Thunder, noise, hubbub, some kind of cacophony sounds in us. We ourselves and the people around us play the instruments that are our own souls – and these are tin cans and rusty basins, so not a single noble sound comes from there. And in order to prepare your soul for the Kingdom of Heaven, you need to bring it to Divine perfection. The Lord calls us: "Be ye perfect, even as your Heavenly Father is perfect" – this is the perfection we must achieve in the Church, this is why we were baptized. For this we gather every Sunday for prayer, for this we partake of Christ's Holy Mysteries, for this we repent of our sins at confession.

What is confession? In the Gospel it is written this and that, and the day before yesterday I did this and that – a discrepancy: here is "la", and there is "do". So, you need to reach this "do" to "A", then there will be a correspondence. One must set one's whole life in such a way that it resounds in unison with God's commandment: whatever God's commandment is, such is my deed, whatever Christ's demand of me is, such is my thought, such is my word. And we have constant disagreements: God demands one thing from us, but we live in a completely different way and then we are surprised: it hurts here, I moan there, it has collapsed for me, my life has fallen into decay, I don't understand anything, I can't do anything with prayer, and so on. But this is only natural, because we live according to the law of sin. Our lives are guided not by the Lord, but by a completely different conductor, whose name is Satan. We obey him more than Christ the Savior.

Let's imagine two orchestras and two conductors on stage. Is it possible to play in this orchestra and in that orchestra at the same time? No, it is impossible, you will definitely play cacophony. Therefore, in order to perfect our soul, we need to separate ourselves from the world completely, so that nothing worldly possesses us. This does not mean going somewhere in the desert. No, one must enter the cage of one's heart, it is necessary that there, in the heart, there should be silence, peace, tranquility, equanimity – equanimity not like that of an indifferent person, but spiritual. We must overcome the passions within ourselves, because the waves that shake the boat of our life come from the heart. Everything that worries us: envy, for example, or some other sins – it comes from our hearts. Why do all our worries in life come from? From pride, from condemnation, from all kinds of sins with which our heart is full. And if we work on our hearts, then the Lord Himself will help us in this, because we will become His disciples.

To learn music, it is necessary to listen to it, otherwise it is impossible. In order to know what the Kingdom of Heaven is, in order to know God, it is necessary to fulfill God's commandments. Some people say: I don't see God, I don't feel God. Why? Because they live in sin. Start fulfilling one commandment – and you will draw closer to God. And if there are two? And if there are three? And what if you begin to fulfill the hundred commandments? And so it gets closer and closer to God. Man, on the contrary, listens only to Satan: Satan inspires him with some desires, temptations, and he does so and falls into trouble, into an even greater abyss of sins.

Therefore, if we want to be disciples of Christ, we want our going to church not to be a useless matter, as often happens, but that every visit to church is a step forward towards God, then our life will not be in vain. Every day lived should be a step towards God. We must live it in such a way that we must stand firm in the commandments that we have realized. Namely, to stand firm in the commandment, not to fall. And we have constant falls: we are irritated – we get irritated, we are offended – we are offended, we are scolded – and we also swear in response, we have lost something – we regret. And so it is in everything: we are lazy, and proud, and vain, and envious, and slanderous, and chatter, and overeaten, and simply spend our lives in vain, idle, and useless; our soul perishes for the Kingdom of Heaven. Therefore, we need to reconsider our whole lives.

This is what the Lord prayed for: "I do not pray for the whole world, but for those whom Thou hast given Me." Because we did not believe ourselves, not by our own strength, we were simply given faith as a gift. Someone was not given because he is not yet ready, but you were given, so you need to develop, grow this precious sprout, so that it grows into the Kingdom of Heaven. So that the tree grows and bears the fruits of Christian virtues and the birds of the air take refuge in it. But there is still time, and if we work, our work will certainly bear fruit – these are the precious fruits that we will eat in the Kingdom of Heaven. As the Lord says in His prayer: "that joy may be complete."

A person receives perfect joy only when he possesses God, when he unites with God forever. Even when we partake of God's creation – we take an apple and eat it, and it is pleasant in our mouth – we even receive joy from the apple, because it is the fruit of God, God's creation. Or we look at the sky, at the stars, at the bird – and this brings joy: what beauty! You look at the kitten – and how nicely the Lord created it, how beautiful, how noble, how interesting this kitten is.

But this is all creation, and how much more joy will the contemplation of the Creator Himself bring us! How beautiful He is, how perfect He is, how all-blessed He is, and this is given to us freely. This gift is given to us in baptism, but we still need to know how to take it, we need to work for it. And it depends on how much we grow it whether we enter the Kingdom of God, whether we come to know God through the Son of God, or whether we remain outside.

It's all up to us. Therefore, by the mercy of God, let us try not to waste time, but to remain in constant spiritual labor, so that neither the day, nor the hour, nor the month are wasted with us. Amen.

Church of the Exaltation of the Holy Cross,

June 15, 1986

All-Night Vigil under the Smolensk Icon of the Mother of God

Today's Sunday coincided with the celebration of the Smolensk Icon of the Mother of God. This icon blessed the daughter of the Byzantine emperor, who was married to the prince of Kiev, on the road, so it is also called "Hodegetria" (in Greek "Guide"). And so she became our Guide to salvation.