V. 8-9.— Jesus Christ the same yesterday, and today, and for ever. Be not carried about with divers and strange doctrines. For it is a good thing that the heart be established with grace; not with meats, which have not profited them that have been occupied therein. This is often understood as being connected with the preceding verse; but it is evidently to be connected with what follows. From the consideration that Jesus is the same yesterday, today, and for ever, the believers are cautioned against being carried away with those winds of doctrine which arise from time to time— they are termed diverse and strange doctrines. There appears, from what follows, to be a reference here to the Judaizing teachers who "taught the brethren, and said, Except ye be circumcised after the manner of Moses, ye cannot be saved," Acts 15:1; for the Apostle goes on,—“It is a good thing that the heart be established with grace, not with meats," &c. It appears from the epistle that many had either apostatized, or were in danger of apostasy and of returning to the weak and beggarly elements. This error is exposed in almost all the epistles, especially in that to the Galatians; and those who inculcated such doctrine are characterized as false teachers. The Apostle would have the hearts of believers established with grace, with enlarged views of the boundless riches of Divine grace, through the one sacrifice of Christ.