We then, as workers together with him, beseech you also that ye receive not the grace of God in vain.
Ver. 1. As workers together] Not as coadjutors, but as instruments, such as God is pleased to make use of. See the note on1 Corinthians 3:9 .
The grace of God in vain, ] That embassy of grace, 2 Corinthians 5:20; or that unspeakable gift of Christ, 2 Corinthians 9:15, which many use as homely as Rachel did her father's gods, -she hid them in the litter and sat on them; or as that lewd boy in Kett's conspiracy, who when the king's pardon was offered the rebels by a herald, he turned toward him his naked posteriors, and used words suitable to that gesture. One standing by discharged a harquebus a upon the body. (Life of K. Edward VI, by Sir John Hay.)
a The early type of portable gun, varying in size from a small cannon to a musket, which on account of its weight was, when used in the field, supported upon a tripod, trestle, or other ‘carriage', and afterwards upon a forked ‘rest'. The name in German and Flemish meant literally ‘hook-gun', from the hook cast along with the piece, by which it was fastened to the ‘carriage'; but the name became generic for portable firearms generally in the 16th century, so that the type with the hook was subsequently distinguished as arquebuse à croc: ŒD
2 (For he saith, I have heard thee in a time accepted, and in the day of salvation have I succoured thee: behold, now is the accepted time; behold, now is the day of salvation.)