FOOTNOTES:

FOOTNOTES:[33]The arrangement above made of the lines of this intricate passage is designed to guide the eye to its elucidation. Our disposition of the verses has not been determined by any preconceived interpretation, but by the parallelism of expression and cadences of phrase. The rhythmical structure of the piece, it seems to us, supplies the key to its explanation, and reduces to order its long-drawn and heaped-up relative and prepositional clauses, which are grammatically so unmanageable.[34]Χαῖρε, κεχαριτωμένη. It is impossible to reproduce in English the beautiful assonance—theplayof sound and sense—in Gabriel’s greeting, as St Luke renders it.[35]See Rom. i. 16–18, iii. 19–v. 21, vi. 7, vii. 1–6, viii. 1–4, 31–34, x. 6–9; 1 Cor. xv. 3, 4, 17, 56, 57; 2 Cor. v. 18–21; Gal. ii. 14–iii. 14, vi. 12–14. The latter passages the writer has endeavoured to expound in Chapters X. to XII. and XXVIII. of his Commentary onGalatiansin this series.[36]It is an error to suppose, as one sometimes hears it said, thattrespassesortransgressionsare a light and comparatively trivial form of sin. Both words denote, in the language of Scripture, definite offences against known law, departures from known duty. Adam’s sin was the typical “transgression” and “trespass” (Rom. v. 14, 15, etc.; comp. ii. 23; Gal. iii. 19).[37]Gal. iii. 13; 1 Cor. vi. 19, 20.[38]SeeThe Evangelical Revival, and other Sermons, pp. 149–170, on “The Forgiveness of Sins.”[39]Bishop Ellicott, who advocates the latter rendering, objects to Meyer’s interpretation that it is “doubtful in point of usage.”Pace tanti viri, we must retort this objection upon the new translation.To obtain by lot, to have (a thing) allotted to one, is the meaning regularly given toκληροῦσθαιin the classical dictionaries; and in O.T. usage thelot(κλῆρος) becomes theinheritance(the thingallotted). The verb is repeatedly used by Philo with the meaningto obtain, orreceive an inheritance; whereas there seems to be no real parallel to the other rendering. It is true thatκληροῦσθαιin the sense of the A.V. requires an object; but that is virtually supplied byἐν ᾧ: “we had our inheritance allottedin Christ.” Comp. Col. i. 12, “the lot of the saintsin the light,” which signifies not the locality, but the nature and content of the saints’ heritage.[40]See Gal. iii. 22—iv. 7; and Chapters XV.—XVII. in theExpositor’s Bible(Galatians), on Sonship and Inheritance in St Paul.[41]Compare Acts xxvi. 18, which also speaks to this association of ideas in St Paul’s mind, with vers. 4, 5, 7, and 11 in this chapter.[42]Vv. 8, 9, ch. iii. 4, 5; comp. Col. ii. 2, 3; 1 Cor. ii. 6–9.[43]“The fulness of the time,” Gal. iv. 4; “in due season,” Rom. v. 6; “in its own times,” 1 Tim. ii. 6. These are all synonymous expressions for the Messianic era. Comp. Heb. i. 2, ix. 26; 1 Pet. i. 20.[44]Ch. iii. 8, 9; Col. i. 25; 1 Cor. iv. 1; 1 Tim. i. 4, i. 7; 2 Tim. i. 9–11; and especially Rom. xvi. 25, 26.[45]Comp. ch. v. 5; 1 Cor. xv. 24–28; Phil. ii. 9–12; Heb. ii. 8; Rev. i. 5, xi. 15, xvii. 14; Dan. vii. 13, 14.[46]One wonders that our Revisers, so attentive to all points of Greek idiom, did not think it worth while to discriminate betweenChristandthe Christin such passages as this. In Ephesians this distinction is especially conspicuous and significant. See vv. 12, 20 iii. 17, iv. 20, v. 23; similarly in 1 Cor. xv. 22; Rom. xv. 3.

[33]The arrangement above made of the lines of this intricate passage is designed to guide the eye to its elucidation. Our disposition of the verses has not been determined by any preconceived interpretation, but by the parallelism of expression and cadences of phrase. The rhythmical structure of the piece, it seems to us, supplies the key to its explanation, and reduces to order its long-drawn and heaped-up relative and prepositional clauses, which are grammatically so unmanageable.

[34]Χαῖρε, κεχαριτωμένη. It is impossible to reproduce in English the beautiful assonance—theplayof sound and sense—in Gabriel’s greeting, as St Luke renders it.

[35]See Rom. i. 16–18, iii. 19–v. 21, vi. 7, vii. 1–6, viii. 1–4, 31–34, x. 6–9; 1 Cor. xv. 3, 4, 17, 56, 57; 2 Cor. v. 18–21; Gal. ii. 14–iii. 14, vi. 12–14. The latter passages the writer has endeavoured to expound in Chapters X. to XII. and XXVIII. of his Commentary onGalatiansin this series.

[36]It is an error to suppose, as one sometimes hears it said, thattrespassesortransgressionsare a light and comparatively trivial form of sin. Both words denote, in the language of Scripture, definite offences against known law, departures from known duty. Adam’s sin was the typical “transgression” and “trespass” (Rom. v. 14, 15, etc.; comp. ii. 23; Gal. iii. 19).

[37]Gal. iii. 13; 1 Cor. vi. 19, 20.

[38]SeeThe Evangelical Revival, and other Sermons, pp. 149–170, on “The Forgiveness of Sins.”

[39]Bishop Ellicott, who advocates the latter rendering, objects to Meyer’s interpretation that it is “doubtful in point of usage.”Pace tanti viri, we must retort this objection upon the new translation.To obtain by lot, to have (a thing) allotted to one, is the meaning regularly given toκληροῦσθαιin the classical dictionaries; and in O.T. usage thelot(κλῆρος) becomes theinheritance(the thingallotted). The verb is repeatedly used by Philo with the meaningto obtain, orreceive an inheritance; whereas there seems to be no real parallel to the other rendering. It is true thatκληροῦσθαιin the sense of the A.V. requires an object; but that is virtually supplied byἐν ᾧ: “we had our inheritance allottedin Christ.” Comp. Col. i. 12, “the lot of the saintsin the light,” which signifies not the locality, but the nature and content of the saints’ heritage.

