A blessing from God ( Elder Paisios )

Elder Paisios quotes this old saying and asks, "What does it mean?" Clearly it is saying that it is better to work, which in earlier times would wear out your shoes, than to be lazy and to spend your time in bed wearing out the blankets.

Elder Paisios describes work in this way:
Work is a blessing, a gift from God. Work gives vigor to the body and refreshes the mind. If God had not given us work, man would have become moldy Those who are diligent work into their old age. If they stop working while they still have strength, they become melancholy; it's like death for them.
There is no way to gain peace without engaging in work of some kind. When we do take a break, like a vacation or even a lunch hour, when we did not return to work, what would we do? We would seek out some other kind of comfort. When it ended we would seek another. We would never find satisfaction. We would be filled with anxiety, not from work, but from our inability to find true comfort. We would feel an emptiness, a need for being of some value to others. Our soul would be longing to carry out the will of God which is to help and love others. This is why even though we may find ourselves fatigued at the end of a good days work, we can feel a sense of joy that we have been useful, worthwhile, have contributed to the life of mankind.


It is important to carry our faith into our work place. We should pray before we take on our various projects for God to guide and help us. We should find ways to show kindness to those we work with. In this way we carry our God's will into our work place. What is essential is to always keep God in mind while we work.


Work is a blessing from God


Resource: Elder Paisios of Mount Athos spiritual Counsels IV: Family Life, pg176

Behind every test lurks the blessing of God ( Elder Ephraim Of Arizona(Philotheou)

Almost all attribute their conversion to some ordeal.

Sorrow is not nice. However, behind it, behind the pain, behind the sorrow, behind the test, lurks the blessing of God, the rebirth, the reforming of man, of family. Almost everyone attributes his/her conversion to some test. They believe everything goes well, then God takes their child, and then there is mourning, pain etc. Then comes the grace of God which overshadows them, making these people calm. They approach the Church, approach the confession, approach the priest. Thanks to that child they go to the Church. Their pain makes them to seek, to pray for repose, to request liturgies.
Pain relieves the heart and makes it receptive to the word of God, while earlier it was hard and unreceptive. For example, a man during his youthful exuberance thinks, "I am and no one else is". There go the degrees, the glories, the health, the beauty and everything else. However, when he is laid in bed sick, he thinks differently. Vanity of vanity, everything is vanity. I may die, he thinks. What is the benefit of all these and he starts to think differently. It is like a man approaching him and tells him, "read this book and check what it says". He hears a word of God and then he listens to it. And if you give him a book, his pain has already made his heart suitable and he opens the book and the Bible and reads it and thus starts the repose of man. And when he is healed, immediately then he stands up and lives carefully his life and does not live like before with pride and with the fantasy he had.
Sickness and sorrow is by and large medicine of the providence of God to bring man closer to Him and increase his virtue.
The sickness and sorrow is by and large medicine of the providence of God to bring man closer to Him and increase his virtue. Job was the best man on earth but God wanted to make him even better. Before he was tested, Job was not famous. As soon as he was tested and fought, struggled, crowned and became rich, after that began his glory to this day. His example is the most brilliant one and empowers every man that is being tested. If he was tested being a saint, so much more us who are sinners. The result was he was made holy and was given again years of life and blessed him doubly and thrice with what he had, thus becoming a bright example throughout the centuries and for him to relax and say: "As the Lord wished so it happened. May the name of the Lord be blessed". He lowers his head and says: "God gave and God took" And even if He took my child, hasn't God given him to me? He took it. Where is my child? In heaven? So what happens there? He reposes there.
Behind every test lurks the will of God and the benefit which naturally he could not see at that time, but with time he will know the benefit. We have many such examples.
Like also the Saints Andronicus and Athanasia. They were a couple. He was a jeweler of great wealth etc. Part of his profit from work was used to feed his family. Another part of his profit he gave to the poor and a third of his profit was lent to people who had no money, interest free. They had two happy daughters. One day both died from sickness. Both parents went to bury them. Athanasia, the unfortunate one, would cry inconsolably over their graves. So did Andronicus. With great pain he started for home. Poor Athanasia stayed behind to mourn over their graves. "My children" and "My children" she cried. The sun was setting and the cemetery was closing. In her sorrow she saw a monk coming to her and telling her: "Lady why are you crying?"
How could I not cry Father?" (She thought he was the priest of the cemetery). "I buried both my children, my two angels, I laid them in their graves and I and my husband are left alone. We have no more freshness anymore.
He tells her: "Your children are in paradise with the angels. They are in the joy and grace of God and you cry? Pity, and you are a Christian.
"So they live my children? Are they angels?"
Of course your children are angels"
He was the Saint of that Church. Finally both Andronicus and Athanasia became monastics and were sanctified.
Elder Ephraim, Abbot of the Holy Monastery of St. Anthony's - Arizona
Tested spiritual admonitions for receiving our spiritual health and salvation.
Publication, "Orthodox Kypseli" Thessalonica.

