Hold thy peace, and come out of him

September 11, 2013 | Saint Theophan, Uncategorized

Wednes­day. [II Cor. 6:11-16; Mark 1:23-28] The de­mon prais­ed the Sav­iour, but the Sav­iour said to him: Hold thy peace, and come out of him. De­mons nev­er say any­thing or do any­thing with a good pur­pose — they al­ways have some­thing evil in mind. So it was here. The Lord, not ex­pos­ing their crafty de­signs, de­cid­ed it with a word: hold thy peace and come out. He did not want to con­verse long with an evil spir­it. Here is a les­son for us. A per­son man­ages to do very lit­tle of some­thing good be­fore a de­mon sits near­by and be­gins to trum­pet in his ears: “You are this and that.” Do not lis­ten and do not en­ter in­to con­ver­sa­tion with this flat­terer, but im­me­di­ate­ly say point blank: “Hold thy peace and come out,” and erase his tracks with sighs and self-re­proach, then in­cense that place where he was with con­trite prayer. He wants to give rise to self-opin­ion and self es­teem, and to fan self-praise and vain­glo­ry from them — all of those thoughts and feel­ings are the spir­i­tu­al life the same as thieves in ev­ery­day life. Like thieves that en­ter a house to rob its goods, so these de­mons, tak­ing root in a soul, de­stroy all that is good in that soul and cast it a­way, so that noth­ing re­mains for the Lord to praise lat­er.

The Monk Pimen the Great

September 9, 2013 | Saint Theophan, Uncategorized

Commemorated on August 27

The Monk Pimen the Great was born in about the year 340 in Egypt. With his two brothers, Anubias and Paisias, he went into one of the Egyptian monasteries, and all three accepted monastic tonsure. The brothers were such strict ascetics, that when their mother came to the monastery to see her children, they did not come out to her from their cells. The mother stood there for a long time and wept. Then the Monk Pimen said to her through the closed door of the cell: “If thou bearest with the temporal parting from us now, then in the future life wilt thou see us, since we do hope upon God the Lover-of-Mankind!”. The mother was humbled and returned home.

Fame about the deeds and virtues of the Monk Pimen spread throughout all the land. One time the governor of the district wanted to see him. The Monk Pimen, shunning fame, reasoned thus: “If dignitaries begin coming to me with respect, then also many of the people will start coming to me and disturb my quiet, and I shalt be deprived of the grace of humility, which I have found only with the help of God”. And so he relayed a refusal to the messenger. For many of the monks, the Monk Pimen was a spiritual guide and instructor. And they wrote down his answers to serve to the edification of others besides themselves. A certain monk asked: “Ought one to veil over with silence the sin of a transgressing brother, if perchance one see him?” The elder answered: “If we reproach the sins of brothers, then God will reproach our sins, and if thou seest a brother sinning, believe not thine eyes and know, that thine own sin is like a wood-beam, but the sin of thy brother is like a wood-splinter, and then thou wilt not come into distress and temptation”. Another monk turned to the saint, saying: “I have grievously sinned and I want to spend three years at repentance. Is such a length of time sufficient?” The elder answered: “That is a long time”. The monk continued to ask, how long a period of repentance did the saint reckon necessary for him – a year or forty days? The elder answered: “I think, that if a man repenteth from the depths of his heart and posits a firm intent to return no more to the sin, then God would accept also a three-day repentance”. To the question, as to how to be rid of persistent evil thoughts, the saint answered: “If a man has on one side of him fire, and on the other side a vessel with water, then if he starts burning from the fire, he takes water from the vessel and extinguishes the fire. Like to this are the evil thoughts, suggested by the enemy of our salvation, which like a spark can enkindle sinful desires within man. It is necessary to put out these sparks with the water, which is prayer and the yearning of the soul for God”.

The Monk Pimen was strict at fasting and did not partake of food for the space of a week or more. But others he advised to eat every day, only but without eating one’s fill. For a certain monk, permitting himself to partake of food only on the seventh day but being angry with a brother, the saint said: “Thou wouldst learn to fast over six days, yet cannot abstain from anger for even a single day”. To the question, which is better – to speak or be silent, the elder said: “Whoso doth speak on account of God, doeth well, and whoso is silent on account of God – that one doth act well”. And moreover: “It may be, that a man seems to be silent, but if his heart doth judge others, then always is he speaking. But there are also those, who all the day long speak with their tongue, but within themself they do keep silence, since they judge no one”.

