Homilies on Romans 7 part 2/2

For this, this it was that overthrew the Churches, this that gave birth to the heresies, this that armed a brother's hand and caused his right hand to be steeped in the blood of a righteous man, this that tore up the laws of nature and opened the doors to death and brought that curse into effect; and it allowed that wretched man to remember neither the birth-pangs, nor his parents, nor anything else, but so drove him into a frenzy and led him into such raving madness that, even when God entreated him and said, 'Unto thee shall be his turning, and thou shalt rule over him,' not even then would he yield.

And yet God even released him from the charge, and subjected his brother to him;

but nevertheless so incurable is this disease that, even when countless remedies are applied to it, it wells up with its own festering corruption.

For what reason do you grieve, O most wretched of all men? Because God was honoured? But this is a satanic disposition.

But is it because your brother was preferred? Yet it is open to you also to surpass him in turn.

So that if you wish to conquer, do not slay nor destroy him, but let him remain, that the ground of the contest may be preserved, and conquer him while he is alive;

for thus your crown would have been glorious;

but as it is, by destroying him you pronounce against yourself a greater verdict of defeat.

But envy knows none of these things.

And for what reason do you crave glory in so great a solitude? For these two alone then inhabited the earth.

But not even this restrained him; rather, casting all things from his soul, he took his stand with the devil and drew up in battle array;

for indeed it was he, the devil, who was then acting as general along with Cain.

For since it did not suffice him that man had become mortal, he endeavoured to make the tragedy greater by the manner of the death also, and persuaded Cain to become a fratricide;

for he was in haste and in travail to see the sentence carried out into deed—he who is never sated with our woes.

Just as if a man having an enemy in prison, seeing him having received sentence, should be in haste, before he leaves the city, to see him slain even within, and would not even await the fitting time;

even so also did the devil then.

And though he had heard that man should return to the earth, he was in travail to see something more—a son dying before his father, and a brother slaying a brother, and an untimely and violent murder.

Do you see to how many ends envy has ministered? How it filled up the insatiable purpose of the devil, and spread before him so great a table as that which he desired to behold? Let us therefore flee this disease.

For it is not, it is not possible to escape that fire prepared for the devil, unless we are delivered from this disease;

and we shall be delivered, if we consider how Christ both loved us and commanded us to love one another.

How, then, did He love us? He gave His precious blood for us when we were enemies and had done Him the greatest wrongs.

Do you also do this toward your brother;

for on this account, He says, 'A new commandment I give unto you, that ye love one another even as I have loved you.'

But rather, not even here does the measure stand still;

for He did this on behalf of His enemies.

But you are not willing to give your own blood for your brother? Why then do you even shed his, disobeying the commandment in diametrical opposition? And yet what He did was not out of any debt;

but you, if you do it, are henceforth fulfilling a debt;

since that man too, who received the ten thousand talents and yet exacted the hundred denarii, was punished not on this account alone, that he demanded it, but because he did not become better even by the kindness shown him, nor, when his master had led the way, did he follow after and remit the debt;

for indeed what would have been done by the servant, had it been done, would henceforth have been a debt.

For indeed all things whatsoever we do, we do them in fulfilment of a debt.

'When ye shall have done all things,' He says, 'say that We are unprofitable servants;

for what we were bound to do, we have done.'

If, then, we show forth love, and if we give money to those in need, we are fulfilling a debt;

not only because He Himself began the good deeds, but also because it is His own that we distribute, whenever we do give.

Why then do you deprive yourself of those things of which He Himself wishes you to be lord? For on this account He bade you give them to another, that you yourself might have them.

For as long as you hold them alone, not even you yourself possess them;

but when you give to another, then you yourself also have received.

Could there be anything equal to this affection? He Himself poured out His blood for His enemies, but we will not even give money for our Benefactor;

He His own blood, but we not even money that is not our own;

He before us, but we not even after Him;

He for our salvation, but we not even for our own advantage;

for nothing more accrues to Him from our love of mankind, but the whole gain comes round to us.

For on this account also we are bidden to give them, that we ourselves may not fall away from them.

For just as, if one were to give money to a little child, he bids him hold it fast, or even to give it to a servant to keep, so that it may not be possible for anyone who wishes to snatch it away;

'For give to him that is in need,' He says, 'that no one may snatch them from you'—such as a false accuser, or the devil, or a thief, or, after all these, death.

For as long as you yourself hold them, you hold them not securely;

but if you give them to Me through the poor, I keep them all for you with exactness, and at the fitting time I will restore them to you with great abundance.

For I do not receive them that I may take them away, but that I may make them more, that I may guard them more exactly, that I may keep them for you against that time in which there is no one who lends nor who shows mercy.

