For what purpose did Christ come down from Heaven? Answer: “That He might destroy sin, overcome death, and give life to man.”
Along with this pregnant statement we must quickly add yet another great quote: “Man had been created by God that he might have life. If now, having lost life, and having been harmed by the serpent, he were not to return to life but were to be wholly abandoned to death, then God would have been defeated, and the malice of the serpent would have overcome God’s will. But since God is both invincible and magnanimous, He showed His magnanimity in correcting man, and in proving all men, as we have said; but through the Second Man He bound the strong one, and spoiled his goods, and annihilated death, bringing life to man who had become subject to death. For Adam had become the devil’s possession, and the devil held him under his power, by having wrongfully practiced deceit upon him, and by the offer of immortality made him subject to death. For by promising that they should be as gods, which did not lie in his power, he worked death in them. Wherefore he who had taken man captive was himself taken captive by God, and man who had been taken captive was set free from the bondage of condemnation.”
The work of Christ is first and foremost a victory over the powers, which hold mankind in bondage: sin, death, and the devil. This victory does not end with the triumph of Christ over the enemies, which had held man in bondage; it continues in the work of the Spirit in the Church.
Therefore, the gift of the Holy Spirit is the guarantee of continued and future glory – the central and crucial point is the victory of Christ over the hostile powers of the enemy through His death and resurrection empowers us today to live victoriously.
Bishop Quintin
