WHEN we considered this passage in the last lecture, we did not complete the subject. We found who the Redeemer was, viz. the Christ. We found what it was that He redeemed us from, viz. the curse, or just judgment of God’s righteous law. We found also what was the redemption price, or great redeeming act, viz. the substitution of the Lord Jesus Christ, the Son of God for the sinner. But there is a fourth point of the utmost possible importance which we had not time to investigate, viz. the question for whom, or in whose behalf, this great work was accomplished by the Saviour. But there is no part of the subject more vitally affecting our own practical life; for unless the Lord Jesus was a substitute for ourselves, we as individuals may admire His mercy, but can never have a share in the blessing of His saving work. So far as we ourselves are personally concerned, our whole hope depends on our being included in that little word ‘us,’ when it is said, ‘Christ hath redeemed us from the curse of the law, being made a curse for us.’ If we cannot each one make use of that sentence in the singular number, and say, ‘Christ hath redeemed _me_, being made a curse for _me_,’ the passage may call forth our admiration, but to our own souls it will bring no abiding peace. It is, therefore, a matter of the deepest personal interest to us all that we should clearly understand who is included, and who is not included, in that word ‘us;’ or, in other words, who are they that the Lord Jesus Christ has redeemed by His blood. It would have been strange indeed if a matter of such overwhelming interest had been quietly passed by without calling forth a very careful investigation, and accordingly it gave rise at one time to one of the most prominent controversies of the day. Indeed there has always been a division amongst the students of the Word of God on the subject. Some have believed in what is termed ‘particular redemption,’ a redemption limited exclusively to the elect; while others have most earnestly advocated the doctrine of a universal atonement, an atonement, _i.e._ made for the whole world in virtue of which a free offer of complete reconciliation is made without money and without price to every living soul.