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

Self-knowledge is a true idea of one's spiritual growth, and an unbroken remembrance of one's slightest sins.

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

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

Every man that loves God loves a quiet life.

Almsgiving heals the soul's incensive power; fasting withers sensual desire; prayer purifies the intellect and prepares it for contemplation of created beings. For the Lord has given us commandments which correspond to the powers of the soul.

No virtue makes flesh-bound man so like a spiritual angel as does self-restraint, for it enables those still living on earth to become, as the Apostle says, 'citizens of heaven' (cf. Phil. 3:20).

Solitude offers us an excellent opportunity for calming our passions and giving our reason time to remove them thoroughly from our soul. For just as wild animals can be soothed by being stroked, so all our anger, fear and stress, which poison and disrupt our soul, can be soothed by an atmosphere of peace where the freedom from constant disturbance ensures that our soul can be brought more easily under the power of reason.

Nothing is better than to realize one's weakness and ignorance, and nothing is worse than not to be aware of them.

Self-control and strenuous effort curb desire; stillness and intense longing for God wither it.

A fish swiftly escapes a hook and a sensual soul shuns solitude.

Nothing is better for rendering the heart penitent and the soul humble than wise solitude and complete silence.

St. Paul says: 'The person engaged in spiritual warfare exercises self control in all things' (I Cor. 9:25). Aware of all that is said in divine Scripture, let us lead our life with self-control, especially in regard to food.

Love and self-control purify the soul.

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

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

If you lay down rules for yourself, do not disobey yourself; for he who cheats himself is self-deluded.

Nothing so fills the heart with contrition and humbles the soul as solitude embraced with self-awareness, and utter silence.

Lack of self-control is actually an evil both ancient and modern, though it did not precede its antidote, fasting. By means of our Forefathers' self-indulgence in paradise and their contempt for the fast already in existance there, death entered the world. Sin reigned and brought in the condemnation of our nature from Adam until Christ.

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

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440-526-5192 (Phone)