SACRAMENTAL LIVING

“ [‘For though He was crucified in weakness, yet He lives by the power of God. For we also are weak in Him, but we shall live with Him by the power of God toward you.’ (2 Cor 13:4]…This is a difficult passage which causes problems for many people. What is meant here by “weakness”? In Scripture weakness can refer to bodily illness, and it can also mean not being securely grounded in faith. But there is a third possibility, and that is what we find here. Weakness can mean perse

“There are two ways in which the prayer of a righteous man is effective. The first is when the person praying does so by offering to God his works done according to His commands. Then the prayer is not just a matter of words, blurted out meaninglessly with the empty echo of the tongue, but powerful and living and inspired with the spirit of the commandments. For the true basis of prayer and supplication is the fulfillment of the commandments by virtue. This makes the prayer o

“…when we are constantly giving thanks, for both small and big things, even for the things and experiences that challenge us, then God feels very near. When we are thanking God for our daily blessings, for food, for shelter, for a warm coat on a cold day, for the basic health and intelligence of our children, then we remember that it is a gift and that it could be very different. That I have a job in a stable economy is a gift, it is guaranteed to no one. That I have a roof o

“God is a God of order, That is what He is doing when He creates the world as we read in Genesis. He is ordering it, moving things from disorder to order. Moving from evening to morning, night to day, darkness to light, is a movement from disorder to order. In the Hebrew Old Testament the word for evening is erev (air-rev). The root of this word is disorder or chaos. The word used for morning is boker (bo-kare) and it comes from the root or words that means “being orderly” an

“Asceticism does not consist of prohibitions. Asceticism is activity, a working out, a perfection of oneself . . . inspired by the task of inspiration…When you have no theology of asceticism because you believe you’ve got salvation wrapped up, then cultivating virtue has no incentive. All that’s left is activism and activities.” (Father Georges Florovsky, Father Andrew Stephen Damick) “In the first stage a man turns from darkness to light, from the domain of Satan to God; in

“Even if we do not constantly struggle against “murders, adulteries, fornications, thefts, false witness, blasphemies” (Matthew 12:19), all of us have evil thoughts! We are all defiled before God…We must earnestly address the impurity in our heart, that secret defilement which spawns both evil thoughts and actions. The impure heart is the greatest barrier between ourselves and God, for it separates us from Him who alone is able to restore in us the power to do good.” (Dynamis

“It is impossible to know God and not know the self. It is also the case that it is impossible to know the self and not know God. St. Gregory of Nyssa described the soul as a “mirror.” And though this image can be abused, it is, nevertheless, the case that it is within the soul that we see and encounter God. The search for God is thus a search for the self as well. If these are authentic, they tend to occur together.” (Father Stephen Freeman) “…we believe that God is in the “

“Because God created all things through Christ, He will transform and reunite all things—material as well as spiritual—to Himself through Christ.” (Orthodox Study Bible, 2 Corinthians 5:16-17) “The reality that we see is “transient,” it “passes away.” There is, however, a Reality (the unseen) that is eternal. It is this that cannot be shaken. There is a relationship between the two. When we think of the Incarnation of Christ, we see not the change of the material world (Chris

“There are very few people who come to their senses, very few who understand life. We pray with our lips only, and we hurry through our prayers to “get it over with” as soon as possible, and then we lose peace. Fasting and prayer are a means of embellishing our soul and bringing it back to its original state.” (Elder Thaddeus of Vitovnica) “...God’s answers [to prayers] come from God’s perspective. They are not always in harmony with our expectations, for only he knows the wh

“For nothing so weighs upon the soul, and presses it down, as consciousness of sin; nothing so gives it wings, and raise it on high, as the attainment of righteousness and virtue…” (St. John Chrysostom) “The Lord is the Author of the virtues (knowledge with righteousness). Man cannot have the Lord without the virtues, nor can he have the virtues without the Lord. Therefore, when man seeks the Lord and finds Him, he will also find the virtues of which He is the Author. Those w