How should those who enjoy a life of fullness deal with those who are weak?

The apostle says, “Now I myself am confident concerning you, my brethren, that you also are full of goodness, filled with all knowledge, able also to admonish one another” (Rom. 15:14). He speaks of the responsibility of those who are strong to bear with the weaknesses of those who are weak, and of Jewish Christians to accept gentiles into the faith with joy and gladness. He chooses to soften his words so that his commandment might not become a heavy burden on their souls. Therefore, he begins by praising them, showing them that what he asks of them is not much given their spiritual level and understanding. His tact in speaking here is noticeable in the following ways:

First: He does not say that he heard about their goodness, but that he is certain of it, and needs no one to witness to them in front of him. In other words, he is saying to them that even if he commands them or strictly rebukes them, he is confident concerning them, that they are full of goodness.

Second: St. John Chrysostom comments on his expression, “that you are full of goodness” saying, “It was not as if you were cruel, or haters of your brethren, that I gave you that exhortation, to receive, and not to neglect, and not to destroy ‘the work of God.’ For I am aware that ‘you are full of goodness’; but he seems to me here to be calling their virtue perfect.”³³⁴

Third: In his gentleness, he urges them to enlarge their hearts so as to love others more and more, whereby they will not lack the fullness of goodness, knowledge, and ability. Concerning the heart, they are good, gentle, and loving. Concerning the mind, they have the

333 St. John Chrysostom, Homilies on Ephesians 11 (NPNF I/13:106).

334 St. John Chrysostom, Homilies on Romans 29 (NPNF I/11:542).

fullness of knowledge and understanding. Concerning their potential, they have ability. All these qualities encourage him to demand more and more from them.

Fourth : St. Paul writes to them with the spirit of a humble brother, which gives him the boldness to write to them not as someone who gives commands for things that are foreign to their lives, but to remind them to grow more in that which they already practice: “Nevertheless, brethren, I have written more boldly to you on some points, as reminding you, because of the grace given to me by God” (Rom. 15:15). St. John Chrysostom says, “Observe the lowly-mindedness of Paul, observe his wisdom … And having come down from the seat of the master, both there and here, he speaks to them as brethren and friends of equal rank.”³³⁵

Fifth: The apostle declares that he is obliged to write to them, for he must fulfill the apostolic ministry for which he was chosen as an apostle to the gentiles. So, if Rome is the capital of the gentile world at that time, he feels that it should be the center of his ministry. This is the grace that was granted to him by God, to serve the gentiles; a ministry which he never ceased to practice.

Sixth: He says: “being filled with the fruits of righteousness which are by Jesus Christ, to the glory and praise of God” (Phil. 1:11). Righteousness is the Lord Christ. The Christian must bring forth fruit in calmness and peace. The fruit of righteousness is good deeds. When we are rooted in the Lord Christ and nourished from Him, we are no longer wild branches, but rather branches of the divine vine, bearing the fruit of the Spirit. We cherish these sublime and satiating fruits; but not with pride or arrogance since they are nothing but a divine gift for the glory of God and His praise. The word “righteousness” here signifies all the works of the Holy Spirit, who grants us the righteousness of Christ and the partaking of the divine nature. [Some old manuscripts] say, “the fruit of righteousness,” not “fruits of righteousness” — the Greek word is singular, not plural. The same word is also found in the singular form in Rom. 6:22, Gal. 5:22, Eph. 5:9, Heb. 12:11, and Jam. 3:18, since, although the fruit of the Spirit comes in diverse forms — such as love, joy, peace, goodness, etc. — all these are in harmony together, as though they were only one fruit.

St. John Chrysostom says, “And not merely upright, but ‘filled with the fruits of righteousness.’ For there is indeed a righteousness not according to Christ, as, for example, a moral life. [Paul then writes], ‘Which are through Jesus Christ to the glory and praise of God.’ Do you see that I speak not of my own glory, but the righteousness of God … let not your love, he says, indirectly injure you, by hindering your perception of things profitable, and take heed lest you fall through your love to anyone. For I would indeed that your love should be increased, but not so that you should be injured by it.”³³⁶

335 St. John Chrysostom, Homilies on Romans 29 (NPNF I/11:542).

336 St. John Chrysostom, Homilies on Philippians 2 (NPNF I/13:189) amended.

The apostle says, “You are complete in Him, who is the head of all principality and power” (Col. 2:10). When the incarnation was fulfilled by the union of His divinity with His humanity, the right to experience the richness of Christ was bestowed upon us, through our union with Him, for we become full in Him. Through this fullness, we became able to rise with Him and to sit with Him in the heavenly places (Eph. 2:6), and to reign with Him (2 Tim. 2:12), not lacking anything (Rom. 8:32) for all things have become ours (1 Cor. 3:21).

