Homily 3
1 John 2:18-27
"Children, it is the last hour: and as you have heard that antichrist
shall come, even now are there many antichrists; whereby we know
that it is the last hour. They went out from us, but they were not of us:
if they had been of us, they would no doubt have continued with us:
but they went out, that they might be made manifest that they were
not all of us. But you have an unction from the Holy One, and know all
things. I write to you, not because you know not the truth, but because
you know it, and that no lie is of the truth. Who is a liar but he who
denies that Jesus is the Christ? [He is antichrist, that denies the Father
and the Son.] Whoever denies the Son, the same has neither the
Father nor the Son: and he who acknowledges the Son has both the
Father and the Son. Let that therefore abide in you, which you have
heard from the beginning. If that which you have heard from the
beginning shall remain in you, you also shall continue in the Son, and
in the Father. And this is the promise that He has promised us, even
eternal life. These things have I written to you concerning those who
seduce you; that you may know that you have an unction, and that the
unction which you have received of him may abide in you. And you
need not that any man teach you; because His unction teaches you of
all things."
1. "Children, it is the last hour." In this lesson he addresses the
children that they may make haste to grow, because "it is the last
hour." Age or stature of the body is not at one's own will. A man does
not grow in respect of the flesh when he wills, any more than he is
born when he wills: but where the being born rests with the will, the
growth also rests with the will. No man is "born of water and the
Spirit," except he is willing. Consequently if he wills, he grows or
makes increase: if he wills, he decreases. What is it to grow? To go
onward by proficiency. What is it to decrease? To go backward by
deficiency. Whoever knows that he is born, let him hear that he is an
infant; let him eagerly cling to the breasts of his mother, and he grows
apace. Now his mother is the Church; and her breasts are the two
Testaments of the Divine Scriptures. Hence let him suck the milk of all
the things that as signs of spiritual truths were done in time for our
eternal salvation, that being nourished and strengthened, he may
attain to the eating of solid meat, which is, "In the beginning was the
Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God." Our milk is
Christ in His humility; our meat, the selfsame Christ equal with the
Father. With milk He nourishes you, that He may feed you with bread:
for with the heart spiritually to touch Christ is to know that He is
equal with the Father.
2. Therefore it was that He forbade Mary to touch Him, and said to her,
"Touch me not; for I am not yet ascended to the Father." What is this?
He gave Himself to be handled by the disciples, and did He shun
Mary's touch? Is not He the same that said to the doubting disciple,
"Reach hither your fingers, and feel the scars"? Was He at that time
ascended to the Father? Then why does He forbid Mary, and says,
"Touch me not; for I am not yet ascended to the Father?" Or are we to
say, that He feared not to be touched by men, and feared to be touched
by women? The touch of Him cleanses all flesh. To whom He willed
first to be manifested, by them feared He to be handled? Was not His
resurrection announced by women to the men, that so the serpent
should by a sort of counterplot be overcome? For because he first by
the woman announced death to man, therefore to men was also life
announced by a woman. Then why was He unwilling to be touched,
but because He would have it to be understood of that spiritual touch?
The spiritual touch takes place from a pure heart. That person does of
a pure heart reach Christ with his touch who understands Him
coequal with the Father. But whoever does not yet understand Christ's
Godhead, that person reaches but to the flesh, reaches not to the
Godhead. Now what great matter is it, to reach only to that which the
persecutors reached to, who crucified Him? But that is the great thing,
to understand the Word God with God, in the beginning, by whom all
things were made: such as He would have Himself to be known when
He said to Philip, "Am I so long time with you, and have you not known
me, Philip? He who sees me, sees also the Father."
3. But lest any be sluggish to go forward, let him hear: "Children, it is
the last hour." Go forward, run, grow; "it is the last hour." This same
last hour is long; yet it is the last. For he has put "hour" for "the last
time;" because it is in the last times that our Lord Jesus Christ is to
come. But some will say, How the last times? how the last hour?
Certainly antichrist will first come, and then will come the day of
judgment. John perceived these thoughts: lest people should in a
manner become secure, and think it was not the last hour because
antichrist was to come, he said to them, "And as you have heard that
antichrist is to come, now are there come many antichrists." Could it
have many antichrists, except it were "the last hour"?
4. Whom has he called antichrists? He goes on and expounds.
"Whereby we know that it is the last hour." By what? Because "many
antichrists are come. They went out from us;" see the antichrists!
