Homily 10 — John 1, verses 11 to 13

“He came to his own, and his own did not receive him.” [a]

Beloved, God loves humankind and does good, and he does and arranges everything so that we may shine in virtue, because he wants us to be well approved by him. To this end he drags no one by force or compulsion. He draws all who are willing by persuasion and by kindness, and wins them to himself. That is why, when he came, some received him and others did not. For he wants no unwilling servant in his house, no one who serves under force; he wants all to serve by their own will and choice, and to be grateful to him for their service. Men keep many servants in service even against their will, by the law of ownership, because they need the work of servants. But God has no needs and is in want of nothing of ours; he does everything only for our salvation. So he leaves this matter entirely in our own hands, and lays neither force nor compulsion on any who are unwilling. For he looks only to our good, and to be dragged unwilling into a service like this is the same as not serving at all.

“Why, then,” someone says, “does he punish those who will not listen to him? And why has he threatened hell to those who do not keep his commands?” Because he is exceedingly good, he cares even for those who do not obey him, and he does not turn away from those who shrink back and run from him. When we had rejected the first way of his kindness, and refused to come by the path of persuasion and gentle treatment, he brought the other way to bear on us, the way of correction and punishment. It is very bitter, but it is necessary when the first way is ignored.

Think of lawgivers. They too set many heavy penalties for offenders, and yet we do not dislike them for it. We even honor them the more for the punishments they have laid down. They need nothing that we have, and often they do not even know who will enjoy the help their written laws provide, and still they took care for the good order of our lives, rewarding those who live virtuously and checking by punishments those who lack self-control and those who would disturb the peace of others. If we admire and love these men, ought we not much more to marvel at God and love him for his great care? For the difference between their care for us and his is beyond measure. Truly, the riches of God’s goodness are beyond words and beyond all excess!

Consider it: “He came to his own” — not for any need of his own, for, as I said, the divine nature needs nothing, but to do good to his own people. Yet even so his own did not receive him, though he came to his own for their good. They drove him away; and not only that, they even threw him out of the vineyard and killed him. Even then he did not shut them out from repentance. If they had been willing, he granted them, even after such wickedness, to wash away all their offenses by faith in him, and to be made equal to those who had done nothing of the kind and are his special friends.

I am not saying this at random, or just to persuade you. The whole story of the blessed Paul loudly declares it. After the cross he persecuted Christ, and he stoned Christ’s martyr Stephen with all those many hands. Yet when he repented, condemned his former sins, and ran to the one he had persecuted, Christ at once enrolled him among his friends, and among the foremost of them. He appointed as herald and teacher of the whole world the man who had been “a blasphemer, a persecutor, and an insolent man” (First Timothy 1, verse 13).

Paul, rejoicing in God’s love for humankind, proclaimed it aloud and was not ashamed. He recorded in his writings, as though on a pillar, the things he had once dared to do, and put them on show for everyone. He thought it better that his former life should be posted up in full view of all, so that the greatness of God’s free gift might be seen, than that he should hide God’s love for humankind, which is beyond words and beyond description, by shrinking from displaying his own error to everyone. That is why he keeps speaking of his persecution, his plots, his wars against the church. At one time he says, “I am not fit to be called an apostle, because I persecuted the church of God” (First Corinthians 15, verse 9). At another, “Jesus came into the world to save sinners, of whom I am the foremost” (First Timothy 1, verse 15). And again, “You have heard of my way of life in the past in the Jews’ religion, how I persecuted the church of God beyond measure and laid it waste” (Galatians 1, verse 13).

He was making a kind of return to Christ for Christ’s patience toward him. By showing whom Christ had saved — what a hater and an enemy — he declared with great openness the war he had once waged against Christ with all his zeal. And with this he holds out good hope to those who had despaired of themselves. For he says that Christ accepted him so that in him first he might “show all patience” (First Timothy 1, verse 16) and the abundant riches of his goodness, “as a pattern for those who would afterward believe in him for everlasting life.” [c]

For what they had dared was too great for any pardon. The evangelist declares this when he says, “He came to his own, and his own did not receive him.” Where did he come from, he who fills all things and is present everywhere? What place did he leave empty of his presence, he who holds and grasps all things in his hand? He did not exchange one place for another — how could he? It was by coming down to us that he did this. He was in the world, yet he did not seem to be there, because he was not yet known. Afterward he showed himself, when he stooped to take our flesh upon him. That showing and coming down is what John calls “a coming.”

One might admire the disciple, who is not ashamed of the dishonor done to his Teacher but even records the insult that was offered him. Yet this is no small proof of his love for the truth. Besides, whoever feels shame should feel it for those who offered the insult, not for the one insulted. Indeed Christ shone all the brighter because of this very thing, since even after the insult he took such care for those who had offered it. They, on the other hand, appeared ungrateful and accursed in everyone’s eyes, for rejecting him who came to bring them such great good, as though he were hateful to them and an enemy. And this was not their only loss. They also failed to obtain what those who received him obtained. And what did these obtain?

Verse 12: “As many as received him, to them he gave power to become the sons of God,” says the evangelist.

“Why, then, blessed one, do you not also tell us the punishment of those who did not receive him? You have said that they were ‘his own,’ and that when ‘he came to his own, they did not receive him.’ But what they will suffer for this, what punishment they will undergo, you have not gone on to add. Yet that way you would have frightened them more, and softened the hardness of their madness by your threats. Why, then, have you kept silent?” “And what other punishment,” he would answer, “could be greater than this: that when power is offered them to become sons of God, they do not become so, but of their own will deprive themselves of such nobility and such honor?”

