How to maintain peace of mind and living prayer in the modern bustle
Contents

To the readers

Whom we love, we talk to

Nothing gets in the way of loving God

You need to be careful not to ask God for help in some undesirable matters.

Prayer is the secret of communication between the soul and God

That pleasing God and spiritual work are carried out everywhere – both in the deepest desert and among the bustle of the world

Even a small prayer experience teaches us to carry out the process of prayer “at the speed of light”

Asking for direct admonition from God is an extremely serious matter.

God’s will and obedience

“Call Me in the day of your troubles…” (Ps. 49:15)

God has no partiality

The Lord fulfills our desires to an incomparably greater extent than we can imagine.

About surrendering yourself into the hands of God

Faith is breaking through obstacles

Prayer and life are one

We must live before God and acquire the attributes of Christ

When we tell ourselves “I can’t,” we make a big mistake.

God wants to give us more than we can accept

About the fear of God

About spiritual age, attention, patience and courage

Some Challenges for Modern Christians

About despondency

About prayer for peace

Is it possible (and how) to pray for everyone who is asked for? Where does living prayer begin? It is from THIS state that we must pray

What is repentance? About the Jesus Prayer

How to maintain peace of mind and living prayer in the modern bustle

An incident from the life of Abba Anthony

An incident from the life of Abba Macarius

Conversation with a sectarian

To the readers

The author of the proposed “Conversations” is a desert monk who began his monastic journey in one of the deserts of the Caucasus more than 30 years ago. Its first spiritual leader was the Glinsky elder Schema-Archimandrite Seraphim (Romantsov, +1976, Sukhumi), who looked after the desert brethren after the closure of the monastery and was therefore considered the “elder of the desert.” After the death of Father Seraphim, the author enjoyed the spiritual care of the pupil and successor of the Glinsky elders – Schema-Archimandrite Vitaly (Sidorenko, †1992, Tbilisi).

These questions and answers are fragments of conversations with monastics and laity about pressing issues of spiritual life. They were asked to the author at different times, but over the course of a number of years, for obvious reasons, they were of a purely personal nature.

Beginning in 1998, with the blessing of the elders and bishops, the author’s answers to private individuals gradually began to take on a publicly accessible form.

The first “Conversations” were published in 2000 within the walls of the Zadonsk Nativity of the Mother of God Monastery, on the pages of the Orthodox almanac “Zadonsky Pilgrim”. In 2004, by the grace of God and the care of His Eminence Nikon, Bishop of Lipetsk and Yelets, the first brochure was published dedicated to the main Christian activity – prayer.

Over time, the work was significantly corrected and expanded. The author took into account the comments and wishes of God-loving readers.

However, in presenting the Conversations to a wide audience, the author, as before, considered it necessary to make the following remark.

All the advice that the reader will find in this book should be used wisely. Their practical use is possible only in consultation with a confessor or in the case when a person for some reason does not have spiritual guidance and therefore is forced to use “the word of God from books, and not from living lips” (as St. Ignatius Brianchaninov says).

In this regard, when preparing the book for publication, the author expressed a wish that in the preface to the “Conversations” the following phrase of his, addressed at one time to a certain nun, would be quoted:

“The first thing to remember when reading and listening to these answers is that they are all given for the case when a person does not have a spiritual leader (and life goes on, and issues need to be resolved somehow). For the novice, everything is very simple: she presented everything in full to her spiritual father, and: “What do you bless me to do?” As he says, do so (of course, in the spirit of the Gospel commandments).

For those who, due to current life circumstances, have to engage in self-correction and self-education according to the patristic books, God will help them to derive some benefit from what is written here, as a “help” to the active study of the writings of the Holy Fathers.”

Publishers

Whom we love, we talk to

I once had a conversation with a young man – a student. He is a believer and leads a relatively pious life. But when we started talking about prayer, he said:

– I pray very little. And there is no particular need: why pray if you know everything, understand everything? And there are no special circumstances that would encourage prayer. If there is some kind of special extreme situation, then I will pray, but otherwise, why? No hunting.

“So,” I say, “do you want to pray “like a peasant”: until the thunder strikes, the peasant will not cross himself?

– No, in general, I don’t want any disasters and sorrows to befall me. Well, I just somehow don’t feel like praying, that’s all.

What can I say to this? Let’s say parents have a child. And this child will say: “Why should I talk to dad and mom? If I have some need, then I will talk to them, but why do I need them? I don’t want to talk to them – it’s not interesting.” Wouldn’t he offend his parents with such an unloving attitude? It will offend – and severely.

Have you ever noticed that when we stand in prayer with a cold feeling towards God, then people also show coldness towards us? And after fervent, warm prayer to God, people’s attitudes towards us become warmer.

And it happens all the time that if parents become cold towards God, then the children also become cold in their natural love for their parents. But for some reason this is not taken into account. And the Lord said: “With the measure you use, it will be measured to you” (Matthew 7:2).

Whom we love, we talk with, and communicate with. Or even if we sit silently, we still rejoice, feeling the presence of our loved one. It’s the same before God: if we are “bored” with Him in prayer, therefore, we have lost love for Him. We insult our Heavenly Father and, in fact, lose the contact with Him that we first of all need. It is not God who needs this contact, but we who need it for our eternal life. And if we don’t install it, like a light bulb with an electrical network, then what will happen to us? If a light bulb is not plugged into the mains, it becomes unnecessary and is thrown into the trash1. Likewise, if we do not unite with God through fervent, living prayer, then, like a worthless light bulb, we will be thrown into the spiritual trash bin, which is called “hell” and “eternal torment.”

Nothing gets in the way of loving God

– Vanity gets in the way.

– Elder Silouan2 says: “No deeds interfere with loving God.”

– Is this concept applicable to our modern life, especially worldly life? After all, our age is marked by special vanity and unbelief. Does God hear modern people? Is the “living” prayer you are talking about accessible to them today?

– The Lord cares for every soul. There is no soul in the world whose salvation the Lord does not care about. And therefore God hears modern people and heeds their prayers, even if they are weak.

Sometimes we go down from the mountains to the village, stop with worldly people, and communicate with the local residents. And sometimes we are simply surprised at how much living, sincere faith glimmers in such people who seem to be fussed to the limit. It happens that the conversation comes about everyday affairs and sorrows, and a simple worldly woman says:

“I went and prayed, and the Lord gave me this and that.

The other one tells her:

– How can God hear us?

But the first one answers with confidence:

– I stood (for so long), prayed, and God won’t hear me? This can’t be true!

And, indeed, you see: she gets what she asked for.

The Lord cares about every person, and about modern people, perhaps even more than about our pious ancestors who lived two or three centuries ago. Because those people did not have such temptations, did not have such depravity of morals, did not have such disgrace, such a harmful environment – one might even say, the spirit of malice that now fills our society.

After all, how does the current generation grow and be educated? Poor modern kids! From a very early age they are exposed to all kinds of evil, including through television and other media. And as they grow up, they realize this evil in their lives. Apparently, someone is “trying” very hard, creating all the conditions for the development of lawlessness in modern humanity. And therefore, today’s children have incomparably more sin sown in their souls than their peers, say, in the 19th century.

But, despite this sad fact, there is no need to despair. As Elder Paisiy Svyatogorets says, although modern young people have learned all the evil, all the many sins that former people did not know, nevertheless, they can be saved by showing special repentance. The Lord leads them in different ways to this repentance, to the awareness of their negative qualities acquired by them in childhood.

In the prayer for communion, Simeon Metaphrastus3 contains the following words: “Where sin abounds, Your grace abounds.”4 This means that despite our distressed state – despite the fact that we are already saturated with evil more and more, the Lord still takes care of us, multiplying His grace and pouring it out abundantly on every lost soul.

And this concern manifests itself even when a person deviates onto some false path (goes to sectarians, shows interest in extrasensory perception, seeks spirituality in Eastern religions). However, if such a person truly seeks the purpose of life, with a sincere heart he wants to know: “Is there really a God and how can and should you communicate with Him?” – then the Lord will never reject such a person. He hears all his, perhaps even not very modestly expressed desires and shows His mercy.

We once read the following story in an Orthodox magazine:

“A certain disabled person named Sergei read many books on religious topics during his life. He thoughtfully took notes on what he had read, but still could not understand: where is the truth, how to believe and pray?

In the end, tired of fruitless thoughts, Sergei decided to send all his notes to the trash bin. Having collected the papers in a bag, he mentally said: “Which religion is the correct one – let that note come back to me.”

And a miracle happened. Literally the next day, Sergei’s acquaintance, who worked as a janitor and loaded garbage, brought the disabled man his notes on Orthodoxy: “Look, what interesting things I found! Take it and read it.”

Sergei was surprised and amazed. From that day on, he finally and without any doubt became Orthodox.5

It is through such diverse paths of His Wise Providence that the Lord leads people to faith and salvation – if only the people themselves sincerely desire to find God in their souls.

And here is another example – an incident that happened in our area with one young woman.

It so happened that this woman, her sister and brother were tempted by Jehovah’s Witnesses and were already inclined to communicate with them. They began to trust the delusions of the sectarians, including looking at holy icons without faith and proper veneration.

Having learned about this, we tried to help them somehow. They were given large icons of the Savior and the Mother of God (paper, patriarchal edition6), told them about the need to venerate Orthodox icons, about the Jesus Prayer, the prayers “Our Father,” “Hail Mary,” and other important Orthodox prayers. Thank God – after several of our conversations these people began to return to the fold of the Orthodox Church.

When, after some time, we went down to the village again, the woman told us the following story: “One evening we were sitting in the kitchen; there were about ten of us.” Here, in the Caucasus, there is such a custom: in the evenings, relatives, neighbors, friends, acquaintances gather in the kitchen, the stove is on, and various conversations are held. “And so,” says this woman, “they are talking to each other, and I am sitting on a chair, looking at the icons and praying internally, reading the Jesus Prayer. Suddenly everything seemed to be shrouded in some kind of haze, I couldn’t see anyone and I couldn’t hear anyone. And prayer is so sweet and pleasant. And suddenly a voice was heard outside the window: “Oooh!” Christians, to whom are you praying!.. you are praying to a piece of paper!.. to whom are you praying!..” I perked up, looking at everyone – I thought that everyone could hear.

-Have you heard anything?

– No, we didn’t hear anything. And what?

And I realized that no one heard this voice except me.”

Here is an example of a laywoman who, with her sincere desire to pray vividly, received such a prayer. The Lord impartially gave her this prayer experience. And the irritated demon, angry at her because she left the Jehovah’s Witnesses and began to pray fervently even in the middle of the “kitchen market,” tried to ruin her prayer with his blasphemous cries7

The Lord hears every person, be it a monk, a layman or a neophyte (i.e., a novice) – as long as the person sincerely turns to God. In what form – either he reads the Jesus Prayer, or the Psalter, or morning and evening prayers according to the prayer book – is not so important. What is needed is only sincere, heartfelt spontaneity, one might say, a childlike appeal to God. And God, being our Father, accepts the conversion of our hearts. We just need to make sure that the desires we express are pleasing to God.

You need to be careful not to ask God for help for some unpleasing deeds

– What if a person’s desire is not pleasing, but he asks and prays earnestly for it?

– On this topic, I once heard one very edifying story about St. Nicholas.

In former, still tsarist times, there lived a certain horse thief. And although he was a thief by occupation, as a Christian he still prayed sometimes. And then one day he saw a wonderful three horses, which he certainly wanted to steal. As luck would have it, the owner turned out to be a wealthy and very careful man. After several unsuccessful attempts, the thief realized that he would not be able to steal the horses.

What was there left to do? Just pray.

The horse thief went to church. I bought a large candle, placed it in front of the icon of St. Nicholas, knowing that he is a quick helper for every task, and began to pray and ask: “St. Nicholas! Help me steal this three! It’s difficult for me, I can’t waylay her!” Having prayed earnestly, the horse thief went about his “business”, and he succeeded. Pleased with this success, he drove the horses out of the city and galloped to the village.

However, a little time passed, and suddenly a noise was heard from behind – a horse’s stomping. The horse thief looked back, and it was horse riders catching up with him.

Well, that’s it, it’s gone! They will probably catch up, because the horsemen run faster than the troika. A hopeless situation – there is a field everywhere, nowhere to hide. “Lord, help me! Saint Nicholas, help me – things will be bad for me!” – the thief begged and let’s whip the horses with all our strength.

A sharp bend in the road appeared ahead. The horse thief paused slightly so as not to overturn the team. Suddenly he sees an old man coming towards him and pointing to some hillock: “Over there, over there!” To the side of the road! You can hide there!” The fugitive realized this, jumped off the troika, and – quickly towards this “hillock”, and the troika galloped on.

He ran up and looked: it was a fallen horse. It has already begun to decompose, it is all swollen, the stench is terrible. But there was nothing to do, I had to crawl under it. He hid and lies there, waiting.

The horsemen galloped after the troika, the old man called: “Get out, your persecutors have already galloped.” The poor guy crawled out of his “shelter” and couldn’t catch his breath: “fu-u-u!” – speaks. – What an abomination! I almost suffocated from this stench!” And the old man answered him: “That’s how I got your candle, which you lit, and began to ask me to help you steal the horses.”

The old man became invisible. And the thief, struck by the miracle, began to bitterly repent: “Forgive me, Lord! Forgive me, Saint Nicholas, that I offended you so much with my worthless prayer!” Then he went to church and told the priest everything: how Saint Nicholas brought him to his senses and led him to repentance.

In the same way, we need to be careful not to ask God for help for some undesirable matters. The Lord hears all our prayers, all our expressed and unexpressed desires, but we ourselves need to try not to offend the greatness and righteousness of God, not only with some of our bad deeds, but even with our prayers.

Prayer is the secret of communication between the soul and God

– Should prayer be taught using some method?

– Firstly, the word “method” itself is not Orthodox, not patristic, so it is better not to use it when talking about spiritual works. And secondly, in order to avoid any mistakes, you need to read the teachings of the Holy Fathers who wrote about prayer, and there find a solution to your perplexities.

There are many different patristic instructions and advice on this topic. For example, there is such a famous book called “Philokalia”, which contains the teachings of the ancient Saints. There are many teachings from devotees of piety who were closer to us in time – in particular, St. Theophan the Recluse, St. Ignatius Brianchaninov and other Fathers of the Orthodox Church, from whom everyone can find for themselves the answer to a question that interests them.

In general, quite a lot has been written about prayer in the patristic works; all that remains is to read and perform it.

– Why then today, with such an abundance of spiritual literature, do we not see many successful doers?

– Yes, because we have all become very “smart.” But in reality it turns out that we do not know how to apply the patristic teachings in practical life. If we overcome laziness, we often still remain in the networks of pride and arrogance.

And you also need to keep in mind that when practicing prayer, you encounter these two fairly common mistakes. The first is when, for some reason, we completely ignore the theoretical side of doing. And the second is when we perceive the patristic instructions on acquiring prayer as some kind of instruction manual for the operation of household appliances, which says: “If you press this button, then this and that will happen, and if you press this button, then this and that.” We sometimes begin to do something similar when learning to pray. We think that if we close ourselves in a dark room, sit on a low chair, press our chin to our chest, hold our breath, etc., then we will definitely begin to pray unceasingly.

This is why I say that we should not get carried away with this “method”. We just need to understand what the essence of prayer is.

– And what does it consist of?

– The essence is in our standing before God, namely the Living God, Who looks at us. And we must look at ourselves (at our wretchedness, lewdness, at our disastrous spiritual state) and cry out: “Have mercy on me!”

And we also need to understand that there is no one rule for all occasions. Prayer is the secret of communication between the soul and God, and it is not performed according to some kind of “instruction”. If the soul understands what it should strive for, then it must actively fulfill it, and the Lord will instruct it, enlighten it, admonish it, strengthen it, and the person will already walk the path of salvation and drawing closer to the Lord.

But it is difficult to teach any one comprehensive theory here, because theoretically it can be one thing, but practically every person does it in his own way, with his own characteristics.

– Why is this so?

– Because the Lord gives each person his own, as we read in the troparia: “With the depth of wisdom, build all love for mankind and give what is useful to everyone.” One, starting to pray, the first thing he feels is his sinfulness, his lewdness and begins to cry. There is bitter crying; there is crying dissolved by consolation, as they say, “joyful crying,” when a person has already been somewhat cleansed of sins.

For others it happens the other way around. At first he feels Consolation in his soul: joy, peace, love for everyone. He prays and feels the fulfillment of the words of the psalmist: “Taste and see that the Lord is good” (Ps. 33:9). And then, after some time, sorrows come to him: sadness about his sins, external temptations. And he is already dissipated in these external temptations for some time. But then he remembers how he felt at the beginning, what comfort he had, and turns again, seeks that blissful state, heartfelt prayer to God, and turns away from everything sinful and vain.

And another can receive admonition, consolation and prosperity in external affairs. Let’s say he is engaged in construction – building a temple or a monastery. He prayed and saw God’s obvious help: he got the brick, the workers were conscientious, they did everything quickly and well. And he thanks God for this, and thus comes to the knowledge that if he prays, it means that God hears him, accepts his prayer and answers him with such deeds.

In fact, the same thing is happening here: a person enters into Communion with God, only outwardly it manifests itself in different ways – as the Lord will see in each specific case. But each person must have a heartfelt turn towards God and the belief that if he says a prayer, it means that God hears him.

That pleasing God and spiritual work are carried out everywhere – both in the deepest desert and among the bustle of the world

– Once I had to be in a monastery. A certain hieromonk preached a sermon about repentance. And in order to give a clear example, he showed in contrast: “Some people come to confession. You ask them: “What did you sin?” They shrug their shoulders: “We don’t know, father: it seems like they didn’t kill, didn’t rob.” And then the hermit elder, a man with a pure, childlike soul, comes up and confesses to me for about an hour. The question is: what can he repent of? What sins can he tell?

Father brought up such a contrast for visual comparison. Then, after a short silence, he added: “I’ll tell you a secret about what spiritual people can repent of.

For example, a person is standing in prayer, listening to the rule. And if at the same time some phrase from the prayers he listens to is not assimilated by the mind, he passes by, he considers it a sin. But there is another degree of perception. A person listens to the words of prayer, they are perceived by his mind, enter his heart, ascend from the heart to God, an answer comes from God, and a person perceives this answer with his heart. And if such a “chain” did not occur, i.e. the words of the prayer were not perceived by the mind, did not pass into the heart, did not ascend from the heart to God, and the answer did not come from God, then this is considered a sin by a spiritual person, and he repents of it.”

Hearing such words about prayer, my soul was stung by such an ideal. But at the same time she also felt sorrow: after all, an example was given of an elder living in the mountains, i.e. ascetic.

The question involuntarily arises: does it make sense for a “mere mortal” to want to find such a prayer? Is this possible? Or was only a “sample” of a distant, beautiful and completely unattainable ideal shown – so that we would only know that “such things happen”?

– As we see from the lives of the Saints, in particular from the life of St. Anthony the Great, the founder of monastic work, he was sent by the Providence of God to Alexandria to a tanner who had a work superior to him – St. Anthony’s. Likewise, the Monk Macarius the Great was sent to study with two laywomen8

Based on these and other examples described in the lives, we can conclude that God-pleasing and spiritual work are carried out everywhere – both in the deepest desert and among worldly vanity.

– Unfortunately, the examples given are so far from us in time.

– Does it matter? “Jesus Christ is the same yesterday and today and forever” (Heb. 13:8). Everything depends on the person, on his faith and on how he goes through his path, and not on the time, place, title or dignity. And there are many examples of this – you just need to be able to see them (and not get carried away with the search for only “bright” and “out of the ordinary”).

Take, for example, the history of the 20th century. Has she shown us few examples of piety? A number of books have now been written about these people – our contemporaries. Here before us is the life of the holy righteous Alexy Mechev (†1923). “He was an old man and an ascetic,” says his biography9, “and many did not see either his eldership or his asceticism, many, even from among those who truly sought both and loved both. Many were tempted about him: what ascetic is in the eternal rumor, vanity, noise? What kind of eldership is it like in the very center of the city bustle, with the screeching of cars, in the atmosphere of the ordinary family life of the Moscow middle circle?

Everything external about him was exactly the same as all of us… There was no meal. Hasty, random, at different times, when it happens, breakfast, lunch and dinner, but in essence just food – hastily, hastily. From morning to night, phone calls, knocks on the door, trips around the city, house committee, disorder, neurasthenia, everyday life – endless, stretching from day to day, with all sorts of worldly needs of your family, clergy and parish and hundreds of people coming.

In everything, in everything, from food and telephone to the order of worship – there is no monastery or monastery, no silence, no order, no silence. But does this mean that he is not a feat and not an ascetic? Нет, подвиг – и непостижимо великий. No, an ascetic – and incomprehensibly bright. And it was not without reason that the true inhabitants of the monastic desert, the spiritual friends of the deceased, the ever-memorable Optina elders Theodosius and Anatoly, who revered the humble priest Fr. Alexy from Maroseyka was a true self-ascetic and a gracious elder, and Elder Nektary seemed to reproach those who came to him from Moscow: “Why do you come to us when you have Father Alexy.”