"They went out from us:" therefore we bewail the loss. Hear the
consolation. "But they were not of us." All heretics, all schismatics
went out from us, that is, they go out from the Church; but they would
not go out, if they were of us. Therefore, before they went out they
were not of us. If before they went out they were not of us; many
within are not gone out, but yet are antichrists. We dare to say this:
and why, but that each one while he is within may not be an
antichrist? For he is about to describe and mark the antichrists, and
we shall see them now. And each person ought to question his own
conscience, whether he is an antichrist. For antichrist in our tongue
means, contrary to Christ. Not, as some take it, that antichrist is to be
so called because he is to come ante Christum, before Christ, i.e. Christ
to come after him: it does not mean this, neither is it thus written, but
Antichristus, i.e. contrary to Christ. Now who is contrary to Christ you
already perceive from the apostle's own exposition, and understand
that none can go out but antichrists; whereas those who are not
contrary to Christ, can in no wise go out. For he who is not contrary to
Christ holds fast in His body, and is counted therewith as a member.
The members are never contrary one to another. The entire body
consists of all the members. And what says the apostle concerning the
agreement of the members? "If one member suffer, all the members
suffer with it; and if one member be glorified, all the members rejoice
with it." If then in the glorifying of a member the other members
rejoice with it, and in its suffering all the members suffer, the
agreement of the members has no antichrist. And there are those who
inwardly are in such sort in the body of our Lord Jesus Christ - seeing
His body is yet under cure, and the soundness will not be perfect save
in the resurrection of the dead - are in such wise in the body of Christ,
as bad humours. When these are vomited up, the body is relieved: so
too when bad men go out, then the Church is relieved. And one says,
when the body vomits and casts them out, These humours went out of
me, but they were not of me. How were not of me? Were not cut out of
my flesh, but oppressed my breast while they were in me.
5. "They went out from us; but," be not sad, "they were not of us." How
prove you this? If they had been of us, they would doubtless have
continued with us. Hence therefore you may see, that many who are
not of us, receive with us the Sacraments, receive with us baptism.
receive with us what the faithful know they receive, Benediction, the
Eucharist, and whatever there is in Holy Sacraments: the communion
of the very altar they receive with us, and are not of us. Temptation
proves that they are not of us. When temptation comes to them, as if
blown by a wind they fly abroad; because they were not grain. But all
of them will fly abroad, as we must often tell you, when once the
fanning of the Lord's threshing-floor shall begin in the day of
judgment. "They went out from us, but they were not of us; if they had
been of us, they would no doubt have continued with us." For would
you know, beloved, how most certain this saying is, that they who
haply have gone out and return, are not antichrists, are not contrary to
Christ? Whoever are not antichrists, it cannot be that they should
continue without. But of his own will is each either an antichrist or in
Christ. Either we are among the members, or among the bad humours.
He who changes himself for the better, is in the body, a member: but
he who continues in his badness, is a bad humour; and when he is
gone out, then they who were oppressed will be relieved. "They went
out from us, but they were not of us; for if they had been of us, they
would no doubt have continued with us: but (they went out), that they
might be made manifest that they were not all of us." That he has
added, "that they might be made manifest," is, because even when
they are within they are not of us; yet they are not manifest, but by
going out are made manifest. "And you have an unction from the Holy
One, that you may be manifest to your selves." The spiritual unction is
the Holy Spirit Himself, of which the Sacrament is in the visible
unction. Of this unction of Christ he says, that all who have it know the
bad and the good; and they need not to be taught, because the unction
itself teaches them.
6. "I write to you not because you know not the truth, but because you
know it, and that no lie is of the truth." Behold, we are admonished
how we may know antichrist. What is Christ? Truth. Himself has said
"I am the Truth." But "no lie is of the truth." Consequently, all who lie are not yet of Christ. He has not said that some lie is of the truth, and
some lie not of the truth. Mark the sentence. Do not fondle yourselves,
do not flatter yourselves, do not deceive yourselves, do not cheat
yourselves: "No lie is of the truth." Let us see then how antichrists lie,
because there is more than one kind of lying. "Who is a liar, but he
who denies that Jesus is the Christ?" One is the meaning of the word
"Jesus," another the meaning of the word "Christ:" though it is one
Jesus Christ our Saviour, yet "Jesus" is His proper name. Just as Moses
was so called by his proper name, as Elias, as Abraham: so as His
proper name our Lord has the name "Jesus:" but "Christ" is the name
of His sacred character. As when we say, Prophet, as when we say,
Priest; so by the name Christ we are given to understand the
Anointed, in whom should be the redemption of the whole people. The
coming of this Christ was hoped for by the people of the Jews: and
because He came in lowliness, He was not acknowledged; because the
stone was small, they stumbled at it and were broken. But "the stone
grew, and became a great mountain;" and what says the Scripture?
