… But let the Fiery Coal of Thy Most Pure Body and Thy Most Precious Blood bring me … protection against every action of the devil, …

… Bury in me the evil devices of the devil with good thoughts, and destroy the spirits of evil! …

… let Thy Holy Things be for my purification and healing, for enlightenment and protection, for the repulsion of every tempting thought and action of the devil which works spiritually in my fleshly members. …

By the thousand-year kingdom, Orthodox exegetes understand an indefinite but long period of time from the beginning of the grace-filled kingdom of the Church of Christ until the end of the world. Moreover, by the “first resurrection” we mean the spiritual rebirth of people into eternal life in Christ in the sacrament of baptism performed in the Church of Christ, which is also sometimes called the resurrection (see: Col.3:1; Eph.2:5-6, 5:14). The temporary release of the devil from prison for a short time means the appearance on earth of the Antichrist shortly before the end of the world, followed by the General and final judgment. The “second death” is the condemnation of sinners at the General Judgment, which will not affect those who have “participation in the first resurrection,” that is, spiritually reborn in Christ and purified by His grace in the Church. Such will not be condemned, but will enter the blessed life of the Kingdom of Christ.¹³⁷⁶

… The fact that the Revolution [in Russia] came out of the seminaries was said by St. Barsanuphius of Optina. … The idea is so serious that our seminaries are educating revolutionaries. … Seminaries were class-based educational institutions, … and therefore many went to seminary under duress simply because they were born into a priest's family.

And I ask you: Can 100% of children born in a priest's family be priests? No way. No way. They can be engineers, officers, and whoever you want. They are not obliged to be priests, but before the Revolution there was just such a stupid system.

… You know some of these sons of priests. All our 19th century poets, all our writers are there. Well, let's say, Chernyshevsky, the son of the famous archpriest Gavriil Chernyshevsky. When he started signing his trashy books there, everyone said: 'Oh, come on, it's no big deal, father will pray for his forgiveness'. Because father Gavril Chernyshevsky was a very respected archpriest. And everyone thought that he had a very strong prayer. But he did not pray away his son Nikolai Gavrilovich. Nikolai Gavrilovich graduated from both a theological school and a theological seminary, almost a theological academy.

… And what happens as a result, if a person who has no faith, or no desire to be a priest, is forced to finish college, seminary and the Academy. What will become of him in the end? A fierce atheist. It would be fine if he were an illiterate atheist, he turns out to be a highly educated atheist. He is a fierce, complete enemy of the church, if he was shoved there by force and forced to study. That's how it was before the Revolution.

And now it is sometimes like that, when the father is a venerable archpriest. He does not even allow the thought that his sons will not follow in his footsteps: 'Of course, my son will become a priest, and the second son will become a priest, … and where else, how else.' This is a crime, in fact. Because the exceptional happiness of being born into a priestly family does not make a person capable of the priesthood. It is a special calling, a special gift. If people do something that is not their business, then they grow up to be enemies of their business.

… How will you pray to God for people if you hate them? How will you pray for them if you don’t even think that you’re doing your job? How will you preach the Gospel to them if you don’t read it because you don’t like it? … Well, this kind of tragedy happens all the time. It’s just that before it was a tragedy of national proportions. And today it’s a tragedy of a small scale.

What is Written in the Revelation of John Regarding the Two Resurrections, and the Thousand Years, and What May Reasonably Be Held on These Points.

