If you too desire this faith and first receive knowledge of the Father …
For God loved human beings, for whose sake he made the world. To them he subjected everything on earth; to them he gave reason and mind; them alone he permitted to look upward toward himself; them he formed according to his own image; to them he sent his only-begotten Son; to them he promised the kingdom in heaven, and he will give it to those who have loved him.
And once you have come to this knowledge, with what joy do you think you will be filled? Or how will you love the one who loved you first in such a way?
When you love him, you will become an imitator of his goodness. Do not be amazed that a human being can become an imitator of God. It is possible, if God wills it.
For happiness does not consist in ruling over one's neighbors, wanting to have more than those who are weaker, being rich, or using force against those beneath you. Nor can anyone imitate God in these things; such things lie outside his majesty.
But whoever takes upon himself the burden of his neighbor; whoever, in whatever respect he is stronger, wishes to benefit another who is in need; whoever supplies to those in need the things he has received from God, and thus becomes a god to those who receive them—this person is an imitator of God.
Then, though you are still on earth, you will see that God lives in heaven. Then you will begin to speak the mysteries of God. Then you will love and admire those who are punished because they refuse to deny God. Then you will condemn the world's deception and error, when you come to know what it truly means to live in heaven; when you despise the death here that only seems to be death; when you fear the death that truly is death, which is kept for those who will be condemned to the eternal fire, the fire that will punish to the end those handed over to it.
Then you will admire those who endure the temporary fire for righteousness' sake, and you will call them blessed when you come to know that other fire.