Sonship Through Sorrows
“You need not be despondent. Let those be despondent who do not believe in God. For them sorrow is burdensome, of course, because besides earthly enjoyment they have nothing. But believers must not be despondent, for through sorrows they receive the right of sonship, without which is impossible to enter the Kingdom of Heaven.”
-St. Barsanuphius of Optina
#depression #sorrows #heaven
(Photo: Our monastic community was delighted to have Metropolitan Jonah visit us for a few days.)
Saturday December 14, 2024 / December 1, 2024
25th Week after Pentecost. Tone seven.
Nativity (St. Philip’s Fast). Fish Allowed
Prophet Nahum (7th c. B.C.).
Righteous Philaret the Merciful of Amnia in Asia Minor (792).
Martyr Ananias of Persia.
St. Eligius, bishop of Noyon (660) (Neth.).
St. Onesimus, archbishop of Ephesus (Greek).
Sts. Ananias and Solochonus, archbishops of Ephesus (Greek).
Venerable Anthony the New, monk of Kios in Bithynia (865) (Greek).
Venerable Ioannicus of Devich (Serbia).
St. Austremoine, first bishop of Clermont and apostle of the Auvergne (3rd c.).
St. Theoclites, bishop of Sparta (870).
St. Botolph, of Boston (England), abbot and confessor (680) (Celtic & British).
St. Tudwal, bishop of Lan Pabu.
The Scripture Readings
3
Grace to you and peace from God the Father and our Lord Jesus Christ,
4
who gave Himself for our sins, that He might deliver us from this present evil age, according to the will of our God and Father,
5
to whom be glory forever and ever. Amen.
6
I marvel that you are turning away so soon from Him who called you in the grace of Christ, to a different gospel,
7
which is not another; but there are some who trouble you and want to pervert the gospel of Christ.
8
But even if we, or an angel from heaven, preach any other gospel to you than what we have preached to you, let him be accursed.
9
As we have said before, so now I say again, if anyone preaches any other gospel to you than what you have received, let him be accursed.
10
For do I now persuade men, or God? Or do I seek to please men? For if I still pleased men, I would not be a bondservant of Christ.
32
Do not fear, little flock, for it is your Father’s good pleasure to give you the kingdom.
33
Sell what you have and give alms; provide yourselves money bags which do not grow old, a treasure in the heavens that does not fail, where no thief approaches nor moth destroys.
34
For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also.
35
Let your waist be girded and your lamps burning;
36
and you yourselves be like men who wait for their master, when he will return from the wedding, that when he comes and knocks they may open to him immediately.
37
Blessed are those servants whom the master, when he comes, will find watching. Assuredly, I say to you that he will gird himself and have them sit down to eat, and will come and serve them.
38
And if he should come in the second watch, or come in the third watch, and find them so, blessed are those servants.
39
But know this, that if the master of the house had known what hour the thief would come, he would have watched and not allowed his house to be broken into.
40
Therefore you also be ready, for the Son of Man is coming at an hour you do not expect.
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