If you lead a sinful life, satisfy your passions, and at the same time think that you love the Lord Jesus Christ, then His everlasting disciple, who reclined on His shoulders during the Last Supper, convicts you of self-deception. He says: "Thou shalt speak, that thou knowest Him, and keepeth not His commandments, there is a lie, and in this thou hast the truth; and whoever keeps His word, truly in this the love of God is perfect[98].

If you fulfill your sinful will and thereby violate the Gospel commandments, then the Lord Jesus Christ ranks you among those who do not love Him. Thou shalt not love, says He, He does not keep My words [99].

Do not rush recklessly, without carefully examining your garments, in old, stinking rags, for marriage to the Son of God, for union with Him, although you are called to this marriage, to which every Christian is called. There are such servants of this Householder who will bind your hands and feet and cast you into utter darkness, alien to God [100].

Servants, to whose power the impudent seeker of love and other exalted spiritual states, not cleansed by repentance, pompous with conceit and arrogance, surrenders, demons, outcast angels. Utter darkness is the blindness of the human spirit, a passionate, carnal state. Sin and fallen spirits rule in a person in this state. He is deprived of moral freedom: his hands and feet are tied. The binding of hands and feet means the loss of the ability to live God-pleasing life and to achieve spiritual progress. All self-deceived people are in this state. Man emerges from this miserable state with the consciousness of his error, rejection of it, and entry into the salvific field of repentance.

It is difficult to get out of self-deception. There is a guard at the door; the doors are locked with heavy strong locks and bolts; the seal of the hellish abyss is attached to them. Locks and locks are the pride of the self-deceived, which is deeply hidden in the heart, their vanity, which is the initial cause of their activity, hypocrisy and deceit, with which pride and vanity are hidden, with which they clothe themselves in the guise of good intentions, humility, and holiness. The indestructible seal is the recognition of the actions of self-deception as acts of grace.

Can he who is in self-deception, in the realm of falsehood and deceit, be a fulfiller of Christ's commandments, which are truth from the Truth of Christ? Can he who sympathizes with falsehood, who delights in falsehood, who has assimilated falsehood to himself, who has united himself with falsehood in the spirit, sympathize with the truth? No! he will hate her, become her frenzied enemy and persecutor.

What will be your condition, unfortunate dreamers, who imagined that you spent your earthly life in the arms of God, when the saying of the Saviour strikes us: "Nicholas, I know you; depart from me, you workers of iniquity[101].

My true friend in the Lord! Go to the Lord Jesus Christ, draw near to Him by the way of the Gospel commandments; with them know Him; by fulfilling them, show and prove your love for the Lord Jesus. He Himself will reveal Himself to you, He will reveal Himself in the day and hour known to Him alone. Together with this manifestation, it will pour into your heart an ineffable love for Yourself. Divine love is not something that properly belongs to fallen man: it is a gift of the Holy Spirit, sent by God alone into the vessels purified by repentance, into the vessels of humility and chastity.

Entrust yourself to the Lord, and not to yourself: this is much safer. He is your Creator. When you were subjected to a sorrowful fall, He took humanity for you, He gave Himself for you to be executed, He shed His blood for you, He delivered His Divinity to you: what else will He not do for you? Prepare for His gifts by cleansing yourself: this is your business. Amen.

О чтении Евангелия

При чтении Евангелия не ищи наслаждения, не ищи восторгов, не ищи блестящих мыслей: ищи увидеть непогрешительно святую Истину.

Не довольствуйся одним бесплодным чтением Евангелия; старайся исполнять его заповедания, читай его делами. Это книга жизни, и надо читать ее жизнию.

Не думай, что без причины священнейшая из книг, Четвероевангелие, начинается Евангелием от Матфея, а оканчивается Евангелием от Иоанна. Матфей научает более, как исполнять волю Божию, и его наставления особенно приличествуют начинающим путь Божий; Иоанн излагает образ соединения Бога с человеком, обновленным заповедями, что доступно одним преуспевшим на пути Божием.

Раскрывая для чтения книгу Святое Евангелие, вспомни, что она решит твою вечную участь. По ней мы будем судимы и, смотря и по тому, каковы были здесь на земле по отношению к ней, получим в удел или вечное блаженство, или вечные казни [103].