But in moments of grief with one's short-sightedness, with ignorance of the future, one does not reckon with it. They do not think about this and stubbornly stand their ground, demanding the fulfillment of their desires.

It is by "demanding"... There are prayers when dry eyes, in which there are no tears, with some cruelty, almost hatred, bite into the icon, when the words fly out of the cramped chest, like abrupt words of command, angry, stubborn, when the hands are clenched into fists, and when a person looks not like a humble and submissive supplicant, but like a bold, importunate beggar who has decided to get his handout at all costs. And if this prayer is not fulfilled, murmuring and blasphemy begin...

A similar incident is told by the spiritual writer Evg. A villager.

In St. Petersburg, a rich aristocratic lady had a dangerously ill young son. Mother was in despair. As always happens, in a moment of grief I had to remember God. The unfortunate woman spent a terrible night in the bedroom of her little son. She prayed, but it was that passionate, impatient and stubborn prayer of people who rarely pray, when they do not ask God, but demand without humility. However, the prayer was heard. The boy survived, but the disease left its terrible mark on him: something happened to the poor child's brain, and he remained an imbecile half-idiot for the rest of his life. It turned out to be impossible to bring him up, to give him an education. They were embarrassed to keep the aristocratic society to which their parents belonged in St. Petersburg. The boy was sent to an estate, to a remote village, in order to hide him there from the eyes of St. Petersburg acquaintances. But in the village, when he grew up and became a young man, he became infatuated with his maid, an old, pockmarked woman, whom he married. What a blow for a proud aristocratic mother! To top it all off, the pockmarked wife taught her half-idiot husband to drink bitter. He soon became an incorrigible alcoholic and died of drunkenness.

And one involuntarily thinks: wouldn't it have been better for the boy to die in infancy, clean, innocent, not stained with the dirt of life? Would it not have been better to submit obediently to the will of God instead of stubbornly demanding its abolition and praying for the fulfillment of one's own irrational human desires? The Lord Himself, asking in the Gethsemane prayer that the cup of suffering would pass from Him, added: "However, not as I will, but as You... Thy will be done (Matt. XXVI, 39, 42).

For us, this is a lesson and a model of prayer. It is not possible to ask persistently for everything. In choosing the subject of prayer, discernment is necessary.

Persistently, without weakening, it is certainly possible to pray for purity of thoughts, for the moral correction of life; that the Lord would send down peace into a confused, irritated, restless heart; that He would draw to Himself and save those close to us who have strayed into the path of unrighteousness; About his own salvation: "By them weigh the fates, if I will, if I do not will, save me"; in general, about everything that serves the benefit of the soul.

But is it possible to pray for wealth when poverty is good for us? Is it possible to ask for the reciprocity of women's love if it is useful for us to languish in the anguish of unrequited affection? Is it possible to sigh in prayer for the comfort and conveniences of life?

Of course not. All this is vanity of vanities and all kinds of vanity.

Such requests can only anger the Lord. "From the great king," says one holy writer, "you must ask for great and useful things, and if you ask for a little dirt, then by this you only insult Him."

If we are not absolutely sure of the spiritual benefit of the person who asks, then it is best to leave the fulfillment of the request to the will of God.

"If you ask your God for something," writes St. Ephraim the Syrian, "then ask not in such a way as to receive it from Him, but leaving it to Him and His will. For example, you are often oppressed by evil thoughts, and you grieve over this and want to beseech God to free you from the battle. But often this is good for you, my brother. For I say that often this happens to you, so that you do not be puffed up, but be humble-minded. Likewise, if any sorrow or distress has befallen you, do not ask that you may be delivered from them, for this too is often beneficial. And again, if you ask to receive something, do not ask in order to receive it without fail. For I say that you, as a man, often consider it useful for yourself, which is often useless for you.

Listen to what the Apostle says: "Do not know how it is fitting to pray" (Rom. VIII, 26). Thus, what is useful and edifying for each of us, God Himself knows; therefore leave it to Him. I say this not in order to prevent you from turning your petitions to God; on the contrary, I beseech you to ask Him for everything, both great and small. Stand firm in your petition (pray with all earnestness and unceasingly), but, revealing your needs to Him, say: If it is Thy will, O Lord, that this should come to pass, then do it and make it successful; and if it is not Thy will for this, do not allow it to happen, O my God! Only strengthen and preserve my soul, that I may be able to endure this."

Chapter VIII, Articles 1-10