A person who is angry with us is a sick person. It is necessary to apply a plaster to his heart – love. You need to caress him, talk to him affectionately, and if anger is not ingrained in him, but only a temporary outburst has occurred, then see how his heart melts from your love. A Christian needs to be wise in order to overcome evil with good.

The dangers of enjoying a calm, happy life

Our life is a child's game, only not innocent, but sinful, because, with a strong mind and knowledge of the purpose of our life, we neglect this goal and engage in empty, aimless deeds. Thus, our life is a child's indescribable (unsophisticated) game: we amuse ourselves with food and drink, feasting, instead of using it only for the necessary nourishment of the body and the maintenance of bodily life; we amuse ourselves with clothes, instead of decently covering our bodies with them to protect it from the harmful effects of the elements; we amuse ourselves with silver and gold, admiring them in treasuries, or using them for luxuries and pleasures, instead of using them for needs, and sharing the surplus with the needy; we amuse ourselves with our dwellings and the various utensils in them, richly and exquisitely decorating them, instead of having only a strong and decent shelter to protect us from the harmful effects of the elements, and things necessary and appropriate for domestic use; we amuse ourselves with our spiritual gifts, with our minds, imaginations, in words, using them only for the service of sin and the vanity of this world, only for the service of earthly and perishable things, instead of first and foremost using them for the service of God, for the knowledge of Him, the all-wise Creator of all creation, for prayer...; we amuse ourselves with our knowledge of worldly vanity, and we waste the most precious time given for their acquisition, given for preparation for eternity; we often amuse ourselves with our office, our duties, frivolously, negligently, unrighteously fulfilling them and using them for our selfish earthly species; we amuse ourselves with good human faces, or with the fair and weaker sex, and often use them to play with our passions; we amuse ourselves with time, which should be wisely used to atone for eternity, and not by using it for games and various pleasures; Finally, we amuse ourselves by making ourselves some kind of idols, before whom we ourselves bow down and for whom we seek the worship of others. Woe to us, who bear the name of Christ, but do not have the spirit of Christ in us, who bear the name of Christ, and do not follow the teaching of the Gospel..

Love

The life of the heart is love, and its death is malice and enmity. The Lord keeps us on earth so that love may fully penetrate our hearts: this is the purpose of the existence of our temporal world.

Love for God is manifested in us and acts when we begin to love our neighbor as ourselves: when for him, this image of God, we spare neither ourselves nor anything earthly, when we try to serve him for salvation with all we can; when we renounce, for the sake of pleasing God, the pleasing of our belly, this carnal sight, when we submit our carnal mind to the mind of God. The Holy Scriptures teach: "He who does not love his brother whom he sees, how can he love God whom he does not see?" (1 John 4:20; Gal. 5:24)

Remember that the Lord is in every Christian. When your neighbor comes to you, have great respect for him, for the Lord is in him. Often through people the Lord expresses His will: "God works in you both to will and to act according to His good pleasure" (Philippians 2:13). Spare nothing for your brother as for the Lord. Be sincere to everyone, kind and cordial to everyone.

Remember that man is a great and dear creature to God. But this great creature after the Fall became weak, subject to many weaknesses. Loving and honoring him as the bearer of the image of the Creator, endure also his weaknesses – various passions and unseemly actions – as the weaknesses of the sick. It is said: "We, the strong, must bear the infirmities of the powerless and not please ourselves... Bear one another's burdens, and thus fulfill the law of Christ" (Rom. 15:1; Gal. 6:2).