Luke 17:23
People will tell you, 'Look, there He is!' or 'Look, here He is!' Do not go out or chase after them.
Sermons
The Advent of the Kingdom and the KingR.M. Edgar Luke 17:20-37
And Why NotC. H. Spurgeon.Luke 17:22-24
Days of Holy PrivilegesDean Vaughan.Luke 17:22-24
Mistaken Desires for JesusD. G. Watt, M. A.Luke 17:22-24
The Brief Day of OpportunityW. Clarkson Luke 17:22-25














The thought of our Master in this passage (as I understand it) is this: "I have been asked when the kingdom of God will come: my reply is that it has come already; that you have not to look about in this and that direction; here, in the midst of you, impersonated in him that speaks, is the kingdom. It is present in the Present One. But," he says to his disciples, "he is present in a very strict sense. The time will soon be here when you will greatly long for his fellowship, and you will not be able to possess it. Do not believe those who will tell you that the Son of man is still on earth; it will not be true. His life below will be of the very briefest; it will be but as a lightning-flash which passes through the darkened heavens in a moment, and is gone again; so brief will be his stay, so soon will he be gone. But before he goes he must suffer many things; much must be done, for much must be endured, before his short day is done."

I. THE BRIEF DAY OF OUR LORD'S OPPORTUNITY. When we think of the long centuries that preceded, and of those that have already succeeded, the day of Christ, we may well regard his short visit to our world as a mere flash of light for transitoriness. What were those few months of his short stay among men compared with all those dark ages, and to all those that have been illumined by the light which his truth has shed upon them! But, transient as it was, it sufficed. It does not take long to utter or to illustrate the most Divine and the most vital truths; it did not take long to undergo the most mysterious and the most availing sorrows - it took but a few agonizing hours to die the death of atonement. Into that short day of opportunity our Divine Redeemer compressed:

1. The utterance of all needful truth - all the truth we need for our guidance into the kingdom of God, and for our passage through life and death into the kingdom of glory.

2. The illustration of every human grace; the living of a human life in all its perfect loveliness and grandeur.

3. The endurance of sorrow such as constituted him for ever the Man of sorrows, and the High Priest of human nature, touched with the feeling of our infirmities (Hebrews 4:15).

4. The dying of that death which is the all-sufficient sacrifice for sin. A few months of time sufficed to complete his work and make him the Divine Teacher, Leader, Friend, Saviour, of the whole race of man for all time to come.

II. OUR BRIEF DAY.

1. Measured by hours, our day is very brief. Human life is abort at the longest. We are "but of yesterday,' and to-morrow we shall not be. The rocks and even the trees look down on many generations. And in all the bustle and battle, in all the pursuits and pleasures of our lira, the little time we have hastens away and is gone far sooner than we thought it would go. It is not only our poetry that sings, but our experience that testifies of the swiftness of our course beneath the sun.

2. Yet it holds manifold and precious opportunities of regaining our position as the children and heirs of God; of doing "many things" that shall tell even in future years for truth and God; of "suffering many things" after Christ our Lord, and in holy and noble fellowship with him (Philippians 3:10).

3. Its transiency is an urgent reason for

(1) immediate decision, and

(2) constant and earnest action in the cause of righteousness,

Whilst we have the light that shines, let us walk and let us work in the light. - C.

One of the days of the Son of Man.
I. JESUS FORESHADOWS A CHANGE OF FEELING ON THE PART OF HIS DISCIPLES IN REFERENCE TO HIS APPEARING. They will desire to see one day a visible appearance of the Son of Man. If you have the spirit of Jesus, if He has come to you so that you know Him to be your Saviour and Friend, you cannot be free from such changes of feeling in reference to Him. No. There come to you times in which you think, "Surely my life in Christ is not pouring on me so clearly and warmly as it might do." You are inclined to murmur out such plaints as, "I cannot see His face, though I have eagerly looked for it; waiting to catch some beams of the wondrous glory resting on it, and be able to say, 'It is the Lord.' I want to feel His strong hand holding me up; but I do not grasp it, though I stretch out mine before, behind, on each side. My prayer this morning was that I might find to-day to be a day for a personal and new contact with Jesus." So there is a sense in which your feeling in reference to Him is somewhat changed. The day has come "when ye desire to see one of the days of the Son of Man."

