keep it pure, and deliver it, and expound it to all the other Churches as a mistress of truth. This is what Paul proclaims aloud to thee in his Epistle: ‘That I may be the minister of Christ to the Gentiles, sanctifying (Gr. ίερουργοϋντα, that is, consecrating) the Gospel of God, that the oblation of the Gentiles may be accepted and sanctified by the Holy Ghost.’” The Gospel, and the preaching and interpretation of the Gospel, is the sacrifice; the Romans and the Gentiles who believe the Gospel are the victims. These the Apostle offered to God as a most acceptable oblation, when he evangelized them. The blood of Paul was the libation by which this sacrifice was bedewed.
The same S. Paul says in his Epistle to the Ephesians, “To me, the least of all the saints, is given this grace, to preach among the Gentiles the unsearchable riches of Christ: and to enlighten all men, that they may see what is the dispensation of the mystery which hath been hidden from eternity in God who created all things: that the manifold wisdom of God may be made known to the principalities and powers in heavenly places through the church.”
Paul, therefore, was the doctor of angels. S. Chrysostom commenting on the passage says, he taught the principalities and powers the Gospel of Christ. They, therefore, are followers of Paul, and co-workers with him who handle and expound the Gospel, and preach it to countrymen and foreigners, to believers and infidels. These are they whom Isaiah deservedly praises, “How beautiful upon the mountains are the feet of them that preach the Gospel of peace, who bring glad tidings of good things.”
It remains that we should apply the doctrines of the Gospel to
