Abbot Nesteros on the Three Kinds of Gifts

After the evening service we sat down together on the mats as usual, ready for the promised account. We kept silence for a little while out of reverence for the elder, and he broke in on the silence of our respect with words like these: The course of our earlier discussion brought us to explaining the order of spiritual gifts, which, as we have learned from the tradition of the elders, is threefold. The first is for the sake of healing, when the grace of signs goes with certain chosen and righteous men because of the merits of their holiness. It is clear that the apostles and many of the saints worked signs and wonders by the authority of the Lord, who says: “Heal the sick, raise the dead, cleanse the lepers, cast out demons: freely you have received, freely give.” [a]

The second is when, for the building up of the church, or because of the faith of those who bring their sick, or of those who are to be cured, the power of healing comes even from sinners and men unworthy of it. Of these the Savior says in the gospel: “Many will say to me on that day, Lord, Lord, did we not prophesy in your name, and in your name cast out demons, and in your name do many mighty works? And then I will declare to them: I never knew you; depart from me, you workers of lawlessness.” On the other hand, if the faith of those who bring the sick, or of the sick themselves, is lacking, it keeps those on whom the gifts of healing have been conferred from using their power to heal. On this subject Luke the Evangelist says: “And Jesus could not do any mighty work there because of their unbelief.” And so the Lord himself also says: “There were many lepers in Israel in the days of Elisha the prophet, and none of them was cleansed except Naaman the Syrian.”

The third kind of healing is a counterfeit, made by the deceit and scheming of demons. Their aim is this: when a man who is enslaved to open sins is regarded as a saint and a servant of God because people admire his miracles, others may be persuaded to copy his sins, and so, once an opening has been made for faultfinding, the holiness of religion may be brought into disgrace. Or else the man who believes he has the gift of healing may be puffed up by pride of heart and so fall more grievously. That is why the demons call on the names of men who, as they know, have no merits of holiness and no spiritual fruits, and pretend that by their merits they are troubled and made to flee from the bodies they have possessed. Of this Deuteronomy says: “If there rises up among you a prophet, or one who says he has seen a dream, and he declares a sign and a wonder, and what he has spoken comes to pass, and he says to you, Let us go and follow other gods whom you do not know, and let us serve them: you shall not listen to the words of that prophet or of that dreamer, for the Lord your God is testing you, to see whether you love him or not, with all your heart and with all your soul.” And in the gospel it says: “False Christs and false prophets will arise and will show great signs and wonders, so that, if it were possible, even the elect would be led astray.”