Arise, sleep... (Collected patristic writings)

"And rise from the dead, and Christ will illuminate you" (Eph. 5:14) A collection of patristic writings aimed at encouraging a person from the sleep of sin to wakefulness in Christ Holy Mount Athos Second Edition The state of a person who is in sin and careless about his salvation is likened in the word of God to a dream. - And just as a sleeping person does not see anything that is around him, does not hear the talk around what is happening and does not feel danger if any threatens him: so a careless sinner does not see with his mind either the structure that is in him, or the structure of spiritual things that are around him, or the bitter fate that he is preparing for himself with his bad life and which is ready to befall him at any moment. Everything spiritual does not seem to concern him: he sleeps for him. He sleeps: and who will awaken him? The man-loving God disturbs the sleeping sinner in many ways so that he comes to his senses, opens his eyes, and comes to his senses: he disturbs with His Divine word - Prophetic and Apostolic, he disturbs with the voice of conscience, which sounds and worries in the heart, he disturbs with various external events that happen to the sinner himself or to his neighbors. Appeals are extended from everywhere to the fearless and careless sinner: “Arise, sleep, arise!” Why write it off!” When, God willing, someone will hear such an appeal and heed it; then the first effect of this understanding is revealed by the fact that the sinner thinks about himself, thinks and begins to reason within himself: “What can we finally do? Stay like this, woe. Shouldn’t you give up your indecent affairs?” The minute at which such troubling questions arise is very precious in the lot of a sinner. This begins his movement towards conversion. That such thoughts were born is the grace of the Lord. Now the sinner must take charge of himself and persuade his soul to finally leave the self-pleasing life and begin to work to please God for his eternal salvation. It seems that anyone could persuade his soul. But in reality this is not the case. The unlearned, due to his lack of learning, cannot select strong speeches, but the learned, due to his great learning, is filled with speeches that have a completely different tone and structure than what is required when persuading the soul. Which, by the way, is why it happens that not everyone who thinks about himself turns to God: but he thinks and thinks, and again falls into the old sinful ways of life. To help both oneself and others in persuading the soul, a collection of patristic writings is being compiled, which are aimed at admonishing the sinner and turning him onto the right path. The Holy Fathers deliberately entered into the sinful state of man and depicted his misery in detail with amazing clarity in order to lead the sinner to an understanding of the danger of his situation and thereby arouse in him zeal for saving himself from threatening destruction. Having been cleansed of sins, they were vividly aware of all the evil that sin causes to a person; That’s why they described him with a strong and effective word. No one else can do this with such success. And the sinner himself is dissatisfied, perhaps because he himself is still in sin. On this basis, it was considered more appropriate for the purpose not to compose thoughts of our own, but to offer patristic exhortations, for which, moreover, access to the soul is already prepared in advance by the high dignity of the persons from whom they extend to us, and the effect on the heart is promised by the power of anointing, penetrating the patristic writings. We begin this collection with the writings of St. Tikhon of Zadonsk. It will be followed by extracts from the writings of St. Ephraim the Syrian, St. John Chrysostom, Basil the Great, Gregory the Theologian, Macarius the Great, St. Dmitry of Rostov and others. A large proportion is borrowed from St. Tikhon, St. Ephraim the Syrian, and St. Chrysostom, because they more often addressed this in their writings and depicted in more detail the state of the sinner and the need for repentance. The articles themselves are not arranged according to any specific plan, in the belief that the plan needed in the matter of knowledge, in the matter of softening the heart, is unnecessary, and sometimes does not so much benefit as harm, diverting attention from the essence of the matter to the form. No one can definitely say what word influences the heart to direct it there. Offer a lot and different things - something will catch your fancy. We accompany this collection with sincere goodwill, may it serve to admonish sinners like us and help them turn to the path of repentance and Christian living. It happens that a man excites a lazy man and tells him this: get up, it’s time to go to work! Thus, the saving power of God's grace awakens a Christian who is lazy and careless about his salvation: arise and go to the work to which the Lord has called you. Every sinner who is careless and unrepentant lies down and does not work out his own salvation with fear and trembling: he does not labor in the grapes of the Lord (Phil. 3:12; Matt. 20:1, 21:33). There lies a fornicator and an adulterer; lies a thief, a predator and a robber; lies angry and misanthropic; lies the slanderer, the scolder, the slanderer and the one who humiliates his neighbor, and with his tongue he strikes someone like an instrument; lies a drunkard and a sensualist; in short, every sinner is faulty and unrepentant. The grace of God comes to everyone like this and strikes him, and says to him: Arise! It’s time to go to the work of the Lord, it’s time to repent, it’s time to work in the cause of salvation. Arise! Time is running out and will not return; your life is shortened, death comes unexpectedly: Satan, like a cunning thief, steals your salvation. Rise up and shake the sleep from your eyes! Arise from sleep and rise from the dead, and Christ will illuminate you (Eph. 5:14). - Get up! God, like a gracious and merciful Father, like a prodigal son, is waiting for you to come to Him. When you return to breathe, then you will be saved and understand where you were (Isa. 30:15). Arise! Christ the Lord suffered and died for you; the blood of Christ was shed for you; Not with silver or gold, not at any other price, but with the dearest blood of Christ, salvation has been found for you. Do you want to lose such a dear treasure through negligence, and throw yourself into the hands of the devil, and into eternal torment, from which Christ delivered you with His blood? Remember that the death and blood of Christ does not benefit the unrepentant sinner; like medicine for a patient who does not take care of himself. Arise! Behold, the Lord threatens execution on the wicked and lawless: let not execution befall you too. If they hide themselves in hell, then my hand will tear it out from there; and if they ascend into heaven, then I will cast them down from there. And if they hide on the verge of Carmel, then I will seek and take away from there, and if they plunge before My sight into the depths of the sea, then I will command the serpent there, and I will bite; And if they go into captivity before their enemies, there I will command arms and slay them: and I will fix My eyes on them for evil and not for good (Am. 9:2-4). If you do not turn, he will cleanse his weapon, his bow, and his preparation; and in it he prepared the vessels of death, he made his arrows burnt (Ps. 7:13-14). Their blood shall be poured out like dust, and their flesh like linen; and their silver and their gold will not be able to take them away on the day of the wrath of the Lord, and the whole earth will be consumed by the fire of His zeal (Zeph. 1:17–18). Poor man! Repent and escape God’s execution. The rebuke of God is not in vain; will come true when sinners do not repent. Arise! Your life is shortened, and every day a certain part of it is taken away; and death comes, and like a quick messenger, it will come to you; and she is already closer to you today than she was yesterday and the day before; and whatever he finds you wearing, he will send you wearing it for the next century. Beware, so that you are not caught in unrepentance and failure! She comes unexpectedly, like a thief; and then delights people when they don’t like it; and in a way that is not expected. Beware, and expect it every day and hour; and rise up, be sober, stay awake, and be what you want to be at her hour. Remember, where are those who lived in sins, and in luxuries, in voluptuousness, in the gaiety of the world, in honor, glory, wealth? They died; departed from them and their lands; and they are in their places and awaiting the world judgment of Christ. Arise! Behold, Christ the Lord will come to judgment, and will call everyone to His judgment, so that everyone may receive what they have done with their body, whether good or evil (2 Cor. 5:10). Hang yourself to this judgment, and repay the word for every deed, word and thought that is contrary to God. There all people will be divided into two parts, and some will stand on the right side of the Judge, and others on the left. They will hear from the righteous Judge: Come, blessed of My Father, inherit the kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world. These will hear: Depart from Me, cursed into everlasting fire prepared for the devil and his angel (Matthew 25:34–41). Blessed are those who hear: come! The damned and the poor, to whom it will be said: go away from Me! Arise, poor sinner! And work out your salvation with fear and trembling, so that you may then be considered worthy to be among the blessed. Arise! Eternal torment awaits careless and unrepentant sinners! What can you expect if you do not rise up and repent with contrition of heart? Now to every one who repents, God’s mercy is promised and done: then all mercy will cease; then the spoken word will be heard: child! Remember that you perceived good things in your belly (Luke 16:5)! You too will hear this word; you will suffer endlessly; you will always die; You will burn, and you will never be consumed; You will taste eternal sorrows - death. The fire that torments you will not go out, the worm that eats you will not die unless you repent. Rise up, repent, and turn with weeping and tears to the Lord your God, may he have mercy on you, so that you do not fall into endless evil. Arise! Here, to the righteous, saints and all sinners, the contrite-hearted who repent, are promised from God eternal life, eternal joy and eternal bliss! They will be with God forever; they will see God face to face, and enjoy it like sweet drink forever; They will be comforted forever, they will rejoice and rejoice forever; As a king and a lord, they will reign forever. – No sinner will enter into eternal life unless he is washed and cleansed by contrition of heart and hot tears, unless by faith he makes his garments white in the blood of Lambs (Rev. 7:14). For outside are dogs, and sorcerers, and fornicators, and murderers, and idolaters, and everyone who loves and commits lies (Rev. 22:1). Arise, then, and repent and work in the cause of your salvation, so that you do not lose this bliss! Today, if you hear His voice, do not harden your hearts, as in anger, in the days of temptation in the wilderness: when your Fathers tempted Me, you tempted Me and saw My works. Forty years of the indignant generation of that generation also said: they always err in their hearts, not knowing My ways: for they swore in My wrath, if they entered into My rest (Ps. 95:8-11). We earnestly pray that you do not receive the grace of God in vain. The verb is: in time of pleasure I listened to you, and on the day of salvation I helped you. Now is the time favorable! Behold, now is the day of salvation (2 Cor. 6:1–2). Christ calls the sinful soul to himself Why did you, man, leave me? Why did you turn away from your Beloved? Why did you again stick to My enemy? Remember, for your sake, I came down from heaven. Remember, for your sake the flesh was born. Remember that for your sake I was born of a Virgin. Remember, for the sake of your infancy. Remember, for your sake I humbled myself. Remember, for the sake of poverty you have suffered. Remember, for your sake the earth died. Remember that I endured persecution for your sake. Remember that for your sake slander, reproach, cursing, dishonor, wounds, spitting, strangulation, ridicule, reproachful passions have been accepted. Remember, for your sake I was imputed with the lawless. Remember that for your sake I died a blasphemous death. Remember that I was buried for your sake. He came down from heaven to take you to heaven. I humble myself in order to exalt you. I became poor in order to enrich you. We were dishonored in order to glorify you. I am vulnerable so that I can heal you. Died to revive you. You sinned, and I took your sin upon myself. You are to blame, but I accepted the execution. You are a debtor, and I have paid the debt. You are condemned to death, but I died for you. To this My love, My mercy attracted Me. I could not bear for you to suffer such misfortune. Do you despise this love of mine? - Instead of love, you reward hatred. You love sin instead of Me. Instead of working with your passions. But what did you find in Me worthy of disgust? Why don’t you want to come to Me? – Do you want good for yourself? Every good thing is with Me. Do you want bliss? All bliss is mine. Do you want beauty? What is redder than Me? Do you want nobility? What is nobler than the Son of God and the Virgin? Do you want heights? What is more glorious than Me? Do you want wealth? I have all kinds of wealth. Do you want wisdom? I am the wisdom of God. Do you want friendship? Who is more kind and loving than Me, who laid down his life for everyone? Are you looking for help? Who will help besides Me? Are you looking for a doctor? Who will heal besides Me? Are you looking for fun? Who will amuse you besides Me? Do you seek consolation in sorrow? Who will comfort you besides Me? Are you looking for peace? With Me you will find peace for your soul. Are you looking for peace? I am peace of mind. Are you looking for life? I have the source of life. Are you looking for light? I am the light of the world. Are you looking for the truth? I am the truth. Are you looking for a way? There is a way. Are you looking for a leader to heaven? I am a faithful leader. Why, why don’t you want to come to Me? Don't you dare start? Who is the most convenient attack? Are you afraid to ask? Whom did I refuse with faith? Do sins keep you out? I died for sinners. Does the multitude of sins bother you? I have more mercy. Come to Me, all you who labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest (Matthew 11:28). Brief moralizing words 1. About testing yourself Tempt yourselves, if you are in faith, tempt yourself (2 Cor. 13:5). God bless! We are all called Christians; we all confess one Trihypostatic God, the living and immortal God: we were all baptized in the name of the Holy and Consubstantial Trinity, Father and Son and Holy Spirit; We all believe in Jesus Christ, the Son of God, crucified and risen from the dead, and showing the sign of That, we signify ourselves with the cross: we all enter the holy church, and pray, and call, sing and praise the holy name of God; We all listen to God’s holy word; We all partake of the holy and life-giving Mysteries of Christ; We are all called to eternal life and the kingdom of heaven, and we say in the Holy Symbol: the tea of ​​the resurrection of the dead and the life of the next century. Thank God for all this and more! Truly glorious and magnificent are the essence of the sacraments of Christianity: great and glorious to be a Christian. - But let us look around and tempt ourselves, are we truly Christians, according to the apostolic admonition: tempt yourself, if you are in the faith? - Without faith, a Christian cannot be. We show signs of Christianity, as stated above: but do we have true Christianity within ourselves? Everything external without the internal is nothing, and external signs without the truth itself are lies and hypocrisy. We all boast in faith, but do we do works consistent with faith, as the Apostle says to everyone: show me your faith by your works (James 2:18). We are called Christians from Christ, but have we crucified the flesh with passions and lusts, as befits Christians who believe in the crucified Christ, as the Apostle says: those who are Christ’s have crucified the flesh with passions and lusts (Gal. 5:24), and do we feel within ourselves the spiritual joyful anointing of oil (1 John 2:27)? We believe the Gospel, but do we live worthy of the Gospel? We confess and call on the true God, but do we please Him with faith and a clear conscience, which He requires of us? We listen to God's holy word, but do we heed it and correct ourselves according to its rule? We partake of the holy and life-giving mysteries of the Body and Blood of Christ, but are we renewed from holy communion, and do we grow into a spiritual, new person? Let us consider this and the rest and look at how we live, how we address ourselves, how we think, how we speak, how we act, how we address ourselves with our hearts before the Lord who sees everything, and how we treat each other; and having considered this, let us correct ourselves, so that we may be Christians not only in name, but also in truth. – We have become Christians by the grace of God: we strive to have true Christianity within ourselves. We were baptized into one Trinitarian God, and received the gift of holiness and justification: let us strive to preserve that heavenly treasure to the end. We believe in the crucified Jesus Christ: let us strive by faith to follow Him, and take up every cross to follow Him. We confess and call on the heavenly God; let us strive and please Him with heavenly morals. We listen to God's word; let us sweat and live as it teaches us. We hope for the resurrection of the dead and the life of the next century: let us strive and turn in this world worthy of the resurrection of the dead and the life of the next century, and turning away from the vanity of this world, strive for the same eternal blessings. Let us begin the holy and heavenly meal of the mysteries of Christ: let us sweat, so that this heavenly and life-giving bread may turn into life, sanctification, enlightenment, renewal, joy and spiritual consolation. Thus, let us show our faith through works, so that we will be Christians not only in name, but also in reality. - God! Be gracious to us and bless us, make Thy face shine upon us, and have mercy on us: let us know Thy way on earth; Thy salvation is in all nations (Ps. 66:2-3). He who has faith and is baptized will be saved (Mark 16:16) Our Lord our Savior spoke this word for our confirmation and consolation. – What is more comforting for a faithful and baptized soul than this word, which promises it eternal salvation? - Beloved Christians! Glory to God! And we believe in the Gospel and are enlightened by the saints of baptism. But let us see the power of holy baptism, and we will see that we were before baptism, and that after baptism we were created. Let us receive living consolation from there. Through holy baptism we were delivered from all calamity, and we received all true bliss through the grace of God. Before baptism we were removed from God, but through baptism we came closer to God. Before baptism we were enemies of God: but through baptism we were reconciled to God and God was reconciled to us. Before baptism we were children of the wrath of God: but through baptism vessels of God's mercy were created. Before the baptism we were children of darkness and children of the devil: but by baptism we were created children of light and children of God. Before baptism we were defiled by sins: but through baptism we were washed, sanctified, and justified. Before baptism we were lost; but through baptism we were made saved. Before baptism, the doors to eternal life and the heavenly kingdom were closed to us; but through baptism they were opened, and those who guard the grace of holy baptism without restraint enter in. We receive these and other blessings of God through holy baptism—we receive tuna without any of our merits from His sole love for mankind. What can a dead person deserve? - Glory to the goodness of God, glory to His love for mankind, glory to His mercy, glory to His bounty! Blessed be the name of the Lord from now on and forever! – Our Only Begotten Son of God Jesus Christ, our Savior, deserved this entire highest mercy of God with His dearest blood and death. Beloved Christians! Let us remember holy baptism, and let us examine whether we live worthy of holy baptism, lest that very baptism lead to greater condemnation on the day of the Last Judgment of Christ, where every word, deed, and thought that is criminal is judged. 3. About our denials and vows at baptism Holy baptism is like a door through which those being baptized enter the holy church, and become household members of God and cohabitants of the saints: but not simply, but before baptism there are negations and vows. We then renounced Satan and all his evil deeds. – Satan is a crafty and evil spirit; He was created good by God, but with his like-minded people he departed from Him, and so from light he became dark, and from good he became evil and evil. His deeds are: idolatry, pride, deceit, lies, flattery, cunning, envy, malice, theft, adultery, fornication, all uncleanness, slander, blasphemy and every sin: for he is the inventor of sin; He deceived our first parents in paradise, and led them to sin and apostasy from God. – We deny this evil spirit and all its evil deeds before baptism. – We renounce all the vanity, pride and pomp of this world, as if we have been known and renewed to eternal life. – We promise to serve Christ, the Son of God, with the Father and the Holy Spirit, with faith and truth, and to follow His footsteps. This is the covenant between God and us. We, having renounced Satan, promise to serve God and be faithful to Him: God accepts us in His highest mercy, and promises us the inheritance of eternal life and the kingdom, and washes, sanctifies and justifies us with the sins of those defiled by the bath of baptism, just as the priest greets everyone who is baptized: you have been washed, you have been sanctified, you have been justified (1 Cor. 6:11). Beloved Christians! Let us remember the denial and these vows, and take a look at whether we are keeping them: for it is hard for God to lie, and it is very dangerous to be false before Him. Let us therefore look around to see if anyone has turned from us back to Satan, and has not denied Christ and forsaken Him; Let's look around which part we are in, Satan's or Christ's. “Whose will he fulfills, he works for him, he belongs to him.” Christ is denied not only by those who deny His holy name and do not confess Him as the Son of God and their Savior, but also by those who unscrupulously and fearlessly violate His holy commandments. This is the apostolic teaching; The Apostle says: They confess God, but His works are averted (Titus 1:16). We see that people will avenge themselves by deeds, and not just by the mouth of God. If anyone commits fornication and commits adultery, Christ will be avenged. Is anyone angry at his neighbor and is looking for ways to harm him: he has fallen behind Christ. Does anyone steal, kidnap and take away goods from his neighbor: he has retreated from Christ. Does anyone deceive and deceive his neighbor: he is no longer with Christ, but in all these he obeys the enemy of salvation; and so he is not worth his promises, which he promised to God, and so he lied to God. Let us then, beloved, consider our conscience and life, to which part do we belong, Christ’s or His enemy, good or evil, to the saved or to the perishing? He who is not with Christ is adversary to Christ; For Christ himself says: What is not with Me is on Me (Matthew 12:30). Beloved, let us beware, and we will be with Christ here in this world, just as we were promised at baptism; We will be here with Christ, and in the next century we will be with Christ, according to His false promise: where I am, my servant will also be (John 12:26). Let us serve Him here, as our King and God, so that on the day of judgment He will recognize us as His servants, and count us among His faithful servants, and open the doors of eternal joy to us. 4. About the misfortune of a Christian who, after holy baptism, is lawless If a true parable happened to them: the dog returns to his vomit, and the pig washed himself in the pot (2 Peter 2:22) It is impossible to sufficiently describe and mourn the disastrous state of that Christian who, after holy baptism, indulged in lawless deeds, and is committing lawlessness. He is deprived of all that bliss, which he was granted by the grace of God in baptism, and he voluntarily plunges himself into the calamity from which he was delivered; or else you end up in a greater disaster. For he knew the truth, but did not want to live in it; knew God, but did not want to honor Him; knew the path leading to eternal bliss, but did not want to follow it; promised to work to God, but lied to Him about that. He was washed, he was sanctified, he was justified, but he decided on all this; became a child of God, but lost that glorious nobility; became the heir to the eternal life and kingdom, but he destroyed that inheritance. And this is what the Apostle says about such: it would be better for them not to know the way of righteousness, than for those who have known to turn back from the holy commandment handed down to them (2 Peter 2:21). You see, Christians, what a disaster it is for a lawless Christian. It is innocent now, but not with the eyes of the body, but with the eyes of the soul; but then it will appear when our secret and obvious deeds come to be revealed to the whole world, that is, at the second coming of Christ. Then such a poor Christian will know and see his great misfortune and destruction. Truly, many tears and weeping are necessary to mourn such a Christian’s condition. Just as someone who has been washed in a bathhouse is again soiled with dirt and feces: so a Christian who has been washed in the bath of baptism is also desecrated by lawlessness. Just as one who is dressed in purple and clean linen from foul rags again takes off that beautiful robe and puts on that vile rags: this is what everyone does who, after holy baptism, commits lawlessness. For this one too, out of the rags of sin, put on the robe of Christ’s justification, but having rejected that beautiful robe, he again put on the rags of sin. As one comes from darkness into the light, and again turns into darkness: so it happened to him who came from the darkness of sin into the light to Christ, the true light, but again turned into darkness. Just as one who is freed from work and captivity goes to freedom and returns to that bitter captivity: so the lawless Christian was delivered by the grace of Christ from bitter work and the captivity of the devil, but again he returned to disaster. It’s like a man taken out of a deep ditch and then falling into that ditch: so a lawless Christian was taken out of the ditch of eternal destruction, but again he willfully plunges himself into that ditch. A true parable happened to such a person: the dog returned to his vomit, and the pig washed himself in the pot. To this disastrous state belong: 1) fornicators, adulterers and everyone who