Homilies on John 28.1–28.3

[Homily 28.] “For God did not send his Son to judge the world, but to save the world.” Many of the more careless, using God’s love for humankind to increase the greatness of their sins and the excess of their neglect, say these words: “There is no Gehenna, there is no punishment; God forgives us all our sins.” To stop their mouths a wise man says, “Do not say, ‘His compassion is great; he will make atonement for the multitude of my sins’; for mercy and wrath are with him, and his anger rests on sinners”; and again, “As great as his mercy, so great also is his reproof.” And where then, someone says, are the marks of his love for humankind, if we are to receive what our sins deserve? That we shall receive what they deserve, hear both the prophet and Paul saying it: the one, “You will repay each according to his works”; the other, “who will repay each according to his work.” But that even so God’s love for humankind is great is clear from this too. For by dividing our affairs into two ages of life, the present and the future life, and making the one a place of contests and the other a place of crowns, God showed great love for humankind here too. How, and in what way? Because when we had committed many grievous sins, and had not stopped defiling our souls with countless evils from youth to extreme old age, he did not demand an account of any of these sins from us, but gave us their forgiveness through the washing of regeneration, and granted righteousness and sanctification. What then, someone says, if a person counted worthy of the mysteries from his earliest age afterwards sins countless times? Such a person is then worthy of greater punishment. For we do not pay the same penalties for the same sins, but much heavier ones, when we offend after initiation. Paul shows this, speaking thus: “Anyone who has set aside the law of Moses dies without mercy on the testimony of two or three witnesses. How much worse punishment, do you think, will be deserved by the one who has trampled on the Son of God, and counted the blood of the covenant common, and insulted the Spirit of grace?” Such a person, then, will be worthy of greater punishment. Yet even for him he opened the doors of repentance, and gave him many ways to wash away his offenses, if he is willing. Consider, then, how great these proofs of love for humankind are: both to forgive by grace, and, after grace, not to punish the one who has sinned and deserves punishment, but to give him time and an appointed term for his defense. For all these reasons Christ said to Nicodemus, “God did not send his Son to judge the world, but to save the world.” For there are two comings of Christ, the one that has already taken place and the one to come; and the two are not for the same purpose. The first took place not to examine what we had done but to forgive; the second, not to forgive but to examine. That is why he says of the first, “I did not come to judge the world, but to save the world”; but of the second, “When the Son comes in the glory of his Father, he will set the sheep on his right and the goats on his left. And these will go into life, and those into eternal punishment.” And yet the first coming too was one of judgment, by the rule of justice. Why? Because before his coming there was a natural law, and prophets, and again a written law, and teaching, and countless promises, and displays of signs, and punishments and penalties, and many other things able to set people right; and it would have been consistent to demand an account of all these. But since he loves humankind, he makes no examination for the time, but grants pardon. For if he had done this, all would have been snatched away at once: “For all have sinned,” it says, “and fall short of the glory of God.” Do you see the unspeakable excess of his love for humankind? “The one who believes in the Son is not judged; but the one who does not believe has already been judged.” And yet if he did not come to judge the world, how has the one who does not believe already been judged, when the time of judgment has not yet come? Either he says this, that the very disbelieving without repentance is a punishment (for to be outside the light holds the greatest penalty in itself), or he foretells what is to come. For as the murderer, even if he has not been condemned by the judge’s vote, has been condemned by the nature of the deed, so too the unbeliever. For Adam too died on the day he ate from the tree; for so the sentence ran: “On the day you eat from the tree,” it says, “you will die.” And yet he lived. How then did he die? By the sentence and by the nature of the deed. For one who has made himself liable to punishment is under the penalty, even if not yet in fact, then by the sentence. For so that no one, hearing, “I did not come to judge the world,” might think he could sin unpunished and become more careless, he walls off this neglect too by saying, “has already been judged.” For since the judgment was to come and was not yet present, he brings the fear of punishment near and shows the punishment already. And this itself belongs to great love for humankind, not only to give the Son but also to put off the time of judgment, so that those who have sinned and those who disbelieve may have the opportunity to wash away their offenses. “The one who believes in the Son is not judged”: the one who believes, not the one who meddles; the one who believes, not the one who busies himself. What then, if he has an unclean life and deeds that are not good? Paul says that such people are not genuine believers at all: “For they profess to know God, but deny him by their works.” But here he says this: that he is not judged on this very count, but he will pay a heavier penalty for his works, while he will not be punished for unbelief, because he believed once.

