NOTES for Sir 5:4

What does the author of the book want to say when speaking of God's patience? That God, according to a well-known Russian proverb, "waits long but strikes hard"? Maybe that too. But is that all? Why, in fact, would God not arrange the world more simply, so that the consequences of every good and bad deed would become visible at once, affecting the one who committed it? Of course, the question of measures of reward and punishment would immediately arise, of how each corresponds to the measure of good or evil done, and so on. But we are speaking of God, who without doubt would be able to solve this problem if only He wanted to arrange the world in exactly that way. The only thing is that such a world would be, if not for everyone, then for the overwhelming majority of those who would have to live in it, a world of one single chance. And in such a world fallen humanity would not have even one chance at salvation: after the fall, even with the help that the Messiah sent by God can give us, one chance is not enough for our salvation. And God gives us many chances, because He wants not to catch us in our sins but to save us. Rebuke here is only a means, a means of making us think so that we can change our life. But here too we are free: one person perceives God's patience as another opportunity to change his life, while another sees it as God's silent consent to sin, at least where his own life is concerned. But, an impartial observer could ask, does this not mean that some people will keep sinning without thinking until the very day of Judgment? Well, perhaps. Such is the other side of freedom. But the time separating us from Judgment is only a prelude to the main thing. And the main thing will begin after Judgment and will depend on its outcome.