О блаженствах и горе

Blessed are those who have loved God and, out of love for Him, despise all earthly things. Blessed are those who weep day and night, for they will be delivered from the wrath to come. Blessed are those who voluntarily humble themselves, for they will be exalted. Blessed are those who are abstinent, because heavenly pleasures await them. Blessed are those who exhaust their bodies with vigils and deeds, because heavenly joy is prepared for them. Blessed are those who have cleansed themselves of evil thoughts, because the Holy Spirit dwells in them. Blessed are those who love God with all their souls, more than the whole world, for they will be recognized as friends of Christ. Blessed are those who voluntarily bore their cross and truly followed Christ, because they will reach the heavenly Jerusalem. Blessed are those who have girded their loins with the truth and have their lamps ready, waiting for the Heavenly Bridegroom, because with Him they will reign in the Heavenly Kingdom. Blessed is he who acquired intelligent eyes for himself and steadily directed them to the contemplation of future blessings, because he will inherit them. Blessed is he who continually has before his eyes the day of justification and strives to be acceptable on it. Blessed is he who has become a conqueror over carnal pleasures, for on the last day of trial he will gain boldness. Blessed is he who wept on earth for God, for his fruits will be reborn in heaven. Blessed is he who eats bread not in vain, but through the labor of his hands, like the apostle, and who gives to others from his own labors, because he will rest in the bosom of Abraham. But woe to the one who remains in sin and does not know the time of repentance, because he will repent there, mourning his sins without benefit forever. Woe to the one who says: “For now I will delight the flesh, but in old age I will repent,” because, like a snare, death will suddenly cover him, and his expectation will perish. Woe to the one who sins arbitrarily and wants to repent in the morning, “do not know what the day will bring” (Prov. 27:1) and the night that precedes it. Woe to the one who, knowing good, gives his hand to the evil one, because on the day of the exodus the evil angels will receive him. Woe to the one who causes his neighbor to stumble by his evil deeds, because on the day of Judgment he will give an account of everything in which he has seduced others with his evil customs. Woe to him who has renounced the world and again clings to a worldly way of thinking, because the parable of the plow will apply to him (Luke 9:62). Woe to the one who follows the desires of the flesh and neglects the care of his soul, for his life and his hope will be scattered across the earth. Woe to him who does not hasten with all his strength to prepare himself here to give justification there. Woe to those who have lost patience - what will they do when the Lord visits? Try, beloved, to help yourself; in this short time, with repentance and tears, appease the long-suffering and merciful God, who awaits our conversion and gives us life. Let us not be careless about our salvation; Let us not rejoice in the pleasures of this world, because they last an hour, then produce repentance and come again. And all the glory of this world turns from earth to earth, and nothing else accompanies it except sin alone and the punishment for sin. No one will help us on that day, neither friend nor relative, only repentance brought here and the virtues that contribute to it: true love, humility, obedience, abstinence. They will go with us from this life; they will resist the opposing forces that want to take possession of us during our exodus from this life; they will present us to the Savior Christ to worship Him and glorify Him together with the Father and the Holy Spirit, now and always, and forever and ever. Amen. You might be interested in: