Sermon 142

SERMO 142

On the words of the Lord in the Gospel according to John: (14, 6)
"I AM THE WAY, THE TRUTH, AND THE LIFE"

Christ is the safe way.

Divine readings uplift us, lest we be broken by despair; and again they terrify us, lest we be inflated by pride. To hold, however, the middle way, true and straight, as if between the left of despair and the right of presumption, would be very difficult for us, unless Christ said: I am the way. I am, he says, the way, the truth, and the life. As if he were saying: Which way do you want to go? I am the way. Where do you want to go? I am the truth. Where do you want to remain? I am the life. Therefore, let us walk securely in the way; but let us fear the pitfalls next to the way. The enemy does not dare ambush on the way, because Christ is the way; but next to the way, he plainly does not cease. Hence it is said in the Psalm: They have set snares for me alongside the path. Another Scripture says: Remember that you are walking amidst traps. These traps, among which we walk, are not on the way, but still they are next to the way. Why do you fear, why do you dread, if you walk on the way? Then you should fear if you leave the way. For this reason, the enemy is even allowed to set traps alongside the way, so that out of the exultation of security, the way is not abandoned, and one does not fall into the snares.

The way of Christ is humble. Fornicate by the Lord.

The way is Christ, humble is Christ; truth and life is Christ, exalted and God. If you walk in humility, you will arrive at exaltation; if in weakness you do not scorn the humble, in exaltation you will remain very strong. For what cause of the humility of Christ, if not your weakness? For indeed, your infirmity besieged you greatly and irremediably; and this situation made it so that such a great physician came to you. For if you were so diseased that you could go to the physician, the infirmity itself could seem tolerable; but because you could not go to him, he came to you; he came teaching humility, by which we might return. Because pride did not allow us to return to life, and it itself had caused the exalted human heart to withdraw from life against God, and neglectful in that healthy state of the life-giving precepts, the soul fell into infirmity. Let weak ones learn to listen to him whom they despised in health; let them hear that they might rise, whom they scorned that they might fall. Let them finally learn through experience what they were unwilling to obtain through command. For their own misery has taught them, which happiness had made negligent, alas, what an evil thing it is to fornicate against the Lord by presuming upon themselves; oh how good it is to cling to the Lord, always thinking humbly. For withdrawing from that simple and singular good into the multitudes of pleasures, and into the love of the world and corruptions of the earth, this is to fornicate against the Lord. To this one it is called out: A harlot's face has been made for you, and you have become shameless in your entirety. Let us now see the council of rebuke.

Rebuke of the sinner, so that he may healthily be shamed.

For he does not rebuke to insult but wishes to bring presumption to confusion to heal it. Scripture vehemently cried out and did not flatter by caressing those whom it wished to restore by healing. Adulterers, do you not know that a friend of this world is made an enemy of God? The love of the world corrupts the soul; the love of the creator of the world purifies the soul; but unless it blushes with shame for its corruption, it does not long to return to those chaste embraces. Let it be confounded to return, which boasted itself not to return. Therefore pride hindered the soul's return. But he who rebukes does not commit a sin but shows the sin. What the soul did not want to see is placed before its eyes; and what it desired to have behind its back is brought to its face. See yourself in yourself. Why do you see the speck in your brother’s eye but do not notice the beam in your own eye? The soul is recalled to itself, which was going away from itself. Just as it had gone from itself, so it had gone from its Lord. For it had looked upon itself, and had pleased itself, and had become a lover of its own power. It departed from Him and did not remain in itself; therefore, it is driven from itself, and excluded from itself, and falls into externals. It loves the world, loves temporal things, loves earthly things. But if it loves itself, neglecting the one by whom it was made, it is already less, already failing, by loving what is less; for it is less than God; and much less, and so much less, as much as the thing made is less than the maker. Therefore, God is to be loved, so that for the love of Him, if it can be done, we forget ourselves. What is this transition then? The soul has forgotten itself by loving the world; now let it forget itself by loving the maker of the world. Driven from itself, as it were, it has lost itself; and because it does not know how to see its own deeds, it justifies its iniquities. It is carried away and becomes proud in wantonness, in luxury, in honors, in powers, in riches, in the power of vanity. It is reproved, corrected, shown to itself, displeased with itself; it confesses its filth, desires beauty; and what was going out in disarray returns in confusion.

