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“Anoint my heart with the oil of Your Mercy, my Most Merciful Lord.”
“O Lord, my hope in despair. O Lord, my strength in weakness. O Lord, my light in darkness. Place just one finger on my forehead and I shall be raised.”
“Why should we Pray,” grumble my neighbours, “when God knows what we need beforehand?” But I sadly answer them: “That is true, God knows that you need nothing except Him alone. At the door of your Soul He is waiting to come in. Through Prayer the doors are opened for the entrance of the Majestic King. Does not one of you say to the other at your door: ‘Please enter’?”
“What a man thinks and feels as he Prays to God is more important to God than the words his tongue forms. The tongue is capable of delusion, but the heart does not delude: it shows a man as he is – black or white”
“It is a fact that the Eternal God listens to us – corruptible as we are – more than we listen to Him.”
“Brethren, we cannot here on Earth implore a greater good from God than the Grace of God. If we were to receive the entire universe as a gift, that gift would be less than the Grace of God.”
“Expand and deepen your Soul with Prayer, and you will begin to cry over the mystery of the world bitterly and vehemently. Make your heart prayerful, together with your Soul and your mind, and they will become inexhaustible fountainheads of tears for all mankind.”
“Where Prayer is absent, pride is present.”
“A drop of Prayer is worth more than a sea of worrying.”
“For if God does not for a moment tire of giving us good things, how can we tire of thanking Him for these good things?”
“Above all things you should think of God because God thinks of you before all.”
“Prayer is incense, that ceaselessly censes my Soul and raises it toward You.”
“Do you know what the words “To You, Lord” mean? At the end of any ektene, when appealing to the Praying people to completely surrender to the Lord, a Deacon or Priest says, “Let us commit ourselves and one another and our whole life to Christ our God!” And the Praying people answer, “To You, Lord!” These words are very important. They can be applied in any life situation. When you are in good health and successful at work, raise up your heart and say, “It is thanks to You, Lord!” When people respect and praise you, say to yourself, do not deserve this, praise is not to me, but to You, Lord!” When you send your children to school, or they go to work, or join the army, then bless them and say “I commend my children to Your care – to You, Lord!” When people envy you or a friend betrays you, do not lose heart or hold any grudges, but say, “I leave all this to Your righteous judgment – to You, Lord!” When you are following the coffin, escorting the dearest person to his final resting place, walk bravely as if you are carrying a gift to your best Friend, and say, “I bring this beloved Soul to You, Lord!” When the dark clouds of demonic temptations, sorrows and sicknesses gather over you, do not despair, but say, “For help and mercy, I turn to You, Lord!” When the Angel of death stands beside your bed, do not be afraid of him, for he is your friend, but say goodbye to this world and say, I commend my repentant Soul into Your hands, Lord!”
“Prayer was ordained for us by God, not in order for Him to find out what we need – He knows even before we are conceived what we are going to need at every moment of our life – but in order for our Souls to grow, expand, ripen and be exalted under the beams of Prayer. If He does not fulfill our Prayers immediately, that means that He does not want things to happen to us the way we want them, but the way He wants them to. In that case, He is wanting and preparing something for us that is much greater and better than what we are asking for in Prayer. Therefore, we should end each Prayer with the humble words, ‘Father, Thy will be done, not mine.'”
“Why does it say: he Prayed with himself? Why not aloud? Because God listens more carefully to what his heart says than his lips. What a man thinks and feels as he Prays to God is more important to God than the words his tongue forms. The tongue is capable of delusion, but the heart does not delude: it shows a man as he is – black or white.”