The right to be heard

February 5, 2012 | Saint Theophan, Uncategorized

[II Tim. 3:10–15; Luke 18:10–14] Yesterday the Gospel reading taught us persistence in prayer, and now it teaches humility, or a feeling of having no right to be heard. Do not assume that you have the right to be heard, but approach prayer as one unworthy of any at­ tention, allowing yourself only the boldness needed to open your mouth and raise up your prayer to God, knowing the Lord’s boundless condescension toward us poor ones. Do not even allow the thought to come to your mind, “I did such and such — so give me such and such.” Consider whatever you might have done as your obligation. If you had not done it you would have been subject to punishment, and what you did is actually nothing deserv­ ing reward; you did not do anything special. That Pharisee enumerated his rights to be heard, and left the church with nothing. The harm is not that he had actually done as he said, for indeed he should have done it. The harm is that he present­ ed it as something special; whereas, having done it he should have thought no more of it. Deliver us, O Lord, from this sin of the Pharisee! One rarely speaks as the Pharisee in words, but in the feelings of the heart, one is rarely unlike him. For why is it that people pray badly? It is because they feel as though they are just fine in the sight of God, even without praying.

Saint Theophan the Recluse

Too much questioning

February 4, 2012 | Saint Theophan, Uncategorized

[II Tim. 3:1–9; Luke 20:45–21:4] Who are those having a form of godliness, but denying the power thereof? (II Tim. 3–5). Who are those others, ever learning, and never able to come to the knowledge of the truth? (II Tim. 3:7). The former are those who maintain all the external routines in which a godly life is ma­ nifested, but who do not have a strong enough will to maintain their inner dispositions as true godliness demands. They go to church and stand there readily. But they do not make the effort to stand with their mind before God continuously and to reverently fall down before Him. Having prayed a bit, they release the reins of the control of their mind; and it soars, circling over the entire world. As a result, they are externally located in church, but by their inner state they are not there: only the form of godliness remains in them, while its power is not there. You must think about every­ thing else in this manner. The latter are those who, having entered the realm of faith, do nothing but in­ vent questions — “What is this? What is that? Why this way? Why that way?” They are people suffer­ ing from empty inquisitiveness. They do not chase after the truth, only ask and ask. And having found the answer to their questions, they do not dwell on them for long, but soon feel the necessity to look for another answer. And so they whirl about day and night, questioning and questioning, and never fully satisfied with what they learn. Some people chase after pleasures, but these chase after the satisfaction of their inquisitiveness.

Saint Theophan the Recluse

The Church established by the Apostles

January 30, 2012 | Saint Theophan, Uncategorized

[II Pet. 2:9–22; Mark 13:14–23] If any man shall say to you, Lo, here is Christ; or, lo, he is there; believe him not (Mark 13:21). Christ the Lord, our Saviour, having established upon the earth the holy Church, is well pleased to abide in it, as its head, en­ livener, and ruler. Christ is here, in our Orthodox Church, and He is not in any other church. Do not search for Him elsewhere, for you will not find Him. Therefore, if someone from a non-orthodox assemblage comes to you and begins to suggest that they have Christ — do not be­ lieve it. If some one says to you, “We have an apostolic community, and we have Christ,” do not believe them. The Church founded by the A­ postles abides on the earth — it is the Orthodox Church, And Christ is in it. The community established only yesterday cannot be apostolic, and Christ is not in it. If you hear someone saying, “Christ is speaking in me,” while he shuns the [Ortho­ dox] Church, does not want to know its pastors and is not sanctified by the Sacraments, do not believe him. In him is not Christ, but rather an­ other spirit appropriating the name of Christ in order to divert people from Christ the Lord and from His holy Church. Neither believe any­ one who suggests to you even some small thing alien to the [Orthodox] Church. Recognize all such people to be instruments of seducing spirits and preachers of lies.

