The Savior’s Teaching and Miracles

The Son of God calls all people to the practice of virtue, and offers himself to all who have understanding hearts as the teacher of his saving commands. Unless, that is, we choose to deceive ourselves and remain in wretched ignorance of the fact that it was for our good, to secure the blessing of the human race, that he went about on earth. He called around him the best men of their age and entrusted to them teaching full of profit, with the power to keep them on the path of a virtuous life. He taught them the faith and righteousness that are the true remedy against the hostile power of that malicious spirit whose delight is to trap and deceive the inexperienced. So he visited the sick, freed the infirm from the ills that afflicted them, and comforted those who felt the extremes of poverty and want. He also commended a sound and reasonable self-control of character, and commanded his followers to bear every kind of injury and contempt with dignity and patience. He taught them to regard such things as trials allowed by their Father, and that the victory always belongs to those who nobly bear the evils that come upon them. For he assured them that the highest strength of all lay in this steadfastness of soul, joined to that philosophy which is nothing other than the knowledge of truth and goodness, and which produces in people the generous habit of sharing with their poorer brothers the riches they have gained by honorable means. At the same time he utterly forbade all proud oppression, declaring that, as he had come to keep company with the lowly, so those who despised the lowly would be shut out from his favor. Such, and so great, was the test by which he proved the faith of those who acknowledged his authority. In this way he not only prepared them to despise danger and terror, but at the same time taught them the most genuine confidence in himself. [a]

Once, too, he spoke a rebuke to restrain the zeal of one of his companions, who gave way too easily to the impulse of passion: he attacked with the sword, and in his eagerness to protect his Savior’s life he put his own in danger. Then he told him to stop, and he returned his sword to its sheath. He reproved him for not trusting in him as his refuge and safety, and declared solemnly that all who try to repay an injury by a like attack, or who use the sword, will die a violent death. This is truly heavenly wisdom: to choose to endure injury rather than inflict it, and to be ready, if necessity requires, to suffer wrong but not to do it. For since doing injury is in itself a very serious evil, the heaviest punishment must fall not on the one who is injured but on the one who injures. Indeed, it is possible for one who is subject to the will of God to escape the evil both of committing injury and of suffering it, so long as his confidence is firm in the protection of that God whose help is always present to shield his servants from harm. For why should the man who trusts in God try to look for resources in himself? In that case he must face the conflict with no certainty of victory, and no man of understanding would prefer a doubtful outcome to a certain one. Again, how can a man doubt the presence and help of God when he has been through many dangers and has always been rescued easily, at a single nod from God, from every terror; when he has passed, as it were, through the sea that was leveled by the Savior’s word and made a solid road for the people to cross?

This, I believe, is the sure basis of faith and the true foundation of confidence: that we find such miracles as these carried out and completed at the command of the God of providence. That is why, even in the middle of trials, we find no reason to regret our faith, but keep an unshaken hope in God. And when this habit of confidence is established in the soul, God himself lives in our inmost thoughts. But he is unconquerable in power; so the soul that has within it the One who is unconquerable will not be overcome by the dangers that surround it. We learn this truth likewise from the victory of God himself. While he was intent on providing for the blessing of mankind, though he was grievously insulted by the malice of the ungodly, he passed unharmed through the sufferings of his passion and won a mighty conquest, an everlasting crown of triumph, over all wickedness. In this way he accomplished the purpose of his own providence and love toward the righteous, and destroyed the cruelty of the godless and unjust.