In order for the prayer of the fasting for the forgiveness of sins to be more effective before the Lord, the holy hymn-singers of the Church teach us to combine prayerful intensity with works of mercy for the poor and needy.

The penitent must change his former careless attitude towards people. He is obliged to be merciful and philanthropic to them. "He who harnesses generosity to humility rushes to God faster than the Lydian chariot" [53].

Speaking in liturgical language, the ascetic in fasting "kindles the lamp of the soul with the fire of good works" [54], when he gives bread to the hungry, shelter to the bloodless, and lovingly nourishes them, as the prophet Elisha fed the sons of the prophets.

According to the Scriptures, those who put their treasures in the hands of the poor enter the Kingdom of God. Having mercy on the poor, they lend to God, Who repays them for doing good with divine generosity. The oil of charity increases the burning of the fasting with love for God, attracts to them a special merciful favor of God. The Lord gives them heavenly things instead of earthly things, and instead of the bread they have distributed, the food of grace; instead of the perishable garment given to the poor, the robe of grace-filled light [55].

Through humility, prayer and mercy, those who fast open themselves, as it were, to the reception of God's grace, and the Lord graciously warms and enlightens those who aspire to God. For the courageous endurance of painful labors of abstinence, they are adorned from above with the grace of fasting and blossom with fasting virtues [56].

The canons and stichera of the Lenten Triodion irresistibly attract attention by reminding us of the many God-bearing fasters of the Old Testament and New Testament times, beginning with the God-Man Lord Jesus Christ.

Christ the Saviour, by the personal example of forty days of fasting, illuminated and legitimized for all mankind the days of fasting, as a means of overcoming the devil's wiles, cunning traps and enemy arrows [57].

From the distance of centuries there appears, for example, the image of the wondrous Enoch, who by abstinence was changed from earth to heaven [58]. The beautiful Joseph avoided confusion with the lawless wife of Pentephrius by fasting and received the kingdom [59]. Gideon, by abstinence and prayer with only three hundred men, defeats the Midianites [60]. Lent revealed the prophet Samuel to blossom spiritually, brought up the great brave Samson, perfected the Old Testament priests and prophets [61].

The divine Moses, cleansed by fasting, worked many miracles, parted the Red Sea with a rod and fed people for 40 years in an impassable desert [62]. On Mount Sinai, with the eyes of his fasting soul, he beheld God, was the interlocutor of the Creator, was vouchsafed to speak with Him face to face and receive with his ears the voice of the Invisible Most-Pure God. After fasting, Moses received the tablets of the Covenant from God and was the Scribe of the Law [63].

Joshua sanctified the Jewish people by abstinence, crossed the Jordan with them, and inherited the Promised Land. The king and prophet David defeated the foreigner Goliath by fasting and gained the kingdom.

The Prophet Elijah, having fasted, opened the heavens and watered the thirsty earth with clouds. Fasting enlightened Elijah and cleansed him to the Horeb vision of God in a quiet wind. Fasting kept him zealous for drawing all people to the true God, made him a fiery chariot in the fiery chariot he had found, and lifted him up to the heights of heaven [65].

The prophet Elisha, fasting, resurrected the dead child of Shunammite's wife [66].

The fiery Seraphim touched the lips of the wise prophet Isaiah with a mysterious coal from the altar of the Lord [67].

The prophet Daniel, who had once fasted, tamed and stopped the mouths of the roaring lions [68], the three keepers of the fast, the youths in the Babylonian furnace, trampled down the burning flame without being scorched by the fire [69].