The Goodness of God
In the following words, St Augustine expresses to us the remarkable and unfettered goodness of God and the freeness and fullness of His grace in the gospel offer. He shows us that salvation is accomplished through grace - the truth of which is firmly attested to by Scripture, since Scripture says:
While we were still weak, at the right time Christ died for the ungodly. (Romans 5:6)
While we were still sinners, Christ died for us. (Romans 5:8)
While we were enemies we were reconciled to God by the death of his Son. (Romans 5:10)
This means that even though we are hopeless sinners, God gave us His son from the depths of his love for us (John 3:16), to reconcile us to him.[1] Augustine paints this beautifully in his confessions, where he urges us to trust in the unmatched love and goodness of God to us:
"Let the restless unrighteousness go, let them run from you. But you see them, you split the shadows apart - and look, everything around them is beautiful, but they themselves are ugly. But how have they ever hurt you? What have they ever done to discredit your dominion, which is just and unsullied from the sky all the way down to the lowest part of the world?
Where in fact have they fled to, when they've fled from your face? And where won't you find them? (Ps. 139:7-8) They've turned tail and so didn't see you seeing them, and in their blind rush they ran into you - because you don't abandon anything you've created; the unrighteousness ran into you and were rightly harried as they ducked away from your clemency, colliding with your justice and falling into your severity (Romans 11:8-9).
Plainly, they don't know that you're everywhere, as no place confines you within its boundaries; that you alone are near at hand for those who make as if to distance themselves from you. Let them turn around, then, and look for you, because you haven't abandoned what you've created the way they've abandoned you: they're the ones who must turn around.
And see: there you are in their hearts, in the hearts of those who testify to you and cast themselves on you and cry in your arms, since they've come to you by such trying paths. And you obligingly dry their tears (Isaiah 25:8, Revelation 7:17, 21:4) and they weep all the more and rejoice in their weeping, since you, Master, aren't some human being or other, flesh and blood; you, Master who made them, remake them and comfort them.
And where was I myself, when I was looking for you? You were right in front of me, but I had left myself and couldn't find me. How much less was I able to find you!"[2]
Reflections on the Text
In the first paragraph, Augustine speaks about the futility of the sinner's attempt at running away from God. God's eyes pierce through the shadows and sees them as they are. And although they live in a world of beauty, they themselves are most foul. Their foulness, however, cannot harm or discredit the power of God, which remains just and perfect in its rule over all creation.
And although the unrighteous flee from God, in their blindness, God causes them to stumble back into Him, because God has not abandoned that which he has made. He is everywhere, since no physical place contains Him. He is near even to those who run the farthest from Him.
Augustine then calls the unrighteous to turn back and seek the Creator. Because even though they have abandoned Him, He has not abandoned them. He appears in their hearts, and they confess to Him. They cast themselves upon God, and weep on His bosom, and God gently wipes away their tears. They weep even more, and rejoice in their weeping, because God, who is the Creator of all things, has remade them and has comforted them.
Thus, to those burdened by sin and who have hardened their hearts; to those who have, in terror, fled from God or have put up barriers between themselves and God, know only that "the heart that's locked up hardly locks out [God's] eyes, nor do people's hard surface fend off [His] hand, but [He] melts that barrier whenever [He] wants, either in pity or in punishment, and no one can hide from [His] heat (Ps. 19:6)".[3]
Indeed, there is more grace in Christ, than sin in us.[4]
[1]: Sinclair Ferguson, "The Whole Christ", at Chapter 3.
[2]: Augustine of Hippo, "Confessions", at Book V, Chapter 2 (Translation by Sarah Ruden).
[3]: Augustine of Hippo, "Confessions", at Book V, Chapter 1 (Translation by Sarah Ruden).