Yet their punishment will not stop there, at gaining no good. The fire that is never quenched will receive them too, as he shows more plainly further on. But for now he speaks of the good things beyond words that belong to those who received him, and he sets them before us briefly, saying, “As many as received him, to them he gave power to become sons of God.” Slave or free, Greeks or barbarians or Scythians, unlearned or learned, female or male, children or old men, honored or dishonored, rich or poor, rulers or private citizens — all, he says, are counted worthy of the same privilege. For faith and the grace of the Spirit have removed the inequality that worldly things create, have molded all to one shape, and have stamped them with one image, the King’s.

What can equal this love for humankind? A king, formed of the same clay as we are, does not stoop to enroll in the royal army his fellow servants, who share the same nature with him and are often better than he in character, if they happen to be slaves. But the only Son of God did not disdain to count among the company of his children tax collectors, sorcerers, and slaves — no, people of lower repute and greater poverty than these, maimed in body and suffering from countless ills. Such is the power of faith in him; such is the abundance of his grace. As fire, when it meets ore from the mine, at once makes gold out of earth, so, and much more, baptism makes those who are washed gold instead of clay. At that moment the Spirit falls like fire into our souls, burns up “the image of the earthly” (First Corinthians 15, verse 49), and produces “the image of the heavenly,” freshly minted, bright and gleaming, as if from the furnace mold.

Why, then, did he not say, “He made them sons of God,” but, “He gave them power to become sons of God”? To show that we need great zeal to keep the image of sonship stamped on us at baptism unstained and unsoiled all the way through. And at the same time, to show that no one will be able to take this power from us unless we are the first to deprive ourselves of it. For if among men those who have been given full control over any affairs have almost as much power as those who entrusted them with it, much more will we keep this power, we who have received such honor from God, if we do nothing … greater and better than all.

At the same time he also wants to show that grace does not come upon anyone without regard to their will, but upon those who desire it and work hard for it. For it lies in their power to become his children. If they do not first make the choice themselves, the gift does not come upon them, or have any effect.

So, having everywhere excluded compulsion and pointed to our free choice and our own power, he says the same thing now. For even in these blessings of the mysteries, it is God’s part to give the grace, and man’s part to supply faith; and afterward, what remains needs great earnestness. To keep our purity, it is not enough merely to have been baptized and to have believed. If we want to enjoy this brightness always, we must show a life worthy of it. This, then, is God’s work in us. To have been born with the birth of the mysteries, and to have been cleansed of all our former sins, comes from baptism. But to remain pure from then on, and never again to let in any stain, belongs to our own power and diligence. [f]

That is why he reminds us of the manner of this birth, and shows how far it surpasses the other by comparing it with the pains of birth in the flesh. He says, in verse 13, “Who were born, not of blood, nor of the will of the flesh, but of God.” He has done this so that, when we consider how base and lowly the first birth is, which is “of blood” and “of the will of the flesh,” and see how high and noble the second is, which is by grace, we may form from this some great idea of it, one worthy of the gift of him who has given us birth, and from then on show great earnestness.

For there is no small fear that, having at some point soiled that beautiful robe by our later laziness and sins, we may be thrown out of the inner room and the bridal chamber, like the five foolish virgins, or like the man who did not have a wedding garment on (Matthew 22, verses 11 to 13). He too was one of the guests, for he had been invited. But because, after the invitation and so great an honor, he treated the one who had invited him with insult, hear what punishment he suffers — how pitiable, how worthy of many tears! He comes to share in that splendid table, and not only is he refused even the smallest part of it, but he is bound hand and foot alike and carried off into the outer darkness, to suffer eternal and endless wailing and grinding of teeth.

So, beloved, let us not expect that faith is enough for our salvation either. If we do not show a pure life, but come dressed in clothes unworthy of this blessed calling, nothing prevents us from suffering the same as that wretched man. It is a strange thing. He who is God and King is not ashamed of people who are base, beggars, and of no account, but brings even those from the crossroads to that table. And we show such insensibility that we are not made better even by so great an honor, but even after the call remain in our old wickedness, insultingly abusing the love for humankind, beyond words, of the one who called us. For he did not call us to share in his spiritual and awe-inspiring mysteries so that we might enter with our former wickedness, but so that we might put off our filthiness and change our clothes for such as suit those who are entertained in palaces. But if we will not act worthily of that calling, the fault no longer lies with him who has honored us, but with ourselves. It is not he who throws us out of that wonderful company of guests; we throw ourselves out.

He has done all his part. He has arranged the wedding, provided the table, sent men to call us, received us when we came, and honored us with every other honor. But we, when we have insulted him, the company, and the wedding by our filthy clothes — that is, by our impure actions — are then rightly thrown out. It is to honor the wedding and the guests that he drives off those bold and shameless people; for if he let those dressed in such clothes remain, he would seem to be insulting the rest.

But may it never happen that any of us, or of anyone else, meets with this from the one who has called us! For this is why all these things were written down before they come to pass: so that we, sobered by the threats of the Scriptures, may not let this disgrace and punishment go on to the deed, but stop it at the word alone, and each of us come to that call in bright clothing. May we all enjoy it, through the grace and love for humankind of our Lord Jesus Christ, through whom and with whom be glory to the Father and the Holy Spirit, forever and ever. Amen.