A seal of the righteousness of the faith; a token, or visible sign, that by means of the faith which he exercised before he was circumcised, he was justified and accepted with God.

The father; the model or pattern as to the way of acceptance with God, for all who should believe, though not descendants of Abraham, and not circumcised: to encourage them to exercise such faith as he did, that they also might be justified, and through grace be delivered from the punishment of sin and rewarded with eternal bliss. It is dangerous to put the sign for the thing signified, or make the one a substitute for the other. Those who depend on the sign are destitute of the thing signified; and so long as they continue to do it will remain destitute. Glorying in the shadow, they lose the substance.

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Old Testament