“Do not forsake me, O Lord my God, do not depart from me; attend to my help, O Lord of my salvation” (Ps. 37:22-23). When a person, having abandoned his sins, despising the world and its charms, tries to please God, to follow Christ with faith and patience, he is met with the hatred of the world, and those who were previously friends become his enemies, as the same psalm says: “My friends and my neighbors opposite me came close and stood up, and my closest ones stood far from me; those who sought my life pressed in; those who sought my harm spoke vain things, and all the day long they thought of deceit” (Ps. 37:12-13). Although always, but especially in such a case, the heart should be lifted up to God with sighing, so that He does not abandon or retreat with His help. Against enemies and blasphemers one must be as deaf and dumb as the Psalmist speaks of himself in the same psalm: “But like a deaf man I did not hear, and like a dumb man I opened my mouth” (Ps. 37:14). Then God, in whom you trust, will proclaim in your place by his very deed, as the prophet says: “Reveal your way to the Lord, and trust in Him, and He will do it.
And he will bring out your righteousness like the light, and your destiny like the noonday” (Ps. 37:5-6). And at the same time, try not to leave the Lord, and not to depart from Him in your heart, but to always listen to His law, as He says: “Listen, My people, to My law” (Ps. 77:1).
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