I have a lovely little red leather bound prayer book that I bought while attending a Ruthenian Byzantine Church, and I haven't looked at it once since I stopped attending that parish, and I wonder why, because it is precious, as in valuable. There are a number of carefully curated prayers, lists of holy things, simple instructions about how to do the different styles of fasting and abstinence, beautiful prayers to our Lady, the Most Holy Theotokos - all sorts of uplifting, and sometimes challenging offerings. I have decided to put it in my stack of favorite books - the books to which I refer daily. It just took me some time to get around to it. It was waiting for me. Kind of like God, I suppose, who waits for us to reach for Him.
While I was perusing it and admiring the beautiful gold-trimmed edges of each page, I found this comment on 2 Corinthians:
extreme wickedness, despair of himself. For even if you
have passed into the habit, yes and almost into the
nature of wickedness itself, be not afraid...For he did
not simply say that He would wash us, but that He
would make us 'white as snow and as wool,' in order to
hold out good hopes before us. Great then is the power
of repentance, at least if it makes us as snow, and
whitens us as wool, even if sin has first gotten
possession and dyed out souls. Let us labor earnestly
then to become clean; He has enjoined nothing
burdensome."
I really love this quote because I often feel that I am one step behind everything that requires doing - especially during LENT. The physical pain and my newly acquired ungainly hobble frustrate me so that it is difficult, at times, to stay serene at prayer time. There are occasions when I feel an urgency to get it done NOW because I must put up my feet or I will collapse. It's frustrating, this tension that gets generated so easily. And then I wonder if the way I carry out my daily prayer schedule is as disappointing to Him as it is to me.
But then I read a short reminder like this one and I can breathe a sigh of happy relief because I am re-established in His Truth that He loves us and is not unduly testing us. Like the delighted Father that encourages the baby to walk to Him in its first steps on chubby little baby legs, He is not going to let us fall when we are struggling so earnestly to reach Him! Thank you, Lord, for giving us Saint John Chrysostom and the other holy ones who stand on the sidelines, urging us forward.
God bless us all.
Silver Rose
P.S. As some of you are aware, I am disabled, without family, and in three months, I will be 69 years old. Social Security is about half of what I need to live, and every year I get further behind while the disabilities increase in number and severity. The car is a junk heap. Credit cards have piled up in a frustrating cycle of robbing Peter to pay Paul. For the last 20 years I have been unable to work (though I have tried various things and continue to slave over the novel and poetries.) Please consider donating to my paypal, above-right, or sending a little food from my Amazon wish list, below. They have my address and can mail to me directly.
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