Murmuring against God and disagreeing with his will about the death of one's neighbor. Christian materials

"What does it mean to complain about your fate? It means to complain about God himself ... Better be content with everything that happened to you and falls to your lot. Otherwise, you will throw a stone to the sky that will fall on your own head."

The Lord God sends us, sinners, illnesses, but also grants healings, which we most often receive from doctors, who are instruments in the hands of God. Not without reason among the saints there were many healers and healers, including St. Martyr, revered by the people. Panteleimon. But how, at times, exhausting the disease! it seems how good it would be if there were no diseases at all. Why are we sick? what is it - punishment or mercy of God? Finally, why do even the righteous and holy saints of God get sick? These questions are answered by the doctor of medical sciences, candidate of theology, head of the Society of Orthodox Doctors of St. Petersburg, Archpriest Sergiy FILIMONOV.

If we turn to the patristic teaching, it becomes clear that there are several reasons for the occurrence of diseases. And the main one is the sinful nature of man and the commission of sin by man.

- That is, the punishment of God will not keep you waiting.

Not God - man punishes himself, because the grace of God departs from the sinner. As a result, the laws of death will prevail in a person, and it is she who gives birth to diseases.

The second reason for the onset of illness is when the Lord saves us from something in this way. I know cases when a person had to go somewhere, or take some important step, but due to a sudden illness, he stayed at home and, therefore, did not make mistakes. Because if he had been at work that day, he could have come into conflict with his superiors, which would have ended in dismissal, and if he had flown on an airplane, he had crashed. And so he escaped unknown dangers and temptations.

- And there are illnesses, filed on the contrary, - for the cleansing of sins?

I have a parishioner to whom, as soon as he became a church member, the Lord sent the cross of sickness. For the seventh year this man has been ill, and all dried up. He was operated on more than once, cutting up and down. But… I cannot say that this disease is a punishment. And he himself says: “I am so grateful to God that He cleanses me, because my whole life before that was very sinful.”

And let us remember the monks of the Kiev-Pechersk Lavra - the painful Joseph and Pimen. Only shortly before their death God sent them health. But they were in illness for a reason: through their physical weakness they were saved, atoning for some sins, which the Lord knew about and themselves received grace from God to heal other people.

- But, father, the question arises: why did the Lord not send your parishioner a disease before his churching?

And, in your opinion, it is fair, admonishing, to punish a person if he does not understand why? Imagine a small child whom you scold, but he still does not know, does not know about the concepts that you want to convey to him. He does not represent the depth and sinfulness of his offense. Similarly, it does not always make sense for an unchurched person to give an illness, for it will not be of a salutary nature for him. The believer accepts the disease not as a burden and undeserved punishment, but as a saving, cleansing medicine for the soul.

It happens that the Lord sends a disease to correct a particular passion. For example, a person has a sweet tooth. He runs the risk of getting sick with diabetes, but through this disease the Lord grants him a restriction in food, helping to cope with the passions of larynx and gluttony. Another example: it is known that angry, irritable people often have high blood pressure. That is, the Lord, by sending hypertension, helps such a person get rid of the passion of anger and find humility. It is through illness and infirmity that our passions are harnessed like a horse, and a believer thanks the Heavenly Father for this mercy, for he himself cannot cope with his passions.

Another option: the Lord gives the disease in order to prevent the development of some kind of passion. There is a wonderful example of this from the Old Testament - the life of St. Job the Long-suffering. Job was a righteous man, however, despite this, the Lord betrayed him to Satan. Satan, not daring to touch Job's soul, tortured his body. For 18 years, Job suffered from festering wounds. But when he began to reproach the Lord, it was revealed to him that the righteousness that he imagined in himself was far from true. So God destroyed the pride, vanity, conceit that had arisen in Job's soul. And when the Lord turned His word to Job, he, already enlightened, answered: “... I spoke about what I did not understand, about wonderful things for me, which I did not know ... Now my eyes see You; Therefore I renounce and repent in dust and ashes."(Job 42:3,5-6). “And the Lord restored the loss of Job ... And God blessed the last days of Job more than the former”(Job 42:10,12).

Is it possible through illness to completely change the fate of a person?

