thrown there to death. When the apostolic ship was already covered with waves, He appeared to those walking on the sea and rebuked the winds. In times of such need, God’s timely help usually rushes to glorify His holy name; She is also strong enough to hurry to save our ship, which is subject to a storm. All this was said in general about the complete ship of the church and fatherland of the faithful. In particular, when talking about the mental ship - the life of every Christian person, we will again remember Saint Ambrose, who said that because of Judas alone, a storm arose on the sea and waves arose on the apostolic ship, and we will say: in the ship of our life, in each of us, Judas sits separately - our grave sin and ordinary passion. Just as Judas was a thief, a traitor, a flatterer and a suicide, so our ordinary sin is a thief, for it robs us, destroying all our labors and exploits with which we wanted to earn mercy from the Lord our God; he is a traitor, for he betrays us to eternal death in hell; he is also a flatterer, for, having pleased us in small things, he fills us with eternal bitterness; he is, finally, a murderer, for he kills both our soul and our good reputation. Until such a Judas, that is, our grave sin and our usual passion, will be in the ship of our life, until he is expelled from us by perfect repentance, until then we will not sail comfortably and will not reach a good haven. Let us remember the prophet Jonah. He was a righteous man before the Lord, he was a holy prophet; and who does not know that he suffered at sea only for one sin of disobedience? “The Lord raised up a great wind in the sea, and there was a great storm, and the ship suffered, as if it were broken, and the shipwreck was afraid, and each one cried out to his god” (Jon. 1:4:5). Oh, how many grave mortal sins are among us! How do we want to have silence? Great sins have deposed the mighty from their thrones, destroyed kingdoms, laid waste cities, scattered great armies, devastated countries, and have they spared even one evil person? Stingy sins brought a flood on the people of the former world, rained fire on the cities of Sodom, turned the Egyptians' rivers into blood and drowned them in the Red Sea. Which of us can they save? Grave sin broke the sky under Lucifer and opened up the earth under Dathan and Abiron to hell, established a great gulf between the rich and Lazarus, “the angels who did not keep their superiors were kept in chains under darkness for the judgment of the great day,” turned people into cattle, like Nebuchadnezzar, and into insensitive pillars, like Lot’s wife, and never spared anyone. What good can we expect from our evil deeds? As long as that Judas, that is, sin, habitual sin, is on the ship of our life, until then we will not have any good, until then we will be overwhelmed by waves of disasters and evils. We are amazed that sometimes there are droughts, lack of rain, infertility of the land, followed by decay and famine: what causes all this? Who is to blame for such evil? Our sin. Here we hear God say: “A fire will kindle in My wrath, it will burn to the depths of hell, it will destroy the earth and its life, it will burn the foundations of the mountains. I will gather evil against them, and My arrows will end in them; they will melt away with hunger” (Deut. 32:22). Why, Lord, are You so terribly angry with Your beloved people? “For their sins,” he says, “for they angered Me and made Me bitter in their abominations.” We are amazed that sometimes an unexpected fire occurs and many homes and estates are burned. And what does this do? Who is to blame? Our sin! “It will rain,” it is said, “on sinners a snare, a fire and a bogeyman, and a stormy spirit” (Ps. 10:6). We marvel at the incessant wars, battles and the many who fell by the sword; and what does this do? Truly, nothing else is guilty of such evil than our sins, according to the words of God in prophecy: “If you do not listen to Me (that is, if you do not repent of your sins), you will girdle the sword: for the mouth of the Lord speaks this” (Is. 1:20). Oh, how cruelly the waves hit us from everywhere! The cause of all these disasters is Judas in the ship, sin in our members, to which we have enslaved ourselves. Let us drive him out of ourselves by repentance; and until we drive him out, until then we will not cease to be in misery and will not get rid of such many of our misfortunes. Here, my listener, we have learned the reason for the excitement of the ships: both material apostolic and mental - the church, the Christian fatherland and each individual person. Judas is to blame for the disturbance of the apostolic ship; the evil, bitter, unrepentant, numerous, Judas-like sinners are to blame for the disasters of the church and the entire people; in the disturbances of the mental ship - each individual person - the personal sin of each is to blame, from which everyone wants to get behind and repent of it. What should we do so that the turbulence on the great and vast sea of ​​this world will cease, and our ships will have a quiet and trouble-free voyage? This is what we will do: we will cry to the Lord with Saint Peter: “Lord, save us, we are perishing” (Matthew 8:25). God! Turn the Judean-like sinners among us and transform our sins with Your omnipotent mercy into righteous people and justification. God! Come closer to us yourself; walking on the sea, rebuke the winds and storms and turn our worries into silence. God! Tell by Your presence what You said to Your apostles: “Be of good cheer, I am, do not be afraid” (Matthew 14:27). We, sinners and unfortunates, tormented by the waves, will rejoice in You, our God, and, together with those who bowed in the ship, we will worship You, saying. “Thou art truly the Son of God” (Matthew 14:33). Amen. Sermon for the tenth week after Pentecost “Lord! Have mercy on my son, for in the new months he rages and suffers evil. And I brought him to Your disciples, and I was not able to heal him” (Matthew 17:15:16) Beloved listeners! Not always, as we see, holy people can have power over demons in order to cast them out. A certain man who had a demon-possessed son, who suffered greatly from an unclean spirit, brought him to the apostles, to the disciples of Christ, and prayed that they would heal his son and drive out the unclean spirit from him. But they were not able to do this and, what is most surprising, they were not able to cast out after receiving from Christ power over demons, after they were given power over unclean spirits in order to cast them out. Despite this, they could not cast out the demon from the youth whom they brought to them. If they, being saints, turned out to be powerless, then what can we, sinners, do? How can we resist the demon when his power is strong, but our nature is passionate, and our strength is weak? If the Lord were not among us, then who could preserve himself whole from the enemy and murderer? What is the reason for the weakness that the holy apostles were unable to cast out the demon from the youth who was possessed during the new moon? Christ the Lord clearly showed this reason to His disciples in private when they asked Him: “Why were we not able to drive him out? Jesus said to them, “Because of your unbelief.” Although the holy apostles had the power over demons given to them by Christ, yet there was some doubt and unbelief in them, but the unbelief was not in Christ, whom they had already confessed with their lips and hearts as the true Son of God, as we heard this last week, when He turned the turbulence of the sea into silence, when He extended His hand to the drowning Peter and saved him from drowning: “Then those in the ship worshiping Him, saying: “Truly you are the Son of God” (Matthew 14:33). So, the apostles had disbelief not in Christ, but in the power given to them: they doubted whether they could or could not cast out a demon so strong and so terrible that they had not yet had to cast out? They doubted, because they did not yet have courage and boldness, since they had not yet received the Holy Spirit. I, a sinner, defending the holy apostles from the vice of unbelief and seeking in the present Gospel benefit for myself and you, my listeners, decided, with the help of God and those holy apostles, to show you other reasons why the holy apostles could not cast out the demon. I will not do this from my meager intelligence, but from the same holy Gospel I will extract for us a rule on how we could expel demonic passions from ourselves. “Lord, have mercy” and so on. In order to more clearly understand what is intended, we, Orthodox listeners, will first of all consider the time in which the holy apostles were unable to cast out the demon. Our Lord Jesus Christ, shortly before His suffering and cross, wanting to show His chosen disciples on Tabor the glory of His Divinity, on the fifth day of the month of August came to Mount Tabor with all His twelve disciples. There in the evening He took three disciples - Peter, James and John - and went up the mountain to spend the night in prayer, but He left the other apostles, among whom was Judas, under the mountain. At that time, a man brought his demon-possessed son to the nine apostles, and they could not cast out the demon. When that wonderful night on which our Lord was transfigured passed, and the sixth day of August arrived, the Lord walked from the mountain with three disciples, and the people who usually followed Christ gathered under the mountain, waiting for Christ to come down from the mountain. When they saw Him, they greeted Him, and then one man from the people approached Jesus, bowing to Him and saying: “Lord! Have mercy on my son, for in the new months he rages and suffers evil. And I brought him to Your disciples, and I was not able to heal him. Jesus answered and said: O unfaithful and corrupt generation! How long will I be with you, how long will you endure?” (Matthew 17:15, 16:17). Let's look here: at what time were the apostles unable to cast out the demon? When not everyone was together, but only nine, including Judas. Peter, James and John, the most important of the apostles, went with Jesus to the mountain: that is why they could not cast out the demon. They couldn’t do it without Peter, the rock of faith, they couldn’t do it without James, without a strong fighter, they couldn’t do it without John, without the grace of God, and especially they couldn’t do it without the presence of the Lord Jesus Christ Himself. Even if they could do something, Judas, filled with unbelief, was still between them as an obstacle, and because of this unbelief, the other holy apostles could not cast out the demon. Let us proceed to spiritual consideration. Forgive me, sinful people, to which I, the accursed one, belong, forgive me for calling every sinner who exhausts his life without repentance a demoniac. A demon lives in an unrepentant sinner, as in his true home, for just as God lives in a virtuous, righteous man and he lives in God, so a demon lives in a damned sinner and he lives in a demon, since, according to the Apostle, “the sin of the devil is committed” (1 John 3:8).. So, every hardened sinner is possessed by a demon. Since the sinner is multi-passionate and multi-lustful, then the demon in him is multi-faceted. The evangelists describe the present demon-possessed youth in different ways. Matthew says: “He shall fall by great numbers into fire, and by great numbers into water”; Luke: “The spirit eats him, and suddenly he cries out and leaps with foam”; Mark in chapter nine: “He foams and gnashes his teeth and becomes numb.” So, in one possessed youth all the images of the seven-headed serpent were depicted, all, I say, the seven deadly sins were depicted. “Suddenly he cries out” is an image of pride, arrogance and self-praise, for pride and arrogance do not know how to remain silent, they set their mouth in heaven, and their tongue passes through the earth. “Casts into fire” is an image of bodily uncleanness, inflamed by foul lust. Throws “into the water” - this is an image of covetousness and money-loving covetousness, greedily making sure that all abundance and wealth always abounds with him, like a flooded river. “Getting excited” is an image of envy, which, seeing the well-being of others, is consumed in itself. “The foam is flowing” is an image of gluttony and drunkenness even to the point of vomiting, as well as the foul language that occurs during drunkenness. “Grinding teeth” is an image of anger. “Numb” is an image of laziness. Anyone who wants to cast out such a seven-headed and diverse demon from himself must have many feats of virtue, but not without Peter, James and John, that is, not without firm faith, not without a persistent struggle with passions, not without the special grace of God, which is given to those who diligently seek God and truly love Him. Without them, and especially without the presence of God, it is impossible to get rid of sinful, diverse demonic possession: “I was not able to do it.” If someone does not have God before his eyes, it is absolutely impossible for him to lag behind a bad life, for the whole reason for the sins committed is that a person does not remember God, does not have Him before his mental eyes, as David says about the sinner: “There is no God before him; For this reason his ways are defiled for all time” (Ps. 9:25:26). He spends his paths, his life prodigal, because there is no God before him, his mind is far from God, and God is far from him. When the sun sets, night comes: similarly, our life becomes dark and bad when God retreats far from us or we retreat far from God. Just as the disembodied angelic nature in that luminous angel, who later turned into an angel, was luminous, and he himself was called “Lucifer”, “the Lucifer”, while he was with God, and when he fell away from God, he immediately became a Luciper, which means - he who destroyed lordship, dark-bearing, and from an angel turned into a demon - so a person spends an angelic life in the body only as long as he holds on to God, and when If he separates himself far from God, he becomes a demon in the flesh. Remembering here the luminous angel who turned into a dark angel, we ask: why did the devil, wanting to tempt our foremother Eve and with his charm lead her to transgress the commandment of God, appear to her in the form of a serpent? Why was he not transformed into a bright angel, as he was later transformed for many, as the apostle says about this: “For Satan himself is transformed into an angel of light” (1 Cor. 11:14)? Why did he appear to Eve not in the form of some beautiful human face, or even in the form of some animal, for example, a lamb or a calf, but in the form of a serpent? The reason for this is seen in the following: just as the prodigal son, having gone far from his father, came to such trouble that he then asked permission to graze pigs, so Satan, who once fell away from God, turned into a serpent. We can say that the demon appeared to Eve in an image befitting him, appeared as he became after his fall from heaven. The ancient serpent, called the devil and Satan, was overthrown, and therefore God did not allow him to appear in the form of a luminous angel. If Eve had seen an angel talking to her, she would have immediately, without any doubt, tasted the fruit, and not as she, when talking with the serpent, at first doubted. God did not allow the demon to appear in the form of any human face, for if Eve had seen a human face talking to her, she would have especially doubted, saying to herself: Are there other people anywhere besides the two of us, Adam and Eve? Is there still some kind of paradise somewhere? He was not allowed to appear in the form of any animal that does not have poison; It was the serpent that appeared, filled with malice, for this is his true image, in which he was clothed at the very hour of his overthrow. When the angelic image was removed from him, a serpentine one was superimposed on him. And so, when the serpent was talking with Eve, God spoke in Eve’s heart with mysterious inspiration: pay attention, Eve, to whom you are talking - with the serpent, not with an angel and not with a man, but with a serpent; If you listen to the snake, you yourself will become a snake. And so it happened. Eve, having listened to the serpent, herself became such a poisonous snake that she damaged the entire human race with sinful poison. We now know the reason for the transformation of the devil from an angel into a demon - he fell away from God, for what else can one who has fallen away from God be than a serpent? After all, such a character becomes like a snake, full of deadly poison. So, all sinners who are separated from God by your sins, understand what you are. You are snakes, biting snakes, that is, not beneficial, but harming each other through the temptation of sin. You are no longer like angels, children of God, but like angels, children of the devil, not like good people, but like poisonous reptiles, verbal reptiles, whose words are harmful; the poison of slates is in their mouth and their deeds are abominable; their ways are defiled, for there is no God before them. The life of a sinner without the presence of God is wicked and snake-like; he can no longer do anything good, according to the words of God: “Without Me you can do nothing” (John 15:6). Let us have God with us, and then we will drive away the demon from us: otherwise it is impossible to drive it away, and we may be subject to this reproachful word: “I was not able to do it.” People who are friends with a demon cannot get rid of it; they would rather perish forever. Another thing that prevented the apostles from casting out the demon was that Judas was with them, for the Lord did not take this wicked man with Him to Tabor, not wanting to show His secret to His enemy. When the holy apostles said to the demon: go into the abyss, get away from the creation of God, the demon thought to himself, saying: cast out the visible demon Judas from you, then I, the invisible demon, can come out, but while I see Judas among you, I will not come out either, for I do not want to move away from my friend; if it takes place among you, then why are you persecuting me? This is the truth, for where there is a secret Judas in a community, it is difficult to get rid of the demon. Saint Chrysostom, Theophylact and others with them see another special reason why the apostles could not cast out the demon, namely: because of the unbelief of that man himself and others who were there among the people. The Lord Himself convicts them of this, saying: “Oh, unfaithful and corrupt generation! How long will I be with you? (Matthew 17:20); In private, the Lord said to the disciples: “Because of your unbelief,” which was more befitting the scribes, Pharisees and Judas than the disciples. One of the interpreters says to a man who had a demon-possessed son, speaking with him on behalf of Christ: “Oh, Jew, the inability of Myself or My disciples is not to blame, for I have already given them the power to cast out the demon; but it is the unbelief of you and your Jews that is to blame, which creates an obstacle to God’s grace. How can I or My disciples heal your son when you do not believe, but doubt?” Although the holy apostles had power over demons, since there was no faith in that man and others with him, the apostles could not cast out the demon: faith can do anything, but unbelief creates an obstacle to even possible things. Here one should scold that man. You, man, slander the disciples, saying before the Lord and all the people: “I was not able to drive them out.” Why are you silent about your unbelief? Why don't you confess your sin? You are silent about your sin, and great sin, which is even worse than unbelief, but you expose someone else’s small sin, expose it and, as it were, attack the saints, defame them, saying: “I couldn’t do it.” Oh verily they can; only your unbelief hinders. People can do this too. Everyone does not consider his own sin, albeit a grave one, to be a sin; he does not see a log in his eye, but about himself, even if he were up to his neck in a sinful swamp, he thinks that he is a pure, good person, holy and righteous; if we take another good person, then even if he stumbled in a small way, even if the most insignificant vice manifested itself in him, like some small piece of powder that fell on the snow, that holy man, who does not feel the beam in his eye, everywhere with his tongue reviles this one who has the slightest twig, everywhere he preaches about him, everywhere he condemns him, as if saying: “If he is not able to do this,” he cannot be virtuous, he cannot to improve and does not deserve a single kind word. Respond now, Christ our Savior, to such with those words: “Oh, an unfaithful and corrupt generation,” and so on. “I can’t do it.” Oh, stupid man, you yourself are to blame, and you put the blame on others: “I couldn’t do it.” Here we will also consider the following. For example, someone asks a passing priest to pray to God for him. The priest prays, and even very earnestly, but he cannot beg God if the one for whom he prays not only does not stop sinning, but falls into even greater sin; and the praying priest is not to blame for this - all the fault lies with the one for whom he is praying, since he creates an obstacle to the prayer of the one praying. The priest prays, but he sins; he is crying, and he is jumping; he fasts, and he gets drunk. Prayer here is in vain, labor is in vain: “I couldn’t do it.” In the Divine Scripture we read the following: two Israeli kings, Saul and David, once sinned before God; Saul had a prayer book for God and an intercessor in the holy prophet Samuel, and David had a pilgrim for his sin in the person of the holy prophet Nathan. At a time when Nathan begged God for his sinner, that is, David, and sought quick forgiveness for him, Samuel not only does not appease God towards his sinner, but even more, as it were, irritates Him and with his prayer encourages him to greater anger against Saul. Why? What is the reason for this? Was Nathan, David's pilgrim, more kind to God than Samuel, Saul's pilgrim, if He listens to the prayers of the first, but does not want to listen to the prayers of the second? No, we cannot say that both of these prophets were not in equal favor with the Lord God. Why is the prayer of one accepted, but not the other? The reason is that Samuel prays for Saul, and Saul does not think about prayer. Samuel stands in prayer all night, and Saul sleeps, stretched out on a soft bed; Samuel is in sackcloth and ashes, and Saul is in revelry; Samuel hungers and thirsts in fasting for Saul, and Saul feasts and gets drunk. Do not be surprised, Saul, that Samuel could not pray to God for you: “I am not able.” Samuel is not to blame for this, but you yourself are to blame; Your unrepentant sins are to blame: “I couldn’t do it.” David does the exact opposite of Saul and agrees with Nathan. Nathan prays for David, and David himself falls crosswise before God in prayer and cries out: “Have mercy on me, O God!” (Ps. 50). Nathan gets up at midnight to pray for David, and David also gets up, saying: “At midnight I will rise to confess to You about the destinies of Your righteousness” (Ps. 119:62). Nathan put on sackcloth for David, and David says: “Let us put on sackcloth.” Nathan fasted for David, and David also fasted: “I humbled my soul with fasting” (Ps. 34:13). Be sure, David, that God has heard your pilgrim and is giving you forgiveness. It is good to pray for such a one; It’s easy to drive out a grave sin from such a thing, like some kind of demon. But you, who are like Saul in life, do not put blame on your pilgrims, do not say: “I couldn’t do it,” when you do not care about yourself and neglect your own salvation. They could not because of your unbelief. Now, my listener, we have learned the reasons why the holy apostles could not cast out the demon from the youth who was possessed on the new moon. On the one hand, they could not because not everyone was together, the three most important apostles were not there, and most importantly, the Lord Jesus Himself was not there; on the other hand, because Judas was some obstacle for them, as well as the unbelieving father of the demoniac. We will borrow here an example of how one must drive away demonic passions from oneself in order to acquire all virtuous deeds - faith with Peter, hope with James and love with John, and especially with the presence of the Lord Himself; Let us avoid the Judean debauchees, look at our own, and not at the sins of others, not blame anyone for our failure in our prayers, but attribute it to our own negligence, and pray to God that He will raise us to true repentance and arm us weak against demonic power, girding us with His Divine power from above. Amen. First sermon on the thirteenth week after Pentecost “A certain man was a steward who planted grapes” (Matthew 21:33). Grace and peace from our Lord Jesus Christ be to us all My dear listener! I am a guest in this God-saved reigning city, and it is fitting for a guest to come to worthy persons not without a gift, for it is written: “You shall not appear empty before the Lord” (Ex. 23:15). This means that I should not appear skinny in the face of your love. But what will I bring? What gift, what gift can I offer when I myself am poor both in spirit and in reality? I don’t have gold or silver and I don’t want to have it. I will bring what, by the grace of God, I have, although not richly, I will offer the word of God to your love. This gift, this gift is more valuable than thousands of gold and silver. With this, many bought eternal life for themselves: “Test,” it is said, “the scriptures, in which you hope to have eternal life” (John 5:39). So, let this word of God be a gift and a gift for you from our insignificance, and let your love not be rejected, for the words of God, although they are offered simply, not decorated with floridity, are still “the words of the Lord, pure words, kindled silver” (Ps. 11:7), full of dignity and benefit. So I begin in the name of the Lord. The current Gospel parable about planting grapes and killing the heir has been clearly interpreted, dear listeners, by the holy fathers and interpreters of Divine Scripture. In the Old Testament, the people of Israel, brought out of Egypt, were called grapes, about which the Psalmist says: “You brought grapes from Egypt” (Ps. 79:9). And Isaiah says: “The vine of the Lord of hosts is the house of Israel” (Isaiah 5:7). The stronghold of this grape was the law given to Moses by God at Sinai; the winepress is the altar of Old Testament sacrifices, through which the blood of animals flowed; pillar - Solomon's temple; workers - teachers of the law, scribes and princes, arch-synagogists; beaten slaves are prophets; the heir, taken out and killed, is the Messiah, Christ. In the new grace the grape is the church of Christ, transferred from Israel to the Gentiles. Its stronghold is the same law of God; the winepress is the word of God; pillar – firm faith; workers - shepherds, bishops and priests; slaves - those who bear obedience; sheep of words are pious people; the heir and head of the church is Christ. That's what they say in general. In particular, every Christian soul of an orthodox and pious person is a grape. His stronghold is the fear of God; the sharpener is a heart exuding tenderness; the pillar is the cross and the constant remembrance of the suffering of Christ; doers - mental powers: memory, reason and will; slaves - feelings; the heir of these grapes is one and the same - Christ. The vine of the Old Testament, or the house of Israel, was desolate, but the vine of new grace, that is, the Church of Christ, flourishes, although it is in the midst of thorns. Special, soulful grapes require planting and cultivation every day. I am walking past the Old Testament and long-deserted grapes; I will not talk now about the new-grace church grapes, but let’s talk about the mental, spiritual grapes and their spiritual planting. So, now, with God’s help, I want to be a homely person, I want to plant grapes, and spiritual grapes. To plant it, I will look for places in two countries: within the boundaries of this world and outside the boundaries of this world; within the limits of this world – in creation, and outside the limits of this world – in the Creator Himself. May you, your love, help me in my intended task by lovingly and attentively listening to you, and where we find a good place, there we will begin to plant our grapes. The spiritual grape is our soul, planted in our flesh as if in the earth, but living more where it loves something than where it exists. She exists in the flesh, and all her desires are where she loves something: where the treasure is, there is the heart; Where someone’s favorite thing is, there is his soul. The root of this spiritual grape of the soul, delving with the mind into what he constantly dreams of, and bypassing the lower and the higher, is planted there, deepening with his thoughts, where he likes it, regardless of whether this place is good or bad. Let us walk intelligently, first of all, through the boundaries of this world and look for a good place to plant our grapes. In this world there are three things, like three places, into which a person, being drawn to them by nature itself, usually goes deep with his mind, enjoys and takes root with all his soul. The first place is honor, the second is self-interest, and the third is pleasure, for everyone by nature desires honor, seeks gain and loves pleasure, which the apostle clearly depicted when he said: “All that is in this world is the lust of the flesh, and the lust of the belly, and the pride of the belly” (1 John 2:16). In the pride of life one desires honor, in the lust of the eyes one seeks self-interest and the exciting collection of property, in carnal lust the pleasure of carnal love is sought. These are all the limits of this world; that's all there is in the world. These three things are, as it were, three places for planting moral grapes: pride, which desires honor, passion, which seeks to gain wealth, and voluptuousness, which enjoys carnal love. All the people of this world, like vineyards, have been planted in these places and are being planted, deepened and deepened. After all, who in his pride does not desire honor? Who in his hobby does not seek wealth and profit? Who in his voluptuousness is not enslaved by carnal love? These three places were depicted in ancient times in the ancient grapes of God, which we will now see. There was once a time when the Lord God sent his messenger, the prophet Isaiah, to the judges of Israel on a mission; and the thing was this: God brought complaint and rage to the judges of Israel; He complained about some of His grapes and asked for judgment on them, and the words in God’s complaint were: “Now you who live in Jerusalem and the men of Judah judge Me and My grapes” (Is. 5:3). It is a wonderful thing to judge God with His grapes! God! Are you not the Judge of the living and the dead? Can't You judge Your grapes Yourself? No, he says, you people, judges of Jerusalem, judge Me and My grapes: “Judge Me and My grapes.” What is there to judge? This is what it says: “I fenced in my grapes,” says God, “I planted a chosen vine, and created a pillar in the midst of it, and a gravestone in it; Let us hear, in what way does God seek judgment on His grapes? He fenced it, He says, stuck stakes along which the grapes should grow, planted the chosen vine and did everything appropriate, putting a lot of care, effort and labor into it, and when I was already hoping for fruits, joy and profit, and was already preparing the desire to taste sweet grapes, My grapes instead of fruit gave birth to thorns, instead of joy - sorrow, instead of joy - sadness, instead of profit - deprivation, instead of a wonderful taste - bitterness: “The grapes theirs is a bunch of gall, a bunch of sorrow; The fury of serpents is their wine and the fury of asps is incurable!” (Deut. 32:32:33). Hands cannot be stretched out to My grapes; where there should be a cluster, there a thorn was born: “I waited for the cluster to make, so make thorns” (Is. 5:4). So, “Judge Me and My grapes,” says the Lord Almighty. Let us see why the grapes of God, well planted, fenced and cultivated, gave birth not to grapes, but to thorns? Isn't the place to blame? It happens that a good garden, but planted in a bad place, is barren. So let's see the place. The place where God planted His grapes is called a hill and a good place in the Slavic Bibles: “There were grapes for the beloved on a hill, in a place of blaze” (Is. 5:1), and the Chaldean translation reads: “on a rose,” that is, on a hill, “in a fat place.” These places are considered good, but they did not benefit the grapes of God. Let us examine these three names: “hill”, “good place” and “fat place”. According to the literal or written interpretation, it is explained as follows: the grapes of the Lord of hosts are, as we said earlier, the house of Israel, brought from Egypt to Palestine; hill - a Palestinian country lying high on mountains and hills - for example, Jerusalem is located on Mount Moriah, on Mount Zion, its surroundings are on the Mount of Olives, Tabor and others; the place was good because this country was fat, fertile and abundant in bread, vegetables, gold, silver and all sorts of goods; the place is fat, for it was rich in wood oil, having a mass of olive gardens, which is why in Jerome’s translation Jerusalem is called the son of oil, that is, oil. This is also why this country was called a fat place, because it abounded in honey and milk. Honey because there were many swarms of bees born everywhere, not only on the trees, but also in the mountains between the stones, and in the crevices of the earth; It was abundant in milk because it had excellent pastures for livestock, which is why there were a great many herds of dairy cattle. Thus, this country was very rich in both oil (wood oil) and cow oil. In such high and fertile places, rich in honey, milk and oil, grapes brought from Egypt were planted by the Jewish people, as it is written about them in the psalms: “Thou planted their roots, and filled the land. The mountains were covered with its shadow and its branches with cedars of God. Spread his rods out to the sea and even to the rivers of his branches” (Ps. 79:9-12). However, this people, called God’s grapes, turning out to be ungrateful for such God’s blessings, gave birth not to grapes, but to thorns, that is, they did deeds that were not pleasing to God, but that angered God. Having become rich in a good place, he first of all became proud, and just as he lived on a hill, in high places, so he was exalted in character and was arrogant, boasting of his high origin and freedom: “We are the seed of Abraham and have worked for no one” (John 1:33). Then, having grown fat and obese, he forgot God, who saved him, and worshiped idols. This did not appear to God as grapes, but as thorns. They sacrificed their daughters and sons to demons - and this is a thorn; having mixed with the pagans and learned their deeds, they inclined towards carnal impurity and intemperance and committed adultery with foreigners - and this is also a thorn. That is why the Lord God sought judgment against them, saying: “Judge Me and My grapes.” This interpretation is literal, as written. The spiritual interpretation is that the grapes of God, which God wants, as if from Egypt, from this deplorable vale, to be transferred to the heaven promised to us, are called the soul of every Christian person. By those above-mentioned places - a hill, a good place and a fat place - we will understand those above-mentioned three passions of this world, into which the human mind usually deepens, namely: carnal lust, lust of the eyes and worldly pride. Hill is the pride of life, which thinks highly of itself, climbs the mountain of arrogance and rises above others. A good place is an addiction to estates and riches, for they are usually called blessings, as, for example, the gospel rich man said: “Soul, you have many blessings, many things lie ahead.” The fat place is voluptuous carnality, lustful intemperance. This is how those ancient grapes of God, transferred from Egypt to Palestine, depict the three natural passions in the world that we are talking about. Let us, listeners, use our reasoning in those places and see whether it is useful to plant the spiritual grapes of the soul in these places? Truly, the grapes planted in those places will not produce clusters of godly deeds, but thorns of God’s wrath. God says: “I am waiting for the fruit to come forth, so make thorns” (Isaiah 5:4), and thorns prick both God, and one’s neighbor, and oneself. A grape planted on a hill, that is, a man exalted with pride, seeking the honors of this world, will not give birth to a bunch sweet to eat, but a sharp, prickly thorn, with which he first of all pricks God, for the proud is not dear to God, the arrogant is not loved by Him, like the eye of a thorn, which is why Scripture says: “Everyone who is proud in heart is abomination to the Lord” (Prov. 16:5 ). He stabs his neighbor, for the proud despises his neighbor, humiliates and annoys him, and sometimes beats and kills. Where do wars and many bloodsheds come from? Is it not from the worldly pride of those who seek glory for themselves and want to rule over others? Why does nation rise against nation and kingdom against kingdom? Is it not because of being higher, more glorious and more honest than each other? Do not quarrels live in high-born houses, among princes and boyars, bickering about their nobility and saying: I am more honest than him, I am nobler than him? And from disputes come anger and enmity. This is how mental grapes give birth not to bunches, but to thorns. That thorn also chops itself, for pride soon falls and is dethroned, since “the Lord resists the proud” (James 4:6). Was not the proud Nebuchadnezzar dethroned from his throne? When he was proud of the greatness of his glory and power, even before his words had time to come out of his mouth, he suddenly turned into cattle, was expelled from among people and ate grass. This is how unprofitable it is for spiritual grapes, that is, for man, to be planted on the hill of pride. Let’s pass this bad, unhelpful place and look for another one. A grape planted in a good place, that is, a person who labors after the lust of his eyes, overcome by the attraction of earthly goods and seeking riches immeasurably and insatiably, what will produce: a bunch or a thorn? Truly, not a bunch, but a sharp thorn that pricks God, his neighbor and himself. He stabs God, for he touches holy things, and he appropriates God, and he suppresses the word of God that fell among his thorns, as the Holy Gospel speaks about this in the parable of the sown seed: “Another fell in the midst of the thorns, and the thorns that grew up crushed them” (Luke 8:7), the interpretation of which is there: “But the one who fell into these thorns is the one who heard the word.” God, but are overwhelmed by sorrows and riches and the pleasures of life and do not bear fruit.” He also stabs his neighbor, according to the words of the holy Apostle James: “Do not the rich rape you, and drag you to judgment? Do they not blaspheme the good name that is given to you? (James 2:6:7). After all, those who insatiably enrich themselves rob other people’s property, kidnap it, take it away through unjust justice, and sometimes even exterminate from among those living on earth those from whom they want to take something. Did not Ahab, the king of Israel, destroy the innocent Israelite Naboth because of the vineyard that he wanted to take away from him? Anyone who wishes can read about this in the third book of Kings, chapter twenty-one. He also stabs himself, for, according to the words of the Apostle Paul, “those who want to get rich fall into misfortunes and snares, and many senseless and harmful lusts, which plunge people into all-destruction and destruction; For the love of money is the root of all evil” (1 Tim. 6:9:10). Therefore, the holy Apostle James cries out: “Come now, you rich people, weep and howl for the fierce sorrows that are coming upon you: throw away your wealth, and consume your prayers; Your gold and silver will rust, and their rust will come upon you and consume your flesh like fire” (James 5:1 et seq.). So, it is not useful for the mental grapes of a person to be planted in a good place, that is, to deepen his heart and mind in an insatiable search for earthly goods and possessions, riches and delicacies. And since it’s not useful, then we’ll pass this bad place too. A grape planted in a fat place, that is, a person working with carnal lusts, overcome by voluptuousness and wallowing incontinently in the mire of sinful carnal deeds, what will give birth: a bunch or thorns? Truly, not a bunch, but