ACC ~ Colossians 1 v12b

THE HEAVENLY SPECTATORS. ORIGEN: A great theater is filled with spectators to watch your contests and your summons to martyrdom, just as if we were to speak of a great crowd gathered to watch the contests of athletes supposed to be champions. … Thus, the whole world and all of the angels of the right and the left, and all men, those from God’s portion and those from the other portions, will serve as spectators when we contest for Christianity. Indeed, either the angels in heaven will cheer us on, and the floods will clap their hands together … or, may it not happen, the powers from below, which rejoice in evil, will cheer. EXHORTATION TO MARTYRDOM 18.

ONLY HIS FREE GIFT. CHRYSOSTOM: But why does he call it an inheritance (or lot)? To show that by his own achievements no one obtains the kingdom, but as a lot is rather the result of good luck, so in truth it is the same principle here. For no one leads a life so good as to be counted worthy of the kingdom, but the whole is his free gift. HOMILIES ON COLOSSIANS 2.

ONLY THE ELECT. AUGUSTINE: The lament in the Psalms, indeed, is absolutely true: “Behold in iniquity was I conceived, and in sins did my mother nourish me in her womb.”Again, there is what is written, that there is none clean in God’s sight, not even an infant whose life has lasted but a day on the earth. So these are the exception, and it is to exceed our limited human measure to wish to inquire about the rank they may deserve in that “lot of the saints in light” which is promised for the future. SERMONS 351.2.

AUGUSTINE: See, then, how it can come to pass that a man may have the baptism of Christ and still not have the faith or the love of Christ; how it is that he may have the sacrament of holiness and still not be reckoned in the lot of the holy. With regard to the mere sacrament itself, it makes no difference whether someone receives the baptism of Christ where the unity of Christ is not. SERMONS 8.2.

SHARING IN THE LOT OF THE SAINTS. CASSIODORUS: Moreover in writing to the Thessalonians he says: “Giving thanks to God the Father, who has made us worthy to be partakers of the lot of the saints in light.” Since we read that many things in the Old and New Testaments were divided by lots, none has dared to deny that the lot has been God’s way of manifesting what devoted hearts sought with prayerful petition. EXPLANATION OF THE PSALMS 21.19.

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