Galatians (Sections 212-218)

Section 212 "Immediately I conferred not with flesh and blood."—Galatians 1:16 The conversion of Paul is a memorable proof of the truth of Christianity. A consideration of it has been the means of the conversion of many thoughtful persons. His case is a noble instance of the gospel's power over men of mark, men of learning, men of zealous mind, and men of energetic character.

Paul, being converted, took an independent course. Being taught of God.

He did not consult those who were already believers, lest he should seem to have received his religion at second-hand.

He did not consult his relatives, who would have advised caution.

He did not consult his own interests, which all lay in the opposite direction. These he counted loss for Christ.

He did not consult his own safety, but risked life itself for Jesus. In this independent course he was justified, and should be imitated.

I. Faith needs no warrant but the will of God.

1. Good men in all ages have acted upon this conviction. Noah, Abraham, Jacob, Moses, Samson, David, Elijah, Daniel, the three who were cast into the furnace, etc.

2. To ask more is virtually to renounce the Lord as our Commander and Guide, and to lift man into his place.

3. To hesitate from self-interest is openly to defy the Lord.

4. To submit the claims of duty to the judgment of the flesh is diametrically opposed to the character and claims of the Lord Jesus, who gave himself to us, and expects us to give ourselves to him without question or reserve.

5. To delay duty until we have held such consultation almost always ends in not doing the right thing at all. Too often it is sought after that an excuse may be found for avoiding an unpleasant duty.

II. The principle has a wide range of applications.

1. To known duties. In forsaking sin we are not to consult society. In upright dealing we are not to consult the custom of trade. In consecration to Christ we are not to follow the lower standard so common among our fellow Christians. In service we are not to consult personal liking, ease, honor, prospect of advancement, or remuneration.

2. To needful sacrifices. We are not to shrink from—

Losses of situation through honesty or holiness. Losses in trade through religion.

Losses of friendship and kindly feeling through faithfulness.

Losses of position and worldly honor through inability, to lie, bribe, cringe, flatter, compromise, conceal, or change.

We had better not confer with flesh and blood; for—

Good men may be self-indulgent, and so consult their own flesh.

Bad men may practically be consulted by our fearing that they will ridicule us, and by our acting on that fear. Our own flesh and blood may be consulted by unduly considering wife, husband, brother, child, friend, etc.

3. To special service. We are not to be held back from this by—

Considerations of personal weakness.

Considerations of want of visible means.

Considerations of how others will interpret our actions.

Consult not even your brethren here; for—

Good men may not have your faith.

They cannot judge your call.

They cannot remove your responsibility.

4. To an open avowal of Christ. We must not be deterred from it by— The wishes of others, who think themselves involved in our act. The dread of contempt from those who deride godliness. The fear of not holding on, and of thus disgracing religion.

Reluctance to give up the world, and a secret clinging to its ways. This is a very perilous vice. "Remember Lot's wife."

III. The principle commends itself to our best judgment.

It is justified by—

1. The judgment which we exercise upon others. We blame them if they have no mind of their own. We applaud them if they are bravely faithful.

2. The judgment of an enlightened conscience.

3. The judgment of a dying bed.

4. The judgment of an eternal world.

Let us be in such communion with God that we need not confer with flesh and blood.

Let us not wait for second thoughts, but at once carry out convictions of duty, and obey calls for help, or impulses of love.

Confirmations An Indian missionary says that the Hindus do not act on their own convictions, but according to their own phrase, "I do as ten men do." Let the maxim of the Christian be, "I do as my God would have me do."

"Sir," said the Duke of Wellington to an officer of engineers, who urged the impossibility of executing the directions he had received, "I did not ask your opinion, I give you my orders, and I expect them to be obeyed." Such should be the obedience of every follower of Jesus. The words which he has. spoken are our law. We are not permitted to oppose thereto our judgments or fancies. Even if death were in the way, it is— Not ours to reason why—

Ours but to dare and die; and, at our Master's bidding, advance through flood or flame. —"Feathers for Arrows." But this is a hard lesson to learn. I read sometime ago of a German captain who found this out. He was drilling a company of volunteers. The parade ground was a field by the seaside. The men were going through their exercises very nicely, but the captain thought he would give them a lesson about obeying orders. They were marching up and down in the line of the water at some distance from it. He concluded to give them an order to march directly towards the water, and see how far they would go. The men are marching along. "Halt, company," says the captain. In a moment they halt. "Right face," is the next word, and instantly they wheel around. "Forward march," is then the order. At once they begin to march directly towards the water; on they go, nearer and nearer to it. Soon they reach the edge of the water. Then there is a sudden halt. "Vat for you stop? I no say halt," cried the captain. "Why, captain, here is the water," said one of the men. "Vell, vot of it," cried he, greatly excited, "Vater is nothing; fire is nothing; everything is nothing. Ven I say, Forwart martch, then you must forwart martch." The captain was right; the first duty of a soldier is to learn to obey.—Dr. Richard Newton.

