When it is said
It stands near the end of Small Compline, the Orthodox Church’s short service after supper, just before the closing blessing. It also ends Great Compline, the longer form of that service, and the Midnight Office, the service said at midnight. Russian prayer books put it among the prayers before sleep. In each place it is said once.
Where it comes from
Author by tradition
A soldier who became a hermit
Ioannikios was born poor in Bithynia, in what is now Turkey. He served six years in the emperor’s army. Then he spent two years in a monastery, where he learned to read and learned 30 psalms by heart. After that he went to live alone in the wilderness. He died on 4 November 846.
Orthodox Church in America, St Joannicius (Ioannikios) the Great
The line in his biography
The monk Sabas wrote an account of Ioannikios within about a dozen years of his death. It says he praised God with his 30 psalms and was content with one small line: “My hope is God, my refuge is Christ, my shelter is the Holy Spirit.” An earlier account, by the monk Peter, does not have the line.
Life of Ioannikios by Sabas, Dumbarton Oaks hagiography database; Life of Ioannikios by Peter, Dumbarton Oaks hagiography database
What the words mean
From “God” to “the Father”
In the account by the monk Sabas, the line says “God” and “Christ”. Sabas explains that Ioannikios did not mean that God the Father alone is our hope, or Christ alone our refuge. Hope, refuge and shelter belong to all three, the one God. The prayer now names “the Father” and “the Son”, and ends “O Holy Trinity, glory to You.”
Life of Ioannikios by Sabas, Dumbarton Oaks hagiography database; Orthodox Church in America, St Joannicius (Ioannikios) the Great
The Scripture in it
I will say to the LORD, “You are my refuge and my fortress, my God, in Whom I trust.”
For You are my hope, O Lord GOD, my confidence from my youth.
Bible text: Berean Standard Bible, public domain.
In Greek
Ἡ ἐλπίς μου ὁ Πατήρ,
καταφυγή μου ὁ Υἱός,
σκέπη μου τὸ Πνεῦμα τὸ Ἅγιον·
Τριὰς Ἁγία, δόξα Σοι.