From the coming glories of the Universe he returns, in the consciousness of an inspired but human heart, to the present discipline and burthen of the Christian. Let us observe the noble candour of the words; this "groan" interposed in the midst of such a song of the Spirit and of glory. He has no ambition to pose as the possessor of an impossible experience. He is more than conqueror; but he is conscious of his foes. The Holy Ghost is in him; he does the body's practices victoriously to death by the Holy Ghost. But the body is there, as the seat and vehicle of manifold temptation. And though there is a joy in victory which can sometimes make even the presence of temptation seem "all joy" (Jas i. 2), he knows that something "far better" is yet to come. His longing is not merely for a personal victory, but for an eternally unhindered service. That will not fully be his till his whole being is actually, as well as in covenant, redeemed. That will not be till not the spirit only but the body is delivered from the last dark traces of the Fall, in the resurrection hour.
Ver. 24.
Ver. 25.
For it is as to our (τῇ) hope that we were saved. When the Lord laid hold of us we were indeed saved,[136] but with a salvation which was only in part actual. Its total was not to be realized till the whole being was in actual salvation. Such salvation (see below, xiii. 11) was coincident in prospect with "the Hope," "that blessed Hope,"[137] the Lord's Return and the resurrection glory. So, to paraphrase this clause, "It was in the sense of the Hope that we were saved."[138] But a hope in sight is not a hope; for, what a man sees, why does he hope for? Hope, in that case, has, in its nature, expired in possession. And our full "salvation" is a hope; it is bound up with a Promise not yet fulfilled; therefore, in its nature, it is still unseen, still unattained. But then, it is certain; it is infinitely valid; it is worth any waiting for. But if, for what we do not see, we do hope, looking on good grounds for the sunrise in the dark east, with patience we expect it. "With patience," literally "through patience," δι' ὑπομονῆς. The "patience" is as it were the means, the secret, of the waiting; "patience," that noble word of the New Testament vocabulary, the saint's active submission, submissive action, beneath the will of God. It is no nerveless, motionless prostration; it is the going on and upward, step by step, as the man "waits upon the Lord, and walks, and does not faint."
[130] 2 Kings xx. 12, 13.
[131] Θανατοῦτε: observe the present tense, the process is a continuing one.
[132] The Aramaic "Abba," used by our Lord in His hour of darkness, had probably become an almost personal Name to the believers.
[133] With this verse on his lips, unfinished, Calvin died, 1564.
[134] We cannot think that the κτίσις of this passage refers only, as some would have it, to humanity (as Mark xvi. 15, Col. i. 23). The κτίσις is a something which was "subjected" involuntarily, and so, surely, not guiltily. This could not be said of humanity.
[135] See Col. i. 15, 16. The Lord's Headship of Creation, explicitly revealed there, is seen as it were only just below the surface here.
[136] See the perfect participle, σεσωσμένοι, Eph. ii. 5, 8.