The Church
State of the Church under the Law
"But before faith came, we were kept under the law, shut up unto the faith which should afterwards be revealed. Wherefore the law was our schoolmaster to bring us unto Christ, that we might be justified by faith."
The first thing to be inquired into here is the meaning of the phrase, "the coming of faith." By "faith" some interpreters understand the system or order of things in which faith is the grand means of justification. But this mode of interpretation is obviously inadmissible. For in this sense "faith" came immediately after the fall, or in the revelation of the first promise. There has been but one way of justifying sinners all along. Adam, if he was justified, as we have reason to hope he was, was justified by believing. Abraham was justified by believing. It was true under the Old, as well as under the New Testament dispensation, that it was the person justified by faith that lived - enjoyed true happiness in the possession of the Divine favor, which is life.
By faith, I apprehend we are to understand, not the act of believing, but the revelation believed, just as in our language we call the article which a man believes "his creed," "his belief," "his faith." The expression literally rendered is, the faith, and looks back to the phrase, faith of Christ, in the preceding verse. "Before the faith of Christ came," is just equivalent to, "before the Christian revelation was given."
Now, what was the state of the Jewish church previously to this period? "We," says the apostle, "were kept under the law shut up." The apostle in using the pronoun "we," plainly speaks of himself as belonging to the Jewish church previously to the coming of the Messiah. 'We Jews were kept under the law shut up,' or, 'shut up under the law.'
It has been common to connect the words "shut up" with the concluding clause "to the faith," and to consider the words as conveying the idea, that the design and effect of the commands and threatenings of God's law on the mind of an awakened sinner, is to close every avenue of relief but one, and shut him up to accept of the free and full salvation of Christ by believing the gospel. But though this is a truth, and an important one, it is not the truth taught here.
The apostle is speaking of the design of the law in reference to the Jewish church or people as a body, and their situation under it. They were kept shut up under it. They were kept as under the care of a sentinel; they were shut up as in a fortress, or confined within certain limits. The general idea is, they were in a state of restriction. They were kept from mingling with the rest of mankind, preserved a distinct people; and to gain this object, were subjected to many peculiar usages. The law was "the middle wall of partition" which kept them distinct from the other nations of the world. The making one city the seat of religion, the laws with regard to food and ceremonial pollution, the institutions directly opposed to the prevailing customs of the surrounding nations, and the express prohibition to form alliances with heathen nations, all these formed a more powerful barrier to commixture with the surrounding nations than any physical separation of mountains, or seas, or distance could have done.
The apostle seems obviously to have intended to convey the accessory idea of uneasy confinement. Their state was necessary, and it was happy when compared with that of the heathen nations; but still it was a state of restriction and confinement, and in this point of view not desirable. Their state was, however, never designed to be permanent. It was intended to serve a purpose, and when that purpose was served, it was intended to terminate.
"We were," says the apostle, "kept under the law, shut up unto the faith which should afterwards be revealed." "Unto," is here equivalent to 'until.' A parallel mode of expression, though the subject is different, is to be found, I Pet. 1:5. The phrase is parallel, though not quite synonymous, with that used in the nineteenth verse, "till the Seed should come in reference to whom the promise was made." "The faith" here, is plainly the same thing as the faith in the first clause of the verse. The Jewish church was not without a revelation as to the way of justification, for in that case they could not have been justified by faith. We know that the Divine method of justification is "witnessed by the law and the prophets." But it was not manifested - fully, clearly, made known - till the fullness of the time, when "the mystery which had been kept secret" was disclosed. The phraseology adopted by the apostle, the revelation of faith, makes it evident that faith here refers to doctrine. He speaks of it as "afterwards to be revealed." The gospel revelation formed a principal subject of Old Testament prophecy; and the believing Jews under the law were encouraged to look forward to a period when "the glory of the Lord should be revealed, and all flesh should see it together." When his "salvation should be brought near, and his righteousness should be revealed." The apostle's assertion then in this verse is, 'previously to the Christian revelation, we Jews were kept in a state of separation from other nations by the restrictive ordinances of the Mosaic law, till that revelation was made to which we had been taught to look forward.' He expresses nearly the same idea under a different figure in the following verse.
