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Dec 29th, 2019
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from Heirmonk Elias
Perhaps I shouldn't say anything more, ... but forgive me if I will speak out of turn. I remember being in a spot once, where my ministry was unwanted and dispensed with for reasons I have never been able to understand. I felt quite devasted because my priestly ministry was not needed anywhere. Don't get me wrong, it was very painful indeed, one of the most painful things ever to live through, and at the time, too hard to take or accept.
Today I see the hand of God, in what at the time I only ascribed to human folly and spite. But now it means something altogether different to me. Now, I see that it was important for me to come to know that my own relationship with God, and my own prayer, and my own faith, did not at all depend upon what I was doing, whether my ministry was wanted or repected, or whether I was 'useful' to anyone at all. I had defined my relationship to God in terms of my service as a priest, and when I did, that was taken away rudely! But God wanted to love me, and for me to love him, for who I was simply, and not in terms of service and 'role'. I suppose anything, even my vocation, might be an 'idol' if I let it be. In my life, God has always cast down every idol I have ever fashioned. I had made my vocation one, without even knowing it. Funny thing about idols, ...the disguises they wear. They can be like that famous demon, that dresses like an angel of light.
Thanks for such a wonderful testimony about facing the trials in our lives and the fruit that they bear for each one of us. Also, serving as a reminder about how works brought about because of our faith can become idols without our even being aware and cause us to get it out of perspective.
Rose
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May God grant you, O holy Father Elias, many, many years!
Thank you, Rose.
In Christ,
Andrew
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Bless me a sinner, Father Elias!
That is precisely what the Life in Christ is all about.
We are leaves driven by the wind and ultimately what we are about is to live in God, love Him and be loved by Him.
We live for Him and sometimes He reminds people like me who sometimes think the world couldn't get along without us just Who He really is!
Alex
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[Heiromonk Elias wrote:
...Now, I see that it was important for me to come to know that my own relationship with God, and my own prayer, and my own faith, did not at all depend upon what I was doing, whether my ministry was wanted or repected, or whether I was 'useful' to anyone at all...]
Thank you for this testimony Father Elias! Far too often I fail to see the bigger picture.
(and thank you, Rose!)
Sam
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Dear Father, I also would like to thank you for your post. I can really empathize with many of your sentiments. We all go through a "poustinia" or time in the desert at some point in our lives. Sometimes more than once in my own case. And not just clerics.
Usually later on we realize that at those times God was actually closer when we felt great emptiness or desolation.
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God Bless you Father Elias, and thank you for your warm words of wisdom.
We appreciate your guidence and gentle corrections.
May Almighty God always keep you in his light
Michael
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May you be blessed, Fr. Elias, for who you are shines from your words and work among us here.
Thank you for your words of true spiritual wisdom.
Long may be be the beneficiaries of your presence here.
Steve
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Thank you for sharing your experience, Fr. Elias.
Many of us go through comparable situations and learn similar lessons.
Please continue to share with us here your words of wisdom.
God bless you in your parish work, your seminary teaching, and your support of monastic life. Truely, it is a marvelous thing to belong to Jesus Christ!
:p
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When in disgrace with fortune and men's eyes,
I all alone beweep my outcast state,
And trouble deaf Heaven with my bootless cries,
And look upon myself, and curse my fate,
Wishing me like to one more rich in hope,
Featur'd like him, like him with friends possess'd,
Desiring this man's art, and that man's scope,
With what I most enjoy contented least:
Yet in these thoughts myself almost despising,
Haply I think on thee,--and then my state
(Like to the lark at break of day arising
From sullen earth) sings hymns at heaven's gate;
For thy sweet love remember'd such wealth brings
That then I scorn to change my state with kings'. WS sonnet 29
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Dear djs, Do you belong to that movement that wants to canonize Shakespeare?  Alex
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Had he capitalized the Thy and Thee, I would be more inclined.
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Dear djs, How positively "Kyivan" of you!  Alex
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And what happens if Marlowe really wrote Shakespeare? 
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Originally posted by Diak: And what happens if Marlowe really wrote Shakespeare? Trust you to put the spanner in the works  Ignorance is bliss Anhelyna
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Originally posted by Diak:
And what happens if Marlowe really wrote Shakespeare? Well, then it would be an ingenious political move for the Church, judging from today's warped morals. Logos Teen
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