When a person has become open to demonic influence, the devil can indeed grant him, or rather exercise through him, the considerable power of the devil naturally possesses as a spirit. Thus , such a man might gain great physical powers.. He might be able to alter his appearance, to speak with peculiar voices, to cause himself to levitate, or to make lights or different objects to appear. He may seem to be able to foretell events, and he may be able to reveal a person's hidden sins... MOreover, acting through demons, such a man can exploit others' imaginations in order to form images and sounds in their minds, and can bring about striking physical effects, such as cracking a mammoth tree or shattering a large boulder. I knew these phenomena well... And yet, despite the terrifying visage of the devil in his true form, a person who has opened his soul to the devil's power may appear to be quite virtuous.
On the other hand, when someone approaches God by keeping His commandments and participating in the Mysteries of Christ, God comes to abide in that person's soul. With the keeping of Christ's commandments, man shows his love for God, and when a man loves Christ, he will keep His words, and His Father will love him, and They will come unto him, and make their abode with him. Then man's soul is so closely united with God that he and God become one: He that is joined unto the Lord is one spirit (1Cor 6:17). Thus, man's soul experiences theosis and acquires by grace those traits that are God's by nature: immortality, light, glory, knowledge of the future and past, dominion over matter, authority over illness, and much more.
But we all, with open face beholding as in a glass the glory of the Lord, are changed into the same image from glory to glory (2Cor 3:18). In such a person, the light of Christ that is present in his soul is o intense that it also illumines his body, os that when that person so wills for reasons he knows best, he can reveal his soul's glory to others. He does os even as Christ revealed His divinity to His three disciples on Mount Tabor: Jesus taketh Peter, James, and John his brother, and bringeth them up into an high mountain apart, and was transfigured before them: and His face did shine as the sun, and His raiment was white as the light (Matt 17:1-2).
In time I realized the father Paisios could also be numbered in the company of these God bearers. By his words, deeds, and life, he manifested it is a special, supernatural way.
From The Gurus, The Young Man, And The Elder Paisios, by Dionysios Farasiotis, pp 261-263
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