II. +He frames his reproof with great wariness and
circumspection.+--He says not, ye of yourselves do remove to another
gospel, but ye are removed. He blames them but in part and lays the
principal blame on others.
III. +The revolt was a departure from the calling to the grace of
Christ.+--1. They were soon carried away. This shows the lightness
and inconstancy of man's nature, especially in religion. The
multitude of people are like wax and are fit to take the stamp and
impression of any religion; and it is the law of the land that makes
the most embrace the Gospel, and not conscience. 2. That we may
constantly persevere in the profession of the true faith we must
receive the Gospel simply for itself. 3. We must be renewed in the
spirit of our minds and suffer no by-corners in our hearts. 4. We
must not only be hearers but doers of the Word in the principal
duties to be practised.
IV. The Galatians revolt to +another gospel, compounded of Christ and
the works of the law.+--Here we see the curious niceness and
daintiness of man's nature that cannot be content with the good
things of God unless they be framed to our minds. If they please us
for a time, they do not please us long, but we must have new things.
The apostle shows that, though it be another gospel in the estimation
of the false teachers, is not another, but a subversion of the Gospel
of Christ. There is but one Gospel, one in number, and no more. There
is but one way of salvation by Christ, whereby all are to be saved
from the beginning of the world to the end.
V. +The apostle charges the authors of this revolt with two
crimes.+--1. They trouble the Galatians, not only because they make
divisions, but because they trouble their consciences settled in the
Gospel of Christ. 2. They overthrow the Gospel of Christ. They did
not reach a doctrine flat contrary. They maintained the Gospel in
word and put an addition to it of their own out of the law--salvation
by works. They perverted and turned upside-down the Gospel of
Christ.--_Perkins._
_The Perversion of Truth--_
+I. Supplants the Gospel with a valueless imitation.+--"Another
gospel which is not another."
+II. Is contrary to the Divine purpose.+--"From Him that called you
into the grace of Christ."
+III. Creates a gulf between the soul and God.+--"I marvel that ye
are so soon removed from Him."
+IV. Unsettles the faith of new converts.+--"There be some that
trouble you and would pervert the gospel of Christ."
Ver. 6. _Disappointed Hopes in Christian Work._--1. It is the duty of
Christian ministers, not only to hold out the pure truth of the
Gospel, but to defend it by convicting gainsayers and reproving
solidly those who are carried away with contrary errors. 2. Ministers
in all their reproofs are to use much wariness and circumspection,
not omitting any circumstance which may justly extenuate the sin or
furnish ground of hope of amendment. Hereby the bitter portion of a
medicinal reproof is much sweetened, and the guilty patient allured
to the more thorough receiving of it. 3. The most quick-sighted may
be deceived and disappointed in their expectation of good things from
some eminent professors, and so may readily fall short of their hope.
4. As the dangerous consequences which follow upon error ought to be
presented unto people that they may fly from it, so there are some
errors in doctrine which do no less separate from God than profanity
of life doth, of which errors this is one--the maintaining of
justification by works. 5. It is ordinary for seducers to usher in
their errors by some excellent designations as of new lights, a more
pure gospel way, and what not, as here they designate their error by
the name of another gospel.--_Fergusson._
Ver. 7. _The Inviolable Unity of the Gospel._--1. There is but one
Gospel, one in number and no more, and but one way to salvation,
which is by faith. 2. The effect of error is to trouble the Church's
peace; peace among themselves, the patrons of error being zealous of
nothing so much as to gain many followers, to attain which they
scruple not to make woeful rents and deplorable schisms; inward peace
of conscience, while some are perplexed and anxious what to choose
and refuse until they question all truth, and others to embrace error
for truth and so ground their peace on an unsure foundation. 3. The
doctrine which maintains that justification is partly by Christ and
partly by the merit of good works is a perverting and total
overturning of the Gospel, in so far as it contradicts the main scope
of the Gospel, which is to exalt Christ as our complete Saviour,
Mediator, and Ransom, and not in part only.--_Fergusson._