Every work you do, whether good or evil, is written in a book before God. Every thought you think, whether good or evil, is written in a book before God. How else can He be just? All your motives are written.
—H.H. Pope Shenouda III, Before the Just Judge
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Repent before the time comes when your sorrow will not make a difference. You have the opportunity now as long as you live.
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Even at the Hour of Death! There was a very devout woman who was ill with cancer. She turned to God with prayers, and Communion and fasts were held for her. The cancer entered a very critical stage and when her final hour approached she called for me. At that time I was a bishop, and was able to visit people more than I can now, so I went to her and stood beside her bed listening to her complaints. She told me, “I am very sad because many doubts are going round in my thoughts about whether prayer, fasting and Communion are of any value, and where is God’s mercy and response?! So often I have prayed for these thoughts to leave me but they persist and I get anxious and say, ‘Shall I lose my life now, and lose my chance of eternal life too, because of these doubts?… So I said to her, “Do not be anxious, for they are not your thoughts. They are just doubts which the Devil casts into your mind. Your prayers prove that you do not accept them and that these thoughts are not from you. God will not allow a good woman like you to suffer here and in eternity as well. You are like Lazarus who received his full share of misfortunes on earth, but was deemed worthy to go to the arms of Abraham on his way to a happy eternity with God… If God wants to take you to Him, this is not against His mercy nor against prayer, for eternity is a delight which the Saints eagerly desire.” Then I read an absolution for her and she relaxed and departed, to the amazement of the devils who fight the Saints even at the hour of death!
—H.H. Pope Shenouda III, Experiences in Life
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We should not always say about somebody that he is evil, and that we are not able to deal with him.
But if we looked at him as a person who has [both] the good and bad, then we are able to deal with him.
—H.E. Metropolitan Youssef, How to Develop Your Personality
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Horrible is the approach of death to those who are passionate, wicked and weak, who have not attempted to live purely in this vain world.
Those who toil, and successful contestants of devoutness, delight at the hour of their departure.
They see before their eyes the great work of their fight, watchfulness, fasting, prostrations, prayer, weeping and sackcloth.
Their souls are glad when they are summoned away from their bodies to go into their rest.
But leaving this life is a cause for great sorrow for the sinner, who sees in front of his eyes his apathy and its caustic fruits.
What repentance will then take hold of the heart of the one who has here ignored his salvation.
O my soul, Woe to you, why do you neglect your life?
Suddenly your call will come and what will you do there if you have been neglectful here?
What will you do in front of the throne of the just Judge?
How is it that the foe robs you, but you do not realize it?
How is it that the foe robs you of heavenly wealth, but you are so preoccupied that you do not even realize it.
Have mercy on me, O long-suffering Son of God and sinless Christ.
O my Savior, allow me to ponder the coming life, so that I will do Your will.
When I get old at very least let me partake of Your grace, so that I finish my unfortunate life with a profitable end.
How will I who am careless stand in front of Your fearful throne?
How will I who am impatient and unprofitable enter into the company of those who have here brought forth the fruits of goodness?
By what characteristics will they recognize me when the saints and the upright on their heavenly beds perceive each other by their works?
No, you have no grounds to laud yourself.
The upright, the pure and the humble will walk in the unattainable light, but the sinful, the lazy, the arrogant, the proud and those who heedlessly live for their own satisfaction like me, will find themselves in the everlasting and inextinguishable fire.
O my soul, be alert, and pray with tears.
Call out with all your heart that before the end comes you might be converted and make a good beginning.
O Lord, grant this to us, through the prayers of our spotless Lady the Theotokos and all Your saints, for You are blessed forever.
—St. Ephraim the Syrian
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If God is the Father of every human, then there is no doubt that every man, whoever he may be, is my brother, and every woman or girl is my sister; consequently I behaved very foolishly if I treated some people as strangers, and did not find them deserving of even a glance or word , or considered them the kind of people to whom I do not owe any love. I acted very foolishly, and I must correct myself, otherwise I must not dare to pray using this Lord’s Prayer, and therefore, must not consider myself as belonging to the number of true children of the Father God.
—Metropolitan Gregory (Postnikov) of St. Petersburg
How to Live a Holy Life p.133
SO GOOD QUOTES 