Mr. Husband and I were given a book recently
by Archimandrite John Krestiankin
of the Pskov-Caves Monastery in Russia
entitled
May God Give You Wisdom!
The Letters of Fr. John Krestiankin
which I have been reading over the last days...
his letters speak of many things...
one of the themes that struck me is the
speaks of enduring under one's Cross
without murmuring
and with faith and hope in God.
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I am enjoying these letters;
I find that I often find letters by various holy people
in the Orthodox church to be very uplifting.
You can read parts of these letters here.
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Listening to this podcast by Fr. Thomas Hopko
today while I try to clean our home,
I found the same theme...
salvation will be found through endurance of affections.
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Fr. John Krestiankin was, it seems, asked many times by many
people for their life path in the
traditional Orthodox paths of either
marriage or monasticism.
He spoke of both being of a Cross and
of the cutting of one's will.
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Fr. Thomas Hopko speaks of bearing with
each other in love and being kind to everyone.
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I found myself thinking of many of those who I love
who are married with children
and how there are a lot of every day afflictions that
we endure ~ now a lot of my friends have young children
and that has it's on challenges of exhaustion and not much
if any break from the constant effort that is called for
in the raising of children.
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Or others who are in
increasingly difficult work situations
or are in other painful and grief-filled situations.
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Or those who are just trying to make their way
through things and find life currently bewildering
and without clarity or focus.
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Or those who are suffering from illnesses.
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Or those needing work...
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Or those who are in more than one of the above categories.
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There are many struggles in our life...
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This theme continues throughout this year for me ~
those who endure to the end will be saved.
