If I do not forgive, I cannot be forgiven. But stop! When I think of my offences against others, that I do not pray for them, that I am indifferent to their salvation, that I do not set a good example for them, that I speak empty or angry words, etc., I should ask them for forgiveness in my spirit, or sometimes even in words. I feel guilty towards the other person, and when I realize that he, the other person, has also hurt me, it’s like a triumph for me – I have a chance. Something for something!!! If I am able to forgive, I take the credit for it and, in a sense, I triumph over my neighbour. Then I can say in earnest, “Our Father, forgive us our trespasses as we forgive those who trespass against us…” Forgive us both, me and the one who hurt me. And now I forgive, and it is as if I am forgiving those who have hurt him too, and then the Lord hears such a sincere prayer of the Our Father.

The Lord shows us that the harder and deeper the fight is, the more humility and self-surrender to Jesus we need. We need to deny ourselves! Here we can no longer defend the divine truth by human means, however good they may be. There is only one rule here: to carry the cross and enter into death with Christ through the Mother of God. This is the way – the way of death towards resurrection.

The Blessed Virgin Mary is a model of humility. She said: “I am a bondslave of the Lord!” “He looked upon the lowly state of His bondmaid.” Let us keep our eyes on her and become like her. She is our Mother!

As for purity, let us remember that it is the fruit of God’s grace bestowed upon the humble. Purity must be rooted in humility, that is, in complete self-surrender to God, or self-sacrificing and all-consuming love. Without humility, we will have neither love for God nor for our neighbour, neither purity nor any other virtue. Saint Basil writes in one of his letters: “If you excelled in prayer, self-denial, extraordinary self-sacrifice and the like, it would all come to nought without humility!” So let us really try hard to take the lowest place. If we are mocked, unjustly suspected, disparaged, slandered or considered useless, harmful or dangerous because of Jesus, let us accept this injustice through faith. Let us give it all to Jesus and thank Him for it.

We greatly need people who pray, suffer and sacrifice everything. This is all love, and what could be more useful in this short life, where not only our own eternity is decided, but that of others too? Through faith and sacrifice, we can save immortal souls. It is wonderful that Jesus waits for our faith, through which He wants to give grace not only to us, but also to others whom we can influence through our faith and prayers to turn to God, open their hearts to Him and follow Him.

A certain priest in the USA began to be pressed by temptations against faith – he felt like God did not know about him because He was not intervening in His life. The Lord taught him a lesson. The priest decided to go on holiday, but did not tell anyone where he was going. While staying at a motel, the receptionist called him to the phone. There was a woman on the phone who wanted to commit suicide. She thought she had called the rectory because she had written down his number from a programme about Jesus Christ that he had presented on television; she had simply dialled the number she had written down. She had no idea that she had called the motel where he was staying. The woman was saved, and the priest realized that he could not hide from God – He knew everything about him. That was a great encouragement to him.

The younger generation longs for a great ideal. There is no greater ideal than following Jesus radically. Jesus says: “Everyone will be salted with fire. Salt is good, but if it loses its saltiness, how can you make it salty again? Have salt in yourselves, and be at peace with each other.” (Mk 9:49-50) Therefore, we must be persistent in radically following Jesus. We must have salt, the fire of zeal, within us. At the same time, our old self must be crucified in our everyday life; in other words, we must lose “our own” for the sake of Jesus. Otherwise, we will not be at peace with each other! Holiness lies in walking steadfastly in faith through life. Every day we need to be filled with the zeal of the Gospel, never ceasing to be salt, never conforming to the spirit of the world, which tries to lead us away from Jesus through trifles. Therefore, we must be vigilant and radical so that we do not fall into their traps. We cannot remove the traps, but we must guard our saltiness! Jesus says: “Be the salt. Be the light.” (cf. Mt 5:13-16)

As was the case with Abraham, every work of God must have at its core obedience of faith unto death. This is the law of the wheat grain. The devil will attack us with depression, pressure, gloom, tension, or an indefinable apathy, but there is no reason to take these feelings seriously and remain in that state. That is the wealth of vanity. We must pray with faith. God alone knows how He will resolve the matter. He wants us to have absolute faith in His omnipotence and to surrender completely! What He will do with it, we will see later or in eternity. The death of a grain of wheat always bears manifold fruit.

Today is a very serious time indeed. The spiritual atmosphere is poisoned. It is hard to discern what is what. New demonic forces are entering the scene and working through people who have power and influence – not only material, but also spiritual. The Church, the Mystical Body of Christ, is literally crucified. Now more than ever, it is crucial to unite with Jesus so that we may persevere and remain faithful to Him. We must also cooperate with the graces God gives us and the Mother of God mediates to us. We are her spiritual children. We must always keep our eyes on her. She will never abandon us.

The enemy of God attacks in order to destroy the work of God, Christianity, to steal Christ – the life of God – from the souls and to lead them to eternal damnation. His attacks are from both without and within and have a meaning. We need to see them as a cross to be borne. The carrying of this cross is the will of God. However, before we can carry this cross, we need to deny ourselves. Jesus first demands: “Deny yourself!” and only then He adds: “Take up your cross!” To deny oneself means to be poor in spirit, to be humble.

Of all people, the Virgin Mary is the supreme model of humility. The Lord Jesus, God and Man, said: “Learn from Me, for I am gentle and lowly in heart.” He said clearly that this is what we should learn from Him. He clearly demands it from us. We should practically deny ourselves, accept our cross and follow Him humiliated, abandoned and crucified. Humility is the basis of all virtues. The opposite of humility is pride which leads to eternal death, while humility is the key to heaven. Humility overcomes the devil and the old self in us. Different forms of jealousy, comparing with others, competitiveness even in spiritual life, sadness when someone is successful – this all is a sin of pride! We need to humble ourselves in thoughts time and again. But then we need to do so in words, deeds and gestures as well. Sadness is often a sign of preoccupation with ourselves, failure to achieve our plans or dreams etc. Unless we grow in this virtue, we will never have true unity with Christ or any man either. Humility overcomes the spirit of pride.