Hatred of the sinner with his love.

Against that person it seems to be prayed, who says: "Fill their faces with shame." He says, "Fill their faces with shame, and they will seek Your name, Lord." Did he hate those whose faces he wished to be filled with shame? See how he loves those whom he wants to seek the name of the Lord. Does he only love, or only hate? Or does he both hate and love? Indeed, he both hates and loves. He hates your actions, he loves you. What does it mean: He hates your actions, he loves you? He hates what you have done, he loves what God has done. For what are yours, if not sins? And who are you, but what God has made? You neglect what you have been made, you love what you have done; you love your works outside of yourself, you neglect God's work within you. Justly, you fall, justly you also depart from yourself; justly you hear: "A spirit that walks and does not return." Rather, listen to the one calling and saying: "Return to me, and I will return to you." For God does not turn away and turn back; remaining, He corrects, He corrects without changing. He has turned away, because you turned away from Him; you caused your fall away from Him, He did not cause His fall away from you. Therefore, listen to Him saying to you: "Return to me, and I will return to you." For what it means that I return to you, is that you return to me. He follows the back of the one fleeing, He illuminates the face of the one returning. For where will you flee, fleeing from God? Where will you flee, fleeing from Him who is contained in no place and is nowhere absent; who frees the convert, punishes the one turned away? The judge you have while fleeing, have Him as a father when returning.

The swelling of pride must be healed with the medicine of humility. Christ is both the way and the door.

Pride had swollen, and with that swelling, it could not return through a narrow way. He who was made the way cries out: Enter through the narrow gate. He tries to enter, but the swelling prevents it; and the more harmfully he tries, the more the swelling prevents it. For narrowness vexes the swollen; but vexed, he will swell even more. Swelling more, when will he enter? Therefore, he must deflate if he wishes to enter. From what deflate? Let him take the medicine of humility. Let him drink a bitter, but wholesome potion against the swelling; let him drink the potion of humility. Why does he narrow himself? The mass prevents, not large but swollen; for largeness has solidity, swelling has inflation. Let not the swollen seem great to himself; let him deflate so that he may be great, firm and solid. Let him not desire these things: let him not glory in the pomp of fleeting and corruptible things. Let him hear Him Himself who said: Enter through the narrow gate; saying: I am the way. As if the swollen one sought: By what shall I enter? I am, He said, the way. Enter through Me; walk only through Me so that you may enter through the gate. For as I said: I am the way, so: I am the gate. Why seek the way to return, where to return, by what to enter? Lest you err somewhere, He Himself has made everything for you. Briefly He says: Be humble, be meek. Let us hear this most openly said, so that we may see what way it is, where the way goes, where the way leads. Where do you wish to go? Certainly perhaps, through greed, you wish to possess all things. To Me all things have been delivered by My Father, He says. Perhaps you will say: To Christ have they been delivered; but what about me? Hear the Apostle saying: Hear, as I have said long ago, so that you do not break with desperation; hear how you were loved being unlovable, hear how you were loved as dirty, foul, before there was something in you worthy of love. You were loved first, so that you might become one worthy of being loved. For indeed, Christ, as the Apostle says, died for the ungodly. Or perhaps did the ungodly deserve to be loved? I ask what the ungodly deserved. To be condemned, you answer. Even so, Christ died for the ungodly. Behold what has been bestowed on you as ungodly; now what is preserved for you as godly? What has been bestowed on the ungodly? Christ died for the ungodly. Yet you desired to possess all things. Do not seek this through greed; seek it through piety; for if you seek it thus, you will possess. For you will hold Him through whom all things were made, and with Him you will possess all things.

Christ the healer drank the cup before the sick person.

