Life is in the heart

Tuesday. [II Cor. 5:15-21; Mark 1:16-22] The Lord taught in the Caperna?um synagogue, and everyone mar?velled at His teaching: for He taught them as one that had authority, and not as the Scribes. This authority is not a commanding tone, but the power of influence on souls and hearts. His Word entered within, and bound itself to human con?sciences, showing that all was as He said. This is how a word which is imbued with Divine power, a word from the Spirit, or an anointed word always is. This is how it was with the holy apostles, and after them, with all influential teachers. They spoke not from learnedness, but as the spirit gave them the gift of prophesy. It is a gift of God which can only be acquired through labors to master it in one’s heart and life, and not just by learning. Wherever this occurs the word is imbued with cogency, because it moves from heart to heart; in this is the power of the word over souls. Scribes, speaking and writing from their learnedness, are not given such power, because they speak from their head and mix into their head their own philosophizing. Life is not found in the head, but only life’s surface. Life is in the heart, and on?ly what comes forth from the heart can influence the currents of life.

Saint Theophan the Recluse