defiles themselves in some way; 2) thieves, predators, robbers, and somehow unjustly stealing someone else’s property; 3) people are evil and hurt their neighbor’s belly; 4) crafty people, cunning people, hypocrites and those who treat their neighbors flatteringly; 5) blasphemers, scolders and slanderers; 6) judges by rewards and gifts, and not by the power of the oath and truth; 7) merchants who sell a bad thing for a good one, and a cheap one for an expensive one, and a rotten one for a healthy one, and ask for a higher price for the goods than they are worth; 8) those who perform spells and those who call them into their homes (spiritualists); 9) everyone is against their conscience and fearlessly violating the law of God; To all such a true parable happened: the dog returned to his vomit, and the pig washed himself in the pot. Beloved Christians, washed in the bath of holy baptism! Let us examine ourselves to see if any of us have returned from Christ, and whether we have fallen into the above-described disastrous state. He who resists the law works for the devil, but already moves away from Christ. Woe to Christians who are lawless after holy baptism! It will be more tolerable for Sodom and Gomorrah on the day of judgment than for such Christians (Matthew 11:24). Poor Christian! Look around and beware, lest you be an eternal captive of the devil and destruction; their fire is not quenched, and their worm does not die. God! Have mercy on Your intelligent creation, created in Your image. Come to me, all you who labor and burdened, and I will give you rest (Matthew 11:28). For those who have sinned after holy baptism, one hope remains - true repentance. - Thank God for this, thank God! We haven't died yet. - Sinners! There is still hope, God’s bounty has not yet expired, repentance is still preached to sinners, the good news is still preached to the poor, the mercy of the Heavenly King is still published everywhere, the doors of mercy are not yet closed, the grace of God is still open to all, sinners who repent are still saved, and tax collectors and fornicators, cleansed by repentance, enter the kingdom of God, God is still merciful to all who turn away. He calls to himself, and expects, and promises mercy, even as a child-loving father, he receives prodigal sons from a distant land, and opens the doors of his house to them, and clothes them with the first clothes, and gives a ring to each hand, and boots on their feet, and commands his entire holy family to rejoice over them: Rejoice, angels, and all My chosen ones! Sinners turn to Me, men, My creation, created in My image and likeness, the lost are saved, the dead are quickened, and the corrupt are found. - Glory to His goodness, glory to His love for mankind, glory to His mercy, glory to His bounty! Poor sinners! Why do we also tarry in a distant land and not go to our Father? Why are we dying of hunger? Why are we filled with lawlessness, like faces? In our Father's house there is all abundance: even so the hired hand is filled to abundance. With great zeal and desire, our Father is waiting for us, and those returning to Him from afar will kindly see us, and will look at us with merciful eyes, and we will be dear to him, and so he will attack our neck, and will embrace us and kiss us with the kiss of his holy love, and will not reprimand us, and will not remember our sins and our iniquities: and all the holy angels will begin to rejoice and have fun over us. and His chosen ones. So, let us come to our senses, and having risen, let us go and hasten to our Father, and let everyone say to Him with humility and pity: Father! I have sinned in heaven and before You, and I am no longer worthy to be called Your son: make me as one of Your hired servants (Luke 15:18–19). Let us hasten, let us hasten, sinners, before time runs out, while the Father waits, until the doors of His holy house are shut. Let us repent while God’s mercy operates, so that we may not recognize God’s righteousness, eternal judgment. Man lies to die alone (Heb. 9:27). Death has the power to move a sinner to repentance. Death is known to us and unknown; known, because we will all die; unknown, because when, and how, and where we will die, we don’t know. The more we live, the more our life diminishes, and our days are shortened, and we approach death: and we are already closer to this day than we were yesterday, to this hour than to the past. Death follows everyone invisibly, and delights him when he does not care. Almost all people, and especially the healthy and strong, dream within themselves: I will still live, my death is not yet visible; I will collect and be satisfied with the collected benefits. But then death unexpectedly attacks him, and then all his dreams and thoughts perish. The one who promised himself life for a long time will soon die; leaves both the world and his body in the world (he) who wanted to collect and become rich. So the death is unknown to us, Christians. The philanthropic God, taking care of us, has laid down our unknown death for us, so that we will always be ready for it and remain in true repentance. With what a person leaves this world, he will appear with him at the judgment of Christ. Sinners! Let us diligently consider this word and repent, so that we may not go away with our sins into this age, and appear at that judgment. The merciful God promised to show us his grace and mercy, but he did not promise the morning. Let us heed this much more, let us awaken from sleep, and remembering our death, correct ourselves, and prepare ourselves for the outcome, so that we may die blissfully. Blessed are those who die in the Lord (Rev. 14:13). He who dies in repentance and faith and true prayer dies for the Lord. That hour is terrible for everyone; All the saints looked at that hour and cried, and thus they propitiated the man-loving God, so that he would deliver them at that hour. It is marvelous that the saints, looking at that hour, cry: but sinners do not cry, although all the days they see their dying brethren. Poor sinners! What are we dreaming about? Behold, the devil steals our salvation like a thief; Let us write the hour in our memory, and we will be ready; from this hour a person will either be eternally blessed or eternally miserable. Here the doors to eternity are opened for everyone - and he will go either to a happy or unhappy eternity. From that point a person begins to either live forever or die forever. Where are those who lived before us now, both in luxury and sweets and unrepentantly? - They have departed from this world, and have left all their successes and remain in their places, and are awaiting the final judgment, where they will fully accept them according to their deeds. For this reason, before the hour comes to us, let us turn with a pure heart to our God, and through repentance and faith we will be reconciled to Him, and we will receive eternal life. The holy Apostles exhort and pray to us about this in their writings: according to Christ we pray, as we pray to God, we pray according to Christ, be reconciled to God. For He who saw no sin, create sin for us, so that we may be the righteousness of God in Him (2 Cor. 5:20–21). I heard a voice from heaven saying: write Blessed are the dead who die in the Lord from now on. To her, says the Spirit, let them rest from their labors (Apoc. 14:13). Our life is like a path that we constantly walk from birth to death. Are we watching or sleeping, doing or resting? This path is constantly diminishing, and everyone is approaching his end. When we are born, we enter this path; and when we die, this path ends. And the more we live, the further we move away from the term of birth, and the more we approach the term of death. So, our life on earth is nothing more than a constant approach to death. This path is the longest for others, and the shortest for others. Some in infancy, others in adolescence, others in youth, others in manhood, and others graduate from it in old age. As we know that we began this path, we know that we are finishing it. But when we finish it, God’s Providence hid it from us, so that we would always expect the end of that, and would always strive to be what we want to be at our death. “For this reason,” says Saint Chrysostom, “God has decreed for us an unknown day of our death, so that for the sake of the unknown end of our life we ​​will always maintain ourselves in virtue?” 1 Both the time and the manner of death are unknown to us. We are all born in the same way; but we die diverse; and almost as many deaths as there are people. Some are drowned in water and end their lives, others are devoured by the earth, others are struck by thunder and leave this world, others are cut by the hands of robbers, others lie down and do not get up, others walk, others sit, others stand and fall breathless; many, weighed down with wine and sleep, will not awaken and will sleep until the general uprising; some in the arms of harlots, others in theft, robbery, murder, others in other iniquities are struck by God's righteous judgment. But what happens or has happened to others can happen to you and anyone else. They, whom such a death befell, did not expect this for themselves, however, they found out for themselves: so you too, although you do not hope, something similar can happen to you. For this reason, learn to be careful from someone else’s misfortune, and always prepare yourself for that hour by repentance, so that no matter what death finds you, it does not delight the unprepared. At death, everyone knows completely what opinion a healthy person should have about worldly things. Then everyone speaks righteously about wealth, honor, glory, and voluptuousness. Righteously, I say, he reasons that he admired them as in a dream, and that, like the dreams of a rebel, their image has passed away. For as he entered this world naked, so naked he shall come forth; does not take anything with him; everything worldly leaves to the world. Then he truly acknowledges with Solomon that vanity is vanity and all vanity (Eccl. 1:2). Although we often see our repentance later in others, the charming world blinds us so much that we don’t feel it until we find out for ourselves. Some people think of destroying old granaries and creating new ones in order to collect their lives, and cheerfully establish their souls after many years; but she doesn’t listen to God’s terrible voice: you’re crazy! This night they will take your soul from you: what have you prepared for whom? (Luke 12:20). He expands another land, fatherland, and chambers: but he does not see that one coffin of three arshins in the ground is being prepared for him, but even that, perhaps, he will not be worthy of; for either the belly of an animal, or the depths of the sea, or something else can be a grave. Another tries, as it were, to rise to the heights of honor and glory; but does not notice that the equally glorious, dignified and vile are consigned to the earth. Another fattens his body; but he does not see that he is preparing large amounts of food for worms. But it is not in such plans that the end befalls everyone, and thus all his thoughts perish (Ps. 146:4). He recognizes himself in the same circumstances in which he previously saw others. Then he himself will recognize everything as vanity, or as an obstacle to true bliss; then he repents, regrets that his mind was occupied in such vanities; then he himself righteously, but too late, talks about all this. When we are born, we do not feel how we are born, although we know that there is one image of birth for all; and when the first voice is born we let out tears (Wis. 7:3). But this is not how we die: then we feel how bitter death is; Then we will understand how difficult it is to separate the spirit from the flesh, the union of which was insensitive to us. We notice this mortal grief on those who, before our eyes, depart from us. We hear them sigh and groan heavily; We note how painfully they are ill, how difficult it is to break the union of soul and body, how a great feat rebels in the conscience against despair, since the unbearable fear of condemnation, the horror of Gehenna envelops us, and so on. Then reason, advice and wisdom become impoverished; one person remains, although we are many friends and relatives; He struggles alone in fierce battle, fighting against enemies, if the strong help of the merciful Jesus does not arrive. For the sake of this, those who are to come in such a case should fervently pray so that His help will come and deliver them from the sorrow that besets their brother. Just as there is a twofold kind of those who follow the path of this world, that is, the pious and the ungodly, so there is a twofold and different end, that is, a blessed and unfavorable one. Blessed is the end of the pious when they die in piety in the Lord, as a heavenly voice declares: blessed are the dead who die in the Lord! The unfortunate death is that of the wicked, who end their lives in wickedness without true repentance and living faith. For just as death is a rest from labors and a coming from a painful life to an eternal and joyful life, so after temporary death follows eternal death. Both are perceived by eternity, which has a beginning but no end; but eternity is unequal: those are blessed, containing all that is good; these are unfortunate, deplorable, most painful and containing everything evil. 8. About the Last Judgment of Christ Behold, I am coming quickly, and My reward is with Me, reward someone according to his deeds (Apoc. 22:12). Beloved Christians! I tremble and shake with fear, hearing and reasoning this word. Who says this? - God is great and terrible. What is he talking about? - That He Himself comes to judge the universe and reward everyone according to their deeds. Poor sinners! What do you think when you hear this word? God Himself comes to judge and reward you according to your deeds. You will be horrified to sin and commit iniquity: God Himself comes to judge you, He comes with power and much glory. - Have mercy, Lord, have mercy on Your creation: no one is sinless, except You alone. Terrible, beloved, is the day and hour in which God will judge sinners. Human judgment is terrible for us; but incomparably the most terrible judgment of God. At the human court, a person like us is judged; at this judgment, God himself judges. At a human court, witnesses accuse or acquit a person; there they are not needed, for the Judge Himself knows everything completely. In human judgment, persons are often accepted, and the rich are preferred to the poor, and the noble is preferred to the ignoble; there the Judge does not know persons, but judges according to conscience and deeds. In human court, people often help people to intercede with their own, such as the noble to the noble, the rich to the rich, to each other; It won’t happen there, but everyone will give an answer for themselves. In human judgment, silver and gold often protect a person, but there it will not be. In human judgment, eloquence and cunning often help a person, but there they become silent and numb. At the judgment of man, a man is convicted and judged before a few; there, before the whole world, a sinner will be convicted and judged. At the human court, only evil deeds are judged; at this court, people will give an answer for idle words (Matthew 12:36). If for an idle word they will be rewarded with an answer, which is what these people already expect for themselves, who defile their soul and body with uncleanness, these who shed the tears of widows and orphans, these who steal and steal other people's property, these who with their tongue, like a sword, cut and kill their neighbor, these who are cunning and deceive people; Why do other wicked people, who feed on wickedness like bread? Behold, I am coming quickly, and My reward is with Me, to reward everyone according to his deeds. Chosen race, Christians! We have seen the first coming of Christ our God, and we will also see the second, as He Himself promises: Behold, I am coming quickly. About the first, His holy prophets proclaimed to the world: Christ is coming, Christ is coming into the world, and He has come. About the second, (according to the word of Himself), church teachers proclaim to us: here comes, here comes Christ and peace - and He will unexpectedly appear! – His first coming was quiet and humble, the second will be quick and glorious: as lightning comes from the east and appears to the west; so will be the coming of the son of man (Matthew 24:27). In the first, the world saw Him suffering and dying for our sins: in the second, it will see Him sitting on the throne of His glory, judging the sins of men, and rewarding everyone according to their deeds. Now he says to sinners: repent! Then he will say: answer me. Now he calls sinners to himself: come to me; then he answers unrepentant sinners: go away from Me (Matthew 25:41). Where? Into eternal fire, prepared for the devil and his angels. Oh, what a terrible word this is! Poor sinners! That day has not yet come, the Judge is still patient with us, though no one will perish; still awaits our repentance, does not yet judge us, still shows mercy to everyone who repents and prays. Let us also repent, that we may receive mercy from Him, and be worthy to stand at His right hand at His coming, and hear from Him an all-favorable voice: Come, blessed of My Father, inherit the kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world (Matthew 25:34). I will expose you and present you before Your sins are in your face (Psalm 49:21). This word is also terrible, beloved! I will reprove you and bring your sins before your face. For this is also the word that the great God speaks. To whom? To the sinner, as it is written above in the same psalm: God speaks to the sinner. What is he talking about? That He will convict the sinner for all his sins, and will present all his lawless actions before his face. Where? At the universal disgrace, where all the holy angels will be, and from the beginning of the world to the end, all people who have lived will gather. At that world meeting, every sinner will be exposed, and unscrupulous and ungodly actions will appear to him, and will come to the whole world to be revealed. I will reprove you and bring your sins before your face. You, a sinner, did just that: if you saw the thief, you flowed with him and you shared your participation with the adulterer. Your lips multiply malice, and your tongue weaves more than flattery. You slandered your brother, and you set a temptation against your mother’s son (Ps. 49:18-20). Sinner! You destroy My law and turn back My words; and you think that all this will happen to you without punishment, and I will not exact it. Why anger the wicked God? Say in your heart: He will not seek (Psal. 9:34). No, no, it won’t be as you lawlessly dream and caress yourself. Whatever you do, I will punish you; and I will present all your lawless deeds, words, thoughts, undertakings, plans and deeds before you. Here you are a sinner, you thought and conceived this and that, did and said this and that, and so you destroyed My eternal and inviolable law, and despised and trampled on the words of My mouth, the words of the saints. I will reprove you and bring your sins before your face. - The fornicator and every defiler will be presented with all his nasty dreams, words, looks and deeds; where and when he committed them and with what person he mixed with uncleanness. The evil one will imagine who he harmed and with what, to whom and when he gave the dissolved cup of poison, and thus his stomach was either taken away or reduced; whom and before whom he dishonored with his slander, and was the cause of dishonor, reproach, reproach, ridicule, and sorrow. The thief and predator will see before him all his thieving deeds, secretly or openly, or flatteringly done; he will see where and what and from whom, or he brazenly stole, or treacherously misappropriated, or secretly stole. The lawless merchant will see what goods he shamelessly sold and deceived people, what rotten things he sold for healthy ones, and cheap ones for expensive ones, and sold some things for others; how much water he mixed into the wine, how many times and for what goods he demanded higher prices than it was worth, and so he acted shamelessly, and he honored his influx more vile than My commandment: do not steal. The blasphemer and scolder will be presented with all his blasphemies, which he belched against God, his Creator, and against His holy saints, and against other people who were in the likeness of God; and he will be exposed where and when and before whom he spoke those destructive words. The wicked boss will see his negligence about his subordinates, violence, bitterness of the people entrusted to him, and his other lawless deeds. A careless shepherd will see his neglect of the flock of Christ and his other sins. The bribe-taking judge will see the oaths and oaths of crime, and the trampling of the truth and the judgment of God, and other iniquities placed before him. A careless parent will see his negligence in raising his children, who are therefore corrupted and perished, and other temptations that he showed them before him. In a word, every sinner’s sins, which he secretly or openly committed, will appear with him and be presented to him. Your banquets, your masquerades, your dances, your dog hunts, and your other amusements will be presented to you, too, as if you turned your hearts away from the God whom you professed, and attached yourself to this vanity, and not to God and His kingdom, but to the delights of the world, you turned your desire, and in that you found your consolation and joy. Then, instead of past joy, you will see your present and eternal sorrow, sadness, illness - and sighing. I will reprove you and bring your sins before your face. Then every sinner will be convicted and hear: behold the man and his deeds... Every sinner who has not been cleansed by repentance will hear this... will hear and cover his shame and disgrace, and will be overcome with fear, trembling and horror. Then they will say to the mountains and the 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 save? ( Rev. 6:16–17 ). Poor sinners! That great day has not yet come, God still accepts repentance and forgives the sins of those who repent: let us turn to God with repentance and tears, and we will stop sinning, and with warm tears we will atone for our sins, so that he will not appear with us in this worldwide disgrace, and like fierce rivals will expose us. Cry, cry, sinful soul, be sick, sigh, for you have sinned against God. Ask, seek and talk, so that the Lord will open the doors of mercy for you. Everyone who asks receives, and everyone who seeks finds, and it will be opened to the one who interprets (Matthew 7:8). Glory to God, the lover of mankind, for this! And let all people cry, wake up, wake up! These go into eternal torment: but the righteous into eternal life (Matthew 25:46). Nothing moves a sinner to repentance more than eternity: and nothing is so useful to every Christian as memory and reasoning about eternity. Eternity keeps a person from sin, pacifies passions, turns him away from the world and all its vanity, crushes the heart, gives birth to tears of repentance, excites him to prayer and makes true heartfelt sighing. Eternity of reflection and memory can correct the most depraved. For eternity, meditation filled the deserts, dens, mountains and abysses of the earth with inhabitants. Reasoning for eternity, the holy martyrs deigned to endure the most severe torments rather than the will of wicked kings to submit and deny Christ. From the perspective of eternity, thieves, murderers, sinners, became the chosen saints of God. Glory to God’s love for mankind, for he opens the door to himself to all and the worst sinners. It is amazing that Christians of this century, hearing in the Holy Scriptures about eternity, nevertheless cleave to the vanity of this world, and seek honor, glory and wealth in this world, and create, and expand and decorate houses and other buildings, as if eternity did not exist. What makes them oblivious to eternity is that the charm of visible vanity darkens their hearts. Beloved Christians! Let us write eternity in our memory, and we will always be in constant true repentance, contrition of heart and prayer: and we will not be deceived by any of the vanities of this world, and we will turn away from every sin, like from a poisonous serpent. Everything that seems bright, favorable and dear to the sons of this age is disgusting to us. Let us truly be content with a grain of bread, and a little hut, and a robe of sackcloth. This contentment will create in us the memory and reasoning of eternity. There is a twofold eternity, the most prosperous and the most unfavorable. In a prosperous eternity there will be the kingdom of God, God will be seen face to face, there will be joy and joy unspeakable, the soul and body will receive their all-perfect bliss, and man will be honored with good things that no eye has seen, nor ear heard, nor has entered into the heart of man (1 Cor. 2:9). Then the righteous will shine like the sun in the kingdom of their Father (Matthew 13:43). In an unfavorable eternity, there will be deprivation and removal from God, all suffering in body and soul. Then people will wish to die, and death will flee from them: which is the second death and eternal death. Sinners! We hear eternity from the word of God, and we see that this eternity is twofold: a prosperous one, filled with joy and all good things: this is the eternal life, and an unprosperous one, filled with torment, sorrow, illness and all evils: this is eternal death. Let us repent, and wash away our sins with tears, so that we bow down to a troubled eternity, and enter into the eternal life and kingdom of God. According to the terrible judgment of Christ, everyone will go to their eternity. For then the Judge, Christ, will tell everyone a decent definition; He opens the doors of His kingdom to the righteous, and says to them: Come, blessed of My Father, inherit the kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world; He will say to sinners: Depart from me, cursed, into eternal fire, prepared for the devil and his angel. And these go into everlasting punishment, but the righteous into everlasting life (Matthew 25:34, 41, 46). Remember us too, Lord, when you come into Your kingdom. 