There is a legend that when the Lord passed by one legless man, the disciples asked: “What is he suffering for? What did you do wrong?" Jesus answered that if this beggar cripple had legs, then half the world would be put to fire and sword, he would become a tyrant, a murderer, a rapist. And so he, legless, asks for alms and is saved through his weakness. Here is an example of a change in the fate of a person.
And the last - the disease for a specific, already committed sin: a person steals, and then he or his children get cancer.

- The saints and the righteous also get sick. But why are they?

With this question we come to the last aspect of the Christian doctrine of sickness. The saints and the righteous get sick, according to the testimony of the Holy Fathers, for two reasons: for the glory of God and for the test of faith. Let's go back to Job the Long-suffering. Sickness and other troubles were allowed in the name of testing his faith. How his wife and friends tempted him, how people abused him, how grievously he suffered from leprosy! What did the devil want to cause with this disease? - Blasphemy against God! And what were the arguments of the enemy of man? Like, it is easy to praise the Lord in prosperity, let's see what Job will say when everything is taken away from him - children, wealth, family, health ... St. Job withstood the temptation: “Naked I came out of my mother's womb, and naked I will return. The Lord gave, the Lord took; (as the Lord pleased, so it happened) may the name of the Lord be blessed! .. If I am guilty, woe to me! if I am right, I will not dare to raise my head!”(Job 1:21; 10:15).

I often see with sorrow that many Christians do not stand the test of a serious illness and calamity - grumbling and blasphemy against God begin. So, they could not pass this difficult exam.

Another meaning of the sickness of the saints and the righteous is when the sickness is to the glory of God. So Lazarus fell ill and died, and Jesus Christ told His disciples that this event happened to the glory of God. For the Lord, through the death of Lazarus, wanted to show the omnipotence of His Only Begotten Son, His power over death and corruption, and the prototype of the future age - the resurrection from the dead. This was shown, because after Lazarus was resurrected, many Jews believed in Christ and became His disciples.

Now let's turn to the resurrection of the daughter of Jairus and the story of a woman who bled for 12 years. We see that when the Lord resurrected one and healed the other, many people believed in God. Therefore, sometimes the Lord sends people such painful states, the healing of which glorifies the name of God.

- The Lord can send a miracle of healing. And what can a doctor and a priest do?

The doctor's task is to heal the body, alleviate the mental suffering of a person, moderate his fears on the eve of the operation, and find peace of mind. The task of a priest is to teach a sick person in an illness to call on the grace of God, which strengthens and heals, to make it clear that the illness is saving for him, and that in illness it is necessary to be sympathetic, and not to grumble, to help the patient understand his soul, repent and be reconciled with God, check his life path and actions with the will of God. St. John Chrysostom said that the one who thanks God for illness receives a crown. And in our time, one can be saved either by humility, or by suffering in a disease endured with humility.

Questions were asked by Daria NIKOLAEVA

One of the main vices of our time is ingratitude to God. It comes from a lack of faith and love. And at the heart of it all is a wavering faith. Even in the existence of God, some people's faith wavers. But hesitation in faith in God is already on the verge of insanity, that is, if such thoughts come to mind and a person stops at them, his mind is on the verge of insanity, because that "the voice of the steel in his heart: there is no God"(Ps. 13:1; 52:1).

At one time, Metropolitan Platon (Levshin) remarkably said - we had such a well-known church figure, one might even say a saint. Then all sorts of so-called “enlighteners” were received at the royal court, or rather, “dark”, and one of these French atheists, having arrived, it seems, under the Empress Catherine, self-satisfiedly declared: “But Diderot says that there is no God.” This is how he decided to show off his "progressive" knowledge. And Metropolitan Platon calmly answers like this: “Yes, he didn’t come up with anything new, because already several thousand years ago it was said“ Speech foolish in his heart: there is no God. This is what David said. So they've been predicted for a long time."

Why is there now some kind of general stupefaction of the mind? Because they always forget about God. All understanding comes from God. The Lord is the Supreme Intelligence. Higher intelligence! Therefore, if a person breaks away from the Higher Reason, that is, from God, he loses his mind, he becomes insane and instantly falls into the power of the devil. Of course, the Lord tries to save a person, but if a person does not realize this danger, then he completely falls into the power of the devil, and what he does - for example, drunkenness, drug addiction, obsession with all passions - is evidence of the devil's violence against a person.