II. JESUS FORESHADOWS HERE THE FAILURE OF SUCH DESIRES FOR HIS APPEARING. "Ye shall not see it." He does not want His people to indulge in vain dreamy longings. He does not want to frustrate hopes that at the bottom might express loyalty to Him, but are mistaken as to the way in which their purport is to be achieved. He could not grant that which would not be for the honour of God; that which would be to the hurt of those who desired only one day of the Son of Man.

III. JESUS FORESHADOWS HERE THAT THERE WILL BE FALSE ANNOUNCEMENTS MADE IN REFERENCE TO HIS APPEARING. "They shall say to you, 'See here! or see there!'" From history we find that there has hardly ever been a time of special trouble in the world, hardly ever a time of formality and deadness in the Church, but men have risen up to declare that the Son of Man was just coming, and that plans should be adopted to meet Him. But that is not the kind of expectation I want to warn you against; it is not the one that you are most in danger of succumbing to. But is there not a tendency to gather religious meetings under the idea that because you thus gather together Jesus will manifest Himself? Is there not a tendency to believe that, if you can get up a great organization to carry out a Christian purpose, obtain plenty of money, and seem to succeed outwardly, Jesus is there? Is that not saying, "See here, see there"? Against all that sort of thing His words ate meant to bear. You may gather meetings; you don't necessarily gather with Christ. You may get wealth to support your efforts; that is not a proof that Christ approves them. You may find numbers to sustain certain plans; that is no pledge, on the part of those numbers, that they are moving under the leading of Christ. You must learn that there is no power of life in those things by themselves. I do not despise meetings, wealth, or numbers. There is a certain value to be attached to them; but that value is just equivalent to any number of cyphers, good for something when you put one, two, or other numeral before them. So gather all kinds of people, money, and meetings; but until you put Christ into them they are of no real value. It is the power of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus that is to be desired, not the power of external agencies. Pray that your heart may be brought more and more into sympathy with His, and that you may more and more clearly know that you are living on the Son of God by faith. Then you will not need anybody to point out the Son of Man to you when He comes. You do not need anybody to tell you that there is light in this place — you know it; and when Christ appears, His servants will know it without going by the reports of others, without following any one. We shall know it by the power He Himself will exert. Meantime we have to walk by faith, and not by sight.

(D. G. Watt, M. A.)

While the Lord was yet on earth the days of the Son of Man were but lightly esteemed. The Pharisees spoke of them with a sneer, and demanded when the kingdom of God should come. "Is this the coming of Thy promised kingdom? Are these fishermen and peasants Thy courtiers? Are these the days for which prophets and kings waited so long?" "Yes," Jesus tells them, "these are the very days. The kingdom of God is set up within men's hearts, and is among you even now; and the time will come when you will wish for these days back again, and even those who best appreciate them shall ere long confess that they thought too little of them, and sigh in their hearts for their return."

1. We are bad judges of our present experiences.

2. We seldom value our mercies till we lose them.

I. Consider THE IMMEDIATE INTERPRETATION of the text.

1. Our Lord meant that His disciples would look back regretfully upon the days when He was with them. In a short time His words were true enough, for sorrows came thick and threefold. At first they began to preach with uncommon vigour, and the Spirit of God was upon them. But by and by the love of many waxed cold, and their first zeal declined; persecution increased in its intensity, and the timid shrank away from them; evil doers and evil teachers came into the Church; heresies and schisms began to divide the body of Christ, and dark days of lukewarmness and half-heartedness covered them.

2. These disciples would look forward sometimes with anxious expectation. "If we cannot go back," they would say, "Oh that He would hurry on and quickly bring us the predicted era of triumph and joy. Oh for one of the days of the Son of Man."

II. AN ADAPTED INTERPRETATION SUITABLE TO BELIEVERS AT THIS PRESENT MOMENT.

1. Days of holy fellowship with Jesus may pass away to our deep sorrow. While the Beloved is with you, hold Him, and do not let Him go. He will abide if you are but eager for His company.

2. Days of delightful fellowship with one another. Let us labour in love, zeal, humility; for a continuance of these all our life long.

3. Days of abundant life and power in the Church.

III. A MEANING ADAPTED TO THE UNCONVERTED. When on your death-bed you will be willing to give all you possess to he able once again to hear the voice of God's minister proclaiming pardon through the blood of Jesus. Emotions formerly quenched will not come back; you resisted the Spirit, and He will leave you to yourself; and yet there will be enough, perhaps, of conscience left to make you wish you could again feel as when almost persuaded to be a Christian.

(C. H. Spurgeon.)

