Galatians 4

4. Suffering: believers are as a lily among thorns; as the dove among the birds of prey. The wicked have an antipathy against the righteous, and secret hatred will break forth into open violence (Galatians 4:29). He that was born after the flesh, persecuted him that was born aft…

3. A third slight, or cheat seducers have, is a laboring to vilify and nullify sound orthodox teachers; they would eclipse those that bring the truth; like the black vapors that darken the light of heaven: they would defame others that themselves may be more admired. Thus the fa…

It was real flesh Christ took. Not the image of a body, (as the Manichees erroneously held) but a true body; therefore Christ is said to be made of a woman (Galatians 4:4). As the bread is made of the wheat, and the wine is made of the grape; so Christ was made of a woman; his b…

Well, but how shall we know? Response 1. If Christ be praying for us, then his Spirit is praying in us (Galatians 4:6). He has sent forth his Spirit into your heart, crying, Abba Father.

14. We glorify God by laboring to draw others to God; we convert others, and so make them instruments of glorifying God. We should be both diamonds and lodestones, diamonds for the luster of grace, and lodestones for our attractive virtue in drawing others to Christ (Galatians 4…

1. God adopts us to a state of liberty; adoption is a state of freedom. A slave being adopted is made a free man (Galatians 4:7): You are no more a servant, but a son. Question. How is an adopted son free?

You know the fiery serpents did sting Israel. These have the sting of the serpent; they have a sting in their tongues, stinging the people of God with bitter slanders and invectives, calling them factious and seditious; and they sting with their indictments and excommunications…

Isaiah 53:8. Who shall declare his generation? Christ is a Son to the Father, yet so, as he is of the same nature with the Father, having all the incommunicable properties of the Godhead belonging to him: but we are sons of God by adoption and grace; Galatians 4:5. That we might…

Many baptized Christians are no better than heathens. O, labor to find the fruits of baptism, that Christ is formed in us! (Galatians 4:19) That our nature is changed, we are made holy and heavenly; this is to be baptized into Jesus (Romans 6:3).

Whose are the Fathers, and of whom as concerning the flesh Christ came. Galatians 4:4. God sent forth his Son, made of a Woman, made under the Law.

That the righteousness of God was glorified (Romans 3:25, 26): Whom God has set forth to be a propitiation through faith in his blood, to declare his righteousness for the remission of sins. The Law fulfilled and satisfied, as in the places before quoted (Romans 8:3; Galatians 3…

There is mention in the Scripture of the Godhead of God (Romans 1:20): His Eternal power and Godhead. And of his Nature, by excluding them from being objects of our worship, who are not God by nature (Galatians 4:8). Now this natural Godhead of God, is, his Substance or Essence…

The Son of God therefore became a man, assumed a true human body, and a true reasonable soul, was the Son of David; the Word was made flesh (John 1:14). And by this way he was fitted to be under the law, and responsible to it, upon our account, and therefore the Apostle puts the…

(1) Luke 18:1; Chap. 21:36; Romans 12:5; 1 Timothy 2:1, 2. (2) Ephesians 4:8, 12, 13; Romans 8:15, 16; Galatians 4:6. (3) Acts 2:42; 1 Timothy 4:5.

Q. But when was he manifested in the flesh? A. In respect of his manifestation in the flesh, he was given in the fullness of time in these latter days (1 Peter 1:20; Galatians 4:4; 1 Timothy 2:6). Q. What is the effect and benefit of his mediatorship?

