Then, when he has told them that, or
rather made them understand that he knows that, and is delighted at it,
then he can go on safely and boldly to tell them of their sins also in
the plainest and sternest and yet the most tender and fatherly language.
This is very important, my friends. I cannot tell you fully how
important I think it, in more ways than one. I am sure that if we took
St Paul's method with our children we should succeed with them far better
than we do. And I think, I have thought long, that if we could see that
St Paul's method with those Corinthians was actually the same as God's
method with us, we should have far truer notions of God, and God's
dealings with us; and should reverence and value far more that Holy
Catholic Church into which we have been, by God's infinite mercy,
baptized, and wherein we have been educated.
For, and now I entreat you to listen to me carefully, you who have sound
heads and earnest hearts, ready and willing to know the truth about God
and yourselves, if St Paul looked at the Corinthians in this light, may
not God have looked at them in the same light? If St Paul accepted them
for the sake of the good which was in them, in spite of all their faults,
may not God have accepted them for the sake of the good which was in
them, in spite of all their faults? and may not He accept us likewise? I
think it must be so.
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