“Seek first the kingdom of God” (Matthew 6:33)

A few words about Elder Paisius

In Cappadocia (Asia Minor), in a large family with Prodromos and Evlampia Eznepidis, a son was born on July 25, 1924 - who would later become Elder Paisios. At that time, Orthodox families in Cappadocia experienced oppression from Turkish Muslims, and many were forced to leave their homeland. In September 1924, refugees arrived in Greece. Paisius loved solitude, prayed unceasingly, and loved reading the lives of saints. He really liked the Athonite elders. Since 1962, Elder Paisios has lived in Sinai in the cell of Saints Galaktion and Epistimia. In 1964, the elder returned to Athos and settled in the Iveron monastery.

From the memoirs of Elder Paisius: “Once, during night prayer, heavenly joy began to take possession of me. At the same time, my cell, whose darkness was only slightly illuminated by the trembling light of a candle, began little by little to be filled with a beautiful bluish light. This mysterious light was extremely strong, however, I felt "That my eyes can withstand its brightness. It was the Divine Light that once illuminated the holy apostles on Mount Tabor! For many hours I remained in the illumination of this wondrous light, not feeling earthly objects, and being in the spiritual world, completely different from the local physical one. Being in this state and receiving heavenly sensations through that Light, I spent many hours without feeling time, with it the sunlight seemed like a full moon night! However, my eyes received the ability to withstand the brightness of that light."

Since 1968, the elder settled in the Athos monastery "Stavronikita." Having learned about the whereabouts of the elder, pilgrims rushed to this monastery.

The elder’s love for people was boundless, he tried not to denounce anyone publicly, for everyone he had a piece of sweet delight and a mug cold water, good advice and prayerful support. All day long he consoled the suffering and filled souls with hope and love for God, and at night he prayed, allowing himself to rest for only 3-4 hours. When the elder’s spiritual children asked him to take pity on himself - to rest, he answered: “When I want to rest, I pray. I learned that only prayer correctly frees a person from fatigue. Therefore, pray and study.” He said: “I always try not to deal with my pain. I have the pain of other people on my mind, and I make this pain my own. So we are obliged to always take the place of others... Good is good only if the one doing it sacrifices something - then with my own: sleep, rest and the like, that’s why Christ said: “... from my deprivation...” (Luke 21:4). When I do good, having rested, it does not cost much... Charter, and by making a sacrifice in order to help another, I experience heavenly joy... My own peace is born from the fact that I bring peace to another."

The elder read the entire Psalter every day. At night the elder prayed for the whole world. Separately, he offered prayers for those who are in hospitals, for quarreling married couples, prayed for everyone who finishes work late, for everyone traveling at night...

One night, when the elder was praying, it was revealed to him that at that moment a man named John was in danger. The elder lit a candle and began to pray for John. The next day, the same young man for whom he had prayed came to the elder. John told him that it was at that hour when the elder began to pray for the salvation of his soul that, out of despair, he decided to commit suicide. He got on a motorcycle and rushed out of the city, only to ride off a cliff and crash. Suddenly the thought came to him: “They talk so much about this Paisia ​​on the Holy Mountain, shouldn’t I go to him too.” Having met the elder, John found a loving spiritual father, through whose prayers he set out on the true path.

Through the prayers of Elder Paisius, many believers received healings. One day, the father of a deaf-mute girl turned to the elder for help. He said that several years ago, before the birth of the child, he put obstacles in the way of his brother, who wanted to become a monk. Seeing the man’s sincere repentance, Elder Paisios prayed for the girl’s healing and promised: “Your daughter will not only speak, but will also deafen you!” After a while the girl began to speak.

Often the relatives of those who, according to doctors, were not destined to survive after serious operations and incurable diseases, turned to the elder for help. There are many testimonies about the miraculous healing of hopelessly ill people through the prayers of the elder. However, the health of the old man himself deteriorated catastrophically from year to year.

Back in 1966, after a pulmonary disease, as a result of taking strong antibiotics, the old man developed pseudomembranous colitis with sharp abdominal pain. Despite the pain, he stood for hours, receiving people who wanted to take his blessing. The elder believed that pain greatly helps the soul and humbles it, and the more sick a person is, “the more benefit he receives.”

Since 1988, the old man developed an additional complication in the intestines, accompanied by bleeding. By 1993, the elder’s condition became very serious, but Elder Paisios did not stop receiving pilgrims. When his spiritual children begged him to see doctors, he replied that “such a state is very helpful in spiritual life, so it is not beneficial to drive it out.” The elder bravely endured the suffering that befell him, never asked for anything for himself, and prayed only for the healing of others. At the insistence of his spiritual children, he nevertheless went to the hospital for treatment; doctors determined the presence of a cancerous tumor. In 1994, the elder underwent two operations, but his health continued to deteriorate: on July 11, he took communion for the last time. On July 12, 1994, the elder gave up his soul to the Lord.

Lord, rest the soul of Elder Paisius, rest with the saints, and through his prayers save us.

Providence of God

The providence of God is the constant care of the Creator for everything that He has created. To a person who is inattentive and leads an absent-minded lifestyle, it seems that everything is going on as usual. All events are the result of a coincidence. It seems to such a frivolous person that God, if He exists, is somewhere far away in the sky, that He is not interested in our world, since this world is too small and insignificant in the eyes of God. People who think this way are what are called deists. The deistic teaching about God has become especially widespread in the West in recent centuries, when people began to lose living contact with God in the Church, the sacraments and prayer. Such people are usually at the same time superstitious. Great importance They give the influence of stars on human life, they monitor all sorts of stupid things, for example: so that the cat does not cross the road, so as not to spill salt on the table, not to say hello across the threshold, not to sleep with your feet towards the door, and so on. For some superstitious people, the number of such signs reaches a huge number. But in vain these people only complicate their lives. If you don’t pay attention to all these stupid superstitious signs, then it will be best, because the whole world in general and the life of every person in particular is controlled by God.

The Savior said that even the smallest bird will not fall without the will of God (Matthew 10:29), especially since nothing in our lives can happen apart from His will. Everything good and good is sent by the Lord, for He is the eternal source of all good things. Yet evil is not sent directly by God, for God has no shadow of evil. But the Lord sometimes allows evil to harm us for the sake of our benefit and salvation. In this case, various troubles have the same effect as bitter, unpleasant, but at the same time life-saving medicines. Almost all medications and medical operations are unpleasant for us, but we still resort to them, because we know their benefits and necessity.

All people should firmly know that only God is the source of happiness, peace and bliss. Consolation and joy visible world The Lord created for our bodily nature. But a person, using everything with moderation and possessing a rational soul, should not forget God. After all, the soul cannot be satisfied with anything earthly and material. In most cases, it turns out that we satisfy our bodily desires with some kind of insatiability, but completely forget about the soul and its spiritual needs. For our salvation, the Lord allows various sorrows to befall us. Suffering, we begin to understand the vanity of our earthly life and turn to God for admonition and help.

While suffering, we must firmly believe that God is infinitely good and that He wants only our eternal happiness. Therefore, we must gratefully accept various trials from Him. After all, children do not stop loving their parents when they punish them, because they feel that their parents are doing this for their own good.

Below we present a number of thoughts and examples of Elder Paisius about the providence of God. These statements of the Elder are especially valuable because they were drawn from his personal experience. The Elder's statements are offered here in the form of questions from his visitors and the Elder's answers.

Bishop Alexander (Mileant)

Questions from visitors and answers from the Elder

Geronda! (i.e. spiritual father), Abba Macarius says that God will give us heavenly blessings [ 199 ], and we believe in it. Should we also believe that He will give us earthly blessings that are not so essential?

What earthly goods?

What we need.

That's what you said correctly. God loves His creation, His image, and takes care of what it needs.

Should you believe in this and not worry?

If a person does not believe in this and strives to acquire these benefits, then he will suffer. But a person who lives spiritually will not be upset even if God does not give him earthly and material things. If we seek first the Kingdom of God, if the search for this Kingdom is our only concern, then everything else will be given to us. Will God abandon His creation to the mercy of fate? If the Israelites left the manna that God gave them in the desert the next day, it began to rot [ 200 ]. God arranged it this way so that they would rely on divine providence.

We have not yet understood even the words “seek first the Kingdom of God.” Either we believe [and entrust ourselves to God] or we do not believe [and therefore we ourselves must take care of the necessary things]. When I went to live in Sinai, I had nothing with me. However, I didn’t think at all about what would happen to me in the desert among strangers what I will eat and how I will live. The cell of St. Epistimia, where I was to settle, had long been abandoned, abandoned by people. I didn’t ask the monastery for anything, not wanting to burden it. Once they brought me bread from the monastery, and I returned it back. Why should I worry if Christ said: “Seek first the kingdom of God” [ 201 ]. There was very little water either. I didn’t know any needlework. Now ask me how I lived and how I earned my bread. The only tool I had were scissors. I separated them into two halves, sharpened them on a stone, took a board and began to cut out icons. I worked and said the Jesus Prayer. I quickly learned carving, cut the same design all the time and finished five days’ work at eleven o’clock. Not only did he not endure hardship, but he also helped the Bedouins. At some point I did this for many hours a day, and then I came to such a state that I did not want to do needlework, but at the same time I saw the need that the Bedouins suffered. It was a great blessing for them to receive a hat and a pair of sandals as a gift. And I had a thought: “Did I come here to help the Bedouins or to pray for the whole world?” So I decided to cut back on my handicrafts so I could be less distracted and pray more. Do you think I was waiting for someone to help me? Where? The Bedouins themselves had nothing to eat. The monastery was far away, and on the other side there were uninhabited places. But on the very day when I limited my work in order to devote more time to prayer, one person came to me. I was near the cell then, he saw me and said: “Here, take these hundred gold pieces. You will help the Bedouins, and you will follow your routine and pray.” I couldn’t restrain myself, I left him alone for a quarter of an hour and went to his cell. The providence and love of God brought me to such a state that I could not hold back my tears. Do you see how God arranges everything when a person has a good disposition? Because how much could I give to these unfortunate people? I gave it to one, and another immediately came: “My father didn’t give it to me!” - then the third: “My father didn’t give it to me!”

Geronda, why do we, having felt the omnipotence of God many times, do not see His providence for us?

This is the devil's snare. The devil throws ashes into a person’s eyes so that he does not see God’s providence. After all, if a person sees the providence of God, then his granite heart will soften, become sensitive and pour out in praise. And this is not good for the devil.

Man often tries to arrange everything without God

One man began breeding fish and spent all day saying: “Glory to Thee, God!” - because I constantly saw divine providence. He told me that from the moment of its fertilization, when it is still tiny, like a pinhead, there is a sac with liquid, which it feeds on until it grows and becomes capable of independently eating aquatic microorganisms. That is, the fish receives a “packed ration” from God! If God even provides for fish, then how much more does He provide for man! But often a person arranges and decides everything without God. “I,” he says, “will have two children [and that’s enough].” He doesn't consider God. This is why so many accidents happen and so many children die. Most families will have two children. But one child is hit by a car, another gets sick and dies, and the parents remain childless.

Blessings of miraculous divine providence

Sometimes, Geronda, I have some desire, and God fulfills it without my asking Him. How does this happen?

God cares for us. He sees our needs, our desires, and when something is for our good, He gives it to us. If a person needs help with something, then Christ and the Most Holy Theotokos help him. When Elder Philaret [ 203 ] asked: “How can I help you, Geronda? What do you need?” - he answered: “What I need will be sent to me by the Mother of God.” That's what happened. When we entrust ourselves to the Lord, He is ours Good God, watches over us and cares about us. As a good Steward, He gives each of us what we need. It even includes our material needs. And in order for us to understand His care, His providence, He gives us exactly as much as we need. However, do not wait for God to give you anything first; no, first give yourself all to God. Because if you constantly ask God for something, but do not give yourself to Him with trust, then it is clear that you have your own home, and you are a stranger to the eternal heavenly abodes. Those people who give everything to God and wholly surrender themselves to Him are covered by God’s great dome and protected by His divine thought. Trust in God is an endless, mysterious prayer that, at the right moment, silently attracts Divine forces to where they are needed. And then His curious children endlessly praise Him with much gratitude.

When Father Tikhon settled in the Kaliva of the Holy Cross, there was no church in it, which he needed. He didn’t even have money for construction - nothing except great faith in God. One day, after praying, he went to Karyes with the faith that God would help him with the money needed to build a church. On the way to Karyes, the abbot of Ilinsky Skete called him from afar. When Father Tikhon approached him, he said: “One good Christian from America sent these dollars so that I would give them to some ascetic who does not have a temple. You just don’t have a temple, take this money and build " Father Tikhon shed tears of emotion and gratitude to God, the Knower of the Heart, who took care of the temple even before Father Tikhon asked Him about it - so when he prayed about it, the money was already ready.

If a person trusts God, then God does not leave him. And, indeed: if tomorrow at ten o’clock you need something, then (if this need does not exceed the limits of reason and the thing is really necessary) at fifteen minutes to ten or half past nine God will have it ready to give you. For example, tomorrow at nine you need a mug. It will be with you at five minutes to nine. You need five hundred drachmas. At the hour when you need them, exactly five hundred drachmas appear, and not five hundred ten and not four hundred ninety. I noticed that if I, for example, need something tomorrow, then God has taken care of it today. That is, even before I thought about it, God thought about it, He took care of what was necessary in advance and gives it at the hour when it is needed. I realized this by seeing how long it takes for some thing to come to me from somewhere at the very hour when I need it. Therefore, God takes care of this in advance.

When we, out of curiosity, please God with our lives, He gives unenvious blessings to His curious children at the hour when they need them. Then the whole life passes in the blessings of divine providence. I can spend hours giving you examples of God’s wonderful providence.

When I was at war, participating in combat operations, I had the Gospel, and I gave it to someone. Then I said:

“Oh, if I had the Gospel, how it would help me!” For Christmas, two hundred parcels from Mesolonghi were sent to our unit, which was then in the mountains [ 204 ]. Of the two hundred parcels, only the one that I received contained the Gospel! It was an old edition of the Gospel, with a map of Palestine. The parcel also contained a note: “If you need other books, write and we will send them to you.” Another time, when I was already in the Stomion monastery, I needed a lamp for the temple. One morning, at dawn, I went down to Konitsa. Passing by one house, I heard a girl say to her father: “Dad, the monk is coming!” He came out to meet me and said: “Father, I made a vow to donate a lamp to the Mother of God. Take this money and buy it yourself.” And he gave me five hundred drachmas - exactly what the lamp cost in 1958.

Even now, when I have some need, God immediately covers it. For example, if I want to cut firewood and I can’t, then the firewood comes on its own in no time. Before coming to you, I received a parcel containing fifty thousand drachmas - exactly what I needed. Another example: I gave someone as a blessing the icon “It is worthy to eat.” The next day they bring me “Iverskaya”! And this summer [ 205 ], until it rained, I had no water at all. Now it’s only a little splashed, and I take [at most] one and a half cans of water a day. There was still water in the tank from last year, but it had gone rotten. How, however, God arranges everything! I have a barrel of water. Every day so many people come - they drink, wash, they come sweating, and the water level only drops by four to five fingers! One barrel for one hundred and fifty to two hundred people - and it never gets empty! At the same time, some people sometimes open the tap too much, others forget to close it, and the water flows out, but does not end!

Entrusting yourself to divine providence

A person who follows God's blessings learns to make himself dependent on divine providence. And then he already feels like a baby in a cradle, who, as soon as his mother leaves him, starts crying and does not stop until she runs to him again. It is a great thing to entrust yourself to God! When I first came to the Stomion Monastery, I had nowhere to live. The whole monastery was littered construction waste. I found one corner near the fence, covered it a little from above and spent the night sitting there, because lying down I would not have fit there. One day a hieromonk I knew came to me and asked: “Listen, how do you live here?” “What,” I asked him in response, “did the worldly people have more than ours? When Canaris asked for a loan, they told him: “You don’t have a homeland,” then he replied: “We will win back our homeland.” If such faith was in "A worldly person, shouldn't we have trust in God? Since the Mother of God brought me here, will she really not take care of Her monastery when the time comes?" And, indeed, little by little, because how the Most Holy Theotokos arranged everything! I remember when the craftsmen poured concrete into the ceilings of burnt-out cells, the cement ran out. There was still a third of the floor to be concreted. The craftsmen come up to me and say: “The cement is running out. We need to put more sand and less cement in the concrete in order to concrete everything.” - “No,” I told them, “don’t dilute it, continue as you started.” It was impossible to bring more cement because all the mules were in the field. The craftsmen had to walk two hours to Konitsa, then another two hours to the field, to look for mules in the pasture there. How much time they would have lost... And then people had their own affairs, they would not have been able to come another day. I look: two-thirds of the ceiling has been filled. I went into the church and said: “My lady, what now?! I ask you, help us!” Then I left the temple...

And then what, Geronda?

And the floors were finished, and there was extra cement left!

Did the masters understand this?

How they didn’t understand! How great is the help of God and the Most Holy Theotokos sometimes!

God uses everything for good.

Geronda, sometimes we start something, and a whole bunch of obstacles appear. How can you tell if they are from God?

Let's see if this is our fault. If we are not guilty, then the obstacle is from God and serves our good. Therefore, there is no need to be upset that the job is not done or is delayed in completion. One day, in a hurry on some urgent matter, I was descending from the Stomion monastery to Konitsa. On one difficult section of the road (I called this place Golgotha) I met a monastic acquaintance, Uncle Anastasy, with three loaded mules. On a steep climb, the pack saddles slid to one side, and one animal was on the very edge of the cliff - about to fall down. "God sent you, father!" - Uncle Anastasy was delighted. I helped him load the mules, then we took them out onto the road. There I left him and continued on my way. A fair portion of the path had already passed when the path ran into a rubble. A large, three hundred meters long, landslide had just occurred, crushing the path. Trees, stones - everything was carried down into the river. If I had not been delayed with the mules, I would have ended up in this place just at the time of the landslide. “Uncle Anastasy,” I said, “you saved me, God sent you.”