thorns: “For the essence of the deeds of the flesh is revealed,” says the apostle, “the essence of which is adultery, fornication, uncleanness, filthiness” and lasting (Gal. 5:19). All of these are sharp thorns that prick God, our neighbor and ourselves. This thorn pricks God, for it drives out the Holy Spirit from the fishing rods of men, and turns the fishing rods of Christ into the fishing rods of fornication. Stabs a neighbor, causing offense to a legal marriage. Didn’t the thorns of David’s adultery with Bathsheba prick Uriah even to his death? Was it not from this very thorn, that is, from Herod’s adultery, that Saint John, the Forerunner of Christ, suffered, who denounced him? That thorn stabs the lustful person himself, reducing his bodily strength, shortening this temporary life, depleting his property through fornication, dishonoring his name, disgracing his honor and, finally, kindling an unquenchable hellish fire, multiplying the flame of hell for his eternal torment. So, it is not useful for the mental grapes of man to be planted in fat places, in sinful carnal areas. Behold, my beloved listener, within the boundaries of this world we have seen three places of the moral, moral grape-man; They saw honors, self-interest, sweetness, pride - in a word, everything tasty and voluptuous, which the apostle calls the pride of life, the lust of the eyes and the lust of the flesh, and they did not find any benefit in those places, they did not find sweet grapes, but only prickly and painfully biting thorns. Let us go past these unprofitable places, let us pass the boundaries of this world, which lies in evil, let us go beyond its boundaries, let us look for a good place, which we will immediately find if we consider the power of the present Gospel. The current Gospel parable about the planting of vines and the killing of the heir depicts for us the suffering of our Lord Jesus Christ. Just as those workers of the vineyard, having seized the heir, took him out of the vineyard and killed him, so the Jews, having brought Christ out of Jerusalem, killed Him by death on the cross. Let us go to the place where the Heir, our Lord Jesus Christ, was killed, who calls to Himself, saying: “Depart from the midst of this people and do not touch their uncleanness, and I will accept you” (2 Cor. 6:17), And the Apostle advises: “Let us go to Him outside the camp (that is, outside this world), for which Jesus may sanctify people with His blood, outside the gates of suffering of His will; In the same way we come to Him outside the camp, bearing His reproach” (Heb. 13:12:13). When we, having left all worldly concerns outside the camp or outside the boundaries of this world, begin to leave it with our minds, we will immediately see our Lord Jesus Christ crucified on the cross. Beautiful are these grapes, the body of Christ, which, like a vine, is tied to the stake of the cross with a nail. He, with His true flesh, watered with water and blood flowing from his ribs, shows us five large wounds, like five large beautiful grapes, on his hands, on his feet and on his pure ribs. This Grape is on a hill, but not on a hill of pride, but on a hill of extreme humility, on Calvary, where He humbled himself not only to the image of a slave, but also to the image of a sinner; on this hill He was condemned as a sinner, “counted with the wicked” and crucified in the midst of two thieves. These grapes are in a good place. After all, there God incarnate showed us such a benefit that no one can ever show: “He redeemed us with his honest blood.” Good is the place where our Lord prayed for His enemies who were killing Him: “Father, let them go,” where He promised to open paradise to the thief: “Amen, I say to you, today you will be with Me in Paradise,” where He revealed to us and poured out all His treasures, when He shed all His pure blood for us to the last drop. This place is fat, for it has been drunk and fattened with the blood of Christ. Oh, how wonderfully the robber and Magdalene flourished in the abodes of our God, planting themselves in this very place! But here the most pure Virgin Mary and Saint John stand in that place, like beautiful grapes, exuding the wine of tears, which later turned into great joy. So, in this place, beloved listeners, we will plant the spiritual grapes of our soul, here we will deepen our mind, here we will root our desires like roots on the hill of Calvary, on the earth, watered with the blood of Christ, in the good place on which our salvation is accomplished. The Apostle advises: “I judged nothing else to see in you, even our Lord Jesus Christ, and Him crucified” (1 Cor. 2:2). How can you see? It is not enough to see only with our carnal eyes the crucifixion of the Lord, depicted in icon art on the image of the cross, but it is also necessary to look at Him with spiritual eyes, as if He were suffering now, for even now He suffers, although not in the body, however, speaking spiritually, He suffers, according to the apostolic explanation, being crucified a second time by sinners. An example of how one can see Christ crucified with spiritual eyes, let us be St. Stephen, about whom the following is written in Limonar. Three elders came to Abba Stephen, and when they talked about the benefit of the soul, the elder was silent. They said to him: “Will you really not answer us anything, father? After all, we came to you for your benefit.” Then he said to them: “Forgive me, brothers! I still don't understand what you are saying; however, what I have, I will tell you. Both day and night I see nothing else in my mind but our Lord Jesus Christ hanging on the cross” (Limonar, 64). Oh, how wonderful is that father’s thinking about God! He sits among the brothers, among human conversations, and with his mind he stands before the crucified Christ on Calvary, he sees Christ, he listens to Christ. Likewise, the Monk Pimen, when Abba Isaac came to him, sat in silence and seemed to be in a frenzy. Having waited for quite a long time and seeing that he had come to his senses, the abba prayed to him, saying: “Tell me, father, where have you been with your mind?” The same one, forced by prayer, answered: “My mind was where the most pure Virgin Mary, Theotokos, wept while standing at the cross.” Oh, a wonderful image of speculation! Oh, beautiful contemplation of the crucified Christ! These holy fathers planted the spiritual grapes of their souls on the hill of Golgotha, in a rich place where the blood of Christ was shed, in a good place where the work of our salvation was accomplished. Let us, sinners, stand with our minds on Calvary and look at Him who is now, as it were, nailed to the cross, wounded, bloodied, hanging dead, bowing His head, and we will see His inexpressible love for us: “God so love the world,” which suffered so terribly for us. Who ever loved anyone as He loved us? Who ever loved a father, or a mother, or a son, or a daughter, or a friend, so much as to suffer for them as much as He suffered for us? “So love God the world” (John 3:16). Can there be anywhere a better love than His love for us? “No one can have greater love than he sows, but he who lays down his life for his friends” (John 15:13). If only for friends, this would not be so wondrous as the fact that our Lord laid down His soul for His enemies, for sinners, as the Apostle proclaims: “God works His love in us, for while we are still sinners, Christ died for us” (Rom. 5:8). This is how God loved the world, this is how He loved it! Oh, Thy ineffable love, Lover of mankind! Why did our Lord love us so much? Are we really worthy of His love and His blood shed for us? No! How can we be worthy when we are His enemies? How will we be worthy, always angering Him? How worthy will we be, trampling with evil deeds His dearest blood, shed for us? How will we be worthy, constantly annoying Him? Why did He love us so much? By His goodness, compassion, ineffable mercy. This was done by the One who loved us even before he created us. Foreseeing our fall, He prepared salvation for us. Oh, Your ineffable mercy and love for mankind! What does He demand from us for this? Is it our wealth, silver or gold? Nothing: “You are my Lord, for you do not require my good things” (Ps. 15:3). But what does He require? He demands from us only love, saying: I loved you, love me too. I was beaten for you, spat on, hit on the cheek, but you just love Me for this. For your sake I was crowned with thorns, beaten on the head with a reed and condemned to death, but for this you love Me. I was nailed to the cross for you, pierced with a spear, but you love Me for this. For shedding My blood for you, I do not require anything from you except your loving heart. My son, give Me your heart, love Me with your heart. Oh, my dear Lord! “My heart is ready for You, O God, my heart is ready” (Ps. 56:8). “I will love You, O Lord, my strength,” only You grant me what You desire, and command what is pleasing to You. Grant that I may love You, and You will love me. “I will love you, O Lord, who loved me and gave Himself for me.” Amen. Second sermon on the thirteenth week after Pentecost “A certain man was a steward who planted grapes” (Matthew 21:33) The current Gospel parable, my listener, is clearly interpreted by the holy fathers and interpreters of Divine Scripture. In the Old Testament, grapes were the name given to the people of Israel, whom God transferred from Egypt to Palestine: “You brought grapes from Egypt” (Ps. 79:9). And Isaiah says: “The vine of the Lord of hosts is the house of Israel” (Isaiah 5:7). The stronghold of that grape was the law given to Moses at Sinai; the winepress was the altar of the Old Testament sacrifices, on which the blood of animals flowed; pillar - Solomon's temple; workers - teachers of the law, scribes and princes, arch-synagogists; beaten slaves are prophets; the heir: the one who was brought out and killed is the Messiah, Christ. In the new grace the grape is the church of Christ, transferred from Israel to the Gentiles. Its stronghold is the same law of God; the winepress is the word of God; pillar – strong will; workers - shepherds, bishops and priests; slaves - those who bear obedience; sheep of words are pious people; the heir and head of the church is Christ. That's what they say in general. In particular, every Christian soul of an orthodox and pious person is a grape. His stronghold is the fear of God; the sharpener is a heart exuding tenderness; the pillar is the cross and the constant remembrance of the suffering of Christ; doers - mental powers: memory, reason and will; slaves - feelings; the heir of these grapes is one and the same - Christ. I want to cool off here, take a walk among those mysterious grapes, and I ask you, my listener, to come with me, for the time for the ripening of the grapes is already approaching. The time has come to prune it, and whatever grapes we collect for our spiritual benefit, we will divide in half or eat together. First of all, let us enter the most ancient vineyards of the Old Testament. The country of Old Testament antiquity is Palestine, and the capital or royal city is Jerusalem. Let us not bypass it with our minds; let us enter there and talk with the inhabitants of Jerusalem, and not with ordinary inhabitants, but with the prophets. First of all, we came across the holy prophet Isaiah, to whom we ask: what is heard in Jerusalem? What news? What is being done? The Prophet says that a meeting of the most important judges of Jerusalem is taking place, a thought and a trial are taking place. What is the trial about? What's the matter? It’s a wondrous thing: God Himself brought the complaint and His wrath to the judges. About what? To whom? He complains about some of His grapes and asks for judgment on them. In the complaint he says: “Now you who live in Jerusalem and the men of Judah judge Me and My grapes” (Is. 5:3). It is a wonderful thing to judge God with His grapes. God! Are you not the Judge of the living and the dead? Can't You judge Your grapes Yourself? No, he says: you people, judges of Jerusalem, judge between Me and My grapes. What is there to judge? And here’s what it’s about: “I enclosed My grapes with a fence, I planted (in it) a chosen vine, and waited for it to produce clusters, and create thorns” (Is. 5:2). Here we see what God asks for judgment on His grapes. I, He says, fenced him with a strong stronghold, planted a beautiful vine in him, and what did I not do for him that he needed? I arranged everything necessary for it: I stuck stakes on which it could grow; He set a pillar in the midst of it and dug a winepress in it; I put a lot of care and work into it, and when I hoped for fruit, joy and profit, when I was preparing to taste the grapes, then instead of fruit My grapes gave birth to something opposite: instead of joy - sorrow, instead of profit - emptiness, instead of a wonderful taste - bitterness; their clusters are clusters of gall, clusters of bitterness, and one cannot stretch out one’s hand to them, for where the grapes should have been born, there the thorns were born. I waited for him to bring grapes, but he brought thorns. Judge Me with My grapes. Holy prophet Isaiah! Do you really, in telling us this, not know why these grapes of God, so beautifully arranged, fenced and planted, turned out to be barren and bear not bunches, but thorns? I know, he says; the place is to blame, the place is bad, barren, because it is very high. “The grapes,” he says, “became to the beloved on the hill” (Is. 5:1), that is, at the extreme height, even under the clouds. The height of this is arrogance and pride reaching to heaven; they have set their mouths in heaven. The grapes are located on a hill, and therefore they are unprofitable and fruitless: “Everyone who is high-hearted is an abomination to the Lord.” Such a person will not produce the fruit of joy, but the thorns of sorrow, for the proud one, on the one hand, pricks others to the point of tears or blood, saddening, persecuting and tormenting, on the other hand, he himself soon falls into the thorns of disasters and sorrows. “The Lord resists the proud” (Prov. 3:34), but where the Lord resists, what can stand? Tell God, judges of Jerusalem: do not surprise us, Lord; You cannot judge this matter with Your grapes, for the place is to blame; the grapes stand on the hill, in pride, in arrogance. Move and replant it lower, in the valley, bring down the strong, humble those who exalt themselves, then he will become better, for the humble one learns and corrects himself. Let us also pass by this proud grape, since we will not find fruit in it, but only thorns, that is, we will not fall into pride, we will not be exalted and talk a lot with empty self-praise, so that God does not demand judgment on us, saying: “Judge Me and My grapes.” Let's move on. O prophet! Doesn’t the Lord God have any other, better grapes that we could be content with, find spiritual grapes in and use? There is, he says, but no better than the first. Where is he? The Prophet says: in a good place. “The grapes,” he says, “will be in the place of the beloved.” If you are in a good place, then you can hope for good things? No, he says: for this place is called good and good only in name, hypocritically, but in reality it is evil; by name alone it is reputed to be the grape of God, but in fact it is an empty land, frozen and giving birth only to “thorns and thistles.” It is precisely in order to express this, as it seems to me, that the same prophet Isaiah, when he had something to announce to the Israelites on behalf of God, who were the grapes of God, says to them: “Hear this, the house of Jacob, who is called by the name of Israel” (Is. 48:1). Let us heed these words: “Called by the name of Israel.” Would it not have been better for the prophet to simply say: “Hear this, O Israel,” rather than: “Hear this, you who are called by the name of Israel”? No, not better, for here the prophet shows that the Israelites, having become corrupted, went far from the previous Israelites with their evil deeds and, having moved away from God through their sins, were called Israelites in vain. They were Israelites only in name, hypocritically, as if they were Israelites only in writing, but in reality they were the seed of Canaan. Israel was righteous, but they are full of iniquities; Israel worshiped the true God, but they worshiped idols; Israel did good deeds, but they multiplied evil ones. Therefore, you are not true Israelites, says the prophet, but only in name. Reasoning about this, Saint Cyril says: “They had his name, but in their minds they were in a detrimental state.” They had different morals, were embraced by a different thought, not by the same custom, not by the same mind that ancient Israel itself had, but embraced only by his name. Just as a human image written on a board is considered a person, but is not a person, for the face written on the board differs in many ways from the face of a living person, so the name often differs from life. It is about these grapes that God complains: “I have waited for the fruit to come forth, so make the thorns. Judge Me and My grapes." The judges answer this: we cannot judge an unknown thing, covered with hypocrisy. Take away, Lord, from them the cover of their hypocrisy, expose their unrighteousness: then it will be convenient for everyone to judge. We also pass by these evil grapes, for what could be worse than hypocritically, only in name, being known as a good person, but in fact remaining in anger; only to be a Christian in name, but unclean in deeds; to be true believers in name, but to imitate evil believers in deeds; to have an image of piety, but by deeds to reject it? Therefore, let us not enter such grapes, lest we make friends with hypocritical debauchees, for in them we will not find useful grapes, but only harmful thorns. If anything is false and appears to be like grapes, then their wine will be like the poison of a snake. The Lord complains: “The wrath of serpents is their wine, and the wrath of asps is incurable” (Deut. 32:33). Why is this so? But because the vineyard of God has moved close to foreigners, that is, to foreign morals. “Mixed,” it is said, “with tongues and habituated by their work,” like those about whom Scripture says: “Their grapes are from the vines of Sodom and their vines are from Gomorrah,” that is, God’s people lived near Sodom and near Gomorrah and from them they learned a sinful, depraved and ungodly disposition; That’s why “the rage of serpents is their wine and the rage of adders is incurable.” Who would not be corrupted by friendship with the wicked? “With the obstinate,” it is said, “you become corrupt” (Ps. 17:27). Let us pass by these obstinate, corrupted grapes; let's move on. Those prophetic words: “The beloved had grapes in the place of blaze,” another translation reads like this: “The beloved had grapes on the horn of the son of oil.” Here interpreters by horn mean the fate, happiness, prosperity and wealth of those whose horn on earth rises in glory and power; By oil they mean carnal voluptuousness and sinful lust. In such a beautiful place, lifted up like a horn, anointed and fat like oil, can the grapes of God be born? No way! And here God complains: “I waited for him to create the grapes, but create the thorns.” Where do sharp, ungodly things come from most of all, if not from carnal, sinful voluptuousness? “The wisdom of the flesh is enmity against God,” says the apostle (Rom. 8:7). Do not be surprised, Lord, that these Your grapes are not profitable; he is lifted up on the horn of fate, vain happiness, wealth and fattened with the oil of carnality and love of sin. We, having passed these grapes, will move on. It seems to me that we have already passed all the evil grapes of this world that lies in evil: we have passed the grapes of pride on the hill; the grapes of hypocrisy and feigned kindness have passed through in the place of goodness; passed the grapes of vain happiness and carnal sinful lust on the horn of oil. Now we should enter into good vineyards and gather in them grapes that are tasty and healthy for our souls. Having left the Old Testament vineyards, we will enter the New Grace ones, and just as there we talked with the first prophet Isaiah, so here we will talk with a certain holy apostle, with that apostle who knew the mysteries of Christ more than anyone else. Holy Apostle and Evangelist John the Theologian! At Christ’s last supper you rested on His toes, and therefore you learned the incomprehensible; tell us what Christ talked about with you, His apostles, going to free suffering and death after Judas left you? The Evangelist tells, not so much speaking with his lips and tongue as writing with pen and ink in the Gospel, that the Lord, speaking kindly and for a long time with His disciples on the eve of His suffering, called Himself a grape, which was cultivated by the Father: “The Lord said to His disciples: I am the true vine, and My Father is the workman” (John 15:1). We will enter these grapes; here we will truly find benefit, for here are the grapes and the wine of gladness. Let us see why our Lord called Himself grapes. Is it because in St. In the mysteries, under the guise of wine, do believers drink His life-giving blood? After all, He said at the supper: “Drink of it, all of you, this is My blood” (Matthew 26:27). He called Himself grapes so that they would know that anyone can drink blood only under the guise of grape blood, that is, under the guise of wine, which in Scripture is called grape blood: “Blood,” it is said, “is a drink of grapes” (Deut. 32:14). Was it not for this reason that He called Himself a grape, to show that just as a bunch of grapes, until it is put into the winepress, trampled and crushed, does not produce wine from itself, with which the human heart rejoices, so it was fitting for Him, our Lord, like the grapes, to be trampled and crushed by suffering, in order to exude blood like wine, for the joyful salvation of the entire human race. Having to ascend to the cross, He called himself a vine, and just as a vine, having grown on a stake, will give birth to clusters, so our Lord, ascended on the cross, had to bring five wonderful red clusters, five, I say, large wounds on His hands, feet and His most pure side; That is why He said: “I am the vine.” Let us gather from this mysterious vine those five clusters, the five wounds of Christ, and let us eat everything for health, spiritual and worldly, great and small, old and young. Truly, those grapes are tasty for spiritual saturation and useful for mental health, for they have much power. The grape or wound of the right hand of the Lord has the power to love the good, but the grape of the left hand, or the wound of the left hand, has the power to have mercy on sinners. This is why He suffered with His right and left hands, to show that He loves the righteous and has mercy on the sinners. The grape or wound of the Lord’s right foot has the power of setting us on the right path, while the grape or wound of His left foot has the power of preventing our feet from the evil path. Finally, the grape or wound of His pierced heart has the great power of the highest love, with which He loves with all his heart not only friends, but also enemies: “Father, let them go” (Luke 23:34). No one has such love anymore, to lay down his life not only for friends, but also for enemies. You see what taste those five spiritual grapes have. Let us eat them for health, let us eat with desire, and let us understand their power: “Taste,” it says, “and see that the Lord is good” (Ps. 33:9). But let us not abandon all the other, albeit smaller, clusters of that vine; let us not neglect, I say, all the other wounds that were on the body of the Lord, for they all have the same power to deliver and save us from our sins. The Apostle says: “Christ Himself bore our sins in His body on the tree, so that we, having put away our sins, might live in righteousness: whose wounds you were healed of” (1 Pet. 2:24). Let us also look for where those beautiful grapes, that “true vine” that is Christ, loves to plant, grow and bear fruit. We know that He was born once before the ages from the Father, without a mother. We also know that in recent times He was born from a Mother without a father, from the Most Pure Virgin Mary, and has a body like a grape vine, and the Divinity in the body, like grape juice in the vine and clusters. Where now will these beautiful and dear grapes of ours be born, where will they be planted and grow? I think not everyone can guess this. There is a study by divinely inspired men about the holy martyr Ignatius the God-Bearer: why is he called the God-Bearer? They say this is why: when the Lord, walking on earth and teaching people, says: “Do not scold children to come to Me” (Mark 10:14), then Ignatius’s parents happened to be among the people, along with the youth Ignatius, who was already beginning to walk. The Lord, calling the youth Ignatius from them, placed him in the middle and, taking him in his arms and hugging him, said: “Unless anyone is like this youth, he cannot enter the kingdom of heaven” (Matthew 18:3). That is why Saint Ignatius was later called the God-Bearer, because he was carried by the hands of God incarnate, and no less because he was called the God-Bearer, because he carried God in his heart. When he was thrown by his tormentors to be devoured by wild beasts for Christ, he was asked by them why he always has the name of Christ on his lips? The saint responded to this: I have this name written in my heart, for with my lips I confess the One Whom I always carry in my heart. Later, when the saint was eaten by beasts, by God’s will, among the bones, his heart was preserved intact, not eaten by the beasts. The infidels, having found him and remembering the words of the saint, cut this heart in two in the middle, wanting to find out whether he was telling the truth, and found that inside on both sides of the cut heart it was written in gold letters: “Jesus Christ.” Thus, Saint Ignatius, both in name and in deed, turned out to be a God-Bearer, since he bore Christ God in his heart. We, returning to the conversation, will say to ourselves: this is where the mental vine - Christ - loves to be planted: in the hearts of His faithful servants who truly love Him. Let us each look into our hearts, will we find Christ in it? Oh, the Christian heart, the obstinate, depraved, hardened and petrified heart! Is there God in you, do you carry God within you? Is the true vine, Christ, planted in you? Will you not give birth more to the obscene, stinking and harmful potion of evil thoughts, about which the Lord Himself speaks: “From the heart come evil thoughts, thefts, murders, adulteries” (Matthew 15:19)? He would be a madman who, in his small garden, from which he gets all his food, instead of any fruits necessary for food, he would plant nettles or thorns and spoil the useful land with such useless plants. Consider not among the wise, but among the foolish, the one who in his heart plants the brushwood of passions and sinfulness instead of the vine—Christ, and bears thorns instead of grapes. Saint Ambrose calls Ahab, the king of Israel, crazy, but for what? For his reckless intention and stupid words. He says to Naboth: “Give me your grapes, and I will have a hedge of potions” (1 Chronicles 29:5). Reasoning about this, the teacher says: “That was all the madness (of Ahab), that was all the rage, that space was sought for a bad potion.” O foolish Ahab! You take away someone else’s beautiful, fruitful grapes only so that, having uprooted the vine with its clusters, you plant in that place some kind of bad hedge potion: onions, garlic, etc. O foolish Christian man! In your heart, instead of the beautiful, sweet and joyful grape - Christ - you plant stinginess, bitterness and long-suffering love for sinful lusts. That vine is planted and that spiritual grape will be born in the heart of His servants, and not in the heart of the slaves of sin. Let us become true servants of Christ, and not slaves of sin, enslaved by voluptuous lusts. But let us turn again to our conversation about spiritual grapes. Will there be any other grapes after that chosen grape, Christ our Lord? Although not the same, there will be something similar. Where is he located? He was formerly in Nazareth, and now in the holy church of the Lord. The great feast of the Nativity of the Virgin Mary from the righteous parents Joachim and Anna has approached: here are the grapes of the Lord of hosts, who from a barren root grew for us a life-giving garden - His Mother. Holy, righteous parents are like the chosen vine; and the Mother of God born from them is like a grape that brings the wine of joy, for she is the joy of all who mourn. So, let us flow to these grapes and accept the clusters of the Mother of God’s grace for the pleasure and joy of our hearts. Amen. Teaching on the fourteenth week after Pentecost and on the Beheading of the Venerable Head of the Holy Glorious Prophet, Forerunner and Baptist of the Lord John, August 29 “Be like the kingdom of heaven to a man king, who made marriages for his son” (Matthew 22:2). “Herod made a supper for his Nativity” (Mark 6:21) In today's Gospels, beloved listeners, we hear about two feasts. In the ordinary weekly Gospel we hear about the feast of the prince’s marriage, in the holiday Gospel we hear about the feast on Herod’s birthday. Two feasts: one is good, the other is evil. The good feast is the wedding feast of the royal son, who is Christ our Lord, who betrothed the holy church to Himself, with which He united, having redeemed it with His blood. The evil feast is the feast of Herod’s birth, at which the head of the great saint of God, John the Baptist, was innocently cut off. Who feasts at these feasts? What rank are people? The Gospel says that at the wedding feast of the king's son, all the common people, gathered from the streets and roads, the poor and the poor, rejoice: “I said to my servant: go out quickly into the highways and the city, and bring in the poor, the needy, the blind, and the lame” (Luke 14:21). At Herod’s feast, all the people are in charge: “Herod gave supper to his princes and to the captain and to the elders of Galilee” (Mark 6:21). There is not a single wretched commoner there. Christ called the poor to His feast, and Herod gathered the rich to His feast. I want to take a closer look at both of those feasts with intelligent eyes and find out for sure and see who exactly is sitting and feasting at which feast? I want to know not only by the names of human faces, but by recognition of the good or evil morals of people. Whomever I see, I will tell your love what they eat, drink and who amuses them: I will proclaim all this, “I will make haste to the Lord.” When I direct my eyes in order to see two feasts, then first of all I immediately see Herod’s feast, as it was before the passion and resurrection of Christ, for before Christ consummated His marriage with His bride, the church, redeemed by blood, and said on the cross, “It is finished,” Herod’s feast was already completed. So, I will first look at Herod's feast as it happened before. At Herod’s feast, although many princes, boyars and elders of Galilee were invited, I see only three of the respectable guests. In Greek they are called Aphrodite, Dionysus and Ares, in Roman - Venus, Bacchus and Mars, and in Slavic - adultery, drunkenness and inhumanity or murder, for Herod, committing adultery, got drunk, and having gotten drunk, he killed Saint John the Baptist with the sword. In first place sits Aphrodite or Venus, and in our opinion – adultery; for this passion usually rules and even reigns everywhere, since everything in the world is carnal lust. It is not in vain that Diogenes, the glorious Greek philosopher, called fornication the queen of kings, for she reigns not only over ordinary people, but also over kings: these rule over the peoples, and she reigns over them. This could have been seen before in the example of Darius, the king of Persia, from whose head his concubine Apamina, daughter of Vartakov, sitting on his right hand, took off the royal diadem, put it on herself and beat the king on the cheeks, but he only looked at her with open lips. When she laughed with him, he laughed; if she becomes angry, he consoles her until she begins to speak to him. Similarly, history tells of Alaric, the Gothic king, glorious and strong, that he did not hesitate to cleanse the sandals of his harlot Pinthia, providing servile services to the prodigal woman whom he loved immensely. Oh, passionate enslavement! The one who was terrible to many nations, invincible in battles, reigned in Rome, owned countries, he was the slave of a harlot! Oh, extreme blindness, madness and shamelessness! Such and such a queen prevailed over Herod; she commanded him to commit adultery, commanded him as her slave and captive; for with sinful passion she captivated him, enslaved him and completely enslaved him, and he served her like a captive slave, and fulfilled all her commands with meekness and zeal. She commanded: “Commit adultery,” and commits adultery; she commanded: “get drunk,” and gets drunk; commanded: “kill,” and kills the saint of God John the Baptist. At the opposite feast, at the feast of the king's son - Christ our Savior, instead of adulterous passion sits chaste purity; for that most pure and undefiled Bridegroom, just as He was born from the Most Pure Virgin and was nourished by the most pure virgin milk, so loves the pure, allows the pure to rest in His bosom and entrusts His Mother to them. Did He not allow the virgin John to recline on His bosom at the Last Supper? Was it not to him that He gave His Mother under the cross? “Woman, behold your son; behold your mother” (John 19:26). True, He does not disdain vile sinners, as the Jews who hated Him say about Him: “He eats and drinks with sinners” (Matthew 9:11); but He does not disdain only such sinners, He has fellowship only with such who repent with a true soul, who with a righteous heart, with tenderness and prayers come to Him, only such He does not drive away from Himself. “He who is to come,” he said, “I will not cast out from behind me.” Not only does he not drive away the one who comes, but fatherly embraces him with open arms and honors him with His feast; but let unclean, unrepentant, embittered sinners, who become defiled every day and do not want to give up their filth, not approach the most pure Bridegroom, for no unclean person is invited to this feast, and no filth can enter there. There, at the entrance, stands the purest virgin, Saint John the Theologian, and with a loud voice drives out all the unclean, saying: “The dogs are outside, the adulterer and the fornicator” (Apoc. 22:15), and the Bridegroom, sitting in His place, orders: “Do not give the holy dog, do not cast pearls before swine.” So, there you are, shameless ones, there you are, nasty pigs, wallowing in the mud of sinful mud, in the mud of fornication and fornication, away from the feast of Christ! Looking again at Herod’s feast, I see Bacchus sitting next to Venus, who among the Greeks was the god of gluttony, the god of gluttony and drunkenness, and about whom the apostle also recalls: “Whose god is the belly, and their glory is in cold, and they who philosophize on the earth” (Phil. 3:19). Among the Greeks, the most beloved god was the one who ordered to eat and drink, and not think about tomorrow, who even ordered to be satiated and drunk, but not to worry about the soul. But not only the Greeks, but, as I see, also our so-called Orthodox Christians, did not dislike that god, they liked it, for they are very prone to gluttony, imitating Bacchus’ disciple Luther. Not observing fasts, they say, is not a sin; drinking day and night - sociability; spending time hanging out is friendship; As for what happens after death, as for the soul, they say: where should it go? This is a fairy tale. This is the teaching of Bacchus, the god of the womb. And who doesn’t know what the temperament of such a drunkard is? The famous philosopher Anacharsis among the ancient Greeks said that the grapevine will give birth to three clusters: the first is a bunch of pleasure, the second is of rapture, and the third is of sorrow. That philosopher indicates by this that a small amount of wine serves the pleasure and health of a person, for it quenches thirst, gives healing to the belly and cheers the heart of a person; Much drinking of wine makes a person a drunkard, gives rise to numerous quarrels, incites rage and incites fights and battles, and considerable sadness follows. If we want to consider in detail the power of drunkenness and if we call drunkenness grapes, then we will find grapes born from drunkenness that bring no benefit to a person, but harm and sadness - we will find not three, but more, namely ten. So, let drunkenness be called by us grapes, but unfruitful, but perhaps the one about which the prophet Moses writes in Deuteronomy: “Their grapes are from the vineyards of Sodom and their vines are from Gomorrah; their bunch is a bunch of gall, their bunch of sorrow; the wrath of serpents is their wine and the wrath of asps is incurable.” Truly, the drunkenness of Sodomo-Gomorrah is a grape that produces no other clusters than clusters full of gall, bitterness, snake and slate venom. As is the garden, so are the fruits in it. So, the first bunch of drunken, bilious grapes is a darkening of the mind, a change in the mind and the destruction of memory, for the steam and power of wine, rising from a stomach filled with wine into the head, fogs the brain and confuses the mind. That is why there are many who, in a drunken state, do not remember themselves, do not know what they are doing and what they are saying, like madmen; If any evil happens to them next, whether dishonor, or wounds, in the morning they do not remember anything. On such people, what is written in Proverbs is fulfilled: “Bisha me, and did not get sick, and scolded me, but I did not understand” (Prov. 23:35). The other bunch is shamelessness, for a drunk is not ashamed of anyone, but, having lost shame, he utters nasty, blasphemous, shameless, stingy words that are unbearable for chaste ears. His mouth becomes like an empty stable, full of stinking pus, and his tongue becomes like a shovel throwing out pus. The heart of such a person is nothing more than a treasury of many evils, from which nothing good can come, but only evil, according to the words of the Gospel: “An evil man out of the evil treasure of his heart brings forth evil: for out of the abundance of the heart his mouth speaks” (Luke 6:45). The third bunch of drunken grapes is a failure to keep secrets, for everything that a sober person hides deep in his heart, buried in silence, whether it be his own secrets or secrets entrusted to him by someone else, the drunken person makes known to everyone. In addition, everything that was done long ago and consigned to oblivion, he remembers and resurrects like a dead man. This is like a barrel full of new drink, in which, when the drink is noisy and pouring out, the yeast does not stay at the bottom, but rises to the top and, driven out of the barrel by internal warmth, flows out. Likewise, in a drunken person, the power of intoxication disturbs the secrets of the heart and drives them out. He reveals secrets with his lips, just as yeast rises from the bottom of a barrel, and, as usually happens, like food from a stomach filled with drunkenness, secrets are also thrown out by vomiting. When drunk, both of these, that is, food and secrets, turn into vomit. The fourth bunch of drunken Sodomo-Gomorrah grapes is the inflaming of lust for carnal confusion. That is why the Apostle exhorts: “Do not get drunk with wine, for there is fornication in it” (Eph. 5:18), and Saint Basil the Great says: “Undoubtedly, from wine, as from some source, flows unbridled lust, which far exceeds even the fury of all dumb people in relation to the female sex; for dumb animals do not cross the boundaries of the natural, but those who drink wine seek the female sex in men and the male sex in women.” The fifth cluster, full of snake and slate venom, is rage, anger, enmity, quarrels, fights and bloodshed. The prophet Hosea says: “When the princes began to become angry because of the wine, not only the princes, but also the common people, filled with wine, rebelled against each other with rage” (Hos. 7:5). That is why the Pritochnik expresses censure: “Who is being fierce? Word of mouth to whom? Courts for whom? Who needs tightness and diarrhea? Who needs contrition in vain? Who has blue eyes? Are they not abiding by wine and not supervising where and when the feasts take place? (Prov. 23:29:30). And Sirach admonishes: “Do not take courage in wine, for wine will destroy many: the furnace tempts iron, but the heart is tempted by wine in the quarrel of the proud” (Sir. 31:29:30). And the same one