On the Passion, Sixteenth Sermon

The minds of the faithful, beloved, ought indeed always to be taken up with wonder at God’s works, and their powers of reasoning given especially to those reflections by which they may grow in faith. For as long as the devout heart’s attention is turned either to the benefits that all enjoy or to the special gifts of his grace, it keeps clear of many empty things and withdraws from bodily cares into a spiritual retreat. But this must be done the more eagerly and thoroughly at the season of the Lord’s passion, so that what is then read in the sacred readings may surely be received with the ears of understanding, and the themes that are great in word may be seen to be greater still from the mysterious realities that lie beneath them. For the first reason for lifting up our hearts is that the voices of the prophets sang of the things that the truth of the Gospel has also told, not as going to happen but as having happened; and what human ears had not yet learned would be accomplished was already being proclaimed as fulfilled by the Holy Spirit. For King David, whose seed according to the flesh is Christ, finished his lifetime more than eleven hundred years before the day of the Lord’s crucifixion, and he endured none of the punishments that he describes as inflicted on himself. But because one spoke by his mouth who was to take suffering flesh from his stock, the story of the cross is rightly told beforehand in the person of the one who was the Savior’s bodily ancestor. For David truly suffered in Christ, because Jesus was truly crucified in the flesh he had from David. [a]

Since, then, everything that Jewish ungodliness did against the Lord of majesty was foretold so long before, and the language of the prophets is concerned not so much with things to come as with things past, what else is shown to us by this but the unchangeable order of God’s eternal decrees? With him, what is still to be decided is already settled, and what will be is already done. For since both the character of our actions and the outcome of all our wishes are known beforehand to God, how much better known to him are his own works? And he was rightly pleased to have things recorded as if already done which nothing could keep from being done. And so, when the apostles too, full of the Holy Spirit, suffered the threats and cruelty of Christ’s enemies, they said to God with one accord, “For truly in this city, against your holy Servant Jesus, whom you anointed, Herod and Pontius Pilate, with the Gentiles and the peoples of Israel, were gathered together to do what your hand and your counsel had ordained should come to pass.” Did the wickedness of Christ’s persecutors, then, spring from God’s plan? Was that unsurpassed crime prepared and set in motion by the hand of God? Clearly we must not think this of the highest Justice. What was foreknown about the malice of the Jews is very different from, indeed quite contrary to, what was ordained about Christ’s passion. Their desire to kill him did not come from the same source as his will to die, nor were their monstrous crime and the Redeemer’s endurance the offspring of one Spirit. The Lord did not stir up those madmen’s wicked hands but allowed them. Nor, in foreknowing what had to be accomplished, did he force it to be accomplished, even though it was for its accomplishment that he had taken flesh. [c]

In fact, the case of the Crucified is so different from that of his crucifiers that what Christ took on could not be undone, while what they did could be wiped out. For he who came to save sinners did not refuse mercy even to his murderers. He changed the evil of the wicked into the goodness of believers, so that God’s grace might be the more wonderful, put to work in mercy, not according to human merits, but according to the abundance of the riches of God’s wisdom and knowledge; for even those who had shed the Savior’s blood were received into the waters of baptism. For so says the Scripture that contains the acts of the apostles. When the preaching of the blessed apostle Peter pierced the hearts of the Jews and they acknowledged the wickedness of their crime, saying, “What shall we do, brothers?” the same apostle said, “Repent and be baptized, each one of you, in the name of Jesus Christ for the forgiveness of your sins, and you will receive the gift of the Holy Spirit. For the promise is for you and for your sons, and for all who are far off, whomever our Lord God has called.” And soon after, the Scripture goes on to say, “So those who received his word were baptized, and there were added that day about three thousand souls.” So, in being willing to suffer their furious rage, the Lord Jesus Christ was in no way the Author of their crimes. He did not force them to want this; he allowed them to be able to do it. He used the madness of the blinded people just as he also used the treachery of his betrayer. That man he graciously sought, by kind acts and words, to call back from the dreadful crime he had conceived: by taking him as a disciple, by raising him to be an apostle, by warning him with signs, by admitting him to the revelation of holy mysteries. So the one who had lacked no degree of kindness to correct him would have no excuse at all for his crime. [e]