Father Alexy brought the desert to Moscow, enclosed it in his much-loving soul and long-suffering heart, and generously distributed to those who came to him the endless fragrant gifts of the desert – humility, joy, consolation, mercy and the gift of gifts – love.” I think there is no need to comment anything here. We can only advise Christians who are exhausted in faith (who doubt the possibility of cultivating spiritual life in modern conditions) to read such lives more often.

And I’ll also tell you about a person with whom I personally happened to know. This is our contemporary, the servant of God Alexei Podroikin, later our companion in the desert, monk Afanasy (†1995). Father Afanasy lived not far from us, and therefore we had the opportunity to know some details of his life in the world and in the monastery.

About the life of Fr. Athanasius, of course, would be worth telling in more detail, since it is edifying in many respects. But now, in order not to be distracted from the topic, we will dwell only on certain points.

In the world about. Afanasy’s name was Alexey. He led an ordinary worldly life, was a family man: he had a wife, son, daughter. First he worked as a taxi driver, then as a mechanic in the same fleet.

It was Soviet times, so we had to endure oppression,

and ridicule, and even open persecution. But, nevertheless, Alexey tried to live according to his conscience and observe

Gospel commandments. He went to church, prayed fervently, humbled himself, endured (and he had

to endure a lot) and called upon God’s help for every good deed.

He had such an interesting case. His boss, the director of the fleet, bought himself a foreign car. I drove it a little and it got damaged. I needed to go somewhere urgently, but she was standing there. The director called the chief mechanic, mechanic and turner: “Make me a car tomorrow.” They called Alexey: “Go, do it!”

– Tomorrow is Sunday, I won’t go.

They cursed him, but seeing that he stood his ground adamantly, they waved their hand:

– Well, there’s no need, you’re such a devout! We’ll do it ourselves without you. We went and fiddled around all day, but didn’t get it done. They seem to do it, install it, but the pump leaks again.

The next day we went to report to the director: they say nothing is working out. He calls Alexey:

– Go make me a car.

– How so? The chief mechanic and the craftsmen didn’t do the job, but what will I do?

– Well, go ahead, maybe you can do something after all.

He obeyed and went. I prayed before that, of course. He crossed himself: “Lord, give me understanding, what needs to be done here?” And these chief masters stand and watch what he will do. Alexey crossed himself, crossed the car, then went, tightened something, and said to the driver: “Take it apart.” He took it apart. We looked: everything was in its place. Alexei crossed the pump: “Now collect it.” The driver assembled it, set it down, filled it with water – no leaks.

The driver went and reported to the director that the car had been repaired. The director and mechanic ask: “What did he do?” – “I took it apart, he crossed it, I put it back together – and that’s it.”

Since then, Alexei was no longer terrorized at work for going to church, and was not forced to work on Sundays.

But one temptation passed and another came: the wife rebelled. And she rebelled very strongly. “I,” Fr. later said. Afanasy, “realized that it was the demon who was acting through her in this way, and began to pray more earnestly,” although, practically, his entire life was a constant appeal to God.

It even happened that he was so immersed in prayer that his wife screamed with irritation, but he prayed for her with compassion and at some point stopped hearing her. “I,” he says, “pray, and my soul is so quiet, so peaceful. Then I come to my senses and look at her. She stands and screams. Finished, and:

– Well, do you understand everything?! – What?..

– Didn’t you hear anything?! Are you already flying in the skies?!! – and away we go again.”

It even got to the point where she rushed at him with a knife. But he endured everything very peacefully, very meekly. She reached the point of hysterics, and the Lord gave him the grace to endure everything graciously. And this went on for many years.

Then, by the destinies of God, the servant of God Alexey became a monk in the Pochaev Lavra (he was tonsured with the name Athanasius). The last years of his life, Fr. Afanasy spent in the Caucasus, in the mountains. His death was blessed (we witnessed this) Before his death, he accepted the schema with the name Alexy

Here’s an example. And there are many such examples in life. Therefore, one can only wish that each of us, having heeded these soul-saving lessons of Christian piety, would draw the appropriate conclusions for ourselves, and would not justify ourselves by “lack of” favorable conditions for prayer.

Even a small prayer experience teaches us to carry out the process of prayer “at the speed of light”

– What can you still say about the above-mentioned prayer “chain”? Is it correct to understand that this is exactly the quality prayer should have: perception from the ear, then entry into the heart, then ascent from the heart to God and then perception of an answer from God, or is there some other quality?

– Here, it seems to me, the process of prayer is examined as if “under a microscope.” In fact, everything happens much simpler: we internally cry out to God with our souls, He hears, perceives and somehow, at His discretion, answers us – usually with a good thought or a good arrangement of the necessary circumstances. And whether we read the prayers ourselves at this time, or listen to what the reader reads, or simply pray in our own words – this is not so important, as long as there is attention, faith and reverence.

…The above-mentioned “chain” – yes, it exists. But this knowledge itself is needed only so that we understand how we should act. And if we understand this, then even a small prayer experience teaches us to carry out the process of prayer “at the speed of light.”

– And the answer?

– And the answer will be when the Lord sends. And what it will be depends on His wisdom and… on our stupidity.

– How is this so?

– And like this. Because the Lord admonishes a fool in different ways. Well, that’s how it is in my example.

One day a man came to see us. He stayed for a while and he needs to leave – he’s packing his things. Then a book caught my eye that I had been working with for some time—copying quotes from it. I think: “Give it away, or what? It seems like I don’t need her. Lord, what should I do? I feel inside myself: “Don’t give it away, you’ll need it later.” I mentally resist:

– For what? I don’t want to do this! And the answer is quiet:

– What will you do then? You will look, but she won’t be there. And then you will demand that it be returned to you.

– No, I don’t want to do this anymore!!!

And he gave it away. And then for several months I remembered: “Oh, if only there was a book!.. Oh, if only there was a book!.. I need a quote, but I don’t remember!”

So he suffered for several months because of his stupidity, until he returned the book back. Why did you suffer? Because admonition came, but I rejected it, and even argued with him. Of course, next time it will be more difficult to get an understanding answer for such inattention.

Asking for direct admonition from God is an extremely serious matter

– But how can the “answer” not be confused with something else – for example, with one’s suspiciousness or the voice of passions and demons? So you can fall into delusion.

– Indeed, asking for a direct “answer” from God, and right there in your thoughts, is an extremely serious matter; to make a mistake is very scary. I resorted to this only when I lived in complete solitude without a single person nearby for a day’s journey (and in winter there was no opportunity to go anywhere at all). Because I won’t say better how this is done.

Now that I have a hieromonk nearby, it is much simpler and safer to do differently: having abandoned all my desire (for my matter to be decided this way or that), praying fervently: “Lord, instruct Your servant Hieromonk N. as You would have me act in this matter…” and, impartially expressing my bewilderment, accept his first word as the will of God.

In general, this very question of admonition from God is very serious. But since it is not possible to teach it in a more or less satisfactory form in this conversation, we will only say this. When discussing this topic, you need to keep the following points in mind.

It’s one thing when the “answer” is given to us through our prayer – when we are in some kind of bewilderment and ask the Lord to enlighten us on what we should do in this or that particular circumstance.

Another type of admonition occurs when we seek God’s will regarding some serious step in life (for example, whether we should go to a monastery or start a family). This is a different case. Accordingly, the approach to solving this issue will be different.

A different understanding occurs in extreme situations. Since this is a special point, the admonitions here are unique.

There is also instruction on how we can fight and get rid of passions.

There is also the so-called “warning” admonition, which is given to us from God without our asking. It warns us of some danger that we do not anticipate.

There are other types of admonitions. But now we do not have the task of revealing this large, complex topic in detail. We only want to note: since all these admonitions stand “in isolation,” then they must be considered independently – each point separately, using specific examples. But a general rule cannot be derived for all cases. Speaking about this, we can only point out some general guidelines that could help avoid mistakes along this path, because human life is filled with such bitter mistakes.

The will of God and obedience

In order to understand this issue more fully and deeply, you need to look into history: where all our diseases came from. And they came from disobedience to God of our first parents Adam and Eve. For this reason, it is extremely necessary for us, during our earthly life, to correct this ancient mistake in ourselves, or, more precisely, the illness of our ancestors, and again learn to be obedient to God.

However, for an ordinary person to learn to do the will of God is not as simple as it seems at first glance – one cannot “immediately” become completely obedient to God, i.e. learn to fulfill God’s will in life.

– Why?

– Because since the fall of our first parents, human nature has been damaged by sin; Our way of thinking is carnal, not spiritual. “The wisdom of the flesh,” says the Apostle Paul, “is enmity against God; for it is not subject to the law of God, for it can do worse” (Rom. 8:7).

And therefore, in order to get rid of such trouble

and learn to be obedient to God in a perfect form, you first need to learn to cut off

in a crude form. your will before a person (first of all, before a spiritual mentor – an elder, a confessor).

Usually a mentor person tells us: “Do this, but don’t do that.” For example: “Don’t get carried away with this matter, but force yourself to do this.” Or: “Do so many bows. Eat then.” Or: “Now go to work, and then, at such and such a time, you will read the rule.” That is, we are given instructions in a crude material form. For what? In order for us to learn to cut off the gross manifestations of our sin-loving will, our proud, passionate “I”: “I want this, I don’t want this; I love this, I don’t like this,” etc. This form of cutting off one’s will is the first step in learning spiritual life.

It must be said that in earlier times, children received the beginnings of such training in the family from their parents, so it was much easier for those people to undergo obedience both in monasteries and in family life. Today, this good experience, unfortunately, is almost lost, and modern Christians often have to break their overgrown “I” and diverse “I want” “even to the point of bleeding.”

– And if for some reason a person does not have a mentor who would tell him: “In this case, do this, and in this case, do that”? What should such a person do?

– Speaking about this problem in general, we can say that St. Ignatius Brianchaninov advises, in cases where we do not have a mentor, to be guided by the word of God from books. But since we are all in communication with people, then in everyday trifles, i.e. not very serious matters, you can (and even need) to cut off your will in front of your neighbors (of course, except for obedience to bad deeds), because we are given the commandment: “Submit yourselves to one another in the fear of God” (Eph. 5:21). And if we do this, these will be the first steps of our doing. For, by learning human obedience in everyday affairs, we will acquire the skill of cutting off our will, necessary for spiritual life. And having learned to act in this way, it will be easier to fulfill the demands of our conscience.

If the need arises to solve some serious, vital matters, you need to resort to spiritual advice from experienced people. Diligent prayer is needed here. Its meaning can be expressed approximately in the following words: “Lord, I want to receive admonition from You, but I am afraid that I will confuse the voice of conscience with the voice of my passions, because… I am in a poor spiritual state. You see my weakness, therefore give understanding to Your servant… [the pious man who is], give him some understanding, so that I may know how to do the right thing, because I want to do Your holy will, and not my own.” And after fervent prayer, even if there is no priest, you can ask some brother or sister – a well-meaning, pious person who is not interested in our matter, so that he judges the situation impartially.

In general, it must be said that this issue of obedience has been discussed for a long time, and it is especially topical today – it confuses minds and shakes our fraternal relations in all layers of Christian society. All self-justifications boil down to the fact that there is no one to obey. But in the Gospel we are clearly told Whom we must obey: “This is My beloved Son; listen to Him” (Luke 9:35). But we read the Gospel and do not fulfill what we hear.

After all, the whole “salt” of obedience ultimately comes down to correcting the mistake of Adam, who did not listen to God, but listened to the devil. Consequently, if a person does not want to make mistakes in cultivating obedience, he must strive with all his soul to do God’s will in all his big and small deeds, and obedience itself should not just be formal (or, on the contrary, biased) submission to a particular person, but acquire and assimilate this virtue as a property of the soul – in order to easily cut off your will in front of any neighbor – be it bishop or just brother10

Only in each specific case is it necessary to consider whether such obedience contradicts Christ’s commandments. And if not, then for the sake of God we need to obey not only our mentors and elders, but also each other. But all this must be done, I repeat, with reasoning, because it is impossible to take into account and consider all circumstances – everyone has their own.

– And if there is no reasoning, what to do then?

“You shouldn’t be embarrassed by this, let alone become despondent.” You just need to intensify your prayer, heartily clinging to the Lord with a simple, childlike prayer, and the Lord will undoubtedly somehow enlighten and help, for He said: “Ask and it will be given to you” (Matthew 7:7). And the Apostle James says: “If any of you lacks wisdom, let him ask God, who gives generously to all without reproach, and it will be given to him” (James 1:5).

From much experience, it has been noted that if we truly want to cut off our will and act according to the will of God, then God’s Providence arranges everything necessary for this: either the person we need is sent, or circumstances providentially change, or something completely unexpected happens – events unfold that we did not even imagine, i.e. everything works out in the best way for us. If only we had a sincere desire to cut off our own will and do the will of God. But God has a lot of mercy, and with Him everything is arranged very simply and quickly.

Further, if a person learns to cut off his will in front of his neighbors, he will need to learn to cut off his will in front of the voice of his conscience. And if a person strives correctly, then he clearly notices the voice of his conscience – what it approves and what it does not: “Do this, but you cannot do this. You can say that, but you can’t say that. Now get up for prayer, and then rest a little, but not as much as you want, but this much, and get up at such and such a time.” Our conscience prompts us to follow these instructions. Here, in comparison with the coarse material form of “human dictate,” admonition is given more subtly. This is the second stage of education11

Then the person will gradually learn to fulfill the demands of the more subtle, one might even say more gentle – non-forced – voice of the Guardian Angel. And only after this will he be able to perceive the meek, gentle voice of the Holy Spirit. Then, if a good thought dawns on a person, and he feels that this is admonition from Above, he cuts off his will and goes to the feat.

– Why “for a feat”?

– Because in this case the requirements for a person are the highest. After all, the requirements of a mentor are relatively low, because he is a man himself. The voice of the Christian conscience is higher – accordingly, it requires greater self-denial. And admonitions from Above according to the action of the grace of the Holy Spirit are the highest. After all, when grace comes, it brings with it not only joy, pleasure and consolation (as some people think), but also elevates a person to feat, struggle and suffering. Of course, the soul is comforted by grace: it feels the presence of the Holy Spirit and rejoices, but often the body, and sometimes even the whole person, all the powers of his soul, are elevated to a feat – it’s like a crucifixion. In general, the life of a Christian on earth is nothing more than a path of unceasing struggle – unceasing war with the enemies of our salvation: the world, the flesh and the devil. And the most difficult thing in this war is to defeat your proud self.

– And if a mentor tells a person one thing, but his conscience says another, what should a novice do in this case?

– Firstly, a prudent novice, before asking about any matter, will fervently pray that the Lord will admonish his mentor to speak according to the will of God. And secondly, if such a contradiction occurs (for some reason), then the novice will again need to resort to prayer and ask the Lord for guidance on what to do in this case.

But that’s not what I’m talking about now – not about the various perplexities in the relationship between mentors and their spiritual children (since this is a big, separate topic). I mean the very principle and order of spiritual life: what stages in it we must go through, how selflessly we must cut off the will of our fallen nature, and how diligently and selflessly we fulfill the will of God that we know. Because if we recognize it and do not fulfill it, we will thereby commit a great sin.

– So such strict consistency in spiritual life is mandatory?

– In spiritual life in general it is very difficult to make any generalizations. Moreover, it is impossible to write one rule for all occasions, because God’s Providence for each person is special. Each person is a unique personality in the history of humankind, and therefore the Lord leads each person in his own way, with some of his own characteristics.

Of course, there are general guidelines on the path of salvation, but there are also some specific features. So, the general guideline is cutting off the will of one’s fallen nature and creating the will of God – so that a person knows the will of God and fulfills it in practice.

But since each of us is in passions, each is prone to exaltation, conceit and other manifestations of pride, then, having understood this, we should not rely on ourselves – on our “jealousy”, on our “reasoning”, on the feelings of our passionate heart and other selfishness, but only must heed the commandments of the Holy Scriptures, the patristic teaching and learn what stages in spiritual life we ​​must go through.

Therefore, it is very bold to say this: “What a spirit-bearing elder he would be!” If I knew God’s will, I would do everything!” Will you do it if you know this will of God? Very doubtful.

– So what then: is it better not to know her at all, or what?

– To know and fulfill the will of God is the direct responsibility of every Christian, and indeed of every earthly being. But this issue must be taken seriously and not frivolously. Before we begin to seek knowledge of the will of God, we must prepare for self-sacrifice – so that, having known the will of God, we can decide on everything: to take up our cross and follow Christ. And it’s not that if this will corresponds to my will, then I will fulfill it, and if it doesn’t correspond, I’ll ask another priest, maybe he’ll tell me something different. This is exactly what often happens today: they go to one priest and ask, to the second they ask, to the third they ask. If they don’t like it, they’ll go to the fourth or fifth. And such people think that they are doing the will of God. But in fact, they are fulfilling theirs – they are looking for someone to tell them the way they want.

For this reason, it is very dangerous for someone who is not accustomed to cutting off his will in front of a person (but is accustomed to trusting his opinion) to directly determine the will of God. Firstly, even if the admonition that comes to a person really comes from God, then it is unlikely that he will show obedience to the will of God. And secondly, such a person can simply confuse God’s admonition with the voice of his passions or the seduction of demons.

In order to make it more clear what we are talking about, we can (for the sake of benefit) tell one of the examples that we had to observe in the recent past.

One elderly monk came from the monastery to the desert. Serious, independent – as they say, “a mature personality.” Usually, when young novices or monks come to the desert, the difficulty of their stay here is that they cannot build a cell for themselves, cannot make a stove, cannot develop a vegetable garden, cannot do anything else for themselves – in a word, they are not adapted to work and independent life. And usually this circumstance leads young people out of the desert – even those who have zeal and want to strive.

But this newly arrived elderly monk gave hope that he would remain living in the desert until his death. He built himself a cell, developed an area for a vegetable garden, and lived there for two years.

But, unfortunately, he consulted little with others. Not far from him lived two monks: one old, the other young. After talking with the old man and learning some of his characteristics – what kind of demonic temptations happen to him, the novice desert dweller lost confidence in him. And he didn’t “get along” with the young man either, because he was much younger than him, and also had not lived in the desert for so long, only about five years. So he didn’t pay attention to his advice either. Thus, this monk was left “on his own.”

Although, in general, he was a serious person – he even prayed with tears, and therefore gave hope that his residence in the desert would last for a long time and would bring good spiritual fruits. But since he neglected the adviser and trusted himself, the enemy caught him trusting his own opinion.

He began to build all sorts of “concepts” for himself: to connect different events into one whole picture and draw his own conclusions from this.

Thoughts began to overcome him. From the outside, of course, they looked ridiculous: it was clearly clear that this was a demonic mockery, but, nevertheless, for him it was an insurmountable wall.

One day, this brother and I had a frank conversation. The obsession has receded a little. However, a few months after our conversation, having arrived in the city on business, I suddenly met him by chance and found out that he was already leaving. I approached him and asked:

– Why? What’s the reason?

“You know,” he tells me, “I can’t explain this to you.” With WHAT feeling, with WHAT irresistible attraction I went to the Caucasus at one time – it is the SAME feeling that is now driving me to Russia.

– Where? For what reason?

“I myself don’t know anything, I don’t understand anything – I have one persistent thought: “Leave from here, you won’t be able to stand here!”

– But where?

– Don’t know. I drive with my eyes closed. I don’t know what awaits me and where I will be. I’m going, just to get out of here as quickly as possible.

I talked to him a little – it was just a pity that the enemy had so caught this well-intentioned man in his thoughts, in his trust in himself, and thus drove him out of the desert. But, unfortunately, it was no longer possible to stop him.

The whole trouble is that today many live, as they say, “carelessly” – carelessly, carelessly about their salvation, not understanding what a cruel war Satan is waging for every soul in order to catch it as his prey for all endless eternity. And each such entrapment in the soul-destructive net of the enemy begins with trusting the devil’s false thoughts as true and good.

It is no coincidence that Saint Ignatius Brianchaninov says that “in one false thought lies the entire building of delight, just as a future plant is contained in a grain.” When the enemy plants some false thought in us (“we need to do such and such, such and such”), and we accept it without checking it with the Holy Scriptures, the advice of the Holy Fathers or experienced mentors, we can make a mistake. And then the development of seduction begins.

I remember what a bitter, clear example of such self-confidence we had to see at the beginning of our monastic residence in the Caucasus.

Around 1971, one educated young man N came here. He graduated from Moscow State University, worked as one of the editors of the magazine “Soviet Cosmonautics”, then turned to faith and decided to live in the mountains as a monk. Since there were no equals in education here, he kept to himself. He comprehended everything with his own mind and blazed “his own” path in spiritual life.

Three years later, when N. was sufficiently established and “ripe” in his own worth, one day a spirit appeared to him and repeated the gospel word: “It is I [i.e. supposedly Christ12], do not be afraid!” – after which he began to answer all his questions and give “admonitions”. When N. told us about his “insights” in a conversation, we were simply horrified, but we were unable to convince him.

He told us that he had already written several of his works: “Colored Psalter”, “Tetrad”, “Pentode”, “Hexad”, “Eternal Gospel”. We haven’t read them, however, so we can’t say with certainty what they are. In the end, the poor fellow imagined himself to be the reincarnated apostle and evangelist John the Theologian. The enemy brought him to the point of confidence: “Fear nothing. By expressing your thoughts, you will not sin, for you are the reincarnated John the Theologian.” And he walked without hesitation, headlong.

