You feel so distressed and at a loss because of a minor temptation, but should you? The Lord has allowed this to happen to you so that you may realize your iniquity and see how many things there might lay concealed in one’s soul and what an effort one should undertake to cleanse oneself from passions and become a sanctuary of the Living God and achieve salvation. When human iniquity opens to you, you will turn to the Lord appealing to Him from the bottom of your heart, like drowning Apostle Peter did. Then you will get help from the Lord and will understand that the Lord is indeed close to those who appeal to His name in the fullness of the heart; then you will fall to His feet with gratitude, weeping over all your sins by which you used to offend the Him. Then you will become humble, stop accusing other people and will begin seeking Lord’s forgiveness for your sins committed in the past and asking Him to keep you from committing new ones and not let you offend Him any more by violating His commandments. You will also see the vanity of this world, and that your attachment to earthly things, quarrels and feeling bad about certain things, words or doings – all these are nothing to be sorry about and argue over and lose the peace of the soul, and may be salvation itself.
You already know what the word “mother” means and how to be sick at heart, jealous and so on. But should the Lord have chosen to open the innermost of your soul, you would probably have fallen into despair. However, all bad things, passions, all intrigues of demons, all grievances and sufferings are overcome by humbleness. To exercise humbleness, we should just say, like the prudent thief, addressing to the Lord: “We have justly received the due reward for our deeds. Remember us when you come into your Kingdom.”
If we succeed in saying these words on all occasions in our life, without any grudges regarding God or other people, we will immediately feel good and find ourselves on the right spiritual road. If we happened to have grumbles against someone, we should humble ourselves even more and say: “Oh, Lord, I am indeed an unworthy person, and you alone can save me.” “Lord, if this is your will, you can make me clean,” said a leper, who lost every hope for ever being healed, but he heard in response: “I will: be clean.” Then the Lord touched the leper and healed him.
Let us also, fully realizing our spiritual meagerness and powerlessness, turn to the Lord as our only Savior and with a humble heart beg: “Lord, if you will, you can heal us and save.” And the Lord, crucified for our sake, will answer: “I will: be clean.” Our soul will clearly hear this answer and will be strengthened to endure with gratitude all the sorrows of the earthly life, just like the thief did, who tortured by great pain did not grumble hanging crucified on the cross the whole day until the night fell. May the lord help you, dear Marisha, to realize this and humble yourself and give yourself over into the hands of the Lord. Repeat incessantly: ”Lord, may your holy will be done; do to me whatever you will, but do not let me have grumbles against you, and save me.”
So far you have only read and heard about the struggles, weeping and pains of the heart. Now the Lord lets you live through this knowledge and choose whether to endure the pains of life without grumbling and with gratitude to Go, or give in to grumbling and then – which is worse – to despair.
The decision is yours. Give blood and receive spirit. The time of infancy is gone; it is time to set about doing the work of grownups. God will not despise contrite and humble heart, and “the Devil’s net does not touch the humble.” (The Vision of St. Anthony the Great about the Net.)
If you give yourself to grudging and start to accuse other people and circumstances, you will then move on to grudging against God and may come to despair. May God save you from this.
May the Lord grant you peace at soul, spiritual meekness and wisdom. May the Lord grant you endurance and strength to carry the burden of your own passions and of the passions of those around you.
Forgive me if I upset you. Live peacefully with Katya. Do whatever you can to have peace with her. I would like to say once again that your salvation is related to Katya. Try to cede to her in everything, even if this might be of disadvantage to the work you do. What good will it do to people, if they acquire the entire world, but lose their soul? So you should better try not to cause harm to your soul because of trifles. Preserve peace and remember that she also has passions, just like you have them, and that it is more difficult for her to struggle with them. If you show charity to her and do not accuse her, so also the Lord will show charity to you and will not accuse you.
I sympathize with you and ask the Lord to help you overcome the temptations….. Study yourself and do not boast that you are free from this or that vice. You have them all, but not all have been revealed to you; proud and foolish words, as well as boastfulness may punish you with suffering.
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