True, the Lord could have provided the wedding guests with wine and filled the hungry with food without using any pre-existing created thing. But that is not what He did. He took loaves which earth had given and gave thanks (cf John 6:11). It was the same when He changed the water into wine, satisfying those reclining at table and quenching the thirst of those invited to the wedding (cf Matt 11:2-10; Apoc 19:9). By so doing, He showed that the God who made the earth and commanded it to bear fruit (cf Gen 1:11), who established the waters and brought forth the fountains (cf Gen 1:9), has in these last times granted mankind, through His Son, the blessing of food and the grace of drink, the Incomprehensible through the Comprehensible, the Invisible through the Visible [the incarnate Son]. Against Heresies III 11, 5
They are totally foolish, these people who despise the whole saving plan of God, who deny the salvation of the flesh, and scorn its regeneration, claiming it is not capable of incorruptibility. If the flesh is not saved, the Lord did not redeem us by His Blood, the cup of the Eucharist is not communion in His Blood, and the bread we break is not communion in His Body. For blood can only come from veins, flesh, and whatever else makes up the substance of man. All this the Word of God really and truly became, in order to redeem us by His Blood. As the apostle says, ‘In Him we have redemption through His Blood, the remission of sins’ (Col 1:14). And because we are His members, we are nourished by means of creation, the creation which He Himself gives us by making His sun to rise and sending the rain as He pleases (cf Matt 5:45). The cup, which is part of creation, He declares to be His Blood, by which our own blood is fortified, and the bread, which is part of creation, He affirms to be His Body, by which our own body is fortified. So then, if the mixed cup and the manufactured bread receive the Word of God and become the Eucharist, that is to say, the Blood and Body of Christ, which fortify and build up the substance of our flesh, how can these people claim that the flesh is incapable of receiving God’s gift of eternal life, when it is nourished by Christ’s Blood and Body and is His member? As the blessed apostle says in his letter to the Ephesians, ‘For we are members of His Body, of His flesh and of His bones’ (Eph 5:30). He is not talking about some kind of ‘spiritual’ and ‘invisible’ man, ‘for a spirit does not have flesh and bones’ (Luke 24:39). No, he is talking of the organism possessed by a real human being, composed of flesh and nerves and bones. It is this which is nourished by the cup which is His Blood, and is fortified by the bread which is His Body. The stem of the vine takes root in the earth and eventually bears fruit, and ‘the grain of wheat falls into the earth’ (John 12:24), dissolves, rises again, multiplied by the all-containing Spirit of God, and finally, after skilled processing, is put to human use. These two then receive the Word of God and become the Eucharist, which is the Body and Blood of Christ. Similarly, our bodies, having been nourished by the Eucharist, having been laid to rest in the earth, and having there dissolved, will rise again at their appointed time, for the Word of God will grant them resurrection ‘to the glory of God the Father’ (cf Phil 2:11). He will clothe the mortal with immortality and freely bestow incorruptibility on the corruptible (cf 1 Cor 15:53), for God’s power is made perfect in weakness (cf 2 Cor 12:9). So we must never become puffed up, as if we had the source of life within ourselves, asserting ourselves, with ungrateful minds, against God. In fact, experience should teach us that it is through God’s grandeur and not our own nature that we possess eternal duration. Against Heresies V 2, 2-3
It is right that we should make an oblation to God, and in all things show our gratitude to God our Maker, with a pure intention and a faith free of hypocrisy, in firm hope and fervent love, offering the first-fruits of His creation. Only the Church offers the Creator this pure oblation, offering Him, with thanksgiving, things that are part of His creation. The Jews no longer offer, for their hands are full of blood; they did not accept the Word through whom an offering can be made to God, Nor do any of the conventicles of the heretics make an offering. For some of them say that the Father is different from the Creator, and so, in offering Him things from this created world of ours, they make Him look envious and covetous of someone else’s property. Other heretics say that our world is the outcome of defect, ignorance, and passion, and so, when they offer Him the fruits of ‘ignorance’, ‘passion’, and ‘defect’, they sin against their Father, insulting Him rather than giving Him thanks. And how can they say that the bread over which thanks has been given is the Lord’s Body and the cup His Blood, when they will not admit that that same Lord is the Son of the world’s Creator, that is, His Word, through whom trees bear fruit, the fountains gush forth, and ‘the earth gives first the blade, then the ear, then the full grain in the ear’ (Mark 4:28)? Then again, how can they say that the flesh, which is nourished with the Body and Blood of the Lord, falls into corruption and does not partake of life? They should either change their opinions or stop offering what we have just mentioned! Our opinion, however, is in harmony with the Eucharist, and the Eucharist confirms our opinion. For we offer Him His own, consistently proclaiming the communion and unity of flesh and Spirit. For just as the bread which comes from the earth, having received the invocation of God, is no longer ordinary bread, but the Eucharist, consisting of two realities, earthly and heavenly, so our bodies, having received the Eucharist, are no longer corruptible, because they have the hope of the resurrection. Against Heresies IV 18, 4-5