"Whoever shall stumble at this stone shall be broken; and on whoever
this stone shall come, it will grind him to powder." We must mark the
difference of the words: it says, he who stumbles shall be broken; but
he on whom it shall come, shall be ground to powder. At the first,
because He came lowly, men stumbled at Him: because He shall come
lofty to judgment, on whoever He shall come, He will grind him to
powder. But not that man will He grind to powder at His future
coming, whom He broke not when He came. He who stumbled not at
the lowly, shall not dread the lofty. Briefly you have heard it, brethren:
he who stumbled not at the lowly, shall not dread the lofty. For to all
bad men is Christ a stone of stumbling; whatever Christ says is bitter
to them.
7. For hear and see. Certainly all who go out from the Church, and are
cut off from the unity of the Church, are antichrists; let no man doubt
it: for the apostle himself has marked them, "They went out from us,
but they were not of us; for if they had been of us, they would no
doubt have continued with us." Therefore, whoever continue not with
us, but go out from us, it is manifest that they are antichrists. And how
are they proved to be antichrists? By lying. "And who is a liar, but he
who denies that Jesus is the Christ?" Let us ask the heretics: where do
you find a heretic that denies that Jesus is the Christ? See now, my
beloved, a great mystery. Mark what the Lord God may have inspired
us withal, and what I would fain work into your minds. Behold, they
went out from us, and turned Donatists: we ask them whether Jesus
be the Christ; they instantly confess that Jesus is the Christ. If then
that person is an antichrist, who denies that Jesus is the Christ,
neither can they call us antichrists, nor we them; therefore, neither
they went out from us, nor we from them. If then we have not gone
out one from another, we are in unity: if we be in unity, what means it
that there are two altars in this city? what, that there are divided
houses, divided marriages? that there is a common bed, and a divided
Christ? He admonishes us, he would have us confess what is the truth:
- either they went out from us, or we from them. But let it not be
imagined that we have gone out from them. For we have the testament
of the Lord's inheritance, we recite it, and there we find, "I will give
You the nations for Thine inheritance, and for Your possessions the
ends of the earth." We hold fast Christ's inheritance; they hold it not,
for they do not communicate with the whole earth, do not
communicate with the universal body redeemed by the blood of the
Lord. We have the Lord Himself rising from the dead, who presented
Himself to be felt by the hands of the doubting disciples: and while
they yet doubted, He said to them, "It was necessary for Christ to
suffer, and to rise from the dead the third day: and that repentance
and remission of sins should be preached in His name" - Where?
which way? to what persons? - "through all nations, beginning at
Jerusalem." Our minds are set at rest concerning the unity of the
inheritance! Whoever does not communicate with this inheritance, is
gone out.
8. But let us not be made sad: "They went out from us, but they were
not of us; for if they had been of us, they would no doubt have
continued with us." If then they went out from us, they are antichrists;
if they are antichrists, they are liars; if they are liars, they deny that
Jesus is the Christ. Once more we come back to the difficulty of the
question. Ask them one by one; they confess that Jesus is the Christ.
The difficulty that hampers us comes of our taking what is said in the
Epistle in too narrow a sense. At any rate you see the question; this
question puts both us and them to a stand, if it is not understood.
Either we are antichrists, or they are antichrists; they call us
antichrists, and say that we went out from them; we say the like of
them. But now this epistle has marked out the antichrists by this
cognizance: "Whoever denies that Jesus is the Christ," that same "is an
antichrist." Now therefore let us enquire who denies; and let us mark
not the tongue, but the deeds. For if all be asked, all with one mouth
confess that Jesus is the Christ. Let the tongue keep still for a little
while, ask the life. If we shall find this, if the Scripture itself shall tell
us that denial is a thing done not only with the tongue, but also with
the deeds, then assuredly we find many antichrists, who with the
mouth profess Christ, and in their manners dissent from Christ.
