Gal. i. 4. Who gave himself for our sins, that he might deliver us from this present evil tvorld, according to the will of God and our Father.
THESE words are a part of an introductory prayer, with which St. Paul begins almost all his epistles. The portion of it which I have selected for the subject of our present contemplation, expresses a truth, which, if stated in a didactic form, might have somewhat of a forbidding aspect ; but, as incidentally mentioned, in the midst of a prayer which conveyed to the Ga- latian Church the strongest evidence of his regard for their welfare, it comes recommended to us by all the endearments of Christian love. One thing, in particular, we cannot fail to notice ; namely, that the sentiment contained in it was well known amongst them, and universally approved. It needed nothing to confirm it, nothing to enforce it. They were in the habit of looking to the Saviour, as well as to God the Father, for all the blessings of " grace and peace:" and to the one, as well as to the other, of these divine Persons, did they ascribe all " glory for ever and ever." The nature of their obligations, too, both to the one and to the other, they clearly understood. They knew, that to " deliver them from this present evil world," was the Father's object in sending to them his Son, and the Son's object in dying for them.
The introduction therefore of this sentiment would not offend them : on the contrary, it would meet with their most cordial concurrence ; and would in- creasingly occupy their minds, whenever they were engaged in the blessed work of supplication and thanksgiving. Well therefore may the truths which it will of necessity lead me to inculcate be received by you, not as hard sayings, but as expressions of love.
Consider, then, with me, I. What is the great object aimed at in our redemp- tion by Christ —
Persons at all conversant with the Gospel would, without hesitation, say, that Christ gave himself for us, to deliver us from the guilt of our sins, and from the condemnation due to them. But the complete connexion which that subject has with our deliver- ance from the world would not so immediately occur to the minds of all. That, therefore, it shall now be my endeavour to point out.
Through the fall of our first parents, the world has usurped, in the heart of man, the place which was originally assigned to God —
[The world, as first constituted, and as subordinated to God, was good : but, as rivalling God in the affections of men, it, and every thing in it, is evil. To fallen man it is become his one object of desire, his one source of pleasure, his one ground of confidence. It occupies all his thoughts : it is his pursuit, his portion, and his god. As for his Creator, he flees from him, as Adam did in Paradise. He delights not to contemplate him, to seek him, to serve him, to enjoy him. Nay, if the inspired testimony be true, " God is not in all his thoughts." The things of time and sense engross him utterly. When he rises in the morning, when he passes through the day, when he lies down to rest at night, the world, with its cares, its pleasures, its vanities, binds him as with adamantine chains, and keeps him from ever soaring to his God. He loves his bonds indeed, and feels them not : but he is bound notwithstanding ; and, whilst " walking according to the course of this world, he is walking according to the dictates of the prince of the power of the air, the spirit that now worketh in all the children of disobedience a."]
a Eph. ii. 2.