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   Day by Day with the Early Church Fathers
   Devotion for Monday , August 07, 2000
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Selection Taken From:
Day by Day with the Early Church Fathers by

Taken from the Early Church Fathers, 38-volume set comes 366 powerful Bible passages and devotional readings.

"August 7"

"Bring forth therefore fruits meet for repentance." - —Matthew 3:8

Our wills should keep up with the grace of God and not fall behind. Otherwise, while our wills are idle, the grace given to us might begin to leave us. The enemy, finding us empty and naked, would then enter into us. This happened to a man in the Gospel of Matthew. The devil went out of the man. However “having gone through dry places, he took seven other spirits more wicked than himself; and returning and finding the house empty, he dwelt there, and the last state of that man was worse than the first.” . . . But Paul orders us not to let the grace we received be unprofitable. He wrote these things particularly to his disciple Timothy but enforces them on us through him. He said, “Neglect not the gift that is in thee. For he who tilleth his land shall be satisfied with bread; but the paths of the slothful are strewn with thorns.” The Spirit forewarns us not to fall into these thorns. He says, “Break up your fallow ground, sow not among thorns.” When we despise the grace given to us, and, as a result, fall into worldly concerns, we give ourselves over to our lusts. Then in times of persecution we are offended and become completely unfruitful. . . . Servants of the Lord should be diligent and careful. Moreover, they should burn like a flame. Then, when they have passionately destroyed all their fleshly sin, they can draw near to God. For according to the saint’s expression, He is “a consuming fire.”