Here is an example of how dangerous it is to trust your mind and hope to independently understand the phenomena of the spiritual world.

After three and a half years of residence here, N. returned to the world to teach and preach. For this, he really wanted to take holy orders. True, I don’t know whether he was able to carry out his plans13

– Why did you say that even if the admonition that comes to a person really comes from God, then he is unlikely to show obedience to the will of God?

– The fact is that if we do not try to cut off our sin-loving will every day – in various cases of every day we live, then it is very doubtful that we “in the twinkling of an eye” will be able to cut off our passionate skills in knowing the will of God and the requirements of the grace of the Holy Spirit, Whom we desire to have in our soul.

As an example, I will tell you an incident that happened at one time to a local monk. This brother lived as a monk for more than ten years, trying to practice the Jesus Prayer. His mentor also prayed for him. And finally, through the prayers of the elder, the Lord granted the young monk the gift of grace – connecting the mind with the heart. Prayer began to happen differently.

However, after occupied with it for some time, this brother began to be burdened by the fact that the grace of mental-heart prayer forced him to stand in prayer, and not sit down, as he had done before. Moreover, the prayer had to be read more slowly – before he read it quickly, but when overshadowed by grace, the prayer was performed much more slowly.

And so the monk, according to him, not being accustomed to cutting off his own will in everything, did not obey the grace that was given to him to perform mental-heart prayer. He began to “customize” the prayer. She began to read faster, but even that seemed slow to him. He was also burdened by the fact that he had to stand on his feet during prayer – grace required self-denial from him. But at the same time, my legs swelled and I felt tension throughout my body.

And the monk, not accustomed to cutting off his will, his desires, his self-indulgence in everything, did not achieve the feat required of him. From then on, he began to gradually lose the grace of God bestowed upon him, until, in the end, he lost it completely. And then he began to grieve and cry, because, as he said, with his disobedience he “offended God to the face.”

So we need to be extremely careful so that we don’t make any similar mistakes.

That is why we need to follow the common path of spiritual life: not to trust our opinions, thoughts and desires, to listen to Christ-loving shepherds, to obey our pious neighbors, to be guided by the New Testament commandments of Christ and the patristic writings, and most importantly – to fight with ourselves, with our passions.

You need to educate yourself in such a way that you completely banish from yourself “I want” or “I don’t want,” “I like” or “I don’t like.” And even “I can” or “I cannot” – we must strive to ensure that, having learned the will of God, we say to ourselves: “If this pleases the Lord and saves me, then “I can do all things through Jesus Christ who strengthens me” (Phil. 4:13).”

If we continue in this kind of struggle with our passions (especially the passion of conceit), then the Lord, even without our special request, will reveal to us His further will: how we should live, how we should act in every circumstance of our life. Even without our request, He will send us admonitions: both through the circumstances themselves, and through people, and in other ways of His All-Wise Providence.

For this reason, the fight against passions and the fulfillment of God’s commandments and the demands of the voice of conscience in every case of life is our most basic work, which we must continue for many, many years.

“Call Me in the day of your troubles…” (Ps. 49:15)

– But each of us in life can (and does) have extreme situations when there is no one to ask or there is simply no time for it….

– Extreme situations are a “special” point. Yes, each of us can have them. But the words of the Lord are addressed to each of us: “Call Me in the day of your sorrow, and I will wear you out, and glorify Me” (Ps. 49:15).

– What if you are confused by thoughts of unbelief and cowardice?

– If we do not believe that the Lord hears us in extreme situations, then our faith is in vain. What do we believe then, if, even on the brink of life and death, we doubt: will God hear us and give us admonition and deliverance?

The Lord does not want the sinner to die and cares about his admonition and salvation. Therefore, let no one doubt that if circumstances require it God speaks His word in the heart of any person – who in simplicity, faith and humility resorts to Him.

The soul usually feels when its prayer is accepted. We will stop doubting this if we have some experience of our own.

– How exactly to act in such cases?

– Often in such cases there is no time to make any “speeches” or read long prayers. A heartfelt cry is simply born in the soul, and this internal appeal ascends from the heart to God: “Lord, what should I do in this situation (or in this state)? Tell me some sense! Help me! And immediately the Lord gives an answer – a good thought or feeling in the heart – and the person begins to act.

– Could you give any example of God’s help in an extreme situation from your life?

– There were different cases. The Lord helps in everything. Prayer and the Lord’s help in all circumstances are inseparable and act instantly, if, of course, we rely on God and not on ourselves.

I had such a case. One day I went to look for a new secluded place for a cell. At first I walked along the path, and then turned and headed, as they say, “along the azimuth” to one mountain spur. We had to crawl through such thickets that branches poked not only into our eyes, but sometimes even into our nostrils.

But, fortunately, on my way I came across a stream, as it is called here – a “gutter”. I went down and followed it down. After walking a little, I came across an eight-meter waterfall. Seeing that it would not be possible to go down, he began to go around it, but soon the road was blocked by a vertical stone wall. After a careful examination, I discovered a small cornice on it, three or four fingers wide. At great risk, I walked along it for about four meters, and, coming out onto a stone scree, again wandered down the gutter.

And now – again a waterfall about twelve meters long. At first I wanted to go down the rope, but, having changed my mind, I took out a hatchet, cut through the bushes around and made a detour along the slope. However, the path was soon blocked by a third waterfall. I could no longer find any way to get around it – there were steep cliffs hanging on both sides.

Seeing that it was impossible to move further, I decided to go back, but then I suddenly noticed that under the rock there was a trail of wild goats that were going around this waterfall. “Well,” I think, “if the goats passed here, maybe I’ll somehow manage to get through with God’s help.” Having made steps with the butt of the ax, he safely went down. The stream flowed into a small river, crossing which I began to climb the opposite mountain. It was very difficult to walk because of the impassable jungle, so again we had to look for some kind of chute.

On my back I had a rather heavy backpack with clothes, food and everything necessary for traveling and spending the night in the forest under the open sky. The day was approaching evening, it was necessary to look for a convenient place to spend the night, and here was the waterfall again. But since it was not vertical, but sloping, I decided not to climb into the jungle, but to climb along it.

The higher I climbed, the steeper and more difficult it became. Then we began to come across stones with a downward slope, covered with a thin layer of scree earth. My legs began to slip and I sank to my knees.

There are two meters left to the top, but there is nothing to grab onto. I grabbed onto one pebble and pulled myself up, but I couldn’t climb up. I reached out to one more stone and grabbed it, but it broke, almost hitting me in the hand. “Well, that’s it! – flashed through my head – mortal danger! Any more effort is useless.

I stick my chest to the rock. The backpack is pulled back, the knees slowly slide down. I hold on, leaning on my left hand, with only one thumb hooked on a small protruding pebble. Suddenly I feel that he, too, is moving. “Well, that’s it, it’s over! If I don’t kill myself, I’ll definitely break my bones. Who will find me here? Nobody!”

Here I prayed to the Lord and the Mother of God: “Mother of God, leave me alive, because I have not repented yet!” And I hear the answer in my heart: “Just throw off your backpack” – “Well, of course,” the thought immediately worked, “after all, I have a flashlight and matches there!” Without all this, how can I survive in the cold in the forest in only a canvas shirt, and even wet? Besides, the backpack will hit me on the legs, and I will fly after it.” But I feel that the first command remains in force.

I’m resetting.

Relieved by the load and clinging to the stones, I slowly slide down the cliff, listening to the noise of my backpack rolling far down. Without wasting a minute, I quickly go down after him.

I went down to the river – my backpack was nowhere to be found. I walked about fifty meters downstream, too. Back and forth – nowhere, as if he had fallen through the ground! The water is not so big that it can carry you far. Moreover, in the water there are branches, roots, stones – it must be caught by the straps. But he is nowhere to be seen. Yes, it’s already dusk, it’s useless to look further.

So I was left without a backpack in the gorge of a mountain river, through which a cold draft wind flows, in wet trousers and a wet shirt. There is a small hatchet in his belt, a watch in his pocket, and a rosary on his neck.

I stood up to pray, thanked the Lord and the Queen of Heaven for deliverance from misfortune and death, and prayed from eight to eleven o’clock in the evening.

But I feel like I’m starting to vegetate, so much so that I can hardly make the sign of the cross with my fingers. “Uh-uh,” I think, “I won’t make it until the morning, I’ll freeze, because it’s autumn. I walked all day, I was very tired, I was sure to fall asleep. And if I fall asleep, I won’t wake up again (I know from medical experience that this happens). And to go back to these waterfalls… it’s humanly incredible that you can cross them safely. What should I do? I prayed as best I could and as best I could. The heart inclined to “go.” “Well, Lord,” I said, “You kept me there, keep me here too, everything is possible for You!”

And he went.

Of course, he was groping his way, and at the first waterfall he fell with one foot into the abyss, but managed to catch on to some root. The second one went well. But what scared me most of all was that narrow cornice, along which I walked with great danger even during the day. I approached it, found some branch at the top and, pressing close to the rock, squeezed back much easier than during the day.

When I ascended to the impenetrable wilds, a cloud descended and it began to snow. Despite the fact that I climbed up, straining with all my might, I was chilled “to the bone” – if I had stayed in the gorge, I would probably have frozen to death.

It was so dark around that sometimes I even walked with my eyes closed. Only the crowns of the trees were visible against the sky, and below there was complete darkness. But I must say, it seemed very surprising to me that, crawling through these jungles in the autumn darkness (where dry branches poked my nostrils even during the day), I did not notice any serious scratching on the face.

After several hours of walking through the thickets, it was necessary to reach the hunting trail. But I couldn’t find any way to determine whether I was going the right way. I sat down, rested, prayed and thought: “Where am I? Where is the hunting trail? How can I figure out where to go next?”

Suddenly I hear a noise: “chap-chap”, “chap-chap”. Yeah, that means there’s a bear coming! I sit quietly, and he comes closer and closer. It is known that bears in a calm state also walk along the trails, so I began to listen carefully. It was very joyful that the Lord showed me the path in this way. I walked along it, and shouted to the bear to run away.

In an hour and a half there should be a turn from the hunting path to ours. Confusion again. And again – prayer and a good thought.

Suddenly I remembered that at the site of the fork, a dry chestnut hung on a living tree and could be seen against the sky. I began to look at the sky more often, and, in fact, soon I noticed the outline of a fallen chestnut. I turned around, made sure by the cut branches that I was definitely on my path, and thought: “Well, that’s it, now I can reach my cell!”

I rested a little more and went. I took two or three steps – there was some kind of big stone, there was no path. I returned back and walked a little in the other direction – there was no path, just thickets. Still to the side – there is no path.

I returned and felt the cut branch – I was standing on the path! But I take a few steps and lose her. “Lord, give me some sense! What kind of temptation? I walked through such wilds, but got confused on the path!” And I hear a mental answer: “But now you have already relied on yourself, that you have gone out on your path and will end up in a cell… well, well, go and try…” – “Lord! – I begged, – forgive me, the arrogant madman! I’m sorry!”

After that, he walked without ever losing his way, and by morning he safely reached his cell.

About a month later I went to look for my missing backpack and found it in the same place. It turns out that when he rolled off the cliff, he fell into the water between two stones the same size as himself. The water covered him from above and was running, which is why I could not detect him then, in the descending twilight.

Two years later I had to visit those waterfalls again, but this time alone with Father N. I told him about my night journey. I don’t know what Father N. thought when we passed along that section of the path, but the thought came to me: “Although I am a believer, if someone led me through these places and said that he passed here in the darkness of an autumn night without any harm, then this might seem incredible to me.”

Yes, what is impossible for man is possible for God. And our God is one and the same today, as He was hundreds and thousands of years ago, Who said: “Call upon Me in the day of your tribulation, and destroy you, and glorify Me” (Ps. 49:15).

So, THANK GOD, who does not want the sinner to die! And praise and thanksgiving to the Queen of Heaven, the zealous Intercessor of the Christian race!

God has no partiality

– What if an inexperienced, “spiritually weak” person finds himself in an extreme situation?

– God has no partiality. As an example, I will give an incident that happened to a worldly man and, one might say, almost an unbeliever.

One day in late autumn this man went hunting. He went far from the village – he hunted in high mountain pastures. At this time it began to rain heavily. The hunter, wet to the skin, walked to the nearest booth14, lit a fire, drank tea and settled down for the night. In order to dry, he undressed, hung all his clothes and shoes on a rope over the fire, lay down next to him and fell asleep.

I woke up from some strange smell. He looks, and his last shirt is burning out. It turns out that while he was sleeping, the fire flared up, the rope on which the clothes were hanging burned out and broke, all the clothes fell into the fire and burned. And then, to top off all the troubles, the cold rain gave way to snow. And the poor fellow was left barefoot, in only a “loincloth” in the winter in the mountains.

What to do? I sat and sat, but there was nothing to wait for: while I have the strength I must run. And he started running through the snow. The nearest village is about forty kilometers away. There is almost no hope of staying alive. Then the hunter, although he had little faith, cried out to God in despair: “Lord, help me! You see, I’m dying!”

And on this day, a certain desert monk M., who had built himself a secret cell far in the mountains, was returning home through fresh snow, rejoicing that no one would disturb him, because… the snow closed all the roads.

The hunter descended from the pastures into a wooded area and, after running a little more, suddenly saw the trace of a person who had recently passed. And although it was strange to him that the trail led to the mountains and not to the village, he moved along it, believing that it was arranged by God (there were still about thirty kilometers to the village).

M., having arrived at the cell, rejoiced at the beginning of the long-awaited loneliness.

And suddenly someone’s voice is heard outside. M. looks out and sees in the snow: … a naked man with a gun in his hands. Lord, have mercy! What is this? Or is it a ghost? Or for real?

– Don’t be afraid, don’t be afraid! Help me – I’m freezing!

M., of course, took the hunter into his cell, dressed him, shod him, warmed him up, fed him…

Thus, by the grace of God, this man was saved from obvious death. His name was Sergius. He himself told us this with a feeling of gratitude to God for hearing his prayer and delivering him from trouble and death.

The Lord fulfills our desires to an incomparably greater extent than we can imagine.

– Some people still do not believe that God hears us and somehow answers us. They don’t understand how God can answer us.

– We feel God’s answer in our hearts. More often, he comes to us by the way (as in the case of the freezing hunter). Everyone watch your life, and you will see that not only prayerfully expressed requests are fulfilled by the God who loves us, but also many of our good desires, expressed or unexpressed, heartfelt feelings, aspirations are realized over time by His Providence. This is God’s answer. But we receive this answer not in the same form as in a conversation with a person, but in the form that God deigns to reveal.

Even our unspoken desires are often fulfilled. I also remember what fleeting desires I had at one time, and the Lord fulfilled them. I remember looking: tourists were walking with backpacks. I think: “I wish I had a backpack like this!” And after a while they present me with such a backpack. Another time I saw boots, I thought: “Nice boots.” And here you are wearing these boots. And so – at every step. One day a novice came to visit us, and I thought: “Here is a servant of God, it would be quite possible to labor together with him.” And ten years later he came here for good.

So the Lord fulfills our desires to an incomparably greater extent than we can imagine, only we do not heed this and therefore fall into apathy, grumbling, despondency, cowardice – as if the Lord does not love us, as if the Lord does not hear us, as if the Lord has forgotten about us. This is an insult to God, and one must repent of it. If God hears every idle word, when a person says blasphemy or some kind of obscenity (this is all written down, you will have to answer), then all the more does He not hear our prayers? He hears everything and perceives everything, but we do not listen to how He answers us. This is our problem.

About surrendering oneself into the hands of God

– How to correctly assess unfulfilled prayer requests? Does this mean that they are displeasing to God?

– This is not always the case. These are the destinies of God’s Wise Providence, and it is not for us to judge “why,” “why,” and “why.” But, it must be said, we, without realizing it, very often are like little children: our requests turn out to be so frivolous that they are not fulfilled by the God who loves us for the sake of His love for us.

In this regard, it is appropriate to quote one woman’s story about her spiritual father. This shepherd, wise with worldly experience, wanting to show by example what kind of spiritual foolishness we sometimes have, told the following story about himself. As a child, he often had to see his grandfather take unusually beautiful teeth out of his mouth (so even and white), put them in a glass of water at night, and put them back on in the morning. The boy really liked these “extraordinary” teeth, and he began to pray: “Lord, I want the same ones! Give me teeth like my grandfather’s!” “And when I grew up,” the priest later said, “I found out what the matter was, what kind of “teeth” they were, – I said: “Glory to You, Lord, that You did not listen to my prayers and did not give me what I asked of You!” So ​​these are the cases.

Of course, there are also prayers in which we seem to ask for both a good deed and something beneficial for the soul, but we cannot receive it. I remember one person talking about himself. He asked the Lord for the same thing for many years, but did not receive it. At first I thought: why? “And then,” he says, “he noticed: when I received something, I could not correctly accept this gift, I could not assimilate it—it was with humility to accept and preserve it. As soon as this mercy of God began to act, complacency, arrogance, and humiliation of neighbors immediately appeared. And the gift was taken away.”

Based on this example, we can conclude that many of our requests are not fulfilled by God only because, having received what we asked, we cannot, because of our pride, accept and assimilate this gift, but we will become arrogant and perish.

So, as we see, everywhere and in everything the Wise Providence of the Lord is manifested.

– In this case, if there is a danger of making mistakes in your petitions, maybe you shouldn’t turn to God with “personal” prayers at all?

– This opinion is also extreme. We must pour out our whole soul in prayer, but at the same time surrender ourselves into the hands of God. As St. Theophan the Recluse says, we must end each of our petitions with something like this prayer: “Lord, here I have poured out my soul before You, and You, as the All-Perfect, Almighty and Loving Father, arrange my salvation through destinies. As you know, as you want, but just save me from my sins, passions and from my madness. In the image of destinies, arrange my salvation! With these words, i.e. Each of our prayers should end with surrendering ourselves into the hands of the Lord, as the Loving Father and All-Perfect God.

And indeed, we must believe in God as God, hope in God as God and know that All things are possible to Him. And this faith of ours must remain unshakable even when it seems to us that there seem to be no obvious manifestations of God’s help in any of our needs.

Unfortunately, many people today say and think something like this: “Here we pray and pray, but there’s no point! God doesn’t hear us.” This happens especially often with mothers who pray for their lost children. They, seeing the disastrous state their children are in, pray for their admonition, but there are supposedly no positive changes. And they begin to faint in faith. Most often they weaken prayer or give it up completely, or even grumble at God: “Here I prayed, but God does not hear and does not fulfill my desires!” And it happens that they even completely lose hope in God. But this, of course, is a big mistake.

On this occasion, I remember the story of Father N. from Pochaev. One mother had an only son. Returning from the army, he began to live dissolutely: drinking, partying, and getting involved in drugs. His mother was a believer and tried as best she could to reason with him.

However, the son, instead of coming to his senses and correcting himself, became even more embittered: he began to insult and then even beat his mother. The poor woman, of course, grieved greatly. She prayed, went to church, gave alms, asked that they pray for her son.

Many years have passed, and my son has shown no change – he has become even worse. The woman goes to the priest all in tears: “Father, what should I do?” He answered her: “Pray. With the Lord all things are possible.” Time passes, she again goes to the priest: “Father! There is no change. What’s the matter? The Lord does not hear me, does not accept my prayers.” She began to feel embarrassed and hesitate. Father tells her: “Pray. With the Lord all things are possible.”

After some time, the woman became very ill and was on her deathbed. She called upon the priest: “Father, I might even die, but the Lord does not hear my prayers!..” The priest consoled her as best he could, but she was still left with grief, because she saw that her son was in a distressed state.

…On the day when the Lord was pleased to take the suffering mother from life, the son came home, as always, “tipsy.” He came and looked, and his mother had already died. And then he suddenly seemed to “wake up”: “What have I done! After all, I ruined my mother! How she suffered, how much harm I caused her! After all, it was I who drove her into the coffin!” He took this so close to his heart that he had a complete revolution in his consciousness: he began to cry, curse himself, went to church and there brought deep, sincere repentance. Since then, he turned to faith and began to live piously – he became a real servant of God.

Here is such a case. And although the mother, it would seem, did not see this good fruit during her lifetime, nevertheless, her prayer did not remain fruitless.

So we shouldn’t despair and be embarrassed by the fact that God supposedly “doesn’t hear” us and doesn’t do anything in some difficult circumstances for us. Everything that happens in our lives is arranged by the Wisdom of God, which the human mind cannot think of. Therefore, we must honor God as God, and surrender all our deeds to Him, and not try to do them only at our own discretion, supposedly the “best.”

And this is very important – to learn to surrender ourselves and our neighbors, and all the circumstances of our lives into the hands of God. Because it is a very great sin to not honor God as God (St. Ignatius Brianchaninov says that we often do not honor God as God). And we are almost not aware of this sin.

This manifestation happens even during prayer. Sometimes our prayerful appeals to God turn into daring demands, which is very sad.