"Wherefore the law was our schoolmaster to bring us to Christ, that we might be justified by faith." "Wherefore" does not here intimate that what is contained in this verse is a logical inference from what has preceded. It is not properly an inference, but a superadded illustration. It is just as if he had said, 'Thus the law was our schoolmaster,' etc. "Schoolmaster," in the modern use of the term, scarcely answers the apostle's idea. A pedagogue, a tutor, was anciently among the Greeks and Romans - and let it be remembered Paul is writing to a Gentile church - a servant or slave to whom the charge of the children was given while they were under age, and whose business was not solely, or chiefly perhaps, to instruct them, but to keep them from mischief and danger. The pedagogue and the preceptor were two different persons, and had entirely different duties to perform. Now, says the apostle, the law acted to us the part of a tutor or pedagogue, restraining, chastising, and protecting us, and preparing us by its discipline for a higher and better order of things. The apostle's object is plainly to lower the idea of the Galatians respecting the state of the Jews, and the economy under which they were placed. He intimates that they were in an infantine state, and that the economy they were put under suited it. They were wayward children, put under the care of a faithful, but somewhat severe and strict, tutor - a servant or slave only temporarily employed till the children should arrive at maturity.
"The law was our schoolmaster to bring us to Christ." These words have often been applied to express this idea, - that it is by the commands and threatenings of God's law brought home to the conscience of the sinner by the effectual working of the Holy Ghost, that he is induced to believe the revelation of mercy, and gladly to receive Christ Jesus as the only and all-sufficient Savior. But this, though a very important truth, is obviously not what the apostle means. He is speaking of the church as a body, and the law it was subject to. Nor is the somewhat more plausible exegesis, that the apostle means to say, that the law by its typical ordinances introduced the Jews into an acquaintance with the Messiah whom they prefigured, satisfactory, for the leading idea in the word tutor or pedagogue is not teaching, but custody - restriction - correction. You will notice that "to bring us" is a supplement, and is one of the supplements which might as well have been omitted. "Unto Christ" is equivalent to 'until Christ.' The three following expressions are obviously parallel, and throw light on each other. "The law was added because of transgressions till the Seed should come to whom the promise was made." "We were kept shut up under the law till the faith was revealed." "The law was our tutor till Christ, that we might be justified by faith." These last words may signify, 'Thus the law was our tutor till Christ; this was its character; so that if we Jews are justified at all, we are justified by faith. The law restrained, commanded, and punished, but it did not justify. If we Jews are justified, it is not by the law, but by faith.' The substance of the apostle's assertion is, that "the law was added because of transgressions till the Seed should come, in reference to whom the promise" of justification to the Gentiles by faith "was made"; that "before faith came," before the gospel revelation was given, the Jewish church "were shut up under the law," till the good news promised afore was announced; and that "the law was the tutor or pedagogue" of the infant church "till Christ." The apostle now proceeds to show that the law, though an institution necessary in and suited to that imperfect and preparatory state, was utterly unnecessary and unsuited to that new and better state into which the church had been brought by the coming of the Savior, and to the full and clear revelation of the way of salvation, and therefore to endeavor to perpetuate it was the height of criminal folly. This is the principle which the apostle lays down in the verse which follows, and which he illustrates down to the close of the eleventh verse of the next chapter.
State of the Church after "faith has come"
"But after that faith has come, we are no longer under a schoolmaster: for ye are all the children of God by faith in Christ Jesus."
The meaning of the phrase, "the coming of faith," has already been illustrated. By "faith" we understand the gospel revelation, not only as given, but received. "After that faith is come," is, we apprehend, equivalent to, 'After that the truth about the come Savior, and the completed revelation, has been made known to us, and believed by us.'
"We are no longer under a schoolmaster." These words seem a statement not only of the fact, but of the reason of it. It is as if the apostle had said, 'We are no longer, and we no longer need be, under such a restrictive system as that of the law. The necessary imperfection of the revelation of the method of salvation, till the Savior appeared and finished his work, and the corresponding limitation of the dispensation of divine influence, rendered such a restrictive system absolutely requisite; but the cause having been removed, the effect must cease. Till faith came, it was necessary that we should be under the tutelage of the law; but now that faith is come, we need our tutor no longer. When the child, in consequence of the development of his faculties, and the completion of his education, becomes a man, and capable of regulating his conduct by internal principles, the tutor is dismissed, and his pupil is freed from external restraints now understood to be superseded by the expanded, instructed, disciplined, rational and moral powers of his nature.'
