Word from the Desert

Meditations on the Orthodox Life from the Early Church Fathers, Ascetics, Saints and Righteous

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Prayer, fasting, vigils, and all other Christian practices, however good they may be in themselves, certainly do not constitute the aim of our Christian life: they are but the indispensable means of attaining that aim. For the true aim of the Christian life is the acquisition of the Holy Spirit of God. As for fasts, vigils, prayer and almsgiving, and other good works done in the name of Christ, they are only the means of acquiring the Holy Spirit of God. Note well that it is only good works done in the name of Christ that bring us the fruits of the Spirit.
~St. Seraphim of Sarov

In order for one to understand the Saints and Fathers of the [Orthodox] Church, it is not sufficient to merely read them. The Saints spoke and wrote after having lived the mysteries of God. They personally experienced the mysteries.

In order for one to understand them, he too must have progressed to a certain degree of initiation into the mysteries of God by personally tasting, smelling, and seeing. You can read the books of the Saints and become very well versed in them with a ‘cerebral’ knowledge without even minutely tasting that which the Saints tasted who wrote these books through their personal experience.

In order to understand the Saints essentially, not intellectually, you must have the proper experience for all that they say; you must have tasted, at least in part, of the same things as they. You must have lived in the fervent environment of Orthodoxy; you must grown in it… A Whole new world must be born in a Westerner’s heart in order for him to understand something of Orthodoxy.

~Alexandar Kalomiros, Against False Union, 1959

The mysteries of our Faith are unknown and not understandable to those who are not repenting.

~Archpriest Nicholas Deputatov, ‘Awareness of God’ in the Orthodox Word Magazine, July-August 1976

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Monday, January 7, 2008

12:59PM

The gift which we have received...

…from Jesus Christ in holy baptism is not destroyed, but is only buried as a treasure in the ground. Both common sense and gratitude demand that we should take good care to unearth this treasure and bring it to light. This can be done in two ways. The gift of baptism is revealed first of all by a painstaking fulfillment of the commandments; the more we carry these out, the more clearly the gift shines upon us in its true splendor and brilliance. Secondly, it come to light and is revealed through the continual invocation of the Lord Jesus, or by unceasing remembrance of God, which is one and the same thing. The first method is powerful but the second is more so; so much so that even fidelity to the commandments receives its full strength from prayer. For this reason, if we truly desire to bring to flower the seed of grace that is hidden within us, we should hasten to acquire the habit of this exercise of the heart, and always practice this prayer within it, without any image or form, until it warms our mind and enflames our soul with an inexpressible love towards God and men.

St. Gregory of Sinai
late 13th century

12:59 PM |

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