Saint Theophan the Recluse

Armour of God

January 29, 2012 | Saint Theophan, Uncategorized

[Eph. 6:10–17; Matt. 4:1–11] The A­ postle clothes Christians in the whole armour of God. It is appro­ priate that this follows the previous lesson. For, if someone, heeding the call of God, has taken on the begin­ ning of a new life through God’s grace, providing for his own part all diligence (II Pet. 1:5), then he must not expect to rest on his laurels, but rather to struggle. He has left the world — for that the world will be­ gin to press him. He was saved from the power of the devil — the devil will chase after him and set snares before him, to throw him off the path of good and drag him back to his domain. He has denied himself, denied selfishness together with a whole horde of passions. But this sin living in us will not suddenly re­ linquish its free and untrammelled existence as we live in self-pleasure, and every minute it will attempt un­ der various pretexts to establish once more the same life routine that so richly filled and fed it earlier. These are three enemies, each with innumerable hordes; but the com­ mander-in-chief is the devil, whilst his closest helpers are the demons. They run the show in a sinful life —the opponents of a spiritual life. That is why the Apostle arms the Christian against them as if there were no other enemies at all. He says: we wrestle not against flesh and blood, but against principalities, against powers, against the rulers of the darkness of this world, against spiritual wickedness in high places (Eph. 6:12). If they did not exist, per­ haps battles would not exist either. Likewise, as soon as they are re­ pelled and struck down, it takes nothing to repel and defeat the oth­ ers. So each of you look to see where you need to direct your arrows, or at least look to see from which side you particularly need to defend yourself. Then, defend yourself! The Apostle prescribed several weap­ ons; but all of them have power only through the Lord. That is why expe­ rienced spiritual fighters have pass­ ed on to us this instruction: “Strike the enemy with the name of the Lord Jesus!”

Saint Theophan the Recluse

Rejecting the Lord

January 27, 2012 | Saint Theophan, Uncategorized

[Col. 4:10-18; Luke 10:1-15] Will there be such indulgence in the other world toward those who do not accept the Lord as He showed toward those living on the earth? No, there will not be. Sending “the seventy” to preach, the Lord com­ manded them, that they when they are not received, they should say on the crossroads: Even the very dust of your city, which cleaveth on us, we do wipe off against you: notwith­ standing, be ye sure of this, that the Kingdom of God is come nigh unto you. That is, we do not need any­ thing of yours — not with self-inter­ est do we walk and preach, but for the proclamation unto you of peace and the Kingdom of God. If you do not want to receive this good — as you like; we will go on. Thus it was commanded for the present time; but how will it be in the future? It shall be more tolerable in that day for Sodom, than for that city. There­ fore, it is useless for unbelievers to hope for the Lord’s indulgence. While on the earth they only do as they like; but as soon as death comes, the entire storm of God’s wrath will come down on them. It is great unhappiness to be as the un­ believers! They do not even have joy on the earth, because without God and the Lord Jesus Christ, the Saviour and Redeemer, even here all is dismal and dreary; what will be there is impossible to describe in words or to imagine. It would be more tolerable to be destroyed, but even that will not be given to them.

Saint Theophan the Recluse

Simplicity of Faith

January 20, 2012 | Saint Theophan, Uncategorized

[Heb. 11:8, 11-16; Mark 9:33-41] The Saviour sets forth a child as a model of faith and life. Simplicity of faith gives birth to simplicity of life; from both of these comes a model moral system. Let philoso­ phizing in here, and it will make disorder within; under the appear­ ance of better arranging affairs, it will throw one’s entire life into dis­ order. Philosophizing always cries, “This is not so, that is not so; let me establish everything in a new way; the old is worthless, boring.” But it has never yet, in any place, ar­ ranged anything good; it only throws things into confusion. The mind should obey what is com­ manded by the Lord. True, the mind is called “the tsar in the head”; how­ ever, this tsar is not given legisla­ tive power —only executive power. As soon as it starts making laws, it constructs it knows not what. Moral, religious, worldly, and political or­ ders are thrown into confusion, and everything goes upside down. It is a great misfortune for society when the mind in it is given freedom to soar, with no restraint by Divine truth! This is God’s wrath. About it is said, hide thyself a little for a mo­ ment, until the indignation pass a­ way (Isaiah 26:20) During this apo­ gee of mental self-wilfulness it is best to wrap oneself in simplicity of faith. Just as during a storm it is bet­ ter to sit at home and not step out to fight self-assuredly with it, so dur­ ing stormy self-mindedness it is bet­ ter not to step out into battle with it, or to seize the weapon of philoso­ phizing, or resist it. Simplicity of faith is stronger than philosophiz­ ing; clothe yourself in it, like in ar­ mour, and you will withstand.