It is plainly on this principle that the apostle reasons; for he immediately adds, "For ye are all the children of God by faith in Christ Jesus." 'Faith being come, you no longer need a tutor; for by faith in Christ Jesus ye are all the children of God.' The change of the person from the first to the second, from we to ye, is easily accounted for. The language in the twenty-fifth verse is strictly applicable to believing Jews only, who once were under the tutelage of the law; the statement made in the twenty-sixth verse is equally applicable to believers, whether Jews or Gentiles, to all the Galatian converts, and is plainly intended to lay a foundation for this conclusion - 'if the coming of the faith emancipates those believers who were under the tutelage of the law, it surely must prevent those believers who were never subject to it from being brought under its bondage.'
To perceive the force of the apostle's reasoning it is necessary to observe that the figurative appellation "children of God" is here used with a certain peculiarity of reference and meaning. When Christians are represented in Scripture as the children of God, we have a view given us sometimes of their state, and sometimes of their character, and sometimes of both conjoined. We are taught either that God regards them as his children, or that they regard Him as their father, or both. To speak in technical language, it sometimes represents them as justified, and sometimes as sanctified, and sometimes as both justified and sanctified. In most of the passages where this figurative expression occurs, it describes the state and character of saints, in opposition to the state and character of unconverted, unforgiven, unsanctified sinners. But in the passage before us, it obviously describes the state and character of saints under the Christian dispensation, in contrast with the state and character of saints under the Jewish dispensation. The persons spoken of as having been under the law, previously to the coming of faith, are not represented as aliens from the family of God. They belonged to it; but being under age, they were "under tutors and governors till the time appointed of the father," when they were to receive, what our translators call, "the adoption of sons" - the privileges of grown-up children. There can be no reasonable doubt then that the phrase "children of God" is here equivalent to grown-up children.
The meaning of this language is not obscure. It is as if the apostle had said, 'There is as great a difference between the privileges you possess, and the character of love to God, and confidence in Him, and submission to Him, to which you have been formed, and the privileges and character of those who lived under the law, as there is between the state and feelings of a son arrived at maturity, and having finished his education, and those of the same child while an infant or still under the care of the nurse and the tutor; and it were not more incongruous for such a person to insist on still remaining in the nursery or the school - to have all his movements watched and regulated by servants - than it is in you believers in Christ to seek to remain under the bondage of the law, not to speak of your subjecting yourselves to that bondage.'
It is "through faith in Christ Jesus" that they were introduced into the privileges and formed to the character of mature children. "Faith in Christ Jesus," here as in the whole of the context, is equivalent to the revelation of the truth about Christ Jesus viewed as believed. It is by this revelation believed that Christians obtain that knowledge of the Divine Being as "the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ," and our God and Father in him, which at once fills them with joy and peace, and forms them to that love and confidence in Him which leads them to "serve Him without fear," and to "walk at liberty, keeping his commandments." To such persons the restrictions of the Mosaic law are unnecessary, and its carnal ordinances altogether unsuited; and such is the state into which every believer of the gospel is brought, and such is the character to which every believer of the gospel is formed.
We are now prepared to feel the force of the apostle's reasoning. 'Now that the gospel revelation has been made, and believed by us, we stand no more in need of such an elementary, restrictive, external dispensation as the law; for through this gospel believed we are introduced into a state, and formed to a character, to which such an introductory institution, however well fitted to serve its own purposes, is utterly unsuited.'
That this high honor of being "the children of God" is not peculiar to any class of believers, but common to them all, is the principle which the apostle states and illustrates in the succeeding verses. "For as many of you as have been baptized into Christ have put on Christ." This is the privilege of all believers. For the apostle add, "There is neither Jew nor Greek, there is neither bond nor free, there is neither male nor female: for ye are all one in Christ Jesus." The general idea obviously is, that under the Christian dispensation our religious privileges depend on nothing but our connection with Christ Jesus, which is formed entirely by faith. External distinctions are here of no avail. It is neither as a Jew nor as a Greek equivalent to a Gentile, as a bondsman nor as a freeman, as a man nor a woman, but purely and solely as a person "in Christ" that the believer enjoys any spiritual blessings. And all who are in Christ Jesus are blessed with the same privileges. Believers when they have put on Christ, put off these external distinctions, and appear, as it were, all one in Christ Jesus.
"But before faith came, we were kept under the law, shut up unto the faith which should afterwards be revealed. Wherefore the law was our schoolmaster to bring us unto Christ, that we might be justified by faith."
The first thing to be inquired into here is the meaning of the phrase, "the coming of faith." By "faith" some interpreters understand the system or order of things in which faith is the grand means of justification. But this mode of interpretation is obviously inadmissible. For in this sense "faith" came immediately after the fall, or in the revelation of the first promise. There has been but one way of justifying sinners all along. Adam, if he was justified, as we have reason to hope he was, was justified by believing. Abraham was justified by believing. It was true under the Old, as well as under the New Testament dispensation, that it was the person justified by faith that lived - enjoyed true happiness in the possession of the Divine favor, which is life.
By faith, I apprehend we are to understand, not the act of believing, but the revelation believed, just as in our language we call the article which a man believes "his creed," "his belief," "his faith." The expression literally rendered is, the faith, and looks back to the phrase, faith of Christ, in the preceding verse. "Before the faith of Christ came," is just equivalent to, "before the Christian revelation was given."
Now, what was the state of the Jewish church previously to this period? "We," says the apostle, "were kept under the law shut up." The apostle in using the pronoun "we," plainly speaks of himself as belonging to the Jewish church previously to the coming of the Messiah. 'We Jews were kept under the law shut up,' or, 'shut up under the law.'
It has been common to connect the words "shut up" with the concluding clause "to the faith," and to consider the words as conveying the idea, that the design and effect of the commands and threatenings of God's law on the mind of an awakened sinner, is to close every avenue of relief but one, and shut him up to accept of the free and full salvation of Christ by believing the gospel. But though this is a truth, and an important one, it is not the truth taught here.
The apostle is speaking of the design of the law in reference to the Jewish church or people as a body, and their situation under it. They were kept shut up under it. They were kept as under the care of a sentinel; they were shut up as in a fortress, or confined within certain limits. The general idea is, they were in a state of restriction. They were kept from mingling with the rest of mankind, preserved a distinct people; and to gain this object, were subjected to many peculiar usages. The law was "the middle wall of partition" which kept them distinct from the other nations of the world. The making one city the seat of religion, the laws with regard to food and ceremonial pollution, the institutions directly opposed to the prevailing customs of the surrounding nations, and the express prohibition to form alliances with heathen nations, all these formed a more powerful barrier to commixture with the surrounding nations than any physical separation of mountains, or seas, or distance could have done.
The apostle seems obviously to have intended to convey the accessory idea of uneasy confinement. Their state was necessary, and it was happy when compared with that of the heathen nations; but still it was a state of restriction and confinement, and in this point of view not desirable. Their state was, however, never designed to be permanent. It was intended to serve a purpose, and when that purpose was served, it was intended to terminate.
"We were," says the apostle, "kept under the law, shut up unto the faith which should afterwards be revealed." "Unto," is here equivalent to 'until.' A parallel mode of expression, though the subject is different, is to be found, I Pet. 1:5. The phrase is parallel, though not quite synonymous, with that used in the nineteenth verse, "till the Seed should come in reference to whom the promise was made." "The faith" here, is plainly the same thing as the faith in the first clause of the verse. The Jewish church was not without a revelation as to the way of justification, for in that case they could not have been justified by faith. We know that the Divine method of justification is "witnessed by the law and the prophets." But it was not manifested - fully, clearly, made known - till the fullness of the time, when "the mystery which had been kept secret" was disclosed. The phraseology adopted by the apostle, the revelation of faith, makes it evident that faith here refers to doctrine. He speaks of it as "afterwards to be revealed." The gospel revelation formed a principal subject of Old Testament prophecy; and the believing Jews under the law were encouraged to look forward to a period when "the glory of the Lord should be revealed, and all flesh should see it together." When his "salvation should be brought near, and his righteousness should be revealed." The apostle's assertion then in this verse is, 'previously to the Christian revelation, we Jews were kept in a state of separation from other nations by the restrictive ordinances of the Mosaic law, till that revelation was made to which we had been taught to look forward.' He expresses nearly the same idea under a different figure in the following verse.
