CHAF. II.] YOU HATH HE QUICKENED. 165 CHAP. II. A b ND you hath he quickened, who were dead a John v. 24. Col. ii. 18. b ver. 5. ch. iv. 18. 1. "And you hath he quickened, who were dead in trespasses and sins." "And you." Here the Apostle signifies the Gentiles who believed in Christ and were brought into the Unity of His Body. It is a carrying out of the distinction alluded to in verses 12 and 13: "That we should be to the praise," &c. "In whom YE also trusted." "Hath he quickened." We have to supply this from verse 5. But if so we must also supply, “Hath raised us up together, and made us sit together," from verse 6. "Who were dead in trespasses and sins." This being one of the comparatively few, but very decisive places which pronounce those not in Christ to be in a state of death, we must in all humility see as to how far it actually conducts us in this direction, for we may so interpret it as to make nothing of the distinction between right and wrong, and as if God, in His judgment of the heathen, would make no difference between one heathen man and another, but would sweep them all indiscriminately into the same pit of unutterable anguish. It is universally true that all men require the new life from Christ, and if they have it not are in a state of death compared to those who have it. But we commonly use the phrase "dead in sin," of those who have no stirring of spiritual, or even of moral life within them, but are, as we say, dead to all better feelings and aspirations. Now it was not the Apostle's purpose to predicate this of all the heathen; if so, he would have denied the truth of what he asserts by implication in Rom. ii. 26, "If the uncircumcision keep the righteousness of the law, shall not his uncircumcision be counted for circumcision?" but it was the Apostle's purpose to predicate this state of death of the generality of the heathen. This he could do without denying that the Spirit of God worked in one here and another there, which differed immeasurably from the mode of His working in the Church (Titus iii. 6). 166 c 1 Cor. vi. 11. & iii. 7. 1 d cho vi. 12. e ch. v. 6. Col. iii. 6. THE COURSE OF THIS WORLD. [EPHESIANS. с 2 Wherein in time past ye walked according to the course of this world, according to the prince of the power of the air, the spirit that now worketh in the children of disobedience: 2. "According to the prince of the power of the air, of the spirit," &c. So Revisers. "According to the prince of the empire of the air, of the spirit that," &c. Ellicott. If any one reads, in a Christian spirit, any heathen book, say the "Odes and Satires" of Horace, he will find enough there to convince him that the heathen were in a state of spiritual death. He will find, it is true, much which shows that the moral sense was, if one may so say, intellectually alive, but that is all; they had pleasure in unrighteousness, in all manner of wickedness. They not only did the same, but had pleasure in them that did them. 2. "Wherein in time past ye walked, according to the course of this world." "The course of this world," literally, the " æon of this world," but Alford and Ellicott deny any reference to Gnostical æons, and assert (the former at least) that the authorized translation is the very best. The course of this world, its very days, as the Apostle writes in chapter v., are evil. "The prince of the power of the air." This is by many supposed to mean that the evil one and his wicked angels are not in heaven, and have no access there (Job. i. 6: Luke x. 18), neither as yet are they shut up in hell (Rev. xx. 2), but have power to inhabit the air, and so to have ready access to all the dwellers upon earth. Alford explains it as meaning that they have as ready access to us as the very air with which we are surrounded, and illustrates his meaning by the words of our Lord, when in the parable of the sower He represents the devils as like the fowls of the air, who snatch away the seed sown on the hard beaten path. Others suppose it to be a Rabbinical interpretation. Thus Dale: "The evil power is described, according to a Rabbinical tradition, as having his home in the air,' beneath the happy seats of the saints and of the angels which have kept their first estate, and therefore above the sphere of human life." "The spirit that now worketh in the children of disobedience." Those who are under the dominion of wilful sin are called here the children of disobedience, just as those who walk in the light are CHAP. II.} CHILDREN OF WRATH. 167 3 Among whom also we all had our conversation in times past in the lusts of our flesh, fulfilling h the desires of the flesh and of the mind; and 'were by nature the children of wrath, even as others. f Tit. iii. 3. 1 Pet. iv. 3. 8 Gal. v. 16. † Gr. the wills. h Ps, li. 5. Rom. v. 12, 14. said to be the children of light. Those who wilfully disobey God, whoever they are, have the enemy—the evil one-the prince of the power of the air, working within them. 3. "Among whom also we all had our conversation in times past," &c. We all-all we the chosen people of God, the Israel, the seed of Abraham-all we, notwithstanding our descent, our Circumcision, our Scriptures, our Sacrificial Ritual, our Law-fulfilled the desires of the flesh and of the mind. This is not said as if there were no spiritual persons amongst the Jews, but there was universally a far lower standard than that which was brought in by the teaching of Christ, and by the descent of the Spirit at Pentecost. "Of the flesh and of the mind." The latter word, being in the plural, signifies the thoughts or imaginations. It seems equivalent to the