THE MEANING OF THE CROSS THROUGH THE THREE STAGES OF THE SPIRITUAL LIFE
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For the message of the cross is foolishness to those who are perishing, but to us who are being saved it is the power of God. (1 Cor. 1, 18).
The Cross and Its meaning
Man, having been created in the image and likeness of God, disobeyed the providence of God and his predestination, deceived himself with the perishable and earthly things and fell away from God and from that which is eternal. He was expelled from paradise into this land that brings forth thorns and thistles; and by the sweat of his brow he will eat the bread (Gen. 3, 18-19). This means that the man chose the more difficult path, which through suffering, pain, renunciations and struggles will have to acquire what he initially had as a gift and lost. Because he was expelled from Heaven, that is, deprived of grace, impure passions began to arise in his heart which seize and suffocate the freedom (space) of the heart and now with sweat, that is, with much effort and exertion, he has to free himself (purify and ennoble himself).
The purpose of our life is to be united with God, and that is to re-establish our close personal relationship with Him. Our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ, in accordance with the Salvific Dispensation of God, was incarnated by the Holy Spirit and the Virgin Mary, and became Man in order to raise the fallen image of God in man and re-establish the broken relationship between man and God. For this reason the Son of God voluntarily became Man, lived on earth, suffered and was crucified in order to take away the sins of the world and raise the original image of man by showing the way, or rather, He revealed to us that He is the way, the truth and the life (John 14, 6). The Holy Fathers have called this “The Cross” or “carrying a cross “, according to the words of Christ, “Whoever wants to follow Me, let him deny himself and take up his cross and follow Me. For whoever wants to save his soul will lose it; and whoever loses his soul for Me and the Gospel will save it.” (Mark 8, 34-35) That is why every personal life struggle (path) of returning to the first created human image and raising it to the likeness of God is called a cross, that is, carrying one’s own personal cross.
The meaning of the cross through the three stages of spiritual life
In that process, the holy fathers note three stages. These are the three stages in the spiritual life of man:
• Purification of the heart from passions
• Enlightenment of the mind and
• Likeness or deification of the entire human person
Each stage or period in that process is characterised by its own specific criteria.
• The first stage
At the first stage of the spiritual life, our heart is defiled (held captive) by the passions, and our mind is darkened. We are slaves to sins and passions, that is, we have become slaves to the devil. The struggle in this stage is in the fight to re-conquer the realm of the heart and Its liberation from the passions.
The mind is the eye, the reasoning part of the human soul which should be the leader, it should keep the heart clean and direct it to God. At this (first) stage the mind is darkened to notice and powerless to fight (overcome) the passions that have taken up residence in the heart because of our fall. Temptations at this stage come from within our heart which is full of passions, “for out of the heart proceed evil thoughts, murders, adulteries, fornications, thefts, false testimonies, blasphemies” (Matthew 15, 19).
Therefore, at this, first stage we need a helper, a guide. that is, the spiritual Father to whom we should be obedient and cooperate with. The cure itself was shown to us by the Lord Jesus Christ; first of all by His example, through His obedience to His Father and also with the words: “Take My yoke upon you and learn from Me, for I am gentle and humble in heart, and you will find rest for your souls; For My yoke is easy and My burden is light.” (Matthew 11, 28-29), also: “Whoever wants to follow Me, let him deny himself and take up his cross and follow Me” (Matthew 8, 34).
In this process of liberation and healing, we must first become aware and confess that we are sick, that is, fallen and sinful, and then to want to be healed and to be patient and endure to the end. After the fall, sin penetrates, dominates and identifies with man so much that such a condition has become “second nature” to him, and therefore self-denial is inevitable for his healing. Our downfall is in the mind. The main cause of the fall is pride. Therefore, the medicine should be in accordance with the illness. The mind should be submitted and surrendered in perfect obedience to the spiritual father and thus put into the healing process. According to the extent the mind has surrendered and is obedient to the Spiritual Father, to that same extent it will be healed (liberated).
The cross that we have to bear in this period consists of humble acceptance of all the situations, circumstances and people around us that God allows in our life, as is the will of God. We need to accept that everything is from God and for the sake of our salvation. We need to endure everyone, and, to take the blame on ourselves for everything that happens to us, considering ourselves to be guilty.
We need to thank God for everything. For the good, but also for the bad. Because what seems bad to us is in essence good. God is merciful and always gives us the right medicine for the healing of our sick soul. God who is absolutely good, nothing bad can come out of His essence; it is us that are bad, our energy is directed badly in us and because of our self-love we hurt each other and get hurt. That this is so, can be seen from the in identical situations we react differently in different periods of our spiritual life, which means that the problem is not external but internal, within us.