"Wherefore the law was our schoolmaster to bring us to Christ, that we might be justified by faith." "Wherefore" does not here intimate that what is contained in this verse is a logical inference from what has preceded. It is not properly an inference, but a superadded illustration. It is just as if he had said, 'Thus the law was our schoolmaster,' etc. "Schoolmaster," in the modern use of the term, scarcely answers the apostle's idea. A pedagogue, a tutor, was anciently among the Greeks and Romans - and let it be remembered Paul is writing to a Gentile church - a servant or slave to whom the charge of the children was given while they were under age, and whose business was not solely, or chiefly perhaps, to instruct them, but to keep them from mischief and danger. The pedagogue and the preceptor were two different persons, and had entirely different duties to perform. Now, says the apostle, the law acted to us the part of a tutor or pedagogue, restraining, chastising, and protecting us, and preparing us by its discipline for a higher and better order of things. The apostle's object is plainly to lower the idea of the Galatians respecting the state of the Jews, and the economy under which they were placed. He intimates that they were in an infantine state, and that the economy they were put under suited it. They were wayward children, put under the care of a faithful, but somewhat severe and strict, tutor - a servant or slave only temporarily employed till the children should arrive at maturity.
"The law was our schoolmaster to bring us to Christ." These words have often been applied to express this idea, - that it is by the commands and threatenings of God's law brought home to the conscience of the sinner by the effectual working of the Holy Ghost, that he is induced to believe the revelation of mercy, and gladly to receive Christ Jesus as the only and all-sufficient Savior. But this, though a very important truth, is obviously not what the apostle means. He is speaking of the church as a body, and the law it was subject to. Nor is the somewhat more plausible exegesis, that the apostle means to say, that the law by its typical ordinances introduced the Jews into an acquaintance with the Messiah whom they prefigured, satisfactory, for the leading idea in the word tutor or pedagogue is not teaching, but custody - restriction - correction. You will notice that "to bring us" is a supplement, and is one of the supplements which might as well have been omitted. "Unto Christ" is equivalent to 'until Christ.' The three following expressions are obviously parallel, and throw light on each other. "The law was added because of transgressions till the Seed should come to whom the promise was made." "We were kept shut up under the law till the faith was revealed." "The law was our tutor till Christ, that we might be justified by faith." These last words may signify, 'Thus the law was our tutor till Christ; this was its character; so that if we Jews are justified at all, we are justified by faith. The law restrained, commanded, and punished, but it did not justify. If we Jews are justified, it is not by the law, but by faith.' The substance of the apostle's assertion is, that "the law was added because of transgressions till the Seed should come, in reference to whom the promise" of justification to the Gentiles by faith "was made"; that "before faith came," before the gospel revelation was given, the Jewish church "were shut up under the law," till the good news promised afore was announced; and that "the law was the tutor or pedagogue" of the infant church "till Christ." The apostle now proceeds to show that the law, though an institution necessary in and suited to that imperfect and preparatory state, was utterly unnecessary and unsuited to that new and better state into which the church had been brought by the coming of the Savior, and to the full and clear revelation of the way of salvation, and therefore to endeavor to perpetuate it was the height of criminal folly. This is the principle which the apostle lays down in the verse which follows, and which he illustrates down to the close of the eleventh verse of the next chapter.
State of the Church after "faith has come"
"But after that faith has come, we are no longer under a schoolmaster: for ye are all the children of God by faith in Christ Jesus."
The meaning of the phrase, "the coming of faith," has already been illustrated. By "faith" we understand the gospel revelation, not only as given, but received. "After that faith is come," is, we apprehend, equivalent to, 'After that the truth about the come Savior, and the completed revelation, has been made known to us, and believed by us.'
"We are no longer under a schoolmaster." These words seem a statement not only of the fact, but of the reason of it. It is as if the apostle had said, 'We are no longer, and we no longer need be, under such a restrictive system as that of the law. The necessary imperfection of the revelation of the method of salvation, till the Savior appeared and finished his work, and the corresponding limitation of the dispensation of divine influence, rendered such a restrictive system absolutely requisite; but the cause having been removed, the effect must cease. Till faith came, it was necessary that we should be under the tutelage of the law; but now that faith is come, we need our tutor no longer. When the child, in consequence of the development of his faculties, and the completion of his education, becomes a man, and capable of regulating his conduct by internal principles, the tutor is dismissed, and his pupil is freed from external restraints now understood to be superseded by the expanded, instructed, disciplined, rational and moral powers of his nature.'
