What do we live for? Or rather, better stated, Who do we live for? As we come to the end of the Ladder of Divine Ascent, St. John speaks to us about the nature of Divine Love that is our destiny and dignity in Christ. We pursue the spiritual life for no abstract reason - not for moral perfection - not to satisfy a sense of religious duty. Nor are we driven by fear or anxiety as has sadly so often been the case. 
It has always been Love that beckons us forward, that gradually heals the wounds of our sin or the traumas that we have borne. Anything that obstructs our vision of love and the mercy, God desires to overcome. God has created us for himself, made us in his own image and likeness precisely that we might share in the fullness of his life. The nature of love is curative not punitive. 
St. John begins by speaking of those who keep in their imagination the face of the beloved and embrace it tenderly. This love often is so strong that it strips them even of the need for sleep or for food. The one who yearns for God says: “My soul thirsts for God, the mighty, the living God. The grace of this reality transforms nature to the point that even their countenance changes and is filled with the joy and the peace of the kingdom.
Furthermore, the pure of heart, the one who loves without impediment, is the truth theologian and so grasp the very nature of the most holy trinity. Their heart transformed by love shows itself in their love of neighbor, their intolerance for slander or anything that might diminish the other.
St. John also tells us that the power of love is in hope because by it we await the reward of love. Even when we cannot see, when we find ourselves wrapped in the darkness of the cross that we carry, it is in hope that we find rest and the reassurance of God‘s love for us .
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Text of chat during the group:
00:14:33 Bob Cihak, AZ: P. 245, # 16
 
00:27:24 Jeff O.: Seems like Psalm 1, Jeremiah 17, the river of life flowing in and through us producing within us fruit no matter what
 
00:30:04 Anna Lalonde: Is that the fear of reverence and awe of God?
 
00:31:17 Cindy Moran: I remember in a worldly being a love sick teenager and could care less about eating
 
00:32:30 David: Are there different levels of fear? I remember when I was a child my sister and I used to say the worst punishment was seeing disappointment from our mother and father not any correction. I sometimes feel more like this than trying to reconcile a loving God who has done so much and fire and brimstrone.
 
00:34:48 Myles Davidson: I love St. Isaacs view of hell as the love of God that is painful to those who have rejected Him
 
00:43:17 David: I love the mass no matter what but I often find homilies downloaded from sites which feel detached, not from the heart. I find the priest who speak of personal experience or their struggles capture the parish more. It seems there are administrators and holy men but they are often not in balance.
 
00:47:57 Jeff O.: St. Maximos’s “Questions 17-19” are great examples of examining the inner meaning of Scripture’s ‘enigmas’ with the fear of God (as he says). A higher reading, deeper reading - a mystical engagement with the Spirit that brings out the beautiful truths. He works out Exodus 4 with Moses and the angel threatening death into a beautiful way of describing the spiritual journey
 
00:48:54 Rebecca Therese: I heard someone say once that hell is a mercy for
those who feel tortured by the vision of God.
 
00:50:19 Nypaver Clan: Reacted to "I heard someone say ..." with ??
 
00:53:26 Francisco Ingham: We need less news and more nous
 
00:53:37 David: Reacted to "We need less news an..." with ?
 
00:53:45 Bob Cihak, AZ: Reacted to "We need less news an..." with ?
 
00:54:01 Myles Davidson: Reacted to "We need less news an..." with ?
 
01:02:20 Anna Lalonde: I call that domestic monastic as we do
 
01:12:15 Nick Bodmer: Wow, that's amazing, Fr. !
 
01:12:38 Serene Lai: How can we increase our hope?
 
01:14:49 Nypave