g;" the author, owner and sovereign
ruler of "the creation of God." This is clearly taught in Col. i. 15-18,
where the same person, who (in v. 18) is called "the beginning," as
here; is (in v. 17,) said to "be before all things;" by whom (v. 16,)
"were all things created, that are in heaven, and that are in
earth."--Creation is a work proper to God only. But our Redeemer has
"created all things." Now, according to Heb. iii. 4, "he that built all
things is God;" therefore he of whom these things are spoken is "the
Most High God." And so said the inspired prophet long ago, "For thy
Maker is thine husband." (Isa. liv. 5.) In the language of Jeremiah, (x.
11,)--thus do we say to Arians, Socinians, and other self-styled
Unitarians,--"The gods that have not made the heavens and the earth,
even they shall perish from the earth, and from under these heavens:"
and their blinded votaries, "except they repent, shall all likewise
perish."--However far the body of this church had declined, it does not
appear that they had yet, as a community, gone the length of "denying
the Lord that bought them."

Spiritual pride, self-sufficiency, seems to have been the prevailing sin
among these degenerate professors. Like the Pharisee, they would boast
of their riches, the spiritual gifts which they possessed, by which they
flattered themselves that "they were not as other men." Possibly they
might excel in knowledge, that "knowledge which puffeth up;" in
utterance,--"great swelling words of vanity," by which they gained both
"filthy lucre" and the admiration of an ignorant and carnal multitude.
Such is too often the actual condition of ministers and people, when
they are all the while under the power of sin, and wholly "blind" to
their spiritual destitution. Self-deception is fatal; and it would be
just in the Lord Jesus to give such persons up to their own hearts'
lusts. So he threatens,--"I will spue thee out of my mouth," as a man's
stomach loathes that which is nauseating. The like figure is used by
Isaiah, (lxv. 5,) personating his Lord when describing similar
characters:--"These are a smoke in my nose,"--intolerably offensive.--To
us the case of this church would appear hopeless. It is not so, however:
on the contrary, he assures them that these sharp rebukes proceed from
love. "As many as I love, I rebuke, and chasten." (Heb. xii. 6-8.) And
from the "counsel" which he gives, as farther evidence of his love, we
learn wherein this church w