But he who endures to the end shall be saved.
But do we have what to endure? Nobody lacks this. Everyone has a large stadium where he can train his patience. This means that everyone has his salvation at hand. Endure everything till the end and you shall be saved. But you must endure it consciously. Otherwise you can endure and have no avail.
First you must keep the holy faith and live a virtuous life according to the guidelines of the faith and the sins you may commit cleanse them by repentance and secondly receive everything you must endure as if it is from God`s hand, taking into account that nothing happens without God`s will and thirdly having the faith that everything which comes is sent by Him for the goodness of our souls, give thanks for everything to God without dissimulation: give thanks for troubles and comforts and fourthly love the troubles, because they are powerful means of salvation and try to feel thirst after them as if they were a bitter medicine and in the fifth place remember that when the trouble comes you can`t get rid of it as you did with a tight coat, you have to endure it. Whether you endure it in a Christian way or not, you must endure it anyway, so it is better to endure it in a Christian way. Complaints don`t escape us of troubles, only make them harder. And the humble obedience proven in the arrangements of the divine providence and a good heart ease the troubles. And in the sixth row, think what would have meant if God had wanted to behave with you according to the full measure of justice and in the seventh row, before everything else, pray and the Most Merciful God will give strength to your spirit and when others will be shocked by your troubles for you they will seem a trifle to endure.
Excerpt from Interpretations from the Holy Scripture for every day of the year saint Teophanus the Recluse, Editura Sophia, 2015.
