Reading this morning from the small prayer book, The Light of the World, Prayers to Our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ, Translated by the V. Rev. Archimandrite Maximos Costas, New Rome Press,  A prayer to Our Lord Jesus Christ, by St Isaac the Syrian, these words:
"Let your soul which You surrendered to your Father when you were on the cross, guide me to your grace..."
The word 'soul', jumped out like a hammer, and whacked me on the head. 
Jesus, fully God and fully man, as He is defined in Christian Tradition, struck me with a new reality. 
Jesus is fully man, in that he was born of a woman, and moved on this earth healing people, loving those around Him, and being attacked, stoned, slandered, punched, beaten, crucified, killed, and then resurrected from the dead. In the process of His life, He carried with him a soul, just like each of us. 
Here is the thing that I had not seen before: In His Heart, the Father lived and spoke to Him, and in this knowledge, He labored in all that the Father intended of Him. And see how He did this, by treating disrespect, violence, and distrust and all the sins committed against Him without holding it in His heart.  No grudges, there, simply pointing out, “behold the leaven of the Pharisees”.
In this He set a pattern for the “New Adam”, a name that He is called. By laying aside all of the passions, (avarice, pride, vanity, lust, etc.) He did not respond to those traps which we fall into. By carrying the Father in His heart and responding to the Father’s direction, the hardest perhaps, to wait for Lazarus to die, and the other to be crucified, He laid a pattern for us to follow.
At His resurrection he laid the pattern and refashioned us in His image as mankind.  We, through prayer, fasting, and Loving of Him, not ourselves, have been conceived to carry Him in our hearts, listening for His Instruction, or the instruction of the Holy Spirit whom the Father sent to instruct us. If we do not act on the passions when they confront us, or we when are tempted- we gain Theosis, (the deification of man), to become, little Christs. Listening, not acting on impulse, and not struggling with the why of things, so much as trusting what we know is right in our hearts and following that even if it is hard. That is the way Saints are made.
This is an amazing gift.  The words of Jesus to Peter, when he asked about John come to me, “What of Him?” Jesus says, “Don’t look at him, follow me.”  

This is a hard saying that I am not good at following, from The Book of James- "...to love others with humility and mercy, even if they are in the wrong. James 4:11-12
I pray that I would take this to heart and be better at backing off of what I want to say, to have the humility to listen and ask questions, rather than assign my meanings and understanding as a response.
This encompasses people with whom I work or live, or those viewed from afar, who do not do what we feel they should be doing.  Loving them despite disagreeing with them, as people who are perhaps deeply fallen, feeling they are wrong, but still accepting them as one whom God has created, like myself.
Humility and mercy... in daily passage, doing unto others as I would have them do to me.

The Reading was John 5:39-47. The parable was about the rich man who had a beggar at his gate. The beggar died, and so also the rich man.  The rich man was in hell, and across the gulf, he saw Lazarus the beggar in the bosom of Abraham. 
Abraham explained that in life, the rich man had everything he wanted, but Lazarus had suffered and had little. Abraham asked if Lazarus could come and put a drop of water on his dry lips. Abraham explained there was a great gulf between them, and it could not be crossed. The rich man then asked if Lazarus would go to his Father's house and tell his brothers this. Abraham says, "They have Moses and the prophets; let them hear them. 30And he said, Nay, father Abraham: but if one went unto them from the dead, they will repent. 31And he said unto him, If they hear not Moses and the prophets, neither will they be persuaded, though one rose from the dead."
 How important acceptance is. Here was the Son of a loving Father, sent to earth to heal people and bring them a message of love from the Father. He was condemned for his loving grace and mercy towards us. He endured crucifixion, that we would have the chance to sit, so to speak, in the bosom of Abraham (Heaven).  It is amazing to me that the evil one is able to block and ridicule that Love, and make it so hard to hear, for us poor human beings whom He created. 
I was just such a person. Too intellectual to believe something so mind-boggling.  Jesus knocked on my door (noggin), and I got the message. Jesus is real, and I had better find out who he is! 
I just finished reading a George MacDonald series of books centered around a young Curate. The first book, The Curate's Awakening, says it profoundly and well. Better and more succinctly than I had ever read in a capsulized form about Faith, and the reality of Jesus Christ. It's worth reading, as are the other two.  The first one is exceptional.
And then this:  Luke 11:9-10
"So I say to you, ask, and it will be given to you; seek, and you will find; knock, and it will be opened to you.
  For everyone who asks receives, and he who seeks finds, and to him who knocks it will be opened. 
 
​(In regard to the above, this line represents the way we communicate with Jesus. He is not saying, 'I will give you the material goods that you want,' though He might. He is asking you to talk to Him, to ask Him to help you with worries, or sadness, or even to accomplish everyday chores. Speak to Him when you feel joy and are thankful for good things.  He wants you to ask Him for help that others might need, with friends, family, people that you love.)  

The wise Abbot made a distinction in this: When an event happens that needs your involvement, look to the good and the positive. He said, "If a child is being kidnapped, we rush to the aid of the child, not the attack of the kidnapper". 
The world is full of litigation, anger towards others, impatience, and so on. Much of that negative energy is based on someone doing something bad (to me), and I am going to get even, or do something equally bad to pay them back, 'an eye for an eye'.  The negative responding to the negative. Instead, he said, respond on behalf of the good, if the negative is in the way of it or trying to destroy it; so be it, protect the good. 
Do you see that way of responding? To me, it was profound. Building on what is good and true, vs heaping bad upon bad.
That point of view has immense Power. 
Another side of this- If three policemen are standing in view of the kidnapper and the child is being abducted, rather than getting in the way or taking it upon yourself, leave it to those who are protecting the child (or group) to respond, as long as they clearly know that something is amiss. My role in this is asking God for help in the situation.