The Way of A Pilgrim
Our thoughts determine our whole life. If our thoughts are destructive, we will have no peace, if they are quiet meek and simple, our life will be the same, and we will have peace within us. It will radiate from us and influence all beings around us – rational being, animals and even plants.
Our Thoughts Determine Our Lives
“Our life depends on the kind of thoughts we nurture. If our thoughts are peaceful, calm, meek, and kind, then that is what our life is like. If our attention is turned to the circumstances in which we live, we are drawn into a whirlpool of thoughts and can have neither peace nor tranquility.”
Why does the Lord command us to love our enemies and to pray for them? Not for their sake, but for ours! For as long as we bear grudges, as long as we dwell on how someone offended us, we will have no peace.
Our Thoughts Determine Our Lives
Brethren, let us nourish our souls with Christ, that our souls may be alive and healthy. Let us continually nourish our minds with Christ’s thoughts, that our minds might be enlightened and clear.
Let us continually nourish our hearts with the love of Christ, that our heart might be full and joyful.
February 28
Our starting point is always wrong. Instead of beginning with ourselves, we always want to change others first and ourselves last. If everyone were to begin first with themselves , then there would be peace all around!
Our Thoughts Determine Our Lives
“…starting with the man in the mirror
I’m asking him to change his ways
And no message could have been any clearer
If you want to make the world a better place
Take a look at yourself, and then make a change”
Michael Jackson Man in the Mirror
a new commandment I give to you,
that you love one another; as I have loved you.
John 13:34
These things I have spoken to you, that my joy may be in you,
and that your joy may be full.
John 15:11
Christian humility is not in any way a form of weakness, but just the opposite: it is strength in a person, although not human strength, but rather God’s strength.
My strength is made perfect in weakness , said the Lord to the Apostle Paul when the latter asked the Lord that the messenger of Satan that was buffeting him depart from him (2 Cor 12: 9).
Therefore, the Holy Apostle , understanding the significance of the Lord’s words, said: Most gladly I will rather boast in my infirmities, that the power of Christ may rest upon me ( 2 Cor 12: 9).
Man has free will, and therefore the grace or power of God is fully manifested in him only when he wholly gives himself over to God, that is, when he is permeated with the spirit of humility and obedience to God’s will.
Archbishop Averky
The Struggle for Virtue: Asceticism in a Modern Secular Society
O give thanks unto the Lord
for He is good
for His mercy endures forever…
This is the day that
the Lord has made
let us rejoice and be glad in it.
Psalm 118: 1 & 24
Fasting, in the Orthodox understanding, includes more than abstinence from certain types of food. It implies prayer, silence, and internal disposition of mind, an attempt to be charitable, kind, and – in one word – spiritual. “Brethren, while fasting bodily, let us also fast spiritually.”
Great Lend : A School of Repentance
It’s Meaning for Orthodox Christians
The Greek word for patience is hypomoni, which means “endurance.”… But patience also means endurance. The greatest form of patience, and its greatest test, is patience in the face of suffering— the ability to endure wrongs and afflictions patiently. It is rooted in humility, for the humble man does not consider himself worthy of more than he receives… That is why the humble man is patient with people.
Vassilios Papavassiliou
Reflections on the Triodion
gladsomelife.com 