Sermon 90: when God's Son is born in the soul

Elizabeth impletum est tempus pariendi et peperit filium (Luke I, 57): Now Elizabeth's full time came that she should be delivered, and she brought forth a son and called him John. Then the people said, What kind of child will this be, for the hand of the Lord is with him. One scripture says, the greatest gift is that we are God's child: that he begets his Son in us. The soul who is God's child, in whom the Son of God is born, in her nothing else will be brought to birth. God's ultimate purpose is birth. He is not content until he brings his Son to birth in us. Nor is the soul content until the Son of God is born in her. It is from this that grace springs. Grace is poured in there, grace doing nothing: its work is its own becoming. It flows out of the essence of God and into the essence of the soul, not into her powers.

When the time was fully come, grace was born. Time is fulfilled when time is done. The person who in time has his heart established in eternity, and in whom all temporal things are dead, in him is the fullness of time. Rejoice in God all the time, says St Paul. He rejoices all the time who rejoices above time and apart from time. Three things keep a person from knowing God at all. The first is time, the second is body, and the third is multiplicity or number. As long as these three things are in me, God is not in me, nor is he really working in me. St Augustine says, because the soul is greedy, because she wants to have and hold so much, she reaches into time and, grasping at the things of time and number, loses what she already has. While there is more and less in you, God cannot dwell or work in you. These things must go out for God to come in, unless you hold them in a higher, better way: multiplicity gathered into one in you. Then the more there is of multiplicity, the more there is of unity, for the one changes into the other.

I said once, unity unifies multiplicity but multiplicity does not unite unity. Once we have gotten past things, with everything in us raised up to a higher power, we will never be cast down. If I had my mind on God and God alone, had nothing over me but God, then nothing would be hard and certainly nothing troublesome. St Augustine says, Lord, when I turn to you, all hardship, suffering and toil are taken from me. Once we are past time and temporal things we are free and joyful all the time; then is the fullness of time, then the Son of God is born in you. I once said that in the fullness of time God sent his Son. If anything is born in you except the Son, you have gotten nothing of the Holy Spirit, and grace is not working in you. The origin of the Holy Spirit is the Son. If there were no Son there would be no Holy Spirit. The Holy Spirit does not proceed, it cannot come forth, except where the Father is in labor with his Son. Then he gives him everything he has, natural and intrinsic. It is in this giving that the holy Breath wells out. And it is God's intention to give himself entirely to us. As fire, to consume the wood, must penetrate the wood, finding the wood unlike itself. That takes time. First it makes it warm, then hot, then it smokes and crackles, because of its unlikeness; and the hotter the wood grows the quieter and stiller it becomes, and the more like the fire, the more peaceful it becomes, until at last it turns entirely to fire. For fire to consume the wood there must be no unlikeness left.

In truth, which is God, if you intend anything but God, or seek anything but God alone, the work you do is neither yours nor God's. Your intention in your work, that is also your work. What energizes in me is my father, and I am subordinate to him. It is impossible in nature for one to have two fathers: in nature one father is the rule. When other things are all fulfilled and done with, then this birth happens. A thing that fills something is everywhere in contact with its boundary, falling short nowhere; it has length, breadth, height and depth. If it had height and no length, breadth or depth it would not fill. St Paul says, pray that you may be able to comprehend with all the saints what is the height, breadth, length and depth.

These three things stand for three kinds of knowledge. The first is sensible. The eye sees from a distance what is outside it. The second is rational and is far higher. The third corresponds to an exalted power of the soul, a power so high and noble that it can see God face to face in his own self. This power has nothing in common with nothing, it knows no yesterday or day before, no tomorrow or day after, for in eternity there is no yesterday or tomorrow: there it is always the present now; the happenings of a thousand years ago and a thousand years to come are there in the present, and the far ends of the earth are the same as here. This power catches sight of God in his entryway. In him, over him, through him, says the scripture. In means in the Father; over him means in the Son; through him means in the Holy Spirit. There is no truth that does not contain the whole of truth, as St Augustine says. This power knows all things in the truth. From this power nothing is veiled. According to the scriptures, men's heads should be bare, the women's covered. The women stand for the lower powers, which are veiled. The man stands for the power which is bare and face to face.

What wonders will come from this child? Speaking lately to some people who are very likely here today, I said, nothing is so hidden that it will not be revealed. All that is nothing will be done away with, hidden and no longer thought of. We will know nothing of nothing, will have nothing in common with nothing. All creatures are a mere nothing. That which is not here or there, which is a forgetting of all creatures, that is the fullness of being. I told them that nothing within us will stay hidden, that we will uncover and give up to God everything we find within ourselves, willing or unwilling, good or bad, and whatever we are prone to we will die to in the truth. If we disclose everything to God, he will disclose to us in return everything he has: he will hide from us, in truth, absolutely nothing of all that he has, not wisdom, truth, holiness, deity, nor anything at all. As God lives, this is truly the case. If we disclose nothing to him, it is no wonder if he reveals nothing to us: we must both do the same, as we to him, so he to us.

It is sad how some people think themselves so far advanced, so one with God, while they still cling to themselves, in small ways, through fortune and misfortune, having never truly set self aside. They are far from what they think. They are full of notions and intentions. I sometimes say, if a man who seeks nothing finds nothing, what right does he have to complain? After all, he has found what he sought. To seek or intend anything is to seek or intend nothing, and to pray for something is to get nothing. But a man with no ulterior motive, who sets his mind on God and God alone, to that man God opens himself completely and gives him all the things hidden in his heart, for his very own, exactly as they are God's own, no more and no less, provided he is after God and not things in between. What wonder if a sick man finds no taste in meat and wine? He cannot taste the meat and wine; his tongue, with which he tastes, is covered with a coating that is unpleasant and bitter because of his sickness: he does not taste the true flavor, everything tastes bitter to him. His sense is sound enough; things are made bitter by means and hindrances. When the hindrance is removed he tastes things properly. As long as there is anything in between, God will never taste like himself to us, and life will seem very hard and bitter.

I once said that virgins follow the lamb wherever it goes, close behind. Some are virgins and some are not, whatever they appear to be. Wherever this lamb goes the virgins follow, some only while it leads them through pleasant places that they like. When it takes them into suffering, labor and discomfort, they turn back and refuse to follow, and these are not virgins for all they seem to be. Some say, Lord, I want to go in honor, riches, comfort. Well, if the lamb has led you that way, I wish you well in following his footsteps. True virgins will follow the lamb through the highways and byways, wherever it may lead, and have no pity on themselves, whatever happens. In the fullness of time John was born, that is, grace, as I have explained. May all things be fulfilled in us and grace be born in us. So help us God.