[40]See Gal. iii. 22—iv. 7; and Chapters XV.—XVII. in theExpositor’s Bible(Galatians), on Sonship and Inheritance in St Paul.

[41]Compare Acts xxvi. 18, which also speaks to this association of ideas in St Paul’s mind, with vers. 4, 5, 7, and 11 in this chapter.

[42]Vv. 8, 9, ch. iii. 4, 5; comp. Col. ii. 2, 3; 1 Cor. ii. 6–9.

[43]“The fulness of the time,” Gal. iv. 4; “in due season,” Rom. v. 6; “in its own times,” 1 Tim. ii. 6. These are all synonymous expressions for the Messianic era. Comp. Heb. i. 2, ix. 26; 1 Pet. i. 20.

[44]Ch. iii. 8, 9; Col. i. 25; 1 Cor. iv. 1; 1 Tim. i. 4, i. 7; 2 Tim. i. 9–11; and especially Rom. xvi. 25, 26.

[45]Comp. ch. v. 5; 1 Cor. xv. 24–28; Phil. ii. 9–12; Heb. ii. 8; Rev. i. 5, xi. 15, xvii. 14; Dan. vii. 13, 14.

[46]One wonders that our Revisers, so attentive to all points of Greek idiom, did not think it worth while to discriminate betweenChristandthe Christin such passages as this. In Ephesians this distinction is especially conspicuous and significant. See vv. 12, 20 iii. 17, iv. 20, v. 23; similarly in 1 Cor. xv. 22; Rom. xv. 3.

“[That we might be to the praise of His glory:]We who had before hoped in the Christ, in whom also yehave hoped,Since ye heard the word of truth, the gospel of your salvation,—In whom indeed, when ye believed, ye were sealed with the Holy Spirit of the promise,Which is the earnest of our inheritance, till the redemption ofGod’spossession,—To the praise of His glory.”Eph.i. 12–14.

When the apostle reaches the “heritage” conferred upon us in Christ (ver. 11), he is on the boundary between the present and the future. Into that future he now presses forward, gathering from it his crowning tribute “to the praise of God’s glory.” We shall find, however, that this heritage assumes a twofold character, as did the conception of the inheritance of the Lord in the Old Testament. If the saints have their heritage in Christ, partly possessed and partly to be possessed, God has likewise, and antecedently, His inheritance in them, of which He too has still to take full possession.[47]

Opening upon this final prospect, St Paul touches on a subject of supreme interest to himself and that could not fail to find a place in his great Act of Praise—viz.,the admission of the Gentilesto the spiritual property of Israel. The thought of the heirship of believers and of God’s previous counsel respecting it (ver. 11), brought before his mind the distinction between Jew and Gentile and the part assigned to each in the Divine plan. Hence he varies the general refrain in verse 12 by saying significantly, “thatwemight be to the praise of His glory.” This emphaticweis explained in the opening phrase of the last strophe: “that have beforehand fixed our hope on the Christ,”—the heirs of Israel’s hope in “Him of whom Moses in the law and the prophets did write.” With this “we” of Paul’s Jewish consciousness the “ye also” of verse 13 is set in contrast by his vocation as Gentile apostle. This second pronoun, by one of Paul’s abrupt turns of thought, is deprived of its predicating verb; but that is given already by the “hoped” of the last clause. “The Messianic hope, Israel’s ancient heirloom, in its fulfilment isyoursas much as ours.”

This hope of Israel pointed Israelite and Gentile believer alike to the completion of the Messianic era, when the mystery of God should be finished and His universe redeemed from the bondage of corruption (vv. 10, 14). By the “one hope” of the Christian calling the Church is now made one. From this point of view the apostle in chapter ii. 12 describes the condition in which the gospel found his Gentile readers as that of men cut off from Christ, strangers to the covenants of promise,—in a word, “having no hope”; while he and his Jewish fellow-believers held the priority that belonged to those whose are the promises.The apostle stands precisely at the juncture where the wild shoot of nature is grafted into the good olive tree. A generation later no one would have thought of writing of “the Christ in whomyou(Gentiles)alsohave found hope”; for then Christ was the established possession of the Gentile Church.

To these Christless heathen Christ and His hope came, when they “heard the word of truth, the gospel of their salvation.” A great light had sprung up for them that sat in darkness; the good tidings of salvation came to the lost and despairing. “To the Gentiles,” St Paul declared, addressing the obstinate Jews of Rome, “this salvation of God was sent: they indeed will hear it” (Acts xxviii. 28). Such was his experience in Ephesus and all the Gentile cities. There were hearing ears and open hearts, souls longing for the word of truth and the message of hope. The trespass of Israel had become the riches of the world. For this on his readers’ behalf he gives joyful thanks,—that his message proved to be “the gospel ofyoursalvation.”

Salvation, as St Paul understands it, includes our uttermost deliverance, the end of death itself (1 Cor. xv. 26). He renders praise to God for that He has sealed Gentile equally with Jewish believers with the stamp of His Spirit, which makes them His property and gives assurance of absolute redemption.

There are three things to be considered in this statement:the sealitself,the conditionsupon which, andthe purposefor which it is affixed.

I. A seal is a token of proprietorship put by the owner upon his property;[48]or it is the authentication of somestatement or engagement, the official stamp that gives it validity;[49]or it is the pledge of inviolability guarding a treasure from profane or injurious hands.[50]There is the protecting seal, the ratifying seal, and the proprietary seal. The same seal may serve each or all of these purposes. Here the thought of possession predominates (comp. ver. 4); but it can scarcely be separated from the other two. The witness of the Holy Spirit marks men out as God’spurchased rightin Christ (1 Cor. vi. 19, 20). In that very fact it guards them from evil and wrong (iv. 30), while it ratifies their Divine sonship (Gal. iv. 6) and guarantees their personal share in the promises of God (2 Cor. i. 20–22). It is a bond between God and men; a sign at once of what we are and shall be to God, and of what He is and will be to us. It secures, and it assures. It stamps us for God’s possession, and His kingdom and glory as our possession.

