Existence, Reason, and Holiness

Now that we have said this much about the unity of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit, let us go back to the order we set out in at the beginning. God the Father gives existence to all. Sharing in Christ, in that he is the Word — that is, Reason — makes them rational beings, and from this it follows that they deserve either praise or blame, since they are capable of virtue and of vice. That is why the grace of the Holy Spirit is present: so that beings which are not holy by what they are may be made holy by sharing in it. [a]

So, then: first, they get their existence from God the Father; second, their rational nature from the Word; third, their holiness from the Holy Spirit. Those who have first been made holy by the Holy Spirit are in turn made able to receive Christ, in that he is the righteousness of God; and those who have earned this step up by being made holy through the Holy Spirit will go on to receive the gift of wisdom as well, according to the power and working of the Spirit of God. This, I think, is what Paul means when he says that “to some is given the word of wisdom, to others the word of knowledge, according to the same Spirit.” And while he is pointing out the distinct gifts one by one, he traces every one of them back to the source of all things: “There are different kinds of workings, but one God who works all things in all.”

So the working of the Father, which confers existence on all things, turns out to be the more glorious and magnificent; while each one, by sharing in Christ — who is wisdom and knowledge and holiness — makes progress and advances to higher degrees of perfection. And since it is by taking part in the Holy Spirit that anyone is made purer and holier, he receives, once he has been made worthy, the grace of wisdom and knowledge; so that when every stain of defilement and ignorance has been cleansed and taken away, he may make so much progress in holiness and purity that the nature he received from God becomes worthy of the God who gave it, to be pure and perfect — so that the being which exists may be as worthy as the One who called it into existence.

For in this way the person who is what his Creator wanted him to be will receive from God the power to exist always and to last forever. And for this to happen — for those he has created to be present with the One who Is, without interruption and without separation — it is wisdom’s work to teach them and train them, and to bring them to completion by the strengthening of his Holy Spirit and by an unceasing making holy, which alone makes them able to receive God.

So then, by the renewal of the ceaseless working of Father, Son, and Holy Spirit in us, through its various stages of progress, we may perhaps be able at some point — though only with difficulty — to look on the holy and blessed life. And since we reach it only after many struggles, we ought to go on in it in such a way that we never have so much of that blessedness that we stop wanting it. Rather, the more we perceive its blessedness, the more the longing for it should grow and intensify in us, while we receive and hold on to the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit more eagerly and more freely all the time.

But if that kind of fullness should ever take hold of someone standing on the highest and most complete summit of attainment, I do not think he would suddenly be thrown down from his place and fall away. He would have to decline gradually, a little at a time. So it can happen that if a brief slip occurs and the person repents quickly and comes back to himself, he does not fall away entirely, but retraces his steps, returns to his former place, and makes good again what his carelessness had lost.