+I. To accept legalism is to reject Christ+ (vers. 2, 4).
+II. Legalism demands universal obedience to its enactments+ (ver.
3).
+III. Legalism is a disastrous abandonment of Christianity.+--"Ye are
fallen from grace" (ver. 4).
Vers. 5, 6. _Righteousness attained by Active Faith._--1. No personal
righteousness entitles us to the blessed hope of the heavenly
inheritance, but only the righteousness of Christ apprehended by
faith. It is only the efficacious teaching of God's spirit which can
sufficiently instruct us in the knowledge of this righteousness and
make us with security and confidence venture our hope of heaven upon
it. 2. To impose the tie of a command on anything as a necessary part
of Divine worship wherein the Word has left us free, or to subject
ourselves to such command, is a receding from and betrayal of
Christian liberty. 3. The sum of a Christian's task is faith; but it
is always accompanied with the grace of love. Though faith and love
are conjoined, faith, in the order of nature, has the
precedency.--_Fergusson._