11. About the first Christian cause There is only one thing that is needed (Luke 10:42). This word: “There is only one thing that is needed,” our Savior said to all of us, O Christians! Many Christians care and try about this or that, but often they themselves do not know what they are concerned about. Warning the Lord about this useless care and care, he says to everyone: there is only one thing that is needed. -What is it? Eternal Salvation. This is the first Christian work; This is what Christians should have as their primary concern. We need food, clothing, a home, etc., and everything proper to this life, just as we pray for this to the heavenly Father: give us this day our daily bread. But eternal salvation is so necessary that without it everything is nothing: what good is it to a person, even if he gains the whole world, but loses his soul (Matthew 16:26). There is no benefit, truly none, where there is no salvation. What good is it to us, even though we gain the whole world, but lose our soul? We take care of the temporary belly above all else: if we take care of the eternal belly more than the whole world, we must take care of it. Just as every person has his first job, such as: for a judge - to judge, for a farmer - to cultivate, for a merchant - to be a merchant, for a shepherd - to herd cattle, for a teacher - to teach, for a student - to study, etc., so for a Christian, the first job should be - God, Whom he professes and reveres, to please with faith and truth, and thus from Him to hope for eternal life and expect. This is the first Christian work, diligence and care. This is the only thing needed. Beloved Christians! We were created not for temporary, but for eternal life, by the word of God we were called to eternal life, Christ the Son of God came into the world, suffered and died for the sake of eternal life. You see how dearly God honored our eternal salvation. For this purpose He created everything: and for this purpose He Himself came into the world. Therefore, we too must have the utmost care and concern for this. Satan strives to capture this from us and destroy us forever: neither should we slumber, but take care of this priceless treasure. But we see and sigh that many Christians neglect this primary matter: fornicators, adulterers, and defilers neglect; blasphemers and scolders are negligent; drunkards and sensualists are careless; thieves, predators and robbers are careless; the deceitful, the cunning, and the hypocrite are negligent; slanderers and reproaches are negligent; All are careless, who do not please God, but the world, and please their own desires. All such and similar to them, the treasure of eternal salvation, through labor, illness, suffering and death on the cross - Christ the Son of God, are found for little, but they do not honor the One who suffered and died. For today's Christians, that is dear and great, in order to be in honor, in glory, in wealth, in luxury; but eternal salvation, like the last thing, is their work: to which such works will follow. Eternal salvation is only for need, according to the words of Christ: but here it is found or lost. It is gained through repentance and faith; it is destroyed by an unrepentant life. Hear, sinners, and you, blessed Christians! Eternal salvation is our only need, and here it is either gained or lost. Let us deepen this in our memory, beloved. Sinners! Let us remember our vows that we made to God at baptism, and repent, so that we may not appear lying before God; Let us remember the hour of death and repent, so that we may not leave this world without hope of salvation; Let us remember the terrible judgment of Christ, and repent, so that we will not appear there with our sins; Let us remember the sweetness of eternal life and the sorrow of eternal death, and let us turn to God and appease Him with tears and repentance, so that He may open for us the doors of mercy and His eternal kingdom. Lord, God of hosts, turn us and illuminate Your face and we will be saved. We see threats written in Holy Scripture with which God threatens unrepentant sinners with temporary and eternal execution. Just as a king, who cares about the good state of his state, publishes a useful decree and in the decree declares what his subjects should do and what not to do, and in the decree he also prescribes execution for lawbreakers: this and that will be the case for criminals of the law: so the Heavenly King, the Lord God, published his holy and righteous law to all people, so that they would live by the rule and correct themselves; and what He forbids, they avoided, and what He commands, they did, and to declare temporary and eternal punishment on transgressors of the law. Already the ax lies at the root of the tree: every tree that does not produce good fruit is cut down and thrown into the fire (Matthew 3:10). The fearful, and the unfaithful, and the abominable, and murderers, and those who commit fornication, and those who perform enchantments, idolaters, and all who lie, their portion will be in the lake that burns with fire and the bogeyman, which is the second death (Rev. 21:8). If you do not turn, he will cleanse your weapon, your bow will be strained and prepared, and the vessels of death will be prepared in it, your shot will be burnt (Ps. 7:13-14). He will rain nets on sinners: fire and blight and a stormy spirit are part of their cup (Ps. 10:6). Do not flatter yourselves; neither fornicators, nor idolaters, nor adulterers, nor defilers, nor fools, nor sodomites, nor the covetous, nor thieves, nor drunkards, nor molesters, nor extortioners, will inherit the kingdom of God (1 Cor. 6:9-10). This and other threats of God are terrible for us; but they show God’s great love for us. Nothing brings a sinner to repentance more than the threat of executions. Through the promise of good things, God calls us to himself and to eternal salvation; but through the threat of execution it excites, forces and convinces. For this reason, He threatens sinners, since He does not want to destroy them; For this reason He manifests His wrath, so that we would correct ourselves through the fear of it and escape eternal punishment. Even if the fear of an earthly king turns us away from much evil, how much more powerful is the fear of the Heavenly King to turn us away from all evil and to move us to repentance, if we often talk about His righteous anger against sin, and about His terrible threats. Truly, a person will be bound and contained by the fear of execution, like a rope, and will not be moved toward any evil. Truly, a sinner will not want to when, before his intelligent eyes, he sees the eternal fire prepared for sin. Truly, the memory of execution will not allow one to fall into execution, and the reasoning of Gehenna will not allow one to enter Gehenna. Truly we owe a lot to our God, beloved Christians, and for this His love for us is that He declared Gehenna and other plagues on us. The threat of execution moves us more toward repentance than the promise of good, as stated above. But open the ears of your souls, and listen to what I want to offer you. It is dangerous, very dangerous, to despise God’s threats and not repent and correct oneself. Know, and know without a doubt, that he who despises His threat will in fact incur God’s punishment. There is nothing more dangerous than to despise what God threatens. He who neglects Gehenna falls into Gehenna; He who despises that death will not escape eternal death. He who does not fear the wrath of God and does not repent will experience the wrath of God: our God is a giver of fire. It is terrible to fall into the hands of the living God. God cannot be mocked: whatever a man sows, that he will also reap. God is truly merciful and humane, but He is also righteous: He will reward everyone according to their deeds. Sinners, let us remember and confirm this word: it is dangerous to despise God’s threats. God threatened our first parents in paradise: you will surely die, and at that hour you will eat of the commanded tree (Gen. 2:17). The ancestors despised it and died. The wicked who were under Noah despised the threats of God and perished in the global flood; despised by the Sodomites and burned with fire. Even now sinners despise and perish. The wicked were drowned by the flood, who did not believe the righteous Noah’s preaching of repentance: what should the current wicked and scoffers and despisers of God’s law expect? They too will be plunged into the most terrible flood of eternal destruction. Fire burned the Sodomites from heaven for their vile uncleanness: what do fornicators and adulterers and other defilers expect now, except the fire of Gehenna, in which they will burn and not be consumed forever? Many Israelites were struck down in the desert for their iniquity, and did not reach the promised land. The same will happen to lawless Christians: they too will not be allowed into the kingdom of God. For all are dogs, and sorcerers, and fornicators, and murderers, and idolaters, and everyone who loves and commits lies (Rev. 22:15). And this is what the Lord says: unless you repent, you will all perish likewise (Luke 13:3). Sinners! Hear this word and repent! Temporary destruction is terrible, but eternal destruction is far more terrible. Let us fear destruction, and repent, and flee from it! The Ninevites were afraid of the next destruction, and repented, and did not fall into destruction, but received mercy from the man-loving God. Let us also turn with all our hearts to our God, and repent, and stop irritating Him with our sins, so that we may receive mercy from Him. 13. About eternal torment and eternal life Just as eternal bliss comes from temporary well-being, so eternal misfortune from temporary well-being is known and felt. There is no such great calamity in this world that does not have some consolation and relief. Poverty is boring; but receives consolation from the name of Christ and the mercy of good people. A cruel disease is painful; but cools himself with medicine, or something else. For great misfortune and misfortune, not only will one be deprived of honor, property, wife, children, but also be thrown into prison: however, such a distressed person, not without consolation, light and air, enjoys everything in common, although unequally, like free people; He cools himself with food and drink, forgets the boredom of sleeping, is comforted by visiting good people, and is nourished by the hope of freedom; It may be that he does not tolerate wounds and beatings; when he suffers unjustly, he rejoices in the hope of heavenly reward; when it is righteous, he humbles himself before God and admits sin, repents, and thus rejoices in the hope of God’s mercy, saying: It is good for me, for you have humbled me, so that I may learn by your justification (Ps. 119:71). Moreover, death will end everything. But how hard, how unbearable it is to lose that glory, before which all the glory of this world is collected like pus! To lose sight of that beautiful Face, Whose beauty, kindness and favor, the whole heart and whole spirit, transforms into desire and love; of which the blessed spirits from the beginning cannot be satisfied, and will forever be satisfied without satiety! They will reject the King of glory, Christ, Whose beauty surpasses the radiance of the sun, Whose sweetness, having tasted a little on the mountain, Saint Peter cried out: It is good for us to be here (Matthew 17:4). Move away from that beautiful city, heavenly Jerusalem, which does not require the sun and moon to shine in it; the glory of God enlighten him, and the Lamb is his lamp! ( Rev. 21:23 ). To be driven away from this glorious and sweet supper, at which from the beginning of the world to the end the calling and election of God will sing, rejoice, and shout for joy! To be alienated from the kind friendship of the blessed spirits and all the saints; moreover, to be numbered as dark and crafty spirits; to be imprisoned, uninvolved with the world; suffer without weakening in the fire of Gehenna, which burns but does not consume, torments but does not kill! Temporary disaster and suffering, as it is said, no matter how great it may be, is not without consolation; and no matter how long it continues, it ends with death: but this disaster and misfortune is endless! There will be no return to the glory of God; there will be no deliverance from the bonds of hell and fiery suffering; in a word: eternal despair of God’s mercy, eternal feeling of God’s righteous wrath. There the answer will be heard: remember that you received good things in your belly (Luke 16:25). Here people are running away from death, but there they will desire it and run away from them; They will want to turn into nothingness, but they will not be able to. And such will always die, but never die; and this is the second death. Green suffering is multiplied by the fact that the sufferer never has any hope of returning the good that he lost through negligence - and of freeing himself from the terrible evil into which he voluntarily fell. From this will follow great anguish, great fear and horror; conscience will arise, which throughout all eternity will denounce and gnaw at the sinner who so rejected God’s lofty grace, and so arbitrarily lost God’s highest mercy forever, and came to such a painful state. God, the Creator of heaven and earth, did not spare His Son for your sake, but handed Him over to death and cruel suffering, as the Gospel declared to you, and the church teachers taught; and God did this in order to save you from this trouble. But you despised this ineffable love of God; He left God for the sake of temporary small pleasure; fulfilled your own whims, and not the will of God, which wanted to save you; worked and pleased Satan, not Christ. Other people like you are now consoled, rejoice, and are filled with eternal blessings; They believed as much as ever, and by faith they followed Christ their Savior: but you rejected God’s advice and thus perished! How many times has God called you to repentance! How many preachers exhorted! You despised all that; You did not want to listen to God in your belly: God will not hear you now either! Do not expect anything more than this, in which you are in distress. You will always drink this cup of sorrow, but you will never drink it all. Repent now: but it is late and useless, when you did not want to repent usefully in the world. Moan, sigh, cry, sob; but it’s useless when you didn’t want to cry where tears were useful! There, the condemned person will be tormented, and like a worm, his conscience will gnaw endlessly, and illness will be added to illness, torment will be added to torment. In such cramped conditions and despair, nothing more will follow than that the condemned person will hate himself, be angry with himself, freeze, abhor himself, condemn himself, condemn himself, curse the hour of conception and the hour of birth; curse the time in which you sinned; curse the cases that led to sin; curse those persons who gave rise to sin; remember those who warned against sin. O eternity, eternity, ill-fated eternity! How your very memory terrifies our spirit! How much the spirit of the meditating blessed one amuses and delights, how much does ill-fated eternity lead to sadness and fear. It is impossible to think about this last thing without sighing and horror. It is better to endure any calamity here; It is better to suffer through every grave illness throughout life; It’s better for me to sit chained in a stinking and gloomy dungeon all my life, take beatings and wounds, die all my days, burn in fire when this is possible; It is better, finally, to endure all the troubles that there may be in the world, gathered together, with thanksgiving, when the will of God pleases, than to lose the blessed one and end up in an unfavorable eternity. For here, no matter what suffering happens, everything has some consolation, and ends in death; suffering not only in words, but also incomprehensible to the mind; suffering that will always be, but will never end: their worm will not die, and their fire will not be quenched, says the prophet (Isa. 66:21). Whoever believes this, often reflecting and remembering this terrible misfortune, can be aroused to the most fervent repentance in order to get rid of that disaster: and whoever does not believe, will taste it by the very act of sorrow, and will taste it endlessly, as it is said. The pious enter into blessed eternity, justified by faith in Christ the Son of God, and those who have passed away in this living life through faith, whom Christ himself, pleasing, calls into that bliss: come, blessed ones... (Matthew 25:34-36). Unrepentant sinners, whom Christ will send away from Himself as ungrateful, will be thrown into trouble, thus: Depart from Me, cursed, into eternal fire... (Matthew 25:41-43). And these go into everlasting torment: but the righteous into everlasting life (Matthew 25:46). The wallpaper goes, but not equally: some with crying and inconsolable sobbing; others with joy and indescribable joy. For they go to unequal places: alone in the abode of the Heavenly Father, in the decorated palaces of the King of glory, to the great supper, endlessly entertaining, and the sweet marriage of the Lamb; others into eternal prison and a place of weeping, weeping and the most severe torment. Some are received by heaven with all blessings, whom no eye has seen, no ear has heard, and no one has entered into the heart (1 Cor. 2:9). Others are locked in hell with all the evil ones, whom we cannot depict in words or comprehend with our minds. Cases and spiritual ones from that reasoning You see a servant standing before his master, fulfilling his command with all obedience. - This case gives you the opportunity to judge how incomparably greater respect we must stand and address ourselves before God, our Lord (for God is in every place; and wherever we are, and whatever we do, we do it before God’s face, looking at us), and to fulfill His commands. After all, a master, no matter how high he may be, is a man, and a man is the same as his servant; but his servant shows him such reverence; and God is Lord of lords and servants, and King of kings and His subjects; and to Him are both masters and their servants, kings and their subjects, servants; and the Lord is great and terrible, and the powers of heaven stand before Him with fear and reverence, and fulfill His commands. Consider how shamelessly we do and how gravely we sin, when we do not show Him the same reverence and reverence that slaves show to their master, like a man, but we act outrageously before Him; and we do not do the kind of obedience that slaves do to a man’s master, but we boldly and fearlessly dare to break His commandments. What the Lord himself convicts us of through the prophet: the son glorifies his father and the servant of his master fears. And if I am the Father, then where is My glory? And if the Lord I am, then where is My fear? The Lord Almighty speaks (Mal. 1:6). From here, learn, since our blindness and insensibility are great, to be amazed at the goodness and long-suffering of our God, who deals so meekly and patiently with us, indecent slaves. This teaches you not only not to do or say anything, but also not to think evil or indecent thoughts. Before God, as He who discerns all things, both word and deed, so our thoughts are equally: for He sees our thoughts as well as the deed itself: and His thought offends (in the same way) as a bad deed; and it is not only the one who does evil who does evil who acts outrageously before Him, but also the one who thinks evil. Do you see the trial being carried out, in which the guilty person, exposed, trembles with fear and is completely covered with shame; hears a reprimand for breaking the law, is deprived of honor and property, is excluded from the ranks of good and honest people, and is labeled an evil and indecent person; then he is taken to prison in shame, and according to the laws, he accepts execution. From this judgment, may faith take your spirit to this terrible and universal judgment, at which the Judge, God Himself, tests our hearts. Imagine in your mind that at that judgment there are sinners, excommunicated from the ranks of the righteous, standing with shame, fear and trembling unspeakable; they are convicted of transgressing the law of God, they are convicted before the whole world, before angels and men; they see their sins, which they committed in secret by word, deed and thought, and revealed to the whole world for knowledge; they see the execution prepared for their deeds; they see those who were reviled here, scolded, laughed at, persecuted, embittered, and trampled upon like courage, in glory and great joy; The unrighteous see the wrath of the righteous Judge, hear a terrible sentence and definition: go away from Me, cursed, into eternal fire, prepared for the devil and his angel... (Matthew 25:41). Finally, with great shame, fear, sadness, crying, sobbing, screaming and despair, they are rejected from the face of God; They are drawn by fierce angels, and are imprisoned, where their worm does not die, and their fire is not quenched (Mark 9:48). May this case and this reasoning teach you to repent, cry for your sins, and now seek mercy from the Judge: so that you too will not be put to shame in this universal disgrace, and not hear this terrible reprimand and definition. You see that stone, iron, tin and other heavy things, no matter how much they rise and throw themselves upward, nevertheless turn towards the earth, their center, with great aspiration and fall. From this case you learn what is the state of those who are addicted to the world, who, no matter how excited they are by the preaching of the word of God, by exhortations and intimidations, and who, as it were, rise up in order to free themselves from vanity and rush to heaven, however, cannot lag behind the custom of addiction: and although over time they strive and are forced to break away from this evil, driven by the grace of God, and to the top, then there is a love of heavenly blessings, to rise; however, back down, that is, they turn to passion with considerable desire. The passion of the addicted one, like an iron magnet, draws and attracts to itself. This reasoning admonishes you to avoid any addiction other than to avoid fire or deadly poison, and to force yourself with all your might to desire and seek the heavenly blessings acquired by the death of Christ. But God helps those who strive. You see that the light is burning, and then it burns out. This example gives you to know that our life, while we live, is like a light that burns and then goes out, and to remember its death, which is unknown, on what day and hour it will be; and therefore one should always expect it. You see a person suffering from fire or fever; or when you enter the bathhouse you feel a great heat; or you see a furnace burning with fire. From this fire, move your mind to the fire of Gehenna, in which repentant sinners will suffer endlessly. This reasoning teaches you to appease the goodness of God with repentance and tears in order to get rid of that misfortune. You see a man imprisoned in a dungeon, bound in chains, all pale and withered. From this prison, move your mind to the eternal prison of hell, in which those condemned for iniquity are imprisoned and will not see the light forever. Why repent for your sins, so that you too do not come to that place of torment. You see or hear that the father of a disobedient and defective son renounces and deprives him of his inheritance. Learn from this incident that Christ, a Christian, will renounce those who are faulty and unrepentant, and will deprive them of an eternal inheritance. He will say to them, although His name has been called: We do not know where you come from; Depart from Me, all you workers of iniquity (Luke 13:25–27). This admonishes you not only to have a Christian name, but also to strive to have a life consistent with the name and confession. Do you see or hear that the earthly monarch rewards his slaves abundantly for faithful service. At the same time, think about how Christ, the heavenly and eternal King, will reward and glorify His faithful servants in His kingdom, according to a false promise: but eye has not seen, nor ear has heard, nor has breathed into the heart of man what God has prepared for those who love Him (1 Cor. 2:9). And again: then the righteous will be enlightened, like the sun in the kingdom of their Father (Matthew 13:43). Then they will truly see and groan, as if they are unworthy of the passion of this time for the glory that wants to appear (Rom. 8:18). Then they will see what the eye could not see here, and hear what the ear could not hear here, and feel what the heart could not ascend here. Then their heart will rejoice, and no one will take their joy from them (John 16:22). Then those who now mourn will be comforted; then those who now hunger and thirst for righteousness will be satisfied; then those who are now deprived will be enriched; then those who have now been exiled for the sake of righteousness will receive the kingdom, then they will receive from the hand of the Lord everything that they now looked at with faith, like a mirror in fortune-telling, and to which those inspired by hope strove. Then everyone will rejoice in the Lord, and in the joy of the spirit they will exclaim: clothe me with the robe of salvation, and clothe me with the robe of gladness, as you put a crown on me as a bridegroom, and adorn me with beauty as a bride (Isa. 61:10). This reasoning teaches you to despise the glory of the world, and to always strive for that glory, to faithfully serve the Heavenly King Christ, so that with His elect you may be worthy to inherit that glory by His grace. You see a tree withered and of no use except for burning. Understand that there is a sinful soul that does not have living faith and its fruits, whose death is beheading and eternal fire in hell. Every tree that does not produce good fruit is cut down and thrown into the fire (Matthew 3:10). This case gives you a reason to turn your eyes to your soul, whether it is in such a poor state - and to pray to Christ God, Who revives the dead, to revive it, and to water it with the dew of His grace so that spiritual fruits may grow. You see the farmer winnowing his seeds, and gathering the seeds into the barn, and sweeping away the tares. So it will be at the end of this age, as it is written: then faithful and pious people, like wheat into a barn, will enter the kingdom of heaven; but the wicked will be cast out like tares and thrown into the furnace of fire; there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth (Matthew 13:40–42). This example encourages you to be very careful about your salvation, and not to be unprofitable tares, but to be wheat. You see a man dressed in rags, half naked, completely soiled with vices. From him, turn your mind to the sinful soul, which was exposed by the grace of God, like a beautiful garment, and instead was covered with sinful vices, like rags. A man who is sullied before human eyes is vile; but the soul, stained with sinful filth, is most vile in the eyes of God. This incident admonishes you to avoid every sin by which the soul is defamed and unworthy of the sight of God. You see a man with wounds and stinking pus. Turn your eyes to the sinful soul, which emits a far greater stench than the stinking body. Because there is pus and wounds on the body, there are sins and iniquities on the soul. Hear what the prophet says: my iniquities have exceeded my head, and like a heavy burden is heavy upon me; My wounds have become stale and rotten because of my madness (Ps. 37:5-7). The stench of the body is unbearable to us; the stench of the soul is unbearable to God. We turn away from the stench of the body and run away; from the stench of the soul we turn away and depart from the spirit of God. This again exhorts you to flee from sin. If you feel a soul infected with sinful leprosy, although you have stood afar, lift up your voice, as the lepers once did, to Jesus, the Son of God, the Banisher of all mental and physical illnesses, and lifting up your heart, prayed not only with your lips: Jesus, Master, have mercy on me! (Luke 17:13). Thus, the One who cleanses the lepers will also cleanse your spiritual leprosy. There is more mercy; listens to the voices of our poor. For this reason he came into the world, that he might deliver us from our sins. There cannot be such a great sinful leprosy that our All-Wise and All-Powerful Physician would not or could not mercifully cleanse. You see a blind man who does not see the way, does