The Source

One of the best reasons for not judging your brother, is you never know when it could happen to you. One of the greatest sins is to think yourself above someone else because "I would never do that," demeaning someone else. We are all sinners and are no better than anyone else. The theme of not judging your brother visits us over and over during lent. It is certainly true. Last time I posted, it was about forgiveness Sunday. We all make mistakes because we are human, and simply cannot help ourselves.

Last evening we attended our first of a series of Pre-Sanctified Liturgies. You can hear words repeated over and over again, but then for the first time you hear something that you didn't quite get before. That was the way it was for the Prayer of St. Ephraim of Syria. During the priests homily, it was pointed out that there are two versions, one Greek and one Slavonic. Being from the Romanian church I wondered which verse is used and what the popular one was. I learned that the standard form of the prayer is the Greek version.

This is the Greek version "O Lord and Master of my life, give me not the spirit of sloth,..."
The Slavonic version "O Lord and Master of my life, take from me the spirit of sloth,..."
They have two different meanings, which I never thought about before and I wondered which is correct?

I thought about this off and on during the day and have concluded that they are both correct. God allows things to happen for your edification, or at times, to edify someone else through you, as He wills. And yes, only God can change the disease of "sloth" within us if we ask Him to.

A great way to begin is on our knees with our focus on our own mistakes in a very humble manner. There is no other way to rid ourselves of unwholesomeness, no matter how we arrive at it, but to turn to Him who is our Life. Living that life according to His plan and purpose.