In this video, Fr. Rafail Noica explains how people should fulfill God’s will not out of obligation but out of love. God’s commandments are not harsh orders but loving guidance, and our sincere love for Him naturally leads us to live according to His desires.
Fr. Rafail Noica is a disciple of St. Sophrony the Athonite, living now as a hermit in Romanian mountains.
Video source: doxologia.ro https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yagFnE7NcHk
Conferința “Părintele Sofronie Saharov, staretul meu”, November 13th, 2016
Fr. Rafail:
What is a commandment? For many years I struggled to understand the word ‘commandment’ because I did not see God, as I was beginning to understand Him more through Father Sophrony, commanding! And I was coming to understand that a commandment means something else. This was revealed to me, in a way, through someone else.
There was an Englishman who had become Orthodox and would come to our monastery [Essex Monastery], and he loved us very much. And one day Sister Magdalena, who was working around the kitchen, said to him, “Uh, sir, could you help me for a moment?” And he turns to her. He says: “Sister, your slightest wish, for me, is a command.” It was then that I began to understand what the commandments of Christ mean.
The word of Christ is a commandment for me if I love Him, if I have faith in Him; if not, I can spit on it, pass it by, I might find that perhaps Nietzsche is smarter or who knows what other philosopher or politician… And from then on, for me, the word ‘commandment’ took on another [form]… And I also understood the words of Father Sophrony differently.
If the Father says: “perhaps do this thing today,” for me it must be a commandment… And we must learn to receive from our elders, from the bishops, from the spiritual fathers, and especially in the Church… At the office and in the factory, it is much harder, but in the Church we must learn that every word of the spiritual father, of the bishop, of the priest must be a commandment for me, that means to love, to trust… But I also pray that our spiritual leaders and yours may give us the word of God.
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