Two kinds and sets of days are here contrasted: coming days and days that are now. The general thought is very natural and very human. It might be said to almost any one at certain periods of life, that he will one day be looking back upon that period wiG, regretful fondness, even though it may not be entirely bright or altogether enjoyable while it is passing. Days of childhood, though many restrictions have fettered, and many faults may have saddened them; days of school life, though often complained of at the time as days of burdensome lessons, arbitrary rules, and irritating punishments; days of early struggle, and hope long deferred, in the practice of a profession; days of uncertain health or variable spirits, while opinion, faith, and habit, are anxiously shaping themselves, and the aspects and prospects of life are in many ways both gloomy and formidable; of all these, and many other examples might be added to them, it might yet be said with great truth by an experienced looker-on to the person passing through them: "Days will come when ye will be desiring to see one of these days over again, and when, alas, you shall not see it! Yes, you may well prize, while you have them, the days that are now, though they may be very far from perfect, either in opportunity or in circumstance; for assuredly you will one day be desiring one of them back — no tears and no prayers of yours will be of any avail to recall it." When our Lord said here to His disciples: "The days will come when ye will desire to see one of these days" — "days of the Son of Man," He calls them — "and ye shall not see it," there was a solemnity and a pathos in the prediction far beyond the universal experience of which we have spoken. There was much to make the days of that time far from enjoyable. They were days of unrest; they were days of toil; they were days of anxiety; they were days also of perplexity and bewilderment in spiritual things. They were very slowly and very intermittently realizing very elementary conceptions. They had no such hold of great hopes or great faiths as might have made their heaven all brightness, whatever their earth might be. They were always disappointing their Master by some expression which betrayed ignorance, or by some proposal which threatened inconsistency, which must have made, we should have thought, the very memory of those days of the Son of Man a bitterness rather than a comfort. Yet it is quite plain that our Lord looked upon those as in some sense happy days for them. "The days will come when ye will desire to see one of them, and sorrow because ye cannot." "Can ye make the children of the bride-chamber fast while the bridegroom is with them?" And in that last clause He touches the one point, which makes those happy days for them, whatsoever their drawbacks, and whatsoever their discomforts; it was the personal presence of the loved and trusted Lord. In that one respect they would be losers even by the accomplishment of redemption. "A little while," He said, as the end drew on, "a little while, and ye shall not see Me, and verily I say unto you, that then ye shall weep and lament, while the world is rejoicing, then ye shall be sorrowful, though at last your sorrow shall be turned into joy." Yes; when He speaks of a sorrow in separation,and then of a joy growing out of it, He combines in a wonderful and a merciful way the natural and the spiritual, recognizes the difficulty of rising into the higher heaven of faith, and yet points us thither for the one real and one abiding satisfaction. We have had no such personal experiences as these which the text tells of — none of those companyings with Jesus, as He went in and out among the disciples. It is only from afar off that we can contemplate that living companionship. It is only by a remote emulation that we can desire one of those days of the Son of Man. In the hope of catching some distant ray of that glory travellers have sometimes sought the land of Christ's earthly sojourn, if so be they might live themselves back into the days of His ministry and of His humanity. But others, with a truer and a deeper insight, have sought their inspiration in the holy Gospels, have read and pondered those four sacred biographies till they could see and hear Him in them, without those distractions of surrounding imagery and scenery which can but divert the soul from that heavenlier wisdom. "He is risen; He is not here." It is not in hallowed ground, any more than in imaginative dreaming, that we shall find, in this far-off century of the gospel, the best and most life-like conception of what the text calls "the days of the Son of Man." Rather shall we seek to frame our idea of them — first, in the most human and personal contact with such wants and woes as He came to seek out and to minister to; and, secondly, in the diligent study and imitation, so far as we may, of those characteristics and those ministries which, in our own day and generation, make the nearest approach, however distant it must be, to the character and ministry below of the Divine Son Himself. To acquaint ourselves, not as unconcerned hearers, but as sorrowing sympathizers, with the actual condition at our very doors of the toilers and sufferers by whose labour — alas! too often by whose sacrifice — the wealth and luxury, nay, the comforts and conveniences of the higher English life, are made what they are; not to shrink from the contemplation with a sentimental repugnance, but to compel ourselves to take notice of it, and to encourage by word and deed, by giving and feeling, all the serious enterprises by which English manliness, and English philanthropy, and English Christianity, late or early seek and strive to grapple with it. Thus, on the one side, we shall be realizing the days of the Son of Man. For this was the earth which He came to save, and this was the man whom He took upon Him to deliver. True, He did not become Himself the denizen of an overgrown city. He did not take our flesh in the midst of that swarming hive of humanity, imperial Rome. He did not wait for that latest age which should develop into its gigantic proportions such a metropolis as this London. But no monstrous growth and no uttermost corruption was out of the ken and scope of His incarnation. The days of the Son of Man are wherever Christ and misery stand face to face. Whosoever tries to bring Jesus Christ into one lodging-house or one alley of sinning, suffering London, is doing more to realize to himself, and to others, the ministry of the Saviour, than if He tried to track His earthly footsteps through Palestine, or to picture in vivid imagination the very occupations and employments of the days of His flesh.

