The Victor Returns with Honor

The Lord says to my Lord: “Sit at my right hand, until I make your enemies your footstool.”  (Psalm 110:1)

All these things are brought about in us by Christ, the Lord who, before He returned to heaven, made this promise to His disciples: And I will ask the Father, and he will give you another Helper, to be with you forever, even the Spirit of truth.*  Thus it must be believed that Christ has ascended to the Father when we see that the Helper has descended upon the apostles.  It must be believed, I tell you, that He sits at the right hand of God, as David says of the Savior, because we see the Holy Spirit, as the Lord promised, exulting in the disciples.  Consequently, the prophetic psalm says: The Lord says to my Lord: Sit at my right hand.†  According to our custom, the right of sitting is offered to one who, like a victor returning from having accomplished a great deed, deserves to be seated for the sake of honor.  And so the man Jesus Christ, who overcame the devil by His suffering and unlocked the underworld by His resurrection, returning to heaven like a victor after having accomplished a great deed, hears from God the Father: Sit at my right hand.  And it is not to be wondered at that sitting on the same seat is offered to the Son by the Father, since by nature He is of one substance with the Father.  But perhaps someone is puzzled that the Son is said to be on the right.  For although there are no degrees of dignity where the fullness of divinity is concerned, nonetheless the Son is on the right, not because He is preferred to the Father, but so that He not be believed to be inferior.  And the Son is on the right because, according to the Gospel, the sheep will be gathered on the right but the goats on the left.  It is necessary, therefore, that the first lamb occupy the place of the sheep and that the unsullied leader come before the unsullied flock that will follow Him, as John says in the Apocalypse: It is these who have not defiled themselves with women, for they are virgins.  It is these who follow the Lamb wherever he goes.‡  Therefore the prophet David says: The Lord says to my Lord: Sit at my right hand.  That is to say, the Lord who is Father offers the lofty seat of His throne to the Lord God Christ, who is His Son, and for the sake of honor He places Him at His right hand on an eternal seat.

Maximus of Turin, Sermon 40, 2

*  John 14:16-17
†  Psalm 110:1
‡  Revelation 14:4

Confessing God as Father and Creator

I believe in God the Father Almighty, maker of heaven and earth.

Thus we learn from this article that none of us has of himself, nor can preserve, his life nor anything that is here enumerated or can be enumerated, however small and unimportant a thing it might be, for all is comprehended in the word Creator.

Moreover, we also confess that God the Father has not only given us all that we have and see before our eyes, but daily preserves and defends us against all evil and misfortune, averts all sorts of danger and calamity; and that He does all this out of pure love and goodness, without our merit, as a benevolent Father, who cares for us that no evil befall us.

Thus we have most briefly presented the meaning of this article, as much as is at first necessary for the most simple to learn, both as to what we have and receive from God, and what we owe in return, which is a most excellent knowledge, but a far greater treasure.  For here we see how the Father has given Himself to us, together with all creatures, and has most richly provided for us in this life, besides that He has overwhelmed us with unspeakable, eternal treasures by His Son and the Holy Ghost, as we shall hear.

Martin Luther, Large Catechism: Apostle's Creed, 16-17, 24

Christ at the Father's Right Hand

But when Christ had offered for all time a single sacrifice for sins, he sat down at the right hand of God  (Heb 10:12)

We hold, moreover, that Christ sits in the body at the right hand of God the Father, but we do not hold that the right hand of the Father is actual place.  For how could He that is uncircumscribed have a right hand limited by place?  Right hands and left hands belong to what is circumscribed.  But we understand the right hand of the Father to be the glory and honor of the Godhead in which the Son of God, who existed as God before the ages, and is of like essence to the Father, and in the end became flesh, has a seat in the body, His flesh sharing in the glory.  For He along with His flesh is adored with one adoration by all creation.

John of Damascene, On the Orthodox Faith, IV.2

God's Providence Points to Himself

For from him and through him and to him are all things.  To him be glory forever.  Amen.

He made everything personally, as controller he personally brings to completion all things that have been made.  It behooves everyone to look to him, giving thanks for what they have, and asking for providence in the future.  They ought also offer him due praise.  Through these expressions the divine apostle showed that he did not acknowledge a difference in purpose between from whom and through whom, the former (as though indicating something greater) belonging to the Father, and the latter (as conveying something less) referring to the Son: he applied both to each person.

Theodoret of Cyrus, "The Letter to the Romans" on Romans 11:36