Even an unbelieving person, when suddenly confronted by a difficult situation, subconsciously cries out like a small child: “Mummy!” We can have recourse to Mary as our Mother. Jesus gave her to us as our Mother. Eve is the mother of the human race. Mary became our spiritual Mother. The task of a mother is not only to give birth to or receive children, but to feed and rear them. Mary accompanied Jesus on His Way of the Cross. None of the people knew Him so intimately, none was in so deep unity with Him as His Mother. And Jesus gave His Mother to us, His children. We have the same Mother: you and I and Jesus.

Turning to her in life situations is not like turning to God, but to someone who is older and more experienced – like turning to mother. We are inexperienced children in our spiritual life. We should have recourse to her especially when we are overwhelmed by worries and weaknesses so much that we are unable to turn directly to Jesus. This is mainly when we are subject to various temptations and are like drunk: we say “no” to sin but actually in our innermost being we agree with sin and our soul is in confusion.

In one of the gospels, Jesus tells a parable of two debtors – one who owed ten thousand talents, the other who owed a hundred denarii. You forgive something small and the Lord forgives you millions in debt. What folly it is to know this and not act on it. We need to put this into practice on a daily basis. By eagerly forgiving others and walking in truth and light, we get healed and free from all sorts of indefinable or definable gloomy emotions or feelings of guilt. These are false emotions. Ask yourself – Where is Jesus in all this? And where are you? Are you in your self or in Christ when you have such thoughts? If you are in Christ, God’s word is your guide as interpreted in the Spirit and in truth, rather than by the evil spirit in the wilderness.

At Elijah’s word: “Lord, let fire come down from heaven”, fire came down and consumed the bull on Mount Carmel, and then it came down twice more and consumed fifty soldiers each time. However, that fire had come down into him first. The Prophet Elijah had experience of the fire of God. This fire had already purified his soul. So this fire should purify us. For example, I say: “Lord, let fire consume this thought!” I can imagine fire and say: “This thought is a lie. It has taken flesh in my feelings. I did not want it to but there is a mechanism of sin in me which immediately embodies it. I unite with it although I do not want to. Lord, let fire consume it all. If I have seen any impure images or billboards, now I bring it all to Your light. Let Your fire purify my heart of all impure thoughts or feelings. Let it consume all envious, critical or other thoughts. Let it burn!” Jesus said: “I came to cast fire on the earth, and how I wish it were already kindled!” And I call: “Let it burn, I want it too.” You brought fire and You want us to be baptized with fire, so that this fire may consume all that is not of God – all despair, all rebellion against God, all jealousy, envy. Now I suffer purgatory here on earth.

A man walked across a desert and carried a cross together with Christ. There were two sets of tracks seen in the sand: one of the man and the other of the Lord Jesus. When the man turned round at nearly the end of his way, much to his surprise he could see only one set of tracks in the sand. He turned to the Lord: “Lord, when I started my way of following You, You promised to walk with me all the way. But now I can see that in the hardest moments of my life there was only one set of tracks in the sand. How could You leave me alone when I needed You most?”

And Jesus said: “I never left you alone, never. That one set of tracks you could see was left in the sand from the moments when I was carrying both you and your cross.” This example expresses a profound truth.

The Lord Jesus is really present in the Divine Liturgy. When we receive His Body and Blood in Holy Communion, we need to realize: “Jesus, You are in me now.” Jesus asks every one of us: “What do you want Me to do for you?” If you have a concrete problem, tell Him: “Lord, this is my problem – I am ill. You are my Physician, You are almighty!” And Jesus says to you the same as He said to the women in the Gospel who came to Him with a fervent plea or to the parents who asked Him to heal their child: “Let it be done for you as you have believed!” Or He says to you as He said to the leper: “I am willing; be cleansed!” Jesus is the same, and He is present in the Eucharist. He comes in a special way. When you receive His Body and Blood, He comes to you and becomes your guest. Think of Zacchaeus who wished to see Jesus, and Jesus said to him: “I must stay at your house today!” and entered his house. Jesus comes into your soul in the same way today. Say to Him: “Jesus, You are the Lord of the universe!” Jesus asks you: “What do you want Me to do for you?” So tell Him concretely what you want.

“If you love Me, you will obey what I command. And I will ask the Father, and He will give you another Counsellor to be with you for ever – the Spirit of truth. The world cannot accept Him, because it neither sees Him nor knows Him. But you know Him, for He lives with you and will be in you.” (Jn 14:15-17)

Jesus says, “If you love Me…” – this is the condition. And He continues, “…I will ask the Father…” He says, “I” – Jesus. “…and He – the Father – will give you another Counsellor to be with you for ever – the Spirit of truth.” The Spirit of truth, the Holy Spirit, the Counsellor – He intercedes for us with groans that words cannot express, as we read in chapter eight of the Letter to the Romans. We do not know what we ought to pray for, but the Spirit Himself intercedes for us. So, Jesus will ask the Father. The Father will give the Spirit of truth, the Holy Spirit. Here we are already talking about the third Person of God. Jesus goes on to tell us about the Holy Spirit: “The world cannot accept Him, because it neither sees Him nor knows Him. But you know Him, for He lives with you and will be in you.” (Jn 14:17) The world, or the spirit of the world, is the spirit of lies.