What God calls a man to do he will carry him through. I would undertake to govern half-a-dozen worlds if God called me to do it; but if he did not call me to do it, I would not undertake to govern half-a-dozen sheep.—Dr. Payson.

Section 213

"But before faith came, we were kept under the law, shut up
unto the faith which should afterwards be revealed."—Galatians 3:23 Here we have a condensed history of the world before the gospel was fully revealed by the coming of our Lord Jesus. The history of each saved soul is a miniature likeness of the story of the ages. God acts upon the same principles both with the race and with individuals.

I. The unhappy period.

"Before faith came."

1. We had no idea of faith by nature. It would never occur to the human mind that we could be saved by believing in Jesus.

2. When we heard of faith as the way of salvation we did not understand it. We could not persuade ourselves that the words used by the preacher had their common and usual meaning.

3. We saw faith in others, and wondered at its results; but we could not exercise it for ourselves.

4. We could not reach to faith, even when we began to see its necessity, admitted its efficacy, and desired to exercise it. The reason of this inability was moral, not mental:

We were proud, and did not care to renounce self-righteousness.

We could not grasp the notion of salvation by faith, because it was contrary to the usual run of our opinions.

We were bewildered, because faith is a spiritual act, and we are not spiritual.

5. We were without the Spirit of God, and therefore incapable.

We do not wish to go back to the state in which we were "before faith came," for it was one of darkness, misery, impotence, hopelessness, sinful rebellion, self-conceit, and condemnation.

II. The custody we were in.

"Kept under the law, shut up."

1. We were always within the sphere of law. In fact, there is no getting out of it. As all the world was only one prison for a man who offended Cæsar, so is the whole universe no better than a prison for a sinner.

2. We were always kicking against the bounds of the law, sinning, and pining because we could not sin more.

3. We dared not overleap it altogether, and defy its power. Thus, in the case of many of us, it checked us, and held us captive with its irksome forbiddings and commandings.

4. We could not find rest. The law awakened conscience, and fear and shame attend such an awakening.

5. We could not discover a hope; for, indeed, there is none to discover while we abide under the law.

6. We could not even fall into the stupor of despair; for the law excited life, though it forbade hope.

Among the considerations which held us in bondage were these: The spirituality of the law, touching thoughts, motives, desires. The need of perfect obedience, making one sin fatal to all hope of salvation by works. The requirement that each act of obedience should be perfect. The necessity that perfect obedience should be continual throughout the whole of life.

III. The revelation which set us free.

"The faith which should afterwards be revealed." The only thing which could bring us out of prison was faith.

Faith came, and then we understood—

1. What was to be believed.

Salvation by another.

Salvation of a most blessed sort, gloriously sure, and complete.

Salvation by a most glorious person.

2. What it was to believe.

We saw that it was "trust," implicit and sincere.

We saw that it was ceasing from self, and obeying Christ.

3. Why we believed.

We were shut up to this one way of salvation.

We were shut out of every other.

We were compelled to accept free grace, or perish. Our duty is to show men how the way of human merit is closed.

We must shut them up to simple faith only, and show them that the way of faith is available. To Arrest Attention The Law and Gospel are two keys. The law is the key that shutteth up all men under condemnation, and the gospel is the key which opens the door and lets them out.—William Tyndale.

"Shut up unto the faith." To let you more effectually into the meaning of this expression, it may be right to state that in the preceding clause, "kept under the law," the term, kept, is in the original Greek, derived from a word which signifies a sentinel. The mode of conception is altogether military. The law is made to act the part of a sentry, guarding every avenue but one, and that one leads those who are compelled to take it to the faith of the gospel. They are shut up to this faith as their only alternative—like an enemy driven by the superior tactics of an opposing general, to take up the only position in which they can maintain themselves, or fly to the only town in which they can find a refuge or a security. This seems to have been a favorite style of argument with Paul, and the way in which he often carried on an intellectual warfare with the enemies of his Master's cause. It forms the basis of that masterly and decisive train of reasoning which we have in his epistle to the Romans. By the operation of skillful tactics, he (if we may be allowed the expression) maneuvered them, and shut them up to the faith of the gospel. It gave prodigious effect to his argument, when he reasoned with them, as he often does, upon their own principles, and turned them into instruments of conviction against themselves. With the Jews he reasoned as a Jew. He made use of the Jewish law as a sentinel to shut them out of every other refuge, and to shut them up to the refuge laid before them in the gospel. He led them to Christ by a schoolmaster whom they could not refuse; and the lesson of this schoolmaster, though a very decisive, was a very short one —"Cursed be he that continueth not in all the words of the law to do them." But in point of fact, they had not done them. To them, then, belonged the curse of the violated law. The awful severity of its sanctions was upon them. They found the faith and the free offer of the gospel to be the only avenue open to receive them. They were shut up unto this avenue; and the law, by concluding them all to be under sin, left them no other outlet but the free act of grace and of mercy laid before us in the New Testament.—Dr. Chalmers. The law was meant to prepare men for Christ, by showing them that there is no other way of salvation except through him. It had two especial ends: the first was to bring the people who lived under it into a consciousness of the deadly dominion of sin, to shut them up, as it were, into a prison-house out of which only one door of escape should be visible, namely, the door of faith in Jesus; the second intention was to fence about and guard the chosen race to whom the law was given—to keep them as a peculiar people separate from all the world, so that at the proper time the gospel of Christ might spring forth, and go out from them as the joy and comfort of the whole human race.—T. G. Rooke.

