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| Chapter XXIV
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Chapter
XXIV.
But possibly one who has given his attention to the course of the
preceding remarks may inquire: “wherein is the power of the
Deity, wherein is the imperishableness of that Divine power, to be
traced in the processes you have described?” In order, therefore,
to make this also clear, let us take a survey of the sequel of the
Gospel mystery, where that Power conjoined with Love is more especially
exhibited. In the first place, then, that the omnipotence of the Divine
nature should have had strength to descend to the humiliation of
humanity, furnishes a clearer proof of that omnipotence than even the
greatness and supernatural character of the miracles. For that
something pre-eminently great should be wrought out by Divine power is,
in a manner, in accordance with, and consequent upon the Divine nature;
nor is it startling to hear it said that the whole of the created
world, and all that is understood to be beyond the range of visible
things, subsists by the power of God, His will giving it existence
according to His good pleasure. But this His descent to the humility of
man is a kind of superabundant exercise of power, which thus finds no
check even in directions which contravene nature. It is the peculiar
property of the essence of fire to tend upwards; no one therefore,
deems it wonderful in the case of flame to see that natural operation.
But should the flame be seen to stream downwards, like heavy bodies,
such a fact would be regarded as a miracle; namely, how fire still
remains fire, and yet, by this change of direction in its motion,
passes out of its nature by being borne downward. In like manner, it is
not the vastness of the heavens, and the bright shining of its
constellations, and the order of the universe and the unbroken
administration over all existence that so manifestly displays the
transcendent power of the Deity, as this condescension to the weakness
of our nature; the way, in fact, in which sublimity, existing in
lowliness, is actually seen in lowliness, and yet descends not from its
height, and in which Deity, entwined as it is with the nature of man,
becomes this, and yet still is that. For since, as has been said
before, it was not in the nature of the opposing power to come in
contact with the undiluted presence of God, and to undergo His
unclouded manifestation, therefore, in order to secure that the ransom
in our behalf might be easily accepted by him who required it, the
Deity was hidden under the veil of our nature, that so, as with
ravenous fish2001
| 2001 as
with ravenous fish. The same simile is
found in John of Damascus (De Fid. iii. 27), speaking of Death.
“Therefore Death will advance, and, gulping down the bait of the
Body, be transfixed with the hook of the Divinity: tasting that sinless
and life-giving Body, he is undone, and disgorges all whom he has ever
engulphed: for as darkness vanishes at the letting in of light, so
corruption is chased away by the onset of life, and while there is life
given to all else, there is corruption only for the
Corrupter.” | , the hook of the
Deity might be gulped down along with the bait of flesh, and thus, life
being introduced into the house of death, and light shining in
darkness, that which is diametrically opposed to light and life might
vanish; for it is not in the nature of darkness to remain when light is
present, or of death to exist when life is active. Let us, then, by way
of summary take up the train of the arguments for the Gospel mystery,
and thus complete our answer to those who question this Dispensation of
God, and show them on what ground it is that the Deity by a personal
intervention works out the salvation of man. It is certainly most
necessary that in every point the conceptions we entertain of the Deity
should be such as befit the subject, and not that, while one idea
worthy of His sublimity should be retained, another equally belonging
to that estimate of Deity should be dismissed from it; on the contrary,
every exalted notion, every devout thought, must most surely enter into
our belief in God, and each must be made dependent on each in a
necessary sequence. Well, then; it has been pointed out that His
goodness, wisdom, justice, power, incapability of decay, are all of
them in evidence in the doctrine of the Dispensation in which we are.
His goodness is caught sight of in His election to save lost man; His
wisdom and justice have been displayed in the method of our salvation;
His power, in that, though born in the likeness and fashion of a man,
on the lowly level of our nature, and in accordance with that likeness
raising the expectation that he could be overmastered by death, he,
after such a birth, nevertheless produced the effects peculiar and
natural to Him. Now it is the peculiar effect of light to make darkness
vanish, and of life to destroy death. Since, then, we have been led
astray from the right path, and diverted from that life which was ours
at the beginning, and brought under the sway of death, what is there
improbable in the lesson we are taught by the Gospel mystery, if it be
this; that cleansing reaches those who are befouled with sin, and life
the dead, and guidance the wanderers, in order that defilement may be
cleansed, error corrected, and what was dead restored to
life?E.C.F. INDEX & SEARCH
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