Last night, in the Treasury of the Serbian Orthodox Church in Kotor, a lecture was given by Hieromonk Makarije, abbot of the Savina Monastery, on the topic of "Internal Prayer".
The lecture this Thursday was also organized by the Serbian Orthodox Church Municipality of Kotor as part of the cycle of guest visits during Great Lent.
Before the video, which you can watch at the link at the end of the text, we presented to you an excerpt from our guest's presentation and a quote from the "Theological Philosophy" of St. Simeon the New Theologian: "Through unceasing prayer, man reaches out to God. Until he is so humbled as to recognize his sinfulness and slavery to passions and until he recognizes his complete powerlessness, man cannot find Christ".
"A person is faced with temptations that go against the logic he has in his head, and then he struggles in life. Well, these struggles help him to feel his weakness, and according to the measure that God gives him.
He gives us the perfect measure, how to feel our own weakness. No less, no more.
It is important to remember that in our thinking it seems to us that God is late, because "it is hard for me to finish it myself"... But, He is never late. At one point you feel lost, and that is the moment when you gain humility.
That is the moment of faith. That is the moment of complete powerlessness, when only one movement, the inner movement of thought, returns you to God.
That is what God asks of us, that is who we are. That is the essence that He asks of us. It is not easy to dig that out of ourselves. So, we have to struggle a lot. It is not some kind of masochism, but through these mental torments, which God's providence sends us, that gives us our essence.
Everything then becomes clearer in life.
First, there is no coincidence for everything that happens. It is difficult when we lose meaning. It seems to us that we are suffering without any meaning, and that is actually despondency and sadness. These are two passions that work together.
It seems to us that this does not happen to anyone else but me. It is not true. It is a signal to us that we have fallen into despondency or sadness.
The sorrows that come to us draw out from us that true cry towards God. Then my Jesus prayer will be true.
Today, man has a hard time bearing difficulties and falls, either into sadness or into anger.
When we feel powerless, then we sincerely cry out to God. Then our true prayer begins and that is why it is difficult in the sense of human logic.
Then we are crucified, then we stand on the crucifix, and at the same time we look towards the resurrection. This is not easy to hold and it requires, above all, deep faith, as well as determination and psychological stability within a person.
All of this can be meaningless if the grace of the Holy Spirit does not make it clear to us.
No one can explain to us from people how grace is obtained when a person is ready to suffer for Christ. Then, we can also receive the grace of a martyr.
They can kill us, but from us will always spring the love of Christ that dwells in us, the grace of the Holy Spirit that loves everyone.
It does not make a difference whether someone kills you or someone praises you. Christ is that love. That is the meaning of our prayer and union with God. That is the inner prayer that we need to acquire as true Christians. Anything outside of that is a failure. I am absolutely sure that I am not mistaken, that this secret was given to the Orthodox Church,” said, among other things, Hieromonk Makarije.You can watch the video at the link: ЈЕРОМОНАХ МАКАРИЈЕ -ПРЕДАВАЊЕ НА ТЕМУ "УНУТРАШЊА МОЛИТВА" У РИЗНИЦИ СПЦ КОТОР 4. АПРИЛА 2025.Г. - YouTube