1 Peter 1:1-2 Peter.The several names of St. Peter 1. Simeon or Simon: that he had at his circumcision. 2. Cephas, a stone: given him by Christ at his calling, to signify that He meant to make him a stout defender of the faith. 3. Peter: the Greek equivalent of the Syriac Cephas. Learn-1. Christ’ s kindness to Peter in giving him a name to assure him of some grace which He would bestow on him. Though we cannot do this, yet it behoves us to give our children such names as may put them in mind of some good thing; either to imitate some good man or woman whose name they bear, or else to follow some good that the name puts them in mind of. 2. In that he puts his name to his Epistle, he shows his godliness. A man bold for truth may be blamed, but cannot be shamed. This condemns the vile practice of the wicked, who hide themselves in the dark. We must do nothing but that we dare put our hands to it, and our names. (John Rogers.) Christ’ s selection of Peter When you have been down on the shore in the summer time you have found on the beach a dull-hued pebble, rounded and beaten, with all the colour washed out of it. But you have brought it home and broken it open, and lo! the whole interior was full of purple amethysts and sparkling crystals, of which the rough exterior gave no sign. So does Christ see in many a dull and unattractive life the jewels that shall sparkle forever. In Nathaniel He found an Israelite without guile, in Mary of Magdala a noble woman, and in Peter a foundation rock. (W. P. Faunce.) The introductory greeting I. The greeter.1. His name-Peter. The giving of that name leads us to recollect- (1) What is recalled to him of his former life.(2) What it tells of Christ’ s knowledge of his capacities and promise.(3) What it indicates of his ideal. 2. His vocation-“ an apostle.” (1) His dignity-authoritative messenger.(2) His brotherhood-“ an.” No claim of supremacy.(3) His Lord-“ Jesus Christ.” Sent by Him, to speak of Him, and to serve Him. II. Those greeted.1. Who? Sojourners of the dispersion. Homeless through persecution. 2. Where? Scattered from under the shadows of the mountains of Galilee down to the shores of the Black Sea. 3. What? “ Elect.” Divinely chosen to perfection of character. (1) To be made holy.(2) To be made holy by the Spirit.(3) To be made holy by the Spirit through obedience. III. The greeting-“ Grace and peace.”1. The highest conception of Greek and of Hebrew blessedness. Greek-grace; Hebrew-peace. Both combined. (1) Grace, the attitude of Christ, the gift of Christ, the issue of the work of Christ.(2) Peace-with God, with men, with conscience. 2. This multiplied indefinitely, not to say infinitely. They cannot have too much to exceed the apostle’ s desires for them. (U. R. Thomas.) An apostle of Jesus Christ. Commissioned by Christ It makes a great difference whether we are going out, in a kind of social knight errantry, to live for humanity of our own motion, or whether we have met with Jesus Christ in secret, and go forth with His commission and promise at our back, and with His love and inspiration in our souls. (James Stalker, D. D.) Sent by God Girolamo Savonarola was walking to Florence to become prior of a convent. When a few miles from the town he began to feel faint from want of food and rest, and sank wearily upon the ground. Then an unknown man appeared to the tired traveller, and walked with him. Savonarola believed it was a heavenly messenger, and took to his heart the stranger’ s parting words, “ Remember that thou dost that for which thou hast been sent by God,” and entered Florence ready to live in the midst of her unruly people, and work among them till his death. (“Three Great Lives,” Frances E. Cooke.) To the strangers scattered.-Persecution 1. Sundry of the Jews received our Saviour, and believed in Him, though the body of them did not. Those made a good progress in the cause of Christianity who were contented to undergo such dangers as might befall them in a strange land, only that they might keep faith and a good conscience. 2. The estate of the Church of God here on earth is under persecution. The world having power and wealth, is full of malice against the poor Church, so that were it not that God Almighty defends it, it could not endure. It is as a sheep among wolves, or a ship among the waves. Though God will exercise it to keep it front errors and corruptions, which it is subject to through much prosperity and peace; though it have need of some peace to gather itself, yet if it be long in peace it gathers mud as standing waters, rust as the ploughshare in the hedge, yea, settles itself on the lees, therefore God pours it out from vessel to vessel. The Church never shines so gloriously as either in or after persecution; then life, zeal, sincerity, heavenly-mindedness, and such like graces, appear in their true lustre. It follows- (1) That as we are not to conclude for a company, because they have so much peace, that therefore they are beloved of God; so must not we against any because they be few in number and outwardly despised. (2) That we are to prepare ourselves for persecution. (3) That it is lawful to fly in time of persecution. (John Rogers.) God’ s people scattered 1. That God’ s children may be driven from their native dwelling, God doth not always build them a house in their own hind. 2. That the Church of God is not tied to any one place, neither to Rome nor to Jerusalem. 3. That the godly are thin set. It is rare to find true godly men, they dwell here and there. 4. That the Church hath not always an external glory to commend it. 5. That there may be a great inward beauty under a despised condition. These dispersed ones are glorious creatures, sanctified in their spirits, and shall have an immortal inheritance. 6. That there may be excellent order in appearing confusion. One might think the husbandmen spoiled their corn when they scatter it abroad on the ground; and yet we know it is better so than when it is in the barn all on a heap. So is it with the godly. (N. Byfield.) Genuine disciples of Christ I. They are strangers in the world. II. They are chosen of heaven.1. To the sanctification of the Spirit.2. To obedience.3. To a consecration to Christ. III. They are prayed for by the brethren.1. For the favour of God.2. For peace of soul. (Homilist.) Elect.-How may we know the election of others Not with the judgment of certainty, because the heart of man is known to none but God, and a man may go far who yet may fall away; but with the judgment of charity, which hath degrees according to the fruits we see in them: if they only profess religion and be in the Church, we may hope, but it is a weak hope, where we see no fruits. Now when we see the fruits of faith, sanctification, and godliness in men, and that they show them not by fits, but constantly; not in some things, but in all; not in prosperity only, but in adversity, we may very boldly judge of them as the elect of God; and so does the apostle here, as appears by the next words, “ Through sanctification of the Spirit.” (John Rogers.) The elect St. Peter here tells you what you are-for what purpose you are such, and to how great privilege you may reach. “ Elect,” he says, “ according to the foreknowledge of God.” I. What does elect mean? The word is taken from the Old Testament, where it is applied not to one or two individuals, but to the Jewish nation. They were highly favoured, they were gathered from other nations; they had the law and the prophets and means which others had not. To the Christian Church it is now said, “ Ye are a chosen generation, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, a peculiar people.” Again, the very title of this Epistle shows for whom it was meant. “ Elect according to the fore knowledge of God.” For what is the title? The general-in Greek, the catholic-Epistle of St. Peter. Now what does this mean but that it is not for a small number of Christians, nor yet for the Church of a particular district, like some of St. Paul’ s Epistles; but for the Church universal, all the members of which he calls “ elect” ? Again, observe the first verse: “ To the strangers scattered throughout Pontus,” etc. As to the greater part of the persons whom he addresses, St. Peter could have known nothing of their character or habits any more than we can tell how individuals are living in private in France or Ireland. How, then, could he pronounce upon their eternal salvation? But he means nothing of the sort. He knew that life was before them; that they had light, and knowledge, and grace, and opportunities not given to others; he knew that they had been gathered into the Christian fold, which was not the case with others. Upon all these grounds he calls them elect, and predestined to this before the foundation of the world. That which is true of the Church as a whole is true of its parts. Accordingly, St. Paul, addressing different parts of the Christian body, at different times, calls them in turn elect, chosen, called, saints, sanctified. He does not mean to say that all he calls saints were so in their practice, any more than those whom we call Christians are really such. But he means that they were designed by God to be truly saints upon earth and triumphing souls in heaven. Why, I would ask, do you send missions to the heathen if you have not something to enrich them with which they possess not? You are in the light: you are a chosen people. I say not as to the use of privileges, but as to their possession. A man may shut his eyes though the sun be beaming; a man may turn back from the brink of heaven. Nevertheless, the possession of such privileges proves you to be high in God’ s favour-His chosen people, for an exalted purpose. II. And now what does God, according to St. Peter, to His elect people? How does He assure them of their election, and enable them to make their calling and election sure? He gives them His Spirit in their hearts: “ through sanctification,” it is said, “ of the Spirit.” It is affirmed in the following words, “ that God hath elected you unto obedience.” Surely to bear the fruits of the Spirit a man must have the Spirit. Therefore St. Paul writes, “ Ye have received the Spirit of adoption, whereby we cry Abba, Father,” etc. Let me mention two reasons why it is necessary to believe that Christians are sanctified, or receive the Spirit in their childhood.1. The first is that our children are all expected to serve God, to renounce the devil, keep the Commandments, and believe the faith. But they are not able to do it without the Spirit. 2. When God takes away any of your children from you in their early years you have a confident belief that they are saved. 3. And this conducts me very naturally to the third point: supposing people to grow up, and to have passed the unconscious time of childhood, what is the immediate object of their sanctification? The text informs us, “ Unto obedience and sprinkling of the blood of Jesus Christ.” The apostle is thought to allude here to the covenant God made with Israel, which was confirmed by the sprinkling of blood. Another meaning is, that the Spirit hath been given to us in order that we might obey and so be pardoned; in either case the result is the same, that without obeying Christ none shall be saved. Let me address these who think they shall be saved without obedience. It cannot be denied that this is a fearfully large number. Every man who puts off repentance thinks he can be saved without obedience; for if he keep putting it off, when does he hope to obey? Again, are there not persons who arrive at the same deceit in another way? who are not careful to inquire whether they keep the commandments of Christ, but only whether they feel in a particular manner? (J. M. Chanter, M. A.) The plan of salvation I. Election in its source.1. Election as an eternal act of the Divine mind is inaccessible to us; it is only in its effects that it comes within our mental cognisance. 2. This election is “ according to the foreknowledge of God.” God is the only and whole cause of every man’ s salvation. 3. The Supreme Being not only drew the plan, but continually emits a stream of energy to impel men into acquiescence with it. This energy is not physical but mental and spiritual, making man a willing co-worker with God in his own salvation. II. Election in its means.1. Election first shows itself in a man’ s separation from the world which lieth in wickedness. 2. Election is indissolubly connected with holiness as the sphere in which it moves, the atmosphere in which it breathes. 3. The holiness of the believer is not a created finite thing, like that of the angel, but an active participation in the uncreated, infinite holiness of God in virtue of the personal indwelling of the Holy Ghost. III. Election is its end.1. Election has for its object our obedience. (1) The obedience of which faith is the substance, the obedience we render God when we believingly receive the truths of the gospel. (2) The obedience which faith produces. 2. But notwithstanding all our efforts, aided even by Divine grace, bitter experience reminds us that we often stumble, and sometimes fall. Is there any provision for our manifold imperfections? Yes, there is the “ sprinkling of the blood of Jesus Christ” -to secure forgiveness for the sins we daily commit despite our aspirations after holiness, and to wash away the pollution cleaving to us, notwithstanding our endeavours after a higher Christian life. (J. C. Jones, D. D.) How a man may know his election If any man would know whether the sun shineth or not, let him go no further, but look upon the ground and the objects around him, to see the reflection of the sunbeams from thence, and not upon the body of the sun, which will but the more dazzle his sight. The pattern is known by the picture, the cause by the effect; let no man, then, soar aloft to know whether he be elected or not, but let him gather the knowledge of his election from the effectualness of his calling and sanctification of his life spent in obedience to the revealed will of Heaven. (J. Spencer.) According to the foreknowledge of God.-Lessons from the foreknowledge of God 1. To fear God and forsake sin, and not to dally with disobedience (Hebrews 4:13). 2. To trust upon God in all estates, seeing there is nothing but He knows and hath considered of it long since. 3. It should inflame us to piety, seeing no good can be done; but He will know it, though it be done never so secretly (Psalms 139:17; 1 Thessalonians 5:8-9). 4. It should quicken us to the meditation and care of our assurance of our eternal salvation. God hath delighted Himself to foresee it from eternity, and shall not we foremeditate of our own glory? 5. Paul useth this as a reason why we should help and encourage Christians, and do all the good we can for them. For their names are in the book of life (Philippians 4:3, etc.). 6. When we are to choose men for any calling we should learn of God to know before, and those we see to be wicked we should never elect: custom, riches, friends, intreaty, kindred, etc., should never prevail with us. 7. It shows us how we should love one another. No time should wear out our affection; God is not wearied with love, though He set His affections upon us before the beginning of the world. 8. This doctrine of God’ s eternal knowledge is terrible for wicked men. (N. Byfield.) Through sanctification of the Spirit.-Sanctification, and by whom wrought Sanctification begins in regeneration and is carried on in two ways-by vivication and by mortification; that is, by giving life to that which is good, and by sending death to that which is evil in the man. Now this work, though we commonly speak of it as being the work of the Spirit, is quite as much the work of the Lord Jesus Christ. Sanctification is a work in us, not a work for us. It is a work in us, and there are two agents: one is the worker who works this sanctification effectually-that is the Spirit; and the other agent, the efficacious means by which the Spirit works this sanctification, is Jesus Christ and His most precious blood. Suppose, to put it as plainly as we can, there is a garment which needs to be washed. Here is a person to wash it, and there is a bath in which it is to be washed-the person is the Holy Spirit, but the bath is the precious blood of Christ. It is strictly correct to speak of the person cleansing as being the sanctifier; it is quite as accurate to speak of that which is in the bath and which makes it clean as being the sanctifier too. To repeat my illustration: here is a garment which is black: a fuller, in order to make it white, uses nitre and soap, both the fuller and the soap are cleansers; so both the Holy Spirit and the atonement of Christ are sanctifiers. While the Spirit of God is said in Scripture to be the author of sanctification, yet there is a visible agent which must not be forgotten. “ Sanctify them,” said Christ, “ through Thy truth. Thy word is truth.” The Spirit of God brings to our minds the commands and precepts and doctrines of truth, and applies them with power. We only progress in sound living as we progress in sound understanding. Do not say of such-an-such an error, “ Oh, it is a mere matter of opinion.” If it be a mere matter of opinion today it will be a matter of practice tomorrow. As every grain of truth is a grain of diamond dust, prize it all. The agent, then, is the Spirit of God working through the truth. There is no being sanctified by the law; the Spirit does not use legal precepts to sanctify us; there is no purification by mere dictates of morality, the Spirit of God does not use them. The Spirit of God finds us lepers, and to make us clean He dips the hyssop of faith in the precious blood, and sprinkles it upon us and we are clean. There is a mysterious efficacy in the blood of Christ, not merely to make satisfaction for sin but to work the death of sin. Just as the Spirit only works through the truth, so the blood of Christ only works through faith. Our faith lays hold on the precious atonement of Christ. It sees Jesus suffering on the tree, and it says, “ I vow revenge against the sins which nailed Him there” ; and thus His precious blood works in us a detestation of all, and the Spirit through the truth, working by faith, applies the precious blood of sprinkling, and we are made clean, and are accepted in the Beloved. (C. H. Spurgeon.) Justification and sanctification Justification was never intended as a substitute for sanctification. (J. H. Evans.) Sanctification necessary Suppose you had a son-you forbad him to enter a place of contagion on pain of losing all you could leave him. He goes, and is seized with the infection. He is guilty, for he has transgressed your command; but he is also diseased. Do you not perceive that your forgiving him does not heal him? He wants not only the father’ s pardon but the physician’ s aid. In vain is he freed from the forfeiture of his estate,, if he be left under the force of the disorder. (W. Jay.) The Spirit purifying the heart Germs of disease may be constantly breeding in an infected house; but, so long as the disinfecting fluid is well sprinkled on the floors and pendent sheets, they are killed off as soon as they are formed. So sin, though present in the heart, may be choked off, so as to be almost unperceived, because the Holy Ghost is ever at work acting as a disinfectant; but, so soon as His grace is withdrawn, sin regains its old deadly sway, and breathes forth its pestilential poison. It is of the utmost importance, then, to keep in with the Holy Ghost. (F. B. Meyer.) The Spirit counteracting the evil tendency in man If you take a heavy book and hold it at arm’ s length, the pull of the law of gravitation will soon draw it downwards; but if some friend will pour down that arm a constant stream of electricity the flow of the electric current will set you free from the effect of the downward pull. It will still be there, though you will have become almost unconscious of it. Thus it will be when we are filled by the Spirit of God; the downward tendency may be in us yet, but it will be more than counteracted by the habit of that new life, in which the power of the living Saviour is ever at work, through the grace of the Holy Ghost. (F. B. Meyer.) Unto obedience.-Obedience When obedience to God is expressed by the simple absolute name of obedience, it teacheth us that to Him alone belongs unlimited obedience, all obedience by all creatures. It is the shame and misery of man that he hath departed from this obedience; but grace, renewing the hearts of believers, changeth their natures and so their names, and makes them “ children of obedience.” This obedience consists in receiving Christ as our Redeemer, Lord, and King. There is an entire rendering up of the whole man to his obedience. “ By obedience” sanctification is here intimated. It signifies then both habitual and active obedience, renovation of heart, and conformity to the Divine will. This obedience, though imperfect, is universal in three ways-in the subject, in the object, in the duration, the whole man is subjected to the whole law, and that constantly and perseveringly. The first universality is the cause of the other. Because it is not in the tongue alone or in the hand, but has its roots in the heart, therefore it doth not wither as the grass or flower lying on the surface of the earth, but it flourishes because rooted. And it embraces the whole law, because it arises from a reverence it has for the Lawgiver Himself; reverence, I say, but tempered with love. Hence it accounts no law nor command little or of small value which is from God, because He is great, and highly esteemed by the pious heart; no command hard, though contrary to the flesh, because all things are easy to love. That this three-fold perfection of obedience is not a picture drawn by fancy is evident in David (Psalms 119:1-176), where he subjects himself to the whole law; his feet (Psalms 119:105), his mouth (Psalms 119:13), his heart (Psalms 119:11), the whole tenour of his life (Psalms 119:24). He subjects himself to the whole law (Psalms 119:6), and he professes his constancy therein (1 Peter 1:16 and 33). (Abp. Leighton.) Sprinkling of the blood of Jesus Christ.-The sprinkled blood of Christ 1. There was blood in Christ; He took the true nature of His brethren that He might serve and satisfy God in the same nature that had offended. 2. This blood was shed. If you ask, who shed it? I answer, Judas by selling it; the priests by advising it; the people by consenting to it; Pilate by decreeing it; the soldiers by effecting it; Christ Himself by permitting it, and after presenting it to God (Hebrews 9:14), our sins, that chiefly caused it. 3. It is not enough that the blood of Christ be shed unless it be applied also, which the word “ sprinkling” notes. 4. This effusion of blood was solemnly pre figured or foretold by the sacrifices of the law. For this word “ sprinkled” is a metaphor borrowed from the legal sprinkling, which shows us two things. (1) The great account that God and good men make of it in that it was so solemnly and anciently typed out. (2) That the ceremonies of that Law are now abolished, seeing we have the true sprinkling of the blood. 5. That our estate in Christ is better now than our estate in Adam was. That Christ’ s righteousness imputed to us is better then that righteousness was, inherent in Adam. Now for the world to come; heaven is better than paradise. 6. We can never discern our comfort in the blood of Christ till we be sanctified in spirit, and set upon the reducing of our lives unto the obedience of Christ. Justification and sanctification are inseparable. (N. Byfield.) Grace unto you, and peace, be multiplied.- A loving salutation I. The characteristics of those addressed.1. They are sojourners.2. They have one common sympathy. Scattered in dwelling, but one in heart. II. The blessedness of the redeemed.1. Elected by the Father.2. Salvation by Christ.3. Sanctification by the Spirit. III. The affectionate desire. He does not seek their restoration, nor their temporal welfare, nor their immunity from suffering or persecution, but grace and peace.1. Grace is help. It is easy to bear trials and pains if strength is given. 2. Peace is tranquillity. It overshadows all our difficulties, and sheds a halo of light upon our course. (J. J. S. Bird, B. A.) Multiplied grace and peace What should we do that grace and peace might be multiplied?1. Be sure his true grace, else it will never increase. 2. Thou must increase in meekness and humility (James 4:8; Psalms 36:6; Psalms 36:11). 3. If thou wouldst have thy grace and peace increase, thou must be constant in the use of all the ordinances of God. As thou measureth to God in the means, so will God measure to thee in the success: thou must be much in hearing. 4. Thou must not perplex thy heart with the cares of this life, but in all things go to God by prayer, and cast all thy care upon Him (Philippians 4:6-7). 5. Thou must be resolved upon it to deny ungodliness and worldly lusts, and to live righteously and religiously and soberly in this present world, else thou canst never meet with true peace. This likewise may be comfortable to a poor Christian, and that two ways.1. First, If he consider that grace is not given all at once but by degrees, and therefore he must not be discouraged, though he have many wants. 2. Secondly, If he consider the bountifulness of God to all that seek grace and peace, it may be had in abundance. (N. Byfield.) Grace and peace, their true order While this beautiful introductory salutation, “ Grace unto you, and peace,” is a formula common to all the apostles, it is also an exact theological definition, rightly dividing the word of truth. The right thing is put fore most here. The living root lies in the ground below, and the fruit-bearing branches tower above it. It is grace first, and peace following it. When God and man meet it is pardon first, and then a mutual confidence. When He in the Mediator dispenses freely His favour, you in the Mediator draw near without dread. He manifests Himself a forgiving Father, and that very thing infuses into your heart the spirit of a trusting child. “ May grace and peace be multiplied.” In the Old. Testament (Isaiah 48:18) there is a promise that His people’ s peace “ shall be like a river” -gaining affluents from either side as it flows, and at the last opening out into “ a righteousness like the waves of the sea.” (W. Arnot.) The beauty of grace 1. The connection, grace and peace. The way to have peace is to have grace; grace is the breeder of peace. 2. The order; first grace, then peace. Grace is the elder sister. I. What is meant by grace? The infusion of a new and holy principle into the heart, whereby it is changed from what it was, and is made after God’ s own heart. II. The author or efficient of grace; namely, the Spirit of God, who is therefore called the Spirit of grace. The Spirit is the fountain from whence crystal streams of grace flow.1. Universally; “ the God of peace sanctify you wholly.” The Spirit of God infuseth grace into all the faculties of the soul; though grace be wrought but in part, yet in every part; in the understanding light, in the conscience tenderness, in the will consent, in the affections harmony; therefore grace is compared to leaven, because it swells itself in the whole soul, and makes the conversation to rise as high as heaven. 2. The Spirit of God works grace progressively, He carries it on from one degree to another. III. Why is the work of holiness in the heart called grace?1. Because it has a super-eminency above nature. It is of Divine extraction (James 3:17). By reason we live the life of men, by grace we live the life of God. 2. It is called grace because it is a work of free grace; every link in the golden chain of our salvation is wrought and enamelled with free grace. IV. The cogency and necessity of grace. It is most needful, because it fits us for communion with God. Alexander being presented with a rich cabinet of king Darius, he reserved it to put Homer’ s works in, as being of great value. The heart is a spiritual cabinet into which the jewel of grace should be put.1. Grace hath a soul-quickening excellency in it: “ the just shall live by faith.” Men void of grace are dead. 2. Grace hath a soul enriching excellency: “ ye are enriched in all knowledge.” As the sun enricheth the world with its golden beams, so doth knowledge enrich the mind. 3. Grace hath a soul-adorning excellency (1 Peter 3:4-5). A soul decked with grace is as the dove covered with silver wings and golden feathers. 4. Grace hath a soul-cleansing excellency. Grace lays the soul a-whitening, it takes out the leopard spots, and turns the cypress into an azure beauty. Grace is of a celestial nature; though it doth not wholly remove sin, it doth subdue it; though it doth not keep sin out, it keeps it under; though sin in a gracious soul doth not die perfectly, yet it dies daily. Grace makes the heart a spiritual temple, which hath this inscription upon it, “ Holiness to the Lord.” 5. Grace hath a soul-strengthening excellency, it enables a man to do that which exceeds the power of nature. Grace teacheth to mortify our sins, to love our enemies, to prefer the glory of Christ before our own lives. 6. Grace hath a soul-raising excellency; it is a Divine sparkle that ascends; when the heart is Divinely touched with the loadstone of the Spirit, it is drawn up to God. Grace raiseth a man above others; he lives in the altitudes, while others creep on the earth and are almost buried in it; a Christian by the wings of grace flies aloft; the saints “ mount up as eagles.” A believer is a citizen of heaven. 7. Grace hath a perfuming excellency; it makes us a sweet odour to God. Hence grace is compared to those spices which are most fragrant (Son 4:13). 8. Grace hath a soul-ennobling excellency; grace makes us vessels of honour, it sets us above princes and nobles. The saints are called kings and priests for their dignity, and jewels for their value. 9. Grace hath a soul-securing excellency, it brings safety along with it. Xerxes, the Persian, when he destroyed all the temples in Greece, caused the temple of Diana to be preserved for its beautiful structure; that soul which hath the beauty of holiness shining in it shall be preserved for the glory of the structure; God will not suffer His own temple to be destroyed. 10. Grace hath a heart-establishing excellency; “ it is a good thing that the heart be established with grace.” Before the infusion of grace, the heart is like a ship without a ballast; it wavers and tosseth, being ready to overturn. A gracious heart cleaves to God, and let whatever changes come, the soul is settled as a ship at anchor. 11. Grace hath a preparatory excellency in it; it prepares and fits for glory. First you cleanse the vessel, and then pour in wine. God doth first cleanse us by His grace, and then pour in the wine of glory; the silver link of grace draws the golden link of glory after it: indeed, grace differs little from glory; grace is glory in the bud, and glory is grace in the flower. In short, glory is nothing else but grace commencing and taking its degrees. 12. Grace hath an abiding excellency; temporal things are for a season, but grace hath eternity stamped upon it. Other riches take wings and fly from us; grace takes wings and flies with us to heaven. Let us try whether our grace be true; there is something looks like grace which is not. Chrysostom saith the devil hath a counterfeit chain to all the graces, and he would deceive us with it. Lapidaries have ways to try their precious stones; let us try our grace by a Scripture touchstone: the painted Christian shall have a painted paradise.1. The truth of grace is seen by a displacency and antipathy against sin: “ I hate every false way.” 2. Grace is known by the growth of it, growth evidenceth life. 3. True grace will make us willing to suffer for Christ. Grace is like gold, it will abide the “ fiery trial.” Lessons:1. If we would be enriched with this jewel of grace, let us take pains for it; we are bid to make a hue and cry after knowledge, and to search for it as a man that searcheth for a vein of gold. Our salvation cost Christ blood, it will cost us sweat. 2. Let us go to God for grace; He is called “ the God of all grace.” We could lose grace of ourselves, but we cannot find it of ourselves. 3. If you would have grace, engage the prayers of others in your behalf. He is like to be rich who hath several stocks going; he is in the way of spiritual thriving who hath several stocks of prayer going for him. (T. Watson.) The beginnings of grace small Trace back any river to its source, and you will find its beginnings small. A little moisture oozing through the sand or dripping out of some unknown rock, a gentle gush from some far-away mountain’ s foot, are the beginning of many a broad river, in whose waters tall merchantmen may anchor and gallant fleets may ride. For it widens and gets deeper till it mingles with the ocean. So is the beginning of a Christian’ s or a nation’ s grace. It is first a tiny stream, then it swells into a river, then a sea. There is life and progression towards an ultimate perfection when God finds the beginning of grace in any man. (J. J. Wray.) Grace continually from God As grace is at first from God, so it is continually from Him, and is maintained by Him, as much as light in the atmosphere is all day long from the sun, as well as at first dawning, or at sun rising. (J. Edwards.) Multiplied grace I have in my garden a tree that I have very carefully cultivated. It is not difficult for me to conceive that that tree may be perfect-that there is not a root nor a branch wanting; its foliage and fruitage are perfect; it is yielding fruit; but next summer I expect a little more than it has borne this year. The fruit may be no better than it was last year; it was perfect then, and is perfect now, but there is more of it, because, in the meantime, the tree has grown. So with your Christian experience. (Bp. Bowman.) Of peace I. What are the several species or kinds of peace?1. There is an external peace, and that is- (1) Economical, peace in a family. (2) Political, peace in the State.(3) Ecclesiastical, peace in the Church. A spiritual peace, which is twofold-peace above us, or peace with God, and peace within us, or peace with conscience. This is superlative; other peace may be lasting, but this is everlasting. II. Whence comes this peace? This peace hath the whole Trinity for its author.1. God the Father is the “ God of peace” (Philippians 4:9). 2. God the Son is the purchaser of peace (Colossians 1:20). Christ purchased our peace upon hard terms. 3. Peace is a fruit of the Spirit. The Spirit clears up the work of grace in the heart, from whence ariseth peace. III. Whether may such as are destitute of grace have peace? No. Peace flows from sanctification, but they being unregenerate, have nothing to do with peace: “ There is no peace, saith my God, to the wicked.” They may have a truce, but no peace. IV. What are the signs of a false peace?1. A false peace hath much confidence in it, but this confidence is conceit. 2. False peace separates those things which God hath joined together: God joins holiness and peace, but he who hath a false peace separates these two. He lays claim to peace, but banisheth holiness. 3. False peace is not willing to be tried; a sign they are bad wares which will not endure the light; a sign a man hath stolen goods, when he will not have his house searched. A false peace cannot endure to be tried by the Word. The Word speaks of a humbling and refining work upon the soul before peace; false peace cannot endure to hear of this; the least trouble will shake this peace, it will end in despair. V. How shall we know that ours is a true peace?1. True peace flows from union with Christ. We must first be ingrafted into Christ, before we can receive peace from Him. 2. True peace flows from subjection to Christ; where Christ gives peace, there He sets up His government in the heart. 3. True peace is after trouble. Many say they have peace, but is this peace before a storm, or after it? True peace is after trouble. VI. Whether have all sanctified persons this peace? They have a title to it; they have the ground of it; grace is the seed of peace, and it will in time turn to peace, as the blossoms of a tree to fruit, milk to cream. VII. But why have not all believers the full enjoyment and possession of peace? Why is not this flower of peace fully ripe and blown?1. Through the fury of temptation.2. Through mistake and misapprehension about sin.3. Through remissness in duty. VIII. What shall we do to attain this blessed peace?1. Ask it of God.2. Make war with sin.3. Go to Christ’ s blood for peace.4. Walk closely with God. Walk very holily: God’ s Spirit is first a refiner before a comforter. (T. Watson.) 1 Peter 1:3-5 Blessed be the God and Father.Man blessing God I. Man blesseth God three ways.1. In his heart, when, refreshed with God’ s favour and inflamed with the joys of His presence, he doth lift up his heart with affection, striving to laud God and acknowledge His mercy. 2. In his tongue, when he taketh to him words, and openeth his lips to confess and praise God either in secret or openly. 