Elder Ephraim of Arizona: Making the Barren Desert Fertile

I feel only one thing rivals seeing and receiving the blessing of a living saint: being able to watch a crowd of people receive the same.

By the grace of God I was able to make a pilgrimage to St. Anthony’s Monastery in Arizona. While there I had the great blessing of seeing Elder Ephraim three times. He does not currently see people one-on-one like he used to, but he comes out almost every morning to greet the pilgrims. The fathers bring him in a car so that the elder (who is close to 90 years of age) can sit while greeting the people. Although the elder has become physically weakened in his old age the strength of his spirit, which is full of life and love for the people, in no way has diminished.

On the last day of our pilgrimage a significant crowd had gathered to wait for the elder as more pilgrims and nuns had arrived the day before. Just as on other days, the car pulled up so the people could receive the elder’s blessing. Each lined up to receive a cookie and an icon as they kissed the elder’s right hand.

I have great love and reverence for Elder Ephraim, a person who works tirelessly for the Lord, a person who (I believe) will be able, at the end of his life, to say with Christ, “I have glorified thee on earth: I have finished the work which thou gavest me to do” (John 17:4). So, you can understand that receiving his blessing means a great deal to me. But seeing others receive his blessing gives me even more joy.

You can tell a person is holy by the effect he or she has on other people. When you see the effect Elder Ephraim has on the people it’s impossible not to be reminded of St. Seraphim of Sarov’s famous quote: “Acquire the spirit of peace and a thousand around you will be saved”. This does not necessarily mean everyone will become a Christian, but it illustrates the depth of influence a person who has become holy has on his or her surrounding environment.

One just needs to look at the monastery gardens to be convinced that the natural beauty found there cannot simply be attributed to the monks’ commitment to water and weed. Driving through the Sonoran Desert – mostly bleak and barren – the lushness of the monastery’s gardens seems even more incredible. How is such a contrast possible? Because holiness has produced such gardens. The acquisition of the Holy Spirit (Who is the ‘spirit of peace’) not only affects the spiritual but the physical atmosphere. And so, the colourful and lush grounds and gardens of the monastery are a physical manifestation of the spiritual reality that has taken place: that because of one man’s commitment to the will and love of God he too has “made the barren desert fertile” as the apolytikion for the monastery’s patron, St. Anthony, reads.

I want to be like that man, to be like Elder Ephraim, who left the world he knew (the Holy Mountain) in order to labour in a foreign land (America) to share the sweetness of grace with his fellow man. Through his prayers I want to share the blessings I was given in Greece and elsewhere. But more than this I want to struggle to make the barren desert of my own heart fertile ground for the Holy Spirit so that myself and those around me may be saved.