It has been asserted that this passage proves that St. Paul was mistaken in his view of the nearness of the day of the Lord. This is almost equivalent to saying that the whole Epistle is founded on a mistake. Our Lord had in the plainest terms declared that that day was at hand, that it should come speedily; and he showed that the downfall of Jerusalem was a coming to judgment (see notes on St. Matt. xxiv.). It is evident that it is this judgment of which the Apostle is speaking. The Church of his fathers, the city and nation which he had held most sacred, were all to be overthrown and taken away, while the Church should be preserved by Christ's Almighty power. The Apostle says, and Christ Himself had said, that this judgment should prove that Jesus was Lord and King of the whole earth. It was an unveiling of Jesus Christ, and therefore a vision of glory. But what had the dead to do with this?-God knows. We cannot see them. But we can believe, we must believe (even as St. Paul saw), that if the judgment passed upon the ancient world was literally and truly to believers a vision of Christ, then those who had gone from the world into His presence would have their part in it. Even as the bodies of the saints which slept arose when He arose from the dead, so when He came to be the judge, at that great judgment, those who slept should hear the archangel's trumpet. Those who were alive and saw the Lord's victory over His enemies, and the deliverance of His Church, should not prevent those who were asleep. For since Christ is Lord of Heaven, and Earth, and things under the earth, the quick and the dead should be united together in Him. They would all meet the Lord in the air "Above the smoke and stir of this dim spot Earth is no home for those who believe in Christ. Their citizenship is in As if he desired to show that the judgment of this day of the Lord was not to be the final consummation of all created things, the Apostle warns the Thessalonians not to allow the expectation of it to unsettle their minds, and cause them to neglect the ordinary duties and business of life (1 Thess. iv. 10, 11, v. 14; 2 Thess. iii. 10, 11). And lastly, the wickedness of the heathen world, the proverbial immorality of Thessalonica, and the light way in which sins of impurity were regarded, made the Apostle most anxious lest the Christians should fall into these evils, instead of striving to draw their neighbours away from them (1 Thess. iv. 3, v. 22, 23). The Second Epistle travels much in the same line as the first. It is plain that the first, although it had done much, had not done all. There was the same unhealthy excitement. Their wrong notions had been further strengthened by a letter which pretended to be Paul's, but which was a forgery (2 Thess. ii. 2, iii. 17). The Apostle in consequence, seeking to calm their excitement, tells them that the day of the Lord shall be preceded by the appearance of the Man of Sin, or Antichrist. The latter word, indeed, occurs nowhere but in the Epistles of St. John; but there can be little doubt that the different expressions of the two Apostles mean the same thing. As has been already hinted, St. Paul saw in the attitude, both of Jews and Heathens, signs of an Antichrist at hand. That his prognostications were fulfilled any one may see who reads either the history of the Roman Empire at that awful period, or, which seems more in the Apostle's view now, the history of the false Christs who appeared at Jerusalem in its later days. But the Apostle speaks of some one who "letteth (i. e., hindereth) and will let, until he be taken out of the way" (2 Thess. ii. 7). Some one is retarding the manifestation of the Antichrist. Who is it? Some answer, it is the Roman power which for a while kept the Jews in some degree of order. But the expression "taken out of the way" hardly suits this interpretation. It seems more probable that it was St. James, the Bishop of Jerusalem. His holiness of life, and immense influence over the Jews (sec Introduction to the Epistle of St. James, page 31), long restrained them from their fatal acts of violence. But he was taken out of the way," the restraints were removed, and Jerusalem rushed to meet her doom. Antichrist was revealed then. 66 But we must bear in mind that as the destruction of Jerusalem was but a great rehearsal of God's judgment on the world, so the Antichrist which sprung up then was but a foreshadowing of a greater Antichrist to come. Attempts have been made, many of them both presumptuous and uncharitable, to identify this Antichrist with the Bishop of Rome. Whilst there are, indeed, many and fearful evils in the Romish doctrine and discipline, and, therefore, many Antichristian elements, still the Antichrist is not, cannot be here. The Romanist declares, as we do, that "Jesus Christ is Lord" (see 1 Cor. xii. 3). But the Antichrist is an infidel power, which comes, not professing to speak in Christ's name, but seeking to cast Him down from the throne of His glory. Such a power we have seen in the history of old,-God knows how near may be the manifestation of such a one again, of which that was but a foreshadowing,— setting up power as the object of worship, hating the Cross of Christ. For such a one Holy Scripture certainly bids us look, while it tells us also that the Crucified is King of Kings, and Lord of Lords. He shall triumph over alf His enemies, and beat down Satan under the feet of those whom He has redeemed. The Epistle for the Second Sunday in Lent is 1 Thess. iv. 1–8. THE EPISTLE TO THE GALATIANS. THE Galatians were a colony of Gauls or Kelts, who, in one of the great migrations of the Old World, invaded