Section 214 "Ye did run well; who did hinder you that ye should not obey the truth?"—Galatians 5:7

Never censure indiscriminately; admit and praise that which is good, that you may the more effectually rebuke the evil. Paul did not hesitate to praise the Galatians, and say, "Ye did run well."

It is a source of much pleasure to see saints running well. To do this they must run in the right road, straight forward, perseveringly, at the top of their pace, with their eye on Christ, etc.

It is a great grief when such are hindered, or put off the road. The way is the truth, and the running is obedience: men are hindered when they cease to obey the truth.

It may be helpful to try and find out who has hindered us in our race.

I. We shall use the text in reference to hindered believers.

1. You are evidently hindered.

You are not so loving and zealous as you were.

You are quitting the old faith for new notions.

You are losing your first joy and peace.

You are not now leaving the world and self behind.

You are not now abiding all the day with your Lord.

2. Who has hindered you? Did I do it? Pray, then, for your minister. Did your fellow-members do it? You ought to have been proof against them; they could not have intended it. Pray for them. Did the world do it? Why so much in it? Did the devil do it? Resist him. Did you not do it yourself? This is highly probable. Did you not overload yourself with worldly care? Did you not indulge carnal ease? Did you not by pride become self-satisfied? Did you not neglect prayer, Bible reading, the public means of grace, the Lord's Table, etc.?

Mend your ways, and do not hinder your own soul. Did not false teachers do it, as in the case of the Galatians?

If so, quit them at once, and listen only to the gospel of Christ.

3. You must look to it, and mend your pace. Your loss has been already great. You might by this time have been far on upon the road. Your natural tendency will be to slacken still more. Your danger is great of being overtaken by error and sin. Your death would come of ceasing to obey the truth. Your wisdom is to cry for help, that you may run aright.

II. We shall use the text in reference to delaying sinners.

1. You have sometimes been set a-running.

God has blessed his word to your arousing.

God has not yet given you up; this is evident.

God's way of salvation still lies open before you.

2. What has hindered you?

Self-righteousness and trust in yourself?

Carelessness, procrastination, and neglect?

Love of self-indulgence, or the secret practice of pleasurable sins?

Frivolous, sceptical, or wicked companions?

Unbelief and mistrust of God's mercy?

3. The worst evils will come of being hindered.

Those who will not obey truth will become the dupes of lies.

Truth not obeyed is disobeyed, and so sin is multiplied.

Truth disregarded becomes an accuser, and its witness secures our condemnation.

God have mercy on hinderers. We must rebuke them.

God have mercy on the hindered. We would arouse them.

Spurs

Cecil says that some adopt the Indian maxim, that it is better to walk than to run, and better to stand than to walk, and better to sit than to stand, and better to lie than to sit. Such is not the teaching of the gospel. It is a good thing to be walking in the ways of God, but it is better to be running—making real and visible progress, day by day advancing in experience and attainments. David likens the sun to a strong man rejoicing to run a race; not dreading it and shrinking back from it, but delighting in the opportunity of putting forth all his powers. Who so runs, runs well.—The Christian. The Christian race is by no means easy. We are sore let and hindered in running "the race that is set before us," because of—(1.) Our sinful nature still remaining in the holiest saints. (2.) Some easily-besetting sin (Hebrews 12:1). (3.) The entanglements of the world, like heavy and close-fitting garments, impeding the racer's speed. (4.) Our weakness and infirmity, soon tired and exhausted, when the race is long, or the road is rough.—"In Prospect of Sunday," by G. S. Bowes.

Some are too busy, they run about too much to run well; some run too fast at the outset; they run themselves out of breath.—T. T. Lynch.

