Category: SUFFERING & TRIBULATION

  • Sometimes it looks as if we are bound to act. Every one says we must do something; and indeed things seem to have reached so desperate a pitch that we must…It is not easy at such times to stand still and see the salvation of God; but we must. God may delay to come in the guise of His Providence…He stays long enough to test patience of faith, but not a moment behind the extreme hour of need. “The vision is yet for an appointed time, but at the end it shall speak, and shall not lie; though it tarry, wait for it; because it will surely come; it will not tarry.”

    The Gift of Suffering
    by F.B. Meyer

  • “Three things the mind is enlightened with: doing good to those who wrong you, enduring what befalls you from your enemies, and abandoning looking at and envying those who are ahead of you in the world.“

    —Abba Arsenius
    Abba Arsenius – The Tutor of the Emperor’s Sons

  • Many times when we are approached by someone at times when we are fatigued or preoccupied, we are annoyed and discomforted and say, ‘I have no time for you now, come back later, wait for a while’. But Christ the Lord, even on the cross, did not say such phrases. In spite of His pains, He gave due attention to the thief, and answered his request to gladden his heart. He showed us that even on the cross, we can still serve others.

    —H.H. Pope Shenouda III, Father, Forgive Them

  • There are some who, if they meet with any reverse, or are slandered by any one, or if they fall into any bodily malady, any pain in the foot or head, or any other disease, immediately blaspheme. In this way they endure the affliction, but are deprived of the benefit.

    On Wealth and Poverty
    St. John Chrysostom

  • A person who has no longsuffering falls in anxiety, annoyance and disturbance. He becomes worried and loses his inner peace.

    Such a person will be always anxious, looking at his watch every minute and every moment. He may also be rash and do himself much harm. Such an impatient person may in his rashness take decisions or actions haphazardly, like one who thinks God has not responded to his prayers and so swears never to enter the church, as if protesting against God!

    —H.H. Pope Shenouda III, Fruits of the Spirit

  • God forms character in obscurity. Right now you might feel forgotten. Do not despise the hidden season. Hidden years are not wasted years.

    —Fr. Paul Girguis

  • If only we could go back and do something differently, perhaps we would feel differently right now. But perhaps not. If things unfolded differently, we may be suffering a different hurt, and wish for that to be different.

    On moving things forward
    Madeleine Dore

  • “To suffer terribly and to know yourself as the cause: that is Hell.”

    —Jordan B. Peterson, 12 Rules for Life: An Antidote to Chaos

  • Truly God has many solutions… We think of our problems, using our human mind, which is limited. As for God He is unlimited in His knowledge and His wisdom. When matters become complicated, their complication is relative for us human beings. As for God nothing becomes complicated, everything is easy and the solutions are many. God interferes at the right time and in the suitable way. It could be a solution that never crossed our minds, one that we never thought of or expected…

    —H.H. Pope Shenouda III, WORDS OF SPIRITUAL BENEFIT VOL. II