When the Door Opens

A Visitor Speaks with Abba Arsenius as His Life Draws to Its End

“Why are you weeping, Father? Are you also afraid?”

“Indeed, the fear which is mine at this hour has been with me ever since I became a monk.”

— Sayings of the Desert Fathers, Abba Arsenius

A brother came to see Abba Arsenius when the old man was nearing the end of his life.

Word had passed quietly among the brothers that Arsenius had become very weak. The man who had once stood in the palace of the emperor now struggled to rise from his mat.

His body had grown thin.

His hair was white.

His eyes, which had shed so many tears, seemed to look upon things from a great distance.

The brother entered the cell and bowed.

Arsenius raised his hand and blessed him.

“Sit.”

The brother sat.

For a long while neither spoke.

At last the visitor said:

“Abba, they say that you are dying.”

Arsenius looked at him.

“So they tell me.”

The brother was startled by the answer.

“Does this not trouble you?”

“Should it?”

“I do not know. That is why I have come.”

Arsenius closed his eyes.

The visitor wondered whether the old man had fallen asleep.

Then Arsenius said:

“You have come to ask a dying man about death.”

“Yes.”

“You have come late.”

The brother looked confused.

“Father?”

“I began dying many years ago.”

⸻

The First Death

The visitor waited.

Arsenius continued.

“When I left the palace, something died.

“When I left those who knew my name, something died.

“When I ceased defending myself, something died.

“When another was preferred to me, something died.

“When I discovered that I was not the man I imagined myself to be, something died.”

He looked at the visitor.

“The desert is full of graves.”

The brother glanced outside.

There were no graves that he could see.

Arsenius touched his breast.

“Here.”

The visitor understood.

“Was it painful?”

“Yes.”

“Then why remain?”

“Because what was dying was not what God had created.”

⸻

The brother thought about this.

“Then the ascetic life is a preparation for death?”

Arsenius shook his head.

“No.”

The visitor waited.

“It is the discovery of what cannot die.”

⸻

What Death Takes

“Abba, what does death take from us?”

“Everything that is not ours.”

The brother frowned.

“My body is mine.”

“For a little while.”

“My possessions?”

“You will leave them.”

“My work?”

“Another will continue it or it will disappear.”

“My reputation?”

“Men will speak of you for a time.”

“My name?”

“Perhaps a little longer.”

“My memories?”

“Those who remember you will also die.”

The visitor became uneasy.

“Then nothing remains.”

Arsenius looked at him.

“Now you are beginning to understand.”

The brother lowered his eyes.

After a moment Arsenius said:

“You think death takes everything from you.”

“Does it not?”

“No.”

“What does it do?”

“It reveals what was yours.”

“And what is mine?”

Arsenius answered:

“What you have given to God.”

⸻

The Fear of Death

The visitor looked at the old man’s face.

There were tears in his eyes.

“Father, you are weeping.”

“Yes.”

“Are you afraid?”

Arsenius did not answer immediately.

Then he said:

“Yes.”

The brother was surprised.

“You?”

Arsenius looked almost amused.

“Why not me?”

“But you have lived in the desert all these years. You have prayed. You have fasted. You have renounced everything.”

Arsenius shook his head.

“Do not make an idol of an old monk.”

The brother fell silent.

“I have seen enough of my heart,” Arsenius said, “to know that I cannot save myself.”

“Then what hope do you have?”

“Christ.”

“Only that?”

“What more would you have?”

⸻

The visitor considered the tears of the old man.

“Then your fear is fear of punishment?”

“No.”

“Of judgment?”

“Yes, but perhaps not as you mean it.”

“What do you mean?”

Arsenius looked toward the doorway.

“When you have spent many years trying to stand before God, you begin to understand what it means to be seen.”

The brother said nothing.

“To be seen entirely.

“No explanation.

“No excuse.

“No image of yourself to protect.

“No story about why you did what you did.

“Only truth.”

“And that frightens you?”

“Yes.”

“Why?”

“Because God is light.”

The old man paused.

“And I have spent a lifetime discovering how much darkness a man can hide from himself.”

⸻

After So Many Years

The brother asked:

“Abba, after all these years in the desert, what have you learned?”

Arsenius smiled faintly.

“That God is God.”

The visitor waited for more.

Nothing came.

“Is that all?”

“Is it little?”

The brother lowered his head.

Arsenius continued:

“When I was young, I thought I knew many things.

“I knew books.

“I knew arguments.

“I knew the speech of educated men.

“I knew the ways of the court.

“I knew what men called wisdom.”

“And now?”

“Now I know that I do not know God as He knows me.”

He closed his eyes.

“And this is peace.”

⸻

“How can not knowing bring peace?”

“Because I no longer need to understand everything before I entrust myself to Him.”

The brother looked at him.

Arsenius said:

“A child sleeps without understanding the house.”

⸻

Those We Leave Behind

After a time the visitor spoke again.

“Father, what of those we love?”

Arsenius opened his eyes.

“What of them?”

“Death separates us.”

“Yes.”

“Does that not grieve you?”

“Yes.”

“Then how do you bear it?”

Arsenius thought for a moment.