Henry Ward Beecher, in a sermon on this text, describes one of the hindrances to Christian progress thus: "We have fallen off immensely on the side of religious culture—earnest, prolonged habitual, domestic, religious culture, conducted by the reading of God's Word, and by prayer, and its family influences. And this tendency is still further augmented by the increase of religious books, or tracts, of biographies and histories, of commentaries, which tend to envelop and hide the Word of God from our minds. In other words, these things, which are called 'helps,' have been increased to such a degree, and have come to occupy so much of our attention, that when we have read our helps, we have no time left to read the things to be helped; and the Bible is covered down and lost under its 'helps.' "

It is possible that fellow-professors may hinder. We are often obliged to accommodate our pace to that of our fellow-travelers. If they are laggards we are very likely to be so too. We are apt to sleep as do others. We are stimulated or depressed, urged on or held back, by those with whom we are associated in Christian fellowship. There is still greater reason to fear that in many cases worldly friends and companions are the hinderers. Indeed, they can be nothing else. None can help us in the race but those who are themselves running it: all others must hinder. Let a Christian form an intimate friendship with an ungodly person, and from that moment all progress is stayed; he must go back; for when his companion is going in the opposite direction, how can he walk with him except by turning his back upon the path which he has formerly trodden?—P. A sailor remarks—"Sailing from Cuba, we thought we had gained sixty miles one day in our course; but at the next observation we found we had lost more than thirty. It was an under-current. The ship had been going forward by the wind, but going back by the current." So a man's course in religion may often seem to be right and progressive, but the undercurrent of his besetting sins is driving him the very contrary way to what he thinks.—Cheever.

Section 215 "Then is the offence of the cross ceased."—Galatians 5:11

Paul intends here to declare that the offense of the cross never has ceased, and never can cease. To suppose it to have ceased is folly. The religion of Jesus is most peaceful, mild and benevolent.

Yet its history shows it to have been assailed with bitterest hate all along. It is clearly offensive to the unregenerate mind.

There is no reason to believe that it is one jot more palatable to the world than it used to be. The world and the gospel are both unchanged.

I. Wherein lies the offense of the cross?

1. Its doctrine of atonement offends man's pride.

2. Its simple teaching offends man's wisdom, and artificial taste.

3. Its being a remedy for man's ruin offends his fancied power to save himself.

4. Its addressing all as sinners offends the dignity of Pharisees.

5. Its coming as a revelation offends "modern thought."

6. Its lofty holiness offends man's love of sin.

II. How is this offense shown?

1. Frequently by the actual persecution of believers.

2. More often by slandering believers, and sneering at them as old-fashioned, foolish, weak-minded, morose, self-conceited, etc.

3. Often by omitting to preach the cross. Many nowadays preach a Christless, bloodless gospel.

4. Or by importing new meanings into orthodox terms.

5. Or by mixing the truth of Christ with errors.

6. Or by openly denying the Deity of Him who died on the cross, and the substitutionary character of His sufferings.

Indeed, there are a thousand ways of showing that the cross offends us in one respect or another.

III. What then?

1. Herein is folly, that men are offended, With that which God ordains; With that which must win the day; With the only thing which can save them; With that which is full of wisdom and beauty.

2. Herein is grace, That we who once were offended by the cross, now find it to be: The one hope of our hearts, The great delight of our souls, The joyful boast of our tongues.

3. Herein is heart-searching.

Perhaps we are secretly offended at the cross.

Perhaps we give no offense to haters of the cross. Many professed Christians never cause offense to the most godless. Is this because they bear no testimony to the cross? Is this because they are not crucified to the world? Is this because there is no real trust in the cross, and no true knowledge of Christ?

Let us not follow those preachers who are not friends to the cross.

Let us have no fellowship with those who have no fellowship with Christ.

Preachers who have caught the spirit of the age are of the world, and the world loves its own; but we must disown them.

Let us not be distressed by the offense of the cross, even when it comes upon us with bitterest scorn.

Let us look for it and accept it as a token that we are in the right.

Annotations

There is a want in the human mind which nothing but the Atonement can satisfy, though it may be a stumbling-block to the Jew, and foolishness to the Greek. In the words of Henry Rogers: "It is adapted to human nature, as a bitter medicine may be to a patient. Those who have taken it, tried its efficacy, and recovered spiritual health, gladly proclaim its value. But to those who have not, and will not try it, it is an unpalatable potion still."