Where find we this in Scripture? Hear Paul the Apostle; speaking of
such, he says, "For they confess that they know God, but in their deeds
deny Him." We find these also to be antichrists: whoever in his deeds
denies Christ, is an antichrist. I listen not to what he says, but I look
what life he leads. Works speak, and do we require words? For where
is the bad man that does not wish to talk well? But what says the Lord
to such? "You hypocrites, how can you speak good things, while you
are evil?" Your voices you bring into my ears: I look into your
thoughts. I see an evil will there, and you make a show of false fruits. I
know what I must gather, and whence; I do not "gather figs of thistles,"
I do not gather "grapes of thorns;" for "every tree is known by its
fruit." A more lying antichrist is he who with his mouth professes that
Jesus is the Christ, and with his deeds denies Him. A liar in this, that
he speaks one thing, and does another.
9. Now therefore, brethren, if deeds are to be questioned, not only do
we find many antichrists gone out; but many not yet manifest, who
have not gone out at all. For as many as the Church has within it that
are perjured, defrauders, addicted to black arts, consulters of fortune-
tellers, adulterers, drunkards, usurers, boy-stealers, and all the other
vices that we are not able to enumerate; these things are contrary to
the doctrine of Christ, are contrary to the word of God. Now the Word
of God is Christ: whatever is contrary to the Word of God is in
Antichrist. For Antichrist means, "contrary to Christ." And would you
know how openly these resist Christ? Sometimes it happens that they
do some evil, and one begins to reprove them; because they dare not
blaspheme Christ, they blaspheme His ministers by whom they are
reproved: but if you show them that you speak Christ's words, not
your own, they endeavour all they can to convict you of speaking your
own words, not Christ's: if however it is manifest that you speak
Christ's words, they go even against Christ, they begin to find fault
with Christ: "How," say they, "and why did He make us such as we
are?" Do not persons say this every day, when they are convicted of
their deeds? Perverted by a depraved will, they accuse their Maker.
Their Maker cries to them from heaven, (for the same made us, who
new-made us:) What made I you? I made man, not avarice; I made
man, not robbery; I made man, not adultery. You have heard that my
works praise me. Out of the mouth of the Three Children, it was the
hymn itself that kept them from the fires." The works of the Lord
praise the Lord, the heaven, the earth, the sea, praise Him; praise Him
all things that are in the heaven, praise Him angels, praise Him stars,
praise Him lights, praise Him whatever swims, whatever flies,
whatever walks, whatever creeps; all these praise the Lord. Have you
heard there that avarice praises the Lord? Have you heard that
drunkenness praises the Lord? That luxury praises, that frivolity
praises Him? Whatever you hear not in that hymn give praise to the
Lord, the Lord made not that thing. Correct what you have made, that
what God made in you may be saved. But if you will not, and love and
embrace your sins, you are contrary to Christ. In or out the church,
you are an antichrist; in or out the church, you are chaff. But why are
you not out? Because you have not fallen in with a wind to carry you
away.
10. These things are now manifest, my brethren. Let no man say, I do
not worship Christ, but I worship God His Father. "Every one who
denies the Son, has neither the Son nor the Father; and he who
confesses the Son, has both the Son and the Father." He speaks to you
that are grain: and let those who were chaff, hear, and become grain.
Let each one, looking well to his own conscience, if he is a lover of the
world, be changed; let him become a lover of Christ, that he is not an
antichrist. If one shall tell him that he is an antichrist, he is wroth, he
thinks it a wrong done to him; perchance, if he is told by him that
strives with him that he is an antichrist, he threatens an action at law.
Christ says to him, Be patient; if you have been falsely spoken of,
rejoice with me, because I also am falsely spoken of by the antichrists:
but if you are truly spoken of, come to an understanding with your
own conscience; and if you fear to be called this, fear more to be it.
11. "Let that therefore abide in you, which you have heard from the
beginning. If that which you have heard from the beginning shall abide
in you, you also shall abide in the Son, and in the Father. And this is the
promise that He has promised us." For haply you might ask about the
wages, and say, Behold, "that which I have heard from the beginning I
keep safe in me, I comply therewith; perils, labours, temptations, for
the sake of this continuance, I bear up against them all: with what
fruit? what wages? what will He hereafter give me, since in this world
I see that I labour among temptations? I see not here that there is any
rest: mere mortality weighs down the soul, and the corruptible body
presses it down to lower things: but I bear all things, that "that which I
have heard from the beginning" may "remain" in me; and that I may
say to my God, "Because of the words of Your lips have I kept hard
ways." to what wages then? Hear, and faint not. If you were fainting in
the labours, upon the promised wages be strong. Where is the man
that shall work in a vineyard, and shall let slip out of his heart the
reward he is to receive? Suppose him to have forgotten, his hands fail.
