The Groans of Creation.
I. In trying to understand the several voices which make up this chorus of expectation, we must commence with the dumb companion of our hope, the physical creation.
II. Deep in the constitution of our present earth, and continuous along its whole past history, I think we may trace the subjection of all its animated beings to a law of vanity. We are in a world which has not yet attained, neither is already perfect, but which yearns and labours in the hope to produce what shall be better than itself.
III. Christ has been delivered from the bondage of corruption into the liberty of the glory of the Son of God. In His deliverance is contained a pledge of that for which nature groaning waits. The original conditions under which our world was placed and has been kept so long become intelligible when we see that the world, like man, is a redeemed world, on its way to share in the splendid destiny to which Christ conducts redeemed humanity.
J. Oswald Dykes, The Gospel according to St. Paul,p. 246.
References: Romans 8:18-23. Homilist,new series, vol. iv., p. 154.Romans 8:18-27. Preacher's Monthly,vol. iv., p. 395.Romans 8:19; Romans 8:20. W. C. E. Newbolt, Counsels of Faith and Practice,p. 134.