The saint said: “For a man it is necessary to observe three primary rules: to fear God, to pray often and to do good for people”. “Malice in turn never wipes out malice. If someone doeth thee bad, do them good, and thine good will conquer their bad”. One time, when the monk with his students arrived at an Egyptian wilderness-monastery (since he had the habit to go about from place to place, so as to shun glory from men), it became known to him, that the elder living there was annoyed at his arrival and also was jealous of him. In order to overcome the malice of the hermit, the saint set off to him with his brethren, taking along with them food as a present. The elder refused to come out to them. Thereupon the Monk Pimen said: “We shall not depart from here, until we are granted to see and pay respect to the holy elder”, – and he remained standing in the bright heat at the door of the cell. Seeing such perseverance and lack of malice on the part of the Monk Pimen, the elder received him graciously and said: “It is right what I have heard about you, but I see in you the good deeds and an hundred times even moreso”. Thus did the Monk Pimen know how to extinguish malice and provide good example to others. He possessed such great humility, that often with a sigh he said: “I shalt be cast down to that place, whither was cast down Satan!”

One time there came to the saint a monk from afar, to get his guidance. He began to speak about sublime matters difficult to grasp. The saint turned away from him and was silent. To the bewildered monk they explained, that the saint did not like to speak about lofty matters. Then the monk began to ask him about the struggle with passions of soul. The saint turned to him with a joyful face: “Here now thou well hath spoken, and I mustneeds answer”, – and for a long while he provided instruction, as to how one ought to struggle with the passions and conquer them.

The Monk Pimen died at age 110, in about the year 450. Soon after his death he was acknowledged as a saint pleasing to God and received the title “the Great” – as a sign of his great humility, modesty, uprightness and self-denying service to God.

© 1996-2001 by translator Fr. S. Janos.

Kingdom of God is at hand

September 9, 2013 | Saint Theophan, Uncategorized

Mon­day. [II Cor. 5:10-15; Mark 1:9-15] The Lord began His ser­mon thus: The time is ful­fill­ed, and the King­dom of God is at hand: re­pent ye, and be­lieve the Gos­pel. At the end of the ages it will al­so be said: the time is ful­fill­ed, the king­dom is at hand; but this state­ment will not be fol­low­ed by re­pent ye, and be­lieve but “come out to the judg­ment.” The time for re­pen­tance and la­bours of self-im­prove­ment is end­ed; let ev­ery­one give an ac­count of what good or evil things he did in his bod­y. And so, while there is time, hur­ry to use this time un­to your sal­va­tion. The Fa­ther’s em­brace is o­pen for the ac­cep­tance of all who come with a sin­cere feel­ing of con­tri­tion a­bout the past, and with a de­sire to serve God hence­forth by zeal­ous ful­fill­ment of His ho­ly com­mand­ments. For each of us the end of this age is death: it is the door to the oth­er life. Look in­to it more of­ten and de­ter­mine for your­self more tru­ly: what then? And hav­ing de­ter­mined this with­out pit­y­ing your­self, be­gin laboring to pre­pare what is not read­y, to en­ter the place where joy is un­end­ing. La­bor to push aside all that could give the ser­vants of out­er dark­ness the right to pre­vail over us and car­ry us a­way to their realm, from whence there will no long­er be a way out.

Forgive Trespasses

September 8, 2013 | Saint Theophan, Uncategorized

Elev­enth Sun­day Af­ter Pen­te­cost. [I Cor. 9:2-12; Matt. 18:23-35] The Lord con­cluded the par­a­ble a­bout the two debt­ors with the fol­low­ing words: So like­wise shall My Heav­en­ly Fa­ther do al­so un­to you, if ye from your hearts for­give not ev­ery one his broth­er their tres­pass­es. It would seem that such a small thing is need­ed: for­give and you will be for­given. When you are for­given, you are brought in­to mer­cy; and when you are brought in­to mer­cy, you have be­come a par­tic­i­pant in all the trea­sures of mer­cy. So here is sal­va­tion, and par­a­dise, and eter­nal bliss. What a great ac­qui­si­tion for such a small thing as forgiving!… Yes, it is a small thing, but for our self-love there is noth­ing more dif­fi­cult than to for­give. We still per­haps for­give some un­in­ten­tion­al an­noy­ance dealt us in pri­vate so that no­bod­y sees; but if it is just a bit more sen­si­tive, and in front of peo­ple, do not even ask — no for­give­ness. There are cir­cum­stances when wheth­er you want to or not, you are not al­low­ed to ex­press your dis­plea­sure — and so you re­main si­lent. How­ev­er, on­ly your tongue is si­lent — mean­while your heart speaks and builds evil plans. Raise the an­noy­ance yet an­oth­er de­gree — and there is no re­straint. Nei­ther shame, nor fear, nor loss, nor any oth­er thing will re­strain you. Ego­ism which has reach­ed the boil­ing point makes a per­son as though in­sane, and he who gives in to it be­gins to talk fool­ish­ness. The peo­ple most sub­ject to this mis­for­tu­na­te state are usu­al­ly not just any­bod­y — the more civilized one is, the more sen­si­tive he is to in­sults, and the less forgiving. Re­la­tions will of­ten re­main smooth on the sur­face, but in­ward­ly there is clear­ly dis­cord. Mean­while, the Lord re­quires that we for­give with our whole heart.

