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

We must be patient and merciful towards sinners if we want our long-suffering God to be merciful to us.

Patience increases obedience to the Divine words that have been written, are being written, and will be written.

Patience must grow and not diminish, because when it diminishes sin increases in the life of man, evil results.

True patience grows with the growth of love. We put up with our neighbors to the extent that we love them. If you love, you are patient. If you cease loving, you will cease being patient. The less we love, the less patience we show. If we truly preserve patience in our souls, we are martyrs without being killed.

Affliction, if not accompanied by patience, produces double torment, for a man's patience casts off his distress, while faintness of heart is the mother of anguish. Patience is the mother of consolation and is a certain strength which is usually born of largeness of heart. It is hard for a man to find this strength in his tribulations without a gift from God, received through his ardent pursuit of prayer and the outpouring of his tears.

Patient endurance is the fruit of love, for 'love patiently endures all things' (I Cor. 13:7), and teaches us to achieve such endurance by forcing ourselves so that through patience we may attain love...

Blessed is he who, though maligned and disparaged every day for the Lord's sake, constrains himself to be patient. He will join the chorus of the martyrs, and boldly converse with the angels.

Do not be surprised that you fall every day; do not give up, but stand your ground courageously. And assuredly, the angel who guards you will honor your patience.

Patience is an unbroken labor of the soul which is never shaken by deserved or undeserved blows.

Persevere with patience in your prayer, and repulse the cares and doubts that arise within you.

If in time of trial a man does not patiently endure his affliction, but cuts himself off from the love of his spiritual brethren, he does not yet possess perfect love or a deep knowledge of divine providence.

When you receive from Heaven the gift of patience, be attentive and vigilant over yourself, so as to hold and keep within yourself the grace of God, lest sin should creep unnoticed into your soul or body and drive away this grace.

For preaching and instruction unto salvation are received with fruit only when listened to in patience. And, beloved brethren, among the varied ways along which the Church is divinely guided towards heaven, I do not find any more profitable to this present life, or more helpful in obtaining future glory, than that we, who with reverential fear and devotion place our trust in what the Lord has taught us, should hold most carefully to patience.

If we abandon our own desires and opinions, and endeavor to fulfill God’s wishes and understanding, we will save ourselves, no matter what our position, no matter what our circumstance. But if we cling to our own desires and opinions, neither position nor circumstance will be of help. Even in Paradise, Eve transgressed God’s commandment, and life with the Savior Himself brought the unfortunate Judas no good. As we read in the Holy Gospels, we require patience and an inclination to pious living.

Let the impatient be told what the Truth says to His elect: `In your patience you shall possess your souls.' Truly, we are so wonderfully created, that reason possesses the soul, and the soul possesses the body. But the soul is dispossessed of its right over the body, if it is not first possessed by reason. Therefore, the Lord has pointed out that patience is the guardian of our estate, for He taught us to possess ourselves in it. We, therefore, realize how great is the fault of impatience, seeing that by it we lose even the possession of what we are.

Do not want things to turn out as you would like, but want whatever happens. That way you will be at peace with everyone.

The Holy Fathers say, 'Pride goeth before a fall, and humility before grace.' Whereas faintheartedness is the mother of impatience.

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