Christ sees from above how each of us acts, knows when and how He Himself will act for our good. He knows how and where to lead us, as long as we ask Him for help, open our desires to Him and let Him arrange everything Himself. When I was in the Athos Philotheevsky Monastery, I wanted to go into the desert. I was thinking of retiring to a deserted island and had already arranged for a boatman to come and pick me up, but in the end he didn’t show up. God arranged it this way, because I was still inexperienced and on a deserted island I would have been badly damaged, I would have become a victim of demons there. Then, having failed with the island, I became eager to go to Katunaki. I loved the Katunak Desert, I prayed to be there and prepared for it. I wanted to settle and asceticize next to Elder Peter, a man of high spiritual life. However, an event occurred that forced me to go not to Katunaki, but to Konitsa. One evening after Compline, I retired to my cell and prayed until late. Around eleven o'clock I lay down to rest. At half past two in the morning I was awakened by the knocking on the monastery bell, calling the brethren to the church for the Midnight Office. I tried to get up, but I couldn't. An invisible force bound me, and I was unable to move. I realized that something special was happening. I remained bedridden until noon. I could pray, think, but could not move at all. Being in this state, as if on TV, I saw Katunaki on one side, and the Stomion Monastery in Konitsa on the other. With strong desire I fixed my eyes towards Katunak, and then a certain voice clearly said to me:

“You will not go to Katunaki, but to the Stomion Monastery.” It was the voice of the Most Holy Theotokos. “Mother of God,” I said, “I asked You for desert, and You send me into the world?” And I again heard the same voice, sternly telling me: “You will go and meet such and such a person. He will help you a lot.” I immediately freed myself from these invisible bonds, and my heart was filled with Divine Grace. Then I went and told my confessor about what had happened. “This is the will of God,” the confessor told me. “However, don’t tell anyone about this. Say that for health reasons (and I was bleeding at the time) you need to leave Athos, and leave.”

I wanted one thing, but God had His own plan. I thought then that God’s will was for me to revive the monastery in Konitsa. This is how I fulfilled the vow I made to the Mother of God when I was at war. “Mother of God,” I asked Her then, “help me become a monk, and I will work for three years and put Your burnt monastery in order.” But, as it became clear later, main reason The reason that the Most Holy Theotokos sent me there was the need to help eighty families who had turned to Protestantism return to Orthodoxy.

God often allows things to happen for the benefit of many people. He never does only one good thing, but three or four good things together. And He never allows evil to happen unless much good comes from it. He uses everything: both mistakes and dangers for our benefit. Good and evil are mixed together. It would be good if they were separate, but personal human interests interfere and confuse them with each other. However, God benefits even from this confusion. Therefore, one should believe that God only allows things to happen from which good can come, because He loves His creation. For example, He may allow some small temptation in order to protect us from the temptation of a larger one. Once upon a time, a layman was at a patronal feast in some Svyatogorsk monastery. There he drank and got drunk. On the way back from the monastery, he fell on the road. It began to snow and drifted, but the wine spirit caused a hole to form in the snowdrift above it. A passerby was walking past that place. Seeing a hole in the snow, he said in surprise: “What is this here? Isn’t it a spring?” and hit the hole with a stick. "Ox!" - the drunk shouted. So God did not let him die.

God's blessings make a hole in the heart.

Geronda, what does God want from us?

God wants our will, our good disposition, manifested, even if only a little, by an honest deed. He also wants us to recognize our sinfulness. He gives everything else. Spiritual life does not require biceps. Let us strive humbly, ask for God’s mercy and thank Him for everything. Over a person who, without any plan of his own, gives himself into the hands of God, God’s plan is fulfilled. As much as a person clings to his “I,” he remains behind. He does not prosper spiritually because he hinders God's mercy. It takes a lot of trust in God to succeed.

At every moment, God caresses the hearts of all people with His love, but we do not feel it, because our hearts are covered with scum. Having cleansed his heart, a person is touched, melts, goes crazy, seeing the benefits and kindness of God, who loves all people equally. For those who suffer, such a person feels pain, for those who lead a spiritual life, he experiences joy. If an inquisitive soul thinks about the good deeds of God alone, then they can lift her up, but what can we say if she thinks about the many of her sins and the many benevolence of God! If a person’s spiritual eyes have been cleansed, then, seeing God’s care [for himself and others], he feels and experiences all divine providence with his sensitive, naked heart, he melts with gratitude, he becomes crazy in the good sense of the word. Because God's gifts, when a person feels them, they make a hole in the heart, tear it apart. And then, when, caressing a curious heart, God’s hand touches this gap, a person internally flutters, and his gratitude to God becomes greater. Those who strive, feeling both their own sinfulness and the good deeds of God, and entrust themselves to His great benevolence, elevate their souls to heaven with greater reliability and less physical labor.

Gratitude to God for little and much.

“I believe that God will help me,” some say, but at the same time they try to save money so as not to experience any deprivation. Such people mock God because they entrust themselves not to Him, but to money. If they do not stop loving money and placing their hope in it, they will not be able to place their hope in God. I'm not saying that people shouldn't have some savings in case of need, no. But you should not put your hope in money, you should not give your heart to the din, because by doing this, people forget God. A person who, not trusting God, makes his own plans, and then says that God wants it that way, “blesses” his work like the devil and is constantly tormented. We have not realized how powerful and good God is. We do not allow Him to be the master, we do not allow Him to control us, and therefore we suffer.

In Sinai, in the cell of St. Epistimia, where I lived, there was very little water. In one cave, about twenty meters from the cell, water was oozing drop by drop from a crevice in the rock. I made a small water collector and collected three liters of water per day. When I came for water, I would put out an iron can and, while it was filling, I would read an akathist to the Most Holy Theotokos. I wet my head a little, just my forehead, it helped me, as one doctor advised, I took a little water for drinking, and in a separate jar I put a little water for the mice and birds living near my cell. For washing and other needs I used the same water from the cave. What joy, what gratitude I felt for the little water I had! I praised God for having water.

Then, when I arrived at the Holy Mountain and settled for a short time in the Iveron monastery, there, since the side was sunny, there was no shortage of water. There was one tank, the water from which overflowed over the top. Uh! I washed both my hair and my feet, but... the old things were forgotten. In Sinai, tears welled up in my eyes from gratitude for the low water, but here, in the monastery, due to the abundance of water, I fell into forgetfulness. Therefore, I left this cell and settled further away, about eighty meters away, where there was a small cistern. How lost, how forgotten a person is from abundance!

We must completely, unconditionally, entrust ourselves to divine providence, God's will, and God will take care of us. One monk went one evening to the top of the mountain to perform vespers there. On the way he found White mushroom and thanked God for this rare find. On the way back, he wanted to cut this mushroom and cook it for dinner. “If the laity begin to ask me if I eat meat,” the monk reasoned in his thoughts, “then I can tell them that I eat every autumn!” Returning to the kaliva, the monk saw that while he was reading Vespers, some animal had stepped on the mushroom, and only half remained intact. “Apparently,” said the monk, “I need to eat so much.” He collected what was left and thanked God for His providence, for half a mushroom. A little lower he found another half a mushroom, bent down to cut it and make up for the lack of it for dinner, but saw that the mushroom was rotten (perhaps it was poisonous). The monk left him and again thanked God for saving him from poisoning. Returning to the kaliva, the monk dined on half a mushroom. The next day, when he left the house, a wonderful sight was revealed to his eyes. Beautiful mushrooms grew all around the kaliva, and when he saw them, the monk again thanked God. You see, he thanked God for the whole mushroom and for the half, for the good and for the bad, for one and for many. He was grateful for everything.

The good God bestows abundant blessings upon us, and His actions are for our benefit. All the blessings we have are gifts from God. He put everything at the service of his creation - man. He made sure that everyone: animals, birds, small and great, even plants - sacrificed themselves for him. And God Himself sacrificed himself in order to deliver man. Let us not be indifferent to all this, let us not wound Him with our great lack of gratitude and insensibility, but let us begin to thank and glorify Him.

See: Rev. Macarius of Egypt. Spiritual conversations. STSL, 1904.

See: Ref. 16:19-20.

Narthex - western part of the temple, porch. - Approx. lane

Elder Paisios. Svyatogorsk fathers and Svyatogorsk stories. Holy Trinity Sergius Lavra, 2001. P.62-65.

City in Central Greece. -Approx. lane

Pronounced in the summer of 1990

See: Heb. 12:1.

In. 11:25-26.

See: Zech. 11:1-13.

See: Ps. 21:19.3

See: Jer. 18:2; 32:9. Matt. 27:7-9.

Acts 9:1-18.

See: Matt. 14:30.

See: Elder Paisios. Svyatogorsk fathers and Svyatogorsk stories. Holy Trinity Sergius Lavra, 2001. P. 9.

Matt. 17:20. OK. 17:6

In this case, faith means simple acceptance of the existence of God, which is not sufficient for life in Christ.

See: Heb. 11:1.

Theotokos at Great Compline, tone 6.

See: Matt. 9:29. Mk. 9:23.

Wed. Is. 6:9-10

On June 3, 1979, Elder Paisios prayed the rosary, saying: “Saints of the day, pray to God for us.” He did not remember which saint was commemorated that day, and could not find glasses to look at in the monthly book (just a few days earlier, the Elder had moved to the Panaguda cell and had not yet sorted out his things). Then the holy martyr Lucillian, whose memory is celebrated on June 3, visited him and repeated his difficult name to him three times.

Among pious Christians in Greece, there is a widespread tradition of building tiny chapels along the roads, usually in gratitude to God, the Blessed Virgin Mary or saints, or in memory of loved ones who died in car accidents. - Approx. lane

How many of us remember God in the bustle of worldly life? We are mired in everyday affairs, eternal household worries, eternal lack of money, problems with children, unloved work, and if we turn to the Lord, it is with requests or reproaches, why don’t you give it? Why are you taking this away? And if trouble or misfortune happens, we are sincerely indignant “for what?”

“One of the most common activities of a modern adult is self-pity; we love to retire, sit down and think about life and say the phrase “why did this happen to me?” What have I done? Is this an accident or the action of some fatal forces, or is it God’s providence?”

But there are no accidents in our lives, we simply do not understand how events are connected to each other, why we meet certain people along the path of life. And when something pleasant happens, we say: “it was God’s providence,” the Lord took care of us. What if trouble happened? Got sick close person or lost their home and everything they owned due to a fire, had an accident and became disabled, were left without work and money, how many in such situations will be able to understand and accept God’s providence?

“Illness is most often not a punishment, but God’s permission, a person in a healthy state sometimes goes very far from God, like the prodigal son in the Gospel, to a distant land, and when illnesses appear, he returns to the saving fence of the church and begins to analyze what I am not I do this because God allows these diseases, that is, the word punishment is inappropriate here, but permission.

That is, the admission of some kind of illness for the purpose of our correction, for the purpose of our healing of our sinful ulcers. After all, sometimes sinful ulcers are much worse than external, bodily diseases, which the Lord allows us for our correction. Therefore, treating illnesses without grumbling is a purely Christian approach. To thank God is like the righteous Job, about whom it is written in the Bible, who thanked him not only for what was good and good, but also for the sorrow that befell him by God’s permission. Read the book of Job and it is clearly written there how the Lord allowed Job to suffer these sorrows, including the terrible and incurable disease of leprosy at that time, but today it is called leprosy.”

For parents, there is nothing worse than the death of a child, why does God allow the death of a completely innocent child, what is his purpose here?

“The answer to this is, I won’t even cite the holy fathers, Jesus Christ himself answers, such is the Kingdom of Heaven. I don’t even need holy fathers; moreover, he said if you don’t be like them, you won’t enter the Kingdom of Heaven like them. And what children was he talking about? There was no baptism then. About those who are not even baptized, such is the Kingdom of Heaven. And these children are already waiting for your parents there. They have already reached home, can you imagine? And if you want this to sound more convincing, imagine that you are walking along a very dangerous section of the road, traveling, and at any moment you can fall into an abyss, be attacked by robbers, and torn apart by animals. And you are walking with your child and suddenly a helicopter appears and, seeing your distress, sits down to you and says that there is only one place, we are flying exactly to where you are going. What will you parents do? You will fall to your knees, asking to pick up your child, thinking that you will somehow get there on your own. Now do you understand what happened? The helicopter flew up and took the child to where we are all going and we are not going anywhere, we are all going. The child is already there and waiting for you, and try to meet your child with dignity so that you don’t feel ashamed. Do you understand what worthy means?

“There is God’s providence over every person and the whole world, and our society is so short-sighted that we cannot see this providence even at a meter, let alone at a greater distance. We cannot even understand the providence of God about one person, let alone several. And we cannot say why this happened, we can only say when innocent people suffer that this is the will of God. I can give several examples from life. One mother had a little daughter and she and her husband divorced or he died. And then my daughter got sick. The mother was so tormented, and it is said that if you ask and ask with faith, the Lord will give, and so they asked for their daughter to recover. Although the doctors said that she was hopeless. And a miracle happens, the daughter instantly begins to recover. The mother is very happy, the daughter grows up and at a completely young age, maybe 18-20 years old, she begins to live a prodigal life, starts drinking, falls into very bad company and finally drives her mother out of the house, who, like a beggar, lives out her life under the fence. It would have been God’s will for this child to die, because God foresaw what would happen next to this child and this woman. She would have died innocently and received the Kingdom of Heaven, but God arranged it so that there would be someone to care for her mother. It turned out that one suffered terribly, and the other spiritually perished.”

“We don’t know what God’s providence is, what God is protecting us from, what God is preparing us for, where God is leading us, because everything that doesn’t happen is for the salvation of the soul. We accept this as the will of God, we accept it with thanksgiving, and perhaps with tears. With tears, but still with thanksgiving. And we find joy, and we find life, and we find God.”

Often illness saves us from something more significant and terrible. It’s good if we understand this and thank God for it.

“Or that wise simple man, the bus driver, why did you come to the temple? To which he replies: “Because God broke my leg. Open fracture. How? What? Why?

But that’s why.”

They broke their leg, they put a cast on, friends came, let’s go there now, have a drink, take a walk. They went out and drank, went for a walk, gang rape, everyone was eight years old. Then he says: “How can I thank God? My leg healed in three months, I’m now working and feeding my children, but they’ve been sitting for a year now.”

God gave us free will and the right to choose to do good or evil. He will not force bad people to become good.

“We are all children of God, we all quarreled, quarreled like careless brothers and sisters, and we have established bad orders in our human society, not God’s orders and God expects from us. That we will correct the situation, we created this situation ourselves, we ourselves will correct it. here is the answer to your question. The world is free for us and everyone can take the side of God and actively carry out the will of God. But this does not mean that we are protected from the evil people with whom we come into contact. Because we live in a society in society, we are not closed individuals. And the sins of any member of society are reflected on you and us. I repeat, our world is free.

If someone screwed up some nut on a plane poorly and because of this the plane fell apart and let’s say I and my children died, well, you see, I bear the stamp of this tragedy of the world, the carelessness of a person, if some doctor performed an operation with a hangover and it was bad did, and then the person got infected and measures, well, you see, the patient also bears the cross of life in a sinful human society, if some drunk person gets behind the wheel and hits innocent people, or someone drunk burns down a house with children, so what? Well, we can cry for these children, we will sing for these children. We will believe that they will go to the Kingdom of Heaven, but at the same time the Lord does not want to perform a lobotomy, does not want to forcefully re-educate all the bad and evil people. He believes that human society itself will find the resources to do this.”

We are often ungrateful and forget how the Lord more than once rescued us from troubles through His providence. Just strain your memory and remember, because there were such cases.

“I want to say this, I am deeply convinced that when we come to another world, when the truth about our life is revealed to us, because something will be revealed to us, then we will know how many troubles the Lord has saved us from. And we will feel so ashamed of our ingratitude. One of my spiritual daughters recently wrote an essay and it’s called “Ten times when the Lord saved me from death.” We ourselves can remember offhand ten times. I can immediately remember how I got caught on a tram, and it dragged me along with it, and I almost died. And there are many other cases when we walk along a dark alley, we cannot predict that the Lord turned away some drug addict who had already sharpened a knife and was coming to stab us or take money from us. We don’t know, maybe God sent him the idea to stay home and take a different path, or maybe he shouldn’t use drugs today, but go to bed to sleep it off. I don’t know, but I’m sure that when we come to the next world we will see that God has saved us an infinite number of times. Maybe if it weren’t for God’s providence, then cars would collide more often and planes would crash more often, but the Lord protects us and saves us, but this cannot happen all the time, because we live within the framework of a fallen, defeated, sick world. The world, which is just waiting for its healing, therefore let us pray for all the departed, let us pray for all the sufferers and put ourselves into the hands of God. When Saint Anthony prayed why, Lord, do you allow such injustices, that the innocent suffer, God said: “Anthony, pay attention to yourself, otherwise do not test the ways of God.” that is, something is not open to us, we have to come to terms with it.”

“For a non-believer there are no miracles, there are coincidences, there are accidents, but for a believer there is a miracle at every step, not only in the sense of mysticism, but in the fact that without God’s providence nothing happens in the world.”

Magdalena, the daughter of father Nikon Vorobyov, learned from the example of her own life what God’s providence is.

