Tractates on the Gospel of John

⁵ But what is this, “Whom the Father shall draw,” when Christ Himself draws? Why did He say, “Whom the Father shall draw”? If we must be drawn, let us be drawn by Him to whom one who loves says, “We will run after the odor of Your ointment.” But let us, brethren, turn our minds to, and, as far as we can, apprehend how He would have us understand it. The Father draws to the Son those who believe in the Son, because they consider that God is His Father. For God begot the Son equal to Himself, so that he who ponders, and in his faith feels and muses that He on whom he has believed is equal to the Father, this same is drawn of the Father to the Son.

Arius believed the Son to be creature: the Father drew not him; for he that believes not the Son to be equal to the Father, considers not the Father. What do you say, Arius? What, O heretic, do you speak? What is Christ? Not very God, says he, but one whom very God has made. The Father has not drawn you, for you have not understood the Father, whose Son you deny, it is not the Son Himself but something else that you are thinking of. You are neither drawn by the Father nor drawn to the Son; for the Son is very different from what you say.

Photius said, “Christ is only a man, he is not also God.” The Father has not drawn him who thus believes. One whom the Father has drawn says: “You are Christ, Son of the living God.” Not as a prophet, not as John, not as some great and just man, but as the only, the equal, “You are Christ, Son of the living God.” See that he was drawn, and drawn by the Father. “Blessed are you, Simon Barjonas: for flesh and blood has not revealed it to you, but my Father who is in heaven.” This revealing is itself the drawing.

You hold out a green twig to a sheep, and you draw it. Nuts are shown to a child, and he is attracted; he is drawn by what he runs to, drawn by loving it, drawn without hurt to the body, drawn by a cord of the heart. If, then, these things, which among earthly delights and pleasures are shown to them that love them, draw them, since it is true that “every man is drawn by his own pleasure,” does not Christ, revealed by the Father, draw? For what does the soul more strongly desire than the truth? For what ought it to have a greedy appetite, with which to wish that there may be within a healthy palate for judging the things that are true, unless it be to eat and drink wisdom, righteousness, truth, eternity?