Orthodox River

Elder Symeon Kragiopoulos

Let us seek God and choose His love, even if we need to put ourselves into trouble. There can be no life in Christ without sacrifices.

Every one of us barricades himself behind his own justice –he believes the way he looks at things is absolutely right, he believes his reasoning is great, he believes every spiritual affair of his is sorted out fine. And the only problem is what’s going to happen with other people, where the entire fault lies.

Having grasped his own inner reality and his own un-good state the person, however, who has started discovering God thinks totally differently. He sees things differently and has a totally different mentality. He says that the problem is he himself: he himself is the one that has no love, no understanding or sacrificial spirit.

Desire for Repentance

Let us all, without exception, stand sincerely and honestly before God. Are we repentant? Do we have every intention to repent? Would we like God to visit us with His grace and grant us true repentance? This repentance would make us look at our whole state and our sins in their entirety, but also in every detail. Are we willing to receive such repentance by God? Do we really want to?

Our stance before God

The question is what stance the soul takes, man’s deeper being, before God, before God’s love, God’s energies, and before any sort of reality.

The more you say the prayer “Lord Jesus Christ, have mercy on me”, the more you want to say it. In the same way, the more we feel God’s love, the more we want to love Him. This prayer helps very much and a miracle takes place in your soul at every moment. As you say it with your whole being, little by little you start to feel that Christ is near, sitting by you and listening to you. You speak to Him and you realize that He answers back; He accepts and loves you.

If you go to Christ, and entrust yourself into His hands and have Him within you, things are simple and easy, because afterwards the whole work is done by Christ. We shouldn’t consume ourselves with worry. It’s God who takes care of us. Your only care and concern should be to be united with God and your whole existence should be a prayer to God.

The obstacle that is deep down in our soul must be removed. And the obstacle that exists, is neither the unhealthy state nor, if you like, simply sin itself. Believe it or not, all these help: you go to Christ because you are a sinner; you go to Christ because you are in a mess. The obstacle in the relationship between you and God is that you strive to salvage your ego. Even the most spiritual things are called for in order to salvage your ego, which is full of self-justification, heartlessness and pride; True love, true devotion to Christ and repentance are missing. You are desperately trying to deceive God.

May God make you in such a way that you are not concerned at all about how to turn grass into gold, but to step on gold as if it were a patch of grass. May God make you in such a way that you do not care if others love you, care about you, appreciate you or acknowledge you. Then, of course, all people will turn to you.

Come to the light

People don’t come to the light, which is Christ; people don’t come to the light which is the truth of Christ; because if they do, their works will be revealed, which are the works of darkness, not of the light.

Circumstances

We shouldn’t think of ourselves as victims of our circumstances. God who loves and protects us is present. He won’t allow anything to happen to us unless it is for our benefit.

Humility

The problem isn’t simply that we are sinners, or that the sin exists inside us. The problem is we do not deal with the whole matter as we should. Why are you afraid of admitting that you’re a sinner, that you have sin inside? Why are you afraid of it? That’s your salvation; your sin itself is your salvation. Salvation, of course, from sin. Why? Because admitting to your sin truly helps you attain humility. It keeps you in touch with reality, too: you are not under the false impression that spiritually you are somebody important or that you carry out some significant spiritual struggle.

If you look closely at the deep, inner state of yourself, you will realize that there is such villainy, such darkness, such meanness and guile, that there is no time to deal with what the other person does. You do not have the luxury of paying attention to his mistake. It’s not that you don’t see what the other is like, or, that he does that particular thing. You don’t, however, stick to these, but you look more deeply into his soul: he is also a man for whom Christ has died and, if he repents, God will sanctify him. Then, you sympathize with him, you love him, you sacrifice yourself for his sake, like Christ did.

Carelessness

Whatever is given by God in the life of the Church, you may lose if you aren’t careful with it. The experience of God takes its leave and deserts you, if you live frivolously and in a care free manner, if you are totally unconcerned about whether you get lost, and, in the end, whether you fail to see the face of the Lord.

Man loses so much due to his carelessness, even if he doesn’t sin heavily. Be careful and pray!

We should examine ourselves carefully and our expressions, too. We should wonder: is what we do virtuous or does our own profit lurk behind?

