ouk
este upo nomon. "They who 'are led
by the Spirit,' of course, 'have the Spirit;' and none 'have the Spirit of
Christ' but those who are 'his,' 'in him;' and all who are 'in him' are
'dead to the law by his body.'" "When it appears, by 'the fruits
of the Spirit,' that men are thus 'in Christ,' the law has nothing to say to
them: they are, as we may say, out of its jurisdiction, and under another
government, where the measures of judgement, both in justifying and
condemning, are altogether different. The law had its course on Jesus
Christ, and, in him, on all who are 'made conformable to him in his death;'
and has no more to say to them. They are left dead in the hands of their
great Creator, and are quickened by his sovereignly free grace; for surely
nobody will pretend that God was under any the least obligation to employ
his creating power to raise any of the apostate race; and if He was bound to
none, He may quicken whom He will; and none can complain of being injured
when He leaves them where they have chosen to be.
"But
this same sovereignty of grace, wherever it is exerted, is so far from
inferring the conclusion, which some who reckon themselves very wise very
ignorantly fasten upon it, to wit, that it encourages men to continue in
sin, and neglect the study of holiness, –
that it is absolutely impossible for those who have tasted of the
grace of God in truth to draw any such conclusion from it. It is true, the
external doctrine of grace may be, and has been, turned into wantonness; but
that is only grace in the theory. But wherever it is received and
entertained in the heart, it teaches what the law could never
effectually teach, 'to deny ungodliness and worldly lusts.' The apostle
gives the reason, Rom. vi. 2-11." – RICCALTOUN.
Reference
Galatians
by John Brown, DD. Banner
of Truth Trust 2001. Quotation fr. Robert Riccaltoun (Addenda, p 431).