We do not say these things as if reasoning. Listen to the Apostle himself saying: He who did not spare his own Son, but delivered him up for us all; how shall he not with him also freely give us all things? Selfish one, behold you have all things. Despise all that you love which hinders you from Christ, and hold him in whom you can possess all things. Therefore, the physician, needing no such remedy himself, yet to encourage the sick, drank what was not necessary, as if speaking to the reluctant one and lifting up the fearful one, he drank first. The cup, he says, that I shall drink. Though I have nothing in me that needs to be cured by that cup, nevertheless, I shall drink, lest you disdain, you for whom it is necessary to drink. Now see, brothers, if humanity ought to linger in sickness longer having received such a great medicine. Now God is humble, and yet man is still proud. Let him hear, let him learn: All things, he says, are delivered unto me by my Father. If you desire all things, you shall have them with me. If you desire the Father, you shall have him through me, you shall have him in me. Why shall I have all things, you say, if I do not have him? You rightly say. If you also desire to have him, hear what follows. For when he had said: All things are delivered unto me by my Father, as if exhorting and saying: Come to me, if you wish to possess all things, and lest you say: I do not want all things, but him who made all things, he follows and says: No one knows the Son except the Father, and no one knows the Father except the Son. Do not despair, hear the rest: and to whomsoever the Son will reveal him. He says to whomsoever: perhaps he will not reveal to me? He would not have come humbly to you if he did not wish to make known the exalted to you. Perhaps you say here: Even if he reveals himself to me, I want to know the Father. Do you wish to know the Father? Hear Philip's voice; he was the first to announce this voice, and very aptly, as was fitting; he was thirsting after blessedness, and everywhere seeking it, he everywhere remained thirsty; he found nowhere to be satisfied. He said to the Lord thirsting: Lord, show us the Father, and it suffices us. What is: it suffices us? There resting, I shall seek no more. And the Lord: Have I been so long a time with you, and you have not known me? Philip, he who has seen me has seen the Father. This, therefore, is needed, that the Son shows himself. You will not find the Son to be lesser than the Father, nor did he say in vain: I and the Father are one. But he, one with the Father, emptied himself for you, taking the form of a servant. Because he emptied himself, taking the form of a servant, he granted this to you when you were turned away from him; however, being turned to him, he preserved for you I and the Father are one.

Christ presents a certain future vision.

And see how openly he speaks this. He who loves me keeps my commandments; but he who loves me will be loved by my Father, and I will love him. He suspends us, as if about to give something, because he loves us. Just as if a man says to you: I love you, you only pay attention to what he gives you, what he offers you, what benefits you, in what way he is useful. Therefore, the Lord says: and I will love him. Seek what He is about to give you. Hear what follows: and I will show myself to him. What is this, brothers? You see where the flame of love carries you. We are about to see something; and that something is the Word of God; and that something is God with God, through whom all things were made. The gift is proclaimed, the gift is proposed. How great and how vain human joy is! Everywhere there is the fervor of the tumult of those rushing to meet, announcing to each other as if it were something great, encouraging themselves with exhortation and idle flatteries to go, to see. Where to go? What to see? Where the corrupted soul goes, and returns more corrupted, and unworthy of the embrace of such a legitimate spouse. People go there, people run there. And Christ proposes a certain future vision, a future expectation. For he says: I will love him, and I will show him - not what I have done, not the depths of the abyss, not the secrets of the earth, not the varieties of plants, not the multitude of kinds of animals, not finally the number of stars, not the conversions of stars, not the dimensions of times. Why do you want to see these things? For if you see them, surely they would not be great. I made these things. - I will show myself to him.

Your capacity is exercised by the delay of good things.

But when will this be, someone says, when will it show? It postpones, it does not remove. And in deferring, what does it do? It expands the bosom of the soul with desire. He is going to give something great, brothers; and what do I say, even great? If even this must be said. See how much he gives to the impious, and how much he grants to the unworthy. Why to them as well? Because: "He makes his sun rise on the good and the bad." See how the creature serves blasphemers; examine these natural gifts. They have health, they have the integrity of the senses, they have the spirit that invigorates their earthly members, they have the function of this air, the vision of light, the rational mind by which they are superior to other living beings. All these lie as common riches for the rich, the poor, the good, the evil. All are nourished, all are enlightened by this light, all live as if from public resources. He gives all these things. Hence, brothers, we should consider what he saves for his own, what he prepares for the faithful, so that those who do not see and believe may see? To believe before seeing is the merit of future vision. Therefore, your capacity is exercised by the deferment of goods; so that, increased by desire, you may be fit to receive what he promises and what you desire.