also says: “Wine that drinks much wine brings sorrow to souls; with anger and slander it will increase the wrath of the fool” (Sir. 31:34:35). The sixth gall bunch of drunken grapes is damage to health, weakening of bodily strength, trembling of hands, pain in the head, changes in the eyes, distress in the stomach, groans, illnesses, premature old age, shortening of years of life and early death. The seventh bunch is waste of property, destruction of wealth and lack of profits. “A drunken worker,” says Sirach, “will not be rich” (Sir. 19:7). Oh, how many there are who have come from great wealth to extreme poverty! An example of this would be the prodigal son. The eighth unsweetened bunch is deprivation of salvation, for drunkenness destroys, like material possessions, spiritual wealth. It dares to commit all sins, for the sin that a sober person abhors, fears or is ashamed of, the same sin he is not ashamed to commit while drunk, does not fear and does not disdain. In the Patericon there is a story about a certain Egyptian desert dweller, to whom the demon promised that he would no longer oppress him with any temptations, if only he committed one sin out of three. He suggested the following three sins: murder, fornication and drunkenness. Do, he said, one of them: either kill a person, or commit fornication, or get drunk once, and then you will remain in peace, and after that I will no longer tempt you with any temptations. The hermit thought to himself this way: to kill a person is terrible, for this is in itself a great evil, and deserves the death penalty both in God's court and in civil law. To commit fornication, shame, to destroy the previously preserved purity of the body is a pity, and it is disgusting to defile one who has not yet known this defilement. Getting drunk once seems to be a small sin, for a person soon sobers up with sleep. So, I will go, get drunk so that the demon no longer oppresses me, and I will live peacefully in the desert. And so, taking his handicrafts, he went to the city and, having sold them, entered the tavern and got drunk. According to the action of Satan, he happened to talk with a certain shameless and adulterous woman. Being seduced, he fell with her. When he was committing a sin with her, the woman’s husband came and, finding him sinning with his wife, began to beat him; and he, having recovered, began to fight with that husband and, having overcome him, killed him. Thus, that hermit committed all three sins: fornication and murder, starting with drunkenness. Whatever sins he feared and abhorred when sober, he boldly committed while drunk, and through this he ruined his many years of work. Was it only later through true repentance that he was able to find them again, for by the mercy of God a man who truly repents is returned to his former merits, which he destroyed through the Fall. This is how drunkenness leads to all sins and deprives one of salvation, destroying virtues. Saint Chrysostom clearly speaks about this: “Drunkenness, if it finds in someone chastity, shame, reason, meekness, and humility, everything plunges into the abyss of crime.” Will that person who through drunkenness lose all his virtues not lose his salvation and be cut off from the heavenly inheritance? The apostle speaks the truth: “Drunkards will not inherit the kingdom of God” (1 Cor. 6:10). The ninth gall cluster is the wrath of God, for a drunkard, breaking the commandments of God, provokes the wrath of God with his sins. Therefore, the prophet Isaiah exclaims: “Woe to those who rise in the morning, those who drink strong drink, those who drink until the evening: for I will burn the wine. They drink wine with harps and harps, and tambourines, and flutes, but do not know the works of God” (Isaiah 5:11:12). To such the prophet Jeremiah says: “Drink and become drunk, and vomit, and fall, and rise not from the presence of the sword which I will send among you” (Jer. 25:27). The tenth and most bitter bunch of drunken grapes is the undoubted destruction of the soul, for other sinners, when they approach the hour of their death, can repent and regret their sins, having a sober mind; How can a drunk man, dying, repent if he does not remember himself and does not know that an unexpected death is approaching him? For those who die without repentance, Gehenna is inevitable. These are the bunches of those Sodomo-Gomorrah grapes, that is, drunkenness, the taste of which, although at first it seems sweet, but later turns into bilious bitterness and into snake and slate poison. All this is said not to blaspheme wine, but to root out drunkenness, for wine was created by God for the joy and health of people, and not for drunkenness and harm. Let us listen to what Saint Chrysostom says: “Wine was given so that we would have fun and not be outrageous, so that we would laugh and not be ridiculed, so that we would be healthy and not sick, so that we could correct the weakness of the body and not destroy our spiritual strength.” He also says in another place: “Drunkenness does not come from wine, but from immeasurable consumption: wine was given to us for no other purpose than for bodily health, but this is prevented by its immeasurable consumption.” From these words of the teacher it is clear that it is not the wine that is to blame, but the intemperance of those who drink beyond measure. The same saint considers drunkards, for their immeasurable drunkenness, more dishonest than dogs, donkeys and other dumb animals, for every animal does not eat or drink more than it needs, and no one can force it to eat or drink more than its nature desires. A drunken person, without coercion, fills his belly more and more, so that he even harms himself. See about this moral teaching 57 in the conversation with the holy evangelist Matthew. On the contrary, at the feast of the Heavenly Bridegroom, Christ our Savior, holy abstinence sits next to chaste purity and supports purity, for purity weakens without abstinence, but strengthened by abstinence, it is strong. So, next to cleanliness at the feast of Christ sits abstinence, and while sitting, he observes fasting. If she eats and if she drinks, then she eats and drinks for the glory of God, and not to please her belly. Although she eats, she nevertheless gets up from the meal somewhat hungry, and although she drinks, she still leaves a little thirst in herself. She does not eat to the point of satiety, does not drink to the point of intoxication, and is in no way comparable to someone who is fasting. As for breaking the church fast, she considers this to be a grave mortal sin, which God will not allow! She knows the disposition of the Bridegroom, who fasted in the desert for forty days and forty nights. Although the envious said something different about Him: “This Man is a poisoner and a wine drinker” (Matthew 11:19), yet He Himself abstained from everything and taught His disciples: “Be careful that your hearts are not burdened with gluttony and drunkenness and worldly pleasures” (Luke 21:34). Bacchus, the god of gluttony, with his disciple Martin Luther, says this: it is necessary in the regiments not to look at fasting and to eat meat during fasting, so that the soldiers are strong in war, strong in battle and would not weaken in battle from fasting and abstinence. Without answering this right away, I will remind you of the story of Gideon. The Israelites in ancient times were greatly oppressed by the Midianites, and because of many disasters they cried out to God. God had mercy on them and gave them a leader - a strong man named Gideon, who, gathering the strength of Israel, went against Midian. The Lord God tells him not to bring with him a large force for battle, but to choose only the best and bravest warriors. How could Gideon recognize the best and the bravest? Here's how he was able to do it. At the command of God, he led them all to the water and ordered them to drink. And so some, falling to their knees and bending their faces to the water, drank water from the river like cattle; others, scooping up water by the handful, drank from their own handful. After this, Gideon divided everyone into two parts: he placed those who drank water like cattle separately, and those who drank by the handful - separately. There were few who drank water by the handful, only three hundred people; the rest of the warriors drank like animals, immersing their faces and lips in the water. And the Lord commanded Gideon to bring back all those who drank water like cattle, and to take with him to the war only those three hundred, and promised him, saying: “With three hundred men who drank water by the handful, I will save you and deliver Midian into your hands.” Approaching the countless strength of Midian at night with three hundred men, Gideon, at the command of God, crawled into the Midian camp with only one youth and, walking quietly in it, listened. And then he hears how one warrior, awakening from sleep, tells his dream to his friend: “It was as if the dough of barley bread rolled from Gideon’s regiment and rolled into our Midian camp to the Midian tent, beat it, overturned it, and the tent fell.” To this his friend replied: “This is not dough, but the spear of Gideon: the Lord will deliver Midian and our entire army into his hands.” Hearing this, Gideon bowed to the Lord, returned to his own, prepared for battle and, attacking the Midian regiment, beat it and drove it to the end. Here I will ask; Why did it roll towards the Midian tent to overturn it, not the meat that is eaten in the shelves, but the dough of bread, and the bread was not wheat, but barley? That barley dough, as explained by the interpreters, was a sign of the fast of Gideon, who, preparing for battle, diligently fasted and prayed, and in fasting strengthened his body not with meat, not with sweet foods, but with barley bread, and God helped him. Shame on you, Bacchus and Luther, who say that the soldiers in the regiments will become weak because they abstain from meat. Theodosius the Great, fighting with Eugene, the Roman tormentor, fasted a lot with prayer, preparing himself for the fight; But did he become weak in the struggle without eating meat? Heraclius did the same when fighting the Persians. So, you lie, glutton and drunkard Bacchus, and you are a stranger to the feast of Christ; You, holy abstinence, sit well here at the marriage of your Bridegroom. Looking again at Herod’s feast, next to Venus and Bacchus, that is, next to prodigal and gluttonous passion, I see the inhuman tormentor Ares or Mars sitting, that is, inhuman torment. This filthy god or demon, sitting at Herod’s feast, taught Herodias to ask for the head of the Forerunner, and taught Herod to kill the innocent saint, the great saint of God. What inhuman torment is it to kill an innocent person and put to death one who has not committed a sin and on whose lips there was no flattery? On the contrary, at the wedding feast of the Heavenly Bridegroom sits the love of Christ, good, gracious, merciful and not only does not oppress the innocent, but even forgives sinners, and loves enemies, and prays for those who kill Him: “Father, let them go” (Luke 23:34). Glory to Your love for mankind, our merciful Lord! Glory to Your mercy! Here we saw those sitting at Herod’s feast and at Christ’s feast. There there is fornication, drunkenness and inhumanity, and here there is purity, abstinence and love of mankind. What do they eat and drink? At Herod's feast they eat people and drink their blood and tears. This is what God says in the psalms: “He who consumes My people instead of bread” (Ps. 13:4). They carry the head of the Forerunner to the feasting Herod - this is food; dripping blood from the head is a drink. Oh, godless torment! See how the feast of merciless rulers takes place. But even now, almost the same thing happens to many masters: they eat and drink the bloody labors of men, and mercilessly torture their poor peasants: it is they who eat the people of God instead of bread. The gentlemen have enough of everything to the point of satiety, but the poor peasants do not have enough of even a piece of bad bread. Those overeat, and these starve; those get drunk, but these only quench their thirst with water; those rejoice, and those cry when the debt is collected from them through torture. This is the master's feast: people are eaten instead of bread. What do they eat and what do they drink at the wedding feast of the Heavenly Bridegroom? Now, under the guise of bread and wine, His most pure and life-giving body and His most pure and life-giving blood, but in the next century, not “in a mirror and fortune-telling,” but “face to face,” we will see Him as He is: “I will be satisfied when I am revealed to Your glory” (1 Cor. 13:12; Ps. 16:15). Who amuses those who feast at both those feasts? At Herod's feast, shameless virginity rejoices; Herodias' daughter danced and pleased Herod and those reclining with him. Damned is that virginity, that fornicating virginity that shamelessly dances in front of such a large gathering of worthy persons and seeks someone else’s head. She should be a harlot, not a virgin; She is a virgin only in name and appearance, but in reality she is a nasty animal. Who amuses the Heavenly Bridegroom at the feast? A woman weeping at the feet of Christ, washing His feet with her tears and kissing them: she rejoices, for through her guilt God’s great mercy towards sinners was manifested. Our most merciful Master Himself said with His most pure lips: “Her many sins are forgiven, for she loved much” (Luke 7:47). Do you see the difference? At Herod's feast they dance, but at Christ's feast they cry. There they accumulate sins, add sins to sins, but here they take away a great pile of sins. There the one who dances is called a virgin, and here the one who weeps is called a sinner. But what a wonderful change! From a sinner came a righteous woman, from a harlot a maiden, the bride of Christ, and from Herodias' maiden the greatest of all harlots. Saint Jerome says well: “Oh, how many who are considered virgins will be disgraced on the day of judgment! Oh, how many imaginary fornicators will be crowned by God!” The imaginary virgins will be disgraced, for they will be exposed in their secret impurities. Those who are blasphemed by people as harlots will be honored with the crown of heavenly glory from God; There, their repentance, warm tears, and good and only God-known correction of life will be revealed. Behold, my listeners, everything that I saw at both feasts, I told your love; Having said, I pray: avoid the evil feast; go good. Do not associate with Herod’s feast-goers: “Do not be jealous of those who are evil; do not envy those who commit iniquity” (Ps. 37:1); have fellowship with the feasters of Christ and steadfastly adhere to them. Amen. Sermon on the fifteenth week after Pentecost and on the day of the Feast of the Exaltation of the Precious and Life-Giving Cross of the Lord “Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy soul, with all thy heart, and with all thy mind” (Matthew 22:37) Beloved listeners! He did not sin when he called love, Divine love, fire. Whether fire shines in the darkness, love also shines, according to the words of the Theologian: “He who loves abides in the light, and there is no temptation in him” (1 John 2:10). Whether the fire warms, love does not chill when, like clothing, it covers all and many sins. Whether fire burns brushwood, love does not know how to turn the brushwood of our iniquities into ashes, as, for example, it is said about one person: “Her sins, many of them, are forgiven, because she loved much” (Luke 7:47). “Does wax melt before the fire” (Ps. 21:15), and the human heart also melts from the warmth of love. “Be,” they say, “my heart is like wax, melt in the middle of my belly.” Does the fiery flame burn upward, and love seeks the highest and surpasses all virtues; she is above everything. It was this fire, the fire of love, that our Savior brought to us from heaven: “Fire,” He said, “came to the earth, and whatever I wanted, even if it was already on fire” (Luke 12:49). Oh, that our minds would be enlightened by that fire, that our hearts would be warmed, that our souls would melt, that our spirit would ignite! Burn us into Thy love, O most merciful Word of God! A fire does not burn without fuel. Even someone sent from heaven demands firewood. After all, in the Old Testament, fire from above came down on the sacrifices of Moses and Aaron, but so that it would never go out, the priests put wood on the altar day and night. The altar of God in the spiritual sense is our heart; the fire that descends from above is the love of God, poured out from above on our hearts, according to the apostolic word: “The love of God was overflowing in our hearts through the Holy Spirit who was given to us” (Rom. 5:5). Whoever wants to burn with the flame of Divine love, look for such wood with which you could ignite the immaterial, spiritual fire in yourself, the fire of God’s love, and keep it never extinguished on your heart’s altar. I, a sinner, to help you, my God-loving listener, will go for firewood into the forest or into the garden of the Divine Scripture and collect a bundle of firewood not from ordinary trees, but from those from which the honorable cross of Christ was made (the worldwide erection of which we celebrated last week, and now we are commemorating this holiday); Having collected a bundle of firewood from such trees, I will bring it here to the people, so that anyone who wants can easily take it for their own benefit and need. “God, please help me; Lord, seek my help” (Ps. 69:2). “Thou shalt love the Lord thy God.” They talk about a certain bird, the same name as the date tree, called the date and located in the countries of Arabia, near India. After a five-hundred-year stay, she, having collected twigs and branches from the fragrant trees, puts them in a heap somewhere on a high hill and, sitting on this hill and spreading her wings against the sun's rays on a very hot afternoon, lights up and burns in the ashes, and then again in these ashes she is conceived and born from the dew of heaven. Whether this is true or not, I do not ask; Let the narrators have faith in this. I know the undoubted truth that the mental date, our Lord Jesus Christ, embraced by indescribable love for man, having gathered fragrant trees - cedar, pine and cypress, carrying them on His shoulders to the hill of Mount Golgotha, folding them into a cross, as if in a heap, and spreading out His arms like the wings of a date, He burned with the flame of love, when, out of love for us, He laid His hand on the cross for us. soul. If we want to be kindled with mutual love for Him, then we will look for fragrant trees - not brushwood with stinking smoke, but fragrant substances - we will pile them on the hill of our hearts and spread the wings of faith and love to the Lord, who stretched out his hands on the cross, so that we too may be aflame from that fiery fire of love. Where do incense trees grow? Who knows? Tell us to go there? Here I hear in the Divine Scripture: the Wisdom of God boasts of a certain beautiful thing of His, consisting of fragrant glorious trees, a garden or forest in various places - sometimes in Lebanon, sometimes on Aermon, sometimes on the seaside; in Lebanon - cedars, in Aermon - cypresses, and on the seaside - dates. She says about Herself: “I have risen up like a cedar in Lebanon, like a cypress tree on the mountains of Aermon, and like a date tree have risen up like a seaside” (Sir. 24:14:17). But I, hearing about such glory and honor of those trees that even the Wisdom of God itself liked to be like them, I say to myself: those trees are very good for our needs, pleasing to our needs. I will take one log from those three in the name of the Holy Trinity and place it on the heart altar following the example of the Old Testament priests who, protecting the heavenly fire so that it would not go out, put logs on the altar day and night. So, I will go with my mind to those countries and, first of all, to the Lebanese desert to the fragrant cedar. Perhaps someone remembers the story in the Bible about how Solomon acquired cedar trees from Lebanon to build the temple, the Holy of Holies, sending to Hiram, king of Tyre, for Lebanon was in the power of the king of Tyre. Approaching there, I see the city of Zarephath, bordering Tyre, and in it the house of a widow, where the prophet Elijah lived. I also see that woman collecting firewood. What are you doing, widow of Sarepta? I’m collecting, he says, two logs. For what? “I will make for myself and my children little unleavened bread and pits, and we will die” (1 Chronicles 17:11). Truly, you will die if you do not collect even the third log in the name of the Holy Trinity, which you will honor if you kindly treat the prophet of God, who has to arrange water on the altar. (You collect two logs, but I want to collect three in order to kindle the fire of God’s love in my heart.) I continue on my way past Sarepta and Tire to Lebanon and reason with my mind: Sarepta is interpreted as “crowding”, Tire as “sorrow”, and Lebanon as “whiteness”, or “censer”, or “preparation of the heart”; the spirit tells me that it is impossible to come to the whitening of the conscience, from which a censer-like prayer would emanate, and to the readiness of the heart for love except through the tightness of life and sorrow for sins. Having been in Sarepta and Tire, to reach Lebanon means, having gone through the cramped conditions of life in sorrow for sins, to achieve a clear conscience and readiness of the heart for the love of God. Entering that very Lebanese forest, our mind contemplates the tall cedars; but before us, Saint David had already gone there long ago with his psalter, and came to sing his Psalter in the midst of silence. Holy David! What are you doing here in Lebanon? David answers: I am considering cedars, which ones to liken the righteous and which ones to liken sinners to. “The righteous will flourish like the date tree, and like the cedar tree in Lebanon he will multiply” (Ps. 91:13); “And I saw the wicked exalted and towering like the cedars of Lebanon” (Ps. 36:35). Do not tell us, Saint David, about cedars being like sinners; lead us to the cedars, who are like the righteous. But the Wisdom of God immediately responded in that forest: “I am like a cedar that has grown up in Lebanon” (Sir. 24:14). Now we know, David, why you entered the Lebanese forest: you are looking for the Wisdom of God among the cedars, the Wisdom that says: “I am like a cedar.” Who will say what is the similarity of cedar to the Wisdom of God and why is the Wisdom of God likened to cedar? The interpreters of Divine Scripture will tell us this, who say that the Wisdom of God is immortal and is the Creator of immortality, for it created immortal angels and immortal human souls. Cedar is the most important tree among the non-rotting trees from which Noah’s Ark, the Ark of the Covenant, the Temple of Solomon, and then the Cross of Christ were created. And for some sages, such as the natural scientist Pliny, cedar is an image of eternity and immortality, due to the fact that it is difficult to rot, so because of this ability of non-rotting, not only holy things were made from cedar, but also idols among the Greeks. The mentioned Pliny says that in Rome some cedar idols remained undecayed for a thousand years or more and stood even before their destruction by Christians; therefore, as it is said, cedar is an image of eternity and immortality. The Wisdom of God, wanting to clearly show Her immortality to the human mind, was likened to a cedar in Scripture, so that the Creator of all creatures - Wisdom - could be recognized in creation, as if saying: know, people, that just as you see the cedar, to which you attribute eternity and immortality, so know that I am eternal and immortal, and not only I, but also your souls, created by Me, also eternal and immortal. Now I go from the immortal cedar-shaped Wisdom of God to the immortal cedar-shaped souls, to the souls of the righteous, multiplied “like a cedar in Lebanon.” From them I want to take some logs for our needs. But how will I take it? How can I cut it off without a proper weapon? Saint David consoles me in this, saying: do not be sad; neither an ax nor an ax is needed here, for the word of God, the voice of God, sharper than iron, will immediately prepare a lot of wood to kindle the fire of love. “Behold, hear and give heed: the voice of the Lord breaking the cedars, and the Lord will wipe away the cedars of Lebanon” (Ps. 28:5). Which voice of the Lord is so strong that, without an iron weapon, it breaks great cedars into firewood and logs? Let's listen and listen. This is the voice coming from the mouth of God, not like thunder, but like a sweet song: “Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy soul.” Oh, a strong voice, a powerful voice, a voice not terrible, but sweet, not formidable, but kind, a voice much more effective than a two-edged sword, more effective, “cutting asunder to the division of soul and spirit, members and marrow” (Heb. 4:12), a voice sharper than a sword and sweeter than honey, for the wound you cause us is a healing plaster for our spiritual wounds, for sinful wounds: “Thou shalt love the Lord thy God!” And after that voice comes Saint Chrysostom, exclaiming: “For this reason he forbade Gehenna and promised the kingdom, so that he might be loved by us” (on the Epistle to the Romans, chapter 2). Who will not be crushed by that voice, will not be touched in his heart? When that voice was first heard at Sinai, very many of the most pure Old Testament spiritual cedars - the forefathers and prophets - were immediately crushed, that is, they were touched in their hearts, and each of them cried out, saying: “I will love You, O Lord, my strength: the Lord is my strength” (Ps. 17:2:3). When for the second time that voice was heard from the lips of the incarnate Divine Wisdom of Christ, who exclaimed in the present Gospel: “Thou shalt love the Lord thy God,” then very many of the most honorable new-grace cedars—the apostles and martyrs—were crushed, that is, they were touched in their hearts, and each responded with Saint Peter, saying: “Lord, Thou art weighed, Thou art weighed in all respects, because I love Thee” (Jn. 21:17), and immediately some, leaving everything, followed this voice, while others dared to suffer wounds and torment, like that person who “calls with a great voice: I love You, my Bridegroom, and I seek suffering for You and crucify myself.” From those cedars, crushed and touched by the voice of God’s love, from that image of the virtuous life of the holy saints of God, who loved God with all their souls, let us take one first log in the name and love of the first person in the Holy Trinity, in the love of God the Father; for the log of love for God with the whole soul reaches from us to God the Father, who gave us the soul by Divine and life-giving inspiration. Having taken this tree into the hands of our reasoning, let us consider its power this way: the immortal wisdom of God wisely created our immortal soul, for it adorned it in His image with memory, will and reason. Consequently, our soul, adorned with godlike wisdom, must wisely love God, its Creator. Here I am not talking about the wisdom of theological reasoning about God, but about the wisdom of skillfully distinguishing a good thing from an evil one, with the help of which a soul, respected by God-wise reason, could consider, reason and understand the same love for God, whether it is good, true and perfect. After all, we sinners often have such love that we only seem to love God, but in reality we grieve Him as if He were hated. That’s how many of us have gathered here in this holy church, and if someone asked each one individually: “Do you love God,” then everyone would answer: “Yes, I do.” But if everyone looked at their lives, at their deeds, there would not be even a shadow of love for God. We are vain that we love God, but we do not care at all to truly love Him: we love with words, but we hate with deeds. If someone received a worthy guest into his home and said to him: “I love you, I am glad to see you,” but having said this, he would immediately expel him from his home in shame, would that person’s true love for the guest be? No way: this is not love, but abuse. We sinners do the same. Having barely accepted Christ the Lord, who wants to dwell in our souls, we immediately drive Him away from ourselves in shame with our sinful morals and laugh at Him more than we love Him. The property of a wise soul is to consider love and reason whether it is love that truly loves God, and, having found something opposite, to correct it and not to mix God’s love with ungodly love into the love of God. In the Old Testament tabernacle there were two fires: one that came down from heaven on the sacrifices, which, as said earlier, the priests always protected by adding wood so that it would not go out on the altar; this fire was called the fire of God; another fire, ordinary, popular, was located in front of the doors of the tabernacle; ordinary people kept it unquenchable, and it was called “alien fire.” So, only sacrifices to God were burned with God’s fire, and alien fire was used only for some other common needs (Lev. 1:1–7; 6:9). There was a commandment of God, firmly legitimized under pain of death, so that none of the priests would dare to bring alien fire inside the tabernacle of God. The following thing happened: the two sons of Aaron, Nadab and Abihu, it is not known with what intention, having put alien fire into the censers, they dared to bring it into the tabernacle, where the fire of God was, and immediately for this insolence they suffered vengeance and execution, for the flame, coming out of the altar from the fire of God, burned them to ashes. This was already interpreted earlier that the altar of God mysteriously represented the human heart, while the fire of God meant the love of God burning in the heart. But what is “alien fire”? Love for the world, which is enmity towards God, love for the pleasures and passions of the flesh, contrary to God - this is what alien fire means. In addition, the fire of rage, the fire of anger, the fire of rancor - all these are alien fires, extremely contrary to the love of God. Here, true and wise lover of God, pay attention and be careful that you do not bring into the altar of your heart, in which you keep the fire of God’s love, an alien fire; for if you dare, you will also have to suffer, just as the above-mentioned sons of Aaron suffered. God's love is extremely jealous and does not tolerate you loving anyone else more than it. It is not for nothing that God is called fire: “Our God is a consuming fire”; for just as fire shines and burns, so does God: if you truly love Him, then He shines for you; If you love Him not truly, but hypocritically, only with your lips, then He will burn you - “consuming fire” will devour you. Thus, having judged the power of that spiritual cedar, we place the mystical tree on the altar of our hearts, putting in our hearts all those words of Divine Scripture that David says: “In my heart I have hidden Your words” (Ps. 119:11), and the most pure Virgin, Mother of God: “Mary has kept all these words that she has composed in her heart” (Luke 2:19 ). Having placed that spiritual log on the heart altar, we will blow it so that it flares up; let us inspire, on the one hand, with frequent teachings about the love of God: “In my teaching,” says David, “a fire will burn” (Ps. 39:4), and on the other hand, with deep sighs from a tender heart and warm prayers, speaking with secret appeals to God: O God, most beloved of all love! Love that surpasses every mind and every desire! For all the good things You have done to us and always done secretly and openly, You do not require anything else from us but this one thing: that we love You with the love of our whole soul. Behold, my heart is ready for Your love: “My heart is ready, O God, my heart is ready” (Ps. 6:8). You Yourself kindle it with the coal of Your love; kindle my bowels and my heart, O God of my life; kindle and soften my soul like wax, so that it all melts and pours out before You, Lord, so that I love nothing else - neither my soul, nor my life - more than You, my Creator, my Lover, so that I do not love any of the vanity and temporary sweetness of this age, but so that I may remain entirely in Your love and never be separated from it. So, having placed and lit the first tree on the heart altar, let's go for another. Another fragrant tree, to which the Wisdom of God is likened, is the cypress in Aermon: “I,” they say, “are like a cypress on the mountains of Aermon” (Sir. 24:14). So, first of all, I will look where those Aermon mountains are. In the psalter interpretations I find news that they are in Palestine, very close to Lebanon. Aermon is interpreted as “radiance”. I, again turning to the consideration of names, pay attention: Lebanon - whiteness, Aermon - radiance, not far from Lebanon; and the spirit says to me: whoever has a white conscience, cleansed from the filth of the flesh and spirit, the righteous radiance is close to him: “The righteous,” they say, “will be enlightened like the sun” (Matthew 13:43). Having ascended Aermon with my mind, I reason: why is the Wisdom of God likened to a cypress tree? I know that among the ancients the cypress was the image of death: just as the cedar is of immortality, so the cypress was the image and writing of death. There was a custom to plant this tree in cemeteries near the tombs of the dead. In the life of St. Nikita the Confessor, we find that in his monastery a certain godly father named Athanasius, who truly loved God, reposed in his monastery, and after his burial a cypress tree grew from his very chest on his grave. It grew at the command of God to glorify His saint, and the leaves of this tree healed all sorts of diseases. The Greeks had a custom of announcing the death of a person by means of a cypress branch, and where a cypress branch was visible stuck on any house, then everyone knew that there was a dead person in that house. In addition, coffins for the dead were made from cypress, since the bodies of the dead did not quickly decay in cypress wood, for this tree, like cedar, was indestructible and had the power to keep the human body incorruptible. When I want to comprehend this mystery, why the Wisdom of God, being immortal, was likened to a cypress tree, which was the image of death, then reason itself comprehends that precisely because the incarnate Wisdom of God, the Son of God, was destined to die on the cross, in which, along with the cedar and the tree, there was also a cypress. Just as the cedar in the cross was an image of the immortality of God’s incarnate Wisdom, so the cypress served as an indication of Her incorruptible death: for God the Father “did not allow His venerable (Son) to see corruption.” Here, by cypress trees one must spiritually understand those who always die to sin, but live for God, “crucifying with Christ,” according to the Apostle, “always bearing the death of the Lord Jesus in their body” (1 Cor. 4:10), that is, they always kill themselves. From these cypress trees, from the image of their virtuous life, let us take one second log to kindle the fire of Divine love in us, and let this other log be in the name and love of the other person of the Holy Trinity, God the Son, “who loved us and gave Himself for us.” What weapon will cut off the log for us from this cypress forest? Truly, it is the same voice of the Lord that crushes cedars: “The voice of the Lord that crushes cedars” (Ps. 28:5), the voice of the Lord that crushes cypress trees. However, that voice of the Lord here, in the cypress forest, says almost the same thing, for there he sweetly exclaimed: “Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy soul,” and here even sweeter: “Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart” (Matthew 22:37). Truly, it is worthy and righteous to love Him with all our hearts, Who did not spare His heart for us, but gave it to be pierced by a spear on the cross. What does it mean to love God with all your heart? To love Him with all your heart is to love Him sweetly. Just as loving God with all your soul means loving Him wisely, so loving Him with all your heart means loving Him sweetly. The heart in a person is the foundation, beginning and source of all love, desire and love sweetness. Let us love the Lord our God with all our hearts, with all our love, with all our desire, with all our pleasure. Before we learn to sweetly love God with our hearts, let us first remember the character and custom of true heartfelt love described by the Apostle: “Love does not seek its own” (1 Cor. 13:5). Consider, everyone, and understand what it means: “Love does not seek its own”? That is true love from the bottom of the heart, which loves someone not for itself, that is, not for its own benefit or profit, but for the sake of love itself; For the sake of her beloved, she “does not look for her si.” Sometimes they love someone only because they receive benefits from him, and if they had not received them, they would not have loved them. Sometimes someone pretends that he loves his master and does his will, but this is only because he is afraid that he will get angry and punish him with something. True love does not “look for its own” and is not afraid of anything: it has only one thing, that it loves its beloved. Here let us heed that only that kind of love is that which loves God sweetly, with all its heart, which loves Him not in order to receive anything from Him, not for the sake of heavenly reward: “What do we have in heaven?” (Ps. 72:25), not for the sake of earthly blessings: “And what have you desired on earth?” - but solely for the sake of love for the sweetest Jesus, who draws everyone to His love, who is worthy of being loved by everyone, who is all desire, all sweetness. The skilled ones judged well: he who works for God for the sake of the kingdom of heaven is, as it were, in the rank of a hired hand, working as if for pay in order to receive the kingdom of heaven as a reward; he who works for God out of fear of torment is in the rank of a servant who does good, fearing that he will be punished; He who works for God for the sake of God’s love itself is in the rank of a son, who neither seeks reward nor fears torment, for perfect love casts out fear, loves the Father for the sake of love for the Father itself and does not transgress His will in anything. This is what it means to love God sweetly with your heart. The Gospel remembers the following. At one time, Christ’s disciples betrayed Christ: “Many of His disciples went back, and no one walked with Him. Jesus spoke to the twelve: food and do you want to leave? Simon Peter answered Him: Lord! Who are we going to? Verbs of the life of the eternal imashi” (John 6:66–68). I would say the following to those who remained: I know why you hold on to Christ and do not depart from Him - you have learned that He is the King of Heaven, and you work for Him so that He will reward you with heavenly things. But Saint Chrysostom defends them, saying: “They preferred neither heaven nor the kingdom of heaven to their beloved, for He was everything to them. And why are you surprised? After all, the prophet, listen, says: “What do we have in heaven? And what do I desire from You on earth?”, that is, I desire neither the things above, nor the things below, nor anything else, but You alone.” Having written this, Chrysostom exclaims: “Here is a wish! That's love! And he also says: “Here is the kingdom, here is sweetness, here is satiation, glory and honor, here is light and innumerable bliss!” What is it, Chrysostom, to love Christ not because of a reward, but for His sake? So, let us love Him as we should love. I looked again at Saint Peter, weeping bitterly, and said: You are crying Peter, because you are afraid that you have rejected Christ, you are afraid that Christ will plunge you into torment for your rejection. But here, too, the same Saint Chrysostom defends Peter, saying: “Peter has a burning heart for Christ, preferring Him more than life, soul and everything else; when he rejected Him, he cried not because of torment, but because he rejected his beloved, which was more bitter for him than any torment. Here we see sweet love, loving sweetly from the heart. So, let’s put that other log on the heart’s altar to the fire of Divine love and blow on the words of Saint Ambrose, who says: “You know, God, who knows the hidden, that you are not only greater than the earth and everything that is on it, but even greater than the sky and everything that is on it, You are dearest to me, You are the most desirable, You are the most dear! I love You more than heaven and earth and everything that is in