St. Augustine comments on the phrase, “And of His fullness we have all received, and grace for grace” (John 1:16) saying that God granted us a free gift although we deserved a punishment. By this gift, He granted us faith, by which we receive a great reward. This faith leads us to the knowledge of the truth. Through faith, He grants us justification from our sins and grants us the gift of immortality. But all this requires that we guard these gifts.

St. Hilary of Poitier says, “After the announcement that in Christ dwells all the fulness of the Godhead bodily, follows immediately the mystery of our assumption, in the words, ‘you are complete in Him’ (Col. 2:10) … we are made full in Him [we partake of fulness] … for all who are, or shall be, regenerated through the hope of faith to life eternal, abide even now in the body of Christ; and afterwards they shall be made full no longer in Him, but in themselves, at the time of which the Apostle says, ‘Who shall fashion anew the body of our humiliation, that it may be conformed to the body of His glory’ (Phil. 3:21). Now, therefore, we are made full in Him, that is, by the assumption of His flesh, for in Him dwells the fullness of the Godhead bodily. Nor has this our hope a light authority in Him”³³⁷

St. John Chrysostom says, “By ‘fullness’ is meant ‘the whole.’ Then the word ‘bodily,’ what did it intend? ‘As in a head.’ But why does he say the same thing over again? ‘And you are made full in Him.’ What then does it mean? That you have nothing less than He. As it dwelt in Him, so also in you.’³³⁸

The apostle says, “But we all, with unveiled face, beholding as in a mirror the glory of the Lord, are being transformed into the same image from glory to glory, just as by the Spirit of the Lord” (2 Cor. 3:18). Being granted the divine light and true freedom, our nature is renewed and grows every day as we are molded and become an icon of Christ our creator. We are raised from glory to glory. Thus does the believer taste a daily experience and practical knowledge through the power of the Word which is continuously renewed. The Jews were unable to look at the face of Moses, the mediator of the Old Testament, so they had to cover his face with a veil. But for us, we have an unveiled face that we may see, as though in a mirror, how our nature is being molded every day, according to the glorious promise of the gospel of Christ, through the work of the Holy Spirit, “the Spirit of the Lord.”

St. Gregory of Nyssa says, “It has been proved that this union of the soul with the incorruptible Deity can be accomplished in no other way but by herself attaining by her virgin

337 St. Hilary of Poitiers, On the Trinity 9.8 (NPNF II/9:157) amended.

338 St. John Chrysostom, Homilies on Colossians 6 (NPNF I/13:285) amended.

state to the utmost purity possible — a state which, being like God, will enable her to grasp that to which it is like, while she places herself like a mirror beneath the purity of God, and molds her own beauty at the touch and the sight of the Archetype of all beauty.”³³⁹

“Let us change in such a way that we may constantly evolve towards what is better, being transformed ‘from glory to glory’ (2 Cor. 3:18), and thus always improving and ever becoming more perfect by daily growth and never arriving at any limit of perfection.”³⁴⁰

“We see, then, that the Bride is being led by the Word through the ascents of virtue up to the heights, just as if she were climbing stairs. To this Bride the Word first of all sends in, through the prophetic windows and the law’s lattices, the ray of the commandments and summons her to draw near to the light and to become beautiful once, in the light, she has been given the shape of the dove. Then, when she has shared, as far as is possible for her, in the good things, he draws her toward participation in the transcendent Beauty just as though she had hitherto had no part in them at all. The result is that it seems to her that desire increases in proportion to her progress toward that Light which eternally shines out and at the same time that her ascent is just beginning, on account of the transcendence of the good things, which are always beyond her. That is why he says once again to the awakened soul, Rise up , and to the soul that is coming, Come [Song 2:10]! For to one who has risen up in this manner there will never be wanting an up-rising without end; nor for one who runs to the Lord will opportunity for the divine race be used up. For it is always necessary to rise up, and it is never right for those who are drawing near by their running to halt. For that reason, as often as he says Rise up! and Come! He confers the capacity for an ascent toward what is better. This is also the meaning of what comes next in the passage, for he who commands virtue to be born of virtue straight way appends the apostolic counsel by prescribing that the same image ‘be transformed from glory to glory’ (2 Cor. 3:18), meaning that glory is always being received and that what is forever being discovered, no matter how great and exalted it is, is believed to be less than what is hoped for. So it is, then, that the bride is commanded, dove though she was in her former achievements, to become nothing less than a dove again by being transformed for the better; and if this comes to pass, the Word, when next he uses the word dove , will again refer to what lies beyond this.”³⁴¹

