By Fr.
Andrew Lemeshonok
When the Lord's grace touches a person and he understands that it
is his personal meeting with God, it is just impossible to express with words what is
going on in his soul at this moment. This event outperforms any human feeling.
In Church, the Lord gives us an opportunity to
become a part of a new life - eternal life - through His word, through Divine
services and through chants. Everything we hear and see in the church,
everything what we take part in – it all makes up our meeting with God. Holy
Communion is the meeting with God. Here are the Body and Blood. Partake!
This is our key to victory. This is our hope that one
day I will finally say “no” to sin in my life and repent. And I will not just say
it, but change myself.
When our Christian faith is external, we get calm: we
find some words, for example, the wise words of a priest, which support us, and
we feel it is important to us… But this is not enough. There must be a word
that will enter our heart; there must be such a meeting, after which we will be
unable to sin because it will be impossible for us. Our mind, our perception of
our life and the world in general should change.
One person decides to devote his life to God and goes
to a monastery – this is his choice. Another one will have doubts… One person raises
a family, while another one is still not sure. Why do people prefer not
to register their marriage these days? We can say it is because they have no desire to
be responsible for something. They do not want any responsibility. At the same
time, people do not believe they can love someone their entire life. They do
not believe in their power, they do not believe that one can devote one’s whole
life to another person. “What if this is not my person? What if something
happens, and I will be alone?” This is the volatility and doubt that a sinful
person lives in, who has no pillar, no foundation of faith, on which one could
build his life. One cannot build anything on sand because the construction on something unstable will fall…
God prepares us for this meeting. For many of us it will
happen at the last moment of our life. Unfortunately, we know what can happen
to people who did not know God: at the moment when they are finally able to see the
spiritual world, they see demons instead of God. A person is afraid, because he
does not know what to expect - he has no experience of communion with
God. This is terrible. This is the final stage in life, which can lead to eternal
fear. And this is completely different from what is happening to a person, who has
spent his life in faith! He sees something, too, but in his eyes there is hope, not fear. A person is not afraid because he trusts God. And then,
finally, his meeting with God happens – the beginning of a new life, eternal
life… When you witness this, you feel that you are part of the mystery of
eternal life.
May 11,
2018
St.
Elisabeth Convent
CONVERSATION