Q. These covenants are only concerning external and earthly blessings; but is there not some covenant concerning everlasting happiness, besides that covenant of grace in Christ? A. Yes, that which is usually called the covenant of works (Galatians 4:24, 25; Romans 10:5). Q. What…

Q. How many are the persons in the Godhead? A. They are three, the Father, the Son, and the Holy Ghost (Matthew 3:16-17 & 28:19; John 14:16-17 & 15:26; 2 Corinthians 13:14; Galatians 4:6; 1 John 5:7). Q. Whether are these three, the Father, the Son, and the Holy Ghost several, a…

Are our sins the transgression of the holy and righteous law in every part of it? And did not Jehovah who gave and made that law, to make himself our righteousness, 'make himself under the law' (Galatians 4:4) and to make up a full righteousness, 'fulfill every part of it' (Roma…

For, though you yourself cannot bear it; yet trust undoubtedly, that Christ who bears with you, will give you strength to undergo it, unto victory. Thirdly, if the afflictions of a Christian, be the afflictions of Christ; then it is a fearful sin for any man to mock or reproach…

Thirdly and lastly, let us here know and learn, that this holy Matron, Sarah, figureth unto us mystically the spiritual Jerusalem, the Church of GOD. Allegories are charily and sparingly to be taught; else much unsound Doctrine may cumber men's consciences: but this is sound and…

We harden the obstinate Papist in their superstition; for they say, and that truly, we received most of our forms of prayer and praise from them. We rob the Spirit of his glory, who is given to Saints to form prayer and praise in them (1 Corinthians 14:15, 16; Romans 8:26; Galat…

5. That whatever grace any man seem to have, whatever profession he make, of whatever use he appear to be, if he have not this love, if he live not in the exercise of it, he has indeed no grace in truth, nor any real interest in the benefits of the Gospel. Faith where it is sinc…

For so there were then lords many, and gods many in the world. So they were esteemed by them that made them, and worshipped them: [⟨in non-Latin alphabet⟩] as our Apostle speaks, such as were called gods (1 Corinthians 8:5), but by nature were not gods (Galatians 4:8). They were…

This filled the whole people with terror and amazement. Upon the administration of the Spirit by the Gospel believers do immediately cry, Abba Father (Romans 8:16; Galatians 4:6). They have the liberty and boldness to draw nigh to God, and to call him Father.

For God sent his own Son in the likeness of sinful flesh (Romans 8:3). He sent him in the flesh, for he sent him made of a woman, made under the Law (Galatians 4:4), wherein the Word was made flesh (John 1:14); but he sent him only in the likeness of sinful flesh. And that becau…

The other is promised (Jeremiah 31:31, 32, 33, 34; Chapter 32:40), which is the new gospel Covenant as before explained, mentioned (Matthew 26:28; Mark 14:24). And these two Covenants or Testaments are compared one with the other, and opposed one to another (2 Corinthians 3:6, 7…

But it is not they alone who are intended. All the children of the faith of Abraham are heirs also (Galatians 4:27, 28). It is therefore with respect to all Believers absolutely, that God confirmed his Promise with his Oath, though the natural seed of Abraham was respected in th…

Christ knew all men, and he knew that such as now cried, Hosanna to the Son of David, would some of them ere long, cry, Crucify him, Crucify him, away with him: and truly, we may see something of this often, how common and frequent is it for such as for a season were much affect…

The Answer is, That it is very unusual that children at thirteen years of age should be fit for full communion. And as for Ishmael, there is no such thing testified of him in the Scripture; but on the contrary, when the Lord says, He should be a wilde man, and his hand against e…

Now from the birth of Christ to this day are 1592 years, and adding these together, the whole time amounts. And God would have the very time of the beginning of the world to be revealed, first that it might be known to the church, when the covenant of grace was first given by Go…

Jesus Christ is a rich heir (John 16:15). He is Lord of all (Galatians 4:1; Hebrews 1:2), and the saints are co-heirs, they go sharers with Christ. 9. God calls them the luminaries of the world: they give light by their precepts and example (Philippians 2:15).