“Mother Magdalene in the world Olga Andreevna Nekrasova for three years now, after returning to her historical homeland from France, she is the bearer of the famous Marfomarin monastery. On her father’s side, our heroine is a relative of the poet Nekrasov, and on her mother’s side, her family descends from the Prophet Mohammed, a Persian sheikh who fled to Russia . His son, having converted to Orthodoxy, became the founder of Russian Oriental studies. The great-grandmother of our heroine was the daughter of Leo Tolstoy, Maria Lvovna. The most revered of the relatives is Saint Joseph of Belgorod. Our heroine is a real legend; twenty letters from Father Nikon Vorobyov’s book “Repentance is Left to Us” are addressed to her. Nikon Vorobyov was tonsured in 1931, survived arrest, imprisonment, and exile. He acquired the unceasing Jesus Prayer and the gift of spiritual reasoning. Sermons and letters from spiritual children “Repentance is left to us” are included in the golden fund of Orthodox literature.”

God’s providence is amazing, how a girl from a non-religious family of Russian immigrants came to God. In 1945, Olya returned to her homeland with her mother, stepfather and three children. This is largely thanks to Metropolitan Yaroshevich, with whom God’s providence will bring young Olga, the future nun Magdalene, together. But difficult trials awaited Olya in her homeland. The stepfather was arrested, and the family was sent to southern Kazakhstan. Then my mother became very ill, there was only one chance of recovery, to go to Moscow for help from Metropolitan Nicholas.

“The girl decides to escape; capture meant twenty years of strict regime. Without money, without documents, without really knowing the country, with the constant prayer of the Mother of God, she gets to Moscow, meets with Metropolitan Nicholas, and then returns back. From a letter to my brother:

“After these terrible 17 days of escape, logically they simply cannot help but catch me. A few days later I ended up on the Tashkent-Moscow train, it was a real miracle and I was smart enough to send an encrypted telegram to my mother, it was intercepted and I should have been immediately removed from the train. And I drove for another four days. Do you think they did a bad job? No. They worked well, and they didn’t have to work hard to catch me. Now the action of God’s providence in all subsequent events is obvious to me. If earlier in the most difficult moments the Lord saved us, then during these 17 days this happened to me constantly, as if in a movie played at an accelerated pace. Olga met with Metropolitan Nicholas, who gave her money and sent her back, but the girl received four months in prison for escaping.

“From a letter to my brother:
Suddenly there was a knock behind the wall and a man’s voice was heard, I immediately jumped away from the wall, remembering that behind it there was a cell with bandits, but the voice softly and clearly told me: “don’t cry girl, don’t cry in life everything happens only for the better.” . And I suddenly remembered that today is a holiday, I remembered that there is a God about whom I had completely forgotten, how he saved me in the most hopeless situations, and in this snow-covered ice chamber I experienced such joy that I had never experienced with such strength again. These words, spoken by a man whom I had never seen, were never perceived by me as spoken by God. If only a person loves the Lord, everything will work for his good.”

“Not a single hair will fall from a man’s head without the will of God,” said Christ. Everything that happens to us in life is lessons designed to bring us closer to the Heavenly Father. The main thing is to understand this in time and accept his will, trust him. After the insight of what Olga Nekrasova experienced during one of the most difficult periods of her life, the unexpected happened. The guard brought a padded jacket, a gift from the next cell, and gave me hot tea. And the prison suddenly turned into a temple of God, and this day, as Mother Magdalene says, became one of the brightest days in her life. In the morning, the doctor cut out her appendix and thereby saved her from the stage.”

“Man is the temple of the living God,” said the Apostle Paul, “but first this temple must be built, not just anywhere, but in one’s soul. Someone builds it all their lives, someone leaves without ever starting and without even realizing its necessity, and someone is led into this temple by the Lord himself, in one jerk, like our heroine. But what is God's providence? Everyone take up your cross and follow me, Christ said, and save yourself and thousands around you will be saved. Meeting with people like Magdalene, who managed to see and embody in their destiny, more and more strengthens the belief that our people, who have gone through a severe spiritual fall and thirst for light, will enter God’s temple, and for them we and the whole world, because It was said by the holy elders who saw through God’s providence that the salvation of the world will come from Russia.

Preface

"...God's providence protects our entire lives. But sometimes there are special cases. To others they will seem like ordinary stories. But we consider them the work of Divine providence..."

PREFACE

In my life or the life of people I knew, there were events that testified to the supernatural world: about its existence, about the life of the dead, about their appearances to the living, about extraordinary cases of God’s Providence, etc. For the most part, all this was preserved in my memory, but over time it began to be forgotten. Therefore, I came up with the intention of writing down these cases, in the hope that they will also serve as an edification to others: after all, we are always more convinced by facts than by reasoning.

Every world is known through its direct revelation to our knowledge: this fundamental law of knowledge applies in exactly the same way to both this, the so-called “natural” world, and to “that”, called the “supernatural”.

And in our time, it is especially necessary to provide factual material.

I will write without a special system - and there isn’t one. I will remember over time, from childhood until now.

I will not chase accuracy and details, especially when I have to talk about others, but for the essence and certainty of the basic data I answer not only to the readers, but even more so to the Truth itself, the Triune Lord.

It is for His glory that I write what follows.

I warn the reader that I have no right to be considered any kind of “holy” person, honored with the special mercy of God. I quite often remember my sinfulness: alas, hitherto! And I will write it down so that at least one person will be strengthened in faith - with assisting grace...

In childhood

I was dangerously ill with pneumonia. My mother made a vow to God: if I remain alive, then she will go with me on a thanksgiving pilgrimage to St. Mitrofan of Voronezh. And, thank God, he recovered...

I was probably a year and a half or two years old at the time. But my mother told my sister about the end of this pilgrimage (she still lives near Moscow, a widow). And she - to me, only two years ago.

Mother stood in the church of St. Mitrofan. A monk watchman walked past her. I, a baby, was spinning around (and maybe even standing decorously) next to my mother. He must have blessed us, but said about me: “He will be a saint!”

And my mother never told me about this. And before her death, she bequeathed to put my photograph (transferred by the same sister) in the coffin.

May she rest in heaven! And to this unknown old man!

And so it came true - thank God.

By the way, she “kept Monday” for the children (fasted on Monday), but she always hid it from us. In fact, she raised and educated all six children (three in higher educational institutions, and three - in the middle). God save her!

At Father Peter's

They decided to send me to a religious school in Tambov. Before the exams, my mother first took me to venerate the relics of St. Pitirim of Tambov (later canonized and glorified on July 28, 1914 - Author's note).

A memorial service was held for him. And then they went to “Father Peter,” about whom there was a rumor that he was a saint and a visionary. Mom wanted him to bless me. Father Peter lived next to the cathedral where St. rested. Pitirim - in a church house on the ground floor, almost in the basement.

When we came to him, an old priest, short in stature, all gray-haired, came out to us. Having blessed me, he, however, told me that I would first experience failure.

And indeed, during an exam at one theological school (there were two of them in Tambov), I “failed” at the very first test, according to the Law of God: I did not count all the Jewish (and not Jewish in general) kings. And when I, childishly frankly, began to tell the caretaker (I remember his last name - Shchukin) that these names were not in my textbook (Teacher Athensky), he became completely angry and, except for the kings, did not ask me anything...

With bitterness I had to leave the testing room with my mother. In tears, she took me to another school (it was called “the first”), which was considered more “strict.” But my mother wanted to feel sorry for her son and therefore took me first to the “second” - good.

But God’s Providence corrected the mother’s harmful tenderness. Shchukin's severity also came in handy. At the “first” school I was not asked about the kings of Judah or Israel, but about the appearance of God to Abraham in the form of three strangers.

He answered perfectly... But in the end it turned out that I was not ready for the Slavic language (due to ignorance of the program, or better - according to the Providence of God). But since I answered perfectly in other subjects, I was accepted into the school, although in a lower class (not in the 2nd, but in the 1st), and then with the permission of the Bishop, since I was “advanced”: then I was twelve years, but it was necessary - eleven.

So, not without failures, not without effort, I became a “confessor” (that was the name of the students of the theological school). And this determined my entire future life; and maybe... eternal destiny!

Twenty-one years later, as an archimandrite, rector of the Tver Theological Seminary, I was present at the opening of the relics of St. Pitirim, and had the grace from him to “open” the all-night service.

Father Peter had long been dead at that time... Memories of him were preserved!

It was not in vain that they revered him as a saint. I still remember his face: calm, quietly serious, not smiling, simple, slightly stooped from old age, with white hair on his head shortened by time, and a small, also white, somewhat pointed beard. The sight of him even now makes me feel serious in my soul. Life is not a joke, but a feat, a struggle... And it’s clear, Fr. Peter knew this: that’s why he didn’t smile (at least to us then). I, an innocent child, also treated him simply, calmly, looking straight into his eyes with a clear gaze.

He was the first saint I met in my life.

Penetrating

When I was a second-year student at the Petrograd Theological Academy, a group of comrades decided to visit the famous Valaam Monastery on Lake Ladoga. I was among them.

I saw a lot of interesting and instructive things there (I published my impressions in the magazine “Wanderer” under the title “On Northern Athos” - for 1905).

But the most significant thing was Father Nikita.

They spoke of him as a saint: and with this word I have always been connected (although this is not necessarily connected) with the idea of ​​clairvoyance.

Without any particular need, perhaps more out of good curiosity, my friend Sasha Ch. and I asked Fr. The abbot of the monastery, - without whose permission nothing is done in the monastery - visit Fr. Nikita.

To reach Predtechensky Island it was necessary to sail through the straits separating a group of islands bearing the common name “Valaam,” but in the monastery each island was given its own name.

O. Nikita lived on the "Predtecha", i.e. on the island where there was a monastery with a temple in honor of St. John the Baptist. This monastery was considered one of the strictest and most fasting: they never ate fasting there. And only, it seems, on Christmas and Easter, milk was given to the few inhabitants of the monastery. And during Lent and all Wednesdays and Fridays, and maybe even Mondays, they didn’t even use vegetable oil.

Women were never allowed there, and even male pilgrims were very rarely able to visit the “Forerunner”: the authorities did not want to disturb the silence of the prayer elders. And it was not easy to get there: you needed a boat, a rower, and people in the monastery were needed for their business.

But for us, as students of the academy, an exception was made: Brother Konstantin, a former officer, was entrusted with driving us. This brother was then already about 50-55 years old. And such a respectable monk had to take us, almost just boys. But in the monastery everything is done “for obedience,” and therefore it never occurs to a good monk to be embarrassed by such oddities. And soon we got used to it, having learned the good nature of Brother Konstantin. On the way we helped him row a little.

Another monk guide sent to introduce us to Fr. Nikita was Zerubbabel's father. A capable builder of monastic life, although he came from peasants, he treated the monk-officer with authority, although calmly: Fr. Zerubbabel was already in the rank of hieromonk and held senior positions in the monastery.

We set off along quiet straits, among mountains and forests,

to our goal, without a doubt, rather, like tourists, to see the saint.

The warm July sun was shining; Rare white clouds floated across the sky. We complacently exchanged our impressions with the monks. And unnoticed we arrived at the Predtecha.

And it should be noted that both Sasha and I were not dressed in our student jackets with blue bows and silver-plated buttons, but in monastic cassocks, belted with leather belts, pointed skufs were placed on our heads, and rosaries in our hands; they even put large monastic boots on their feet, called “shoe covers”; in short, we have the blessing of Fr. The abbots were dressed like ordinary novices. But this did not mean at all that we were going to become monks, we were just pleased to dress up in an original, monastic way. Sometimes other students, who were usually “pampered” at the monastery, did this before us.

Leaving Fr. Konstantin in the boat, the three of us went to Father Nikita.

In a few minutes I will see the saint... First, we looked near the shore into a tiny “black” house, upholstered everywhere with black roofing felt, belonging to a novice, also an officer and also Konstantin, but young. At this time he was in the Japanese war, where he ended the days of his life. The human heart is a great mystery. And God leads souls in different ways.

Then we headed higher up the island to Fr. Nikita.

The monks of the monastery - there were not many of them, it seems, barely even ten, and maybe less, lived in separate houses scattered here and there on a small high island - “per verge kritsi,” i.e. such a distance that it was possible to throw a stone from one cell to another. Why is this? I don't know myself. It seems that there should not be close proximity from monk to monk, so that they do not walk in the “neighborhood” to talk. But, on the other hand, so that they still live a common life, together.

The houses were wooden: their own pine forest, their own carpenters.

We reached Fr.'s house. Nikita. I see a stick at his door. Of course, there is no constipation.

There is a stick at the door. This means that the priest is not at home,” the guide, Fr., explained to us. Zerubbabel, who knows very well the latest details in monastic life.

Where is he? - I asked in bewilderment, - will I really not see him?

“Somewhere here,” Fr. calmly answered. Zerubbabel, let's look.

And then I noticed a feature that was strange to me in the conductor’s voice: we came to the saint - and he talked about him quite simply, as about an ordinary person. I have already begun to feel a trembling anxiety in my soul before meeting God’s Pleasant, but he, complacently, philistinely, apparently does not see anything special in him...

We started looking. Let's go to the shore.

“Isn’t he washing his own laundry?” Fr. conductor. And so he went to the place where the monks usually washed their simple attire.

And indeed, Fr. Zerubbabel saw Father Nikita doing this from above. I saw him too. In a white "hoodie", i.e. a short summer working cassock, the kind that doctors wear when visiting clients, but only on Valaam they were made of coarse and strong home-woven peasant linen, or, in other words, canvas.

But I couldn’t see his face: the shore was too low.

And only then did I fully come to consciousness - now I will see the Saint! The former carelessness disappeared completely, and it was replaced by fear... Why? Before I had time to figure it out, my companion (I definitely forgot about Sasha), Fr. Zerubbabel shouted down playfully and loudly:

Father Nikita-ah! Guests have come to see you!

I was very confused. What a way to treat a saint! We are accustomed to reading their wondrous lives, marveling at their deeds, praying reverently before their icons, on which they are depicted for the most part stern, or at least internally focused. And suddenly, so easily, “the guests have arrived.”

Wanting to correct what seemed to me an unworthy mistake, Fr. conductor, I immediately after his words shouted down loudly:

Father! We'd better go there and see you!

And at this time a thought flashed through me, frightening me even more: now he will see my soul, and begin to expose me, my sins! And Fr. introduced himself to me. Nikita with stern, piercing eyes, looking from under his brows, with thick eyebrows hanging over them, converging at deep folds above the bridge of his nose...

And why did we go! For curiosity! This is why “they” are especially strict.

I remembered an incident: one such curious person came to chat with Father John of Kronstadt, and he saw this and ordered the servant to bring the visitor a glass of water and a spoon and add:

Father ordered you to chat. He didn't know where to go...

But imagine my pleasant disappointment when I heard a rather quiet but clear answer from below:

No no! I'll get up myself.

But it’s not just the words, but the main thing is the voice: he was remarkably affectionate and meek... And my heart was immediately relieved: well, if such a pleasant voice, then, undoubtedly, Fr. Nikita is “good”, kind... He probably won’t denounce! Probably his appearance is as gentle as his voice. I'll see it now.

And o. Nikita slowly put on his outer black cassock below, and leaving his work, began to quietly climb the steps of the stairs.

He's already close! Yes, I think his face seems to be kind too! He came up to us. Fr. Zerubbabel, smiling, cheerfully greeted him with a mutual “kiss” on the hand, and explained that we were students, and had come to him for a blessing and for a conversation, with the permission of Fr. Abbot.

I glared at him - how kind he is! And no thick eyebrows, no severe wrinkles. There are, however, wrinkles, but not between the eyebrows, but near the outer corners of the eyes; and somehow they calmed down so much that they gave off a dual impression: both gentle sadness and a quiet smile.

Yes, he will not denounce...

We approached him for blessing and kissed his hand. Everything turned out somehow extraordinarily simple: but at the same time, I saw a truly saint... And Fr.’s tone became clear to me. Zerubbabel: the saints were amazingly meek and simple.

And all fear disappeared from my soul.

Father, tell us something to save our souls,” I began in the usual manner.

What should I tell you? After all, I am simple, and you are scientists.

Well, what kind of scholarship is ours! - I object, - but if you learned anything, it was only from books, and you went through spiritual life through experience.

But oh. Nikita did not give up right away.

That’s true, but I’m still uneducated. I was still a serf peasant, I was a lackey for my masters. They were good people, kind: they set me free, and I went to the monastery here. So I live little by little.

But we kept asking him. Then he, just as simply as he refused, began to say:

What! Endure the sorrows, endure the sorrows! without patience there is no salvation.

And little by little I started talking about different things, but, to my regret, I didn’t write it down then, and now I don’t remember everything.

Then he invited us both to sit on a bench above the shore. It seems that I was sitting to his right, and Sasha to his left. Father Zerubbabel must have stood calmly, listening to the conversation and looking affectionately at the priest. I don’t remember how much time has passed. My soul was so calm and joyful that I felt like I was flying in warm air...

Then the conversation was interrupted. And suddenly oh. Nikita takes me by the left hand and says quite firmly, undoubtedly the following words that amazed me:

Vladyka John (my name was Ivan), let’s go: I will treat you.

These words poured like fire into my heart... I opened my eyes wide, but could not say anything from terrible tension...

Then I remember that we were both dressed like monks, and this could give Fr. Nikita has reason to think that I will accept monasticism, and, according to custom, will reach the rank of bishop, like other learned monks. But Sasha was dressed the same as me! And during the entire conversation, neither he nor I made the slightest hint about monasticism, and we didn’t even think about it then. However, I thought before, but only in the recesses of the soul. And he didn’t tell anyone his thoughts... And this time he didn’t dare to speak: it would be especially shameful to talk about this in front of a saint, otherwise it would turn out that he was a monk, and I would be “also” a monk, “like him. .." And it would be indecent and insolent: to think of yourself along with him, the saint...

