almighty, creator of all things, king of the ages, immortal and invisible (1 Tm
SERMON 215
AT THE GIVING BACK OF THE CREED
Date: uncertain1
Always retain the Symbol in mind and heart
1. The Symbol of the most sacred mystery, which you received all together, and have given back today one by one,2 contains the words in which the faith of mother Church is solidly based on the firm foundation which is Christ the Lord. For no other foundation can anybody lay, besides the one that has been laid, which is Christ Jesus (1 Cor 3:11). So you have received and given back what you must always retain in mind and heart, what you should recite in bed, think about in the streets, and not forget over your meals; in which even when your bodies are asleep your hearts should be awake.
On renouncing the devil, you see, and withdrawing your minds and hearts from his parades and his angels,3 you must forget the past, reject as worthless the staleness of the old life, and join the new man4 in renewing life itself in holy behavior; and as the apostle says, forgetting what lies behind, and stretching out to what lies ahead, follow on toward the palm of God's summons up above (Phil 3:13-14); and you must believe what you cannot yet see, so that you may deservedly attain to what you have believed. For why should one hope for what one can see ? But if we hope for what we do'not see, we wait for it with patience (Rom 8:24-25).
We believe in God the Father Almighty
2. So this faith is also a rule for salvation, to believe in God the Father almighty, creator of all things, king of the ages, immortal and invisible (1 Tm
1:17). He is indeed the almighty God who at the origin of the world made all things out of nothing, who is before the ages, and who made and governs the ages. He doesn't, after all, grow with time, or stretch out in space, nor is he shut in or bounded by any material; but he abides with and in himself as full and perfect eternity, which neither human thought can comprehend, nor tongue describe. I mean, if neither eye has seen nor ear heard the gift which he promises his saints, nor has it come up into the heart of man (1 Cor 2:9), how can either