The Sunflower: Conforming the Will of Man to the Will of God

"May our love for the Sun, the will of God, be as strong as the sunflower's, so that even in days of hardship and sorrow we will continue to sail unerringly along the sea of life, following the directions of the barometer and compass of God's will that leads us to the safe haven of eternity." This is a thoroughly practical manual of the spiritual life focusing on the central goal of every Christian: learning the will of God and struggling to mold our life to it, just as Christ "humbled Himself and became obedient." (Phil. 2:8) Even more fundamentally, St John addresses the question of why we should care about God's will. Finally, the reader will find eternal wisdom running through these writings on questions of theodicy, free will, and Divine Providence. This work is reminiscent of the classic textEUnseen WarfareEin its historical genesis as an Orthodox redaction of an originally Roman Catholic text. First published in 1627 asEThe HeliotropiumEit was the work of a German Jesuit writer Jeremias Drexelius. The future St John adapted this text for an Orthodox audience as a student and then teacher at the Kiev Academy in the 1670's but it was not published until 1714, just a year before the author's death. This is the first English edition of St John's text, further edited and abbreviated for the contemporary reader. AUTHOR: St John Maximovitch (1651-1715) was Metropolitan of Tobolsk and all Siberia. His veneration among the people grew after his repose to the point that he was canonized by the Russian Church in 1916. Nicholas Kotar is a graduate of Holy Trinity Orthodox Seminary in Jordanville, NY. He is an translator of many spiritual works in the Russian Orthodox tradition.

About the Author :
St John Maximovitch (1651-1715) was Metropolitan of Tobolsk and all Siberia. His veneration among the people grew after his repose to the point that he was canonized by the Russian Church in 1916. Deacon Nicholas Kotar is a recent graduate of Holy Trinity Seminary and an assistant editor at Holy Trinity Publications in Jordanville, NY. He also has a degree in Russian Literature from UC Berkeley. Having begun conducting with the youth choir in the Holy Virgin Cathedral in San Francisco, Nicholas helped establish the St John of San Francisco Men’s Chorale, which has released two disks to date: Rejoice in Song and Chrysostom. Currently he conducts the monastery and seminary choir at Holy Trinity Monastery in Jordanville. He is also a founding member of Conquering Time, an ensemble of performance, visual, and literary artists inspired by the Inklings that stages original works of storytelling and traditional music and publishes new poetry and prose.