3. In his works, and that- (1) When he sets up memorials of God’ s great works or deliverances. (2) When he receives the sacrament, setting himself apart to celebrate the memory of Christ’ s death. (3) By the obedience of his life, striving to glorify God in a holy conversation. (4) And lastly, by showing mercy, and thereby causing others to bless God. II. Great reason hath man to bless God.1. For God is blessedness itself, and whither should the water run but into the sea, from whence it is originally taken. 2. Besides, the Lord hath required our praise, as the chief means of glorifying Him. 3. And He hath blessed us, and therefore we have great reason to bless Him. He hath blessed us in the creatures, in His Son, by His angels, by His ministers; blessed us in the blessings of the gospel, blessed us in His house, and in our own houses, in our sabbaths, sacraments, the Word, prayer, etc., blessed us in our souls, bodies, states, names, etc. (N. Byfield.) An ascription of praise I. The spirit of devotional thankfulness. “ Blessed be the God and Father of Jesus Christ.” A living Christian cannot receive Divine mercies like a dumb animal, but rejoices in the sunshine of thanksgiving.1. It should be the ruling principle of our lives. How much happiness is lost by forgetting the privileges we enjoy! Thankfulness in our lives would enable us to appreciate what we already possess. 2. It should be the keynote of our prayers. It is discouraging to bestow favour on a hard and unthankful recipient. 3. It should permeate all our religion. There is something in praise that softens the heart and ennobles the mind. II. The grand reason which demands this spirit. It is the regeneration which is in Christ Jesus. This regeneration is represented as introducing us to three grand privileges, which may well excite our praise.1. A prospect of eternal life-“ To a lively hope.” 2. A prospect of unchanging possession-“ To an inheritance incorruptible,” etc. 3. A possession of perfect protection-“ Who are guarded” by the power of God. 4. A prospect of perfect victory-“ Unto salvation.” (J. J. S. Bird, B. A.) The apostolic benediction The Epistle at this point where it begins to flow is Like one of those infant rivers which burst full bodied at their birth from a great inland sea in which their waters have been gathered. Unlike the waters of Ezekiel’ s vision, that gathered volume as they flowed, this is a river to swim in the moment that it breaks away from the fountainhead,1. Who is this of whom the prophet speaks?-God. 2. In what aspect does the Supreme present Himself?-As the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ. 3. What has He done?-Begotten us again; made us new creatures. 4. From what motive has He acted?-According to His abundant mercy. 5. By what means has He accomplished this great change?-By the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead. 6. To what end in the experience of His people does He thus work?-To a living hope burning in their hearts here, and an inheritance incorruptible beyond the grave. (W. Arnot.) An outburst of praise I. Praise to God.1. Reverent.2. Loving.3. Intelligent.4. Grateful. II. Praise to God, for a bright hope of a glorious future.1. It is praise to God for a hope. (1) Expectant desire.(2) Living hope. In contrast with dead hopes; lying hopes; weak hopes. 2. It is praise to God for a future. (1) In contrast with the present lot.(2) A completion of what inheritance in Palestine might have been. III. Praise to God, for His wonderful methods of ensuring the future and inspiring that hope.1. The future is ensured. (1) God has reserved it in safe keeping.(2) God will, in due time, let it be revealed.(3) God has ensured it as an inheritance. 2. How is the hope of the future inspired and preserved? (1) It is a hope that is born with man’ s new birth.(2) It is a hope that is continued by God in connection with man’ s character. “ Guarded by the power of God through faith.” (U. R. Thomas.) A seven-fold hymn praise 1. “ Abundant mercy.” Everything must start from that. Our first cry must be, “ God be merciful to me, a sinner.” God’ s mercy is abundant wherever you see it. You see mercy in nature and in providence, but in Christ it seems to overflow its banks. 2. The new birth. If we are to enjoy heaven we must be born again, have new tastes. 3. A living hope. This irradiates all the future. Earthly hopes are dying hopes. The most that the worldly man can say is, “ while I breathe I hope.” But the Christian’ s hope is not crushed by death; it is a living hope in that He gives me life. See yonder swimmer tossed about by the waves; he is sinking, but at last they see him; a boat puts off; the cry is raised from the pier head; the rescuers are on their way; he lifts himself once more, he sees the boat sweeping towards him; he has a living hope; he struggles a little longer, until the rescuers are able to pull him into the boat. So it is with our hope; living hope inspires us with courage. 4. Then he comes to the blessing, which is like the central shaft of the candlestick-the blessing upon which all the rest depends-the risen Christ. “ By the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead.” We worship no dead hero, but a living, loving Lord. 5. “ An incorruptible inheritance.” I once received a letter asking me to preach a sermon about heaven. I cannot preach about heaven. St. Peter could not. He could only tell us what it was not. 6. The guaranteed preservation. “ Kept by the power of God.” 7. “ Salvation to be revealed.” (E. A. Stuart, M. A.) Benedictus Deus The sum of this text, and the name of it too, is set down in the very first word of it. A Benedictus it is from us to God, for something coming from God to or for us. Something? Nay, many. And many they are; we reduce them to three: Our regeneration which is past, our hope which is present, and our inheritance which is to come.1. Regenerating, or begetting, is of itself a benefit; we get life by it if nothing else. 2. But to beget to an inheritance is more than simply to beget. 3. And yet more than that, to beget to such an inheritance as this, of which so many things are here spoken. For the order we will put the words in no other, for we can put them in no better than they stand.1. God first, and the true God, the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ.2. Then His mercy, the cause moving.3. Then Christ’ s resurrection, the means working.4. Then our regeneration, the act producing. Producing hope of the inheritance, then after the inheritance we hope for. Of which two points there are: How it is qualified, uncorrupt, undefiled, not fading. Then, how seated, even in heaven there it is, there kept it is. Now then for these. For His mercy first: for our regenerating by His mercy; for the hope of this inheritance, but more for the inheritance itself, specially such a one so conditioned as here is set down; for keeping it for us in heaven; for keeping us for it on earth. For these all, but above all for the means of all, the rising of Christ, the gate of this hope, the pledge of this inheritance; for these owe we this Benedictus to God. To God the Father and to Christ our Lord, by whom and by whose rising, lose this life when we will, we have hope of a better; betide our inheritance on earth what shall, we have another kept for us in heaven. Thus every one naturally ariseth out of other. Blessed be God. Yea, blessed and thanked and praised; but here blessed suits best, that the most proper return for a blessing that we inherit is the blessing (1 Peter 3:9). The hope is a blessed hope (Titus 2:13). But the inheritance is the state of blessedness itself. Therefore Benedictus is said well. But thereby hangs a scruple; for what are we that we should take upon us to bless God? Yes, He us, and we Him too, as if they were reciprocal, one the echo, the reflection of the other. Equal they are not. It were fond to imagine the Father gives the child no other blessing but the child can give him as good again. What then? He that wisheth heartily would do more than wish if his power were according. What say we, then, when we say Benedictus? It is a word compound; take it in sunder, and dicere is, to say somewhat, to speak; and that we can; and bene is (speaking), to speak well; and that we ought. To speak, is confession; to speak well, is praise; and praise becometh Him, and us to give it Him. And what good can we wish Him that He hath not? Say we it, say we it not, He is blessed alike. True to Him we cannot wish; not to His person; but to His name we can, and to His Word we can; we can wish it more devoutly heard. God and the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ. This is the style of the New Testament, ye read it not in the Old. The sun was yet under the horizon, but now up, and of a good height.(1) Blessed be God; say that, and no more, and never a Jew, Turk, or Pagan but will say as much. We would not bestow our Benedictus upon any but the true God, so settle our Benedictus upon the right God. (2) For this cause, but not for this alone, when we bless Him I daresay we would bless Him with His best title. So hath it ever been. You shall observe in titles ever upon the coming of a greater, the less is laid down. For if this be to be God, to be bounteous, beneficial. In nothing was God ever so beneficial as in sending His only begotten Son into the world. This shall be His title forever. Forever to have a chief place in our Benedictus. And yet there is another on Christ’ s behalf, our Lord; even to bring Him in too. For, seeing all that which follows comes not but by the rising of Christ, we cannot leave Him out. All the good that comes to us, as it comes to us from God, so it comes to us by Christ. This is most plain; first, that did generate Christ; before that did regenerate us. If He not generate, we not regenerate; then no children, then no inheritance. For in Him this text, and all other texts, are yea and amen. By this time we see why this addition, it is His title of severance, it is the highest title of His honour; it takes in Christ, who would not be left out in our Benedictus. From the party whom we pass to the cause, why. For we say not this Benedictus, as we say many a one here, without any cause; Benedictus for nothing; nay, for God is ever aforehand with us. For generation is the proper act of a Father. But before we come to it let us not stride over that which stands before it. God did this, did all that follows, but upon what motive? According to His mercy. And mercy accords well with a Father; no compassion like His. But the benefits ensuing are too great to run in the common current of mercy. “ Great,” therefore according to His great mercy. Mercy, the thing; great, the measure; a word of number rather than magnitude. The meaning is, no single mercy would do it; no, though great, there must be many. For many the defects to be removed, many the sins to be forgiven, many the perfections to be attained, therefore, according to His manifold mercy. “ According” is well said. For that indeed is the chord, to which this and all our Benedictuses are to be tuned. Yea, many times blessed for His manifold mercies. Mercy, then, first; regeneration second, the act of this mercy. Verily, even for our natural generation, we owe Him a Benedictus. No man by his first birth, be it never so high or noble, is a whir the nearer this inheritance. Now “ re” hath in it two powers. “ Re” is “ again” the second time. For two there be, that old creation, and the new creature in Christ. But “ re” is not only again, but “ again” upon a loss. Not a second only, but a second upon the failing of the first. So doth redemption, a buying again, upon a former aliening. Reconciliation, upon a former falling out. Restitution, upon a former attainder. Resurrection, upon a fall taken formerly. Regeneration, upon a former degenerating, from our first estate. Our first would not serve; it was corrupt, it was defiled, it did degenerate. There was more then need of a new, a second, a regeneration, to make us children of grace again, and so of life. This act of regenerating is determined doubly, Åé̓́ò is twice repeated. To hope first, then to the inheritance; ye may put them together, to the hope of an inheritance. But because an inheritance is no present matter; it is to come, and to be coming to. From begetting, we step not straight to entering upon our inheritance. There needs no great Benedictus for hope. For what is hope? What, but a waking man’ s dream? And such hopes there be many in the world. But this is none such. To show it is none such it is severed by two terms: regeneravit and vivam. They are worth the marking both. (a) Regeneravit, first; that it is spes generata. So this a substantial hope, called therefore by St. Paul the “ helmet of hope” (1 Thessalonians 5:1-28), the “ anchor of hope” (Hebrews 6:1-20), things of substance, that will hold, that have metal in them. (b) Then mark vivam. And vivam follows well of regeneravit. For they that are begotten are so to live, to have life. Vivam also imports there is a dead or a dying hope, but this is not such but a living. Nay, viva is more than vivens, lively, then living. Where viva is said of ought the meaning is they spring, they grow, they have life in themselves. And, indeed, regeneravit is a good verb to join with hope. There is in hope a kind of regendering power; it begets men anew. And viva is a good epithet for it. When one droops give him hope, his spirits will come to him afresh, it will make him alive again. And for such a hope blessed be God. And whence hath it this life? The next word shows it, vivam, per resurrectionem. The vigour it hath from Christ rising, and by His rising opening to us the gate of life at large. Life by the resurrection, the true life indeed. Not to live here still, but to rise again and live as Christ did. We for the most part put it wrong, for we put it in them that must die, and then must our hope die with them, and so prove a dying hope. But put it in one that dies not, that shall never die, and then it will be spes viva indeed. No reed, no cobweb-hope then; but helmet, anchor hope-hope that will never confound you. And who is that, or where is He, that we might hope in Him? That is Jesus Christ, our hope; so calls Him St. Paul (1 Timothy 1:1). Yet not Christ every way considered; not as yesterday, in the grave, nor as the day before, giving up the ghost upon the Cross, dead, and buried, yields but dead hope. But in Jesus Christ rising again. We pass now to the inheritance. But as we pass will ye observe the situation first? It is well worth your observing that the resurrection is placed in the midst, between our hope and our inheritance. To hope before it, before the resurrection, hope; but after to the inheritance itself, to the full possession and fruition of it. An “ inheritance” accords well with “ according to His mercy.” We have it not of ourselves or by our merits, but of Him and by His mercies. Else were it a purchase and no inheritance. It comes to us freely, as the inheritance to children. Well with mercy, and well with regeneravit. For the inheritance is of children. Nor shall we need to doubt any prejudice to God, from whom it comes, by our coming to this inheritance. Here the inheritance comes not but by the death of the party in possession, but there no prejudice to the ancestor; he dies not for the heir to succeed. Nor no prejudice to the heir neither; to us by Him, not to Him by us. It is not as here, one carries it from all, and all the rest go without; or if they come in his part is the less. So say we again now, one thing to be born to an inheritance, another to such an inheritance as this here. For in inheritances there is great odds, one much better than another even here with us. St. Peter writes to the dispersed Jews, and by in caelo, he gives them an item, this inheritance is no new Canaan here on earth, nor Christ any earthly Messiahs to settle them in a new land of promise. “ In heaven,” then. There it is first, and there it is kept; the being there one, the keeping another. For that there it is kept is happy for us. Earth would not keep it, here it would be in hazard. It would go the same way Paradise went. Since it would be lost in earth it is kept in heaven. And a Benedictus for that too, as for the regenerating us to it here on earth, so for the keeping, the preserving of it there in heaven. Kept, and for us kept, else all were nothing, that makes up all that it is not only preserved, but reserved for us there. But reserved yet under the veil. But time shall come when the veil shall be taken off, and of that which is now within it there shall be a reveiling. Only it stayeth till the work of regeneration be accomplished. For these come we now to our Benedictus. For if God, according to His manifold mercy, have done all this for us, we also, according to our duty, are to do somewhat again. First, then, dictus, somewhat would be said by way of recognition; this hath God done for us, and more also. But to say Benedictus anyway is not to content us, but to say it solemnly. How is that? Benedictus in our mouth and the holy Eucharist in our hands. And yet this is not all; we are not to stay here, but to aspire farther, even to strive to be like to God, and be like God we shall not unless our dicere be facere as His is, unless somewhat be done withal. In very deed there is no blessing, but with the hand stretched out. (Bp. Andrewes.) According to His abundant mercy. God’ s abundant mercy A little mercy, such as is in man, or some reasonable store, as in angels, would not serve the turn.1. Was it a small matter that moved God to choose thee to salvation, rather than thousands of others, or was it a small mercy to give us His only Son, to deliver us by suffering all the wrath due to us? 2. Is it a small measure of mercy to call us to the hope of salvation from our wretched estate when we went on in sin, and minded no good, nay, all evil? 3. They that have had their part in this abundant mercy must be stirred up to abundant thanksgiving (Psalms 116:12-14). We must testify our love in zealous obedience all the days of our life, showing forth the virtues of Him that hath called us out of darkness into His marvellous light. 