What, then, could be more brutal than we, if after such promises we will not endure to lend to Him? For this very reason we depart to Him desolate and naked and poor, not having the things entrusted to us, because we did not deposit them with Him who guards them more exactly than all.

Wherefore also we shall pay the uttermost penalty.

For what, when accused, shall we be able to say in defence of our own destruction? What pretext shall we put forward? What defence? For why did you not give? Do you disbelieve that you shall receive again? And how could this stand to reason? For He who gave to one that had not given, how shall He not much more give after receiving? But does the sight of them delight you? Then all the more, for this very reason, give, that you may be delighted the more greatly there, where no one shall take them away;

since now at least, by holding them fast, you will suffer countless terrible things.

For like a dog, so does the devil spring upon the rich, as though wishing to snatch away a morsel or a cake that a child is holding.

Let us therefore give them to the Father.

And if the devil sees this done, he will assuredly withdraw;

and when he has withdrawn, then the Father will give them all to you in security, when that one can no longer trouble you, throughout the age to come.

For as it is now, from little children troubled by curs—

the rich differ in nothing from little children troubled by curs, with all things barking around them, tearing at them, dragging them—and not men only, but also illiberal passions: gluttony, drunkenness, flattery, and every kind of licentiousness.

And when we have to lend, we busy ourselves about those who give much, and look narrowly for the honest debtors;

but here we do the contrary;

for God, who is a good debtor and provides not the hundredth part but a hundredfold, we let go, but those who will not repay us even the principal, these we seek out.

For what will the belly repay us, consuming as it does the greater share? Dung and corruption.

And vainglory? Envy and malice.

And niggardliness? Anxiety and care.

And licentiousness? Gehenna and the venomous worm.

For these are the debtors of the rich, and it is by paying to these the interest upon the principal that they incur the evils here and the dreadful things that are looked for hereafter.

To such men, tell me, shall we lend at the cost of so great a punishment, and yet shall we not entrust our goods to Christ, who holds out to us heaven, life immortal, and blessings unspeakable? And what excuse shall we have? For why do you not give to Him who will assuredly repay, and repay yet more? Is it, perhaps, because He gives after a long time? And yet even here He gives.

For He who says it cannot lie: 'Seek the kingdom of heaven, and all these things shall be added unto you.'

Do you see the exceeding greatness of His bounty? 'Those things,' He says, 'are kept in reserve for you and are not diminished; but these present things I give you over and above, as a bonus and a surplus.'

And apart from this, the very receiving after a long interval of time multiplies your wealth for you;

for the interest becomes greater.

For indeed in the case of those who lend money we see the lenders doing this very thing, lending more readily to those who repay after a long time.

For he who pays back the whole at once cuts short the running of the interest;

but he who keeps it for a longer time has also made the profit greater. Then, in the case of men, we are not vexed at the delay, but even contrive to make it longer; yet toward God shall we be so mean-spirited as on this very account to shrink back and draw away? And yet, as I said, He gives even here; and along with the reason mentioned, He is ordering something else and greater, laying up the whole in that other world.

For the greatness of what is given, and the beauty of that gift, transcend the meanness of the present life.

For it is not possible in a body that is corruptible and perishable to receive those unfading crowns, nor in the present manner of life, tumultuous and full of disturbance and subject to many changes, to attain to that unmovable and untroubled portion.

But you, if someone who owed you gold, while you were sojourning in a foreign land and had neither servants nor the means to convey it to your house, promised to hand over the loan, you would entreat him in a thousand ways to pay it not in the foreign country but rather at home;

and yet those spiritual and unspeakable things you insist on receiving here? And how great a folly is this! For if you receive them here, you will receive things wholly corruptible;

but if you await that other season, He will repay you with things incorruptible and undefiled;

if you receive here, you have received lead;

but if there, tested gold.

Yet neither has He deprived you of the things here.

For along with that promise He has set down another also, saying thus: that everyone who loves the things there shall receive a hundredfold in this present age, and shall inherit eternal life.

But if we do not receive a hundredfold, we ourselves are to blame, in not lending to Him who is able to give so much;

since all who have given received such abundance, and that though they gave but little.

For what great thing did Peter give, tell me? Was it not only a torn net, a reed, and a hook? Yet nevertheless God opened to him the houses of the whole inhabited world, and spread out for him land and sea, and all men called him into their own dwellings;

or rather, selling their own possessions, they brought them to his feet, not even putting them into his hands (for they did not dare), thus paying him, together with their liberality, so great an honor.

'But that man was Peter,' someone says.

And what of that, O man? For it was not to Peter alone that He promised these things, nor

did He say, 'But you, O Peter, alone shall receive a hundredfold,' but, 'Everyone who has left house or brethren shall receive a hundredfold.'