This seal is constituted bythe Holy Spirit of the promise,—in contrast with the material seal, “in the flesh, wrought by hand,”[51]which marked the children of the Old Covenant from Abraham downwards, previously to the fulfilment of the promise (Gal. iii. 14). We bear it in the inmost part of our nature, where we are nearest to God: “The Spirit witnesseth to our spirit.” “The Israelites also were sealed, but by circumcision, like cattle and irrational animals. We were sealed by the Spirit, as sons” (Chrysostom). The stamp of God is on the consciousness of His children. “We know that Christ abides in us,” writes St John, “from the Spirit which He gave us” (1 Ep. iii. 24). Underthis seal is conveyed the sum of blessing comprised in our salvation. Jesus promised, “Your heavenly Father will give His Holy Spirit to them that ask” (Luke xi. 13), as if there were nothing else to ask. Giving us this, God gives everything, gives us Himself! In substance or anticipation, this one bestowment contains all good things of God.

The apostle writes “the Spirit of the promise,the Holy[Spirit],” with emphasis on the word of quality; for the testifying power of the seal lies in its character. “Beloved, believe not every spirit; but try the spirits, whether they are of God” (1 John iv. 1). There are false prophets, deceiving and deceived; there are promptings from “the spirit that works in the sons of disobedience,” diabolical inspirations, so plausible and astonishing that they may deceive the very elect. It is a most perilous error to identify the supernatural with the Divine, to suppose mere miracles and communications from the invisible sphere a sign of the working of God. Antichrist can mimic Christ by his “lying wonders and deceit of unrighteousness” (2 Thess. ii. 8–12). Jesus never appealed to the power of His works in proof of His mission, apart from their ethical quality. God’s Spirit works after His kind, and makes ours a holy spirit. There is an objective and subjective witness—the obverse and reverse of the medal (2 Tim. ii. 19). To be sealed by the Holy Spirit is, in St Paul’s dialect, the same thing as to besanctified; only, the phrase of this text brings out graphically the promissory aspect of sanctification, its bearing on our final redemption.[52]

When the sealing Spirit is called the Spiritofpromise, does the expression look backward or forward? Is the apostle thinking of the past promise now fulfilled, or of some promise still to be fulfilled? The former, undoubtedly, is true.Thepromise (the article is significant[53]) is, in the words of Christ, “the promise of the Father.” On the day of Pentecost St Peter pointed to the descent of the Holy Spirit as God’s seal upon the Messiahship of Jesus, fulfilling what was promised to Israel for the last days. When this miraculous effusion was repeated in the household of Cornelius, the Jewish apostle saw its immense significance. He asked, “Can any one forbid water that these should be baptized, who have received the Holy Spirit as well as we?” (Acts x. 47). This was the predicted criterion of the Messianic times. Now it wasgiven, and with an abundance beyond hope,—poured out, in the full sense of Joel’s words,upon all flesh.

Now, if God has done so much—for this is the implied argument of verses 13, 14—He will surely accomplish the rest. The attainment of past hope is the warrant of present hope. He who gives us His own Spirit, will give us the fulness of eternal life. The earnest implies the sum. In the witness of the Holy Spirit there is for the Christian man the power of an endless life, a spring of courage and patience that can never fail.

II. But there are very definite conditions, upon which this assurance depends. “When you heard the word of truth, the gospel of your salvation”—there is the outward condition: “when you believed”—there is the inward and subjective qualification for the affixing of the seal of God to the heart.

How characteristic is this antithesis ofhearingandfaith![54]St Paul delights to ring the changes upon these terms. The gospel he carried about with him was a message from God to men, the good news about Jesus Christ. It needs, on the one hand, to be effectively uttered, proclaimed so as to be heard with the understanding; and, on the other hand, it must be trustfully received and obeyed. Then the due result follows. There is salvation,—conscious, full.

If they are to believe unto salvation, men must be made tohearthe word of truth. Unless the good news reaches their ears and their heart, it is no good news to them. “How shall they believe in Him of whom they have not heard? how shall they hear without a preacher?” (Rom. x. 14). The light may be true, and the eyes clear and open; but there is no vision till both meet, till the illuminating ray falls on the sensitive spot and touches the responsive nerve. How many sit in darkness, groping and wearying for the light, ready for the message if there were any to speak it to them! Great would Paul’s guilt have been, if when Christ called him to preach to the heathen, he had refused to go, if he had withheld the gospel of salvation from the multitudes waiting to receive it at his lips. Great also is our fault and blame, and heavy the reproach against the Church to-day, when with means in her hand to make Christ known to almost the whole world, she leaves vast numbers of men within her reach in ignorance of His message. She is not the proprietor of the Christian truth: it is God’s gospel; and she holds it as God’s trustee for mankind,—that through her“the message might be fully preached, and that all the nations might hear” (2 Tim. iv. 17). She has St Paul’s programme in hand still to complete, and loiters over it.

The nature of the message constitutes our duty to proclaim it. It is “the wordof truth.” If there be any doubt upon this, if our certainty of the Christian truth is shaken and we can no longer announce it with full conviction, our zeal for its propagation naturally declines. Scepticism chills and kills missionary fervour, as the breath of the frost the young growth of spring. At home and amongst our own people evangelistic agencies are supported by many who have no very decided personal faith, from secondary motives,—with a view to their social and reformatory benefits, out of philanthropic feeling and love to “the brother whom we have seen.” The foreign missions of the Church, like the work of the Gentile apostle, gauge her real estimate of the gospel she believes and the Master she serves.

But if we have no sure word of prophecy to speak, we had better be silent. Men are not saved by illusion or speculation. Christianity did not begin by offering to mankind a legend for a gospel, or win the ear of the world for a beautiful romance. When the apostles preached Jesus and the resurrection, they declared what they knew. To have spoken otherwise, to have uttered cunningly devised fables or pious phantasies or conjectures of their own, would have been, in their view, to bear false witness against God. Before the hostile scrutiny of their fellow-men, and in prospect of the awful judgement of God, they testified the facts about Jesus Christ, the things that they had “heard, and seen with their eyes, and which their hands had handled concerning the word of life.” They were as sure of these things as of their own being.Standing upon this ground and with this weapon of truth alone in their hands, they denounced “the wiles of error” and the “craftiness of men who lie in wait to deceive” (iv. 14).