As an example of what such reckless behavior can lead to, I’ll tell you another case about maternal prayer. It was in Pochaev. There lived a mother and son. The son went into the army, and there an accident happened to him: some kind of acid splashed into his eyes, and he went blind. He was treated in the hospital, but to no avail – he returned home blind. The mother, of course, was shocked: a young guy, and already disabled. She began to pray, began to go to church more often, travel to monasteries, give out alms, ask everyone for the Lord to heal her son.

After some time, she was given an admonition from Above: “Don’t cry like that. It is not good for your son to be sighted. It’s better for him to be who he is.” But the mother did not accept this admonition, but continued to pray. She began to simply demand: “Mother of God, heal him!”

A little time passed, and she was again given admonition: “It’s not good for him.” But she still continued to insist: “No, Mother of God, heal! It’s possible for you!” In Pochaev there were many healings from the icon of the Mother of God, so she addressed the Mother of God with such reproach: “If You heal others, why don’t You heal my son? You heal others, but you don’t heal him!” And with such exactingness, with such pressure: “Heal him – that’s all!”

And then one day, on some holiday, they blessed water in the temple and began to sprinkle people with it. They sprayed it on this guy too. He wiped himself with this water and began to see – better, better. He washed his eyes and was healed (how complete the healing was, of course, is not known, but at least he could walk on his own, without outside help).

The mother was delighted!.. But this joy of hers ended very soon. As soon as the son came home, he saw that the situation in their house had changed. Previously, the situation in their house was good, and for the sake of his healing, his mother sold everything that was valuable and gave it away for alms. The son, seeing this, flared up with anger: “What have you done?!” You made us beggars! How will I live now?!” Since then he rebelled against his mother. He started beating her, started mocking her, and started drinking. And it got so bad that he ran after her with an ax around the house, shouting: “I’ll kill you!” And then, after a while, she actually died some mysterious death. And although they say that “not caught, not a thief,” some suggest that he killed her.

Every day in church at litanies we hear: “…we will commit ourselves and each other and our whole life to Christ God”. If we persist, insist on our opinions and desires, then this is how this persistence can end. In this case, this woman, through her immoderate maternal love, perhaps destroyed the soul of her son. What she asked him was of no use to him. The Lord arranged the way of salvation for this young man in the best way for him, but she believed that this was not so, not wanting to honor God as God. And these were the sad consequences.

Thus, in fact, faith in God manifests distrust in Him. But we often do not realize this, we do not repent and do not correct ourselves.

Help us, Lord, because we really sin in many ways – we sin even with prayer itself. So we need to be very careful, and if we notice something like that in ourselves, then we immediately need to repent, humble ourselves and correct ourselves.

As I once heard, a certain woman said: “I can ask God for everything I want through prayer. It happens like this: I pray for something and I don’t receive it. But I ask: “Lord, I really want it, give it to me.” After a while I get it. Then another desire arises. I know that maybe the Lord doesn’t want to give me this, but I still really want it. And I ask, I ask, I ask: “Well, Lord, I really want to!” Give it to me!” And after a while He gives.” And so I thought that this reckless “I-want” might not have brought her to what happened with that previously mentioned woman. Because you can’t behave like that with God.

Of course, the Lord tolerates our foolishness and satisfies many of our desires, even those that are not beneficial for us. But He is waiting for us to learn to surrender ourselves into His hands. He is waiting for us to completely surrender our entire temporary and eternal fate, and all our life circumstances, to Him, i.e. They honored Him as the True God – the All-Wise and All-Perfect Loving Father.

– From the above examples it follows that persistent prayer can be sinful. What if the soul asks for something necessary for salvation? For example, does she ask that the Lord not take her from this life unprepared? If such requests remain, as it were, “unanswered,” can a person continue to pray? Isn’t such persistence a sin? Or does this not apply to the above cases (with women demanding theirs), since these are different examples?

– Of course, these are different examples. Each case must be considered separately, because general phrases can mean different things. And if we talk specifically about the case when someone asks the Lord: “Lord, don’t take me from this life unprepared,” you can continue to pray about this. But you need to know within yourself that only the Lord knows when to take someone away from this life. And if it happens that such a person suddenly finds himself in the face of death, then even then he will only need to say: “Lord, although I thought that I would still live, but if at this moment You are already taking me away from here, then I believe You that You considered it necessary to take me away at this very moment. You know better than me at what point I need to be taken away from this life.”

You need to firmly believe in God to prevent grumbling. Because at the moment of death, in the face of death, you can complain to the Lord: “Well, I wanted to live some more, I’m not ready, but You’re already taking me.” This is wrong in relation to God, because the Lord knows when someone needs to be taken, knows when a person is ready, and He takes exactly the “ready” one.

And in general, they say that it is not the old or the sick who die, but the ready – ready for either hell or heaven. This means that a person can no longer continue to live; he is already, as it were, at the highest point of his capabilities. The virtuous cannot continue to succeed, because then he will begin to decline: either conceit, or arrogance, or something similar. Or if a person is so established in evil that he can no longer turn to repentance, but is only capable of increasing evil for himself and for others, then the Lord often takes him from this life for the sake of others, so that he does not cause evil to others.

– So, we must, in any case, surrender ourselves into the hands of God? In any, right?

– Certainly. In any case we must surrender ourselves into the hands of God and honor God as God – that he is All-Good, All-Perfect and Loving.

God is Love. And if we treat Him with love and trust, then we assimilate His love.

If we treat Him with confusion, distrust, discontent, murmuring or even hostility, then through this we damage ourselves and become incapable of accepting and assimilating His Divine love. And what this means, I think, is clear to everyone. So, God help us.

Faith is breaking through obstacles

– When the soul becomes familiar with small grains of living prayer experience, and then (the rest of the time) the chain of communication with God is destroyed, the soul falls into a relaxed state: “If there is no living feeling in the heart, then nothing is needed at all!” – apathy, despondency sets in and every attempt at prayer is destroyed, a “quiet rebellion”: “Either this way, or no way!” But I won’t pray a dead prayer!” This is surely a temptation?

– Yes, this is a temptation. Leaving prayer is caused by the devil. When we break out of his nets, he manages in every way to catch and hold us in them again, so that the soul does not soar to God. That’s why he makes such suggestions. As one priest said: “I felt that some kind of chilling feeling was filling me, as if someone was pouring something cold, vile and terrible into my soul with a syringe – like some kind of rebellion against God. I realized that it was not mine, but I could not resist it. And then he finally began to fight and free himself from this devilish pumping.” Similar temptations befall every person in life: some to a greater extent, some to a lesser extent. And we must fight with them, because in this struggle our loyalty and devotion to God are manifested.

Here we read the gospel story: a blind man was sitting near the path, and Christ walked by (Mark 10:46-52). The blind man shouted: “Son of David, have mercy on me!” It is said: “Those who came before forbade him,” they say: “Be silent, don’t shout!” And he began to scream even more. This is an image of the fact that when the soul begins to cry out to God, the “passing ones” are our passions, our sins, they teach, advise and even close our lips: “Don’t, stop it!” And these crafty advisers suggest stopping prayer under a variety of pretexts: “You still don’t know how to pray, stop it!”, “God won’t hear you!”, “Yes, this is a waste of your time!”, “Yes, this is a useless task, leave it!”, “But anyway, you will not receive real prayer!”, “Today there are no mentors in doing prayer, stop doing it, otherwise you will fall into delusion!” – and other most varied plausible pretexts are suggested to us by demons, who do not allow us to call on our Healer and Savior. And if we stop praying, then we are making a big mistake.

And the evangelical blind man screamed even more. And when Christ called him, he “threw away,” it is said, “his garments and came to Jesus.” Notice that when he rejected everything material and carnal, then he approached the Savior. So we too must reject everything carnal, the old man, and then we will come to Jesus, and the Lord will open our eyes. This is the image of our prayer.

The Holy Scripture says: “Be patient in tribulation, constant in prayer” (Rom. 12:12). This means that we must, no matter what, be constant in prayer and endure this warfare and burden from the flesh and the devil. After all, all demonic power resists it – prayer, our old man resists, our body itself resists, because it is mortal. But, nevertheless, we must reject everything that stands in our way to God and shout like the gospel blind: “Jesus, Son of God, have mercy on me!”

Here, gratitude for the hardship itself may also be important: “Lord, I thank you for allowing me to see how unfit I really am before You, and for helping me overcome all the obstacles on the way to You!” For our love and desire for God are tested by opposition, as someone said: “Faith is a breakthrough through obstacles.”

In prayer, our faith is evidenced by the fact that we break through thoughts, desires, dreams, reluctance, burdens, and even bodily fatigue itself, fatness, worries, burdens, etc. We testify that, being clothed with flesh, we desire to live not according to bestial lusts, but according to the mind, i.e. to be spiritual personalities and serve God, like the Angels, mysteriously becoming like them in standing before the Creator. So this struggle of ours contains a very important moment in spiritual life.

I remember the story of an archimandrite I knew who was present at the death of a certain elder. The story of this elder was this: he came to the monastery and began to diligently practice the Jesus Prayer. After some time, the young ascetic actually succeeded in prayer – it became self-propelled for him. And then one day this monk saw in a dream a beautiful maiden who, approaching him, said: “Well, you saw me. And now I’m leaving, and you look for me.” When he woke up, he felt that self-propelled prayer had left him.

And then he realized that the girl he saw in his dream was an image of prayer that had left him, and that now he again needed to engage in labor prayer. The monk set about it intensely and spent about 50 years in this work.

Shortly before his death, he was visited by an old friend and associate (who later told this story). When he was near the elder, he suddenly saw that the elder had become unusually joyful and exclaimed in spiritual delight:

– She has come!.. She has come!.. Finally she has come!.

– Father, who came? – after all, there was no one around.

– The prayer came!.. And it came so much that it filled me completely! I can’t tell you how what I feel!

At the same time, the elder told his brother his story: how prayer first came, then left him, and how many years he had been looking for it.

So, indeed, if we do something for the sake of God, the Lord will not leave us with His mercy, as long as we do not leave Him and do what depends on us. And the Lord will complete all good things in due time with His grace.

We need to force ourselves to be virtuous – and not so that today we start doing it and tomorrow we are already looking for fruits. We say: “I have been doing this, that, and the third for so long, but there is no fruit.” The elder, as we see, forced himself to pray for 50 years – and only before his death did she visit him and give him peace, joy and grace-filled consolation to such an extent that it could not fit in his soul. And the elder passed away from this life in joy and gratitude to God, showing us an example of work and patience.

But modern workers often have neither patience nor consistency and therefore remain without fruit. As soon as he gets down to business, he soon becomes exhausted and can no longer force himself. Vernet>; not “can’t”, but doesn’t want to. He wants the fruit to fall immediately.

That is why many today are seduced by all sorts of “spiritual systems” that promise to “acquire grace within one week.” Or they try to mix Orthodoxy with yoga and the occult in order to quickly “advance” into the spiritual world and get rid of this… (for example, drunkenness) and acquire this… (for example, “dispassion” or “clairvoyance”)15

Prayer and life are one

– There is a fairly widespread opinion that prayer is one thing, but life is something completely different. Prayer can include church services, cell rule, etc. The rest of the time is taken up by “just life” – work, rest, household chores, personal interests, etc. Thus, our earthly existence is made up of alternating prayer and ordinary human life. Is this correct?

– St. Mark the Ascetic said: “Everything that we say or do without prayer later becomes either sinful or harmful and exposes us through deeds.” It’s just a pity that we rarely take this into account.

Prayer is a conversation between the soul and God, and it must be dissolved in our entire being. In all sorrows and joys, in all sorrows and bewilderments, in all confusions and stumblings – prayer penetrates everywhere, i.e. turning the soul towards God.

We must live before God and acquire the properties of Christ

– Isn’t there prayer “in its pure form”?

– Let’s take two images. Here is a bird in front of us. If you watch her, you can see how she flutters and what she does. She sings. She sang for a while, then pecked that she found something edible on the ground. If she pecks, she looks at the sky: is there a kite or other enemy there? Then she sang again, pecked again and started singing again. This is an image of the initial prayer, indicating that it – prayer – should be intertwined with all of our Life.

And here is the second image. When it gets dark, a nightingale sits on a branch and sings. And he sings so much that he no longer sees anyone and hears nothing…

This question, of course, is complex and multifaceted; you can’t say everything in a few words. In this case, it is better to carefully read what has already been written by the Holy Fathers about prayer, and apply it in life.

But if we try to briefly express the main idea regarding the issue of prayer – prayer is inseparable from life simply because WE MUST LIVE BEFORE GOD AND ACQUIRE THE CHARACTERISTICS OF CHRIST. And this is a very important conclusion.

I once had to talk with a priest who visited Old Athos. The conversation turned to why today’s monks – in particular, we – having been engaged in the Jesus Prayer for many years, are not honored with mental-hearted self-motivated prayer. My interlocutor, while on Athos, spoke on the same topic with the Athonite elders (and with famous ones who had reached high degrees of spirituality).

And so, while talking, we agreed with him on one opinion – and there he made the following conclusion, and here we came to the same thing: The Jesus prayer is not grafted into our hearts only because we do not acquire the properties of Christ – we are not transformed into a new creation. That is, we do not try to be merciful, loving, meek, humble, quiet, we do not try enough to repent of all sins – and all this is accompanied by the fulfillment of the other commandments of Christ. And the first commandment: “Repent and believe in the Gospel” (Mark 1:15) – you need to start with it. Then the commandment: “Blessed are the poor in spirit,” “Blessed are those who mourn,” “Blessed are the meek,” “Blessed are those who revile you” (Matthew 5:3–12) and others.

If we understand what we must do and begin to do it, then there will be success in prayer. And since we do this, then prayer visits us from time to time, gives us repentance, crying, tenderness, consolation – and leaves again. And we mourn, become despondent, become exhausted, and plunge into darkness.

But it is also important to note the following. When a person decides to begin to fulfill the commandments, he needs to realize that we need these commandments not for the sake of the commandments themselves, i.e. for the sake of their formal, cold execution. We need them so that with their help we acquire properties that are pleasing to God and saving for us.

For example, it says: “Submit yourselves to one another in the fear of God” (Eph. 5:21). This means that we must joyfully obey each other, cutting off our own will. Not in order to please the person: “Okay, since you said it, I’ll do it so that there are no consequences later,” no. We must try to get used to cutting off our will before our neighbor, in order to acquire the property of Christ, Who was obedient to God the Father even to death, and thereby get rid of the property of the old man, which we received from our forefather Adam, who did not obey God, but listened to Satan, taking fruit from the forbidden tree.

Also, when they insult us or do some kind of trouble to us, we must happily forgive the offender in order to assimilate the spirit of forgiveness.

If we see someone in mental distress, in sinful darkness and infatuation, we must sympathize with him: “Help him, Lord, enlighten him, enlighten him, help him both physically and mentally, so that he gets rid of the snares of the enemy!”

By doing this in each case, we will gradually put off the old man and put on the new, doing every good work before God (in secret from people, as far as possible).

We need to understand how important it is for us to have these properties. When we have them, then every other person’s pain will become ours, and we will be able to pray attentively, and cry, and humble ourselves, and love – prayer itself will flow from the heart. And only after this we will be able to ascend to the “nightingale” prayer.

When we tell ourselves “I can’t,” we make a big mistake

– But what if you can’t live piously, according to the commandments? Sometimes you seem to see, and feel, and understand that you are not living as you should, but you absolutely cannot cope with yourself. And then thoughts come: “Such a “correct” life is available only to a select few. I can’t do this.”

– When we tell ourselves “I can’t,” we make a big mistake. Simply put – stupidity. We need to understand the fact that we ourselves cannot be saved. We cannot perform any virtue ourselves, because the Lord said: “Every garden that My heavenly Father does not plant will be uprooted” (Matthew 15:13) And: “Without Me you can do nothing [i.e. nothing good]” (John 15:5). Every garden, i.e. Every work that is not accomplished by the grace of God is not suitable for the Kingdom of God.

And therefore, in order for us to acquire the properties of Christ, we need to understand that they are acquired in us only by the grace of the Holy Spirit (with the joint cooperation of our will). It is then that we perform some kind of virtue, i.e. a good quality is manifested in us, similar to some extent to Christ’s (in feelings, thoughts, dispositions) – just as the apostle says that we “should have the same feelings that were in Christ Jesus” (Phil. 2:5).

The work of saving transformation is accomplished this way. We read some commandment, for example: “Forgive, and you will be forgiven” (Luke 6:37). And so we seem to be trying to forgive our offender. But everything is boiling inside us: “No, I can’t forgive him! I said “I can’t”, that means I can’t – that’s all!” In this case, evil (as a property) remains in us and takes root in the soul the passions of rancor and hatred. And “everyone who hates his brother is a murderer” (1 John 3:15). If we begin to do this good deed of forgiveness (or any other good deed) and, seeing our weakness, we ask: “Lord, I see that I cannot, but I must do it according to Your commandment, help me!” – then the Lord gives His grace.

We, understanding the necessity of the work, begin to do it with our free will, realize our weakness (that we ourselves cannot do this), we humble ourselves, but continue to force ourselves, and ask for the help of the grace of the Holy Spirit. The Lord, seeing our voluntary undertaking, gives us grace, and it completes the work begun. Thus, the tree of a fertile garden is planted in us – we acquire the ability to forgive. And then we forgive with joy. And after this we will be able to pray for our enemies: “Do not make this a sin for them,” and thus another tree is planted in us with the help of our efforts and the help of the grace of the Holy Spirit.

Other properties are also cultivated: mercy, meekness, abstinence and others. After all, it is not God who needs all this (for us to have, for example, abstinence), but we need it ourselves. It is necessary that we acquire the following property: so that, seeing something tempting, we know how to abstain, knowing that it is sinful and not pleasing to God.

– But it’s one thing if I just think that “I probably can’t do this.” What if I feel like I can’t do something specific? Well, I just don’t have enough strength.

– Here we need to judge for what reason this happens: from bodily nature or from the devil’s temptation. And then decide. If this is indeed a physical illness, then you can give the body rest, since everything should be done with moderation. And if your conscience tells you that this is mental weakness, then you need to ask the Lord for help: “Lord, help me, strengthen my weak will to resist this temptation,” for example, laziness, carelessness, relaxation when getting up in the morning.

Such cases have happened to me too.

When I need to get up early, and I’m tired after traveling, I no longer rely on the alarm clock, but simply pray: “Lord, help me, Guardian Angel, wake me up at 5 o’clock – I need to get up. I know that I am tired, and I will sleep soundly.” The bell rang, and I thought: “Yes, yes, I have to get up,” and fell asleep again. But since I asked the Guardian Angel, suddenly a cramp in my leg begins (cramps in my toes). I’m looking for somewhere to apply pressure so that the cramp will go away. While I was pressing, I woke up. But I fall asleep again and need to get up. And the cramp begins again: I’ve already grabbed my calves! Oh!. I pressed and pressed, and she kept getting higher and higher. Well, that’s it. Then I grab the pin and start stabbing my leg. Then I think: “Glory to You, Lord, that even though the Guardian Angel raised me, a quitter, like this.”

Yes, I can’t, but I asked the Angel, and he raised me in this way. What if I hadn’t asked? I would sleep, hoping to myself that I would get up. And there were a lot of such cases. This is how our struggle with our passion begins.

– And if, for example, there are a lot of people in the church (sometimes with little church), who are constantly fussing, moving back and forth during the service, and this “crush” makes me angry – what should I do? How to cultivate a peaceful dispensation of the soul in this case? This “I can’t” seems somehow insurmountably difficult.

– You need to think: “What will happen to me if I go into eternity with this property? What then will happen to me if I now cannot tolerate my neighbors? Where will I end up? Where will they put me, in what prison will they lock me up, if I do not love those for whom Christ died – those whom He redeemed with His Honest Blood, whom He tolerates, but I do not tolerate?

– Doesn’t help.

– This means that we need to strengthen our prayer about this: “Lord, take me out of this petrified insensibility, my darkness, brother-hatred, impatience, etc., from my disastrous state!” But on the contrary, stand with these people and endure, forcing yourself to be in such a society. But at the same time cry out: “Lord, help me to love, help me forgive, help me have compassion for the weaknesses of my neighbors! If You tolerate my madness, then teach me to tolerate at least this small weakness of my neighbors!” And stand and cry out internally and endure.

And if you do this, well, at least for 2-3 weeks, then, I think, this “allergy” of yours will go away with God’s help.

But you just need to do this, relying not on yourself, but on God’s help. The Lord will help. Because it is said: “Ask, and it will be given to you” (Matthew 7:7). But what do we do as usual? We don’t ask, we rely on ourselves: “I can’t – I tried, but it doesn’t work! So, I need to run away from them – that’s all.” And thus we are left with our weakness, with our devilish property of brother-hatred. And everyone who hates his brother is a murderer. But every murderer does not have eternal life. This is how it ends.

God wants to give us more than we can accept

We need to understand a very simple thing: our life is given to us only to prepare ourselves for eternity. And if we don’t prepare ourselves here, we will cry there forever, blaming ourselves. We need to understand that God wants to give us more than we can accept. But He cannot give it to us because we are not able to use this gift for our own good, for salvation, for eternal joy and bliss. After all, parents do not give their child, say, a knife, an ax or a gun, because he will use them to harm himself and others. And after this child grows up, he is already entrusted with such objects, and he uses them for good (becoming a doctor, builder or military man).