4. It teaches us also to show mercy to one another: in giving, forgiving, and the like. 5. It shows also the miserableness of our estate, that without abundant mercy we can never be saved. (John Rogers.) A string of pearls I might almost entitle these three verses a New Testament psalm. They are stanzas of a majestic song. You have here a delightful hymn; it scarce needs to be turned into verse; it is in itself essential poetry. To lead the mind to praise God is one of the surest ways of uplifting it from depression. The wild beasts of anxiety and discontent which surround our bivouac in the wilderness will be driven away by the fire of our gratitude and the song of our praise. In these three verses we have a string of pearls, a necklace of diamonds, a cabinet of jewels. I. I see in the text, as the source of all the rest, abundant mercy. No other attribute could have helped us had “ mercy” refused. As we are by nature, justice condemns us, holiness frowns upon us, power crushes us, truth confirms the threatening of the law, and wrath fulfils it. It is from the mercy of God that all our hopes begin. Mercy is needed for the miserable, and yet more for the sinful. Misery and sin are fully united in the human race, and mercy here performs her noblest deeds. God has vouchsafed His mercy to us, and we must thankfully acknowledge that in our case His mercy has been “ abundant” mercy. Where sin hath abounded, grace hath much more abounded. Contemplate the abundant mercy of our blessed God. A river deep and broad is before you. Track it to its fountainhead; see it welling up in the covenant of grace, in the eternal purposes of infinite wisdom. The secret source is no small spring, no mere bubbling fount, it is a very Geyser, leaping aloft in fulness of power; the springs of the sea are not comparable therewith. Not even an angel could fathom the springs of eternal love or measure the depths of infinite grace. Follow now the stream; mark it in all its course. See how it widens and deepens, how at the Cross it expands into a measureless river! Mark how the filthy come and wash; see how each polluted one comes up milk-white from the washing!1. It is God’ s great mercy that is spoken of herein. You must measure His Godhead before you shall compute His mercy. 2. But note again, it is the mercy of the “ God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ.” When I see Jesus descending from heaven to earth, paying all the debts of His people, I can well understand that the mercy of God in Christ must be abundant mercy. 3. Note carefully another word, it is the mercy of “ the Father.” The Father of Him who is the perfect and the ever blessed is also your Father, and all His mercy belongs to you. “ Bless the Lord, O my soul, and all that is within me bless His holy name.” II. The next great blessing in the text is that of incorruptible life. Mark that, O believer. One of the first displays of Divine mercy which we experience is being begotten again. Our first birth gave us the image of the first Adam-“ earthly” ; our second birth, and that alone, gives us the image of the second Adam, which is “ heavenly.”1. The new life of a Christian is Divine in its origin-God hath begotten us. The new life cometh not from man, it is wrought by the operation of the Holy Ghost. As certainly as God spake, and it was done, in the creation of the world, so He speaks in the heart of man, and it is done, and the new creature is born. 2. The new life in us, as it has a Divine origin, has also a Divine nature. Ye are made partakers of the Divine nature. The Holy Spirit Himself enters the believer and abides in him, and makes him a living man. What a great mystery is this, but at the same time what a blessing! Observe, to be begotten again is a very marvellous thing. Suppose a man born into this world with a predisposition to some sad hereditary disease. There he is, filled with disease, and medicine cannot eject the unwelcome tenant from his body. Suppose that man’ s body could be altogether new born, and he could receive a new body pure from all taint, it would be a great mercy. But it does not approach to regeneration, because our supposition only deals with the body, while the new birth renews the soul, and even implants a higher nature. Regeneration overcomes not a mere material disease, not an infliction in the flesh, but the natural depravity of the heart, the deadly disorder of the soul. III. A third blessing, strictly connected with this new life, is a lively hope. “ He hath begotten us again unto a lively hope.” Could a man live without hope? Men manage to survive the worst condition of distress when they are encouraged by a hope, but is not suicide the natural result of the death of hope? Yes, we must have a hope, and the Christian is not left without one.1. He has “ a lively hope,” that is to say, first, he has a hope within him, real, true, and operative. A Christian’ s hope purifies him, excites him to diligence, makes him seek after that which he expects to obtain. 2. It is a “ lively hope” in another sense, namely, that it cheers and enlivens. 3. It is also called a “ living hope,” because it is imperishable. Other hopes fade like withering flowers. The only imperishable hope is that which climbs above the stars, and fixes itself upon the throne of God and the person of Jesus Christ. 4. The hope which God has given to His truly quickened people is a lively hope, however, mainly because it deals with life. Charles Borromeo, the famous bishop of Milan, ordered a painter who was about to draw a skeleton with a scythe over a sepulchre to substitute for it the golden key of Paradise. Truly this is a most fitting emblem for a believer’ s tomb, for what is death but the key of heaven to the Christian? We notice frequently over cemetery gates, as an emblematic device, a torch turned over ready to be quenched. Ah, it is not so, the torch of our life burns the better, and blazes the brighter for the change of death. IV. We notice another delightful possession which ought effectually to chasten away from all of us the glooms of this life, and that is a risen Saviour. Jesus Christ died, not in appearance, but in reality; in proof whereof His heart was pierced by the soldier’ s spear. He was laid in the tomb of Joseph of Arimathea, truly a corpse. He really and literally rose from the dead,-the selfsame Christ who was born of the Virgin Mary, who suffered under Pontius Pilate, and afterwards ascended into heaven. Now, note ye well the comfort which arises out of this fact, since it proves that we possess a living advocate, mediator, and high priest, who has passed into the heavens. Moreover, since all believers, being partakers of the incorruptible life of God, are one with Jesus Christ, that which happens to Him virtually happens to them. They died in His death, they live in His life, they reign in His glory. V. The fifth is as incorruptible inheritance. A heavenly nature requires a heavenly inheritance, heaven-born children must have a heavenly portion.1. First, as this substance-it is “ incorruptible.2. Next, for purity-it is “ undefiled.”3. And then it is added for its beauty,-“ it fadeth not away.”4. And then for possession, it is secure reserved in heaven for you. VI. The sixth blessing is inviolable security. The inheritance is kept for you, and you are kept for the inheritance. The word is a military one, it signifies a city garrisoned and defended. Each believer is kept by that same power which “ bears the earth’ s huge pillars up,” and sustains the arches of heaven. VII. Out of the seven treasures of the Christian the last comprehends all, is better than all-it is a blessed God. “ Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ.” It is joy to have heaven, it is joy to possess a new life to fit me for heaven, but the greatest of all is to have my God, my own Saviour’ s God, my Father, my own Saviour’ s Father, to be all my own. God Himself has said, “ I will be their God, and they shall be My people.” (C. H. Spurgeon.) The anthem of the redeemed Gratitude is happiness, and happiness speaks in poetry, and delights in song. Music is the language of a jubilant heart. I. We have here the “ abundant mercy” of God in producing a living hope in the breast of rebels against his authority. This expression implies three things:1. That humanity once had a living hope. The breast of man, in the short but bright period of innocence, was indeed inspired with a living hope. 2. That mankind have somehow or Other lost this living hope. We know how they lost it. It was sin that quenched this glorious lamp. 3. That the reproduction of this living hope is a wonderful display of Divine mercy. Justice overwhelms the sinner with terror and midnight despair. II. We have here the “ abundant mercy” of God, in the transcendent value of the object on which this living hope is fastened. “ An inheritance incorruptible, undefiled, etc. Hope always implies an object. The value of the hope depends upon the nature of the object. III. We have here the “ abundant mercy” of God, in the wonderful instrumentality by which this living hope is reproduced. It is “ begotten again by the resurrection of Christ from the dead.” How does the resurrection of Christ appear necessary for the reproduction in man of this living hope?1. Christ taught the existence both of the desirable and the obtainable in connection with the future state. In the nature of the case hope implies both of these things. This something Christ presented in His teaching. He revealed to men heaven in all its glories, and He revealed too the manner in which that heaven could be obtained. Hence His teaching was in every way adapted to generate this living hope in the minds of men. 2. His resurrection from the dead was an incontrovertible proof of the truth of what He taught. IV. We have here the “ abundant mercy” of God, in the almighty agency he employs, to secure the ultimate realisation of this living hope.1. The implied necessity of God’ s preserving agency “ Who are kept.” No power but that of God can keep us. 2. The expressed method of God’ s preserving agency. “ Through faith.” He always works by means. 3. The glorious designs of God’ s preserving agency. “ Unto eternal salvation.” And in this constant agency what “ abundant mercy” ! “ Oh, give thanks unto the Lord, for His mercy endureth forever.” (Homilist.) God’ s mercy manifold As John Bunyan says, all the flowers in God’ s garden are double; there is no single mercy; nay, they are not only double flowers, but they are manifold flowers. There are many flowers upon one stalk, and many flowers in one flower. You shall think you have but one mercy, but you shall find it to be a whole, flock of mercies. Manifold mercies! Like the drops of a lustre, which reflect a rainbow of colours when the sun is glittering upon them, and each one, when turned in different ways from its prismatic form, shows all the varieties of colour, so the mercy of God is one and yet many, the same, yet ever changing, a combination of all the beauties of love blended harmoniously together. (C. H. Spurgeon.) Begotten us again unto a lively hope.-The Christian’ s living hope and incorruptible inheritance If I had to say in a word what the Christian’ s hope is, I should say it is the hope of an unfading inheritance, the hope of being made meet for it, the hope of what is condensed into that all-comprehensive word “ salvation!” And can you make mention of any other hope that does not pale when placed beside this? I. It is a living hope.1. The living hope of a living man. A man spiritually dead cannot possess this hope. It is not a phantasy. It is not an effeminate wish, or a masculine wish for that matter; it is not a mere sentiment or a fond desire. It is a living hope! It is an indivisible, inalienable part of his new life, and it cannot exist in any other heart than that of the spiritually transformed man-the man who is “ begotten again.” 2. It is a living hope because it centres in a living Christ. Begotten to it, how? “ By the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead.” The life of Christ, so full of goodness, and love, and purity, and self-sacrifice, and His death, so awful, the culminating sacrifice of all, were not enough. He must come back into life, or no sinner can be forgiven. Blessed be God! He did come back! 3. The Christian’ s hope is a living one as contrasted with and opposed to hopes that perish. God hath pledged its realisation under the seal of His own oath. II. God is the author of this hope. He hath begotten us again to it. It is all of His abundant mercy. Therefore let us bless Him for it. And let us show our gratitude to Him by letting the light of our hope shine on others. III. The inheritance to which the Christian’ s hope points. (E. D. Solomon.) Shadows of the future To the Christian the future life is not merely a subject of anticipation, but of confident and well-grounded assurance. Our Saviour seemed specially anxious to impress this fact on the minds of His disciples. He said to them, “ Because I live, ye shall live also.” Well, now we know that Christ lives. The existence of the Church of Christ today is an unmistakable evidence of the existence and continued activity of Christ. And if Christ lives, then we shall live also. What ought to be the influence of these anticipations on our life as Christian men and women here? I. These anticipations ought to have a place in our thoughts, in our conversations, in our prayers, in our affections, and in the activities of our lives. It is the fashion of some preachers to decry this “ other world religion,” as they call it. They say, “ We have nothing whatever to do with the other world; the present life demands all our care,” and they would severely repress all interest in the future life. The human heart rebels against all such unnatural restriction. You may just as well say to the mariner, “ Because there are rocks and quicksands in the course which you have to take you must never lift up your eyes to the stars, but keep them steadily fixed on the waters you have to cross.” “ Why,” he would say, “ I guide my way across the waters of this world by the light of other worlds.” And so the Christian mariner can say, “ I guide my course through this world by the light and the hope and the influence of the other world.” II. Our thoughts of the future life should be characterised by moderation, reverence, and spirituality. Let us be content with the beautiful simplicity and lofty spirituality of the New Testament representations as a life of glorious spiritual progress, of freedom from sin, holy love, honourable service, delightful fellowship, and a growing likeness to Christ; “ We shall be like Him, for we shall see Him as He is,” We shall be with Him, and we shall do Him service. (F. Binns.) Great expectations I. Christian hope in the excellency of its nature. Life’ s pathway strewn with withered hopes. Gold, pleasure, fame, etc., disappoint. II. Christian hope in the divinity of its source. III. Christian hope in the medium of its production. Jesus, by His resurrection, the proof, pledge, and pattern of our future heavenly happiness. IV. Christian hope in the glory of its object.1. Vast “ inheritance.”2. Righteous-gotten rightly and enjoyed rightly.3. Everlasting. V. Christian hope in the certainty of its realisation. (B. D. Johns.) The lively hope I. The true character of the Christian’ s hope.1. It is lively in the sense of living. It is not delusive. It is no self-excited sentiment-the fruit of ignorance and presumption. It has a real, a well-defined, and well-ascertained existence in the heart. 2. It is a lively hope in the sense of activity. It produces courage, patience, holiness. II. The object of the Christian’ s hope. “ An inheritance,” etc. III. The method of attaining this hope.1. Its author is God. It is a Divine creation in the heart. 2. This gift of God is prompted by His abundant mercy. 3. Yet the mercy which restores hope to man is not indiscriminate-it is the mercy of righteousness. 4. The medium through which this blessing reaches us-“ the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead.” This was pre eminently the Divine attestation of the truth of the Saviour’ s Messianic mission. IV. The security or the possessors of this hope. (Thos. Brookes.) The Christian salvation described and acknowledged I. The blessings acknowledged.1. Divine sonship. We become the children of God-both in reference to state and character, to condition and disposition-through the belief of the truth; and this belief of the truth is produced and maintained by the influence of the Holy Spirit. 2. The inheritance provided for them. 3. The living hope of the inheritance, through the resurrection of Christ Jesus from the dead. This hope rests entirely on God’ s free sovereign kindness, manifested in harmony with His righteousness; but it is only in the belief of the truth that this sovereign kindness can be apprehended as a ground of hope. II. The acknowledgment of these blessings.1. God is the author of these blessings. 2. It is as the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ that God bestows these blessings. In the riches of His sovereign mercy He determined to save an innumerable multitude of sinful men, and in the depth of His wisdom He formed a plan for realising the determination of His mercy, not merely in consistency with, but in glorious illustration of, His holiness and justice. 3. These blessings originate in the “ abundant mercy” of God. (1) Think on the character of Him who bestows these blessings-the absolute, independent Jehovah, perfectly, infinitely, unchangeably, happy in Himself. (2) Think on the nature of the blessings,-the very highest that can be conferred on creatures, and in their measure limited by nothing but the capacity of the recipient. (3) Think on the character of those on whom they are bestowed-sinners, guilty, depraved, condemned; deserving everlasting destruction. (4) Think of the number of those on whom these blessings are bestowed (Revelation 21:24; Revelation 7:9). (5) Think of the means through which the blessings are communicated-the Incarnation, the sacrifice of God’ s own son (1 John 4:10; John 3:16). 4. These blessings are of vast magnitude and incalculable value. They include deliverance from guilt, depravity, degradation, death, everlasting misery; the enjoyment of the favour of God, tranquillity of conscience, ever-growing conformity to the Divine image, and happiness throughout eternity. 