self mean the soul. But the body is the outer self, the soul the inner.6 So this
SERMON 218A
FRAGMENTS FROM A SERMON
ON THE LORD'S PASSION
Date: 400-4101
Christ brought us life
1. For if, while we were enemies, we were reconciled to God through the death of his Son, much more, after being reconciled, shall we be saved by his life (Rom 5:10). So, Christ died for the godless; and Christ is God. How can you possibly not reign, when you have been found to be just by the life of God,2 when while you were godless you were sought by the death of God, to save you from perishing? But when we hear of both the life of God and the death of God, we must distinguish what each is and where it comes from. He brought us life, then, while he received death from us; not, though, because of his merits, but because of our needs.
The mercy of God toward the Gentiles
2. So Christ is the king of the Jews, and under his easy yoke3 the Gentiles too have been placed for their salvation, because this has been conceded them out of an even greater mercy. The apostle himself makes this clearer, where he says, For I say that Christ was minister to the circumcision because God is true, in order to confirm the promises made to the fathers; but that it is because he is merciful that the Gentiles glorify God (Rom 15:8-9).4
Nor, I mean to say, would it have been right to take the children's bread and throw it to the dogs, unless the dogs, by being humble enough to pick up the scraps which they saw falling from the table of their masters, were raised up by that humility and turned into human beings, and so deserved to come to the table.5
The interior person
3. Nor, as some people suppose, does the old self mean the body and the new self mean the soul. But the body is the outer self, the soul the inner.6 So this