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

How destructive to the heart is even momentary attachment for anything earthly.

When one gets angry, he is deprived of God's protection.

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

According to the teaching of the Fathers, any impression which, touching the heart, fills it with a great irritation, must come from the region of passions. Therefore impulses which spring from the heart should not be followed at once, but only after careful examination and fervent prayer. God preserve us from a blind heart! It is well known that passions do blind the heart and screen the shining sun of the mind that we should all strive to gaze at.

Unless a man keeps the commandments of God, he cannot progress, even in a single virtue.

Make the body serve the commandments, keeping it so far as possible free from sickness and sensual pleasure.

Prayer is the seed of gentleness and the absence of anger.

In the heart is the will; in the heart is love; in the heart is the mind--in the heart is the image of the divine Trinity. The heart is the home of the Father, the altar of the Son and the workshop of the Holy Spirit. God wants our hearts: Son, give Me thy heart. Oh, my brother, above and beyond all else that you keep safe, guard your heart. Let the mountains be overthrown and the seas dried up; let friends forsake you and riches betray you; let your body be eaten by worms; let the world pour on you all the scorn of which it is capable--and do not fear. Only guard your heart; guard it and make it cleave to the Lord; give it into His keeping. Life flows from the heart; but whence comes this life in the heart, unless it is the abode of the breath of the Lord and Source of life-God? Oh, my brother, the Spirit of God Himself can, when He so desires, dwell in the human heart. He not only can, but wills to do so. Only, He waits for you to prepare your heart for Him; to make it into a temple, for God the Holy Spirit only lives in a temple. As a snake protects its head, so, my son, guard your heart. For the life that comes from the living God enters into it and flows forth from it.

How then shall we escape the disasters that anger brings? By training the force of our feelings not to rush ahead of the power of reason.

Truly, arrogance knows that it is guilty; therefore it places anger at the gate, to act as its sentry.

It is necessary most of all for one who is fasting to curb anger, to accustom himself to meekness and condescension, to have a contrite heart, to repulse impure thoughts and desires, to examine his conscience, to put his mind to the test and to verify what good has been done by us in this or any other week, and which deficiency we have corrected in ourselves in the present week. This is true fasting.

If you have a heart, you can be saved.

The heart is the home of the Father, the altar of the Son and the workshop of the Holy Spirit.

Long-suffering and readiness to forgive curb anger; love and compassion wither it.

Not every man is wakened to wonder by what is said spiritually and has great power concealed in it. A word concerning virtue has need of a heart unbusied with the earth and its converse.

When a valve of the heart closes to the receptivity of worldly enjoyments, another valve opens for the reception of spiritual joys.

Do not let the sun go down on the anger of your brother (Eph. 4:26); that is, let no one be angry and enraged against his brother until the setting of the sun.

Through anger the brightness of the Holy Spirit is shut out from the soul.

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

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