5. The proper method of acknowledging these benefits is “ to bless” their munificent giver. This is one of the purposes for which we are begotten again (Isaiah 43:21; 1 Peter 2:9). Our whole life should be a hymn of praise to the God of our salvation (Psalms 103:1-4; Psalms 86:12-13; Romans 12:1; Hebrews 13:15-16; Revelation 5:13). (J. Brown, D. D.) Begotten unto a living hope We are not surprised that Peter attached special importance to the resurrection of Jesus Christ. The most significant fact about the crucifixion was that it culminated in the resurrection. If Christ had not risen from the dead, there would have been no adequate message for the world. Now, though the story of the resurrection was to all the apostles specially inspiring, it was that which brought hope to Peter above all others. After his three-fold denial of Christ, he had gone out, weeping bitterly. Hence the special emphasis with which our Lord mentioned Peter in His message to His disciples: “ Tell My disciples, and Peter, that I am risen from the dead,” etc. Thus the resurrection of Jesus Christ was everything to Peter. It was that which brought; with it hope to the man who, of all the apostles-excepting Judas-had lost most hope. I. Peter’ s high conception here of God’ s mercy. Peter does not undertake to measure or to describe it. It is a mercy that has filled him with wonderment and with boundless gratitude. Peter speaks these words out of the exuberance of his own joy. That word “ us” has a “ me” at the heart of it. The powerful preacher is the man who preaches out of his own experience; and thus the greatest sinner forgiven must always be the greatest witness, if he is only true to his privilege. No other disciple had experienced the intense grief which Peter had felt. Hence the special significance of these words upon his lips. This word “ again” further emphasises the testimony. All hope had practically died out of Peter. He thought everything had ended in darkness; hence the thanks he gives to Him who had begotten him and his brethren unto a lively hope. II. Peter’ s high conception of the hope unto which he and others had been begotten. It was a hope full of life. Peter had no patience with anything that did not abound with life. He himself was all alive, whether he confessed or denied his Lord. His was an intense nature. And when hope was rekindled in him, it was a living hope. Peter, on the day of Pentecost, had that living hope. Then he spoke in the face of the mightiest opposition, spoke only as a man with a flaming heart and a fiery tongue could have spoken. He attributed all this hope to God’ s mercy. “ It was the gift of another,” said Peter, practically; “ I never could work myself up into this enthusiasm. All my energy was gone, and my enthusiasm had died out of me; but He who gave His Son has given me again this lively hope.” III. Peter’ s high conception of the inheritance in store for us-“ an inheritance incorruptible and undefiled,” etc. This assurance, if you possess it, ought to make a difference to all your life. Here is a man who believes that this life of fifty, sixty, or seventy years, as the case may be, embraces everything: that there is nothing beyond it for him. What noble heroism can you expect of that man? But here is another man who feels that, after all, this life is but the preparatory period, the time of schooling for an inheritance in which life shall show its full meaning, and every capacity of our being shall be ennobled and find full exercise. I will tell you what such a man ought to be. I do not say what those who profess to believe this often are, but what each of them ought to be. (D. Davies.) A right to hope My father said once, “ Harriet, I have been reviewing my evidences. I have been putting the question to myself, just as I would press it on a sinner, or a person newly converted; and I have come to the conclusion that I have a right to hope.” That kind of mechanical or conventional test used to prevail in churches as now; and here was this old saint, that had been for fifty or sixty years working almost beyond human strength in the midst of the world, as sweet as honey in the honeycomb in his disposition, putting himself on the rack of self examination, and coming, with great hesitation and modesty, at last, to the conclusion that he had a right to hope! Hope! When a man has any conception of Jesus Christ, how can he have anything else? Hope! When the heart of Christ is pouring forth salvation, and is made manifest, as the shining of the sun, and has enough and to spare, how can one do otherwise than hope? And yet there are a great many persons who cannot do it. There are a great many who do not realise the blessing which is vouchsafed to them, sometimes from their bodily condition, and sometimes from their mental training; sometimes from one reason, and sometimes from another. (H. W. Beecher.) The Christian’ s hope Dr. Arnold’ s whole countenance would be lit up at his favourite verse in the Te Deum: “ When Thou hadst overcome the sharpness of death, Thou didst open the kingdom of heaven to all believers.” (Stanley’s Life of Arnold.) Christian hope well founded God would never show us a thing He did not mean to give us. This is the way one boy teases another. (Geo. MacDonald.) The death test A few hours before Bishop Jones’ s death (Methodist Episcopal Church), his son-in-law, anxious for some dying testimony, bent over him and asked, “ Bishop, say something to us, some parting words.” The brief, emphatic reply was, “ I am not disappointed.” Christianity provides a future A converted Japanese artist said recently to a missionary, “ I suppose the reason why English artists put so much perspective into their drawings is because Christianity has given them a future; and the reason why Oriental artists fail to do so, is because Buddha and Confucius do not raise their eyes above the present.” By the resurrection of Jesus Christ.-Easter hopes I. To say that we cannot get on without hope is a truism. Hope is not the salt, it is the sinew of man’ s moral life. His capacity for excellence is exactly proportioned to his power of throwing himself onward into a future, which is as yet beyond his reach, and which may even be always beyond it. This truth holds good whether we look at man as an individual or as a member of society. The great object of a wise educator is to set before the boy whom he is teaching some future to which he may aspire, and which may fire his best enthusiasms; some future which may supply him with a strong motive for making the most of his present opportunities; some future upon which, during the drudgery and toil of his earlier tasks, his eye may rest, as upon the prize which will reward| him, the object of his hope. And does not the same rule hold in later life? The boy becomes a man, the father of a family, and he transfers to his children some of the hope which he cherished for himself. He thinks less of what they are than of what it is probable that they will be a few years hence. So strong and penetrating is his sympathy, that in them he lives his own boyhood over again, only with the larger experience and wider horizon of his manhood. Nor is this less true of a professional work in life: hope is ever the motive principle of the exertions which command success. Minds of a lower type look forward to the reputation which will be won by success; minds of a higher order look forward to the happiness of doing work for God by rendering some real service to their generation or to posterity. And it is this hope which sustains them under all discouragements. Nor is hope less essential to associations of men than to man in his individual capacity. An army is never thoroughly demoralised until the hope of victory is gone. A nation is not ruined until it, has reached a point at which it remarks that it can make out for itself no prospect of expansion in coming years. And as hope is thus necessary to the temporary well-being of societies of men, and of individual men, so is it essential to the highest well-being of man as man. The hope upon which states, institutions, artists, painters, military men, politicians rest, is directed to objects within the sphere of sense and time. But man, as man, must look beyond sense and time. The man who has no clear belief in a future life may undoubtedly have, within some very restricted limits, a strong sense of duty. He may even persuade himself that this sense of duty is all the better and purer from not being bribed by the prospect of a future reward or stimulated, as he would say, unhealthily, by the dread of future punishment. But, for all that, his moral life is fatally impoverished. It is not merely that he has fewer and feebler motives to right action; it is that he has a false estimate of his real place in the universe. He has forfeited, in the legitimate sense of the term, his true title to self-respect. He has divested himself of the bearing, the instincts, the sense of noble birth and high destiny which properly belong to him. II. Man then needs a hope, resting on something beyond this scene of sense and time. And God has given him one, by the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead. Our Lord indeed taught, in the plainest language, the reality of a future life (John 14:2; Matthew 25:46; Matthew 6:20; Luke 20:38). He contributed to the establishment of this truth in the deepest convictions of men, not merely many lessons taught in words, but a fact, palpable to the senses. His resurrection converted hopes, surmises, speculations, trains of inference, into strong certainties. Not that the fact of Christ’ s resurrection could force itself upon reluctant minds, or rather upon reluctant wills, in the earliest ages, as now, there were expedients for evading its force. The evangelical narrative, the convictions of the earliest Church, the moral strength of the Church, advancing through blood and suffering to the heights of a worldwide empire, resist these expedients, as inconsistent with fact, inconsistent with reason. There are at least three forms of interest which might be accorded to such a fact as the resurrection. The first, the interest of curiosity in a wonder, altogether at variance with the observed course of nature. This interest may exist in a high degree; observing and registering the fact, yet never for one moment getting beyond it. The second, the interest of active reason, which is satisfied that such a fact must have consequences and is anxious to trace them. This interest may lead a man to see that the resurrection does prove the truth of Christianity, even though he may know nothing of the power of Christ’ s blood and of Christ’ s life as a matter of experience. A third kind of interest is practical and moral. It is an effort to answer the question, What does the resurrection of Christ say to me, mean for me? If it is true, if Christianity is true, what ought to be the effect on my thoughts, my feelings, my life? Now St. Peter answers that all should be invigorated by a living hope. Burthen this absorbing moral interest does not come of ordinary powers of observation and reason, like the two earlier forms of interest. We are, says St. Peter, “ begotten” unto it. Of this birth, the Father of souls is the Author, and His Eternal Spirit the instrument, and union with Christ the essence or effect. It does much else for us; but it does this among other things, and not least among them: it endows us with a living hope. III. St. Peter calls this “ hope” a lively, or living, one. What does he mean by this? There are within many a soul trances of powers, ideas, feelings, which once lived, but which have died away. We investigate them from time to time, like the buried ruins of Pompeii or Herculaneum. But a Christian’ s hops endures. Earthly disappointments do but force us to make more of it. The lapse of time does but bring us nearer to its object. Surely we can ask ourselves few questions so important as “ Have I this hope?” Not to have this hope is to be living at random; it is to be drifting on towards eternity without a chart in hand, or a harbour in view. And if we humbly trust that we have this hope, what are the tests of our possessing it?1. A first test is that earthly things sit easily upon us. We are not uninterested in them: far from it. We know how much depends on our way of dealing with them. But, also, we are not enslaved by them. To have caught a real glimpse of the eternal is to have lost heart and relish for the things of time. 2. A second test of our having this hope is a willingness to make sacrifices for it. “ What difference do my hopes of another world make in my daily life? What am I doing, what do I leave undone, that I should not leave undone or do, if I believed that all really ended at death? What changes would be made in my habits, occupations, daily modes of thought and feeling, if-to put a horrible supposition-I could awake tomorrow morning and find that Christ’ s conquest of the eternal world for me was a fable?” 3. A third test is progressive efforts to prepare for the future life (1 John 3:3). (Canon Liddon.) The risen Lord the Christian’ s hope I. The ground of this hope. II. The power of this hope. III. The destiny of this hope. (J. E. H. Meier.) The right view of Christ’ s resurrection I. The different effects produced upon the minds of many, who have only an outward belief of the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the grave. Of all the wonderful events which marked the Saviour’ s abode upon earth, there does not appear one for which so much was done to make it clearly proved by its evidence as His resurrection. It was proved by the angels, by the confession of the Roman soldiers who guarded the sepulchre. It was proved by the single testimony of some of the apostles. It was proved by the testimony of the eye, the ear, and the hand (1 John 1:1). The consequence has been, that all who profess to believe Christianity believe the fact of Christ’ s resurrection. But with many it goes no further than to convince their reason. It brings no personal conviction of the deep interest which the soul now has, and the soul and body hereafter shall have, in this great truth. Then, again, many believe the resurrection of Christ, not only as an established fact, but as a certain pledge of the general resurrection in the last day. But here they also stop. The belief of their own resurrection has no effect upon their will. They cannot look forward with the certain hope of holy Job (Job 19:25-27). How different a view does St. Paul give us of what the belief of the resurrection of Christ, as the pledge of our own, ought to produce upon the soul (Romans 6:4). St. Paul shows that there must be a conformity of the soul to Christ while it is in the fleshly body, if we would be partakers of the glorified body “ at the resurrection of the just” (Colossians 3:1). I will name one other class of persons, who, in a certain way, believe in the resurrection of Christ. Many believe it because it stands as an article in the creed. But here they also stop. The fact of the resurrection of our Lord produces no soul-stirring feelings of wonder, gratitude, and love towards this triumphant Conqueror of Satan, sin, and death; neither does it beget in them any holy desires to be conformed to His image in the converting power of the Holy Ghost. Beware of this deadening view of any of the great doctrines of the gospel of our salvation. II. The only right view of this great and most important fact of the resurrection of our Lord Jesus Christ from the grave. The text shows us what effect true faith in this great fact had produced upon the first Christians: by it they were “ begotten again unto a lively hope.” It was in them a practical truth-it touched their hearts. Through the power of it, in the presence and influence of the Holy Ghost, they were anew created, new born unto God. It was a hope which was embodied in their whole character, gave strength and substance to all they did, and was to them that “ hope which” was “ laid up for them in heaven” (Colossians 1:5). Hence we see that a real and justifying belief of the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ acts immediately upon the will and the affections. (H. Marriott.) A lively hope generated by Christ’ s resurrection By speaking of our being “ begotten again to a lively hope,” the apostle would simply indicate something of a universal change having passed, through Christ’ s resurrection, over this earth and its inhabitants. And such a change did actually pass. There was substituted a living hope for a dead throughout every department of this creation, amongst its irrational as well as its rational tenants. It was not that heretofore there had been no hope whatsoever; for man is so constructed that he cannot live without hope; he must follow a meteor where there is no star on the firmament. There was hope amongst men, even when truth had almost departed, and ignorance of God pressed heavily on all countries and classes. There was hope that Deity might be propitiated; that in some better world the disorders of the present might be rectified. Reason did something, in the midst of ponderous night, to keep men from quite parting with the expectation of immortality; and, combining the teachings of conscience with the lingerings of tradition, it caused a spectre of hope to flit to and fro amid the cloud and the darkness. Yes, a spectre of hope!-a dead thing, though, at times, it appeared amongst the living, and wore something of the hues which had belonged to the fresh and beautiful visitant that had gladdened the earth, whilst yet untainted by sin. A living hope! a hope that is not merely performing some of the actions, but possessing all the energies, of life-that should not merely beckon onward, but waited to be examined and handled-this never sprang from the reveries of philosophers, but eluded the searchings of those who laboured most gravely at the opening a path to happiness hereafter (H. Melvill, B. D.) To an inheritance incorruptible.-The heavenly inheritance The greatness of God’ s mercy is to be seen- I. In the great number of the saved. II. In the greatness of the change which takes place in this great multitude. The very life of God is transmitted to the soul of the believer in regeneration. III. In the greatness of the inheritance.1. “ Incorruptible.” Heaven has in it the power of endless rejuvenation. 2. “ Undefiled.” Its worth is intrinsic; it does not sometimes go up and sometimes come down; its value is the same the centuries through; it was worth the blood of Christ two thousand years ago, and it is worth the blood today again. 3. “ That fadeth not away” -amaranthine, evergreen, always fruitful, always beautiful. No autumn winds strip the trees of their foliage, no winter blasts rob the fields of their verdure. A pamphlet was being lately circulated in this country to persuade English men to emigrate to Texas, and one reason adduced was that the soil being so rich and the climate so equably soft, two harvests could be gathered in one year. A very cogent reason, doubtless, if true. But my text speaks of a better country than Texas-a country which will yield not two crops, but twelve crops in the twelve months (Revelation 22:2). IV. In the greatness of the expense to which He went to be able to confer this great inheritance. V. In the greatness of the power that is pledged to bring the great multitude to the possession of the inheritance. (J. C. Jones, D. D.) The inheritance of moral manhood I. The inheritance of the good is distinguished by every species of excellence.1. “ Incorruptible.” The principle of decay is not in it. The pyramid crumbles at the touch of time, and the long-during mountains shake under the footstep of ages; but eternal cycles roll over the plains of heaven without impairing the beauty or paling the brilliance of the “ incorruptible” inheritance. 