And so, indeed, if a person does not prepare himself for eternity, does not acquire the properties of Christ, then he will not be able to accept the gift of grace there. You need to understand this, feel with your heart and soul that it is so simple and at the same time so scary: GOD WANTS TO GIVE US MORE THAN WE CAN ACCEPT. But we do not prepare ourselves for this, and therefore we cannot accept the gift of grace from God.

And the most common obstacle on this path is our tendency to self-exaltation and humiliation of others. Until we free ourselves from these passions, we will not be able to accept and preserve any gifts of grace. (That is why the Church, during Lent, teaches us to pray and ask: “Grant me, Lord, to see my sins and not condemn my brother!”).

While we still have time in earthly life, we must repent, be cleansed of all our sinful inclinations and acquire the properties of Christ, i.e. virtues. If we acquire such properties, then it will be good for us – we will become viable for future life in the Kingdom of Heaven.

This is obviously a serious matter. And, indeed, the Last Judgment will be terrible precisely because we will condemn ourselves. Having realized the entire actual reality of eternity, we will see what we have made an irreparable mistake. And then we will not be able to say: “Forgive me, Lord.” Because we will see how unfit we have become for the calling to which the Lord called us: we did not become sons of God, but through our passions we became like cattle, beasts and demons. And we will only have to cry forever and gnashing our teeth: “What a fool I was!.., how recklessly I lived my earthly life!.. And I didn’t bother to acquire at least a little of the properties of Christ.”

About the fear of God

– Can a person, when praying, experience fear of the greatness of God?

– If anyone has fear of the greatness of God, then this is the most necessary thing for a person. If anyone wants to acquire real living prayer in a short time, he must pray with such fear that “a chill will go down your spine,” i.e. to stand before God as before the Judge, whose verdict we are about to hear for all of endless eternity. (But sometimes there is a feeling of reverent fear – from the awareness of the greatness of God and one’s own insignificance).

If we act this way, we will quickly learn to pray. And if we stand just to subtract the quantity, or whoever reads the kathisma the fastest is the “best reader,” then – alas! Alas! – such a prayer is worthy of crying. For, according to the words of St. Simeon the New Theologian, “there is no greater sin than to pray without the fear of God, without attention and reverence” (Homily 9).

About spiritual age, attention, patience and courage

– Is prayer heard by God only the kind that comes from the heart? Is a prayer “formally” said completely useless?

– The fact is that the Lord knows who is saying this prayer. Prayer is accepted in accordance with the spiritual level at which a person is. If, let’s say, he’s a beginner and only went to church two or three times, he’ll barely even read the “Our Father,” and maybe even distort all the words written there. But, nevertheless, this prayer of his is accepted by God, because the person is just converted – he is a baby. After all, a baby cannot immediately learn to speak clearly – no one demands from him that he immediately pronounce all the words correctly, but they are happy that he said at least something. It’s the same in prayer. If, according to his spiritual level, a person is not capable of more, then his prayer is accepted as it is.

And if a person can already pray more or less purely, but does not pray, this is imputed to him as negligence (because he does not force himself to do something that he can bring to God according to his spiritual level, but does not bring).

However, there is no need to be embarrassed by your inability to pray. We go through the stages of learning (pure prayer) in the process of prayer itself.

Let’s say we started reading the rule. “Our Father” was read absentmindedly. Then we tuned in a little, “Have mercy on me. God” was read more carefully. And “It is Worthy to Eat” was read (or sung) with all zeal, with all the soul, knowing that these words praise the Mother of God, Who is our Mother, Intercessor and Mediator of all good things to us – both temporary and eternal. And if at least we read “It is worthy to eat” with diligence, it is already accepted as a prayer.

– And the rest? What was read absentmindedly?

– What we read somehow, with carelessness, alas, will not rise “high.” From prayer, only that which was “pure” is “accepted”: what the mind listened to and the heart sympathized with.

But all this, I repeat, depends on the spiritual level at which a person is.

– Once I asked my spiritual father: “If you notice that you read the prayer inattentively, should you re-read it?” He replied: “No. Just say: “Lord, I’m sorry – I was daydreaming.” Well, I somehow calmed down. And you say that if you read or listened inattentively, then it “doesn’t count.”

So what happens: I stood, for example, on the rule. It makes you sleepy – the fight against sleep begins. I woke up and went to the left with my thoughts. Returned. Then suddenly I remembered some old grievance. “Oh, you are. – it’s clearly an enemy thought!” – having discovered it, he drove it away, gathering his attention in half with grief. While the “competition” was going on, the rule ended. But almost all the time there was a struggle, and thoughts were scattered. And absent-minded prayer “doesn’t count.” It turns out that everything is in vain. So what now: it’s better not to follow the rule, because anyway “I didn’t pray”?

– The first thing you need to remember when reading and listening to these answers is that they are all given for the case when a person does not have a spiritual leader (and life goes on, and issues need to be resolved somehow). For the novice, everything is very simple: she presented everything in full to her spiritual father, and: “What do you bless me to do?” As he says, do so (of course, in the spirit of the Gospel commandments).

For those who, due to current life circumstances, have to engage in self-correction and self-education according to the patristic books16, God will help them to derive some benefit from what is written here, as a “help” to the active study of the writings of the Holy Fathers.

Now let’s consider the question posed: “So what now: is it better not to follow the rule?” How is it: not to follow the rule?.. “After all, I didn’t pray anyway…” You’re wrong to think so.

One military man (let’s call him N.), dressed in full dress uniform, went to the regiment for a festive formation. But unexpectedly on the street I came across a fight started by an old repeat offender. N. had to fight him. The case ended happily – the criminal was neutralized and closed. But. the uniform had lost its festive look. And N. was only ready for the festive formation towards the very end. At the beginning of the formation, the general expressed his indignation due to N.’s absence in the ranks. But, having learned what the matter was, he changed his anger to mercy, praised N. for his courageous fight against an experienced criminal and even promoted him in rank.

So we will not be discouraged and faint-hearted, daily entering into a fight with an experienced mental criminal, for the Lord loves courageous fighters.

Yes, absent-minded prayer on the rule “does not count” – let’s not be deceived. But the obedience to the monastic charter that you show by following the rule counts. What counts is the fight against drowsiness, which is brought on by the demon of despondency (and the fight against despondency brings the greatest crowns). The fight against “leftist” thoughts counts (and, in addition, the art of mental warfare is acquired, which is vital for us). The struggle against all the passions that the devil arouses in us during prayer counts. In particular, having conquered rancor within yourself and forgiven the offender, you yourself will be granted forgiveness from the Lord for your sins with which you offended God and your neighbors.

And so, forcing yourself to do all this, you “gained your attention with grief.” Having humbled yourself, seeing your weakness, but also forcing yourself to the good work of pure prayer, you stand before Him in reverence and fear, asking for His mercy – so that He will help you in this difficult struggle with yourself and Satan. Such needy women delight the Kingdom of Heaven (cf. Matt. 11:12).

And you think: if absent-minded prayer “does not count,” then maybe it’s not worth following the rule – it’s still in vain. As you can see, it was not in vain.

Some challenges for modern Christians

– What to do in situations where no intelligible arguments to “pray reverently and attentively” help? How to set yourself up?

For example. By the evening I was very tired: I had been doing obedience all day, and my dad also came. And it turned out that the break time from work, which I usually spend reading the cell rules, I spent on my dad. As a result, the entire rule was left for the evening.

I start reading prayers and I’m in such a mood – at least cry: I’m tired, I want to sleep. I understand that this is a sin (which I read almost with irritation), but I can’t do anything. It’s a sin to read like that and a sin to quit, but I can’t read “normally” in this situation. If I had been guilty of not reading it in time, it would have been easier for me. “It’s my own fault,” I tell myself in such cases, and I usually calm down, accepting such a “heavy” prayer as penance. And then I know that I simply couldn’t read it in time, because I couldn’t tell my dad: “Dad, I don’t have time!” That’s all. It turned out that no one was to blame: neither dad for coming, nor me for giving him time. Nobody. What should I do?

“Just as there is no smoke without fire, so there is no strong victory from the enemy without our cause.”

Didn’t you say something to dad? For example: “Dad, I’m praying for you so much!” In this case – after self-praise – nothing really helps until you humble yourself and repent.

So you need to think about the fact that “no one is to blame”: what does this mean? Interesting: I am guilty of a double sin and – “no one is to blame”! Eureka! Discovery in the asceticism of the 21st century!

About despondency

– For what reason does a person develop a spiritual coolness towards prayer, towards spiritual work – relaxation and indifference sets in, one does not want to do anything?

– As Saint Theophan the Recluse says, there are two types of cooling. Firstly, the cooling is educational. In this case, a person simply undergoes spiritual “training” through the stages of spiritual growth. The Lord gives such a person a lesson, provides a practical opportunity to demonstrate his free will in the performance of spiritual work, which he had previously learned theoretically by reading patristic books (that “love for Christ is tested by adversity”). In this case, the test is cooling.

And another kind of cooling is punitive. It is tolerated when a person, out of laziness and carelessness, does not put his theoretical knowledge about the path of salvation into practice, but continues to live “as he has to.”

Cooling down can also be punitive when a person judges someone or becomes arrogant about his actions. In this case, the grace of the Holy Spirit departs from the sinner to some extent and the person recognizes his weakness: what he really is. If he thought that he was good, that he was an ascetic, that he was a worker, that he was successful and had already risen high, then suddenly he sees that he is poor, and blind, and naked, and poor (cf. Rev. 3:17). And that he was overcome by coldness towards God, and laziness, and negligence towards spiritual works, like other people whom he condemned and over whom he exalted himself.

And, therefore, based on this concept (that there are two types of cooling), we must draw conclusions for ourselves. First, you need to pray: “Lord, why was this allowed to me? For some sin? Or so that I can show my zeal before You and show in practice how diligently I will demonstrate a lifestyle that pleases You, and not one that pleases my flesh, my pride and other passions?” And, based on this, force ourselves to work: fight our passions, repent of what we have sinned and, having humbled ourselves to the core and asking for help from God, still try, despite relaxation, to practice in those activities in which we should practice. Everyone has their own: some don’t want to engage in prayer, some don’t want to perform obedience, and still others don’t want to act according to the commandments (for example, they definitely want to take revenge on the offender) – everyone has their own characteristics.

–Despondency is the most common condition today, to varying degrees for everyone. To what extent is it related to spiritual cooling? What to do in this state?

– Indeed, despondency develops from cooling. First, a person loses spiritual zeal. And then, if he does not fight this cooling, does not repent, does not look for the reason, then he becomes despondent.

There are other reasons.

For example, if a person has not yet entered into an independent struggle with himself, with his passions, then, in this case, he does not yet have a spiritual way of thinking and looks at life “from a purely human perspective,” i.e. carnal eyes. He looks and doesn’t understand anything. And because of this he falls into despondency, relaxation, murmuring, not knowing what to do.

St. Mark the Ascetic says: “If you deviate from the spiritual way of thinking, you will feel suffering.”. This means that our mental suffering (including despondency) arises because we do not care about acquiring spiritual concepts – we do not look at the events of our lives spiritually.

Well, let’s say we were insulted. We immediately get offended and think: “Well, I respected him as decent, but look what he did!” But we don’t think spiritually that “God’s Providence has arranged it so that I need to endure something in this world, forgive someone something, so that my many sins will be forgiven me.” And this is just one example. Similarly, in many other cases you need to look for the spiritual meaning of what is happening – then the cooling loses its strength and despondency recedes. And if we live “as we have to,” “carelessly,” “just to while away the day until the evening,” then coldness and despondency begin to torment us. This is punitive despondency – you need to repent of it and correct yourself.

A spiritually more mature person can examine why this despondency befell him. And whoever does not yet have experience, just needs to understand and remember what the Holy Fathers said – the Lord gives the greatest crowns for the fight against despondency. Why? Yes, because a person in such a state shows his loyalty and devotion to Christ: he forces himself to do everything pleasing to God that he does not want to do in a relaxed state. And for this struggle, for the fact that a person forces himself, the Lord will grant him heavenly crowns, for it is said: “The needy women delight in the kingdom of heaven” (cf. Matt. 11:12).

– But this compulsion is suppressed by the thought that arises during despondency: “Everything you do is useless, everything is in vain.”

– This is the devil’s lie. What could be simpler than serving a glass of cold water to a thirsty person? But this is not in vain. For, as Christ told us in the Gospel, “whoever gives one of these little ones to drink only a cup of cold water in the name of a disciple, truly I tell you, will not lose his reward” (Matthew 10:42). And because we do not heed the words of the Gospel, the devil so easily deceives us with his false thoughts.

…I had such a case. We once met with a monastery confessor. They sat down in the shadow of a grape arch and began to talk. Suddenly I notice that two or three meters from us, near the wall, there is a liter jar of water, and a lizard has fallen into it. He floats, flounders, wants to get out, but cannot. The confessor began a serious conversation, and I listened to him and looked at this lizard. I think: “Should I continue listening to him or should I go release the lizard? No, it’s a pity. Poor thing, how long has she been floundering there? I jump up and, without saying anything, run to the jar. Of course, I should have apologized. The confessor looked so surprised: “What is it that happened to him that he jumps up and runs somewhere?” I take a can, pour water on the lawn, the lizard jumps out, and – jump! – ran.

I look at the reaction of this hieromonk. What he thought, of course, I don’t know. But I see that I need to explain myself at least now.

I come up and say: “You know, I looked at this lizard and remembered myself. I’m actually the same. As you have noticed: when a beetle gets into a glass jar and sits there quietly, you think: “Ah!.. He’s probably already dead.” And you leave him unnoticed. And when this beetle still flounders, you think: “Poor thing, how long has he been floundering there! We need to get him out of there, he won’t get out of this glass jar on his own.” You take him out, set him free, and he runs. So, I think, I am before God: if I sit and do nothing in my negligence, then I am just like this dead beetle. And if I do at least something, then the Lord, in His mercy – not because of my deeds, but in His mercy, because I am still floundering – will take pity on me too. After all, if I feel sorry for a beetle or a lizard, then I think the Lord will also take pity on me and take me out of the “ditch of passions and the mud of the mire” (Ps. 39:3).”

When I said so, the confessor agreed, and our conversation continued as before.

We need to remember that the Lord saves us. It is not we ourselves who cultivate our salvation, but the Lord, in His mercy towards us, removes us from every passion – including from the spirit of despondency (if we, for our part, show active resistance to sin).

In fact, what happens in our lives is what we see in nature: sometimes a sunny day, sometimes a dark night. On a sunny day, grace shines upon us, the soul rejoices, plays, rejoices, everything seems cheerful, joyful, and everyone around is like Angels. And at other times darkness and gloom cover the soul. The person doesn’t want to look at anyone, doesn’t want to see anyone, doesn’t want to talk to anyone. Just put your head under the pillow and – “don’t touch me.” This is a night in spiritual life. And the harder we fight it, the faster we are freed by the Lord from this darkness.

No one escapes such, even short-term, darkening; every Holy Father had such trials. Because, as St. Isaac the Syrian says, “he who walks without change is on the path of the wolf,” i.e. he fell into the trap. If his spiritual state does not change, is stable all the time, without change, therefore, he is not on the path of salvation, but on the path of error.

And therefore we must remember the words of the Apostle Paul that “all things work together for good to those who love God” (Rom. 8:28). Even in the most difficult moments, the Lord does not turn away from us, as it seems to us. At this time, our loyalty and devotion to Him is tested. At such moments, the Lord looks at us most carefully – looks at how faithful we are to Him, how much we surrender our desires to His will, trying to do what He pleases, and resist sin and everything that He does not like.

Sometimes I had to talk with modern young people and at the same time hear their complaints about their state of mind: such burden, such despondency, such dissatisfaction with life attacks that “there’s even a noose around your neck.” They are perplexed: why does this happen, and what needs to be done to get rid of such a painful feeling? Well, I said what I could. But I felt that I was not able to answer this more fully because I did not have such experience.

And then one day the following happened. I once came back from a trip very tired and exhausted almost to the limit. I rested in the evening. I rested in the morning. I dozed off while praying and was overcome by a burden. Went back to bed. In general, I slept a lot – I slept to my heart’s content. And so, when I woke up for the last time and stood up, I felt a state of mind that I had never experienced before. It’s hard to put into words. Life seemed like some kind of gloomy, difficult, uninteresting, aimless, stupid toy. I felt like (in the words of the Venerable Elder Silouan) “an animal in a human body.”

And then I immediately “understood everything.” I understood what happens when we satisfy our passions. After we have satisfied and enjoyed them, these passions become our tormentors: they find darkness, despondency, relaxation, burden on us – to the point that “life is not worth living.”

It was not in vain that the Apostle Paul said: “Let everyone strive, let everyone else abstain” (1 Cor. 9:25). And the Monk Nile the Myrrh-Streaming says: “Keep yourself from everything that you like.” This means that we, Christians, must abstain from everything that is not a necessity for our life, but only seduces our feelings (eat better, stay longer in bed, etc.).

Of course, it is useless to say this to purely worldly people – they will not accept it anyway. But those who lead a serious, attentive lifestyle can take note that you cannot satisfy your whims, i.e. passionate desires.

We need to understand that the more we strive to receive all kinds of pleasures, the more unhappy we become in real life – not so much from external circumstances, but from this selfish, voluptuous attitude.

And if we struggle at least a little with our passions, life can be interesting and meaningful for us. And although we may not receive that grace-filled consolation that the Holy Fathers received before, we still feel a keen interest in life. As one mother, Schema-nun Ilaria, once said: “What an interesting spiritual life!” She repeated this many times because she felt that spiritual life was indeed interesting.

And now we have to meet with purely secular people, and even with monastics, for whom life is becoming uninteresting, gloomy and gray. And this is precisely because we satisfy our passions, i.e. we do what we want. And therefore we become “children of wrath”17 while still here on earth. And this gives us a reminder, a presentiment, a foretaste of what awaits us there – in eternity.

– You gave an example about how you got enough sleep. Not clear. Now, if a person satisfies a “real” passion – for example, got drunk on vodka – this is understandable: further punishment will follow. Passion really torments such a person – it “tears” him apart, he finds no place for himself, his head hurts, he wants another drink. But what if the body has a natural need for rest – do you just want to get enough sleep? It’s not clear what sedition is in this?

– Yes, sleep is a natural need. But how did the Holy Fathers determine the natural need for sleep? When a person lies down, falls asleep and sleeps as long as he needs. If he wakes up, it means that the body has already cheered up and needs to get up. After all, there were no alarm clocks before. We slept like this: lay down, fell asleep. If you wake up, that means you need to get up. The man satisfied his natural need for sleep.

But if he lies down, sleeps as much as he needs, wakes up, turns over to the other side: “Well, at least it’s time to get up – oh well, I’ll sleep a little more.” Turned around a little more, turned around a little more. And I don’t want to sleep anymore, but he keeps saying, “I’ll lie down a little longer, I’ll think about what I dreamed about yesterday, what I dreamed about today,” – he just wants to soak up in bed. And this is already the satisfaction of passion (the so-called kindness). And for the fact that we pampered ourselves and enjoyed ourselves, we will receive retribution in the future – this passion-sweetness will turn into a tormentor for us and will torment us.

This is the difference between a natural need and satisfying your passion.

– But how to properly deal with sleep discipline? Previously, people were healthy: they fell asleep in the evening and woke up in the morning. And now almost all people are sick. They will wake up twenty times a night and turn over from side to side. There is no sleep, because of this there is a failure of the regime. How to judge here? He fell asleep, woke up half an hour later – it’s clear that this was not his norm of sleep… half an hour.

– I’m not talking about sick people, I’m talking about healthy people.

– But now there are practically no healthy people!..

– If a person seriously identifies himself as sick, then he will seek healing: both spiritual and physical18

Well, let’s say, if a person does not fall asleep, and if he does not take, for example, Elenium or something similar, he can simply eat a spoonful of honey. If he eats a spoonful of honey, then after half an hour he naturally falls asleep. And if he follows this, he will sleep more deeply.

-Nothing like that! Even five spoons don’t help me. And I know people for whom even pills sometimes don’t help. And despite all this, such people are considered healthy, because others are even worse. Now life dictates to people completely different norms than before.

“The fact of the matter is that the spirit of resistance makes the soul anxious, restless and drives away healthy sleep. One spoon helps, not five.

As for treatment with tablets and other chemicals, you need to keep in mind that many of the medications may indeed not produce the expected therapeutic effect, or even be harmful (just as many dyes and preservatives are harmful). Therefore, it is better not to get carried away with “chemistry” unnecessarily.

And there is no need to refer to the vicissitudes of modern life. They cannot dictate to us their own, “other” standards of life, for the standards of life are embedded in human nature by the Creator. And the world, lying in evil, can only offer us its own (tempting for human passions) distortions of life. But it’s not without reason that they say that “only dead fish swim with the flow” – while living ones resist and swim against the current. Moreover, a believer may not conform to this age.

But if it really is a disease, then it does not fit the rule. The disease needs to be treated and some appropriate measures must be taken.

