True spiritual growth comes by participating in the Lenten effort and by experiencing for ourselves the content of the Lenten services of our Church. Fr. Alexander Schmemann has written a book, Great Lent, which is very helpful in understanding the Lenten services.

The writers of the Bible and the Fathers of the Church, who composed our church services, struggled personally to overcome their weaknesses and cleanse their passions. They desired to become clean vessels of the Holy Spirit. And God endowed them with His holy grace. What they share with us in their writings are the fruits of their spiritual struggles and growth, the presence of the Holy Spirit in their lives.

Among the many gems of the Lenten services is the Prayer of St. Ephraim the Syrian:

O Lord and Master of my life!
Take from me the spirit of sloth, faintheartedness, lust of power, and idle talk.
But give rather the spirit of chastity, humility, patience, and love to your servant.
Yea, O Lord and King! Grant me to see my own sins and not to judge my brother; for Thou art blessed unto the ages of ages. Amen.

In this prayer, St. Ephraim acknowledges God as Lord and Master of our lives. It is important to keep alive this confession of God as Lord and Master of our lives, because what follows in the next two lines of prayer will shake our spiritual life at its foundation.

For this reason, we ask God to take away from us the spirit of sloth, faint-heartedness, lust of power, and idle talk. For sloth is spiritual laziness. It is the inner feeling that pushes us down and leaves us with low self-esteem. It drains us of energy and it produces in us a form of cynicism every time we try to make a new start.

Sloth leads to faint-heartedness, to depression, to despair. One cannot see anything good around him. Everything seems negative. A feeling of pessimism pervades his being. It is demonic influence at its worst. Man is unable to see the light, the goodness of creation, to desire it, and strive to achieve it.

Despondency and faint-heartedness fill the heart with lust of power. Being empty inside, man tries to dominate the people around him. If the Lord is not the Master of my life, then I become lord and master and consider the others my subjects, for my use. Lust of power also can take the form of indifference, contempt, lack of interest, lack of consideration, and lack of respect.

And idle talk: Man has the gift of speech to communicate with others and praise God. God revealed Himself as the Word. "And the Word became flesh," a human being. But man can abuse this gift of speech with idle talk, through gossip and wasteful verbiage, and thus bring great catastrophe on his fellow man and on himself.

St. Ephraim moves quickly to the positive virtues which we need to grow spiritually. "The spirit of chastity" does not refer only to sexual purity, but also to whole-mindedness, wisdom to see clearly the blessings of God upon us and the goodness of His creation and to praise Him for it. He calls upon God to give us this wholeness that we may grow spiritually in Him. Humility is the fertile ground - the mother of virtues - that helps us relate correctly to our fellow man and to our God.

Patience is needed in everything. How much more we need patience in our era when we want everything "instantly," as a form of cure-all. God takes His time to make us and shape us. The attaining of virtue and sanctity is a lifelong process, one in which we have to be co-workers with God.

Love is the goal of all virtues. That's why God summed up all the commandments into one: Love for God and love for our fellow man. When we have love, we are closer to God.

St. Ephraim, as an experienced spiritual father, can see the danger of self-righteousness and pride. To protect us, he asked the Lord to grant us the discretion/discernment to "see our own errors and not to judge our brother."

During Great Lent we become spiritually introspective and examine our personal lives. We avoid the pitfalls of sin and strive to cultivate the virtues that will bring us closer to God and to our fellow man, as Saint Ephraim urges in his prayer.

May each of us, as we set out on the Lenten journey, ask God to be the Lord and Master of each of our lives, and then may we walk with Him all the days of our lives.