A person thinks that he does it himself, but in fact he already lives as a puppet, a puppet that is pulled by the strings, and she does what she is ordered to do. Also, the language of a person who has departed from God pronounces all sorts of crazy phrases, as the Gospel says - other crazy verbs. Hence all kinds of curses, foul language - all this influence is diabolical. A person who has lost faith, who has departed from faith, no longer knows what he is doing. Therefore, the purpose of all the devil's tricks is to shake faith, and it is with this goal that they began to corrupt people, turn them away from the church, from faith in God.

Or, as we used to, I remember, they wrote: "I am an atheist." But it's like saying "I'm blind" or "I'm deaf". So what, poor thing, that you are blind and deaf? So you can't see or hear, that's your problem. But why brag about it? This can only be regretted.

There is a story on this topic: there are former classmates who have become doctors, she is a simple doctor, treats people, and he is a professor, wrote dissertations. And he suddenly sees a chain around her neck: “What do you have - a cross? Are you a believer?!" She says: “Yes, Petya, a believer” (calling him in a student way). “But I,” he says, “I can’t, I’m so learned that I can’t believe.” And she calmly answers him like this: “Well, what can I do if it is given to me, but not given to you.” That is, he thought that he could not believe, because he was so smart, but in fact it was the other way around.

How many people deny God, deny the providence of God. After all, they’re like: “Here’s the case, what a coincidence!” Someone wisely said a long time ago: "Chance is the god of the fool." After all, among us Orthodox people they say: “The Lord has arranged it this way!” I met someone, someone said something to you, I saw someone ... How many such examples there were, people say: something delayed, late, and at that time there was an explosion or some kind of accident. If he hadn't been late, he would have been in trouble. “Wow, what an occasion! “Not a “case”, but the Lord took away, and they all have a “case”

Therefore, these people live in hopeless darkness, that they have all “accidents”, and in this life they don’t know where they are going, and they don’t know what will happen next, when life begins to approach sunset, all desires die off, nothing is left necessary, and with what then the person remains? He does not understand that the essence of life is the future eternal life, that the soul is what it is. By the way, what is the soul, you most clearly begin to understand with age: you rushed somewhere, but you no longer have the strength. Because the impulses are still spiritual, the soul does not grow old, the body grows old, and the soul - as young as it was, remains so.

It is not common for a person to think about death, because his soul is immortal, because if you were born, then that's it: you are and you can't go anywhere. Another thing is that you will have to answer for everything - they don’t want to think about it. They want to live for the flesh, and it turns out that people sin so much that they completely ceased to distinguish between where the soul is and where the body is.

Remember how in the Gospel a man who received a good harvest decided: “That's it, I now have a supply for many years, the river of my soul: soul, imache much good. rest, eat, drink, be merry"(Luke 12:19). And the Lord says to him: "Madman" - madman, first of all, because the soul does not eat or drink, it does not need any of this, but he says: the river my soul - that is, people put the body in place of the soul, and, as the holy fathers say, the soul falls into slavery to the body and is tormented by it. Why does the Prophet say bring my soul out of the dungeon(Ps. 141:7). That is, the soul rushes about, the soul is hard. So, what is next? A person got what he wanted, enjoys it, enjoys it. Here is the food - I ate it, I ate it again - that's it, there is nowhere else, the body does not let in more food. And all? What's next? Sweet sleep? When you get tired, it's good, but then it gets boring, a person also suffers from idleness. Sometimes a person does not want to work, quits work, and then suffers from idleness.

We sin, first of all, with ingratitude to God, and not only with ingratitude, but also with grumbling. We sin with pride - we have a little bit of something, but we are already proud. We sin with self-conceit, pride, vanity. Forgive me, Lord! We sin by justifying ourselves and condemning others.

We sin a lot with idle talk. How much empty talk, how much chatter! We sin by slander, by all kinds of lies. Forgive me, Lord!