Obedience

During the early years of Christianity, martyrdom for the faith was the central feature in the life of Christians. Everybody wanted to be a martyr for Christ. And the Church was full of martyrs and saints. Nowadays, obedience is what will make a martyr out of someone, as blood will be spilling in his soul by the cutting of his will. The souls who enter the road of obedience, and willingly bind themselves to indiscriminate and perfect obedience, are the ones to find the way to salvation, the way to sanctification.

Idolatry

When we preserve our very own idol inside of us, which we have put on a pedestal and revered, not even God Himself can destroy it. Not because God is weak or limited but because He doesn’t save man by force. Thus we must freely choose and desire God.

God allows a fall, a blunder, a mistake, a sin, or a failure to happen to us. This happens exactly because another fall has to take place (like in Peter’s case): the fall of the idol that exists in us, which we worship like a god. Each one of us has to experience this fall. Yet, man needs to mature in order to endure it. Only God knows when this will happen to each one of us.

Pain

We are so pampered in the present day that we seek for convenience in everything. We want to take everything easy, we want nothing to upset us or displease us. It’s not like that. In the present world, for as many years as we live for, we should offer ourselves for martyrdom. Whoever is eventually saved, he will have gone through martyrdom.

Pain brings to the soul more gain than anything else. No matter how hard you try -with prayer or any other virtue- to overcome yourself and give yourself to Christ, it’s not easy, because you pity yourself, you love yourself and can’t bear pushing yourself more than yourself allows it.

Sacrificial Love

Let us seek God and choose His love, even if we need to put ourselves into trouble. There can be no life in Christ without sacrifices.

Every one of us barricades himself behind his own justice –he believes the way he looks at things is absolutely right, he believes his reasoning is great, he believes every spiritual affair of his is sorted out fine. And the only problem is what’s going to happen with other people, where the entire fault lies.

Having grasped his own inner reality and his own un-good state the person, however, who has started discovering God thinks totally differently. He sees things differently and has a totally different mentality. He says that the problem is he himself: he himself is the one that has no love, no understanding or sacrificial spirit.

Salvation

Man is saved when he has Christ in Him, not by simply performing some external tasks.

You should believe that nothing pleases Christ more than you experiencing his love and forgiveness.

We should constantly give ourselves to God and all the more strive to become totally devoted to Christ. Participating in the life of the Church is definitely something, but it has to be the fruit of our prior internal intention and devotion to God.

Serving mostly his egoism, captured and affected by it as he is, man doesn’t want to go to Christ. If someone comes to Christ, he has to change. And that’s something man refuses to accept; man doesn’t want to change. People don’t come to the light, which is Christ; people don’t come to the light which is the truth of Christ; because if they do, their works will be revealed, which are the works of darkness, not of the light.

The person who will finally find God will experience immense comfort and solace in his heart. Because man is created in such a way, that only when he finds God, does he satisfy his hunger. The holy Augustine writes: “Restless is the soul of man, my Lord, until it finds you.”

If you show your sin to God, He will heal it.

We don’t reach salvation or holiness, if we don’t go through pain, abandonment and death.

Prayer

The more you say the prayer “Lord Jesus Christ, have mercy on me”, the more you want to say it. In the same way, the more we feel God’s love, the more we want to love Him. This prayer helps very much and a miracle takes place in your soul at every moment. As you say it with your whole being, little by little you start to feel that Christ is near, sitting by you and listening to you. You speak to Him and you realize that He answers back; He accepts and loves you.

Love

Let us seek God and choose His love, even if we need to put ourselves into trouble. There can be no life in Christ without sacrifices.

In God’s being, there is no trace of hate, no trace of retaliation or meanness. There is always limitless love going to every direction and everybody. And He calls us to become compassionate, as he is a compassionate God. He calls us to become love, as he is love. As a sympathetic, merciful, condescending and forgiving God, he calls us to also be the same.

You can never be hurt by love, when love is healthy. What hurts man is the effort to dominate over him.

Spiritual Struggle

Spiritual struggle doesn’t mean striving to be somebody. Spiritual struggle is to take it for granted that you’re a sinner, to renounce yourself, lift your cross and run after Christ. Then, you learn the lesson of humility and repentance. Christ is the teacher who tolerates us and teaches us His lessons. We have nothing to be afraid of because He is meek and humble.
Who ever wants to be saved, will find themselves, on the path of martyrdom. The more a person loves the Lord and surrenders to Him, the bigger their martyrdom will be.

Whoever sees the Christian life in a way that escapes martyrdom, in not in alignment with the kingdom of God. They will fall behind. They cast themselves aside.