Paul is telling his hearers that they must not relax just because God has sought them out and sent them as ambassadors. On the contrary, for that very reason we should hasten to please him and reap our spiritual blessings.

What does it mean to receive the grace of God in vain except to be unwilling to perform good works with the help of his grace?

That man, indeed, is in danger who does not throughout his whole life place before himself the will of God as his goal, so that in health he shows forth the labor of love by his zeal for the works of the Lord and in sickness displays endurance and cheerful patience. The first and greatest peril is that by not doing the will of God, he separates himself from the Lord and cuts himself off from fellowship with his own brothers; secondly, that he ventures, although undeserving, to claim a share in the blessings prepared for those who are worthy. Here also we must remember the words of the apostle: And we helping do exhort you that you receive not the grace of God in vain.^[1] And they who are called to be brothers of the Lord should not receive in a wanton spirit so great a divine grace nor fall from so high a dignity through negligence in doing the will of God but rather obey the same apostle, saying: I, a prisoner in the Lord, beseech you that you walk worthy of the vocation in which you are called.^[2]

Paul is teaching that God’s grace in Christ was predestined. God decreed that his mercy would be poured out in this way, that help would be lavished on those who called for it in the name of Christ.

Now is the acceptable time, says the apostle, now is the day of salvation. This is the time for repentance; the next life, for reward. Now is the time to endure; then will be the day of consolation. Now God is the helper of such as turn aside from the evil way; then he will be the dread and unerring inquisitor of the thoughts and words and deeds of humankind. Now we enjoy his longanimity; then we shall know his just judgment, when we have risen, some to never-ending punishment, others to life everlasting, and everyone shall receive according to his works.

Let us not let the opportunity slip, but rather let us display a zeal worthy of his grace. We press on because we know that the time is both short and opportune. The acceptable time is the time of the gift, the time of grace, when it is decreed that not only will no account of our sins be demanded from us, but that we shall also enjoy abundant blessings, righteousness, sanctification and all the rest.

Paul backs his exhortation up with this prophetic testimony.

For the blessed Paul also knew the distance between the present world and the world to come. He knew that only in the present world could the blessing of salvation be acquired but that only in the world to come could a just reward be given to individuals according to the quality of their works, good or wicked. So, when he had repeated the prophetic testimony which God speaks: In an acceptable time, I heard you, and on the day of salvation, I helped you, he immediately followed it up by adding, Behold now is a very acceptable time, now is the day of salvation. But concerning the future he says, For we must all appear before the judgment seat of Christ, so that each one may receive recompense according to what he did in the body, whether good or evil.^[1] Therefore, eternal life will be given in the future only to the one to whom forgiveness of sins has been given in this world. Only he will receive the forgiveness of sins here who renounces his sins and hastens to the highest and true God with true conversion of heart. For the future will not be a time of forgiveness but of retribution. There mercy will not justify the sinner, but justice will distinguish the just and the sinner.

There they will be tortured endlessly, not only with the hellish punishment of soul together with body but also by the very darkness of the will set in evil. Here for such people there will be the evil will itself for a heaping up of punishment, because of which there remains for them torment without end. They now scorn the opportunity offered by the acceptable time and on the day of salvation; they do not seek to be helped by God. God has conveyed this time to us in the words of the prophet, saying, In an acceptable time, I heard you and on the day of salvation, I helped you. When the blessed apostle inserted this testimony in his letter, he immediately added, Behold, now is the very acceptable time; behold now is the day of salvation. ^[1] The holy apostle presents testimony from the prophets when he says: At an acceptable time I heard you, and on the day of salvation I helped you. And this follows: Behold, now is the acceptable time; behold, now is the day of salvation. Hence I also testify to you that these are the days of redemption, that this is the time, as it were, of heavenly medicine, when we shall be able to heal every stain of our vices and all the wounds of our sins. We shall do so if we faithfully implore the physician of our souls and do not, as people scarcely worthy of the undertaking, despise his precepts. For a person wearied of his illness has found healing when he very carefully observes his doctor’s orders; but if he does one thing when another is ordered, then the transgressor and not the physician is guilty if the sickness is aggravated. ^[1]

If we go on crying out and do not receive any answer, this is for our advantage: instead of losing heart and growing weary, we should go on brazenly asking God, for it is certain that at an acceptable time and at the appropriate hour he will answer us and deliver us.

By his faith and vigilance, Paul is cutting away everything which might cause the negligent to stumble, out of fear that their sluggishness might present his disciples with a cause for stumbling. Fault would have been found with their ministry if they did not exemplify in their deeds the things they were teaching.

Servants of God teach without flattery, so that they might please him whose servants they are, unlike the false apostles, who sought only to please their hearers.

This is the grace of the Holy Spirit, possessing the entire soul and filling the dwelling place with gladness and power, making sweet for the soul the sufferings of the Lord, and taking away the perception of the present pain because of the hope of the things to come.

It is one thing to be free from accusation, but it is a far greater thing to appear as servants of God. To be acquitted of all accusation is not nearly as grand as to be covered with praise.