We sin with self-will, stubbornness, unwillingness to yield to our neighbor. Now, since childhood - this is especially noticeable when there are several children in a family - everyone is fighting for his own. Nobody will give in! Everyone shouts: Give it to me, give it to me! I myself, a sinner, was small, but now you look at your children - they fight from morning to evening. One grabbed some toy - immediately it becomes necessary for the other. It just lay there and no one needed it, but as soon as someone took it, everyone needed it. What does it mean? It turns out, downright, some kind of need from a person to take away from another. Be sure to take it! Strength can be taken away, but in order to give in, humility is needed for this. Let u him will, not you, and at him. Two fight, one takes away the toy from the other, and the third one comes up and says: “Yes, give it to him, he doesn’t need it, he just needs to take it away from you.” I was even amazed how children understand everything correctly, the child said exactly.

What is envy? It's when someone else has it and you don't. Well, you take it for yourself, now you will have it - what next? And it turns out that this is where it all ends. Saint Nicholas of Serbia said that freedom is like bread: one has a lot of bread - the other does not, one has a lot of freedom - the other does not have freedom. And there is. Take the family. One is completely free - when he wants to leave, when he wants to come, and all the others around him “dance”, they are in slavery to him. If there is a drunkard in the family, then everyone around him, everyone is not free, only he is free. And freedom was called arbitrariness, licentiousness in sin. Forgive us, Lord!

We sin a lot in our thoughts. We sin since childhood - all sorts of dreams, plans. A person dreams for himself, imagines something extraordinary, and if this does not work out in life, then he considers himself unhappy. You are not unhappy! You came up with something that does not belong to you, and when it turned out, because it is not yours, you still grumble. A person does not really know even himself and what he deserves.

For example, in each country there should be one king, the whole people cannot be king, but everyone dreams about it. Remember: "Every cook can run the state"? One said foolishly, and all the rest foolishly began to repeat. Everyone imagines himself to be someone, sits in front of the TV and thinks that he controls the state. Folly, of course, no one manages anything, who is in front of the TV, and even more so in the kitchen Where is there to rule the state - you can’t manage anything in your family! So they made a mess, because the cooks began to run the state.

All this why? Because a person lives a ghostly life, dreams, imagines something to himself: “I would tell him this .. I would do this and that ...” Two will quarrel, and then for days, or even weeks, sometimes even grind for years all this in yourself. A person sins, sins, but why? Forget. If you have sinned, say: "Forgive me, Lord, if I am guilty of anything." You need to stop grinding, it's all empty. In thoughts, in imagination, a person sins a lot.

And all kinds of sinful dreams! Someone liked - and the person begins to imagine something. He can no longer sin, so he begins to imagine, all sorts of abnormal perversions begin. Why? Because I dreamed of everything. Some people go crazy from such things, what they just do not do. And it's all from the imagination.

The Holy Fathers said that the devil leads a person away from true spiritual life, fixing him on earthly temporary life. And now a man acts even more insanely and leaves this earthly life - into an imaginary one. They watch TV shows, all sorts of nonsense. This is fiction, but people are sitting worried. What is there to worry about? There's nothing! Turn it off and everything is dark. And so a person, deceived by the devil, lives all his life. He watches these films, imagines the so-called “beautiful life”, but he does not get this imagined beautiful life and considers himself unhappy. Yes, thank God for what you have! People who have experienced need, hunger, misfortune - they understand the price of everything and are grateful: "Glory to Thee, Lord, - there is shelter, there is something to wear, there is something to eat, And that's good." And we are not enough. As Pushkin wrote: the fisherman had an old wife - everything was not enough for her. Can you satisfy a person with something if his greed is immeasurable and he envies everything, just to envy.

The world is laughing at itself. There was such an anecdote. Out of envy, a person writes a denunciation of someone "The neighbor eats caviar." Then time passes, caviar is no longer available, he writes: “The neighbor is eating sausage”, then: “The neighbor is eating white bread”, then: “Eating black bread”, and then already: “The neighbor is eating something there, in my opinion” . That is, a person comes to the point that if only to inform. Such envy! What are we jealous of? All this worldly decay? Our life is like bitter laughter. And hell omniscient, this is what the holy fathers call hell, because the devil laughs at everything.