(Dean Vaughan.)

People
Jesus, Noah, Noe
Places
Galilee, Jerusalem, Road to Jerusalem, Samaria, Sodom
Topics
Follow, Or'look, Pursuit, Run, Start
Outline
1. Jesus teaches to avoid occasions of offense;
3. and to forgive one another.
5. The power of faith.
6. How we are bound to God.
11. Jesus heals ten lepers.
22. Of the kingdom of God, and the coming of the Son of Man.

Dictionary of Bible Themes
Luke 17:20-24

     2565   Christ, second coming

Luke 17:22-23

     5178   running

Luke 17:22-25

     5694   generation

Library
May 7 Evening
They persecute him whom thou hast smitten.--PSA. 69:26. It is impossible but that offences will come: but woe unto him, through whom they come!--Him, being delivered by the determinate counsel and foreknowledge of God, ye have taken, and by wicked hands have crucified and slain.--They did spit in his face, and buffeted him; and others smote him with the palms of their hands, saying, Prophesy unto us, thou Christ, Who is he that smote thee?--Likewise also the chief priests mocking him, with the scribes
Anonymous—Daily Light on the Daily Path

June 5 Morning
When ye shall have done all those things which are commanded you, say, We are unprofitable servants.--LUKE 17:10. Where is boasting then? It is excluded. By what law? of works? Nay: but by the law of faith.--What hast thou that thou didst not receive? now if thou didst receive it, why dost thou glory, as if thou hadst not received it?--By grace are ye saved through faith; and that not of yourselves; it is the gift of God: not of works, lest any man should boast. For we are his workmanship, created
Anonymous—Daily Light on the Daily Path

June 18 Evening
Faith as a grain of mustard seed.--MATT. 17:20. Barak said unto [Deborah], if thou wilt go with me, then I will go: but if thou wilt not go with me, then I will not go. God subdued on that day Jabin the king of Canaan.--Gideon . . . feared his father's household, and the men of the city, that he could not do it by day, . . . did it by night. And Gideon said unto God, If thou wilt save Israel by mine hand as thou hast said, . . . let me prove, I pray thee. And God did so. Thou hast a little strength,
Anonymous—Daily Light on the Daily Path

Where are the Nine?
'And it came to pass, as He went to Jerusalem, that He passed through the midst of Samaria and Galilee. 12. And as He entered into a certain village, there met Him ten men that were lepers, which stood afar off: 13. And they lifted up their voices, and said, Jesus, Master, have mercy on us. 14. And when He saw them, He said unto them, Go show yourselves unto the priests. And it came to pass, that, as they went, they were cleansed. 15. And one of them, when he saw that he was healed, turned back,
Alexander Maclaren—Expositions Of Holy Scripture

God's Slaves
'Doth He thank that servant because he did the things that were commanded him! I trow not. 10. So likewise ye, when ye shall have done all those things which are commanded you, say, We are unprofitable servants: we have done that which was our duty to do.' --LUKE xvii. 9-10. There are two difficulties about these words. One is their apparent entire want of connection with what precedes--viz., the disciples' prayer, 'Lord, increase our faith,' and the other is the harshness and severity of tone which
Alexander Maclaren—Expositions Of Holy Scripture

Thankfulness for Mercies Received, a Necessary Duty
Numberless marks does man bear in his soul, that he is fallen and estranged from God; but nothing gives a greater proof thereof, than that backwardness, which every one finds within himself, to the duty of praise and thanksgiving. When God placed the first man in paradise, his soul no doubt was so filled with a sense of the riches of the divine love, that he was continually employing that breath of life, which the Almighty had not long before breathed into him, in blessing and magnifying that all-bountiful,
George Whitefield—Selected Sermons of George Whitefield

