passion signified our old life,5 so his resurrection is the sacrament, the model,
282 SAINT A UGUSTINE - SERMONS of it, and a perfect instance. There can be no graver sin than to kill Christ; when even this has been forgiven, what guilt will remain in one who believes and is baptized?
The resurrection is the sacrament, the model, of the new
3. But let us consider Christ's resurrection, dearly beloved; since just as his passion signified our old life,5 so his resurrection is the sacrament, the model, of the new life. That's why the apostle says, We have been buried together with Christ through baptism into death, so that just as Christ rose from the dead, in the same way we too may walk in newness of life (Rom 6:4). You believed, you were baptized, your old life died, slain on the cross, buried in baptism. The old, which you lived so badly, has been buried; let the new life arise. Live a good life; live in such a way that you may live; live in such a way that when you die, you don't die.
Consider, dearly beloved, what the Lord said in the gospel to the man he cured: Look, you have been made well; do not sin any more, in case something worse should happen to you (Jn 5:14).We would have been trapped by this pronouncement and reduced to great straits—but his mercy did not abandon us there. He gave the baptized a prayer (because here one cannot live without sin), that we should say every day, Forgive us our debts (Mt 6:12). There are debts; that's a general statement, and we never stop getting into debt. We admit what we need to be forgiven for every day; but we ought not, for that reason, to relax comfortably in shameful behavior, in misdeeds and crimes, as though we had nothing to worry about. Sins mustn't be our friends; we have vomited them out, we have expressed our hatred for them; don't let's return to our vomit, the way dogs do.6 And if they do creep up on us, let them creep up against our wills, without our welcoming them or deliberately seeking them. You see, anyone who wants to be friends with sins will be the enemy of the one who came to do away with sins, since he himself had no sin.
My brothers and sisters, consider what I'm saying; be the disease's friend, and you're the doctor's enemy. If you were ill with a bodily ailment, and the doctor came to see you in his professional capacity, just let me know what he would mean by coming to see you; what else would he mean, but to make you better? So since he would be a friend to you, he's bound to be an enemy to the fever; I mean, if he was fond of your fever, he wouldn't be fond of you. So he hates your fever; it's against it that he entered your house, against it that he went upstairs to your bedroom, against it that he approached your bed, against it that he felt your pulse, against it that he gave you instructions, against it that he mixed and applied medicines; all this against the fever, all this for you. So if he does everything against the fever, everything for you, then you by loving the fever will be alone against yourself.
You'll answer me, yes I know, you'll answer me and say, "Who was ever fond of a fever?" Yes, I know too that sick people aren't fond of their fevers; but they're fond of what the fever is asking for. What is it the doctor said, when