Here, for example, one person at first won, won, because he was engaged in spiritualism and the devil told him everything. Finally, he settled into the idea that he would win so much. He bet everything and lost everything. Comes home and hears: "Ha-ha-xa." That is, the devil laughs at man, mocks at creation, at the image of God, and man, instead of worshiping God, chases ghosts like a cat sometimes runs after a sunbeam.

At one time they gave us a "ghost of communism", now other ghosts are the ghosts of this ghostly life. And this is instead of living in good relations with each other, in love, in the world, in the temple of God's spiritual life, in prayer, - Instead, a person turns into who knows what. They drive people like cattle in herds to all sorts of performances, to all kinds of fashion shows - everyone has gone crazy. This is madness - it is precisely that slavery from which only the Lord can free. Forgive us, Lord! We do not listen to the commandments of God, or the law of God, or spiritual instructions. We do not live by these laws. We are even ashamed - forgive me, Lord! - we are ashamed of faith, we are ashamed to profess faith. And the Lord said: who is ashamed of me and mine words in this kind adulterous clothes and a sinner, the Son of Man will be ashamed of him when he comes in the glory of his Father with the holy angels(Mark 8:38).

We sin with laziness, forgive us, Lord! Since childhood, laziness: they don’t do homework, it’s hard to get up in the morning, it’s hard to do something, and everywhere everything is laziness, laziness, laziness. And we don't make any effort.

We sin by laziness in prayer, by not doing good deeds to fixing your soul. Around we can all turn ourselves upside down, but only not in ourselves, in ourselves - all from a place. Forgive us, Lord!

We don’t have patience, we don’t have humility, so we are completely relaxed in our thoughts, everything is just random. Forgive me, Lord! We succumb to two dangers that people sometimes talk about without thinking and which are very common in our lives. The first is when he says: “Oh, a thought came to my mind!, Thoughts come to our head, a lot of thoughts - but they are not ours. We must firmly remember that if thoughts of disbelief, doubts, all sorts of henna - this is all demonic. Drop it right away. Sometimes there are more subtle thoughts - to take away from prayer.

And the second danger is when they say: "I'm not in the spirit." This must be fought. This is not an excuse “I’m in such a mood, I’m in a bad mood today, You never know what is“ out of sorts ”, you need to work on yourself. Spirit something need peaceful acquire! And no matter what happens, if you start to resent, if something starts to “boil up” inside, this is bad. You need to try to calm down, calm down, whatever it is. The matter itself is no longer important, or rather, not so important, compared to what what's up with happens to you.

We must always try to be attentive, internally collected. This does not mean to be tense, on the contrary - you need to be calm. Quietly contemplate what is happening. When, by the grace of God, you learn to to this, then you already begin to understand: for example, some thing has fallen or something has fallen over, caught on, you begin to “flash” - it’s clear that the enemy is already starting to “work”: he is trying to make you irritated. And you, knowing this, do not get irritated and do not grumble - but pray and humble yourself. Forgive us, Lord!

Let us read the following denunciations of the holy fathers about grumbling against God about the death of their neighbors.

Tikhon Zadonsky (On true Christianity, v. 1, § 164): “From excessive grief, many reach the point that they say: “God offended me, that he took something dear from me,” and they blaspheme God so terribly. God does not offend anyone, but does everything according to His wise Providence for us.

Whatever pleases God, as the Supreme Lord and Creator, he does. So, when you mourn and mourn for the dead, who died by the will of God, you show your displeasure, and thereby you oppose the will of God, in which you sin before your Creator. The Lord gave you a son, or a daughter, or a wife, or you, a wife, a husband. He takes away your son, or daughter, and so on; and therefore he takes what he has given you, and not your own. We are all God's: fathers and mothers, sons and daughters, husbands and wives, brothers, friends, masters and slaves. And therefore, there is nothing to grieve and complain inconsolably, but everyone should say with Saint Job in such a case: “The Lord has given, the Lord has taken away; as the Lord pleased, so it was. May the name of the Lord be blessed forever” (Job 1:21).

