are getting off the ground of grace, by the addition of something else.

Another thing I would desire to mention. This is the only instance in which several congregations in a large province were written to by Paul. He addressed "the saints that be at Rome," "the saints at Ephesus," "the saints at Corinth," &c., but Galatia was not a city, but a province, a part now of Asiatic Turkey.

In Acts xvi. 6, the first mention is made of Paul's visiting Galatia. In chapter xviii., we find him going through Galatia "strengthening all the disciples." Peter also addresses "the strangers (the elect remnant) scattered throughout Galatia." There were several congregations in the province of Galatia. They were formerly from Gaul, and like the French, their peculiar characteristic was fickleness. He took therefore their national character into account. I believe most nations have their characteristic failings. "The Cretians were always liars," &c. The Spirit of God shews how national peculiarities manifest themselves in God's dear people.

There is no place in the Scriptures in which Paul so strongly asserts his Apostleship, and rests every thing on having received the gospel immediately from Christ Himself, and not from man, as in this Epistle. They spoke of him as having been sent by man, and this assertion he had to contradict. God seems to have anticipated the fiction of the present day, by breaking any semblance of Apostolic succession, in choosing the Apostle Paul. Paul did not go up to Jerusalem to those that were Apostles before him, until some years after his conversion.

He insists on it that his gift for

ministry was directly from the Lord Jesus Christ; he did not receive it from man, neither was he taught it by man. But as the Lord Himself said, "He is a chosen vessel unto Me," &c. (Acts ix. 15.)

"Paul an Apostle....by Jesus Christ, and God the Father." He here insists on the speciality of his Apostleship. None of the twelve were made Apostles in this same way. His commission was direct from the risen Jesus. It came fresh from heaven after Jesus had finished His work, as the Apostle himself states to the elders of Ephesus-"That I might finish my course with joy, and the ministry which I have received of the Lord Jesus, to testify the gospel of the grace of God."

Ver. 2. "All the brethren which are with me unto the churches of Galatia." Fellowship in labour was very precious to Paul; he delighted to associate persons with him as co-workers, thus shewing their perfect sympathy and concurrence with him in what he states here. "Grace be to you," &c.

In the first few verses of the Apostolic Epistles the subject is first introduced, and afterwards amplified. Ver. 4. "That He might deliver (rescue) us from this present evil world." What then has the law to do with us, if Jesus has given Himself to get us out of this present evil world? A person needs quite as much to be rescued out of professing Christianity, as to be rescued from idolatry-he needs to be redeemed from the religion, which he has received by tradition from his fathers. It has struck me in my own experience that I have received many things from tradition, and not from God's word. If any say, "I hold to the Scriptures, and to tradition also," do not deceive yourselves. Tradition

will swamp the Scriptures. "He gave Himself for us." The moment I believe in substitution, and see that the Lord Jesus has stood in my place, I am "delivered (or rescued) "out of this present evil world, according to the will of God, and our Father."

Ver. 6. The apostle had to minister the gospel of the grace of God. It is a most difficult thing to keep one's standing in grace. Natural men always say, “If I were to know that I was to stand still and see His salvation, I should be happy." Ah! but those who do, continually find a tendency in them to be turned aside from the grace of God unto "another gospel." I may put devotedness, or the best of my good works, in the place of Christ, and it is no gospel at all. The Christian's Magna Charta is Acts. xv. There we see that false teachers said, Except ye be circumcised, after the manner of Moses, ye cannot be saved." The gospel is independent of all "ifs." Where there is an "if," I immediately stand on another ground. We often hear it said, “I know what the Lord has done for me, if I," &c. James, in this chapter of the Acts, teaches the same truth as Paul, that this thought subverts the soul. If I say to any, "Except you do so and so," &c., I put him off the ground of grace. There are no glad tidings of great joy for man as a sinner, unless it be a finished work on which the soul can repose. It is God who tells us how precious the work of Christ is; and He knows its value as we know it not. He sets it forth as meeting all that God Himself knows concerning the sinner; for if the omniscient God searches the heart, and trieth the reins, the omniscient God knows also the preciousness of the blood of Christ, and testifies of it

to us. The religion of Christendom, like the Galatian error, perverts the gospel of the grace of God, and substitutes in its place a modified covenant of works.

Ver. 8. It is a solemn thought, that the apostle Paul should thus speak of an angel. Angels heralded the birth of Jesus, beautifully tracked His footsteps, were at His grave, followed Him into heaven, but they never tasted of His grace. They do say, "Worthy is the Lamb," &c., but cannot add, for "Thou hast redeemed us to God by Thy blood." The experience of such grace brings us in a greater nearness to God than they. A poor lost redeemed sinner is thus brought nearer to God than an angel. Paul the Apostle adds, (v. 13,) “I persecuted the church of God," &c.; and, to shew what grace was, "He revealed His Son in me, that I might preach Him among the heathen." God's ordained ministry is, that His ministers must be first reconciled to Himself, and then they can go and tell others, and shew them that the grace that met their need can also meet the same need in others, even as Paul could speak to blasphemers, &c., having been himself a blasphemer. But he adds, "If an angel," &c., "let him be accursed." Is there such a sense now of the value of the gospel? Is there such a jealousy for the gospel in our day? The jealousy of the apostle for the gospel was such, that he could say, Though we, or an angel from heaven, preach any other gospel unto you than that which we have preached unto you, let him be accursed." Will this gospel, this faithfulness, be pleasing to men? No; "Do I now persuade men?" The gospel cuts from under man every possible assumption. The denial of self must be the denial of bad self, good self, and

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religious self; and this is impossible with men, though it is possible with God to save sinners. But, in order to be put into a place where the grace of God can reach the sinner, every thing must be taken from under himself as self.

"If I seek to please men," &c. In preaching, there is no occasion to attempt singularity. The gospel will not please the carnal mind when preached simply, and all refuges of lies are taken away.

"The gospel which was preached of me is not after man," &c. No; God's thoughts are higher than man's thoughts. The most experienced Christians find a constant battle, and struggle to beat down their carnal thoughts, and bring every thought into captivity to the obedience of Christ. His thoughts towards us are thoughts of grace, of love, and peace; but we often think Him a hard master, and an austere man. You must not expect that the gospel will flow according to the current of your thoughts, you must expect conflict, the casting down imaginations, and every high thing that exalteth itself, &c.

"I was not taught but by the revelation of Jesus Christ." Go, He says, and tell them "what thou hast seen and heard," with a promise of future revelations. (See Acts xxvi. 16-18.) We never get any thing but by revelation, and we need to pray for the spirit of wisdom and revelation in the knowledge of Jesus. Paul then shews himself to have been a most unlikely person to receive the gospel of the grace of God. He says "I persecuted the church of God, and wasted it." This shows how every thing is entirely of God's grace. The most religious man of the day, and