But he didn’t say a word to Sasha...

And suddenly these words shocked me! And for Sasha - nothing... As if there was nothing, not a single word. Supported by the arm of Fr. Nikita, as usual, “lead the arm” of real bishops - I obeyed almost without a thought and walked alongside.

Sasha, having not received an invitation, followed us with Fr. Zerubbabel.

In a special house where there was a common refectory, Father Nikita seated us all. The “owner” of the skete came here, Fr. Jacob, from the Karelians, is quiet, meek, but with a constant smile and a cheerful face. We were served tea with dry pretzels, shaped like the letter B, which is why they are called “bagels.” And before that they brought pickles with black bread. This was the whole treat.

But there was nothing better on the Forerunner. They gave us everything they could. And man is not in food!

After the refreshment, I, struck by the priest’s prophecy, wanted to talk in more detail and in private about monasticism... Or maybe the priest himself led me to this. And we, walking quietly around the island, continued the conversation.

Father! I'm afraid it will be difficult for me to carry monasticism into the world.

So what! Don't be embarrassed. Just never be discouraged. We are not angels (And I was also told something encouraging. I’ll keep silent... - Author’s note).

Yes, you feel good here in the monastery, but what is it like in the world?

This is the truth, the truth! Almost no one visits us. And in winter we will be covered with snow, and we won’t see anyone. But the world needs you,” the priest finished firmly and decisively.

Don't be embarrassed. God will give you strength. You are needed there. But I continued to object.

But one person made it clear to me that I should not become a monk.

Suddenly the priest seemed even angry, which was so strange for his meek and quiet appearance, and asked sternly:

Who it? - And without even waiting for my answer, he told me with emphasis a lot of significant words, but I’m afraid to convey them inaccurately, but approximately the meaning was this:

How dare he? Who is he to speak against the will of God?

And about. Nikita continued to tell me other comforting things.

We spent another night and part of another day in the monastery. Then we left. Father said goodbye to us and to me again simply, as if he had not said anything special to me. And I also calmed down.

Five years have passed since Fr. Nikita died. The compiler of his life, having somehow learned about his prediction, asked me to provide material. At that time I was already Hieromonk Benjamin. And he lived in the bishop’s house of Archbishop Sergius of Finland as a secretary and “alternate” (that is, on the line, or in the schedule, of priestly service - Ed.).

And I wrote with joy, but only hid what the priest predicted to me about the bishopric. The hieromonk was embarrassed to write about this then. Nine years passed after that, and fourteen from the time of the insightful conversation, and I, a sinner, was consecrated bishop in Simferopol.

What happened to Sasha Ch.? He got married. And he did not marry in good conscience: he and his brother fell in love with two sisters. But since our laws prohibit such marriages, they agreed to get married at the same time in different churches. But still, this was a deception before God...

Apparently, the priest saw the light too. That’s why he left him sitting on a bench on Valaam without answering, and he took me out to “treat me.”

Afterwards I had to be on the Precursor again. In the house of Fr. Nikita lived with his student and successor in old age - Father Pionius, also quiet and meek.

I asked him for something in memory of my father. Father Pionius took off the paper icon of Saints Cyril and Methodius, Equal-to-the-Apostles, and blessed me with it on behalf of Father Nikita.

And Sasha - Alexander M. Ch. - later went into the teaching service. Then I was in exile for three years...

By the way - about sinfulness. Just now I read such a comforting incident from the life of St. Seraphim. I will rewrite it in its entirety for the encouragement and strengthening of all of us.

Nadezhda Fedorovna Ostrovskaya told how her brother received a completely unexpected prediction from the wondrous seer Seraphim of Sarov.

“My brother, Lieutenant Colonel V.V. Ostrovsky often visited Nizhny Novgorod from our dear aunt, Princess Gruzinskaya, who had great faith in Father Seraphim. Once, on some occasion, she sent her brother to the Sarov Hermitage to this perspicacious old man. Father Seraphim received my brother very graciously and, among other good instructions, suddenly said to him:

Oh, brother Vladimir, what a drunkard you will be!

These words greatly upset and saddened my brother. He was awarded by God with many wonderful talents and always used them for the glory of God. He had deep devotion to Father Seraphim; he was like a father to his subordinates. Therefore, he considered himself very far from such a name, indecent to his rank and way of life.

The perspicacious old man, seeing his confusion, said to him again:

However, don’t be embarrassed and don’t be sad. The Lord sometimes allows people who are zealous for Him to fall into such terrible vices, and this is so that they do not fall into an even greater sin - arrogance. Your temptation will pass, by the grace of God, and you will humbly spend the remaining days of your life. Just don't forget your sin.

The wondrous prediction of the Elder of God actually came true later. Subsequently, due to various bad circumstances, my brother fell into this unfortunate passion of drunkenness and, to the general regret of his relatives, spent several years in this pitiful state. But finally, for the prayers of Fr. Seraphim, was pardoned by the Lord: he not only abandoned his previous vice, but also completely changed his entire way of life, trying to live according to the commandments of the Gospel, as befits a Christian."

The monks

People are saved in different ways and, in particular, they come to choose the monastic path in different ways. When I was a student, we were three friends. Of these, two were younger than me in course: Victor R. and Kolechka S. We all later went into monasticism, but each had a different approach to accepting this lofty but also dangerous life.

Victor - like this full name Everyone called him for his serious views and behavior, and I don’t remember that he ever laughed openly, unless he smiled sweetly and childishly.

Small in stature, with thoughtful dark eyes, with a high and wide forehead, with leisurely movements, he, however, lived a strong life in his soul. It was no longer possible to attach the name “warm-cold” to him. But his inner experiences were intimate: he came to a decision thoughtfully and principled (Viktor was extraordinarily capable, his mind was deeper than ours). And when it came to something, he took appropriate action - quietly, without noise, but firmly. And then he did not need any “revelations”, “visions” and even visionary elders. It was clear to him what to do even without this.

In this way, he reached not only the conviction of the superiority of celibacy and monasticism, but also the practical conclusion for himself that he should become a monk.

“I,” he once told me, “could not go into monastic monasticism now, I am not yet able to do this and have no such desire, but I will go into “learned monasticism,” with God’s help. This path is clear to me.

And somehow he quietly submitted a petition to the rector of the Academy for tonsure. None of the students were surprised by this.

After that - an ordinary educational and monastic career. Father John (so they named him in honor of St. John the Climacus) was always seen serious, with large, as if open eyes, which indicated a continuous internal process taking place in his soul, as if he was listening to himself.

But he turned out to have consumption, and he died in the Poltava hospital, being an inspector of the seminary, with the rank of archimandrite.

I visited him shortly before his death. He lay hopeless, with sunken eyes and cheeks. And yet he still wanted to live. And he hoped:

I'll recover a little, get stronger and stand up...

I was silent.

The kingdom of heaven to you, pure friend... Pray for me there...

But our other comrade, Kolechka S., was completely different and became a monk in a completely different way.

His name was so affectionate diminutive name, because among his comrades, and often even among those older in age and position, he showed a completely unusual kindness in his treatment. It used to go along interesting rooms(where the students were studying) and suddenly, out of the blue, greets us:

Hello, my dears!

Or he pats someone on the shoulder, pats them on the head, unable to cope whether he wants it or not. Or he would also say:

Vanechka! Let me kiss you, darling. Because I love you...

He had no enemies; admirers, perhaps, too, but they loved him in a comradely way. He was of average ability; sometimes I was upset by this, especially during exams, when in 2-3 days it was necessary to “overcome”, “absorb” hundreds of sophisticated, learned and unknown pages (after all, no one went to the lectures, except for two regular students). Once, during a patrol exam, he rambled for a long time about one of the holy fathers * and then stopped altogether, embarrassed and guilty. It is false to pretend that he “knew, but forgot a little.” Kolechka was ashamed.

The professor, knowing that he (like us and some of our other friends) studied patristic literature on his own in the so-called “Zlatoust circle,” began to encourage him:

Yes, you know, you know, don’t be embarrassed!

But Kolechka, as he knew, forgot everything now and continued to remain silent guiltily. The professor, exchanging glances with his assistant, said affectionately:

That is OK! Enough of you. Go ahead, don't be embarrassed. A ring from the exam straight to my room:

Well, my dear, I failed! And then with a laugh, clutching his nose and shaking his head, then with sadness he told me about the failure. I began to encourage him as best I could:

Well then! Well, they'll give you a three, you won't be lost. We almost never gave unsatisfactory grades: already a four was considered a weak score.

It’s a shame! - he says. - Even if he failed in philosophy or metaphysics, but here in patrolology he disgraced himself. And he disgraced you all, all the “Zlatoustites.” This is how they say the “patristic” circle!

And he again smiled and frowned.

After the survey, the examiners produced an overall score and then announced the result to the eagerly waiting students.

Ring ran to me again, burst in and, rolling around with laughter and joy, hugging me and kissing me, shouted:

Five! Five! My dear! What the hell is this, Lord! - and again he bursts out joyfully, like a child...

Yes, I can’t even get a C, but they, my dears, gave me five! God save them!

He came from a simple city bourgeois environment: his mother had been a widow for a long time. Besides him, she also had another son. The whole family was very religious. And at the Academy, all of us (and Victor) were under the strong influence of the ascetic inspector, Archimandrite F. Kolechka, with his characteristic cordiality, he immediately became interested in him. Then we created, under the leadership of the same Archimandrite F., a patristic circle. And all this together inclined Kolechka to the idea of ​​monasticism.

But he faced a pressing question: will he survive! And the torment of doubt began...

So a year passed, then another. The issue was still not resolved. Then, on the advice of Archimandrite F., he went to one elder to consult. And he answered him ambiguously:

You can go, or you don’t have to go. If you want, be a monk, but you would also be a good priest.

Ring was not satisfied. And again I yearned for monasticism.

Shortly before this, the glorification of St. Seraphim and the discovery of his relics took place (July 19, 1903). Two years later, I wanted to bow to the Pleasant, and I went to Sarov. And from there, having bought monastic gifts, he arrived at the Academy at the beginning of the school year. By the way, I brought Kolya a small icon of the saint. And he had long honored the Wonderworker of Sarov (even before his canonization). I had absolutely no special intentions in doing this, and that’s what happened to Kolechka.

Having received a pleasant gift from me, he, as he himself told me later, decided to turn to the monk with a request to put an end to the question of monasticism that was tormenting him one way or another. He wanted to know only one thing: whether it was God’s will for him to become a monk or not.

And so,” he said, “I put your icon in front of me and said to the Pleasant out loud: “Father, Reverend Seraphim, the great Wonderworker of God! You yourself said during your life: “When I am gone, come to my grave... All Whatever is in your soul, whatever you grieve about, whatever happens to you, come to me as if I were alive and tell me. And I will hear you, and your sorrow will pass. As with a living person, speak to me, and I will always be alive for you!” (as St. Seraphim commanded before his death to the sisters of the Diveyevo monastery he created - Author’s note).

Dear Father! I am already tormented by my monasticism. Tell me: is it God’s will for me to become a monk or not! So I will make three bows for you, as if you were alive, and I will reveal your life, and where my gaze falls, let it be an answer to me.”

All this out loud. After this, he bowed three times to the ground. Seraphim, took the life, opened it approximately to the middle and immediately began to read from the left side... Afterwards I personally examined the book, and now I am rewriting the right place (Page 252, left side: on the page this story alone begins with a red line. - Author's note).

“In 1830, one novice of the Glinsk hermitage (Kursk province, the hermitage was distinguished by strict regulations, and at that time the famous saint Filaret Glinsky also labored there. - Author’s note), who was extremely hesitant about his vocation, deliberately arrived in Sarov to ask Father Seraphim for advice, falling at the saint’s feet and begging him to resolve the question that was tormenting him: “Is it God’s will for him and his brother Nicholas to enter a monastery?”

The Holy Elder answered the novice: “Save yourself, and save your brother.” Then, after thinking a little, he continued: “Do you remember the life of Father Ioannikis the Great? While wandering through the mountains and valleys, he accidentally dropped his staff from his hands, which fell into the abyss. The staff could not be reached, and without it the saint could not go further.

In deep sorrow, he cried out to the Lord God, and the Angel of the Lord invisibly handed him a new staff." Having said this, Father Seraphim put it in right hand The novice took his own stick and continued: “It is difficult to rule human souls! But among all the misfortunes and sorrows in ruling the souls of the brethren, the Angel of the Lord will constantly be with you until the end of your life.”

And what happened? This novice, who asked for advice from Fr. Seraphim, actually accepted monasticism with the name Paisius, and in 1856 he was appointed abbot of the Astrakhan Churlin Hermitage, and six years later he was elevated to the rank of archimandrite, thus receiving, as Fr. predicted. Seraphim, governing the souls of the brethren. My own brother, Fr. Paisius, about whom the holy elder said: “save your brother too,” ended his life as a hieromonk in the Kozeletsky St. George Monastery.”

You can imagine the joy, gratitude, and tenderness that gripped Ring’s soul. The monk performed an obvious miracle: St. Seraphim answered directly and even to exactly the same question about “the will of God.” So the monk blessed Kolechka to become a monk... The torment ended once and for all. And soon Kolechka was gone; instead, the monk Seraphim, so named at the time of tonsure by an admirer of the monk, was covered with a hood, and was awarded a miraculous answer from him.

But in the above story about the Glinsky novice there were also two other wonderful instructions from the Rev. Seraphim Kolechke. One thing is that he, too, will have to not only be a monk, but also “rule human souls,” although he did not ask him about this then. Now the former affectionate student is a bishop...

However, this is still natural. But something else is more remarkable: “save your brother too.” Ring, occupied only with his torment, then during prayer forgot everything and everyone except the monk and himself. He had no time for his brother. But we need to know that his younger brother suffered from unbearable headaches, so that more than once he even reached extreme desperate thoughts. But he loved his older brother, who in every possible way strengthened him in faith, patience, and trust in God. And one can say that the sufferer lived more like a brother.

And suddenly the answer now turns out: not only “save yourself,” but also save your brother.

And indeed, as soon as Hieromonk Seraphim finished his studies, he took in his brother, and then his widowed mother. The brother was also tonsured a monk and named Sergius. Now he is already in the rank of archimandrite. His illness seems to have completely passed, but still he still lives with his brother, and they are saved together...

In 1920, on the day of the Intercession of the Mother of God, Fr. Seraphim was ordained bishop in Simferopol, with the title of Lubensky. At dinner, I gave him a speech and recalled this wonderful incident of showing him the path to becoming a monk.

Drowning Rescue

I want to tell you an incident from my life, how I was saved from death. And nothing other than the name of God.

I drowned in water five times. The first time was when I was probably still four years old.

Mother! We want to swim.

Go ask your father.

Our house was close. Your father has given permission: your mother will be with you.

And we, holding the boards of the raft with our hands, increased the noise by dangling our legs. Mom stood facing the river, and we right side raft, so she didn't even look at us.

Then a vainglorious thought suddenly occurred to me:

“Even though I’m smaller than Misha, I can go further into the water than him.” To do this, I let go of my right hand, moved forward, holding on with my left hand, towards my brother and then, behind him, extended my right hand to grab the raft beyond him.

Reaching the right place, I let go of my left hand. But at that time my right hand fell off, and I fell into the water like a stone. Where my older brother was up to his neck, I was already up to my nose, and beyond that - up to my head.

The brother apparently continued to dangle his legs and did not suspect trouble. Mother was doing her job.

I don’t know how long I stayed in the water, and now there’s no one to ask: everyone died. Whether my brother told my mother or she herself noticed that I was missing, I don’t know. She rushed into the water and began looking for me. Our river is quiet and shallow. They immediately pulled me out, but I was already unconscious and not breathing. Go home now... And who taught them and my father, but somehow they began to pump the water out of my lungs. And they pumped it out.

I don’t remember at all and never remembered how I felt when I drowned. It was as if I just disappeared at that very second: I don’t remember either pain or consciousness...

Another time, I was already eight or nine years old. I swam alone, I swam freely across the river. It was 5-6 fathoms wide: that seemed like a lot to me at the time.

I swam. But a fathom or three before the opposite bank, suddenly a cramp seized both my legs, and they sank down like whips. But the hands were still working. I was very frightened, but did not lose my presence of mind, and with great effort I swam to the shore, working only with my hands. And the shore was almost vertical. Here I rested, the cramp ended, and I swam back across the river safely.

Usually, when we started bathing, taught by our parents, we always crossed ourselves, although, of course, more mechanically, out of habit. But even then - glory to God!

For the third time I swam along the deep river Vorona (which flows into the Khoper, and the Khoper into the Don) and I wanted to try the depth of the river. Climbed down. But the river here was so deep that as soon as my feet touched the bottom, I already wanted to breathe unbearably. I began to swim up very quickly. But within a second I swallowed some water and went down again... Still, at the last moment I jumped to the surface with an effort. Remained alive.

For the fourth time as a seminarian, he fell through new ice on a newly frozen river. Then I was saved by my overcoat, which spread like an umbrella across the ice over the hole, and I carefully crawled out. Nearby there was a warm hut on pillars, where women washed their clothes in winter. I ran there... And nearby, on the mountain, stood our seminary. I remember the women laughed at me benevolently.

But the fifth time was the worst. A group of our relatives and all the young people, about eight of them, went to stay with my brother the priest Fr. A., in the village of Dobroye, Lebizhinsky district, Tambov province. He was two years younger than me, but when I was still a student at the academy, he graduated from the seminary and soon became a young priest.

