The method of disciplining one's will to have only one goal in everything, which is, to externally and internally please God. [THREAD]

It is not sufficient for you merely to wish and seek to be pleasing to God, always and in all things. You need to desire it as if God Himself were moving you, and for one aim, to please Him with a pure heart.

The apostle teaches us to test what is God's will, that it is not just good, but also acceptable to Him and perfect in every respect. He states

Because if our works are defective, even to some small degree, or if we do things without our whole will and ability, it is plain that it is, imperfect.

So if you want to keep yourself from various hidden obstacles on the way to perfection, eager only to gratify and glorify Him and to labor for Him only, because He wants to be the start and end of every deed and thought of ours, act in the following way:

So it happens many times that in reality we desire or do not desire something for ourselves, for our own regard, and yet we suppose that we desire it simply to satisfy God.

The only means of keeping from this self-deception is a pure heart, which means forsaking the old Adam and clothing oneself with a new man. This is the goal and aim of the full unseen warfare.

We might have a genuine feeling of God working in us to do something either by a divine understanding or enlightenment, whereby the will of God is uncovered to spotless hearts in various ways.

These come about not from our own will but from God, not through our own working but passively. Such feelings act as assurances that what we are pursuing fits with the will of God.

But before all else we should speak to God with the most warm and pure prayer, beseeching Him with all care... many times, to illumine the darkness in us and to teach us. We should pray 3 times say the fathers Barsanuphius and John and then we should do as your heart is given to.

But you should not forget that every decision, which is borne in you from such spiritual stirrings as we have spoken of, must be confirmed by the counsel and judgment of an experienced person.

With regard to matters that take a long time, or which are constant, we must set in our heart a steadfast resolve to do them only to be well-pleasing to God. And this determination should be renewed often, right to the end.

And so if one does not take heed to himself, he might start some work with the sole aim of pleasing the Lord, but after awhile, he may bring in something of self-regard. In this he finds that his own wants are satisfied, to such a degree that God's will becomes neglected.

One who is moved to doing something solely by the understanding of the will of God and a desire to satisfy Him, never will favor one thing over another, even if one is great and elevated, while the other is small and insignificant.

Rather he has his own will equally split between them, so long as they are well-pleasing to God.

Even if some occupation is rather unimportant, if it performed with the sole aim of glorifying and pleasing God, it becomes to God's eyes infinitely more precious than many other heroic deeds, done without such a goal.

God is more pleased to see u giving a small coin to a beggar, merely with the intent of pleasing His noble divinity, than if you divest yourself of all ur goods for some other aim, even if you're doing it to get divine blessings, even tho such an intention is good and expedient.

This task of focusing your thoughts, feelings and deeds solely to please God, will appear difficult initially, but later on it will become easy.