Chrysostom
Beloved of All
The cry of your heart reaches toward a great truth, but you must understand clearly from what bondage you need to be delivered. There are many who feel shame at indifferent matters, yet feel none for the bondage of sin, and would rather be called servants to this latter kind of bondage ten thousand times than once to the former. The most grievous slavery is not the sort that men can see, but the slavery of sin, from which God alone can deliver. For to forgive sins belongs to none other.
Do you believe that a man consumed by unclean passions and self-chosen madness is in any respect different from a demoniac? Such a one makes his mouth and his eyes mere sewers, bringing upon himself a madness far more to be lamented. This is the bondage that holds a soul all its lifetime subject to fear. Yet why do you shudder? He that had the power of death has been brought to nought. He is no longer terrible, but has been trodden under foot and made vile.
You seek deliverance, and rightly so, for the Son came to set us free. But see that you do not merely seek the name of some man, as if breaking off from the common body to attach yourself to a name. The hand that healed the demoniac is stretched out to you now, not in the shadows of the law, but at a most awful table. There, He says, “Take, eat, This is my body, Which is broken for many.” The type of old delivered from earthly bondage, but the truth itself sets the world free from far heavier chains. Flee, then, to the physician of souls. Bear whatever you must suffer to be loosed from these bonds thankfully, for He does not come unwillingly to heal you. Pour out your confession, not merely with your lips, but with a heart that has made room for Him and hates the pestilent company of sin. He will deliver you, and your bondage to the corruption of the inward man will be broken.
Do you believe that a man consumed by unclean passions and self-chosen madness is in any respect different from a demoniac? Such a one makes his mouth and his eyes mere sewers, bringing upon himself a madness far more to be lamented. This is the bondage that holds a soul all its lifetime subject to fear. Yet why do you shudder? He that had the power of death has been brought to nought. He is no longer terrible, but has been trodden under foot and made vile.
You seek deliverance, and rightly so, for the Son came to set us free. But see that you do not merely seek the name of some man, as if breaking off from the common body to attach yourself to a name. The hand that healed the demoniac is stretched out to you now, not in the shadows of the law, but at a most awful table. There, He says, “Take, eat, This is my body, Which is broken for many.” The type of old delivered from earthly bondage, but the truth itself sets the world free from far heavier chains. Flee, then, to the physician of souls. Bear whatever you must suffer to be loosed from these bonds thankfully, for He does not come unwillingly to heal you. Pour out your confession, not merely with your lips, but with a heart that has made room for Him and hates the pestilent company of sin. He will deliver you, and your bondage to the corruption of the inward man will be broken.
