Strong in Grace

The athlete does not become strong by admiring strength. Formation that creates transformation requires faithful, consistent training. The same is true of the spiritual life.

Jul 27, 2026

Someone once said, “The pain you feel today is the strength you will feel tomorrow.” I know this with my head. But my “want to,” that inner motivational engine necessary to get me exercising regularly, sometimes just is not there.

I get it.

What I know I need to do, I do not do, because I do not want to strongly enough to overcome my own inertia. And that, my dear friends, applies to spiritual exercise at least as much as physical exercise. Probably more.

So what can I do to strengthen my will? What are the costs of doing nothing? The answers are not going to make you feel good. But they might just get you off the couch and on your knees.

“An athlete is not crowned unless he competes according to the rules.”

St. Paul uses the image of the athlete repeatedly when describing the Christian life, and it is exactly right. The athlete does not become strong by admiring strength or by reading about training programs. The athlete becomes strong by training.

Faithfully. Consistently.

Even when the motivation is not there. Especially when the motivation is not there.

And the formation that creates transformation is at the heart of the spiritual disciplines of the Faith.

Timothy, my son, be strong in the grace that is in Christ Jesus, and what you have heard from me before many witnesses entrust to faithful men who will be able to teach others also. Share in suffering as a good soldier of Christ Jesus. No soldier on service gets entangled in civilian pursuits, since his aim is to satisfy the one who enlisted him. An athlete is not crowned unless he competes according to the rules. It is the hardworking farmer who ought to have the first share of the crops. Think over what I say, for the Lord will grant you understanding in everything.
Remember Jesus Christ, risen from the dead, descended from David, as preached in my gospel, the gospel for which I am suffering and wearing fetters like a criminal. But the word of God is not fettered. Therefore I endure everything for the sake of the elect, that they also may obtain salvation in Christ Jesus with its eternal glory.

St. Paul is writing to his spiritual son, St. Timothy, trying to equip him to lead his parish well and help those Christians actually practice the Faith rather than merely admire it. He knows that if the Faith is going to transform lives and be strong enough to pass to future generations, the people must exercise their spiritual lives.

And that means sore spiritual muscles.

He gives St. Timothy three images. A soldier. An athlete. A farmer. Each one is a portrait of disciplined, purposeful, motivated effort. None of them coasts. None of them shows up and waits to feel inspired. Each one does what is required because the goal is worth it.

What Can We Take From This?

First, genuine strength in the Faith flows from love for Christ, not from religious information or doctrinal knowledge alone.

“Be strong in the grace that is in Christ Jesus.”

Not strong in the correct theology. Not strong in the right cultural tradition. Not strong in the accumulated habits of a religious upbringing.

Strong in the grace that is in Christ Jesus.

There is an old memory tool that may sound trite but is useful. GRACE is God’s Riches At Christ’s Expense. If I am going to be a strong Christian, the foundation must be a genuine and growing love for Jesus Christ for what He has done, is doing, and will do because He loves me.

This is where the will is located and healed. Orthodox wisdom has always understood that the deepest problem is not in the mind, which knows the right things, or even primarily in the body, which tends toward its appetites. The deepest problem is in the will, the inner faculty that chooses, that prioritizes, that either acts on what it knows or remains passive.

And what heals the will is not more information. It is love.

A strong enough love for Christ always motivates valuing the relationship with God as the top priority. And what drives that love? His everlasting love for us. His desire for our salvation overwhelms the selfish, self-centered patterns that create isolation rather than communion. When I am genuinely gripped by the truth that God loves me, has proven it in the Resurrection of His Son, and wants me with Him forever, the “want to” starts to move.

No wonder the athlete competes according to the rules. The reward at the finish line is Love Himself.

Next, staying focused means identifying and refusing the distractions that take our eyes off the goal.

“No soldier on service gets entangled in civilian pursuits, since his aim is to satisfy the one who enlisted him.”

The soldier who tries to run a side business while deployed is going to be a poor soldier. The athlete who trains casually and intermittently is not going to compete effectively. The farmer who shows up occasionally and only when motivated is not going to have crops worth harvesting.