fleshly thoughts or imaginations. "And were by nature the children of wrath." "By nature" can mean nothing else than "by birth." By our natural birth we received from the first Adam a taint of evil which can only be neutralized or removed by our new Birth into the Second Adam, the Lord from heaven. The Scripture, however we may dislike the idea, reveals no entrance of evil into the world but this. But this term "children of wrath" must be read in the light of what we read in the very next verse, "for his great love wherewith he loved us." Here are children of wrath who are loved by God, the Supreme Being Whom they have offended, with "great" love. How can these two things be reconciled—children of wrath, and yet greatly beloved? With the greatest ease, I answer, if we only lay aside the deductions of human systems. The race were under wrath, and intended by the very God Whose wrath they had incurred to be redeemed from all the effects of that wrath, and placed under an infinitely better state than they were in by creation. The history of the race, and of every part of it, especially the 168 i Rom. x. 12. k Rom. v. 6, 8, 10. ver. 1. GOD WHO IS RICH IN MERCY. i [EPHESIANS. 4 But God, who is rich in mercy, for his great love wherewith he loved us, k 5 Even when we were dead in sins, hath 1 Rom. vi. 4, 5. 1 quickened us together with Christ, (|| by grace ye Col. ii. 12, 13. & iii. 1, 3. Or, by whose grace: see Acts xv. 11. are saved ;) 6 And hath raised us up together, and made us sit together in heavenly places in Christ Jesus: m part most favoured by God, is the history of a race who deserved wrath a very great part of them, if we judge by the simplest rules of right and wrong, deserved very severe wrath, and consequent punishment; and by another proof all are children of wrath, for all incur the effects of wrath in the universal prevalence of death. I am writing, of course, for those who believe that the Scriptures reveal to us the will of God, and certainly the Scriptures make temporal death to be the wages of sin. "By one man sin entered into the world, and death by sin, and so death passed upon all men, in him in whom all have sinned" (Rom. v. 12). It is impossible to isolate any part of the race, and to educate them so as to prevent sin appearing in them, and not only appearing but ruling rampant over them. God Himself for our sakes tried this in the case of His chosen people, and as He foresaw and foretold, it failed. It is then almost a natural, almost a self-evident truth that we are by nature, or by birth, children of wrath. 66 'As others," i.e., "we Israelites even as the rest of men." I need hardly say that this doctrine of transmitted sin is our Lord's doctrine as well as St. Paul's. The Lord by His universal preaching of repentance assumes that men are sinners, and so have need of it. By His institution of Baptism He assumes that all need to be washed from sin in the bath of new Birth. He includes all under sin when He says, " If ye then being evil know how to give good gifts to your children,” and He includes the chosen seed as all under sin when He says, "If ye believe not that I am he, ye shall die in your sins." 4, 5, 6. "But God, who is rich in mercy, for his great love wherewith he loved us. Even when we were dead in sins, hath quickened us together with Christ... And hath raised us up together," &c. God hath not quickened us—that is, made us to live CHAP. II.] THE RICHES OF HIS GRACE. 169 7 That in the ages to come he might shew the exceeding riches of his grace in "his kindness toward us n Tit. iii. 4. through Christ Jesus. with a new principle of life by the law, or even by a new law of mere words, but by the Resurrection of Christ. In His Resurrection God caused that we who believe in Him should receive a new Life, and not only receive a new Life, but show it openly in a new life before the world, and not only be raised, but be made to ascend with Him and even sit together with Him in heavenly places. That we receive a new life with Christ is the mystery set forth in Romans vi.; that we sit together with Him is contained in such words as 66 our life is hid with Christ in God." The new life is not only a new life in the world, but a new life above the world. Such was the Apostolic life, such was St. Paul's life. Such has been and is the life of unnumbered saints whom the world has not known, but whom God has known and whom God will make known in a day which may be nearer than we think. But why does the Apostle interject, "By grace ye are saved"? Evidently to assert that it is not by nature. By nature we are children of wrath only. By grace we are quickened, raised, and set on high in Christ. Such things are beyond the imagination of nature, they can only be in Christ, which is equivalent to "by grace," inasmuch as only by a special act of grace can we be brought into Christ. 7. "That in the ages to come he might shew the exceeding riches," &c. If He has begun with a thing so wondrous that it could rightly be described as being raised together, and made to sit together in the heavenlies in Christ, what may we look for in the continuance of such loving-kindness? "This then he saith, that even we shall sit there. Truly this is surpassing riches, truly surpassing is the greatness of His power, to make us sit down with Christ. Yea, hadst thou ten thousand souls, wouldst thou not lose them for His sake? Yea, hadst thou to enter into the flames, oughtest thou not readily to endure it? Himself too saith again, I will that where I am, there also shall my servants be.' Why, surely, had ye to be cut to pieces every day, And He also |