Spiritual Poverty: Death to Life

Recently, in a piece on The Deification of Man, I mentioned the Prodigal Son’s “coming to himself” as being a place of reality, decision and conversion. In another article on Orthodox Evangelism, death is mentioned as a prerequisite. Here follows a quote from Archimandrite Zacharias in his work, Christ, Our Way and Our Life, which touches on similar themes:

Mindfulness of death raises man from the age-long torpor of sin and offers him a vision of divine eternity. This vision serves to convey knowledge of God through the mystery of God’s absence. Man learns the consequences for all the created world of separation from Him. The uncreated divine Light illumines initially from “behind” and at a distance from the spiritual “place” man is situated in; the knowledge he gains is of the “hell” of his spiritual poverty, not to say his destination. It is nevertheless the first glimmer of grace, and it inspires fear of God: “fear of proving unworthy of God made manifest to us in Light that never sets.” The sight of one’s spiritual poverty and the awareness of one’s fallen state, far from God, is the foundation for new life. It is the starting point in the journey, the first rung on the ladder of perfection in Christ, as the Lord certifies when he calls blessed the “poor in spirit” [cf Mt.5:3]. It is also the prerequisite for spiritual mourning, which, according to the Lord’s Beatitudes [cf Mt.5:4] is the second rung.

[p.83]

NOTE: Phrases in quotation marks, other than Scriptural references, refer to writings of Archimandrite Sophrony.