Thrace some centuries before Christ. About 240 B.C. large numbers of them crossed over into Asia Minor, as mercenaries of the King of Bithynia. Like the Saxons in England in similar circumstances, they proved a terrible scourge, and overran the whole country. But after a while they were overcome by Antiochus I., King of Syria, who was in consequence called "Soter" (Saviour). He confined them within the district to which the name Galatia was consequently given. There they remained, like the Hungarians of the present day, in the midst of people of other blood, and speaking a different language, and were called "Gallo-Græci." They were conquered by the Romans B.C. 188, but were allowed to retain the shadow of independence until Augustus made Galatia a Roman province. Various colonists were attracted into their country by the fertility of its soil and the opportunities of commerce. The people dwelt, for the most part, in villages; hence, perhaps, the reason that St. Paul speaks of the Churches in Galatia (1 Cor. xvi. 1; Gal. i. 2). Josephus mentions that the Jews were very numerous there, no doubt in consequence of the central position of the country; roads ran through it from the Black Sea, from the Hellespont, from Armenia, &c. It would seem that the Galatians had been converted from heathenism to Judaism a short time before they embraced Christianity; for St. Paul speaks to them at one time as having been once heathens, at another of their returning to the weak and beggarly elements of the Law (Gal. iv. 8-10). The Galatian Church was founded by St. Paul in his great missionary tour (Acts xvi. 6). We are not directly told anything of the circumstances; but we gather from the Epistle that he was received with hearty good will (iv. 14); the simple and comparatively uncorrupted people gladly embraced the Gospel. The Apostle visited them afterwards, but found no ground for anxiety (Acts xviii. 23). But soon after this visit Judaizing teachers crept in, preaching another gospel, and only too successfully. They alienated the Galatian converts from St. Paul's doctrine and person; from his doctrine by saying that keeping the ceremonial law was a condition of justification; from his person by affirming that he was by no means an apostle in the same respect that the twelve were, having received no direct commission (Gal. i. 6, 7, iv. 17, v. 10, vi. 12, 13). It is not very hard to understand the success which for a while attended their efforts. To the simple Galatians, they seemed, no doubt, to have a good deal to say for themselves. They pointed to Jerusalem, and urged that the Law of Moses was there observed, as no doubt it was (Acts xxi. 20); while they kept back the fact that only Jewish Christians thus obeyed the Law, and that only by permission. What was thus in fact permitted was pressed on the Galatians as being so necessary, that it could not be neglected without hazard of salvation. St. Paul was at Ephesus (Acts xix.) when the tidings reached him of the too successful emissaries. He instantly wrote the Epistle to the Galatians, full of the profoundest and most passionate grief at their alienation, not from him, but from the way of life; full also of the deepest tenderness and affection. This Epistle and that to the Romans supplement each another, and they form together a complete body of doctrine in respect of the way in which man is justified before God. There is this difference between the two Epistles,-the present is controversial, the other is not. This is written to combat error, that is a calm and tranquil setting forth of the truth. It might in consequence seem to us, that the occasion of this Epistle was a temporary one, and that so its interest is not lasting. But this is not so. The same errors are evermore newborn in the heart of man; old heresies continually come up again, begotten as they are by self-will, or self-righteousness, by restless craving after philosophical systems, instead of the Word of Life. Wherever men would fain establish a righteousness of their own, instead of resting on the everlasting righteousness of God, there this Epistle will always confront them. All the attempts which have ever been made to set up the works of man against the Work of Christ, have been shattered to pieces against the strong bulwarks of truth which St. Paul has set up in this Epistle. It consists of three parts. I. The defence of his own apostolic authority. He declares that the Gospel which he preached was not of men; but that he was taught it by the revelation of Christ. When he went up to Jerusalem, after his conversion, it was not to be instructed by the Apostles, for they admitted him at once on terms of equality. Nay more, when afterwards St. Peter acted doubtfully at Antioch with regard to the Gentiles, St. Paul withstood him to the face, and openly rebuked him (Ch. i. ii). II. The argument against the false doctrines into which the Church had fallen, and the defence of Christian freedom (iii. iv.). III. Practical exhortations (v. vi.). The Epistles from this Book are— iii. 16-22 iv. 1-7 21-31 v. 16-24 vi. 11-18 Thirteenth Sunday after Trinity. THE FIRST EPISTLE TO THE CORINTHIANS. WE return now to St. Paul's work in Europe, of which we have already considered the beginning (page 4). On leaving Thessalonica he came to Berea, and thence to Athens. Here he remained a very short time, only gathering in a few souls; then he moved on to Corinth, the southernmost limit, apparently, of his progress. He remained there a year and a half, perhaps more. It was the longest missionary stay he had yet made. It is easy to see why he should have stayed so long, though