О девстве

Our best adviser, the Apostle Paul, teaches us all about virginity and spiritual holiness. He considers the degree of virginity to be the most perfect and highest in the whole world. He who has a wife, says the apostle, has concern “how to please his wife”; and those living in virginity always have one concern for themselves, “how to please the Lord” (1 Cor. 7:32-33). The first care leads to torment, and the last to eternal life. Blessed is the man who cares to please the Lord and to keep his body clean, in order to become a holy and undefiled church of Christ the King. By your own free will, have you already become a church, man? - So be attentive to yourself day and night, so that the church that you have acquired into your power does not become corrupted. You yourself, by your own thought and freedom, not by force, but by zeal, became the church of God. You yourself, who have become a man of the Most High God, clearly know that the Spirit of God lives in the church, if it is pure and sanctifies itself in order to be beneficial to its Master. Listen to me, my sincere brother, and write the words of my evilness on your heart. Gird yourself with sincere faith, hope and love, and stand on guard like a strong one, protecting the church of God from all unclean thoughts. Become an eye, constantly watching and looking out for the evil robbers; and these robbers, as soon as they find someone weakened, absent-minded, they rush at him in order to corrupt his, pathetic, bodily church, so that it is no longer useful to the Master. So, be attentive to yourself, so that it does not turn out that you yourself are receiving the robbers of the evil one. Do you understand, brother, who these evil robbers and murderers are? These are unclean thoughts, evil wishes, irritability and inner turmoil, anger and quarrels, and slavery to passions. Here are the shameless and evil robbers who never stop robbing, who are not satisfied with their wickedness, and those who are defeated incessantly attack again. The root of lust is shameless. If you cut it every day, then it vegetates (germinates) every hour. Tear out, brother, the root of lust from your heart, so that it does not vegetate and grow hourly. Although you cut it thousands of times, it will regenerate twice as many times until you completely tear out its roots. Strive unceasingly so that you may become an undefiled and undefiled church of God. If you decorate your church to God, then the Holy God himself will give you a delightful paradise for your repose for victory over passions and unclean thoughts. Be the guardian of your holy church, so that it may be splendid and pleasing to God. So, be attentive to yourself, so that instead of the Holy and Most Pure Lord you do not introduce a nasty enemy into your church, so that your church is not corrupted by the shamelessness of this enemy, a hater of good. He is shameless, stubborn in his intention; You repeatedly kick him out with reproach, but he shamelessly tries to enter. If you bring him into your bodily church, the Most Pure and Holy God is not to blame. It was not He who abandoned you, but you who drove Him away; you brought in the bad, you lost the Holy; hated the Tsar, loved the tormentor; moved away from the Source of life, stuck to the dirt; You have deprived yourself of the Light, you are in communion with darkness, and out of your laziness you have given yourself over to the enemy and the bad. The Holy God deigned to dwell in your church forever, but you upset the good Lord, the Lord inexhaustible in mercies, who wants to give you His Kingdom. God dwells in the body of those who have become immaculate and pure churches. If you wish for God to dwell in your body always, all the days that you live on earth, then the Holy God Himself will dwell you in His paradise, in incomparable light, in immortal life, forever and ever and with great joy will rest you there. Of course, you have heard, even read, that one day in the light of the Kingdom of God is the same as thousands of years in this age. Open your heart, brother, decide to desire God all the days of your life. To desire God is constant delight and enlightenment, constant joy. If you always desire Him, He will always dwell in you. God is a jealous God, God is Most Pure and Holy, He dwells in the souls of those who fear Him and fulfills the will of those who love Him. Do you want to be a holy and immaculate church of God? Always have the image of God in your heart. By the image of God I do not mean an image with paints on wood or anything else, but that image of God that is constantly and purely painted in the soul through good deeds, fasting, vigils, success in goodness, abstinence, and prayers; and the colors for (the image in the heart) of this heavenly Master’s image are prosperity, pure thoughts, the removal of everything earthly, also meekness and an honest life. Both in the world and in the ascetic life, no one gets married without a struggle; without struggle, no one can receive an unfading crown and eternal life, for real life is always like a race. Perfect warriors, of their own accord (will), without excuses, appear in the field themselves, while timid and pampered ones, due to their pampering, always avoid fighting. Perfect fighters and abstinent ascetics have a sweet paradise before their eyes, expecting to enjoy its benefits in eternal light and immortal life. Do you want to be in the fight and be perfect? – Always be clothed in virtue as in clothing! Have you put on virtue? – Constantly make an effort not to let go of it! Be afraid of wine, lest it overcome you and you become naked of virtues, as the ancient righteous man was naked. Do you know the power of wine? If not, listen, I'll tell you. Noah was a righteous, holy, (most) noble man in that generation (Israel) who corrupted himself. Noah was even honored to hear from God verbs and praise of his piety, because God said to him: “I have seen the only one righteous before Me in this corrupt generation” (Gen. 7:1). But this same righteous man, having overcome the flood of water, fell asleep and was overcome by miserable wine. The immense waters did not overcome him, and in a dream the worthless wine exposed the body of the righteous man, who again became the patriarch of the clan. The same wine robbed righteous Lot in a dream, because the Tatski (robber) through his daughters stole from him (I give the beginning) an unnatural conception. So the wine did not spare the righteous and saints; will he not even overcome you, insignificant one? Be afraid of wine at all times, young man, because wine never spares the body and ignites the fire of evil desire in it. Do not relax your body with wine-like inflammation, so that evil thoughts and the worst thoughts do not attack you. Although you will keep yourself from bodily communication, you will participate in the matter with a bad thought, communing with the shadow and idol of the same sin. And if you are busy with this idol, this shadow and thought, whether talking about something or doing something, then every time you will repent, that is, you will, while creating, always destroy. The idols of sin constantly stand before the eyes of the mind; a person dreamily contemplates them, spreads (conducts) a conversation with them, enjoys the thought of them. His thoughts weaken, he is overcome invisibly, but he sins clearly. To every viewer he seems clearly filled with reverence, and he himself, perhaps, is tormented internally by his conscience, always regretting, constantly grieving at the fact that he has his conscience as an accuser. This is a common consequence of a bad wish. As soon as one commits sin, being carried away by it, sorrow follows in its wake. Outwardly a person shows a reverent face, but inwardly he has no boldness at all before God. Who will not shed tears, who will not cry, when in an instant the thought relaxes, and then the person arbitrarily sins before God and drives away the heavenly gift from himself, I mean shrines, as well as virginity? As long as the physical church is holy and pure, the Most High God dwells in the church. But if the church is corrupted and desecrated, then the Holy and Most Pure Lord immediately leaves the church, and in the place of the holy and heavenly light the evil one enters and settles there, and with him comes evil, always frantic lust. Who cannot accept all this into his heart without tears, namely: that the Holy God left the church - and a bad desire took possession of him? If anyone understands all this, that is: Whoever left a person, where a person fell from and with what he was separated, will never be satisfied with tears and sighs. If someone overcomes laziness during a feat, and meanwhile sees that another has won a victory in the same feat, that the winner is wearing a crown and with a reward, and everyone around praises the winner - as soon, I say, he who has fled from the feat sees this - he is immediately overcome by terrible repentance; He torments himself with great sorrow and says to himself: “Why did I, in an instant, defeated by thought, flee from the struggle? And I see others as victorious!.. They accomplished the feat with great glory and the greatest praise, and I, having fled from the struggle, will hide in shame.” So on the day of retribution, when the lazy and sinners see there that some righteous and saints with great joy are already in paradise, others in the Kingdom, others in the light are carried on the clouds, and they themselves, the poor, are in unquenchable fire and in total darkness - then they will fall into terrible repentance and useless crying. Therefore, I beg you, my brother, always be an imitator of the perfect fathers, who became holy and immaculate churches of the Most Pure Lord. Follow in the footsteps of the holy fathers, who lived their lives in pure virginity, in honest deeds, in prayer and fasting. Love asceticism, love prayer, which is a conversation with the Lord. Every holy and pure prayer is a conversation with the Lord; the prayer of the perfect, who longed for God, with great joy and much boldness directly ascends into heaven itself. The Angels and Archangels admire her and present her to the Throne of the Holy and Exalted Master of all. Then there is joy when the prayers of the righteous who love God are brought to the Lord. So, try, brother, to become an imitator of the life and virtue of the reverend fathers; follow the path of their life, strive as they do, strive with your mind, strive with your spirit, strive with your body; be an ascetic in clothing, be an ascetic in food, be an ascetic in language, be an ascetic in your gaze, be an ascetic in thought, be an ascetic in laughter, so that you may be perfect in everything. Be attentive to yourself so as not to be distracted during prayer. When you stand in prayer before God, stand before Him with fear and trembling. All around, cut off from your heart thoughts and concerns about everything earthly. At the hour of prayer, be entirely a Heavenly Angel and make every effort so that your prayer is holy, pure, undefiled, so that the heavenly enemies see it, and the Angels and Archangels, welcoming it, greet it with joy and bring it to the holy and exalted Throne of the Most Pure Lord. So, at the hour of prayer, always prostrate yourself before God, like the Cherubim and Seraphim. Reflect, brother, on these words, repeat them with fear and joy. They deliver spiritual food to the soul, delight it in the sorrows of a vain life and relieve it from the burden of caring for earthly things. Hasten to observe everything that you have heard, always rest God in your mind, so that you may be found to have boldness in that terrible and trembling hour when Christ comes to reward everyone according to his deeds. To him be glory and power forever and ever! Amen. You might be interested in: