Written by Greg Pantelidis BSc(Hons)
gregpantelidis@gmail.com
Lay up treasures.
Work diligently.
Get to work promptly.
Comfort your neighbor.
Love first. Do good first. Lend first. (See Luke 6:32-36).
Treat your neighbor as yourself.
Love your neighbor as yourself.
Repent and Return to God.
Be humble and virtuous. Not proud and vicious.
On the four pursuits: Overeating must be renounced. Stealing and overpossessing must be renounced. Vanity must be renounced. Unchastity must be renounced.
An Orthodox Christian must shine.
You should respect the likes, dislikes, and neutralities of your neighbor.
There are three types of goods: material goods, goods of grace, and goods of glory.
Temptation tries to pervert nature by leading us to a state overnatural or undernatural. An example is overeating and undereating. Another example is overcourage or rashness, and undercourage or cowardice.
Do not accept a lawless thought.
Be law-conscious.
Grab the moment.
Do your spiritual work unceasingly.
Become Holy in thought, word, and work.
We reap what we sow.
Remove cunning from your soul.
Remove malice from your soul.
Remove the weeds from your soul.
Wrath destroys even the prudent. (Prov. 15:1). A humble answer turns away anger. (Prov. 15:1). A grievous word stirs up wrath. (Prov. 15:1).
Correct your faults.
Be humble and logical. Not proud and illogical.
If you are willing, you can overcome your passions with the help of God.
The worldly person is attached to food, possessions (including knowledge), glory, and romance. The spiritual person is detached from food, possessions (including knowledge), glory, and romance.
Practice humility, meekness, mercy, and love.
Renounce food, possessions (including knowledge), glory, and romance.
Keep your rule and do not do anything out of your rule.
Renounce possessions, glory, and pleasure, to obtain Grace.
Seek your Deliverer.
Loose yourself from sin.
You must resolve your overeating, your stealing and overpossessing, your vanity, and your unchastity.
True wealth is virtue. Seek virtue and not material wealth.
If you have renounced glory why do you care for worldly respect?
Wisdom is humility, meekness, mercy, and love.
(Matt. 18:1-4): “Who is the greatest in the kingdom of heaven? Then Jesus called a child, set him in the midst of them and said: “Amen I say to you, unless you change and become as children, you will not enter the kingdom of heaven. Whoever humbles himself as this child is the greatest in the kingdom of heaven.”
True wisdom is humility.
“No one is higher than he who is humble. As when there is no light all things are dark and obscure, so when there is no humility, all our works in God are vain and useless.” St Hesychios, Text 84, Philokalia Vol. 1.
“God asks for only one thing from us: humility; nothing else. He requires us to be humble, so that He can in this way make us active partakers of His divine grace; something he gave us through holy baptism in His indescribable goodness”. Priestmonk Christodoulos, Elder Paisios, p. 179.
If a person is not willing, he cannot correct his faults.
Our life on earth is a warfare against the dragon.
Christ came to abolish sin.
Love does no injustice.
Be honorable.
Be prudent and wise.
Be a lover of God and a lover of neighbor. Not a lover of possessions, a lover of pleasure, or a lover of glory.
Be a lover of God and a lover of neighbor, not a lover of self.
The will to practice virtue belongs to us. The power to practice virtue belongs to God.
Be a lover of God, not a lover of the body.
(James 4:10): “Humble yourselves before the Lord, and He will exalt you”.
Obedience and humility will give rise to all the virtues.
Ask yourself: Have you done your fastings, prayers, charities, Confessions, and Communions?
Do you see what vanity it is to have worldly wealth? Do you see what vanity it is to have worldly glory? Do you see what vanity it is to have only bodily beauty and not beauty of the soul? Worldly wealth, worldly glory and bodily beauty are vanity. But charity, humility, and the beauty of the soul are not vanity.
Abolish sin thru Repentance.
(Lev. 19:13): “You shall not wrong your neighbor”.
Be self-less.
Give and lend.
Love all. Do good to all. Lend to all.
Respect and love your neighbor.
Be humble and just, not proud and unjust.
Love God and all your passions will be cured.
Do not just eat, drink, and gather possessions. This is the worldly way. Rather, love God and neighbor. This is the spiritual way.
Show love.
Renounce food, possessions (including knowledge), glory, and romance, and love God and neighbor.
Do not think evil.
Do not injure your neighbor by thought, feeling, word, or deed.
Practice altruism.
Practice obedience, humility, poverty, and chastity.
Establish a good routine.
Keep Orthodox Christian doctrines. Keep Orthodox Christian ethics. Keep Orthodox Christian traditions.
Keep the Orthodox Christian Dogmas, Commandments, and Traditions.
Glorify God in your thoughts, words, and works.
People who love food are always talking about food. People who love possessions are always talking about possessions. People who love glory are always talking about glory. People who love romance are always talking about romance. People who love virtue are always talking about virtue. People who love God are always talking about God. People who love religion are always talking about religion.
Repent of your unethical behavior.
The world rejoices in wealth, glory, and pleasure. The Orthodox Christian rejoices in non-wealth, non-glory, and non-pleasure.
The world suffers from overeating, stealing and overpossessing, vanity, and unchastity. The Orthodox Christian delights in fasting, frugality, humility, obedience, and chastity.
If you consider non-glory as glory, non-wealth as wealth, and non-pleasure as pleasure, do not fear, for sin has died in you.
The elder must love the younger so that the younger may respect and love the elder.
The secular Church, that is the World, practices overeating, stealing and overpossessing, vanity, and unchastity.
The secular Church cannot inherit the Kingdom of Heaven. Only the Orthodox Church inherits the Kingdom of Heaven.
Obey God by obeying your elders in Christ.
Be in obedience to your spiritual father.
Stay in the place that you have been called.
You must first practice polybattle and then monobattle.
Say no to pride and vice.
Say yes to humility and virtue.
Have an orthophronema.
When the mind is humble it is a vessel of mercy. When the mind is proud it is a vessel of wrath.
Guard yourself against the five temptations related to the four pursuits of food, possessions (including knowledge), glory, and romance. These five temptations are: the temptation of gluttony, the temptation of love of possessions, the temptation of vanity, the temptation of disobedience, and the temptation of unchastity.
Guard against the temptations of the four pursuits. Guard against overeating. Guard against stealing and overpossessing. Guard against vanity. Guard against disobedience. Guard against unchastity.
The spiritual way is the opposite of the worldly way. The worldly way seeks glory, wealth, and pleasure. The spiritual way seeks non-glory, non-wealth, and non-pleasure.
Repent of your overeating, stealing and overpossessing, vanity, disobedience, and unchastity.
Help one another. Love one another. These two are a summary of New Testament ethics.
“Humility is an abomination to the proud”. (Wisd. of Sirach 13:20).
“A poor man is an abomination to a rich man”. (Wisd. of Sirach 13:20).
