(Rom. 9 to 11.)
The third chapter of the Epistle to the Romans JL opens with that which might well be the exclamation of an angry Jew:"What advantage then hath the Jew ? or what profit is there of circumcision ? " This reveals the blending power of his religious self-esteem and the consequent ignorance of his ruin.
In the first two chapters of our epistle, the apostle has, first of all, made declaration of "The gospel of God "-the good news of which God is the source; good news from God, because in righteousness He has declared Himself for the sinner who will believe Him. He then proceeds to show how deep is the need that this good news, if it is to be indeed good news for man, must come from God.
This He does by going over the salient points in the moral history of the human race. The openly wicked and morally-debased Gentile is brought before the bar of God; guilt is here unmistakable. Next we have the more cultured and philosophical Gentile, who, with his ability to descant on moral questions, would fain make for himself an apron of fig-leaves therefrom. But culture, philosophy and ability to find fault, give to him no protection from the wrath of God. In the indictment of the Gentile, the apostle would have no difficulty in carrying with him the approval of the Jew, but when the Jew is shown to have been as grossly untrue to his later and greater light and privilege as the Gentile to his earlier and lesser light, he, too, is brought in under the just judgment of God-lo, the apron of fig-leaves again in the "Jew" and the "circumcision." These things, by which God meant to uncover him to himself, he uses to hide his nakedness.
But to the question, "What advantage then hath the Jew, or what profit is there of circumcision ? " the apostle replies, "Much every way:chiefly because that unto them were committed the oracles of God" (Rom. 3 :2). "The oracles of God" is the title given by the Spirit of Truth to the Old Testament Scriptures, and hence, in the words of our blessed Lord, " The Scripture cannot be broken " (Jno. 10:35). But these very oracles of God had been distorted and abused by those to whom they had been given, and the conduct of the Jew, so richly blessed of God, .had been such that His Name had been "blasphemed among the Gentiles" on account of it. Their place of light and of privilege had become to them (because of their refusal of the light, and their abuse of the privilege) an obscuring to their souls of the true character of God; their privileges being taken for immunity from penalty.
But God is holy, and being holy the unbelief of the mass cannot affect the blessing of those who were of the "faith of God" (Rom. 3:3)-those into whose hearts the light had revealed their need, and who, in the consciousness of their failure and their sin, had by their legal privileges been shut up to God; in the depth of their need they were taught that the privilege of the sinner is to come to God.
The apostle pursues his theme-the gospel of God-its freeness to all; the grace of it; its sovereign declaration of justification of the ungodly who believe in Jesus. And further, what I am as a son of Adam's race-a condemned man, under God's displeasure and just judgment – crucified and put away from God's sight in the crucifixion of Him who, while bearing that displeasure, was yet the full object of His Father's delight. The dominion of sin is broken:" Sin shall not have dominion over you, for ye are not under law, but under grace." I am redeemed from the curse of the law, and more, free from law as a principle of demands, free from its fretting interdicts; free now to serve God, not in the oldness of the legal code, but in the gladness of the new nature, empowered by the grace of the Spirit of God.
Then the glorious climax :" No condemnation." "Who shall lay anything to the charge of God's elect?" " Who is he that condemneth ?-it is God that justifieth." "If God be for us, who can be against us ? "-and no separation from the love of God ! Sweep the universe with faith's unfearing gaze, embrace in that gaze every object, every power, and there shall be nothing found that is able " to separate us from the love of God which is in Christ Jesus our Lord."
"The gospel of God, concerning His Son, Jesus Christ our Lord "-in that gospel behold what God is ! Whether we stand in the wilderness of this world, which is but " the valley of the shadow of death," or whether we stand in faith with John, the servant prophet, on the eternal strand, thrilled with the visions of glory, rejoicing in the final triumph of God's grace, we bow low in worship, as
the whole character of God is revealed to us in that wondrous truth-a truth which, because it so reveals God, commands the reverence of heaven; a truth to which the throne of God proclaims itself a debtor. God has been glorified by it. G. MacKenzie
(To be continued.)