By St. John of Kronstadt
Then [Jesus Christ] said to them, “Follow Me,
and I will make you fishers of men.” They immediately
left their nets and followed Him (Matthew 4:19–20).
and I will make you fishers of men.” They immediately
left their nets and followed Him (Matthew 4:19–20).
The Savior of men, our Lord Jesus Christ, after forty days of fasting and His temptation in the desert, having appeared to the world, came to the pagan country of Galilee, preaching the gospel of the Kingdom of God and saying that the time was fulfilled and the Kingdom of God was at hand: “'Repent and believe in the gospel.' Now as He walked by the Sea of Galilee, He saw two brothers, Simon Peter and Andrew his brother, casting a net into the sea; for they were fishermen. And He said to them, 'Follow Me, and I will make you fishers of men.' And they immediately left their nets and followed Him” (Mark 1:15–18). Here is the amazing simplicity and complete trust in the divine Teacher of the Galilean fishermen. Here is quick, unquestioning obedience, without any doubts or hesitations! Truly wise are you, Apostles of Christ, brothers in the flesh and in the spirit, Andrew and Peter: for you suddenly cut off from your soul every passion, every attachment to earthly, corruptible things and followed the Savior of men. We worthily bless you: for by your evangelical labors you have rescued many human souls from the power of the devil and from the eternal fire, and as a rich spoil you have acquired eternal life for yourselves and for them. We magnify you, Apostle of Christ Andrew the First-Called, as the author of the present triumph, and we honor your tribulations and labors, with which you labored for the gospel of Christ, having reached even the Kiev mountains and erected the cross of the Lord on them with the prediction that here there would be a great Christian city with many churches of God.
Brothers and sisters in Christ! We have gathered today in this temple, dedicated to the Holy Apostle Andrew the First-Called, to celebrate the holy memory of this Apostle. May our celebration be worthy of it. You, Holy Apostle, teach us to celebrate the day of your glorious memory in a Christian spirit. How can we celebrate worthily? What worthy and pleasing sacrifice could there be for you from us now? Of course, the sacrifice of our imitation of you. You, like the Apostle Paul, would certainly say to us: "Be imitators of me, as I am of Christ" (1 Cor. 11:1). But for the sake of Christ and for the good of mankind you left everything: your little property, among which was your fishing net, not of little value to you, your father, your home, your relatives, and followed your and our Savior, to be a fisher of men for the Kingdom of Christ.
And what should we leave to follow Christ without hindrance for the sake of the salvation of our souls? We must leave behind laziness and negligence. Do you not know, brethren, that the life of a Christian on earth is a podvig, unceasing labor, and not pleasure and laziness? Do you not know what a multitude of passions our flesh is subject to, and in order to suppress their rebellion and uproot them, we must constantly occupy it with the psychic or spiritual and physical labor of vigil and prayer? And yet many of us allow ourselves a long, relaxing sleep, and even on Sundays and feasts, when the Church calls her children to the morning service, we relax in our beds; many of them are not even visible at the liturgy.
What a strange phenomenon! Those whom the Lord has blessed with every kind of abundance, who should all hasten to the temple of God as those who have been honored with greater, in comparison with others, material gifts of God - they are almost never in the temple on Sundays and even feasts. How can one not grieve about this, how can one not sigh to God? Here are the poor and mediocre people, whom You have not honored with Your generous gifts, they stand before Your face, but those You have been generous to fled from You. Our beloved brethren! In the name of the Lord we beseech you: "Do not forsake the assembling of yourselves together, as is the manner of some, but exhorting one another, and so much the more as you see the Day approaching" (Heb. 10:25). These are the words of the Apostle. Leave your many-passioned flesh to indulge, get up early and hurry to the Divine Service, and in order to be in the temple for the liturgy, leave trade and all your worldly affairs on Sundays and feasts, educate, at least on these days, your soul for the heavenly Fatherland, sow to the spirit, and not to the flesh: "For he who sows to the flesh will of the flesh reap corruption, but he who sows to the Spirit will of the Spirit reap eternal life" (Gal. 6:8).
