The Ignored Heart is a Lost Heart
It is important that we direct all our thoughts, all our actions, and all our desires towards a burning love for God. Our heart must become inflamed with the love of God, and all our intellectual and emotional striving must be directed towards the development of the heart, for the Kingdom of God is within. When we seek the Lord with all humility, and keep His commandments, love takes the heart by storm, and joy resides in us. If we ignore the spiritual life, and make no effort to join our heart to God, our heart will be lost, for an ignored heart is a lost heart.
With love in Christ,
Abbot Tryphon
Monday March 25, 2024 / March 12, 2024
Second Week of the Great Lent. Tone one.
Great Lent. By Monastic Charter: Strict Fast (Bread, Vegetables, Fruits)
Venerable Theophanes the Confessor of Sigriane (818).
St. Alexander confessor priest (1933).
New Hieromartyrs John, Constantine priests, New Hieromartyr Vladimir (1938).
New Hieromartyr Sergius priest (1943).
Righteous Phineas, grandson of Aaron (1500 B.C.).
St. Gregory the Dialogist, pope of Rome (604).
Venerable Symeon the New Theologian (1022) and his elder Symeon the Reverent of the Studium (987).
The Lydda Icon of the Mother of God Not-Made-by-Hands (1st c.).
Righteous Aaron the High Priest, brother of Prophet Moses the God-Seer.
Venerable Cyrus, monk of Alexandria (6th c.).
St. Alphege, bishop of Winchester, England (951) (Celtic & British).
St. Paul, bishop of Leon in Brittany (572).
St. Nicodemus of Mammola in Calabria (990).
Restoration of the Autocephaly of the Georgian Apostolic Church (1917) (Georgia).
St. Demetre the Devoted, King of Georgia (1289) (Georgia).
St. Theoctistus Dragutin of Serbia (1316).
The Scripture Readings
Hebrews 6:13-20
God’s Infallible Purpose in Christ
13 For when God made a promise to Abraham, because He could swear by no one greater, He swore by Himself, 14 saying, “Surely blessing I will bless you, and multiplying I will multiply you.” 15 And so, after he had patiently endured, he obtained the promise. 16 For men indeed swear by the greater, and an oath for confirmation is for them an end of all dispute. 17 Thus God, determining to show more abundantly to the heirs of promise the immutability of His counsel, confirmed it by an oath, 18 that by two immutable things, in which it is impossible for God to lie, we might have strong consolation, who have fled for refuge to lay hold of the hope set before us.
19 This hope we have as an anchor of the soul, both sure and steadfast, and which enters the Presence behind the veil, 20 where the forerunner has entered for us, even Jesus, having become High Priest forever according to the order of Melchizedek.
Mark 9:17-31
17 Then one of the crowd answered and said, “Teacher, I brought You my son, who has a mute spirit. 18 And wherever it seizes him, it throws him down; he foams at the mouth, gnashes his teeth, and becomes rigid. So I spoke to Your disciples, that they should cast it out, but they could not.”
19 He answered him and said, “O faithless generation, how long shall I be with you? How long shall I bear with you? Bring him to Me.” 20 Then they brought him to Him. And when he saw Him, immediately the spirit convulsed him, and he fell on the ground and wallowed, foaming at the mouth.
21 So He asked his father, “How long has this been happening to him?”
And he said, “From childhood. 22 And often he has thrown him both into the fire and into the water to destroy him. But if You can do anything, have compassion on us and help us.”
23 Jesus said to him, “If you can believe, all things are possible to him who believes.”
24 Immediately the father of the child cried out and said with tears, “Lord, I believe; help my unbelief!”
25 When Jesus saw that the people came running together, He rebuked the unclean spirit, saying to it: “Deaf and dumb spirit, I command you, come out of him and enter him no more!” 26 Then the spirit cried out, convulsed him greatly, and came out of him. And he became as one dead, so that many said, “He is dead.” 27 But Jesus took him by the hand and lifted him up, and he arose.
28 And when He had come into the house, His disciples asked Him privately, “Why could we not cast it out?”
29 So He said to them, “This kind can come out by nothing but prayer and fasting.”
Jesus Again Predicts His Death and Resurrection
30 Then they departed from there and passed through Galilee, and He did not want anyone to know it. 31 For He taught His disciples and said to them, “The Son of Man is being betrayed into the hands of men, and they will kill Him. And after He is killed, He will rise the third day.”