Письмо 12
The Path of Patient Waiting
The author encourages the reader to find peace in patience, prayer, and steady, incremental progress.
So your soul is very constrained! May the Lord warm it, and it will expand. Patience, entrusting everything to the Lord, and waiting for His decisions are the best guides for our life. And prayer is the atmosphere in which we must live and by which we must breathe. And that's all. It's better to move little by little than by leaps.1 Sit and wait.
The True Spirit of Fasting
True fasting requires humility and a recognition of one's own sinfulness rather than self-righteousness.
But here comes the Fast as well: "Let’s fast, brethren, with a fast that’s pleasing." Woe when the fast is pleasant neither to us nor to God. How weak we've become! .2 .3 And it all comes from this: that we’re righteous.4 .5 .6 A sinner won't spare himself; and when he comes to feel his sinfulness—then hang on, sinful flesh!
Read the original Russian
Так ваша душа очень стеснена! Да согреет ее Господь, и – разширится. Терпение, предание всего Господу и ожидание Его решений, суть лучшие руководители нашей жизни. А молитва – атмосфера, в коей жить и коею дышать должны. И все тут. Мало по малу лучше двигаться, нежели на вскочь. Сидите и ждите.
Но вот и пост: «постимся братие постом приятным». Горе, когда пост ни нам, ни Богу неприятен. Коль немощны стали мы! . . А все от того, что праведны. . .
Грешник не станет себя жалеть; и – когда восчувствует греховность, тогда держись грешная плоть!
Notes
- 1 ↩«на вскочь» is archaic/colloquial for sudden leaping or rushing motion; rendered as 'by leaps' against the slow 'little by little'.
- 2 ↩Source sentence is only a bare period; no recoverable Russian wording.
- 3 ↩Source sentence is only a bare period; no recoverable Russian wording.
- 4 ↩Irony is almost certain in Feofan's pastoral voice: self-righteousness, not true righteousness, is the cause. Rendering keeps the bare claim; the sarcasm is carried by context.
- 5 ↩Source sentence is only a bare period; no recoverable Russian wording.
- 6 ↩Source sentence is only a bare period; no recoverable Russian wording.
Letters on the Christian Life companion
Rule yourself daily, not just on retreat
Chosen Portion turns the mirror into a daily practice — a short reading and examining question each morning before you lead anyone.
Chosen Portion makes the mirror daily: the ruler-formation questions this collection preserves become a two-minute morning examination in the app.
- A daily formation reading drawn from centuries of counsel to those in authority
- One pointed examination question a day — two minutes, before the meetings start
- Track your practice over weeks and watch the examined life become a habit