Sermon 20

SERMO 20

OF WHAT IS WRITTEN IN PSALM 50:
"Create in me a clean heart, O God"

He who was capable of wounding himself is not fit for healing.

With a harmonious voice and a concordant heart, praying to the Lord for that very heart of ours, we have said: Create in me a clean heart, O God, and renew a right spirit within my inmost parts. Because of this, we will minister to you a little of what the Lord has given, in His grace. It is a psalm of a penitent, desiring to recover lost hope, lying in his fall, and praying to rise by the hand of the Lord, as though he were capable of wounding himself but not of healing himself. For just as we can strike and wound our own flesh whenever we wish, but seek a doctor to be healed, and we are not so healed by our own power as we are wounded by it, so the soul is sufficient for itself to sin, but implores God's healing right hand to heal what it has injured by sinning. Hence it says in another psalm: I said, O Lord, be merciful to me. Heal my soul, for I have sinned against You. To this, he adds: I said, O Lord, to show that the will and the choice to sin arise from the soul and are sufficient for it to destroy itself, but it belongs to God to seek what has perished and to save what has wounded itself. For the Son of Man came to seek and to save what was lost. To this we are offering our prayer, saying: Create in me a clean heart, O God, and renew a right spirit within my inmost parts. Let the soul that has sinned say this, lest it perish further by despairing over having lost itself through sinning.

Do not seek an excuse for sin, but rather your own accusation. Let your sin be punished by you, so that you are not punished.

Above all, indeed, we must ensure that we do not sin, nor form any familiarity and friendship with sin as with a serpent. For it kills the sinner with a venomous bite, and there is nothing with which friendship is to be made. But if by chance it oppresses the weak or deceives the unsuspecting or captures the erring or ensnares them in repeated error, let the soul not hesitate to confess and not seek excuse but self-accusation. For this reason, one also prayed in a psalm and said: "Set a guard, O Lord, over my mouth; keep watch over the door of my lips. Incline not my heart to any evil, to busy myself in wicked deeds in company with men who work iniquity." Does sin entice you? Before all else, reject it. But if persuaded, do not excuse it but rather accuse it. For even he who said, "Create in me a clean heart, O God," began thus: "Have mercy on me, O Lord, according to Your great mercy." A great sinner implores great mercy. A great wound desires great medicine. It is said there: "Turn Your face away from my sins and blot out all my iniquities. Create in me a clean heart, O God." God turns His face away from the sins of the one confessing and accusing himself, seeking God's help and mercy. For He turns His face from his sins, not from him. To whom it is said, "Turn Your face away from my sins," it is also said elsewhere: "Do not turn Your face away from me." He turns because He does not regard; for if He regards, He overthrows. Thus judges are said to notice when pronouncing sentence on convicted criminals. May God not do this, that is, not notice, we say to Him: "Turn Your face away from my sins." If He does not recognize, He forgives. Just as we say noble, not ignoble, so we say knowing, not unknowing, forgiving. Yet if you wish: for Him to forgive, acknowledge. Sin cannot be impunished; it does not become, it is not fitting, it is not just. Therefore, because sin should not be unpunished, let it be punished by you, lest you be punished for it. Let your sin have you as judge, not defender. Ascend to the tribunal of your mind against yourself, and appoint yourself guilty before yourself. Do not place yourself behind yourself, lest God place you before Himself. Hence it is said in the same psalm, where he may easily seek pardon: "For I know my iniquity and my sin is ever before me." As if to say: "Because it is before me, let it not be before You, and because I acknowledge, You forgive." Therefore, sin is either punished by you or by God; but by you without yourself, by God with you. Let your punisher be you, so that you may find God as your defender. Say: "I have done it." I said: "Lord, have mercy upon me. Heal my soul for I have sinned against you." I, he said, have declared. I do not seek, to excuse my sin, who sinned through me, or who compelled me to sin. I do not say: "Fate did it." I do not say: "Destiny willed it." Ultimately, I do not say: "The devil did it." For even the devil has the power to persuade, ultimately terrify, and if permitted, inflict severe afflictions. Virtue must be sought from the Lord, so that neither enticements ensnare nor hardships crush. He grants us two virtues against the enticements and threats of the enemy: to restrain and to endure, to restrain lusts so that successes do not capture; to endure terrors so that adversities do not crush. "And since I knew," he said, "that no one can be continent unless God grants it," he therefore said: "Create in me a clean heart, O God"; and: "Woe to those who have lost endurance." Do not seek to accuse anyone lest you find an accuser from whom you cannot defend yourself. For even our enemy the devil rejoices when accused. He completely wants you to accuse him, wants him to bear any blame you wish, while you lose confession. Against this cunning he exclaims: "I said, Lord." The enemy lies in wait for me in vain, I know his cunning, he captures my tongue and wants me to say: "The devil did it." I said, Lord. By these tricks, therefore, he deceives souls and turns them away from the medicine of confession, either persuading them to excuse themselves and seek those to blame; or persuading them that having sinned, they despair and think they cannot belong to pardon; or persuading them that God quickly pardons everything, even if man does not correct himself.

