19. To Sinners Who Are Negligent About Their Salvation

Sinners who are negligent about their salvation, in order to stifle the voice of conscience within themselves, typically comfort themselves with the hope of God’s mercy and of going unpunished, saying: “God is merciful—everything will be fine, everything will pass”—and they go on sinning. Know, brothers, that the hope of such people in God’s mercy is vain, and their hope of going unpunished is empty. God forgives only sinners who repent and take care to amend themselves; but toward people such as those described above, he is just and punishes them not only in the life to come, but in the present life as well. A certain woman, while staying at the Sarov Hermitage, fervently desired to see the great ascetic Father Seraphim. The elder received her with fatherly love and, among various counsels and instructions, began to tell her to persuade her husband to reform himself from intemperance, arrogance, unjust oppression, and mercilessness toward his neighbors. To this the Venerable One added: “If your husband does not abandon these passions that have taken root in him, he will assuredly be punished by God.” Saying these last words, he took a bundle of matchsticks from the stove, handed them to the woman, and said: “Here, take these matchsticks and keep them.” When Father Seraphim began to speak of her husband’s punishment by God’s wrath, the woman was deeply troubled, and afterward she and her household and acquaintances debated for a long time the meaning of this simple but strange gift from Father Seraphim; but no one could explain its significance. Then at last the terrible hour came when the meaning of the gift was made plain and the prophecy of the wondrous elder was fulfilled. One day the sky began to cloud over on every side, and by evening a fearful storm had gathered. All the people turned with prayer to God; the woman mentioned above also began to pray. Meanwhile, in this terrible time, two of her young children were asleep—one near the window, and the other a little farther away. Suddenly a terrible thunderclap burst over her house, and in an instant, following a flash of lightning, a wooden cornice was torn from the window and splintered into the smallest of splinters; most of them were driven into the face and beard of her husband—and struck by this blow, he soon died (Account of the Life of Father Seraphim by Schema-Abbot Seraphim, pp. 222–223).

Meanwhile, to the no small astonishment of all, neither the children who were sleeping near the very window, nor the woman herself, was in the least touched by the blow. Afterward the woman involuntarily recalled the words of Father Seraphim and only then understood the meaning of his seemingly strange gift, and marveled at his wondrous clairvoyance. Thus, let those who are negligent about their salvation—if they do not abandon their sinful life—not flatter themselves with the hope either of God’s mercy or of going unpunished; and let them be convinced by the example given that the Lord does not leave unrepentant sinners without punishment, sometimes even in this present life. And being convinced of this, in order not to incur the righteous wrath of God in the future, let them first of all change their sinful life for a virtuous one, and after they have established themselves in the latter, let them then boldly hope for God’s mercy as well—and assuredly the Lord will forgive them and deliver them from punishment, of which he himself is witness. If, he says, the people… turn from their evil ways, I will relent of the evil that I intended to bring upon them (Jer. 18:8). And the same is confirmed by the book of the prophet Jonah, where it is written: And God saw their deeds (those of the Ninevites), that they turned from their evil way, and God relented of the disaster that he said he would bring upon them, and he did not bring it (Jona 3:10).

Hurry then, you who have until now been negligent about your salvation—hurry to repentance and to the amendment of your life, and the Lord will forget your past and, instead of punishment, will visit you with his mercies. Amen.