Spiritual Fruitlessness

August 26, 2013 | Saint Theophan, Uncategorized

Mon­day. [I Cor. 15:12-19; Matt. 21:18-22] The Lord con­demn­ed the fig tree to fruit­less­ness be­cause in ap­pear­ance it was so cov­er­ed with leaves that there ought to have been fruit on it; how­ev­er, none could be found. In ap­ply­ing this to the Chris­tian life, the leaves rep­re­sent out­ward works of pi­e­ty and out­ward spir­i­tu­al feats, while the fruits rep­re­sent in­ner dis­po­si­tions. This is a law: the for­mer should pro­ceed from the lat­ter. But out of con­de­scen­sion for our in­fir­mi­ty, the lat­ter should in any case de­vel­op to­geth­er with the for­mer. When the for­mer are strong but the lat­ter are not even bud­ding, a lie of life re­sults, which ex­press­es it­self like this: to seem, but not to be. At first this un­for­tu­nate state is per­haps not in one’s thoughts, but then it ap­pears un­no­tice­ab­ly and es­tab­lish­es it­self as a way of life. When one ap­plies him­self ex­ces­sive­ly to externals and be­comes pas­sion­ate­ly at­tached to them, his at­ten­tion to­ward his heart is sup­press­ed, his spir­i­tu­al feel­ings die a­way, and cold­ness set­tles in. At this stage spir­i­tu­al life freezes, and there re­mains on­ly an ap­pear­ance of pi­e­ty, but no pi­e­ty. The be­hav­iour is prop­er on the out­side, but in­ward­ly to the con­tra­ry. The con­se­quence of this is spir­i­tu­al fruit­less­ness–deeds are done, but they are all dead.

House of Prayer

August 23, 2013 | Saint Theophan, Uncategorized

Fri­day. [I Cor. 14:26-40; Matt. 21:12-14, 17-20] My House shall be call­ed the house of prayer; but ye have made it a den of thieves. Ev­ery­one knows that a church calls for rev­er­ence, for a col­lect­ing of thoughts, for deep think­ing a­bout God, and for stand­ing in the pres­ence of God, but who fulfils this? Peo­ple go to church with a de­sire to pray, to stand in it for a while with warm fer­vour; but then thoughts be­gin to wan­der, and bargaining be­gins in one’s head even louder than that which the Lord found in the Je­ru­sa­lem tem­ple. Why is this so? Be­cause the way one stands in church is a re­flec­tion of one’s en­tire life. As peo­ple live, so do they be­have in church. A church in­flu­ences and some­what sup­ports spir­i­tu­al move­ments; but then the usu­al course of one’s spir­i­tu­al con­sti­tu­tion takes over. There­fore if you want your time in church to con­sist of worthily stand­ing in the face of the Lord, pre­pare for this in your or­di­nary life; walk, as much as you can, in a prayer­ful frame of mind. This la­bour will bring you to the point that in church al­so you will stand rev­er­ent­ly all the time. This rev­er­ence will in­spire you to be rev­er­ent in your or­di­nary life as well. Thus you will walk ev­er higher and higher. Say, “O Lord, help” — and be­gin!

Be a servant to everyone

August 22, 2013 | Saint Theophan, Uncategorized

Thurs­day. [I Cor. 14:6-19; Matt. 20:17-28] Chris­tian­i­ty ful­ly sat­is­fies our striv­ing for su­pe­ri­or­i­ty — but how? Through a meth­od to­tal­ly op­posed to the one used in the world. Do you want to be first? Be a ser­vant to ev­ery­one; that is, be the last a­mongst them, and this is just as es­sen­tial as it is to at­tune your life and your dis­po­si­tion ac­cord­ing to the ex­am­ple of Christ the Lord. The Lord says, the Son of Man came not to be ministered un­to, but to min­is­ter, and to give his life a ran­som for man­y. The Lord min­is­ters, even wash­es the feet of His dis­ci­ples; there is no need, there­fore, to be a­shamed of ministering to some­one. Min­is­ter how­ev­er, and with what­ev­er, you can; there are op­por­tu­ni­ties ev­ery step of the way: feed one who is hun­gry, clothe one who is na­ked, bring a strang­er in­to your home, vis­it one who is sick and even tend to him, and do not re­fuse all oth­er help to those who ask it. Serve not the bod­y on­ly, but al­so the soul: give un­der­stand­ing, ad­vice, point out a good book, con­sole, sup­port. A word is al­so a pow­er­ful means to help; a soul goes out from it, and helps an­oth­er by join­ing with him.

