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1. The Lord Jesus raises up His people to a great hope, than
which there could not possibly be a greater. Listen and rejoice in
hope, that, since the present is not a life to be loved, but to be
tolerated, you may have the power of patient endurance amid all its
tribulation. Listen, I say, and weigh well to what it is that our
hopes are exalted. Christ Jesus saith, The Son of God, the
Only-begotten, who is co-eternal and equal with the Father,
saith: He, who for our sakes became man, but became not, like every
man besides, a liar, saith: the Way, the Life, the Truth saith:
He who overcame the world, saith of those for whom He overcame it:
listen, believe, hope, desire what He saith: "Father," He
says, "I will that they also whom Thou hast given me be with me
where I am." Who are these who He says were given Him by the
Father? Are they not those of whom He says in another place, "No
man cometh unto me, unless the Father, who hath sent me, draw
him"? We already know if we have made any beneficial progress in this
Gospel, how it is that the things which He says the Father doeth,
He Himself doeth likewise along with the Father. They are those,
therefore, whom He has received from the Father, whom He Himself
has also chosen out of the world, and chosen that they may be no more
of the world, even as He also is not of the world; and yet that they
also may be a world that believeth and knoweth that Christ has been
sent by God the Father that the world might be delivered from the
world, and so, as a world that was to be reconciled unto God, might
not be condemned with the world that lieth in enmity. For so He says
in the beginning of this prayer: "Thou hast given Him power over all
flesh," that is, over every man, "that He should give eternal life
to as many as Thou hast given Him." Here He makes it clear that
He has indeed received power over all men, that, as the future Judge
of quick and dead, He may deliver whom He pleases, and condemn whom
He pleases; but that these were given Him that to all of them He
should give eternal life. For so He says: "That He should give
eternal life to as many as Thou hast given Him." Accordingly they
were not given Him that from them He should withhold eternal life;
although over them also the power has been given Him, inasmuch as He
has received it over all flesh, in other words, over every man. In
this way the world that has been reconciled will be delivered from the
hostile world, when He putteth into exercise His power over it, to
send it away into death eternal; but the other He maketh His own that
He may give it everlasting life. Accordingly, to every one, without
fail, of His own sheep the Good Shepherd, as to every one of His
members the great Head, hath promised this reward, that where He
is, there also we shall be with Him; nor can that be otherwise which
the omnipotent Son declared to be His will to the omnipotent Father.
For there also is the Holy Spirit, equally eternal, equally God,
the one Spirit of the two, the substance of the will of both. For
the words that we read of Him as uttering on the eve of His passion,
"Yet not, Father, as I will, but as Thou wilt," as if the
Father has or had one will, and the Son another, are the echo of our
infirmity, however faith-pervaded, which our Head transfigured in
His own person, when He likewise bare our iniquities. But that the
will of the Father and the Son is one, of both of whom also there is
but one Spirit, by including whom we come to the knowledge of the
Trinity, let piety believe, even though our infirmity meanwhile
permitteth us not to understand.
2. But as we have already, in a way proportionate to the brevity of
our discourse, spoken of the objects of the promise, and of its own
stability; let us now look at this one point, as far as we are able,
what it is that He was pleased to promise when He said, "I will
that they also whom Thou hast given me be with me where I am." As
far as pertains to the creaturehood wherein He was made of the seed of
David according to the flesh, not even He Himself was yet where He
would afterwards be: but He could say in this way, "where I am,"
to let us understand that He was soon to ascend into heaven, so that
He spoke of Himself as being already there, where He was presently
to be. He could do so also in the same way as He had said on a former
occasion, when speaking to Nicodemus, "No man ascendeth into
heaven, save He that came down from heaven, even the Son of man who
is in heaven." For there also He did not say, Will be, but
"is," because of the oneness of person, wherein God is at once
man, and man God. He promised, therefore, that we should be in
heaven; for thither the servant-form, which He received of the
Virgin, has been elevated, and set at the right hand of the Father.
