The Pulpit Commentary — Galatians — Section 207

trade e.nd commerce, and also more the moulding of the individunl charncter. The last distinction bttween male and female ha.a been materially changed by Christianity. Her equality before God was a lever power which could not but raise woman out of that degradation into which man's sin had brought her. We see the process going 011 in India which has ta.ken place in many nations, zenana agencies especially spreading influences which must eventually liberate. The most real inequ,ality is that which is produced by sin. If we are equal in son ship, let us also be equal in fidelity. (3) Ground of our <Jh,-istia,n equality. "For ye all are one man in Christ Jesus. And if ye are Christ's, then are ye Abraham's seed, heirs according to promise." It has already been implied that we are equal because of our sonship in Christ. That it may be placed beyond doubt, it is explicitly stated that we are equal because of what we are in Christ. And we &re in Christ in such a way that, because he is Abrnham's seed, we are Abraham's seed too. And, as Abraham's seed, we are heirs according to the tenor of the promise. This heirship he proceeds to connect with sonship. So that the teaching is that our equality is based on our sonship in Christ.-R. F. Ver. !.-Bewitched. Here, it is said, the doctrinal section of the Epistle beoins the preceding section being historical and the concluding section hortatory. But "'ho~ unlike this is to a cold abstract theological argument the opening words clearly show. St. Paul cares little for mere speculations of divinity. His object is practical, personal, earnest. Thus h.e expostulates rather than argues, and appeals to experience for con- firmation. He is not simply shocked at a heresy; he is grieved and hurt at the unfaithfulness, the weakness, the folly of his hearers. All error that leads us away. from Christ is sad and shameful l. THE FIRST OBJECT OF THE TRUE PREACHER OF THE GOSPEL IS TO SET FORTH CHRIST CRUCIFIED. 1. He preaches Christ. Christ is Christianity. 'l'o know him is to know all. St. Paul was most anxious to make manifest _the person and character and life of Christ. To demonstrate a system of doctrine or to expound a " plan of salvation " was not his method of preaching the gospel. Only show men Christ; that was enough. Even doctrinal errors wonld melt and vanish before that vision. 2. He preaches the crucified Christ. A crucified Christ was a King humiliated, a Lord slain; yet herein lay the essence of St. Paul's gospel. We see Christ, not only as a beautiful character, a great Teacher, or a wise Reformer; we see him dying-revealing thus his faithfulness, his purity, his love, ~uffering for us, sacrificed for us. 3. He preaches Christ by setting him forth openly. St. Paul says that Christ was "placarded" before the eyes of the Galatians. This suggests a vivid, pictorial style of language united to an energetic, almost dramatic, force of expression. The whole effort of the apostle was to make his hearers see Christ. No doubt the method was in some respects specially adapted to the Celtic excitability and the semi-barbarous condition of the Galatians, and was in form very different from the apostle's manner of speaking to the cultured Athenians on the Areopagus. Yet to the Greeks at Corinth he says he determined to know nothing among them "save Jesus Christ, and him crucified." It is to be feared that of late the pulpit has lost weight through abandoning descriptive for argumentative preaching, in deference to the supposed higher intelligence of the age, but in defiance of the natural disinclination of average men for reasoning and of their susceptibility to visual imagi- nation. Whatever may be said as to the method of doing it, it is plain that what is most wanted for the man of culture, as much as for the illiterate man, is not to under- stand Christian theology, but to see Christ. II. THEY WHO HAVE ONCE SEEN CHRIST CRUCIFIED BET F0BTB OPENLY MUST BE " BEWITCHED" IF THEY EVER FORSAKE HIM. 1. They must have seen him. The _vision by the hearer may be missed through no fault of the preacher. There must be the eyes to see. Cattle that see only the grass at their feet will not be impressed by the grandest BceDe of crag and moor. They who see Christ to any effect must see him spiritually, not m11rely as the crowd about the cross saw his bodily agony, but as St.•Paul set forth the great, awful fact. 2. Such a vision of Christ will produce a profound impreaawn. No one who saw the 110a for the first time-really saw it-returned home the same man. ']'here are sights tha.t transform. Sinking; deep into our hearts, they saturate our whole nature and haunt our memories for ever. Such is a true vision of Christ crucified. At the sight of the cross, Christian lost his burden, never to recover it. The OIi, W. 1-29.] 'l'HE EPISTLE TO THE GALATIANS. 173