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Awake thou that sleepest and arise from the dead, and Christ shall shine upon thee. 4:25-32. At first sight the Apostle appears, as in vv. 1-3, to descend to humble deductions from great principles; but the point of his teaching lies not in the precepts themselves, but in the sanctions by which he enforces them. Christian action is shewn to be ruled not by law, but by love. The obligations of Christian to Christian, determined by their personal relation to Christ, reveal and determine the relations of man to man. Here also the cardinal truth that love rests on the love of the brethren finds its application.

25. diov ...] Wherefore , seeing that Christ is your life (Gal. 2:20), putting away all falsehood speak ye truth .... (Zech. 8:16). For ajpoqevmenoi see Eph. 4:22 and note.
To; yeu'do" , ‘the lie,’ expresses falsehood in all its forms.

Falsehood is unnatural: it is disloyalty to Christ in Whom we all are. In a healthy body the eye cannot deceive the hand.
ajllhvlwn mevlh ] Latt. invicem membra. Compare Rom. 12:5; 1 Cor. 12:12 ff. See also Marcus Aurelius 9.1.

26. Men claim truth from us; and, if they move our just resentment, they claim the moderation of self-control. jOrgivzesqe assumes a just occasion for the feeling.
oJ h{lio" ...] Perhaps as if he would say ‘Let the returning calm of nature restore calm to your soul,’ or simply ‘Let the feeling of provocation end with the day.’ This rule was followed by the Pythagoreans: Plut. de am. frat. p. 488 B.
ejpi; parorgismw'/ uJ. ] Latt. super iracundiam vestram. Parorgismov" , which occurs here only in N.T., is not the feeling of wrath but that which provokes it (cf. Eph. 6:4 mh; parorgivzete , Deut. 32:21, Rom. 10:19). The first keenness of the sense of provocation must not be cherished, though righteous resentment may remain.

27. mhdev ...] Unchecked passion leaves the way open to the Tempter. Compare and contrast Rom. 12:19 mh; eJautou;" ejkdikou'nte", ajgaphtoiv, ajlla; dovte tovpon th'/ ojrgh'/ .
tw'/ diab .] Eph. 6:11. The word does not occur elsewhere in St Paul except in the Pastoral Epistles (1, 2 Tim., Tit.). It is found in St Matthew, St Luke, St John, Acts, Heb., Cath. Epp. and Apoc.

28. oJ klevptwn ...] Let him that stealeth .... If sins from the old life still remain,
they must be abandoned under the constraining force of a new obligation. Our faith constrains us to serve one another. Stealing is the typical form of using the labour of another to supply our wishes, while it is our duty to make our own labour minister to the needs of others. The inspiration of labour is not personal gain but fulness of service.

JO klevptwn must mean ‘he that stealeth’ and not ‘he that used to steal’ (Vulg. qui furabatur ).
metadidovnai ...] Latt. unde tribuat (V.L. tribuere ) necessitatem patienti
( indigenti, cui opus est ). Lk. 3:11; Rom. 12:8. In the gift there is the thought of fellowship.

29 f. We wrong by action and we wrong by word. Evil speech corrupts: our duty is to edify. And more than this: evil speech grieves the Holy Spirit. By using it we offend man and GOD.

29. pa'"...mh; ejkpor .] A Hebraism which emphasises the negation. ‘Let every corrupt speech, if it is suggested in thought, be refused utterance.’ It is, so to speak, a positive form of expressing the negation. Comp. 1 John 2:21 note.
saprov" ] elsewhere used in N.T. only of material things. The word conveys the


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