not know where he is going, does not see anything in front of him, does not see the ditch into which he has his mouth. From this case, turn your reasoning to spiritual blindness, by which the stricken sinner also does not see good and evil, does not know where he is going, does not see his own destruction into which he has his mouth. Disastrous bodily blindness, but most disastrous spiritual! It is better not to have physical vision than mental vision. This incident and reasoning exhorts us to pray to Christ, who gives sight to the blind: Look, hear me, O Lord my God! Enlighten the eyes of my soul, so that I may one day sleep into death (Ps. 12:4). You see a deaf person who, no matter what is said or forbidden, does not heed and does not do so: he still does not hear speeches, and does not understand orders or prohibitions. Understand that there is a sinner whose spiritual ears are stopped by Satan so that he does not hear the voice of the words of God. He has ears, but does not have the ability to hear. He hears with his bodily ears, but is deaf with his spiritual ears. The voice of the word strikes the physical ear, but does not touch the spiritual; and it happens like a deaf person: that’s why a word is invalid. What God’s word tells him, he does not heed; What he commands or forbids, he does not listen to, like a deaf man. Such a person does not benefit from words, admonitions, or advice, like music to the deaf. Why does Christ say in the Gospel: have ears to hear, that he may hear (Luke 8:15). Everyone has ears, but not everyone has ears to hear. How does it happen that not everyone gathered in the church hears the word of God, not everyone uses it: because not everyone has ears to hear. Body deafness is deplorable; but the soul deserves more crying. For a soul that does not hear or listen to God’s voice is subject to all delusion and eternal destruction. This exhorts you to pray to Christ, so that he will open the hearing of your soul, as he once opened the ears and tongue of the deaf and humming man, and gave ears to hear. Do you hear that when such and such a person is captured by the enemy, why does he not suffer in that calamity? He is taxed with iron, forced by the will of the captor to live, to do whatever the captor pleases; endure ridicule, reproach, wounds; in a word: a bitter life and not better to live than death itself. From this sensory captivity, turn your mind to invisible captivity. What bitter captivity does the sinful soul suffer, which was captured by the prince of this world, the devil! Having bound her with the lusts of this world, he commits his evil will over her, mocks her, curses at her, inflicts wounds on her, from trouble to trouble, from lawlessness to lawlessness, drags her. Bitter is bodily captivity, but most bitter is spiritual! He who is captive in body, although he works as a tormentor, is free in spirit; no one can captivate or bind the spirit; Moreover, by death he will be freed from that calamity: captive in soul, although free in body, perhaps he is the poorest of any slave; for he will be bound forever, unless he is delivered by the grace of Christ. And this is the poorest captivity, because the sinner does not see it; thinks of himself that he is free, that he does not work for anyone, but in the most prophetic way he is poorer than the one who has a bound body. That this true word is, hear what the Lord says to the Jews. To the Jews they say to Him: We are the seed of Abraham, and we have no one to work for; how can you say that you will be free? Jesus answered them: Amen, amen, I say to you, for everyone who commits sin is a slave of sin (John 8:33–34). This reasoning gives you, beloved, a reason to look around; Are you not working for this vile tyrant in his lusts, that is, in the love of money, covetousness, voluptuousness, uncleanness, pride, malice and other similar things. If you see how your heart is captivated, sigh to Christ the Son of God, Who alone delivers from this captivity and grants freedom; pray to Him with the psalmist: Lord, return my captivity, like streams to the south (Ps. 126:4). If the Son of God frees us, we will be free indeed (John 8:36). Do you see or hear that a husband renounces his wife when she does not remain faithful to him, but, having left him, lawlessly mixes with others and commits adultery. Know for sure that in the same way Christ, the heavenly and most pure Bridegroom, renounces the soul that clings to this world, the lusts of the flesh, the lusts of the soul and the pride of life: no longer remains faithful to Him, which upon entering Christianity he promised to preserve until the end of his life. To such He will say: We do not know where you are from (Luke 13:25), when He comes in His glory. This reasoning exhorts you, Christian, to look around to see if you have left Christ, clinging with your heart to the world, that is, to the wealth, honor, glory and sweetness of this world. If you notice this, do not hesitate to turn to Christ with repentance and tears, before the time has passed; for He accepts those who turn: lest you be one of those to whom He speaks; we do not know you, although (you now) say with them: Lord, Lord! - not everyone, He said, saying to Me, Lord, Lord, will enter the kingdom of heaven, but he who does the will of My Father who is in heaven (Matthew 7:21). You see that there is a time for everything, as Ecclesiastes says: a time for everything, and a time for every thing under heaven (Eccl. 3:1). Birds in their time make nests and give birth to children; cattle and beasts come together in due time and give birth; fish also in due time; Trees and grass in due time put on leaves, blossom and fruits vegetate; farmers in their own time plow (plow - ed.), sow, and collect fruits: in a word, our Creator God has determined its time for every thing. By this we learn that God has determined the time for us to seek eternal salvation. This time is the present time, until today it is called, until we are in this world, until we live and we are travelers. This time has been appointed for us to seek salvation, which Christ, the Son of God, deserved with His blood. From there, this time is likened in Scripture to the time of sowing: as a man sows, that will he also reap. For if you sow to your flesh, from the flesh you will reap corruption; but if you sow to the Spirit, from the Spirit you will reap eternal life (Gal. 6:7–8). Those who sow with tears will reap with joy. Those who walk walk and weep, throwing their seeds: those who are coming will come with joy, taking hold of their hands (Ps. 126:5-6). There will be a time when no one will receive it, although he seeks with tears and sighing. When foolish farmers, having missed the opportune time, although they sow, they destroy the seed; for they sow at the wrong time; so foolish sinners will once seek salvation, but will not receive it; as if then there will be a time of judgment, and not repentance. Now is the time to sow, seek, ask, push at the doors of God’s mercy, when God promised to hear and help: and he listens and helps. The verb is: in a favorable time, I listened to you and on the day of salvation, I helped you. Now is the time acceptable, now is the day of salvation (2 Cor. 6:2). Now everyone who asks receives, and everyone who seeks finds, and it will be opened to him who interprets, says Christ (Matthew 7:8). Then it won't happen. “I can repent when I’m dying,” another responds? With such repentance you can go to hell. O man, do you then want to repent when the time for repentance ceases, and the time of judgment and torture comes? Then do you want to turn to God when God calls you to answer? Then do you want to search when time is already running out? It is indisputable that one should repent even at death, especially pray, and call on God with zeal, as then a great feat of the soul occurs; but to put off repentance until death is delusion of the mind, negligence about salvation and the intrigue of the devil, who puts such a thought in a person’s heart and teaches him to break the law of God with fearlessness, to anger God, and to put off repentance day by day in order to flatteringly destroy a person. For this reason, when you want to die blissfully, now be as you wish to be at death. Talk about the worldly things of honor, fame, wealth and luxury now as the dying talk, who then leave everything. Beware of sin, and regret what you have done now, just as you were careful and sorry then. Do you then want to receive remission of sins from God in the name of Christ? Now try about that. Do you want to receive mercy from God then? Now look for that one. But whoever wants to receive mercy from the merciful God stops angering Him and regretting his former fearlessness. The one who stops sinning and producing the fruits of repentance ceases to anger Him. - Consider this, sinful soul, and listen to what the Forerunner said: even the ax lies at the root of the tree: every tree that does not produce good fruit is cut down and thrown into the fire (Matthew 3:10). You see where sinners who do not produce the fruits of repentance are determined: they are cut down like barren trees with the ax of God’s judgment, and they are thrown into eternal fire like firewood. When the warriors of this world are recruited, then those recruited into the army leave their homes, wives, children, their relatives and their property. You see, Christian, what people do who enroll in the service of the earthly king. Know for sure that Christians who have signed up for the service of the heavenly King should do the same. And they are commanded to do what God once commanded to Abraham, all the faithful to the Father: get thee out of thy land, and from thy kindred, and from thy father’s house (Gen. 12:1). The Old Adam, from whom we were born and whom we carry within, is our father; self-love is the favorable home of our flesh; our relatives and possessions are our passions, the lust of the flesh, the lust of the eyes and the pride of life. All this must be abandoned by Christians who, at holy baptism, enlisted in the military service of Christ, the heavenly King: to deny the old Adam all the days and to put it off (Eph. 4:22 Col. 3:9). To crucify one’s flesh with passions and lusts (Gal.5:24) - to leave self-love, love of glory, love of glory, lust and love of money, with which the flesh is consoled, as if it were its own relatives, and thus serve Christ the King. All Christians are called Christians for the reason that they believe in Christ, have signed up to work and serve Christ, and this is how they are called soldiers of Christ. Is it proper for warriors to carry out their will; and not your King? It is shameful for Christians to spend their days in the luxuries and gaiety of this world, when Christ, their King, bore the cross and fought against his enemies with the cross. It is a shame for soldiers to lie down, and even more so to return back, when the Tsar Himself struggles until the outpouring of blood: it is a shame for Christians to lose heart when they see their King, Christ, struggling so hard that He did not spare His blood on them; much more so, go back to your homes and leave the fighting! It is unfortunate for soldiers who have enlisted in the service of their sovereign to leave him and go to another enemy; and this is nothing other than obvious treason to the sovereign: it is disastrous and obvious destruction for Christians, who are called warriors of Christ the Heavenly King, to leave Him and work for the world; call themselves Christians, but do not want to listen to Christ; To be called His servants, but not to work for Him! And this means that Saint Peter wrote: if we have escaped the defilements of the world through the knowledge of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ, these same things are intertwined and we hope that the last is worse than the first. It would be better for them not to know the path of righteousness than for those who have known it to turn back from the holy commandment handed down to them. When a true parable happened to them: a dog returned to his vomit, and a pig washed himself in pot (2 Pet. 2:20–22). Christians do the same thing, who, having been cleansed in baptism from the defilements of sin and promised to work in faith and righteousness to Christ, deviate into corruption and work for the lusts of the flesh and the lusts of the self and the pride of life, and thus they want to be Christ’s and children of this world, and to please Christ and to work for the world, and to be Christians and to have fun with the world: which is impossible to do, just as it is impossible to look forward and backward. The warriors of this world, faithful to their sovereign, how whole and inviolably they keep the oath to their sovereign, how they strive for his honor and the integrity of the state! They go to distant countries, go into deadly situations, are not afraid of enemy weapons that threaten them with death, accept wounds and fall wounded. This is what the duty of the oath requires of them. And these are united by temporary hope and the oath made to man, so strongly encourages. Christians, who have sworn allegiance to the Heavenly King and God, do not show it to Him; for the honor of the King of heaven, who for them, before the shedding of His blood and the death of the cross, labored, and promised them not temporary, but eternal glory in heaven to give for the feat, they do not want to struggle, but, throwing down their weapons, give way to their enemy, or run back. For this reason, those (the warriors of this world) will be judges for Christians on the day of judgment. The Christian feat, which is not against flesh and blood, but against the spirits of evil, consists of humility, contempt of vain glory, patience and meekness, denial of oneself, crucifying the flesh with passions and lusts, and courageous patience with temptations. When Christians show this, then they do not give up their place in battle to their enemy - the devil. This is how all the saints labored and received the crown of righteousness from the hero Jesus Christ: which we too must follow, beloved Christian, when we want to share with them in the kingdom of Christ. Otherwise they will not recognize us that we are Christians; Christ also does not recognize us as His own, because we do not have His sign, that is, the patience of the cross, under which faithful servants labor. ABOUT! God forbid that we should hear that terrible voice from Him: we do not know you (Luke 13:27). You see or hear that a slave whom the master bought for himself from another, or appropriated in some other way, no longer knows the former master; but the one who bought it knows that one, serves, works, and fulfills his will. Note that among the sons of this age it happens that man shows man by force the rights common to all nations. The evil Satan has cunningly and unrighteously taken possession of us and captured us into his dark power; but Christ, the Son of God, redeemed us from his power, and appropriated us to Himself; and He redeemed you not with silver or gold, but with His honest blood, as he says: It was not with true silver or gold that the faithful fathers delivered you from your vain life, but with the honest blood of the Lamb, like the spotless and most pure Christ (1 Pet. 1:18-19). And in another place he says: with the price of buying it (1 Cor. 7:23). For this reason, Christians, we must unconditionally work for Christ the Son of God, Who bought us with His priceless blood, just as the apostle says: at the price of the purchase of nature: we must fulfill His holy will, obey Him and show all obedience to Him from the heart, as faithful servants show their masters; in a word: we must live for Him, and not for ourselves, as the Apostle teaches: Christ died for all, so that those who live do not live for themselves, but for Him who died for them and rose again (2 Cor. 5:15). The very duty of truth requires this, so that the slave whose slave he is works for the master. Consequently, since those Christians who are called servants of Christ sin gravely against the Lord Jesus Christ, but do not work for Christ, do not listen to His commands, but live according to their own will. What does it mean for Christians to be like that? What Christ says about the unbreakable slave: cast the unbreakable slave into the outer darkness; there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth (Matthew 25:30). For even a human master rightly punishes his rebellious and disobedient slave. But how the slave will feel and repent, admit his guilt and humble himself before his master, and will act as a slave should, that is, serve his master faithfully; His mercy is worthy: so Christ, the humane Lord, accepts a Christian into His mercy when he, having sincerely admitted his sins, repents, and shows the fruits of repentance, without which true repentance cannot exist. You see that the creditor tortures the debtor and puts him in prison in order to repay the debt. Thus, God punishes sinners for the sinful debts they owe Him, and the more they sin and add sins to sins, the more they are burdened with this debt: hence, they are subject to greater torture and God’s judgment. Because of your hardness and unrepentant heart, you store up wrath for yourself on the day of wrath and revelation of God’s righteous judgment (Rom. 2:5). The lender imprisons the debtor in prison, so that he can repay the debt: thus God will imprison His debtors in eternal prison, where His righteousness will forever be repaid with torment, but will never be repaid. How then can sinners free themselves from these heavy debts, which plunge debtors into hell? The Lord answers: if the Son sets you free, you will be free indeed (John 8:36). The merciful God for the sake of His Son, our Lord Jesus Christ, Who paid for all sinful debts with His blood and death, forgives those who repent earnestly and believe in Him: and thus freed from debts, they are also freed from subsequent executions. For this reason, everyone who wants to be free from these debts, which imprison debtors in eternal prison, must repent and resort to the Intercessor, the merciful Jesus Christ. And it is inevitable for a repentant person to renounce his sins. You must first leave them yourself, so that God will leave them too. How can he ask for forgiveness of debts that he never ceases to multiply and burden? For, beloved Christian, there cannot be true repentance, where sins are not abandoned - but there is feigned and false: with which repentance, oh, since many people, especially in this century, are seduced, who want to repent and do not want to give up their sins. For this reason, such people cannot free themselves from their sinful debts until they sincerely forsake their sins. Moreover, we ourselves must leave our debts to our debtors, when we want to receive forgiveness for our debts from God; Otherwise, it will not be forgiven us, as the Lord says: If you forgive men their sins, your heavenly Father will also forgive you; if you do not forgive men their sins, your Father will not forgive you your sins (Matthew 6:14–15). You see that the mirror takes in such an image and turns to it. Whether it addresses the sky, the image of the sky is depicted in it; turning to the earth, he receives the earthly image within himself. So the human soul exists: what it turns to and cleaves to through love, it is seen in it. When one turns to God, God’s image is depicted in it by the power of the Holy Spirit: when one inclines towards earthly and worldly things, the earthly image is drawn. And what image he carries within himself, such is his wisdom. When God has the image, loves God and man, created in the image of God, the heavenly one is wise - the one on high, not the earthly one; when she wears an earthly and bestial image, the earthly one philosophizes, does what is pleasing to her feelings, what senseless brutes tend to eat. This reasoning teaches you, through repentance and faith in Christ Jesus, to put off the old man and his bestial image, and to seek and put on the image of God, which is the most precious and most excellent adornment of the soul. And what is now depicted in your soul will appear on the day of judgment; and then, seeing His image in you, the Lord recognizes you as His own; others who do not have that splendor, but carry a bestial image and sinful ugliness, like a terrible monster, will deny and say to them: we do not know you, although they say to Him: Lord, Lord! You see that the mirror does not show dust or smoke, although you look into it; but when you want to see your face in it and the defects on your face, you must wipe it off. This is how human conscience exists: when it is stained with many sinful vices and lawless life, a person does not see in it the vices stuck to his soul, and so he is completely soiled, like an Ethiopian, walking around, and safely falling from sin to sin. This state of affairs is disastrous and deplorable! Such a one does not see his filthiness and abomination, but he will see it when the books are opened to the shame of the whole world, angels and men, and his sins are presented before his face, as God says: I will reprove you and bring your sins before you (Ps. 49:21). Then he will see himself as a black Ethiopian and as a terrible monster. For this spiritual abomination, which is now hidden within, will then appear without; like righteous souls kindness will appear; and they will shine like the sun in the kingdom of their Father (Matthew 13:43). Then the poor sinner will begin to abhor himself, to hate himself, and to run away from himself, and will want to turn into nothing, but will not be able to: for forever and ever this stinginess will be upon him as a reproof for him, that he spent his life on earth in such abomination. Oh, if only I could look at this abomination and see it now; I would cry incessantly, and would seek to get rid of her by the grace of Christ: but, to my misfortune, I am blinded and do not see it! “But when the mirror is clean, then everything will clearly show whatever appears in front of it; and we see defects on the face, not only great ones, but also small ones. Such is a clear conscience: it sees the very vices, and a person washes them with repentance, tears and faith. This reasoning teaches you to feel, to delve into the law of God, which shows and exposes our sins, and to repent and cleanse your conscience by diligently considering it, repentance and faith; and thus begin a new life, so that your sins will not then appear to the whole world for knowledge, which now you yourself do not want to consider and know, and thus cleanse them. You see that heat softens and melts other things, such as wax, lard, oil, etc.; others become hardened, such as clay, wood, grass, and so on. And this is done not from the side of warmth, but from the side of things that receive warmth: warmth warms everything, both equally. This is how there are people: others are softened by the warmth of God’s goodness and long-suffering, melted, touched and offended into repentance and sorrow for God; others become hardened and become more and more evil, to whom the Apostle says: about man, ... or about the riches of His goodness and meekness and long-suffering, not knowing how the grace of God leads you to repentance? Because of your cruelty and unrepentant heart, you are storing up wrath for yourself on the day of wrath and revelation of the righteous Judgment of God (Rom. 2:3-4). And this also happens not from the side of God’s goodness, but from the side of the human heart, which abuses God’s goodness and does not want to repent: for God’s goodness leads everyone equally to repentance. So Pharaoh, who only saw the miracles of God, became hardened, and did not correct himself, and died. Thus, even now, many are hardened, who put off repentance day after day, who are accidentally overtaken by death and sent to another age without hope of salvation! By this you learn, Christian, not to put off repentance, but immediately, getting up, correct yourself and repent, according to the admonition of the Holy Spirit: today if you hear His voice, do not harden your hearts (Ps. 95:7-8). You see that either a son behaves outrageously before his father, or a slave behaves outrageously before his master and does not give worthy honor: it seems to you that the behavior of such outrageous people is unbecoming. Understand that Christians act outrageously before God, who watches everything and looks at every deed and thought of ours, when they sin secretly or openly. A father is saddened by the outrageousness of his son, and the master of his servant; much more than God, the Father and Lord of all, is saddened by the outrageousness of faulty Christians. This case and reasoning teaches you: 1) It is dangerous to act in words, deeds and thoughts and keep from ungodly deeds, words and thoughts, which offend His Holy Spirit. 2) To be amazed at His goodness and the long-suffering of God, Who endures so much for us, before Him, in words, deeds and thoughts that are outrageous. 3) Forgive your neighbor any offense inflicted by him, for the sake of so much of God’s goodness, which we experience in ourselves every day and hour. 4) Heartily regret previous sins and outrages, and humbly fall before Him, be ashamed and ask for forgiveness. 5) Diligently thank Him that in such atrocities and bad deeds He did not strike us with righteous judgment. You see that a wound clock is constantly moving, and although we sleep or are awake, do or don’t do, they have an incessant flow, and are approaching their term. This is how our life is: from birth to death it constantly flows and diminishes. Whether we rest or work, whether we are awake or asleep, whether we talk with someone or remain silent, our course continually flows and approaches its end; and it has already happened closer to the end now than yesterday and the third day, this hour than the past. It is so insensitive to us that our life is shortened! Hours and minutes pass like this! And when the rope ends and the pendulum stops striking, we don’t know. The providence of God hid this from us, so that we will always be ready for the exodus, whenever our Master, God, calls us to him. Blessed is he whom the Lord will find vigilant! (Luke 12:37). Damned, the one who is immersed in a sinful sleep will find him! This incident and reasoning teaches you, Christian: 1) That the time of our life is constantly running out. 2) That the past tense cannot be returned. 3) That the past and the future are not ours, but only what we now have. 4) That our death is unknown to us. 5) Consequently, we must always be ready for the outcome at every hour when we want to die blissfully. 6) From everywhere it is concluded that a Christian must be in constant repentance, the struggle of faith and piety. 