Fight the Good Fight of Faith
“Whoever is in Christ
is a new creation; the old has passed away. Now by the “new creation” Paul
means the indwelling of the Holy Spirit in a heart that is pure and blameless,
free of all malice, wickedness or shamefulness. For when a soul has come to
hate sin and has delivered itself as far as it can to the power of virtue, it
undergoes a transformation by receiving the grace of the Spirit. Then it is
healed, restored and made wholly new. Indeed the two texts: Purge out the old leaven that you may be a
new one, and: Let us celebrate the
festival, not with the old leaven but with the unleavened bread of sincerity
and truth, support those passages which speak about the new creation.
Yet the tempter spreads many a snare to trap the soul, and
of itself human nature is too weak to defeat him. This is why the Apostle bids
us to arm ourselves with heavenly weapons, when he says: Put on the breastplate of righteousness and have your feet shod with
the gospel of peace and have truth around your waist as a belt. Can you not
see how many forms of salvation the Apostle indicates, all leading to the same
path and the same goal? Following them to the heights of God’s commandments, we
easily complete the race of life. For elsewhere the Apostle says: Let us run with fidelity the race that has
been set before us, with our eyes on Jesus, the origin and the goal of our
faith.
So a man who openly despises the accolades of this world and
rejects all earthly glory must also practice self-denial. Such self-denial
means that you never seek your own will but God’s, using God’s will as a sure
guide...
...Our service of mankind must be given freely. One who is in
such a position must be subject to everyone and serve his brothers as if he
were paying off a debt. Moreover, those who are in charge should work harder
than the others and conduct themselves with greater submission than their own
subjects. Their lives should serve as a visible example of what service means,
and they should remember that those who are committed to their trust are held
in trust from God...
...For this is what the Lord wants when he says: Whoever wishes to be first and great among
you must be the last of all and a servant to all...”
~St. Gregory of Nyssa
~St. Gregory of Nyssa
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