By Fr. Andrew Lemeshonok
When I
anoint or sprinkle people with Holy water, I feel the depth of every person
standing in front of me; there are so many things inside of this person: pain,
joy, contradictions, sin, and God's mercy! Man has this all mixed up in him.
And when you begin to unravel it - you get confused. Therefore, it is very
important for us not to make it more complicated, but to be able to free
ourselves from our selfishness, get rid of today’s bewilderments and
misunderstandings in order to find God and see the light. Just like when you
turn on a lightbulb and it gets brighter, the light falls onto people and
illuminates everything. The same thing happens in our lives: we need to find
the light to see who we really are and accept our life’s circumstances. It will
keep us from making the wrong decisions and actions that could cause our
further destruction. We are mistaken if we choose to close ourselves off,
because leading such a sheltered life will not allow us to serve God.
You need
to see your neighbor. You need to see the person next to you. You have to open
up your heart for one, for two people. People who managed to break the shackles
of time ended up having a big heart where able to embrace all of humanity and
support it together with their prayers, their pain, joy and sorrow. Only
imagine what a great challenge it is for an Orthodox Christian to get away from
their selfish world and enter the world of God, the history of mankind, and,
moreover, you are there not only as a spectator, but you actively participate in
it. Here we are looking at the history: the creation of man, the fall of Adam,
the Tower of Babel, the return of the prodigal son, Zacchaeus climbing a tree,
a publican who comes into the church and says: "God, be merciful to me a
sinner" (Luke 18: 13). We enter this world, we live in it and we must be
able to give up all the worldly cares, leave all our fantasies behind and start
a new life together with God.
It is
vital for us to experience real life, God's beauty, the love of God! We need to
start to show sign of life, movement: to do something in order to wake up from
our dazed state. I gave advice to one of our sisters (her inner state is quite
bad, she is torturing herself and she looks really hopeless): "Come on,
get up, turn on the cold water in your tap and stand under it for a minute. I
am sure, it will make a difference: you
will be cold, it will wake you up, your face will change - you will no longer
be standing with such a grim face under the icy water. It will be your small
victory. "You have to do something about your inner state, you have to
move, do you understand what I mean? Instead, you look like frozen mummies:
motionless... It is awful to see a young
man at his forties who finds it hard to live, that’s crazy! Hopefully, there are elderly people here like
our sister Lydia, look at her - she is so beautiful! I think she is one of the
youngest sisters in our convent. How old is she? Seventy-two. And you ask me
why? Because she has life in her eyes, she is living, she has interests, she
cares. That is what is important.
June 18, 2018
St. Elisabeth Convent
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