July 22
Faith is not true faith if love is not in harmony with it.
The door to heaven is opened to you to the same extent you want it. Get rid of your troubles and problems, and direct your soul to spiritual things. Be attentive, and fulfill your duty without thinking about the consequences. You should not guide events, but be guided by events.
—INDIAN WISDOM
What doth it profit, my brethren, though a man say he hath faith, and have not works? Can faith save him? If a brother or sister be naked, and destitute of daily food, and one of you say unto them, Depart in peace, be ye warmed and filled; notwithstanding ye give them not those things which are needful to the body; what doth it profit? Even so faith, if it hath not works, is dead, being alone…. Ye see then how that by works a man is justified, and not by faith only…. For as the body without the spirit is dead, so faith without works is dead also.
—JAMES 2:14-18, 24, 26
A person who knows the law but does not fulfill it reminds me of one who plows the land but does not put seed in it.
—EASTERN WISDOM
If a person is not in a hurry to fulfill the things which he understands as the law of God, then he believes neither in the law, nor in God.
July 23
Effort is the necessary condition of moral perfection.
Those who think that they can live a high spiritual life whose bodies are filled with idleness and luxuries are mistaken.
The body is the first student of the soul.
—HENRY DAVID THOREAU
Nothing more can be considered as real merit for a person than his effort. Only in his effort is a person shown in his real light.
—The KORAN
If you were abused, make an effort to love those who have abused you. If you have abused someone, make an effort to correct the evil which you created.
July 24
When one understands life’s law, one manifests the part of God which lives inside him.
Every man, from the king to the poorest pauper, should seek his own perfection, because only self-perfection improves mankind.
—CONFUCIUS
In the long run, people achieve only that which they have set as goals for themselves; therefore, set the highest possible goals for yourself.
The fulfillment of the law of goodness has nothing in common with everyday material prosperity. Sometimes material prosperity and moral goodness clash in conflict. These sufferings lead to the highest elevation of spirit.
July 25
Sometimes we cannot see any connection between our suffering and our sin, but this connection definitely exists.
“I was repaid with evil for the goodness which I have done.” But if you love those for whom you did good, then you have already received your reward. Therefore, all that you do with love, you do for yourself.
The reward for virtue is the understanding of the good deed.
—MARCUS TULLIUS CICERO
Look for the causes of the evil from which you suffer in yourself. Sometimes this evil is the direct consequence of your activity; sometimes it happens after a lengthy period of transformation of an evil which you committed long ago. But the source is always in you, and salvation from it lies in changes in your actions, your way of life.
July 26
In every faith, only what is spiritual is true.
God is a spirit, and those who worship Him must worship in spirit and truth.
—JOHN
If you do not believe that at its beginning, your life came from spirit, why are you looking for it elsewhere, thinking that you can find spirit in other places? He who behaves in this way is like the man who burns a lantern in bright sunlight.
Do not be afraid to get rid of things which distract your attention—everything material, everything which can be seen or can be felt. The more you purify the spiritual core of your faith, the firmer your faith will be.
July 27
Knowledge is a tool, not a purpose.
People know little, because they try to understand those things which are not open to them for understanding: God, eternity, spirit; or those which are not worth thinking about: how water becomes frozen, or a new theory of numbers, or how viruses can transmit illnesses. How to live your life is the only real knowledge.
People who think that the most important thing in life is knowledge remind me of a butterfly who flies into the flame of a candle, and in so doing burns, and extinguishes the light.
The title “scholar” suggests that a person has gone to school, and that he studied, but it does not mean that he has acquired any truly important knowledge.
—GEORGE LICHTENBERG
The purpose of life is the fulfillment of the law of God, not the acquisition of ever more knowledge.
July 28
Repentance always precedes perfection. It is sad that people think repentance is unnecessary.
It is dangerous to see the cause of evil as lying outside ourselves; for them repentance becomes impossible.
—FREDERICK WILLIAM ROBERTSON
Not to accept your mistakes is to increase them.
I have a burden on my soul. During all my long life, I did not make anyone happy, neither my friends, nor my family, nor even myself. I have done many evil things…. I was the cause of the beginning of three big wars. About 800,000 people were killed because of me on the battlefields, and their mothers, brothers, and widows cried for them. And now this stands between me and God.
—OTTO VON BISMARCK
You should live in such a way that you can confide anything on your mind.
July 29
The more important something is in your life, the more harmful it can be for you in the future if you abuse it. The misfortunes and woes of people often come from the abuse of the most precious tool of our life: intellect.
God gave his spirit, his intellect, to us, so that we can understand his will and fulfill it; but we misuse it and apply this spirit for the fulfillment of our own will.
When the intellect becomes the slave of vices and passions, the supporter of lies, it becomes not only a perversion, but an illness, and we cannot see the difference between truth and falsehood, good and evil, virtue and vice.
—WILLIAM ELLERY CHANNING
When a person tries to apply his intellect to the question “Why do I exist in this world?” he becomes dizzy. The human intellect cannot find the answers to such questions. What does this mean? This means that our intellect is not given to us to find a solution for this question. Our intellect can only answer the question: “How shall I live?” And the answer is simple: “We should live so as to bring good to all people.”
The purpose of the intellect is to reveal the truth; therefore it is a harmful misconception to pervert the truth with intellectual efforts.
July 30
Only those who know their weaknesses can be tolerant of the weaknesses of their neighbors.
My children, if someone abuses you with words, do not pay much attention; be quiet at your prayer, and ask your friends to settle the dispute and find peace between you and those who have abused you.