their Lord, when he comes from the wedding (Lk 12:35-36). And don't let's start
122 SAINT A UGUST1NE - SERMONS
The day of bringing forth
7. So, let our loins be girt and our lamps alight, and we like men waiting for their Lord, when he comes from the wedding (Lk 12:35-36). And don't let's start saying to one another, Let us eat and drink; for tomorrow we shall die (1 Cor
15:32). But the more uncertain the day of death is, and the more irksome the day of life, "let us fast and pray, for tomorrow we shall die." A little while, he says, and you will not see me; and again a little while, and you shall see me (Jn
16:16). This is the moment about which he said, You will be sad, but the world will rejoice (Jn 16:20); that is, this life, full of trials and temptations, in which we are wandering in exile away from him.22 But I shall see you again, he says, andyour hearts will rejoice, and your joy nobody shall takefrom you (Jn 16:22).
Even now let us rejoice somehow or other in this hope derived from the promises of one most faithful, until that richest of all possible joys arives, when we shall be like him, because we shall see him as he is (1 Jn 3:2), and our joy nobody shall take from us. Of this hope, you see, we have also received already23 the acceptable and freely given pledge which is the Holy Spirit, who produces in our hearts the unutterable groanings of holy desires.24 For we have conceived, as Isaiah says, and have brought forth the spirit of salvation (Is 26:18).25 And, when a woman is in labor, the Lord says, she has sorrow, because her day has come; but when she has broughtforth, there is great joy, because a human being has been born into the world (Jn 16:21). This will be the joy that nobody will take away from us; on the day when we are brought forth into the eternal light from this conception of faith. So meanwhile let us fast and pray, while it is still the day of bringing forth.
The fast before the fifty days
8. This is what the whole body of Christ does, spread throughout the world, that is to say the Church, that unity which says in the psalm, From the ends of the earth I have cried out to you, while my heart was distressed (Ps 61:2). From this it should now be clear to us why the fQrty days of Lent were instituted as the way to solemnize this humbling of our souls. The Church which cries out from the ends of the earth while her heart is distressed, is crying out from the four comers of the earth which are also frequently mentioned in scripture, from East and West, North and South. Throughout this whole world the ten com¬ mandments of the law have been promulgated, no longer just to be feared in the letter, but now to be fulfilled by the grace of love. Thus with ten multiplied by four, we can see the number forty completed; but still with all the difficulties of temptation, with pardon needed for our failings. Who, after all, can perfectly fulfill. You shall not covet (Ex 20:17; Rom 7:7)? That's why we have to fast and pray, without ceasing to do good.
This toil and labor receives its wages at the end, which are given the name of a tenner,26 which gets its name, of course, from ten; add this to the number forty, and it's like wages being paid for work done. The result is fifty, and this represents the time of that joy which nobody will take from us.27 We don't, of