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Sin has its dark offices — offices which it is always fulfilling. For sin is that dividing element, which, where it comes in, breaks up the harmony of all things, and sends them out into the distance of chaos and dismay. God, at the beginning, made the heaven to be subservient to the earth; and the earth to be subservient to the harvest; and the harvest to be subservient to His people. But sin has broken the beautiful chain of the material universe. When man fell, nature fell; and the links were severed by the fall. There is an interval, and an interruption now, between the right causes and the right effects in God's creation. And worse than this, man is divided from man; every one from his fellow. The very Church is broken up — Christian from Christian. And St. James traces it out: "From whence come wars and fightings among you? come they not hence, even of your lusts that war in your members?" The lust of pride, the lust of an opinionated mind — the lust of prejudice — the lust of jealousy — the lust of selfishness — the lust of a worldly ambition: these are the fabricators of all discord. These make foes out of hearts which were meant to love as brethren. And what are these, but some of sin's many forms which it loves to take, that it may then better work as a separator between man and man? No wonder, for sin separates a man from himself. I question whether any man is at variance with his brother, till he has first been at variance with himself. But sin takes away a man's consistency. A man is not one; but he is two — he is many characters. What he is one time, that is just what he is not another. Passions within him conflict with reason — passions with passions — feelings with feelings — he is "far off" from himself. And this the separator does. But never does he do that, till he has done another act of separation — and because he has done that other — he separates man from God. If you wish to know how "far" sin has thrown man away from God — you must measure it by the master-work which has spanned the gulf. The eternal counsel — the immensity of a Divine nature clothing Himself in manhood — love, to which all other love is as a drop to the fountain, from whence it springs — a life, spotless — sufferings, which make all other sufferings a feather's weight in the balance — a death, which merged all deaths — all this, and far more than this, has gone to make the return possible. And when it was possible; then the life of discipline and struggle — a work of sanctification, going on day by day — many crucifixions — the seven-fold operations of the Holy Ghost — death — resurrection — these must make the possible return a fact. By all these you must make your calculation, if you wish to measure the distance of that "far off," which we ewe to that great separator — sin. And this is the reason why God so hates sin, because it has put so "far" away from Him those He so dearly loves. And now let us deal with this matter a little more practically. Since Christ died, there is no necessary separation between any man and God. Without that death, there was.

(J. Vaughan, M. A.)

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KJV: But now in Christ Jesus ye who sometimes were far off are made nigh by the blood of Christ.

WEB: But now in Christ Jesus you who once were far off are made near in the blood of Christ.