The grace of the Lord Jesus Christ... — It is not without a special significance that the Epistle which has been, almost to the very close, the most agitated and stormy of all that came from St. Paul’s pen, should end with a benediction which, as being fuller than any other found in the New Testament, was adopted from a very early period in the liturgies of many Eastern churches, such as Antioch, Cæsarea, and Jerusalem (Palmer, Origines. Liturg. i. 251). It may be noted that it did not gain its present position in the Prayer Book of the Church of England till the version of A.D. 1662, not having appeared at all till A.D. 1559, and then only at the close of the Litany.
The order of the names of the three Divine Persons is itself significant. Commonly, the name of the Father precedes that of the Son, as, e.g., in 2 Corinthians 1:2; Romans 1:7; 1 Corinthians 1:3. Here the order is inverted, as though in the Apostle’s thoughts there was no “difference or inequality” between them, the question of priority being determined by the sequence of thought, and not by any essential distinction. To those who trace that sequence here there will seem sufficient reason for the order which we actually find. St. Paul had spoken of the comfort brought to his own soul by the words which he heard in vision from the lips of the Lord Jesus, “My grace is sufficient for thee” (2 Corinthians 12:9). He had spoken of that grace as showing itself in self-abnegation for the sake of man (2 Corinthians 8:9). What more natural than that the first wish of his heart for those who were dear to him should be that that grace might be with them, working on them and assimilating them to itself? But the “favour,” or “grace,” which thus flowed through Christ was derived from a yet higher source. It was the love of God in Christ reconciling the world unto Himself (2 Corinthians 5:18-20), the love of the Eternal Father that was thus manifested in the “grace” of the Son. Could he separate those divine acts from that of Him whom he knew at once as the Spirit of God and the Spirit of Christ? (Romans 8:9-14; 1 Corinthians 2:11; 1 Corinthians 6:11; Galatians 4:6.) Was it not through their participation, their fellowship in that Spirit (the phrase meets us again in Philippians 2:1) shedding down the love of God in their hearts (Romans 5:5) that the grace of Christ and the love of the Father were translated from the region of abstract thoughts or mere empty words into the realities of a living experience?[60]
[60] The note, added by some unknown transcriber, though having no shadow of authority, is, probably, in this instance, as has been shown in the Notes on 2 Corinthians 8:16-22, a legitimate inference from the data furnished by the Epistle.
And so the Epistle ends, not, we may imagine, if we may once picture to ourselves the actual genesis of the letter, without a certain sense of relief and of repose. It had been a hard and difficult task to dictate it. The act of dictation had been broken by the pauses of strong emotion or physical exhaustion. The Apostle had had to say things that went against the grain, of which he could not feel absolutely sure that they were the right things to say. (See Note on 2 Corinthians 11:17.) And now all is done. He can look forward to coming to the Corinthian Church, not with a rod, but in love and in the spirit of meekness (1 Corinthians 4:21). What the actual result of that visit was we do not know in detail, but there are at least no traces of disappointment in the tone of the Epistle to the Romans, which was written during that visit. He has been welcomed with a generous hospitality (Romans 16:23). He has not been dis-appointed in the collection for the saints (Romans 15:26) either in Macedonia or Achaia. If we trace a reminiscence of past conflicts in the warning against those who cause divisions (Romans 16:18), it is rather with the calmness of one who looks back on a past danger than with the bitterness of the actual struggle.