And covetousness must be abandoned. We must abandon the passion for earthly possessions, for earthly things, and especially for money, for this dust, so much deified, especially now, for because of your covetousness, from greed for acquisition, my brethren, you grow cold to the Lord God, the Author and Source of our life and all contentment, to the temple of the Lord, you neglect eternal life and the salvation of your soul, the virtue of mercy, the correction of your heart and in general your life. "No one can serve two masters," says our Savior, "for either he will hate the one and love the other, or he will be zealous for the one and despise the other. You cannot serve God and mammon (that is, wealth). Therefore I say to you: do not worry about your life, what you will eat or what you will drink, nor about your body, what you will wear. Is not life more than food, and the body more than clothing?" (Matt. 6:24–25). Is it not because of greed that many of you do not even go to the liturgy on Sundays and feasts and violate the fourth commandment of God, which commands us to remember the day of the Lord’s rest, the day of the glorious resurrection of our Lord Jesus Christ from the dead, and to spend it holy, in soul-profiting deeds?
Further, hard-heartedness and stinginess towards the poor must be cast aside. Either you do not know, or you have forgotten, brethren, that the Lord Himself accepts alms in the person of a beggar and will Himself reward you a hundredfold both in this age and in the future, giving you eternal life if you are merciful until the end of your life? You say of a beggar: he is a beggar and a drunkard. Do you know this correctly? Is it not in vain that you cast a stone of condemnation at him? If you know for certain that he drinks away his alms, do not give him any, do not indulge in idleness, parasitism and drunkenness, but also be careful in your judgment: do not condemn the truly poor, the sick, the weak, the old, the crippled, the homeless orphan, in idleness and parasitism, in a word: do not despise the beggar in vain, on one suspicion of his deceit, on the stinginess, pride and malice of your heart. How often it happens that such a poor man, who is worthy of all compassion, is insulted for nothing, and in general we are generous in contempt, malice, irritability towards the lesser brethren of Christ, but we are very stingy in respect, love and compassion for them, as for our members and for the members of Jesus Christ Himself, in condescension to their infirmities. For do some of us always give our kopecks and half-kopecks to the poor from the heart, from a good heart, with due respect for the personality of a man and a Christian? Do we always give them our kopecks and half-kopecks with faith in Christ and for Christ, Who loved us all so much, Who honored us all so much with His incarnation, Who showed so much self-denial and extreme indulgence for us, the unworthy? We condemn the poor for every speck in their eye, for every spot in their life, but why do we not strictly condemn ourselves? They are ready to blame almost for the fact that they eat and drink and live on the same land with us, are illuminated by the same sun, breathe the same air, go to the same temple of God and in general enjoy the same rights of humanity - why do we not condemn ourselves for various excesses and vices, why do we recognize ourselves as worthy of the material and spiritual, natural and gracious gifts of God? "Judge not, my brethren, lest ye be judged" (Matt. 7:1) with all the severity of divine justice, "but rather give alms of such things as you have" (Luke 11:41). This will be safer. This will obtain mercy for you yourselves at the judgment: "For the merciful shall obtain mercy" (Matt. 5:7).
What else do we need to give up? All-consuming luxury – this modern infectious plague of society. Our trouble, brethren, comes from luxury in clothing, in decorating homes, and what else? In smoking, in burning, precisely in the burning of God's gifts, and all the more trouble is that this plague is almost not reproached or condemned by anyone, on the contrary, everyone is amazed at it, everyone looks at it, i.e. at the luxury in the adornment of clothes and dwellings, many even approve of it as something great and worthy of wonder and imitation. And smoking tobacco, so harmful to health, is approved as good for health. Oh, how much chaff has grown in our lives! When some malignant disease appears in some city or town, then everyone is wary of it, takes precautions so as not to become infected with it and not die, but when a dangerous disease for the soul rages - luxury, not only no one is wary of it, but on the contrary, everyone with pleasure wants to apply it to himself and indulge in its intoxication. To such an extent has the age-old enemy taken possession of us, turned our gaze away from heaven, our true Fatherland, to such an extent have we become earthly and forgotten the purpose of our life and the commandment of our Savior to love one another. For tell me, what love for one's neighbor do those who live in luxury have, when they do not grudge hundreds and thousands of rubles for the adornment of their bodies, their homes and all their household utensils, but for the covering of the nakedness of their neighbor, their brother, their fellow member and the member of Christ, they grudge not only a few rubles, but even a few kopecks; or again, to please the belly of the wealthy they do not spare tens, and sometimes even hundreds of rubles, and in this case they sometimes exceed the expectations of the most fastidious guests, blinding their sight and delighting their taste with a variety and multitude of expensive wines and dishes, while for a piece of bread for poor people they grudge a few kopecks.
