It is
therefore one and the same God the Father who has prepared good things with
Himself for those who desire His fellowship, and who remain in subjection to Him;
and who has the eternal fire for the ringleader of the apostasy, the devil, and
those who revolted with him, into which [fire] the Lord has declared those men
shall be sent who have been set apart by themselves on His left hand. …
Inasmuch as one and the same Lord has pointed out that the whole human race
shall be divided at the judgment, “as a shepherd divides the sheep from the
goats,” and that to some He will say, “Come, you blessed of My Father, receive
the kingdom which has been prepared for you,” but to others, “Depart from me,
you cursed, into everlasting fire, which My Father has prepared for the devil
and his angels.” …
As the
Lord sets forth in the parable of the tares and the wheat, where He says, “As
therefore the tares are gathered together, and burned in the fire, so shall it
be at the end of the world. The Son of man shall send His angels, and they
shall gather from His kingdom everything that offends, and those who work
iniquity, and shall send them into a furnace of fire: there shall be weeping
and gnashing of teeth. Then shall the just shine forth as the sun in the
kingdom of their Father.” The Father, therefore, who has prepared the kingdom
for the righteous, into which the Son has received those worthy of it, is He
who has also prepared the furnace of fire, into which these angels commissioned
by the Son of man shall send those persons who deserve it, according to God’s
command.
The Lord,
indeed, sowed good seed in His own field; and He says, “The field is the
world.” But while men slept, the enemy came, and “sowed tares in the midst of
the wheat, and went his way.” Therefore we learn that this was the apostate
angel and the enemy, because he was envious of God’s workmanship, and took in
hand to render this [workmanship] an enmity with God. …
For “He
came to divide a man against his father, and the daughter against the mother,
and the daughter-in-law against the mother-in-law;” and when two are in one
bed, to take the one, and to leave the other; and of two women grinding at the
mill, to take one and leave the other: [also] at the time of the end, to order
the reapers to collect first the tares together, and bind them in bundles, and
burn them with unquenchable fire, but to gather up the wheat into the barn; and
to call the lambs into the kingdom prepared for them, but to send the goats
into everlasting fire, which has been prepared by His Father for the devil and
his angels.
And why is
this? Has the Word come for the ruin and for the resurrection of many? For the
ruin, certainly, of those who do not believe Him, to whom also He has
threatened a greater damnation in the judgment day than that of Sodom and
Gomorrah; but for the resurrection of believers, and those who do the will of
His Father in heaven. If then the advent of the Son comes indeed alike to all,
but is for the purpose of judging, and separating the believing from the
unbelieving, since, as those who believe do His will agreeably to their own
choice, and as, [also] agreeably to their own choice, the disobedient do not
consent to His doctrine; it is manifest that His Father has made all in a like
condition, each person having a choice of his own, and a free understanding;
and that He has regard to all things, and exercises a providence over all,
“making His sun to rise upon the evil and on the good, and sending rain upon
the just and unjust.” And to as many as continue in their love towards God, He
grants communion with Him.
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