Sermons of M. John Calvin upon the Epistle of Saint Paul to the GalatiansSermons of M. Iohn Caluine vpon the Epistle of Saincte Paule to the Galathians

yea (saith Christ) as though your father Abraham had not rested upon the things that were spoken too him concerning me.¹ Therefore he saw my day, and it was the thing wherein he took all his comfort, in so much that he had not any other hope of salvation, than by the belief which he had in the doctrine which is preached unto you at this day by the Gospel. That also is the very same thing that is spoken of John Baptist by the Prophet Malachi,² namely that he was sent to knit the hearts and minds of the fathers to the children. And this is not spoken only of the person of John Baptist, but it belongeth also to the doctrine of the Gospel. Ye see then that the thing whereunto our Lord calleth us, is that although Abraham be rotten in the earth so long time ago: yet we may assure our selves, that there is none other promise than that for us too trust unto, so we be knit unto him by faith, and do so agree together as we can call upon God with the same mind wherewith he was governed, according as in very deed he had his mind fixed upon our Lord Jesus Christ. Now then for so much as we be united unto Abraham, let us tend to our Lord Jesus Christ, and let him be our aiming mark, and our shoot anchor, till we be all assembled together, and gathered up into the heavenly kingdom. Lo what we have to consider when mention is made of the promise that was made before the law. Yea and we ought to be greatly provoked to constancy, when we perceive that our father Abraham did always wait for our Lord Jesus Christ, although it were so long ere he should be discovered to the world, and it was told him that his seed should be held prisoners in a strange land. After that God had told him that all the world should be blessed in his seed: he addeth, and yet for all that, think not that ⟨p. 153⟩this shall be performed within these two or three days, or a hundred years hence: for thou thy self must first die, thou thy self must first be conveyed hence into a strange country, where thine offspring shall be oppressed with all tyranny and cruelty. Assure thy self I will be revenged of it, but yet must thy seed smart in the mean while. Abraham heard all this: Again after that the law was given, there passed other two thousand years more ere our Lord Jesus Christ came.

yea (saith Christ) as though your father Abraham had not rested vpon the things that were spoken too him concerning mee.