John Chrysostom(vol. 12, part 2, On death): “If we think that the deceased is dead, and that God has abandoned him, we will not receive sufficient consolation. To be indignant at this is the property of those who seek from nature that which is higher than it. Man is born and mortal: so why do you grieve over what has happened in accordance with nature? You do not grieve that you eat when you eat, do you? Don't you strive to live without nourishment?" So it is with regard to death: do not seek immortality, having been born mortal. This is once determined and legitimized. But when God calls and wants to take something from us, we will not, like ungrateful slaves, leave the Master. If He took money, honor and glory, body, even soul, he would take his own, if he took your son, not your son, but his servant, he would take. eat Him?

George Zadonsky(Letters, item 3, 58): “Mortals are born to die. What is strange or terrible in that, that it is not according to our desire that they move to eternity, one before, the other after, as the Lord requires, in young years, or in old ones? Our business is to obey and not grumble at His holy providence.”

Theophan the Recluse(Manuscripts from the cell, Resolving Doubts...): “If you please stop your critical remarks on the deeds of God. All of them are close to blasphemy against God... Here is this speech: “why did God create this death so vilely?” - how to name? - This is a direct blasphemy. - Repent and cry! “The right people die, and the wrong people live.” - Who told you that if things went your way, it would be better?! - I believe that it would have been much worse ... And that, in disgust of this worst, God made it happen. Start believing in this way too, and you will be at peace... and most importantly, avoid the sin of blasphemy against God.”

Ep. Germogen Dobronravin(Consolation in the death of those close to the heart): “... this murmuring is unworthy of a person. These tears are criminal. These sighs God hates. You grumble at Providence for having demanded a sacrifice from you so untimely. Inopportune? ... What are you! ... Only here on earth this or that happens at the wrong time, at the wrong time. Not in heaven! There are no words "early" or "late", there is a time for everything!

Paisiy Svyatogorets(Family life, part 6): “Yes, yesterday a tearful mother came here. "God took my only son," she cried, and blamed God for it. “If you think carefully about what happened to you,” I told her, “you will come to the conclusion that God has honored you. He took the little Angel to Himself, took the child baptized, not allowing him to acquire sins and passions. God took an Angel to Himself, and you also scold Him for it? Very soon you will feel how your dead son is praying for you to God." Then this woman told me about her life. She said that when she was young, she could have many children, but then she didn’t want to.”

And in the case when a neighbor died a violent death, people doubt the existence of God or talk about His injustice.

Paisiy Svyatogorets(Family Life, Part 6): "... some who lack reason in their heads say: "If there was a God, He would not allow so many crimes to be committed. He would punish criminals." Such people do not understand that God leaves criminals to live so that on the Day of Judgment they would have nothing to justify themselves for not repenting, despite the fact that He gave them years to do so. And those whom the criminals kill, God will not leave either.”

All such perplexities and, one might say, claims, refer to grumbling against God and His Providence, as well as the sin of inquisitiveness at the sight of incomprehensible actions of Providence. And therefore, if they arise among us, then this speaks of our lack of faith, our lack of hope in the good will of God for all people and our spiritual folly.

Paisiy Svyatogorets(Family life, part 6): “If a person ceases to treat things in a worldly way, then his soul finds peace. After all, how can a person find true comfort if he does not believe in God and in true life - in life after death, in eternal life? When I was in the monastery of Stomion, (nearby) in Konin there lived a widow who constantly went to the cemetery and sobbed sobbing there for several hours. She beat her head against the gravestone and excited the whole neighborhood with her cries! She gave the cemetery an outlet for all her pain. People came there, took her away, but she still came back. This went on for years. The husband of this woman was killed by the Germans, and her daughter, a few years after the death of her father, as soon as she was nineteen, died of a heart disease. So this unfortunate woman was left alone. If someone looks at what happened to her externally, he will say: "Why did God allow this?" And the woman herself, referring to what happened to her in this way - outwardly, could not be consoled. Once, when I also came to the cemetery to see what was happening, she began to tell me: "Why did God do everything like this? My husband was killed in the war. I had an only daughter. God took her from me too..."