It is plainly on this principle that the apostle reasons; for he immediately adds, "For ye are all the children of God by faith in Christ Jesus." 'Faith being come, you no longer need a tutor; for by faith in Christ Jesus ye are all the children of God.' The change of the person from the first to the second, from we to ye, is easily accounted for. The language in the twenty-fifth verse is strictly applicable to believing Jews only, who once were under the tutelage of the law; the statement made in the twenty-sixth verse is equally applicable to believers, whether Jews or Gentiles, to all the Galatian converts, and is plainly intended to lay a foundation for this conclusion - 'if the coming of the faith emancipates those believers who were under the tutelage of the law, it surely must prevent those believers who were never subject to it from being brought under its bondage.'
To perceive the force of the apostle's reasoning it is necessary to observe that the figurative appellation "children of God" is here used with a certain peculiarity of reference and meaning. When Christians are represented in Scripture as the children of God, we have a view given us sometimes of their state, and sometimes of their character, and sometimes of both conjoined. We are taught either that God regards them as his children, or that they regard Him as their father, or both. To speak in technical language, it sometimes represents them as justified, and sometimes as sanctified, and sometimes as both justified and sanctified. In most of the passages where this figurative expression occurs, it describes the state and character of saints, in opposition to the state and character of unconverted, unforgiven, unsanctified sinners. But in the passage before us, it obviously describes the state and character of saints under the Christian dispensation, in contrast with the state and character of saints under the Jewish dispensation. The persons spoken of as having been under the law, previously to the coming of faith, are not represented as aliens from the family of God. They belonged to it; but being under age, they were "under tutors and governors till the time appointed of the father," when they were to receive, what our translators call, "the adoption of sons" - the privileges of grown-up children. There can be no reasonable doubt then that the phrase "children of God" is here equivalent to grown-up children.
The meaning of this language is not obscure. It is as if the apostle had said, 'There is as great a difference between the privileges you possess, and the character of love to God, and confidence in Him, and submission to Him, to which you have been formed, and the privileges and character of those who lived under the law, as there is between the state and feelings of a son arrived at maturity, and having finished his education, and those of the same child while an infant or still under the care of the nurse and the tutor; and it were not more incongruous for such a person to insist on still remaining in the nursery or the school - to have all his movements watched and regulated by servants - than it is in you believers in Christ to seek to remain under the bondage of the law, not to speak of your subjecting yourselves to that bondage.'
It is "through faith in Christ Jesus" that they were introduced into the privileges and formed to the character of mature children. "Faith in Christ Jesus," here as in the whole of the context, is equivalent to the revelation of the truth about Christ Jesus viewed as believed. It is by this revelation believed that Christians obtain that knowledge of the Divine Being as "the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ," and our God and Father in him, which at once fills them with joy and peace, and forms them to that love and confidence in Him which leads them to "serve Him without fear," and to "walk at liberty, keeping his commandments." To such persons the restrictions of the Mosaic law are unnecessary, and its carnal ordinances altogether unsuited; and such is the state into which every believer of the gospel is brought, and such is the character to which every believer of the gospel is formed.
We are now prepared to feel the force of the apostle's reasoning. 'Now that the gospel revelation has been made, and believed by us, we stand no more in need of such an elementary, restrictive, external dispensation as the law; for through this gospel believed we are introduced into a state, and formed to a character, to which such an introductory institution, however well fitted to serve its own purposes, is utterly unsuited.'
That this high honor of being "the children of God" is not peculiar to any class of believers, but common to them all, is the principle which the apostle states and illustrates in the succeeding verses. "For as many of you as have been baptized into Christ have put on Christ." This is the privilege of all believers. For the apostle add, "There is neither Jew nor Greek, there is neither bond nor free, there is neither male nor female: for ye are all one in Christ Jesus." The general idea obviously is, that under the Christian dispensation our religious privileges depend on nothing but our connection with Christ Jesus, which is formed entirely by faith. External distinctions are here of no avail. It is neither as a Jew nor as a Greek equivalent to a Gentile, as a bondsman nor as a freeman, as a man nor a woman, but purely and solely as a person "in Christ" that the believer enjoys any spiritual blessings. And all who are in Christ Jesus are blessed with the same privileges. Believers when they have put on Christ, put off these external distinctions, and appear, as it were, all one in Christ Jesus.
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