Psalms 57:1

Therefore, let us cry out to Him, as we have now sung: Have mercy on me, O God, have mercy on me, for my soul hopes in You. Have mercy on me, says, O God: why? Because my soul has hoped in You. This, says He, is the sacrifice which I offer to You, that You may hear me: because my soul has hoped in You. Who has hoped in God and been abandoned? It even happens in great temptations; and however much we progress in God, we live under pardon. Did not the Lord Jesus teach the little lambs, and not the rams themselves, to pray? His disciples, our Apostles, the very leaders of the flock, of whom we are the children, as it was said: Offer to the Lord the sons of rams; He was teaching those very rams to pray, when He told them to say: Forgive us our debts. If this daily prayer exists, we live under pardon. And all our sins were forgiven in baptism, and we live under pardon. We progress, if our hope in God is nurtured and strengthened by Him helping us, so that we restrain all lust. Let us fight: our struggle is known to Him, who knows how both to watch and to help.

You cannot move to a good place from a bad place unless you have done well in the bad place. What kind of place is that? where no one hungers. Therefore, if you want to dwell in a good place where no one hungers, in this age break your bread for the hungry. Because in that blessed place no one is a stranger, everyone lives in their homeland; therefore, if you want to be in a good place, where you find a stranger in a bad place who has nowhere to enter, receive him into your home; offer hospitality in the bad place, so that you may come to a place where you cannot be a guest. In a good place no one needs clothing: there is no cold there, no heat there: why a roof? why clothes? Where there will not be a roof, but protection, behold, even there we find a roof: Under the shadow of your wings I will hope. Therefore, in this bad place provide a roof for someone who does not have one, so that you may be in a good place where you have such a roof that you will not seek to make patched roofs: because there the rain does not drip, where there is a perpetual fountain of truth. But that rain delights, it does not wet; that rain itself is the fountain of life. What is it: Lord, with you is the fountain of life? And the Word was with God.

"Have pity on me, O God, have pity on me, for in Thee hath trusted my Soul" [Psalm 57:1]. Christ in the Passion saith, "Have pity on Me, O God." To God, God saith, "Have pity on Me!" He that with the Father hath pity on thee, in thee crieth, "Have pity on Me." For that part of Him which is crying, "Have pity on Me," is thine: from thee this He received, for the sake of thee, that thou shouldest be delivered, with Flesh He was clothed. The flesh itself crieth: "Have pity on Me, O God, have pity on me:" Man himself, soul and flesh. For whole Man did the Word take upon Him, and whole Man the Word became. Let it not therefore be thought that there Soul was not, because the Evangelist thus saith: "The Word was made flesh, and dwelled in us." For man is called flesh, as in another place saith the Scripture, "And all flesh shall see the salvation of God." Shall anywise flesh alone see, and shall Soul not be there? ...Thou hearest the Master praying, learn thou to pray. For to this end He prayed, in order that He might teach how to pray: because to this end He suffered, in order that He might teach how to suffer; to this end He rose again, in order that He might teach how to hope for rising again. "And in the shadow of Thy wings I will hope, until iniquity pass over." This now evidently whole Christ doth say: here is also our voice. For not yet hath passed over, still rife is iniquity. And in the end our Lord Himself said there should be an abounding of iniquity: "And since iniquity shall abound, the love of many shall wax cold; but he that shall have persevered unto the end, the same shall be saved." But who shall persevere even unto the end, even until iniquity pass over? He that shall have been in the Body of Christ, he that shall have been in the members of Christ, and from the Head shall have learned the patience of persevering. Thou passest away, and behold passed are thy temptations; and thou goest into another life whither have gone holy men, if holy thou hast been. Into another life have gone Martyrs; if Martyr thou shalt have been, thou also goest into another life. Because "thou" hast passed away hence, hath by any means iniquity therefore passed away? There are born other unrighteous men, as there die some unrighteous men. In like manner therefore as some unrighteous men die and others are born: so some just men go, and others are born. Even unto the…