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Acquire the Kingdom of God
First of all, seek “the Kingdom of God, and His righteousness”
(Matt 6:33).
Do not hesitate to enter it through the narrow gate and the narrow path, which few find
(Matt 7:14).
Our Heavenly Father loves us
To lay the foundation of our life in the love of our Father for us: “how much more shall your Father which is in Heaven give good things to them that ask Him”
(Matt 7:11).
With childish trust and love, daily surrender completely to the will of the Heavenly Father: “Take therefore no thought for the morrow: for the morrow shall take thought for the things of itself”
(Matt 6:34).
Take up
your cross
and follow Christ
Stop relying on earthly wealth, but, like Christ, accept what is sent from the Father: “take up the cross, and follow me”
(Mark 10:21).
The cross can be heavy: “Yet it pleased the LORD to bruise him;
he hath put
him
to grief”
(Isa 53:10),
“But there shall not an hair of your head perish. In your patience possess ye your souls”
(Luke 21: 18-19).
Christ warns that “he that doeth the will of my Father which is in heaven”
(Matt 7:21)
enters the Kingdom of God, just as He himself did it: “I come to do thy will, O God”
(Heb 10:9).
Prayer of the Optina Elders:
“Grant unto me to dedicate myself completely to Thy Holy Will.”
Sacrifice your life for God
Like Christ, who offered Himself to God the Father for us, we must offer our lives as a sacrifice to God the Father in order to have a part in Christ's sacrifice, “that we might be partakers of his holiness”
(Heb 12:10).
Likewise, the apostle Paul said: “for whom I have suffered the loss of all things, … that I may win Christ, … That I may know him, and the power of his resurrection, and the fellowship of his sufferings, being made conformable unto his death;
If by any means I might attain unto the resurrection of the dead.”
(Phil 3:8-11).
To sacrifice our life to God for those around us: “Greater love hath no man than this, that a man lay down his life for his friends”
(John 15:13).
Saint Philaret of Moscow: “I offer myself as a sacrifice to Thee.”
Live for Christ
“And
that
he
[Christ]
died for all, that they which live
should not henceforth live unto themselves,
but
unto him which died for them,
and rose again”
(2 Cor 5:15).
Always remember that “every good deed
done for Christ's sake,
are the only means of acquiring the Holy Spirit of
God.”[**]
Unceasing Prayer
Prayer is a meeting with God, an appeal to Him. This is a “face-to-face” conversation with God
(Exo 33:11).
With unceasing prayer to God and the Mother of God, press close to the Heart of Christ through the Heart of the Mother of God.
See also
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