During my initial monastic service in the Donskoy Monastery of Moscow, there was a period when I stopped reading the Gospel. I had a lot of work at the time, and I didn’t have enough time to focus on the Holy Scriptures and immerse myself in the meaning of words. I did not attach much importance to this, but simply continued to perform obediences, working from four in the morning until late at night.
There were no external changes, but I gradually began to notice that I was more and more burdened by a feeling of intense spiritual and bodily fatigue, which I could not “discard” either by sleep, food, or rest. I would fall asleep and wake up, go to fraternal services, work, but the feeling that someone had got into my neck and sucked all my strength from me did not leave. I walk — my legs bend, I get behind the wheel — my hands shake. My body and soul were exhausted every day, and I couldn’t figure out why.
Once, in this state, I went to the office of the governor, Father Agafodor, to discuss certain labor matters. He, like an astute person, as soon as I started the conversation, asks me: «What is happening to you?» I am almost exhausted voice, quietly answering: “I don’t know…” Something is bad for me. He stared at me, as if in a few seconds he could see my soul and find the source of the disease, and suddenly asked the question: “Have you read the Gospel long?” I began to remember: indeed, I stopped reading the Gospel. How could this have happened? How long have I been without spiritual food? I began to remember and was horrified to find that I could not remember the last time I picked up a book.
With great inner excitement I ran into my cell, grabbed the Gospel and began to read. He opened it and, like a man dying of thirst, read and read, read and read.
The more I read, the more I felt I was getting better. The teeth that had clawed into my neck and sucked out my strength gradually became looser, breathing more freely. With each new chapter (and I read about ten at a time) it became easier and easier. I turned page after page until I realized that I was completely free of the disease. The feeling of oppression has passed. The enslavement I was in all that time was a big lesson for me that I didn’t have to repeat twice. Since then, I’ve been reading 365 chapters a year, which means I read a chapter every morning.
Man consists of two parts: the soul and the body. We feed our flesh and our soul is hungry. The main food for the soul is the Gospel. We do not forget to charge our cell phone in the evening, but forget about the soul. When we read the Gospel, we receive grace. In the morning I read a chapter – grace for the whole day. And the day will go very differently — with grace. We will also reflect on what we have read, and some of this will come true, although the Gospel is not a divination book. This is the book of life that every Christian should live by.
Sometimes we don’t even realize what a great power lies in this book. If we ever saw the devil shunting like fire when we took the gospel, we would hold it close to us and never let it go. For my confessor, Father Kirill (Pavlov), the Gospel was always in the first place: he found it in the ruins of Stalingrad during the Great Patriotic War and went with him throughout the war. So I, but much later, had to visit the battlefield to understand that without the Gospel can not win.
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