Annual Retreat Exercise #12: Consideration of the eternal love of God towards us

October 27, 2021 • 1 min

From Introduction to the Devout Life, page 279
By St. Francis de Sales

CHAPTER XIV.

The fifth consideration: the eternal love of God towards us.

Consider the eternal love which God has had for you; for before our Lord Jesus Christ, as man, suffered on the cross for you, his Divine Majesty, by his omniscience, already foresaw your being, and loved you exceedingly.

But when did his love for you begin? Even when He began to be God. But when did He begin to be God? Never; and thus as He has always been without a beginning or end, so He has loved you from all eternity; and in consequence of this love has prepared for you those graces and favours.

Hence, speaking to you as well as to others, by the prophet Jeremias, ch. xxxi., He says: “I have loved thee with an eternal love, therefore taking pity on thee I have drawn thee to myself:” and amongst other things He caused thee to make firm resolutions to serve Him.

O God, what resolutions are those on which Thou hast thought and meditated from all eternity: Ah, how dear and precious ought they be to us! What ought we not suffer rather than forget the smallest portion of them! no, not even though we were to gain the world; for the whole world is not worth one soul, and a soul is worth nothing without these resolutions.