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Who are the wicked?
When you are surrounded by people you are related to or friendly with, whom you love but who are not Christians in any sense that the Church would recognise, you have a problem.
Many sages have told us to leave the question of who is saved or not to God. Our Saviour told us the Way is narrow and few find it.
It is a horrible and disturbing thought that someone you love might be deserving of hell (by default, because they didn't take the Lord up on His offer of Grace, but remained good people in the humanist sense).
As the prayer says, 'O Giver of Light, who makes the sun shine upon the righteous and the wicked...' Who are the wicked? Are my dear ones living and dead wicked and in what sense?
God bless you
Many sages have told us to leave the question of who is saved or not to God. Our Saviour told us the Way is narrow and few find it.
It is a horrible and disturbing thought that someone you love might be deserving of hell (by default, because they didn't take the Lord up on His offer of Grace, but remained good people in the humanist sense).
As the prayer says, 'O Giver of Light, who makes the sun shine upon the righteous and the wicked...' Who are the wicked? Are my dear ones living and dead wicked and in what sense?
God bless you
Comments
some non-Christians are very very good people. better than me who knows God.
surely they can't be wicked if they live a good and honest life, but are just not Christian.
akhadna el baraka... neshkor Allah!
Definitely, we worry about the people we love and we want them to taste and enjoy the salvation as we do. The only things we have towards our loved ones are to pray for their salvation and to set a Christian example for them to follow. Remember the story of Monica and Augustine! :) We see how she sets an example for her son and how with her prayers, she was able to turn him from his evil ways. The good thing is that every day we are surprised by people who join our faith. Heaven is always opened for all.
so we never know what is happening in people's hearts, our job is to be good faithful friends and keep praying and answering their questions.
one of my close friends has been hearing the good news for nearly 20 years now and is still resisting, even his family became Christian. i can only pray and wait and trust God (not always easy!).
it's harder when people die, but remember, they may have prayed to God in their last minutes, of course He considers all their attempts to get close to Him or help other people when they are in that stage before death and wondering what comes next.
i pray God will bless you with His peace about this. when you pray 'your will, not mine' then you receive amazing peace. remember God loves your loved ones even more than you do :)
St Augustine; Expositions of the Psalms 6.9
By the phrase "in all my enemies" the psalmist is speaking of the men and women who refuse to turn to God. For even if these people do not know it, even if they are accommodating. even if they share, on the best of terms, the same meals and households and cities, without any obvious antagonism, and enjoy frequent social contacts in apparent cordiality, nonetheless by their aspirations they are opposed to those who are turning towards God, and hence they are enemies. For when one group longs for this world and the other wishes to be freed from this world, who cannot see that the former is the enemy of the latter? If they could they would be dragging with them to their doom. And yet it is a very special gift to the way of God's commandments. For often as the mind strives to press ahead toward God, it is roughly handled on the road and loses its nerve. This is why it often fails to fulfil its good intention, for fear of offending those with whom it lives, who love and pursue other things that are good but nonetheless perishable and transient. Every sane person is separated from them, not geographically but in mind. Bodies are contained in particular places, but the mind's place is what it loves.
When you are surrounded by people you are related to or friendly with, whom you love but who are not Christians in any sense that the Church would recognise, you have a problem.
Many sages have told us to leave the question of who is saved or not to God. Our Saviour told us the Way is narrow and few find it.
It is a horrible and disturbing thought that someone you love might be deserving of hell (by default, because they didn't take the Lord up on His offer of Grace, but remained good people in the humanist sense).
As the prayer says, 'O Giver of Light, who makes the sun shine upon the righteous and the wicked...' Who are the wicked? Are my dear ones living and dead wicked and in what sense?
God bless you
i totally understand what you are going through. i am the only person in my family to convert to Orthodoxy and it saddens me that i have a brother who is a socialist, a mother and father who are non-denominational, my mother seems to despise Orthodoxy, while my dad thinks all churches are the same. its very troublesome at times since i study eschatology i gain a deep understanding of death an the end. in my eyes and from what i have studied a wicked person can be many things but basically someone who willfully rejects Christ, His Church, the Sacraments etc. hopefully this helps.
(2 When the wicked came against me
To eat up my flesh,
My enemies and foes,
They stumbled and fell.)
As far as I understood, the wicked are who against us and want to harm us because of our faith and beliefs.
You know guys, I understand that you are the only ones in your families who converted to Orthodoxy and it's hard to be this way. At least, they have an excuse. But what about the family members who were born in Orthodoxy and go to church and take communion every single week and know everything about the divinity of God and at the same time they are against you because don’t want to share them their sins! Can I give them an excuse?