2. “ Undefiled.” Inherently and essentially pure. 3. “ Fadeth not away.” II. The inheritance of the good is in safe keeping-“ reserved in heaven.” This “ inheritance” could not be on earth. Its vitality would perish. Its purity would be sullied. Its brightness would be dimmed. It is necessary that it should be “ reserved” or kept back for a season. This entry is longer than a Bible module can hold. The rest is at https://www.sermonindex.net/commentary/bi/ 1 Peter 1:6-9 Wherein ye greatly rejoice.Joy and trial in the Christian’ s life I. The Christian’ s joy.1. It is present joy. God’ s service is gladsome even now (1 Peter 1:8; Philippians 4:4). Nor is this joy for advanced believers only, but for all true-hearted seekers after God (Psalms 105:3). 2. It is great joy (Psalms 68:3). 3. There are many sources of the Christian’ s great joy, but the particular one here mentioned is the present happiness afforded by a believing expectation of the joys laid up for him in eternity. 4. There are important reasons why we all ought to be joyful Christians. (1) It is our privilege as Christians. When we may be so much happier than we are, what folly not to exercise our right! (2) Our influence for good over others depends greatly upon the apparent result which religion produces in our own case. (3) Very much of our own stability as Christians depends upon our joyfulness (Nehemiah 8:10). II. The Christian’ s trial. There is nothing whatever unchequered here below-no joy without sorrow, no sunshine without shadow, no harmony unmixed with discord, Life is like an April day.1. “ Ye are in heaviness” -pressed down, forced to the earth, as if under some cruel load. The Christian’ s joy is from heaven, his grief from earth. These two are ever at war with one another. 2. “ Ye are in heaviness through manifold temptations.” Persecutions abounded. The devil aimed his fiery darts at them. The world spread its allurements for them. 3. Yet this state of trial has its alleviations. (1) It is only “ for a season,” whereas the Christian’ s joy endures forever (Psalms 30:5; 2 Corinthians 4:17). (2) It is only “ if need be” -if there is a necessity, if some good can be effected by it. III. The union of joy and trial in the Christian’ s earthly lot. Does the text teach that times of trial are destroyers of the Christian’ s joy, even for a season? On the contrary, St. Peter speaks of the “ heaviness” only to give us a more exalted idea of the mighty power of the “ joy.” “ Ye greatly rejoice, though ye are in heaviness” ; your hearts remain glad in spite of your trials. Clouds come, but the sun breaks through them and goes on shining still. Obstacles arise, but the bright river of the Christian’ s peace flows past and over them, deep and glad as before. The one great peculiarity of the Christian’ s joy is its comparative independence of outward circumstances-nay, its triumph over them. Worldly men can rejoice when all is prosperous. If, therefore, the Christian’ s joy vanished at the approach of sorrow, men might well ask wherein the Christian differed from others? (J. Henry Burn, B. D.) The Christian’ s joy and the Christian’ s sufferings I. The Christian’ s joy.1. Its greatness. “ Wherein ye greatly rejoice.” There are only three things really great in the universe-God and the soul and eternity, and as religion has to do with them all its dealings have something superior in them all. 2. Its ground. (1) The Christian’ s joy is not unfounded.(2) The Christian’ s joy is founded principally upon spiritual and eternal things. II. The Christian’ s grief.1. The nature of the Christian’ s sufferings.2. The number.3. Their influence.4. Their expediency.5. Their duration. (W. Jay.) The Christian’ s heaviness and rejoicing I. His heaviness.1. If we were not in heaviness during our troubles we should not be like our Covenant Head-Christ Jesus. 2. If we did not suffer heaviness we would begin to grow too proud, and become too great in our own esteem. 3. In heaviness we often learn lessons that we never could attain elsewhere. “ Ah!” said Luther, “ affliction is the best book in my library,” and let me add the best leaf in the book of affliction is that blackest of all the leaves, the leaf called heaviness, when the spirit sinks within us, and we cannot endure as we could wish. 4. This heaviness is of essential use to a Christian if he would do good to others. Who shall speak to those whose hearts are broken but those whose hearts have been broken also? II. His rejoicing. Mariners tell us that there are some parts of the sea where there is a strong current upon the surface going one way, but that down in the depths there is a strong current running the other way. Two seas do not meet and interfere with one another, but one stream of water on the surface is running in one direction, and another below in an opposite direction. Now the Christian is like that. On the surface there is a stream of heaviness rolling with dark waves, but down in the depths there is a strong undercurrent of great rejoicing that is always flowing there. The apostle is writing “ to the strangers scattered throughout Pontus.”1. The first thing that he says to them is, that they are “ elect according to the foreknowledge of God,” “ wherein we greatly rejoice.” Ah! even when the Christian is most “ in heaviness through manifold temptations,” what a mercy it is that he can know that he is still elect of God! 2. The apostle says that we are “ elect through sanctification of the Spirit unto obedience and sprinkling of the blood of Jesus Christ” -“ wherein we greatly rejoice.” Is the obedience of the Lord Jesus Christ girt about my loins, to be my beauty; and is the blood of Jesus sprinkled upon me to take away all my guilt and all my sin, and shall I not in this greatly rejoice? 3. But the great and cheering comfort of the apostle is, that we are elect unto an inheritance incorruptible and undefiled, and that fadeth not away, reserved in heaven for us. And here is the grand comfort of the Christian. 4. There is one more doctrine that will always cheer a Christian, this perhaps is the one chiefly intended here in the text. “ Reserved in heaven for you who are kept by the power of God through faith unto salvation.” This will be one of the greatest cordials to a Christian in heaviness, that he is not kept by his own power, but by the power of God. (C. H. Spurgeon.) The sweetest joys learned in trial Very many of the sweetest joys of Christian hearts are songs which have been learned in the bitter ness of trial. It is said of the canary bird that he will never learn to sing the song his master will have him sing while it is light in his cage. He learns a snatch of every song he hears, but will not learn a full separate melody of its own. And the master covers the cage and makes it dark all about the bird, and then he listens and learns the one song that is taught to him until his heart is full of it. Then, ever after, he sings the song in the light. With many of us it is as with the bird. The Master has a song He wants to teach to us, but we learn only a strain of it, a note here and there, while we catch up snatches of the world’ s songs and sing them with it. Then He comes and makes it dark about us till we learn the sweet melody He would teach us. Many of the loveliest songs of peace and trust sung by God’ s children in this world they have been taught in the darkened chamber of sorrow. Triumph of the soul over trial There are even many facts in our ordinary human experience that render quite conceivable this triumph of the soul over all surrounding tribulations and distresses. What cares the patient, toiling man of science for the incredulity and jeers of his neighbours, or the vexations of poverty, when first the obscurity and meanness of his lonely chamber are lighted up by the flash of some great discovery? How superior to threats and discouragements of every kind was the mighty heart of Columbus as he calmly forced his way through the veil of waters toward this unseen world! Nay, how often has the bitterness of death itself been overcome to the soldier on the battlefield and the patriot on the scaffold, by the silent anticipation of the freedom and glory which their agonies secured for the country they loved! And need we then wonder if the confessors of Jesus have gone singing to the stake, and their shout of victory has been stifled only by the flames into which they sank? (J. Lillie, D. D.) Joy in heaviness They say that springs of sweet fresh water well up amid the brine of salt seas; that the fairest Alpine flowers bloom in the wildest, ruggedest mountain passes; that the noblest psalms were the outcome of the profoundest agony of soul. Be it so. And thus amid manifold trials souls which love God will find reasons for bounding, leaping joy. Have you learnt this lesson yet? Not simply to endure God’ s will, nor only to choose it, nor only to trust it, but to rejoice in it. Of such joy there are two sources: first, the understanding of the nature and meaning of trial; second, the soul’ s love and faith in its unseen Lord. There is enough in these two for unsullied and transcendent joy; in fact, we may question whether we ever truly drink of Christ’ s joy till all other sources of joy are eliminated by earthly sorrow, and we are driven to seek that joyous blessedness which no earthly sun can wither and no winter freeze (Habakkuk 3:17-19). (F. B. Meyer, B. A.) Christian joy Greek, ἀγαλλιᾶσθε, Ye dance for joy, ye dance a galliard, or as children do about a bonfire: ye cannot but express your inward joy in your countenance, voice, and gesture. (J. Trapp.) Variableness of Christian moods The variableness of Christian moods is often a matter of great and unnecessary suffering; but Christian life does not follow the changes of feeling. Our feelings are but the torch; and our life is the man that carries it. The wind that flares the flame does not make the man waver. The flame may sway hither and thither, but he holds his course straight on. Thus oftentimes it is that our Christian hopes are carried, as one carries a lighted candle through the windy street, that seems never to be so nearly blown out as when we step through the open door, and, in a moment, we are safe within. Our wind-blown feelings rise and fall through all our life, and the draught of death threatens quite to extinguish them; but one moment more, and they shall rise and forever shine serenely in the unstormed air of heaven. (H. W. Beecher.) The needs be When our hearts grow a grain too light, God seeth it but needful to make us heavy through manifold temptations. (J. Trapp.) The duality of Christian life As there are two men in every true Christian, a new man and an old one, so heaviness in manifold temptation and rejoicing may readily co-exist. (J. P. Lunge.) In heaviness through manifold temptations.- Why the godly must undergo many troubles 1. To drive them to repentance (2 Samuel 12:18; Genesis 42:21). They are as the shepherd’ s dog, to fetch us out of the corn, to bring us into compass again (Psalms 32:4-5; Psalms 119:67; Psalms 119:71). 2. To keep them from sin, being therefore compared to a hedge of thorns (Hosea 2:6; Job 33:17; 2 Chronicles 20:37). 3. To humble them. We have a proud nature, and while in health we think our heads half touch the clouds; therefore God pulls us down by troubles. 4. To make them more holy, to scourge off the rust, purge out some of the remnant of the old man, and renew the inner man (Isaiah 4:4; Hebrews 12:10; Isaiah 27:9). 5. To wean them from the world, to which even the best are too much addicted, and to make them willing to die and to be gone hence, so setting them on work to look after and make sure of a better inheritance. 6. To prove the devil a liar (Job 1:9). 7. To keep them from hell and condemnation. 8. To bring them to heaven. (John Rogers.) Heaven’ s discipline of the good I. The disciplinary elements are very manifold. II. The disciplinary elements are very painful. “ Ye are in heaviness.” Or, as Dr. Davidson renders it, “ made sorrowful.” “ Heaviness” is a relative term. What is heavy to one would be light to another. Paul gloried in tribulation. III. The disciplinary elements are only temporary. “ Now for a season.”1. The trials of life are short compared with the enjoyments of life. They are exceptional. 2. The trials of life are short compared with the blessedness of the future. IV. The disciplinary elements are very necessary. “ If need be.” As storms in nature are necessary to purify the air, so trials are necessary to cleanse the atmosphere around the soul. V. The disciplinary elements are always beneficent. “ That the trial of your faith, being much more precious than of gold that perisheth.” Nothing is more important to man than that it should be genuine. (Homilist.) The uses of grief What! would you choose that you alone may fare better than all God’ s saints? that God should strew carpets for your nice feet only, to walk into your heaven, and make that way smooth for you which all patriarchs, prophets, evangelists, confessors, Christ Himself, have found rugged! Away with this self-love, and come down, you ambitious sons of Zebedee, and, ere you think of sitting near the throne, be content to be called unto the cross. Now is your trial. Let your Saviour see how much of His bitter portion you can pledge. Then shall you see how much of His glory He can afford you. As snow is of itself cold, yet warms and refreshes the earth, so afflictions, though in themselves grievous, yet keep the soul of the Christian warm and make it fruitful. Let the most afflicted know and remember that it is better to be preserved in brine than to rot in honey. After a forest fire has raged furiously, it has been found that many pine cones have had their seeds released by the heat, which ordinarily would have remained unsown. The future forest sprang from the ashes of the former. Some Christian graces, such as humility, patience, sympathy, have been evolved frown the sufferings of the saints. The furnace has been used to fructify. (C. H. Spurgeon.) Needful afflictions Consider that all thy afflictions are needful, and work for thy good. Nothing is intolerable that is necessary. “ If need be,” whilst we have diseased bodies, physic is as needful as food; whilst we have diseased souls, misery is as needful as outward mercies. The winter is as necessary to bring on harvest as the spring; affliction is as necessary to bring on the harvest of glory as any condition. (W. Swinnock.) Trials and glory Look upon a painted post or sign whose colour is laid in oil, how the rain beats upon it in stormy weather, that one would think all the colour would be washed off, yet how the water glides away and leaves it rather more beautiful than before. And thus it is with every child of God, being well garnished with graces of the Spirit, let the wind of persecution blow, and the floods of affliction lift up their voice, they shall never deface, but rather add unto their beauty; such is the condition of grace, that it shines the brighter for scouring, and is most glorious when it is most clouded. (J. Spencer.) The use of trials Suppose I made a very wonderful steam engine, and put it into a ship, to make it into a steam packet. It is all beautifully made, and complete, and I want to “ try” whether it is all good; whether the machinery is right and works well. Where should I send it, into a smooth sea or a rough sea? I should send it “ up the rapids” -up the river-against the stream, to see whether it would go up, I should. So God does with you. He furnishes you with everything you want-then puts you up “ the rapids,” sends you on the rough water, just to “ try” you, to see what you are made of. The trial of your faith. The trial of faith I. The Christian’ s temptations.1. They are manifold in their nature. What a world of change and sorrow we live in t 2. They are difficult to bear; for they cause heaviness or depression of mind (Hebrews 10:32). If you are in heaviness bear it manfully, but do not show it openly. Speak of your troubles to your bosom friend, but do not talk of them to men of this world. Above all, tell them to Jesus. 3. They are temporary. The longest trials, and those which leave the deepest wounds, are but for a season. 4. They are necessary. “ If need be.” Oh, there is “ a needs be” for every stroke, and though we do not now understand why this trial or the other falls upon us, yet we shall know hereafter. II. The end and aim of these temptations must be carefully observed. “ They are for the trial of our faith.”1. The value of faith cannot be overestimated. Gold perishes, but faith lives-lives in death, and far beyond it (1 Corinthians 13:13). 2. But it must be tried, and sometimes in a very severe furnace. It is proved, tested, or verified by trial, and the faith which cannot stand the ordeal is of little or no value (Job 23:10). There are many ways in which faith is tried. (1) It is tried by Divine commands. God gives His servants some difficult task to perform. True faith will surmount all difficulties. (2) Faith is often tried by doubts. (3) And faith is tried by fire-the fire of discipline, of persecution, of protracted bodily affliction. 3. The ultimate design of the trial is that it may “ be found,” nothing of it being lost, “ unto praise, and honour, and glory, at the appearing of Jesus Christ.” (Thornley Smith.) The testing of religious faith I. The process of testing a man’ s faith involves much pain. This we gather-1. From the use of the word that describes the process-“ temptation.” 2. From the fact that those who are being tested are often possessed with “ heaviness,” “ grief.” 3. From the nature of the elements employed in the process. (1) No material element causes more pain than “ fire.”(2) These elements are “ manifold.” With those to whom Peter wrote it was Gentile scorn, slander, persecution, martyrdom. II. The process of testing a man’ s faith is of such supreme worth as to compensate for all such pain.1. The testing is only temporary.2. The worth of the soul is tested.3. The purpose of the process. (1) To try the genuineness of faith.(2) To remove alloy.(3) To train for highest uses.(4) To lead to highest destiny. (U. R. Thomas.) Afflictions a test of faith 1. To try whether we have any faith. 2. To try whether our faith be as much as we take it to be or more; this, affliction will discover. 