From our village to Dobroye it was necessary to travel up to 200 versts, partly along railway, and partly on horseback.

We had a fun stay for two or three weeks. And they were going to go back. Suddenly, two or three hours before departure, a fire started nearby, 3-4 houses before my brother’s house. The house of one poor widow caught fire. And nearby, three fathoms later, a row of neighbors’ thatched buildings began.

It is known how easily entire villages burn down in Russia...

They sounded the alarm. People came running with buckets of water. The fire department rushed over. And the work began. The tall shopkeeper who managed the intestine especially distinguished himself. He almost stuck his head into the windows of the burning hut and watered it inside. And the people tried to use hooks to destroy and dismantle the hut, log by log.

My brother and I and several other people stood with buckets of water on the neighboring thatched roofs and extinguished the flying and falling fiery jackdaws. The heat was barely tolerable and besides, the sun was still scorching.

But still, through joint efforts, we managed to limit the fire to this one widow’s hut. The village was saved, thank God.

We, all sweaty and wet from the water - sometimes the shopkeeper also watered us with a hose along with the roofs so that they would not burst into flames from the heat alone - returned to our brother. It was time to go and two carts stood waiting for us.

Having quickly washed up and drank tea, we said goodbye, prayed and decided to go.

Well, I’ve already given you all the pleasures of the village,” the brother-priest joked, “even there was a fire.”

We laughed. No one thought about the poor widow then: we are selfish people!

Suddenly, my younger brother Sergei and I had the blissful thought of swimming in the river before leaving. But you still had to drive past it.

The Vorona River flowed just near Dobroye. And here it was perhaps 100 fathoms wide, or maybe 150. A huge artificial dam in a large semicircle stopped the water for the mill that stood here.

No sooner said than done. We hurried to the river, which was more than half a mile away from the house along the village. And the horses were supposed to set off in a few minutes after us.

Approaching the river and undressing, my brother and I suddenly decided to swim across it, holding our clothes in our left hand, and float on our backs. Having quickly rolled everything up - boots, clothes, and caps - into a ball and tied it with a belt, we were about to enter the water. And the coast on this side was very sloping.

At that very moment, as God sent, a local peasant approached the same place to water his horse. Seeing us with our underwear tied up, he asked us in surprise, simply, in a rustic way:

What are you guys up to?

“We want to swim across the river,” we said cheerfully. Vanity is the eternal enemy of people: this is not the first time for us. And to tell the truth, we were pretty good swimmers.

But the peasant - he knew better than us the width of the river and the risk of our mischief - waved his head in disbelief:

Ooh, guys! You're up to no good.

But we wanted even more to prove to “this simpleton” what tricksters we are. And, as usual, having crossed ourselves, we began to enter the river, holding clothes in our left hand.

The peasant, seeing that we could no longer be stopped, said sadly:

Well, Christ save you!

We reached the depths, turned over on our backs and swam. And the peasant, after looking at us for a while, jerked his horse and went back home. We were left alone in the water. There was no one on the shore anymore who could give us help in case of need.

At first it was good. But they soon noticed that we were making semicircles: it turns out that when you row with one hand (we were holding the laundry above the water with your left), you involuntarily make deviations from the right direction towards the rowing hand.

This made our journey even longer. However, we swam a little more than half of the river. I see that my left hand has weakened and released the laundry into the water. It’s a bad thing... But it’s not a big problem, it’s just that everything will get worn out and nothing more.

I see that brother Sergei’s clothes are also in the water. We sail in silence.

But now I feel that my legs are already completely tired, and I am not only unable to push water with them, but I am not even able to lift them myself - the muscles have weakened. The legs slowly began to fall down. I want to continue to breathe wider with my whole chest, but I can’t, I’m no longer able to expand my chest. Not enough air.

And suddenly the thought struck me: “I’ll drown!”

And the laundry, picking up more and more water, began to sink down. In addition to clothes, there was also money to pay for a pool for eight people in a “car”... What to do?

Sergey! - I shout, - It’s bad! I can't swim anymore!

“I’m tired too,” said the brother, and turning over with his chest towards the water, he picked up the wet underwear under his neck, pressed it with his chin and swam quietly further, rowing with both hands. He turned out to be stronger than me. I was not able to move even an arshin further. All that was left was to support myself with my hands so as not to drown, and not to let my clothes sink to the bottom.

Where is the salvation?!

And, to my shame, I must admit that at this terrible moment I did not remember God... But I have always been a believer... The fear of death and the thirst for life shackled me, and there was nothing left except the horror of death. And I screamed in a wild, intoxicated voice:

Guard! Well, well!

I see a village policeman running to the shore. He sees that I'm drowning, but how can I help? There is a boat next to him, but it is locked to a pole. He unsheathes his saber and begins to chop the stake below the castle. But how soon will you cut a thick tree with a saber?!

And at this time, from the garden of another priest of the village of Good, Fr. Vishnevsky, heard a scream, untied their boat and quickly drove diagonally towards me. But it was very far left 4, along a long diagonal. Will they make it? Still, I felt better, just to wait for help. I'll probably hold out...

Just at that very moment our carts approached the river, and the brother priest heard my cry “guard.” Instantly, while still on the road through the village, he began running to throw off his hat, cassock, cassock, boots, and already threw off his shirt in the river itself, and rushed to save me, risking his own life. The rest of the relatives started screaming and groaning... And one sister, like crazy, ran, as it seemed to me from afar, into the water and, like a hen whose hatched ducklings floated on the water, she ran moaning along the shore from one side to the other, shouting my name in a confused voice:

Wow! Wow!

Sergei must have already been on the shore at that time. Yes, I have no time for him. I see the boat is sailing closer and closer. Well, they'll save you...

And my sister keeps screaming: “Wa-anya!” and runs.

Then I gathered my strength and shouted to the shore with all my might: “Na-a-dya! Na-a-dya!”

Wha-oh! - She suddenly stopped, as if coming to her senses.

Du-u-ra! - suddenly this word burst out from me. It seemed too crazy to me tossing it around in the water.

The boat has arrived. I grabbed it with one hand; I no longer had the strength to climb. Yes, and it’s dangerous - you’ll capsize the boat. My brother was already on the shore, the clothes were lifted into the boat, and we quietly reached the shore.

Sergei was resting and squeezing water out of his laundry. I lay down on the ground to catch my breath. My underwear was also wrung out, but my cap turned into something unwearable. The carts and relatives, having gone around a long semicircle, stopped opposite us.

The sisters still had tears in their eyes from grief, horror and frustration at our crazy undertaking.

But little by little everyone began to scold us. We, the guilty ones, were already silent... Having wrung out the underwear, we put it on. Instead of a cap, my brother gave me his priestly hat, which his wife picked up while walking her family through the garden. Shyly we said goodbye and set off on our way.

Nadya, the eldest of the sisters, was sitting in the same cart with me and still could not calm down. It was already evening. We entered the forest. There was a breath of coolness. We felt fresh in our wet clothes, so as not to catch a cold!

Sergei, oh Sergei! - I shout at the other cart - let’s get off, it’s cold, we’d better walk.

He also got down. And we walked behind. Then we saw a large birch tree to the side and piled it on our shoulders to quickly warm ourselves up. And so we walked quite a bit until almost everything was dry. We drove at night.

According to the agreement, a horse was sent to pick us up at our K-v station. Some of the relatives went to T., only we two brothers and two sisters remained.

“We won’t tell mom what happened,” Nadya said.

We were always afraid of mom's strictness. And I didn’t want to upset her, poor thing: she already had a bad heart.

“What about the hat?” I asked.

Well, say that the cap flew into the water and got wet, and Alexander (brother, priest) gave him a hat. Well, you look funny in it! - the sister laughed, - an ordinary shirt and a priest’s hat on your head!

We all had fun. And we laughed and got on the peasant cart and set off home. It was a hot July day. We were welcomed home with joy. There was no end to the stories. They talked about the fire and the hat. They kept silent only about the most important thing - about drowning...

Afterwards I remembered this salvation more than once. And every time I remembered the peasant with the horse and his blessing on us in the name of God: “Christ save you!”

I believe to this day: it was this, the name of the Lord, that saved us from obvious death.

Wonderful is the name of the Lord!

For the glory of God, I will tell you a few more small cases, but all the more amazing, for God is marvelous in both great and small matters.

Began without prayer

In 1913 I visited Optina Pustyn for the second time.

I was placed with one hieromonk, a student at the Kazan Theological Academy, Fr. A., in the monastery.

Once, going out to the liturgy, we forgot to take the key and slammed the door behind us; it was mechanically locked and required a special screw key to open it.

What to do? Don't disassemble the glass in the window?

After the liturgy they told the steward, Fr. Macarius about our mistake.

He was a silent man and even a little stern. Yes, you can’t choose someone who is gentle and kind to be a steward in a monastery - he would waste his goodness too much.

Without saying anything, he took a bunch of keys and walked towards our home. But it turned out that the heart of the similar key he picked up was smaller than the neck of our lock. Then he picked up a thin twig from the floor, broke off a piece of it, applied it to the heart of the key and began to twirl... But no matter how much we worked, it was in vain, the key spun helplessly, not pulling out the lock.

Father,” I tell him, “you apparently put in too thin a twig!” Take it thicker, then it will be tighter!

He was silent for a moment, and then answered:

No, it’s not because of this... But because I started without prayer.

And then he fervently crossed himself, saying the Jesus Prayer.

"Lord Jesus Christ, Son of God, have mercy on me, a sinner."

He began to twist it again with the same twig, and the lock immediately unlocked.

Afterwards, I tested many times, both in my own experience and in the experience of others, that using the name of God works miracles even in small things. And not only have I used it myself and still use it, but I also teach others, where possible, to do the same.

Here's another example.

I was at one Christian youth congress in Germany. They began to organize a church.

A young man nicknamed “Shu-shu” (abbreviated as Shura-Shurovich, Alexander Alexandrovich) hung icons on the wall.

The building was stone. He hits a nail with a hammer, and it bends - it hits a stone. I see his failure and say:

Shu-shu! And you would cross yourself and say “in the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit.” Then things will work out for you.

He believed. Reconciled. After all, it’s not so easy for a young person. He crossed himself, mentioned the name of God, pointed the nail in another place, hit it with a hammer and hit the groove. And then all the work went well.

I told this story recently to a circle of friends. A few days later, one woman, widow K., who had recently lost her husband, told me: “I came home after your story and went to bed. And I’ve had insomnia for a long time... My nerves are clearly getting worse. And suddenly I remembered - you told me to remember the name of God even in small things. And I said to myself: “Lord! Give me sleep!" And I don’t even remember, it seems that I fell asleep that very minute. And until now I suffered from insomnia for a long time.”

Temptation

And now I will tell you, so to speak, the “reverse” case, how dangerous it is to live and even speak without the name of God.

At the very beginning of my monasticism, I was the personal secretary of Archbishop Sergius, who that year was a member of the Synod, and therefore lived in Petrograd. In addition, I was also a successive hieromonk in the courtyard where the archbishop lived. Finally, I had the responsibility of preaching. Thanks to preaching, I, in a sense, began to seem “knowing”, and sometimes simple souls turned to me with questions.

One day after service he comes up to me simple woman tall, rather plump, blonde, with a calm face and manners, and, having received the blessing, slowly says:

Father! What should I do? Some kind of temptation is with me: everything is “thrust” (a Great Russian word; it means “throws”, from the word “throw” - author’s note) into my eyes and appears. Usually - false, dreamy.

How so? - I ask.

Here you go. For example, I’m standing in a church, and suddenly a bucket of cucumbers falls from the ceiling near me. I rush to collect them - there is nothing... And I turned around awkwardly when I rushed to get the cucumbers, but I hurt my leg, apparently I sprained a vein. It hurts now.

There are some cats running around the ceiling of the house, heads down. And all that stuff.

And she told all this calmly; no neurasthenia, agitation or anything abnormal could even be imagined in this healthy Tula girl.

Her husband, also tall and plump, blond, with a calm, smiling face, served as a fireman at the Baltic Shipyard. I recognized him later too. And he was in excellent health. They lived together soul to soul, peacefully, amicably.

It is clear that the reasons here were spiritual, supernatural. Inexperienced, I couldn't understand anything. Even less could he do anything; he didn’t even know what to say to her...

And he asked to prolong the conversation:

How did this start for you?

Yes, that's how it is. I'm sitting in the apartment. And firemen are provided with state-owned houses, both heating and lighting. And the salary is good - enough for my husband and I. We do not have and never had children - God did not give it, His holy will. I’m sitting by the window doing something, and I’m saying to myself:

How good life is: everything is there, everything is fine with my husband... The red corner was in front of me, and after that, Ivan the Baptist suddenly emerges from the icon, as if alive, and says to me:

Well, if you feel good, then you need to repay it with something, make some kind of sacrifice. Before I had time to come to my senses from fear, he again:

Here, stab yourself as a sacrifice.

And disappeared. But, father, such fear fell upon me, such martyrdom seized me that I did not see the white light. My heart is so tight that I can’t breathe. It's better to die. And already, as if without memory, I rushed into the kitchen, grabbed a knife and wanted to stab myself in the chest with it. There was a very strong torment in my heart. Death seemed easier to me...

Well, again I don’t know how it happened - but someone definitely knocked the knife out of my hands. He fell to the ground. And I came to my memory. From that very moment on, I began to imagine different things. Now I’m afraid of this icon too.

I listened and was amazed. For the first time in my life I had to learn this from a living person, and not from lives.

Well, how can I help you? After all, I'm not a miracle worker. But come to the service this evening, confess, and tomorrow receive communion of the Holy Mysteries. And after mass we will go to your apartment and serve a prayer service with the blessing of water. And then what God will give. If you are afraid of it, bring the icon to me.

She listened obediently and quietly and left. In the evening I brought an icon of St. John the Baptist. I remember it as I remember it now: 8 x 5 inches in size, paper oleograph, in a narrow brown frame.

After the service, this woman confessed to me. There are rarely people of such purity in the world. And, in fact, there were no sins. However, she sincerely repented of some small things with contrition, but again peacefully... In general, she was “healthy” not only in body, but also in soul. The next day she received communion, and then we went to her apartment.

I took with me everything I needed: the cross, and the gospel, and sprinkles, and the missal, and candles, and censer, and incense. But I forgot the stole, without which we cannot perform services. And already halfway there I remembered. What to do? Well, I don't think I should go back.

Let's go further. At home, give me a clean towel, I will bless it and use the stole together. This is what we are allowed to do according to church laws in case of need. Just don’t use it for anything around the house afterwards, but either donate it to the Church, or, even better, hang it in the front corner above the icon. This will be a blessing for you.

The apartment is a very ordinary room, cleanly whitewashed, everything is in order. In the corner there is an icon with a lamp. The husband was at work.

We served a prayer service and sprinkled everything with holy water. She immediately hung the towel over the icons. She treated me to tea. And I left.

Two or three days later I saw her in the church of the courtyard and asked:

Well, how are you?

God bless! - she says - it’s all over.

Well, thank God! - I answered and didn’t even think that a miracle had happened. And soon I completely forgot. And for some reason no one even wanted to talk about everything that happened. I revealed everything only to my spiritual father, and then in order to ask him why all this happened to her.

When he listened to me, he said to me without hesitation:

This is because she boasted. You should never do this, especially out loud. Demons cannot bear it when a person feels good: they are angry and envious. But if a person is still silent, then they, as St. Macarius of Egypt, although they guess about many things, not everyone knows. If a person speaks out loud, then when they find out, they get irritated and then try to do harm in some way: the bliss of people is unbearable for them.

Well, what if it’s really good?

And then it is better to “protect yourself by silence,” as St. Seraphim said. Well, if a person wants to say something or thank God, then he needs to protect it with the name of God: say “glory to God” or something else. And she said: “What a good life,” she boasted. Yes, I haven’t added the name of God yet. The demons found access to her, by God’s permission.

So the Monk Macarius says: “if you notice something good, then do not attribute it to yourself, but take it to God and thank Him for it.”

After this incident, many things became clear to me in our language. For example, in ordinary conversations, people of all countries and religions, and especially Christians, use the name of God very honestly, even if almost without noticing it.

God forbid! For God's sake! God with you. Oh, Lord!

What is this, my God! Oh my God! and so on. And the most frequently used name of God is when saying goodbye:

With God blessing!

Why all this? Because people have experienced, through centuries of collective observation, noticed the benefits of just using the name of God, even without special faith and prayer at that moment.

But the attitude towards the praises of our Russian “simple”, and, in essence, wise man, is especially worthy of attention. When you ask him: “Well, how are you?”, he will almost never boast or say “good” or “excellent.” And he will answer something like this with restraint:

Nothing, thank God...

And others will say even more prudently, if all is well:

God be merciful. And how are you? Or:

God tolerates sins.

Or just completely and usually:

Little by little, thank God!

And everywhere you hear caution, humility and the indispensable protection of the name of God.

For example, a cart got stuck in a muddy basin. The little horse is struggling. Another madman beats her, the unfortunate one, and scolds her with desperate words. And the prudent peasant gives her a rest, encourages her, strokes her. Then he’ll prop up the cart with a peasant’s shoulder, wave his whip for decency’s sake, and shout:

Uh, come on, darling! With God blessing!

And look, they both got out...

I read a story from a modern writer about the power of the name of God. That was during the German war. They transported the gun to the position.

It has rained. The road was bad. The severity is incredible. Several pairs of horses. The gun got stuck in a pothole. The soldiers fight, suffer, curse, whip their horses. Neither back nor forward...

