Lecture 3 — Not servants but friends

^15:14^ You are my friends, if you do the things that I command you. [n. 2011]

^15:15^ I will not now call you servants: for the servant does not know what his lord does. But I have called you friends: because all I have heard from my Father, I have made known to you. [n. 2013]

^15:16^ You have not chosen me: but I have chosen you; and have appointed you, that you should go, and should bear fruit; and your fruit should remain: that whatsoever you will ask of the Father in my name, he may give it you. [n. 2019]

^15:17^ These things I command you, that you love one another. [n. 2029]

2010. Above, our Lord urged us to love our neighbor, based on his example. Here, Christ shows his disciples the benefit conferred upon them which obliges them to imitate him, which is, that he has embraced them in his love.

First, he mentions a sign of friendship;

second, the cause of this friendship: you have not chosen me: but I have chosen you.

He gives two signs of friendship:

one is found in the disciples;

the other in himself: I will not now call you servants.

2011. The sign in the disciples that they are friends of Christ is that they keep his commandments; he says, you are my friends, if you do the things that I command you. He is saying in effect: up to now I have urged you to love one another, but now I am speaking and teaching you about your friendship with me.

The statement, you are my friends can be understood in two ways, based on the two ways someone is called a friend. A person is called a friend either because he loves or because he is loved. And what follows, if you do the things that I command you is true for both meanings of friend. Those who love God keep his commandments, and because a friend is, as Gregory says, in a way the guardian of the other’s soul, it is appropriate that one who guards or keeps the will of God in his commandments is called the friend of God. Again, those whom God loves keep his commandments, because by conferring his grace on them he helps them to keep them: for by loving us, God makes us love him: I love those who love me (Prov 8:17). It is not they who first loved God, but God makes them lovers by loving them.

2012. Note that keeping the commandments is not the cause of divine friendship but the sign, the sign that both God loves us and that we love God: love of her is the keeping of her laws (Wis 6:19); he who says he loves him and does not keep his commandments is a liar (1 John 2:4).

2013. The sign of Christ’s friendship for them is mentioned when he says, I will not now call you servants.

First, he excludes what seems opposed to friendship;

second, he mentions the sign of true friendship: but I have called you friends.

2014. Servitude is opposed to friendship; and he rejects this by saying, I will not now call you servants. It is like saying: although you were formerly servants under the law, now you are free under grace: for you have not received the spirit of bondage again in fear; but you have received the spirit of adoption (Rom 8:15).

Second, he adds the reason for this when he says, for the servant does not know what his lord does: for a servant is like a stranger to his master, now the servant does not abide in the house forever (John 8:35). Now secrets should not be told to strangers, do not tell a secret to a stranger (Prov 25:9). And so secrets should not be given to those who are now servants.

We are thus able to continue from the preceeding. The disciples could have said: if we keep your precepts, we are your friends, but keeping precepts is a greater task than that of friendship; and, therefore, to exclude this the Lord says, I will not now call you servants.

2015. But there is hesitation about this. When the apostles say that they are the servants of Christ as, Paul, a servant of Jesus Christ (Rom 1:1), and David, I am your servant (Ps 118:125), and he who is introduced into eternal life, well done, good and faithful servant . . . enter into the joy of your Lord (Matt 25:23), which is what the Lord says, I will not now call you servants.

But there is hesitation even about this, because frequently masters reveal secrets to their servants, as does God, for the Lord God does nothing without revealing his secret to his servants the prophets (Amos 3:7): therefore it does not seem to be true when says, for the servant does not know what his lord does.

I respond, saying with Augustine, that true servitude is made out of fear. For there are two kinds of fear: servile fear, which casts out love, fear is not in charity (1 John 4:18), and filial fear, which is generated out of charity, because he fears that he whom he loves will perish; and this fear is good and pious, about which is said, the fear of the Lord is holy, enduring for ever (Ps 18:10). And, according to this, there are two servitudes. One proceeds out of filial fear according to which the servants are all just and sons of God. The other servitude is that which proceeds from the fear of punishment and is contrary to love; and concerning this, he says, I will not now call you servants.

It should be known that he is properly a servant who is not his own cause: while the free man is the one who is the cause of himself. There is a difference between the actions of servants and of free men, because the servant acts by the cause of another; the free, however, acts as a cause of himself, as much the final cause of the work as the moving cause. For the free man acts on account of himself, as on account of an end, and acts by himself, because he is moved by his very own will to work. But the servant does not act on account of himself, but on account of the master, nor from himself, but rather by the master’s will, as if in cooperation.

But it sometimes falls to a servant to act by the cause of another, as the final cause; still, he acts by himself, insofar as he moves himself to work: and this is good servitude, because it is moved out of charity to the doing of good works; but not on account of itself: because charity does not seek that which is its own, but that which belongs to is Jesus Christ’s and the salvation of his neighbors. Those, however, who entirely act on the account of another are bad servants. It is obvious, therefore, that the disciples were serving, but in good servitude, which proceeds from love.

