Self-Emptying and Being Filled

Whatever has taken place in the history of salvation—whatever was done by Christ, the Father, and the Holy Spirit—must also take place within me.

That's what it means for me to participate in the life of God.

... That is what is meant by "Let it be done to me according to your word", which means: "whatever you say, just as you said it. Even though I cannot understand it, let it happen just as you say."

Do you have a sense of the self-emptying, the self-surrender that occurs? In response, God says: "Be filled with My grace, My energy; be overshadowed by the Holy Spirit."

And this now happens to me. The Divinity bends down over me. I now have a personal experience of the self-emptying of the Divinity, of the divine energy. As a result, the whole of my being receives the radiance, the effulgence of divine energy. This is my divinization, my union with God, in consequence of God’s bending down to me.

—The Way of the Spirit, Archimandrite Aimilianos of Simonopetra, Excerpts from Chapter 1

 





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