And they could always speak of this word of truth, addressing whatsoever circle of hearers or of readers, as “the good news ofyour salvation.” The pronoun, as we have seen, is emphatic. The glory of Paul’s apostolic mission was its universalism. His message was to every man he met. His latest writings glow with delight in the world-wide destination of his gospel.[55]It was his consolation that the Gentiles in multitudes received the Divine message to which his countrymen closed their ears. And he rejoiced in this the more, because he foresaw that ultimately the gospel would return to its native home, and at last amid “the fulness of the Gentiles all Israel would be saved” (Rom. xi. 13–32). At present Israel was not prepared to seek, while the Gentiles were seeking righteousness by the way of faith (Rom. ix. 30–33).

For it is upon this question offaiththat the whole issue turns. Hearing is much, when one hears the word of truth and news of salvation. But faith is the point at which salvation becomes ours—no longer a possibility, an opportunity, but a fact: “in whom indeed,when you believed, you were sealed with the Holy Spirit.” So characteristic is this act of the new life to which it admits, that St Paul is in the habit of calling Christians, without further qualification, simplybelievers(“those who believe,” or “who believed”). Faith and the gift of the Holy Spirit are associated in his thoughts, as closely as Faith and Justification.“Did you receive the Holy Spirit when you believed?” was the question he put to the Baptist’s disciples whom he found at Ephesus on first arriving there (Acts xix. 2). This was the test of the adequacy of their faith. He reminds the Galatians that they “received the Spirit from the hearing of faith,” and tells them that in this way the blessing and the promise of Abraham were theirs already (Gal. iii. 2, 7, 14). Faith in the word of Christ admits the Spirit of Christ, who is in the word waiting to enter. Faith is the trustful surrender and expectancy of the soul towards God; it sets the heart’s door open for Christ’s incoming through the Spirit This was the order of things from the beginning of the new dispensation. “God gave to them,” says St Peter of the first baptized Gentiles, “the like gift as He did also unto us, when we believed on the Lord Jesus Christ. The Holy Ghost fell on them, as on us at the beginning” (Acts xi. 15–18). Upon our faith in Jesus Christ, the Holy Spirit enters the soul and announces Himself by His message of adoption, crying in us to God,Abba, Father(Gal. iv. 6, 7).

In the chamber of our spirit, while we abide in faith, the Spirit of the Father and the Son dwells with us, witnessing to us of the love of God and leading us into all truth and duty and divine joy, instilling a deep and restful peace, breathing an energy that is a fire and fountain of life within the breast, which pours out itself in prayer and labour for the kingdom of God. The Holy Spirit is no mere gift to receive, or comfort to enjoy; He is an almighty Force in the believing soul and the faithful Church.

III. The end for which the seal of God was affixed to Paul’s Gentile readers, along with their Jewishbrethren in Christ, appears in the last verse, with which the Act of Praise terminates: “sealed,” he says, “with the Holy Spirit, which is the earnest of our inheritance,until the redemption of the possession.”

The last of these words is the equivalent of the Old Testament phrase rendered in Exodus xix. 5, and elsewhere, “a peculiar treasureunto me”; in Deuteronomy vii. 6, etc., “apeculiarpeople” (i.e., people ofpossession). The same Greek term is employed by the Septuagint translators in Malachi iii. 17, where our Revisers have substituted “a peculiar treasure” for the familiar, but misleading “jewels” of the older Version. St Peter in his first epistle (ii. 9, 10) transfers the title from the Jewish people to the new Israel of God, who are “an elect race, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, a peoplefor God’s own possession.” In that passage, as in this, the Revisers have inserted the wordGod’sin order to signify whose possession the term signifies in Biblical use. In the other places in the New Testament where the same Greek noun occurs,[56]it retains its primary active force, and denotes “obtainingof the glory,” etc., “savingof the soul.” The word signifies not the possessing so much as theacquiringorsecuringof its object. The Latin Vulgate suitably renders this phrase,in redemptionem acquisitions,—“till the redemption of the acquisition.”

God has “redeemed unto Himself a people”; He has “bought us with a price.” His rights in us are both natural andacquired; they are redemptional rights, the recovered rights of the infinite love which in Jesus Christ saved mankind by extreme sacrifice from the doom of death eternal. This redemption“we have, in the remission of our trespasses” (ver. 7). But this is only the beginning. Those whose sin is cancelled and on whom God now looks with favour in Christ, are thereby redeemed and saved (ii. 5, 8).[57]They are within the kingdom of grace; they have passed out of death into life. They have but to persist in the grace into which they have entered, and all will be well. “Now,” says the apostle to the Romans, “you are made free from sin and made servants to God; you have your fruit unto holiness, and the end eternal life.”

Our salvation is come; but, after all, it is still to come. We find the apostle using the words “save” and “redeem” in this twofold sense, applying them both to the commencement and the consummation of the new life.[58]The last act, in Romans viii. 23, he calls “the redemption of the body.” This will reinstate the man in the integrity of his twofold being as a son of God. Hence our bodily redemption is there called anadoption. For as Jesus Christ by His resurrection was “marked out [orinstated] as Son of God in power” (Rom. i. 4), not otherwise will it be with His many brethren. Their reappearance in the new “body of glory” will be a “revelation” to the universe “of the sons of God.”

But this last redemption—or rather this last act of the one redemption—like the first, is through the bloodof the cross. Christ has borne for us in His death the entire penalty of sin; the remission of that penalty comes to us in two distinct stages. The shadow of death is lifted off from our spirits now, in the moment of forgiveness. But for reasons of discipline it remains resting upon our bodily frame. Death is a usurper and trespasser in the bounds of God’s heritage. Virtually and in principle, he is abolished; but not in effect. “I will ransom them from the power of the grave,”[59]the Lord said of His Israel, with a meaning deeper than His prophet knew. When that is done, then God will have redeemed, in point of fact, those possessions in humanity which He so much prizes, that for their recovery He spared not His Son.

So long as mortality afflicts us, God cannot be satisfied on our account. His children are suffering and tortured; His people mourn under the oppression of the enemy. They sigh, and creation with them, under the burdensome and infirm tabernacle of the flesh, this body of our humiliation for which the hungry grave clamours. God’s new estate in us is still encumbered with the liabilities in which the sin of the race involved us, with the “ills that flesh is heir to.” But this mortgage—that we call, with a touching euphemism,the debt of nature—will at last be discharged. Soon shall we be free for ever from the law of sin and death. “And the ransomed of the Lord shall return and come with singing to Zion, and everlasting joy shall be upon their heads: they shall obtain gladness and joy, and sorrow and sighing shall flee away.”

