Watchfulness and the Providential Care of the Saints

"...to the joy of your lord." "For before my food a sigh comes to me, and I weep, being seized by fear. For the fear which I cared for has come to me, and which I was afraid would meet me." Fear does not always signify the passionate, nor the refined and perfect, but also a middle kind, concerning which neither the passionate nor the refined occurs, but as one might say, one of these things occurs either for the benefit of others or due to a fall

For if the blessed Paul says: 'I fear, lest as the serpent deceived Eve' (2 Cor 11:3), he does not have the fear passionately, nor is the perfect and pure signified in this, even if the wise Paul had it, but rather a care for the salvation of others. It has been said concerning the perfect: 'The fear of the Lord surpassed all things' (Ps 112:7), but concerning the passionate, in order that it may not be carried along, the saying says: 'Do not fear their fear' (Matt 10:28), and: 'Do not fear those who kill the body' (Matt 10:28), and: 'There they feared a fear, which was not fear' (Job 3:25). And all these things are seen because of the saying: 'And I weep, being seized by fear.'

Let us see from the beginning the things set forth: 'For before my food a sigh comes to me' (Job 10:1), which is instructive, that others, having lived a life of luxury, and finding only pleasure and enjoyment and caring for nothing else through their works, cry out to themselves: 'Let us eat and drink; for tomorrow we die' (Eccl 2:2); but the holy man, also according to the blessed Paul saying: 'Who is weak and does not faint? Who is scandalized and am I not burned?' (1 Cor 10:12), approaches sensory food not without a sigh because of human weakness and not for the sake of pleasure, but understanding the pure and incorporeal life and that table which the Savior promised to his own disciples, saying: 'That you may eat and drink at my table in the kingdom' (Luke 22:30) of the heavens, sighs; even while receiving this, he sings in his mind: 'My soul longs and even faints for the courts of the Lord' (Ps 42:2).

And since the holy man, even if he be perfect, knows that it is possible for a man to fall into a lapse as long as he is in life, he leads into: 'And I weep, being seized by fear.' And because the mind is strengthened, the weeping in the pains is according to the saying: 'I shall wash my bed every night, with my tears my couch' (Ps 6:6).

"...to find for me." The saints do this, not by neglecting themselves, but being awakened by prudence, so that through these things they may call upon God for help, just as the blessed David says when calling a congregation like himself: 'Come, let us worship and bow down, and weep before the Lord who made us' (Ps 95:6). For great is the good of the care that comes through vigilance, which the Lord says he desires the disciples to have: 'Watch, for you do not know at what hour the thief comes' (Matt 24:42).

Nor are the saints any less anxious because of approaching temptations, not giving themselves over to negligence, but preparing themselves for these, fearing lest they, having preached to others, themselves become unproven. And they do not avoid the stumbles. They are not without reason ready for preparation. For this reason, the blessed one himself always remains, holding back the uprisings from the devil. He wished not to be in circumstances, since human weakness, as far as it reaches its measure, cannot bear the immeasurability of labors, unless a brave calculation overcomes the weakness. For this reason he says: 'For the fear I thought was not there came upon me, and which I thought would meet me' (Job 5:7).

And he did not say these things by being overwhelmed, but according to the understanding assigned to him. For he had fear, lest he be delayed in his life and be tested by tribulations and circumstances, from which it happens to trip many. Even if they were invincible, they do not want to be drawn into temptations, so that neither the adversary may have more torment through them, nor may he cause them to trip the human weakness as we said; just as a pilot steering the ship straight does not want to be tested by a storm, lest he also fall by a stumble. Because they do not avoid circumstances through cowardice, one of them is heard saying regarding their common faith: 'Our God is a refuge and strength, a help in the tribulations found by us exceedingly. Therefore we shall not be afraid when the earth is shaken and mountains are moved in the hearts of seas' (Ps 46:1-2). In agreement with these, the apostle says: 'Who shall separate us from the love of Christ Jesus? Tribulation or distress or persecution or famine' (Rom 8:35) and the...