Exhortation to the Greeks 9.82–9.88

And I could bring you countless Scriptures, of which not even “one stroke will pass away” without being fulfilled; for the mouth of the Lord, the Holy Spirit, has spoken these things. “No longer, then,” he says, “my son, make light of the Lord's discipline, nor lose heart when you are reproved by him.” O surpassing love for humankind! Not as a teacher to his pupils, nor as a master to his servants, nor as God to human beings, but “as a gentle father” he admonishes his sons. Moses confesses that he is “terrified and trembling” when he hears about the Word; and do you, when you listen to the divine Word, not fear? Are you not anxious? Are you not at once cautious and eager to learn, that is, eager for salvation, fearing the wrath, loving the grace, zealous for the hope, so that you may escape the judgment? Come, come, my young people! “For unless you become again as little children and are born again,” as the Scripture says, you will not receive him who is truly Father, “nor will you ever enter the kingdom of heaven.” For how is the stranger permitted to enter? But when, I think, he is enrolled and made a citizen and receives the Father, then he will be “in the Father's house,” then he will be counted worthy to inherit, then he will share the Father's kingdom with the true Son, “the Beloved.” For this is the firstborn church, made up of many good children; these are “the firstborn enrolled in heaven,” who hold festival with so many “myriads of angels.” And we are firstborn children, the nurslings of God, the true friends of “the Firstborn,” the first of all humankind to know God, the first to be torn away from our sins,

the first to be separated from the devil. But now some are the more godless, the more God loves humankind. For he wants us to become sons instead of slaves, but they have disdained even to become sons. O the great folly of it! You are ashamed of the Lord. He promises freedom, and you run away into slavery. He grants salvation, and you are swept down into death. He gives eternal life, and you wait for punishment; and you look ahead to “the fire which the Lord has prepared for the devil and his angels.” That is why the blessed apostle says: “I testify in the Lord that you no longer walk as the Gentiles walk, in the futility of their mind, darkened in their understanding and alienated from the life of God because of the ignorance that is in them, because of the hardness of their heart; who, having become callous, have given themselves up to licentiousness, for the practice of every uncleanness …

… and greed.” With such a witness convicting the folly of human beings and calling on God, what else remains for the unbelieving but judgment and condemnation? But the Lord does not grow weary of exhorting, frightening, urging, rousing, admonishing; he wakes them from sleep and raises up those who have gone astray from their darkness. “Awake,” he says, “you who sleep, and arise from the dead, and Christ the Lord will shine on you,” the sun of the resurrection, begotten “before the morning star,” who has given life by his own rays. Let no one, then, despise the Word, lest he unwittingly despise himself. For the Scripture says somewhere: “Today, if you hear his voice, do not harden your hearts, as in the provocation, on the day of testing in the wilderness, where your fathers tested me by trial.” If you wish to learn what the trial is, the Holy Spirit will explain it to you: “And they saw my works,” he says, “for forty years. Therefore I was angry with this generation and said: They always go astray in their heart; they did not know my ways; as I swore in my wrath, they shall not enter my rest.” See the threat! See the exhortation! See the honor! Why then do we still turn grace into wrath, instead of receiving the Word with open ears and welcoming God as a guest in pure souls? For great is the grace of his promise, if today we hear his voice; and this “today” is extended day by day, as long as it is called “today.” Until the consummation, both the “today” and the learning remain; and then the true “today,” the unending day of God, stretches out through the ages.

Let us always, then, obey the voice of the divine Word. For “today” is an image of eternity, and the day is a symbol of light, and the Word is light for human beings, by which we are illuminated to see God. Naturally, then, for those who have believed and obey, grace will abound; but with those who have disobeyed and go astray in heart, and have not known the ways of the Lord, which John commanded to be made straight and prepared, with these God is angry and threatens them. And indeed the ancient wanderers among the Hebrews received the fulfillment of the threat in a figure: for they are said not to have entered into the rest because of their unbelief, until they followed the successor of Moses and learned at last, by experience, that they could not be saved otherwise than by believing as Jesus did. But the Lord, who loves humankind, calls all people “to the knowledge of the truth,” he who sends the Paraclete. What then is this knowledge? Godliness; and “godliness is profitable for all things,” according to Paul, “having promise of the life that now is and of that which is to come.” How much, you people, would you have agreed to pay, if eternal salvation were for sale?

Not even if one measured out the whole Pactolus, the legendary river of gold, would he count out a price equal to salvation. Do not lose heart, then: if you are willing, you can buy that precious salvation with a treasure of your own, love and the faith of life, which is a worthy price. God gladly accepts this payment. “For we have hoped in the living God, who is the Savior of all people, especially of those who believe.” But the rest, clinging to the world like seaweed to rocks in the sea, make light of immortality; like the old man of Ithaca, they long not for the truth and the fatherland in heaven, nor for the light that truly is, but for the smoke. Godliness, which makes the human being like God as far as possible, enrolls God as its fitting teacher, since he alone is able worthily to make a human being like God.

The apostle, knowing this truly divine teaching, says: “But you, Timothy, from infancy have known the sacred letters, which are able to make you wise for salvation through faith in Christ.” For truly sacred are the letters that make holy and make divine; and the same apostle consistently calls the Scriptures composed of these sacred letters and syllables, the collected writings, “inspired by God, being profitable for teaching, for reproof, for correction, for training in righteousness, that the man of God may be complete, thoroughly equipped for every good work.” No one would be so struck by the exhortations of the other saints as by those of the Lord himself, who loves humankind; for this is his one and only work, that the human being be saved. He himself cries out, urging us to salvation: “The kingdom of heaven is at hand”; he converts people as they draw near to him through fear. So too the apostle of the Lord, exhorting the Macedonians, becomes the interpreter of the divine voice, saying: “The Lord is at hand; take care that we are not found empty.” But you are so fearless, or rather so unbelieving, that you obey neither the Lord himself nor Paul, and that though he was in chains for Christ.

“Taste and see that God is good.” Faith will lead you in, experience will teach you, Scripture will train you, saying: “Come, children, listen to me; I will teach you the fear of the Lord.” Then, as to those who have already believed, it adds briefly: “Who is the man who desires life, who loves to see good days?” We are, we will say, we who worship the Good, who are zealous for good things. Listen, then, “you who are far off”; listen, “you who are near.” The Word has been hidden from no one; he is a common light, he shines on all human beings; there is no Cimmerian in the Word. Let us hasten to salvation, to the new birth. Let us, being many, hasten to be gathered into one love, according to the union of the one essence. Being made good, let us in like manner pursue unity, seeking the good Monad. The union of many, taking divine harmony out of many voices and dispersion, becomes one symphony, following one leader of the chorus and teacher, the Word, resting on the truth itself, saying “Abba, Father.” This true voice God welcomes from his children, gathering it as their first fruits.