Closing charge: draw living water from prophets and apostles

“Go up upon a high mountain, you who announce good news to Zion; raise your voice with strength, you who announce good news to Jerusalem; raise it, do not fear.” For I say that those appointed to the sacred service, and who speak the mystery of Christ the Savior of us all, must not have a cast-down and ground-level mind, conquered by hesitation and contracted by fear, but must have the mind set high as if well planted and somehow lying on a mountain, eager thus to survey the excellent beauty of the doctrines of the truth, and also to make their words with boldness.

“And draw water with gladness from the springs of salvation.” And we say that the springs of salvation are the holy prophets, evangelists, and apostles, who pour forth the word from above and from heaven and saving for the world, the Holy Spirit supplying them, and thus gladden all under heaven. Come then, letting the mind down into the depths of the thoughts beside them, let us draw the finding of the truth from there.

Farmers, cutting from the fields the most fragrant of the flowers in their seasons, then putting these into baskets, carry them off to their masters; and they both receive them very gladly and delight in what comes from the seasons. But we who have the teaching pursuit, as from a field of the God-breathed Scripture, do not bring a withering sight of flowers, but rather words and the initiation through the Spirit, which has the unfading beauty of the piety toward Christ.