From Diabolic Wars by His Holiness Pope Shenouda III - (Chapter two)
- Destroying one virtue to gain another:
The devil gets annoyed with your stable virtues, those that have
become part of your nature. He tries to destroy them by every
means and the easiest way to do this is to offer you another new
virtue. If you practice the new virtue without discrimination -
for lack of experience - you will lose the first stable virtue.
Here is an example of this:
a) A person leading a life of meekness, quiet, calmness,
peace of heart and decent manners…
The devil wants to make this person lose all his gentleness,
good words and humility of heart. What can he do? Of course
he can not abuse the person’s meekness nor say to him, “Leave
your meek nature which is loved by all…” But he achieves this
by displacement. He offers another virtue without saying that it
is a substitute… How?
First, he explains to the person the importance of the verse,
“the zeal for your house has eaten me up.”
He tells him that it was said by David who was known for his
meekness (Ps. 132:1), and that the disciples remembered these
words when the Lord Jesus Christ, the meek, " had made a
whip of cords, He drove them all out of the temple, with the
sheep and the oxen, and poured out the changers’ money and
overturned the tables." (John 2:15-17) , and said to them, “And
He said to them, “It is written, ‘My house shall be called a
house of prayer,’ but you have made it a ‘den of thieves.’””
(Matt 21:13)
He even calls the person to fight the faults of others and
provides him with all the necessary verses.
He tells him that the Lord Jesus Christ severely rebuked the
scribes and Pharisees through a whole chapter of the Bible,
“Woe unto you, scribes and Pharisees hypocrites…” (Matt. 23).
He confronted them with all their faults calling them more than
once, “blind guides” and saying to them, " you are like
whitewashed tombs which indeed appear beautiful outwardly."
and, “See! Your house is left to you desolate;” (Matt 23:27,38).
John the Baptist also reproved the leaders of the Jews in his
days saying, “Brood of vipers! Who warned you to flee from the
wrath to come?” (Matt 3:7)
The devil says to this person then, "Hearken to the words of St.
Paul the apostle. What he says is an order.
He commands you, ‘Convince, rebuke, exhort’ (2 Tim. 4:2).
But he does not complete the verse, “with all longsuffering and
doctrine.” He does not tell him that these words are said to St.
Timothy (bishop of Ephesus) and not to everyone. He does not
explain to him how St. Paul himself used to reprove, or to say
to the priests of Ephesus, " I did not cease to warn everyone
night and day with tears." (Acts 20:31). Thus, the devil presses
so that such a person may reprove and rebuke others…
As if he were Christ or the Baptist, St. Paul or Timothy the
bishop.
The poor victim is then convinced, goes on reproving everyone
not knowing the spiritual way to do so nor who should reprove
whom, nor what his authority to do so is! While reproving
others, he falls in condemning them, in anger, cruelty and
defaming people. The image of people becomes black in his
eyes and perhaps many would leave the church because of his
conduct… He becomes an exploding bomb casting its shrapnel
everywhere… !
In that way, he loses his meekness, gentleness and decency;
he hates people and becomes hated by them.
Then, he soon gets weary of that conduct which does not
conform with his nature and tries to return to his first condition
but he finds his heart a different heart and his thoughts not the
same. He finds that he has lost his simplicity, purity of heart
and mind, as well as his good relations with others, and no
longer is the good example who benefits others.
The devil has lured him with a virtue which he
misunderstands and made him lose his previous virtue.
Neither did he keep the first nor gain the second but he fell into
confusion!
He allows him to practise the second virtue because it is not
firmly rooted in him and shall not annoy the devil for he can
shake him easily from it.
Hence, our fathers used to advise their children saying, "Refuse
any virtue which the devils offer with the intention of destroying
another virtue which you have, and say to them,
'This virtue is good, but for the sake of God I do not want
it. ’
Indeed, any work of God does not destroy another work of
God, and everyone has his own personality which differs from
that of others. What fits one may not fit another, neither has
everyone the authority to arrange and organise, to reprove and
rebuke, nor to judge and condemn. Whoever is given this
authority by God is certainly also given the way to use it
properly without doing wrong.
\Not everyone can say, “Woe is unto me if I preach not the
Gospel.” These words are said by St. Paul who explained the
reason for this, “Necessity is laid upon me” and, “I have been
entrusted with a stewardship.” (1 Cor 9:16,17). But you, what
is the necessity laid upon you? Who committed unto you a
dispensation as St. Paul had committed to him by Christ Himself
or a mission as the Baptist received through the announcement
of the angel to his father (Luke 1:15-17), or a responsibility as St.
Timothy undertook through the laying on of hands (2 Tim. 1:6).