To God, as He looks down upon men, the sealof His Spirit upon their hearts anticipates this full emancipation. He sees already in the redeemed spirit of His children what will be manifest in their glorious heavenly form. The same token is to ourselves as believing men the “earnest of our inheritance.” Note that at this point the apostle drops the “you” by which he has for several sentences distinguished between Jewish and Gentile brethren. He identifies them with himself and speaks of “ourinheritance.” This sudden resumption of the first person, the self-assertion of the filial consciousness in the writer breaking through the grammatical order, is a fine trait of the Pauline manner.[60]

Arrhabon, theearnest(fastening penny), is a Phœnician word of the market, which passed into Greek and Latin,—a monument of the daring pioneers of Mediterranean commerce. It denotes the part of the price given by a purchaser in making a bargain, or of the wages given by the hirer concluding a contract of service, by way of assurance that the stipulated sum will be forthcoming. Such pledge of future payment is at the same time a bond between those concerned, engaging each to his part in the transaction.

The earnest is the seal, and something more. It is an instalment, atoken in kind, a foretaste of the feast to come. In the parallel passage, Romans viii. 23, the same earnest is called “the firstfruit of the Spirit.” What the earliest sheaf is to the harvest, that the entrance of the Spirit of God into a human soul is to the glory of its ultimate salvation. The sanctity, the joy, the sense of recovered life is the samein kind then and now, differing only in degree and expression.

Of the “earnest of the Spirit” St Paul has spoken twice already, in 2 Corinthians i. 22 and v. 5, where he cites this inner witness to assure us, in the first instance, that God will fulfil to us His promises, “how many soever they be”; and in the second, that our mortal nature shall be “swallowed up of life”—assimilated to the living spirit to which it belongs—and that “God has wrought us for this very thing.” These earlier sayings explain the apostle’s meaning here. God has made us His sons, in accordance with His purpose formed in the depths of eternity (ver. 5). As sons, we are His heirs in fellowship with Christ, and already have received rich blessings out of this heritage (ver. 11). But the richest part of it, including that which concerns the bodily form of our life, is still unredeemed, notwithstanding that the price of its redemption is paid.

For this we wait till the time appointed of the Father,—the time when He will reclaim His heritage in us, and give us full possession of our heritage in Christ. We do not wait, as did the saints of former ages, ignorant of the Father’s purpose for our future lot. “Life and immortality are brought to light through the gospel.” We see beyond the chasm of death. We enjoy in the testimony of the Holy Spirit the foretaste of an eternal and glorious life for all the children of God—nay, the pledge that the reign of evil and death shall end throughout the universe.

With this hope swelling their hearts, the apostle’s readers once more triumphantly join in the refrain:To the praise of His glory.

FOOTNOTES:[47]Exod. xix. 3–6; Deut. iv. 20, 21; 1 Kings viii. 51, 53; Ps. lxxviii. 71, etc. With the above comp. Gen. xv. 8; Numb. xviii. 20; Jos. xiii. 33; Ps. xvi. 5.[48]Ch. iv. 30. The “seal” of 2 Tim. ii. 19 has both the first and third of these meanings.[49]Rom. iv. 11; 1 Cor. ix. 2; John iii. 33, vi. 27.[50]Matt. xxvii. 66; Rev. v. 1, etc.[51]Ch. ii. 11; comp. Rom. i. 28, 29; Gal. v, 5, 6; Phil. iii. 2, 3.[52]Comp. Rom. viii. 9–11; 2 Cor. v. 1–5.[53]Acts i. 4, ii. 33, 39, xiii. 32, xxvi. 6; Rom. iv. 13–20; Gal. iii. 14–29.[54]See Rom. x. 14–18; Gal. iii. 2, 5; Col. i. 6, 23; 1 Thess. ii. 13; 2 Tim. i. 13.[55]1 Tim. ii. 1–7, iv. 10; Tit. ii. 11.[56]1 Thess. v. 9; 2 Thess. ii. 14; Heb. x. 39.[57]Comp. Chapter VIII.[58]For the former usage see, along with ver. 7 and ch. ii. 5, 8; Rom. iii, 24, x. 9; Titus iii. 5; 2 Tim. i. 9; Col. i. 14; Heb. ix. 15; for the latter, ch. iv. 30; Luke xxi. 28; Rom. v. 9, 10, viii. 23; Phil. ii. 12; 1 Thess. v. 8, 9; 2 Tim. ii. 10, iv. 18. It may be doubted whether St Paul ever uses these terms to denote present salvation or redemption without the final issue being also in his thoughts. Perhaps he would have called the redemption of ver. 7, in contrast with that of Rom. viii. 23, “the redemption of the spirit.”[59]Hosea xiii. 14; Isa. xxv. 8.[60]The same incoherence occurs in Gal. iv. 5–7: “thatwemight receive the adoption of sons. And becauseyeare sons, God sent forth the Spirit of His Son intoourhearts.”

[47]Exod. xix. 3–6; Deut. iv. 20, 21; 1 Kings viii. 51, 53; Ps. lxxviii. 71, etc. With the above comp. Gen. xv. 8; Numb. xviii. 20; Jos. xiii. 33; Ps. xvi. 5.

[48]Ch. iv. 30. The “seal” of 2 Tim. ii. 19 has both the first and third of these meanings.

[49]Rom. iv. 11; 1 Cor. ix. 2; John iii. 33, vi. 27.

[50]Matt. xxvii. 66; Rev. v. 1, etc.

[51]Ch. ii. 11; comp. Rom. i. 28, 29; Gal. v, 5, 6; Phil. iii. 2, 3.

[52]Comp. Rom. viii. 9–11; 2 Cor. v. 1–5.

[53]Acts i. 4, ii. 33, 39, xiii. 32, xxvi. 6; Rom. iv. 13–20; Gal. iii. 14–29.

[54]See Rom. x. 14–18; Gal. iii. 2, 5; Col. i. 6, 23; 1 Thess. ii. 13; 2 Tim. i. 13.

[55]1 Tim. ii. 1–7, iv. 10; Tit. ii. 11.

[56]1 Thess. v. 9; 2 Thess. ii. 14; Heb. x. 39.

[57]Comp. Chapter VIII.