Be watchful that you may not perish by despairing nor by hoping badly.

See how many things the repentant heart must be vigilant against. Let him not accuse another by excusing himself; let it come to his mind: "I said, O Lord, be merciful to me; heal my soul, for I have sinned against you." Let him not perish through despair, thinking that because he has sinned, and gravely sinned, he can never be healed, and thereby give himself over to lusts, being dragged by all desires, doing whatever he pleases even if it is not allowed. And if he does not do it, he does not do it where he fears men. With a gladiatorial spirit, since he despairs of life, he does whatever he can to satisfy his greed and lust, as if devoted to a victim. Such people perish through despair. Against them, for these, that is, against such thoughts of theirs, vigilant Scripture has said: "On the day the wicked man turns and does justice, all his iniquities I will forget." Again, the soul, if revived by believing these words from the evil of despair, finds another pitfall and, unable to perish from despair, perishes from hope. And who is it that perishes from hope? Look at such a person: one who says in his heart, "Now God has promised forgiveness to all who turn away from sins, in whatever day they will have turned, He will forget all their iniquities. Therefore, I will do whatever I want. Whenever I want, I will repent, and what I have done will be erased." What do we say? That God does not care for the penitent when he turns? God forgives all the past. If we deny this, we contradict divine forgiveness, oppose prophetic words, and resist divine sayings. This is not the attitude of a faithful steward.

Do not delay to turn to the Lord. Seek a good life, you who desire a long life.

Someone comes back and says to me: "Will you then give freedom to sins so that people do whatever they want, with the promise of forgiveness, the promise of impunity when they turn?" They loosen the reins to sin; they will be carried away with great force, no one recalling them, desperate with hope. Indeed, would Scripture watch over those who despair, and not watch over those who hope wrongly? Listen to its vigilance against evil and perverse hope: Do not delay to turn to the Lord, nor defer from day to day. For suddenly His anger will come, and in the time of vengeance, He will destroy you. What then, wicked hoper? If you despair, you perish; if you hope, you perish. Where will your safe place be, that you may rescue yourself from both pits, and set yourself on the straight path, serving God, pitying your own soul, pleasing God? You despaired wrongly, you heard: On whichever day you turn, all his iniquities I will forget. You began to hope wrongly, you heard: Do not delay to turn to the Lord, nor defer from day to day. On all sides, the providence of God has surrounded you mercifully. What do you say? "God promised me forgiveness; when I turn, He will give it." He will certainly give it when you turn, but why do you not turn? "Because when I turn, He will give it." Indeed, He will give it when you turn, but when is that "when"? Why is it not today? Why not when you hear? Why not when you shout? Why not when you praise? Let my shout be a helper for you; let your shout be a witness against you. Why not today? Why not now? "Tomorrow," you say. God promised you forgiveness; you promise yourself "tomorrow." Or perhaps, just as you read to me from the holy book that forgiveness will be given to you when you turn, has it been promised to you that you may defer until tomorrow? Didn't He first place this in medicinal terror, didn't He say this when He reproaches you: Do not defer from day to day, for suddenly His anger will come? But perhaps, being a wise man, you fear that you might have more than two days of good life, if there will be a tomorrow, let there also be a today, and let it be two days. For if there will not be a tomorrow, today will find you secure. But if there will be a tomorrow, it will be added to today. Yet you wish to have a long life and do not fear to have a wicked life. You wish to live long and live wickedly. You seek long wickedness, why not rather long goodness? Why do you not wish to have that which is good? Will it be the only life that turns out badly for you? If I ask you what kind of garment you seek, you answer a good one; what kind of villa, a good one; what kind of wife, a good one; what kind of children, good ones; what kind of house, a good one; only life, bad. And you place life above all your other good things and among all your good things you wish only it to be bad. For all those things you sought to be good – garment, house, villa, and the rest – you are ready to give for your life. If anyone said to you: "Either give me all your good things, or I will take your life," you are ready to give all your good things and even keep that bad life. Why do you not wish for it to be good, for which you give all your good things even the bad ones? Behold, the excuse has been taken away, let the accusation be present so that condemnation does not come.

After the sermon.

We exhort your Charity that you may not be reluctant to listen diligently and vigilantly to the word of God being ministered by the presbyters. For the Lord our God is the very truth, which you hear through whoever may speak. And no one is greater among us except the one who has been the least. Therefore, we had to speak in advance according to custom. And you act out of love.