Your words ask for a favorable result from a physician and safe passage over the roads, yet the prayer of the faithful gathered here must reach higher, for we bow our knees and entreat God for things to the very thought of which some do not easily arrive. We ask nothing of things present, having no regard for these. What we seek is that your son may sail over the angry sea of this toilsome life with a favorable wind and, with a pure conscience, stand with boldness before the fearful judgment seat. A calm highway is a small mercy if his soul travels a road that ends in ruin.
You seek safety in travel. See then the wisdom of Gamaliel, who taught prudence. If this appointment or this journey is of men, done merely for the body, do not be overthrown by anxiety over it. But if it is of God as a step toward the healing of the soul, all your fears cannot hinder His work. Do not go to work rashly in your heart, letting passion intoxicate you. Refrain from demanding a specific earthly outcome, lest haply you be found fighting against God, who alone appoints the time and manner of our earthly course. The Son of God Himself withdrew into Galilee, teaching us not to cast ourselves headlong into the path of danger nor to demand of God that He smooth every stone, for the failing to stand manfully in trial is the real disaster.
When you pray for a favorable result, understand what is truly favorable. The Son of God was made man for your son, freed him from the deceit of demons, and called him to a kingdom. Those who delay to come to the great Physician of souls, who postpone the Baptism that drowns the old man in an ocean of blessings, are the ones who truly lack safety. The danger is not a difficult diagnosis but a heart still clad in rags, unwashed, approaching the King’s feast unprepared. For if we have ungrateful hearts, God may turn away, and what consolation in life is left for him whom the demons take up?
So we will entreat the God who is the object of our hymns. We will ask not merely that your son’s body know a fleeting calm but that you both escape the darkness of the devil, pass through this life worthy of the faith, and hear not that tearful voice saying, “I know you not.” Let us beseech God to grant your son a life worthy of the gospel, that His name not be blasphemed. Bear this fruit, and you shall be found having God’s grace safe in that day, with your son beside you, celebrating an everlasting feast.