CCXXII. Corollary XVII

COROLLARY XVII.

If the meritorious cause of the restored order is considered a little more intimately, it cannot be doubtful that it is referred to God under a twofold σχέσει, relation or disposition. For it is referred to God as merciful and good, and therefore we read in Scripture¹, οὕτως ἠγάπησεν ὁ Θεὸς τὸν κόσμον, ὥστε τὸν υἱὸν αὐτοῦ τὸν μονογενῆ—

—ἔδωκεν, “God so loved the world that he gave his Only-begotten Son”; and again², οὐ γὰρ ἀπέστειλεν ὁ Θεὸς τὸν υἱὸν αὐτοῦ εἰς τὸν κόσμον, ἵνα κρίνῃ τὸν κόσμον, ἀλλ᾽ ἵνα σωθῇ ὁ κόσμος δι᾽ αὐτοῦ, “For God did not send his Son into the world that he might judge the world, but that the world might be saved through him”; and again³, διὰ σπλάγχνα ἐλέους Θεοῦ ἡμῶν, ἐν οἷς ἐπεσκέψατο ἡμᾶς ἀνατολὴ ἐξ ὕψους, “through the bowels of the mercy of our God, in which the Orient from on high has visited us.” Then it is referred to God as the vindicator of his laws and the defender of his justice, to which, among other things, these pertain⁴: without the shedding of blood remission does not occur, and hence it was necessary that Christ should appear for the destruction of sin through the oblation of himself; he himself bore our sins in his body upon the tree; in him we have redemption through his blood and the remission of sins; while we were still sinners, Christ died for us according to the appointed time; God was in Christ reconciling the world to himself, not imputing their offenses to them; it pleased the Father through him to reconcile all things unto himself, peace having been made through the blood of his cross; when we were enemies, having been reconciled, we shall be saved in his life; the Son of Man came to give his life as a redemption for many; and just as he came to give, so too he gave himself as a redemption for all, so that in him we have redemption through his blood; we were bought with a price, and were redeemed not with corruptible gold or silver but with the precious blood of Christ as of a lamb immaculate and undefiled. Whence, if that question which the Philistines once proposed to David⁵ were proposed to us—“How can we appease our lord?”—nothing would be at hand for us to answer except in the name of Jesus. For there is no salvation in any other⁶, nor is there another name under heaven given to men in which we must be saved.

Now if the meritorious cause of restoration is considered in the former manner and compared with God, who commended his charity toward us⁷, by which he did not spare his own Son but—

—delivered him up for us all, nothing is more manifest than that Christ and his οἰκονομίαν, dispensation, are the gift of merciful love. But if it is considered in the latter manner and referred to God, who made him who had not known sin to be sin for us, that we might be made the justice of God in him⁸, and who placed upon him the iniquities of us all, it appears clearly that both Christ himself and his dispensation are the price paid to offended justice, an incitement of mercy, and an infinite merit of divine love toward us. From these things we finally attain this: that the order of restoration, proceeding from love and mercy, most fittingly agrees with the laws of justice and returns again into love and mercy.