yet is not a son; who abides upon the Son (Jn 1:32), and is not the father of the
156 SAINT A UG USTINE - SERMONS
He will come to judge the living and the dead
9. So from his sublime dwelling in heaven, where his body, already immortal, is now, our Lord Jesus Christ is going to come to judge the living and the dead, according to the plainest evidence of the angels, as it is written in the Acts of the Apostles. As his disciples, you see, were gazing at him ascending into heaven, and trying to bring him down again with their anxious looks,23 they heard the angels say, Men of Galilee, why are you standing here? This Jesus, who has been taken away from you, will come in the same way as you have seen him going into heaven
(Acts 1:11). This firmly puts down much human arrogance of all sorts.24 Christ will judge in the same form as that in which he was judged.25
That, you see, is how the apostles saw him ascending into heaven, when they heard that that was how he was going to come. That form will be plainly visible to the living and the dead, to the good and the bad; whether we understand the good to be indicated by the name of the living and the bad by the name of the dead; or whether we take those as the living whom his coming will find not yet to have ended this life, and the dead those whom his presence will raise, as he says himself in the gospel: The hour will come when all who are in the tombs will hear his voice, and those who have done good will come forth to the resurrection of life, those who have done evil to the resurrection of the judgment (Jn 5:28-29). Those ones will see him in the form of the man in whom they believed, and these of the man whom they despised. For the godless will be taken away, as the prophet says, lest he should see the glory of the Lord (Is 26:10 LXX). And Blessed are the pure in heart, because they shall see God (Mt 5:8). Let that be enough about Jesus Christ the only Son of God our Lord.
The Holy Spirit
10. We also believe in the Holy Spirit, who proceedsfrom the Father (Jn 15:26), yet is not a son; who abides upon the Son (Jn 1:32), and is not the father of the Son; who receives from what is the Son's (Jn 16:14), and yet is not a son of the Son; but is the Spirit of the Father and of the $on, the Holy Spirit and himself God. I mean, if he weren't God, he wouldn't have such a temple as the apostle mentions: Do you not know that your bodies are the temple in you of the Holy Spirit, whom you have from God? (1 Cor 6:19). Not the temple of a creature, but of the creator.
I mean, far be it from us to be the temple of a creature, when the apostle says, For the temple of God is holy, which is what you are (1 Cor 3:17).
In this Trinity there is not one thing greater and another less, no division of operations, no dissimilarity of substance. The Father is the one God, the Son the one God, the Holy Spirit the one God.26 And yet Father and Son and Holy Spirit are not three gods, but one God; in such a way that the one who is the Son is not the Father, nor the one who is the Father the Son, nor is the Holy Spirit either the Father or the Son; and each of these is one, and the Trinity itself one God. Let this faith impress itself on your hearts and guide your confession. On hearing this, believe so that you may understand; so that by making progress you may be able to understand what you believe.27