Because of the same blessed hope the apostle also says: "But God,
who is rich in mercy, for His great love wherewith He loved us, even
when we were dead in sins, hath quickened us together with Christ; by
whose grace we are saved; and hath raised us up together, and made us
sit together in heavenly places in Christ Jesus." And so
accordingly we may understand the Lord to have said, "That where I
am, there they may be also." He, indeed, said of Himself that He
was there already; but of us He merely declared that He wished us to
be there with Him, without any indication that we were there already
But what the Lord said that He wished to be done, the apostle spoke
of as already accomplished. For he said not, He will yet raise us
up, and make us sit in heavenly places; but, "hath raised us up,
and made us sit in heavenly places:" for it is not without good
grounds, but in believing assurance, that he reckons as already done
what he is certain will yet be done. But if it is in respect of the
form of God, wherein He is equal to the Father, that we would be
inclined to understand His words, "I will that they also be with
me, where I am," let our mind get quit of every thought of material
images: whatever the soul has had presented to it, that is endowed
with length, or breadth, or thickness, tinted by the light with any
sort of bodily hue, or diffused through local space of any kind,
whether finite or infinite, let it, as far as possible, turn away
from all such notions the glance of its contemplation on the inward bent
of its thoughts. And let us not be making inquiries as to where the
Son, the Father's co-equal, is, since no one has yet found out
where He is not. But if any one would inquire, let him inquire
rather how he may be with Him; not everywhere as He is, but wherever
He may be. For when He said to the man that was expiating his crimes
on the tree, and making confession unto salvation, "Today shall thou
be with me in paradise," in respect to His human nature His own soul
was on that very day to be in hell, His flesh in the sepulchre; but
as respected His Godhead He was certainly also in paradise. And
therefore the soul of the thief, absolved from his by-gone crimes,
and already in the blessed enjoyment of His grace, although it could
not be everywhere as He was, yet could on that very day be also with
Him in paradise, from which He, who is always everywhere, had not
withdrawn. On this account, doubtless, it was not enough for Him to
say, "I will that they also be where I am;" but He added, "with
me." For to be with Him is the chief good. For even the miserable
can be where He is, since wheresoever any are, there is He also;
but the blessed only are with Him, because it is only of Him that
they can be blessed. Was it not truly said to God, "If I ascend
into heaven, Thou art there; and if I go down into hell, Thou art
present?" or is not Christ after all that Wisdom of God which
"penetrateth everywhere because of its purity"? But the light
shineth in darkness and the darkness comprehendeth it not. And
similarly, to take a kind of illustration from what is visible,
although greatly unlike, as the blind man, even though he be where the
light is, is yet not himself with the light, but is really absent from
that which is present; so the unbeliever and profane, or even the
believer and pious, because not yet competent to gaze on the light of
wisdom, although he cannot be anywhere that Christ is not there
likewise, yet is not himself with Christ, I mean in actual sight.
For we cannot doubt that the true believer is with Christ by faith;
because in reference to this He saith, "He that is not with me is
against me." But when He said to God the Father, "I will that
they also whom Thou hast given me be with me where I am," He spoke
exclusively of that sight wherein we shall see Him as He is.
3. Let no one disturb the clearness of the meaning by any cloudy
contradiction; but let what follows furnish its testimony to the words
that precede. For after saying, "I will that they also be with me
where I am," He went on immediately to add, "That they may behold
my glory, which Thou gavest me: for Thou lovedst me before the
foundation of the world." "That they may behold," He said; not,
that they may believe. This is faith's wages, not faith itself.
For if faith has been correctly defined in the Epistle to the Hebrews
as "the assurance [conviction] of things that are not seen," why
may not the wages of faith be defined, the beholding of things which
were hoped for in faith? For when we shall see the glory which the
Father hath given the Son, even though we may understand what is
spoken of in this passage, not as that [glory] which the Father gave
His co-equal Son in begetting Him, but as that which He gave
Him, when become the Son of man, after the death of the cross;
when, I say, we shall see that glory of the Son, then of a
certainty shall take place the judgment of the quick and the dead, and
then shall the wicked be taken away that he may not behold the glory of
the Lord; and what [glory], save that of His Godhead? For
blessed are the pure in heart, for they shall see God: and because
the wicked are not pure in heart, therefore they shall not see Then
shall they go away into everlasting punishment; for so shall the wicked
be taken away, that he may not behold the glory of the Lord: but the
righteous shall go into life eternal. And what is life eternal?
"That they may know Thee, the only true God, and Jesus Christ,
whom Thou hast sent" (ver. 3): not, indeed, as those knew
Him, who although impure in heart, yet were able to see Him as He
sat in judgment in His glorified servant-form; but as He is yet to
be known by the pure in heart, as the only true God, the Son along
with the Father and Holy Spirit, because the Trinity itself is the
only true God. If, then, it is in reference to His Godhead as the
Son of God, equal and co-eternal with the Father, that we take the
words, "I will that they also be with me where I am," we shall be
with Christ in the Father; but He in His own way, we in ours,
wherever we may be in body. For if localities are to be understood,
and such as contain incorporeal beings, and everything has a place
where it is, the eternal place of Christ where He always is, is the
Father Himself, and the place of the Father is the Son; for
"I," He said, "am in the Father, and the Father in me;" and
in this prayer, "As Thou, Father, art in me, and I in Thee:"
and they are our place, because there follows, "That they also may
be one in us:" and we are God's place, inasmuch as we are His
temple; even as He, who died for us and liveth for us, also prayeth
for us, that we may be one in them; because "His [dwelling] place
was made in peace, and His habitation in Zion," which we are. But
who is qualified to think on such places or what is in them, apart from
the idea of space-defined capacities and material masses? Yet no
little progress is made, if at least, when any such idea presents
itself to the eye of the mind, it is denied, rejected, and
reprobated: and a certain kind of light is, as far as possible,
thought of, in which such things are perceived as deserving only to be
denied, rejected, and reprobated; and the certainty of that light is
known and loved, so that from thence an upward movement is begun in
us, and an effort made to reach into places farther within: and when
the mind through its own infirmity and still inferior purity has failed
to penetrate them it is driven back again, not without the sighings of
love and the tears of ardent longing, and continues to bear in patience
until it is purified by faith, and prepared by the holiness of the
inward life to be able to take up its abode therein.