“And so my discourse has shown that what appears so terrifying (I mean the mutability of our nature) can really be as a pinion in our flight towards higher things, and indeed it would be a hardship if we were not susceptible of the sort of change which is towards the better. One ought not then to be distressed when one considers this tendency in our nature; rather let us change in such a way that we may constantly evolve towards what is better,

339 St. Gregory of Nyssa, On Virginity 11 (NPNF II/5:356).

340 Jean Daniélou, From Glory to Glory: Texts from Gregory of Nyssa's Mystical Writings , trans., S. J. Herbert Musurillo, ed., Herbert Musurillo (Charles Scribner’s Sons, 1961): p. 84.

341 Gregory of Nyssa: Homilies on The Song of Songs , ed., Brian E. Daley S.J. and John T. Fitzgerald, trans., Richard A. Norris Jr. (Society of Biblical Literature, 2012) 5: pp. 171–173.

being transformed from glory to glory (2 Cor. 3:18), and thus always improving and ever becoming more perfect by daily growth and never arriving at any limit of perfection.”³⁴²

St. John Chrysostom says, “Then, that you may not think that he is speaking of a time to come … Do you see how again he places the Spirit in the rank of God, and raises them up to the rank of the Apostles … But we all, with unveiled face, reflecting as a mirror the glory of the Lord … being cleansed by the Spirit; and not only do we behold the glory of God, but from it also receive a sort of splendor.”³⁴³

St. Gregory of Nazianzus says, “I think, that He gradually came to dwell in the Disciples, measuring Himself out to them according to their capacity to receive Him, at the beginning of the Gospel, after the Passion, after the Ascension, making perfect their powers, being breathed upon them, and appearing in fiery tongues.”³⁴⁴

St. Ambrose says, “So he not only called the Spirit Lord, but also added: ‘But where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is liberty. So we all with unveiled face, reflecting the glory of the Lord, are formed anew into the same image from glory to glory, as from the Lord the Spirit’ (2 Cor. 3:17–18); that is, we who have been before converted to the Lord, so as by spiritual understanding to see the glory of the Lord, as it were, in the mirror of the Scriptures, are now being transformed from that glory which converted us to the Lord, to the heavenly glory.”³⁴⁵

St. Augustine says, “At the same time, not even St. Paul's expression, ‘face to face’ (1 Cor. 13:12), compels us to believe that we shall see God by means of our physical face, in which we have material eyes, since we shall have an uninterrupted vision of God in our spirit. For, unless there were some spiritual face of the interior man, St. Paul would not have written the words: ‘But we all, with face unveiled, reflecting as in a mirror the glory of the Lord, are being transformed into his very image, from glory to glory, as through the Spirit of the Lord’ (2 Cor. 3:18). So, too, in the psalm, I take the words, ‘Come ye to him and be enlightened; and your faces shall not be confounded’ (Ps. 33:6 LXX), to refer to this inner face. The truth is that we shall draw near to God by faith, which is a power to see which is not in our body, but in our mind.”³⁴⁶

342 Jean Daniélou, From Glory to Glory: Texts from Gregory of Nyssa's Mystical Writings , trans., S. J. Herbert Musurillo, ed., Herbert Musurillo (Charles Scribner’s Sons, 1961): p. 84.

343 St. John Chrysostom, Homilies on the Second Epistle of St. Paul the Apostle to the Corinthians 7.5 (NPNF I/12:313–314). 344

St. Gregory of Nazianzus, Select Orations of Gregory Nazianzen Fifth Theological Oration 26 (NPNF II/7:326).

345 St. Ambrose of Milan, On the Holy Spirit 3.14.102 (NPNF II/10:149).

346 St. Augustine of Hippo, City of God 22.29 (FOTC 24:502).