Hebrews 12:2

Therefore in Him who is our Head let there appear to be the very fountain of grace, whence, according to the measure of every man, He diffuses Himself through all His members. It is by that grace that every man from the beginning of his faith becomes a Christian, by which grace that one man from His beginning became Christ. Of the same Spirit also the former is born again of which the latter was born. By the same Spirit is effected in us the remission of sins, by which Spirit it was effected that He should have no sin. God certainly foreknew that He would do these things. …

These things let us read continually, these things let us hear aright, these things let us write in our minds, for these are our honors. In these things do I take a pride, not only in the thousands of dead which He raised, but also in the sufferings which He endured. These things Paul puts forward in every way, the cross, the death, the sufferings, the revilings, the insults, the scoffs. And now he saith, “let us go forth unto Him bearing His reproach;”and now, “who for the joy that was set before Him endured the cross, despising the shame.”

And this he always does. For when he was upon the subject of alms, he brought Him forward and said, “Ye know the grace of the Lord, that though He was rich, yet for our sakes he became poor.” ( 2 Cor. viii. 9 .) And when he was exhorting to charity, it was from Him that he exhorted in the words “As Christ also loved us.” ( Eph. v. 25 .) And when he was giving advice about bearing shame and dangers, he took refuge in Him and said, “Who for the joy that was set before Him endured the Cross, despising the shame.” ( Heb. xii. 2 ). So in this passage too he shows how He also did this, and how the prophet proclaimed it from of old. Wherefore also he proceeds:

“A good confession.” What he does in his Epistle to the Hebrews, “Looking unto Jesus, the Author and Finisher of our faith; Who for the joy that was set before Him endured the cross, despising the shame, and is set down at the right hand of the throne of God. For consider Him that endured such contradiction of sinners against Himself, lest ye be wearied and faint in your minds” ( Heb. xii. 2, 3 .), that he now does to his disciple Timothy. As if he had said, Fear not death, since thou art the servant of God, Who can give life to all things.

[4.] Let us too consider these things in our temptations, when we suffer anything from wicked men, “looking to the Beginner and Finisher of our faith” ( Heb. xii. 2 ), and considering that it is by wicked men, and that it is for virtue’s sake, and for His sake. For if we reflect on these things, all will be most easy and tolerable. Since if one suffering for those he loves is even proud of it, what feeling of things dreadful will he have who suffers for the sake of God? For if He, for our sake, calleth that shameful thing, the Cross, “glory” ( c. xiii. 31 ), much more ought we to be thus disposed. And if we can so despise sufferings, much more shall we be able to despise riches, and covetousness. …

[4.] In the next place as the sum and substance of his exhortation, which he puts both first and last, even Christ. ( Ver. 2 ) “Looking” (he says) “unto Jesus the Author and Finisher of our Faith”; The very thing which Christ Himself also continually said to His disciples, “If they have called the Master of the house Beelzebub, how much more them of His household?” ( Matt. x. 25 .) And again, “The disciple is not above his Master, nor the servant above his Lord.” ( Matt. x. 24 .)

I cherish an indelible memory of your magnificence, and now by very religious and holy bishops I salute you. The very holy lord bishop Domnus has arranged for them to journey to the imperial city in order to put an end to the false charges raised against me. For certain men have contrived manifest calumnies against me, and have grievously disturbed the churches for whose sake the Lord Christ “endured the Cross despising the shame”; in whose behalf the band of the divine apostles and companies of victorious martyrs were delivered to many kinds of death. On behalf of their peace I call on your magnificence to contend. It had been easy for the God of all to have nodded His head and scattered the lowering clouds; but He bides His time, and thereby at once shews the endurance of them that are assailed, and gives us opportunities of doing good.

Let us now go on to the next stage in his argument: “….the Only-begotten Himself ascribing to the Father the title due of right to Him alone. For He Who has taught us that the appellation ‘good’ belongs to Him alone Who is the cause of His own goodness and of all goodness, and is so at all times, and Who refers to Him all good that has ever come into being, would be slow to appropriate to Himself the authority over all things that have come into being, and the title of ‘the Existent.’” Well, so long as he concealed his blasphemy under some kind of veil, and strove to entangle his deluded hearers unawares in the mazes of his dialectic, I thought it necessary to watch his unfair and clandestine dealings, and as far as possible to lay bare in my argument the lurking mischief. …

1. We preach not one advent only of Christ, but a second also, far more glorious than the former. For the former gave a view of His patience; but the latter brings with it the crown of a divine kingdom. For all things, for the most part, are twofold in our Lord Jesus Christ: a twofold generation; one, of God, before the ages; and one, of a Virgin, at the close of the ages: His descents twofold; one, the unobserved, like rain on a fleece ; and a second His open coming, which is to be. In His former advent, He was wrapped in swaddling clothes in the manger; in His second, He covereth Himself with light as with a garment . In His first coming, He endured the Cross, despising shame ; in His second, He comes attended by a host of Angels, receiving glory. We rest not then upon His first advent only, but look also for His second. …

23. This is the wish of our schoolmaster the law, of the prophets who intervened between Christ and the law, of Christ who is the fulfiller and end of the spiritual law; of the emptied Godhead, of the assumed flesh, of the novel union between God and man, one consisting of two, and both in one. This is why God was united to the flesh by means of the soul, and natures so separate were knit together by the affinity to each of the element which mediated between them: so all became one for the sake of all, and for the sake of one, our progenitor, the soul because of the soul which was disobedient, the flesh because of the flesh which co-operated with it and shared in its condemnation, Christ, Who was superior to, and beyond the reach of, sin, because of Adam, who became subject to sin.

4. I have been overpowered, my friends and brethren, for I will now, though I did not at the time, ask for your aid. I have been overpowered by the old age of my father, and, to use moderate terms, the kindliness of my friend. So, help me, each of you who can, and stretch out a hand to me who am pressed down and torn asunder by regret and enthusiasm. The one suggests flights, mountains and deserts, and calm of soul and body, and that the mind should retire into itself, and recall its powers from sensible things, in order to hold pure communion with God, and be clearly illumined by the flashing rays of the Spirit, with no admixture or disturbance of the divine light by anything earthly or clouded, until we come to the source of the effulgence which we enjoy here, and regret and desire are alike stayed, when our mirrors pass away in the light of truth. …