One of the reasons I chose the quote from +Symeon the New Theologian was this:
“but without fire of the Spirit, everything he does will remain inactive and useless for his aim, for by itself what he does is powerless to cleanse the soul of its dirt and foulness.”
Seems clear to me that you and +Symeon are saying, at base, the same thing. Theosis is from God, not from our works. Orthodoxy teaches that absent Christ’s Incarnation, Death and glorious Resurrection, we would be doomed to a futile eternity without God in the place of the dead.
What he said makes it sound like we do the works and then the Holy Spirit added to them makes them worthwhile and that with the Holy Spirit the works can then cleanse us from sin.
But I don’t see that as a teaching of Scripture.
But nothing can cleanse us from sin except the blood of Jesus. Works CANNOT do it.
The wages of sin is death, not the wages of sin is works and if you do the works your sin debt is paid off.
The blood of Jesus cleanses us and our sin debt is WIPED. Gone forever.
The works are a testimony to the grace of God at work in us to His honor and glory.