them.” So, having put in another log and blowing it up, let's go for the third one. The third tree, to which Wisdom is likened, is the date: “I,” he says, “are exalted like the date of the seaside” (Sir. 24:15). Where is this seaside? In other translations I hear that instead of the seaside, Cadiz is written: “Like a date in Cadiz”; and some say that the Sinai desert was called the seaside and Cadiz: the seaside because it began from the shore of the Red Sea; Cadiz is interpreted as “shrine”. I think that is why it was so named, because there was the beginning of the shrine, there God appeared in a bush of fire, there He spoke to people in a pillar of fire and cloud, there he gave the law, there was the tabernacle of witness, there, at the command of God, a tabernacle with cherubim was made. That is why the desert was called “Cadiz”, that is, a shrine. Discussing the interpretation of the name and considering the place of the Cadian desert on the seaside, I say to myself: the Divine love of Cadiz, a great shrine, and the godly, holy life that is on the seaside are necessary, that is, it is necessary for there to be a holy life in the sea of ​​​​tears. Cadiz is holy in name, but because of the events that once took place there, it is terrible: terrible because there were flashes and thunders, and great fear; terrible: for there the wrath of God killed many people of Israel for their murmuring: “The wrath of God will come upon me, and kill the multitude of them” (Ps. 77:31). Therefore, David says this about that desert: “The Lord shook the desert of Cadiz” (Ps. 28:8). We listen: it is not possible for a person to achieve holiness and the love of God if he does not first destroy evil, sinful morals within himself. But let's go there for the designated tree. Looking at the tallest Cadian dates, I wonder why the Wisdom of God is likened to them? I ask, and they tell me that the date surpasses any type of tree in its height; therefore, the spiritual bride - the church - in the Song of Songs likens her Bridegroom - Christ - to a date, saying: “Behold, Thy Majesty is likened to a date” (Song 7:7). Interpreters say that this is why the Wisdom of God is likened to a date, because just as a date surpasses trees, so She surpasses everything, rules and dominates over all visible and invisible creation, containing everything and ruling everything. In addition, the date was still among the ancients an image of victory, overcoming triumph due to its unfading, due to the fact that it always remains green and does not fade. Likewise, Wisdom also overcomes everything. Saint Cyprian, by date, means the same as the singer who was in the cross of the Lord, for he says: “You, Lord, ascended the date, for this is the tree of Your cross, thereby signifying the triumph over the devil, the spiritual victory over impurities; and in Your hands were two horns (crosses), in which Your strength was hidden, and Your power was in Your shoulder.” This is what Saint Cyprian says, placing a date in the cross of Christ instead of a peg. But I, without discussing much about what the date and the tree represent: one and the same or something different, I will say about the date itself, that in Scripture both the Wisdom of God and the righteous man are likened to it: “The righteous man will prosper like the date tree,” says David (Ps. 91:13), for the righteous man grows highly in the thought of God, triumphs over the devil, conquering passions, and never his hope fades. “His leaf,” they say, “will not fall away, and everything that he does will prosper” (Ps. 1:3). From such dates, that is, from the image of the virtuous life of the righteous, let us take to ignite in us the fire of Divine love that piece of wood that the same voice of the Lord cut off with slightly different words, saying: “Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy mind” (Matthew 22:37). And Saint Luke adds that “and with all your strength” (Luke 10:27). Interpreters say that both are the same: loving God with all your thoughts is the same as loving Him with all your strength. Let this third date log of spiritual incense be in the name and love of the third person of the Holy Trinity - God the Holy Spirit. We already know that “to love God with all your thought and with all your strength” means to love Him warmly, to always love Him and to love Him constancy, without breaking or dividing your love in two: on the one hand, for the Creator, and on the other, for the creation, as Basil the Great interprets, saying: “What is expressed by the words: “with all your thought”? Let it not be cut into something else, that is, this commandment of love indicates that he who loves God must not cut his love in two, partly for God, and partly for sinful, lustful and lustful lust.” Augustine also admonishes beautifully, saying: “Avoid the creation, if you want to have a Creator.” they are torn apart, they turn out to be bitter soldiers who crucified You, Lord, who did not want to tear Your tunic. It would be necessary to talk a lot about this love, always and constantly warm, unchanging, learning from it and kindling it in myself, but in order not to burden you, my listeners, I will finish my word by saying only one more thing - about the constancy of warm love. The Prophet Isaiah once saw angels with two faces: Lucifer, that is, the light-bringer, and the other, the fiery seraphim, as if one of them was falling and the other was standing motionless; the luminous Lucifer falls: “The star of the morning has fallen from heaven” (Is. 14:12), but the seraphim stands unshakable: “And the Seraphim stand.” Why did the luminous angel, who had an enlightened mind and cherubic wisdom and knew God completely, not stand in heaven for long, but soon fell? Because he did not love God warmly, did not burn with the flame of seraphim love for God. Seraphim, having the same bright, luminous mind, during his enlightenment also burned with warm love for God and therefore remained without falling. One of the interpreters, discussing this, says: “The Lightbringer fell from the sky like lightning; the seraphim stood on it. Seraphim truly stand, for they have never lost love.” We will heed this. It is not enough to be a bright, wise and intelligent angel, but it is also necessary to be a fiery seraphim. It is not enough to have an enlightened mind, but it is also necessary to be fiery. It is not enough to know God wisely, but it is necessary to love Him warmly. Only that kind of love, and not any other, can be constant, stable and never falling away, which loves warmly, fieryly, seraphimically. Oh, heavenly fire, the Holy Spirit, who once descended in fire on those who loved Christ! Holy Spirit, You throw at least one spark of the fire of Divine love into our hearts and create heat that scorches the thorns and brushwood of our sins! Oh, quiet and sweet wind, Holy Spirit! Blow the breath of Your grace, fan that fire in us, the heavenly fire, the fire of God, the fire of love for God, seraphim love, always constant, stable and never falling away! It's time to end the conversation. Behold, my listener, according to my strength, I collected three logs of fragrant trees, remaining in the name of the Holy Trinity, as if from the cross of Christ when it was made. The first is cedar, as a sign of love for God the Father, in order to love Him wisely and with all my soul. The other is cypress, as a sign of love in God the Son, to love Him sweetly with all your heart. The third is date (which Saint Cyprian puts in place of pine), as a sign of love for the Holy Spirit, in order to love Him with all our thoughts or strength, that is, always, constantly and warmly. Anyone who wishes can gather more of those spiritual trees and become inflamed with love for God. We, now being content with these, will say: Amen. Sermon for the Eighteenth Sunday after Pentecost “Depart from me, for I am a sinner, Lord” (Luke 5:8) The glorious “fisherman of Lake Gennesaret, Simon Peter, seeing a great many fish caught in a net, and two ships full of catch, and recognizing Christ the Lord, his Benefactor, who blessed that fishing, rejoiced so much at Him that he prayed to Him to go away from him: “Depart from me, for I am a sinful man, Lord.” Godly listeners! Look how glad Peter is to have a guest, a welcome guest, a most gracious guest - Jesus Christ, who came to him not empty-handed, but with a noble gift, with many fish. So he is glad; but meanwhile he asks not to himself, but from himself: get away from me! I am glad for You, get away from me. Saint Peter! What are you doing? What are you saying? Look around: instead of asking the Lord to never leave you, but to be with you always, you ask: “Get away from me.” Saint Peter! All people will judge you. Political people, courtiers, will judge and say: Peter is not a politician, he is unsociable, he is not happy with the guest, he does not receive, he does not honor. Ordinary, simple people will judge and say: Peter is ungrateful, he did not thank the Lord for the great multitude of fish; but I could have asked the Lord for the same fish: Lord, don’t leave me, wait a little, let’s prepare a meal from the fish You gave us and, having eaten, we will give thanks to You. They will condemn the spiritual ones and say: Peter confesses himself to be a sinner: “I am a sinner,” but the absolver and forgiver of sins survives from himself: “Depart from me.” If you are sick, call a doctor; if you are a sinner, call and keep with you the cleanser of all sins - Jesus. Saint Peter! If you are a sinner, as you say: “Husband; “I am a sinner,” then listen to the Lord, who says: “I did not come to call the righteous, but a sinner to repentance” (Matthew 9:13). And know, Peter, that “the Lamb of God, who takes away the sins of the world,” came to you on purpose, because you are a sinner; came to take away your sins from you. Do not say to Him: “Depart from me,” but pray to Him intensely, saying: abide with me, Lord, always, until the end of the age. However, Saint Peter cannot change his word, which was already written in the Gospel long ago and spread throughout the entire earth and to the ends of the universe. So be it: I said it once, but it will always be preached throughout the world. Saint Peter! If you are silent, then command me, a sinner, to say something for you. Let me, with my sinful words, defend your holy words and explain to my listener their power, only with your grace, which you have from God, act in my mouth, act in the hearts of your listeners. We are not the only ones who slander Saint Peter, but his friends, the holy evangelists, are not silent about him, saying that he, like a Galilean, being simple and unskilled in words, often used to let it slip. Saint Luke, narrating the transfiguration of the Lord, says that when Peter saw the light of the sun at midnight, for the face of Christ was illuminated like the sun, and heard the voice of the Father from above, testifying about Christ: “This is my beloved Son,” then he said to Jesus: “Master, it is good for us to be here; Let’s create three canopies.” At the same time, Saint Luke adds about Peter: “Ignorant of the words he spoke” (Luke 9:33:35) - he himself did not know what he was saying. Saint Matthew tells the following. At one time, when the Lord began to tell His disciples that it was fitting for Him to go to Jerusalem and suffer a lot, Peter began to object to Him, saying: “Be merciful to You, Lord, for You should not have these things” (Matthew 16:22). Here Peter is also “ignorant of the words”: he did not know the secret that the world would be saved through the suffering and death of Christ, and therefore he heard from the Lord a cruel answer: “Follow me, Satan, you are a temptation for me, because you do not think what is God’s, but what is human” (Matthew 16:23). Likewise, now, seeing the fish catch increased thanks to the coming of the Lord and both ships being filled, instead of saying: “Live with me, Lord, do not leave me, Lord,” he says: “Depart from me, Lord,” truly, “not knowing what he said.” But this is not surprising, for a person usually, if he accidentally sees something or hears something amazing, is horrified and, having forgotten himself from horror, does not know what he is saying. Peter was horrified at Tabor, seeing the glory of the Divine, fell on his face out of fear, and from the same fear did not know what he was saying. Peter was horrified when he heard about the suffering and death of the immortal Son of God, and therefore did not know what he was saying. And now he was horrified by the miraculous catch of fish, as the Gospel says: “For fear took hold of him and all that was with him about the catch of fish, even yasha” (Luke 5:9). This means that here, too, out of horror, he, without knowing, said: “Get away from me, Lord.” Saint Ambrose defends Saint Peter, saying: “Although Peter was horrified by the miracle, he was not “ignorant,” but with great reasoning and intelligence said: “Depart from me, Lord.” And then Saint Ambrose speaks about him like this: “A wise and worthy man, in whom there was the foundation of the church and the teaching of teaching, did not see anything useful in himself, except not to be exalted in his prosperity in business, and for this reason he says: “Depart from me, Lord.” He does not pray to be abandoned by Christ, but (worries) only about not becoming proud of the gifts of Christ. Here we see the mind of the wise man, Saint Peter; We see with what thought he said: “Depart from me, Lord,” namely, so as not to become proud, being filled with the gifts of the Lord. So, those words of his were words of humility. It is possible for us to extract useful teaching both from the horror and from the words of Peter. Let us learn from Petrov’s horror to accept God’s gifts with fear. The gifts of God are twofold, in two parts of a person, as in the two ships of Peter’s fish, that is, in the body and soul, namely: external and internal, natural and grace-filled. In the body there are external, physical, natural gifts, such as beauty of face and age, strength of the body, etc. This, to the carnal, pleasant existence, includes all temporary, visible earthly blessings: wealth, power and authority, which are all gifts from God. In the soul there are spiritual, internal, grace-filled, spiritual gifts, which are known to the one who has them: “Who is the message from man that is in man,” says the apostle, “even the spirit of man living in him?” (1 Cor. 2:11). Such a person knows spiritual gifts, which he gratefully receives from God and carefully keeps them within himself. So, following the example of Peter, who was horrified by the multitude of fish caught, we too will accept with fear and horror all the gifts befitting both soul and body. Let us especially accept spiritual gifts with fear, for they are soon taken away. The gifts of God are like morning dew. When the midday heat comes, the dew will dry; If the heat of sin prevails in people, God’s spiritual gifts will be taken away from them. The gifts of God are like a rainbow shining in the clouds on a rainy day. If the density of the clouds thins and the moisture in the air dries up, the rainbow will disappear; Whether a person’s heartfelt tenderness and tears dry up, or whether the desire for God’s service becomes thinner, you will not see God’s gifts in him. The gifts of God are like Sampson’s hair: until the nasty Delilah cut it off, until then Sampson was strong; when she cut off seven strands of hair from his head, then his strength departed from him, and he fell into the hands of his enemies, was blinded by them and enslaved. In the same way, until a certain Delilah is imagined in someone’s mind and sin is delighted in the heart, until then it is terrible for invisible enemies, like a strong conqueror; when any Delilah begins to dominate in someone’s heart, and if not one, that is, not one love of sin, but many, then the power of God’s gifts is taken away from such a person, and he becomes blind in mind and enslaved to his passions. Let us accept the physical gifts of nature with fear, so as not to use them to anger our Creator. Let the beauty of the face serve not deception, but the glory of God; let health not be for idleness, but for labor for the glory of God; strength is not for sin, but for good deeds for the glory of God. If it is otherwise, then the same gifts will plunge that ship to the bottom of hell. With fear we will accept those gifts that are appropriate to human life - wealth, power, and the like; they should especially be received with fear and enjoyed with fear, lest it be said to someone in the next century: “Thou hast received good things in thy belly” (Luke 16:25). If your soul was blessed in your life, then what else are you waiting for after your death? This is the fear of God that Petrov’s horror teaches us. His humble words: “Depart from me, Lord,” teach us that we should consume all the gifts of God with humility and meekness, and not with pride; they come from the mercy of God, as this happens among earthly dominions. To whom the king of the earth is merciful, he favors and bestows. So the Heavenly King, by His mercy, gives His gifts to people. But just as with earthly rulers mercy can be changeable, and it is necessary to be wary of not finding anger instead of mercy, so with the Heavenly Lord, even though mercy would like to be unchangeable and eternal, according to what is written: “For His mercy is good, for His mercy endures forever” (Ps. 135:1), but we ourselves do not allow it to be eternal and unchangeable, often irritating it with our sins. Therefore, it is necessary to take great care and walk before God with meekness and humility. Saint John the Theologian at one time wanted to look at the court of the Heavenly King and find out his deanery. He looks and sees the throne of God in great and ineffable glory; on the throne is the Tsar under a beautiful rainbow, as if under a canopy; around the throne there is a rainbow and twenty-four senators, who look like worthy elders; there at the throne are thousands of thousands and thousands of servants and armies standing before the King of Heaven. In the midst of all that vision the sea shines, and in front of the throne, he says, the sea is glassy, ​​like crystal. The Arabian translation reads that the sea was glassy, ​​like ice. What could this sea mean, seen in the courtyard of the Heavenly King before His throne? The holy fathers and wise commentators have many interpretations on this, which is not the time for us to talk about now. We can only say that just as it is impossible to walk on slippery ice with pride, boldly, quickly and for a long time: you can soon stumble and fall if you do not walk with humility, meekness and fear - so the nobles of the Heavenly King were offered a slippery, glassy, ​​crystal and icy sea in fear and apprehension, so that they would stand before their Lord with fear and humility and walk meekly before Him. On that sea, a luminous angel, proud of the many gifts of God given to the angelic nature, wanted to boldly walk, for he fearlessly placed his proud foot on the sea, saying: “I will ascend into heaven and be like the Most High” (Is. 14:13–14). But immediately he slipped, as if on ice, and in a most terrible fall fell from the light into eternal darkness. Saint Peter must have known this well, who, seeing himself being inducted into the nobility of the Heavenly King for the service of God, which is called catching people, was frightened and horrified, not daring to immediately stand on that glassy, icy sea, and therefore used meek, humble words, considering himself unworthy of such a rank, such a service, and through this he gave us an image and a mysterious teaching, so that we would humbly, but not with proudly used God's gifts. But let’s also look for the secrets of Peter in the words. Peter says: “Depart from me, for I am a sinner, Lord.” Peter confesses himself to be a sinner and condemns himself to be unworthy of seeing Christ; he seems to imprison and expel himself from the face of Christ, as if saying: I am ashamed of my sins, but I fear Your face. O Just One, seer of the unseen! I do not dare to look at You, I am not worthy to be before Your face, but I am worthy to stand far from You, as if condemned and expelled. But “how will I walk from Your Spirit and how will I flee from Your presence” (Ps. 139:7)? You yourself leave me for a while, just as the sun leaves this visible hemisphere and then shines again. Depart from me, my Light, with the fear of Your justice, which I am terrified of, until I question my conscience, examine my sins in detail and pronounce judgment on myself. Then shine on me again, my Sun, illuminating me with the rays of Your grace. This is the meaning of the Petrovs’ words, such is the meaning, such is the secret. Oh, good image of the salvation of sinners! Oh, good advice to everyone! Do you want, sinner, to be uncondemned at the terrible judgment of God? Condemn yourself, preventing the judgment of God by your self-condemnation. It is not in vain that the apostle says: “Even if we had reasoned for ourselves, we would not have been condemned” (1 Cor. 11:31). If each of us learns to know and judge our sins, we will get rid of eternal condemnation. It will not be useless to recall here the story of David's sin and repentance. David sinned, and he sinned gravely, as you already know, for who does not know Uriah, a noble man in Jerusalem, and Bathsheba, his wife? When David was in that sin, God sent the prophet Nathan to him so that he would expose David, frighten him with the vengeful judgment of God and teach him. And so Nathan, coming to David, offered him a parable about two men. “Two,” says the prophet, “are best men in one city, one is rich, and the other is poor. The rich man had many flocks and buffaloes, but the poor man had only one suckled lamb, which he ate from his bread, fed from his cup, and rested on his bosom, and was like his daughter. Someone came from the way to the rich man, and the rich man did not want to slaughter a guest for dinner for the sake of his flock, but they took away from the poor man the last dear lamb and the evil one. Judge, O king, such a matter” (2 Chron. 12 et seq.). If I had been there during that conversation when Nathan told David the parable, then I would have said to Nathan: holy prophet, true servant of God! God sent you to David to expose his sin, to frighten him and punish him with the terrible wrath of God, but you tell him some fables, speak parables and want to make him a judge rather than a guilty, condemned sinner! But Saint Peter answers me for Nathan, explaining that the prophet, before denouncing David, first offered him a parable so that David, having pronounced judgment on himself and condemning himself, would more easily receive mercy and forgiveness from God. Let's look at the prophetic mind. He acted in this way, knowing that it is more convenient for a sinner to receive God’s mercy and forgiveness of his sins in no other way than that, having recognized his sins, he himself pronounces his guilt and recognizes himself as worthy of punishment. That is why he offered the king a parable in which the king himself would be the judge and avenger of his sin. When the king pronounced righteous judgment over such a sin, saying that “the man is worthy of that death,” then the prophet denounces him: “You are, O king, the one who did this,” - you took away the lamb - his cohabitant - from the poor man Uriah, you are the husband whom you consider worthy of death. Here Saint Basil of Seleucia, on behalf of Nathan, speaks to David, saying: “You, king, judged like a king. Know your cause and see who is condemned by your court; I wanted you to first be a judge for yourself, and not condemned, and I am not considering you, but I am seeking judgment from you for your sin.” It will be of great benefit to the sinner at God’s judgment from the fact that by his judgment about his sins he warns the judgment of God. Truly, Saint Peter, knowing this, pronounced condemnation on himself, saying: “I am a sinful man,” and he condemned himself, considering himself unworthy of seeing Christ, which is why he said: “Depart from me, Lord.” Here, from Saint Peter, we will each learn to recognize our sins and judge ourselves, bringing our guilt to God in confession and asking ourselves for spiritual punishment for this - penance and so on. It is also appropriate to consider this last word of Peter’s speech: “Lord,” and to understand the mystery why Saint Peter, seeing the power of God in Christ the God-man (for by Divine command a great many fish were caught), did not call Him God, did not say: “Get away from me, O God,” did not call Him here and the Son of God, as he had already confessed earlier, saying: “Thou art the Christ, Thou art the Son of the living God,” did not call Him teacher, and yet it was truly fitting to call Him a teacher then, when our Lord, having entered the ship of Peter, asked to retreat a little from the land and, having sat down, taught the people from the ship? So, it was fitting for Peter then to say: “Teacher.” But Peter did not call the Lord at that time either God, or the Son of God, or teacher, but only Lord: “Depart from me, Lord.” Let anyone think here as he pleases and seek out the mysterious reasons for this; But before I answer this, I will look a little at the Last Supper of my Lord. Our Lord, sitting with His dear disciples at the Last Supper (Judas was also there), began to tell them about His traitor: “Amen, I say to you, only one of you will betray Me” (Matthew 26:21). The Lord’s disciples were horrified at this, and each of them, immediately looking into his conscience and not finding any guilt in himself towards the Lord, responded, saying: “Am I food, Lord?” Peter said it, Andrew said it, Jacob said it, and each of them said the same thing: “Am I food, Lord? Am I food, Lord?” Then it was Judas’ turn; and Judas says: “I am food, Rabbi?” (Matthew 26:25). Oh, damned Judas! You follow Christ, but you do not agree with the followers of Christ; everyone calls their Lord Lord, but you alone call Him only teacher, and not Lord: “I am food, Rabbi?” Well, Judas, say, like the other apostles: “Am I food, Lord?” But Judas cannot utter this one word “Lord”; cannot call the Lord his Lord, but only by the name with which he intended to betray Him, saying: “Rejoice, Rabbi!” Before he said this, kissing Him flatteringly, he had already manifested at the Last Supper what he held in his mind, saying: “Am I food, Rabbi?” In both crafty phrases of Judas there is one appeal: “Rejoice, Rabbi!” and “I am food, Rabbi?” Why couldn’t Judas say the words “Lord” and confess his Lord as Lord? The reason for this was later explained by the Apostle Paul, saying: “No one can speak of the Lord Jesus except by the Holy Spirit.” No one can pronounce that word “Lord” except through the action of the Holy Spirit. Since Judas was not a vessel of the Holy Spirit, but a vessel of the devil, he could not even pronounce the word “Lord”: he was no longer one of the servants of the Lord, but one of the servants of Satan. Seeing this, Jerome says: “He who began to fall away from the face of the apostles could not have Jesus as his Lord, for Christ the Lord was no longer his Lord, but the devil was Lord; and when Judas wanted to open his mouth and, together with the other apostles, call the Lord Lord: “I am food, Lord?”, then the devil, who sat in Judas and owned his heart, said to him: “Listen, my servant Judas, from now on you know me alone as your master; do not call your first Lord Lord, but only me.” That is why Judas called Christ only “Rabbi,” that is, teacher, and not Lord. Now I will begin to answer the previous question: why did Saint Peter, seeing the Divine power of Christ and hearing His teaching, humbly confessing himself a sinner, did not call Christ Jesus either God, or the Son of God, or Rabbi - Teacher, but only Lord, and Christ Jesus was, is and will be all of this for endless centuries? He is both the Son of God and God, He and the Teacher, He and the Lord. Here it is necessary to understand the difference between these names: one is God and the Son of God, another is the Teacher, another is the Lord. God and the Son of God contains and organizes the whole world, the Teacher teaches the whole sunflower, but the Lord provides and cares for His true and faithful servants. God watches over all the evil and the good, just as the sun shines for the good and the evil; The teacher offers teaching to everyone; The Lord knows only His servants, who always work for Him and not for anyone else, according to the apostolic word: “The Lord knows Him who is” (2 Tim. 2:19). God and demons are called God, as Saint James says: “And the demons believe and tremble in the Son of God” (James. 2:19), and the unclean spirits who were possessed confessed: “What do we have to do with you, Jesus the Son of God? Thou hast come before the time to torment us” (Matthew 8:29). The Pharisees also hypocritically call Him a Teacher: “Ask one of them, tempting and saying: Teacher! What is the greatest commandment in the law? (Matthew 22:36). But only those who call Him Lord, as was said, are His true and faithful servants, who work for Him with all zeal, with all love and all zeal. Indeed, in all four gospel gospels we do not find any demon or Pharisee, or any of the leaders of the Jewish congregations calling Him Lord, but only the apostles. Demons confess the Son of God, Jews are amazed at the teaching that He revealed with authority and miracles, the disciples call Him their Lord: “You proclaim Me as Lord and Teacher,” says Christ to the apostles (first, “Lord”, and then “Teacher”), “and say well, for I am your Lord” (John 13:13). So, when Saint Peter said to the Lord: “Depart from me, Lord,” then in the last word “Lord,” he revealed that inner secret of his heart, that he is a true servant of the Lord, and not a hypocrite, never wanting to leave Him, but ready to go with Him even to death. It also appeared that he was already beginning to become a vessel of the Holy Spirit and by the Holy Spirit he called Jesus Lord. Here, from this example, we will borrow the mysterious teaching about truly working for our Lord Jesus Christ alone, and not for mammon, through which we could non-judgmentally and boldly say to the Lord: “Lord.” When we work for others, that is, for the world, the flesh and the devil, and we call our Lord Lord in vain, then we will turn out to be shameless, impudent and hypocritical Pharisees. My listener! So, according to my strength, I defended the holy words of Saint Peter with my sinful words, and not from myself, but on the basis of Divine Scripture; Those words of Peter: “Depart from me, Lord,” were not words of ignorance, but words of fear and great intelligence, mystery and power. But you, Saint Peter, intercede for both those who spoke about your words and those who listened for eternal, unceasing presence with Christ, both here on earth and forever in the heavenly kingdom, the keys of which you have. Amen. First sermon on the nineteenth week after Pentecost “Love your enemies, do good to those who hate you” (Luke 6:27) Some have the habit of blaming the last times and reproaching the current weak human race, saying: there are no longer miracle workers on earth among people, as there were before, who would perform miracles. But do not believe them, my beloved listeners! If you wish, I will show you that even today there are miracle workers among people, just listen to what I say: everyone who loves his enemy is a miracle worker. Can you hear what I'm saying? Anyone who loves his enemy is a miracle worker. And that this is the truth, I will explain this on the basis of Divine Scripture and the Holy Fathers in my present conversation, “I make haste for the Lord and confirm the word.” Do not think, my listener, that I will speak about those enemies who are at war with our Christian fatherland and are at enmity against our pious faith. I’m not talking about those enemies who, as those who are against God, should be hated, according to the word of David: “Have they not hated You, O Lord, and hated Your whole soul? I hated them with complete hatred, and became my enemies” (Ps. 139:21-22). Not only do you not love those, but you even need to go to war against them, laying down your soul for the Christian kingdom and for the integrity of the church. At one time, the wicked asked the question of this to the holy Christian philosopher Constantine, named Cyril. The Saracens said: “If Christ is your God, why do you not do as He commands you? After all, He commands you to pray for your enemies, to do good to those who hate you, to turn your cheek to those who strike; you are doing the wrong thing, but you are doing the exact opposite. You sharpen your weapon at those who do this to you, go out to fight and kill.” Blessed Constantine answered: “If two commandments are written in any law and given to people to fulfill, then which person will be the true lawmaker: the one who fulfills one commandment, or the one who fulfills both?” They told him: “The one who fulfills both commandments is the best.” Then the philosopher replied: “Christ our God, who commanded us to pray for those who offend and do good to them, also told us the following: “Greater love than anyone can sow” can be shown in this life, if someone “lays down his life for his friends” (John 15:13). In each individual case we endure the insults inflicted on us; In general, we protect each other, laying down our souls so that you, having captured our brothers, would not captivate their souls with their bodies, inclining them to your ungodly deeds.” So, I’m not talking about external and foreign enemies, but about internal, domestic ones, according to the Gospel saying: “Destroy a man of his own household” (Matthew 10:36). Everyone has his own enemy: one is a friend, another is a neighbor, one is equal to himself, another is greater than himself, the third is less than himself, the fourth is distant, the fifth is a nearby ill-wisher who is at war, blaspheming, slandering. It is these enemies that the Lord commands to love: “Love your enemies.” And the fact that he who loves his enemy is a miracle worker, I now begin to find out with this argument. First of all, I ask: what is a miracle? I answer: a miracle is what is above nature. After all, everything that happens naturally is not miraculous, no one is surprised at it or calls it a miracle; only that is considered and really is a miracle that surpasses all nature, all power of nature. It is not a miracle that Pharaoh with all his strength was drowned in the sea, for it is natural for a mortal creature to plunge into water and drown; but the miracle is that the sea unnaturally gave Israel a path in the midst of itself and brought Pharaoh into its bowels in the same way. It is not a miracle that the flame that came from the Babylonian cave burned the Chaldean servants who were around it, for it is natural for fire to burn, and for people to be burned by fire, but the miracle is that the fire unnaturally did not touch the three youths who were inside the cave and could not harm them. It is not surprising if someone loves those who love him, for this is natural, but it is surprising if someone loves his enemy, for this is unnatural. Since loving enemies is a thing that is higher than nature, it is a supernatural virtue that surpasses human nature, therefore, one who loves enemies is a miracle worker. As for the fact that loving enemies is a supernatural thing, we will see this now. Not loving one’s enemies is a phenomenon characteristic of man and natural, for man is God’s creation, in whose nature three properties are implanted: reason, desire and rage or anger. With his mind he understands good and evil; by willing he sometimes desires a good thing, and sometimes an evil one; with anger or rage implanted in his nature, he naturally seeks revenge on his offender, and seeks it not only during his life, but also after death. Does not the blood of Abel cry out from the earth to God, asking for vengeance on his murderer Cain? Also, the souls of the saints, beaten for the word of God, whom the Theologian saw under the altar, do they not cry out with a great voice, saying: “How long, O holy and true Master, do not judge and avenge our blood?” (Apoc. 6:10). In the stories we read that in the Greek kingdom, brother Theodosius, killed by his brother Constantine, appeared to his murdering brother, holding a cup full of blood, and said: “Drink, brother.” And the blood of Vyacheslav, the Czech prince, killed by Boleslav at the church entrance, remaining on the church wall and not erased by any means, cried out to God, like Abel’s blood. Also in the Greek actions we read that two Roman youths, innocently killed in Spain, appeared to the Roman consul, called Marius, and asked him to rise to avenge them. If all this happened after death, then all the more so in this life human nature is vengeful, angry, furious and not tolerant of offense. This does not require a lot of evidence and examples: everyone can see for themselves both in themselves and in others. After all, it is more desirable for someone to die than to suffer an insult from someone. So, as has already been said, it is innate and natural for a person not to love his enemies and to strive for revenge on them. Since it is human nature not to love enemies, then love for them will already be a supernatural phenomenon, and everything supernatural is miraculous. It is quite consistent that everyone who loves his enemy is a miracle worker, for he, conquering and surpassing his natural nature, achieves supernatural virtue. What miracles does such a miracle worker perform? Let's listen. He who loves his enemy and does good to him enlightens the blind, the blind not in body, but in mind. Blindness of the mind is madness, just as blindness of the body is darkening of the eyes. Nothing darkens our intelligent eyes with madness more than anger and rage. It is not for nothing that the churchman exhorts, saying: “Do not strive to be angry in your soul, for wrath rests in the bosom of fools” (Eccl. 7:10). By this he said, as it were, the following: where you see angry rage, there, you know, is the house of madness. Reasoning about this, Saint Cassian says: “An angry man acts without reason, for the light of reason is darkened if the mind is confused by anger.” Saint Gregory also says: “Where anger brings darkness of confusion to the mind, from there God takes away the ray of His knowledge, and what happens is that just as someone who has his bodily eyes darkened by darkness does not know where he is going, so he who has mental eyes darkened by angry confusion, like a madman, does not know what he is doing. The insane anger of King Xerxes is worthy of laughter. When several of his ships sank with his army in the Hellespont, he, angry at the sea, ordered three hundred blows to be struck on the sea waters and to trample these waters with his feet. King Cyrus did the same thing, whose horse drowned in the river called Gindis. He was angry with the horse on that river and ordered it to be dug into one hundred and eighty ditches. In the lives of the saints we read that certain torturers, who gave the holy martyrs to be eaten by beasts, when they saw that the beasts did not touch or harm the saints, they became angry and beat the beasts. History also laughs at that ruler who, being tall, entering a certain house, hit his forehead on the door frame and in anger ordered that house to be destroyed to the ground. It is now clear that one enraged by anger commits actions without reason and is like a blind man: this one is darkened by darkness, and he is darkened by madness and does not know where he is going or what he is doing. What doctor and what kind of medicine can effectively heal such blindness? Strong is the kindness, love and good deed of the one against whom the angry one becomes angry in vain. An angry person, seeing that the one with whom he is angry, not only is not angry in return, but even shows special love and overcomes evil with good, stops being angry and is ashamed of himself, recognizing his sin and the innocence of the other. This is what happened between the angry Saul and the gentle David. Anyone who wishes can read about this in the first book of Kings, but I will proceed to the miracle of virtue. If someone has an enemy who is angry and rages against him in vain, but he, loving his enemy and doing good to him, turns him from an enemy into a friend and from an angry one into a loving one, then such a one enlightens the blind. He takes away the insane darkness from his intelligent eyes and makes him see and know his sin, know that he is angry with the innocent. So, he who loves his enemy is a miracle worker who enlightens the blind. He who loves his enemy transforms the agitated sea into silence, for an angry man is called by Chrysostom a sea disturbed by the winds. Just as a stormy sea throws onto land all the corpses that are in it, so an angry person in his rage brings out, like corpses, all the secrets of his friend, throws them before his eyes, denounces them and dishonors them. Who will calm such a sea? Only the one who destroys the cause of the unrest. The sea is not agitated unless winds and storms arise. The stormy wind will subside, and the roughness of the sea will disappear. If an angry husband, according to Chrysostom, is a sea disturbed by the winds, then these winds disturbing this sea are bickering, quarrels and opposition. Stop bickering and quarrels, leave behind opposition, take away the cause of the excitement, and you will see a sea whose excitement has subsided. Since the one who loves his enemy does not contradict, does not quarrel, does not resist, and through this destroys the cause of the disturbance of the mysterious sea of ​​his enemy, then, consequently, the one who loves his enemy is a miracle worker who turns the sea into silence. He who loves his enemy quenches the fiery power, for hostile anger in man is “like a fire that burns up an oak forest, like a flame that burns up mountains” (Ps. 80:15). On the one hand, the height of his virtues, on the other, the good name and good glory of his neighbor, he burns, destroys and, as it were, turns into ashes. A flaming fire is extinguished in two ways: firstly, with water, and secondly, by scattering the substance burned by the fire. The enemy’s anger is extinguished in similar ways: firstly, by silent meekness, like water, and secondly, by condescension, like scattering a burning substance. Silent meekness is like that quiet water of Siloam, which flows without noise, without sound, as Isaiah says: “The waters of Siloam flowing like a yew” (Is. 8:6). Under those quiet waters, King Solomon was anointed as king, and those waters were a sign of his quiet and meek reign, for with his meekness and silence he did not arouse anger in anyone against himself. A meek and quiet husband, who does not give reasons for anger, not only does not light the fire of enmity, but will also extinguish the fire, according to the words of Chrysostom: “There is nothing stronger than meekness.” Just as water extinguishes a flaming fire, so a word spoken with meekness extinguishes a soul burning with anger stronger than a fiery furnace. To condescend to one who is angry and furious and to move away from his eyes means, as it were, to scatter burning wood far from each other so that each individual log goes out more easily. That is why the apostle teaches, saying this: “Give place to anger” (Rom. 12:19), that is, condescend, yield, move a little away from the angry face. Saint Basil the Great, asking what it means: “Give place to anger,” answers: “Do not resist evil, or so: when they persecute you in this city, flee to another.” Likewise, Saint Gregory says: “We best correct angry people by turning away from them at the moment of indignation at their anger.” Saint Ambrose proclaims: “The weapon of the righteous is to win by yielding, just as those skilled in shooting are in the habit of running away and wounding those pursuing them more.” Since he who loves his enemy extinguishes the fierce fire of his enemy’s anger with silent meekness, like water, and condescension, like scattering a burning substance, it means that he is a miracle worker who extinguishes fiery power. He who loves his enemy turns bitterness into sweetness, like Moses did to Marah: the children of Israel came (to Marah) and could not drink the water of Marah, for it was bitter. Human enmity is also full of bitterness, which is why the apostle exhorts that all bitterness should be removed from us. What kind of bitterness is this? He himself explains: “Anger, rage, shouting, blasphemy” - that bitterness, he says, “may be taken away from you along with all malice” (Eph. 4:31). What sweetness can anyone find in a soul saddened by anger? Bitter is a thought imbued with malice, a bitterly annoying word, reproaching, dishonoring, bitter is the beginning of any undertaking that embitters not so much one’s neighbor as oneself, like the undertaking of those who conspired “neither to eat nor drink until they kill Paul” (Acts 23:14). How can such hostile bitterness be sweetened? We know how Marah enjoyed herself: “Moses cried out to the Lord, and the Lord showed him the tree, and put it in water, and rejoiced” (Ex. 15:25); but what kind of tree it was, neither we know nor the interpreters can guess. Some of the Jewish rabbis say that that tree was called “adelpha”, which by its nature was bitter and deadly. God, wanting to show a greater miracle in the delight of the waters of Merra, commanded to put bitter things into bitter things, deadly things into deadly ones, healing the opposite things with the opposite things, just as the prophet Elisha later healed the barren waters with salt (4 Chron. 