of the Holy Ghost. This fellowship in
Christ's life, this possession of the Spirit, constituted Christianity.
To enjoy these things was to be a Christian. The idea of a
Christianity which stopped short of incorporation into Christ, or which
claimed this incorporation outside His body which is the Church, and
apart from the visible sacramental means of union, did not occur to St.
Paul. A Christianity which did not own allegiance to the Church was
not in question. But his entire present aim is to convince the heart
and reason of Christians that the whole privilege of their new 'state
of grace' belongs to them simply in virtue of faith. As he asks the
Galatians: 'Received ye the Spirit,' i.e. did ye become Christians, 'by
the works of the law or by the hearing of faith?' That is his point.
{182} They were not made Christians because they had done anything to
deserve it. They were simply helpless sinners, and it was the
gratuitous mercy of God which looked upon them and provided a means of
forgiveness for them, and justified them or set them upon a new basis
of acceptance, without any consideration of what they were or had done,
purely and simply because He loved them and meant that the mere
spectacle of His unmerited love and bounty should inspire their
gratitude and win their hearts. Therefore he lays such emphasis on
their initial need of forgiveness: on their helplessness to get rid of
their own sins: on their dependence for forgiveness on a sacrifice to
which they could contribute nothing: on their being justified by simply
receiving in trust the offer of God. But the offer when it is listened
to is found to consist in forgiveness indeed--but forgiveness as a step
toward new life in the body of Christ. Thus what Christ won for man,
what becomes available for each man in virtue of believing the message,
is here described as 'our introduction' (rather than 'access') 'into
this grace wherein we stand'--an introduction into a spiritual region
where God's favour is the prevailing atmosphere, or, to use a later
phrase, into 'a state of grace'; a {183} district of security out of
which, however, men may fall again by deliberate unfaithfulness, as St.
Paul warns the Galatians[2]: 'Ye are severed from Christ, ye who would
be justified by the law; ye are fallen away from grace.'

And St. Paul's language does not let us suppose that the whole of what
he means by our 'salvation' is included in our preliminary
acceptance[