And how this fruitless torment of both people and horses would have ended, God knows. But at this time one handsome, elderly man approached this place.

This venerable old man first greeted the soldiers affectionately. Then, in the name of God, he wished them success. Petted the horses. And then, when they and the soldiers had rested a little, he suggested trying to move again. And he addressed the soldiers so kindly. They are some for the horses, some for the gun. And the old man is right there.

Come on, dear ones, with God!

The soldiers shouted, the horses rushed and the cannon was drawn. Then it was easy.

And how many such cases! Only we, the blind, don’t notice. But it’s good that we speak in language, and this alone often protects us from the power of the enemy.

Meanwhile, in modern times people have become ashamed of using this saving name.

And often we hear either a bitter complaint about a hard life, or, conversely, frivolous praise:

Excellent, excellent!

And sometimes crazy speeches: “damn good”, or using a “dark word”. And feeling sorry for him, I want to correct him.

Sometimes, when I hear praise, I either add it myself, or ask the speaker to add:

Say: "Thank God!"

What for?

So you tell him this story. Others will take into account...

Father Isidore

Now I’ll tell you about it. This man was amazing. Not even a person, but an angel on earth.

I first met him as a student at the academy.

Although Fr. Nikita blessed me to become a monk, and predicted that I would even be awarded the episcopate, but I no longer know how or why, only the question of monasticism arose again. Probably, I myself had to suffer and make the decision so that it would be lasting. And three or four years passed in such searching and hesitation. On the advice of my spiritual father, I went to Father Isidore, whom he knew personally.

Father lived in the Gethsemane monastery, near Sergievsky Posad, next to the Chernigov Hermitage, where the famous elder Varnava used to asceticize.

In Gethsemane, as this monastery was usually called, life was quite strict, established by the ever-memorable saint of God, Metropolitan Philaret of Moscow.

It was here, in a small hut house, that Fr. lived. Isidore.

When I arrived at his place, he was probably about 80 years old. Dressed in a small suit, with a rather long gray beard and an unusually affectionate face, not only smiling, but even laughing eyes - this is his face.

He always appeared laughing like that in photographs.

Whoever is interested in the life of this undoubtedly holy man, let him find his life - “The Salt of the Earth.” There is a lot said about him. I will only write down what is not there yet.

When I came to him and received his blessing, he received me, as was his custom, kindly, warmly and with a joyful smile. I no longer had any fear, as I did then on Valaam. And even if there had been, then from one gentle ray from the priest he would have immediately melted, like snow that accidentally fell in the spring.

Heading to Fr. Isidore, I “thought it all out”, decided to tell him “my whole life”, “open my soul”, as in confession, and then ask his decision: should I become a monk. In a word, how patients tell the doctor all the details.

But I was just about to start my “biography,” and I already told him about my goal when he interrupted me:

Wait wait! Don't go now. And when the time comes, you still won’t be able to hold back.

The question was immediately over. And no biography. They, the saints, just have to look, and they already see everything. And God reveals to them our future.

I stopped. There was nothing more to tell. You will have to be a monk... The only thing left unclear is when! And again there is nothing to ask - it is said, “the time will come.” We have to wait.

And o. Isidor, meanwhile, began to put on a small samovar - about 5-6 cups. Soon he began to make noise... And the priest was constantly saying something or singing in an old, trembling tenor. He told me how wonderful our Orthodox services are. There is nothing like this in the world.

At the same time, I remembered how he sent by mail to the German Emperor Wilhelm our Orthodox Irmology (a special collection of Irmos for 8 tones, with an appendix of other chants used at Vespers, Matins and Liturgy. - Author's note).

It seems that he was later reprimanded for this by the Chief Prosecutor of the Synod.

Then he began to sing - “Christ is my strength, God and Lord” (irmos of the 6th tone).

Only later did I begin to understand that it was no coincidence that the holy elder sang then: he foresaw both my soul and life. And I knew that my only hope is Christ the Lord and my God...

The samovar has already boiled. Cups also appeared on the table. Father reached into a small chest - the kind that new soldier recruits have - and took out some gifts for me - a small orange and already quite shriveled. I cut it, and there was very little juice there. He handed it to me. Then he took out a glass of something red:

And this is jam for you and me. There's not enough of it here. And there it was just a finger from the bottom...

Well, never mind,” he joked, “we’ll add it!” And he immediately took a decanter of kvass, filled the glass with cranberry jam to the top and put it on the table, all with the sentences: “Here’s some jam for us.”

So we drank tea with kvass.

Now I already understand that the dry orange, the jam with kvass, and that chant are in the closest connection with my life. At the same time, I didn’t think of looking for meaning in his symbolic actions... Obviously, what he didn’t want, out of love, to tell me directly, he revealed in symbols.

So does Rev. Seraphim did. So did Father Optinsky, Fr. Nectary.

We drank tea. He said that he has a pet frog and mice that crawl out of their holes in the floor, and he feeds them by hand.

And then he turned to me with a request-desire:

I would like to visit St. Seraphim.

(He was already famous then).

What's the matter?

No money left.

But in the summer I will receive money for a published article and take you there. Do you want it, father?

So we agreed. As soon as I receive the money, I will write to him and come for him.

With that, I went home for the holidays. I received the money in the summer and immediately wrote to Fr. Isidore, - anticipating the joy of long-term communication with him. But in response, I received an unexpectedly strange letter from someone else, signed by some L-m, who asked him for help and desperately complained about his unfortunate fate.

In response to my question about the time of monasticism, at the top of the letter, in senile, trembling handwriting, but very beautiful, almost calligraphic, he wrote only one line: “the commandment of the Lord is bright, it enlightens the eyes.” Words from the psalm of King David (Ps. 18:9).

I read them and looked through the letter. And I didn’t understand anything...

“Probably,” I thought, “the priest didn’t have enough money for blank paper to write a letter, and he signed someone else’s letter. But why didn’t he even answer about the trip to St. Seraphim? Strange.”

Having reached the end of the holidays, I went to the academy, and on the way I decided to stop by Fr. Isidora. Will he go to Rev. Seraphim in Sarov? When we met, I immediately asked about this.

Did you receive my letter?

I received it, but you wrote almost nothing there. I didn't understand.

Why! This is the person from whom I sent you the letter, and you need to help. Rev. Seraphim will not be offended by me, and you will spend the money that you have prepared for me on him.

Where is he?

Yes, he lives in Kursk. His address is also written in the letter.

In Kursk? - I ask, - So you need to go there?

So go there, find him, and help him get settled. He is unhappy, armless. And he writes a letter with his left hand. His arm was torn off at the factory.

Then I understood why the handwriting of the letter was large and straight, uncertain.

I received the blessing and immediately went to Kursk, where the Rev. was born. Seraphim. Somewhere on the edge of Kursk, in the Yamskaya settlement, with a poor woman who had nothing but an empty hut and a half-blind kitten, the unfortunate L. found shelter for himself.

The beggar had a six-year-old granddaughter, Verochka. Poor, poor! How they lived! One could already judge by the kitten - all its ribs were in spades. But how meek both are... Holy poverty. And they didn’t complain. So is the kitten - it looks into your eyes and only occasionally meows pitifully when you eat: “give it to me too.” And if you look at him, he will close his eyes in shame; it’s as if he didn’t ask. And again he is meekly silent. And a person eats for complete pleasure. The same difference happens in the world.

And the hut is miserable and damp. You can reach the ceiling with your head.

And with such and such a beggar another homeless, armless, unfortunate man found shelter.

The rich had neither place nor bread for him.

We met. Then they went to collect help for the rich: they planned to open a shop with him. We didn't get enough. They must have mistaken us more for swindlers. Nothing worked out...

We decided to go to Fr. Isidore, seek advice.

I said goodbye to the holy beggars. And again - to Gethsemane. But the character of the armless man is desperate. And I have no humility. How many times have we quarreled along the way!

Finally, we arrived. It was already the beginning of October. And it snowed in Moscow. It was cold. Let's go to Fr.'s cell. Isidora. I went in first, took off my galoshes, and L. was still in the hallway kicking the snow off his boots.

Father! - I took advantage while I was alone with him, - how difficult he is!

Difficult?! - the affectionate Fr. calmly asks me. Isidore, - do you think it’s easy to do good? Any good thing is difficult to do.

And at this time I.F.L. also entered. We were just talking to him irritably before the entrance about something. But as soon as he saw Fr. Isidora, some miraculous transformation happened to him: he smiled joyfully, became sweet, and lovingly approached the priest.

O. Isidore affectionately blessed him.

Sit down, brother Ivan, sit down - he calmly and kindly indicated a chair.

I.F. sat down, still silent, smiling.

Oh, brother Ivan, brother Ivan! - the priest said sadly, compassionately and affectionately, - how God humbled you, but you still don’t humble yourself!

Here we can say, at least briefly, about the unfortunate I.F. At first he was a driver on the Moscow-Kursk Railway. But, apparently, due to his extremely quarrelsome character, he did not get along there. Afterwards he entered the factory of some Jew in Kyiv. He suggested starting work on the second day of Easter. I.F. agreed, although others were unwilling. While working, he noticed that the drive belt could come off the flywheel. Wanting to correct it as it went, he carelessly approached and was pulled in by the car.

His right arm was completely torn off, his back was cut, and on his left arm there were only thumb yes half of the index. He almost died... The court gave him either a lifelong pension from his owner or a one-time payment. He, of course, agreed to the second. But soon I lived through everything. And he was left without money and without hands. In all other respects he was a very healthy, tall and handsome man. And only his early baldness - he was then about 30 years old - revealed his large forehead even more. He wandered around different places for a long time as a cripple. And already

I don’t know how he got to the Gethsemane monastery to Fr. Isidora... And the priest especially noticed unhappy people, thrown out of the rut of life, as they say - lost. Some former Moscow lawyer, expelled by his corporation not for good deeds, wanted to commit suicide, but was warmed by the priest and saved by him.

All sorts of poor and beggars from Sergievsky Posad met him as a patron. Often he went to them at odd times to console them and help them in some way.

For this he was reprimanded by the abbot, but he continued to do his work of mercy. In winter, he fed freezing sparrows from his hands.

It was to him, like to the warm sun, that God brought the unfortunate cripple. And from then on I.F. He became so attached to the priest that, in fact, one might say, he lived for him.

“I am superfluous to everyone,” he told me many, many times later, “only Father Isidore loved me.”

And this, apparently, was true. It was difficult to love him with his unhumble character. But we also lack patience, because there is no love. And o. Isidore was love itself. That is why the unfortunate man warmed himself next to him. That is why all his words were accepted by Ivan F. quite easily.

“How God has humbled you!” If I had said this, there would have been a storm of anger, reproaches, and quarrels. But when this was said from a loving heart by Fr. Isidora, then I.F. He didn’t say a word, he just bowed his head submissively and, smiling, remained silent.

I was surprised. How could he just, a minute ago, quarrel with me uncontrollably, and now he is silent with a smile?!

“Some kind of taming of animals!” I thought. Rev. Seraphim fed the bear. But I don’t know if it’s easier to calm another person down!

And the priest affectionately approached him and quietly began to stroke his bald head. He bent even lower and became a completely meek lamb... I still don’t know how he restrained himself from tears of tenderness then. It would be nice if he cried too. It would have been even easier for him and he would have been even more humble. And the grace of God would have warmed and strengthened him, the poor man, even more.

But what I saw was enough to be amazed at the great power of Fr. Isidora.

Then we talked about what I.F. and I should do. Father didn’t say anything in particular, he only gave us a commandment:

Try somehow, bother. God will help you both to salvation.

This was what was “special”. He needed the unfortunate cripple to have some kind of guardian. Moreover, the priest was soon to die, and then I.F. I would be left alone again.

But for me, I needed an exercise in God’s commandment of love for others. Ap. Paul says that “the whole law is contained in one word: love your neighbor as yourself” (Gal. 5:14).

And then I realized what the short inscription meant, written in the delicate and beautiful handwriting of Fr. Isidora in a letter from I.F., sent to me in the summer.

“The commandment of the Lord is bright, it enlightens the eyes.” (Ps. 18:9).

So little by little the answer to Fr. Isidora about my monasticism. I thought mainly about form, and he - about spirit. I thought that you would take monastic vows, put on monastic robes, and as if the main thing had already been done. And the priest turned both my soul and my thoughts to fulfilling the commandments of God, to following the law of the Lord.

And King David compares this law in the said psalm with the light of the sun illuminating the entire universe. And this law strengthens the soul, makes wise the simple, gladdens the heart, enlightens the eyes, and endures forever (vv. 8-10).

That is why the commandments, and not monasticism, are more desirable than gold, sweeter than honey (v. 11).

“Your servant,” King David says to the Lord, “is protected by them, and not by black robes, and in observing them there is a great reward! (v. 12).

That’s where my thoughts were turned by the priest, who expertly fulfilled the commandments of God... And we, young students, were carried away by something else - I won’t say career. No, but with dreams of ardent love for God, deeds of holiness, and high prayer.

And before that, it was necessary to fulfill God’s commandments for a long time. And only by doing them in practice will you learn everything; and, in particular, before ascending into the transcendental spheres of contemplation, prayer, holiness, a person who tries to fulfill the commandments of God will first see himself, his weaknesses, his imperfections, his sins, the corruption of his will, to the very recesses of his soul.

This is what it means “the commandment of the Lord enlightens the eyes.” And the Psalmist, who kept the law, speaks about this in the same psalm from his own experience.

“Who can see his own faults? Cleanse me from my secrets, and restrain Your servant from the willful ones, so that they do not prevail over me. Then I will be blameless and clean from great corruption” (vv. 13-14).

And only after going through this path of struggle, which opens only through the fulfillment of the commandments, will a person achieve the highest - prayers and God-pleasing content. And he will enter into communion with the Lord, having first known his helplessness on the one hand, and at the same time and through this, the firmness of trust only in the Lord the Deliverer, the Savior. So the righteous king sings:

“Let the words of my mouth and the meditation of my heart be acceptable in Your sight, O Lord, my rock and my Savior!” (v. 15).

And now, having worked not in the dream of “holiness”, but in the actual experience of realizing the very initial letters of the alphabet of goodness, i.e. fulfillment of the Commandments of God on Ivan F-che, I immediately saw myself: who am I?

How difficult it is! - I confessed...

But he was not the only one who was difficult, but I, above all, was “difficult” for good. And he dreamed of monastic “holiness”. Oh, it’s still a long way from the goal... Yes, I didn’t understand myself yet. I kept blaming others, not myself. And only the further, the more the “great corruption” of my soul was revealed, as the king sings. Not to mention “my secrets”. And gradually I came to the experimental conclusion: the Lord alone is “my stronghold and my Savior.”

This is not how I thought about myself before...

And the Irmos of the 6th tone, which Fr. sang to me more than once, became even more understandable to me. Isidore in an old voice:

Christ is my si-i-la, God and Lord! And now I had to practice the law and through I.F.

Try somehow, work hard... to save both.

And I had to “try” for another 11 years. There was a lot of things... But we are not talking about us, the weak. That’s why I turn to the wondrous old man of God.

I must have never seen him after this meeting. That's how he was imprinted in my mind - laughing, affectionate. He was already “from that world.” He was the Christ-like son of Love... Truly the “salt of the earth.”

Miracle in Serbia

I have spoken about this event many times in private conversations and sermons. And now I want to write this down as a souvenir for others.

Around 1927-28, I wanted to take refuge in a separate monastery in Serbia. To do this, I went to Studenica - to the monastery built by St. Simeon, father of Saint Sava, Serbian enlightener. A few days later I was taken from there to the monastery of St. Savva, located nine kilometers from the monastery.

This place was unusually secluded, in the high mountains, in a deep gorge, far from any village, in a deep forest. At night, I often heard the howling of some wild animals, and rare travelers, driving through the mountains, not far from the monastery, even during the day, entering the forest, often shouted “whoa,” scaring possible wolves.

It was here that there was a small monastery, built, according to legend, by St. himself. Savvoy. It consisted of a small church that could accommodate only five or ten people. And in the altar there is even less.

To the left of the church was a two-story wooden house. That's all the buildings. A little higher up the mountain, a source of clean, cold water gurgled from underground.

I lived in this monastery for about six months with only one

Serb monk, Father Roman. And before him, the old hieromonk Father Gury took refuge here. Both of these monks deserved to have their memory passed down to their descendants.

I will first tell you about these workers.

Previously, Father Roman was married and had seven children. Both he and his wife were completely healthy, but all their children died within a few days. The parents involuntarily thought about this, and came to the conclusion that there was no will of God for their future married life, and decided to go to the monastery, leaving the world. So they did.

But in order to test themselves whether they were capable of a celibate life, they entered this monastery of St. Simeon as workers: he as a coachman, she as a cook.

It should be noted that Serbian monasteries of recent times, although numerous in number, have few monks. Therefore, they needed outside labor.

Having decided to serve in a monastery, Roman and his wife were placed in one room, in which they lived for about three years, celibate, in chastity, like brother and sister. And only after that they took upon themselves the feat of monasticism. His wife left for a nunnery, about two hundred miles from this monastery, and he remained here.

I don’t know how long he lived in the monastery itself, but I found him already in the monastery of St. Sava.

He was a man above average height, unusually thin, but strong and, as they say, wiry.

The skete had a vegetable garden, a small garden, a small vineyard, and a small field of wheat. Fr. worked on all this in complete solitude. Novel. And it should be noted that he was distinguished by an extraordinary thirst for work.

Early in the morning we served with him small rule. After the rule and a light early breakfast, he hurriedly ran somewhere to work. And I remained in the monastery as both the watchman and the cook. However, our food and my work as a cook were extremely simple and meager. O. Roman left me some potatoes and millet. Afterwards I bribed myself with rice and vegetable oil.

