Sometimes people ask: the assumption – a happy event, the mother of God has eternal life in the Kingdom of heaven, connected with the Son why we should do something special to prepare for this, observing a strict fast? Says the priest Andrey mizyuk.
Photo: tatmitropolia.ru
- The Dormition fast in August: why?
- Dormition fast: Christians against philosophers
- Dormition fast: how to live without extremes
- The Dormition fast is like dying to the world
- Went on vacation and forget to pray
Will drive in the enclosure will separate from the will, put on a chain
The Priest Andrey Mizyuk. Photo of Ivan Privalov / eparhia-saratov
It seems to be here only a month has passed and we are again on the threshold of lent. And in General it seems that the post was all summer. However, it is understandable, because of the early Easter and a long Petrov, Apostolic post. And now the assumption.
There can, of course, to start the usual network disassembly note: how is it that summer is the time to rest, gain strength, vitamins, ahead of the season of colds, flus and SARS. But stop: what’s the post? He can cancel in the Christian life? People far from the Church, do not fast and do not look at the calendar, and it will live as he lived, in his usual rhythm and with the usual diet. And what will happen to us?
Will drive in the enclosure will separate from the will, put on a chain? Then at least it is very strange understanding of the post in the post I’m a man virtuous, eat greens and fish in the required days, and then suddenly it’s a full moon, and I am covered with hair?
Once I asked myself the question: why do I need lent? Well, here’s the milk I have in my life and I hardly eat or drink, of meat in my diet is, except that only chicken, and that – rarely, and generally by and large I’m not particularly fastidious, I don’t care whether something is meat in lent on the table or not. Fries love the most. Oh! Perfectly well! That is quite a lean food, no violations. And I feel good, and “the law” – neat.
Laughter laughter, but in these reflections I seem to myself very readily agreed. Convinced myself that I was fasting and did not break. I was comfortable and well, life goes on how many there are in the calendar? Two weeks? What has changed in me, in addition to the contents of the stomach for some short term? And in fact, about the food I absolutely no wonder then, these thoughts led to. What is the first feeling before every post, what the first question is in the conversation in the temple? Right, about food.
Post – it light bulb in a dark room
Yes, not always and not all get stuck in these conversations, but our daily bread is not an abstract God’s forgiveness in the beautiful daily prayer that we need in the future, and it’s a very specific “what I will/won’t eat”. Established: to preserve oneself, abstinence from non-Lenten food – not a goal post. In any case, the main. Someone for health reasons just not to give up many products.
I really useful to do for my spiritual life, what will help me post? Maybe to get back to the fairway, remember that in the sea of life too actually, must be the buoys that I often they swim, that in the world of the elements I am a grain of sand, and where I will suffer the wind in the open sea, the question is actually very big and important.
Because it’s important to not suffered. And I think that post is such a light that for a short time by some miracle she turns on in my dark room. So dark that I almost forgot where it work and where, in the end, switch to already most to patch the lighting in this space.
Photo: tatmitropolia.ru
Don’t take my favorite food, lifestyle, interesting movie, meeting with friends, don’t put me on a diet, don’t give out Psalms and mournful expression. Lent is a chance to stop and look at itself and at its own decision.
This action, which can take place only subject to his own will: that I can limit something, from something to give, something, and more importantly, someone to reconcile and, of course, to trust. Someone who would love to have in my life was the minutes and moments of honesty. Not with Him but with yourself.
It is impossible to be dishonest, just pointless from x-rays to hide a diseased organ, because sometimes even: “Depart from me, o Lord, for I am a sinful man” is more honest than just to negotiate with a conscience to bypass God and think that nothing happened.
Lent is a time of honesty, because it is the awareness and acceptance of the fact that I feel bad when I feel uncomfortable.
Because an uncomfortable state most often our objective reality, but the illusion that all is well and normal in the complete disorder throughout life, is the deception, and very dangerous.
And the only question that the Lord can help you decide in the consciousness of myself in this world, is the question: what can I do? No question Chernyshevsky into the void to someone: what to do, and exactly what I can do. And in this sense everything that is connected with the post, those actions that to me it is this: abstinence, patience, humility, is an auxiliary tools. Another thing is that of them I will need.
If with a sick stomach man can not live without dairy, gnashing of teeth and perseverance “and I still will not eat or drink” can lead to discouragement and resentment. Because to save yourself from an invisible dirt sometimes it’s easier with a glass of milk, than with stubbornness and stupid, strict adherence to the letter. Because fasting is an exercise in balance, not a long marathon to sandwich on the day of the holiday.
Can be perfectly and regularly read daily Psalm somewhere in the dim torch, but if the eye is blind in the daylight to the pain of another person, if the ear responds to the sound of bells, but it does not hear requests from your neighbor, then every post – this is the best role-playing game, and at worst the plague of hypocrisy in my soul. And to heal it will need not hundreds of bows or severe penance from the priest, and the lessons are sometimes taught by the Lord Himself.
Isn’t it sad those who have parted ways with virgin
Dormition fast precedes the feast of the assumption of the blessed virgin. The Church remembers about the end of the earthly life of the Mother of God and Its outcome in the heavenly world. It’s also a reminder that the very life of the blessed virgin in essence was a post in the true sense of the word. Foretold by Simeon’s prophecy was the knowledge that She has gone through Her entire life. And knowing it was Her cross, before the Cross of Calvary was lifted up from the earth Her Son.
It is no coincidence that myself and the Dormition fast begins with a flashback of the Cross feast of the Origin (Iznesenie) honest trees Holy cross.
And somewhere in its rigor this post repeats itself in the life of the virgin. Life, the crown of which was meeting with the Son of God, the ascension, which became a testimony that the human race takes a special Molitvennitsa, Whose presence on earth did not end with Her earthly passing.
Sometimes I ask: but this is a happy event, the mother of God has eternal life in the Kingdom of heaven, ascends into the heavenly world of the body, connects with the Son, what is there to be sad and why we must do something special to prepare for this?
Photo: tatmitropolia.ru
All this is true. But think about it: are the lives of his whole family, in which one of its members suddenly hard, and sometimes fatally ill? Yes, if we are Christians, we believe death is not the end, but the thought of the upcoming separation still does not leave, and sometimes becomes the key in the usual course of life, changing it completely. And it is important to understand how this situation can we live, can we change and in what direction. Isn’t it sad those who have broken up with the mother of God here on earth, do they not know that She is preparing not to death but to a meeting?
And yet… Sometimes the pain of separation can strengthen a person in his effort and diligence to strive for the long-awaited meeting. To go through the time and trials of life to the meeting is hard, and sometimes unbearably painful, but if this is the path of love, each passing day is a reminder that we go through is not alone, but together with those who are waiting for us at the end of this path, with Those who lead us down this road, The one that invisibly accompanies us in all its complexities.