And if a person simply sleeps during the day because he is “depressed,” and then goes to bed in the evening, then it is clear that he can no longer sleep. Bad thoughts enter your head, then you have nightmares. And all because of what? Because, at the suggestion of the demon, he pleased himself, the desires of his flesh. And then these satisfied passions begin to torment both soul and body. Therefore, it is necessary for a person to figure it out on his own or reason with a more spiritual person and eliminate all the reasons that lead him to such a state.

I remember one monk from the Pochaev Lavra, Father Afanasy, whom we discussed above, told us. One day he was attacked by real insomnia. He works all day in obedience, seems to be tired, but goes to bed, takes a nap for about fifteen minutes and wakes up: sleep has passed, he can no longer sleep.

“I,” he says, “lie and lie.” Various thoughts creep into my head, memories, murmurs. This happened once, twice, three times. What is this?! I began to pray: “Lord, I’m sinning, help me!” And the thought came: “Wake up when you’re not sleeping.” The first time it was difficult to get up: half an hour after lying down and suddenly getting up. The first time I forcibly lifted myself up. The second time is a little easier. And if I don’t sleep, then I say to myself: “If you’re not sleeping, get up!” I get up and start praying. Here the enemy, of course: “What are you talking about?!” Have pity on yourself! How will you be at obedience tomorrow?..” – and so on.

But I started to pray. In order not to disturb me in my cell, I go out into the corridor and walk quietly along the corridor, reading a prayer (it happened that I could not sleep for two or three hours). And this went on for about a month. I even liked it: such a good prayer, because sleep does not overcome me. After all, usually when you pray, especially in the evening, you struggle with both sleep and thoughts. It’s like double abuse. The enemy will catch it either in one way or in the other.

And so there is no sleep, and you just fight with thoughts: you tune in to drive away thoughts, and that’s it – pure, sweet, pleasant prayer. You even already feel that you are beginning to fall into a natural sleep, but the prayer is so sweet that you don’t even want to go to bed.”

So oh. Afanasy labored for a long time. Then I went somewhere, reset my routine and started sleeping again as usual. Then he already regretted that natural sleep had returned to him.

So, as we see, from each situation, from each circumstance, you can draw a spiritually useful conclusion for yourself. You can also benefit from despondency and insomnia if you force yourself to work for God.

– There is a proverb: “Choose the lesser of two evils.” And the Holy Fathers also have this advice: if the spirit of despondency comes over you, then, as a last resort, wrap your head in a robe and sleep. How do you say: if despondency sets in during the day and you get enough sleep, this will lead to disastrous consequences?

– I listen and am simply amazed: how much the passion for self-justification is growing and improving now. “Wrap your head in your robe” is a phrase I’ve been hearing a lot lately. They remember her and cite her as an excuse for their laziness and negligence. But this is a seduction, because the Monk Isaac the Syrian does not speak of simple despondency, when he is tormented by a “bad mood” due to the fact that he does not want to force himself to fight passions. This speaks of a state when a person actually experiences the strongest demonic obsession – basically, the most severe mental warfare, and one that the monk did not even write about. This is when a person is still standing, but under his feet there is already a hellish abyss. And this demonic warfare can be so severe that a person cannot mentally resist it. And then, in order not to continue to stand on the brink of death, it is better for him to go to bed and sleep. This is what the above words of the Holy Father refer to. But this is a very rare temptation nowadays.

In addition, it should be noted that the monk emphasizes: do not just put your head on the pillow and sleep, but “wrap your head in the robe,” for the monastic mantle signifies the grace that covers the monk. That is, surrender yourself to the will of God, without delving into the mental demonic obsession that covers you, but rather lie down and sleep. Here, indeed, it is better to choose the lesser of two evils, because these are extreme conditions of spiritual warfare. In these cases it is better to sleep. But this does not apply to those cases when we are overcome by the passions of laziness, negligence, pride, self-indulgence, voluptuousness and others. (He did something and immediately: “Oh, I did so much today, I need to go to bed to rest.” Not because he feels a natural need for this, but “just like that.” Or, for example, one of the elders made a reprimand or reprimand to him – and he expected praise and gratitude. Then he betrays his soul into the darkness of despondency: he gave up on everything and went to bed with thoughts of murmur.)

– But we were talking about despondency, and not about other passions.

– And after the satisfaction of pride, self-indulgence and voluptuousness, despondency will follow. It is precisely because some other passion has been satisfied that the passion of despondency comes. And if we nevertheless enter into the fight against despondency, it means that it will be good for us – we are not yet completely defeated by passions. And if we don’t fight, we will fall into even greater darkness. And then the “snowball” will roll. The enemy will lead to more and more sin – until a person comes to his senses and turns to repentance – from the abyss of destruction he takes the path of self-correction.

This is how it happens. And it all starts with plausible excuses of self-pity and self-indulgence. Having satisfied his passion (conscious or unconscious), a person then begins to suffer from it. Therefore, if we suffer, therefore, we must look for the reason: what passion did we first satisfy and in what way? And, having found it, repent. In this way, we will get rid of many of the devil’s snares, including despondency. And life will be interesting for us, and not a burden.

About prayer for peace

– Is it possible for us, simple sinful people who do not have any special spiritual gifts, to pray for the whole world?

– All of us Christians are present in church during divine services. And there a daily prayer is performed “for the peace of the whole world.” And no matter what we are: cursed, lepers, ugly (in the Spiritual sense), but we, if we are present in the temple, must actively participate in this prayer. And this is already our praise for the whole world, because we attach our souls to the words of the prayer: “Lord, have mercy!”

– Well, it’s in the temple. And privately?

– Privately – everyone must act according to the demands of their conscience and in consultation with their confessor. If conscience compels: “Why are you praying only for your loved ones? The Lord provides for the whole world,” you can pray. But, of course, humbly, recognizing your insignificance and unworthiness.

And if, say, a person is trying to strive, and he has already developed some feelings (crying about his sins, more attentive prayer), but at the same time he has not been able to remain in humility and self-condemnation, and has imperceptibly deviated into conceit and self-worth, then the enemy will certainly catch him with proud thoughts about himself. Then the thoughts may well come: “Oh, I already need to pray for the whole world!”

This suggestion must be carefully examined, because the motivating reason is very important – the first thought when it was sown. If this impulse came with even the slightest vanity or spirit of exaltation, that “I have already achieved something, therefore I can now pray for the whole world,” you need to know: the devil will hesitate on this, will beat you, will “muddy you,” and, in the end, will push you into some kind of pit. Such a person will lose prayer, and tears, and everything else. Therefore, for a special cell prayer for peace, it is necessary to ask for the blessing of your confessor, because There have been cases when we set out to pray for peace and then fell.

I remember about 25 years ago such an incident occurred among our brotherhood. It was the feast of the Dormition of the Mother of God (on holidays we usually gathered for joint prayer in a small chapel). And suddenly, after the service, one brother began to pray directly out loud, strongly, with inspiration, for the whole world: “Lord, have mercy on the world! Lord have mercy on the world! The world is in such a state! Have mercy on the world!

I listened to him, and something alarmed me. Such a prayer – it seemed strange to me: as if it were inspired by the passion of peace. Then this brother spoke out in a similar spirit two or three more times, revealing his “prayer for peace.” She alarmed me even more. And after a while he abandoned everything and went into the world (though he was not a monk – only a novice). Soon he married once, then a second, then a third.

These were the cases. Therefore, the motives for praying for peace must be carefully examined.

Speaking on this topic, you can also notice the following. It is observed that if someone undertakes to pray for the world (or do any “global” things) spontaneously, then falls usually follow. Because when a person begins to act as the “savior of the universe” – the “savior of humanity”, the “benefactor” for all humanity – this shows the greatest pride. As they told about one famous woman. She acted as the “chosen one of God” – she considered herself the “savior of the world.” But in fact, this opinion of her about herself developed into the greatest charm and the greatest destructive state.

So we need to be extremely attentive and not for a moment forget that our enemy the devil “prowls around like a roaring lion, looking for someone to devour” (1 Peter 5:8).

– How can you pray for all people, so that it is a short but effective prayer?

– If anyone wants to offer a prayer for everyone who needs it, then in this regard I can give one instructive example from the life of my spiritual brother D.

D. said that when he was still in the world and was just beginning to pray to the Lord, he thought: how can you pray for your neighbors? For your loved ones – this is understandable. How can you pray for the whole world? In what form? How does this please God? “I,” he says, “began to ask the Lord: “Lord, give me understanding, help me.” And then one day I came to the temple, I stood, praying. The service has not yet started. At this time, an old woman comes in – so reverent – and kisses the icons. He bows to the icon and says: “Remember, Lord, all those who look forward to Your mercy and call upon You!” I listened and listened and thought: what profound words!”

And indeed, how wise and all-encompassing is this small petition: “Remember, O Lord, all who seek Thy mercy and call upon Thee!” After all, everyone expects mercy from the Lord – well, maybe, except for those who already have resistance to God and are Moonies by upbringing, and other lost souls – they still inside themselves expect some kind of mercy from God and at times hesitate at the thought: “If God still exists, then how would He have mercy on me too – both here and in eternity, if it does exist.” And it is precisely this petition – “remember, Lord, all those who are in error, but still inside, in their souls, longing for some kind of mercy from You” – that reaches millions and even billions of people. And, receiving God’s mercy, they already begin to draw closer to God.

The second phrase – “and those who call upon You” – covers people who have already learned that God exists, and they call upon Him in some way: to a greater or lesser extent, more often or less often, in the Church or even outside the Church.

– How is it “outside the Church”?

– Although such people have not yet joined the church, they are still turning to God. And therefore there is hope that if they sincerely strive for Him, then the Lord will not leave them to walk in the darkness of ignorance, outside the saving fence of the Church, but sooner or later He will enlighten them and lead them to the path of salvation19

Thus, almost the entire world is covered by this short prayer request.

Is it possible (and how) to pray for everyone who is asked for?

– There are big disagreements about: to pray or not to pray for people who ask for prayer help for themselves and for their loved ones? Some dissuade each other from such prayer on the grounds that supposedly “we are too weak, “the attacks are too strong,” and they tell what temptations they had after that. After all, who are they usually asked to pray for? One has left the Church, another is a drug addict, the third is an alcoholic, everyone has such sorrow. People talk, and you grieve with them, but you can pray. Sometimes you start, but you are afraid, because you have your own passions, your own weaknesses, your own imperfections. And you don’t know what to do right…

– The whole trouble is that we have forgotten that in all cases of life we ​​must be guided by Christ’s commandments, we must become like Christ. That’s why we have such perplexities, embarrassments, and hesitations.

The Lord said: “Give to anyone who asks you” (Matthew 5:42). Therefore, even if we recognize ourselves as extremely insignificant, extremely fallen, extremely weak, but if, indeed, someone asks us: “Pray for me!” – you need to say: “May the Lord God have mercy on both of us.” This means that we do not put ourselves above him (that we seem to be better than him). And “remember, Lord…” you can say either out loud or silently (to yourself). You can pray like this: “Lord, help Thy servant… (or Thy servant…) and with his holy prayers have mercy on me, the accursed one!” That’s all – there’s nothing out of the ordinary about this. Even if we say so, either mentally or out loud, we cannot completely reject this request, because we do not know the grief and faith of the one asking.

In this case, we must act according to the commandment: “Give to anyone who asks you” (Matthew 5:42). After all, according to the word of the Holy Scripture, with the same measure we use ourselves, the same will be measured to us.

So this needs to be remembered once and for all. But to begin to “pull” someone, to beg for them, is a completely different matter. To begin to beg for a specific person with a specific passion (for example, with the passion of unbelief or drunkenness), for this you need to take a blessing from a confessor who knows us and can give advice on what we should do in this case and how we should pray. Then the grace of blessing will cover this matter.

It must also be said that a big problem in this regard arises from our wrong way of thinking. Usually we think that we are begging someone. But we are not begging for this person, but the Lord is saving him, just like us. Having been crucified for everyone, the Lord took upon Himself the sins of the whole world – starting from Adam and ending with the last man who will live on earth. The sins of the whole world have already been atoned for by the Blood of Christ. And therefore we are not begging, we are not pulling out, we are not helping this person, but Christ helps, pulls him out of the ditch of passions and saves him. We are only like Christ’s accomplices in the work of extracting this soul. And if we experience some kind of demonic obsession, it is because the Lord gives us a little sense of this complicity. And this is a manifestation of our love for Christ and for man.

We don’t understand this and don’t want to bear anything like that, and therefore we seem to be separated from the Body of Christ (for the Church is the mystical Body of Christ: Christ is the head, and we are all members). Christ, for the sake of love for the human race, took upon Himself the sins of the whole world, bore all their burden, but we do not want to bear even a small one. Although this is only an insignificant designation of that heaviness… Very rarely the Lord allows us to do this. And if he allows it a little, it is so that we understand that we too must take part in Christ’s labors to deliver this soul from the hell of the underworld. “Greater love has no one than this, that a man lay down his life for his friends,” said the Lord (John 15:13). Therefore, we should not be horrified by temptations from demons or people – but humble ourselves, endure and pray, for it is in such prayer that love for God and for our neighbors is manifested.

However, speaking about this, it should be noted that often such temptations are not at all associated with prayer for someone. Often we tempt ourselves: we ourselves fall into some passions, but we think that this happened because we prayed for someone – that’s the point. And this may be 95% of all such cases.

But sometimes this really happens. Especially when monotonous life goes on as usual, and suddenly you see and feel that some kind of special kind of abuse has appeared. Then you go, confess and ask: “What should I do? Should I continue to pray for this person or should I leave it for a while?” But this does not mean that you should leave it completely. The Lord simply shows in this case: due to your weakness, for your humility, you need to know that you yourself are still servile to this person. Although you pray for him to deliver him from some passion, nevertheless, you yourself are weak and must understand that both him and you are saved and carried on His shoulders by only Christ. And not that “I myself stand firm, so I can pull out someone else.” No, none of us will stand if the grace of the Holy Spirit is not with us, if the hero of the hero Christ, who defeated the devil and all his wiles, does not help us.

It is with these feelings – humility, love and compassion – that we must treat our neighbors.

Out of compassion, we must pray for people even when no one asks us to do so. Let’s say we saw in a church (in a monastery, on the street): someone said or did something bad, inappropriate – we must pray to Christ for this person. I’m not saying that you need to immediately start reading the Psalter for him. But say at least one phrase, at least one heartfelt sigh: “Lord, help him! Deliver him from the snares of the enemy, arrange his salvation through fate, and with his holy prayers have mercy on me, the accursed!” And this will already be a prayer.

After all, we must understand that we are fellow bodies of Christ: just as the Apostle says that we are all the body of Christ (cf. Rom. 12:5). Therefore, we cannot remain indifferent to the suffering of our neighbors, but we need to help them somehow – at least through prayer (if we cannot help with anything else). This is our Christian duty.

But only so that there is no arrogance – the feeling that “I am better than others: I have already achieved something, but this has completely gone away.” – Because this is precisely why we most often suffer (the Lord allows us to realize that we are no better than others). Only we don’t realize this, but think that the temptation came for compassionate prayer for our neighbor. But if we are prudent, then even in the event of some temptation, we will simply humble ourselves, ask the Lord for help and deliverance – and that’s all. Let’s endure this, show love to our neighbors, pray for them and acquire humility ourselves. And if it happens that we ourselves someday fall into some kind of pit, then someone will pray for us.

And if we acquire another property – we learn to not have compassion for our neighbors, then what may happen to us is as was shown in one vision.

An angel pulled one such proud soul out of hell, because there were strong intercessors and prayers for her. And when he lifted her, other souls began to grab onto her. Seeing such a thing, the proud soul became indignant, began to scream and shake off those who tried to grab onto it: “Come on, let go! It’s me that’s being pulled out, not you!” And when she shook off others like that, she herself broke off and flew back into the hellish abyss.

This example clearly shows us that if we do not acquire compassion, then we simply will not be able to go to heaven. “With the measure you use, it will be measured to you” (Matthew 7:2). If we do not have compassion for our neighbors, then, consequently, we ourselves will lose compassion – both from people and from God.

This is such an essential moment in the matter of our salvation. Therefore, during his earthly life, every person must necessarily learn to have compassion for people subservient to him. To sympathize with heartache, without humiliation, without condemnation, namely with that thought, with that inner mood of your soul that “Christ came to earth to save sinners FROM THEM, THE FIRST IS A3”.

Where does living prayer begin?

– Where does living prayer begin?

– Pray from the heart, i.e. Sincerely and carefully, we begin when we are in cramped circumstances and our natural strength is not enough to get out of them. It is then that we “humble ourselves to the core” and begin to cry out to God. This is where our living prayer begins.

In difficult circumstances we ask, almost even “demand”: “Lord, help! You see what a plight I’m in!” And then the Lord is already, as it were, “forced” to come to our aid and pull us out of this hole – not because of our dignity and spiritual level, but because He is a Lover of Mankind.

Figuratively speaking, when parents buy a new thing for a child, he runs around in it, clean, neat, with the feeling: “This is what I am!” And after he suddenly plops down in the mud and gets dirty in it, his state of health is completely different: he screams, cries, runs to his mother. The mother, of course, begins to wash him, change his clothes, and only then pats him on the head and consoles him.

This is how it turns out for us: until we realize our stench, our lewdness before God, until then we cannot cleanse ourselves of self-satisfaction and exaltation. And when we realize, then we begin to cry and humble ourselves. And the Lord gives us His mercy – tearful repentant crying, cleansing and correction.

Thus, we are already worthy (if we act prudently) of some kind of consolation. Not because we have done something worthy of consolation, but because we, having found ourselves in trouble, grieve over our disastrous state, grieve over the fact that we are so bad. And this is true. As the Hieromartyr Peter of Damascus said: “What is man? Man is nothing more than a small, quickly disappearing stench.” (And another says that “a person sounds proud”21 – that’s how different people’s “feelings of self” are). Or as Pimen the Great said: “I am like a man who is mired in a swamp with a stone around his neck, and cries out: “Have mercy on me!””

It is from THIS state that we must pray

We do not see our sins, we do not feel their severity only because we are insensitive. Just as a person who is unconscious does not feel what position he is in, so we, being in a petrified heartfelt insensibility, do not see or feel our disastrous mental state. And when we see, then we begin to pray, cry and truly humble ourselves. Because only blindness keeps us in this state.

And so that the eyes of our hearts can be opened, the Holy Church teaches us to pray in the words of St. Ephraim the Syrian: “Lord, let me see my sins and not condemn my brother!”

What is repentance?

What to do if prayers of repentance do not give rise to repentance?

What is “dry prayer” and how to get rid of insensitivity in the heart?

– What is repentance?

– St. John Climacus defines repentance as follows:

“Repentance is the renewal of baptism.

Repentance is a covenant [i.e. agreement] with God for the correction of life.

Repentance is the purchase of humility.

Repentance is the constant rejection of bodily consolation.

Repentance is the thought of self-condemnation and self-care, free from external concerns.

Repentance is the daughter of hope and the rejection of despair.

A repentant person is an unashamed condemned person.

Repentance is reconciliation with the Lord through doing good deeds that are contrary to previous sins.

Repentance is the cleansing of conscience.

Repentance is voluntary patience of all sorrowful things.

The penitent is the inventor of punishments for himself.

Repentance is a strong oppression of the belly, a wounding of the soul in deep feeling.”

(“Ladder”, Word 5, 1).

– Well, what should we do if we have neither repentance nor the right (i.e. spiritual) way of thinking?

“Then you need to pray about it: “Teach me, Lord, to repent!” Teach to correct yourself! Teach me to do Your holy will, not mine!”

However, the first thing we will encounter with this course of action is that our prayer is worthless: absent-minded, insensitive. We read, for example, the 50th Psalm, but it turns out that only its name is “repentant”, but there is no repentance in the soul. The prayer given to us by our Lord Jesus Christ Himself – “Our Father” – is also read “somehow”, without full awareness. Also “Rejoice, Mother of God, Virgin” and other most important prayers, not to mention everything else. What to do then?

As the Monk Isaac the Syrian says: “If you want to enjoy psalmody, then completely put aside the quantity, and speak the words of the psalms as if from yourself. Pray from the state you are in at the moment.” “Lay your dead man before you and cry out to the Lord, mourning him,” said one of the Fathers.

Of course, the question immediately arises: how to do this if there is no skill to do so?

Here’s what we can say. In order for our prayer to be pleasing to the Lord and saving us, before prayer we must prepare for prayer. Everyone does it in their own way.

– Why?

– Because each person has his own characteristics. One, for example, soon becomes emotional, while another requires a lot of effort to bring himself into the appropriate state. As a certain person once said: “As soon as I enter my cell and stand in front of the holy corner, tears immediately flow from me, and I thank the Lord that I now have the opportunity to renounce vanity.” Another, on the contrary, says: “I get up for prayer and just can’t get my act together: mental images – what I saw, what I heard during the day – overwhelm me, and I just can’t read my rule more or less carefully.” The third may have some other features. That’s why I say that everyone prepares for prayer in their own way.

And for a person who has not yet learned this, it will be useful to imagine that he is in dangerous life circumstances (for example, he now faces a dangerous flight from an airfield in a military area or in raging bad weather). And now he enters a telephone booth for, perhaps, the last conversation with his dearest person, and wants to ask him for something – about the most important thing for himself.

