Paul as the blessed example of the soul made light by affliction

Such was the blessed Paul. That is why he said: “Who shall separate us from the love of Christ? Affliction, or distress, or persecution, or famine, or nakedness, or danger, or sword? As it is written, ‘For your sake we are being killed all day long; we are counted as sheep for the slaughter.’ But in all these things we are more than conquerors through him who loved us” (Romans 8:35-37). This is what he was hinting at here when he said: “Even if our outer self is wasting away, yet the inner self is being renewed day by day” (2 Corinthians 4:16). The body becomes weaker, he says, but the soul becomes more powerful and stronger, and is winged more. Just as a soldier carrying heavy weapons, even if he is very brave and skilled in war, cannot be terrifying to his enemies, because the weight of his weapons undermines the speed of his feet and his experience in battle—but if he takes light and easily handled weapons, he comes upon his opponents like any winged creature—so also the one who does not fatten his own flesh with drunkenness or with ease and luxury, but makes it lighter and thinner through fasts and prayers and great endurance of afflictions, descends from above like a winged being, and with great force falls upon the phalanxes of demons, easily overthrows the opposing powers, and makes them subject to him. So Paul, after receiving many blows and being thrown into prison and bound in the stocks, had a body made weaker by being stretched with labors, but a soul strong and vigorous. And the bound man was so strong that by his voice alone he shook the foundations of the prison, brought the unbound jailer bound to his own feet, and opened the doors that had been shut. Paul therefore gave us no small comfort even before the resurrection: that we become better and more philosophical through trials. That is why he says: “Affliction produces endurance, and endurance produces testedness, and testedness produces hope, and hope does not put to shame” (Romans 5:3-5). And again someone else says: “An untested man is unapproved, and the unapproved man is worthy of no account.” So we reap no small fruit from affliction even before the resurrection: having a soul that is more tested, wiser, and more understanding, and freed from all cowardice. That is why he says: “Even if our outer self is wasting away, yet the inner self is being renewed day by day” (2 Corinthians 4:16). How is it renewed? Tell me. All unmanliness is driven out, disordered desire is quenched, love of money, vainglory, and simply all the other corrupted thoughts are destroyed. Just as a soul enjoying idleness and security is easily captured by these passions, so the soul continually occupied with contests for godliness never has leisure even to think of them, since concern about its wrestling matches draws it away from all those things. That is why he said: “It is being renewed day by day.” Then again, comforting the souls that grieve over the terrible things that come upon them and do not know how to be philosophical, he raises them up through the hope of things to come, saying: “For this momentary light affliction is working out for us, beyond measure unto excess, an eternal weight of glory, while we look not at the things that are seen, but at the things that are not seen” (2 Corinthians 4:17-18).