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38. And mark that even when He who is Himself the Truth and the
Word, by whom all things were made, had been made flesh that He
might dwell among us, the apostle yet says: "Yea, though we have
known Christ after the flesh, yet now henceforth know we Him no
more." For Christ, desiring not only to give the possession to
those who had completed the journey, but also to be Himself the way to
those who were just setting out, determined to take a fleshly body.
Whence also that expression, "The Lord created me in the beginning
of His way," that is, that those who wished to come might begin
their journey in Him. The apostle, therefore, although still on the
way, and following after God who called him to the reward of His
heavenly calling, yet forgetting those things which were behind, and
pressing on towards those things which were before, had already passed
over the beginning of the way, and had now no further need of it; yet
by this way all must commence their journey who desire to attain to the
truth, and to rest in eternal life. For He says: "I am the way,
and the truth, and the life;" that is, by me men come, to me they
come, in me they rest. For when we come to Him, we come to the
Father also, because through an equal an equal is known; and the
Holy Spirit binds, and as it were seals as, so that we are able to
rest permanently in the supreme and unchangeable Good. And hence we
may learn how essential it is that nothing should detain us on the way,
when not even our Lord Himself, so far as He has condescended to be
our way, is willing to detain us, but wishes us rather to press on;
and, instead of weakly clinging to temporal things, even though these
have been put on and worn by Him for our salvation, to pass over them
quickly, and to struggle to attain unto Himself, who has freed our
nature from the bondage of temporal things, and has set it down at the
right hand of His Father.
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