"No, I mean that they were carrying out the order of the high command. This is his crime, not theirs. "Nevertheless, this is their crime, of course. Any soldier who has carried out a criminal order is a criminal. You need to listen to God, not people, this is a general Christian rule. Let us continue to talk about the properties of God Himself. We know that He doesn't change.

We see His power, we believe that He is omnipotent, He can do anything He wants. And this omnipotence was manifested not only in creation, but also in the fact that God is the Almighty. He still rules the world. Holds the world in His hands. It gives existence to the existing, life to the living, reason to the rational. We must remember that the Lord hears the prayers not only of Christians, but also of other people.

After all, in fact, God hears everyone who calls on Him. There is, for example, a tribe of Semang in Indonesia. They remember God only during a typhoon. As a hurricane comes, they begin to remember Him and call upon Him. Usually they do magic, they offer sacrifices to demons, and as soon as it comes to a hurricane that demons and idols cannot stop, then they fall down to God: "Creator, don't, we are with You, You forgive us, please."

Because they do not want, in fact, to live in God's way. We must remember that the Lord hears everyone, without exception. If a person prays to God, he will certainly be heard. That's not the question. God hears all who call upon Him, and if the petitions are good, He will grant them. But the Lord saves only those who are united with Him in the Sacrament. It is important to distinguish between hearing and salvation.

Some people say: we prayed, and God heard us, so we are right. But this is not so, we were right, because we prayed. And we are wrong in the fact that we do not want to be churched. The mistake is very common. There are cases of God's obvious intervention: a person called out to the Almighty, prayed in an airplane, for example, in a falling plane or in a burning car, and the Lord heard.

The person calms down and says: everything is fine with God and leave me behind with your repentance. But does this really mean that our whole life is justified by one fervent prayer? Of course not. In the literature of the Holy Fathers, there is a case described when a prostitute was walking along the road and saw the widow's child who had just died. This touched her so much that she fell to her knees and began to pray: "God, forgive me that I, a harlot, turn to You; I know that I am a sinner, the last criminal, but not for my sake, an abominable sinner, but for the sake of the widow's tears, raise him up." And the child was resurrected.

But this does not mean that fornication is justified. A person who has cried out to the Lord must change, give up his sin. Many people do this – they will call on God, He will help, but the person will not even say thank you, he will turn around and walk. Unfortunately, such a terrible thing is happening – monstrous ingratitude. And the Scripture said that Israel was full, fat, fat, and turned its back to Him that made it. This is what is happening now.

For example, how many people give thanks after confession? After confession, how often did you thank God for forgiving your sins? After baptism, did you thank the Creator? There is no way without it. In our country, unfortunately, after confession, it does not occur to anyone to thank God, and yet such a gift! The Lord gave man the forgiveness of sins just like that, for free, and we say: "He must do so, so he must." This is wrong. You have to thank for everything.

Now let's see what does it mean to be Almighty? Various classic questions arise: Can God create a stone that He is unable to lift? But we must remember that the Lord can do whatever He wants, omnipotence is a manifestation of His will, accordingly, it cannot contradict the will. For example, God is incapable of doing evil. But does this limit His omnipotence?

The Lord cannot lie and say stupid things. But does this deny His omnipotence? God is omnipotent precisely because He does whatever He wants. There are things that the Lord can do, but does not want to. For example, He can destroy the universe, but He doesn't want to do it because He is true to His word. There are two ideas about God: He is faceless and He is a Person.

Do you think God is faceless or a Person? Can God say "I" or can't? There is a common misconception that God is some kind of power... There is such a doctrine as pantheism. It says: God is everything, or: He is a cosmic force. An example of this can even be Star Wars, where He is portrayed as a cosmic force. This is a misconception, the faceless God turns out to be lower than the personality of a person, this is complete absurdity, stupidity. Of course, the Lord is a Person.

The main characteristics of personality are mind, feelings, and will. Let us consider the property of the mind of God. We know that the Lord has an omnipotent mind, His mind is so great that He does not need anyone's advice. Who was God's counselor, and who told Him what He should do? "For who has known the mind of the Lord? Or who was His counselor?" (Romans 11:34)

This property of the supermind is called wisdom, that is, the superwisdom of God. God is so wise that His thoughts are as far from our thoughts as heaven is from earth. The property of the Lord's supermind is that He is super-wise, and this wisdom is so great that it makes Him incomprehensible. We know that God is incomprehensible, that He cannot be described by human standards, and that His mind does not fit into human standards.

But it is not opposite to them, but relates to them like a straight line with a segment lying on it. It is absurd to think that absolute infinity is limited by something like our knowledge or our notions, although this limited part, which we call truth, is part of God's knowledge. The Lord knows everything that man knows, and infinitely more. Why am I emphasizing this?