orthodoxgladness:

What is holiness? Is this a special gift to heal or predict? No, dear ones. It is simply the ability not to close one’s heart, not to destroy a person in oneself, not to lose love in oneself. And to respond to the love of God with human love, and say: “I am with you, Lord,” and go after Him, no matter how hard it was …

Archpriest Vladimir Astakhov.

We read the lives of the Saints and they seem so far away. So unattainable. So ethereal. But this is not true.

They are not far from us – they are us. God has not called us to an unattainable goal. The holiness of God is given to us by His grace and He calls us to love him more than anything else. To die so that He may be our all.

And this begins with the words “I love You.”