As for the second difficulty, we should say that the servant who is moved only by another and not by himself, is related to the one who moves him as a tool to the worker. Now a tool shares with the worker in the work, but not in the reason for the work. So such servants share only in the work. But when a servant acts by his own will, it is necessary for him to know the reason for the work and have secrets revealed to him so he can know what he is doing. If you have a servant, regard him as your own soul (Sir 33:31). Now the apostles, as was said, were moved by themselves to accomplish good works, that is, they were moved by their own will, inclined by love. And so our Lord revealed his secrets to them. But bad servants do not know what their master is doing. What things don’t they know? Strictly speaking, they do not know what God does in us. For God acts in us in all the good we do: O Lord . . . you have wrought for us all our works (Isa 26:12); For it is God who works in you, both to will and accomplish (Phil 2:13). So the bad servant, darkened by the pride in his own heart, does not know what his lord does when this servant attributes to himself what he does.

2016. Now he sets down the true sign of friendship on his own part, which is that all I have heard from my Father, I have made known to you. For the true sign of friendship is that a friend reveals the secrets of his heart to his friend. Since friends have one mind and heart, it does not seem that what one friend reveals to another is placed outside his own heart: argue your case with your neighbor (Prov 25:9). Now God reveals his secrets to us by letting us share in his wisdom: in every generation she passes into holy souls and makes them friends of God and prophets (Wis 7:27).

2017. There is a question here as to what and in what way the Son hears from the Father. The answer has already been indicated in many ways. Since to hear is to receive knowledge from another, for the Son to hear from the Father is nothing other than for the Son to receive knowledge from the Father. Now the knowledge of the Son is his own essence. Thus, for the Son to hear from the Father is for the Son to receive his essence from the Father.

2018. Another question concerns the statement, all I have heard from my Father, I have made known to you. If he did make all things known to them it would follow that the disciples knew as much as the Son.

The answer, according to Chrysostom, is that all I have heard means all that I have heard which you ought to hear, I have made known to you, but not absolutely all things: below, I have yet many things to say to you, but you cannot bear them now (John 16:12).

Or, one could say, according to Augustine, that what he would say to them was so certain that he used the past tense instead of the future. So the meaning becomes, all I have heard from my Father, I have made known to you, that is, I will make known with that fullness of which the Apostle says: then I will understand fully, even as I have been fully understood (1 Cor 13:12). And below we read, the hour comes, when I will no more speak to you in proverbs, but will show you plainly of the Father (John 16:25), that is, when I lead you to the vision of the Father. For all things the Son knows the Father knows. So when he revels the Father to us, the Son will reveal all that the Son himself knows and which we know.

Again, one could say with Gregory, and this is better, that the same thing can be known perfectly or imperfectly. For example, in the sciences it is obvious that a person who knows all the principles of a science is said to know that science, although imperfectly. And so a person who teaches some principles of a science can say that he teaches that science, because everything that belongs to that science is virtually contained in its principles. But one will know that same science more perfectly when he knows the individual conclusions which are virtually in the principles. In the same way we can have a twofold knowledge of divine matters. One is imperfect, and is gained by faith, which is a foretaste of that future happiness and knowledge which we will have in heaven: faith is the substance of things to be hoped for, the assurance of things unseen (Heb 11:2). He says of this knowledge, all . . . I have made known to you, that is, in faith, by a kind of foretaste, like conclusions are virtually contained in their principles. So Gregory says: all the things he has made known to his servants are the joys of interior love and the feasts of our heavenly fatherland, which he excites in our minds every day by the breath of his love. For as long as we love the sublime heavenly things we have heard, we already know what we love, because the love itself is knowledge.

2019. Now he mentions the cause of this friendship. It is the usual practice for each one of us to say that he or she is the cause of friendship: every friend will say: I started the friendship (Sir 37:1). And so many people attribute to themselves the cause of God’s friendship when they attribute to themselves, and not to God, the source of their good actions. Our Lord rejects this by saying, you have not chosen me. He is saying in effect: whoever has been called to this sublime friendship should not attribute the cause of this friendship to himself, but to me, who chose him or her as a friend.

First, he mentions the gratuitous choice of God;

second, he sets forth for what they have been chosen, that you should go and should bear fruit.

2020. He says, you have not chosen me, you did not choose me to be your friend, but I have chosen you to make you my friends: not that we loved God, but that he loved us first (1 John 4:10). Now God’s love is twofold. One is eternal, by which we are predestined: he chose us in him before the foundation of the world (Eph 1:4). The other is temporal, by which we are called by him, and this is simply the carrying out of eternal predestination. And this is because those he chose by predestining them he also chose by calling them: those whom he predestined he also called (Rom 8:30); he chose from them twelve, whom he named apostles (Luke 6:13).

2021. Some say that God’s temporal choice is caused by the merits of those who are chosen. This conflicts with what it says here. For if God chose you because you were good, you were still not able to be good unless you chose the good, and this good is especially God. Therefore, it was you who first chose the good which is God, before you were chosen. But our Lord says the contrary: you have not chosen me, but I have chosen you. Thus we should not say that our own goodness entirely precedes God’s choice. I say entirely because we might have some particular good which could be the cause of another good being given to us; and this good could be the cause of being given still another good, since there is a certain order in God’s gifts. But in general, nothing can be the cause of and precede the divine choice, because all our goods are from God.

2022. It would be an even greater error to say that our eternal election was preceded by our own choice. Yet there are some who said that our preceding merits are the cause of that election. This was Origen’s error. He said that human souls were created equal at the same time and that while some stood firm, others sinned, more and less seriously. Thus, some merited to receive grace, and others did not. Our Lord’s saying is opposed to this, you have not chosen me.

2023. Others say that it is true that our actually existing merits are not the cause of our predestination, but those merits preexisting in the foreknowledge of God are. Thus they say that because God knew that certain persons would be good and make good use of grace, he decided to give them grace. But if this were so, it would follow that the reason he chose us was because he foreknew we would choose him. And so our choice would be prior to the divine choice; which is contrary to our Lord’s statement.

2024. Perhaps someone might say: what choice could there be since we were nothing and there was no rank among us?

But one who says this is mislead by thinking that the divine choice is like human choice. They are not the same. Our choice is caused by some already existing good; while God’s choice is the cause of an influx of good, greater in one than in another. Since choice is an act of the will, then according as the will of God and the human will are differently related to the good, so the character of their choice will be different. Now God’s will is related to a created good as its cause: how would anything have endured if you had not willed it? (Wis 11:25). And so goodness is dispensed to created things from the will of God. Accordingly, God prefers one person to another insofar as he confers more good on that one than on another. But the human will is moved to something by a preexisting good which has become known. Therefore, in our choices it is necessary that one good exist before another. The reason why God confers more good on one than on another is so that there might be a splendor of order in things. This is clear in material things where prime matter of itself is uniformly disposed to all forms. Also, before things themselves exist, they are not disposed to this or that existence; rather, they receive different forms and existences from God so that an order can be established among them. It is like this among rational creatures, where some are chosen for glory and some are rejected for punishment: the Lord knows who are his . . . in a great house there are not only vessels of gold and silver but also of wood and earthenware, and some for noble use, some for ignoble (2 Tim 2:19). And so we see a diversified order: the mercy of God shines forth in those whom, without any previous merits, he prepares for grace; in others we see the justice of God when, because of their own guilt, he allots them punishment, yet less than is deserved. So, I have chosen you by predestining you from all eternity, and by calling you to the faith during your lifetime.

2025. Then he points out for what he has chosen them when he says, have appointed you, that you should go, and should bear fruit.

First, he states for what he chose them;

second, he gives a reason for the above: these things I command you, that you love one another.

In regard to the first he does two things:

first, he shows that he chose them to do something;

second, that he chose them to receive something, that whatsoever you will ask of the Father in my name, he may give it to you.

2026. He says, I . . . appointed you, that is, I gave you a definite rank in my Church: and God has appointed in the Church, first apostles, second prophets (1 Cor 12:28). Again, I . . . appointed you, that is, firmly set you: and God made the two great lights . . . and God set them in the firmament of the heavens to give light upon the earth (Gen 1:16). The stars remaining in their order and courses fought against Sisara (Judg 5:20). For the position brings about order and strength.

2027. I . . . appointed you, I say, to three things. First to go; and so he says, that you should go, traveling over the whole world to convert the whole world to the faith: go into all the world and preach the Gospel to the whole creation (Mark 16:15). Or, that you should go, that is, progress from virtue to virtue: they go from virtue to virtue; the God of gods will be seen in Zion (Ps 84:7); his shoots will spread out (Hos 14:6).

Second, he appointed them to bear fruit; so he says, and should bear fruit. This fruit is the fruit of conversion to the faith, as in Paul’s first journey, in order that I may reap some harvest among you as well as among the rest of the gentiles (Rom 1:13); or an interior and spiritual fruit, as in his second journey, the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace (Gal 5:22); my blossoms became glorious and abundant fruit (Sir 24:17).

Third, they were appointed to bear fruit that would not be destroyed by death or sin; so he says, and that your fruit should abide, that is, that the society of the faithful would be led into eternal life and their spiritual fruit flourish: he . . . gathers fruit unto life everlasting (John 4:36).

2028. That whatsoever you will ask the Father in my name, he may give it to you. Here he shows that he chose them to receive something, namely, all that they ask for. He is saying: I have appointed you to be worthy to receive from the Father in my name: if our hearts do not condemn us we have confidence before God; and we receive from him whatever we ask (1 John 3:22).

2029. These things I command you, that you will love one another. Here he assigns the reason of the things which he said.

Here he is giving the reason for what he has said. Someone might ask: why did Christ tell them all these things? So our Lord answers, these things I command you, that you will love one another. He is saying in effect: everything I said to you was to lead you to love your neighbor: the aim of our charge is love (1 Tim 1:5).

One could also say, with Chrysostom, that the apostles could have said: Lord, why are you reminding us so much about your love? Are you reprimanding us? But our Lord says: not at all. I am doing this to encourage you to love your neighbor: and this commandment we have from him, that he who loves God should love his brother also (1 John 4:21).