“When I first came to the desert, I believed that renunciation meant learning not to need men.”

“And now?”

“Now I know that it means learning how to love them without possessing them.”

The visitor remained very still.

“We hold one another too tightly,” Arsenius continued, “because we are afraid.”

“Of losing them?”

“Of discovering that they were never ours.”

“Then whose are they?”

“Christ’s.”

The old man looked at him.

“If you love a man in Christ, death cannot take him where Christ is not.”

⸻

The visitor’s eyes filled with tears.

Arsenius noticed.

“You have lost someone.”

“Yes.”

“Then weep.”

The brother looked up.

“You do not tell me not to grieve?”

“Did Christ not weep for Lazarus?”

“Yes.”

“Then why would I command you to be stronger than Christ?”

The brother covered his face.

For a while only his weeping could be heard.

Arsenius allowed him to weep.

At last the old man said:

“Grief is not unbelief.”

The visitor looked at him.

“Sometimes grief is love discovering that it can no longer reach the beloved with its hands.”

⸻

The Cell

“Father, has living in this cell made death easier?”

Arsenius looked around.

“No.”

The visitor was surprised.

“Then what has it done?”

“It has made death familiar.”

“How?”

“Every night I closed my eyes and gave the world back to God.

“Every morning I received it again.”

He pointed toward the door.

“Men came.

“Men left.

“Brothers died.

“Great men were forgotten.

“Emperors passed away.

“Cities changed.

“My own body weakened.”

He looked at his hands.

“The cell teaches a man that everything is passing.”

“That sounds sorrowful.”

“It is sorrowful until you discover the One who does not pass.”

⸻

What Would You Change?

The visitor gathered his courage.

“Abba, if you could live your life again, what would you change?”

Arsenius was silent for a long time.

“I would waste less time.”

The brother almost laughed.

“You fled the world and lived in silence for decades. How did you waste time?”

“In my thoughts.”

“What thoughts?”

“Things that never happened.

“Words spoken against me.

“Things I wished I had said.

“Judgments of other men.

“Imagined futures.

“Old injuries.”

He shook his head.

“A man can leave the whole world and still spend his life talking to it inside his head.”

The visitor smiled sadly.

“What would you do instead?”

“Remain.”

“With God?”

“With God.”

⸻

The Last Renunciation

The light outside the cell was fading.

The visitor knew that Arsenius was tired.

He rose.

“Abba, I should let you rest.”

“Yes.”

But before leaving, he turned.

“Father, you said that you began dying when you entered the desert. What remains for you to renounce now?”

Arsenius looked at him.

“Arsenius.”

The brother did not understand.

“Haven’t you spent your whole life renouncing Arsenius?”

“Yes.”

“And he is still here?”

The old man smiled.

“Until the grave.”

“What must you surrender now?”

“My prayer.

“My fasting.

“My tears.

“My repentance.

“My years in the desert.

“Everything I thought I had given God.”

“Why surrender those?”

“So that I do not stand before Him carrying my virtues like coins.”

The visitor felt something tighten in his throat.

“Then how will you stand before Him?”

Arsenius stretched out his empty hands.

“Like this.”

⸻

The brother could no longer speak.

Arsenius lowered his hands.

“Do you understand?”

“I think so.”

“Tell me.”

The brother hesitated.

“In the end we have nothing to give God.”

Arsenius shook his head.

“No.”

The visitor waited.

“In the end we discover that everything was gift.”

⸻

When the Door Opens

The brother bowed deeply and began to leave.

At the doorway he heard Arsenius speak.

“My son.”

He turned.

“When your hour comes, do not spend it looking backward.”

“What should I do?”

“Look for Christ.”

“And if I am afraid?”

“Call His Name.”

“And if I have sinned?”

“Call His Name.”

“And if I have wasted my life?”

“Call His Name.”

“And if my heart condemns me?”

Arsenius closed his eyes.

“Call His Name.”

The brother stood silently.

Then he asked:

“And what is death?”

Arsenius opened his eyes once more.

He looked toward the entrance of the cell, where the last light of evening rested upon the threshold.

“A door.”

“Into darkness?”

The old man shook his head.

“For the man who has sought Christ all his life?”

He smiled.

“No.”

“Then into what?”

Arsenius looked toward the light.

“Into the One he has been seeking.”

⸻

The visitor left the cell.

Behind him the old man remained upon his mat.

There was little left now of the man who had once lived among emperors.

The palace was gone.

The honors were gone.

The learning had become silence.

The strength of the body had disappeared.

Soon even the cell would belong to another.

Yet perhaps Arsenius had spent all those years learning precisely this:

that death is terrible chiefly because we spend our lives clinging to what death can take.

And the desert had slowly loosened his hands.

Not so that he would cease loving.

But so that he might love without possessing.

Not so that he would despise the world.

But so that he might receive everything as gift.

Not so that he would become indifferent to death.

But so that, when death finally came, there would be less and less between himself and Christ.

The brother walked into the gathering darkness.

Behind him there was only a poor cell, an old monk, and the silence of the desert.

And within that silence a man was preparing for his final renunciation:

to surrender even himself,

to open his empty hands,

and to fall into the mercy of God.