How can we not regret and sigh about such a way of life, how can we not denounce it according to our duty? What answer shall we give to this Judge of all, already prepared to judge the living and the dead? And the blame for all this is the inexorable mistress - luxury, and her sister - vanity. Luxury says: I don’t care about hundreds to dress myself and my wife elegantly, to entertain friends and people I need, but vanity says: they will remember and value me, or they will say about me that I know how to dress with taste, that I am a generous and hospitable person. So what. But what will the Lord say about you on the day of judgment? What will the poor say about you? My brethren! Let us emulate the first Christians and our ancient Russian ancestors, who kept simplicity in everything: in the table, in clothing, in the decoration of their homes. Let us remember the poor and give to them from our property: "He who has mercy on the poor, gives in return to God; according to his giving it will be repaid to him" (Prov. 19:17).
Lest we forget to say this, we consider it our duty to remind you of this, especially you, sisters in Christ: about immodesty and elegance in your clothing, which is unbecoming for Christian wives and virgins. It must be abandoned. The Apostle of Christ Paul says to you: "Women in decent apparel, with modesty and sobriety, adorn yourselves, not with braided hair, nor with gold, nor with pearls, nor with costly clothing, but with good works, as it becomes us who profess godliness" (1 Tim. 2:9-10). We submit to your own judgment and decision the question: do you always adorn yourselves with modesty and sobriety, or, on the contrary, do some women and virgins often dress without modesty and sobriety, so characteristic of the female sex? Do not many disfigure their clothing, unseemly widening it? Many find this amusing, but for chaste souls it is bitter and hard. And what do the head ornaments of some virgins resemble? My God! Sometimes you do not know whom you see in the temple or outside it - an idol or a person, a Christian or the personification of vanity! To such an extent has women's clothing become exquisite in our time, and all this is to the detriment of the inner beauty of the soul. All the glory of the daughters of Christians should be within - in the soul, in their humility, meekness, good nature, chastity, simplicity, but with us, on the contrary, all their glory is external, empty, false, momentary glory, meanwhile the soul is deprived of the beauty of virtues, and does not even zealously care for them: for what zeal for virtue does she have who uses all her zeal to dress her body more elegantly? And if we also pay attention to the fact that those who dress lavishly shame their poor and indigent sisters, who are ashamed to appear in church and on the street in their simple and poor clothes, because they will be condemned for indecency and dissimulation of the world, then we must tearfully beg the former to leave their expensive and too elegant clothes, even for the temple of God, and come to it in simple clothes, so as not to shame the poor, who, because of their rich and vain sisters, do not go to the temple of God, to the house of our common Father in heaven. Sisters in Christ! I say to you with the Apostle: "Do you despise the church of God and shame those who have nothing?" (1 Cor. 11:22). Look at the icon of the Ever-Virgin, the Mother of God, at the icons of the holy martyrs and venerable women, how simple and virginally modest their clothing is, imitate them, and not modern fashions that penetrate to us from frivolous Western daughters.
Again, beloved brethren, I want to draw your attention to very serious vices that exist among you and destroy many souls, namely, idleness and absent-mindedness, spending time, especially evenings and nights, playing cards, and neglecting to read the word of God and the books of the Holy Fathers. It is necessary, absolutely necessary, to abandon these vices. "Take heed," says the Apostle, "how carefully you walk, not as unwise, but as wise: redeeming the time, for the days are evil" (Eph. 5:15-16).