With such an attitude, for a moment throwing away and forgetting everything vain, he says into the ears of God:

Our Father – implying that the Lord, as the most loving Father, cares and provides for all of us.

Who art thou in heaven – understanding His supermundaneity, that He is Omnipresent and Omnipotent, All-Wise and All-Good. And if we have such a Father, then we have nothing to fear or be embarrassed, but we only need to call on Him more diligently for help.

Hallowed be your name – mentally supplementing this saying with the words “… in my heart, so that I pronounce it with faith, fear and love,” – with the realization that if God is in us, then whom shall we fear?

Thy Kingdom come – mentally adding “…into my soul,” – with the realization that we need this in order to be transformed into a new creation (i.e., God’s creation), to be renewed by the Holy Spirit and to learn to live purely and pleasing to God.

Thy will be done, as it is in heaven and on earth – mentally supplementing “…in my whole being (so that I resist my passions and fulfill Your commandments), as well as in all my external circumstances,” – with the awareness of my complete devotion to the good will of God, as we hear in the church at the litanies: “… ourselves and each other and our whole belly [temporal and eternal life] Let us surrender to Christ God.” That is, we surrender our entire life, with all its circumstances, with all its joys and sorrows, to the holy will of God. May everything be as He wants.

Give us this day our daily bread – adding mentally “…and quicken my soul, for only by the Holy Spirit is every soul alive,” – with the awareness that if, according to the commandment, we first of all seek the Kingdom of Heaven within us, then everything else that we need for the body will be added by the Providence of God.

And forgive us our debts – mentally adding “…all known and unknown” – with the awareness that we ask to forgive us all our sins from early childhood to the present hour. And not only sins, but also debts, i.e. loss of various gifts of God (physical and spiritual).

Just like we leave our debtors – mentally adding “…to everyone, without exception,” – with the awareness that we forgive all our offenders for everything that is most offensive, so that God will forgive us the most inconvenient sins. We also rejoice in the fact that we have occasions to forgive someone for something and in this, the easiest way, receive (seek for ourselves) forgiveness of our own sins.

And do not lead us into temptation – mentally adding “… from the demons and passions that fight us,” – with the awareness that our whole life is a continuous chain of temptations (i.e. tests) and struggles, for we constantly face a choice between good and evil; between what pleases God and what pleases the demons and our passions.

But deliver us from the evil one – mentally adding “…and all the known and unknown deceptions and entrapments of him” – with the awareness that we are constantly seduced by the crafty tricks of demons, falling into various sins.

For Thine is the kingdom, and the power, and the glory forever. Amen. – Some confessors bless ending the prayer “Our Father” this way. This ending does not equate to a priestly exclamation (and therefore does not admire priestly dignity). However, due to the fact that it carries an important spiritual meaning, those who wish can read it.

This is the glorification of the supra-mundane Kingdom of God, which, despite its supra-mundaneity, we establish and glorify today, now, on this Earth in our souls.

When reading a prayer in this way, you need to try to penetrate as deeply as possible into the meaning and significance of each spoken petition.

In a short version, the “expanded perception” of the words of the Lord’s Prayer looks like this22

“OUR FATHER…”

OUR FATHER, who art in heaven!

Hallowed be Thy name (in my heart),

thy kingdom come (to my soul),

Thy will be done as it is in heaven and on earth (in all my being and in all my external circumstances).

Give us this day our daily bread (and quicken my soul, for only by the Holy Spirit is every soul alive);

and forgive us our debts (all known and unknown),

just as we leave our debtors (to everyone without exception);

and do not lead us into temptation (from the demons and passions that fight us), but deliver us from the evil one (and all known and unknown deceptions and entrapments of him).

For Thine is the kingdom, and the power, and the glory forever. Amen

You can read other prayers in the same way, for example, “Rejoice to the Mother of God, Virgin.”

“Mother of God, VIRGIN, REJOICE…”

O Mother of God, Virgin, rejoice (with the most perfect joy),

Gracious Mary, (for) The Lord is with Thee (grant me weeping for my sins, for I have departed from Christ);

Blessed are You among women (from all generations of the earth),

and Blessed is the Fruit of Thy womb (forever),

as You gave birth to the Savior of our souls (By the same [i.e., Your Son and our Savior] save our souls).

And here is one of the examples of a repentant sinner’s expanded perception of the words of the repentant 50th Psalm.

The 50th Psalm was written by the king and prophet David after he committed two mortal sins (fornication and murder), but then realized them and began to repent of them (See 2 Samuel, chapters 11–12).

Holy Righteous John of Kronstadt advises reading the 50th Psalm with attention more often, as a prayer of repentance. And in order for this psalm to truly be such (i.e., repentant), the prayer needs to comprehend each of its phrases.

PSALM 50

Have mercy on me, O God, according to Your great mercy (and not according to my works),

and according to the multitude of Your compassions, cleanse my Iniquity (….23).

Wash me most from my Iniquity (….24)

and from my sin (secret and mental) cleanse me:

for I know my Iniquity (and that only in part), and I bear my sin before me (constantly adding sin to sin).

I have sinned against You alone (….25, with the most worthless prayer I have insulted Your greatness),

I have created evil before You (and have tempted all my neighbors):

so that you may be justified in all of Your words, and command that You will always judge.

Behold, I was conceived in iniquity, and my mother gave birth to me in sins; (I am insanely arrogant with self-satisfaction and humiliate my neighbors).

For Thou hast loved the truth (and there are seven lies before Thee),

You have revealed Your unknown and secret wisdom to me (but I have not fulfilled Your commandments in my life).

Sprinkle me with hyssop (my tears), and I will wake up (from love of sin).

wash me (with the Blood of the Lamb26), and I will be whiter than snow.

Give joy and gladness to my hearing, humble bones will rejoice (when you cleanse me from my sins).

Turn Your face away from my sins (at Your Judgment),

and cleanse all my iniquities (before death).

Have a pure heart created in me, O God, and renew a right spirit in my womb (so that I do not add sin to sin).

Do not cast me away from Thy presence (at Thy Judgment),

and do not take Your Holy Spirit from me (in this life).

Reward me with the joy of Your salvation (before my death)

and strengthen me with the Lord’s Spirit (on the path of salvation).

I will teach the wicked (my feelings) Your way,

and wickedness (my wishes from temporary addictions) they will turn to You.

Deliver me from blood (murder and murderous temptation27), O God, God of my salvation:

my tongue will rejoice in Your righteousness (when You teach it to me).

Lord, my lips (heartfelt) open, and my mouth will proclaim Your praise (in unceasing prayer and repentance).

If you had desired sacrifices, you would have given them burnt offerings with displeasure. The sacrifice to God is a crushed spirit(I am not even this imam, so by Your grace crush and humble my proud soul),

God will not despise a contrite and humble heart (out of His love and condescension towards us):

Bless my soul, O Lord (with Your grace) with Your favor in Zion28

and let them be built (around my soul) the walls of Jerusalem.

Then (in the sacred world29) delight the sacrifice of righteousness (accept), the offering (in Thy praise) and the burnt offering (in ardent repentant feelings):

then they will place the calf on Your altar (sacrifices of repentance and correction favorable to You).

As we said before, expanded perception is “worked out” by a person in advance: when he prepares himself for prayer. In the future, attention-grabbing inserts will only remind you of the previously acquired understanding of the words being read.

It is necessary to understand correctly: “expanded perception” is not an interpretation, it is only an auxiliary means for the meaningful reading of psalms and prayers (for the sake of our weakness). The point of this teaching method is not in the sayings themselves. It consists in consciously, effectively, with a living feeling, linking our thought to the spoken words.

The inserts are read mentally and at first you can not use all of them, but only a few according to your heart’s desire.

– There is confusion. How does “expanded perception” differ from the Catholic method of prayer? For example, one Catholic writer has this guide to spiritual life:

“It is recommended to imagine how the three Divine Persons looked at the world overcrowded with people, and how, seeing that everyone was going to hell, they decided in His eternity that the Second Person would become human for the salvation of the human race. It is recommended to imagine the entire vast expanse of the Earth.” Further: “It is recommended to survey the path from Nazareth to Bethlehem, imagining its valley…”, etc., “… to see the persons involved: the Holy Virgin, Joseph, the maid, the Child Jesus. After which I will think about all these words in order to extract some fruit from them for myself.” At the same time, one must “taste and smell the infinite goodness and sweetness of the Divine, touch with a mental touch, for example, hug and kiss the places where these Persons stayed, always trying to receive some spiritual fruit from this,” and so on. And what is the difference here?

– The misconception of those who profess Catholicism is that their teaching, firstly, leaves the complete arbitrariness of human imagination to invent pictures, events, people, actions, words, etc. And secondly, which is most terrible and deeply seductive, it recommends “tasting and smelling the infinite goodness and sweetness of the Divine.” This is the depth of delusion, this is the seduction and destruction: they, NOT smelling, NOT tasting and NOT communicating with God, imagine that they taste and smell the infinite goodness and sweetness of the Divine. They “touch with a mental touch” the places “where these Persons were,” etc. What does it mean? This means that they surrender themselves to the full power of illusions, fantasies, deception, lies. And therefore the devilish spirits acquire complete power over such people.

And we must think about what we say in prayer, as the Scripture says: “Before you begin to pray, prepare yourself, and do not be like a man who tempts the Lord” (Sir. 18:23). The Holy Fathers also speak about this: in particular, Ignatius Brianchaninov and Theophan the Recluse. Saint Theophan the Recluse has a number of teachings on this topic. For example, he says this: “Take Psalm 103 and carefully analyze each of its sayings. Even if it takes you all the time allocated for you to perform Vespers, say, an hour, to sort through this psalm, close the book with a clear conscience, because you have already prayed for an hour. And the next day, continue further. Analyze meaningfully each phrase that you pronounce while performing Vespers. Other prayers need to be understood in the same way.”30

We humans are smart creatures. And, as the Holy Fathers teach us, with our minds we either approach God and are in unity with Him, or we move away from God and are captured by Satan. So we necessarily must think about what we say (but not dream or imagine, like Catholics).

Insertion words of “expanded perception” are a personal adaptation of the words of prayer for a living awareness of what is being said, for the words of prayer are perceived by us vividly when we bring our own prayer to God, and not someone else’s prayer.

– And what about the comparison with the conditions of the “airfield”? Is this not imagination?

– No, this is not imagination, it’s just an association to remind you of the seriousness of the matter and the responsibility of this moment

– a kind of “guide” for the correct “tuning” of the soul. Actually, it has nothing to do with prayer.

Imagination is dangerous when a person in prayer imagines Christ, the Mother of God, the Saints, or begins to fantasize that he is talking with Them: supposedly he tells Them something, and They answer him something. Charm will follow from such an imagination. But this does not apply to the case when a person prepares himself for the fact that “today may be the last day of my life.” So there’s a big difference here.

– Does the thought of mortal danger change the inner mood of a person’s soul?

– Certainly. Therefore, when a person with such an attitude communicates with someone who is near and dear to his heart, he speaks to him the most serious words. Well, let’s say a military man flies off on a combat mission – maybe he will never return from this mission. Therefore, he speaks to his loved one very carefully, putting extremely deep meaning into every word he utters.

In the same way, we should keep ourselves in prayer with God.

About the Jesus Prayer

– I read the Jesus Prayer, but it is somehow “dry” and has little effect on my insensitive heart. It turns out that I’m just “turning over my rosary.” What to do?

– In this case, some advise reading the prayer in tens. I read ten prayers and ask myself: “Well. how did you read it? Attentive or inattentive? Reverently or irreverently? With repentance or without repentance? And immediately you repent: “Forgive me, Lord, insensitive, repentant, absent-minded!”

Read the next ten. If you remember your laziness, gluttony or grumbling against someone or something – you repent again.

And although this prayer is not entirely pure, it is alive, leading to repentance and correction.

If a person exercises diligently in such work, then gradually he will get rid of mental darkness, from chilling passions and the deceptions of the devil, i.e. from everything that ruins and destroys our prayer.

What is “sobriety” and is it available for our time?

– In patristic literature on prayer, much is said about the virtue of sobriety. For example, the Monk Hesychius of Jerusalem said about soberness that it is the creator of all the commandments of the Old and New Testaments. Why did he say that? Is it possible to live soberly in our time? This confusion is based on the following two points:

– in the same quotation about sobriety, the Monk Hesychius says that even in his time the monks had almost lost their sobriety (there is no need to talk about the laity;

– I have heard from some modern ascetics the opinion that, they say, now God forbid, if only one would preserve the Orthodox faith and be protected from mortal sins, and high spiritual deeds are not for our time.

One gets the impression that even desire sobriety is already insolence. Is this true or not?

– So, in order. The Monk Hesychius said about sobriety that it is the creator of all commandments. Why did he say that? Because that’s how it is. A person will not be able to fulfill any commandment if he does not soberly reflect on what he must do, which commandment he must fulfill in each specific case. Consequently, without this reasoning, no commandment is fulfilled.

Let’s say, either forgive an insult, or help a brother who asks him to do something, or give alms, or force yourself to do something good, remembering that “from the days of John the Baptist until now, the kingdom of heaven suffers violence, and those who force themselves take it” (Matthew 11:12), etc. This is sobriety, which forces us to fulfill in each case some commandment, cutting off any of our passions.

Also, for every sin that we commit, voluntarily or unwittingly, we must repent. And this is all done on the basis of sobriety.

You need to understand that sobriety, like doing itself, has different degrees. And perhaps the monks began to lose its peaks back in the time of St. Hesychius. But a Christian cannot be a Christian if he does not have initial sobriety, i.e. if he does not fulfill the commandments of the Gospel, does not heed the voice of his conscience, and does not repent of what he has sinned. This is the beginning of sobriety. Even Christians who lead careless lives still show the beginnings of sobriety when they prepare for confession. They think: “What did we sin in that, other, third case?”

So everyone has sobriety in its own degree, only we do not use the word “sobriety” and therefore it seems to us that this activity is something incomprehensible and seemingly completely unacceptable – too high. Nevertheless, every person to some extent becomes familiar with it and practices it.

Regarding what I heard from some ascetics, that, they say, “now is such a time and we cannot have sobriety – just to preserve the Orthodox faith and be protected from mortal sins.”

It seems to me that if a real ascetic said this, then he could say so out of his humility. An ascetic usually practices self-reproach if he strives correctly. And therefore, while in this activity, he does not see it in himself and does not impute it to himself as a virtue. And when someone asks him, he says this phrase in order to humble his soul and not show to his neighbors that he has some kind of work.

But there may, of course, be another option… there may be some kind of “dislocation” – you need to look at who is saying it.

“It seems that even the desire for sobriety is already insolence.” Well, this opinion, one might say, is “laughter through tears.” What insolence? This is life! Sobriety is the Christian life. I say again that there are different degrees of sobriety: it’s one thing when a person perceives an approaching thought “by smell.” The thought has not yet been depicted in the mind and heart, but the soul already feels its approach and recognizes what “charge” it carries within itself. Or is it rancor, or voluptuousness, or covetousness, or something else…

Someone who practices more or less high degrees of sobriety does not even need to accept thoughts: he smells them, identifies them, and pushes them away. Another, with a lower activity, sees the animals approaching and climbs a tree (i.e., “runs away” into his heart, as the Holy Fathers say), thus saving himself from being captured by passionate thoughts. And we, simple Christians, at least must do what our conscience requires of us. This is our sobriety. This sobriety is the whole of Christian life. And to pose the question that “this is impudence” is simply stupid.

How to maintain peace of mind and living prayer in the modern bustle

– But how can you maintain peace of mind and living prayer in the conditions of modern bustle?

“The curse of the century is haste,” said one of the modern poets. And, indeed, this “rush” today torments everyone very, very much: the devil drives us from thought to thought, from desire to desire, from one thing to another – each in his own way in his place.

I remember what a clear, instructive example was for me – Father Vitaly31 He did everything sedately, slowly, calmly, peacefully, judiciously and, of course, correctly. It is this peace that we all need to acquire, because, as St. Seraphim of Sarov said, “gain peace and thousands will be saved around you.”

We simply need this peace, for the Lord dwells only in a peaceful heart. And when the heart is in confusion, indignation and filled not with what is needed – not with the memory of God, but with the memory of vain worries, worries and entertainment, then a person loses the Lord (not to say – expels him). The Lord withdraws, man becomes restless and falls into even greater snares and machinations of the enemy.

There are, however, people who are naturally slow, but this is a completely different matter. For spiritual life, what is needed is not slowness itself, but spiritual sedateness and prudence – as if mental vigilance: “Lord, what should I do in this matter? Lord, what about this? Lord, what is this? Lord, what can I say here? Lord, how should I communicate with this person?.. and with this one?” – i.e. This is constant internal work.

And although this skill is not acquired immediately, we must strive for it – otherwise many do not even know what we should strive for and what we should do within ourselves.

Every Christian who wants to be saved should practice this, and not just monks (as some think), for in this activity the beginning of repentance, correction, the beginning of putting off all the old man with all his deeds and putting on the new man – in the image of Christ – is manifested.

The Lord said: “Call Me in the day of your tribulation, and wear you out, and glorify Me” (Ps. 49:15). And when we turn to God in all our bewilderment, in all confusion, in every matter, even the most insignificant, the Lord provides for and arranges everything for good. We, although we are in vanity, do not lose Communion with God.

In our time of general vanity and multi-care, this activity, it seems to me, is one of the most necessary and most saving for a person.

– But what if our daily affairs still plunge us into vanity?

– This happens because we perform them incorrectly, i.e. with God-forgetfulness. After all, any everyday deed or obedience must be carried out for the sake of God, before God and in God.

– How is it “for God’s sake”?

– We must pray internally: “Lord, You see that this obedience is impossible for me to fulfill. But for the sake of You, who was obedient to the Father even to death on the cross, I begin to do it. Just send Your grace to help me, for without You I will do only evil – evil in the guise of good.”

After all, if a person thought: “I will do it!” – grace recedes, and he makes mistakes, spoils the work, gets upset, grumbles about the work, grumbles at his superiors, at his employees, grumbles at someone else or something else, but he just doesn’t grumble at his arrogance, that he thought: “I will do it.” Perhaps this movement took place only in the feeling of the heart, the person did not notice it, but it begins to spoil the matter. It is already burdening him, he begins to grumble at everyone and everything, he is irritated. And if they scold him for ruining the matter, he falls into despondency, relaxation, apathy, and can reach great frustration in life: “I’m so tired of this already!.. Something needs to be changed…”, etc. And, in fact, everything is very simple – he feeds his passion of arrogance, which spoils all his affairs and puts “spikes in his wheels” on the path of salvation.

If we were to act prudently, then before doing anything we should have said: “Lord, I am so weak and sinful, so blinded…” – truly reproaching oneself before the Lord. “But although I am such a sinner, send Your grace to help me complete this task!”

The person humbles himself, and the Lord gives him the grace of the Holy Spirit. And he does the job quietly, peacefully, calmly. Even if he made a mistake, spoiled something, or was reproached, it is easy for him to come to terms with it, because he knows: “This is who I really am.”

The main thing that we need to understand is that whatever we do, we must do it not for our own benefit and not for the sake of pleasing a person, but solely for the sake of the consciousness that “it is so pleasing to the Lord.” This determination to do whatever pleases the Lord is, in fact, a manifestation of our active faith and love for God.

– What does “before God” mean?

– If we believe the words of the Lord: “Without Me you cannot do nothing” (John 15:5), then, when doing any work, we should more often turn the eye of our mind to God with approximately the following prayer: “Lord, You know what the consequences will be from this work. And since I am a darkened person, You Yourself enlighten, teach and help me to carry out this matter as You please. For through my foolishness I can ruin this good and pleasing deed to You and harm both my soul and the souls of other people. Help me.”

In this way we become accustomed to the memory of God. And if we acquire it, it means we are entering into living communion with God—we feel that the Lord is close to us, and we are close to Him. And then our work is completed in God. And this is already a guarantee of salvation.

– Where does fussiness in behavior come from?

– This is one of the many passions that we do not notice, as the apostle said: “They do nothing, but fuss” (2 Thess. 3:11). We do many things that are not useful and even harmful to our souls. But, as the popular proverb says, “every sheep hangs by its own legs.”

– But what should we do practically so as not to fall into vanity in all our everyday affairs and concerns?

– There are many different ways to get rid of this passion, it depends on the lifestyle of each person. But generally speaking, the most important thing is to have faith that the Lord cares about us, and we, in fact, have nothing to worry about. We only need to care about conquering our passions in each specific case (by fulfilling one or another commandment), sincerely repenting of our sins and humble ourselves before God and before people. And at least once a day, read some of the Holy Fathers and think about yourself, what state we are in.

Secondly, we need to have the memory of God and turn to Him in every, even insignificant, everyday matter. If we have this, then we will slowly begin to settle down: we will maintain peace of soul, and our everyday affairs will be arranged.

I remember such a clear example. When I was with Father Vitaly, his spiritual children, mothers, came to see him. They stayed for a while, and now they have to leave. They get ready, the priest sees them off. Mother Maria (father’s novice) hurries: “Father Vitaly, hurry up, they’re already late for the train! Half an hour left! But he calmly continues to read prayers for those traveling. She: “Father Vitaly, they are already late! Do you hear?! He doesn’t react at all, continues to read the prayers, finishes, and lets you venerate the icon, the cross. Mother: “Well, that’s it! Now they are definitely late!”

