Accept us as we draw near to Your holy altar, according to the multitude of Your mercy, that we may be worthy to offer You this spiritual sacrifice without the shedding of blood, for our sins and for the transgressions of Your people. Grant that, having accepted this sacrifice upon Read more…
Lord, our God, You created us and brought us into this life. You have shown us the way to salvation and have bestowed upon us the revelation of heavenly mysteries. You have appointed us to this service by the power of Your Holy Spirit. Grant, therefore, O Lord that we may be Read more…
Strengthen us for this service with the power of Your Holy Spirit, and grant speech to our lips that we may invoke the grace of Your Holy Spirit upon the gifts that are about to be offered. And grant that always guarded by Your power we may give glory to Read more…
O God, You have visited our lowliness in mercy and compassion. You have set us, Your lowly, sinful and unworthy servants, to serve at Your holy altar before Your holy glory. (Divine Liturgy of St. Basil the Great, p. 12) — And his father Zechariah was filled with the Holy Read more…
Ascribe to the Lord, O families of the peoples, Ascribe to the Lord glory and strength! Ascribe to the Lord the glory due His name; Bring and offering, and come before Him! Worship the Lord in holy array. I Chronicles 16: 28-29 Saint Basil lived from the year 330 to Read more…
Jesus said “For if you forgive men their trespasses, your heavenly Father also will forgive you; but if you do not forgive men their trespasses, neither will your Father forgive your trespasses. “And when you fast, do not look dismal, like the hypocrites, for they disfigure their faces that their Read more…
Besides this you know what hour it is, how it is full time now for you to wake from sleep. For salvation is nearer to us now than when we first believed; the night is far gone, the day is at hand. Let us then cast off the works of Read more…
So the churches were strengthened in the faith, and they increased in numbers daily. Acts 16:5 The word “community” is actually not found in the Bible. The word “church” is found over 100 hundred times. The word that we translate as “church” is the word “ekklesia.” However, the meaning of this word is Read more…
So faith, hope, love abide, these three; but the greatest of these is love. I Corinthians 13:13 We are about to begin Great and Holy Lent. Clean Monday, or the first day of Great Lent is next Monday, February 27. If we are keeping the Orthodox Tradition correctly, yesterday was Read more…
Food will not commend us to God. We are no worse off if we do not eat, and no better off if we do. Only take care lest this liberty of yours somehow become a stumbling block to the weak. For if any one sees you, a man of knowledge, Read more…
Each year during the last half of February and throughout the month of March, the majority of Major League Baseball teams hold their spring training in the state of Florida. Just in my immediate area, we have the Yankees (Tampa), the Phillies (Clearwater), the Tigers (Lakeland) and the White Sox Read more…
And to keep me from being too elated by the abundance of revelations, a thorn was given me in the flesh, a messenger of Satan, to harass me, to keep me from being too elated. Three times I besought the Lord about this, that it should leave me; but He Read more…