And so St. John the Baptist pointed out to his disciples a certain One and said to them: "... behold the Lamb of God that taketh away the sin of the world..." (John 1:29). And, obedient to the word of the virgin teacher, the virgin disciple leaves John the Baptist to follow the Greatest Virgin and Teacher and Savior.

John followed Christ, leaving everything for Him: his home, his father, his mother, and the quiet, calm life of a fisherman — he walked along the stormy sea of life along a hitherto unknown path to the unknown promised land — to the Kingdom of Heaven. Thus, in the first century, in the presence of Christ, John's heart was kindled.

But did not the heart of the young Vasily Belavin burn in the same way in a country far from Israel, cold Russia, nineteen centuries after the time of the podvig of the Savior and the works of John the Theologian? At the age of thirteen, Vasily left his father's house to study at a theological seminary, for already in his parents' house his young heart was wounded by love for Christ, for His commandments, for His Church. And the jokingly respectful nickname "Bishop", given to him by the seminarians, prophetically sees the life path of the righteous man at its very beginning. And just as John gave God the unplundered treasure – his virgin heart, so Basil brought the same gift to God. And with love, as a holy gift, Christ accepted the devotion of young hearts. From the fullness of His love, the Lord poured into their hearts an inexhaustible source of living, active love. And they, having attained perfection in love, were able to illuminate and warm both those far and those near with it. The love of John the Theologian has passed through the centuries, and the love of St. Tikhon has shone forth to us from the grave. In his time, John loved Christ with all his soul, clung to Him completely, and did not depart from Him until the end of Christ's sojourn on earth. These were the three years of his "academy", where the Divine Teacher Himself became the teacher, where the living word of the New Testament appeared in a visible image.

John the Evangelist, one of the three, witnessed Jesus' resurrection of Jairus' daughter. John, one of the three great ones, saw the glory of the transfigured Christ. John lies on the Savior's feet at the last supper in the Upper Room, where the Paschal lamb of the Old Testament is eaten, establishing the New Covenant with people in His Blood by Christ – the Lamb of God forever.

This was the time when the cornerstone – Christ – was laid in the foundation of the Holy Orthodox Church. And His first disciples became the first teachers and apostles of this Church.

The heart of the disciple, filled with love, merges with the heart of the Divine Teacher, and there is no mystery hidden from the disciple. The entire life of the Divine Teacher, all His deeds, all the incomprehensible depth of the new teaching are opened to the loving heart. And the young John in three years came to the measure of Christ's stature, matured to complete self-denial in order to live only in God, matured for service to God and people, matured for the apostolic path of the cross, becoming everything to all.

Four years of the academy passed and the future Patriarch Tikhon, then still a young man Basil. And his maturation passed at the feet of the Savior, in the bosom of the Holy Orthodox Church, and he foresaw the Lord, "... for he is at my right hand..." (Psalm 15:8). And the new respectful nickname Patriarch, which he received from academic friends and turned out to be visionary, tells us about the way of his life at that time.