2:21). Others say that God did not let anyone know what kind of tree it was. By its nature it was so sweet that with its sweetness it could transform the bitterness of the waters into perfect sweetness, taking that bitterness into itself, and giving its sweetness out of itself to the waters. They confirm this opinion with the words of Sirach, who says: “Shall not the water be sweetened from the tree, that His strength may be known” (Sir. 38:5), that is, (as these interpreters say) the power of the sweetness of that tree, unknown to anyone either before or later, was known only at one time. Interpreters do not agree on that tree and do not know for sure whether it was bitter or sweet. We know for sure that the Marah of human enmity and anger can be enjoyed not with a bitter tree, but only with a sweet one. Here, a sweet tree can be spiritually called a sweet, kind word spoken to a hater, or a good deed shown towards a hater. Both truly delight hostile bitterness. The Pritochnik says about the word: “A humble answer will take away the wrath,” and about doing good, someone inspired by God in the Patericon advises this: “If you find out that your brother is angry with you, then send him some gift.” Since the one who loves his enemy speaks a good word to him and about him, according to his strength does good to him, does good, taking into himself, as it were, the bitterness of his enmity, patiently carrying it on himself, drinking the sweetness of his love into him, and thus transforms the bitterness of his anger into the sweetness of friendship and love, then, consequently, he who loves his enemy is a miracle worker who turns bitterness into sweetness. He who loves his enemy casts out a demon from a person, for everyone who is angry, hostile against his brother and vengefully rages is like a demon possessed and is truly possessed. Saint Chrysostom recalls what he himself saw with his own eyes: someone, angry, became overly enraged and, from that excessive rage, became possessed. Also, the ancient physician Galen recalls how he saw with his own eyes, even during his childhood, that a certain man tried to quickly open the door of a room with a key, but due to great haste he could not do this. For a long time turning the key back and forth and not being able to open it, he became so inflamed with anger that he began to bite the key with his teeth and forcefully push the doors with his feet, and then fell in a rage, began to become numb and bleed foam. Seeing this, the youth Galen made it a law never to be angry or rage. A Hungarian chronicler recalls something similar to this in 1690. A Hungarian prince named Matthew Corvius, on the feast of the Lord’s entry into Jerusalem, ordered fresh dates brought to him from Italy to be brought to his meal. When they were not there, because the servants of the household had secretly eaten them, he became so enraged that he was immediately overcome by apoplexy; he fell to the ground as if possessed and died, uttering terrible screams. Do you hear what angry rage can bring a person to? To the point of death. Eliphaz, Job’s friend, said beautifully: “Wrath kills the foolish” (Job 5:2). Truly, an angry person is like a demoniac: he has a terrible look, his eyes change, his face swells, he screams in a terrible voice, he bites his lips or fingers, and grinds his teeth; all the household are afraid of him, as if he were possessed, they run away from him and hide. Who and with what can drive out an angry demon from such a furious person? King Saul sometimes went into a rage, and, as some say about him, this disease of rage especially came upon him at a time when he, angry with someone, reached the point of rage. Who could he be so angry with if not the innocent David, whom he envied because of his good fame? After all, the victory over the Philistines was attributed more to David than to Saul. The women went and rejoiced, saying: Saul has conquered thousands, and David has conquered thousands of thousands. Saul was jealous of this, and anger was born in him from envy; he became furious with anger; out of rage he fell into a state of madness. What does David do? He played the harp in front of him and with these sounds drove away the unclean spirit from Saul. Marvelous was the sound of those harps, wonderful was the music that could drive away the demon from a person. What was the mysterious power of those harps that drove away the demon with music? We don’t have enough time to talk about this at length now. All that is said is that the music was full of indescribable sweetness and some great, mysterious power. The main reason was that Saint David, being meek in disposition, did not become angry in response to Saul’s anger, and the more gentleness David’s heart was filled with, the more tenderly he played the harp, and the more powerful those sounds were in driving away the unclean spirit from Saul, who was full of anger. We also know that just as the music of the gusli cannot be sweet if the strings are not in harmony, so no one can cast out a demon from his enemy unless he is in harmony with him. In the harp, string under string, positioned one after the other mutually and in agreement, all together produce sweet sounds. In the same way, people, being one under the other and agreeing with one another, show a life beautiful and pleasing to the Lord God, and to demons they show a terrible life, like the music of the harp, with which God rejoices, but the demon, driven away, runs away far away. Since he who loves his enemy submits to him with kindness and humble meekness and, being in agreement with him, like a string tuning to another string, emits the sweet music of humble words, considering himself the same sinner as his enemy considers him, with such humility he destroys the enemy’s anger, saying: “I am guilty,” and thus drives away angry rage from him; and this means that he who loves his enemy is a miracle worker who casts out a hostile demon from a person. He who loves his enemy tames the wild beast and stops his mouth, just as Saint Daniel once stopped the mouth of lions. A hostile person is like a beast that is furious even without being irritated; when irritated, he becomes very and beyond measure angry, torments, bites and is eaten. Naturalists say about the tiger that he really does not like the sound of bells and it becomes so enraged that, biting and tormenting himself, he kills himself. A hostile and angry person is a tiger, but the sound of a bell is a cruel word. A cruel word, as they say, arouses anger, and if the irritated person cannot do anything to the irritating person, then he eats himself and, as it were, kills, damaging his health with rage. Baldad, Job’s friend, admonishes beautifully: “Why are you destroying your soul with your rage?” Another translation reads: “Why do you torment your soul?” Don't ring the bell and you won't irritate the tiger. Stop uttering cruel words, and the anger of your enemy will cease. Naturalists also say about the elephant that when it is irritated, it cannot be tamed by anything except the sound of music, so the elephant’s feeders, using some kind of musical instrument called skindap by the Indians, play some kind of cheerful tune, and with this music the elephant is gradually tamed. Likewise, an irritated enemy is as indomitable as an elephant. When you sing a sweet song in front of him, you begin to speak kind words to him and about him everywhere, you will truly tame him, according to the words of Sirach: “A sweet word multiplies friends and tames enemies” (Sir. 6:5). Since he who loves his enemy does not irritate him with evil words, like a tiger with a bell, but tames him with kind words, like an elephant with music, it means that he who loves his enemy is a miracle worker, taming a wild beast and stopping his mouth so that he no longer bites or eats his neighbor. But why should I burden my listener with a long conversation, telling about many such miracles? I’d rather say one further miracle, surpassing all miracles, namely: he who loves his enemy comes into communion with God’s nature when he becomes His son. “Love,” it is said, “your enemies, do good to those who hate you, and you will be sons of the Most High.” What could be more? What greater miracle do you need? So, let no one condemn these last times and the current weak human race, saying that now on earth there are no miracle workers among people, as there were before, who would perform miracles. Love your enemy, and you will be a new miracle worker: you will save both your soul and his. If you don’t believe me, then try it for yourself: start loving from now on. The Son of God will be your guarantee in this: “Heaven and earth will pass by, but His words will not pass by” (Luke 21:33). You, without a doubt, will be the son of the Most High, which sonship I desire for myself and for everyone, I say: Amen. Second sermon on the nineteenth week after Pentecost “Love your enemies” (Luke 6:27; Matt. 5:44) I decided to offer today a meal of your love, beloved listeners, a spiritual meal, although not decorated with sweets, but very useful for mental health. I will offer bread hard as a stone, and I will offer bitter drink like Marah; but if someone eats with love, the hardness of the stone will turn into a soft pie with manna, and the bitterness of Marah will turn into sweet honey. I imagine a spiritual meal, but not a rich one, and the costs for this meal will not be great - just two small pieces of silver: one is called “love”, and the other is called “endure”. These pieces of silver are God’s words, and “the words of the Lord are pure words, silver is precious” (Ps. 11:7). Both of these pieces of silver go together, for love does not live without patience, according to the testimony of the apostle: “Love is patient” (1 Cor. 13:4). Where there is love, there is patience. Although both of these pieces of silver are small in appearance, that is, in human opinion, they are great in price, for they were forged in the crucible of the heart of Christ, pierced by a spear on the cross, who loved us and suffered for us. So, our meal will be provided with these two pieces of silver, that is, with love and patience. You ask: who to love and what to love? The mouth of Christ answers this - love your enemies, endure from your enemies: “Love your enemies.” At this meal of ours, let love for enemies be bread, and patience be drink. Let us eat both for health, and the Lord will bless our meal. You know, blessed listeners, that in Holy Scripture the word of God is called bread. God, angry at the ungrateful Jews, says through the mouth of His prophet Amos: “I will send a famine on the earth, not a famine of bread, but a famine of hearing the word of God” (Amos 8:11). If anyone does not eat bread, he is starving in the stomach; If anyone does not hear the word of God, he is hungry in soul. What bread is to the body, so is the word of God to the soul. The Word of God is spiritual bread for the soul. Since this word: “Love your enemies” is the word of God, which came from the mouth of Christ God Himself, it means that this word, especially the very deed of this word, is bread. Love for enemies is bread. Oh, how tough, how hard this bread is: it is like a stone! Loving your enemy means gnawing on a stone. It was in vain that the foolish Jews, having heard Christ the Lord saying: “I am bread: unless you eat My flesh, unless you drink My blood, you have no life within you” (John 6:51:53), they decided: “This word is cruel, and who can listen to It?” To this word: “Love your enemies,” someone can also say: “This word is cruel.” And truly it is “cruel,” for it is just as natural for a person not to love his enemies as it is to love his friends. And in the Old Testament it is written: “Love your sincere and hate your enemy” (Matthew 5:43), but to overcome something natural and change what was established by the ancient law is considerable work, it is the same as moving a large stone to another place and moving with great difficulty. Saint Ambrose also testifies to this, saying: “It is great work to love one’s enemies, and to many this thing seems so inconvenient, as if it were impossible to bear, for it commands more than human nature can bear.” How cruel this bread, that is, love, is, one should ask about this the holy protomartyr Stephen, whom the Jews stoned. The stones thrown at him fly like rain, and he prays for his enemies: “Lord, do not put this sin on them” (Acts 7:60). Oh, truly, great is the work, great is the firmness to accept cruel blows to the body with stones, but not to be angry in your heart, to pray for your murderers and to love your enemies! A good stomach is one that can digest stones; good, I say, is a heart that can kindly endure the enmity of enemies, unjust insults from them and oppression. But let's look at the benefits of that stone bread, that is, love for enemies; Let's see what great health it brings to the soul. Holy First Martyr! Exhausted in body during the stoning and already bowing your knees to the ground, are you not also exhausted in soul? No, he says, but I look at the sky. Tell us, saint of God, what do you see in heaven? “I see,” he says, “the glory of God; “Behold, I see the heavens opened, and Jesus standing at the right hand of God" (Acts 7:55-56). Oh, what a benefit, what mental health! Here we see how quickly “and effectively that cruelty of stone turned into soft, warm bread and even manna, as for the servant of God every stone was like a warm pie, anointed with his warm blood. He warmed them, he softened them with warm love for his enemies and warm prayer coming from a warm heart. We, considering the vision of the saint, will pay attention to two things: “Heaven is open” and “Jesus is standing.” "The sky is open." Remember how God fed the hungry people of Israel in the desert? “Open the doors of heaven and bring forth manna for them to eat, and give them the bread of heaven” (Ps. 77:23–24). The Lord also showed the holy First Martyr Stephen “the sky is open”; He sent him manna, the manna of His grace, that manna about which He speaks in Revelation to His beloved confidante: “To him who overcomes I will give food from the hidden manna” (Apoc. 2:17). From the hands of merciless, cruel and hostile murderers, stones fly towards the innocent like rain, and from God, from the open sky, grace-filled manna descends: “Open the doors of heaven and rain down manna for him.” "Jesus is standing." This is the bread of heaven, saying about Himself: “I am the bread of life that came down from heaven” (John 6:51). But why does he see Jesus “standing” and not sitting? Isn’t it written in the symbol: “He who ascended into heaven and sits at the right hand of the Father”? I was sitting, but got up: why? In order to look more closely at the feat of the first martyr and to go through the open heavens to meet the soul of His servant, who loved his enemies and prayed for them. What could be better and more useful for someone who desires heaven, who loves sweet Jesus, who enjoys Divine love in his heart? Would he not exchange all the sweets of this world and all the rich royal feasts just to see heaven open for him to enter, to see the most loving Jesus, his Master, standing at the entrances of heaven, meeting, receiving, embracing with love, calming in His bosom and delighting with His love? O sweetness, the highest of all sweets, Jesus! O love that conquers all desire, Jesus! O bread from heaven! Oh, our immortal saturation! O our eternal delight, Jesus! What tongue can express Your sweetness? What mind will comprehend the pleasure, amusement, joy and sweetness of our Jesus, created by You in the hearts that love You? Let the hands of my enemies flock here, let them collect stones from all four corners of the universe, let them throw stones at me like rain and hail and clouds: I would neglect all this, just to see Your bright face, my light Jesus! Let us also ask the holy Apostle Paul, what does that stone bread, love for enemies, seem to him like? In his apostolic book, he speaks about himself like this: “From the Jews, five times forty were received, struck with clubs, beaten with stones” (2 Cor. 11:24-25). Truly this bread is cruel, clubs and stones are not tasty. What are you, Saint Paul, saying under those clubs, under those stones? Let's listen to what he says: “I speak the truth about Christ, I do not lie, my conscience obeying me through the Holy Spirit” (Rom. 9:1). Don't be afraid, holy apostle! We will believe you even without blasphemy. Tell us, what are you saying? “My sorrow,” he says, “is a great and unceasing pain in my heart” (Rom. 9:2). How can one not grieve? After all, they beat you with clubs and stone you. No, he says, it’s not that I’m grieving and hurting because I’m being stoned. So what are we talking about? About the very ones who beat me. I grieve that they are losing their salvation, that they are going to hell; but it would be more desirable for me that I myself would go to hell for them, if only they would be saved: “I prayed that I myself was anathema to be from Christ (that is, to be excommunicated from Christ) according to my brethren who are Israelites” (Rom. 9:3). Let us heed Pavlov’s words, let us heed his supreme love for his enemies: he is not horrified to be excommunicated from Christ and go to hell, so long as the Israelis who are pursuing and beating him do not die. Saint John Chrysostom raised his voice a little at the holy Apostle Paul for this word, saying: “Oh, Paul! Are you really praying to be separated from your beloved Christ, from whom neither the kingdom, nor hell, nor the visible, nor the intelligible, nor anything else has separated you? What happened to you? Didn't you fall? Didn’t you ruin your old love?” And again Chrysostom, on behalf of Paul, answers himself: “No,” he says, “do not be afraid: not only did I not destroy my former love for Christ, but I showed it even more strongly.” We heed the fact that Saint Paul, wanting to be excommunicated for the Israelis, his brothers, who innocently fought against him, persecuted and beat him, did not destroy his love for Christ, but showed it more strongly, multiplied it; did not destroy, but multiplied. After all, he loved them for the sake of love for Christ, and, moreover, he loved them in the same way as Christ loved us, sinners, His enemies, as it is written about this: “God works His love in us, for while we were still sinners, Christ died for us” (Rom. 5:8). Christ loved us so much that he did not disdain, did not refuse to bear the curse for us, according to the word of the same apostle: “Christ redeemed us from the curse of the law, being the curse of us. For it is written: “Cursed is everyone who hangs on a tree” (Gal. 3:13). If Christ loved us so much, then is it surprising that His saint, Saint Paul, out of love for Him, loves his enemies so much that he is not even afraid to suffer excommunication for them? Let us now see what that stone bread, that is, love for enemies, turned into when St. Paul was stoned by the Jews? What does he say after he patiently endured beatings with clubs and stones, and after he showed such love for those who beat him? “With this man was caught up into the third heaven: with this man was caught up, for he was caught up into heaven, and heard unspeakable words, which a man should not speak” (2 Cor. 12 et seq.). And what is more beneficial for the human soul than heaven? What is sweeter to the human heart than heaven? Here we see that for St. Paul, clubs and stones turned into heavenly food and heavenly pleasure: while still in the flesh, he already knew the third heaven, explored the heavenly paths, saw what “the eye cannot see,” heard what “the ear cannot hear,” and enjoyed such sweets that “the heart of man has not sighed.” Hard bread is a source of love for enemies, but it is very useful; cruel, but healing; not tasty, but gives health to the soul; bitter, but brings eternal sweetness. Love your enemies. Let us not remember here Abel, killed by a stone by Cain, for we do not know whether he prayed for his brother who killed him; we only know that his blood cried out to God, drawing God to vengeance. Let us also pass by Naboth the Israelite, who was killed by stone by Queen Jezebel because of the vineyard, for his blood was avenged (3 Chron. 21). But it is not proper to bypass Moses. Now we've eaten some stone bread, it's time to drink a little. But what should we start drinking? During meals, politicians (secular rank) bring a glass of bitter drink, calling it hot double wine; not a sweet drink, and I promised to present at this spiritual meal the very Marah from which the Israelites could not drink. “I came,” they say, “to Marrah, and I could not drink water from Marah, for it was bitter: for this reason the name of that place was called sorrow” (Ex. 15:23). Whoever wants to keep the Lord’s commandment about loving one’s enemies cannot help but taste bitterness. This love does not live without bitterness. Who enjoys enduring annoyance, insults, slander, condemnation, blasphemy and unjust disgrace? Saint Paul could rather endure wounds, blows and throwing stones than the evil words of evil people, robbing him of his good reputation. “It is better for me,” he says, “to die than for anyone to waste my praise” (1 Cor. 9:15). Although this bitterness is not tasty, nevertheless (like the previously mentioned hard bread) it is very useful and healing for mental health, and it is drunk only with patience, for true love, according to the apostolic word, must be patient. “A loved one,” he says, “is not irritated, does not think evil, does not rejoice over unrighteousness, but rejoices in the truth: he loves everything, he endures everything,” he loves and endures (1 Cor. 13 et seq.). Let patience be for us at the table a spiritual cup of a bitter, but healthy drink. To the saints, John Climacus highly praises this cup of patience as very beneficial for health, saying to one of his own; “Come, dwell with us and drink every hour of ridicule as if it were living water,” and again: “Drink diligently of every man’s ridicule as the water of life.” He wants to give you a healthy drink, with which you will be cleansed of filth: then deep purity will shine in your soul, the light of God will not become scarce in your heart. But someone will say in their thoughts: this is the monastic cup, not ours. Saint John of the Climacus was a monk, a mentor of monks, and he treats the monks with that cup, and not us; They are told to drink it, not us. To those who think this way, instead of answering, I will present the worldly man David. He, having had his fill of the spiritual meal and wanting to drink, says: “I will take the cup of salvation and call on the name of the Lord” (Ps. 116:4). I, being curious, want to know what kind of drink this is, and I ask the psalmists: what is this cup of salvation that David drinks? They give two interpretations of this verse. First interpretation: Saint David with these words prophetically predicted the cup of Christ’s suffering, which He, fulfilling the will of the Father, had to drink for our salvation and leave in memory of this suffering in the cup of His Divine Mysteries His body and blood under the guise of bread and wine. Another interpretation: Saint David, as the prototype of the suffering of Christ, remembers his suffering, which he, persecuted by his enemies, called the cup of salvation, because by enduring them, he firmly hoped to receive salvation and achieve that honor of being the forefather of the Savior. Saul hates his son-in-law David, pursues him and wants to kill him. There is no small bitterness in suffering from one’s own, from one’s father-in-law, and at the same time enduring innocently, but David says: “I will accept the cup of salvation” and drink. In whose name, holy David, will you drink this cup? There is an assumption by some that David, while drinking the cup, looked at the bottom of it and whoever he saw depicted at the bottom of the cup, in that name he drank it. The explanation of this assumption is as follows: the cup is this world with all its times, past, present and future. This cup is filled with bitterness, for the whole “world lies in evil” (1 John 5:19). It is full of disasters, sorrows and all kinds of sorrows. The top of that cup is the first times of the former world, people and the great law, while the bottom of the cup is the last times, people and the new law. In ancient times, King David was, as it were, at the top of the cup, and when he at one time drank the share of his sorrows and calamities, he looked with prophetic eyes at the bottom of the cup, at the last times, at what would happen in the end, and saw the Messiah depicted by the Spirit, whom God had to send in the last times to save the world. David looks at Him and, as if in a mirror, sees the future as the present; and now he sees that He is persecuted by His own people, the Jews, unjustly hated, led to be killed, and says: This is my Lord; I will drink my cup in His name: if He suffers so much for us, then shall I not endure my misfortunes in His name? “I will take the cup of salvation and call on the name of the Lord.” The blood son rebelled against his father, Absalom against David, expelled him from the royal throne and from the capital city of Jerusalem. Not content with this, he also tries to destroy his life from among those living on earth, and he thinks about this with his advisor Ahithophel. Oh, how bitter it is for a father to suffer such persecution from his son! David says: this is the cup of salvation; I'll take it and drink it. David drinks this cup, looks at the bottom of the cup, at the last times, and now he sees the spiritually depicted Messiah and those rebelling against Him, like evil children against their father and benefactor, the scribes and Pharisees, who, having laid a heavy cross on Him, are driven from Jerusalem to be crucified and His life ends with a dishonorable death. Seeing this, David says: This is my Lord, who will suffer so much for everyone; Shall I not drink the cup of my sufferings in His name? I will drink: “I will take the cup of salvation and call on the name of the Lord.” When David was leaving Absalom, a certain simple man from Jerusalem, named Shimei, deliberately came forward and began to scold him to his face with annoying words, saying: “Get out, get out, you are a sheltered man, a lawless husband,” and in addition, he also threw stones at him. It is no small bitterness for the king of Israel to endure such insults from a simple peasant, but David says: this is the cup of salvation; if I drink it, I will be saved; I’ll take it and drink it. David drinks, looks at the bottom of the cup, at the last times, and sees in his spirit the future as the present: he sees Christ, our Savior, nailed to the cross, drunk on alcohol and gall, and the Jerusalemites passing by mock Him, saying: “Wow, you ruin the church, save yourself” and so on (Matthew 15:29–30). Seeing this, David says: This is my Lord, who will have to suffer for the salvation of the whole world; I, too, will drink in His name the cup of my sufferings: “I will take the cup of salvation and call on the name of the Lord.” One of David’s servants, seeing such dishonor committed by Shimei to the king, said: “Why does this dead dog curse my lord the king? I’ll go and take his head.” But David forbade it, saying: “Leave him, let him curse,” - thereby expressing the following: do not prevent me from drinking the cup of salvation: as I began it, so let me finish it, I will empty it to the ground in the name of the Lord. We will pay attention to the fact that David, being a layman, and not a monk, a king, and not a commoner, drank the cup of patience, the cup of vexation, the cup of reproach, the cup of persecution, the cup of disasters and sorrows, the cup that truly brings salvation, as the Gospel testifies, saying: “He who endures to the end will be saved” (Matthew 24:13). Truly, this cup of patience is bitter, but healing. It, like wormwood, tastes bitter, but brings health to the stomach. Once upon a time, the prophet Isaiah saw “the Lord of Hosts on the throne on high and exaltation and the seraphim around” and heard Him say: “Whom will I send and who will go to this people (Israelites)?” Saint Isaiah dared and said: “Behold, send me; and the Lord said to him: Go and speak to this people: you will hear with your ears, but will not understand” and so on (Isa. 6:8-9). Saint Isaiah, sent by God to the people of Israel, went. I look at him and see that he is carrying a cup with some kind of drink in his hand. It seems to me that God came to His people of Israel and sent them a cup of some wonderful drink from His dinner as a sign of His mercy. Isaiah came with that cup first to the country of Zebulun and Naphtali and cried out, saying: “This you first drink quickly, the country of Zebulun and the land of Naphtali” (Is. 9:1). Curiosity attracts me, and I want to know what kind of drink this is, which the prophet of God gives from God to the people of God. I look at the end of the eighth chapter, as if at the top of a cup, and expect that it will be either sweet honey, or Rhine beauty, or “sect”, or “petercement”, or something else precious. But now I see the opposite, I see some of the most terrible wormwood bitterness, for it is written like this: “Behold, there is crampedness and darkness, and sorrow, and tightness, and darkness, as if one could not see” (Is. 8:22). Drink this first quickly, O country of Zebulun and land of Naphtali! I thank you, holy prophet, for what you bestow; you order to drink “crowdedness, darkness, sadness, tightness, darkness, as if you couldn’t see.” What is the power of this drink? What is the secret of these words? Let’s look to the bottom and listen to what the prophet says after this: “People who live in the land and the shadow of death, the light will shine on you; I will bring you joy, and be glad, as one who rejoices in the harvest and as one who shares gain” (Isaiah 9:2-3). Let's look at the power of bitter wormwood drink. You will drink, he says, darkness, but you will see light; You will drink sorrow, but you will find joy; You will drink tuga and you will receive joy; you will drink in tightness, but you will find yourself in spaciousness; You will drink bitterness, but be filled with sweetness: You will sow with tears, but with joy you will reap the fruit of your hands. There is no time to interpret historically these prophetic words, but spiritually they are briefly explained as follows: the cup of disasters and sorrows, which our enemies fill us with God’s permission and tell us to drink, is bitter; but if we drink it for the love of God, patiently and loving our enemies, then it will turn into eternal sweetness for us and bring eternal health to our souls. So, let us love our enemies and suffer from them. When the people of Israel could not drink the bitter Marah and began to grumble against Moses, then the Lord showed him a certain tree. He put it in water, and the water became sweet. Merroy and I, a sinner, indulge your love and fear that someone will grumble against me. Let us also put wood in our Marah so that it may become sweet. What was the tree that the Lord showed Moses and which made the waters of Marra sweet? The interpreters of the Divine Scripture, having studied a lot, definitely did not recognize this. However, there are some who say that there is a certain tree called adelpha, which is very bitter by nature. It was this bitter tree that the Lord commanded Moses to place in the bitter waters in order to manifest a greater miracle, for even with the bitter tree He sweetened the bitter waters. We, together with the holy fathers Gregory of Nyssa, Theodoret and others, will say that that tree that sweetened the waters of Merra was a prototype of the tree of the cross. Whether the tree of Moses was sweet or bitter, we do not know. But we know for sure that the tree of the cross is bitter; it fed our Lord gall and caused Him a bitter death, but it turned our bitterness into sweetness and led us from bitter eternal death to sweet eternal life. So let this tree of the cross serve as the delight of our Marah. When we are saddened and offended by our ailments in word or deed, we will look at the cross and at the Lord crucified on it, who, instead of the joy that was due to Him, endured the cross and, not caring about the shame, “leave us an image, so that we may follow His footsteps.” Christ the Savior drank the bitter cup on the cross - bitterness with gall and even death itself. For whose health? For the health of His enemies, that is, sinners: “Christ died for us as a sinner for us” (Rom. 5:8). How did He drink? Patiently, according to the narrative of St. Peter: “He who is rebuked is not reproached, nor is the suffering forgiven” (1 Pet. 2:23). But He not only “do not rebuke”, but also prayed for those who were killing Him: “Father, let them go” (Luke 23:34). Oh, the kindness of the gentle Lamb of God! We cannot tolerate even one annoying word and in response to them we say many words, but our Lord, having heard a lot of reproachful words, did not say a single nasty word, but was “like a lamb that is silent to its shearer.” We do not endure even the smallest thing from those who hate us, but our Lord bore countless wounds on His body, and there was no integrity in Him from head to toe. We will not endure even one kind of sadness from those who persecute us, and our Lord endured even the most terrible death on the cross. This is how much He suffered out of love for us, but we suffer nothing out of love for Him. Oh, our impatience! Oh, insatiable bitterness! The gospel word is coming true for us: “Because iniquity will increase, the love of many will fail” (Matthew 24:12). Our Lord unfeignedly loved his enemies, as it is said, but we do not really love our friends, who are kind to us; we love them more hypocritically than in reality, and we do not even think of ever loving our enemies. Our Lord calls to us louder than a trumpet in the Gospel: “Love your enemies, bless those who curse you, do good to those who hate you, and pray for those who bring evil upon you and drive you out, that you may be sons of your Father who is in heaven” (Matthew 5:44–45). But it’s time to finish this spiritual meal of ours; Let's create thanksgiving. We thank You, Christ our God, that You have filled us with spiritual bread and the spiritual drink of Your word; do not deprive us of Your heavenly kingdom, where that glorious dinner is celebrated, about which it is written: “Blessed is he who eats dinner in the kingdom of God” (Luke 14:15). Grant to us that Your words may be manifested in us by deed itself, that in our hearts there may be unfeigned love for both our loved ones and our enemies, like healthy, multiplying blood; especially sweeten our hearts with Thy love, sweetest Jesus! Let our love not condemn, but forgive, if there was anything objectionable at this spiritual meal. Amen. Sermon on the twentieth week of Holy Pentecost, in which the memory of the Holy Great Martyr Demetrius occurred, October 26 “I glorify God, saying: For a great Prophet has risen in us” (Luke 7:16) My pious listeners! In this ordinary week, the twentieth according to the order of the Church according to the Holy Spirit, the week of the resurrection of the widow’s son, in which this year the memory of the holy Great Martyr Demetrius took place, our mind seems to look with inner eyes at two cities: at a city in Galilee, called Nain, and at a city in Thessaly, called Thessaloniki, and in both cities they carry out the dead. In a city in Galilee called Nain, a dead son, his mother’s only begotten son, is carried out for burial: “Behold, she died with wear and tear” (Luke 7:12). In a city in Thessaly called Thessalonia, a dead body, stabbed with spears for Christ, is being carried out of prison for burial, the body of the holy Great Martyr Demetrius: “Behold, she died.” Both of these dead are resurrected by the life-giver Christ, but not in the same way: in the Nain dead man He