Everything he did and everything he said on earth, even enduring the insults, the spitting, the buffeting—the cross and the grave—all of this was actually you speaking to us in your Son, appealing to us by your love and stirring up our love for you.
You know that this disposition could not be forced on our hearts, my God, since you created us; it must rather be elicited. And this, for the further reason that there is no freedom where there is compulsion, and where freedom is lacking, so too is righteousness.