3. To purge and purify that true faith which we have, and increase it. (John Rogers.) The trial of our faith The apostle here expresses his very cordial sympathy with his Christian brethren under the circumstances of trial to which they were exposed. “ Ye greatly rejoice in that last time,” or, as the passage might be rendered, “ Wherein ye shall greatly rejoice.” “ Now for a season ye are in heaviness, but in the last time-the time of Christ’ s appearing-the time of your entering upon the inheritance that is incorruptible, ye shall greatly rejoice.” But still the prospect of the great rejoicing in the last time gives some measure of rejoicing in the present. It is impossible for us to hope with anything like assurance for something that will make us very joyful without feeling in a measure joyful now. We can in a somewhat cheerful spirit bear the most dismal wintry weather, as we have the assurance of the spring and summer that are to follow. But this joy is mingled with sorrow. “ Now for a season ye are in heaviness through manifold temptations.” And this brings us to the subject of our text-namely, the trial of our faith. Now your faith is your confidence in God. Your faith is your confidence in God’ s being, and doing all that in His Word He is represented to be and to have done; your confidence in God as infinitely wise, and mighty, and righteous, and merciful; your confidence in Him as having provided a full and free redemption for mankind through the finished work of our Lord Jesus Christ; your confidence in Him as certain to fulfil all the great promises that He has given to His people. That is your faith, your confidence in God. And concerning the trial of this the apostle here speaks. But, first, of this faith he says that it is more precious than gold. I think I can appeal to every Christian here, and say, “ Now, you would be sorry to lose your property, no doubt?” Quite natural. But still, do not you as Christians feel that we would rather be beggared today than lose this precious faith of which the Apostle Peter speaks? Well, this faith, he tells us, is to be tried. That is to say, our faith is subjected to proof-put to the test. If we profess to be Christians, it is very important that the world and the Church and ourselves should have some proof of our Christianity that this profession of ours is a right, honest thing, and neither a piece of hypocrisy nor a piece of self-delusion. And so for our own sakes first of all, but also for the sake of the Church, which we have no right to deceive, and for the sake of the world, which also has a claim to know the genuineness of our religious profession-it is necessary that our faith should be proved. Now, unfortunately, we have in our religious phraseology nearly lost sight of this very common sense meaning of the word “ trial.” When you talk about the trial of a steamship or the trial of a hundred-ton gun, well, we understand that it is putting these things to a proof. But in our religious phraseology, a trial, forsooth, is simply a calamity-some terrible thing. And that is almost the only light in which we regard it, with scarcely any recognition of God’ s design, and of His design being the proof of character. But that is His design. Now here is an alleviation at once, and a very great alleviation of the trials that you and I may have to pass through. Here is a man who comes forward and professes to be a seaman. Well, it is a very reasonable thing that he should be required to prove his seamanship by having, sometimes at any rate, to navigate his vessel amid the perils of a storm. And here is another who professes to be a soldier. Well, no injustice is done, but very much the contrary, if this man be required to prove his courage and skill by being sent, occasionally at any rate, upon some exceedingly hazardous military duty. And here is one who professes to be a servant of God, and do not let him be surprised if God, like any other master, shall subject him to proof, and ascertain, by practical experiment, what he is worth and what he can do, and whether he really be what by his profession he ought to be. So our faith is tried. A reasonable and perfectly right thing that tried it ought to be, as I said just now, for our own sake, if for the sake of nobody else. And, as the apostle reminds us here, the trial of our faith is conducted through manifold temptations. Let us take the word “ trials,” not “ temptations,” for God does not tempt any man in this evil sense of the word “ temptation.” We are tried through manifold trials. That is to say, our faith is subjected to more proofs than one; and so it ought to be. I suppose that when they try a ship they make her go through many manoeuvres; and when they try a horse there is more than one sort of test to which the creature is put. And when a student goes in for examination, success in which is to be crowned with some distinguished honour, he is subjected to a considerable number of trials in order that the height and breadth and length and depth of the man’ s mind, if there be any height and length and depth and breadth in it, may be ascertained. And he is subjected to various manifold trials, because the very brilliant capacity in one direction may, unfortunately, be accompanied by miserable incapacity in another direction, and so the man is subjected to manifold trials. And faith, likewise, is subjected to more trials than one. We find that poverty tries our honesty. A sad reverse of circumstances, such as is very frequently witnessed, does certainly try the integrity of a man’ s principles as a man of business. And then I need not say that unkindness, injustice, is a great trial of our charity; and persecution would be a severe trial of our courage. Insolence is a trial of our meekness. And there are trials of a peculiar character, not very peculiar either, for they are not uncommon. I mean the trials of our faith that are often experienced by men who really find it difficult to retain their confidence in the revelation of God’ s will in His Word. And you must not at all suppose that because a man never knew what bad health is, and never knew anything of poverty, and never had the slightest reason to be anxious about a single secular concern, that that man’ s faith is going untried. It may be being tried a great deal more than yours in the midst of sickness and of poverty. There may be a terrible war going on within that man’ s mind and heart as he is endeavouring, with all earnestness, but often finds himself failing, endeavouring to retain his confidence in the great principles of the gospel of Jesus Christ. Thus our faith is tried, and severe is the trial sometimes, as the apostle indicates when he says, “ Though it be tried with fire.” It has been in the most terribly literal sense tried with fire, for, as you know, for a long time burning to death was the method commonly resorted to in the persecution of those who stood faithful to the truth as it is in Christ. And so the faith of men like John Huss, and Jerome of Prague, and Bishop Latimer, and thousands upon thousands more in the noble army of martyrs, was in the most literal and severe sense tried with fire. But, of course, we can understand this expression “ tried with fire,” in a metaphorical sense, as indicative of any peculiarly severe trial to which faith may be exposed, such as a long and wearisome and painful illness. And now to notice some of the alleviations that we have graciously granted to us in these trials of our faith. Do not let us give way to a hopeless sorrow over the matter, for God has mingled very much comfort with all this distress. In the first place, as the apostle reminds us, it is only for a season, or, as we might render his words, “ Now for a little while ye are in heaviness through manifold temptation” -for a little while. It will not be long. It cannot be long. And then, again, there is a necessity for it. “ If need be,” but not if need not be. Only “ if need be,” and only in proportion as the need really is. And we really must allow God to be the judge and the only judge of this need. We leave it, of course, to the goldsmith to determine how he is to deal with the gold that he is to make up into an article of use or adornment; and we leave it to the lapidary to decide how to cut and to polish the jewels which he intends to set in this fashion or in that. It would be an impertinent thing for persons not skilled in such work even to venture an opinion, and an impertinent thing to venture opinions about the manner in which God Almighty should deal with and make up the gold and the gems whereof He is preparing a glorious crown for our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ. No, “ if need be,” and only if need be. The sculptor, you know, would not on any account chip off a block of marble one atom more than in his judgment is necessary to the realisation of his idea in the statue. And no surgeon or physician of ordinary humanity will give his patient any more pain than is unavoidable in order to the healing of the wound or the curing of the disease. And we, as the children of God, are in very wise hands, in very tender hands, in very safe hands. And then there is a great object secured by these trials, that this faith thus tried is found to be unto praise and honour and glory at the appearing of Jesus Christ. Unto whose praise and honour and glory? Not unto ours-at least, not unto ours in the first place, but unto our Lord’ s, an Archbishop Leighton says, “ God delights to bring out His strongest champions, that they might fight great battles for Him.” And although, certainly, it is sad to think of a good man being cast into prison, and sadder still to think of his being committed to the flame, yet I can imagine that God, not although He loves His people, but just because He loves them, rejoices over such a scene as that. I can imagine God rejoicing to see how His grace strengthens a poor, feeble, mortal man, and makes him firm and enduring unto the end. And at the last it will be found that this trial of their faith was ever unto the praise and honour and glory of their Lord, and to their own praise and honour and glory likewise. But, again, there is this alleviation in the trial of faith suggested in the words, “ Whom having not seen ye love; in whom, though now ye see Him not, yet believing” -the love that we bear to our Lord Jesus Christ will greatly help us in the trial of our faith. You know that for a person whom you love you will do and suffer things that you would never think of doing or suffering for a person towards whom you felt no particular regard. How much a man will do, and how much he will suffer for his wife and for his children! And so, in proportion to the love we bear to Jesus Christ will be the lightness of the infliction involved in any trials to which our faith is subjected. Once more, there is this alleviation, that “ believing in Christ we rejoice with joy unspeakable and full of glory, receiving the end of our faith, even the salvation of our souls.” But some will say, “ Have not we already received the salvation of our souls?” Now salvation is a great compound blessing, if I may so speak, and some of it we have received already, and some of it is in reserve. In fact, salvation is a blessing, of which a Christian is receiving something every day. I had so much salvation yesterday; I have got more today, and I shall have more tomorrow, if I am living the Christian life, that is to say. Now, in so far as salvation is the forgiveness of sins, salvation is ours now. (H. S. Brown.) Trials Trials are of many kinds. Some are very slight; but often a little thing is more severely felt than one that is greater. There are all the little annoyances which happen every hour; things go contrary to our wishes; we have to give up our wills; we are disappointed of our hopes. There are pains of body and sickness; there is the sickness of our dear friends. Now trial is natural to us: it belongs to us as children of Adam. But to Christians trials come in a somewhat different way. They belong to us as members of Christ. I. The first thing to be thought when we have any trial, is that it comes from God. It is not a proof of any special wickedness in the person to whom it is sent, nor of God’ s being specially angry with that person. Quite the contrary. God feels towards each of you the very same tender fatherly love that you feel to your dear boy; and so He corrects you as you correct that boy. And just as you take the trouble to prune and attend to the fruit tree which bears well, in the hope that it will bear still better, so God sends trouble to them who are doing good, in the hope that they will do still better. In all troubles, then, look to God-receive them from Him as the best things which your loving Father can send you. II. Think, next, what are they sent for? They are punishments for sins, that is true; but see the wonderful goodness of God: these punishments His love turns into mercies and blessings. What does He send them for?1. To remind us of our sins; to make us remember our sins, that through His mercy we may repent of them. 2. To draw our thoughts towards Himself. “ In their affliction they will seek Me early.” 3. They are called trials-that means things which try. What do they try? They try us, whether we can trust God when matters seem to be going wrong. 4. To make us patient. Patience is that great gift which most especially helps to make us perfect Christians. “ Let patience have her perfect work, that you may be perfect and entire, wanting nothing.” When we quietly give up our way to others-when we are disappointed and do not fret-when we ourselves have sharp pains to bear and we do not repine-then we are learning to become more perfect Christians-then we are becoming holier-we are really growing into what God intends us to be. III. They lead us on to the crown. To conclude.1. Try to think in this way of all troubles whatsoever, of all the little vexations of life, as well as of the heavier afflictions which come more seldom. 2. Look on continually to the end-the end of all things-heaven and eternity! This will encourage you to bear what now seems so painful. The hope of what is coming will cheer you up. 3. And especially look continually to Jesus Christ, and the example He has set us. Look to Him continually, “ lest you be weary and faint in your minds.” (W. H. Ridley, M. A.) Trials These words are spoken to Christians, to persons called by the apostle “ elect according to the foreknowledge of God,” and “ begotten to an inheritance incorruptible and undefiled, and that fadeth not away.” How great a privilege to be chosen to eternal life I Well may the Christian be delighted with such thoughts, “ wherein,” says St. Peter, “ ye rejoice.” But before the enjoyment of these things there are many troubles to be encountered; we may be glad, yet may we perchance, when we look at intervening difficulties, “ be in heaviness.” It is well known that the most devout Christians are sometimes “ in heaviness.” Do not think it any strange thing for the Christian man to be “ in heaviness,” even as to his salvation. The Lord often lays the severest trial, that is, this feeling of desertion, on the most perfect, as you would place the boldest soldier in the front of the battle. Hence, then, assurance is not necessary; the spiritual atmosphere is variable.1. Poverty is a great temptation-a temptation which throws many “ into heaviness.” 2. But again, the temptations of the rich lie in another direction. 3. The heaviness which sometimes arises from the oppression and power of sin. 4. And some persons are in heaviness-they themselves know not why. None are more to be sorrowed with. There seems to be no known cause-and yet they are in lowness of spirits, and weary of the world. (J. M. Chanter, M. A.) Trial as fire Trial is here compared to fire; that subtle element which is capable of inflicting such exquisite torture on our seared flesh; which cannot endure the least taint or remnant of impurity, but wraps its arms around objects committed to it with eager intensity to set them free and make them pure; which is careless of agony, if only its passionate yearning may be satisfied; which lays hold of things more material than itself, loosening their texture, snapping their fetters, and bearing them upwards in its heaven-leaping energy. What better emblem could there be for God, and for those trims which He permits or sends, and in the heart of which He is to be found?1. But this fire is a refiner’ s fire (Malachi 3:3). (1) It is He who permits the trial. The evil thing may originate in the malignity of a Judas, but by the time it reaches us it has become the cup which our Father has given us to drink. The waster may purpose his own lawless and destructive work, but he cannot go an inch beyond the determinate counsel and foreknowledge of God. The very devil must ask permission ere he touches a hair of the patriarch’ s head. The point up to which we may be tested is fixed by consummate wisdom. The weapon may hurt and the fire sting, but they are in the hands which redeemed us. (2) It is He who superintends the trial. No earthly friend may be near, but in every furnace there is One like the Son of Man. (3) It is He who watches the progress of the trial. No mother bending over her suffering child is more solicitous than He is. Suiting the trial to your strength. 2. Trial is only for a season. “ Now for a season ye are in heaviness.” The great Husbandman is net always threshing. The showers soon pass. Our light affliction is but for a moment. 3. Trial is for a purpose. “ If needs be.” There is utility in every trial. It is intended to reveal the secrets of our hearts, to humble and prove us, to winnow us as corn is shaken in a sieve, to detach us from the earthly and visible, to create in us an eager desire for the realities which can alone quench our cravings and endure forever. (F. B. Meyer, B. A.) The theology of sufferings I. Temptations or trials reveal faith.1. On the one hand, they show us the evil that is in us. More evil dwells in the heart than we have ever realised. “ I never before could believe,” exclaims the afflicted man, “ that so many hard thoughts of God were nestling in my brain, and so many rebellious passions lodging in my heart.” God sends trouble to bring out and make palpable that which is latent. 2. Not only so, but afflictions further serve to evoke our good, to lead forth into visibility the faith, the hope, and the charity God in His loving kindness has infused into our souls. Certain things will not disclose what is in them save under pressure. Aromatic herbs will not diffuse their aroma till they are bruised. II. Temptations or trials strengthen faith.1. Bitters are the best tonic for the spiritual man as for the physical. All who are a little acquainted with gardening operations know how careful the gardener is to lop off all redundant growths which genial weather calls forth, growths which he significantly calls “ suckers,” because they drain away the sap which would otherwise go to form fruit. On just the same principle the Divine Husbandman treats the “ Trees of Righteousness” growing in His vineyard-He mercilessly lops off the worldly “ suckers” which steal away the juice, the fatness, of your religion, and thereby drives the whole energy of your spirit back upon your faith. 