Potatoes, on the advice of Fr. Romana, I didn’t clean it, since the large ones were left for Lent and early spring, and the small ones were difficult to clean and weren’t worth it, since there would be little left for food.

O. Roman led me to the source and showed me how to handle potatoes. He poured water into a bucket, added potatoes, washed them in three waters and set them to boil. Then I added millet or rice, and we got soup. And on fasting days we also ate feta cheese (sheep cheese).

I had quite a lot of time left, and I wrote explanations of holidays, etc. By evening Fr. Roman was returning from work and we were having dinner. For the holidays I also baked prosphora, but I must admit that they were almost always unsuccessful, because... The dough did not rise very well: the kitchen was not warm enough.

There were no living creatures in the monastery, except for a cat and a kitten, who guarded the house from small forest rats.

One day they suggested that we take a cow from the monastery in order to have milk, or at least a goat. But we resolutely refused, since this would have caused us a lot of unnecessary worries and troubles. Almost every Sunday, and especially on major holidays, Fr. Roman went to liturgy 9 miles away to a monastery.

First, we had to descend from the mountains about four miles, and then, crossing a fast river, we had to walk on level ground to the monastery. This river was called "Studenica" because of the very icy cold water. The monastery of St. is named after her. Simeon, located near this river, was also named “Studenica”.

On one of these holidays, it seems, on St. Elijah (but now I definitely can’t vouch for this), and a miraculous event happened. But I will talk about him later, and now I’ll tell you about another hieromonk who lived in the monastery before Fr. Romana - Guria Island.

He was 70 years old at that time, but he was very strongly built and thin, and very short in stature. So he brought me to the monastery for the first time to Fr. Roman.

Approaching the wicker fence of the monastery and showing me a bypass path to the door of the house, he himself jumped over the fence with extraordinary ease.

Having introduced me to Fr. Roman, he showed me his former room, where he had previously lived. I was extremely surprised by the library, which seemed to contain up to 500 books. Between them are several rare specimens. For example, “Memorable Tales” with sayings of the ancient fathers, and others. Of course, all the books were of religious content. I used them the entire time I was in the monastery.

Another time Fr. Gury accompanied me to the monastery with a rather heavy burden. They sent me a package in the mail for over 20 pounds, and the priest wanted to make my journey easier. At least to the Studenica River - it’s about 5 miles. I, as a younger person, was ashamed that the old man was carrying the weight, and I was walking lightly. Therefore, on the way, I turned to him with a request:

Father! Let me carry the parcel now. After all, she was sent for me. And besides, it will be like penance for my sins.

O. Gury objected to this:

No, I'll still carry it. And I have to think more about penance. I have so many sins that if I cut my body into pieces, it would not be enough for penance.

And then I found out and understood why he, being a hieromonk, never serves in the monastery as a priest, although he was never tried and condemned by church authorities. But, out of his own consciousness of his sinfulness, he himself decided not to touch the Divine service and especially the liturgy.

“I made a vow on myself,” he said, “for my sins, never to put on a priest’s stole or bless anyone.

In the monastery, he performed the duties of a reader in the church during Divine services, and in the refectory he served food to the brethren, as the last novice. He did both with extraordinary simplicity and humility, as if it was necessary. And the younger monks were so accustomed to this that they usually treated him imperiously, like elders treating younger ones. And he not only did not show it, but really was not at all upset by this attitude of the other brethren towards him.

After the meal, everyone went to their cells, and he had to clean the refectory. By the way, in church he read unusually slowly, with arrangements, conscious of every word.

This example reminds me of the spirit of ancient times.

In my long life, I have not yet seen another example of clergy voluntarily abandoning their duties and the heights of priestly service, without being prompted by anything.

Of course, he passed away a long time ago. Rest in peace! For his repentance, may the Lord forgive him his sins... What he sinned about, neither he found it necessary to tell, nor did I dare to ask. And it doesn't matter. It has become natural for us to sin, but to repent, and even with such self-reproach and deep awareness of our sinfulness, is a very rare thing and deserves me to write it down as a lesson to ourselves and our descendants.

About Fr. Romana, I also remembered that during the first war with the Germans he spent the entire war - he fought, retreated to the island of Corfu, then returned to the monastery.

And now I will move on to the story of the miracle itself.

It was summer, probably early July. Since I and Fr. On holidays, Roman almost always went to services from his skete to the monastery, and this time we did the same. But unexpectedly for me, oh. The abbot asked me to serve a prayer for rain after the liturgy, since he himself had to go to the monastery farm on business that day.

Of course, I agreed, and immediately after the liturgy I, Fr. Roman and some other monks went to the mountain, where similar prayer services were usually served during drought.

The journey turned out to be very difficult, since the mountain was very high and the climb was steep. To make it easier, I was given a monastery riding horse. I had almost never ridden a horse before, and it was difficult for me to climb the steep mountain. But still, an hour later we climbed it, although it was still about half a mile to the top.

Our stop was timed to the place where there was a well. It was believed that if there was no water in this well, then the drought was great and prolonged. A prayer service with water blessing was performed over this well, and the blessed water was then poured into the empty well.

When we reached this place, there were relatively few people there, or, as the Serbs called them, villagers.

We began to put on sacred clothes, but there were still few people, and we decided to wait. And the clergy are not all there yet.

To occupy time, I began preaching in Serbian. My listeners, with their heads bowed, listened, apparently without much desire. I understood it this way: “after all, we did not come to listen to a sermon, but to pray for rain.” Therefore, I finished my speech very soon. But the clergy had not yet arrived, and I had to wait.

Naturally, my thoughts in my soul settled on the subject of the future prayer service.

“Why did I come here? After all, it wasn’t to perform a service, serve a prayer service and then calmly go down to the monastery, as if I had done something really useful. After all, I didn’t come up here to preach. After all, everyone gathered here with with one desire: to receive mercy from God - to rain on the parched earth in the vast space around. Or to put it another way - we stopped for a miracle."

And it hasn't rained for about a month. Crops began to die. And on this very day the sky was pure blue and cloudless. My thoughts flowed further.

“Do we deserve a miracle? Perhaps the monks standing around me are worthy of a miracle in their lives, I don’t know. Or maybe among the villagers there are godly people. Or for their bitter need and perishing labor the Lord will take pity on them, like a father over the poor children. And he will give them their daily bread."

This idea seemed most understandable to me. They, these simple people, truly deserve God’s mercy more than us, and their sorrowful silence and heartfelt requests are more pleasing to God than our speeches and even prayers. After all, it is not for nothing that the Psalmist said that God sends food to “chickling corvids” that cry out to Him in hunger.

I did not consider myself worthy of the expected miracle: perhaps the Lord will look not at me personally, but at my episcopal rank... And suddenly a quick thought flashed through my soul, as if someone had said it quite clearly:

Pray in the name of My Son!

I immediately remembered the words of the Savior at his farewell conversation with his disciples: “Truly, truly, I say to you, whatever you ask the Father in My name, He will give it to you. Until now you have asked nothing in My name; ask, and you will receive, that your joy may be complete.” (John 16:23-24).

And here I forgot about everyone present and about myself, I began to pray for rain, asking the Heavenly Father in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ. Of course, he prayed in silence.

At this time, the clergy climbed the mountain by a shortened but more difficult route in a straight line. There were also people, although not very many.

The prayer service began. They blessed the water and poured it, according to custom, into the depths of the well. The people began to disperse. The clergy began to descend the same way. The sky continued to be clear, and only here and there light clouds slowly floated by.

I got on the horse. But going down the mountain turned out to be more difficult than going up it, and I was forced to get off my horse and lead him by the bridle. About an hour later we were at the monastery.

There was no change in the sky, they didn’t even think about it. They did their job and forgot about it.

We were served lunch in the refectory. After it, we took bread from the monastery for a week, as we usually did, asked for more cheese, loaded it all on a young donkey and began to get ready to go back to the monastery. It was already approximately six o'clock. The donkey walked ahead of us - he knew this road well. We slowly followed him. We reached Studenica - 4 miles.

To my surprise and completely unnoticed by me, the sky had once managed to become covered with gray solid clouds coming from behind the mountains towards us.

Suddenly a thought struck me: will the Lord really give us rain and create a miracle! But I myself was afraid to believe it. Another half hour passed like this. They began to climb up the mountains. The sky began to darken. But the donkey confidently walked forward along the path. In the dense forest, the darkness thickened more and more. And suddenly I felt dampness in the air, coming from the clouds. Still not believing myself, I said Fr. Roman:

Father! But it probably smells like rain. Silent o. Roman replied:

God bless you with rain!

We moved on again to get the donkey. Suddenly, a dull echo of thunder was heard in the distance. Now it was clear to us that a thunderstorm was approaching with the clouds, and with it, of course, rain. It became so dark in the forest that we literally could not see our own feet. Suddenly lightning flashed and thunder roared. And we saw our path several yards ahead. Then the darkness embraced us again, and only the familiar foal walked firmly ahead of us, like a leader. Lightning began to shine more and more often, as if illuminating our path. And I said oh. Roman:

The Lord lights us like matches in the sky and shows us the way.

The air became cold. We walked more than three miles through the mountains. Here the road split into two: one path was longer, gently sloping to the right, bypassing the ravine; the other walked straight, and then climbed steeply up to the monastery. We wanted to take a more convenient road - to the right. But the donkey became stubborn and did not agree to go this way. And we were forced to obey him. When we reached the middle of the ravine, the donkey turned sharply upward towards the monastery. Lightning flashed and thunder rumbled almost continuously.

Father Roman tells me:

Well, sir, if you want to stay dry, run up alone, and we’ll come after.

So I did. About ten minutes later I approached the porch of our monastery. Suddenly a raindrop fell dully to the ground. But I was already safe. It began to rain.

And it poured all night and gave the thirsty land plenty to drink.

About five minutes later Father Fr. came. Romance with a donkey, but already all wet.

Weeping and peacemaking icons

Who has not heard or read stories about the weeping icons of the Mother of God? I myself had to see two such cases.

When I was still a professorial fellow at the St. Petersburg Academy (1907-1908), I was asked to come to one family to serve a prayer service. These were my acquaintances: the widow of a paramedic who died unexpectedly early, and his son, who, on my recommendation, was accepted into the St. Petersburg Theological School. They lived, it seems, on the Obvodny Canal.

When I entered their room, in the corner in front of the icon of the Mother of God I saw a lit lamp; under the icon there was a wide plate. Some kind of oily liquid, colorless in appearance and odorless, constantly oozed onto it. The oozing liquid was absorbed into the cotton wool, which the widow distributed to her acquaintances, without, out of humility, announcing the extraordinary event to the church authorities.

The icon was 10x6 inches in size. Its back side was soaked through and through with the world, which had never happened before. I served a prayer service before her and returned to the Academy. I haven’t been to this family’s house since. And the widow was not very surprised when the myrrh stream appeared. Miracles seemed natural to believers.

Another case was in the monastery of St. Savva, whom I talked about above. In the small altar in the skete church, on the left side in a small semicircular niche, an icon of some saint was painted, in front of which a proskomedia was performed.

From the very first days of serving the liturgy, I was surprised that water was oozing from the wall. Not knowing how to explain this, I began to wipe the wet spot, under which I soon noticed a completely different image. The icon was not drawn oil paints, but water ones, which were easily washed off. I erased the entire first layer, and underneath it a completely different image was revealed quite clearly. Some young face was drawn, in white clothes, without a belt. I don’t remember now whether it was written, or whether I myself guessed that Jesus Christ is depicted here, whose robe is torn by heretics, as it is said in the stichera in memory of the First Ecumenical Council: “Who is Thy robe, O Savior, torn? Arius - Thou art. "

I don’t remember now - almost 30 years have passed since that time, but it seems that the capital letters IC XC (Jesus Christ) were depicted near the head. Or maybe the above words about Aria were written under the image. In any case, the meaning of this image was completely clear to me. But probably the later icon painter did not understand it at all, and he decided to paint some saint in this place.

But that's not what matters; the important thing is that when I washed away the top image, the water immediately stopped flowing, not resuming for the six months that I lived there. I can only explain this change as a miracle.

But I didn’t try to do this, because, like the paramedic’s widow, I was not and am not amazed at miracles. “What is impossible for man is possible for God,” said the Lord Jesus Christ Himself.

And where the Lord is, miracles are not only possible, but also necessary. That is why the Church sings on holiday evenings: “Who is the great God, like our God! You are God, work miracles.” The highest miracle is, first of all, God Himself. And after God, all miracles are small and insignificant.

Renewed icon of the Mother of God

Here it is appropriate to recall the miracle of icon renewal. As we all remember, in the first days after the revolution, icons were updated in many places in our Rus'.

I saw one of these in Carpathian Rus', among some of the Russian refugees.

The icon was small, 5 inches high and 3-4 wide. And the image of the Mother of God from the oblique right corner to the opposite left was dark, and on the other - completely light.

I saw this.

"On Trinity"

It was in the Serbian monastery "Petkovica". (Petki in Serbian is Friday, and Friday in Greek is paraskevi, a preparatory day for Saturday, and there is a martyr and the Venerable Paraskeva: a particle of her relics was in this Serbian monastery “St. Petka”).

This monastery was 30 kilometers from the city of Shabets. This monastery was at the disposal of Russian monks; 20-25 of us gathered here in 1923, I think.

We performed services there “according to the rules”, quite completely. On the feast of St. Pentecost, after the liturgy, as is known, vespers is celebrated with three large kneeling prayers of St. Basil the Great.

I - in vestments, of course, and with a bouquet of flowers in my hands - for some reason left the altar and stood on the choir, as I remember...

The reader calmly, recitatively reads for an hour. I, and also calmly, while reading this calmly, am thinking about something completely different. I look at the flowers and, as usual, wonder: what a living miracle! They say there are no miracles! And I have a miracle in my hands

God's flowers. How and why are these flowers? I don’t understand at all... In botany they say that it is known that flowers attract insects with their color and thus the plants are fertilized. I do not argue. Although for me it seems extremely one-sided, incomplete. What about beauty? Doesn't it really have another purpose?

But that’s not the point, it’s not the question “for what,” but another question: “Why? How?” it happened and is happening. Completely incomprehensible to me...

And I’m not the only one. In 1954, in Rostov, a university professor in the department of botany approached me. During the first war with the Germans, Warsaw University was transferred to Rostov-on-Don. And this professor was evacuated with him.

In total he served for 40 years. He organized a Botanical Garden here (172 hectares, I think). And he recently retired. After this (and, probably, in his heart even before) he began to study religious issues. And he turned to me with a letter asking me to recommend someone for leadership in religion. At that time I could not indicate an authoritative and capable assistant to him, and I went myself.

During the conversation, I asked him, among other things, whether he understood why roses have red, yellow, and white flowers:

He calmly shook his head and said:

No!

Why on flowers" Pansies", there are also small circles on the petals, sometimes purple, sometimes with yellow shells, sometimes with white ones?

No.

And I don’t understand why there are roots! And why are they like this!

I see that he doesn’t understand either...

So I looked at the flowers on the feast of the Holy Trinity, as always, and now, as an incomprehensible phenomenon. I see the fact, but I don’t understand it at all...

So I thought calmly, as usual. The ninth hour was calmly read... I, as can be seen even now, was not in any ecstasy.

And suddenly something incomprehensible happened.

In flowers, but not in the flowers themselves, or rather, through flowers, somehow gradually, imperceptibly, as if easily, God appeared, and the flowers did not interfere at all: matter did not at all delay the spiritual world, the spirit. Like this? I can’t explain, but what appeared did not depend at all on the flowers, but was from a “special world.” Apart from this fact, which is obvious to me, I can’t add anything.

I repeat: I was definitely not in any ecstasy or hysteria, either before, or at that moment, or even after. Not humanoid, but invisible, but truly existing, animated Spirit appeared... Let me compare - if the air around us came to life... Then in one moment I felt - then God is Trinity and one!

Don't ask, reader - how? what's happened? I can’t explain it in any way... But it’s a fact. It went on like that for about two minutes.

At prayer

I experienced many things that were incomprehensible to my mind. One day I wrote down:

"From now on, for me there is no more valuable than words as Father, Son and Holy Spirit."

And then, when pronouncing them, I burst into sweet tears, or stopped praying completely - I couldn’t. I didn't have the strength to speak.

It’s the same with the words - God and “speech God”, Christ, Mother of God....

And when reading the Gospel - sometimes.

By the way, this is why I loved to serve alone in the house Church on the eve of the Nativity of Christ, Epiphany, and Easter... This was repeated almost every year.

And with all this - I sincerely see myself as I am - a sinner! And I also cry from the consciousness of sins... And this, I know, is not from me, not from the mind, but from grace, from God.

This is the same fact for me as I see this book.

Our Lady

At one time I had a question: should I remove a certain employee from myself or should I be patient. The mind said one thing, but Christian love said another. And in this bewilderment I wrote a letter to the Holy Patriarch. He answered me in the sense that truth should be with love and love with truth.

I wrote a second letter with more detailed explanations. He answered me. Now I've forgotten that. And I continued to hesitate.

And one day I went to bed at three o’clock in the morning - there was a lot to do. But as soon as I got into bed and turned off the electricity, at that moment (I had not fallen asleep at all yet, I know that for sure), near the bedroom table, in front of the window of the room, on the left side of the entrance, in semi-darkness (a tiny electric lamp), I saw the dim figure of the Mother of God (without the baby Jesus Christ), sitting on a chair, in a humble pose with her head bowed: she was so humble.