For this is the grace of the Holy Spirit, possessing the entire soul and filling the dwelling place with gladness and power, making sweet for the soul the sufferings of the Lord and taking away the perception of the present pain because of the hope of the things to come. So, govern yourselves thus as you are about to ascend to the highest power and glory through your cooperation with the Spirit; endure every suffering and trial with joy with a view toward appearing to be worthy of the dwelling of the Spirit within you and worthy of the inheritance of Christ. Never be puffed up or enfeebled by indifference to the point of falling yourselves or being the cause of another’s sin.

Any one of these things is intolerable, but taken together, think what kind of soul is needed to endure them!

By purity Paul means either chastity, or general purity, or lack of corruption or even his free preaching of the gospel. By knowledge he means the wisdom given by God, which is the only true knowledge. When he unexpectedly mentions the Holy Spirit in this list, Paul means more than just that he does everything in the power of the Spirit. He is saying here that the Spirit himself has been given to him and that it is because of this indwelling presence that he has received the spiritual gifts. Genuine love was the motivating power of all these good things. It is that which made Paul what he was. It was also love which caused the Spirit to abide with him, with whose help he did everything in the right way.

The word of truth was in Paul’s teaching, because he conveyed no message other than the one which he had received from the Lord.

The man who rightly seeks righteousness according to human understandings is equipped with the arms of righteousness for the left hand. The man who does the same according to the teachings of the truth and who has been sought out for this task by the Son of righteousness bears the weapons of the right hand.

The things on the left refer to those things which seem to be painful, because it is these which bring the reward.

The weapons of righteousness on the right hand are those which are pleasing to the mind; those on the left hand are those which are not.

But to one who is elevated in thought, all things appear to be of equal honor, and none is preferred to another, because the course of life is run equally by opposites, and there is present in the destiny of each person the power to live well or badly, with the armor on the right hand and on the left, as the apostle says, in honor and dishonor. Accordingly, the one who has purified his mind and rightly examined the truth of reality will go on his way in the time assigned to him from birth to death, not spoiled by pleasures or cast down by austerity, but, in accordance with the custom of travelers, he will be little affected by what he encounters. For it is customary for travelers to hasten on to the end of their journey whether they go through meadows and fertile fields or through deserts and rough terrain; pleasure does not delay them, nor does the unpleasant impede them. So he himself will also hurry on without distraction to the goal before him, turning off into none of the byways. He will pass through life looking only to heaven, just like some good captain who guides his ship to its lofty destination.

Paul is saying that he was recognized as a sincere and faithful preacher by those who believed that the gospel was the glory of God. Even to those who thought that the gospel was vile, he presented himself as a faithful servant of God and was not afraid to say things which they would have been scandalized to hear.

It may seem that it is easier to bear honor than dishonor, but honor too has its perils, because the one who enjoys it may be thrown back and break his neck. Paul therefore glories in both circumstances, because he showed brightly in each of them.

Do not angle for compliments, lest while you win the popular applause, you dishonor God. If I yet pleased men, says the apostle, I should not be the servant of Christ.^[1] He ceased to please men when he became Christ’s servant. Christ’s soldier marches on through good report and evil report, the one on the right hand and the other on the left. No praise elates him, no reproaches crush him. He is not puffed up by riches nor depressed by poverty. Joy and sorrow he alike despises. The sun will not burn him by day nor the moon by night.^[2]

If we have lived a life deserving good repute and have been spoken well of, now let us also bear up under ill repute from the ungodly. Still more, if we have been admired as true by those who love truth, now let us laugh at being called imposters. During the many dangers from which we have been delivered many said that we were well known by God; now let the one who wishes call us unknown, when we are probably better known. Thus, in bearing what has happened to us we are punished and yet not killed, and though rejoicing, we resemble those who are sorrowful.

Those who hated the apostles thought that they were dying every day of their lives as the price for their wickedness. But because the apostles were preaching with God’s approval, they kept being rescued from death by the help of Christ.

Paul and his companions were unknown to the wicked and reprobate but well known to the faithful and just.

People outside the church may think we are sorrowful, but in fact we are always rejoicing. We may look poor, but in fact we have enormous riches, both spiritual and physical. As usual, the Christian life is the exact opposite of what it appears to be on the surface.

The person who has only the bare necessities lacks nothing.

It could happen that some public official would say to a Christian: Either you will stop being a Christian, or, if you persist in being one, you shall have no house or property. That will be the time when those rich men, who had decided to keep their riches in order to win merit with God by using them for good works, will choose to give them up for Christ’s sake rather than Christ for their sake. . . . Thus they become as men having nothing, yet possessing all things —and everlasting life in the world to come, lest by giving up Christ for the sake of riches they be cast into everlasting death.

Paul is saying this because of the freedom he enjoyed in a pure conscience. A mind with a bad conscience is afraid to speak, loses its train of thought and makes verbal slips. People whose heart is enlarged are happy with themselves because they are confident that they have behaved well.

Paul means by this that he talks to the Corinthians freely, as he would to people whom he loves. He holds nothing back and suppresses nothing. Nothing is wider than Paul’s heart, which loved all the believers with all the passion which one might have toward the object of one’s affection.

