A collection of scriptural meditations from Saints and Fathers of the Church.

Leaves, whether of gold or lead, placed over the eyes, obstruct the sight equally, for the value of gold does not affect the blindness it produces. Similarly, anger, whether reasonable or unreasonable, obstructs our spiritual vision.

We are sons of God or of Satan according to whether we conform to goodness or to evil.

Self-love -- that is, friendship for the body -- is the source of evil in the soul.

Fear of the Lord conquers desire, and distress that accords with God's will repulses sensual pleasure.

Control your stomach, sleep, anger, and tongue, and you will not 'dash your foot against a stone.'

Temptations are sent for improvement when God delivers his righteous ones to various temptations, humiliating them for some slight and unimportant offense, or to increase their purity, in order that every uncleanliness of thought, or... dross which He sees they have harbored in secret, may be burnt away in this present life, and that so He may bring them, as it were pure gold, to the future judgment...

Do not neglect the practice of the virtues; if you do, your spiritual knowledge will decrease, and when famine occurs you will go down into Egypt (Genesis 41:57, 46:6).

Break the bonds of your friendship for the body and give it only what is absolutely necessary.

All sin is due to sensual pleasure, all forgiveness to hardship and distress.

Keep the commandments, and you will find peace; love God, and you will attain spiritual knowledge.

The enemy is within ourselves. An invisible war is taking place within us. If interior evil is defeated, then the external, weaker, foe will surrender.

The greatest weapons of someone striving to lead a life of inward stillness are self-control, love, prayer, and spiritual reading.

Just as desire and rage multiply our sins, so self-control and humility erase them.

If you are not willing to repent through freely choosing to suffer, unsought sufferings will providentially be imposed on you.

Love and self-control purify the soul.

How great the evil of pride is, that it deserves to have as its adversary not an angel or other virtues contrary to it but rather God Himself! For it must be noted that it is never said of those who are caught up in the other vices that the Lord resists them, or that the Lord is set against the gluttonous, or fornicators, or the angry, or the avaricious; this is true of the proud alone. For those vices only turn back upon wrongdoers or seem to be committed against those who have a part in them -- that is, against other human beings. This one, however, of its very nature touches God, and therefore it is specially worthy of having God opposed to it.

Struggle until death to fulfill the commandments: purified through them, you will enter into life.

Fasts and vigils, the study of Scripture, renouncing possessions and everything worldly are not in themselves perfection, as we have said; they are its tools. For perfection is not to be found in them; it is acquired through them. It is useless, therefore, to boast of our fasting, vigils, poverty, and reading of Scripture when we have not achieved the love of God and our fellow men. Whoever has achieved love has God within himself and his intellect is always with God.

Parish

Mailing Address

Archangel Michael Orthodox Church
5025 E. Mill Rd
Broadview Heights, Ohio 44147

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440-526-5192 (Phone)