resurrects the body for temporary life, but in the Thessalonica dead man He resurrects the soul from temporary life, as if from death, for eternal life. For both of these resurrections, it is fitting for us to praise God and say: “A great prophet has arisen among us, and God will visit His people” (Luke 7:16). But I, a sinner, standing between these two cities, between Nain and Thessaloniki, and looking at both with inner vision, in one country I hear the voice of the people: “For I will go with Him the disciple Demetrius. I hear about both of them that they are great: there is a great Prophet rising in us”; in another country I see the Holy Great Martyr Demetrius. I hear about both of them that they are great: there is a great Prophet, there is a great martyr. I intend to at least partially measure the greatness of both, or, better, at least from a distance to take a closer look at their immeasurable greatness and know this. How great was the greatness of Christ on earth in the flesh and how great was the greatness of the martyr of Christ on earth? Was the greatness of the martyr similar to the greatness of Christ? You, the gospel son of a widow raised from the dead, do not be angry that I pass you by, having instead of you my angel, the holy Great Martyr Demetrius. Let the citizens of Nain speak about you, and let your mother, to whom you were given, rejoice over you: “For his mother was given” (Luke 7:15), but we are to speak and rejoice about Christ and the martyr of Christ. First of all, having approached, albeit with trepidation, Christ, my Savior, “He is not worthy to bow down, to loose the thong of His boot” (Luke 3:16), and to His greatness, I, although not having the courage, dare to measure this greatness and for this I am looking for a measuring instrument with which to measure. Saint John the Theologian in his Revelation shows me a certain angel in the face of a man, having a measuring reed in his hand: “Speak,” he says, “who has a reed with me against gold, that he may measure the new city that comes down from heaven, and its gates, and its wall” (Apoc. 21:15). What that city meant, what its secret was - there is no need to talk about this in detail now, so that time does not drag on; I will remember only what is appropriate for our conversation. Saint Andrew of Caesarea, interpreting the Apocalypse, calls Christ a wall, saying this: “The wall of the great church, high and protecting those in the holy city, is Christ; the twelve gates in it are His holy apostles, through whom we received guidance and entrance to the Father.” Let us heed these words: “Christ is the wall.” If Christ is the wall of hail coming down from heaven, then it means that the angel who wants to measure this wall wants to measure Christ. In fact, this is so: “Let him measure,” he says, “the hail and the wall.” Measure Christ for me, angel, measure how great His greatness is, while we will look at the finished work. With what standard does an angel measure? “It measures,” says the Theologian, “in human measure, even in angelic measure.” What is this - human measure and at the same time angelic measure? Can a human measure be equal to an angel's? The human measure is based on human height and is measured in cubits and fathoms, but the angelic measure should be immeasurable, since the angelic nature is incomparably greater than the human nature. How is it that in the Revelation of the Theologian the human measure is considered equal to the angelic, and the angelic equal to the human? Before this secret becomes clear, I will say the following: do not think, my listener, that here we are talking about the greatness of some human stature, but about the greatness of honor; honor is known only in a rational creature, which, knowing its Creator, knows itself, knows both its honor and dishonor. In an unreasonable and soulless creature, honor is not known. In honor on earth there is silver, gold, pearls and precious stones, but all this, being soulless, does not know its honor. The stars, moon and sun in the sky are honest, but they also do not know their honor, being soulless creatures. A rational creature knows whether it is honored or dishonored. The rational creature is twofold - visible and invisible: the visible rational creature is a man, and the invisible rational creature is an angel. Therefore, honor is twofold: human and angelic. The greatness of human honor lies in the highest human power, in the rank of king, for there is no higher power than royal power, and it is called royal majesty. Indeed, as one of King Darius’s bedmaids says: “The king prevails over everything and dominates everyone, and rules over them, and whatever he speaks to them, they create everything. If they send them to war, they make war, they go and tear down mountains and walls and pillars; they are tempered and slaughtered, and the words of the king do not transgress, and he himself is the only one; If he says: kill, they will kill; If he says: let him go, he will let him go; and says: smite, they will smite; and says: destroy, they will destroy; says: create, - they create; verb: sow, - sow; says: plant, they plant; and all the people and his forces will listen to him.” This is the greatness of human honor, that is, royal power. The greatness of angelic honor lies, on the one hand, in the immaterial, disembodied nature of angels, on the other, according to the Gospel word, in the fact that they “can see the face of the Heavenly Father” (Matthew 18:10), directly standing before God. “Directly” means that nothing mediates or separates between an angel and God: behind the angel is immediately God, behind God is immediately an angel, but between these two natures, angelic and divine, there is no other nature. Just as on earth it is considered a great honor and glory to be close to the king, to be closest to everyone, to be in such a way that nothing interferes or separates, so in heaven the great glory of the angels lies in the fact that they are near God closer than any other creature and stand directly before Him: this is the greatness of angelic honor. Here let us proceed to the measurer whom the holy Theologian saw, and let us see what he measures in Christ, our Savior. He measures, as it were, the height of the city wall, the greatness of honor, human and angelic honor, and finds the greatness of the highest human honor, that is, royal power, for during the Annunciation he says to the Most Pure Mother of God: “The Lord God will give him the throne of His father David, and he will reign in the house of Jacob forever, and there will be no end to His kingdom” (Luke 1:32–33). When our Lord was born, immediately three eastern kings greeted Him with the royal title: “Where is the King to be born?” (Matthew 2:2). This highest human honor, that is, royal power, was recognized in Him by the people in the current Gospel, saying: “A great prophet has risen in us,” for the word “prophet” among the Israelites was in equal honor with the royal title. After all, at first they were ruled by the prophets, who, although without the royal title, reigned over them. The prophet was Moses; Joshua was filled with the gift of prophecy; the prophet was Gideon; the prophet was Samuel; Other rulers of Israel were also prophets. All of them, even before Saul and David, ruled over them as kings, although without the royal title; David was a king and together with that prophet. Therefore, when the people called Christ the Lord a prophet, they recognized in Him the greatness of the highest human honor, that is, royal honor. The angel in Christ the Lord also finds the greatness of angelic honor, for the same Christ is also called an Angel by the prophet Isaiah, who foretold the birth of Christ and said: “A Son was born unto us, and was given unto us, and His name is called the great counsel Angel” (Is. 9:6). He was not an angel by nature, but by ministry, for just as, according to the Apostle, “all ministering souls who are sent out to serve” (Heb. 1:14) are called angels, so Christ, sent by God the Father to serve in order to serve our salvation, was called an Angel. He was not the lowest angel, but the highest: “Angel of the Great Council”; He was an Angel, and at the same time God, as the same Isaiah says: “Great counsel, Angel, mighty God, Master.” Both of these honors, human and angelic, especially God’s (after all, God once appeared in three angelic faces), are such measures in Christ the Savior that they are truly equal to the measure of that peacemaker whom the Theologian saw. In it there is an equal measure of human honor, as well as angelic honor, and this is exactly what is written in Revelation: “To the measure of man, even as there is angelic honor,” for with the incarnation of Christ, humanity with angelism and angelism with humanity began to be friends, befriended and be in equal honor. Therefore, when Saint John the Theologian wanted to bow to the angel’s feet, the angel forbade him, saying: “See, neither: I am a slander to you and your brethren” (Apoc. 19:10). Before the incarnation of Christ, people bowed to the angels, and the angels did not interfere with them. Joshua bowed to the angel who appeared to him, falling to the ground; Gideon bowed, Manoah also bowed, others also bowed, but the angels did not prevent them from bowing, but accepted this from them as from slaves. When the Lord became incarnate, they no longer allowed people to slavishly bow to them: “See, no: I am your slander”; We are in equal honor with you, our measure is equal, “the human measure is the same as the angelic one.” I wanted to object to that angel and say: look, angel of God, are you not dishonoring humanity when you consider them equal to you? Is not the measure of human honor greater than that of angels? Don’t you know that human nature in the person of Christ is not only angelized, but also deified? After all, church teachers, such as Saint John of Damascus, teach that in the person of Christ we must honor human nature in the same way as the nature of God. I wanted to object to that angel, but time is already drawing me to my angel, to the holy Great Martyr Demetrius. The now celebrated holy great martyr of Christ Demetrius was an angel in the flesh on earth, and how could I measure the greatness of honor in him, both human and angelic, especially martyrdom? I am looking for a measuring stick and see a spear in his hand (this is how artistic art depicts it in the icon). Let his spear be for me instead of a measuring stick, but it would be better to say this: looking at his materially depicted spear, and contemplating with my mind what is spiritually depicted in his life, I will begin to measure with a spiritual spear in the likeness of the material. Here I will spiritually call the life of the Holy Great Martyr Demetrius a spear, sharp for the sharpness of abstinence, iron for the severity of exploits, or copper because of Thessaly, where there was the beginning of the Greeks and the Greek kingdom, which was once presented in the Divine Scripture in the form of copper. Nebuchadnezzar sees in a dream some image, the head of which is golden, the chest and arms are silver, the belly is copper, the legs are iron, and the rest of the legs are clay. What could that image mean? I thought that he prefigured the last weak generation living in modern times, in which a person changes many times in one day. In the morning, a person, getting up from sleep, has a golden head, for if he prays, he has a pure mind, like pure gold, but if he talks about something or advises something, then every word he has is like precious gold. When he gets down to business, then he has silver hands, for if someone is an artist or skilled in any handicraft, he becomes rich and acquires silver; If anyone sits down to study from books, he has a breast of silver, for “the words of the Lord are pure words, silver is kindled” (Ps. 11:7). During divine services or royal services, the iron shins are not felt, although they ache from labor; when dinner time comes and the banquet meal begins, then there is a copper belly, which eats and drinks not only to satiety, but also to excess. And it’s amazing how the belly can accommodate so much food and drink and is not damaged, but appears as if it were made of copper. When it is filled to the extreme and becomes heavy, then the feet become like clay, they want to fall, to rest. Thus, a weak person in one day changes many times like that Nebuchadnezzar image. I thought that this was the meaning of that image, but Saint Symeon Metaphrastus in the life of St. I see a different interpretation of the prophet Daniel. Gold meant the kingdom of Babylon, and silver - the kingdom of Persomedia, for just as two hands were made of one silver, so two kingdoms, Median and Persian, were united into one monarchy. Copper meant the Greek kingdom that was to come into being, which later became the Christian kingdom. Iron meant the Roman kingdom, and just as the two legs were iron, so in the Roman kingdom there were two parts - east and west. Clay meant the destruction of all earthly kingdoms before the terrible day of judgment, after which one eternal heavenly kingdom will come. Here we should speak of the Greek kingdom, represented by copper; why was the Greek kingdom depicted in copper? The reason stated by Blessed Jerome is that the copper circle is more sonorous than all others and rings so that, when struck, it is heard from afar; The Greek kingdom is depicted with copper because this foreshadows the oratory, euphony, eloquence and wisdom of the Greek language, according to what is written: “The Greeks seek wisdom” (1 Cor. 1:22). Another interpreter says that “brass means the strong courage of Christ, who firmly and courageously bore the cane or rod, that is, suffering, and His large, heavy cross, and with this erected and measured the building of the church, that is, His church” (St. Theophylact in the preface to the Gospel). Here, as we hear from these two interpreters, copper means the following two (of the four Gospel conciliar and highest) virtuous powers: wisdom and courage. So, in the Nebuchadnezzar image, copper, meaning the Greek kingdom, which would later become Christian, indicates that this kingdom will be both wise and brave in both times - both idolatrous and Christian. At first, the idolatrous Greek kingdom was brave in the person of Alexander the Great, and wise in the person of the Greek philosophers; at another time, that is, in the Christian period, the Greek kingdom was brave in the person of Constantine the Great and other Orthodox Christian kings who followed him, but it was wise in the person of the universal teachers who were among the Greek people, such as, for example, Basil the Great, Gregory the Theologian, John Chrysostom and others like them. But I will turn again to the ancient Greek, Saint Demetrius. For the sake of his Greek origin, once depicted by copper, I likened the harsh life of the holy great martyr Demetrius, a Greek by birth and faith, to the hardness of copper and the sharpness of a spear, and now I begin to measure the greatness of his honor, and, above all, human honor. The greatness of human honor in him was Greek, that is, royal, brave, wise in relation to the twofold person, external and internal. As a worldly man, he was the governor of the Thessalian country in the city of Thessaloniki, where in ancient times the beginning and throne of the Greek kings were, and he was the ruler of that kingdom, although it was already under the Roman scepter. This was the great honor of Saint Demetrius. He was also skilled in Greek philosophy; He was also brave and courageous in battles; in general, as an outer worldly man he was very worthy, but as an inner man he was even greater and more worthy. In soul he was a spiritual king, ruling over his heart, he was the kind of king that St. John the Climacus exhorts every virtuous man to be, saying: “Be a king over your heart, high in humility, sitting and commanding inappropriate laughter: go,” and he goes, and sweet crying: “Come,” and he will come, and to the slave, that is, the body: do this (mortification of passions) - and he will do it.” After all, our mind is naturally king; he is considered to be the master over all the parts or passions of the soul, which are lust and rage. Such a king, ruling over passions, was the holy saint of God Demetrius. He was also filled with spiritual wisdom, with which he enlightened Thessaly, for the faith of Christ, initially planted in Thessaly by the holy Apostle Paul, became impoverished due to cruel and incessant persecution, but Saint Demetrius again raised it and spread it, preaching Christ apostolically there. He was also courageous in the spiritual struggle, “which is not against flesh and blood, but against the ruler of the darkness of this world, against the spiritual wickedness in high places” (Eph. 6:12). He bravely defeated the world, which was disturbed by evil spirits with pleasures, passions and various vanities, and appeared as a spiritual king, wise and brave. Yet this in him was measured by a sharp iron-copper spear, that is, by the harshness and sharpness of his godly life. Here the spear of his keen life should be likened to the spear of Gideon. There was once a war between the Israelites and the Midianites; Both countries took up arms against each other, and it was night before they clashed. Gideon, the leader of the army of Israel, rose at midnight, walked quietly at the command of God with one of his servants, entered the enemy’s camp and heard in one tent that two soldiers had woken up and were talking. Gideon stopped to listen to what they were talking about, and heard that one was telling the other a dream that he had seen. It was as if a dough of barley bread, rolling from the camp of Gideon to the camp of Midian, rolled towards the Midian tent, beat it, overturned it, and the tent fell. Wonderful dream! It would not be surprising if some large stone rolled towards the tent and broke it, but it is surprising that the soft dough overturned and destroyed the firmly established tent of the Midian commander. But it was a dream, and in a dream one doesn’t know what one dreams; however, sometimes even a dream tells the truth. Let's listen to the interpretation of this dream. Another answered, saying, This is not dough, but the spear of Gideon, for the Lord will deliver Midian and our whole camp into his hands. Soon this dream came true: Gideon, returning to his camp and waking up his soldiers, struck the Midian regiment and completely defeated it. Here we see the interpretation and fulfillment of the dream: the soft dough turned into iron hardness and the weak awns of barley into strong, sharp spears: this is not dough, but a spear. I will explain that dream in the following brief words. The power of Midian, countless as the sand of the earth, put the strength of Israel at nothing, for the army of the Israelites was not large, and from it Gideon chose and took only three hundred soldiers to the war; Therefore, the Midianites hoped to easily crush the Israelites with their teeth, like soft dough, that is, to win. Since God fought for the Israelites, the soft dough for the Midianites turned into sharp iron: it is not dough, but a spear. The strong strength of Midian was like a soft test for the Israelites. A similar thing happened between Saint Demetrius and the vain world, which rises up with the spirits of malice, which seduces and is seduced by worldly pleasures. The world saw the governor of Thessaloniki, Saint Demetrius, in great glory and honor and considered him to be soft dough, for everywhere he looked, he saw softness in him. He looked at the clothes - soft clothes, decent for the rank, according to the Gospel word: “Behold, he who wears soft clothes in kings’ houses” (Matthew 11:8), and he was an outstanding courtier. The world looked at the governor’s meals and saw softness there, for what kind of sweets were there at such a gentleman’s meal? He looked at all his sovereign lands and everywhere he saw an abundance of earthly goods, contentment, softness everywhere, and he thought to himself about the vain world, saying: this is dough; I will crush him with the teeth of my voluptuousness, I will enslave him to my pleasures, I will eat him, I will swallow him, I will overcome him, like the others. But you are seduced, damned world! You don’t know that hard, sharp iron is hidden in this dough; You do not know that under the royal rank lies a servant of Christ; under soft clothes you do not see the sharp hair shirt; under the banquet meals you do not know the hidden abstinence; under contentment you do not know spiritual poverty; under sleep you do not know his all-night prayers, exploits, labors and various mortifications of the body, which were known only to the all-seeing God: you, the world, do not know all this. Know firmly that this is not dough, but the spear of the holy great martyr Demetrius, with which he will defeat you and boast with the Lord, who said: “Be of good cheer, I have overcome the world” (John 16:33). The world also has its spears, with which it wounds those it conquers. His spears are “the lust of the flesh, the lust of the eyes, and the pride of the belly” (John 2:16). These spears are strong; few remain unwounded and undefeated by them: “Everyone,” according to the apostle, “is tempted from his own lust by attraction and deception” (James 1:14). Everyone is wounded by them, because the wound they cause seems at first not painful, but sweet, not terrible, but desirable, and they are not afraid of it, but are even sought after. That is why everyone is wounded by such passions, not knowing that this wound will then hurt mortally and, after temporary sweetness, fill it with eternal bitterness and bile, killing it with spiritual death. However, for those seeking salvation, these wounds are easily healed; if a person sometimes accidentally gets injured, he will be healed immediately; if sometimes he falls, he gets up immediately; on it the words of David come true: “He will fall and not be broken, for the Lord strengthens his hand” (Ps. 36:24). What medicine can easily heal these wounds caused by the above-mentioned passionate spears of the world? Truly, the thought about these passions is that they are vain and briefly temporary, for everything that delights is temporary, but leaves behind eternal bitterness. It would not be out of place to recall here one of the most ancient Greek stories. A certain king of the Mysian countries, named Telephos, the son of Hercules from the nymph Auga, had a war with Achilles, the leader of the Greek army; The reason for the war was as follows. When Achilles walked with the Greek force towards Troy, he wanted to go through the Mysian land, for his path lay through it, then Telephos did not want to let him through his land, began to fight with him and in the battle was wounded by the spear of Achilles, but not to death. This wound was painful and incurable; Many skillful doctors were called in, and she was treated with many medicines, but could not be healed. Doubting his life, Telephos sent to the churches of his gods for magic, seeking information whether he would live or die from that wound, and received the following answer: “The wound will not be healed, and Telephos will not recover, unless the rust from the iron is scraped off from the very spear with which he was wounded and is not applied to the wound.” Telephos, hearing this, immediately sent to Achilles, made peace with him and asked him to send rust from his spear. Having received it, he made an ointment from it, applied it to the wound and immediately received healing and health. Whether this is true or not, let the belief in it remain with the Greek historians; We borrow this example from here. If you, the servant of the Lord, accidentally received in the struggle of your life some sinful wound from worldly addictions, immediately have before your eyes the rust from those addictions, that is, think about short-term and fleeting vanity, and listen to the words of the Apostle, who says to sinful lovers of peace: “Cast away your wealth, consume your garments with prayer; Your gold and silver will rust, and their rust will become obedience to you” (James 5:2-3). Carrying this rust in your mind and applying it like an ointment to a heart wound, you will immediately be healed, immediately freed from sinful passion. Now I turn to Saint Demetrius, in whom there was nothing to heal. He did not receive such wounds, for not only was he not defeated by the world, but he even defeated him himself and crushed his sinful spears. He crushed carnal lust by mortifying the body; the lust of the eyes, that is, the love of money, he crushed with generosity and distribution of all his property; He erased the pride of life through humility, despising all the glory of this world and becoming a prisoner of Christ and an imitator of His sufferings. He showed himself to be a wise and courageous conqueror, reigning over passions. So, in him was the perfection of the greatness of human honor, not only in relation to the external, but especially in relation to the internal person. The greatness of the angelic honor in him, which we have already explained, my listeners, truly needs to be seen in nothing other than his virgin, equal-angelic purity, immaculately preserved from the mother’s womb, for it is an exceptional property of the angelic nature in man. Let us listen to what Saint Ambrose says: “Virginity rises above the laws of human nature; through virginity people become like angels; and even greater than the angels are the virgin conquerors, for the angels are incorporeal, but the virgins triumph in the flesh.” Likewise, Saint Cyprian says: “Virginity is the sister of the angels, the victory over passions, the queen of virtues and the inheritance of all good things.” Since the holy saint of God Demetrius was an immaculate virgin all his life, therefore, he was an angel in the flesh, and in him there was a measure of the greatness of angelic honor, no other greatness than measured by the sharpness of life, as if by a spear. After all, purity is not observed without acute mortification. Therefore, there was a human measure in him and at the same time an angelic one; he was equally both an angel and a man—an earthly angel and a heavenly man. Without continuing the conversation about this, so as not to be painful for the listeners, I will draw closer to the end and only consider a little whether the greatness of the martyr was similar to the greatness of Christ. I do not say: equal, but similar, for no one can be equal to the Son of God; anyone who wants can be like Him, according to the words of the Apostle Paul: “Be like me, just as I was like Christ” (1 Cor. 4:16). How did Saint Paul become like Christ? Let's see. “I,” he says, “bear the marks of the Lord Jesus in my body” (Gal. 6:17). Saint Paul through martyrdom appeared like Christ. Since Saint Demetrius also suffered for Christ, he also turned out to be like Christ; and indeed he is similar, for he also bore on his body the wounds of the Lord Jesus: Christ was pierced with a spear, and His likeness Saint Demetrius was pierced with a spear; Christ the Lord died for His servants, and his servant Demetrius died for Him, his Lord. When Christ laid down His soul on the cross for us, the whole universe was a prison, darkness was over the whole earth; Likewise, Saint Demetrius, having laid down his soul for Christ in prison, became like Christ through suffering. If Scripture says about Melchizedek, who was not a martyr, that he was likened to the Son of God, then even more so about the holy great martyr Demetrius, who suffered for Christ, we can say that he was likened to the Son of God. He was likened for martyrdom, as one who bore the wounds of the Lord and a hole in his body. Great is the honor, great is the glory, high and immeasurable greatness is to be like the Son of God. Since Saint Demetrius is like the Son of God, he is great, which means his greatness is immeasurable, and it is not in vain that the church calls him a great martyr. How high is the greatness of martyrdom, the Son of God Himself measured this with His outstretched hands on the cross and found this honor to be higher than all the honors that the ranks of all saints will receive, for our Lord, having taken upon Himself human nature and desiring to achieve His glory in the flesh, “though with the Father before there was no peace” (John 17:5), passed through the ranks of all the saints and did not receive anywhere this glory, as soon as He began to enter into the martyrdom, He immediately cried out, saying: “Now is the Son of Man glorified” (John 13:31). He was a prophet, for he prophesied about the captivity of Jerusalem and predicted the terrible day of judgment, but he was not glorified in the prophetic rank. He was also an apostle: having been sent by the Father to preach the gospel of the kingdom to the world, He passed through cities and villages, teaching and preaching that the kingdom of God was at hand, but He was not glorified in the apostolic rank. He was a hermit: “He was led up in spirit into the wilderness” (Luke 8:1). There was a faster: “I fasted for 40 days,” but He was not glorified either in the desert or in the fasting rite. He was reverend, as the apostle says about Him: “Reverend, without malice, without defilement” (Heb. 7:26), but it was not in this rank that He became glorified. He was a miracle worker who cast out demons, healed the blind, the lame, the paralytic and raised the dead, but He does not say that He was glorified in this rank. When, after the Last Supper, He began to prepare for martyrdom and set out on this path, then He said to the disciples: “Now is the Son of Man glorified.” Having suffered on the cross, He said, appearing after the resurrection to Luke and Cleopas: “Isn’t this fitting for Christ to suffer and to be brought into His glory?” (Luke 24:26). Look how high was the greatness of martyrdom, that even Christ Himself through martyrdom was fit to enter into His glory. Saint Chrysostom, discussing this greatness of martyrdom and writing about Paul’s prisoner, says that “it is a great honor and glory to be a prisoner of Christ, rather than an apostle, rather than a teacher, rather than an evangelist.” This teacher considers martyrs even higher than angels. Talking about Peter, who was put in prison for Christ, he says: “If someone had told me: what do you want to be: an angel or Peter in chains, then I would rather want to be Peter, bound for Christ with two iron bonds.” But what is even more surprising are his following words: “I would rather suffer cruelly for Christ than to be honored by Christ: this is a great honor, this is a glory that surpasses everything.” The holy great martyr Demetrius was awarded such honor and glory, similar to Christ, the Son of God, through his suffering for Christ, and the greatness in him is measured neither by human nor angelic measure, but by the measure of the Son of God Himself, Jesus Christ, for the great martyr increased with this honor, according to the apostle, “to the measure of the age of the fulfillment of Christ” (Eph. 4:13). Christ, pierced with a spear on the cross, through His martyrdom, as if with a spear, achieved His high glory, which was formerly with His Father. The Great Martyr Demetrius, through his martyrdom, also, as if with a spear (for what is sharper than martyrdom?), achieved the glory of Christ, for, having suffered with Him, he was glorified with Him. Here the saint became like the ancient Jonathan, prince of Israel. God gave the Israelites victory over the foreigners, and they pursued them until evening, cutting them off like stalks. They were pursued by Jonathan, who had not eaten anything all day, so that he became hungry. It happened in the evening that he saw bees on a tree in an oak grove and honey flowing from there; then he extended his spear, reached the bees, took a honeycomb from there, ate and refreshed himself. The Great Martyr of Christ defeated his enemies - the above-mentioned worldly passions; He defeated the airy spirits of malice, and through courageous suffering he defeated the servants of demons, idolaters and tormentors; He did not want to taste any earthly food, but eternal heavenly satiation. He extended the spear of his martyrdom and reached with it that sweetest honey and honeycomb of indescribable joy, which David remembers: “Fill them with the stream of Your sweetness” (Ps. 35:9). Oh, holy great martyr Demetrius, valiant warrior of Jesus Christ! Stand with your spear to defend us from our enemies, defeat visible and invisible adversaries; With your prayers, grant us that greatness, honor, heavenly glory and that sweetness with which you are now filled, so that we too may be partakers of the same with you and with all the saints forever. Amen. Sermon on Thursday of the twentieth week “We preach, chastening every man and teaching all wisdom, that we may present every man perfect in Christ Jesus” (Col. 1:28) We must always learn from God’s words that are offered to us in Divine Scripture, especially the Gospel and Apostolic words read every day in church at the Divine Liturgy. This is why the Apostle and the Gospel are read in church every time, so that a true Christian person, having accepted at least one word from them, would receive spiritual benefit for his salvation. Therefore, today we will also look for some benefit for us in the apostolic reading. From the Apostolic Epistle written to the Colossians, preached throughout the universe and read today at the Divine Liturgy, we will offer you the following words for teaching: “We preach, chastening every man and teaching in all wisdom, that we may present every man perfect in Christ Jesus” (Col. 1:28). Beloved listener! The Apostle desires for every person to be perfect. But which person can be perfect? “No one is perfect except one God” (Mark 10:18). However, a Christian person must take care according to his strength so that, with God’s help, day by day and hour by hour, he comes to perfection in good deeds. Man cannot achieve virtuous perfection on his own, but with the help of God he can, for what is impossible for man is possible for God. This is precisely what the apostle now points to when he says: “Let us present every man perfect in Christ Jesus”; not through our own efforts “let us present ourselves perfectly,” but “in Christ Jesus,” that is, with the help of Jesus Christ (Col. 1:28). Let us now learn a little, at least in part, how a person can achieve virtuous perfection. Just as in terms of physical age a person does not become perfect immediately after birth, but growing little by little day by day, month by month and year by year, he comes to the age of a perfect husband, so in terms of spiritual age, that is, virtue, we do not immediately become perfect, but, as if from infancy, we begin with a good intention, from a good beginning. This is what the holy Apostle Peter teaches: “Putting aside all malice and all flattery, and hypocrisy, and envy, and all slander, like newborn babes, love the verbal and unflattering milk, so that you may grow in it unto salvation” (1 Pet. 2:1-2). Let us heed the words: “Like newborn babies, you love the milk of words.” A person who begins to put aside all malice, all sin and come to senses and repentance is like a newborn baby who is not immediately offered solid food, but first milk; that is, the word of God invites him to bear a burden not immediately heavy and unbearable, but first light, so that, having become accustomed to easy feats, he can then take on more difficult ones. Let us look at the virtuous age itself, that is, at the very perfection. To more conveniently consider it, I propose the following question: what is perfection? Perfection is that which cannot be said to lack anything. A house cannot be called perfect if it lacks a cover or if something else is unfinished in it. A city cannot be called a perfect city if it does not have strong walls, towers, gates, day and night guards. A person cannot be called a perfect person if he lacks an arm or a leg, or any other member of the body. In general, any thing cannot be called perfect if it lacks something; only that which is perfect is that you have contentment in yourself, that you are devoid of any shortcoming and that you do not need anything for your perfection. The same should be virtuous perfection in Christians; it must be complete and without any deficiency. If someone keeps one commandment of the Lord and breaks another, he is not perfect: he who fasts but is angry is not a perfect faster; whoever gives alms and robs others is not a perfect merciful person; he who is reconciled with his neighbor, but remembers malice in his heart, is not a perfect friend; whoever prays with his lips, but does not delve into it with his mind, but dreams of something else, is not a perfect prayer book; whoever is appointed to justice, but judges unfairly, is not a perfect judge; whoever is called a Christian, but does not live like a Christian, is not a perfect Christian; whoever bears the monastic title, but does not perform monastic deeds, is not a perfect monk; He who is appointed as a spiritual shepherd for the verbal sheep, but does not care not only about the salvation of their souls, but also about his own soul, is not a perfect shepherd. Speaking briefly, every Christian person who lacks any of the good deeds in keeping the Lord’s commandments cannot be called perfect. Christ, our Savior, having told His disciples about Himself that He “did not come to destroy the law, but to fulfill it,” added the following: “Amen I say to you, until heaven and earth pass away, one jot or one tittle will not pass from the law” (Matthew 5:18). Iota is a Greek letter, according to our “i” is decimal. Here you can think about why Christ, our Savior, completed the entire law with one letter, and not with any other letter: neither “A”, nor “B”, nor any other, but precisely with an iota, that is, “i” in decimal. There are two reasons for this. The first reason is that in the entire alphabet there is no letter smaller than an iota; only one iota is the smallest of all letters; it is one small, slightly extended stick. It is small, but perfect, and lacks nothing. The Lord remembered this smallest, but perfect letter, wanting to teach us so that we would know that if in fulfilling the commandments of the Lord we violate something small, then we are no longer perfect; Only then will we prove perfect if we accomplish the small things on an equal basis with the great ones. The second reason is that if one stroke, called a title, is written above the letter “i”, the number ten will be obtained - the completion of the entire law. Our Lord, with the letter “i” in decimal with one line, clearly indicates the Old and New Testaments: He points to the Old with the letter “i” in decimal, denoting the ten commandments given in the Old Testament on the Tablets of Moses; with one line above the “i”, that is, the title, He pointed to the New Testament, to the Holy Gospel, which is the completion of the Old Testament, like the title of the decimal “i”. With this one letter with the title, the Lord taught us so that we would know that if we do not keep all ten commandments of God, and in addition we do not preserve the commands and advice of the Gospel, then we cannot be perfect. The spiritual bride of Christ, the human soul, which has reached virtuous perfection, says in the Song of Songs to her beloved Bridegroom Christ like this: “All the new fruits have been kept unto the old” (Song. 7:13). What fruits, new and old, did that spiritual bride preserve for her Bridegroom? This is explained by Theodoret, speaking on her behalf like this: “The commandments of the Old Testament and the commandments of the New Testament, which I received from the grace of the Holy Spirit, I have kept for You and kept intact, as a treasure entrusted to me.” From here we can see that for perfection it is not enough to keep the old fruits (I mean the commandments of God) without the new ones, and the new ones without the old ones. It is necessary to keep both together: this is where perfection will lie. In addition, we can understand old and new fruits in this way: old fruits are those good deeds that are commanded to us by the law of God and which we must do in every possible way; new fruits are those good deeds that we do according to our will, in addition to what is commanded, as, for example: the law commands not to covet any of your neighbor’s things, not to take away or steal, but a true Christian does not spare for his neighbor and his own, shows generosity and gives everything; the law commands not to repay evil for evil, and the true servant of God also does good to his enemy; the law commands one to lead a pure life, but a true Christian will not allow even an unclean thought to be in his mind, and so on. In addition, for