And with this She showed me the path of humility. That was about three minutes. I was calm. Wrote to the Patriarch. He answered - decide the issue yourself. And a month or two later, that man himself submitted his resignation.

Paraklisis

This Greek word is the name of the prayer service to the Mother of God (printed in the Book of Hours: “We bear the misfortunes of many,” sung in sorrows).

Once, it was in Crimea (around 1917) - I had very difficult circumstances, and I did not see a way out of them. Therefore, I opened the Book of Hours and began to read the paraklisis to the Mother of God. And before I had even read half of the canon, people came, and everything turned out completely fine.

The case seems to be very simple. But for me it was unexpected, wonderful. And besides, I prayed for a short time, about five minutes. Gracious Queen of Heaven!

Conclusion

God's providence protects our entire lives. But sometimes there are special cases.

To others they will seem like ordinary stories. But we consider them to be the work of Divine Providence... We won’t argue - I don’t want to. And let the reader figure it out for himself - whether these phenomena are random. Or not?

Divine Providence the unceasing manifestation in the world of the all-good, all-wise and all-powerful, the incessant God, aimed at preserving and developing the world, turning everything towards, directing humanity as a whole and each individual to the eternal. ( The meaning of the word craft, denoting a craft or type of craft, for example, folk craft, should not be confused with the meaning of the word “Providence” (God’s)).

If you want to know God's Providence, determine what your Christian duty is in the situation in which you find yourself today.

God provides and participates in people's lives, but often does not intervene in our lives in a visible way so that our free will can make voluntary choices. God's providence means that at every stage of our life the Lord places us in such conditions under which we could make a free choice in favor of goodness, truth, justice and through this ascend to Heavenly Father. However, the depths of God’s Providence are incomprehensible to the limited human mind, so that, knowing about God’s Providence, we are not able to comprehend it fully.

Very often pains and joys come to us not from our past, but from the future. God sometimes warns us about the future towards which we are rushing at full speed. God's providence, as it were, trips us up so that we fall before we fall into a hole that we do not yet see. Let your knee be broken, but let’s keep your head intact.
Deacon Andrey

One hermit asked God to make him understand the ways of His Providence, and imposed a fast on himself. When he went to visit an old man who lived far away, an Angel appeared to him in the form of a monk and offered to be his companion. In the evening, they stopped for the night with a pious man, who offered them food on a silver platter. But what a surprise! Immediately after the meal, the elder’s companion took the dish and threw it into the sea.
They went further and the next day stayed with another pious man. But trouble again! When the hermit and his companion began to prepare for the journey, the one who received them brought his young son to them to bless him. But instead of blessing, the companion, touching the boy, took his soul. Neither the old man, out of horror, nor the father, in despair, uttered a word. On the third day they took shelter in a dilapidated house. The elder sat down to eat food, and his companion first dismantled the wall and then repaired it again. Here the elder could not stand it: “Who are you - a demon or an angel? What are you doing? The day before yesterday you took away a dish from a good man, yesterday you took the life of a boy, and today you are straightening walls that no one needs.”
Do not be surprised, elder, and do not be tempted about me. I am the Angel of God. The first person to receive us acts in a manner pleasing to God, but he acquired that dish untruthfully, so I threw it away so that he would not lose his reward. The second husband is also pleasing to God, but if his son had grown up, he would have been a terrible villain. The owner of the house where we stayed is an immoral, lazy person and therefore became impoverished. His grandfather, while building this house, hid gold in the wall. That’s why I straightened the wall so that the owner wouldn’t find him and thereby die. Return, elder, to your cell and do not suffer madly, for this is what the Holy Spirit says: “The judgments of the Lord are unknown to men.” Therefore, do not test them either - it will not do you any good.

Everything is from God, both good and sorrowful, and unworthy; but one is by good will, the other by economy, the third by permission. And by good will - when we live virtuously, for it pleases God that we lead a sinless life, live virtuously and piously. According to the economy, when, falling into mistakes and sinning, we are admonished; by permission, when even those admonished we do not convert.
God was pleased that man should be saved, just as the angels cried out, saying: Glory to God in the highest, and on earth peace, good will to men(). Again, economically, God admonishes us who sin, so that we and the world will not be condemned, as the apostle says: We are judged by God and punished, lest we be condemned by the world (). And there is no evil in the city, which the Lord did not create(), are as follows: hunger, ulcers, illnesses, defeats, abuse; for all this serves to cleanse sin, who either do not want to live without sin, or those who are admonished do not convert, but remain in sin, as it is written: blind God their eyes and hardened their hearts(); And: betray them into an unskilled mind, that is, allowed them to freedom create incomparable(); Also: hardening I will harden Pharaoh's heart(), that is, I will allow him to become embittered for his disobedience.
Reverend

Providence of God

Archpriest Alexander Glebov

Is it possible to compare the Orthodox teaching about God's providence with the concept of human destiny? Today we will talk about this with a candidate of theology, teacher at the St. Petersburg Theological Academy, Archpriest Alexander Glebov.

K: Father Alexander, what is God’s providence?

A: A conversation about God’s providence opens up a very important topic – the topic of God’s responsibility for his creation. So we usually talk about our responsibility before God, that we will have to answer to God. Such a concept as God's providence speaks of God's responsibility for the human race and for the world He created. There is a religious and philosophical doctrine called “deism” - in it the concept of God’s providence is absent! Deism speaks of God as the creator of the world, but does not speak of God as the provider of the world. Yes, God created the world, God created man, endowed man with reason, free will, and, as it were, distanced himself from any participation in the further fate of this world. Figuratively speaking, he doesn’t care what happens in this world. Why did I mention deism? Because today many people, perhaps even without realizing it, share exactly this point of view. They see in the creative act of God the justification for the existence of this world, because to imagine that this world, so intelligently structured, so complexly organized, developing according to some specific laws, simply arose on its own out of nothing. This is quite problematic for many people to imagine. But at the same time, they do not see any intelligent presence of God in this world. In this world there is a lot of evil, a lot of injustice, people get sick, suffer, die. That is, on the one hand, they recognize that God created the world, because this world as a creation is beautiful and intelligently designed, but, at the same time, they refuse to recognize God’s providence, because what happens in our world is often not intelligent , illogical, cruel and chaotic.
In Christian revelation, such concepts as God the creator and God the provider are inextricably linked, because God’s very decision to create the world was made inextricably together with His decision to save this world. This dual decision of God about salvation and the creation of the world was called the “Eternal Council of the Holy Trinity.” Eternal means before time, before this age, before the creation of the world. And this eternal council was absolutely brilliantly depicted by the Monk Andrei Rublev on his icon, which is called “Trinity”. Since God in his trinity is impossible not only to depict, but even to somehow imagine, then in Orthodox tradition The Holy Trinity is depicted as three angels who were revealed to Abraham at the Oak of Mamre. But Rublev’s Trinity does not describe this historical episode, when three angels came to Abraham and announced to him the death of Sodom and Gomorrah. He takes the only possible image of the Holy Trinity mentioned in the Bible and fills it not with historical content, but with prehistoric, pre-eternal, he seems to depict this council of the pre-eternal Holy Trinity. Three angels are sitting at the table, on the table there is a bowl, in the bowl you can see the head of a sacrificial animal and the angels look at each other, as if consulting, conferring among themselves, which of them will become this sacrifice - the Lamb of God. And when the decision is made that the second Person of the Holy Trinity will go into the world in order to become this sacrifice, in order to save this world, then after this the decision is made about the creation of the world itself, that is, God’s providence is, as it were, primary, and the act of creation is secondary .

K: How to correlate human freedom and God’s providence, since man is free and can do whatever he wants? How to recognize what happens as a result of our achievements and mistakes, due to the evil or good will of other people, and what happens according to the will of God?

–A: Quite complex issue and, probably, it is impossible to give any comprehensive answer to it! There seems to be an obvious contradiction here, there just isn’t enough logic to cover it. On the one hand, we believe that the Lord guides every person, starting from his birth through life, but, on the other hand, you absolutely rightly said that a person is absolutely free and can do whatever he wants. He plans his life himself, although practice shows that our plans often remain plans and life goes according to a completely different scenario, not the way we planned it, and you have to do in life not what you want, but what you are forced to do circumstances for you. But still, freedom of choice always remains with a person. Moreover, we come under the influence of other people, sometimes this influence is good, sometimes evil, and if the state law and criminal law somehow limit the evil will of people, punishing them for a crime committed, then the Lord does not limit anyone. You don’t have to look far for examples: now our TV viewers will watch this program, switch to the news program, and what will they hear there? News! What's the news? The same as yesterday! There are wars, terror flourishes, blood is shed, innocent people suffer, violence of one against another, and yet the Lord does not stop anyone, because such is the evil, but free will of people. But more than that, there are laws of nature, the law of this world, and we, living in this world, fall under the influence of these laws. Therefore, something comes into our lives according to our will, something according to the good or evil will of other people, somewhere we obey the laws of the universe, but in both cases, and in the third case, there is a place for God’s providence. It is probably impossible to somehow draw such a clear line in this kaleidoscope and say where God’s providence is and where it is not! True, some people solve this problem for themselves in the following way: they say something like this: if something came into my life, something that does not depend either on my will or on the will of other people, but completely unexpectedly, as if unpredictable, something so unusual. You know, as the late Metropolitan Nikodim said: “Everything that is unexpected is from God.” And in fact, of course, it is very difficult to disagree with this, but still, I would not limit God’s providence only to some special events in our lives. We believe that the Lord guides a person through life through His providence, without violating human freedom, but it is impossible to say what the mechanism for combining these seemingly incompatible realities is.

–K: You said that many people refuse to recognize God’s providence because they do not see God’s reasonable action in the world, but it is impossible to disagree with this, because there is a lot of suffering in the world, people do what they want, they commit crimes and the Lord does not stops. Others, going through trials, ask God for help, but the Lord does not often hear them, and if he does, he only intensifies these trials. How to combine God's love for his creation, God's providence for the world with the reality that is happening around us?

A: As for the goodness of God and the evil that is present in the world, two considerations are usually expressed about this. The first is that evil can only be destroyed with its bearer, that is, with man, and God, precisely by his goodness, wants man’s correction, his repentance, and not his death. You and I address God as our father – “Our Father”, “Our Father”. We do not call God a judge, a prosecutor, law or justice, we call him father. And so, if we transfer our relationship with God to intra-family relationships, if a child has done something wrong before his father, then what - the father immediately beats him, destroys him? Even if the child is sick, even if the child spreads evil around him, even if this child has grown up and become a criminal. Yes, society will condemn him, the law will condemn him, but his father will still love him, because the father treats his child not from the position of the legal law, not even from the position of the law of justice, he treats him from the position of the law of love. The same thing happens in our relationship with God. Actually, why the Lord tolerates evil, and until what point this will continue, He explained quite clearly when He told the parable of the wheat and the tares. Well, the second consideration: since there is evil in the world, the Lord turns it around for the sake of saving people, for correcting lost people, sinful people and for strengthening faith and testing the righteous. This was well noted by Goethe in the phrase of Mephistopheles, in the famous phrase: “I am part of that force that always wants evil, but always does good.” The devil sows evil, but the Lord uses this evil as a bitter medicine to save people and thereby turns evil into good.
But, in general, this question that you asked me, I probably will not be mistaken if I say that from an apologetic point of view, this is, of course, the most difficult question. There is an attempt in theology to resolve this issue, which is called “Theodicy,” which means “justification of God.” This name may also seem strange to us, because we are looking for justification from God, and here we are talking about the fact that God must be justified. God, indeed, sometimes has to be justified, but I’ll give you an example that is probably well known to every priest. For example, a mother comes to church and says that her child has died. So she approaches the priest and asks him approximately the following set of questions: “What is this? For what? Why? Why is she or her child worse than others, and what crime did they commit? How can one even understand this action of God, who took her child away from her and doomed her to such suffering, ruined her life?” The priest, of course, is trying to somehow console this person, although it is impossible to talk about any consolation here, but at the same time he is trying to somehow protect God, justify His actions, so that this person does not lose faith. In other words, this is an attempt to reconcile all the contradictions that you mentioned in your question: that God really is love, that his providence is aimed at the good of people. All these provisions are subject to very serious doubts, because absolutely every person, with very varying degrees of church involvement and generally religious feeling, asked similar questions: what if God loves the world so much that he did not spare Himself for the sake of saving this world and, if He is omnipotent, then where is the manifestation of this omnipotence and love in our world. But sometimes completely innocent people go through such a crucible of suffering that simply because of the horror of what is happening, it is not possible to accept it as the good will of God, as some kind of good. And then people correlate what happened and God’s providence, they are left with few options for an answer. Either God really doesn’t care about us and all the stories about his love are greatly exaggerated, or He does not have omnipotence, He is simply forced to watch powerlessly as evil reigns in the world. Or He doesn’t exist at all, and these are all fables. We find the answer about the suffering of the innocent, about the suffering of the righteous, in the New Testament, in the suffering in the death of the innocent Christ. If a person defines eternal salvation for himself as the goal of his life, if he goes to this goal through righteousness and the path of holiness, then it will be the way of the cross, only the way of the cross, there is no way around it! This will be a narrow path and a narrow gate leading to the Kingdom of God. And the Lord does not deceive anyone, He does not give any false promises! Anyone who has read the Gospel should lose all illusions about what it means to follow Christ. The Lord says quite clearly that if you want to follow me, then forget about yourself, take up your cross and follow Me. And the more righteous a person is, the stronger his spiritual life, the heavier this cross will be for him. And if a person meaningfully accepts the Sacrament of Baptism, then he must understand that he thereby expresses a desire to share the earthly fate of Christ. Not only His eternity, not only His Resurrection, but His earthly destiny. Well, everyone knows well how the Lord ended His life.

Divine superperfection knows everything before it happens and before it ends. To us, due to the numerous changes that are caused in us by the Fall, together with the imprudent and criminal behavior of man, all this seems unknown, changeable and incomprehensible.

Despite the fact that everything is subject to Divine Providence and Care, depending on the circumstances, time, place, persons and the cunning of Satan, changes in the established order of things are possible.

But nothing can hinder the Providence of God or cancel its actions in relation to creation. By our evil actions we can only contribute to changing the way the various elements function or act.

The Divine will or Divine counsel, considered in turn, appears in four forms.

First, Divine favor or favor, the benevolent will, that is, what God primarily wills.

Secondly, economy, economic will, according to which, due to our weakness, God gives in to us as a father.

Thirdly, the concession, the yielding will, according to which God intervenes and admonishes.

And, fourthly, much-lamentable abandonment by God: when a person lives in unrepentant stubbornness and insensibility, thereby causing this state when God abandons him.

Through the Divine will, the all-saving Divine Providence is realized even despite the fact that our own fall has distorted the balance, disrupting very good conditions his existence. “Whoever is wise will notice this and understand the mercy of the Lord” (Ps. 106:43).

God, since he foresaw everything, could prevent the misfortune that befell man, but thereby the personal freedom of the latter would be abolished. It was precisely out of respect for her that He left the final choice to the person himself, and thus he himself bears responsibility for his life, full of worries and labors, either due to darkness of the mind, or due to his passionate depravity and neglect of reasoning.

In this deplorable situation in which man finds himself after he has separated himself from a loving God, there are attacks and influences of Satan, who has power in this valley of tears where we live. We ourselves conceded this right to him, leaving paradise and following him.

Being, according to the Apostle Paul, “the prince of this age” (2 Cor. 4:4), the serpent of hell never ceases to attack and deceive a person with shameless offers. We need to be more attentive and pray more, and especially in our time, when a bad example has become the norm and is transmitted instantly using existing means.

Consequently, Divine Providence is the all-saving care and care with which God embraces bodily and spiritual creatures, now living and having to be, now and in eternity.

The truth of God is also realized in the sphere of Divine Providence. It interferes in a person’s life when it is dominated by an unreasonable principle. Thus, the Truth of God, being absolute, holds back this unreasonable principle for the common benefit in man’s achievement of his destiny. Everything that exists, from the beginning of its creation, is destined for some purpose. And this Divine plan cannot change, because God “created all things with wisdom.”

If, through human naivety or demonic cunning, the original goal is violated, then due to the subsequent repentance of the person and depending on the degree of repentance and correction of the sin, the place of Divine favor is taken by Divine economy.

God, “who desires that all men should be saved and come to the knowledge of the truth” (1 Tim. 2:4), ordains all things according to His gracious will, which is nothing less than the absolute and infallible way for us to achieve our goal, and He can give us “incomparably more than all that we ask or think” (Eph. 3:20).

When a person errs or neglects his duty, God, instead of changing His mind, depriving him of the mercy he had bestowed and rejecting him as guilty, intervenes for the purpose of admonition to lead him to correction. These, according to the holy fathers, represent intelligible or conciliatory misfortunes. The saying is justified in practice: “Whom the Lord loves, he punishes, and favors him as his son” (Proverbs 3:12).

Instead of rejecting the offender, God, in his humane economy, heals the disease of betrayal with appropriate temptations. Most of the deepest judgments of God, by which real life is governed, relate precisely to this type of reconciliation. “Blessed is the man whom You admonish, O Lord, and instruct in Your law” (Ps. 93:12). And again: “before my suffering I was mistaken” (Ps. 119:67) and “the Lord punished me severely; but he did not give me over to death” (Ps. 118:18).

The main reasons for the current disorder of fallen man are his fickle state in which he remains, and his thoughts, which are “evil from his youth” (Gen. 8:21).

Because we cannot convince ourselves to be consistent in the performance of our duties, we violate the plan of Divine Providence and force God, in order to maintain balance, to subject us to conciliatory misfortunes that are quite painful. But this is our cross and we must bear it.