Quote:
Originally Posted by aron
My point is this: we often are troubled, even when we try to "serve" God. Our activities consume us. We are threatened by problems, and failure seems close. But if you look at the ancient writers, often they are just gazing at Christ. You may not see the Word, per se, as much as you see the face of one who is gazing continually at the Word. To me this is a great encouragement.
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I want to share Fr George Florovsky's words (
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Georges_Florovsky ) that Kallistos Ware quoted in his book "The Orthodox Way":
The Church gives us not a system, but a key; not a plan of God’s City, but the means of entering it. Perhaps someone will lose his way because he has no plan. But all that he will see, he will see without a mediator, he will see it directly, it will be real for him; while he who has studied only the plan risks remaining outside and not really finding anything.
I can be mistaken but I feel that WL and WN's theology is not about the key to the kingdom of God. It's about the plan. You may have the plan but if you don't have the key, there is a chance that you will not be able to enter the kingdom. WN and WL teach us doctrines, theories and speculations, but Christian life is not about doctrines about God. Christian life is a spiritual journey towards God. You may have right or wrong interpretations of the Bible but the main point is to have the keys to the kingdom, i.e. to live spiritual life in the right way. And that's what the Fathers show us.
I will quote Kallistos Ware's book again:
One of the best known of the Desert Fathers of fourth-century Egypt, St Sarapion the Sindonite, travelled once on pilgrimage to Rome. Here he was told of a celebrated recluse, a woman who lived always in one small room, never going out. Sceptical about her way of life — for he was himself a great wanderer — Sarapion called on her and asked: ‘Why are you sitting here?’ To this she replied: ‘I am not sitting. I am on a journey.’
I am not sitting. I am on a journey. Every Christian may apply these words to himself or herself. To be a Christian is to be a traveller. Our situation, say the Greek Fathers, is like that of the Israelite people in the desert of Sinai: we live in tents, not houses, for spiritually we are always on the move. We are on a journey through the inward space of the heart, a journey not measured by the hours of our watch or the days of the calendar, for it is a journey out of time into eternity.
One of the most ancient names for Christianity is simply ‘the Way’. ‘About that time’, it is said in the Acts of the Apostles, ‘there arose no little stir concerning the Way’ (19:23); Felix, the Roman governor of Caesarea, had ‘a rather accurate knowledge of the Way’ (24:22). It is a name that emphasizes the practical character of the Christian faith. Christianity is more than a theory about the universe, more than teachings written down on paper; it is a path along which we journey — in the deepest and richest sense, the way of life.
http://www.golden-ship.ru/_ld/18/183...RTHODOX_WA.htm