[58]For the former usage see, along with ver. 7 and ch. ii. 5, 8; Rom. iii, 24, x. 9; Titus iii. 5; 2 Tim. i. 9; Col. i. 14; Heb. ix. 15; for the latter, ch. iv. 30; Luke xxi. 28; Rom. v. 9, 10, viii. 23; Phil. ii. 12; 1 Thess. v. 8, 9; 2 Tim. ii. 10, iv. 18. It may be doubted whether St Paul ever uses these terms to denote present salvation or redemption without the final issue being also in his thoughts. Perhaps he would have called the redemption of ver. 7, in contrast with that of Rom. viii. 23, “the redemption of the spirit.”

[59]Hosea xiii. 14; Isa. xxv. 8.

[60]The same incoherence occurs in Gal. iv. 5–7: “thatwemight receive the adoption of sons. And becauseyeare sons, God sent forth the Spirit of His Son intoourhearts.”

“For this cause I also, having heard of the faith in the Lord Jesus which is among you, and whichye shewtoward all the saints, cease not to give thanks for you, making mentionof youin my prayers:“That the God of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of glory, may give unto you a spirit of wisdom and revelation in the knowledge of Him; having the eyes of your heart enlightened, that ye may know what is the hope of His calling, what the riches of the glory of His inheritance in the saints, and what the exceeding greatness of His power toward us who believe, according to that working of the might of His strength, which He wrought in the Christ, when He raised Him from the dead, and made Him to sit at His right hand in the heavenlyplaces.”—Eph.i. 15–20.

“For this cause I also, having heard of the faith in the Lord Jesus which is among you, and whichye shewtoward all the saints, cease not to give thanks for you, making mentionof youin my prayers:

“That the God of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of glory, may give unto you a spirit of wisdom and revelation in the knowledge of Him; having the eyes of your heart enlightened, that ye may know what is the hope of His calling, what the riches of the glory of His inheritance in the saints, and what the exceeding greatness of His power toward us who believe, according to that working of the might of His strength, which He wrought in the Christ, when He raised Him from the dead, and made Him to sit at His right hand in the heavenlyplaces.”—Eph.i. 15–20.

Because of this: because you have heard the glad tidings, and believing it have been sealed with the Holy Spirit (vv. 13, 14).I too: I your apostle, with so great an interest in your salvation, in return give thanks for you. Thus St Paul, having extolled to the uttermost God’s counsel of redemption unfolded through the ages, claims to offer especial thanksgiving for the faith of those who belong to his Gentile province and are, directly or indirectly, the fruit of his own ministry (iii. 1–13).

The intermediate clause of verse 15, describing the readers’ faith, is obscure. This form of expression occurs nowhere else in St Paul; but the construction is used by St Luke,—e.g., in Acts xxi. 21:“All the Jewswhich are amongthe Gentiles,” where it implies diffusion over a wide area. This being a circular letter, addressed to a number of Churches scattered through the province of Asia, of whose faith in many cases St Paul knew only by report, we can understand how he writes: “having heard of the faith that is [spread] amongst you.”—The love, completingfaithin the ordinary text (as in Col. i. 4), is relegated by the Revisers to the margin, upon evidence that seems conclusive.[61]The commentators, however, feel so strongly the harshness of this ellipsis that, in spite of the ancient witnesses, they read, almost with one consent,[62]“your lovetoward all the saints.” The variation of the former clause prepares us, however, for something peculiar in this. In verse 13 we found St Paul’s thought fixed on the decisive fact of his readers’faith. On this he still dwells lingeringly. The grammatical link needed between “faith” and “unto all the saints” is supplied in the Revised Version byye show, after the analogy of Philemon 5. Perhaps it might be supplied as grammatically, and in a sense better suiting the situation, byis come. Then the co-ordinate prepositional phrases qualifying “faith” have both alike a local reference, and we paraphrase the clause thus: “since I heard of the faith in the Lord Jesus which is spread amongst you, and whose report has reached all the saints.”

We are reminded of the thanksgiving for the Roman Church,“that your faith is proclaimed throughout the whole world.”[63]The success of the gospel in Asia gave encouragement to believers in Christ everywhere. St Paul loves in this way to link Church to Church, to knit the bonds of faith between land and land: in this letter most of all; for it is his catholic epistle, the epistle of the Church œcumenical.

In verse 16 we pass from praise to prayer. God is invoked by a double title peculiar to this passage, as “the God of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of glory.” The former expression is in no way difficult. The apostle often speaks, as in verse 3, of “the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ”: intending to qualify the Divine Fatherhood by another epithet, he writes for once simply of “the Godof our Lord Jesus Christ.” This reminds us of the dependence of the Lord Jesus upon the eternal Father, and accentuates the Divine sovereignty so conspicuous in the foregoing Act of Praise. Christ’s constant attitude towards the Father was that of His cry of anguish on the cross, “My God, my God!” Yet He never speaks to men ofourGod. To us God is “the God of our Lord Jesus Christ,” as He was to the men of old time “the God of Abraham and of Isaac and of Jacob.”

The key to the designationFather of gloryis in Romans vi. 4: “Christ was raised from the dead throughthe glory of the Father.” In the light of this august manifestation of God’s power to save His lost sons in Christ, we are called to see light (vv. 19, 20). Its glory shines already about God’s blessed name of Father, thrice glorified in the apostle’s praise (vv. 3–14). The title is the counterpart of “the Father of compassions” in 2 Corinthians i. 3.

And now, what has the apostle to ask of the Father of men under these glorious appellations? He asks “a spirit of wisdom and revelation in the full-knowledge[64]of Him,—the eyes of your heart enlightened, in order that you may know,” etc. This recalls the emphasis with which in verses 8 and 9 he set “wisdom and intelligence” amongst the first blessings bestowed by Divine grace upon the Church. It was the gift which the Asian Churches at the present juncture most needed; this is just now the burden of the apostle’s prayers for his people.

Thespirit of wisdom and revelationdesired will proceed from the Holy Spirit dwelling in these Gentile believers (ver. 13). But it must belong to their own spirit and direct their personal mental activity, the spirit of revelation becoming “the spirit of their mind” (iv. 23). When St Paul asks for “a spirit of wisdom andrevelation,” he desires that his readers may have amongst themselves a fountain of inspiration and share in the prophetic gifts diffused through the Church.[65]And “the knowledge—the full, deep knowledge of God” is the sphere “in” which this richer inspiration and spiritual wisdom are exercised and nourished. “Philosophy, taking man for its centre, says,Know thyself: only the inspired word, which proceeds from God, has been able to say,Know God.”[66]

The connexion of the first clause of verse 18 with the last of verse 17 is not very clear in St Paul’s Greek; there is a characteristic incoherence of structure. Thecontinuity of thought is unmistakable. He prays that through this inspired wisdom his readers may have their reason enlightened to see the grandeur and wealth of their religion. This is a vision for “the eyes of the heart.” It is disclosed to the eye behind the eye, to the heart which is the true discerner.