there were circumstances which at first sight might have seemed to make it the most unlikely and unpromising place for his purpose. It was the great commercial city of Greece (sometimes called " the eye of Greece”). In the best times of Greek history it never assumed that lead which Sparta and Athens had held alternately. But in the last expiring struggle of Greek independence against Rome, Corinth became the chief city of the Achæan league, and led the way in the unwise and fruitless resistance. It was taken and destroyed by Mummius in the same year as Carthage by Scipio (B.c. 146). But many public buildings and temples survived. The scattered inhabitants gradually returned to their old dwelling-place, and Julius Cæsar having rebuilt it, it recovered a great part of that splendour and beauty which it before possessed. It became the capital of the Roman province of Achaia, or southern Greece, which comprised all the country south of Macedonia. Corinth possessed very great natural advantages. It stood on the isthmus which united the peninsula called Peloponnesus to the mainland of Greece. On the west, about a mile off, lay the long, narrow gulf named after the city, the Gulf of Corinth; on the other side was the Saronic Gulf, six miles distant.* The port of Cenchrea connected Corinth with the eastern world; that of Lecheum with the western; and as the way round Cape Matapan was dangerous to ancient navigation, the greater part of the merchandise of East and West passed through Corinth. About the time that the Epistle was written, Nero had endeavoured, unsuccessfully, to unite the two gulfs by a canal. The traffic from north to south also, as a matter of course, passed through Corinth. A writer, who lived a little after St. Paul, reckoned the population to be 460,000. The following description of the city is extracted from Dr. Stanley's commentary on these Epistles. (The whole introduction is most valuable, * Hence its name, diaλàσσios, "double-sea'd." and should be read by all who can obtain access to it). "At present one Doric temple alone remains of all the splendid edifices then standing; but the immediate vicinity presents various features to which the Apostle's allusions have given an immortal interest. The level plain, and the broken gullies of the isthmus, are still clothed with the low pine from whose branches of emerald green were woven the garlands for the Isthmian games, contrasted by the Apostle with the unfading crown of the Christian combatant.* In its eastern declivities are to be seen the vestiges of that 'stadium'† in which all ran with such energy as to be taken as the example of Christian self-denial and exertion; and of that theatre' or 'amphitheatre' which conveyed to the Corinthians a lively image of what those sufferings were which are compared to the fighting with beasts,' or to the spectacle to the world, to angels, and to men,' the Apostles being set forth last in the file of combatants appointed unto death.' § We have but to restore those now desolate spots with the long avenues of statues and marble seats on the grassy slope of the hills and the temple, whose beauty made the name of Corinthian buildings proverbial for magnificence, and which, standing as they did in their ancient glory amidst the new streets erected by Cæsar on the ruins left by Mummius, may well have suggested the comparison of the 'gold, silver, and precious marbles,' surviving the conflagration in which all meaner edifices of wood and thatch had perished; || and we shall have a sufficient conception of the outward objects which caught the Apostle's eye on his arrival and residence at Corinth." Hitherto we have considered the city itself, its situation, wealth, magnificence. Turn now to the people who inhabited it. Even in earlier times it had been a city of great corruption of manners. And when, after its destruction by Mummius, it rose like the phoenix from its ashes, it was only too faithful to its ancient traditions. The reigning sin was impurity, regarded as a sin no longer, but as a religious service to Aphrodite. Thus vice was even deified, though heathen satirists and rhetoricians denounced the dreadful evils. St. Paul doubtless knew all this, but he shrank not from preaching the Word. They were all God's creatures; he knew well that there was good seed amongst the tares; that Christ had died to destroy these vices; therefore he did not despond. Nor did he when other obstacles presented themselves, besides those of shameless dissoluteness and depravity of manners. It must be borne in mind that now, for the first time, St. Paul was addressing himself to the Greek world. Hitherto his labours had been amongst Asiatics,-at Thessalonica and Berea the majority of his hearers had been Jews. But it was not so here. The Greek population was sadly degenerated from what it had been in those high and palmy days when Greece united together and overthrew the Persian invaders at Marathon and Salamis and Platea. Courage, patriotism, poetry, were now all fled. Nothing remained but the traditions of departed glory. A foreign tyranny held undisputed dominion, and hope itself was dead. The uneducated and poor apparently believed in the old religion, even as did those to whom St. Paul preached in Lycaonia.†† The rich believed in nothing. Civilization and large intercourse with the world had destroyed their old beliefs, and they had nothing to put in the place of them. They were still acute, clever, subtle. But they were utterly frivolous and light; ready to discover the ridi * 1 Cor. ix. 25. +1 Cor. ix. 24, English version, "race." 1 Cor. iv. 9, E. V. "spectacle." tt Acts xiv. 11. |