For, lo, the winter is past, the rain is over [and] gone;
Ver. 11. For, lo, the winter is past, the rain is over and gone.] In winter the clouds commonly "return after the rain." Ecc 12:2 A shower or two doth not clear the air; but though it rain much, yet the sky is still overcast with clouds; and as one shower is unburdened another is brewed. Lo, such is the doleful and dismal condition of such as are not effectually called by Christ. Omnis illis dies hybernus est, it is ever winter with them; no spring of grace, no sunshine of sound comfort. It is with such as it was with Paul and his fellow sailors, when, "as neither sun nor stars in many days appeared, and no small tempest lay on them, all hope that they shall be saved was then taken away." Act 27:20 All the hope is that God, who by his all-quickening voice "raiseth the dead, and calleth things that are not as if they were," Rom 4:17 that calleth those "his people that were not his people, and her beloved which was not beloved." Gen 9:25 Together with his voice, there goeth forth a "power," as Luk 5:17 as when he bade Lazarus come forth, he made him rise and come away; so here. Of carnal, Christ makes us a people created again; Psa 102:18 Eph 2:10 of a wild ass colt he makes a man, Job 11:12 and of a hollow person (as empty and void of heart as the hollow of a tree is of substance) he makes a solid Christian, fit to be set in the heavenly building. This is as great a work as the making of a world with a word. God "plants the heavens, and lays the foundation of the earth, that he may say to Zion, Thou art my people." Isa 51:16 Hence Christ is called "the beginning of the creation of God." Rev 3:14 And the apostle in Rom 5:10 argues from vocation to glorification as the lesser.