Instruction Three

In the previous discourse we arrived at the following conclusion: know and hold in your heart all that the holy Church teaches, and, receiving divine powers through the Mysteries and kindling them through all other sacred rites and prayers of the Church, walk unfailingly in the path of the commandments commanded to us by the Lord Jesus Christ, under the guidance of lawful shepherds—and you will undoubtedly attain the Kingdom of Heaven and be saved. And this is the answer, the direct and sole answer to every questioner: what must I do to inherit eternal life? All who have been saved were saved thus, and not by another means, and all who are now being saved are saved thus, and not otherwise.

There would be nothing more to say about this. But I fear there may be someone among you who judges this wrongly. Does not someone think that not everything said is equally necessary, or not all of it is necessary for everyone—that without something one might perhaps get by, not diminishing one’s salvation; something might be left to choice, not being obligatory for all. For this reason I feel compelled to make clear to you that all we have said, that is, sound teaching of faith, living by the commandments, receiving the Mysteries, participation in all the prayers of the Church, and guidance of lawful shepherds—all this is essentially necessary in the work of salvation, so that salvation is accomplished only where all these are present together; where something is lacking, the work of salvation is subjected to great danger and corrupted. For what salvation can be expected by one who does not hold the true teaching of faith and the Church, and thinks wrongly either about God, the world, and man, or about our present corrupted state, or about the means of our restoration, which is unique, or about death and our future fate, or about any dogma whatsoever, when the Lord Himself says that if someone denies “His words” “in this adulterous and sinful generation,” He also will deny that one before His Father in Heaven (Mk. 8:38)? And whom will the Lord deny, where will such a place be? Surely not in the Kingdom of Heaven. Yet there are people who say: believe as you wish, only live well and fear nothing—as if one can live well without having sound notions about the subjects conveyed by true faith. Do not be deceived, brothers! True life consists not only of conduct but also of a sound way of thinking, so that whoever lacks the latter should not be said to have a corrected and good life. On the other hand, to live well means to live in a way pleasing to God; a life pleasing to God is entirely conducted according to God’s will, and one of the first determinations of God’s will toward us is to believe in Him whom He sent, that is, in the Lord Jesus Christ and His divine teaching. Therefore he who says: believe as you wish, only live well, when truly believing is a commandment, resembles a man who undermines the foundation upon which he seeks to build a house, or one who wishes to cross a river on a boat that he himself consciously shatters under himself.

What salvation can be expected by one who transgresses any of God’s commandments, for example: the commandment of righteousness or mercy, temperance or diligence, chastity or non-possession, marital fidelity or any other, lessening the gravity of his sins by some distortion, saying: nature draws me, the heart demands; or trying to hide their ugly appearance from conscience by some visible, not overly difficult works of piety, for example: attending churches, acquiring precious icons, and lighting lamps? What salvation, I say, can be expected by such people, when it is directly said that if you wish “to enter into life, keep the commandments” (Mt. 19:17)? That the unrighteous, of whatever kind, cannot inherit the Kingdom of God (1 Cor. 6:9)? External works of piety are indeed necessary, and essentially necessary, in the work of salvation, but not these alone: there is also the necessity of fulfilling all the other commandments of God. “These you ought to have done,” says the Lord, “and not left the others undone” (Mt. 23:23). As one cannot walk without legs or fly without wings, so one cannot attain the Kingdom of Heaven without fulfilling the commandments.

How again do some willfully contrive to accomplish their salvation by themselves, not receiving the divine powers pertaining to life and godliness through the holy Mysteries and not kindling them through the sacred rites and prayers of the Church? I have already explained that we, fallen creatures, are weak and cannot take a single step on the good path without special grace; that this grace is received in the holy Mysteries and, when received, is like a small spark at first, which then grows into flame through active participation in all the rites of the holy Church of God. All this is clear in itself and is known by experience and attested by all. Yet there are people who say: all this churchness is necessary for the simple folk; for those who understand the matter, mental, spiritual, or heartfelt service to God alone is sufficient. Blessed are you, simple souls, who unhesitatingly receive all and readily obey every voice of the Church! You are like trees planted by streams of water, which yield their fruit in due season. But those who understand the matter—in their own way, of course—are like in a spiritual sense thin grass growing on dry, stony, or sandy ground, showing barely weak signs of life; or worse still: they are like seeds smothered in the earth itself, not sprouted or frozen. Imagine rain, snow, and fierce wind in the weather, and place a person in such weather in the open air without proper clothing—how long will he live? Precisely in such circumstances are those who shun the Mysteries and all our life-giving churchness. Such people are pitiable! Egoism and willfulness gnaw at their bones.

Finally, the Lord chose apostles, the apostles entrusted their work to bishops, appointing presbyters as their helpers. All of them together constitute the divinely-established pastorate in the Church, whose work is to lead all to the measure of a complete man, “to the measure of the stature of the fullness of Christ” (Eph. 4:13), sanctifying through the Mysteries, kindling through sacred rites, and especially guiding by counsel through the many-forked path toward spiritual perfection. And thanks be to the Lord that it is so! We are blind; as the blind need a guide, so we need one to point out the path to God’s Kingdom—in many cases we need a person who, as it were, took us by the hands and led us out of the confusion of thoughts and feelings into which the enemy and our own lack of understanding sometimes casts us. Do not say that the guide for all is God’s word—we ourselves will read and see what is necessary. God’s word contains general guidance for all, but what exactly is necessary for me and in my circumstances must be explained by another—a living, experienced voice. Without this, I must wander at crossroads and be in constant danger. And this is why pastoral guidance and counsel is needful to us. How then do some, and perhaps not a few, seem to think that they have no other obligations toward their shepherd than to call upon him when the need arises to perform a Mystery or some other sacred rite? Such people forget that “where there is no guidance, the people fall, but in abundance of counselors there is safety” (Prov. 11:14).

From all that has been said the same conclusion comes forth again: if you desire salvation—know and hold in your heart all that the holy Church teaches, and, receiving divine powers through the Mysteries and kindling them through all the sacred rites and prayers of the Church, walk unfailingly in the path of the commandments commanded to us by the Lord Jesus Christ, under the guidance of lawful shepherds—and you will undoubtedly attain the Kingdom of God and be saved. All this is essentially necessary in the work of salvation, necessary all together and for all. Whoever does not accept or rejects one thing has no salvation—he will not heal his infirmities and will not escape illness. The Church of God is a healer holding in her structure the cure for every spiritual sickness of ours. The component parts of this cure are: Orthodox teaching, life according to the commandments, the Mysteries with the sacred rites of the Church, and the guidance of shepherds. As in bodily illnesses medicine is healing only when it is composed of all the substances listed in the prescription, so in our spiritual illness healing can only come to us when we receive all the elements comprising the sole cure of our spirit—Christianity, or the Church. Take away some element from bodily medicine—it will no longer have its effect. Do not receive something that necessarily enters into Christianity or the Church—and you yourself deprive yourself of healing so necessary to you, and consequently remain in the same uncured, ruinous state—thus you will not be saved and will not see the Kingdom of Heaven. Amen.