But you, most ungodly of men, “you seed of Canaan and not of Judah,” no longer “a chosen vessel” but “a son of destruction” and of death: you thought the devil’s promptings would profit you more. So, inflamed by the torch of greed, you burned to gain thirty pieces of silver and did not see what riches you would lose. For even if you did not think the Lord’s promises were to be believed, what reason was there to prefer so small a sum of money to what you had already received? You used to command evil spirits, heal the sick and receive honor with the rest of the apostles; and to satisfy your thirst for gain, you were free to steal from the money box that was in your charge. But your mind, which craved forbidden things, was stirred more strongly by what was less allowed, and the size of the price did not please you so much as the enormity of the sin. So your wicked bargain is detestable, not merely because you held the Lord so cheap, but because you sold him who was the Redeemer, yes, your own Redeemer too, and had no pity on yourself. And rightly was your punishment put into your own hands, because no one could be found more cruelly bent on your destruction than yourself. [g]

The fact, then, that at the appointed time, according to the purpose of his will, Jesus Christ was crucified, died and was buried was not a doom his own condition required but the way of redeeming us from captivity. For “the Word became flesh” so that from the Virgin’s womb he might take our nature that can suffer, and that what could not be inflicted on the Son of God might be inflicted on the Son of Man. For although at his very birth the signs of Godhead shone out in him, and the whole course of his bodily growth was full of wonders, yet he had truly taken on our weaknesses, and, without sharing in sin, he spared himself no human frailty, so that he might give what was his to us and heal what was ours in himself. For he, the almighty Physician, had prepared a twofold remedy for us in our misery, one part of which lies in the mystery and the other in the example, so that by the one divine powers may be given and by the other human weaknesses driven out. For as God is the Author of our justification, so man is a debtor who owes him devotion. [i]

So, dearly beloved, this unspeakable restoration of our health leaves us no room for pride or for idleness. For we have nothing that we did not receive, and we are plainly warned not to treat the gifts of God’s grace with neglect. He who comes so timely to our help rightly urges us on with commands, and he who leads us to glory mercifully spurs us to obedience. That is why the Lord himself is rightly made our way, because except through Christ there is no coming to Christ. But through him and to him travels the one who walks the path of his endurance and humiliation; and on that road, you may be sure, there is no lack of the heat of toil, the clouds of sadness, the storms of fear. The snares of the wicked, the persecutions of unbelievers, the threats of the powerful, the insults of the proud are all there. And all these things the Lord of hosts and King of glory passed through in the form of our weakness and in the likeness of sinful flesh, so that amid the dangers of this present life we might desire not so much to avoid and escape them as to endure and overcome them. [j]

That is why the Lord Jesus Christ, our Head, representing in himself all the members of his body and speaking for those he was redeeming in the punishment of the cross, uttered the cry he had once uttered in the psalm: “O God, my God, look upon me: why have you forsaken me?” That cry, dearly beloved, is a lesson, not a complaint. For in Christ there is one person of God and man, and he could not have been forsaken by the one from whom he could not be separated. So it is on behalf of us, the trembling and weak, that he asks why the flesh that is afraid to suffer has not been heard. For when the passion was beginning, to cure and correct our weak fear, he had said, “Father, if it is possible, let this cup pass from me; yet not as I will, but as you will”; and again, “Father, if this cup cannot pass unless I drink it, your will be done.” He had therefore conquered the trembling of the flesh, had now accepted the Father’s will, and, trampling all dread of death underfoot, was then carrying out the work of his design. Why then, at the very moment of his triumph in such a victory, does he ask the cause and reason of his being forsaken, that is, not heard? Only to show that the feeling he took on to excuse his human fears is quite different from the deliberate choice he had made, in keeping with the Father’s eternal decree, for the reconciliation of the world. And so the very cry of one “unheard” is the unfolding of a mighty mystery, because the Redeemer’s power would have given nothing to humankind if our weakness in him had obtained what it asked. Let these words, dearly beloved, be enough for today, so that we do not burden you with a long sermon; let us put off the rest until Wednesday. The Lord will hear you if you pray that we may keep our promise, through the bounty of him who lives and reigns forever and ever. Amen. [k]