"The illiterate grandmother and the Gospel.."

  

A  certain illiterate but pious grandmother went to Church one day and heard the preacher say:

He who does not read the Holy Bible will not be saved!

As soon as the grandmother heard this word, she turned pale, became disappointed and, returning home, said to her daughter:

My child, I will go to hell, because I do not read the Holy Bible!

Her daughter tried to reassure her, but in vain.

One day, the grandmother decided to go to an enlightened elder, to help her.

As soon as the grandmother saw him, she said to him:

My father, I will not be saved, because I do not read the Holy Bible, because I am illiterate!

But the elder reassured her and said to her:

And how were so many illiterate people saved, grandmother? In fact, we also have Saints who were completely illiterate! How were they saved? Letters do not save, but neither does illiteracy bring damnation.

So, grandmother, you will do this: You will take the Gospel, open it to the first page, put your palm on the Gospel and then go to the iconostasis and say the following prayer: ''My Christ, what you write in the Gospel, put into my heart!''.

The next day you will put your palm on the second page and so on.

The grandmother applied the elder's words to the letter for several months. One day at home, her grandchildren were playing and began to speak badly and criticize.

The grandmother heard this and observed them, telling them:

My children, do not judge so that you will not be judged!

Her daughter is a bone!

Mother, what you said, where did you hear it and say it? This is what the Gospel says, you are illiterate, who told you?

My child, I did not hear it from somewhere, but it came from my heart!

From that moment on, the grandmother began to reproduce words of the Gospel, without understanding it! Because the grandmother obeyed the elder with faith and simplicity, Christ began to implant the words of the Gospel in her heart.

What will save us is faith in Christ and not our education.

Besides, Christ chose illiterate people as His Disciples, to show that He can make you all-wise, even if you are illiterate, as long as one has faith and humility..

Elder Ephraim of the Skete of Saint Andrew

Let us therefore, my brothers, take care to guard our conscience, as long as we are still in this world

 Even if the world today has become worse than Sodom and Gomorrah, be careful to make peace with your enemy while you are still in this life.

 “Conscience is called an adversary because it always opposes our evil will and checks us for what we should do and do not do and accuses us for what we do and should not do.” That is why it is said that the best pillow is a quiet conscience.

Go to sleep. When you have remorse of conscience, you cannot sleep, no matter how many sedatives you take. You will have to settle your adversary, your adversary. You must forgive! Conscience says, you must forgive and you say, no, I will keep my character, I do not want to forgive, I do not want to be humiliated, I do everything, let him do it too… and you cannot sleep. Conscience does not let you, the adversary, the rival.

“Have good relations with your rival, while you are still walking together on the road”. In this life. Do not leave it after death. After death you cannot sort out your conscience. After death your conscience will be your condemnation. “The road is, as St. Basil says, this world”. While you are on the road, while you are in this world, sort things out with your conscience, find them, sort out your conscience. And we know what sorting out is, repentance and confession, the correction of evil. Behold, what great things confession offers, which no psychiatrist, psychologist, medicine, or anything can give you! It calms your conscience, because the Holy Spirit comes and tells you, my child, it is as if you had not done it. It is finished... I erase it, I erase it... and the person calms down.

“Let us therefore, my brothers, take care to guard our conscience, as long as we are still in this world, without provoking it to control us for anything, without trampling on it in anything at all, not even in the slightest.” Do not let your conscience control you. Since you know, what you will do now, your conscience will control you later.

The Ascetic Writings of Abba Dorotheos.