The evangelist John has spoken of these two resurrections in the book which is called the Apocalypse, but in such a way that some Christians do not understand the first of the two, and so construe the passage into ridiculous fancies. For the Apostle John says in the foresaid book, “And I saw an angel come down from heaven. … Blessed and holy is he that has part in the first resurrection: on such the second death has no power; but they shall be priests of God and of Christ, and shall reign with Him a thousand years” (Rev 20:1-6). Those who, on the strength of this passage, have suspected that the first resurrection is future and bodily, have been moved, among other things, specially by the number of a thousand years, as if it were a fit thing that the saints should thus enjoy a kind of Sabbath-rest during that period, a holy leisure after the labors of the six thousand years since man was created, and was on account of his great sin dismissed from the blessedness of paradise into the woes of this mortal life, so that thus, as it is written, “One day is with the Lord as a thousand years, and a thousand years as one day,” 2 Peter 3:8 there should follow on the completion of six thousand years, as of six days, a kind of seventh-day Sabbath in the succeeding thousand years; and that it is for this purpose the saints rise, viz., to celebrate this Sabbath. And this opinion would not be objectionable, if it were believed that the joys of the saints in that Sabbath shall be spiritual, and consequent on the presence of God; for I myself, too, once held this opinion. But, as they assert that those who then rise again shall enjoy the leisure of immoderate carnal banquets, furnished with an amount of meat and drink such as not only to shock the feeling of the temperate, but even to surpass the measure of credulity itself, such assertions can be believed only by the carnal. They who do believe them are called by the spiritual Chiliasts, which we may literally reproduce by the name Millenarians. It were a tedious process to refute these opinions point by point: we prefer proceeding to show how that passage of Scripture should be understood.

…

“And he cast him into the abyss,” — i.e., cast the devil into the abyss. By the abyss is meant the countless multitude of the wicked whose hearts are unfathomably deep in malignity against the Church of God; not that the devil was not there before, but he is said to be cast in there, because, when prevented from harming believers, he takes more complete possession of the ungodly. For that man is more abundantly possessed by the devil who is not only alienated from God, but also gratuitously hates those who serve God. “And shut him up, and set a seal upon him, that he should deceive the nations no more till the thousand years should be fulfilled.” “Shut him up,” — i.e., prohibited him from going out, from doing what was forbidden. And the addition of "set a seal upon him” seems to me to mean that it was designed to keep it a secret who belonged to the devil's party and who did not. For in this world this is a secret, for we cannot tell whether even the man who seems to stand shall fall, or whether he who seems to lie shall rise again. But by the chain and prison-house of this interdict the devil is prohibited and restrained from seducing those nations which belong to Christ, but which he formerly seduced or held in subjection. For before the foundation of the world God chose to rescue these from the power of darkness, and to translate them into the kingdom of the Son of His love, as the apostle says. Colossians 1:13 For what Christian is not aware that he seduces nations even now, and draws them with himself to eternal punishment, but not those predestined to eternal life? And let no one be dismayed by the circumstance that the devil often seduces even those who have been regenerated in Christ, and begun to walk in God's way. For “the Lord knows them that are His,” 2 Timothy 2:19 and of these the devil seduces none to eternal damnation. For it is as God, from whom nothing is hid even of things future, that the Lord knows them; not as a man, who sees a man at the present time (if he can be said to see one whose heart he does not see), but does not see even himself so far as to be able to know what kind of person he is to be. The devil, then, is bound and shut up in the abyss that he may not seduce the nations from which the Church is gathered, and which he formerly seduced before the Church existed. For it is not said “that he should not seduce any man,” but “that he should not seduce the nations” — meaning, no doubt, those among which the Church exists — “till the thousand years should be fulfilled,” — i.e., either what remains of the sixth day which consists of a thousand years, or all the years which are to elapse till the end of the world.

Question: What should we do when the devil transforms himself into an angel of light (cf 2 Cor. 11:14) and tries to seduce us?

Answer: You need great discrimination in order to distinguish between good and evil. So do not readily or lightly put your trust in appearances, but weigh things well, and after testing everything carefully cleave to what is good and reject what is evil (cf. 1 Thess. 5:21-22). You must test and discriminate before you give credence to anything. You must also be aware that the effects of grace are self-evident, and that even if the devil does transform himself he cannot produce these effects: he cannot induce you to be gentle, or forbearing, or humble, or joyful, or serene, or stable in your thoughts; he cannot make you hate what is worldly, or cut off sensual indulgence and the working of the passions, as grace does. He produces vanity, haughtiness, cowardice and every kind of evil. Thus you can tell from its effects whether the light shining in your soul is from God or from Satan. The lettuce is similar in appearance to the endive, and vinegar, to wine; but when you taste them the palate discerns and recognizes the differences between each. In the same way the soul, if it possesses the power of discrimination, can distinguish with its noetic sense between the gifts of the Holy Spirit and the illusions of Satan.