She kept talking and talking and blaming God. After letting her talk a little, I said: “I’ll also tell you something. I knew your husband. He was a very good man. He died in the war for the Fatherland, fulfilling his sacred duty. God will not treat him unfairly. death of your husband, God left you a daughter for several years.She lived with you, and you had some consolation.But then God, seeing that the girl might have gone astray (soon) from the right path, took her in that good dispensation that she was in. He did it to save her." This widow, although her husband was a very quiet person, was herself a little worldly. Of course, I didn't tell her directly, I didn't tell her, "You were a worldly person," but I asked her, "What are you thinking about yourself right now? Do you love the world?" "I don't want to see anyone or anything," she replied. “You see,” I told her, “the world is dead for you too. Pain helps you, and nothing worldly interests you. Thus, very soon you will all be together in Paradise. Who else has God given such honor as you? Do you understand that?" After this conversation, the unfortunate woman stopped going to the cemetery. As soon as - with the help of others - she was able to grasp the deepest meaning of life, she immediately calmed down.

This story was told to me by my friend Alina. Aunt Anya, Alina's mother, had two children: the younger Alina and Dimka. Dimka was drafted into the army, and he served safely. In 2001, he returned, got a job, everything was fine, Dimka was moving up the career ladder. He decided to take a loan for a car and they gave him one. Everything was fine, it seemed Dimka caught luck by the tail. It's been 2 months, and something went wrong with his car. He called Vadim to help, and they decided to stay overnight in the garage. Dimka called Aunt Anya and said that he would stay in the garage - a lot of fuss with the car.

When Dima did not return at lunch the next day, Aunt Anya became worried. Dimkin's phone did not answer, and Vadim's is the same. Aunt Anya got ready and went to the garage. When she arrived, she noticed that the garage was closed from the inside. She knocked, but no one answered. Aunt Anya called rescuers, and when they sawed through the door, Dimka and Vadim were lying in the car. The chairs were thrown back, it seemed that they were sleeping. They were pulled out of the car. Dimka had no pulse, but Vadim was more fortunate - he could feel his pulse, and he was sent to intensive care by ambulance.

Aunt Anya was crying, she was in complete despair. As Alina tells strashno.com, she was just not herself: she walked around the apartment, sobbed and yelled very bad words at God. Sorry, I am a believer and I will not write them. In general, blamed the Lord God for everything.

Night fell and they went to bed. But Alina could not sleep, the door in her room was open, she was just lying and then she heard a wheezing, as if someone was being strangled, and he did not have enough air. Alina thought that her mother, out of grief, decided to commit suicide, and flew out of the room. Then she saw that her mother was lying and wheezing.

“Mom, mom, wake up, what’s wrong with you?” Alina screamed.

And when Aunt Anya opened her eyes, she greedily began to gasp for air.

- Mom, what's wrong with you? Alina said again.

But she was silent, after a couple of seconds, Aunt Anya took a strashno.com sheet and a pencil (she is an artist by education) and began to draw. When she finished, she showed Alina, then Alina was very frightened. When she showed me the drawing, I was very scared myself! The face of this monster was elongated, the teeth were huge, one eye was in the middle of the forehead, the other was near the right cheek, there were ulcers or scars all over the face, the body consisted of one human part, the hand was somehow small, like a baby’s, the legs were fused, and the other the part was also human: a fused leg, instead of an arm - a paw similar to a bear paw, and this monster was all in ulcers or scars.

When Aunt Anya was able to speak, she told Alina the following:

“We went to bed, and I quickly fell asleep, although it seemed to me that I did not want to sleep. And then I dream that a man is coming up, fair, handsome, I directly feel warmth from him, and says:

— I'm taking strashno.com away from you.

- What are you taking? I ask him.

“You are now without protection,” and left.

And somehow I immediately felt scared, as if something was missing. And then this monster appeared, it sniffed me, looked straight into my eyes and began to choke me.

Alina was shocked by what she heard. Then she noticed prints on her mother's neck - only three dots, like three fingers on one side and just a red spot on the other.

This went on for four days, Aunt Anya and Alina were afraid to sleep. As soon as her mother fell asleep, she began to wheeze, and Alina screamed and shook her to wake her up. On the fifth day, Aunt Anya and Alina went to some grandmother and told her everything.

Grandma said:

- You are a fool, why did you grumble at God, so he took his protection - his angel. And you strashno.com defenseless easy prey for the devil, so he wants to take you away. Go to church every day, pray and ask the Lord for forgiveness. He will forgive, but not immediately. And remember: never blame the Lord.

