"Not as I want, but as God willing" Is an unthinkable story from the life of a famous Russian merchant who later became a monk.
Vasily Nikolayevich Muravyov is a successful entrepreneur and millionaire who often traveled abroad on commercial matters. After one of the trips, he returned to St. Petersburg, where his personal coachman was waiting for him.
On the way to the house, they met a strange peasant, sitting on the pavement, who was crying, hitting himself on the head and saying: "Not as you want, but as God willing," "Not as you want, but as God willing!"
Muravyov ordered to stop the carriage and called the peasant to find out what had happened. He said that in the village he had an old father and seven children. All are sick with typhoid. The food has run out, the neighbors are bypassing the house, fearing to get infected, and the last thing they have left is a horse. So his father sent him to the city to sell a horse and buy a cow so that he would somehow spend the winter with it and not die of hunger. The man sold the horse, but he never bought the cow: the money was taken from him by dashing people.
And now he sat on the road and cried out of despair, repeating like a prayer: “Not as you want, but as God willing! Not as you want, but as God willing! "
The master put the man next to him and ordered the coachman to go to the market. There I bought two horses with a cart, a milk cow, and also loaded the cart with food.
He tied the cow to the cart, gave the reins to the peasant and told him to go home to his family as soon as possible. The peasant did not believe his happiness, he thought, the master was joking, and he said: "Not as you want, but as God willing."
Muravyov returned to his home. He walks from room to room and reflects. The peasant's words hurt him in his heart, so he repeats everything in an undertone: “Not as you want, but as God willing! Not as you want, but as God willing! "
Suddenly, a personal hairdresser, who was supposed to cut his hair that day, comes into his room, throws himself at his feet and begins to lament: “Master, forgive me! Do not ruin the master! How do you know ?! The demon has beguiled me! By Christ God, I pray you, have mercy! "
And how in spirit he tells the dumbfounded master that he came to him this time to rob and stab him. Seeing the wealth of the owner, for a long time he conceived this dirty deed, and today he decided to fulfill it. Standing outside the door with a knife and suddenly hears the master say: "Not as you want, but as God willing!" Then fear fell on the villain and he realized that, no one knows how the master found out everything. Then he threw himself at his feet to repent and beg for forgiveness.
The master listened to him, and did not call the police, but let him go in peace. Then he sat down at the table and thought, what if it were not for the wretched man he met on the way and not his words: "Not as I want, but as God willing!" - to lie to him already dead with a slit throat.
Not as I want, but as God willing!