Saint Theophan the Recluse

Unbelief

January 12, 2012 | Saint Theophan, Uncategorized

[Eph. 4:14-19; Mark 11:27-33] The Saviour proves that He was sent from heaven using the testimo­ ny of John the Forerunner. They were silent, for there was nothing to say to the contrary, yet they did not believe. Another time He proved the same thing through His deeds, and they thought up a new twist: [He casteth out devils] by the prince of the devils (Mt. 9:34, Mk. 3:22). But when this twist was exposed to be completely inappropriate, they again were silent, but nevertheless did not believe. Thus unbelievers never believe no matter what you tell them and how convincingly you prove the truth. They cannot say anything to the contrary, while nev­ ertheless they do not believe. One might say that their mind is para­ lyzed, since they reason sensibly a­ bout other things. Only when the is­ sue touches upon faith do they be­ come confused in their concepts and words. They also become con­ fused when they present their out­ looks as a substitute for the tenets of faith given by God. Here their doubt raises such a buttress that it is like a firm cliff. If you hear their entire theory through, you will see that a child could figure out that this is a spider’s web; but they do not see it. O unfathomable blind­ ness! One can explain the obstinacy of unbelievers as their not wanting to believe, but where does this come from? Where does it get such power that it makes a sensible man con­ sciously cling to an illogical form of thoughts? This is darkness. Is it not from the father of darkness?

Saint Theophan the Recluse

Fruit-Bearing Tree

January 10, 2012 | Saint Theophan, Uncategorized

[Eph. 2:19-3:7; Mark 11:11-23] The fig tree covered with leaves was splendid in appearance, but was not honoured with approval from the Lord because there was no fruit on it, and there was no fruit because there was no inner fruit-bearing power. How many such fig trees there are in the moral sense! In appearance all is proper, but on the inside there is nothing. They are orderly, honourable, and fulfil all that is Christian, but they do not have the spirit of life in Christ Jesus; that is why they do not have living fruit. And what is in them only seems to be fruit, but is not. In what lies the spirit of life in Christ Jesus? To this we say: one part in this is from the Lord, and the other from us. What is from the Lord essential­ ly is a fruit-bearing spiritual power; while what comes from us is just the receiver of this power. Concern yourself more with the latter. The root of this is the feeling that you are perishing, and that if it were not for the Lord, you would perish. From this you will have a heart that is broken and humbled, in every­ thing you do, throughout your life. Further, since the future is un­ known, there are many enemies, and you can stumble every mo­ ment, fear and trembling accompa­ ny salvation, along with the unceas­ ing cry: “O Thou Who knoweth all things, save me.” Woe to him also who rests on something other than the Lord; woe to him who has worked for something other than the Lord! Ask yourself, you who la­ bour in deeds which are considered God-pleasing, for whom are you working? If your conscience boldly answers: only for the Lord — it is good; but if not, you are building a house upon the sand. Here are sev­ eral indications of a fertile inner spirit. You can understand many other things according to this.

Saint Theophan the Recluse

The Most Holy Trinity

January 6, 2012 | Saint Theophan, Uncategorized

[Titus 2:11–14; 3:4–7; Matt. 3:13–17] The Baptism of the Lord is called Theophany [God Revealed] because in it the one true God, worshipped in Trinity, revealed Himself so pal­ pably: God the Father — through the voice from heaven, God the Son, incarnate — through His baptism, and God the Holy Spirit — through the descent upon the Baptized. Here the mystery of the relationship be­ tween the persons of the Most Holy Trinity is also revealed. God the Ho­ ly Spirit proceeds from the Father and rests in the Son, but does not proceed from the Son. Here also is revealed the fact that the incarnate Divine economy of our salvation is accomplished by God the Son incar­ nate, coexisting with the Holy Spirit and God the Father. And it is reveal­ ed that the salvation of each person can be accomplished no way other than in the Lord Jesus Christ, through the grace of the Holy Spirit, according to the good will of the Fa­ ther. All the Christian Mysteries shine here with their divine light and enlighten the minds and hearts of those who with faith celebrate this great festival. Come, let us men­ tally hasten on high and plunge our­ selves into the contemplation of these mysteries of our salvation, singing, “When Thou, O Lord, wast baptized in the Jordan, the worship of the Trinity was made manifest” — a salvation which in trinity es­ tablishes us, and in trinity saves us.

Saint Theophan the Recluse

Baptism

January 6, 2012 | Saint Theophan, Uncategorized

Baptism (kreshenie) in the Russian language sounds like cross (krest). This is fortunate consonance, for al­ though the visible action of baptism is submersion, its essence is a co-crucifixion with Christ on the inner, spiritual cross. The Apostle Paul says: our old man is crucified with him in baptism (Rom. 6:6). This is not some sort of mechanical act, but a moral change, or a revolution of thoughts, goals, desires, and sym­ pathies. Before, all of these were stained with self-pleasure; now all are selflessly dedicated to God, in Christ Jesus, by the grace of the Holy Spirit. [If you were baptized as an infant] you will say, “I didn’t under­ stand that when I was baptized.” Now you understand; set it in your conscience to carry out the meaning of baptism, for your baptism is in­ delible. Even at the judgement its seal will be visible either for you, or against you.

Saint Theophan the Recluse