I open an ancient book, written in opposition to Christianity by Arnobius, and I read: "Our gods are not displeased with you Christians for worshipping the Almighty God: but you maintain the deity of one who was put to death on the cross, you believe him to be yet alive, and you adore him with daily supplications." Men showed me at Rome, in the Kircherian Museum, a square foot of the plaster of a wall of a palace not many years ago uncovered on the Palatine Hill. On the poor clay was traced a cross bearing a human figure with a brute's head. The figure was nailed to the cross, and before it a soldier was represented kneeling, and extending his hands in the Greek posture of devotion. Underneath all was scratched in rude lettering in Greek, "Alexamenos adores his God." That representation of the central thought of Christianity was made in a jeering moment by some rude soldier in the days of Caracalla; but it blazes there now in Rome, the most majestic monument of its age in the world.—Joseph Cook.

If any part of the truth which I am bound to communicate be concealed, this is sinful artifice. The Jesuits in China, in order to remove the offense of the cross, declared that it was a falsehood invented by the Jews that Christ was crucified; but they were expelled from the empire, and this was designed, perhaps, to be held up as a warning to all missionaries that no good end is to be answered by artifice.—Richard Cecil. The cross is the strength of a minister. I, for one, would not be without it for the world. I should feel like a soldier without weapons, like an artist without his pencil, like a pilot without his compass, like a laborer without his tools. Let others, if they will, preach the law and morality. Let others hold forth the terrors of hell and the joys of heaven. Let others drench their congregations with teachings about the sacraments and the church. Give me the cross of Christ. This is the only lever which has ever turned the world upside down hitherto, and made men forsake their sins. And if this will not do it, nothing will. A man may begin preaching with a perfect knowledge of Latin, Greek, and Hebrew; but he will do little or no good among his hearers unless he knows something of the cross. Never was there a minister who did much for the conversion of souls who did not dwell much on Christ crucified. Luther, Rutherford, Whitefield, M'Cheyne, were all most eminent preachers of the cross. This is the preaching that the Holy Ghost delights to bless. He loves to honor those who honor the cross.—J. C. Ryle. My thoughts once prompt round hurtful things to twine, What are they now, when two dread deaths are near? The one impends, the other shakes his spear.

Painting and sculpture's aid in vain I crave: My one sole refuge is that love Divine, Which from the cross stretched forth its arms to save.

—Last lines written by Michael Angelo, when over eighty.

Section 216 "Bear ye one another's burdens, and so fulfil the law of Christ.

"For every man shall bear his own burden."—Galatians 6:2; Galatians 6:5

Galatians apparently were fond of the law and its burdens: at least, they appeared to be ready to load themselves with ceremonies, and so fulfil the law of Moses.

Paul would have them think of other burdens, by the bearing of which they would fulfil the law of Christ.

We are not under law, but under love. But love is also law, in the best sense. The law of Christ is love.

Love is the fulfilling of the law. "Bear ye one another's burdens, and so fulfil the law of Christ."

Lest this principle should be presumed upon, he mentions the principle of individual responsibility. "Every man shall bear his own burden."

I. Community.

"Bear ye one another's burdens."

1. Negatively.

It tacitly forbids certain modes of action.

We are not to burden others. Some take a liberty to do so from this very text, as if it said, "Let others bear your burdens," which is just the reverse of what it urges.

We are not to spy out others' burdens, and report thereon.

We are not to despise them for having such loads to bear.

We are not to act as if all things existed for ourselves, and we were to bend all to our own purposes.

We are not to go through the world oblivious of the sorrows of others. We may not shut our eyes to the woes of mankind.

2. Positively.

We are to share the burdens of others. By compassion bear with their former sins. Verse 1. By patience bear with their infirmities, and even with their conceit. Verse 3. By sympathy bear their sorrows. Verses 2, 3. By assistance bear their wants. Verses 6, 10. By communion, in love and comfort, bear their struggles. By prayer and practical help bear the burden of their labors, and thus lighten it. Verse 6.

3. Specially: We ought to consider— The erring brother. Referred to in verse 1 as "overtaken in a fault." We must tenderly restore him. The provoking brother, who thinks himself to be something. See verse 3. Bear with him: his mistake will bring him many a burden before he has done with it. The brother who is peculiarly trying is to be borne with to seventy times seven, even to the measure of the law of Christ. The greatly tried is to have our greatest sympathy. The minister of Christ should be released from temporal burdens, that he may give himself wholly to the burden of the Lord.

II. Immunity.

"For every man shall bear his own burden."

We shall not bear all the burdens of others.

We are not so bound to each other that we are partakers in wilful transgression, or negligence, or rebellion.

1. Each must bear his own sin if he persists in it.

2. Each must bear his own shame, which results from his sin.

3. Each must bear his own responsibility in his own sphere.

4. Each must bear his own judgment at the last.

III. Personality.

"Everyman . . . his own burden."