The Apostle commands Christians to redeem time, to value it, to use it for the works of salvation, but we waste time as the most empty thing, on the most empty things, for example: condemnation, gossip, reading empty books, empty games, especially card games, games in the theater, where a person plays with what one can play the least - words. Is it not, by the way, that Christians notice such disdain for the word of God and for the Divine Service in general, because they are accustomed to look at the word as a joke, a game, as a thing for sale in the theater, or in books and leaflets for easy reading? Let those who need it think about this. My brethren! If people will have to give an account for every idle word on the day of judgment, and the Scripture cannot be broken, and this will certainly come to pass, then how much more for every idle, empty deed? What will happen to the gamblers? What to those who laugh frivolously and excite frivolous laughter in others? "Woe to you who laugh now! For ye shall mourn and weep" (Luke 6:25), said the Savior. Our life, Christian brethren, is not a toy, but a thing of infinite importance: eternity is redeemed by time. Remember, brethren, what the Savior has done for us and what He demands of us, what attention to ourselves, what holiness, what deeds? Pay attention to yourselves and leave your idleness and absent-mindedness. Have the whole Gospel with you, and, even on feasts, read it with attention and heartfelt reverence, turn this holy work into a habit and pass on this habit to your children, make your dwellings into dwellings of faith and piety and love for Christ, and not dwellings of vanity, idleness and absent-mindedness, not places pleasing to the devil, who has invented many different nets to catch people, to turn them away from faith in Christ and His teaching and Christian life.
Finally, here are some more vices that Christians must try to eradicate from their midst - enslavement to the belly, failure to observe fasts, drunkenness and carnal impurity. Addiction to the belly, to intoxicating drinks dries up love for God in the heart, produces a disinclination to prayer, closes it to love and compassion for one's neighbor, draws one into violating the Church commandment about fasts and plunges one into carnal impurity, to say briefly: gluttony alone can overthrow all Christianity in a person and make him a carnal person, lacking the spirit, from a Christian to the most vile pagan. Thus, gluttony of Noah's descendants brought them to heavenly punishment - to destruction by the flood. From gluttony the inhabitants of the ancient cities of Sodom and Gomorrah became corrupted and vile before God, to the point that fire fell upon them from heaven and the earth swallowed them up, dissolving beneath them (Gen. 19:24–25). The Savior in many places condemns the passion for food and drink, or gluttony (Luke 12:19; 22:45). Let us try to abandon this vice and the vice of carnal impurity that often results from it, and let us be zealous for fasting, the cause of purity and chastity. In our time, distinguished by the carnal way of life of Christians, there are few true fasters and abstainers, but this should all the more inspire us to abstinence, lest the Lord be completely angry with us for our pagan life. Let us think about the resurrection of our flesh and try to make it fragrant with abstinence. Let us listen to the advice of the Apostle, who is philosophizing about abstinence from the belly and avoidance of fornication. "All things," he says, "are lawful for me, but not all things are beneficial; all things are lawful for me, but nothing should possess me. Food is for the belly, and the belly for food (not for the soul); but God will destroy both; the body is not for fornication, but for the Lord, and the Lord for the body. God raised up the Lord, and He will also raise us up by His power. Do you not know that your bodies are members of Christ? Shall I then take the members of Christ, and make them members of a harlot? God forbid!.. Do you not know that your body is the temple of the Holy Spirit who is in you, whom you have from God, and you are not your own? But you were bought with a price - the blood of the Son of God. Therefore glorify God in your body and in your spirit, which are God's" (1 Cor. 6:12–15,19–20).
Therefore, let us leave all these and many other sins and passions, with God's help, let us love the virtues opposite to them and let us follow in the footsteps of our Lord, and not in the footsteps of the lusts of our corrupted hearts - and then, with our celebration, we will gladden the spirit of the patron of this temple, the Holy Apostle Andrew the First-Called, and we will be honored with his favorable prayers for us to God. Amen.
Source: Translated by John Sanidopoulos.
