Salesian Literature

A TREATISE ON THE LOVE OF GOD

Chapter 6  :  The high value charity gives to its own actions, and to those of the other virtues

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You may be asking, however, what is this value which charity gives to our actions?  Most assuredly, I would never dare to tell you, heaven knows, had not the Holy Spirit expressed it in the clearest possible terms through the great apostle St. Paul: This light and momentary affliction brings with it a reward multiplied every way, loading us with everlasting glory (2 Cor. 4:17).

 

For God’s sake, let us weigh those words carefully.  Our afflictions, so light that they pass in a moment, bring with them the reward, assured and enduring, of everlasting glory.  Notice the wonder of it: affliction brings glory, the lightness of the one becomes the load of the latter, what is momentary results in something that is eternal.

 

What can possibly give such power to fleeting moments, to light afflictions? … Cloth of scarlet or purple is the precious garb of royalty – on account, not of the material, but of its colour.  Such immense worth attaches to the actions we do as good Christians that we are rewarded with heaven.  This is not because the activities are of our fashioning, our material; it is because they are dyed in the blood of God’s Son.  The Saviour, I mean, sanctifies our actions by the merits of his precious blood.  The vine branch does not yield fruit of itself, but only because it lives on the vine.  Through charity we are built into one body with our Redeemer, united with him like limbs to a head (cf. Eph. 4:15-16); that is why our fruits, our good works, deriving all their value from him, earn us eternal life.

 

Left to ourselves, we are withered, useless, unfruitful branches, unable to frame any thought as coming from ourselves; all our ability comes from God.  As soon, therefore, as charity engraves on our hearts the name of our Saviour, the shepherd, who keeps watch over our souls (1 Pet. 2:25), we begin to yield those delightful fruits that bring us eternal life.

 

God awards and repays each man according to the life he has lived (Rev. 22:12), as the whole of Scripture teaches us; for Scripture holds out to us the eternal happiness and bliss of heaven as the reward of all the labours, all the good deeds, which we have done on earth.

 

A magnificent reward that betrays the greatness of the Master we serve!  Had he so wished, indeed, he could quite justly have claimed our obedience, our service, without the offer of any wage or reward; after all, we belong to him on so many grounds, and nothing we do has any value unless it is done through him, by him, for him, or with him.  In his kindness he arranged otherwise.  In view of his Son, our Saviour, he determined to deal with us on the basis of a definite reward … hiring us, agreeing to pay us in eternal wages according to the way we work.

 

He can have no need of our service, no use for it.  Even after we have done all that he has commanded us, we still have to admit – in humble truth or truthful humility – that, when all is said, we are but servants, and worthless (cf. Lk. 17:10).  We have nothing to give our Master, who is so essentially rich in everything; he is none the better for anything we may do.  He turns to our advantage everything we perform; useless as our service is to him, he makes it extremely useful to us, whose tiny toils win such rich rewards.

 

There would be no obligation on his part to pay us for our services, had he not promised to do so.  For all that, you are not to imagine that – by making such a promise – he let his goodness get the better of his wisdom.  On the contrary, he has been scrupulously fair, wonderfully blending generosity with propriety.  Of course our actions are small, of course they bear no numerical comparison with glory; the proportion lies in their excellence.  We owe this to the love of God which has been poured out in our hearts by the Holy Spirit, who dwells in us (Rom. 5:5; 8:11).  So delicately does he conceal his art that actions which are entirely our own are also all his doing.  What it amounts to is that to God’s operation in us we add our cooperation.

 

Our deeds, then, like a grain of mustard seed (Mt. 13:31-32), bear no comparison with the tree of glory they become.  Their strength, their power of growth, is due to the fact that they proceed from the Holy Spirit.  By a wonderful infusion of grace into our souls, he makes our deeds his own, yet at the same time leaves them ours.

 

We are members of a body whose head is Christ, but whose soul is the Holy Spirit; we are branches grafted upon a tree of which he is the divine life-force.  Because, in this way, he is responsible for our actions, and we co-operate with him, he leaves us all the merit, all the profit of our service, our good deeds; we, in our turn, leave him all the glory, all the praise – acknowledging that every work of ours begins, continues and ends through him, through his mercy.  In his mercy he comes to us, prompting us; he dwells in us, helping us; he lives with us, guiding us – until he brings to perfection what he first began (cf. Phi. 1:6).

 

God, in his goodness, shows us great mercy in thus going shares with us, heaven knows!  We give him the glory of our praise, indeed, but he gives us the glory of possessing him.  In a word: for these light and momentary labours of ours we receive the reward of blessings that will last for ever. Amen.

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