Metropolitan of Strumica Naum: Act here and now
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We are all waiting for something to happen, so we can take some concrete steps to improve our spiritual life. For example, better conditions for us to be able to pray.
Or, we wait for things in our lives to become simpler and easier, so we can take action to improve it.
Or, we wait for our laziness to go away, and then to start working on something.
As if the case seems to be, that God does not know exactly what we need, and yet we do not have it. No, that is not the case at all, He has given us all that is required. All we have to do on our behalf is to do His will, in obedience.
It is Important to know that whatever we are waiting for will never come unless we change something for the better immediately. We will definitely not be “more prepared” in the future.
We should invest in the (present) “here and now”. Firstly, in ourselves; in order for some change to happen for the better in the future, and not passively to wait for a better future, and then to make a change within ourselves.
So, one of the biggest problems of modern man, who, at the same time is the least conscious or aware, is the imagined and expected, and even the prophesied life afterwards “over there”, “sometime in the future”, instead of the concrete life here and now.
The importance of that, which is “over there” and “sometime in the future”, is if it belongs to what we usually call a plan, vision, goal, or motive: but it is unattainable, and even a cause for despair, if we fail in what is called life in the “here and now”.
Only the harmonised (coordinated) way of life with the level of our spiritual development, as well as with our real position in the Church, portrays the Orthodox spiritual life here and now. Only in this way can we live in peace and repentance and be happy.
Everything else is pride, darkness, fear and unrest in “over there” and “sometime in the future”.
Consequences of the imagined life “over there” and “sometime in the future” are: despair and abandonment of the tangible calling (asceticism), apocalyptic projections in crisis situations, dependence on social networks, failure, ingratitude, dissatisfaction, lack of knowledge, etc…
There is actually another topic to talk about, but it does not fall in the context of “life, here and now”. It belongs to what it would be – if it could be, “over there” and “sometime in the future” …
Put simply, the life here and now, is the life in the God-Man Christ, which contains the future – the rest of time, the Christian end (of our life) and the Kingdom of Heaven. што би било – кога би било
Most-Holy Birth-giver-of-God, save us!
Metropolitan of Strumica Naum
(30.01.2021 17:13)
Photo by: Fr. Gavril Galev
