{"id":8152,"date":"2020-04-30T23:40:29","date_gmt":"2020-05-01T03:40:29","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/orthodoxinsight.com\/?p=8152"},"modified":"2020-04-05T20:41:25","modified_gmt":"2020-04-06T00:41:25","slug":"elder-st-porphyrios-on-focusing-on-christ","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/orthodoxinsight.com\/?p=8152","title":{"rendered":"Elder St. Porphyrios on Focusing on Christ"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>\u201cGod has placed a power in man\u2019s soul. But it is up to him how he channels it \u2014 for good or for evil. If we imagine the good as a garden full of flowers, trees and plants and the evil as weeds and thorns and the power as water, then what can happen is as follows: when the water is directed towards the flower-garden, then all the plants grow, blossom and bear fruit; and at the same time, the weeds and thorns, because they are not being watered, wither and die. And the opposite, of course, can also happen.<\/p>\n<p>It is not necessary, therefore, to concern yourselves with the weeds. Don\u2019t occupy yourself with rooting out evil. Christ does not wish us to occupy ourselves with the passions, but with the opposite. Channel the water, that is, all the strength of your soul, to the flowers and you will enjoy their beauty, their fragrance and their freshness.\u00a0 You won\u2019t become saints by hounding after evil.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>&#8211;\u00a0 \u2018Wounded by Love\u2019<\/p>\n<p><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"aligncenter size-medium wp-image-8153\" src=\"http:\/\/orthodoxinsight.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/04\/thf-300x200.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"300\" height=\"200\" srcset=\"http:\/\/orthodoxinsight.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/04\/thf-300x200.jpg 300w, http:\/\/orthodoxinsight.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/04\/thf-768x512.jpg 768w, http:\/\/orthodoxinsight.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/04\/thf-1024x683.jpg 1024w, http:\/\/orthodoxinsight.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/04\/thf-480x320.jpg 480w, http:\/\/orthodoxinsight.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/04\/thf.jpg 1600w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 300px) 100vw, 300px\" \/><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>\u201cGod has placed a power in man\u2019s soul. But it is up to him how he channels it \u2014 for good or for evil. If we imagine the good as [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[14],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-8152","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-modern-orthodox-elders","has_thumb"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/orthodoxinsight.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8152","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/orthodoxinsight.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/orthodoxinsight.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/orthodoxinsight.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/orthodoxinsight.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=8152"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"http:\/\/orthodoxinsight.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8152\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":8154,"href":"http:\/\/orthodoxinsight.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8152\/revisions\/8154"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/orthodoxinsight.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=8152"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/orthodoxinsight.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=8152"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/orthodoxinsight.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=8152"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}