He gave the pledge of His Spirit.

For He has already given something; indeed, He has given the pledge of His Spirit. What is it: He gave a pledge? As if saying: Behold, because I will give something, I now give that which may uplift you, which may inflame love, which the taste may carry away to fullness. Taste and see that the Lord is sweet. Where you have tasted, there you shall be satisfied. They shall be intoxicated, He says, with the abundance of Your house, and the rest. For with You is the fountain of life, and in Your light we shall see light. Is the fountain of life different from the light? It is said in many ways that whatever may be said will not be fully expressed. Therefore, let us be uplifted, let us be inflamed, let us burn, let us desire. And if we are delayed, we are not taken away. Let us only hold the way; there will be our satisfaction, there will be the fountain of life. The fountain of life Himself came, clothed in flesh, made us desire. He granted His death to the undeserving, He preserves His life for the deserving.

The burden for you is the swelling of pride.

But because, as we said, due to the swelling of pride we did not return, therefore He granted His death to the unworthy; He became humble so that the exalted might be lifted up. He did this so that your disease might subside. Those disciples, swelling with pride, wanted to enter, the two who asked through their mother- because they did not dare by themselves. Even their modesty should have warned them what to ask for. They did not dare on their own: they made their old mother, as one of deserving age, speak to the Lord. They desired the kingdom, which cannot be entered except through a narrow path. But they, still swelling with the desire for honor, the more they thrust themselves into it, the more grievously they were troubled. The Lord humbles them and gives a bitter cup, of which I spoke a little earlier, against the swelling. You said: I cannot; you call me through the narrow way, I cannot enter through the narrow way. Come to me, He said, all you who labor and are burdened. Your swelling is your burden. Come to me, all you who labor and are burdened, and I will refresh you. Take my yoke upon you, and learn from me.

Christ wants us to learn from him, not to perform miracles, but to be humble.

The Master of angels cries out, the Word of God cries out, by which all rational minds are fed without defect, a food reviving and remaining whole, cries out and says: Learn from me. Let the people hear him saying: Learn from me. Let them respond: What do we learn from you? For we will hear something unknown from the great master, when he says: Learn from me. Who is it who says: Learn from me? He who formed the earth, who divided the sea and the dry land, who created birds, who created land animals, who created all swimming things, who placed the stars in the sky, who distinguished day and night, who established the firmament itself, who separated light from darkness; he himself says: Learn from me. Is he perhaps going to tell us this, that we might do these things with him? Who can do this? God alone does. He says, don’t fear, I do not burden you. Learn this from me, what I became for your sake. He says, learn from me, not to create the creature which was made through me. Nor do I indeed say that you should learn those things which I have granted to some, to whom I wanted, but not to all; to raise the dead, to give sight to the blind, to open the ears of the deaf; do not wish to learn these things as great from me. The disciples returned rejoicing and exultant, saying: Behold in your name even demons are subject to us. The Lord said to them: Do not rejoice in this, that demons are subject to you; rejoice rather that your names are written in heaven. To whom he wanted he gave the power to cast out demons; to whom he wanted, to raise the dead. These miracles were done even before the incarnation of the Lord; the dead were raised, lepers were cleansed. We read these things: and who did these, except he who was later the man Christ after David, but God Christ before Abraham? He granted all these, he did them through men, yet he did not give this to all. Should those to whom he did not give this, despair and say that they do not belong to him, because they did not merit to receive these gifts? In the body there are members; one member can do this, another that. God has joined the body: he did not give to the ear to see, nor to the eye to hear, nor to the forehead to smell, nor to the hand to taste. He did not give these; but to all members he gave health, he gave structure, he gave unity. He vivified all things equally with the Spirit, he united them. Therefore, he did not give to some to raise the dead, to another he did not give to preach; yet to all what did he give? We have heard him saying: Learn from me, for I am meek and humble of heart. My brothers, all our medicine is this: Learn from me, for I am meek and humble of heart. What does it profit, if one performs miracles, and is proud, is not meek and humble of heart? Will he not be counted in that number of those, who will come in the end and say: Have we not prophesied in your name, and in your name done many wonders? But what will they hear? I do not know you; depart from me, all you workers of iniquity.