7) What he wants to be at the end, he strives to be like that at all times of his life: for he does not know whether the morning will wait for the evening, and whether the evening will wait for the morning. We see that those who walked healthy in the morning, by evening lie lifeless on their deathbed; and those who fall asleep in the evening do not rise in the morning and will sleep until the trumpet of the Archangel. And what happens to others can happen to you and me: everything is subject to every case. You see that those who want to reach a certain city, or some other place, do not stand, but walk, and follow the path that leads to that place: so those who want to reach the city of heaven, the heavenly Jerusalem, do not stand, but walk that pious path, on which the leader of the path is Christ, Whom His faithful servants will follow with faith and love. Why do you, a faulty sinner, when you want to be saved and reach your heavenly fatherland, do you stand and not follow Him? or, what is worse than that, have you left that pious path, and, having taken the path of the wicked, are you following it, which leads to hell and eternal destruction? – What path of the pious and the wicked our Lord shows you in His Gospel and commands you to avoid this, and to go. Enter through the narrow gate: as a wide gate and a wide path you lead into destruction, and many are those who enter through it. That you bring a narrow gate and a strait path into the belly, and there are few of them who find it (Matthew 7:13–14). The narrow path is the path of humility, obedience, patience, meekness, and oneself, that is, a reflection of one’s will: the wide path is the path of pride, disobedience, impatience, and self-love. This one leads to hell, it leads to heaven. Choose which way you want to go, or narrow and low to heaven or wide and high to hell? But we don’t see the third in Holy Scripture. Now and in the next century, where we are all going, we see only two places open from God: the eternal belly, which will be in heaven, the eternal torment, which will be in hell. This is for the sake of this, dear reader, it is proposed that many, especially everyone, want to be saved, but not many do what the matter of salvation requires of us. The most murderers, predators, thieves, fornicators, robbers, deceivers, deceivers, drunkards, slanderers, blasphemers, scolders, and others want to be saved; no one will deny salvation from them: but they still do not follow the path that leads to eternal salvation, but follow the destructive path that leads to hell; then there is no real desire for salvation in them. Philosophers teach fairly and firmly: whoever wants to achieve the end also wants and seeks a decent means to that end. For example: as stated above, you want to reach which city. You are looking for the path that leads to that city; If you want to get health in your weakness, you call for a doctor, and so on. Whoever really and diligently desires something, as was also said above, diligently and truly seeks it. Thus, whoever wants to earnestly and truly be saved also seeks a means to salvation. There is only one means to eternal salvation that appears to us in the holy word—the holy faith of the Gospel. But faith must be living, not dead. The vitality of faith is known from good deeds. Just as this faith is a great good and a treasure in man, so, like goodness, it produces good fruits, just as a good tree produces good fruits. From this it follows that where there are no good deeds, but instead evil ones, there is no true faith, but deceitful and deceitful. Those who have such a false faith are similarly deceived, like those who walk in the night, and think that they are going the way that leads to the intended place, but when the star shines, they recognize their error and regret it: so those who have a false faith, dead and fruitless, think that they are Christians, they are following a pious and saving path, but then they recognize their error and repent. And the blessed one is the one who, while still on the way, will have this morning of grace shine in their hearts; blessed are those who see their error before the end and so repent! Such knowledge is the beginning of salvation: for such can turn away from the path of destruction, and ascend by faith onto the path of salvation, which leads to eternal life. You see that those who want to look at the sun turn their faces to the sun: as is natural about every thing: for example, people, or whatever other thing we want to see, we turn our faces to that one. Thus, those who want to see the eternal and spiritual Sun - God, now by faith, in this age, face to face, must inevitably turn to Him with the face of their hearts. God is in every place, and therefore, wherever we walk, we walk before His face. But people, when they do not listen to God’s commands and are lawless, turn away from Him, and, as it were, instead of a face, they turn His backbone, as God says about the lawless: turning the backbone towards me, and not the face (Jer. 32:33); and in the psalms we read: not setting God before you (Ps. 53:5); and again: not offering You (God) before me (Ps. 85:14), which means nothing more than a heart that has turned away from God, does not listen to God, does not honor and despises. Just as, although we may honor someone, we turn our face to him, but by turning away our face we show disrespect and contempt for him: so, turning away from obedience to God, we show great disrespect and contempt for Him, although we are blinded and do not notice it; So, instead of a face, we turn His backbone. But when a person, having recognized his lawless rudeness, which he showed to God and his Creator, feels and, having ceased from sins, repents and sincerely regrets that he acted so disorderly and lawlessly against his Creator and Lord, then he turns to God; and when he stands in this, and strives to show Him the fruits of obedience, then, as it were, he stands face to Him, and what He commands in the holy word, he listens and strives to fulfill. He who is thus converted, both here by faith and in the next century face to face, will be deemed worthy to see God. From this it is clear: 1) how lawlessly and disorderly we do when we sin out of will! Thus, instead of a face, we turn the backbone to God: that it is a sign of contempt for the great and terrible God. 2) How terrible and abominable a delusion is an unrepentant and godless life! So people, as if turning their backbone to God, and not their face, walk and commit lawlessness: it’s scary to write and think. But truly, this is how God himself says through the prophet: turn your back to me, and not your face. 3) How great is God’s kindness towards sinners, which endures such contempt and disrespect for sinners and awaits their repentance! 4) True repentance is the application of the heart and morals of evil into good morals. 5) True repentance certainly creates shame and pity in the heart of the repentant that he acted so shamefully and disorderly with God. 6) True repentance cannot exist when a person renounces his sins and does not want to show obedience to God, but is deluded and false: for this reason, nothing benefits the repentant. To repent and to sin out of will is contrary to oneself, and cannot be a good thing. You see that every seed gives birth to the same fruit as it is: from rye, rye, from wheat, wheat, from barley, barley. Likewise in animals: from a man a man is born, from a wolf a wolf, from a bear a bear, from a sheep a sheep is born. And invariably in the fruit born from the seed, the likeness is shown; for example: a wolf gives birth to a wolf like itself in theft, a fox like itself is a fox in deceit, a pig gives birth to a pig like itself in gluttony and uncleanness. Thus there is also a spiritual birth, by which Christians are born again. Born of God, the fruit must inevitably be shown in them, similar to God, from whom they were spiritually born; we must be like our heavenly Father in our morals, from whom we were born by water and spirit; to be imitators of God, like His beloved children (Eph. 5:1), - to be holy, as He is holy, as He Himself says: Be holy, for I am holy (1 Pet. 1:16), - to be merciful, loving, patient, meek, devoted, etc. For from a holy, righteous, merciful, patient, meek God such children are born. The morals of the father are passed on to the children. Thus, in carnal birth, sinful children are born from the sinner Adam; from the sin-loving, proud, unmerciful, unhappy, unrighteous, malicious, wrathful, such children are born; We represent the children of the father according to the flesh by morals. Thus, he who has been born again from God, portrays God as a child of the Father with good morals: for His seed (that is, grace) abides in him (1 John 3:9), creates the fruits of the new birth, the fruits of righteousness, holiness, love, mercy, patience, meekness, and so on, and so there is a new creation in Christ (2 Cor. 5:17). From this it is clear that Christians who live lawlessly remain in the old birth; and although they were baptized, they lost the gift of holy baptism: and so those who are removed from Christ remain, although they confess His name; for works will abolish Him (Tit. 1:16), - they remain without hope and eternal life while they are in such a state. For the new birth brings two most noble fruits: first, remission of sins, as the Apostle says: “You were washed, you were sanctified, you were justified in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ and by the Spirit of our God” (1 Cor. 6:11), - the second is the renewal of the heart and spirit to obedience, to the creation of good deeds: as he who is born with eagerness and zeal strives to show obedience to God, strives against sin, does not allow it to reign over him, crucifies the flesh with passions and lusts. Like Christ. Just as from the evil serpent’s seed, which he poured into the hearts of our first parents (and in carnal birth we are all born with the same poison), evil fruits come, evil fruits come - love of money, love of glory, self-love, lust, and the subsequent disaster, the oath of eternal damnation, when a person is not born again - from above: so from God’s spiritual seed, which it is conceived and acted by God's word through the Holy Spirit - and in a spiritual new birth it gives birth to man, that is, from evil to goodwill, and from the son of wrath he makes a son of God's blessing, spiritual fruits will follow, that is, the fruits of good character. From like things like things are born: and an evil seed cannot give birth as an evil fruit, and a good seed cannot give birth as a good fruit. As is the seed from which the tree conceived and grew, such is the fruit born from it, as Christ says: a good tree cannot produce evil fruits, nor an evil tree produce good fruits (Matthew 7:18). From this it is correct that there is no Christianity, faith, repentance, piety in that Christian in whom there are no fruits of Christianity, fruits of faith, repentance, piety; but his Christianity, faith, repentance, and piety are false, charming and dreamy, and in the thing itself a pagan state, or even better, bestial and bestial. Whatever the morals are in someone, such is the state inside his heart. What kind of Christianity is there in him who shows himself to be stealing like a wolf, cunning like a fox, proud like a peacock, gluttonous like a pig, lustful like a horse, poisonous like a viper, fierce like a lion? There is no good morals: there is no root of good morals. There are no good fruits: for there is no good seed. There are no Christian deeds: there is no Christianity either. There are no fruits worthy of repentance: there is no repentance either. By this incident and reasoning, you learn, Christian, to test yourself, are you in the faith and number of the faithful? From this you can know that in this especially century there are many pagans under the name of Christians, like wolves under sheep’s skins. You see someone sentenced to death or a sick person near death. Reason and see what he does then? There is no concern for wealth, honor and glory; does not seek judgment against anyone, forgives everyone who is offended by him; does not think about luxury or anything proper to this world. One death turns before his spiritual eyes, and that fear shakes his heart. This incident, dear Christian, warns us about our death. What we see of our brethren, we expect from hour to hour: and we do not know whether they, whom we see at the gates of death, will depart first, or we, who hope to still live in the world. It often happens that those who hope to continue their life immediately fall lifeless, and, previously on their deathbed, lie in the tomb. We are all sentenced to death; God says to everyone in His holy word that He said to our forefather: You are earth and you will go back to earth (Gen. 3:19). Why don’t we remember that verdict? Why aren't we preparing for the outcome? Why do we promise ourselves for many days that is not in our power, but only in God’s? Why are we collecting so much wealth? We build so many houses, we create so many pleasures, but how can we hope to live forever in the world? Why are we chasing after the honor and glory of this world, which today, or the morning, will depart from us and leave us the basest and worst, least of all alive? Why do we fill the courts with caustic and vindictive petitions against each other? Why are we angry and cursing at each other? Why do we steal each other’s goods, slander each other, deceive each other? Why do we unlawfully touch someone else’s bed, and defile our soul and body? This day or morning the voice of God will call us from here, which always thunders to everyone: you are earth, and you will go to earth. Oh woe to us when we leave here with this heavy burden. It will inevitably plunge those burdened into the bottom of hell: there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth (Matthew 25:30). This incident and reasoning urges you to always remember death. She will teach you to be in constant repentance; she will not allow you to collect wealth, seek honor and glory, and console yourself with voluptuousness; extinguish the flame of unclean lust; tame the anger that is smoking in your heart; admonishes you to leave your neighbor all sorts of debts - sins; turn away your hands from theft, and your tongue from foul language, slander, slander and condemnation, and put your lips in guardianship; will inspire you to fervent prayer, sighing and warm tears. The fear of future judgment and the fear of torment binds the heart and does not allow us to want what is disgusting to God and leads to eternal judgment, and it holds back and restores the wavering and falling soul: for whatever God finds us in at our death, that is what He judges (Ezek. 33:20, etc.). Blessed and wise is he who always remembers death! You see people called to court: notice what they do? They prepare, think, try, ask and consult with those skilled in judicial matters; They often do not spare money, so that at the trial they will not be ashamed and not be condemned. You see, dear Christian, what the sons of this age do - what shame and fear of temporary condemnation does in them, how it touches their hearts, to what reverence, diligence and work it encourages them! May this incident encourage you to remember the future judgment of Christ. Christ will call us all to His judgment: He has appointed a day in which He will judge the world in righteousness (Acts 17:31). His throne is prepared for judgment (Ps. 9:8). For it is fitting for us all to appear before the judgment seat of Christ, so that everyone may receive either good or evil for what they have done with the body (2 Cor. 5:10). And when that judgment comes, God has hidden it from us, so that we will always be ready and expect it every day. It is already near, the day of the Lord is near (Rev. 1:3, 22:10; Isa. 13:6; John 1:15; James 5:8–9). The day of the Lord will come like a thief in the night (2 Pet. 3:10). Whenever they speak peace and affirmation, then all of a sudden destruction will attack them (1 Thessalonians 5:3). As it was in the days of Noah, so will the coming of the Son of Man be. For in the days before the flood I ran, eating and drinking, marrying and committing violence, until the day before Noah went into the ark, and before he was taken away, until the water came and was all taken away: so will the coming of the Son of Man be (Matthew 24:37-39). Even if people prepare for human judgment in such a way, as you see: how should we prepare, who will appear before the judgment seat of God from hour to hour, and we do not know the day and hour at which the Judge will come and call us to judgment! If shame, which has to be before a few, so confuses a person: how much more is the shame that has to be before the whole world, before all angels and people! Even if the fear of temporary execution shakes the hearts of people, how much more should the fear of eternal torment shake! Every temporary punishment, no matter how great and long, passes; the eternal one has no end, but once it begins, it never ends. You see how people cunningly prepare themselves for human judgment: not so for God’s judgment. A judge is a man who does not know human affairs, and what he sees and hears is what he judges; often accepting a person, he carries out judgment, and the gifts of many judges can do a lot: God is not the Judge. He knows not only our external deeds and words, but also our heart’s thoughts. Why does he not require witnesses and accusers of human sins, but He Himself convicts the sinner: I will reprove you, and bring your sins before your face (Ps. 49:21). He does not accept any person, he does not look at the rich or the poor, neither at the master nor at the slave; he judges everyone by their deeds, not by their faces. For this reason, preparation for His judgment should not be the same as for human judgment. But which one? One must in advance, before He calls, to humble oneself, admit one’s sins and guilt before Him, to expose oneself before Him and designate oneself from the heart as worthy of great execution, to promise henceforth to serve Him with faith and truth, and to stand motionless in this, and thus to expect His mercy without a doubt. For this reason, the most merciful God has declared His righteous judgment, so that we will repent, and having repented, we will escape condemnation. The righteous Judge will judge not those who have not sinned, but those who have sinned and have not repented. This case and reasoning exhorts you, Christian, to leave behind your sins, to begin a new life pleasing to God, and to do so constantly, with the help of God, so that you may be deemed worthy to stand at His right hand with His chosen sheep at His glorious coming; but do not look at the present world, which lives in insane fearlessness and pernicious security, lest you perish with it. You see that the son, who treated his father rudely and insulted him, bitterly cries and repents himself, regretting that he angered and insulted his father, from whom he was born and raised. From this case we, Christians, must learn true repentance: have sorrow for God, even as unrepentant repentance leads to salvation (2 Cor. 7:10). Even if we regret and cry that we insulted our father according to the flesh, from whom we were just born and raised, and we do it righteously: how much more should we regret, grieve and cry inconsolably because we anger God, the heavenly Father, from whom our fathers and we were created, honored in His image, the fallen raised up, and gifted and bestowed with countless blessings. It is truly great blindness and malice to insult Him Who is the only love! Satanic execution is malice against the Creator and His breathing image, which, unable to do anything to God, rushes towards His image, and thereby wants to offend Him! A blind man, like a fish at a hook, grabs the enemy’s charm and deigns to do so; and thus, listening to the advice of the enemy, he does not listen to his Creator God and insults him. What hasn't God done for us? What good did you not show? He created us, He honored us with His image, He created this red world for our sake; His sun shines on us and rains on us, nourishes us, clothes us, preserves us. But we insult Him. We don’t listen to Him, we don’t love the great benefactor so much. Isn’t this great demonic malice and the delusion of our mind? We perished by demonic cunning, and were deprived of His mercy: but He did not leave us anyway, did not tolerate seeing us lying in destruction, did not reject us forever from Himself, as if we were indecent; but he had mercy on us, sending us salvation to the lost and deliverance to the captives, and restoration to the fallen. How? Not through an angel, nor through a man, but through whom? Through His Only Begotten Son. He gave us Him for our salvation and deliverance: For His sake He did not spare us, but gave Him up for us (Rom. 8:32), the holy Apostle cries to the whole universe. He wants to give us His Holy Spirit, and gives it to those who believe and ask Him (Luke 11:13). What more can God do for us than this? What good and blessing should we give? But even so we do not love Him, we do not love Him who loved us so much; We do not honor Him, who honored us so highly: truly there cannot be greater malice and blindness! All the holy angels worship Him with fear, honor Him and sing to Him (Isa. 6:2-3): a man blinded, earth and ashes, having experienced so much of God’s good deeds and mercies in himself, does not do this, but shamelessly irritates Him!... So demonic cunning has blinded our minds! If someone, a Christian, fed you, clothed you, warmed you, took care of you, preserved you, and loved you like a child; and you would not honor him, despise him and show him all rudeness: wouldn’t your madness and shamelessness be great? Truly, everyone who sees would be amazed at your madness. Know for sure that we show such shamelessness to our God when we do not listen to Him, sin and irritate Him. Oh, it is truly better to lose the light, to lie in rot and wounds, to be imprisoned in prison, to be shackled, to die a hundred times, than to die from God, eternal love, grace, goodness, holiness, truth, righteousness, mercy, the beginning, and the source of all good things, although it is not enough to anger! You see that someone who has fallen into error before the monarch and is subject to mortal condemnation by law, having no hope from anywhere, resorts to the monarch’s dear friend, entrusting himself to whose intercession, he hopes to receive mercy from the monarch; and as he hopes, so he receives mercy from him through his intercessor: from here in the one who receives will follow: 1) consolation and joy in the heart, 2) gratitude and love for his benefactor, 3) hope in a benefactor so strong and merciful, 4) fear, so as not to offend or anger him, and so his mercy will not fall away. - Take note, Christian, what the sons of this age do when they want to get rid of temporary misfortune and receive temporary mercy from people like themselves. From this incident we, Christians, learn that there is an evangelical holy faith that true Christians have in our Lord Jesus Christ. We all, that is, the entire human race, have sinned before our King, God, according to the scripture: all sins and deprivations are the glory of God; and so every mouth was stopped, and the whole world became guilty of God (Rom. 3:23). Thus, according to the law of God's truth, everyone was certainly subject to eternal condemnation and eternal execution for their guilt. But the goodness of God, which constructs everything wisely, has miraculously invented a way of salvation for us. The Son of God, by the good pleasure of His heavenly Father, became man for the sake of men, and satisfied the righteousness of God for us with death, and thus became the Intercessor between the righteous God and us who have sinned. If anyone entrusts himself to this omnipotent and merciful Intercessor, gives his name to Him with his heart and writes down: he receives mercy from God, is freed from sins and punishments for subsequent sins, is considered righteous as if he had not committed any sin: in the righteousness of Christ, which those who believe in His name have earned through innocent death and suffering, are dressed like the royal scarlet, and so it becomes pure, righteous and holy before the purest eyes of God, as about this the wise Paul, in the person of all the faithful, says: Who (Christ) has given us wisdom from God, and righteousness and sanctification and deliverance (1 Cor. 1:30). He receives this great and incomprehensible mercy from God through faith alone, without any merit of his own, but for the sake of the sole merits of Christ. What can someone who has sinned and been righteously condemned deserve, other than anger and an oath? From here, in those who sincerely believe in Christ and feel so much mercy in their hearts, the following will inevitably follow: 1) consolation and joy: for faith does not exist without this. How can one not be comforted and rejoice at one who was subject to God’s eternal wrath and condemnation, but received so much mercy from Him? 2) Gratitude and heartfelt love. How can one thank such a Benefactor and not love such goodness? 3) humility. For such mercy is granted from God not according to one’s own dignity, but according to His sole goodness and the merits of a merciful Intercessor. 4) Fear of God, so as not to anger God again, and thus not lose His mercy. 5) Prayer that God in His grace will contain him, and with His grace will preserve him from sin, the devil and other things. 