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

If you have received from God the gift of knowledge, however limited, beware of neglecting charity and temperance. They are virtues which radically purify the soul from passions and so open the way of knowledge continually.

Do not hate the sinner. Become a proclaimer of God's grace, seeing that God provides for you even though you are unworthy.

Understand what I say: there can be no knowledge of the mysteries of God on a full stomach.

Being delivered from bodily sins is not enough, we must also cleanse the inner energy which dwells in our souls.

Greater therefore is the rejoicing of heaven over the sinner converted than upon the soul that remained just. A captain in battle will feel a warmer regard for the soldier who at first faltered and ran, and then had bravely fought back, than over the one who had never yielded yet had never thrust bravely forward. So will the farmer love more the fields that cleaned of their weeds now bear a fruitful yield, than the land which had never known thorns, yet had never yielded a bountiful crop.

One who is capable of seeing himself is better than one who has been made worthy to see angels.

Do not stir up a memory that will cover your prayer with mud, do not root around in the soil of your old sins.

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

For never is a man forced into sin by another’s fault, unless he have, stowed away in his heart, matter for evil deeds. Nor is a man to be held a victim of sudden deception if at the sight of a woman’s beauty he fall into an abyss of vile lust. Rather is it that diseases of soul, deeply hidden away and lost to view, come then to the surface on the occasion of the sight.

Sin, to one who loves God, is nothing other than an arrow from the enemy in battle. The true Christian is a warrior fighting his way through the regiments of the unseen enemy to his heavenly homeland.

If a person swallows too much food, he is inviting impure thoughts. If he mortifies the stomach, he is creating pure thoughts. Often a lion if it is caressed becomes domesticated, whereas the more you coddle the body, the more it goes wild.

Believe me, brethren, the more we are now in earnest to keep ourselves free from sin, the more confident shall we then be in His Presence.

If however any one thinks that he is not being burned when sinning, to him the Scripture saith, Shall a man wrap up fire in his bosom, and not burn his clothes? For sin burns the sinews of the soul, and breaks the spiritual bones of the mind, and darkens the light of the heart.

Woe is he who knowingly chooses to sin with the intention to repent when morning comes, for he knows not what the coming day or the night that precedes it will bring.

The only thing God requires of us is that we do not sin. But this is achieved, not by acting according to the law, but by carefully guarding the divine image in us and our supernal dignity. When we thus live in our natural state, wearing the resplendent robe of the Spirit, we dwell in God and God dwells in us. Then we are called gods by adoption and sons of God, sealed by the light of the knowledge of God.

Every man who has committed sin, has stopped up the senses of his soul with the mud of pleasure.

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

If you feel no pang in committing minor offences you will through them fall into major transgressions.

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

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440-526-5192 (Phone)