Words from the Saints -- January 7, 2021

"If love is the fulfilling of the law (Romans 13:10), he who is full of rancor towards his neighbor and lays traps for him and curses him, exulting in his fall, must surely be a transgressor deserving eternal punishment." --St. Maximos the Confessor

"The will of man is a brass wall between him and God and a stone of stumbling. When a man renounces it, he is also saying to himself, 'By my God, I can leap over the wall' (Psalm 18:29). If a man's will is in line with what is right, then he can really labor." --St. Poemen

"Through the Holy Spirit comes our restoration to paradise, our ascension into the kingdom of heaven, our return to the adoption of sons, our liberty to call God our Father, our being made partakers of the grace of Christ, our being called children of light, our sharing in eternal glory, and, in a word, our being brought into a state of all “fullness of blessing,” both in this world and in the world to come, of all the good gifts that are in store for us, by promise hereof, through faith, beholding the reflection of their grace as though they were already present, we await the full enjoyment." --St. Basil the Great

"Troubles are usually the brooms and shovels that smooth the road to a good man’s fortune; and many a man curses the rain that falls upon his head, and knows not that it brings abundance to drive away hunger." --St. Basil the Great

"What, my friends, do we think love is if not fire? And what is sin if not rust? Hence it is said that 'many sins are forgiven her because she has loved much' (Luke 7:47). This means she has completely burned away the rust of sin because she is mightily aflame with the fire of love. The more the heart of a sinner is consumed by the fire of love, the more fully is the rust of sin consumed." --St. Gregory Dialogos, Pope of Rome

"A man who is carried away by his thoughts is blinded by them; and while he can see the actual working of sin, he cannot see its causes." --St. Mark the Ascetic