Trust in God, Who has created them and keeps them under His care. For if a leaf does not fall from a tree without His divine will, how much more shall the affairs of a man, His son by grace, a Christian, be under His care? But the devil, who knows your weakness, troubles you with it in order to harass you.  When we have laid our foundation on trust in God, the foundation is on the rock, and even if the winds blow and thunderstorms come, they will not overcome us. But when we have laid our foundation on trust in our own efforts, the foundation is on sand and we shall easily fall.

Do not grieve; everything will pass. This is how the path of those who are being saved is marked out: in torments and afflictions.  Why are you gloomy and devoured by grief? The spirit of grief requires self-consolation for you to overcome the thoughts of despair from the evil one. When you listen to any suggestion of the evil spirit of grief, you will never be able to see the joy of hope. Everything written in the divine Scriptures was written for our admonition, so that with them we may fight back against the one who deceived us, the pernicious dragon.

When the greatly compassionate father saw the prodigal son coming, he hastened to embrace him, kissed him tenderly, and abhorred neither his filthiness nor his whole inward and outward wretched condition. Who can describe his paternal feelings when he embraced his beloved child, whom he had considered dead and lost but then saw alive and returning in repentance? His actions showed his feelings: immediately he lrised him to his original position as son and heir.

To whom did the revered mouth of the Lord say these things? Was it not to us for our consolation, so that when the tempest of despair tosses us about, we may tie our boat to the living anchor of hope in the love and compassion of our Heavenly Father?

– ‘Counsels from the Holy Mountain’