On the Words of the Gospel, Luke xvii. 3, "If Thy Brother Sin, Rebuke Him," Etc. , Touching the Remission of Sins.
Delivered at the Table of St. Cyprian, in the presence of Count Boniface. 1. The Holy Gospel which we heard just now as it was being read, has admonished touching the remission of sins. And on this subject must ye be admonished now by my discourse. For we are ministers of the word, not our own word, but the word of our God and Lord, whom no one serves without glory, whom no one despises without punishment. He then the Lord our God, who abiding with the Father made us, and having been made for us,
Saint Augustine—sermons on selected lessons of the new testament

The Necessity of Increased Faith
It is a matter of dispute as to the occasion when these words were uttered. Some think that we must look at the connection of the chapter for the explanation. Jesus Christ had been teaching his disciples that if their brother should trespass against them seven times a day, and seven times a day turned again to them, saying, I repent, they were to forgive him, and that constrained the apostle to say "increase our faith." They conceived it to be so hard a duty incessantly to pardon and constantly to
Charles Haddon Spurgeon—Spurgeon's Sermons Volume 1: 1855

Li. Gratitude.
14th Sunday after Trinity. S. Luke xvii. 18. "There are not found that returned to give glory to God, save this stranger." INTRODUCTION,--There is nothing that the merciful God desires more from man than thanks, and there is nothing of which He receives less. In the Gospel for to-day we have an example. Christ performs a notable miracle. He heals ten lepers, and only one returns to thank Him. The disease from which He delivered them was disgusting, and it was one which cut the sufferers off
S. Baring-Gould—The Village Pulpit, Volume II. Trinity to Advent

The Ten Lepers
(Fourteenth Sunday after Trinity.) Luke xvii. 17, 18. Were there not ten cleansed, but where are the nine? There are not found that returned to give glory to God, save this stranger. No men, one would have thought, had more reason to thank God than those nine lepers. Afflicted with a filthy and tormenting disease, hopelessly incurable, at least in those days, they were cut off from family and friends, cut off from all mankind; forced to leave their homes, and wander away; forbidden to enter the
Charles Kingsley—Town and Country Sermons

The First Degree of Prayer
The First Degree of Prayer Those who have not learnt to read, are not, on that account, excluded from prayer; for the Great Book which teacheth all things, and which is legible as well internally as externally, is Jesus Christ Himself. The method they should practice is this: They should first learn this fundamental truth, that "the kingdom of God is within them" (Luke xvii. 21), and that it is there, only it must be sought. It is as incumbent on the Clergy, to instruct their parishioners in prayer,
Madame Guyon—A Short and Easy Method of Prayer

Answer to Mr. W's Second Objection.
I pass, says Mr. W. p. 15. to a second observation.--What became of these three persons after their resurrection? How long did they live afterwards? And of what use and advantage were their restored lives to the church or to mankind? The evangelical and ecclesiastical history is entirely silent as to these questions, which is enough to make us suspect their stories to be merely romantick or parabolical; and that there were no such persons raised from the dead; or we must have heard somewhat of their
Nathaniel Lardner—A Vindication of Three of Our Blessed Saviour's Miracles

Of the Fewness of those who Love the Cross of Jesus
Jesus hath many lovers of His heavenly kingdom, but few bearers of His Cross. He hath many seekers of comfort, but few of tribulation. He findeth many companions of His table, but few of His fasting. All desire to rejoice with Him, few are willing to undergo anything for His sake. Many follow Jesus that they may eat of His loaves, but few that they may drink of the cup of His passion. Many are astonished at His Miracles, few follow after the shame of His Cross. Many love Jesus so long as no
Thomas A Kempis—Imitation of Christ

Of the Inward Life
The kingdom of God is within you,(1) saith the Lord. Turn thee with all thine heart to the Lord and forsake this miserable world, and thou shalt find rest unto thy soul. Learn to despise outward things and to give thyself to things inward, and thou shalt see the kingdom of God come within thee. For the kingdom of God is peace and joy in the Holy Ghost, and it is not given to the wicked. Christ will come to thee, and show thee His consolation, if thou prepare a worthy mansion for Him within thee.
Thomas A Kempis—Imitation of Christ

