How important is joy? The Holy Scripture explains that the Lord Jesus was able to endure the Cross "because of the joy set before Him." Imagine, as He faced the horror of the Cross, He looked beyond it to behold joy. Maybe, beyond the Cross, He saw you and me and it filled Him with joy. How then is it possible for us to claim that we share in His life, and at the same time, be so joyless?

Unmercenaries and Wonderworkers (Miracleworkers), they were brothers in the flesh and in the spirit, born somewhere in Asia of a pagan father and a Christian mother. After their father's death, their mother Theodota devoted all her time and energy to the bringing-up of her sons as true Christians. God helped her, and her sons grew as two choice fruits and as two holy lamps. They were skilled in medicine and command: "Freely have you received; freely give" (Saint Matthew 10:8).

Perhaps, we still can't see how to become holy in a work oriented, 9-5 world with all of its cares and concerns. Again, I would like to quote from Saint Theophan the Recluse:

The Lord said, "...narrow is the way that leads to life, and few there be who find it" (Saint Matthew 7:14).

Metropolitan Laurus, in his lecture, "The Ascetic Podvig of Living in the World," writes the following: "Christianity is an ascetic religion. Christianity is a teaching about the gradual extirpation of the passions, about the means and conditions of the gradual acquisition of virtues. And this Podvig, this struggle comes as we begin to separate ourselves from the world.

You might feel that keeping the mind in the heart before God and controlling all of our inward movements is too much to ask. That's fine for Monasticism, but what about those of us who must work, raise children, and pay our taxes. What do we do? Consider the vision of Saint Marcarius:

Almost every Orthodox spiritual writer has emphasized that true Orthodoxy is a matter of the heart. Without warmth of heart towards God and neighbor, there can be no true faith. Father Seraphim Rose wrote: