But with what? With that sword which, if it wound, heals likewise,--
if it kills, also makes alive; the sword which slays the sins of a
man, that he may die to sin, but rise again to righteousness; the
sword of the Spirit, which is the Word of God, the message of God,
the speech of God, the commandment of God. They were to conquer the
world simply by saying, 'Thus saith the Lord.' They were to preach
God, and God alone, revealed in his Son, Jesus Christ, a God of love,
who willed that none should perish, but that all should come to the
knowledge of the truth.
But a God of wrath likewise. We must never forget that. A merely
indulgent God would be an unjust God, and a cruel God likewise. If
God be just, as he is, then he has boundless pity for those who are
weak: but boundless wrath for the strong who misuse the weak.
Boundless pity for those who are ignorant, misled, and out of the
right way: but boundless wrath for those who mislead them, and put
them out of the right way. All through St. Paul's Epistles, as
through our blessed Lord's sayings and doings, you see this wholesome
mixture of severity and mercy, of Divine anger and Divine love, very
different from the sentimentalism of our own times, when men fancy
that, because they dislike the pain and trouble of punishing evil-
doers, God is even such a one as themselves, who sits still and takes
no heed of the wrong which is done on earth.
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