True godliness is a personal affair, and we cannot cast off our individuality: therefore, let us ask for grace to look well to ourselves in the following matters:—

1. Personal religion. The new birth, repentance, faith, love, holiness, fellowship with God, etc., are all personal.

2. Personal self-examination. We cannot leave the question of our soul's condition to the judgment of others.

3. Personal service. We have to do what no one else can do.

4. Persona] responsibility. Obligations cannot be transferred.

5. Personal effort. Nothing can be a substitute for this.

6. Personal sorrow. "The heart knoweth its own bitterness."

7. Personal comfort. We need the Comforter for ourselves, and we must personally look up to the Lord for his operations.

All this belongs to the Christian, and we may judge ourselves by it. So bear your burden as not to forget others. So live as not to come under the guilt of other men's sins. So help others as not to destroy their self-reliance.

Pithy Brevities An old anecdote of the great Napoleon records that, while walking along a country road attended by some of his officers, he encountered a peasant heavily laden with fagots for fuel. The peasant was about to be jostled aside, as a matter of course, by his social superiors, when the Emperor, laying his hand on the arm of the foremost member of his escort, arrested the whole party, and gave the laboring man the use of the road, with the remark, "Messieurs, respect the burden."

Let him who expects one class in society to prosper to the highest degree, while others are in distress, try whether one side of his face can smile while the other is pinched.—Thomas Fuller.

There is a proverb, but none of Solomon's, "Every man for himself, and God for us all." But where every man is for himself, the devil will have all.—William Seeker.

"Every man shall bear his own burden"; this is the law of necessity. "Bear ye one another's burdens"; this is the law of Christ. Let a man lighten his own load by sharing his neighbor's burden.—T. T. Lynch.

There is a gateway at the entrance of a narrow passage in London, over which is written, "No burdens allowed to pass through." "And yet we do pass constantly with ours," said one friend to another, as they turned up this passage out of a more frequented and broader thoroughfare. They carried no visible burdens, but they were like many who, although they have no outward pack upon their shoulders, often stoop inwardly beneath the pressure of a heavy load upon the heart. The worst burdens are those which never meet the eye.

Bishop Burnet, in his charges to the clergy of his diocese, used to be extremely vehement in his declamations against pluralities. In his first visitation to Salisbury, he urged the authority of St. Bernard, who being consulted by one of his followers whether he might accept of two benefices, replied, "And how will you be able to serve them both?" "I intend," answered the priest, "to officiate in one of them by a deputy." "Will your deputy suffer eternal punishment for you too?" asked the saint. "Believe me, you may serve your cure by proxy, but you must suffer the penalty in person." This anecdote made such an impression on Mr. Kelsey, a pious and wealthy clergyman then present, that he immediately resigned the rectory of Bernerton, in Berkshire, worth two hundred a year, which he then held with another of great value.—Whitecross. With many, personal service in the cause of humanity is commuted for a money payment. But we are to be soldiers in the campaign against evil, and not merely to pay the war-tax. —"Ecce Homo."

Section 217

"Be not deceived; God is not mocked: for whatsoever a
man sow eth, that shall he also reap."—Galatians 6:7

Both Luther and Calvin confine these words to the support of the ministers of the Word, and certainly therein they have weighty meaning.

Churches that starve ministers will be starved themselves. But we prefer to take the words as expressing a general principle.

I. God is not to be trifled with.

1. Either by the notion that there will be no rewards and punishments.

2. Or by the idea that a bare profession will suffice to save us.

3. Or by the fancy that we shall escape in the crowd.

4. Or by the superstitious supposition that certain rites will set all straight at last, whatever our lives may be.

5. Or by a reliance upon an orthodox creed, a supposed conversion, a presumptuous faith, and a little alms-giving.

II. The laws of his government cannot be set aside.

1. It is so in nature. Law is inexorable. Gravitation crushes the man who opposes it.

2. It is so in providence. Evil results surely follow social wrong.

3. Conscience tells us it must be so. Sin must be punished.

4. The Word of God is very clear upon this point.

5. To alter laws would disarrange the universe, and remove the foundation of the hopes of the righteous.

III. Evil sowing will bring evil reaping.

1. This is seen in the present result of certain sins.

Sins of lust bring disease into the bodily frame.

Sins of idolatry have led men to cruel and degrading practices.

Sins of temper have caused murders, wars, strifes, and misery.

Sins of appetite, especially drunkenness, cause want, misery, delirium, etc.

2. This is seen in the mind becoming more and more corrupt, and less able to see the evil of sin, or to resist temptation.

3. This is seen when the man becomes evidently obnoxious to God and man, so as to need restraint, and invite punishment.

4. This is seen when the sinner becomes himself disappointed in the result of his conduct. His malice eats his heart; his greed devours his soul; his infidelity destroys his comfort; his raging passions agitate his spirit.

