О молитве и посте

The Gospel says that one day they brought a demon-possessed man to the disciples of Christ. No matter how much the apostles tried to drive out the evil spirit, he did not listen and said: “I will not come out.” Then the demoniac was taken to Christ, and the Lord Himself cast out the demon. The disciples, left alone with Christ, said to Him with a tinge of reproach: Why couldn’t we drive him out? The Lord first said: Because of your unbelief, then he added: This generation (that is, evil spirits) is driven out only by prayer and fasting (Matthew 17:19-21). So, prayer, fasting and vigilance over ourselves, that is, keeping our thoughts and feelings, make us conquerors of demons - the enemies of our salvation. The most difficult of these things is prayer. Every virtue, as a result of practice, turns into a skill, and prayer until death requires motivation and is a consequence of achievement. Prayer is difficult because our old man resists it 2 . But it is also difficult because the evil one rises up against the one praying with all his might. For the devil, prayer is a taste of death, although, of course, he has already died spiritually. But prayer seems to strike him again, and therefore he resists it in every possible way. Even saints, it seems, should only be consoled by prayer, but at times it is difficult for them too. True, prayer brings with it high consolation, and not only to the righteous, but also to the sinner. The enemy attacks strongly, inspiring despondency, despair and some kind of extraordinary fear. There they will be afraid of fear, where there is no fear (Ps. 13:5). Sometimes a person feels completely powerless and gives up. But such sadness is illegal: you need to resist the wiles of the evil one through prayer and the sign of the cross, in which an incomprehensible power is hidden. The second means of obtaining salvation is fasting. Fasting can be twofold: internal and external. The first is abstinence from sight, hearing and all our senses from everything bad and unclean, the second is abstinence from fast food. Both posts are inextricably linked with each other. Some people pay all their attention only to the external post, without understanding the internal one at all. You might be interested in: