If we were willing to make even small efforts, we would not suffer either distress or difficulty. For if a man urges himself to make efforts, then, as he continues them, he gradually makes progress and later practices virtues with tranquility; for God, seeing him urge himself, sends him help. So let us urge ourselves, for, although we have not reached perfection, if we make efforts, through efforts we shall receive help, and with this help shall acquire all kinds of virtues. Therefore one of the fathers said, 'Give blood and receive spirit,' that is, strive and you will become practiced in virtue.
Believe that dishonors and reproaches are medicines that heal the pride of thy soul, and pray for those who reproach thee, as for true physicians of thy soul, being assured that he who hates dishonor, hates humility, and he who avoids those who grieve him, flees from meekness.
If a man has a friend and he is absolutely certain that his friend loves him, and if that friend does something to cause him suffering and be troublesome to him, he will be convinced that his friend acts out of love and he will never believe that his friend does it to harm him. How much more ought we to be convinced about God who created us, who drew us out of nothingness to existence and life, and who became a man for our sake and died for us, and who does everything out of love for us?
When a passion arises, when it is young and feeble, cut it off, lest it stiffen and cause you a great deal of trouble. It is one thing to pluck out a small weed and quite another thing to uproot a great tree.
Those who want to be saved scrutinize not the shortcomings of their neighbor but always their own and they set about eliminating them. Such was the man who saw his brother doing wrong and groaned, `Woe is me; him today-me tomorrow!' You see his caution? You see the preparedness of his mind? How he swiftly foresaw how to avoid judging his brother? When he said `me tomorrow' he aroused his fear of sinning, and by this he increased his caution about avoiding those sins which he was likely to commit, and so he escaped judging his neighbor; and he did not stop at this, but put himself below his brother, saying, `He has repented for his sin but I do not always repent. I am never first to ask for forgiveness and I am never completely converted.'
Therefore, let us force ourselves. Let us make a beginning and let us desire the good with all our heart. Because, even if we are not perfect, wanting to be, is the beginning of our salvation. From wanting we come, with God’s help, to struggling and from struggling one is helped in acquiring the virtues. This is why one of the fathers says, 'Give blood and receive spirit,' that is to say, 'Struggle and you will become accustomed to virtue.'
Therefore, let us force ourselves. Let us make a beginning and let us desire the good with all our heart. Because, even if we are not perfect, wanting to be, is the beginning of our salvation. From wanting we come, with God’s help, to struggling and from struggling one is helped in acquiring the virtues. This is why one of the fathers says, 'Give blood and receive spirit', that is to say, 'Struggle and you will become accustomed to virtue.'
We must through tribulation enter into the kingdom of God (Acts 14:22).The tribulations draw the mercy of God to the soul like the wind moves the rain. As the rain, if it falls very heavily when a plant is young and delicate, it will rot the plant and the fruit will be lost, while the wind will dry out a plant in part and secure it, so it is with the soul. Relaxation, carefreeness and comfort make it flabby and dissolute but temptations fortify it and unite it to God...
Wherefore a man can know nothing about the judgments of God. He alone is the One Who takes account of all and is able to judge the hearts of each one of us, as He alone is our Master. Truly it happens that a man may do a certain thing (which seems to be wrong) out of simplicity, and there may be something about it which makes more amends to God than your whole life; how are you going to sit in judgment and constrict your own soul? And should it happen that he has fallen away, how do you know how much and how well he fought, how much blood he sweated before he did it? Perhaps so little fault can be found in him that God can look on his action as if it were just, for God looks on his labor and all the struggle he had before he did it, and has pity on him. And you know this, and what God has spared him for, are you going to condemn him for, and ruin your own soul? And how do you know what tears he has shed about it before God? You may well know about the sin, but you do not know about the repentance.
Joseph was amazed as he saw what was supernatural. He understood, O Virgin, the rain upon the fleece In thy conception without seed. And he understood the bush that burned without fire and was unconsumed, And Aaron's rod, which blossomed. Indeed, thy betrothed and guardian cried out to the priests: 'A virgin gives birth, and after the birth remains a virgin.'
The person who truly comes to serve God must prepare his soul, as it says in the Wisdom of Sirach (2:1), for temptations. Thus, that he will never be surprised or disturbed by what happens, believing that nothing happens without the providence of God and where there is the providence of God certainly what happens is good and for the benefit of the soul. For, everything that God does, He does for our benefit and because He loves us and has pity on us. We must, as the Apostle says, 'In everything give thanks' (1 Thess. 5:18), for His goodness.
The guarding of the conscience with regard to one’s neighbor is doing absolutely nothing at all that we know will upset or wound him, either by deed, word, gesture or even a glance. Even a gesture, can wound one’s neighbor. Briefly, man infects his conscience by deliberately doing those things that he knows will provoke his neighbor and will harm and embarrass him. Therefore, to keep one’s conscience and not act in this manner, is what we mean by keeping our conscience towards our neighbor.
With such a welcome does the representation of the Virgin's form cheer us, inviting us to draw not from a bowl of wine, but from a fair spectacle, by which the rational part of our soul, being watered through our bodily eyes, and given eyesight in its growth towards the divine love of Orthodoxy, puts forth in the way of fruit the most exact vision of truth. Thus, even in her images does the Virgin's grace delight, comfort and strengthen us! A virgin mother carrying in her pure arms, for the common salvation of our kind, the common Creator reclining as an infant - that great and ineffable mystery of the Dispensation! A virgin mother, with a virgin's and a mother's gaze, dividing in indivisible form her temperament between both capacities, yet belittling neither by its incompleteness.