We carry the cross in two ways.
The first is by a willing effort to purify the heart, that is, voluntarily carrying the cross encouraged by ourselves.
It consists of fulfilling God’s commandments and virtues, obedience, prayer, fasting, prostrations, abstinence, self-willed deprivation, regular attendance and standing at Divine Services in each of our ascetic-hesychastic endeavours, and, every effort that we voluntarily offer for the sake of God and for the sake of our communion with Him.
The second is by enduring involuntary suffering, pain, illness, etc. It is by carrying the cross not by our will, but by the will of God in the humble suffering of all the trials allowed for our salvation. Humble endurance of insults, humiliation, ridicule, unjust accusation, are the best medicine for our pride, vanity and high opinion of ourselves. No struggle of our will can so effectually purify the heart as the humble and grateful endurance of involuntary suffering. Look only at the martyrs, who attained perfection overnight.
Any self justification and opposition in this struggle is a fall. It is akin to coming down from the cross that the Lord gives us for our salvation, not drinking the medicine and delaying our healing. Sickness, poverty, submission, worldly infirmity and every kind of infirmity are suitable remedies for our healing and lifting at the first stage of spiritual life.
That is why we should not justify ourselves, get angry or rebel against those by whom the temptation presents itself, but with joy we should say to ourselves: “Thank you, God, for remembering me and visiting me. Everything that happens to me is because of my sins and for my upliftment (growth) and salvation. God wants to forgive me some of my (forgotten) sins and heal me from some trapped passion of the soul. Blessed be the name of the Lord. Thank you God for everything, forgive me God for everything!”
Experiencing these involuntary sufferings is also the best way to check our spiritual condition, i.e. the purity of our heart.
• The second stage
At the second stage, after the heart is sufficiently cleansed of passions, the struggle consists in the fight to further purify the essence of the mind that is in the heart and enlighten the mind.
Now, since the heart is sufficiently purified, i.e. freed from passions, the devil no longer has power over it and cannot influence and tempt us from within, he does so from outside, inciting other people as his instruments of our downfall (of attack).
The struggle or, the cross, of this stage consists of gratefully enduring the temptations and responding with love to everyone from whom that temptation comes, especially to the enemies.
We said before that those trials and temptations help us the most in the struggle of love and spiritual perfection. We should look upon each and every person as Christ and our neighbour (brother, sister) and love them.
Christ was crucified with his arms wide open to all, and He accepted all in His heart. Our goal is to be as a likeness of Christ, and we are His image, therefore we should be that. Love towards our enemies is the final annihilation of all vanity, high opinion of ourselves and all pride within us.
The characteristic of this stage is the prayer of the mind in the heart, which is not yet full of grace and it is necessary with our own will and effort to bring the mind down and keep it in the heart.
• The third stage
The third stage of deification of the whole human person, the heart and the essence of the mind are pure and in them the human-loving Lord poured out all the fullness of His grace, or rather, the baptismal grace inside us was actualised again. The ascetic ceaselessly delights and quenches his thirst from it and he is no longer of this world, but he already lives in the eternity (age to come). In his heart, even here and now, the Kingdom of God reigns, and his mind ceaselessly dwells in the heights of God.
At this stage of spiritual life it seems as if there are no temptations. It is not that there are no temptations, because with the progress in the spiritual life the magnitude of the temptations increases and they become more obvious and direct from the devil, but now because of the immeasurable grace that the ascetic possesses, it only seems that they do not exist. The devil becomes a tool of practice in the hands of the ascetics, through which they advance in their perfection. The possibility of fall is not excluded even at this level of spiritual growth, because now the demon attacks directly, but it is negligible. The cross at this third stage consists of full of grace and grateful endurance of everything and love for everyone, without exception and prayer and pleading (cry) for the whole world.
The meaning of the cross is only in the Church
The cross has its true meaning only in the Church. Therefore, the carrying of the cross, that is, the whole struggle is possible only in the Church. The Holy Fathers say that there is no salvation outside the Church, outside the Holy Liturgy. There is no healing outside the Church without Christ and every suffering makes sense only in the Church. The Church as the body of Christ and as a congregational community of virtuous holy life in Christ.
Prepared by: Fr. Gabriel,
Abbot of the Monastery “St. Clement of Ohrid”
Kinglake, Melbourne, Australia