example, someone is commanded by his spiritual father to fast on Wednesday and Friday, and he also adds fasting on Monday; He was commanded to listen to the holy liturgy on certain days, and he also sings a prayer service; It will be commanded to make one hundred bows a day, and in addition he will add another hundred. Equal exploits and deeds performed beyond what is due out of zeal for God are new fruits, kept with the old, about which the bride of Christ says: “All the new fruits are kept unto the old.” Our salvation in Scripture is called a cup: “I will take the cup,” it says, “of salvation.” Therefore, this cup should not be half, but full, that is, our salvation should not be meager, but perfect. Don’t we usually drink a full cup when talking about each other’s health? Are we really going to drink the cup of salvation halfway for the eternal health of our souls? Shall we not care for perfection in good works? Let it be known to us that this cup of our salvation must not only be full, but even overflowing, just like that measure or cup about which it is written in the Gospel: “Good measure, pounded and shaken, and pouring over, will be given into your bosom” (Luke 6:28). If the Lord wants to pay us, His servants, from His generous mercy above our dignity with a much increase, since all the sufferings of this age are not worth His glory that is to appear, then we must work more than we are commanded, so that our cup is not only full, but also “shaken and overflowing,” so that our salvation is not only perfect, but also perfect, as the Apostle exhorts, saying: “Other.” For, brethren, we ask and pray for Christ Jesus, as He hath received from us, as it is fitting for you to walk and please God, even as you walk, that ye may abound even more: for this is the will of God, your sanctification” (1 Thessalonians 4:1-3). Saint John Chrysostom, writing his interpretation of this apostolic letter to Thessalonians, says: “Prosperity consists in surpassing commandments and testaments not by the compulsion of teachers, but by one’s own will.” Just as the earth returns to the sower not only those seeds that it receives into itself, but with multiplication and instead of one grain, many grains; so it is fitting for our soul not only to stand in what is commanded, but also to surpass what is commanded; this is called virtuous perfection. After all, keeping the commandments alone is not perfection, worthy of praise from God, but only a servile duty, as Christ says: “When you have done all that is commanded you, say, ‘We are unseemly servants; Such are free from duty, but not glorious in merit: they escaped torment, but did not receive crowns. If you did not kill, did not steal, did not bear false witness, did not commit adultery, did not covet someone else’s property, then by this you have not yet woven a crown for yourself, but only freed yourself from debt and got rid of torment; crowns are set aside for the perfect, who have labored beyond the commandments. Oh, how ashamed it is now and will be ashamed in the day and hour of death for a Christian who not only did not exceed what was commanded, but did not even go half of what was commanded and kept barely one commandment. If someone fulfills all the commandments and, having sinned in one, turns out to be guilty of everything, then the one who fulfilled only one commandment and despised all the others will be even more guilty. Oh, how far from perfection he is! Oh, how empty is the cup of our salvation! Oh, how meager are our fruits! All this is due to our negligence, all because we do not care about the salvation of our souls. There are also other signs of perfection, such as love for enemies, according to the word of the Lord: “Love your enemies” and “Be perfect, even as your Father in heaven is perfect” (Matthew 5:44:48). But let's not talk about this now. Let us also say that the worthy death of a virtuous man who dies in the Lord is perfection, for in Fatherland it is usually said about the death of blessed fathers that such and such was “completed,” that is, reposed in the Lord. Today we commemorate the blessed memory of the deceased servant of God Evsigny, a man who was perfect in years, in mind, and in merit before God and people; therefore, without a doubt, we can say about him that he died a blessed death. The Lord said to a certain young man in the Gospel: “If you want to be perfect, go, sell your possessions and give to the poor, and you will have treasure in heaven” (Matthew 19:21). The husband now mentioned, having obeyed this advice of the Lord, distributed his property to the poor; therefore, he appeared perfect before the Lord and received treasure in heaven, for the Lord is faithful to all His words and His word is not false. The Lord praised the widow who invested all her wealth (two mites) in the church storehouse; The servant of God Evsignius has no small praise from his Lord, who spent all his wealth on the construction and decoration of the churches of God, just as he created and decorated this holy church for the glory of God, like the earthly heaven. For this, he now has a church in heaven for the repose of his righteous soul, according to the apostolic word: “Even if the earthly church of our body is destroyed, the creation of God is a church not made with hands, eternal in heaven” (1 Cor. 5:1). Saint David, asking God for the salvation of his soul, as if instead of a preface to his prayer, made a remembrance of his zeal for the house of God, saying: “Lord, I have loved the beauty of Your house and the dwelling place of Your glory.” Then he says, as if seeking some kind of debt from God: “Let me not destroy my soul with the wicked and my belly with the blood of men” (Ps. 25:8-9). Since, he says, I have loved the splendor of Your house, then You, Lord, do not destroy my soul, but save me. The deceased husband Evsignius also loved the splendor of the house of the Lord (which is obvious); he adorned the house of the Lord like a beautiful bride. Therefore, we firmly believe that the righteous Lord did not destroy his soul with the wicked, sinful and deprived of salvation, but installed him in the heavenly villages with the righteous, where may he have eternal pleasure from the most merciful grace of God, eternal rest with the saints, and on earth among people eternal memory. Amen. Sermon for the twenty-first week after Pentecost “You went out and sowed your seeds; an ovo fell along the way, an ovo fell on the stones, an ovo among the thorns” (Luke 8ff.) On this Sunday, at the Divine Liturgy, we heard the Holy Gospel, or rather the Lord Himself, telling us a parable about sowing seeds, of which one fell along the way, another on stones, a third among thorns, and only a few ended up on the good ground. The seed that fell in bad places died: on the way it was trampled underfoot and pecked by birds; on the stone - dried up; in thorns - depressed. What fell on the good soil vegetated and bore fruit. We heard the interpretation of this parable in the same Gospel, but since the interpretation consists of brief words and, I think, not everyone can fit it into their minds, then with God’s help we want to at least explain some of it in more detail. The seed is the word of God, and the earth is the human heart. A good heart is good earth, but an evil heart is evil earth, trampled by feet like a path, hard like a stone and sharp like thorns. From the beginning of the world, the Lord our God sowed His word in the hearts of men: first through the forefathers and prophets who preached the word of God, then Himself, having become incarnate from the Most Pure Virgin Mary, appearing on earth and living with people, for He passed through cities and villages, teaching and preaching the kingdom of God; then He sent His apostles into the universe to sow the seeds of the word of God, and after the apostles He appointed church teachers to do this, and this duty has reached even to this day, to bishops and priests who must sow spiritual seeds, that is, the word of God. But woe to our damned time, for this sowing is completely neglected, the word of God is completely abandoned, and no one cares about his soul and his neighbor, so that during the last harvest it will not be presented to God in vain and not empty. I don’t know who should be considered damned first of all: the sowers or the land, the priests or the hearts of men, or both. “Together there was indecentness, there was no goodness, there was no one” (Ps. 52:4). The sowers do not sow, and the earth does not receive; the priests are careless, and the people are mistaken; the priests do not teach, and people remain in ignorance; The priests do not preach the word of God, and the people do not listen and do not even want to listen. There is badness on both sides: the priests are stupid, and the people are unreasonable. The shepherds go astray, and the sheep follow them, not knowing where; The blind lead the blind, and together they fall into the pit. God, being angry with the Jewish people in ancient times, threatened through His prophet Amos, saying: “I will send a famine on the earth, not a famine of bread, nor a famine of water, but a famine of hearing the word of God. They will run around seeking the word of God, and will not find it” (Amos 8:11–12). I know that all the ignorant do not consider the famine of hearing the word of God to be a great punishment sent to us by God for our sins. They consider the famine of bread to be greater than the famine of hearing the word of God. O foolish ones! Don’t you know which is greater: the body or the soul, and which food is more worthy and healthier: perishable or incorruptible, carnal or spiritual, and which deprivation is greater: the poverty of bread or the word of God. There is also a hunger for bread, but an even greater evil is a hunger for the word of God. After all, bread strengthens only our temporary life, but the word of God builds us into eternal life. Every farmer knows how to cultivate perishable bread, but not everyone knows how to test the incorruptible word of God. This spiritual hunger, the hunger of hearing the word of God, has become very intense in our diocese, since there are neither sowers of spiritual seed nor good land. There are no, I say, teachers, and there are no hearts suitable for accepting the teaching. There are, as we hear, only damned sowers, sowing tares among the wheat. The tares are schismatic teachings, and the cursed land that receives the tares are those damned hearts that listen to schismatic teachings and are seduced by them. The long-suffering Lord leaves them to grow until the harvest, but during the harvest He will command the reapers, saying: “Gather the tares first and bind them in sheaves, as I burned them: and so He will burn the tares with unquenchable fire” (Matthew 13:30). The bishop, who was appointed by God to shepherd here, is not a little sad about the destruction of many human souls, just as David says: “I have received sorrow from sinners who forsake the law of God, forsake the word of God and listen to false and flattering teachings” (Ps. 118:53); sadness that his bishop’s teaching is not accepted, and the teaching is not his own, but the word of God, for he teaches not from himself, but on the basis of the Gospel and Apostolic writings; sadness that children do not listen to their father, sheep do not follow the shepherd, disciples do not listen to the teacher, avoid the holy church, shun church shrines and become children of wrath, sons of perdition, heirs of hell, for whom nothing else can be expected but fiery hell along with demons. He sows the seeds of the word of God in our hearts, but they fall into us along the path trampled under foot. We heard in the Holy Gospel that the seed falling along the way is harmed in two ways: firstly, it is trampled under the feet of those walking, and secondly, birds peck at it. The corrupted human heart is, as it were, the public path along which people and animals walk and trample it. A corrupted heart is trampled upon by all sorts of vain, evil, nasty thoughts and passionate lusts, not only human, but also bestial. “I was joined,” it is said, “to foolish cattle and became like them” (Ps. 48:13). If the word of God enters such a heart, it is immediately trampled underfoot by evil, nasty thoughts and bears no fruit. But trampling alone is not enough; Birds also peck at it. “It fell,” it is said, “on the way and was quickly trampled, and the birds of the air attacked it” (Luke 8:5). What kind of birds are these? Christ the Lord Himself interprets this: “The devil comes and takes away the word from their hearts” (Luke 8:12). The devil is a bird that pecks the word from the human heart; it was a bird of heaven, but had already been cast out of heaven into hell. Not wanting to live in hell, she went to earth into heaven, made herself a nest in the desert, in the Bryn forests, and bred many chicks. The devil multiplied his disciples there and, like birds from a nest, sends them from there to all cities and villages to peck at the seeds of the word of God and destroy the teachings of the Orthodox Eastern Church, and they have already pecked and destroyed almost all the seeds in all the fields of the heart, for in few people one can now see true piety and the Orthodox faith. Good is the seed of the word of God, which teaches us not to move away from the holy church, but to stay near it like children near the mother who gave birth to us through holy baptism, but the birds of demons, schismatics, flying out of their Bryn nest, pecked at this seed, teaching many to avoid the holy church and to abhor the shrines of God, deceiving and seducing ordinary men and women and saying: “The church is no longer a church, priests are not priests.” Oh, damned, demonic birds! O foolish Galatians! Who tempted you to resist the truth? Has the church changed? Has the priesthood ceased? Will not the church endure until the day of judgment, and “the gates of hell (according to the Lord) will not prevail against it” (Matthew 16:18)? Has Christ the Lord already abandoned His church, which He “redeemed with His honest blood”? Did He really lie when he said: “I am with you always, even to the end of the age” (Matthew 28:20)? “Heaven and earth pass by, but the words of the Lord do not pass by” (Matthew 26:35), and you, the damned, who say that the church is no longer the church, consider the words of the Lord to be a lie! Who is better to believe: you or Christ the Lord? Good is the seed of the word of God, which teaches us to confess and partake of the Divine Mysteries often or at least once a year. The demonic birds, schismatics, having flown out of their cursed nest, from Brynia, pecked at this seed, teaching many to shun holy communion as some kind of abomination, and there are many who from birth do not remember whether they have ever received communion. But the most surprising thing is that even many priests’ wives and children never receive communion. We learned this this way: the sons of priests come to be put in the places of their fathers, and when we ask them how long ago they took communion, many sincerely say that they do not remember when they took communion. Oh, damned priests who do not care about their salvation! How can they care about the holy church if they do not bring their household to holy communion? How can they bring parishioners if they do not care about the salvation of the souls of those at home, I’m talking about their wives and children? How can such people care about the souls of all Orthodox Christians? Haven’t you, priests, heard and read the words of the Lord, who says: “Unless you eat the flesh of the Son of Man and drink His blood, you have no life in you; eat My flesh and drink My blood to have eternal life”? I know that many make excuses for their unworthiness, saying that they are unworthy; To this I will answer everyone this way: as long as you remain in any mortal sins, you are truly unworthy and will eat and drink as a condemnation to yourself; if you truly repent of your sins, regret, cry and no longer want to commit evil, then proceed without doubt, and communion will serve you as salvation. The Lord came not for the sake of the righteous, but for the sake of sinners, to save them; Our Lord came not to heal the healthy, but to heal the sick. He gave us His flesh and blood for the forgiveness of our sins. He calls us: “Take, eat for the remission of sins. Drink for the remission of sins” (Matthew 26ff.). If you are unworthy because of sins, then make yourself worthy through repentance. And Saint Mary, if you remember her life, while she remained in sins, until then she was unworthy not only to partake of the Divine Mysteries, but even to enter the church; and when she wanted to enter the church, the power of God threw her away. When she repented with true repentance, immediately that same day in the evening she was granted communion of the body and blood of Christ in the Church of the Forerunner, which is by the Jordan, as it is written in her life. The seed of the word of God was good and that which teaches to live in marriage according to God’s law purely, chastely, not in adultery, without desecrating the marital bed; and now the demonic birds in Bryn have pecked at this seed, for it reaches our ears that in their Bryn hermitages, in demonic nests, they teach to have common wives and to consider fornication not a sin, but the love of Christ. Oh, damned, godless birds! Where did Christ command such love as to commit fornication? Doesn't He teach a pure life more, being Himself pure and blameless? Fornication is not the love of Christ, but carnal, devilish, lawless. Where is the law for having common wives? Oh, terrible lawlessness! After all, even the pagans, neither the Turks nor the Tatars, do not have such lawlessness, for they all have a marital law and punish adultery. The Bryn teachers, called holy fathers, teach those tempted by such lawlessness. Is this not the Nicolaitan heresy? Is this pleasing to the Lord God? Listen to what is written in the Apocalypse. Saint John the Theologian once saw Christ the Lord walking between the seven lamps, and from His mouth came a sharpened, double-edged sword (Apoc. 1:16). We will look at whom our Lord sharpened that two-edged sword. Here we hear Him saying to His beloved disciple John: “Write to the angel of the Church of Pergamon, saying, having a two-edged, sharp sword: the imam is against you, as the imashes hold the teaching of Balaam, who taught Balak to lay a stumbling block before the children of Israel, to eat food sacrificed to idols and to commit fornication, so imash you too. those who hold the Nicolaitan teaching, which I hate. Repent: otherwise, I will come quickly and make war on them with the sword of My mouth” (Apoc. 2ff.). We listen, with whom does our Lord want to fight with the sword of His mouth, sharpened on both sides? “With those who hold the Nicolaitan teaching.” What was the Nicolaitan teaching? The same as Valaamovo. What was the teaching of both? In committing fornication and having common wives. This is the teaching that Christ the Lord hates. “Imashi,” he says, “hold the Nicolaitan teaching, which I hate.” At the same time, He hates this teaching, this lawlessness, so much that He arms itself against those who commit it, as against His obvious enemies, prepares a two-edged, sharpened sword against them, and wants to wage war against them with the sword of His mouth: “I will make war,” He says, “against them with the sword of My mouth.” Do you hear these words of the Lord, Bryn teachers, who consider themselves to be holy fathers, but in reality they are damned wolves, demonic birds who adhere to the Nicolaitan teaching, fornicators, adulterers and defilers, whom Christ God hates. Listen, be ashamed and repent, lest the two-edged sword coming out of the mouth of Christ strike you. But you, true believers and Orthodox Christians, God-loving children of the Church of Christ, faithful and true servants of the Lord, beware of those seductive demonic birds flying out of the Bryn nest and hiding here as thieves, and seducing those lost and insane people who hide them in their underground, not knowing the law of God and the true path, and for whom the end will be destruction, from which may He deliver Christ the Lord us through His mercy. Amen. Sermon for the Twenty-Second Sunday after Pentecost “There was a certain rich man, and a certain poor man named Lazarus” (Luke 16:19–20) Two people are remembered in the current Gospel parable - one is rich and the other is poor. Both of them clearly depict their lives, both present and future, and it is clearly shown that one is the bliss of the present life, and another is the bliss of the future; also distress: some are of the present life, others of the future; and just as the bliss of the present life does not turn into the bliss of the future life, but changes into misery, so the misery of the present life in the future life will no longer be misfortune, but will change into bliss. To put it more clearly, the present wealth there will be poverty, and the present poverty there will be wealth. So, let's look first at real life. In real life, looking at both those people mentioned in the Gospel parable, the rich and the poor, and considering their lives, who would not prefer the rich to the poor? Who would not please the rich, and who would not curse the poor? The rich are in beautiful chambers, the beggar is in the dirt before the gates; the rich man is in purple and fine linen, in precious clothes, and the beggar is in rags; the rich rest on soft beds, and the beggar on rot; the rich man rejoices brightly every day, the beggar weeps bitterly every day; the rich man eats abundant food from sweet dishes, but the beggar wants to be satisfied with the grains given from the rich man’s meal, and even that is not given to him. The rich man drinks and is intoxicated with fine drinks, but hardly anyone will give a ladle of water to the sick beggar; the rich man has many servants, but the beggar has no one - everyone turns away from him; Everyone consoles the rich, but everyone saddens the poor; Everyone looks at the rich man and bows to him, but no one even looks at the beggar. If a rich man falls ill, even slightly, skilled doctors are immediately called to him, and his friends visit him, sympathize with him and grieve for him; and who treats a poor sick person? Who mourns for him? Who will come to see him? Nobody; unless the dogs come to him: “And the dog that comes licks his pus” (Luke 16:21). And in all this temporary life, the rich are blessed, and the beggar is wretched and poor. The rich are considered blessed in this life also because they dominate poor people and oppress them. The Holy Apostle James says: “Do not the rich force you, and drag you to judgment? Do they not blaspheme the good name that is given to you? (James 2:6–7). Here the holy apostle clearly showed what those rich people are like who rape the poor, drag them to judgment, blaspheme their good name: they rape, taking, robbing and offending; they are dragged to trial, that is, they are put on the right, the place of torture, they beat without mercy and are not at all merciful; they blaspheme their good name, reproaching, annoying and insulting with stingy words. This is how the rich are towards poor people. The rich on earth are more blessed and happier than the poor: the rich in every good thing, the poor in every misfortune. Here I am not talking about the virtuous, merciful and rich from their righteous labors, but I am talking about the evil, unmerciful and who accumulate wealth for themselves not from their own labors, but from others, and not from truth, but from untruth; It’s about them that I have a word to say today. A virtuous, merciful rich man buys for himself the kingdom of heaven by giving alms, building churches of God and extending a helping hand to the needy: such a one finds salvation for himself, as it is written: “Redemption for a man is his wealth” (Proverbs 13:8). The merciless and evil rich man does not care about his salvation and neglects the kingdom of heaven: as long as it is good for him on earth, but he places the kingdom of heaven at nothing. He doesn’t even think about death, he expects to live a long life, like the rich man whose field failed and who said: “I will destroy my barns and build great ones, and I will give a river to my soul; The whole thought of the rich is to eat, drink and be merry for many years to come. When he eats, he eats the labors of the poor, eats people, according to the words of God Himself, who speaks of the rich like this: “He who devours My people instead of bread” (Ps. 13:4); and when he drinks, he drinks human blood, intoxicates himself with human tears, for he eats and drinks from the wealth that was broken out of human feet by torture. In short, all the bliss on earth in this life is the bliss of the rich, but all the misfortune in this life is the misfortune of the poor. Who is held in high esteem? Rich. Who is dishonest? Poor. Who is noble? Rich. Who is thin? Poor. Who is wise? Rich. Who's stupid? Poor. Even if the rich man were completely stupid, the mere fact that he is rich makes him smart among ordinary people; everyone listens to his words, like the words of a wise philosopher, and praises his mind. A poor and beggar, even if he were very smart and a real philosopher, is still stupid because he is poor. All this bliss of the unrighteous rich came from the bloody sweat of wretched people. The rich get richer, and the poor become poor; the rich increases, and the poor decreases; the rich man spreads, but the poor man is shy; the rich man grows fat and fat from much food and luxury, and the poor man withers from hunger and sadness; the rich man boasts, and the poor man sighs. But wait a little, rich, unmerciful, offenders of wretched people, give time: the hour of death will come to you, and at that time you will see what bliss and happiness will be like. Nebuchadnezzar, king of Babylon, saw a wondrous dream on his bed: he saw an oak tree standing in the middle of the earth; its top reached to heaven, and its roots were in the ends of the whole earth; its leaves were beautiful, and its fruits were plentiful. Then he saw someone descending from heaven and loudly commanding: cut the oak, cut off its branches, pluck its leaves and scatter its fruit (Dan. 4). When no one could interpret this dream, the holy prophet Daniel was called, a skilled interpreter of dream visions, who said to the king: the great oak tree that you saw is you, king, for your majesty has risen, and your power has spread to the ends of the earth; but the hour of God’s judgment will come to you, and you will be driven out from people, and your life will be among wild animals. Much could be said about how everything happened there, but for our conversation we need only that one oak tree, for it represents the real life of people who are great in this world with their glory and wealth. The rich in this world are like some great oak tree, tall with pride, wide with wealth, beautiful with honor, fruitful with profits. But suddenly the judgment of God comes and cuts this oak with a mortal ax, and in one hour the oak that has been growing for a long time falls into the grave. He is expelled from people, from those living on earth, and dwells among the dead, as if with wild animals; His life passes with worms that will eat his body, which fed on sweets. Tell me, oak tree, where is the height of your pride; where is the expanse of your branches, your estates; where is the beauty of your leaves, your glory; where are the fruits of your profits and self-interest? Wasn’t it all destroyed and gone missing? And who are David’s words talking about? “I saw the wicked exalted and towering like the cedars of Lebanon, and I passed by, and behold, I sought him, and his place was not found” (Ps. 36:35-36). Everything went away, died with a noise, where is the soul, we will see later. Now we have seen real life, we have seen how in it the rich are blessed, while the wretched are poor, damned, poor and homeless. Let us still look with intelligent eyes at the future life, but first let us listen to the following words of the current Gospel parable: “The beggar was to die, and the angels were carried into the bosom of Abraham; And the rich man died, and buried him, and lifted up his eyes to hell, being in torment” (Luke 16:22–23). We see a change in the bliss of the rich and the misery of the wretched beggars. The hour of death came to the rich man, and the demons also came and tore his accursed soul out of his bad body with terrible pain, for “the death of sinners is cruel” (Ps. 33:22). The hour of death came for the beggar, and the holy angels also came and took his soul from his body painlessly, easily, honestly, for “honorable before the Lord is the death of His saints” (Ps. 116:6). Let us remember here a little from the lives of the saints about the death of the rich and the death of the poor. The death of a certain rich man is written about in the life of St. Andrew the Fool. At one time, Saint Andrew met a boyar walking past on the way and, penetrating into his life, spat on him, saying: “You wicked fornicator, a church scolder! Isn’t it you who, when you go to church, say: I’m going to Matins, but you go to Satan to do bad things? The wicked one who rises at midnight and angers God! Now your time has come for you to accept according to your deeds. Or do you think that you will hide from the terrible and all-seeing eye of God, which tests everything?” Hearing this, the boyar hit his horse and left, so as not to be embarrassed even more. A few days later that boyar fell ill with an evil illness, and his body gradually began to dry out; his relatives began to carry it from church to church and from doctor to doctor, but it did him no good. After some time, exhausted, he went into eternal torment. For one night the saint saw near his court an angel of the Lord coming from the west, who was like a flame of fire and holding a great fiery club. When he came to the sick man, he heard a voice from above saying: beat this scoffer, the vile Sodomite, and at the same time say this: do you still want to commit sins and defile various persons? Or, pretending to be going to Matins, do you, the devil, want to commit lawlessness? The angel began to beat him and tell him what was commanded, and the voice of the speaker was heard, and the blows of the club, but the beating man was not visible, and the man thus tormented gave up the ghost. This is the death of a rich man! Let us now also hear about the death of a beggar. The Monk John was nicknamed the silent man. At first he was a bishop, but then, for the sake of God, he left the rank of bishop and went into silence into the desert. One day he had a desire to see how the soul was separated from the body. When he prayed to the Lord God about this, then he was taken away in his mind to Holy Bethlehem and saw, at the church that was there, the dying husband of a wanderer, whose soul was taken by the angels to heaven with sweet singing. Blessed John, seeing this with his intelligent eyes, immediately got up, went to Bethlehem and at the church found the body of the deceased husband still warm and lying as he had seen in his vision, for he died precisely at that hour in which John, sitting in his cell, saw his soul taken by the angels with songs to heaven. Having embraced his relics with love and kissed them, he buried them with dignity in the same place and returned to his cell. We have heard about the death of both the rich and the poor. Everyone dies, but not in the same way, as we heard about this in the Gospel; the soul of the rich man was in the hands of demons, while the soul of the beggar was in the hands of angels. One was carried away to hell to Satan, the chief of the demons, and the other was carried away to Saint Abraham, the chief of the holy forefathers. The one in hell lifted up his eyes, being in torment, and the other saw himself in the peace of the righteous. What is their life like there? The rich man in this life was rich, but there, in the future life, he turned out to be poor, according to the word of the Psalmist: “They will perish and leave their wealth to strangers, and destroy their dwellings forever” (Ps. 49:11). And again: “They fell asleep with their sleep (that is, they died) and found nothing, all the men of wealth in their hands” (Ps. 75:6). The beggar Lazarus was poor in this life, but rich there. The rich are in the abyss of hell, the poor are in Abraham’s bosom. The rich are in the fire of Gehenna, the poor are in coolness. The rich are in darkness, the poor are in light. The rich man weeps and weeps, the poor man lives in joy and joy. The rich are in torment, the poor are in glory. The rich are naked, the poor are in the purple of incorruptibility and eternal glorification. The rich man thirsts for a drop of water on his tongue, but the beggar drinks a stream of eternal sweetness. The rich man cries out: “Father Abraham, have mercy on me and send Lazarus, so that he may dip the tip of his finger in water and cool my tongue, as I suffer in this flame” (Luke 16:24). Oh, damned one! In this life you have drunk a lot of wonderful drinks, you got drunk with your friends day and night, and now you ask for a drop of water for a hangover. Can you extinguish an entire fiery Gehenna with one drop of water? All springs, rivers and seas cannot extinguish the fire of Gehenna, but you want to extinguish it with one drop of water. Your request is vain! In your temporary life you did not listen to the beggar who asked you for a small crumb of bread, and the beggar in this life will not listen to you and will not give you, who are thirsty, a drop of water. After wonderful drinks, drink the cup of pitch and burning brimstone, the cup of God’s wrath! This is how the parable of this Gospel presents a double life - the present and the future - and the changes in both of these lives: how a rich man, who was blessed here, turned out to be damned and poor there, while a beggar, who was bad and poor here, turned out to be blessed, rich and glorious there. This is why the holy Apostle James cries out to the rich: “Come now, you rich people, weep and howl for the fierce sorrows that are coming upon you. Cast away your wealth, and consume your garments with prayer, your gold and silver will rust, and their rust will come upon you in obedience and consume your flesh like fire” (James 5:1 et seq.). About the poor and wretched, the same apostle says: “Hear, my beloved brethren, has not God chosen the poor of this world, rich in faith, and heirs of the kingdom he promised to those who love Him” (James 2:5). Hearing this, you wretched people, the beggars, the poor, the meager, oppressed by the rich, thank the Lord Christ, who prepared for you after your death the bosom of Abraham - the blessings of heaven and the kingdom of heaven. Endure here with gratitude all kinds of calamities, all kinds of oppression and insults, expecting to receive mercy from the Lord in that life: there your poverty will turn into wealth, your sighing into joy, and your tears into eternal joy, and the righteousness (torture) that you endure here will turn into a crown of martyrdom for you, and you will reign with Christ forever. Let it also be known that not all rich people will be condemned to torment; also, not all the poor and poor will be sent to heaven. There will be many rich people in the kingdom of heaven, and many poor people will be in fiery hell. Those rich who acquire wealth for themselves from sinless providences, from their own labors, from fair collections, who, in addition, are merciful and gracious - such, as we said earlier, buy themselves great salvation. Do we not hear that many who were rich in this life are now in the kingdom of heaven? King David was rich, and the holy forefathers Abraham, Isaac and Jacob were not poor, and they were all saved. Also in the new grace there were many kings, nobles, rich and glorious, about whom we know that they were saved, and some of them are even considered among the saints in the calendar. The poor, the wretched, who are lazy to work and toil, and feed on theft, steal or go to robbery, or do something else bad, or seek food only from alms, from human giving, and climb into people’s eyes like tar, although others could work and earn their own bread - such people will not only not receive the mercy of God and the kingdom of heaven in their future life, but will even be sent to torment eternal and will be tormented by demons forever. Thus, the righteous and virtuous rich are rich in this life, and in the next life they will inherit heavenly riches. Poor thieves, laymen and parasites are poor here, and there will be poor there, and moreover, they will be condemned to eternal torment, from which may Christ God deliver us with His mercy. Amen. Sermon for the twenty-third week after Pentecost “And all the people of the Gadarene region asked Him to depart from them. But the man from whom the demons had come out asked Him to be with Him” (Luke 8:37–38) Beloved listeners! In today's Gospel we see an example of ingratitude and gratitude. An example of ingratitude in the Gadarenes, who, having seen such a Physician of souls and bodies come to them, and even a free one, who heals everyone freely, such a Benefactor, Who passed through doing good and healing all those tormented by the devil, instead of asking Him never to leave them or at least to live with them for a short time, they pray that He would go away from them: “All the people of the Gadarene region asked Him get away from them." O ingratitude! We have an example of gratitude in a man healed, delivered from demonic torment, who so loved his Doctor, his Benefactor, that, having nothing with which to repay and thank for such great mercy, he wants to give himself into constant service, clinging to Him with all his soul and with all his heart, in order to follow Him wherever He went: “The man from whom the demons had come out asked Him to be with Nim." God save such a grateful one. I decided to have my present conversation for your love, “with the Lord’s assistance and reinforcement of the word,” about what a great evil is ingratitude and what a great virtue is gratitude. “All the people of the Gadarene region asked Him to depart from them.” In order to make the ingratitude of the Gadarenes towards the Lord God clearer, we will first look at the goodness of the Lord towards them. Our Lord Jesus Christ did a lot of good in the Galilean country where He lived, for He went through all the Galilean cities and villages, healing souls with teachings and bodies with miraculous power. After this, He wanted to show the same spiritual and physical benefit to the Gadarene country, especially when He recognized God as omniscient and, in addition, heard from human news that unclean spirits had multiplied there and were causing great disasters to people, that a whole demonic legion had entered into one person (and St. Matthew also remembers another demoniac who was there), and that this demonic multitude kept the entire Gadarene, or Gergesene, in fear. country. The Lord, having entered the ship with His disciples, headed there, and, like a warlike Governor, he wanted to defeat the enemy regiments, and like a Good Shepherd, he wanted to drive away the wolves from the verbal flock. When He landed on the shore and left the ship on land, He was met by a certain man from the city who had demons for many years. What is the name of that husband? Legion, for many demons have entered into it. How large was the number of demons in the legion? It is not calculated equally. The Kiev-Pechersk lexicon puts it at 5000, others talk about 6000, and others about 12000, but it is best to say that in one legion there was countless demonic power. We, having reasoned, will say that no matter how many of them there are in the legion, in any case this is evil, since one demon can, with God’s permission, cause great troubles, for his power is strong. What can such a multitude of them fail to do that there is not even a specific number for them? It was only in one Gadarene demoniac that there were so many demons - a whole legion, but in another, we recall from Matthew, there were so many more. This is how the number of unclean demons multiplied in the Gadarene country, frightening the whole country. After all, they tormented not only those in whom they settled, but also showed their tormenting malice over others who fell in their way, so that hardly anyone dared to leave the Gadarene city. If anyone was traveling along the way somewhere on his own business, he was attacked by a demon-possessed robber, beat him, crushed him and killed him, for the devil is “a murderer from the beginning” (Matthew 8:28) and no one could avoid that path. If anyone went into the desert for something, he was there possessed by a