For He knows no distinction of persons, but the right accomplishment of deeds.

'But a band of children surrounds me,' one says, 'and I desire to leave them rich.'

For what reason, then, do we make them poor? For if you leave them everything, you have again entrusted all your goods to an insecure keeping;

but if you leave God to them as a joint-heir and guardian, you have left them countless treasures. For just as, when we avenge ourselves, God does not defend us, but when we yield the matter to Him, more is done than we expect;

so also in the matter of possessions, if we ourselves are anxious over them, He will withdraw His providence concerning them;

but if we cast the whole upon Him, He will establish both them and our children in all security.

And why do you marvel that this happens in God's case? For one may see this coming to pass even in the case of men.

For if you call upon none of your kinsmen when dying, to care for your children, even one who greatly wishes it is often ashamed and blushes to leap of his own accord upon this charge;

but if you cast the care upon him, then, being honored with the greatest honor, he too will render the greatest recompense.

If, therefore, you wish to leave much wealth to your children, leave them the providence of God.

For He who, when you had done nothing, both gave the soul and fashioned the body and bestowed life, when He sees you displaying such generosity, and distributing to Him what is theirs along with them, how shall He not open to them every kind of wealth? For if Elijah, fed with a little meal, when he saw that woman preferring him to her own children, showed threshing-floors and wine-vats upon the widow's little chamber;

consider how great a kindness the Master of Elijah will display.

Let us not, therefore, look to this, how we may leave our children rich, but how we may leave them virtuous.

For if they trust in wealth, they will take heed to nothing else, since they are able to screen the wickedness of their ways with the abundance of their money;

but if they see themselves bereft of the consolation from that source, they will do everything so as to find, through virtue, much consolation for their poverty.

Do not, therefore, leave wealth, that you may leave virtue.

For it is the height of unreasonableness, while we live, not to make them masters of all our substance, but when we die, to grant a great license to the heedlessness of youth.

And yet, while we live, we shall be able both to demand an account, and to bring back to sober-mindedness and to bridle those who use their substance ill;

but when we are dead, if together with our absence and their youth we grant them also the license that comes from wealth, we shall thrust those wretched and miserable creatures into countless precipices, casting fire upon fire, and dripping oil upon a grievous furnace.

So that, if you wish to leave them rich with security, leave God as their debtor, and put into His hands the bond of their inheritance.

For if they themselves receive the money, they will not even know to whom to give it, but will fall in with many false accusers and thankless men;

but if you, taking the lead, lend it to God, the treasure remains thenceforth inviolable, and the repayment will be made with much ease.

For God feels gratitude even when He pays back what He owes to us, and He looks with more pleasure upon His own creditors than upon those who have not lent to Him, and those to whom He owes most, these He loves most.

So that, if you wish to have Him as a friend continually, make Him debtor to you for much.

For no lender so rejoices in having debtors as Christ is gladdened in having creditors;

and those to whom He owes nothing, these He even shuns; but those to whom He owes, to these He even runs.

Let us therefore do everything, so as to have Him as our debtor;

for this is the season for lending, and now He is set in need.

If, therefore, you give Him nothing now, He will not need you after your departure from this world.

For here He thirsts, here He hungers;

and He thirsts, because He thirsts for your salvation;

for on this account He even begs, on this account He even goes about naked.

procuring for you life immortal.

Do not, therefore, overlook Him;

for He does not wish to be fed, but to feed; not to be clothed, but to clothe, and to fashion for you that golden garment, the royal robe.

Do you not see also, among physicians, those who are more careful, that when they bathe the sick, they too bathe, though they have no need? So He also does everything for your sake, the sick one.

For this reason He does not even demand it of you by force, that He may give you a great recompense;

that you may learn that He demands not because He has need, but that He is setting right your own need.

For this reason He also comes to you in a lowly guise, and stretching out His right hand;

and if you give but an obol, He does not turn away; and if you dishonor Him, He does not withdraw, but comes to you again;

for He loves greatly, He loves our salvation.

Let us therefore despise money, that we may not be despised by Christ;

let us despise money, that we may attain to the very money itself.

For if we keep it here, we shall utterly lose it both here and there;

but if we distribute it with much liberality, in each of the two lives we shall enjoy much abundance.

Whoever, then, wishes to become rich, let him become poor, that he may become rich.

But if these things seem novel and paradoxical, consider the sower, and reckon that not even he can gather in a greater harvest by any other means, unless he scatter what he has and let go what lies ready to hand.

Let us therefore also sow, and let us cultivate heaven, that we may reap with great abundance and attain the eternal good things, through the grace and lovingkindness of our Lord Jesus Christ, with whom to the Father, together with the Holy Spirit, be glory, might, and honour, now and ever, and unto the ages of ages. Amen.