“The seeing eyesSee best by the light in the heart that lies.”

Yonder is an ox grazing in the meadow on a bright summer’s day. Round him is spread the fairest landscape,—a broad stretch of herbage embroidered with flowers, the river gleaming in and out amongst the distant trees, the hills on both sides bounding the quiet valley, sunshine and shadows chasing each other as they leap from height to height. But of all this what sees the grazing ox? So much lush pasture and cool shade and clear water where his feet may plash when he has done feeding. In the same meadow there stands a poet musing, or a painter busy at his easel; and on the soul of that gifted man there descends, through eyes outwardly discerning no more than those of the beast at his side, a vision of wonder and beauty which will make all time richer. The eyes of the man’s heart are opened, and the spirit of wisdom and revelation is given him in the knowledge of God’s work in nature.

Like differences exist amongst men in regard to the things of religion. “So foolish was I and ignorant,” says the Psalmist, speaking of his former dejection and unbelief, “I was as a beast before Thee!” There shall be two men sitting side by side in the same house of prayer, at the same gate of heaven. The one sees heaven opened; he hears the eternal song; his spirit is a temple filled with the glory of God. The othersees the place and the aspect of his fellow-worshippers; he hears the music of organ and choir, and the sound of some preacher’s voice. But as for anything besides, any influence from another world, it is no more to him at that moment than is the music in the poet’s soul or the colours on the painter’s canvas to the ox that eateth grass.

It is not the strangeness and distance of Divine things alone that cause insensibility; their familiarity has the same effect. We know all this gospel so well. We have read it, listened to it, gone over its points of doctrine a hundred times. It is trite and easy to us as a worn glove. We discuss without a tremor of emotion truths the first whisper and dim promise of which once lifted men’s souls into ecstasy, or cast them down into depths of shame and bewilderment so that they forgot to eat their bread. The awe of things eternal, the mystery of our faith, the Spirit of glory and of God rest on us no longer. So there come to be, as one hears it said,gospel-hardenedhearers—and gospel-hardened preachers! The eyes see—and see not; the ears hear—and hear not; the lips speak without feeling;the heart is waxen fat. This is the nemesis of grace abused. It is the result that follows by an inevitable psychological law, where outward contact with spiritual truth is not attended with an inward apprehension and response. How do we need to pray, in handling these dread themes, for a true sense and savour of Divine things,—that there may be given, and ever given afresh to us “a spirit of wisdom and revelation in the knowledge of God.”

Three things the apostle desires that his readers may see with the heart’s enlightened eyes: thehope towhich God calls them, thewealth that He possesses in them,and thepower which He is prepared to exert upon them as believing men.

I. What, then, is ourhopein God? What is the ideal of our faith? For what purpose has God called us into the fellowship of His Son? What is our religion going to do for us and to make of us?

It will bring us safe home to heaven. It will deliver us from the present evil world, and preserve us unto Christ’s heavenly kingdom. God forbid that we should make light of “the hope laid up for us in the heavens,” or cast it aside. It is an anchor of the soul, both sure and steadfast. But is itthehope of our calling? Is this what St Paul here chiefly signifies? We are very sure that it is not. But it is the one thing which stands for the hope of the gospel in many minds. “We trust that our sins are forgiven: we hope that we shall get to heaven!” The experience of how many Christian believers begins and ends there. We make of our religion a harbour of refuge, a soothing anodyne, an escape from the anguish of guilt and the fear of death; not a life-vocation, a grand pursuit. The definition we have quoted may suffice for the beginning and the end; but we need something to fill out that formula, to give body and substance, meaning and movement to the life of faith.

Let the apostle tell us what he regarded, for himself, as the end of religion, what was the object of his ambition and pursuit. “One thing I do,” he writes to the Philippians, opening to them all his heart,—“One thing I do. I press towards the mark for the prize of my high calling of God in Christ Jesus.” And what, pray, was that mark?—“that I may gain Christ and be found in Him!—that I may know Him, and the power of His resurrection and the fellowship of His sufferings, being conformed to His death, if by any means I may attain unto the final resurrection from the dead.” Yes, Paul hopes for heaven; but he hopes for something else first, and most. It is through Christ that he sees heaven. To know Christ, to love Christ, to serve Christ, to follow Christ, to be like Christ, to be with Christ for ever!—that is what St Paul lived for. Whatever aim he pursues or affection he cherishes, Christ lies in it and reaches beyond it. In doing or in suffering, in his intellect and his heart, in his thoughts for himself or for others, Christ is all things to him and in all. When life is thus filled with Christ, heaven becomes, as one may say, a mere circumstance, and death but an incident upon the way,—in the soul’s everlasting pursuit of Christ.

Behold, then, brethren, the hope of our calling. God could not call us to any destiny less or lower than this. It would have been unworthy of Him,—and may we not say, unworthy of ourselves, if we are in truth His sons? From eternity the Father of spirits has predestined you and me to be holy and without blemish before Him,—in a word, to be conformed to the image of His Son. Every other hope is dross compared to this.

II. Another vision for the heart’s eyes, still more amazing than that we have seen: “what is,” St Paul writes, “the riches of the glory of God’s inheritance in the saints.”

We saw, in considering the eleventh and fourteenth verses, how the apostle, in characteristic fashion, plays upon the double aspect of theinheritance, regarding it now as the heritage of the saints in God and again as His heritage in them. The former side of this relationshipwas indicated in the “hope of the Divine calling,”—which we live and strive for as it is promised us by God; and the latter comes out, by way of contrast, in this second clause. Verse 18 repeats in another way the antithesis of verse 14 between our inheritance and God’s acquisition. We must understand that God sets great store by us His human children, and counts Himself rich in our affection and our service. How deeply it must affect us to know this, and to see the glory that in God’s eyes belongs to His possession in believing men.