6) High respect for Christ’s saving vision, incarnation, suffering and death: for by this alone he was delivered from a great calamity and was honored with the great mercy of God. 7) The undoubted hope of eternal life: for He who did not spare His own Son, but gave Him up for us all, just as He did not give us all things with Him (Rom. 8:32). This is how a faithful soul reasons with the Apostle: what if I sin, having received so much mercy from God and having been justified, will I lose that justification? The Apostle Saint John answers this: if anyone sins, the imams intercede with the Father, Jesus Christ the Righteous. And that cleansing is about our sins, not about ours specifically, but about the whole world. That is: the one who has sinned should not despair, but immediately turn and resort to the merciful Intercessor, Jesus Christ, admit his sin with humility, and ask Him for forgiveness and mercy, so that he can again be accepted into the company of his faithful. For His compassions are not diminished, and the doors of His mercy are opened to those who repent and interpret. However, we must be extremely wary of sin, although there is so much God’s mercy for sinners, so that we may not sin against God’s mercy, and, instead of mercy, we will recognize His truth in ourselves. Without doubt, God is merciful, but he is also righteous: and whoever, trusting in the mercy of God, does not stop sinning, must be afraid, lest he feel His righteous judgment upon himself. God is never mocked (Gal. 6:7). From this it follows that in whom there are no fruits of faith, that is, good deeds, much more than evil deeds, a fearless life and contrary to the law of God, there is no true heartfelt faith, but only an oral, false and delusional one, even if he preached and taught the faith: with which faith the mouths of many Christians are filled in this especially century, who confess and preach God with their lips, but have godlessness in their hearts and His works will be avenged (Titus 1:16). If only you had seen that the royal son, having rejected the precious scarlet robe with which he was dressed, had dressed himself in thin and stinking rags, you would certainly have been surprised at this obscene deed. Thus there is a Christian who, having abandoned God and Christ the Son of God, will give himself over to sin. Everyone who is baptized is made a son of God by faith in Christ Jesus, according to what is written: You are all sons of God in Christ Jesus (Gal. 3:26) - and is clothed with the beautiful robe of God’s justification on the inside, like the royal scarlet robe, as the Apostle says to Christians: “You were washed, you were sanctified, you were justified in the name of the Lord.” our Jesus Christ, and by the Spirit of our God (1 Cor. 6:11), and again: if you were baptized into Christ, you put on Christ (Gal. 3:27). We are all born from sinful Adam; but in holy baptism, spiritual birth, by faith in Christ the Son of God we are washed from the defilements of sin, we are born spiritually of God, and we are made children of God, according to the scripture: those who received Him (Jesus Christ), gave them the domain to become children of God, who believe in His name (Jn. 1:12), and again: you see, - St. John the Apostle says in wonder, “what love our father has given, so that we cannot speak and are children of God (1 John 3:1). This great grace was earned by our Jesus Christ, the Son of God, by His free obedience, suffering and death, earned by those who believe in His name; our heavenly Father gives with his goodness and love for mankind; performed by the Holy Spirit. But a Christian, when he deviates to sin and commits unrighteousness, this great grace is so dear, that is, through the suffering and death of the Son of God, the Lord of glory, acquired, and the loss of the only mercy from God given to him, he destroys, takes off the beautiful royal robes in which he was clothed in baptism by the grace of Christ, and dresses himself again in the stinking and foul rags of sin, which in the same At baptism he was stripped: and thus a deplorable shame is brought upon the angels and all the saints. Just as there is joy in heaven over one sinner who repents (Luke 15:10), says the Lord, so there is sadness over a righteous man who errs and falls away from the eternal life. The poor sinner does not see this stench and cold, but he will see it when the sons of God are revealed and become like the Only Begotten Son of God, who appeared in His divine glory, as the Apostle says: beloved! Now we are children of God, and we shall not be revealed (1 John 3:2). And sinners will be separated from their number, and their inner stinginess will appear as a shame to the whole world. This case and reasoning teaches you, Christian, to test yourself and consider your conscience, are you not in such a poor and deplorable state? And when you notice, do not hesitate to return to the heavenly Father, in the likeness of the prodigal son, and pray to Him with humility: Father of those who have sinned in heaven and before You; and Thy son is no longer worthy to be called: make me as one of Thy hired servants! (Luke 15:18–19). He, being merciful, is ready to receive you and embrace you with his holiest love: and so there will be joy in heaven for you who repent. Do you see that the father, although he turns his fickle son to an honest and constant life, admonishes him and says to him: Is it for you to squander what I have collected through my labors with drunkards and harlots? There are many such cases in the world. From this case, take the discussion about the spiritual property given to every Christian in baptism, that is, grace, truth, sanctification, adoption, inheritance of eternal life; and turn your mind from your carnal father to Christ. Who is the Eternal Father of his faithful (Isa. 9:6), and remember that He says in His Gospel: He who does not gather with Me scatters (Matthew 12:30). Christ, by His free life on earth, patience, suffering and death, earned us, sinners and outcasts, from His heavenly Father mercy, remission of sins, justification, sanctification and deliverance, as the Apostle teaches: for we have received wisdom from God, and righteousness and sanctification and deliverance (1 Cor. 1:30). And this invaluable treasure is given by faith to everyone who is baptized: then the person is made worthy of the tuna of these heavenly gifts. Just as an honest and rich man, although he has an heir to his estates, accepts a poor man as his son, and makes him, by his mercy, his heir: so is God, who is rich in mercy and bounty, a man who is the cunning of the devil. And by his own will he was torn away from Him, and became the poor, the needy, the wretched and the damned, and by the grace of His Only Begotten Son, Jesus Christ, receives Him, and with His Holy Spirit washes him from the filth of sin, sanctifies and justifies him (1 Cor. 6:11), makes him His son and His heir, and the heir of Christ (Rom. 8:16–17). But when a person, having forgotten this great grace, turns to sin, like a dog to his vomit and a pig, having washed himself in the pot (2 Pet. 2:22), and squanders his priceless heavenly treasure, as the prodigal son did (Luke 15:13-14), and thus, saddening Christ immeasurably, he also destroys himself: he hears from Him in your conscience and holy scripture a voice similar to this: O man! Should you squander My wealth, given to you, which I collected through great labor, sweat, illness, patience, suffering and death? Remember who I am and who I am, who worked so hard for you, and how I earned you this treasure! God and the Creator of all, Whom every tribe worships, in heaven and on earth and under the earth: but for your sake He was created as a man like you, He made Himself a little lower, we took on the form of a servant, He became in human likeness, and was found in the likeness of a man, He humbled Himself, becoming obedient even to the point of death, even death on the cross (Phil. 2:7-8); and so you have remission of sins, grace, blessing, righteousness, adoption - and you have acquired the inheritance of eternal life. Remember who you were? A lawless one, an apostate, rejected from the face of God, the son of the oath and wrath of God, a captive and slave of the devil, a child of unquenchable fire and eternal destruction. But I delivered you from all this action, not with silver or gold, but with My precious blood (1 Pet. 1:19); I washed you from the filth of sin, and covered you with My pure clothing of righteousness, and promised you the inheritance of eternal life. And I entered into a covenant with you, says Adonai the Lord: and you were unto me, and I washed you with water, and rinsed you with your blood, and anointed you with oil. And he clothed you in stripes, and shod you in scarlet, and girded you with fine linen (Ezek. 16:8–10). You have neglected so much of My love and mercy shown to you; that through labor, illness, patience, suffering, obedience to death, death on the cross, I have collected everything, you have squandered and squandered it all, following your will and passionate lusts, and you do not want to leave this evil and passionate disposition, to feel and repent, so that you will again receive mercy from Me. O man! Or do not seek the riches of My goodness, and My meekness and long-suffering, not knowing that My goodness leads you to repentance (Rom. 2:4). Remember where you slept from (Rev. 2:5). From what dignity and height, to what meanness and wretchedness? Where are you now and where are your will and your passionate life leading you? Remember and repent! Otherwise, you will forever sigh, grieve, grieve and cry about this, but it is useless, when you see Abraham, Isaac - and Jacob and other righteous people in my kingdom, you will be driven out into the outer darkness, there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth (Luke 13:28). Thus, the goodness of Christ our God convicts the Christian, who has turned to sin and is faulty, inside and outside - inside in conscience, and outside in holy scripture. A Christian should not fail to care for the great grace of God, calling him to repentance, so that he does not accumulate more of God’s wrath for himself, according to what is written: according to your cruelty and unrepentant heart, you store up wrath for yourself on the day of wrath and revelation of the righteous judgment of God (Rom. 2:5). You see that a naked man is ashamed and ashamed of himself, and others are ashamed and disgusted with him. Thus there is a soul that does not have the grace of God covering it. Satan, our enemy, like a thief, has exposed us, stripping us of the robe of God's grace and salvation. Where our ancestors, having been exposed by his cunning, recognized their nakedness, which they had not seen before their fall, and began to be ashamed and disgraced themselves, which was proof and evidence of their inner nakedness. Christ, the Son of God, seeing our nakedness, from which God and His holy angels turned away, had mercy on us, came to earth to us naked, poor, wretched, and beggars, clothed ourselves with our flesh and became like us in everything except sin, in order to wash us naked, soiled and defiled, with His blood, and to make us pure in His clothing, and so to present His heavenly Father to the purest. This holy garment is given by faith to everyone in baptism. If anyone keeps it, struggling against his enemies, who are invisibly taking up arms against us and want to expose us again, to commit our shame and shame before God and His angels, blessed is he, as the Lord says. Blessed is he who is watchful, and he who guards his garments, lest he walk naked, and they see his shame (Rev. 16:15). For such a one, the heavenly Father, seeing him clothed with the garment of His Only Begotten Son, will recognize and recognize him as His own, and will give him an inheritance with His chosen saints and will bring him into the palace of His glory. If someone through negligence and laziness has lost that sacred scarlet robe, and thus appears before God and His chosen ones, nothing else will follow him but unbearable shame and disgrace, he will shame himself as if he were naked; and God and His chosen ones will be ashamed of his nakedness, and will deny him as not his own. The blinded sinner does not see his nakedness, because he does not have open eyes, and for this reason he is not put to shame: just as a sleeping or blind person does not see his bodily nakedness, which is why you do not feel the shame. But God's all-seeing eye sees; sees and is disgusted by such a soul. The poor sinner will also see when the books of conscience are opened, and the secret thoughts of human hearts are brought into manifestation to the whole world; he will see, but to his extreme shame, disgrace, dishonor and disaster. Even if in the eyes of a few people there is shame and disgrace to stand naked in body, and we do not tolerate it, but we either run away or hide ourselves: how much more before the whole world, before angels and men, chosen by God and the righteous Judge himself, to stand naked in the soul, moreover soiled and defiled, the shame and shame will be unbearable. Such a soul will inevitably want to take refuge in a cave and darkness and hell itself, not tolerating worldwide shame and disgrace, and the righteous judgment of wrath, but it cannot. Oh, how blessed is he who now recognizes his poorest nakedness. - So he will be ashamed and ashamed of himself, and will seek clothing for himself with faith from Christ, who clothes everyone who believes in Him and asks Him with the robe of salvation. This incident teaches us to test our soul to see if it is naked, and so to seek and ask by faith for clothing for it from Christ, the Son of God, so that we may not appear on that day before God and His saints and be covered with cold. You see that a house that does not have a master living within itself is not clean, it is full of rubbish, dirt, and cobwebs; the earth becomes desolate without a worker, becomes barren and gives birth to indecent potions; the garden and grapes are lost without a worker; a ship without a good helmsman is sunk by storms and sea waves. Thus there is a human soul without Christ: and it is like a desolate house, full of stench, uncleanness and cobwebs, from the devil and demons prostrate, that is, evil lusts, plans and undertakings; there is like uncultivated earth, only thorns and thistles sprouting and subject to curse; It is like a garden and a vineyard, desolate without a worker, producing no fruit, and subject to nothing other than being cut and burned; It is like a ship floating without a helmsman, tossed about by storms and waves, and near sinking. For what is the master of the house, the worker of the earth and the vines, the helmsman of the ship, then Christ is our soul. After the fall, Christ retreated from the human soul; and it became like a house without an owner, land and grapes without a worker, a ship without a helmsman. There is no Christ in that soul, which, although it was born by water and spirit in baptism, but, following the first Adam, rejected the commandment of God, and rejected the evil enemy the devil. I followed the ancient serpent by my will; and when he remains in that wretched state to the end, he will be without Christ forever; and since Christ is the life of the soul, then remaining without Christ, like the life, he will forever be in death. Let us repent, Christians, and cleanse ourselves from all filthiness of the flesh and spirit, so that we may be worthy to receive Christ into the homes of our souls and accept Him. He stands and strikes the doors of our hearts, so that we may open to Him and rest in our souls; and let us wash His holy feet (Luke 7:37), and make an abode with us (John 14:23). “Behold, I stand at the door,” He says, “and it is to this effect: if anyone hears My voice and opens the door, I will come in to him (Rev. 3:20). Woe to us when now we do not listen to Him, and for the sake of Him who came into the world and was pleased to wander in it, He will not receive us into His homes! Hear what He says at His second coming to those who are on His side: He was strange and did not know Me (Matthew 25:43). It will be a shame and fear to endure this reprimand from Him! What’s worse is to be separated from him forever, and to go with the devil into eternal fire. Depart from Me, the curse into the everlasting fire prepared for the devil and his angels (Matthew 25:41). Since great evil is sin Something evil will happen to him according to the work of his hands (Isa. 3:11). Everything is sin, no matter what is done against the holy and eternal law of God, as the Apostle teaches: everyone who commits sin also commits lawlessness; and sin is lawlessness (1 John 3:4). Sin is a crime and destruction of the eternal and immutable law of God, disobedience and resistance to the holy will of God. Sin is a great evil, as the following conclusions show: The majesty of God is offended by every sin. It is no less easy to offend a person, more dignified than a great king: but as a grave evil, to offend the infinite and indescribable God! Resentment and insult grow from the person being insulted: and the greater and higher the person being insulted is, the greater the insult and the greater the sin. But an insult to every person, not only a simple person, but also to a high-ranking person and the king himself, is like nothing in comparison with an insult to God: for every person, and the king himself, is like nothing before the majesty of God, before whom the whole world and all the nations are counted as a drop of water (Is. 40:15). For this reason, every sin is a very grave evil, since thereby the infinite majesty of God is offended; which evil throughout all eternity will be cleansed by the fire of Gehenna, when here we break our hearts, it will not be cleansed by repentance and the blood of the Son of God. Through sin, God's eternal, immutable law is ruined. For God gave His law to us for this purpose, so that we might keep it completely. And when a person sins and breaks the law, then he violates that Divine institution and law, which is eternally indestructible and must remain intact: and thus a person ruins what God has established; and the damned sinner changes and destroys what should be in itself irreplaceable and indestructible. In the law of God it is depicted that this is how it should be depicted, and not otherwise; eg Honor and love God above all else, and love your neighbor as yourself. The eternal and unchangeable truth demands from a person. But the blinded sinner, despite this, dares to destroy what cannot be destroyed, and to violate what cannot be broken, to the dishonor of the eternal God and his own destruction. A person, when he sins, honors himself more than God, listens more to his lust than to God; He prefers his will to the will of God and His holy law, and becomes, as it were, autocratic and disobedient to the power of God, and so with the devil he stubbornly stands against God. This cannot be otherwise when a person sins out of willfulness, prejudice and against his conscience. The devil’s work is to resist God and not submit to Him. From there it is written about such sinners: everyone who commits sin is of the devil (1 John 3:8) and is called children of the devil (1 John 3:10; John 8:44). Since it is so difficult and scary to resist God and Your Creator with the devil, everyone can see. Sin is such a great and terrible evil that no one could destroy it except the Only Begotten Son of God. It was necessary for the almighty son of God to come and take him away with His suffering and death. For this reason the Son of God appeared, that he might destroy the works of the devil (1 John 3:8). God’s law is immutable and, as stated above: for this reason, a person had to either fulfill it in its entirety, or the one who transgressed and sinned suffered eternal punishment; for this is what the truth of God requires of man. But since everyone was designated by the word of God to be lawbreakers, that is not why they were subject to eternal condemnation; and no one could free himself from that by his own strength. For this reason, the Son of God came, and satisfied sin with His suffering and death, and cleansed it with His sacrifice on the tree with the cross; Consequently, he withheld the execution following the sin of those who believe in Him. There is no sin without punishment; and when sin is taken away, then execution will not follow: execution does not happen except for sin. For this reason, when the faithful pray and ask for remission of sins, they ask in the name of Christ, Who alone forgives and takes away sin. Without it, there is no remission and remission of sin. For He is the Lamb of God, who takes away the sins of the world (John 1:29). Don’t think, O man, that something is a little sin. When the Lamb of God does not take away sin from you, then throughout all of endless eternity you will pay for it in Gehenna to the righteousness of God; He will receive only from those who stop sinning, repent and believe in Him. And when you consider sin as little, you cannot escape its sorrow: for there is a sign that you do not have true repentance. The one who truly repents knows its heaviness and sorrow, and for this reason he guards against it like a deadly poison. It is terrible for pagans who do not know God and His holy law to sin; but it is more terrible for Christians who confess God and are enlightened by the light of His word. For pagans by one conscience, Christians by conscience and the written law of God are convicted of sin. The pagans both do not know God and do not see His will as declared in the law: Christians hear the will of God preached all day long, and the punishment for criminals of God’s law is the following. And those who know the will of God do not fulfill it. Pagans, just as they do not know God, do not make any promises to Him: Christians, entering Christianity, promise to work for God, to do His will, they deny Satan and his works; but when they turn to their sins, they all forget and trample on them, and betray God, and become deceitful. And so a true parable happened to them: a dog returned to his vomit, and a pig washed himself in pot (2 Pet. 2:22). Sin for Christians is nothing other than apostasy, treason, which is betrayed not to man, but to God. Reason then, Christian, that there is a sin that you delight in. Although you confess the name of God, you avenge Him by deed when you approach His commandment. How many times do you sin, for example, kill, commit fornication, steal, abduct, slander, blaspheme, slander, etc., how many times do you listen to the advice of the devil, and you reject the commandment of God and His command; how many times do you listen to the enemy the devil and not listen to God, how many times do you retreat from Him and approach the devil. Truly this is so, although you don’t notice it. Sin separates a person from God, as the Prophet says: your sins separate you and God (Isa. 59:2). And the more a person sins, the more he moves away from God; the more one moves away, the more one becomes darkened. God is light (1 John 1:5). For this reason, the further someone departs from Him, the more he is led into darkness, and the more blind he becomes in his mind. How does it happen that such a person often does not blame the sin for what is a great sin, and rejoices in that for which he should cry. For example: to take revenge on a neighbor, to repay evil for evil, to insult, to deceive, to deceive, and in a word, to hurt a person like an arrow, many set themselves up for consolation: which is great madness and extreme darkness of the mind. For this reason, in all his actions, deeds and undertakings, such a one walks like a blind man or in darkness, and does not see the pit of destruction in which he has his mouth. About such it is said: without understanding, without understanding, they walk in darkness (Ps. 82:5); and again: they will touch, like a blind wall, as if they touch a being without their eyes, and they will fall at noon, like at midnight (Is. 59:10). Sin leads to this disaster. The Lord says: everyone who commits sin is the slave of sin (John 8:34). The servant who commits sin is prodigal lust; the drunken and gorged servant is the belly: to this belly is God (Phil. 3:19). He who loves silver and gold is a servant of mammon, and works for mammon (Matthew 6:24). Think the same about other passions. For if anyone is overcome, he also has work to do (2 Pet. 2:19). How hard and vile this work is! The hardest and most despicable thing is more than to work for any person and for the tormentor himself, as for the creation of God to work, rather than sin, and the sin of the devil. Oh, if only the poor man could see this work! I would recognize myself as poorer than captives, convicts, imprisoned, chained and other poor and physically suffering people. But even more so is the poorest because he does not recognize his own poverty. Passion blinds the rational eye. The Apostle says: everyone who commits sin is of the devil, as the devil sinned from the beginning; and below, he calls sinners children of devils (1 John 3:8–10). And the Lord said to the evil Jews: you are of your father the devil, and you want to do the lusts of your father (John 8:44). It is very disastrous and scary to be a son of the devil. But sin, the evil and devilish seed, leads a person to this terrible disaster. For a sinner who commits sin and does not want to repent, portrays this prince of darkness as the son of his father, by his morals, and by his very deed shows that he is from that bad father: as if from his evil seed he creates evil fruits, that is, sins. From the fruit the seed is known. And as is the seed, so is its fruit. The devil resists and does not submit to God: and the unrepentant sinner remains in the same disobedience. Listen to this, everyone, and consider whose son you are, even though you bear the name of Christ. The word of the Apostle is true and true: everyone who commits sin is of the devil; and: Every tree is known by its fruit, says the Lord (Luke 6:44). Sin, as it is said, separates from God, Who alone has life, or rather, He Himself is the source of life, deprives the separated soul of life, and thus mortifies it. Such a person is alive and there is dead; alive in body, but dead in soul. So our ancestors in paradise, on which day they ate from the commanded tree and sinned, died according to the word of the Lord: if you eat one day from it, you will die (Gen. 2:17). Thus, about the prodigal son, who was separated from his father, but returned through repentance, it is said: this son of mine was dead and is alive: and he was bent, and was found (Luke 15:24). We are not talking about physical death here, because he was alive in body even when he was separated from his father, as the circumstances of the parable show, but about spiritual death, from which he came to life when he returned from error to his father through repentance. This parable depicts a sinner who has been separated from God as his Father, but who, through true repentance, turns back to Him, who is still dead in soul until he is separated from God. One who is separated from the stomach must inevitably be dead. Just as one who has departed from the light should turn into darkness, so one who has departed from the belly should return to the shadow of mortal existence. For where there is no light, there is inevitably death. God is an animal and life-giving light: therefore, in darkness and death there are those who are separated from Him. To such a dead man the word of God speaks: rise from the dead and Christ will sanctify you (Eph. 5:14). An irritated conscience torments a person through sin, and the torment is so severe that it often leads to despair, as happened to Cain the fratricide (Gen. 4), and Judas the traitor to the Lord (Matthew 27:5). As long as sin is committed, its evil is not known; but when, after the fall, conscience awakens, then the sinner will know that bitterness is sin. Like a drunk, as long as he drinks and is drunk, he does not feel his harm; and when he sleeps it off, then he feels how harmful drunkenness is: so a sinner, while he remains in sinful drunkenness, does not feel sinful harm; but when he awakens from that drunkenness, then he will know how great, grave and painful evil is sin. Then his conscience will awaken, and it torments him more than any tormentor, and, like a worm on a tree, gnaws and devours his soul inside; then sadness, fear and horror of God’s wrath and judgment, Gehenna and eternal torment arise in him; then thoughts, like waves, strike the wretched soul: there is no salvation for you in your God (Ps. 3:3). Wherever the sinner is, everywhere this tormentor is inseparably with him, everywhere he torments and devours him; worries during the day, worries at night and takes away sleep; he sleeps a little, and then he frightens him; If he awakens from sleep, his evil conscience will also awaken. The day begins and goes through with this misfortune, and so he can never free himself from that misfortune: because he always has that evil within himself. O evil, tormenting evil - evil conscience! And grave evil is sin, which so troubles our conscience! It is better to have a wounded body than a wounded conscience by sins; It is better to have a beating of the body than a beating of the conscience; It is better to accept all sorts of external troubles than to have this one internal trouble. Even in this age, where we do not see every sin in our conscience: for who understands the Fall? (Ps. 18:13). So severely does the conscience torment for sin: what a heavy and unbearable torment there will be in the future, where all the sins in it will be revealed and presented, and the poor soul will feel all the wrath of God on itself, and will remain in the infinite mercy of God in despair forever and ever! But whoever, after committing a sin, does not feel conviction and torment of conscience, has lost his last hope of salvation, and the sign that he does not put any sin into sin: it only seems that this is impossible. For this witness is faithful: no matter how you console him or soften him, he will not stop