Cry out the prayer without ceasing. May God grant you a blessed beginning! May it not abandon you, or rather, may you not abandon the prayer—the life of the soul, the breath of the heart, the sweet-scented springtime which creates a spiritual spring in the struggling soul. My children, prayer and humility are the all-powerful weapons which we must keep continuously in our hands with sleepless attentiveness, because these, with God’s help, will give us the victory against the demons.
Persist in the prayer; do not think that great things are achieved so easily. You will labor; you will sweat—and God will see your labor and humility, and then He will easily bestow upon you the gift of prayer. The more you say the prayer, the more you will bring joy to me—primarily to God—and the more you will alleviate your souls. You must help each other in this sense: when you say the prayer out loud, and someone else is not saying it and his mind is wandering elsewhere, as soon as he hears the others saying it, he wakes up from his daydreaming. Then his conscience reproves him because he is not saying the prayer, too, but is just sitting there, letting his mind wander. So he also begins to say the prayer, and thus the sayings are fulfilled: “A brother helped by a brother is like a strong city,” 1 and, “bear one another’s burdens.” 2
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1 Prov. 18:19
2 Gal. 6:2
From the book
Councels from the Holy mountain
Selected from the letters and homilies of Elder Efraim of Arizona
Selection of passages from the book by Silviu Podariu
subm. no. 3
paragraphs: 3, 7, 18, 10, 12, 19, 21, 22 from pages 303-312