Spirit of the world

August 20, 2013 | Saint Theophan, Uncategorized

Tues­day. [Heb. 4:1-13; Luke 21:12-19] And ye shall be hat­ed of all men for My name’s sake. He who breathes even a lit­tle of the spir­it of the world in­to him­self be­comes cold to Chris­tian­i­ty and its de­mands. This in­dif­fer­ence turns in­to dis­like when one re­mains in it a long time with­out com­ing to one’s sens­es, and es­pe­cial­ly af­ter pick­ing up some­where a par­ti­cle of some false teach­ing. The spir­it of the world with its false teach­ings is a spir­it of dis­lik­ing Christ: it is of the an­ti­christ. It is the spread of hos­tile at­ti­tudes to­ward the Chris­tian con­fes­sion and Chris­tian tra­di­tions. Ap­par­ent­ly some­thing like this is hap­pen­ing a­round us. So far on­ly hol­low roars are sound­ing ev­ery­where; but it will not be sur­pris­ing if soon the Lord’s proph­e­sy will be­gin, that, they shall lay their hands on you… and per­se­cute you… ye shall be be­tray­ed… and cause you to be put to death. The spir­it of an­ti­christ is al­ways the same; what was in the be­gin­ning will be now, per­haps in an­oth­er form, but with the same mean­ing. What should we do? In your pa­tience pos­sess ye your souls. Be pa­tient, with a firm word of con­fes­sion of the truth in your mouth and in your heart.

You give them something to eat

August 18, 2013 | Saint Theophan, Uncategorized

Eighth Sun­day Af­ter Pen­te­cost. [I Cor. 1:10-18; Matt. 14:14-22] Be­fore the mi­rac­u­lous fill­ing of the five thou­sand peo­ple, the dis­ci­ples of the Lord want­ed the peo­ple to be sent a­way; but the Lord said to them: They need not de­part; give ye them to eat. Let us learn this word, and each time the en­e­my sug­gests to us to re­fuse some­one who asks for some­thing, let us say from the face of the Lord: “They need not de­part, give ye them to eat” — and let us give what­ev­er we find at hand. The en­e­my de­stroys the de­sire to of­fer char­i­ty, and sug­gests that may­be the asker is not wor­thy of be­ing giv­en to; but the Lord did not in­ves­ti­gate the worthiness of those sit­ting there: he served ev­ery­one e­qual­ly, while of course, not ev­ery­one was e­qual­ly devoted to Him; per­haps there were even those who lat­er cried: “cru­ci­fy him.” Such is God’s over­all prov­i­dence to­ward us: He mak­eth His sun to rise on the evil and on the good, and send­eth rain on the just and on the un­just (Matt. 5:45). If on­ly the Lord would help us even a ti­ny bit to be mer­ci­ful, as our heav­en­ly Fa­ther is mer­ci­ful (Luke 6:36).

Thirst for Sorrows

August 14, 2013 | Saint Theophan, Uncategorized

Wednes­day. [I. Cor. 10:12-22; Matt. 16:20-24] When the Ho­ly A­pos­tles con­fess­ed the Sav­iour to be the Son of God, He said, I must… suf­fer… and be killed. The work had rip­en­ed; it re­main­ed on­ly to com­plete it through the death on the cross. The same thing oc­curs in the course of a Chris­tian’s mor­al prog­ress. While he is strug­gl­ing with his pas­sions, the en­e­my still hopes some­how to tempt him; but when pas­sions have set­tled down and the en­e­my no long­er has e­nough pow­er to awak­en them, he pres­ents ex­ter­nal temp­ta­tions, all sorts of wrong­ful ac­cu­sa­tions, more­over, the most sen­si­tive. He tries to plant the thought: “So what did you work and strug­gle for? No good will come of it for you.” But when the en­e­my thus pre­pares a war from with­out, the Lord sends down the spir­it of pa­tience to his strug­gler, there­by pre­par­ing a live­ly read­i­ness in his heart for all sorts of suf­fer­ing and hos­til­i­ty be­fore the en­e­my can man­age to stir up trou­ble. As the Lord said a­bout Him­self, I must suf­fer, spir­i­tu­al strug­glers al­so feel a sort of thirst for sor­rows. And when the suf­fer­ing and hos­til­i­ty come, they meet them with joy, and drink them in like a thirsting man drinks cooling wa­ter.