Aunt Anya began to go to church, but everything happened again, but she did not despair. On the third day, everything stopped, and Aunt Anya had a dream that that man came again and said: “I have returned, and now you are protected.”

Here is such a story. So, people, never speak ill of our Lord God.

Murmuring is a kind of blasphemy against God, ingratitude to Him for all His great blessings. This is spiritual and spiritual blindness, aversion from the Providence of God, a descent from the divine path, the road to the underworld. This is grief that darkens the soul; it is an impenetrable darkness that makes the path of man deadly both for the temporal life and for the life to come.

Murmuring is a manifestation of human pride, proud opposition of a creature to its Creator. All the days of our lives we should remember that no matter how much we want otherwise, no matter how much we go out of our way, we will always remain God's creatures. Holy Scripture says: “Woe to him who quarrels with his Creator, a shard of earthly shards! Will the clay say to the potter, "What are you doing?" and your work [will he say of you], “He has no hands?” (Isaiah 45:9). The pot did not mold itself, but was molded by the master. And it is not the pot, but the potter, who determines which vessel has a great, which small, and which an insignificant use. He himself breaks his creation, and restores it again. What can we oppose to our Creator? Nothing. He determined for each his life path and his life cross. He gave everyone a special one, which we must carry through our whole life, and maybe be saved, or maybe die.

From the Holy Scriptures we see what terrible consequences grumbling has always led to. Through the mouths of the prophets and the righteous, both in the Old Testament and in our time, the Lord convicts our wrongness and our ingratitude to Him. What for? Then, so that we would not anger Him, so that we would turn to Him and become truly holy Israel, the holy people of God. But this often doesn't happen. Because we don't have enough; or everything that is sent, we perceive as evil; or we want another, we think in our own way, forgetting that the Creator exists above us.

It should be remembered, my dears, that for every murmuring word, for every ungratefulness to the Lord, for every blasphemy against Him, you will give an answer. And it will be with you as it was with the people of Israel. Today the Lord blesses you and puts into your hands the opportunity to live differently and inherit life, but tomorrow he will take it away for your grumbling. And then, all the days of your life, you will not find peace or joy, only sorrows and illnesses will haunt you. Today you were close to finding peace of mind, peace in your family and with those around you, and tomorrow, for grumbling, the Lord will harden your environment, and you will begin to experience terrible disasters. And perhaps, as it was with the people of Israel, only children, seeing your mournful example, will understand how they should be afraid of grumbling against their Creator.

Murmuring moves the Kingdom of God away from us, raises the wrath of God and His rebuke on us. Let's look at the pages of Holy Scripture, at the pages of history, at the present day. What happens to those who go against God, do not accept what He sends? Where are they? They are gone, and their ashes were scattered by the wind, and their very kind was uprooted.

Let us remember the suffering of the people of Israel. The Lord sent many plagues before the people of Israel could leave Egypt. During the first procession through the desert, the people were extremely hard, and people grumbled, remembering the old time, when they had plenty of meat, and they lived in peace, although they were slaves. And when the Lord had already led them to the promised land, when it was visible - at hand - another murmur blocked the mercy of God, and the people were forced to wander in the wilderness for another forty years.

The Lord, angry, did not allow almost anyone to enter the promised land. The entire generation of those who grumbled has died out. They were buried in the desert. Only their children inherited the opportunity to enter there, into that land where, as the Lord said, milk and honey flow. Only children who have grown up in obedience and loyalty to their Maker and Creator have inherited the Lord's promise.

Human life is a procession in the wilderness. The tabernacle, which the Israelites carried with them, is a type of the altar of the Lord; the ministers who carry this tabernacle are the priests; and you, naturally, are Israel, who must go through a difficult path of trials.

The Lord did not spare His chosen people, and for their murmuring sent them to wander in the wilderness for another forty years. So the Lord can delay each of you to see the Kingdom of Heaven, to find peace of mind, peace in the soul, the Kingdom of God within yourself - to postpone for thirty years, forty, seventy - for as long as you like. Remember that every murmuring word, every blasphemy of the day of our life, of what is happening to us, angers the Creator and leads to the fact that He changes the line of our life. He makes it so that we come to our senses, come to our senses and come to the right conclusions.

arch. Sergiy Filimonov