4. How, then, shall we not be with Christ where He is, when we
shall be with Him in the Father in whom He is? On this, also, the
apostle is not without something to say to us, although we are not yet
in possession of the reality, but only cherishing the hope. For he
says, "If ye be risen with Christ, seek those things which are
above, where Christ sitteth on the right hand of God: set your
affections on things above, not on things on the earth. For ye have
died," he adds, "and your life is hid with Christ in God."
Here, you see, our life is meanwhile in faith and hope with Christ,
where He is; because it is with Christ in God. That, you see, is
as if already accomplished for which He prayed, when He said, "I
will that they also be with me where I am;" but now only by faith.
And when will it be accomplished by actual sight? "When Christ,"
he says, " [who is] your life, shall appear, then shall ye also
appear with Him in glory." Then shall we appear as that which we
then shall be; for it shall then be apparent that it was not without
good grounds that we believed and hoped we should become so, before it
actually took place. He will do this, to whom the Son, after
saying, "That they may behold my glory, which Thou gavest me,"
immediately added, "For Thou lovedst me before the foundation of the
world." For in Him He loved us also before the foundation of the
world, and then foreordained what He was to do in the end of the
world.
5. "O righteous Father," He saith, "the world hath not known
Thee." Just because Thou art righteous it hath not known Thee.
It is as that world which has been predestined to condemnation really
deserved, that it hath not known Him; while the world which He hath
reconciled unto Himself through Christ hath known Him not of merit,
but by grace. For what else is the knowing of Him, but eternal
life? which, while He undoubtedly withheld it from the condemned
world, He bestowed on the reconciled. On that very account,
therefore, the world hath not known Thee, because Thou art
righteous, and hast rendered unto it according to its deserts, that it
should not know Thee: while on the same account the reconciled world
hath known Thee, because Thou art merciful, and, not for any merit
of its own, but by grace, hast supplied it with the needed help to
know Thee. And then there follows, "But I have known Thee."
He is the Fountain of grace, who is by nature God, and, by grace
ineffable, man also of the Holy Spirit and the Virgin: and then on
His own behalf, because the grace of God is through Jesus Christ
our Lord, He adds, "And these have known that Thou hast sent
me." Such is the reconciled world. But it is because Thou hast
sent me that they have known: by grace, therefore, have they known.
6. "And I have made known to them," He says, "Thy name, and
will make it known." I have made it known by faith, I will make it
known by sight: I have made it known to those whose present sojourn in
a strange land has its appointed end, I will make it known to those
whose reign as kings shall be endless. "That the love," He adds,
"wherewith [literally, which] Thou hast loved me, may be in them,
and I in them. (The form of speech is unusual, "the love, which
Thou hast laved me, may be in them, and I in them;" for the common
way of speaking is, the love wherewith thou hast loved me. Here, of
course, it is a translation from the Greek: but there are similar
forms also in Latin; as we say. He served a faithful service, He
served as a soldier a strenuous soldier-service; when apparently we
ought to have said, He served with a faithful service, he served as a
soldier with a strenuous soldier-service. But such as the form of
expression is, "the love which Thou hast loved me;" one similar to
it is also used by the apostle, "I have fought a good fight;" he
does not say, in a good fight, which would be the more usual and
perhaps correcter form of expression. ) But how else is the love
wherewith the Father loved the Son in us also, but because we are
His members and are loved in Him, since He is loved in the totality
of His person, as both Head and members? Therefore He added,
"and I in them;" as if saying, Since I am also in them. For in
one sense He is in us as in His temple; but in another, because we
are also Himself, seeing that, in accordance with His becoming man,
that He might be our Head, we are His body. The Saviour's prayer
is finished, His passion begins; let us, therefore, also finish the
present discourse, that we may treat of His passion, as He granteth
us grace, in others to follow.
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