5. This is seen when the impenitent is confirmed in evil, and eternally punished with remorse. Hell will be the harvest of a man's own sin. Conscience is the worm which gnaws him.

IV. Good sowing will bring good reaping. The rule holds good both ways.

Let us, therefore, enquire as to this good sowing:

1. In what power is it to be done?

2. In what manner and spirit shall we set about it?

3. What are its seeds?

Towards God, we sow in the Spirit, faith and obedience.

Towards men, love, truth, justice, kindness, forbearance.

Towards self, control of appetite, purity, etc.

4. What is the reaping of the Spirit?

Life everlasting dwelling within us and abiding there forever.

Let us sow good seed always.

Let us sow it plentifully, that we may reap in proportion.

Let us begin to sow it at once.

Seeds They that would mock God mock themselves much more.— John Trapp.

It is not an open question at all whether I shall sow or not today; the only question to be decided is: Shall I sow good seed or bad? Every man always is sowing for his own harvest in eternity either tares or wheat. According as a man soweth, so shall he also reap; he that sows the wind of vanity shall reap the whirlwind of wrath. Suppose a man should collect a quantity of small gravel and dye it carefully, so that it should resemble wheat, and sow it in his fields in spring, expecting that he would reap a crop of wheat like his neighbor's in the harvest. The man is mad; he is a fool to think that by his silly trick he can evade the laws of nature, and mock nature's God. Yet equally foolish is the conduct, and far heavier the punishment, of the man who sows wickedness now, and expects to reap safety at last. Sin is not only profitless and disastrous; it is eminently a deceitful work. Men do not of set purpose cast themselves away: sin cheats a sinner out of his soul. But sowing righteousness is never, and nowhere, lost labor. Every act done by God's grace, and at his bidding, is living and fruitful. It may appear to go out of sight, like seed beneath the furrow; but it will rise again. Sow on, Christians! Sight will not follow the seed far; but when sight fails, sow in faith, and you will reap in joy soon.—William Arnot.

"Whatsoever a man soweth that shall he also reap," etc.— No blight, nor mildew, nor scorching sun, nor rain deluge, can turn that harvest into failure.

Cast forth thy act, thy word, into the ever-living, ever-working universe: it is a seed-grain that cannot die: unnoticed today, it will be found flourishing as a Banyan grove (perhaps, alas! as Hemlock forest) after a thousand years.—Thomas Carlyle. So it is with all temptations and lusts. They are ever scattering seeds—as weeds do. What a power there is in seeds! How long-lived they are!—as we see in the mummies of Egypt, where they may have lain for thousands of years in darkness, but now come forth to grow. What contrivances they have to continue and to propagate themselves! They have wings, and they fly for miles. They may float over wide oceans, and rest themselves in foreign countries. They have hooks and attach themselves to objects. Often they are taken up by birds, which transport them to distant places. As it is with the seeds of weeds, so it is with every evil propensity and habit. It propagates itself and spreads over the whole soul, and goes down from generation to generation.—Dr. James McCosh.

Doth any think he shall lose by his charity? No worldling, when he sows his seed, thinks he shall lose his seed; he hopes for increase at harvest. Darest thou trust the ground, and not God? Sure God is a better paymaster than the earth; grace doth give a larger recompense than nature. Below, thou mayest receive forty grains for one; but in heaven (by the promise of Christ) a hundred-fold a measure heapen, and shaken, and thrust together, and yet running over. "Blessed is he that considereth the poor"; there is the seeding: "The Lord shall deliver him in the time of trouble" (Psalms 41:1); there is the harvest. Is that all? No; Matthew 25:35 : "Ye fed me when I was hungry, and gave me drink when thirsty"—comforted me in misery; there is the sowing. Venite, beati. "Come, ye blessed of my Father, inherit the kingdom prepared for you"; there is the harvest.—Thomas A dams.

Section 218

"But God forbid that I should glory, save in the cross of our Lord Jesus
Christ, by whom the world is crucified unto me, and I unto the world."—Galatians 6:14 Paul vigorously rebuked those who went aside from the doctrine of the Cross. Verses 12, 13. When we rebuke others, we must take care to go right ourselves; hence he says, "God forbid that I should glory, save in the cross." Our own resolute adherence to truth, when practically carried out, is a very powerful argument against opponents.

Paul rises to warmth when he thinks of the opponents of the cross. He no sooner touches the subject than he glows and burns.

Yet he has his reasons, and states them clearly and forcibly in the latter words of the text.

Here are three crucifixions: —

I. Christ crucified:

"The cross of our Lord Jesus Christ."

He mentions the atoning death of Jesus in the plainest and most obnoxious terms. The cross was shameful as the gallows tree.

