the Lord! Why should we do this? What is the foundation of our hope?
3. Hope and confidence in God should be your protection and your support throughout your life, because, in the first place, God is almighty, He is infinitely merciful, faithful, and true; therefore He can and will fulfil the promises He has made to us. It is certain that He is able to fulfil His promises. For how could God be almighty if He were not able to do all things, if He could not pardon us, grant us graces, and receive us into heaven? Certainly God has only to will, and His grace penetrates our hearts, filling them with sincere penitence, washing away our sins, abolishing our debt. God wills indeed our sanctification, our salvation, and our happiness, for He is infinitely good. He truly loves all men, and desires to have them all with Himself in heaven. In the most touching manner has He made . this clear and plain, since He delivered up His only begotten Son to suffer a most agonizing death. The words of St. John will be true for evermore : " God so loved the world as to give His only begotten Son: that whosoever believeth in Him may not perish, but may have life everlasting" (John iii. 16).
4. Trust in the Lord, for He sealed His promises with the blood of His own Son. Of ourselves we could indeed not deserve eternal happiness, nor the graces needed for its attaintments, nor could we ever merit them. But what we could of ourselves not merit, Jesus Christ has merited for us, by means of His bitter passion and death. On this account we have, as the Apostle says: "Such confidence through Christ toward God."
For the same reason Sr. Ambrose writes, in