Love without arrogance.

What then is the benefit of learning? Because I am gentle and humble in heart, he says. He introduces love, genuine love, without confusion, without arrogance, without exaltation, without deceit. It is this he introduces, who says: Learn from me, because I am gentle and humble in heart. How can the proud and inflated have the purest love? Indeed, it is necessary that he envies. Perhaps, does he who envies love, and are we mistaken? God forbid that anyone errs in such a way as to say that the envious have love. Therefore, what does the Apostle say? Love does not envy. Why does it not envy? Because it is not inflated. He immediately sets forth the cause where he has removed envy from love; because it is not inflated, it does not envy. At first, he said this: Love does not envy; but as if you asked why it does not envy, he added: it is not inflated. So, if it is envying because it is inflated; if it is not inflated, it does not envy. If love is not inflated, and therefore does not envy, he introduces love, who says: Learn from me, because I am gentle and humble in heart.

Without love, the other gifts of God are of no use.

Now let anyone have what they will, boast of themselves from wherever they will: If I speak in the tongues of men and of angels, but have not charity, I am become as sounding brass, or a tinkling cymbal. What is more sublime than the gift of various tongues? It is brass, a tinkling cymbal, if you take away charity. Hear other gifts. If I know all mysteries; what is more excellent, what more magnificent? Hear yet another. If I have all prophecy, and know all mysteries, and all knowledge; and if I have all faith, so that I could remove mountains, but have not charity, I am nothing. He added ampler things. Brothers, what else did he say? If I distribute all my goods to the poor. What can be done more perfectly? When the Lord, for perfection, commanded this to the rich man, saying: Do you want to be perfect? Go, sell all that you have, and give to the poor. So is he now perfect, who has sold all that he has, and given to the poor? No: for he added: and come, follow me. He said, Go, sell all that you have, and give to the poor; and come, follow me. Why should I follow you? Now since I have sold all and distributed to the poor, am I not perfect? What need is there for me to follow? Follow, to learn: that I am meek and humble of heart. For one can sell all that they have and give to the poor, and yet not be meek, yet not be humble of heart. Surely they can. For if I distribute all my goods to the poor... And still hear. For some, leaving all they have behind, have followed the Lord, but have not yet followed to perfection—for to follow to perfection is to imitate—they could not bear the temptation of suffering. For Peter, brothers, was of those who had left all and followed the Lord. For when the rich man went away sorrowful, and the disciples, troubled, asked who then could be perfect, and the Lord consoled them, they said to the Lord: Behold, we have left all and followed you; what then shall we have? And the Lord told them what he would give them here, what he would reserve for the future. Yet he was already of their number, who had done these things. But when it came to the moment of passion, at the voice of a single maidservant he denied him three times, though he had promised he would die for him.

Perfection and charity are attained through the imitation of Christ.

Therefore, let your Charity take heed. "Go," he says, "sell all your possessions, give to the poor, and you will have treasure in heaven; and come, follow me." Peter was perfect already when the Lord was sitting in heaven at the right hand of the Father; then he was perfect and made mature. Therefore, when he followed the Lord to His passion, he was not perfect; but when he began no longer to be on earth whom he was to follow, was he then perfect? On the contrary, you always have Him before you, whom you may follow. The Lord set an example on earth, he left the Gospel there; he is with you in the Gospel. For he did not lie, saying: "Behold, I am with you all days, even to the consummation of the age." Therefore, follow the Lord. What does it mean to follow the Lord? Imitate the Lord. What does it mean to imitate the Lord? Learn from me because I am meek and humble of heart. For if I distribute all my goods to the poor, and deliver my body to be burned, but do not have charity, it profits me nothing. Therefore I exhort your Charity to that very charity. But I would not exhort to charity, except by some charity. What therefore has been begun, I exhort to be completed; and what has been started, I pray to be perfected; and I ask you to pray for me, that what I advise to you may also be perfected in me. For we are all imperfect, and we shall be perfected there, where all things are perfect. The Apostle Paul says: "Brothers, I do not consider myself to have apprehended." He himself says: "Not that I have already received, or am already perfect." And does any man dare to boast of perfection? Rather let us confess our imperfection, that we may deserve perfection.