The remembrance of the promised wages makes him persevering in
the work: and yet he who promised it is a man who can deceive your
expectation. How much more strong ought you to be in God's field,
when He who promised is the Truth, Who can neither have any
successor, nor die, nor deceive him to whom the promise was made!
And what is the promise? Let us see what He has promised. Is it gold
which men here love much, or silver? Or possessions, for which men
lavish gold, however much they love gold? Or pleasant lands, spacious
houses, many slaves, numerous beasts? Not these are the wages, so to
say, for which he exhorts us to endure in labour. What are these wages
called? "eternal life." You have heard, and in your joy you have cried
out: love that which you have heard, and you are delivered from your
labours into the rest of eternal life. Lo, this is what God promises;
"eternal life." Lo, this what God threatens; eternal fire. What to those
set on the right hand? "Come, you blessed of my Father, receive the
kingdom prepared for you from the beginning of the world." To those
on the left, what? "Go into eternal fire, prepared for the devil and his
angels." You do not yet love that: at least fear this.
12. Remember then, my brethren, that Christ has promised us eternal
life: "This," says he, "is the promise which He has promised us, even
eternal life. These things have I written to you concerning them which
seduce you." Let none seduce you to death: desire the promise of
eternal life. What can the world promise? Let it promise what you will,
it makes the promise perchance to one who tomorrow shall die. And
with what face will you go hence to Him that abides for ever? "But a
powerful man threatens me, so that I must do some evil." What does
he threaten? Prisons, chains, fires, torments, wild beasts: aye, but not
eternal fire? Dread that which One Almighty threatens; love that
which One Almighty promises; and all the world becomes vile in our
regard, whether it promise or terrify. "These things have I written to
you concerning them which seduce you; that you may know that you
have an unction, and the unction which we have received from Him
may abide in you." In the unction we have the sacramental sign [of a
thing unseen], the virtue itself is invisible; the invisible unction is the
Holy Ghost; the invisible unction is that charity, which, in whoever it
is, shall be as a root to him: however burning the sun, he cannot
wither. All that is rooted is nourished by the sun's warmth, not
withered.
13. "And you have no need that any man teach you, because His
unction teaches you concerning all things." Then to what purpose is it
that "we," my brethren, teach you? If "His unction teaches you
concerning all things," it seems we labour without a cause. And what
mean we, to cry out as we do? Let us leave you to His unction, and let
His unction teach you. But this is putting the question only to myself: I
put it also to that same apostle: let him deign to hear a babe that asks
of him: to John himself I say, Had those the unction to whom you were
speaking? You have said, "His unction teaches you concerning all
things." To what purpose have you written an Epistle like this? what
teaching did you give them? what instruction? what edification? See
here now, brethren, see a mighty mystery. The sound of our words
strikes the ears, the Master is within. Do not suppose that any man
learns ought from man. We can admonish by the sound of our voice; if
there be not One within that shall teach, vain is the noise we make.
Aye, brethren, have you a mind to know it? Have you not all heard this
present discourse? and yet how many will go from this place
untaught! I, for my part, have spoken to all; but they to whom that
Unction within speaks not, they whom the Holy Ghost within teaches
not, those go back untaught. The teachings of the master from without
are a sort of aids and admonitions. He who teaches the hearts, has His
chair in heaven. Therefore says He also Himself in the Gospel: "Call no
man your master upon earth; One is your Master, even Christ." Let
Him therefore Himself speak to you within, when not one of mankind
is there: for though there be some one at your side, there is none in
your heart. Yet let there not be none in your heart: let Christ be in your
heart: let His unction be in the heart, lest it be a heart thirsting in the
wilderness, and having no fountains to be watered withal. There is
then, I say, a Master within that teaches: Christ teaches; His
inspiration teaches. Where His inspiration and His unction is not, in
vain do words make a noise from without. So are the words, brethren,
which we speak from without, as is the husbandman to the tree: from
without he works, applies water and diligence of culture; let him from
without apply what he will, does he form the apples? does he clothe
the nakedness of the wood with a shady covering of leaves? does he
do any thing like this from within? But whose doing is this? Hear the
husbandman, the apostle: both see what we are, and hear the Master
within: "I have planted, Apollos has watered; but God gave the
increase: neither he who plants is any thing, neither he who waters,
but He who gives the increase, even God." This then we say to you:
whether we plant, or whether we water, by speaking we are not
anything; but He who gives the increase, even God: that is, "His
unction which teaches you concerning all things."