Monday, August 11, 2008

Lightfoot on Col. 2.15

Lightfoot's commentaries are not dry remarks on ancient Greek, but are powerfully sermonic at certain points. Consider this quote on Colossians 2.15:

"The final act in the conflict began with the agony of Gethsemane; it ended with the cross of Calvary. The victory was complete. The enemy of man was defeated. The powers of evil, which had clung like a Nessus robe about His humanity, were torn off and cast aside for ever. And the victory of mankind is involved in the victory of Christ. In His cross we too are divested of the poisonous clinging garments of temptation and sin and death" (p. 190).

1 comment:

Matthew R. Malcolm said...

Wow - this is vivid. It's such a disarmingly simple way into Paul's idea of union with Christ. I'm actually working on a wedding sermon right now, based on Colossians 2-3... but, being a wedding, perhaps I'll avoid the rhetoric of "poisonous clinging garments of temptation and sin and death"!