Prologue in Sermons: October 17

Weeping for Sins

October 17

(The Thief Who Was Saved After Ten Days of Tears)

By Archpriest Victor Guryev

One of the most effective means of obtaining forgiveness of sins is weeping over them and contrition of heart. "For godly sorrow," says the Holy Apostle Paul, "produces repentance leading to salvation, not to be regretted; but the sorrow of the world produces death" (2 Cor. 7:10). "A broken and contrite heart God will not despise," teaches the Holy King and Prophet David. Lacking the means to atone for our sins before God, we should, brethren, resort to this means more often and more often experience sorrow, contrition of heart, and genuine tears for the fact that we have hitherto served the Lord imperfectly and unworthily; that we deserve nothing more from Him than wrath and punishment for our deeds; that we are unworthy of His mercy. This humility and contrition of heart are very pleasing to the Lord and always turn His wrath into mercy.

During the reign of King Maurice in Thrace, there lived a fierce and cruel thief. Unable to take him by force, the king decided to use the opposite method — mercy — to subdue him, and sent him his cross with the words, "Fear not." This extraordinary act touched the thief's heart. He immediately repented, appeared before the king, fell at his feet, and promised to reform. The king forgave him, and he remained to live in the city. A short time later, he fell into a serious illness, and during it, one day, in a dream, he saw the Last Judgment. Awakening, he sensed the approach of death and, horrified by his sins, began to beg forgiveness with bitter tears. "Master, Lover of Mankind, King," he said, "as You saved the thief before me, so now show Your mercy upon me and accept my lament on this deathbed. And as You accepted others who came at the eleventh hour and did nothing worthy, so accept my bitter tears, and cleanse me, and baptize me with them. Seek nothing more from me than this! Do not seek or test, for you will find nothing good in me; my iniquities and the countless sins I have committed have surrounded me. But as You accepted the lamentation of the Apostle Peter, so accept my few tears, and with the sponge of Your mercy, blot out my transgressions!" And so he wept and confessed his sins for many hours, then died. At the hour of his death, a physician who lived in the same house saw the following in a dream: many demons appeared at the thief's bedside, holding in their hands the record of his sins, and behind them two angels with scales; on one side of them the demons placed the manuscript of the deceased's sins. "What shall we place on our side?" asked the angels. "We have nothing, for only ten days have passed since he ceased murder! Shouldn't we just place a handkerchief, soaked in his tears, which he shed before his death?" And they did. And, oh, the abyss of God's mercy! The handkerchief covered all the thief's sins, and the demons' manuscripts vanished. The angels took the soul of the dead man, and the demons fled in shame. So this is what it means, brethren, to weep and lament over your sins!

But is this the only example? No, there are many. The harlot was justified by the Lord, but not before she had wet His feet with tears and wiped them with the hair of her head. The publican left the temple justified, but after standing in the temple, not daring to lift his eyes to heaven, he beat his breast and cried, "God make atonement for me the sinner." The Apostle Peter, who had denied Christ three times, was forgiven, but only because he wept bitterly over his sin. David was forgiven for the grave sins of adultery and murder, but only after he had watered his bed with tears every night. Let us also weep more often for our countless sins, so that the Lord, seeing our contrition, will accept us as the father accepted the prodigal son, and forgive us as He forgave the thief who cried out from the depths of his soul from the cross: “Remember me, O Lord, when You come into Your Kingdom.” Amen.

Source: Translated by John Sanidopoulos.