denouncing, denouncing and screaming; always seeks judgment against the sinner. Just as the written law of God is also natural, this law, although darkened in the sinner, this law exposes sin, and means God’s judgment on the sinner. God’s law and conscience come together, and what God’s law says on the charter, conscience says inside. The Law of God says: Thou shalt not steal; your conscience speaks to you too. Why does it happen that even the greatest lawless people look for a hidden place to commit lawless deeds? No one wants to sin openly, and the sin committed is concealed in every possible way. This does not come from elsewhere, but from conscience, which convicts the sinner of what he is doing badly, and creates shame in him. For sin, Gehenna, hell and eternal torment are prepared. Since there is a great and terrible misfortune, first of all, to be deprived of God's mercy forever, and His sweetest contemplation, of which all the holy angels and holy men will forever be satisfied without satiety, to be alienated and rejected by that blessed council and to be caught in the most painful eternal state, with the devil and his evil angels, endlessly drinking the cup of God's wrath, suffering in the flames one that consumes, but does not kill (Matthew 13:42, 25:41; Mark 9:43–45, etc.), where a single drop of water is desired, but never happens, and the answer is heard: child! Remember that you received your goodness in your belly (Luke 16:25). If, I say, it is hard to sigh, groan, weep, weep, be consumed in such a disaster, to gnash your teeth endlessly, incessantly and uselessly! Sin leads to this terrible evil (Rev. 21:8). Sin brings about temporary punishments, such as bloody wars, pestilences, illnesses, sorrows, famines, cowards, fires, etc. If there had been no sin, nothing like this would have happened. Sin is the cause of all evil and disasters. Sin is the reason that even the most innocent nature suffers. Man sins, but other creatures suffer; the earth does not produce fruit, livestock and animals perish from hunger, the air and water are corrupted, and so on. Human sin is the cause of all this. You see, man, great evil is sin. O sin, unspeakable evil! How the infinite and all-good God is offended and angry! Shameless betrayal is a sin that we betray to the immortal and righteous God! An incurable ulcer is a sin that hurts, torments and consumes our conscience! Mental leprosy is a sin that no one except the Only Begotten Son of God can heal! The source of temporary and eternal disasters, the root of condemnation and death, the transformation of nature, the darkening of the mind, the corruption of spiritual kindness and all evils, the worst sin! Righteous St. Chrysostom wrote: there is nothing worse than sin; there is nothing more filthy and unclean from sin 3 . Truly the most evil sin is greater than the demon, as the Father also teaches 4. For sin also made the demon a demon, who was created by the Creator as a bright angel. Truly it is better to walk naked than to walk burdened with sins, the Father speaks in the same way 5. O sin-loving soul! Look and reason how great, terrible and incurable evil you love! How you delight in the vile monster! Feel yourself, look around to what end whose bad love is leading you, and, turning away from this monster, turn to the beginning and source of all good things - God. When you return to breathe, then you will be saved and you will understand where you were (Isa. 30:15). About God's wrath against sin O man! Or about the riches of His goodness and meekness is not for the sake of long-suffering, not knowing how the goodness of God leads you to repentance? Because of your cruelty and unrepentant heart store up wrath for yourself on the day of wrath and revelation of the righteous judgment of God, whoever will repay anyone according to his deeds (Rom. 2:4–6). The wrath of God against sin is shown through executions sent against sinners by God. Even if God is good, so that no one is good, except one God (Matthew 19:17), according to the testimony of Christ: however, as much as there is good, so much is there righteousness, Whom justice demands that the sinner, as a transgressor of His holy and inapplicable law, should be executed. If a sinner is not immediately executed upon sin, or is executed in the very act of sin, then it must be attributed to the goodness of God, which endures the sinner, and so awaits him for repentance, just as the Apostle says to the sinner: O man! Or are you not interested in the wealth of kindness and meekness and long-suffering, not knowing how the goodness of God leads you to repentance? We read in Holy Scripture that God sends various executions to sinners. The angels who sinned are overthrown from heaven. Christ says about this: I saw Satan like lightning falling from heaven (Luke 10:18); and Peter the Apostle says: The angels who sinned were not shown mercy, but, having been bound in captivity in darkness, they delivered them over to be tormented to judgment (2 Pet. 2:4). Our ancestors Adam and Eve were expelled from paradise for their crime and were subject to every calamity, and with them we. For sins, the first world, except for Noah, the preacher of truth, was destroyed by a terrible flood (Gen. 7; 2 Pet. 2:5). Sodom and Gomorrah with the surrounding cities were burned by fire for vile uncleanness (Gen. 19; 2 Pet. 2:6). The proud and bitter Pharaoh with all his army was drowned in the Red Sea (Ex. 14). Dathan and Abiron with their like-minded people rebelled against Moses and Aaron in the desert, and were consumed alive by the earth (Num. 16). The earth opened and devoured Dathan, and covered the hosts of Abiron (Ps. 106:17). Other people of Israel there, for various iniquities, were variously struck by the wrath of God, some with fire, some with poisonous snakes, others with the sword of foreigners, others in a different way, as we read about in the books of Moses, the Prophets and in Chapter 10 of 1 Corinthians. Those who came to the promised land were handed over to foreigners to work how many times, how many times they were taken into captivity and otherwise executed: the books of the Old Testament testify. Their sins and iniquities were to blame for all this, as these holy books testify to the same. After the coming of Christ into the world, we also see the executions of God sent against sinners. We read that Ananias and his wife Sapphira were accidentally struck down with death for lying to the Holy Spirit (Acts 5:1-10). Herod was suddenly struck down by an angel of the Lord, before he had given glory to God: and he was eaten away by worms (Acts 12:23–24). The city of Jerusalem, having beaten the prophets and stoned those sent to it, and was stained with the blood of Christ the Son of God, is completely devastated, and its children, that is, the inhabitants, are broken with the edge of the sword, as Christ Himself prophesied with tears: the days will come against you, Jerusalem, and your enemies will lay a guard against you, and they will circumvent you, and they will defeat you and your children in you (Lk. 19:43–44). But what we read in books, we see in our times. We still notice the same terrible judgments of God; His same righteous wrath now appears on unrepentant sinners. We see and hear terrible battles, both terrible and crying worthy of bloodshed; so many thousands of those falling in battle, so many remaining widows, orphans, crying fathers and mothers, so many cities being devastated by foreign weapons, from pestilence, from famine, cowardice and fire, how many suddenly admire the lawless and come from this light. These are all traces of God’s righteous judgment and wrath, which consumes the unrepentant lawless people like fire. What happened to them by God’s righteous judgment should be expected by other unrepentant sinners. We read in the Gospel of St. Evangelist Luke that when some came to Christ and told Him and the Galileans, to whom the blood of Pilate was mixed with their sacrifices, Christ answered and said: Do you remember that these Galileans were more sinners than all the Galileans, because they suffered in this way? Neither, I say to you: but unless you repent, you will all perish the same way (Luke 13:1-3). From these words of Christ it follows that other unrepentant sinners must expect the same destruction that they see in others. Even the ax lies at the root of the tree: every tree that does not produce good fruit is cut down and thrown into the fire (Matthew 3:10). From past and existing plagues we conclude both about future ones, and from temporary ones about eternal ones. There will be eternal punishment for bitter sinners, there will be fiery Gehenna, there will be hell, pitch darkness, gnashing of teeth; the wicked will turn away from the face of God and His kingdom. Do not flatter yourself: neither harlots, nor idolaters, nor adulterers, nor defilers, nor wicked women, nor sodomites, nor covetous women, nor thieves, nor drunkards, nor molesters, nor extortioners, will inherit the kingdom of God (1 Cor. 6:9-10; Gal. 5:19-21), wrote St. Apostle. Christ will proclaim on the day of His righteous judgment to sinners: Depart from Me, cursed into eternal fire, prepared for the devil and his angel (Matthew 25:41). To the fearful, and to the unfaithful, and to the abominable, and to murderers, and to those who commit fornication, and to those who perform enchantments, to idolaters and to all who lie, their portion will be in the lake that burns with fire and the bogeyman, which is the second death, as Christ says (Rev. 21:8). We also read on other St. Scriptures places. God's words and reproaches, Christian, are not vain and empty, but they are true and reliable: what he said is certainly as it is said; and what he predicted will certainly happen. He foretold to our first parents the death that would come from the commanded tree: and death followed to those who transgressed His commandment. Noah the righteous predicted a worldwide flood on the wicked: and there was a flood. He predicted destruction for the fierce Pharaoh: and Pharaoh died. He predicted captivity for the Israelites, and they were captured. He predicted the destruction and devastation of Jerusalem, and it came true. He declared in His Scripture that there will be eternal torment for the wicked; it will certainly be: they will experience the eternal righteous judgment of God's wrath; They will drink this cup of sorrow, but they will never drink it. Let us fear, Christian, the judgment of God and His righteous wrath, and let us repent, lest we fall into the hands of the living God! It is a terrible thing to fall into the hand of the living God (Heb. 10:31). Whoever does not believe the words of God will experience the matter of God’s righteous judgment for himself. God is not mocked: for whatever a man sows, that will he also reap, says the Apostle (Gal. 6:7). The Day of the Lord, like a thief in the night, will come. Whenever they speak peace and affirmation, then all destruction will suddenly attack them, like sickness in the womb of a woman: and they will not be able to escape (1 Thessalonians 5:2-3). How does God call a sinner to repentance? Come to Me, all you who labor and burdened, and I will give you rest. Take My yoke upon you, and learn from Me, for I am meek and lowly in heart: and you will find rest for your souls (Matthew 11:28–29). As long as a person stands in front of someone, he faces him; and when he wants to get away from him, he turns away from him with his face, and turns his back to him, and, having thus turned away, goes on his intended path; and the more he goes, the more he moves away and moves away from him. Thus, as long as a person strives to fulfill the holy will of God, and listens to what God commands in His word, and shows himself ready for God’s command, as if he stands before God with his face and gives his respect to Him, abides with Him and does not separate from him; but when the good changes his will, and chooses evil instead of good, he commits sin instead of virtue, as if he turns his face away from God, and turns his backbone, as he says about the lawless Israelites through the Prophet: turning his backbone towards Me, and not his face (Jer. 32:33). Thus, having turned a person from God, as infinite good, the more sins and iniquities he commits, and remains in unrepentance, the more he departs and moves away from Him. What turns away from the thing itself is not the face, but the heart; and it is not the backbone that turns, but disobedience and an unrepentant heart; and he moves away not with his feet, but with his will, not by changing place, but by changing the morals of evil into the most evil. Where can one turn one’s face away from the One who is everywhere? And where do we go from Him, Who is found in every place? As the psalmist says: How can I go from Your Spirit, and how can I flee from Your presence? Even if I ascend to heaven, You are there; Even if I go down to hell, there you are (Ps. 139:7–8). And this means turning away, retreating and moving away from God! - This aversion and removal of the sinner from God was depicted to us by the parable of the prodigal son, who, having taken a worthy part of the estate from his benevolent Father, with his misfortune fell behind Him, squandered his estate, living fornication, and afterward began to be deprived, and wanted to be satisfied with the faces of the pig. Thus, a person, having departed from God through disobedience, destroys the spiritual property given to him from God, that is, holiness, truth, integrity, etc., and thus he finds himself in difficult work of passions, and in this disastrous work he cannot find pleasure and joy from anything. The human soul, like a spirit created by God, has no other pleasure and joy. The human soul, as a spirit created by God, cannot find pleasure, rest, peace, consolation and joy in anything other than in God, from Whom it was created in His image and likeness; and when she is separated from Him, she is forced to seek pleasure for herself in creatures, and to feed herself with various passions, like faces, but does not find proper peace and joy; and so one should die from hunger. The spirit needs spiritual food to eat. The most merciful God does not turn away the sinner who turns away and moves away, but, as if in the wake of a fatherly voice, cries out: child, where are you moving away from Me? Where will you find bliss without Me and besides Me? Trouble will befall you everywhere. And thus crying out, he calls him to Himself. He calls in different ways. Inside, through His grace, which strikes the doors of our hearts. This happens how many times does a conscience, irritated by sins, convict and strike the sinner, presenting to him the judgment of God and eternal torment for his sins. He calls through the salvation providence, suffering, death and resurrection of His Son Jesus Christ, presenting to him how that great work was accomplished for his sake. For no other sake did Christ come into the world than for the sake of a sinner. For the Son of Man came to seek and save the lost (Luke 19:10). “I have not come,” he said, “to call the righteous, but sinners to repentance (Matthew 9:13). Who also, as it were, cries out after the sinner and exhorts him to return with repentance to Himself: “Why have you, sinner, forsaken Me? Why are you withdrawing from your Beloved? Remember that for your sake I was born of a Virgin and took on the form of a slave (Phil. 2:7); For your sake, I became a child, became poor, humbled myself, lived on earth, cried, worked, suffered persecution, slander, reproach, ridicule, and suffered all kinds of hardship; Finally, he died a blasphemous death, and died on a cross. I did all this for your salvation. He came down from heaven to lift you up to heaven; I humbled myself in order to exalt you, the humble one; I became poor so that you, who were poor, could be rich; I was dishonored in order to glorify the dishonored; I was wounded in order to heal you who was wounded; died in order to revive the dead. You sinned, and I took your sin upon myself; you are guilty, but I suffered execution; you are a debtor, and I paid the debt for you; You are condemned to death, but I died for you. And it was nothing other than My love that attracted Me to this suffering for you. Why is it that you arbitrarily neglect this love of Mine, labors, deeds, sufferings, for the sake of raising you, and want to destroy yourself, not having delivered yourself from sin, the devil, death and hell with corrupted silver or gold, but with My honest blood? (1 Pet. 1:19). Remember this, coking, since the price given for you has been given! You have been redeemed by My blood and My death. Remember these all My merits, by which you have earned remission of sins and eternal life, and repent: and thus you will be saved. Behold, I stand at the door, and to no avail: if anyone hears My voice and opens the door, I will come in to him and dine with him, and he with Me (Rev. 3:20). O Divine, O dear, O sweetest voice - the voice that seeks our salvation! O most kind and merciful Jesus, our merciful Redeemer! Do not depart from us sinners, whom You have redeemed with Your holy blood; but strike the doors of our stone hearts, strike firmly with your sweet and saving voice, so that we may awaken from our deep sinful sleep and hear your sweet and most lovable voice; For Your voice is sweet and Your image is beautiful; and so we ourselves will begin to ask, seek and push, push into the door of Thy mercy (Matthew 7:7-8). Thus, the Son of God calls after the erring sinner and turns him to repentance! And the Father from heaven testifies to this: Hear him (Matthew 17:5). And the Holy Spirit in the psalm says to us: today if you hear His voice, do not harden your hearts (Ps. 94:8; Heb. 3:7). Thus, our Holy and merciful God, Father, Son and Holy Spirit, calls us with His grace to repentance! He calls us to repentance through the Prophets and Apostles, as His messengers and servants, whom He sends after us, as it were, and through them He turns us to Himself, who exhort us and pray: according to Christ we pray, as we pray to God, we pray according to Christ, be reconciled to God (2 Cor. 5:20). And again: turn to me, says the Lord of hosts, and I will turn to you, says the Lord of hosts (Zech. 1:5; Mal. 3:7). And again: turn, O Israel, to the Lord your God: you have already fainted in your iniquities (Hos. 14:2). And again: Turn to Me, the house of Israel, says the Lord, and I will not set My face on you; For I am merciful, says the Lord, and I will not be angry with you forever (Jer. 3:12). And again: and now the Lord your God says: Turn to Me with all your heart, in fasting and in weeping and in mourning, and rend your hearts, and not your garments, and turn to the Lord your God; for you are merciful and generous, long-suffering and abounding in mercy, and repent of your evil (Joel 2:12–13). And again: turn and renounce all your wickedness, and unrighteousness will not be tormenting you; cast away from you all your wickedness, even if you are dishonest towards Me; and create for yourself a new heart, and a new spirit, and do all My commandments (Ezek. 18:30–31). So, as you see here and in other places in the Scriptures, through the voices of the Prophets and Apostles, God converts the sinner and calls to repentance! He calls through the promise of temporary and eternal blessings, with which, like a child-loving father, he attracts a little boy to himself with an apple, so that we will be aroused by the blessings and turn to Him; about which we find plenty in the Prophetic books and Apostolic Epistles. This is how Christ calls us to Himself and promises sweet rest to our souls: come to Me, all you who labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you, and learn from Me, for I am meek and lowly in heart, and you will find rest for your souls. As if to say: O poor and troubled sinners! It’s enough for you to work hard and burden yourself with plans, undertakings, endeavors, worries, and the sorrows of life. Nowhere will you find true peace and bliss except Me. Whatever you don’t turn to, you won’t find any true benefit from it. Everywhere you are, except me, you encounter true misfortune and evil. The wealth, honor, glory and sweetness of this world, which you seek, will burden you more than they will ease you, they will burden you more than they will give you rest... Come to me, all you who labor and are burdened, and I will give you rest. “We, sinners, should not listen to this auspicious and sweet voice, but turn and come to our merciful Redeemer, so that our souls may find peace.” He calls through the repression of temporary and eternal punishments, as we also see in many places in the Holy Scriptures. If you do not turn, he will cleanse his weapon, he will make his bow tense, and his vessels of death will be prepared in him, his arrows will be burned to ashes (Ps. 7:13-14). O man! Or do you not care about the wealth of goodness, meekness and long-suffering, not knowing how the goodness of God leads you to repentance? Because of your cruelty and unrepentant heart, you are storing up wrath for yourself on the day of wrath and revelation of God’s righteous judgment (Rom. 2:4–5). Further, the Fatherly Providence of God sends punishments to sinners, with which it seems to cut off their destructive path, so that they stop and turn to God. And this is what diseases, famines, fires and other misfortunes mean. We are finally called through everyday mortal events, when we see our brethren departing from here, and we ourselves expect this from day to day; For God says to everyone from us: You are earth, and to earth you will return, which was said to the forefather Adam (Gen. 3:19). Repent so that you may have a part in the resurrection of the righteous, who will rise in glory. The reasons that can and should motivate a sinner to repentance are: God's great will, desire and, as it were, hunger and thirst for our salvation. Everyone wants to be saved, and to come into the true mind, our God, as you see from the previous paragraph, and from other prophetic and apostolic exhortations, which are noted, which reveal God’s fatherly heart and the great desire for our salvation, and depict in various words, and especially from the fact that for our sake He did not spare His Only Begotten Son, but gave Him up for us, that we might be saved. For this reason, he attracts us to himself in various ways, exhorts us, beckons us through His messengers, promises good things, threatens us with evil, promises help and grace to give to those who turn, promises forgiveness of sins committed and not remembering them, frightens us with eternal fire, and reveals eternal bliss, and promises, so let us move to repentance and receive salvation. It is not fitting for us to want to despise the great, merciful God, but to turn and repent. This is what is required of us by the wonderful Son of God’s look upon us, his incarnation, his humble life on earth, his suffering and death, which he accomplished all for the sake of our salvation. But all this is useless for those who remain without repentance, and do not want to correct themselves and show the fruits of repentance; but he will condemn them even more, for they have despised so much grace. You hear and read in St. Gospel, O sinner, how in a humble manner our Savior came to us to save us; The manger and den where you were born show this: you want to live in pride. In what poverty did I live on earth for your sake, so that the Son of Man had no place to lay his head: but you insatiably desire possessions and wealth. How many years have you worked on earth for the sake of your soul: you don’t care and don’t work for your salvation, but you despise it all. Koliko wept for your perishing soul, and in the days of his flesh he also expressed his supplications and prayers to Him who was able to save Him from death with a strong cry and with tears: you don’t want to sigh and shed tears for the sake of your soul, to regret your sins. What blasphemies and reproaches I endured for your sake: you do not want to suffer insults from your neighbor, but you are angry with him, and you breathe the spirit of vengeance. Remember how you grieved, grieved, horrified, sweated bloody: you don’t want to grieve, grieve and grieve over your sins with which you offended the Majesty of God; but you madly spend your days in worldly gaiety. How terribly I was scolded, laughed at, spat upon, strangled and wounded for your sake: you seek honor and glory in this world and want to become famous, earth and ashes, poor and outcast. How terribly tormented, crucified, hanged among robbers, nailed to a cross, and dishonorably died for your sake: you never cease to be comforted by the pleasures and luxuries of the flesh. This ineffable His love and grace cries out to us, let us turn and leave our lawless life, and repent, and thus live our time with the fear of our life, seeing that we have not been delivered from our vain life with corruptible silver or gold, the faithful fathers, but with honest blood, like the spotless and most pure lamb of Christ (1 Pet. 1:17–19). Should we commit those sins for which Christ the Son of God was so wounded and tormented? His very blood cries out to us, let us cease from sins and repent. If we do not repent, then the same blood will cry out against us, so that we will fall under God’s judgment and accept it according to our deeds. It’s scary to hear this, but it will definitely happen! God is not mocked (Gal. 6:7). God's rebuke can and should awaken us to repentance. God abhors execution of the unrepentant. If you do not turn, He will cleanse His weapon, He will make His bow ready, and in it will be prepared the vessels of death, and so on. God's rebuke, man, is not empty and vain, but it will certainly be the very thing when a person neglects it and does not correct himself. And it is impossible to hide from Him anywhere; Everywhere He takes His vengeance on the unrepentant, as He says through the Prophet: If they hide in hell, then from there My hand will pluck them out; If they ascend to heaven, then I will overthrow them from there; and if they hide on the verge of Carmel, then I will seek and take back from there; and if before My sight they are plunged into the depths of the sea, then even there I will command the serpent, and I will bite (Amos. 9:2-3). There is only one refuge from the wrath of God - repentance; it hides the sinner from vengeance and execution. I will speak against the tongue and against the kingdom, and I will uproot them, and destroy and waste them. And if that tongue turns back from all its wickedness, then I will repent of the evil I thought to do to them (Jer. 18:7-8). The Ninevites ran to this safe refuge when they heard the coming wrath of God, and hid themselves and thus were saved. Even now many resort to this and are saved. It is fitting for us, humans, to also flee to the refuge of the city, so that we may hide in it from execution and the vengeance of God: repentance is that mountain in which Lot hid from the destructive wrath of God who burned Sodom and Gomorrah. Those who do not want to perish with the lawless world, like Sodom and Gomorrah, must inevitably run away and hide in this quiet and safe mountain. Run, run, sinner, to this mountain, while the wrath of God, like fire in heaven, is not asleep, and do not look back. Remember Lot's wife, as Christ exhorts us (Luke 17:32). What encourages us to repentance is the unknown end of our life, which will inevitably happen, but when it will be unknown. God