What presumption is all this, some one says. How preposterous to imagine that the Maker of the worlds interests Himself in atoms like ourselves,—in the ephemera of this insignificant planet! But moral magnitudes are not to be measured by a foot-rule. The mind which can traverse the immensities of space and hold them in its grasp, transcends the things it counts and weighs. As it is amongst earthly powers, so the law may hold betwixt sphere and sphere in the system of worlds, in the relations of bodies terrestrial and celestial to each other, that “God has chosen the weak things to put to shame the mighty, and the things that are not to bring to nought the things that are.” Through the Church He is “making known to the potentates in the heavenly places His manifold wisdom” (iii, 10). The lowly can sing evermore with Mary in the Magnificat: “He that is mighty hath magnified me.” If it be true that God spared not His Son for our salvation and has sealed us with the seal of His Spirit, if He chose us before the world’s foundation to be His saints, He must set upon those saints an infinite value. We may despise ourselves; but He thinks great things of us.

And is this, after all, so hard to understand? If the alternative were put to some owner of wide lands and houses full of treasure: “Now, you must lose that fine estate, or see your own son lost and ruined! You must part with a hundred thousand pounds—or with your best friend!” there could be no doubt in such a case what the choice would be of a man of sense and worth, one who sees with the eyes of the heart. Shall we think less nobly of God than of a right-minded man amongst ourselves?—Suppose, again, that one of our great cities were so full of wealth that the poorest were housed in palaces and fared sumptuously every day, though its citizens were profligates and thieves and cowards! What would its opulence and luxury be worth? Is it not evident thatcharacteris the only possession of intrinsic value, and that this alone gives worth and weight to other properties? “The saints that are in the earth and the excellent” are earth’s riches.

So far as we can judge of His ways, the great God who made us cares comparatively little about the upholstery and machinery of the universe; but He cares immensely about men, about the character and destiny of men. There is nothing in all that physical science discloses for God tolove, nothing kindred to Himself. “Hast thou considered my servant Job?” the Hebrew poet pictures Him saying before heaven and hell!—“Hast thou considered my servant Job?—a perfect man and upright: there is none like him in the earth.” How proud God is of a man like that, in a world like this. Who can tell the value that the Father of glory sets upon the tried fidelity of His humblest servant here on earth; the intensity with which He reciprocates the confidence of one timid, trembling human heart, or thesimple reverence of one little child that lisps His awful name? “Hetaketh pleasurein them that fear Him, in those that hope in His mercy!” Beneath His feet all the worlds lie spread in their starry splendour, our sun with its train of planets no more than one glimmering spot of light amongst ten thousand. But amidst this magnificence, what is the sight that wins His tender fatherly regard? “To that man will I look, that is poor and of a contrite spirit, and that trembles at my word.” Thus saith the High and Lofty One that inhabiteth eternity. The Creator rejoices in His works as at the beginning, the Lord of heaven and earth in His dominion. But these are not His “inheritance.” That is in the love of His children, in the character and number of His saints.Weare to be the praise of His glory.

Let us learn, then, to respect ourselves. Let us not take the world’s tinsel for wealth, and spend our time, like the man in Bunyan’s dream, scraping with “the muck-rake” while the crown of life shines above our head. The riches of a Church—nay, of any human community—lies not in its moneyed resources, but in the men and women that compose it, in their godlike attributes of mind and heart, in their knowledge, their zeal, their love to God and man, in the purity, the gentleness, the truthfulness and courage and fidelity that are found amongst them. These are the qualities which give distinction to human life, and are beautiful in the eyes of God and holy angels. “Man that is in honour and understandeth not, is like the beasts that perish.”

III. One thing more we need to understand, or what we have seen already will be of little practical avail. We may see glorious visions, we may cherish highaspirations; and they may prove to be but the dreams of vanity. Nay, it is conceivable that God Himself might have wealth invested in our nature, a treasure beyond price, shipwrecked and sunk irrecoverably through our sin. What means exist for realizing this inheritance? what power is there at work to recover these forfeited hopes, and that glory of God of which we have come so miserably short?

The answer lies in the apostle’s words: “That ye may know what is the exceeding greatness of His power toward us that believe,”—a power measured by “the energy of the might of His strength[67]which He wrought in the Christ, when He raised Him from the dead and set Him at His right hand in the heavenly places.” This is the power that we have to count upon, the force that is yoked to the world’s salvation and is at the service of our faith. Its energy has turned the tide and reversed the stream of nature—in the person of Jesus Christ and in the course of human history. It has changed death to life. Above all, it certifies the forgiveness of sin and releases us from its liabilities; it transforms the law of sin and death into the law of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus.

We preachers hear it said sometimes:“You live in a speculative world. Your doctrines are ideal and visionary,—altogether too high for men as they are and the world as we find it. Human nature and experience, the coarse realities of life are all against you.”

What would our objectors have said at the grave-side of Jesus? “The beautiful dreamer, the sublime idealist! He was too good for a world such as ours. It was sure to end like this. His ideas of life were utterly impracticable.” So they would have moralized. “And the good prophet talked—strangest fanaticism of all—of rising again on the third day! One thing at least we know, that the dead are dead and gone from us. No, we shall never see Jesus or His like again. Purity cannot live in this infected air. The grave ends all hope for men.” But, despite human nature and human experience, He has risen again, He lives for ever! That is the apostle’s message and testimony to the world. For those “who believe” it, all things are possible. A life is within our reach that seemed far off as earth from heaven.Youmay become a perfect saint.

From His open grave Christ breathed on His disciples, and through them on all mankind, the Holy Spirit. This is the efficient cause of Christianity,—the Spirit that raised Jesus our Lord from the dead. The limit to its efficacy lies in the defects of our faith, in our failure to comprehend what God gave us in His Son. Is anything now too hard for the Lord? Shall anything be called impossible, in the line of God’s promise and man’s spiritual need? Can we put an arrest upon the working of this mysterious force, upon the Spirit of the new life, and say to it: Thus far shalt thou go, and no farther?

Look at Jesus where He was—the poor, tortured, wounded body, slain by our sins, lying cold and still in Joseph’s grave: then lift up your eyes and see Himwhere He is,—enthroned in the worship and wonder of heaven! Measure by that distance, by the sweep and lift of that almighty Arm, the strength of the forces engaged to your salvation, the might of the powers at work through the ages for the redemption of humanity.

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