Scoffing Ishmaels that will be mocking, are sure to be cast out (Genesis 21:9). They do not belong to God: the Apostle interprets that mocking to be persecution (Galatians 4:27). So it is in God's account; and yet it is always found in those that are born after the flesh: profan…

But after that you have known God, or rather are known of God, how turn you again to the weak and beggarly elements, whereunto you desire again to be in bondage, you observe days and months, and times, and years. I am afraid of you lest I have bestowed upon you labor in vain (Ga…

Your eyes shall see the land that is very far off (Isaiah 33:17). Jerusalem also was a type of the Church, and of Jerusalem above (Galatians 4:26; Revelation 21:2), and so the Temple (Psalms 15:1), and it was a type also of Christ's body (John 2:21; Colossians 2:9). Hence some h…

But 4. Suppose the signification of the Jewish music could not be found out, (as indeed it is a hard thing to find out the meaning of all their ceremonies) we are delivered not only from their types and ceremonies, but also from all their yokes and burdens. These things were a p…

Where this frame is, a conscientious fear of sinning will always prevail in the soul; where it is lost, men will be bold in all sorts of follies. And that this frame may be preserved, it is required, (1.) that we cast out all vicious habits of mind that are contrary to it (James…

This should be our wisdom and ambition, not only to have the presence of God with us, but the Spirit of God in us. Gal. 4. 6. God hath sent forth the Spirit of his Son into your hearts. 2. If God be in the midst of his Church to uphold and preserve it, then let not Gods people g…

In order to Christ's being mystically born into the world, in the advancement and flourishing of true religion, and great increase of the number of true converts, who are spoken of as having Christ formed in them, the Scriptures represent it as requisite, that the Church should…

Sometimes they are ready to breathe out their own souls toward them among whom they labor (1 Thessalonians 2:8). Sometimes represented as traveling in birth with them that are committed to their charge (Galatians 4:19). There are ministers whose hearts are in pangs and agonies f…

But we shall not exagitate that, in that Church, which it would never have affirmed of itself, because it is fallen out to be the interest of some men in these latter days to talk at such a rate, as primitive humility was an utter stranger to. I somewhat guess at what he means b…

For it had been made most clear that a sinful man had no hope residing in himself. Then He declares that this Savior, that other one through whom all salvation was henceforth to be expected, must be brought into the world by becoming incarnate — made, namely, of a woman (Galatia…

— of whom the apostle speaks (1 Corinthians 8:5). They are indeed called gods by many impiously, but they are not; that is, they are not, as he says elsewhere (Galatians 4:8), gods by nature, but only gods by repute and in common estimation. III. Further, with respect to efficac…

Now, there are things said about that time which pertain to theology. For Christ is said to have come in the "fullness of time" (Epistle to Galatians 4:4); He is also said to have come in the "last days" (Epistle to Hebrews 1:1); and therefore we must see in what sense these two…

Their youth. [Galatians 4:1. This I say, the heir as long as he is a child, differs not from a servant, though he be Lord of all. 2. But is under tutors and governors, until the time appointed of his father.]

The first reason is, from the adjoint of relation, Our Father, which is adorned with that manner of exclamation which utters a familiar affection, as My father, my son! (Genesis 22:7). So that we must in the assured feeling of faith, according to the Spirit of adoption and sanct…

A common truth, yet a truth fundamental to the Gospel, of which we are not to think the less or the worse because it is a common truth. When the fullness of time came (says the apostle, Galatians 4:4), God sent forth his Son made of a woman, made under the Law; who, as it is in…

We know in Scripture our and us are sometimes extended to all mankind, so we are all lost in Adam, and sin has a dominion over us all; and that part of the words (verse 6), All we like sheep have gone astray, may well be extended to all mankind. Sometimes it is to be restricted…

2. The respect that a faithful minister has to the people's souls, has influence on this; A tender shepherd will watchfully care for, and wish the sheep well, and be much affected when they are in an evil condition, and where the relation is of a more spiritual nature, and the f…

Because, not any Saint on earth can be so united personally to God, as the Son of Man; for he being made of a woman, of the seed of David, the Son of Man, he, and not any but he, is the eternal Son of God, God blessed for ever. The Child born to us, is the mighty God, the Father…

Christ so condescends to work upon the will, as with art, and unawares the will is taken, and made sick of love for Christ, and the man intended no such thing; as sickness comes on men besides their knowledge or intention: So Christ makes himself and heaven so lovely, and such a…