And one benefactor was supposed to come for them in a car and take them to the station, but for some reason he was not there – either he was late, or forgot, or something happened. We need to run to the metro. Faster, faster, let’s run.

And so, when they already went to the metro, ten minutes later the driver arrives.

– Well, where are your passengers? Mother immediately said to him:

– Why are you late? He let us down, they already ran to the metro. You’re not there, they might have missed the train!

– How late are you? It’s only five o’clock now!

– How?!! Can’t be!

– Yes, yes! It’s your watch that’s fast!

I thought: “Well, Father Vitaly!..” I was struck by the calmness with which he reacted to these seemingly well-founded reproaches from his mother: “They’re late, Father Vitaly! Well, what are you doing? What are you waiting for? Watching all this, I thought: if I were in his place, I would have lost my calm long ago and somehow “reacted.” And he is so quiet, peaceful, unperturbed. Wonderful lesson!

This is what it means to constantly turn the eye of the heart towards God – only then can one maintain peace in the soul amid the bustle.

To get rid of fussiness, such a remedy can also be useful. You need to try to learn to look at yourself, at your affairs – daily, everyday, ordinary, small and large – from the point of view of eternity: “What will all this look like when I move into eternity?”

This, of course, will not work out right away. To begin with, it would be good if we remembered this once or twice a day, or, for the first time, at least in the evening we looked over our lives – what happened during the day. How we argued with someone, how we overate ourselves, how we laughed or slept at the wrong time, how we were offended by someone, grumbled, condemned someone.

You need to observe yourself, and then reconsider everything. Just as they now record on a video camera and then look at it, so we must review what is “recorded” in our memory. And then we will see ourselves. We will see our sins, we will see our insignificance, we will see our damnation. This will greatly help “break our horns” of complacency, exaltation and other pride and passion, including our vanity and over-concern. This is a very effective remedy.

Of course, acquiring such a skill is not at all easy. But we must at least begin with our free will (as St. Ephraim the Syrian says about this), and only the grace of the Holy Spirit will complete the work. After all, the Lord said: “Without Me you can do nothing” (John 15:5). We begin the work: “Lord, bless! Lord help me! Lord, give me some sense! Lord, strengthen me! Lord, do it!” – and the Lord will always give grace to help a good deed. And then we will feel ourselves before the face of God: we will have humility, we will have repentance, we will have sobriety, we will have other fruits pleasing to God.

And if we fuss, run around “like crazy,” then the demons have power over us during our work (or travel). Here the enemy acts as if according to the law of justice – we fall under his influence, because… we listen to him, and not to the Lord: having not done God’s work, we want to do only our own vanity, and therefore we suffer.

There is another very effective way – how we should act in the vanity that consumes us. We can use it – this vanity.

– How?

“We can act like a mill.” I think everyone knows what a water mill is when the water “works”, or a windmill when the wind “works”. There is a stream of wind or dirty, muddy water, but they nevertheless turn the wheel. This wheel transmits the movement to the inner wheel, the millstone rotates inside the mill and, ultimately, grinds the flour. Thus, from this stream of muddy water or wind, a good deed is obtained – we get flour for bread (for the body). And in this case, from the flow of vanity and the wind of temptation we can in the same way receive bread for the soul.

– How is this?

– Here’s how. Well, let’s say we had an argument with someone. Then we came to our senses and immediately: “Lord, forgive me that I have sinned like this!” – we condemn ourselves right there, at the scene of the crime. And after this, if we see that another person behaves the same way, we no longer condemn him, but pray: “Lord, help him and with his holy prayers, have mercy on me, the accursed one!” Thus, the feeling of condemnation is replaced in us by a feeling of compassion. Or if we see that someone has become too fussy, then we immediately remember ourselves, feel sorry for our neighbor and pray for ourselves and for him: “Lord, forgive me and help my brother, and with his holy prayers, have mercy on me, the accursed one!” The feeling of condemnation is again replaced by a feeling of compassion. The same should be done with any other passion that we notice in ourselves.

Thus, the flow of “muddy water” – everyday temptations – begins to turn our inner mill, with the help of which we begin to extract saving bread for our soul, that is, prayer, repentance, humility, self-condemnation, compassion for our neighbors and other fruits that everyone will already acquire their own. But the main thing is that this doing begins to teach us the memory of God.

I remember I had such a case. When I decided to retire, they told me: “If you want to live alone, then build alone.” I took a saw and went to build. I made a platform, I need to put up pillars. But how can I lift a pillar four meters long by myself? He’s heavy. Then I did not cut down the trees, but decided to climb about three meters from the ground and cut them down there.

And now you are standing on the stairs and sawing this tree, and now it will break in front of your nose, and it is 30-40 cm thick and 20 meters long, and you don’t know where it will fall and what will happen to you now: will you remain alive or will you no longer be there?.. And already in such a state: “Lord, only You can save me!

I somehow cut down the trees, they fell, everything turned out well. Then I looked – a huge plane tree, about a meter thick, needed to be removed above the site. It is rotten at the roots and may fall over in strong winds. And if it falls, it will fall directly on the cell. And if such a one “sinks,” then there will be nothing left of my building, and I will have a coffin in that cell. We need to cut it down. And at the same time manage to make it fall away from the construction site, because its branches are inclined towards the site. Pilyu: “Lord, help me!.., well, who will help me? Guardian Angel! You move it a little – what does it cost you?.., push it, and it will fly!.., but how difficult it is for me!”

It was the Dormition Fast, and I thought: “Lord, forgive me that I have to fuss during Lent!” Previously, Stare32 advised me to reduce the bustle during Lent, but here I already see that I won’t have time to move on before winter, so I need to quickly build a cell. But, working with all my might, I still realize that without God’s help I will not be able to finish the construction on time, and therefore in my thoughts I often turn to God: “Lord!.., well, help me!.., well, you see: who will help me?.., there is no one but You, you help me!” And I pray so, and I turn to God so vividly that I feel: I am before God, and the Lord is looking at me. And my soul is joyful, and I work a lot, but I don’t feel any fuss: there is work, but there is also the Lord.

And then I realized that you can work and not fuss, you can work and pray, work and have the memory of God – everything depends only on us.

After all, if you look deeper, why do we pray? Why are we commanded to read unceasing prayer? In order to have the memory of God, which then opens the way to Communion with God. And here, in this doing (which I mentioned), this is exactly what is happening. If we watch inside, if our inner “gear” works, then it gives us the memory of God – it leads us to it with our diligence and with the help of the grace of the Holy Spirit. Forced external circumstances force us to turn to God. Our only problem is that we don’t care about it. But it would be necessary: ​​if you are exhausted, tired: “Help, Lord!”: irritated: “Forgive me, Lord!”; confused in bewilderment: “Get some sense. God!”; condemned someone: “Lord, forgive him and me, have mercy on us and help us correct ourselves!”

Thus, under the influence of external circumstances, we begin to resort to God more and more often with living prayer, and through this we acquire the memory of God. And by acquiring the memory of God, we get closer to the goal we strive for, for which we read prayer. And although we do not pray incessantly, we still acquire the memory of God, and it teaches us, leads us along the path to communion with God. Of course, not right away, not at the first stages. But this is the same path. Only some become accustomed to the memory of God through attention, without distracting their thoughts. And others who are in the world, among temptations, can acquire this through living prayer about everything that happens before them, constantly confessing their weakness before God, asking Him for help and admonition in all circumstances.

This is very important. This work was taught by the holy righteous John of Kronstadt. And we know that Father John of Kronstadt is a sign of our time, his image of salvation is given to us as a model for our salvation. He was constantly among people, constantly in the crowd, but he did not stop praying. As the Venerable Elder Silouan testified about him: “He never lost the grace of the Holy Spirit.” Other ascetics lost even while in the desert or in seclusion. He, it is said, never lost the grace of the Holy Spirit, but preserved and multiplied it. Why? Because he had exactly this work: he looked at the sorrows of people, looked at their suffering, illness, and they moved him to fervent prayer for these people. They taught him living communion with God and unceasing prayer. He cried out to the Lord with all his heart, as his soul itself spoke. And here he was, in such turmoil, in such a terrible pre-revolutionary time, he retained the grace of the Holy Spirit and appeared as one of the greatest saints of our time.

So we must learn this too. And this should not just be theory, but practical, everyday life.

An incident from the life of Abba Anthony

One day Blessed Anthony was praying in his cell – and a voice came to him: “Antony! You have not yet come to the measure of the tanner living in Alexandria.” Hearing this, the elder got up early in the morning and, taking his staff, hastily went to Alexandria.

When he came to the husband indicated to him, this husband was extremely surprised to see Anthony there. The elder said to the tanner: “Tell me your deeds, because for you I came here, leaving the desert.” The tanner answered: “I don’t know that I have ever done anything good. For this reason, getting up early from my bed, before I go to work, I tell myself that all the inhabitants of this city, from large to small, will enter the Kingdom of God for their virtues, and I alone will go into eternal torment for my sins. I repeat these same words in my heart before I go to bed.”

Hearing this, blessed Anthony answered: “Truly, my son, you, like a skilled jeweler, sitting quietly in your house, acquired the Kingdom of God; Although I spend my whole life in the desert, I have not acquired spiritual intelligence, I have not achieved the level of consciousness that you express in your words”

An incident from the life of Abba Macarius

Once, when the Monk Macarius was praying, there was a voice to him that said: “Makarius! You have not yet achieved such perfection in a virtuous life as two women living together in the nearest city.”

Having received such a revelation, the monk took his staff and went to that city. Having found the house where the said women lived, Macarius knocked on the door. Immediately one of those women came out to answer the knock and, seeing the monk, with great joy received him into her home. Calling both women to him, the monk said to them:

“For your sake, I took upon myself such a great feat, coming here from the distant desert, for I want to know your good deeds, which I ask you to tell me about, without hiding anything.

“Believe us, honest father,” the women answered, “that last night we shared our bed with our husbands: what virtues do you want to find in us?”

But the monk insisted that they tell him their way of life. Then, convinced by him, the women said:

“We weren’t related to each other before, but then we married two brothers, and for fifteen years now we’ve all been living together in the same house. Throughout our life together, we did not say a single angry or bad word to each other and never quarreled with each other, but until now we have lived in peace and harmony among ourselves. Recently, we unanimously decided to leave our carnal spouses and retire to the host of holy virgins serving God. But we cannot beg our husbands to let us go, although we begged them about it with great persistence and many tears. Having not received the desired permission, we made a covenant with God and among ourselves – not to utter a single worldly word until our death.

After listening to their story, the Monk Macarius said:

– Truly, God is not looking for a virgin, nor a married woman, nor a monk, nor a layman, but a free intention, accepting it as a matter itself, and gives the voluntary will of every person the grace of the Holy Spirit, acting in a person and governing the life of everyone who wants to be saved.

Conversation with a sectarian

One day I was on my way to the monastery N. I got to the city and rushed from the bus to the train station to catch the train. On the way I catch up – they are walking: an old woman, a young woman and her son of about ten years old. When I caught up with them, suddenly a young woman turns to me with a question:

– Sorry. Are you a spiritual person? Answer us one question.

– Which?

– Answer: when will the end of the world happen?

The question seems to be to the point and seemingly not mockingly. However, how can I answer her in a nutshell? I thought and prayed mentally: “Lord, give me some understanding of what to answer her.” A thought comes, I say: “The end of the world will be when people stop repenting.” (“Well, remember this yourself,” my thought tells me). I told her, she didn’t answer me anymore, and I moved on.

I arrive at the station, and the train has already left. These three come for me – they were also late. We stand together, waiting for the next train. The woman came up and started talking again. It turned out that she was a Jehovah’s Witness sectarian. We talked with her for more than three hours. A lot of things were discussed, but she didn’t say anything, “no matter what”: she disputes everything. The train arrived, we sat down and continued talking. But she rejects everything: “we don’t believe in miracles,” and “we don’t recognize the soul,” etc.

When our train approached station N., I prayed: “Lord, give me some sense: what should I tell her? I just feel sorry for the man. She does not accept any conviction, either from the Holy Scriptures or from other considerations. What should I tell her? And I say: “Well, you know, now we will part, and perhaps we will never meet again on earth. But I tell you, as a person to another, that you will make a grave mistake, because you will find yourself in a disastrous state after death. And this will be aggravated for you by the fact that both your mother, who trusts you, and your son, whom you apparently love, will also suffer with you, because… They trusted you, they listen to you, but you make a great spiritual mistake. You have fallen into error. We may be disagreeing with you forever, but, of course, out of the duty of human love, I will pray for you. So be careful. The Lord does not want the sinner to die, but wants everyone to be saved and to come to the understanding of truth. And it seems to me that if He did not first give you some kind of admonition regarding this error, then, I think, after our parting He will not leave you in the dark. If you are sincerely mistaken and want to know the truth with a sincere heart, then the Lord will not leave you like that. He will give you admonition: either through a dream, or in some other way. So be careful”

When I told her that maybe the Lord would give understanding through a dream, she suddenly perked up, her whole face changed and said:

– And you know, apparently, I was already given admonition! – Which?

– Here, on the train, I met two women Jehovah’s Witnesses. They convinced me of the faith they preached. I listened to them and accepted them. After that, at night I dream that these two women are pushing me into a deep, terrible hole. They pushed me in, but I seemed to be climbing, I wanted to get out of there, but I couldn’t. They hinder me and push me back into this hole. I flounder and flounder, but I just can’t get out. Maybe this dream is “admonition”?

“Yes,” I say, “certainly.” Moreover, you saw these women as they really were. So thank God, take note and leave your previous heretical wisdom.

So we parted with her.

I thought then: if we say or do something, then every word and deed must be preceded by prayer, because if we speak only “from our mind,” simply because we are well-read, then our words are of little effect and are not perceived by the interlocutor. When we speak, asking for help from above, then with the help of the grace of the Holy Spirit they become more effective, and the person listening to them becomes more receptive.

And I also thought: truly the Lord is near us in every place, in every circumstance. Closer than we think—closer than our shirt is to our body. And therefore, if we ask Him for help, He comes to us and gives us instructions on what to say. And the other person is given help and admonition to accept. The Lord sent this woman – Xenia – admonition (a dream about Jehovah’s Witnesses) before her prayer. But since she did not pay attention to him, the Lord was pleased to remind her of this through another person, so that she would accept such mercy of God with due attention and draw appropriate conclusions for herself.

The Lord does not want the sinner to die, but gives everyone according to his needs, and wants everyone to be saved and to come to the understanding of truth.

Therefore to our God be glory, praise and thanksgiving in every place of His dominion forever and ever!

* * *

Notes

That is, to the landfill (ed.).

He is also the Venerable Silouan of Athos (†1938) (ed.).

In some modern prayer books this prayer is omitted (ed.).

Compare: Rom.5 (ed.).

The quote is paraphrased by the author. Quote by: Orthodox interlocutor “Living Spring”, Donetsk diocese of the UOC MP, No. 5 (13), May 2004 (ed.)

The reader will understand the reason why the author emphasizes this detail from the further narrative (ed.).

However, this did not happen without the will of God – to strengthen the faith of this woman (author).

See appendix (ed.) for a description of these two cases.

“Good Shepherd. The life and works of the Moscow elder Archpriest Alexy Mechev.” Moscow. Serda-Press. 2000 (ed.).

Archimandrite Sophrony (Sakharov) on this occasion gives the following example from the life of his Elder, the Venerable Silouan of Athos: “Once Father Benjamin of Kalyagrsky, walking on a holiday in the monastery forest with Father Silouan, suggested that he go to the remarkable and then very famous Elder on Athos, Father Ambrose, confessor of the Bulgarian Monastery “Zograph”. Silouan immediately agreed. They’re coming. Father Benjamin became curious about what Silouan would ask Elder Ambrose. “I don’t think about asking the Elder anything,” Silouan answered. “I don’t have any doubts now.” – “Then why are you going?” “I’m going because you want me to.” – “But they go to the elders for the sake of benefit.” – “I cut off my will before you, and this is my benefit, greater than from any advice of the Elder.” I was surprised by this conversation about. Benjamin…” (author).

This counting of “steps” is purely a convention, for greater clarity of presentation of thoughts (author).

“The disciples, seeing [Jesus Christ] walking on the sea, were alarmed and said: it is a ghost; and they cried out in fear. But Jesus immediately spoke to them and said, “Be of good cheer; It is I, do not be afraid” (Matthew 14:26–27) (ed.).

I think it’s worth noting in passing that usually a person who imagines about himself that “I’m still not like everyone else” is attacked by the strongest prodigal warfare. And since he loses hope of somehow freeing himself from it, he plunges into this swamp arbitrarily. And it would be easy to free oneself from such a lustful obsession if a person began to repent, humble himself and cleanse himself of self-satisfaction and opinions about his “good things”, i.e. from the spirit of pride. One who has adopted the spirit of pride loses strength and cannot resist the spirit of fornication, so he begins to think and say that it is natural for a person to have carnal lust. And many human souls perish from such false thoughts (author).

On the mountain pastures there are small sheds – booths, in which shepherds live in the summer, and hunters rest in winter and autumn (author).

Those who are interested in this question more deeply should turn to the book by Father Seraphim (Rose) “Orthodoxy and the Religion of the Future” (author).

It should be noted: I use the words “self-correction”, “self-education”, “self-compulsion” and other “self” intentionally – not for cultivating the self, i.e. arrogance, but to heal our current negligence in correcting our sinful inclinations, and to eradicate the self-justification of our sins by the fact that “we, they say, do not have spiritual mentors today, that’s why we live so carelessly.” More than once in conversations we had to mention the vision of St. Pachomius the Great. In this vision, the Lord showed the Monk Pachomius the greatest disasters of the last monks. However, he said “And those like you [i.e. after you] they will be in the dark ditch you saw. not having such mentors who can lead them out of that darkness, jumping off from the darkness by their own will, they will diligently follow the bright path of My commandments, and those who please Me will find themselves” (See the life of St. Pachomius the Great, May 15, Old Art.). This is why I say: if for some reason we do not have a spiritual mentor, then we should not justify ourselves by this, being in negligence, but we should engage in self-correction according to the commandments of Christ through self-compulsion and self-education – for otherwise we cannot be saved. The whole essence of the prudence of salvation is to direct one’s self-will not to satisfy one’s sinful desires, but “by one’s own willfulness” to move away from darkness and follow the path of fulfilling the commandments of Christ. “Willfully” one must begin to fulfill the will of God, and the Lord, seeing this good undertaking, will enlighten and help (author).

Wed. Eph.2:2-3: “…you once lived according to the course of this world, according to the prince of the power of the air, the spirit who is now at work in the sons of disobedience, among whom we all once lived according to our fleshly lusts, fulfilling the desires of the flesh and the mind, and were by nature children of wrath, like the rest” (ed.).

There is a certain relationship here. If the soul is burdened with sins, then it languishes and suffers. And over time, this weak soul also begins to weaken the body – some earlier, some later. And when doing good deeds, both soul and body are encouraged. To the extent that deeds are pleasing to God, the soul becomes healthy. And from her comes the body. But this latter does not always happen, of course, but in accordance with the Providence of God (ed.).

On this occasion, the author of “Conversations” has an interesting story about his meeting with a Jehovah’s Witness sectarian. Those interested can read this story in the appendix (ed.).

Compare: Matthew 7 (ed.).

From A.M. Gorky’s play “At the Lower Depths” (ed.).

Since these samples are intended to train our minds in attentive prayer, they are naturally read in private. Each phrase is pronounced slowly, with a pause – so that the meaning of what is being said can be assimilated (author).

Everyone says their own thing, what their conscience denounces – prodigal, proud, angry, etc. (author).

What worries him at the moment (author).

What specifically (author).

Christ’s (author).

So that he himself is not tempted and does not seduce others – for temptation kills faith and thereby kills the soul (ed.).

Zion is the Old Testament prototype of the Church, and we ask for the establishment of a temple of our soul, just as the apostle says: “you are the temple of God” (1 Cor. 3:16) (author).

When sacred peace is established in the soul (author’s note).

The quote is retold by the author (ed.).

Schema-Archimandrite Vitaly, in the world Vitaly Nikolaevich Sidorenko, was born in 1928 in one of the villages of the Krasnodar Territory. From early childhood, the future elder was marked with the seal of God’s special chosenness. From the age of 14, by the destinies of God, he was a wanderer. Since 1948 – novice of the Glinsk Hermitage (under the guidance of an experienced confessor – Schema-Archimandrite Seraphim (Romantsov)). Further, with the blessing of the elders of the monastery, on the eve of the closure of the Glinsk Hermitage, he became a hermit monk in the Caucasus Mountains. And, finally, for the last 16 years – shepherd of the flock of Christ in the priesthood. Having actively fulfilled the Gospel of Christ throughout his life, this wonderful ascetic showed us an example of a truly Christian life. The blessed death of Schema-Archimandrite Vitaly occurred on December 1, 1992. He was buried in the fence of the Church of St. Blessed Prince Alexander Nevsky, Tbilisi (ed.).

Schema-Archimandrite Seraphim (Romantsov, †1976)