The heart of one who loves is wide open. He walks with great freedom. It is when love is lacking that restrictions appear. Paul did not want to accuse them openly of lack of love. He merely points to the behavioral result and encourages them to perceive the cause for themselves.

The return is not equal, because to respond to love is not as great as to offer it in the first place. Even if the amount is the same, it still comes in second place.

Paul blunts the force of his accusations by calling the Corinthians his children.

Paul sounds here like the father who asks a son who despises his parents and prefers wicked companions: What are you doing? Do you not realize that you are much nobler and better than they are? He will detach his son more easily from such people by appealing to his self-respect rather than by demeaning him. In the same way, Paul appeals to the Corinthians, not mentioning himself or God but appealing directly to their sense of who they are in themselves.

But if we consider what the apostles thought about heretics, we shall find that in all of their epistles they execrate and abominate the sacrilegious depravity of the heretics. . . . And since they say that there is nothing in common between justice and iniquity, no communion between light and darkness, how can the darkness illuminate or iniquity justify? And since they are not from God but from the spirit of antichrist, how do they who are enemies of God and whose breasts the spirit of antichrist fills carry on both spiritual and divine affairs?

For, says the apostle: What fellowship has light with darkness? Since there is a distinct and irreconcilable contradiction between light and darkness, the person partaking of both has a share in neither, because of the opposition of the parts drawn up against each other at the same time in his mixed life. His faith provides the lighted part, but his dark habits put out the lamp of reason. Since it is impossible and inconsistent for light and darkness to exist in fellowship, the person containing each of the opposites becomes an enemy to himself, being divided in two ways between virtue and evil. He sets up an antagonistic battle line within himself. And just as it is not possible, when there are two enemies, for both to be victors over each other (for the victory of the one causes the death of his adversary), so also in this civil war brought about by the confusion in his life, it is not possible for the stronger element to win without the other becoming completely destroyed. For how will the army of reverence be stronger than evil, when the wicked phalanx of the opponents attacks it? If the stronger is going to win, the enemy must be completely slaughtered. And thus virtue will have the victory over evil only when the entire enemy gives way to it through an alliance of the reasonable elements against the unsound ones. . . . For it is not possible for the good to exist in me, unless it is made to live through the death of my enemy. As long as we keep grasping opposites with each of our hands, it is impossible for there to be participation in both elements in the same being. For, if we are holding evil, we lose the power to take hold of virtue.ON PERFECTION.

It is the same now with us who are baptized: neither the wetness of the water in which we are baptized nor the oiliness of the oil with which we are anointed remain with us after our death. But the Holy Spirit, who is mingled in our souls and bodies through the oil and the water, does remain with us, both in this life and after our death.

Shall we stoop to say of mammon who have been reborn in Christ? Formed to God’s eternal image, shall we serve the fleeting world? God forbid that celestial flame should be mingled with earth’s mire.

There cannot be two contradictory loves in one man. Just as there is no harmony between Christ and Belial, between justice and iniquity, so it is impossible for one soul to love both good and evil. You who love the Lord, hate evil, the devil; in every deed, there is love of one and hatred of the other. He who has my commandments and keeps them, he it is who loves me.^[1] . . . You who love the things that are good, hate the things that are bad. You cannot love good unless you hate evil.

Now, I speak to the true Christians. If you believe, hope and love otherwise [than the pagans do], then live otherwise and gain approval for your distinctive faith, hope and charity by distinctive actions. Pay attention to the apostle when, in earnest admonition, he says: Do not bear the yoke with unbelievers. For what has justice in common with iniquity? Or what fellowship has light with darkness? . . . Or what part has the believer with the unbeliever? And what agreement has the temple of God with idols?

These words clearly indicate an act which is absolutely forbidden and is displeasing to God and perilous for the one who would venture to commit it.

The Holy Spirit is our true baptism, and for this reason we remain always baptized, for he is in us always, and nothing can deprive us of our baptism apart from the denial of God and consorting with demons. In such cases the Holy Spirit really does depart, because he cannot agree to remain in a place where Satan dwells. For what fellowship does Christ have with Satan or the believer with the unbeliever, or God’s temple with that of demons?

It is obvious that the things Paul lists are opposites and that we are to flee from the ones and cling to the others. No one can serve two masters. Christ has proclaimed that we should go away from the devil, who wants to represent himself falsely as God. He has promised us eternal life, so we should be strangers to the treachery and wrong-headedness of unbelievers. He has forbidden the worship of idols because they are incompatible with the temple of God. We are temples of the living God. There is nothing more damaging to us than idols, because they tempt us to depart from our faith in the one true God.

Unclean things refer to adultery and fornication in the flesh and to evil thoughts in the soul. We must be delivered from both.

Paul is prophetic in telling us to put up a barrier, not between ourselves and the married but between ourselves and the Gentiles who are still living immorally, and also from those heresies which believe neither in chastity nor in God.

God wants us to be set apart from all contamination so that he can receive us as his children. By this testimony Paul exhorts us to a pure life. He shows that Jesus Christ was already our Lord in ancient times and was predestined to receive us in the fondness of his love.