demon, for “he broke his bonds and was driven by a demon into the desert” (Luke 8:29). Did someone go into the mountains to catch birds or animals, and there he was possessed, according to the words of Mark: “In the mountains and in the tombs he screamed and beat himself against the stones” (Mark 5:5). If anyone died, he could not be taken to the cemetery for an ordinary burial, for there the terrible demon possessed had a home. He lived not in a house, but in the mountains, and thus he caused disaster not only to the living, but also to the dead. These are the dirty tricks the demonic legion committed against the Gadarenes. The merciful Lord, having come to their country, immediately drove the demons away from there. He cleansed and freed all of Gadara from demonic monsters, attacks and torment. What do the Gadarenes repay the Lord for such a good deed? Instead of gratitude, they drive Him away from them and pray for Him to leave them, and as if they are saying: “You drove out demons from our country, so leave yourself from our borders.” O mad Gadarenes! O foolish mind of yours! O blindness, darkened and unable to be enlightened by any light! Isn’t it better for you to live with the true light - Christ, the Son of God, who “enlightens every man” (John 1:9) who comes to Him, rather than with hellish darkness and Satan, who drags you all into the abyss? Isn't it better for you to live with the Lord the Benefactor than with the demon tormentor? Isn't it better to be with a soul-lover than with a murderer? But the Gadarenes say the opposite, they complain about the Lord the benefactor: he destroyed our pigs, for “demons came out of the man and entered the pigs, and the herd rushed down a steep slope into the lake and drowned” (Luke 8:33). Here, reasoning spiritually, we will say: the foolishness of sinners is so great that a sinner loves some pig, some, I say, fornicating person more than God. It is better for him to endure demonic torment than to lose his pig. Every sinful addiction in us is like a pig wallowing in a swamp of sewage. He who loves one sin and is addicted to it has one pig. Whoever is addicted to another love of sin has acquired another pig. He who is overcome by countless passions has an innumerable number of pigs, and where a herd of pigs gathers, there will be a legion of demons, for with every sinful addiction there is a special demon. That demonic legion torments the soul of a sinner, although not openly now, but secretly. In the conscience of the sinner himself, he exposes the garments of God's grace, settles him, as it were, in stinking tombs, in nasty carnal deeds; beats him with a stone of despair; pursues him either through the deserts of idleness with depraved idlers, or through the mountains of vain, proud arrogance. It encourages him to attack others with malice, anger and rage. Here he temporarily manifests all his demonic power, will and strength on him until he takes him body and soul to eternal torment. Christ the Lord, who always desires salvation for everyone and not destruction, wants to come to such a person in order to drive out the demonic legion from him, but he, fearing to lose his pigs, to lag behind his sinful addictions, turns away from the Lord. If he is lazy to come to church, he turns away from the Lord, and even if he comes, he does not listen to prayer. If he prays with his lips and dreams of vain things with his mind, then again he turns away from the Lord. If he hears a church teaching, a spiritual exhortation, but does not write it down in his heart, then it means he turns away from the Lord. If a good thought ever comes to him, advising him well and prompting him to repentance, and he strives for ordinary lawlessness, then it means that he turns away from the Lord. If not in words, then in his very deed, he tells the Lord to leave him, while he himself wants to be better with his pigs and demons than with God. But let us return again to the Gadarenes. You are unrequited, ungrateful Gadarenes: for drowning your pigs, you drove such a Benefactor away from you! You have forgotten such a great benefit shown to you, you have forgotten the deliverance from demons that is still standing before your eyes. You are angry with the Lord as if you suffered something great, having suffered only a small loss, only the deprivation of pigs. But think about it: God has come to you, and yet God arranges everything for good. Even if He saddens someone for a while in something small, He soon consoles them with something big. Having taken less wealth from Job, He gave him more. He took the shoes from Moses: “Take off,” he said, “the sandals from your feet” (Ex. 3:5), and gave him power over Pharaoh and over all of Egypt. He took Saul's donkeys and gave him the kingdom. Having taken little from us, God gives us more than a hundredfold, and in addition eternal life. God took your pigs from you, Gadarenes, but wanted to save your souls and heal all the mental and physical illnesses existing among you; you, having turned out to be ungrateful, suffered a great loss: you lost your pigs, and you sent God away from your country, and even then you will not run away from demons, for when God is not with you, demons will take possession of you again. The Samaritans were more grateful to the Lord for His coming, who prayed for Him to stay with them: “And He stayed there two days” (John 4:40). The Gadarenes did not want to have Him with them even for one hour, therefore, “He entered the boat, crossed back and arrived at His city” (Matthew 9:1), as if saying to the Gadarenes: “You did not want My blessing, you wanted it to leave you: “Behold, your house is left desolate” (Matthew 23:38), your city and your country will be deprived of My grace, for you have proven unworthy of it.” Anyone who is ungrateful for anything is not worthy of it. Ingratitude is a sword that cuts off good deeds and, in addition, kills the ungrateful. God did a great good for the Israelites by leading them out of slavery in Egypt through the Red Sea on dry land. He wanted to do even more for them: He wanted to lead “them into the promised land, boiling with milk and honey” (Ex. 3:17). But since they turned out to be ungrateful for the first good deed, for they murmured against God and remembered the dishes made from Egyptian pork, the Lord cut off both the good deed and their life, for it was not they who entered the promised land, but their children, and they fell in the desert, destroyed by the wrath of God: “While food was still in their mouth, when the wrath of God came upon them and killed very many of them” (Ps. 77:30–31). The Lord did a great deed for the great city of Nineveh: He wanted to destroy it in the days of the prophet Jonah, but, taking pity on it, He did not destroy it and wanted to do it even more, wanted to keep it intact forever, even to this day. But since that city turned out to be ungrateful for the first benefit of God’s mercy, was corrupted by iniquities even worse than the previous ones, and angered God more heavily, God cut off both its benefit and its existence in the days of the prophet Jonah. He destroyed that city with an earthquake, water and fire, for there was a large lake near Nineveh, and when the earth shook, the city sank into the lake, and the rest of it burned in the fire that came from the desert. Christ did no small benefit to Judas, numbering him among the apostles and giving him the power equal to the other apostles to heal every disease in people and cast out unclean spirits. He wanted to do him an even greater benefit: He wanted to give him, like the others, the Holy Spirit in tongues of fire; but since he turned out to be ungrateful for the first good deed, the Lord cut off both the good deed and his life, taking away his former grace and allowing him to fall into extreme despair and hang himself. But why do we remember the latter? Let us remember the first man, our forefather Adam. But before we see his ingratitude, we first ask Saint Athanasius: who first began to call God God? From whose lips did the word “God” first come out? Would you say that Adam or Eve called God God first? No, neither Adam nor Eve. You might say that the book of Genesis itself, in its first chapter and first verse, called God God, for it writes: “In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth” (Gen. 1:1). But this book was written three thousand years after the creation of the world, and even more: it was written by Moses after leaving Egypt in the desert according to the story of an Angel. Therefore, the question again arises: from whom did the word “God” come from at the beginning of the world? Who called God God first? Read carefully the first, second and third chapters of Genesis, even to the place where the serpent began to tempt Eve, and you will find that the serpent, first of all, began to call God God. The word “God” first of all came from the serpent’s mouth, and not from Adam’s or Eve’s, for the serpent said to Eve: “Did God truly say: “You shall not eat from every tree of the garden?” (Gen. 3:1); after the serpent and Eve began to call God God. Read and see if this is true. Here one should say to Adam: our forefather is the first, the most worthy and the wisest! You knew how to name all the animals, livestock, birds, fish and all visible creatures (see Gen. 2:20). You also named the name of your helper Eve (see Gen. 3:20), but you were unable to pronounce the name of God with your lips. Were you really lazy if the serpent warned you of it? He called God God, but you are silent. It was truly up to you, and not the serpent, to confess the name of God with your heart and lips, and to teach Eve the same, so that she would learn the name of God from you, and not from the serpent. It was fitting for both of you to say with gratitude: blessed is God, who created us, who brought us from non-existence to existence and who has blessed us with so many gifts! “Blessed is the name of His glory” (Ps. 71:19), blessed is God from now on and forever! But, ashamed, our forefather remains silent; His last children accuse him of ingratitude, they accuse him of the fact that, being ungrateful for such blessings, he never once glorified God and did not even pronounce His name. Having joined here the forefather to the above-mentioned ungrateful people, I say: God did a great good deed to Adam, creating him in His image and likeness, letting him live in a paradise of sweets and putting everything under his feet. And he wanted to do him an even greater benefit, he wanted to move him from heaven to heaven without any inconvenience. But since Adam turned out to be ungrateful for his previous blessings, God stopped his good deeds for him, and expelled him from paradise, and ordered him to return to the earth, and gave him a very inconvenient path to heaven. Christ wanted to do more to the Gadarenes: He wanted to save their souls. Since he saw their ingratitude, he left them and stopped His good deeds to them. You see what a sword ingratitude is: this sword cuts off both good deeds and not only temporary life, as with Adam and the Israelites, but also eternal life, as with the Ninevites, Judah and the Gadarenes. But it’s time to say something about gratitude, an example of which is the evangelical man who was delivered by Christ God from the demonic legion and who wanted to be a relentless follower of Christ the Lord, his Benefactor. “The man from whom the demons had gone out asked Him to be with Him” (Luke 8:38). The desire to continually be with Christ is a clear sign of gratitude. The man from whom the Lord cast out the demonic legion was grateful. Sitting at the feet of Jesus, clothed and rational, he thought to himself, saying: What will I render to my Lord, my free Physician? How will I repay my Benefactor? How will I thank you and what will I bring? I will bring myself to Him, I will give myself to Him in eternal slavery, I will remain with Him, diligently and faithfully serving Him as long as I live, until my death, not retreating from Him anywhere and not moving away from Him even for a short time. Lord, accept me that I was with You, so that I would follow You wherever You went: “I asked Him that I might be with Him.” Gratitude is the guardian of all other virtues, and just as the fruits of a garden or vineyard, at which a watchful guard stands, are not robbed or plundered, so the virtues protected by gratitude remain intact from the spiritual or invisible thief and predator. The holy apostle, having gathered the virtues in one place, like ears of corn in a sheaf, and having bound them with love, set gratitude as a guard, saying this: “Put on yourselves, as God’s chosen ones, holy and beloved, in mercy, kindness, humility, meekness, long-suffering, bearing with one another and forgiving each other,” - these will be the ears of corn gathered in a sheaf. “Above all, put on love, which is the sum of perfection,” is the guard posted to keep the sheaf from being stolen by any thief. Where this guard is not present, spiritual wealth is plundered (Col. 3:12–15). To confirm this truth, we must again recall Judas. He had, as it is said, great spiritual wealth, for the Lord, even before His free suffering, did not deprive him of anything in comparison with the other apostles, when he sent His twelve disciples in twos to preach (see Mark 6:7). All those gifts that He gave to Peter, Andrew, James, John and the other apostles - all these gifts He gave to Judas. He gave everyone the power to cast out unclean spirits and heal every disease and every disease. To everyone in general He said: “Heal the sick, cleanse the lepers, raise the dead, cast out demons” (Matthew 10:8). In the same number was Judas, according to the Gospel: “And these are the names of the Twelve Apostles: the first Simon, who was called Peter, and Andrew his brother,” and others by their names, finally, “and Judas Iscariot, who betrayed Him” (Matthew 10:2-4). Jesus sent these twelve, commanding them, saying: “Heal the sick, cleanse the lepers, raise the dead, cast out demons” (Matthew 10:8); therefore, Judas also had the same gifts from Christ and, by the grace of Christ, performed the same miracles that the other apostles did: he healed the sick, cleansed lepers, raised the dead and cast out demons. What else was he missing? He lacked a watchful guard, he lacked gratitude that would have kept intact that spiritual treasure of Judas. Since he turned out to be ungrateful for all those gifts of God, he lost them all in one hour, and invisible thieves plundered them. Saint Chrysostom, looking at the Last Supper, analyzing Judas’ intentions and keeping in mind the words of the Gospel: “He (Judas), having accepted the piece, immediately left,” reflects on this, saying that “when Judas took communion of the last supper on that last night along with all those reclining, he himself, getting up, left. This is imitated by those who leave before the last thanksgiving, that is, before the last church dismissal. After all, if Judas had not come out, he would not have become a traitor.” We heed the following words: “Judas would not have become a traitor if he had not gone out before thanksgiving,” if he had waited with the other apostles for the last thanksgiving. So, here this universal teacher, Saint Chrysostom, believes that the entire blame for the destruction of the spiritual treasures of Judas lies in the fact that Judas the traitor, being ungrateful for so many of the benefits of Christ shown to him, did not want to wait for thanksgiving at the last Supper, but went out before everyone else. If he had waited, then this very gratitude, like some kind of wakeful guard, would have protected him from betrayal and would have kept his spiritual wealth intact. If he had not gone out before Thanksgiving, he would not have become a traitor. As for how gratitude is a guardian of spiritual and material treasures, we will see this in the example of the beautiful Joseph. This chaste young man was gifted and enriched with many blessings by two great benefactors: God and man. God enriched him with spiritual gifts, purity, chastity and other virtues befitting the soul. The man, the Egyptian military leader Pentephry, enriched him with external gifts, entrusting him with his entire house and all his property. The spiritual enemy and thief, being envious, wanted to steal all this from him, steal it, and for this purpose he taught his mistress, Pentefriev’s wife, to seduce Joseph into sin, with which he would anger both God and insult his master, would lose the mercy and grace of God and man, would destroy spiritual wealth and lose material wealth. Let's see how the good young man responds to women's temptations. “Behold, my master, having put everything into my hands, knows nothing in his house, and there is nothing that is not in my power or that he has not entrusted to me, except you, because you are his wife: how can I do this evil?” (Gen. 39:8–9). Saint Gregory, reflecting on these words of his, says: “He immediately brought to mind the benefits that he received and thereby defeated the evil that oppressed him. He remembered the covenants of gratitude and broke the power of the sin that came upon him.” During the most sinful struggle, when the chaste Joseph, on the one hand, was carried away by a nasty wife, and on the other, was encouraged to sin by natural lust, when he was already standing in the midst of snares and a captive, then he thought in his mind how he could repay good with evil, and said with his lips: “How can I do this evil?” With this, he immediately destroyed the charms of the captor and natural need, drove away the spiritual thief and predator, and preserved the virtuous wealth intact. He did not anger God and did not offend his master. Look what the guardian of all virtues is - gratitude. The present evangelical man was also grateful for the good deeds of the Lord, from whom demons came out, driven out by the power of Christ, for he “asked the Lord that he might be with Him.” Although the Lord did not deign to have him among those who followed Him, for he let him go, however, that man did not forget the good deeds of his Benefactor: he went throughout the whole city, preaching about what Jesus had done for him. Truly, there is no doubt that this man was enriched with spiritual and inexplicable treasures: for his gratitude he was awarded the gift of preaching. We will pay attention to the sign of his gratitude that, as a sign of gratitude, he wanted to always be with Christ: “I asked Him to be with Him,” and we will say to ourselves this: nothing else can be done to thank the Lord God, our Creator and Redeemer, Who always shows us innumerable benefits, except by being diligent and, according to our strength, trying relentlessly and always to be with Him, our Lord, for obvious, known and perfect gratitude consists in always clinging to your benefactor. The Holy Spirit in the Song of Songs tells His bride: “Arise, My beloved, My beautiful one, and come, My dove, who dwells in the clefts of the stones and in the clefts of the rock” (Song. 2:13). Saint Gregory here by stone clefts means the Most Pure wounds of Christ that were on His hands and feet. By gorge he means His Most Pure great wound, which was pierced by a spear in His ribs. Finally, the dwelling of the bride of the Holy Spirit there means constant remembrance of the sufferings of Christ and imitation of them. We look: the bride of the Holy Spirit, that is, the soul of a God-loving person, likened to a dove, having found the great blessing of Christ’s redemption, is so grateful to Him that she never wants to be separated from these wounds that brought us redemption, but forever settles in them and abides like a dove in the clefts and gorges, and abides relentlessly. There she sits, there she rests, there she lives all days and nights, that is, whether she sits, whether she rests, whether she eats, drinks, or does anything else, she always sees with her mind the crucified one before the eyes of her Lord and with her thoughts settles in His wounds. Such was, for example, Abba Stefan, about whom we read the following in Limonar. One day three elders came to him and talked for a long time about spiritual benefits. When Abba did not tell them anything, the elders asked: “Are you really not going to answer us anything, Father?” Then Abba said to them: “Forgive me, I still have not yet understood what you said. I did not listen to your conversation, but stood with my mind on Calvary, looking at my crucified Lord, for both day and night I see nothing else but Jesus hanging on the tree.” Here is a dove that lives in stone crevices. Here is a soul, grateful for its redemption and always placing its mind in the wounds of Christ. This is gratitude, always clinging to its Lord and desiring to continually live with Him: “To be with Him.” We, my listeners, seeing in the Gospel an example of gratitude and ingratitude, having heard enough about this in our conversation and having understood, we will reject the ingratitude of the ungrateful and will imitate the gratitude of the grateful. Let us learn to be with the Lord always and relentlessly, so that nothing will tear us away from His love - neither wealth, nor glory, nor beauty, nor the sweets and sinful passions that exist in this vain world. If any sin seduces us and wants to remove us from our Lord, let us remember the many and countless blessings of the Lord, past, present and future, and we will reflect the sinful charm with the words of that beautiful Joseph, whom we remembered before, saying: “How can I do this evil?” (Gen. 39:9) - and to anger my God, my Creator, my Lord, who has so blessed me! I will never commit this evil under any circumstances! It is better for me to be dead than to grieve my Lord greatly. I will not separate myself from my God for sin, for things contrary to God, I will not distance myself from my Lord all the days of my life, until my very death. If we, being so grateful for the mercy of God, will cleave to Him and abide inseparably with Him, then He will cleave to us with inseparable love and will remain with us all the days until the end of the age. Amen. Sermon for the twenty-fourth week after Pentecost “There came a man named Jairus, who was a ruler of the synagogue; and, falling at the feet of Jesus, he asked Him to come into his house, because he had one daughter, about twelve years old, and she was dying” (Luke 8:41–42) My beloved listeners! Today's Gospel contains two stories: about a woman with bleeding, healed by Christ our Lord, and about a maiden, the daughter of Jairus, raised from the dead. For a long time I thought about which of those two stories I should offer my conversation to your love. Is it about a bleeding wife? But I, a sinful monk, not only don’t want to talk, but even think about my wife and women’s weakness. Perhaps about a dead girl? Perhaps it would be a good idea to talk about your death about your death as a reminder. When I hear that at the touch of the hand of the Lord she came to life, stood up, walked and ate: “And her spirit returned; she immediately stood up, and He ordered that she be given something to eat” (Luke 8:55), - then I don’t want to talk about her, I don’t examine her life after her resurrection - that’s not my business. I glorify the Almighty God, who showed His miraculous mercy on both those faces in that he healed a bleeding wife from weakness, and raised a girl from death: for this I glorify God with the entire Church in general, but I am both ashamed and afraid to talk about both. I know that when some noble Roman senatorial wife came to Saint Arsenius the Great for a blessing and said to him: “Pray for me,” he replied: “I pray to my God that He will blot out the memory of you from my heart.” Who and what will I talk about? I know, my listeners, about whom and what: about Prince Jairus, the father of the dead girl. I have business with him; What is the matter, I won’t say now, but after waiting a little, you yourself, my listener, will find out if you listen to my conversation with attention. “A man named Jairus came to Jesus.” Let anyone praise the prince of the host, Jairus, as he wishes, about whom we read in this Gospel, but I will not praise him very much. Let anyone praise him as a lover of children because he took care of his dying daughter and the already deceased one so that she would live. Let anyone praise him as prudent, for he called not sorcerers or sorceresses, but Christ the Lord, to his daughter, who was lying on her deathbed. I will not call him either child-loving or prudent, and I will not praise him. Why? But because not before the time of death, but already at the time of death itself, he cared about the life and health of his daughter. After all, he turned to Jesus at a time when his daughter was already dying: “And she was dying.” Saint Matthew narrates that already when his daughter died, he turned to Jesus, saying: “My daughter is now dead.” If you are the true father of your daughter, Jairus, if you are loving and prudent, then why didn’t you look for a doctor at the time when your daughter was just starting to get sick? Why didn’t you turn to Jesus, preventing her death, at least at a time when her illness had already intensified? Since your daughter is dying or has already died, then you are already too late to take care of her health, you are too late to see a good doctor. Why are you bothering the Teacher? After all, who heals the dead? Who puts a band-aid on a soulless corpse? Your daughter died, why are you bothering the Teacher? Is it only the supernatural power of the Life-Giver, all-powerful, possessing life and death, that will help your daughter and resurrect the deceased? Indeed, the daughter of Jairus was resurrected by the touch of the merciful and omnipotent hand of Christ. Jairus, her father, was left without praise because he took care of his daughter late, when he should have taken care earlier, preventing the severity of a serious illness and the hour of death. Why was Jairus late? Because he was careless and lazy. His daughter fell ill, and he hears that a great Doctor has come to their city, healing all sorts of diseases with a word or a touch, and even free of charge, and does not require anything except faith in our Lord Jesus Christ. And Jairus says to himself: I will also go to That Physician, worship Him and ask Him to come to my house and heal my only begotten daughter. Jairus thought well, but did not do it immediately, and, being careless and lazy, he put off coming to Jesus day by day, hour by hour, saying: “Tomorrow I will go.” When morning came, he said again: I’ll go tomorrow, and then again: I’ll go tomorrow. When he put it off from day to day, the illness in the girl intensified, and the hour of death came to his daughter, and she died. And then Jairus' daughter died. Here I have something to do with Jairus. In the face of Jairus’s daughter, who was sick and died, the image of our spiritual death is shown, for when any sinful desire comes to a person either by accident, or from natural weakness, or from a devilish temptation, then his soul is sick. And just as a sick person in body is in the midst of hope and despair, for he either hopes to recover, or, not hoping to recover, expects death - so the soul is between committing sin and abstaining from it. She sways with confusion, like a reed in the wind, when, on the one hand, conscience forbids sin, and on the other, sinful desire draws him to a planned evil deed. When, in this doubt, he begins to gradually lean toward desire, which pushes him to sin, rather than to conscience, which forbids sin, then illness begins, and he is sick until he gives birth to lawlessness. When he comes to sinful principles, he begins to die. When sin is finally committed, then grace is taken away from it, and it becomes dead, for just as the soul is life for the body, so grace is life for the soul, and just as the body becomes dead after the departure of the soul, so the soul becomes dead after God’s grace is taken from it through sin. In the person of Jairus himself, an image of our negligence is shown, an example is shown of the fact that we are looking for a spiritual doctor for our soul not at the time when it begins to suffer from sinful desires, not at the time when it is already beginning to die, that is, to touch a sinful matter, and not even at the time when it is already dying. When? In this respect we are even worse than Jairus. After all, he turned to Jesus when his daughter was dying, or, as St. Matthew says, when she had just died; we do not want to turn to Jesus and pray to Him for the resurrection of our soul, even in the case when it has long been dead and frozen, when it smells of sinful carrion and has rotted. We even increase its deadness every day, repeating the same falls. We do not care about resurrecting through repentance from spiritual death into a life of grace, but we put off our repentance from morning to morning, day from day and hour from hour. The young man puts off repentance until old age, and the old man puts it off until the time when he begins to suffer from death: “Then,” he says, “I will repent.” O crazy one! Do you really want to repent when you are completely exhausted in both spirit and body? First of all, I will say something appropriate for young people who put off repentance until old age. In the Old Testament, God commanded that sacrifices be brought to Him from the fruits of the earth and the firstborn, from herds of livestock, to bring the best and not the worst, the healthy and not the rotten or sick, the first and not the last, the young and not the old (see Lev. 22:21–22). If from the fruits of the earth, then the first sheaf from the field, the first vegetable from the garden, the first bunch of grapes. If from herds of livestock, then a one-year-old lamb, a three-year-old heifer, and in general everything that is young and healthy, and not lame, not blind, not sick, and not having any damage. About how God is angry with those who sacrifice evil, listen to the one who speaks in prophecy: “If you sacrifice a blind thing, is it not evil? If you bring something that is lame or sick, is it not evil? Bring this to your prince, will he accept it? “Neither will I accept such sacrifices at your hands,” says the Lord (Mal. 1, 8:10). Your youth, young man, are the days of the first fruits. You must give them as a sacrifice to the Lord Your God, that is, you must learn in your youth to serve the Lord, keep His commandments, diligently guard against angering your Creator with any mortal sin, live in chastity purely and honestly, walking the path of God’s law. This will be a pleasant sacrifice to God from your first fruits. If you spend your youth in a corrupt life, and you put off repentance, correction and virtues until old age, then you want to sacrifice to God the lame, the blind, the sick and covered with sores. On the one hand, you will experience bodily weakness in all your members with which you would like to serve God, and you will not be able to accomplish such a feat as you could have accomplished in your youth. On the other hand, the sinful morals that have grown old in you will burden your soul and make it seem blind, lame and weakened, so that it will no longer be able to easily perform godly deeds. Will you not then hear from God what those who sacrificed the lame, blind and sick heard to God: “I will not accept such sacrifices at your hands? The apostle exhorts well, speaking with prayer: I beseech you, brethren, by the mercies of God, to present your bodies as a living sacrifice, holy, acceptable to God” (Rom. 12:1). He orders to present a living victim, not a dead one. That is, while you, a person, are healthy in body, young, pure and strong, be a sacrifice to God, without delaying until the time when, having grown old, you become weak and become, as it were, dead and ineffective in bodily strength. Or I’ll say this: while you are alive, until you die in soul through mortal sin, be a sacrifice to God, that is, live in God’s way. When your body, weakened by old age, becomes, as it were, half-dead, and your soul is filled with sinful deadness, then you will no longer be an acceptable sacrifice to God, as you could have been before, for God does not accept carrion as a sacrifice, and where and when did anyone sacrifice carrion? He who puts off repentance until old age is like one who, after the harvest, looks for ears of corn in the field, or after gleaning grapes, looks for grapes. The prophet Micah groans, crying out in the sorrow of his soul: “Oh, woe is me!” (Mic. 7:1). Let us ask him: why are you, holy prophet, groaning? What sadness or sorrow or illness do you have? The prophet answers: “I was like one who gathers stubble in the harvest, and like one who plucks unripe grapes” (Mic. 7:1). O holy prophet! We don't understand your words, tell us more clearly. The prophet says: “My Lord sent me to His field so that I could reap His wheat; The Lord sent me into His grapes, so that I might gather His grapes; I came to the field and found it empty - everything had been reaped; came to the grapes - all the grapes were picked and cut off. Some enemies of my Lord thieves reaped the field and robbed the grapes, but I remained to collect the ears of corn that remained here and there in the field, and the small clusters that remained in the grapes here and there between the leaves: “I was like one who gathers straw during the harvest, and like one who gathers unripe grapes, and therefore, oh, woe to me!” But even now, prophet, we do not quite understand your parable. Explain it to us more clearly. The prophet interprets: I was sent to the people of Israel to sow in their hearts the seed of the word of God, to plant in their souls a virtuous vine of spiritual grapes; I worked for a long time, sowing and planting for many years, and did not succeed: everyone is corrupt, rarely is anyone good, like an ear of corn left here and there in a reaped field, or a bunch of grapes left after picking; but all the rest were reaped and iniquity overtook them. “The God-fearing man on earth has disappeared,” he says, and there is no one who is truthful among people, everyone quarrels with bloodshed, each of them reviles his friend, prepares his hands to do evil; leaders ask for gifts, judges utter peaceful words with their lips, but plot deceit with their souls. Oh, woe is me! Oh, woe is me! (Mic. 7:1–3). Holy prophet! You cry when you look at the ancient Israelites, but if you look at us Christians, you will cry harder. There, after all, at least some small part of the good could have been found, but here in these fierce times “everyone has turned aside, they have become completely worthless: there is none who does good, not even one” (Ps. 52:4). Let us now turn from prophetic lamentation to our consideration of ourselves. A young man is like an unharvested field, like unharvested grapes, full of fruits, that is, strength, strength and abilities to please God. But who in him reaps these benefits? The world comes with vanities, like with a sickle, and reaps for itself. The flesh comes with the sickle of natural passions and reaps for itself what it wants. The devil comes with tempting temptations and tries to reap and consume even the remnants. When the years of young days have passed and the autumn of old age comes, then the man himself will want to reap something in the field of his life or pick his grapes, but he will not find anything useful, for everyone before him has reaped and robbed the world, the flesh and the devil, and all that remains for him is straw. He remains in poverty, having the opportunity to find in his entire life barely any ear of grain, barely any small bunch of virtues. Seeing at his death all his poverty and poverty, and having considered his entire life, passed in negligence, does he not burst into tears, saying: “Oh, woe is me!” Likewise, the holy Guardian Angel, not being able to collect anything good at the death of such a person and put this good against his evil deeds, prophetically bursts into tears, crying and saying: “Oh, woe is me!” So, it is not good for a young person to put off repentance until old age. When old age comes, it remains to be seen whether he will repent. After all, the old man, having grown old in his evil disposition and weakened in his bodily strength, will be even more careless and will begin to put off repentance until the last exhaustion, until the last illness and hour of death, saying to himself: “When I approach death, when I feel my death, then I will repent.” O extreme madness and negligence! The holy prophet Hosea, describing the madness and negligence of the two Israelite tribes, who previously did not think about their integrity, but began to take care of themselves during their very misfortune, says this about them (according to Jerome’s translation): “When Ephraim saw his illness, and Judah saw his wound, Ephraim went to Assur and sent ambassadors to the avenging king, and he could not deliver them” (Hos. 5:13). I will not spread the story of that story, when those peoples, oppressed by their enemies, sought help from the strongest Assyrian king Teglath-phalaser, whom they had over everyone as a judge and avenger, and did not find it. But I and the prophet are surprised at their madness, that they did not seek help even before they were surrounded by enemies and bound, like bonds, by an enemy ring, but they sought it when their strength was already exhausted and ineffective. The person who then hopes to free himself from the hands of his spiritual enemies is also unreasonable when he is exhausted in his strength, lies down on his sick bed, ties his head and other painful parts of his body with bandages, like bonds. Then he wants to send envoys to the avenging king, that is, to pray to God to deliver him from the demonic monsters surrounding his bed. But who knows whether he will be heard at that time, whether his repentance will be pleasant and whether God will deliver him? “And he,” they say, “could not deliver them,” he could not, not because of his own powerlessness, but because they turned for help too late. Some say about Pharaoh that when he followed the Israelites into the sea by dry route and when the waves of the sea surrounded him, then, having realized his sin and his madness, he began to repent greatly, but he could no longer do anything. Why? But because his repentance was too late. Then he called Moses, called Aaron so that they would pray for him, but they no longer heard him and, having heard, did not listen. He called on the God of Israel, but He could not deliver him, not because he was powerless, but because Pharaoh was late in repenting. Then Pharaoh wanted to open his mouth to cry out to God: “God,” but immediately sea water filled his mouth and flooded his throat, so that it did not allow him not only to cry out, but even simply to direct his mind to God. So hope you too, a person who puts off your repentance until your last mortal illness, hope so! Many waves will surround you, just like in a sea dive. On the one hand, the widowhood of a friend, the loss of children and deprivation of property, and in addition, serious illnesses, the end of life and the sad separation of the soul from the body. Many more and great sins of yours, with which you have upset God all your life, will appear before your eyes, they will appear in your faces so that you can see every thing you have done. On the other hand, terrible demonic ghosts, surrounding you, will depict them in their faces to you, as in some kind of comedy. “The diseases of hell” (Ps. 114:3) will surround you, and mortal snares will warn you. At that hour you will truly recognize your madness and, repenting, you will begin to call on God, but He will not want to deliver you because of your belated repentance, just as He did not want to save Pharaoh from drowning. At your death, do not hope to be a tearful Magdalene, weeping at the feet of Christ and receiving forgiveness, if throughout your life you were a bitter Pharaoh. You say: the thief confessed at his death: “Remember me, Lord,” he said (Luke 23:42), and was saved. And others did not die, bringing their repentance to God at their death. Well you say, but tell me with proof, will you get what they got? An untimely, sudden death will come to you, which you do not expect, and will you then find time to repent? It happens that even at death someone finds time for repentance, but few people, only a few: perhaps only those who in their life, although sinful, had some good deeds worthy of remembrance and the mercy of God, as is told about the thief. When the Most Pure Mother of God, with Her Son Christ the Lord, fleeing from Herod, was going to Egypt, then somewhere in desert places robbers attacked them and wanted to take away the donkey on which they were carrying some of their necessary things, and sometimes the Mother and Child were also riding. And then one of those robbers saw