II. In their states before God —
In the words of the text there is a double anti- thesis, which is rather obscured by the present trans- lation, but which should be noticed in order to a clear understanding of the passaged
" These (the unbelievers) stumble at the word, being disobedient" —
[In what manner they stumble at the word, has been already noticed. We must now endeavour to trace their stumbling to its proper causes.
It is certainly, in the first instance, owing to their own
e Ps. cxviii. 22. f Isai. viii. 14.
s The words in Italics, ver. 8. should he left out ; and 0< be translated " these." The double antithesis will then be clear : — 'Yjj.lv, he is precious ; utthQovoi Se, he is a stumbling-block. Ol, these, stumbje through their oivn depravity ; 'Y/jeIq Be, enjoy your privileges
as a chosen generation.
o
" disobedience." Men are filled with pride, and are unwilling to embrace any sentiment that tends to abase them. They are also full of worldly and carnal lusts, which they cannot endure to have mortified and subdued. In short, their prejudices and their passions are altogether adverse to the Gospel : so that, when the word is preached to them, they instantly set themselves against it. In vain are proofs adduced ; in vain are motives urged; in vain are all human efforts to conciliate their regard to Christ : the language of their hearts is, " I have loved strangers, and after them will I goh." The contempt which the Pharisees poured on Christ, on account of his pro- hibiting the love of money, is traced by the Evangelists to this very source; "The Pharisees were covetous, and they derided him1." And our Lord expressly recommends obedience as the best preparative for receiving the knowledge of his Gospel ; " If any man will do God's will, he shall know of the doctrine, whether it be of Godk."
But, according to the words of the text, it seems as if men's unbelief was to be traced ultimately to the decrees of God respecting them. We cannot however understand them as establishing so awful a doctrine : nay, we cannot think that the doctrine of absolute reprobation can ever be established, while those words remain in the Bible, " As I live, saith the Lord God, I have no pleasure in the death of a sinner1." Nevertheless we are not disposed to explain away the words of the text; for they certainly have a very awful and im- portant meaning, to which it becomes us to attend. God has decreed, that they who will not receive the Gospel for the illumination of their minds, shall eventually be blinded by it; that they who are not softened by it, shall be hardened™; that they to whom it is not " a savour of life unto life, shall find it a savour of death unto death11." The Gospel is cer- tainly so constituted, that it shall produce these effects. Christ is " set for the fall, as well as for the rising, of many in Israel0." " He is for a sanctuary," to protect and save the humble ; but he is also " for a stone of stumbling," yea, " for a gin and a snare, that many (even all that are proud, perverse, and obsti- nate) may stumble and fall, and be broken, and be snared, and be taken p."]
" But ye" (believers) are exalted to the highest privileges by the Gospel —
[The various terms here used were originally intended to mark the privileges of the Jewish nation q: but they are
h Jer. ii. 25. ' Luke xvi. 14. k John vii. 17.
1 Ezek. xxxiii. 11. m lsai. vi. 9, 10. n 2 Cor. ii. 16.
0 Luke ii. 34. p lsai. viii. 14, 15.
i Exod. xix. 6. Dent. vii. 6.