Blessing of Homes

Why we bless our homes

We, as Christians, are engaged in a struggle to reclaim fallen nature for the Kingdom of God. We often talk about this in terms of our own salvation, but the Church, addressing all of creation in a wholistic manner, also reaches out and reclaims a bit here and a bit there of creation in general. We do this in order that we might restore the usefulness of creation for working out our own salvation. Hence we bless anything that might help us in our salvation - and by blessing it we reclaim it for the Kingdom of God.
There are few things more vital to our lives than our homes. In our homes we pray, we work, we talk to others, we order our lives, we work out our marriages, etc. What more important place to reclaim for the Kingdom of God - or is it better to continue living in a place which is occupied by the enemy. For the most effective working out of our salvation, we must drive the enemy out of our homes, and keep him at bay by our prayers, our righteous life, and the annual sprinkling by Holy Water at Theophany. Source: http://www.orthodox.net/articles/whybless.html

OrthodoxWiki on Blessing the Home

Sanctification of the home
The sanctification of the home takes place with prayer and the sprinkling of holy water. The priest, at this annual visit, asks God to have mercy on the house, to rid it of every evil and to fill if with every blessing. Everyone of the house, prays together for the living and the dead of the family, and all who live and have lived in the house. They all sing the hymn of salvation and process from room to room while the priest blesses the house.

Preparation
Traditions of the ceremony differ according to local custom, but these general guidelines should are observed:
A candle with an icon and some holy water should be placed in a suitable place, such as kitchen or dining room table, or a home altar.
Also, a list of first names for whom prayers are to be offered, including members of the family and all those living in the house. The list should have a clear distinction between the living an the dead.
If it is the practice to give the priest a gift, it should not be placed with the holy objects on the table. It can be prepared in advanced, but given at the conclusion of the service.

The ceremony
When the priest comes, all who are present in the house should gather around the icon with the candle. They should, if they are able to join in, say theTrisagion Prayers and sing of the Troparion of the Feast of Epiphany. Then a family member leads the priest through the house with the candle. As he goes, he sprinkles holy water, and prays for a blessing upon each room and the activity that goes on there. When they have gone through the entire house, the family gathers again around the table and the priest blesses each person present.

Prayer for Blessing of Homes Priest: Blessed is our God always, both now and ever, and to the ages of ages.

Reader:
Amen. Trisagion Prayer. All Holy Trinity ... Our Father. (see page 32).

Priest:
For Yours is the Kingdom. . . Amen. Troparion, Tone I
When You in Jordan for Your baptism were come, O Lord, then was revealed unto us to worship the Trinity, for lo, the Father's voice spoke to bear witness of You, by Name, declaring You His well-beloved Son; and the Spirit in form like a dove appeared to confirm the sure truth of the spoken Word; O Lord made manifest and light of the world, we give glory to You, O Christ our God.
Priest:
Let us pray to the Lord. Lord have mercy.
O God our Savior, the True Light, Who was baptized *in the Jordan by the Prophet John, and Who did deign to enter under the roof-tree of Zacchaeus, bringing salvation unto him and unto his house: do You, the same Lord, keep safe also from harm those who dwell herein; grant to them Your blessing, purification and bodily health, and all their petitions that are unto salvation and Life everlasting; for blessed are You, as also Your Father Who is from everlasting, and Your All; Holy, Good and Life; creating Spirit, both now and ever, and to the ages of ages. Amen.
And the Priest shall bless the whole house with Holy Water, saying:
When You in Jordan ...
Apolysis
May He Who condescended to be baptized in the river Jordan by the Forerunner and Prophet John, for our salvation, through the intercessions of His immaculate Mother, the Theotokos and Ever-Virgin Mary, and of all the Saints, have mercy on us and save us, for He is our good and loving Lord.
The Priest proclaims:
Grant, O Lord, a prosperous and peaceful life, health and salvation, and the furtherance of all good things to all Your servants (Names)who dwell herein, and preserve them for many years.
Reader: Many years! (3)

Source: http://www.goarch.org/en/chapel/liturgical_texts/home_bless.asp