Do you see how, having begun from fearful things, he ended again with these very things? For at the beginning he said, “Unless one is born of water and the Spirit, he cannot enter the kingdom of God”; and here again, “The one who does not believe in the Son has already been judged”; that is, do not think that the delay is of any use to one who has already become liable, unless he changes. For the one who has not believed will be in no better state than those already condemned and being punished. “And this is the judgment, that the light has come into the world, and people loved the darkness rather than the light.” What he says is this: they are punished because they would not leave the darkness and run to the light. Here then he deprives them of every defense. For “if I had come punishing,” he says, “and demanding an account of what had been done, they could have said, ‘That is why we leapt away.’ But now I have come to free them from darkness and bring them to light. Who then would pity the one who will not come from darkness to the light? For having nothing to accuse us of, but receiving countless benefits,” he says, “they leap away from us.” He made this charge elsewhere too, saying, “They hated me without cause”; and again, “If I had not come and spoken to them, they would not have sin.” For one who sits in darkness in the absence of light might perhaps have pardon; but one who clings to the darkness after the light has come brings against himself proof of a perverse and contentious mind. Then, since what was said seemed incredible to most (for no one would prefer darkness to light), he sets down the reason why they suffered this. What is it? “For their deeds,” he says, “were evil. For everyone who does wicked things hates the light and does not come to the light, so that his deeds may not be exposed.” And yet he came not judging or examining, but pardoning and forgiving offenses and giving salvation from faith. How then did they flee? If he had come and sat in a court, what was said would have had some reason; for one who is conscious of wickedness usually flees the judge; but to one who pardons, offenders actually run. If then he came pardoning, those most conscious of many sins were the most likely to run to him; and that is what happened with many. For tax collectors and sinners came and reclined at table with Jesus. What then is it that is said? He says these things about those who choose to remain in wickedness for ever. For he came in order to forgive their former sins and secure them against future ones. But since some are so slack and so unstrung for the labors of virtue as to wish to cling to wickedness to their last breath and never depart from it, he is here censuring and pointing them out. For since Christianity demands, together with right teaching, a healthy way of life too, they are afraid, he says, to come over to us, because they do not wish to show an upright life. For no one would reprove the one living in paganism. For one who has such gods, and feasts as shameful and ridiculous as his gods, shows deeds worthy of his teachings; but those who belong to God, if they live carelessly, have everyone calling them to account and accusing them; so great is the admiration even among the enemies of the truth. See, then, how exactly he puts what he says. For he did not say, “the one who did wicked things does not come to the light,” but “the one who does them” always; that is, the one who always wants to wallow in the mire of sin does not want to subject himself to my laws, but, staying outside, commits sexual immorality without fear and does all the other forbidden things. For if he came here, he would be exposed like a thief in the light. That is why he flees my rule. One can hear many pagans say even now that they cannot come to our faith because they cannot give up drunkenness and sexual immorality and such offenses. What then? someone says. Are there not Christians who do wicked things, and pagans who live in philosophy? That there are Christians who do wicked things, I know too; but whether there are pagans who live rightly, this I do not yet know for certain. For do not tell me of those who are gentle and orderly by nature; for that is not virtue. But tell me of one who endures great violence from the passions and practices philosophy. But you could not. For if the promise of the kingdom and the threat of Gehenna and so much other teaching scarcely keep people in virtue, those persuaded of none of these things would hardly pursue virtue. And if some even pretend, they do it for the sake of glory; and one who does it for glory will not refrain from indulging his wicked desires when he can escape notice. However, so that we may not seem contentious to some, let us grant that there are people among the pagans who live rightly; for this never contradicts the saying. For he spoke of what happens for the most part, not of what happens rarely.

And see how from another side too he deprives them of every defense, saying, “The light has come into the world.” “Did they seek it themselves?” he says. “Did they labor, did they toil to find it? The light itself came to them, and not even so did they run to it.” But since there are some even among Christians who live wickedly, we would say that he does not say this about those who were Christians from the beginning and received true religion from their ancestors (even if these too have very often been shaken from the exactness of the teachings by a wicked life); but still I do not think he is speaking of them now, but of those from among the pagans or Jews who ought to come over to the right faith. For he shows that no one living in error would choose to come to the faith without first having enrolled himself for an upright life, and that no one would remain in unbelief without first having chosen to be wicked always. For do not tell me that he is chaste and does not rob; for these alone are not virtue. For what use is it, when he has these, but is a slave of empty glory and remains in error out of shame before the company of his friends? For this is not to live rightly. The slave of glory is no less than the fornicator; and he does much more and graver evils than the other. But tell me of someone freed from all the passions and free of every wickedness, and remaining among the pagans. You could not. For even those among them who made great boasts and mastered money and the belly, as they say, were enslaved to glory most of all men; and this is the cause of all evils. So too the Jews have remained what they were. That is why he reproached them, saying, “How can you believe, when you receive glory from men?” And why did he not discuss these things with Nathanael, to whom he even bore witness to truthfulness, nor extend his discourse at length? Because he did not come with such earnestness. For Nicodemus made this his business, and the time others had for rest he made a time for hearing; but Nathanael came persuaded by another. Yet he did not pass him by either; for he says to him, “From now on you will see the heavens opened and the angels of God ascending and descending.” But to Nicodemus he said none of this, but spoke about the dispensation and [eternal life, addressing each according to] his underlying intention. For to Nathanael, since he knew the writings of the prophets and was not so timid, it was enough to hear only so much; but since Nicodemus was still held by timidity, he did not reveal the whole to him clearly, but shook his mind …