Yet with the clearest contrast as to the person enduring it; for to him he gives his full honors in the glorious title— "our Lord Jesus Christ."

He refers to the doctrine of free justification and full atonement by the death of Jesus upon the cross. In this he gloried so as to glory in nothing else, for he viewed it—

1. As a display of the divine character. "God was in Christ"; 2 Corinthians 5:19.

2. As the manifestation of the love of the Saviour. John 15:13.

3. As the putting away of sin by atonement. Hebrews 9:26.

4. As the breathing of hope, peace, and joy to the desponding soul.

5. As the great means of touching hearts and changing lives.

6. As depriving death of terror, seeing Jesus died.

7. As ensuring heaven to all believers. In any one of these points of view the cross is a pillar of light, flaming with unutterable glory.

II. The world crucified:

"The world is crucified unto me." As the result of seeing all things in the light of the Cross, he saw the world to be like a felon executed upon a cross.

1. Its character condemned. John 12:31.

2. Its judgment condemned. Who cares for the opinion of a gibbeted felon?

3. Its teachings despised. What authority can it have?

4. Its pleasures, honors, treasures, rejected.

5. Its pursuits, maxims, and spirit cast out.

6. Its threatenings and blandishments made nothing of.

7. Itself soon to pass away, its glory and its fashion fading.

III. The believer crucified:

"And I unto the world." To the world Paul was no better than a man crucified. If faithful, a Christian may expect to be treated as only fit to be put to a shameful death. He will probably find—

1. Himself at first bullied, threatened, and ridiculed.

2. His name and honor held in small repute because of his association with the godly poor.

3. His actions and motives misrepresented.

4. Himself despised as a sort of madman, or of doubtful intellect.

5. His teachings described as exploded, dying out, etc.

6. His ways and habits reckoned to be Puritanic and hypocritical.

7. Himself given up as irreclaimable, and therefore dead to society.

Let us glory in the cross, because it gibbets the world's glory, and honor, and power.

Let us glory in the cross when men take from us all other glory.

Memoranda

It is the subject of rejoicing and glorying that we have such a Saviour. The world looked upon him with contempt; and the cross was a stumbling-block to the Jew, and folly to the Greek. But to the Christian that cross is the subject of glorying. It is so because—(1) of the love of him who suffered there; (2) of the purity and holiness of his character, for the innocent died there for the guilty; (3) of the honor there put on the law of God by his dying to maintain it unsullied; (4) of the reconciliation there made for sin, accomplishing what could be done by no other oblation, and by no power of man; (5) of the pardon there procured for the guilty; (6) of the fact that through it we become dead to the world, and are made alive unto God; (7) of the support and consolation which go from that cross to sustain us in trial; and (8) of the fact that it procured for us admission into heaven, a title to the world of glory. All glory is around the cross. It was a glorious Saviour who died; it was glorious love that led him to die; it was a glorious object to redeem a world; and it is unspeakable glory to which he will raise lost and ruined sinners by his death. Oh, who would not glory in such a Saviour!—Albert Barnes.

If you have not found out that Christ crucified is the foundation of the whole volume, you have hitherto read your Bible to very little profit. Your religion is a heaven without a sun, an arch without a keystone, a compass without a needle, a clock without spring or weights, a lamp without oil. It will not comfort you, it will not deliver your soul from hell.—J. C. Ryle. Do not be satisfied, with so many others, only to know the cross in its power to atone. The glory of the cross is that it was not only to Jesus the path to life, but that each moment it can become to us the power that destroys sin and death, and keeps us in the power of the eternal life. Learn from your Saviour the holy art of using it for this. Faith in the power of the cross and its victory will day by day make dead the deeds of the body, the lusts of the flesh. This faith will teach you to count the cross, with its continual death to self, all your glory. Because you regard the cross not as one who is still on the way to crucifixion, with the prospect of a painful death, but as one to whom the crucifixion is past, who already lives in Christ, and now only bears the cross as the blessed instrument through which the body of sin is done away (Romans 6:6, R. V.). The banner under which complete victory over sin and the world is to be won is the cross.—Andrew Murray. When Ignatius, pastor of the church at Antioch, was condemned by the emperor Trajan to suffer death at Rome, he was apprehensive that the Christians there, out of their great affection for him, might endeavor to prevent his martyrdom; and therefore wrote a letter from Smyrna to the Roman Christians, which he sent on before him, wherein he earnestly besought them to take no measures for the continuance of his life; and, amongst other things, said, "I long for death," adding as a reason why he was desirous of thus testifying his love to Christ, "My love is crucified."

Love makes the cross easy, amiable, admirable, delicious.

Brethren, the cross of Christ is your crown, the reproach of Christ your riches; the shame of Christ your glory.—Joseph, Alleine, written from "The Common Prison."