Col. ii. 10 — 12. Ye are complete in him, which is the Head of all principality and power : in whom also ye are circumcised with the circumcision made without hands, in putting off the body of the sins of the flesh by the circumcision of Christ : buried with him in baptism, wherein also ye are risen with him through the faith of the operation of God, who hath raised him from the dead.
MAN is prone to corrupt whatever proceeds from God. He himself came pure out of his Maker's hands : but he soon corrupted his way ; as it is said, " God made man upright ; but they have sought out many inventions a." As man has effaced the law originally written upon his heart, so has he, by ima- ginations of his own, obscured the revelation which God has given to the world. The Mosaic code was perverted by the Jews : the Christian code has been no less perverted by those who have called them- selves Christians. Even in the apostolic age, and whilst the Apostles were yet in the full exercise of their ministry, persons arose to mutilate and destroy the faith of Christ. The very professors of Chris- tianity, instead of receiving implicitly the truth as it was revealed, introduced into it their own corrupt notions : the heathen converts retaining their predi- lection for their former idolatry ; and Jewish converts striving to encumber it with their former supersti- tions. It is against such persons that St. Paul is cautioning the Colossian Church : " Beware lest any man spoil you through philosophy and vain deceit, after the traditions of men, after the rudiments of the world, and not after Christ b. The heathen phi- losophers having multiplied their deities, and assigned to them a variety of ranks and offices, those who had been converted from amongst them still felt inclined to look to subordinate deities as their mediators and protectors : whilst others from among the Jews, who
a Eccl. vii. 29. h ver. 8.