Church Fathers, Day 311: St. John Chrysostom wants us to keep on your toes

Last updated on: May 28, 2015 at 3:30 am by Pete Socks

Church Fathers, Day 311: St. John Chrysostom wants us to keep on your toes 2015-05-25T20:56:15-05:00 Pete Socks

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Keep on your toes

The devil would love it if you despaired of repentance, says St. John Chrysostom. But don’t give him the satisfaction. Always be ready for the day of the Lord.

I’ve said all these things, not to exempt the devil from blame, but to free you from slothfulness. For he really wants us to attribute all our sins to him, so that, nourished by these hopes, and going ahead with all kinds of evil, we may increase our own punishment, and find no pardon because we transferred the cause to him—just as Eve found none.

But let us not do this. Let us know ourselves. Let us know our wounds. Then we can apply the medicines. For whoever does not know his disease will not take care of his weakness.

We have sinned much: I know this well. We all deserve the penalties. But we are not without pardon. We shall not fall away from repentance. For we still stand in the arena, and we are in the struggles of repentance.

Are you old and in the last stage of life? Don’t think that even now you have fallen from repentance. Don’t despair of your own salvation. Think of the robber who was freed on the cross. What was briefer than the moment in which he was crowned? Yet even so this was enough for his salvation.

Are you young? Don’t be confident in your youth, or think that you have a long life ahead of you. “The day of the Lord will come like a thief in the night” (1 Thessalonians 5:2). This is why he has made our end invisible: so that we might make our diligence and our forethought plain.

–St. John Chrysostom, Homily 2 on the Power of Demons, 5

IN GOD’S PRESENCE, CONSIDER . . .

If the day of the Lord came right now, would I be ready?

CLOSING PRAYER

Lord, you accepted the repentance of David; accept also my repentance for all my transgressions and my errors.

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