Are You Willing to be a Servant?
Nothing is clearer from the New Testament than that the Lord Jesus expects us to take the low position of servants. This is not just an extra obligation, which we may or may not assume as we please. It is the very heart of that new relationship which the disciple is to take up to God and to his fellows if he is to know fellowship with Christ and any degree of holiness in his life. When we understand the humbling and self-emptying that is involved in really being a servant, it becomes evident that
Roy Hession and Revel Hession—The Calvary Road

Journey to Jerusalem. Ten Lepers. Concerning the Kingdom.
(Borders of Samaria and Galilee.) ^C Luke XVII. 11-37. ^c 11 And it came to pass, as they were on their way to Jerusalem, that he was passing along the borders of Samaria and Galilee. [If our chronology is correct, Jesus passed northward from Ephraim about forty miles, crossing Samaria (here mentioned first), and coming to the border of Galilee. He then turned eastward along that border down the wady Bethshean which separates the two provinces, and crossed the Jordan into Peræa, where we soon
J. W. McGarvey—The Four-Fold Gospel

Unprofitable Servants.
"Then said he unto the disciples, It is impossible but that offences will come: but woe unto him, through whom they come! It were better for him that a millstone were hanged about his neck, and he cast into the sea, than that he should offend one of these little ones. Take heed to yourselves: If thy brother trespass against thee, rebuke him; and if he repent, forgive him. And if he trespass against thee seven times in a day, and seven times in a day turn again to thee, saying, I repent; thou shalt
William Arnot—The Parables of Our Lord

His Passion and Crucifixion.
AS all active virtues meet in Jesus, so he unites the active or heroic virtues with the passive and gentle. He is the highest standard of all true martyrdom. No character can become complete without trial and suffering; and a noble death is the crowning act of a noble life. Edmund Burke said to Fox, in the English Parliament, "Obloquy is a necessary ingredient of all true glory, Calumny and abuse are essential parts of triumph." The ancient Greeks and Romans admired a good man struggling with misfortune,
Philip Schaff—The Person of Christ

The Conflict with Evil
The Kingdom of God Will Have to Fight for Its Advance The great objective is the Kingdom of God. In realizing the Reign of God on earth three recalcitrant forces have to be brought into obedience to God's law: the desire for power, the love of property, and unsocial religion. We have studied Christ's thought concerning these in the foregoing chapters. The advance of the Kingdom of God is not simply a process of social education, but a conflict with hostile forces which resist, neutralize, and defy
Walter Rauschenbusch—The Social Principles of Jesus

The Two Classes.
"Two men went up into the temple to pray."--Luke xvii. 10. I now want to speak of two classes: First, those who do not feel their need of a Saviour who have not been convinced of sin by the Spirit; and Second, those who are convinced of sin and cry, "What must I do to be saved?" All inquirers can be ranged under two heads: they have either the spirit of the Pharisee, or the spirit of the publican. If a man having the spirit of the Pharisee comes into an after-meeting, I know of no better portion
Dwight L. Moody—The Way to God and How to Find It

Whether a Man Can Merit Anything from God
Whether a Man can Merit Anything from God We proceed to the first article thus: 1. It seems that a man cannot merit anything from God. No one merits a reward by repaying what he owes to another. But we cannot even fully repay what we owe to God, by all the good that we do. For we always owe him more than this, as the philosopher says in 8 Ethics 14. Hence it is said in Luke 17:10: "when ye shall have done all those things which are commanded you, say, We are unprofitable servants: we have done that
Aquinas—Nature and Grace

Whether Charity is Prior to Hope
Whether Charity is Prior to Hope We proceed to the eighth article thus: 1. It seems that charity is prior to hope. For on Luke 17:6, "If ye had faith as a grain of mustard seed . . .," the gloss by Ambrose says: "From faith issues charity, and from charity issues hope." But faith is prior to charity. Hence charity is prior to hope. 2. Again, Augustine says (14 De Civ. Dei. 9): "good movements and affections are derived from love, and from holy charity." Now to hope, as an act of hope, is a good movement
Aquinas—Nature and Grace

The Boasted Merit of Works Subversive Both of the Glory of God, in Bestowing Righteousness, and of the Certainty of Salvation.
1. After a brief recapitulation, the question, Whether or not good works merit favor with God, considered. 2. First answer, fixing the meaning of the term Merit. This term improperly applied to works, but used in a good sense, as by Augustine, Chrysostom, Bernard. 3. A second answer to the question. First by a negative, then by a concession. In the rewarding of works what to be attributed to God, and what to man. Why good works please God, and are advantageous to those who do them. The ingratitude
John Calvin—The Institutes of the Christian Religion

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