There is an old story about how a farmer plows a straight row. He does not look down at the plow. If he does, the rows will be crooked. He fixes his eyes on a point at the far end of the field and plows toward it. That is the exercise that keeps the row straight.

Whatever takes my eyes off Christ, off the eternal goal, off the relationship that is the whole point of the Faith, is a distraction I cannot afford to indulge indefinitely.

Not all distractions are sinful. Many are simply civilian pursuits, good things in themselves that have been allowed to crowd out the one thing that is most important.

Regular examination of what is actually occupying the center of my life, what I am actually spending my time, energy, and attention on, is the spiritual equivalent of the athlete reviewing training footage. Honest. Sometimes uncomfortable. Necessary for improvement.

In other words, go to confession!

Finally, faithfulness, not success or brilliance, is the quality that carries us to the finish line.

“Therefore I endure everything for the sake of the elect, that they also may obtain salvation in Christ Jesus with its eternal glory.”

Paul is writing this from prison, wearing chains like a criminal, for preaching the Gospel. And he says, “But the word of God is not fettered.” His circumstances are terrible. His faithfulness is unbroken.

The Church does not call us the successful, the brilliant, or the spiritually impressive.

She calls us the Faithful.

The key to seeing our “want to” become healthy, the key to spiritual strength and maturity, the key to endurance through hard seasons and even persecution, all of it rests in faithfulness, regardless of what is happening around us.

Consistency is the enemy of every failed exercise program.

The person who trains hard for three weeks and then stops has gained very little. The person who trains moderately but consistently for three years has been transformed.

The same is true of the spiritual life. The disciplines practiced faithfully over time do what no intense burst of spiritual enthusiasm can produce. They form the will itself, slowly reshaping the inner faculty from the one that chooses what is easy to the one that chooses what is true.

Start today. Not tomorrow. Today. Stretch and exercise the Faith. Be faithful in prayer, in the spiritual disciplines, in gathering with the community for worship. Apply yourself to learning the Faith. Read the lives of the saints.

St. Panteleimon the Great Martyr and Healer

Today we celebrate the Feast of St. Panteleimon the Great Martyr and Healer, one of the most beloved saints in the Orthodox world. Born in Nicomedia in the late third century to a pagan father and a Christian mother, St. Panteleimon was trained as a physician. After his mother’s death, his father raised him in paganism, but the holy physician St. Hermolaus brought him to faith in Christ, and he was baptized.

St. Panteleimon practiced medicine freely, healing the sick without charging payment, and became known throughout the region for miraculous healings performed in the name of Christ. When persecution began, he was denounced, tortured with extraordinary cruelty, and finally beheaded after refusing to deny Christ despite every attempt to break him.

St. Panteleimon is the living illustration of today’s passage. He was strong in the grace that is in Christ Jesus. He stayed focused on the goal, using his medical gifts entirely in service of the One who had given them. And he endured everything faithfully, not because he was naturally fearless but because his years of faithful practice had formed a will that could not be broken by temporary threats.

He is the athlete who competed “according to the rules” and received the crown.

Your Response Today

Today, be honest about your “want to.”

Not about what you know you should be doing. About whether you actually want to do it strongly enough to overcome your inertia. If the “want to” is weak, the answer is not to will yourself harder. The answer is to look where love is lacking. To spend time with the Risen Christ, in prayer, in the Scripture, in the Eucharist, until the love that drove St. Panteleimon to the physician’s table and finally to the martyr’s block begins to stir in you again.

Then start. Even a small start made faithfully is worth more than a grand resolution made once and abandoned.

Then pray simply:

“Lord Jesus Christ, strengthen my will with the grace that is in You. Let my love for You be strong enough to drive my faithfulness, and let my faithfulness, practiced consistently, form me into the person You have always known I could be.”

Being Orthodox on Purpose means training the will through faithful spiritual exercise, driven not by obligation but by love for the One whose grace is strong enough to transform every weak “want to” into the endurance of a champion!

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