has determined this hour, unknown to us, so that we may always expect it. God promises us to accept those who repent, to grant us remission of sins, but He does not promise us the morning. Heed this, poor sinner, and do not set aside this morning for yourself to repent. God always commands us to be ready for the outcome, and as the hour of death finds us, we will appear as such before His judgment. And therefore, as you want to die, such you must be throughout your life. Do you want to die the way pious Christians die? For you must live as the pious live. Every person is a servant of God. A slave must always be ready whenever his master calls him to him. Likewise, a Christian, as a servant of God, must always be ready when God calls him. And God calls everyone to Himself through the end of this life. Blessed are the servants, whom the Lord will find watchful when He comes (Luke 12:37). He certainly watches who is in constant repentance. The damned and the poor are those whom the Lord will find intoxicated with the love of this world and sleeping in the sleep of sin! Remember, where is the rich man, who dressed in purple and fine linen, rejoicing all day long? He is crying out from hell in torment, and will cry endlessly. Where are the other sinners who did not repent and were caught up in death? They remain in their specific places, awaiting the universal judgment of God and the final determination, and the retribution perfected according to deeds: they would like to return to this world and do all sorts of repentance, but it will not be given to them. We still, thank God, live on earth, death has not yet taken us, the time has not yet passed for us to repent, we can still be saved by God’s grace, God still calls us to repentance and promises mercy: well, let us repent, man, and show the fruits of repentance, and establish ourselves in that new life, so that when the hour of death comes to us, it will find us, like Christians who die blissfully, as they die about Lord, and through death, like through doors, the best and eternal bliss will enter into the belly. May the Last Judgment of Christ move us to repentance, at which it is fitting for all of us - all of us, the righteous, I say, and the sinners, to appear and render an answer to the righteous Judge for our deeds. Now God is calling for repentance; then he will call for an answer. Now he says: repent; Then he will say: Answer Me. Now he calls: come to Me, you who are weary and burdened, and I will give you rest; Then he will say: Depart from Me, cursed, into everlasting fire. Let us fear the judgment of God, more than God Himself, Who judges not as a person, only outward deeds, but also tests the fullest thoughts, and is not ashamed of the human face, but will reward everyone according to his deeds, and does not require witnesses, but He Himself is a faithful witness to everything - word, deed and thought: for He examines hearts and wombs (Jer. 17:10; Ps. 7:10). Eternal death or hellish torment strongly motivates a person to convert. Then all mercy will cease, but the truth of God will enter into His work; then repentance is useless; crying and tears are vain then. There you will hear the answer: child! Remember that you received your goodness in your belly (Luke 16:25). Now you cannot bear the heat that was created in the movement of the blood: how can you endure that flame, which even the demons tremble, which torments and does not consume? May eternal bliss, prepared for God’s chosen ones, attract us to repentance and diligent diligence in the work of piety. What it will be like, the mind cannot understand and cannot explain in words. It will be in the sight of God's face: then they will see God face to face. Beloved, says the holy Apostle, now we are children of God, and we shall not appear: but we know that when He appears, we will be like Him: for we will see Him as He is (1 John 3:2). But the pure and holy ones enter into it, purified by repentance and faith. Anyone who wants to go there must make his robe white in the blood of Lambs (Rev. 7:14). For without are dogs, and sorcerers, and fornicators, and murderers, and idolaters, and everyone who loves and commits lies (Rev. 22:15). Isn’t it crazy to destroy eternal joy for the sake of temporary and imaginary sweetness? Finally, the gnawing that comes from sins exhorts and convinces us to repentance of conscience, from which gnawing we get rid of nothing other than true repentance, and we receive silence, peace and consolation. Like a person walking along the path, when he sees that the path he should follow is not the one he should follow, or that path is not useful to him, thinking like this, he stops and turns back and goes where he needs to: like a sinner, walking along the path of destruction, which leads to eternal destruction, when by the grace of God he comes to the knowledge of his error and damnation, and, reflecting on his error, says: what Am I doing this? To what end does my path lead me? Thus doubting himself, he seems to stop and does not go further. Oh, what a good reflection that leads to this saving doubt! What a blissful confusion that sanctifies the will that conceives evil, and restrains the feet that go towards evil, and stops the path that leads to destruction! For in such bewilderment is the first degree of salvation. To know oneself and one’s wretchedness is the beginning of salvation: first, the knowledge of one’s poverty leads to the search for a way to get rid of trouble. This is what the prodigal son did when he ran away from his Father and, being in the misfortune of a famine that had come to him, said: How long have my father’s hired servants run out of bread, and am I perishing with famine? And he got up and went to his father (Luke 15:19–20). Thus a sinful man, reflecting on his poverty and the goodness of the heavenly Father, which all who work for Him enjoy, comes to his senses and says; since many receive mercy from God through true repentance, I am deprived of it by my negligence. Having risen, I too will go to God, I will return to Him by repentance, from Whom I withdrew with a lawless disposition; I will cast myself down before Him with humility and tears, from Whom I retreated with pride and lust; I recognize myself as unworthy before Him - neither heaven nor earth, who considered himself to be a great deal; I will tell Him with pity my sin with which I grieved Him. Rising, I go to my Father, whose kindnesses the angels and saints delight in; I am going to My Father, from Whom I have separated myself willfully and insanely; I go to My Father and say to Him: My Father, I have sinned in heaven and before You! (Luke 15:18). Thus, or thinking similarly to this, a poor sinner, when he changes his heart and his will for good, seems to turn backwards; and when he stands in willfulness, a good beginning, and shows the fruits of conversion, seeing vices and shortcomings in his conscience, he strives to destroy them through prayer and contrition of heart, as if he were going to God, from Whom he had withdrawn through his evil life; and the more diligently he corrects himself, the faster he goes, and, as it were, runs to the house of the Heavenly Father. This is what the aforementioned prodigal son did, and he rose up and went to his Father. Such a converted and coming sinner, when God the heavenly Father sees: oh, how favorably he looks upon him! How sweet His hair is to the holy and merciful! With what eagerness does the approaching one meet him! How kindly he receives him! How ardent love kisses him with her divine kiss! (Luke 15:20) Commands the first to wear out the garment and put it on him; puts a ring on his hand and boots on his nose (Luke 15:21). He calls together angels and righteous souls, like his friends and neighbors (Lk. 15:6), and commands them to rejoice, be glad and rejoice, saying: Rejoice with Me, for this My son was dead, and is alive, and was crooked, and is found (Luke 15:10–24). Christ, the Only Begotten Son of God, wants the sinner to be a participant in this joy, joy and rejoicing. Behold, I stand at the door and understand: if anyone hears my voice and opens the door, I will come down to him and dine with Him, and he with Me (Rev. 3:20). This also means His grace-filled, joyful presence in the heart of the repentant. Listen, O sinner, to God’s voice; fulfill the desire of the Heavenly Father, who thirsts for your salvation. Look at the death and blood of Christ, shed for you. A great price has been given for you - the blood of Christ, dearest to the whole world! Repent while you still have time! Convert while the Lord accepts! Behold, the blood of Christ cries out to you about this! Behold, the heavenly Father is waiting for you! The angels are ready to rejoice over your repentance. The righteous women are waiting for you until you repent, and they will rejoice over the repentant. Behold death is present, opening endless eternity! Behold, the judgment of Christ frightens, Gehenna terrifies, eternal bliss approves, the Gospel assures of this! The great thing is salvation, for which the Son of God shed His blood: that is the only thing needed (Luke 10:42). Once you find, you will never lose; and once you lose, you will never find. Here one must look for it, and look for it more than food, drink, clothing and temporary belly; but after death you will not find it, although you will search with sighs and tears. The body hungers and thirsts, and you feed and feed it; the soul hungers and thirsts, and don’t be lazy! You clothe the naked body, wash the dirty body, heal the weak: the soul is naked, stained with vices, weak, and already dead - and for no good! The house is on fire, and you are trying to extinguish it: the house of the soul is on fire, and is already burning down - and don’t do it for the sake of it! You are trying to find the stolen wealth: Satan has stolen all the wealth of your soul - and not for the sake of it! O poor and damned sinners, why are we sleeping? Behold, Satan is stealing our priceless treasure - eternal salvation, which Christ purchased for us with His blood! Behold, the voice of God strikes our conscience and stirs us up: arise from sleep and rise from the dead (Eph. 5:14). The apostles and preachers of God’s word pray to us: we pray in Christ, be reconciled with God! That we will not awaken until time has passed, while God calls and accepts those who repent? There will be a time when sinners will not be called, but sinners will be judged! We do something bad and senseless when we put off repentance either until illness, or until old age, or until death, or from day to day: how long we live and when we die is not in our power, but in God’s. And even then, do we want to live with God when we finish living? Should we then stop sinning when we can no longer sin? Should we then turn to God when God Himself calls us to Himself even those who do not want to? Should we then correct our life when we finish our life? There is a devilish plot! He puts this thought into our heads so that he can destroy us more conveniently; His job is to represent God’s only mercy to man, bypassing His justice, so that it is more convenient to lead a man to sins and to keep him in sins. There is a God of mercy; but there is also a righteous one. Therefore, we must always look with one eye on God’s mercy, and with another eye on God’s truth. This is the reasoning of God's mercy for the one who has sinned to despair, and His reflection on righteousness does not allow him to sin again. “In order, says Basil the Great, not to sin, you need to have the fear of God’s judgment; So that the one who has sinned does not despair, the hope of God’s mercy is useful.” Sadness, as in Bose, unrepentant repentance He will work for salvation (2 Cor. 7:10). I have known my iniquity, and have not covered my sin; reh: let me confess my iniquity to the Lord: and you have forsaken the wickedness of my heart (Ps. 31:5). Do you see in Holy Scripture that this is repentance? Peter the Apostle, having rejected Christ, went out, weeping bitterly (Matthew 26:75) and was thus accepted into the first person of the Apostle. The harlot washes the nose of Christ with tears, and wipes her hair with her hair, and kisses His nose; and this is what he hears from Christ: Your sins are forgiven (Luke 7:37–48). The Ninevites put on sackcloth, which is a sign of sorrow and lamentation, and cried out loudly to God; and each one should return from his evil way and from the unrighteousness that is in their hands: and God repented of the evil that he said he would do to them, and do not do it (Jon. 3:8-10). The prodigal son admits before his Father that he is unworthy of being called a son: Father! I have sinned in heaven and before You, and am no longer worthy to be called Your son: make me as one of Your hired servants (Luke 15:18–21); It is hopeful that this humble calling was not without tears: and he puts on the first filial garment (Luke 15:22). David says: the source of the waters, that is, my eyes have seen tears, since I have not kept Your law, O Lord (Ps. 119:136); and again: I have known my iniquity and have not covered my sin; reh: let me confess my iniquity to the Lord. And he adds: You have also forsaken the wickedness of my heart (Ps. 31:5). The publican does not dare to raise his hair to heaven, but beats his breasts, saying: God, be merciful to me, a sinner! And he went into the house justified more than the Pharisee (Luke 18:13–14). Jeremiah the prophet, in the person of all his people who have sinned, weeps and laments, saying: Woe to us, for we have sinned! Our hearts are troubled about this! For this our eyes have darkened! (Lam. 5:16–17). Daniel says: To You, O Lord, there is righteousness, but to us it is a disgrace to our king, and to our prince, and to our father, who have sinned against You (Dan. 9:8). Ezra is ashamed and disgraced to lift up his face to God. Lord my God! I am ashamed and disgraced to lift up my face to You: for our iniquities have multiplied more than the hair of our head, and our sins have increased even to heaven (1 Ezra 9:6). And the Apostle says to sinners: cleanse the hands of the sinner, correct your hearts, those who are double-minded: suffer and weep and weep; Let your laughter turn into crying, and your joy into lamentation; humble yourself before the Lord and he will exalt you (James 4:8–10). Repentance, then, is sorrow for God, which brings unrepentant repentance to salvation, according to the words of the Apostle. Tears, crying and sighing are signs of heartfelt sadness, which stings the heart like an arrow and thus sheds tears. Just as a lip filled with water, when clenched and compressed, releases water from itself: so a heart filled with sadness, when it is, as it were, clenched with greater sadness, spews out tears, and with tears it is relieved from sadness. Sadness and tears ease sadness; and, just as the air is rained, so the lamenting and grieving soul is cooled by tears. This heartfelt sadness is accomplished by reasoning and thinking about God, who is angry with sins. When the sinner, having come to his senses, judges that the great, most good, merciful, holy God, Whom he should fear, has angered His fearlessness and transgression of His holy law; Whom he should love, irritated; Whom he should honor, has been dishonored by evil spirits: he cannot help but grieve. When a son, from whom he was born and raised and provided with every good thing, shows hatred instead of due love, ingratitude instead of gratitude, and dishonor instead of respect; and he thinks about this great rudeness and ingratitude of his: he comes into regret, cries, and reproaches himself - and is ashamed that he acted so foolishly with his parent. Much more should we feel sorry, cry and be ashamed when we are ungrateful to God, who created us, gave us body and soul and life, feeds, clothes, preserves and supplies us with all kinds of blessings; and Whom the Angels sing, honor, and worship with fear and good will, we, the earth and the ashes, do not honor; and we do not love Him, Who is eternal love and goodness; and with our sins we anger Him, Who is eternal truth. When a sinner thinks about this, his heart is greatly wounded, he becomes angry with himself, and he is disgusted with himself. But fear is added to illness and to sadness, when he also talks about his own damnation, and that one should expect nothing more than judgment from an angry God. So, he is either overcome with sadness or fear, and does not know where to turn. In such cramped conditions, he sighs from the depths of his heart, and, not daring to raise his hair to heaven, but beating his chest, cries out with the tax collector: God, be merciful to me, a sinner! He is comforted by God’s ineffable mercy, which is revealed to all who repent, thinking that just as God has shown and continues to show His mercy to other sinners who repent, so He will certainly show it to him. Confirmed in this hope, having risen in the likeness of the prodigal son, he goes to his Father and says: Father! I have sinned in heaven and before You, and I am no longer worthy to be called Your son: make me as one of Your hired servants! Thus, a sinner’s humble coming with contrition of heart and faith to the Heavenly Father is not fruitless, but certainly receives such mercy as the prodigal son was granted from his gracious Father. About true sadness and regret (Vol. 8. pp. 280–286. – P. 438) Sadness for God and true pity can, with the help of God, be born from reasoning and reflection, when a person returns to himself and talks about his insignificance and God’s majesty, which he offended with his sins. From the consideration of the highest power of God, to which the sinner does not submit. – God is the most supreme ruler and ruler over all creatures, visible and invisible, including every sinner; and every tribe of things in heaven and on earth and under the earth worships His power (Isa. 45:23). The holy angels fulfill his will with all zeal and obedience; holy people obey His command with zeal, fear and love; the demons of His terrible power tremble; and all animate creation, such as livestock, animals, birds, fish and other moving things, and soulless creatures, such as the sun, moon, stars, fire, and so on, create His word (Ps. 149:8), and all kinds of work are done by Him (Ps. 119:91). But one sinner does not want to submit to His highest authority, as if he does not want to listen to Him and His holy commandments. God says to everyone: turn away from evil and do good (Ps. 33:15). But the insensitive sinner does not heed what he does that is contrary to him, avoids good and does evil: and so shamelessly and lawlessly despises His terrible power. From the reasoning of God's Majesty, before which the senseless sinner does not want to humble himself. – Our God is an eternal God, beginningless, infinite, living, immortal, and there is an infinite and indescribable majesty, so that before Him the whole world is like nothing, as we see in the Holy Scriptures. Even if the whole world, heaven and earth and all the nations, are like nothing before God: how much more are you one, or I, who am against the whole world, as a drop is one against the ocean. But the sinner does not humble himself before His infinite Majesty, and so does not give His Majesty reverence, but even more despises Him: which is terrible devilish pride. He does not humble himself because he does not fulfill His holy commandments. All disobedience, and therefore sin, comes from pride. Just as humility is submissive and obedient, pride is the root of disobedience. From the reasoning of the omnipresence of God, to whom the sinner does not give due honor. - God fills heaven and earth, and is in every place, and every person, whatever he does, does everything before Him. He looks at our every deed, undertaking and thought, and hears every word. But when a sinner commits lawlessness, for example, commits fornication, kidnaps, steals, blasphemes, uses foul language, blasphemes, flatters, lies, deceives, quarrels, is angry, rages, and commits other iniquities: he commits outrages before His most holy face, and thus does not do Him worthy honor. Just as we do not pay respect to an earthly king, or to some other ruler, or to a high person, or to a father, when we act outrageously before Him, that is, when we do something indecent to their face: so, most of all, we do not give respect to God, the Creator, the Heavenly King and the Father of bounties, when before Him and His all-seeing eye, this is done, like any other thing; and thus the lawless one annoys Him, just as the lawless one annoys the royal present or some other honorable and high-ranking person. The cause of sadness for Bose is man’s shameless aversion from God to sin. – A person, when he turns away from God to sin, then turns his face to sin, and his backbone to God: just as he turns from east to west, he turns his face to the west, and his backbone to the east. Sin and God are opposite things: and when we turn to one, we turn away from the other, and turn our backbone towards that one. Thus, a shameless sinner, turning away from God to sin, turns his spine to God, just as God says about the lawless Israelites through the Prophet: turning his back to Me, and not his face (Jer. 32:33). Just as these Israelites, turning from the living God to idols, turned their backbone, according to the word of God, to God: so, now foolish Christians, when they turn to sin, fall into idolatry, not sensual, but spiritual, and thus turn their backbone to God, and not their face, which is great shamelessness. For such a sin is revered as an idol; and how many times they do it willingly, so many times they stretch out to him and bow their knee to him. Before sinning, a person stands between two opposite things - God and Satan; and has free will to turn to one or another. God calls him to good and calls him away from evil: Satan seduces and calls him away from good, and inclines him to evil and sin - his work. And so when he listens to God and does good, he turns his face to God: and when he listens to Satan and does evil, he turns his face to Satan, and turns his back to God; and thus turning away from God, he follows Satan. From this you can see, Christian, how gravely a person sins before God when he turns to sin, the work of the devil. The reasoning of the omnipotence of God, in which we are all contained, gives guilt and matter to the sinner for sorrow for God. God holds everything in His hand, as the Prophet sings: in His hand are all the ends of the earth (Ps. 94:4). Where is the Almighty called? in which the omnipotent hand and the sinner is contained, preserved, lives, moves and is: for in Him we live, we move and we are (Acts 17:28). But when a person sins and is lawless, he dishonors and insults God, his Almighty, and acts like that foolish child who, being in the arms of his mother and father, blasphemes, beats and spits on him. The shameless sinner does the same thing to God, his Lord and Father, in whose arms he remains, although the blinded one does not notice it. Considering the goodness of God, which preserves us from the snares of the devil, we can have this regret. – When a person sins, Satan comes to him and wants to capture his soul and cast him into the bottom of hell; but the merciful God does not allow him. And while he remains in unrepentance and corruption, the same spiritual enemy watches all his paths and wants to destroy him; He hungers and thirsts for our destruction, like an envious and evil spirit, like a dog of blood, but God forbids him and holds him by His power. You see, man, what kindness and love of God is to the sinner. A sinner angers and embitters God; but God does not abandon him and does not deliver him into the hands of his enemy. The sinner departs from God and gives himself over to his enemy the devil; but God forbids him to destroy it. O goodness of God, invincible by our sins! O foolishness and insensibility of sinners! Who can comprehend this goodness of God towards us sinners? The sinful and lost soul does not understand this and does not impute it to anything! Reasoning about the great blessings of God, shown and shown to us, but despised by every sinner, can lead him to true contrition and pity. What has God, our Creator, not done for us? What good of His did He not show us, and does He not show us? We are enclosed in His love and good deeds that come from His love for mankind. He created us with special and wondrous advice; He created in his own image and likeness, and gave us all the light for our service; the sun, the moon and His stars shine on us, His clouds, like bottles, carry water over us and sprinkle on us and our fields: the earth with its fruits, livestock and beasts serves us; seas, lakes and rivers with fish work for us, and so on. – He Himself, our Lord, came to earth for our sake, to seek and save those who perished. But the accursed sinner counts all this as nothing, and like a foolish man he does not recognize, and a foolish man does not understand these things (Ps. 91:7). The Lord wants to make us blessed, holy and righteous, He wants to be loved by us, just as He Himself loves us, and thus to have friendship with us; wants to come to us and create an abode with us; He wants to be our father and make us his sons; wants to give us the inheritance of the heavenly kingdom and eternal blessings. What could be greater and more worthy of this? But the sinner neglects all that God’s favor (Oh, ingratitude and fury!). And so God wants to wash, cleanse, sanctify, save and enlighten the sinner forever (Oh, incomprehensible love for mankind!); but the sinner turns away, runs away from his great Lover and Benefactor, and willfully strives into eternal destruction, prepared for the devil and his angels! God sends after him his servants, ministers and preachers of his word, and through them calls him to Himself, converts and attracts him; but the sinner does not want to hear His voice, to turn and come to his Lord! Thus, the malice of the devil hardens the human heart to the chagrin and anger of God, Who is the only love, goodness, holiness, and meekness; What we cannot truly mourn, Christians. When a sinner turns to himself the reverence, honor, glory, and love that he owes to God, as his Creator, Redeemer and Provider, he turns to himself: then he must honor himself above God, Whom he must above all, above himself and his will, above all creation, above father and mother, and everything that exists besides God; and so in the place where he should have and honor God, he sets himself up like an idol and worships him. Then this happens when he proposes and prefers his will to the will of God; what God wants, he does not do, and what God commands, he does not fulfill; and so, having despised the will of God, he follows his own will; and this is done arbitrarily, as the supreme master and not subject to God: which is a godless apostasy from God, and idolization of oneself. He who is subject to his power submits and obeys, just as a subject of the king, a slave of the master, a son submits to his father and mother. A faulty sinner, when he does not show submission and obedience to God, thereby shows himself to God as insubordinate and insubordinate, as anyone can see and admit. Otherwise, there is a sin from weakness and ignorance, to which even God-fearing people are subject; Otherwise, there is a sin of willfulness, insolence and against conscience, which cannot be other than from a rebellious and fearless heart. Conversation 4th to last to Heb. You might be interested in: