Possession of What We Believe

2 Cor. 5:16-21

From now on, therefore, we regard no one according to the flesh. Even though we once regarded Christ according to the flesh, we regard him thus no longer. Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation.The old has passed away; behold, the new has come. All this is from God, who through Christ reconciled us to himself and gave us the ministry of reconciliation; that is, in Christ God was reconciling the world to himself, not counting their trespasses against them, and entrusting to us the message of reconciliation. Therefore, we are ambassadors for Christ, God making his appeal through us. We implore you on behalf of Christ, be reconciled to God. For our sake he made him to be sin who knew no sin, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God. (ESV)

Leo the Great has a high sense of the present possession of the things of the faith. In an Easter sermon Leo says, "We already possess what we believe." The possessing hand of faith receives everything that God grants to us through the preaching of the Word and sacraments. Faith possesses all, because God gives all through faith. Not that faith sees, or even experiences all this, because faith is confident against all reason and knowledge. So in faith we have a clear vision of what we shall be as we see the resurrected Christ living among his disciples with the glory of his divinity shining forth. Everything he has and does is ours. All our hopes are guaranteed, because we already possess what we believe.

Leo the Great

"The Apostle of the Gentiles, Paul, does agrees with the belief that Christ remained both human and divine after his resurrection, when he says, 'even though we have known Christ after the flesh, yet now we know Him so no more' (2 Cor 5:16). For the Lord's Resurrection was not the ending, but the changing of the flesh, and His substance was not destroyed by His increase of power. The quality altered, but the nature did not cease to exist. The body was made incapable of suffering, which it had been possible to crucify It was made incorruptible, though it had been possible to wound it.

Properly is Christ's flesh said not to be known in that state in which it had been known, because nothing remained capable of suffering in it, nothing weak, so that it was both the same in essence and not the same in glory. But should not be amazed that St. Paul maintains this about Christ's body, when he says of all spiritual Christians, 'From now on, therefore, we regard no one according to the flesh' (2 Cor 5:16). From now on, he says, we begin to experience the resurrection in Christ, since the time when in Him, who died for all, all our hopes were guaranteed to us. We do not hesitate in timidity, we are not under the suspense of uncertainty, but having received an earnest of the promise, we now with the eye of faith see the things which will be, and rejoicing in the uplifting of our nature. We already possess what we believe."

Leo the Great, Sermons, 71.4

Prayer

Almighty God our heavenly Father, I possess what I believe because I am your possession purchased by Christ and given new life by Him. Grant me to live in the Easter joy beyond all reason and experience. Amen.

For the Little Lambs Scholarship Fund drive, that God our heavenly Father would give us the faith to guide the little lambs by providing sufficient funding for Christian education

In thanksgiving to God for the faithful confessors of old, who risked all for the sake of Christ, that we too would be filled with the Spirit unto faithful confession

For all military personnel on deployment, especially Jeff Meyers, Matthew Emswiler, Matthew Webber, and Don Ehrke, that the Lord would keep them safe

Art: PISANO, Andrea The Baptism of the Multitude