“Since God already gave you a penance through your conscience, I don’t need to give you another penance. God has taught you how serious it is for a priest to break his promise and even more so a promise to his elder.” Even though Geronda forgave him, Papa Ephraim still suffered greatly from his conscience pricking him.
~Elder Joseph
~My Elder Joseph

“Christianity is true; you can point to the various comparative elements of truth in other religions and often they are very profound, but they do not open up heaven. Only when Christ came to earth and told the thief, “you will be with me in paradise,” was heaven actually opened up two men.”
Father Seraphim Rose
~God’s Revelation to the Human Heart

“I do not remember how it started off by a know very well that I had just begun and had not pronounced the Name of our Christ many times before my heart was filled with love for God. Suddenly it increased so much that I was no longer praying but wondering in amazement at this outpouring of love. I wanted to embrace and kiss all people and the whole of creation and at the same time I was so humble in my thoughts that I felt I was the lowest of all creatures.”
~Fr. Joseph of Vatopedi as a disciple
~My Elder Joseph

“Many times just one sigh is equal to prayer, too many hours of prayer, or to digital… Without righteousness prayer isn’t heard.” The elders prayer for the world sprang from and went hand in hand with his whole spiritual state and particularly his great love.
Elder Paisios
~Elder Paisios of Mount Athos

“Oh how good our kind God is! How compassionate. He does not have any self interest are any need of man as the most perfect one. But since out of his great love He wanted to impart Is most perfect gifts, He created all of creation. And having formed man, he made him king and bestowed everything upon him.”
Elder Joseph
~ Monastic Wisdom

“All of us who walked towards the kingdom of light and eternal life are obliged to keep watch daily and see what sort of garments are soul is clothed in. Let us look at those men and women who daily dress up, change clothes, decorate themselves, groom themselves and adorned themselves in order to physically look as nicely as they can. We ought to apply that much care and even more than that on the clothing of our soul. They look at themselves in the Mirror. Our Mirror is Jesus Christ. Looking at Him, the most pure, the most holy, the most beautiful Man, we find what we are really like. So as soon as we notice some dirt are some rag on our soul we should immediately take it off and dress ourselves in purity, holiness and beauty of Christ. What ever the carnal people do for the improvement and beauty of the body can serve as an image of what the spiritual people should do on the spiritual level.”
St. Nikolai Velimirovich
~Missionary Letters #2

“When Philip spoke to the Ethiopian eunuch something in the UNIX heart changed. It says in Acts that he came to believe; that is, his heart was melted by the truth he heard. The words of Scripture are very powerful and when the right interpretation is given to them something in a human being opens up if his heart is ready. Therefore, the eunuch accepted Christ with his whole soul; he was a changed man. This was not for the sake of miracles but for the sake of that which Christ came to earth to bring.”
Father Seraphim Rose
~God’s Revelation to the Human Heart

“The elder greatly valued blessed labor. No one has ever become wholly without effort and struggle. God is moved by it. “The present generation,” he concluded, “has a laziness gets brought into the monastic life, to. We want to become wholly without effort. Wouldn’t it be better,” jokes the elder, “to do vigils while lying in bed, to get a tape player to play whatever chance you wanted? To make an ascetic out of straw with a motor who can do our prostrations and say the Jesus prayer on the prayer rope?””
Elder Paisios
~Elder Paisios of Mt Athos

“Changes and trials form an almost indistinguishable union in which either one may provoke the other and the two of them lead those who are prudent to profit and advancement. Whether the trial produces the change are the change the trial, we reached the same conclusion: that we must face them philosophically and with patient endurance. Abba Mark says, “afflictions that come to us are the result of our own sins. But if we accept them patiently through prayer we shall again find blessings.””
Elder Joseph
~Elder Joseph the Hesychast

“So when you want to find out the will of God, abandon your own will completely together with every other thought of your plan and with great humility ask for His knowledge in prayer. And whatever takes shape that carries weight in your heart, do it and it will be according to God’s will. Those who have greater boldness and practice in praying for His will hear a clear assurance within them, and will become more careful in their lives not to do anything without divine assurance. There is also another way of discovering the will of God which the Church uses generally, and that His advice through spiritual fathers or confessors.”
Elder Joseph
~Elder Joseph the Hesychast