When we think of what the Saviour has done to save us, and what condescension He has made, we cannot help but grieve and weep over the spiritual indolence and sleep that has taken hold of us. When we lose an earthly treasure, we feel great sorrow, and the memory of the good things we have lost brings tears to our eyes. Why should we not grieve when we think of the great riches we have lost and thrown away, when we could have possessed this treasure in full and with all certainty? That we appear ungrateful to Him who has done us good causes sorrow within us. How much should it shake us that we have appeared ungrateful and lazy, not to man but to the Lord Himself, who has met us with such mercy and love?

Love of God! The Lord came down from heaven to earth, moved by this love, and sought our souls. He lived and socialized with us, taking our form and image. He became like us to stir and warm our love. He appeared as man and God to inspire us with love and help us to live in love. The Master came and sought us and found us. He does not want to leave an empty place in our hearts without filling it with His presence. He came as a benefactor and a brother; He came and paid what we should have paid. He did all this not with a simple gesture as He did before in the creation of the world, but He needed to suffer and sweat. Pain had no right over the innocent Master, and yet we see Him standing in the midst of torment, in the midst of humiliation, in the midst of shame, full of wounds, breathing His last and dying the most horrible death. What shall we do? Shall we feel the great benevolence? It is a pity that we do not think of the sublime grace of the Lord nor of His love which is expressed everywhere. We do not seek the things by which we can change our lives, but we tend toward the heroism which the Lord detests. We possess what the Lord forbids. We shirk from the sublime things which He advises us to pursue and develop in our lives. Our conduct is not only ungrateful but also malicious. Impotent and malicious! That is, worthy of pity and tears. Oh, how we care about idle and wrong things! Do we consider them so worthy of our attention that we despise the Lord for their sake, and all the great, sublime and eternal things to which the most merciful Lord calls us? If we do not care about the eternal things which He has revealed to us, in which He has revealed His truth, and shown His care and dear love, who will care?

We care about material things and what is necessary to maintain our strength. We are busy with speech, deeds, and professions.

Some become peasants, some become soldiers, others are attracted by politics, and some take up other professions. We do not waste time praising our work friends. All this interest, this desire and love for work, is aimed at the material life. Life for the sake of good spiritual things rarely attracts us. Thus we are lower than those who work for the sake of the material life, who consider it above the spiritual life. We are lower than them because we do not care about the high, imperishable, eternal things as those care about what they consider above the high ideals. And in order for us to turn to these high things, the Lord came down from heaven, and by His presence the earth became heaven and He became the tyrant of the world, Satan became a prisoner whose head was trampled by those who were his prisoners. The Lord took a body in order to achieve this victory over the tyrant, and kissed His wounded body, and poured out His blood on the cross, and while He was dead He shook the foundations of the earth and gave life to the dead. All these things happened so that we might know the Lord, and be freed from our attachment to the earth, and direct our eyes toward heaven. And yet when we descend, we fall asleep, and when we descend like stone statues, the violent storms do not wake us. Is there anyone more miserable than we, if we are like this? Are we not more miserable than anyone else? Do we not need to be pitied? And who else needs this pitifulness?

What calamities deserve our tears? Illness. It is not the body that is sick here. The sick is the noblest part of man. It is the soul. Should we shed tears for our poverty and need? We are poorer in our negligence than those who lack everything. What is material wealth compared to the spiritual wealth that we lose when our hearts are not drawn towards heaven? Poverty ends at the hour of death, but spiritual poverty and nakedness do not end but continue after death in the next life to feed our sorrow and nakedness. What then? Should we stop being indifferent and allow the evil devil to control us, our will and our thoughts? He who throws himself on the edge of the sword to commit suicide or into the abyss to be crushed and evades his friends and approaches his criminal enemies gives tangible evidence of a disease in his mind. And the man who surrenders to his enemy, the devil, and evades Christ only proves his madness.

If we had a conscious knowledge of this great evil and the danger to which we are exposed, we would easily shed tears and sorrow would accompany us all our lives. This wound is so deep in our hearts. Although we could have been happy, we chose misery and chose to sink into darkness, although we could have lived in the light. Such tragic situations require the tears of everyone, especially those who feel the enormity of the calamity. It is enough for us to think that the Lord was slaughtered naked on the cross to deliver us from the state in which we are, to shed tears. He to whom all things are subject and serve sees us rebelling against the will of Him who became man while He is God in order to make us men gods. The Engineer of heaven clothed the earth in order to transform it into heaven, and the Lord took the form of a servant in order to bestow true glory on servants. Because the King of glory “endured the cross, despising the shame” (Hebrews 12:2).