2. Sorrows further invigorate faith, because they call it into frequent, yea, constant exercise. And it is an universally admitted truth that all our natural faculties and spiritual graces grow in exercise. To be a robust Christian you must battle with difficulties. III. Temptations or trials purify faith.1. They release it from the impurities which attach to it. Religion in this world lives among pots, and, as might be expected, it does not quite escape “ the corruption that is in the world through lust.” And God in His wisdom judges it expedient to cast it into the sea; but, as Leighton quaintly remarks, He does it “ not to drown it, but to wash it.” But this process of separation is not an easy one, pleasant to flesh and blood; rather it requires the penetrating action of the flame. 2. Adversity, moreover, throws faith more upon its own proper resources, making it draw its aliment and inspiration more directly from God as revealed in His Book. IV. Temptations or trials beautify faith.1. Trials evolve the latent beauty of faith. Faith is intrinsically a beautiful grace, but to disclose its beauty it must often undergo the severe operations of chisel and hammer. 2. But it is also true that sorrows impart beauty to faith, a kind of weird-like fascination that makes it, in its struggle with obstacles, a “ spectacle worthy of the gods.” God throws the Christian into “ many-coloured” afflictions that he may be thereby adorned and made meet to enter the society of heaven. He makes His Church a coat of many colours to show His love to her and appreciation of her. (J. C. Jones, D. D.) The trial of faith I. The value of faith1. Even considered intellectually, as a mere belief of revealed truth, faith is of the highest possible value, as the great instrument by which we obtain religious knowledge and wisdom. 2. But its value-as it is not merely an intellectual exercise, but an act of trust, and thus a work of the heart-is shown by this, that it connects us immediately and personally with the merits of the great Atonement. 3. The value of faith is seen in this, that it not only connects man, as guilty, with the meritorious atonement of the Saviour, but man, as weak and helpless, with the omnipotence of Divine grace. 4. Another proof of the value of faith is found in that wonderful property which the Apostle Paul assigns to it, and which, indeed, we find by actual experience that it possesses-the property of fixing its eye on invisible and eternal realities, and keeping the soul continually under their influence. II. The trial of faith.1. In its lower sense-merely considered as belief of truth-faith will be tried. This may occur in many circumstances, and especially from infidel sophistry. 2. But our faith will not only be tried by sophistry; it will be tried also by what may be termed practical unbelief. This is especially the ease in all temptations to sin. 3. Faith, in that higher sense in which the word is used-as implying a simple trust in the atonement of the Saviour-will be tried by our proneness to self-dependence. 4. Faith is also tried by afflictions and sorrows. In sorrows our faith has to repose entirely on the great doctrine that all that concerns us is in the hands of God, that here there is no chance, no oversight, no delegation of the Divine power to the creature. III. The final honours of faith. It has, indeed, its honours now, far greater than any of which unbelief can boast. Is it not that which brings man to God for the blessings of reconciliation and adoption? Is it not that which brings with it the mighty influence of that Holy Spirit which works in man the death unto sin and the new life unto righteousness? Is it not that which is the source of our spiritual victories, which gives us strength to do and strength to suffer? Is it not that which enables us to resist the temptations with which the present world continually surrounds us? And is it not that which extracts the sting of death? Such are the honours of faith here on earth. Where shall we look for those of formality and unbelief? But the apostle refers to its future honours, to the praise and glory in which our faith shall issue at the appearing of the Lord Jesus Christ. Then shall the faith which has received the mysteries of God be honoured. (R. Watson.) The trial of faith I. Faith is much more precious than gold.1. Gold is of an earthly, but faith of a heavenly origin. 2. Faith has its object, as well as its origin, in God; whereas gold, unless placed in the hands of him who has the new nature, tends to the place whence it came, and is often also in the child of God the means of dragging hint too much to earth. 3. Faith always enriches the possessor, but gold often impoverishes. II. This faith must be tried, and that with fire.1. The world is a great trial to faith. 2. Satan is always attempting to try and to overstep the faith of God’ s people. III. What is the great end and purpose for which faith is so tried? It is that it may be proved to be faith, just as the gold is tried in the fire. (J. H. Evans, M. A.) The trial of your faith I. Your faith will be tried surely.1. Faith, in the very nature of it, implies a degree of trial. God never gave us faith to play with. It is a sword, but it was not made for presentation on a gala day, nor to be worn on state occasions only, nor to be exhibited on a parade ground. It is a sword, and he that has it girt about him may expect, between here and heaven, that he shall know what battle means. Faith is a sound sea-going vessel, and was not meant to lie in dock and perish of dry rot. To whom God has given faith, it is as though one gave a lantern to his friend because he expected it to be dark on his way home. The very gift of faith is a hint to you that you will want it, and that, at all points and in every place, you will really need it. 2. Trial is the very element of faith. Faith is a salamander that lives in the fire, a star which moves in a lofty sphere, a diamond which bores its way through the rock. Faith without trial is like a diamond uncut, the brilliance of which has never been seen. Untried faith is such little faith that some have thought it no faith at all. What a fish would be without water or a bird without air, that would be faith without trial. 3. It is the honour of faith to be tried. He that has tested God, and whom God has tested, is the man that shall have it said of him, “ Well done, thou good and faithful servant.” 4. The trial of your faith is sent to prove its sincerity. 5. It must also be tested to prove its strength. 6. The trial of our faith is necessary to remove its dross. “ Why, a week ago,” says one, “ I used to sing, and think that I had the full assurance of faith; and now I can scarcely tell whether I am one of God’ s people or not.” Now you know how much faith you really possess. You can now tell how much was solid and how much was sham; for had that which has failed you been real faith, it would not have been consumed by any trial through which it has passed. You have lost the froth from the top of the cup, but all that was really worth having is still there. II. Your faith will be tried variously.1. There are some whose faith is tried each day in their communion with God. That is, God in Christ, who is our God, is a consuming fire; and when His people live in Him, the very presence of God consumes in them their love of sin and all their pretentious graces and fictitious attainments, so that the false disappears and only the true survives. The presence of perfect holiness is killing to empty boastings and hollow pretences. 2. God frequently tries us by the blessings which He sends us. (1) Riches.(2) Praise. 3. Another trial of faith is exceedingly common and perilous nowadays, and that is heretical doctrine and false teaching. 4. The trial of our faith usually comes in the form of affliction. I remember Mr. Rutherford, writing to a lady who had lost five children and her husband, says to her, “ Oh, how Christ must love you! He would take every bit of your heart to Himself. He would not permit you to reserve any of your soul for any earthly thing.” Can we stand that test? Can we let all go for His sake? Do you answer that you can? Time will show. III. Your faith will be tried individually. It is an interesting subject, is it not, the trial of faith? It is not quite so pleasant to study alone the trial of your faith. It is stern work when it comes to be your trial, and the trial of your faith. Do not ask for trials. Children must not ask to be whipped, nor saints pray to be tested. The Lord Jesus Christ has been glorified by the trial of His people’ s faith. He has to be glorified by the trial of your faith. IV. Your faith will be tried searchingly. The blows of the flail of tribulation are not given in sport, but in awful earnest. The Lord tries the very life of our faith-not its beauty and its strength alone, but its very existence. The iron enters into the soul; the man’ s real self is made to endure the trial. V. Your faith will be tried for an abundantly useful purpose.1. The trial of your faith will increase, develop, deepen, and strengthen it. We may wisely rejoice in tribulation, because it worketh patience, and patience experience, and experience hope; and by that way we are exceedingly enriched, and our faith grows strong. 2. The trial of our faith is useful, because it leads to a discovery of our faith to ourselves. I notice an old Puritan using this illustration. He says, you shaft go into a wood when you please, but if you are very quiet, you will not know whether there is a partridge, or a pheasant, or a rabbit in it; but when you begin to move about or make a noise, you very soon see the living creatures. They rise or they run. So, when affliction comes into the soul, and makes a disturbance and breaks our peace, up rise our graces. Faith comes out of its hiding, and love leaps from its secret place. 3. Besides, when faith is tried, it brings God glory. (C. H. Spurgeon.) The trial of faith precious It is not faith, but the trial of faith, that is here pronounced to be precious. Precisely because faith is the link by which the saved are bound to the Saviour, it is of unspeakable importance to have faith tested in time and proved to be true. Here the fire and the crucible are the most valuable of all things for the investor. These are his safeguards, In like manner, it is dangerous to venture our eternity on a fair weather profession; an assay in some form is essential to determine whether there is life or only a name that you live. The trial of faith by affliction is com pared to the testing and purifying of gold by fire. The greatest results will be seen within the veil. When Christ comes the second time to reign, the effect of these trials will appear to his praise. (W. Arnot.) The trial of faith This trial is made upon faith principally, rather than any other grace, because the trial of that is, in effect, the trial of all that is good in us. (M. Henry.) Trials are tests The surest way to know our gold is to look upon it and examine it in God’ s furnace, where He tries it for that end, that we may see what it is. If we have a mind to know whether a building stands strong or no, we must look upon it when the wind blows. If we would know whether that which appears in the form of wheat has the real substance of wheat or be only chaff, we must observe it when it is winnowed. If we would know whether a staff be strong or a rotten, broken reed, we must observe it when it is leaned on and weight is borne upon it. If we would weigh ourselves justly, we must weigh ourselves in God’ s scales that He makes use of to weigh us. (Jonathan Edwards.) Burnt in Yonder is a porcelain vase just fashioned; it is now in the decorator’ s hands, who paints on it various pretty and delicate figures-here and there he paints a passage of Scripture. Presently he passes it into the hands of another who glazes it, who in his turn passes it on to a third. But what is the third doing? Why, he is putting the vase into a hot oven. “ Sir,” we exclaim, “ you will spoil your ware, and your labour will be in vain.” Smiling at our alarm, he placidly replies, “ Gentlemen, I will take care that the vase suffers no injury. I put it into the oven to enhance its value, for I mean thus to burn in what has been painted on it, which would otherwise wash off. There-it is finished now,” he adds, “ and you may wash that vase for twelve months without making any impression on the colours. They are burnt in, sirs, burnt in.” Similarly God burns in verses of the Bible into our experience. Having infused His grace into us in regeneration, and made wholesome impressions on the mind through the ministry of the Word, He consigns us to the furnace of affliction that they may be burnt into the very core of our being, so burnt that nothing will ever again erase them. (J. C. Jones, D. D.) Much more precious than of gold that perisheth.-Tried faith more precious than gold 1. Gold comes out of the earth; faith from heaven, whence every good and perfect gift is. 2. Faith is more rare, termed therefore the faith of God’ s elect, whereas most, even of the wicked, are not without gold. 3. Faith cannot be purchased with all the gold in the world. 4. It is hardly gotten and hardly kept, and has many and strong enemies-our own nature, the world and the devil are all against faith, but not against getting of gold. 5. It apprehends salvation and life eternal, and so is the instrument of our happiness. So is not gold but the instrument of many a man’ s damnation; by unconscionable getting, and covetous keeping the same, many cast away their souls. 6. It will comfort a man with true comfort in his life, carry him strongly through troubles, and boldly through the gates of death. 7. Gold perisheth, here canker and rust consume it; we may be taken from it, as it from us; but faith endureth till Christ’ s appearing, to our full redemption, as the fruit thereof forever. Uses:1. To them that want gold, and yet have faith. Know that thou art richer than he that hath thousands of gold and hath not faith. 2. To the rich. Rejoice not that thou art rich, but that thou hast faith. Again, think all your pains to become you well, and well bestowed in getting this precious faith. 3. To those who have not faith. Poor souls, labour after it, that you may be made inwardly rich. 4. To rich men who have toiled for gold. Seek this that is so much better. (John Rogers.) Genuine faith more precious than gold I. Gold cannot satisfy the soul. Genuine faith does. As a rule it will, perhaps, be found that he who has the most gold is the most discontented and restless in heart. Faith fills the soul with joy unspeakable and full of glory. II. Gold cannot strengthen the soul. Genuine faith does. In what does the strength of the soul consist? In force of sympathies generous and devout; force of determination to pursue the right; force to bear up with buoyant magnanimity under all the trials and sorrows of life. Gold cannot give this strength. How strong were the men mentioned in the eleventh chapter of Hebrews! III. Gold cannot ennoble the soul. But genuine faith ennobles the soul, enthrones it above the tide of passion and the force of circumstances. (Homilist.) Peter’ s list of valuables Peter is very fond of this word “ precious.” He uses it more frequently than all the other New Testament writers, with the exception of John in the Revelation, where, however, it is only employed in reference to things of material value, such as jewels and costly woods. Paul uses it only once, and in a similar connection, speaking about “ gold, silver, and precious stones.” James employs it once in regard of the fruits of the earth; and all the other instances of its use are in Peter’ s writings. Here are the cases in which he uses it. First, in my text, about the process by which Christian faith is tested; then about the blood of Jesus Christ; then, in a quotation from Isaiah, about Christ Himself as the cornerstone. These three are the instances in the first Epistle. In the second we find two, where he speaks of “ like precious faith,” and of “ exceeding great and precious promises.” I. That our true treasures are all contained in, and clustered round, the person and work of Jesus Christ. Now, in order to estimate the value of a thing, the first necessity is a correct standard. Now, if we are seeking for a standard of value, surely the following points are very plain. Our true treasure mast be such as helps us towards the highest ends for which we are fitted by our make. It must be such as satisfies our deepest needs; it must be such as meets our whole nature; and it must be such as cannot be wrenched from us. I do not want to undervalue lower and relative good of any kind, or to preach an overstrained contempt of material, transient, and partial blessing. Competence and wealth, gold and what gold buys, and what it keeps away, are good. High above them we rank the treasures of a cultivated mind, of a refined taste, of eyes that see the beauty of God’ s fair creation. Above these we rank the priceless treasures of pure reciprocated human love. But none of them, nor all of them put together, meet our tests, simple and obvious as they are. They do not satisfy the whole, or the depths, of our natures. Only God can fill a soul. So Peter is right after all, when he points us in a wholly different direction for the true precious things. “ Christ is precious.” Now, the word that he employs there is slightly different from that which occurs in the other verses. The speaker in the original words of the prophet is God Himself. It is the preciousness in God’ s sight of the stone which He “ lays in Zion” that is glanced at in the epithet. Let me suggest how the preciousness of His beloved Son, in the eyes of the Father who gave Him, enhances the preciousness of the gift to us. God obeys the law which He lays upon His servants; and He “ will not give” to us “ that which costs Him nothing.” But Christ is precious to us. Yes, if we know ourselves and what we want; if we know Him and what He gives. Do you want wisdom? He is the wisdom of God. Do you seek power? He is the power of God. Do you long for joy? He will give you His own. Do you weary for peace? “ My peace I leave with you.” Do you hunger for righteousness? “ He of God is made unto us wisdom and righteousness.” Do you need fulness and abundance? “ In Him dwells all the fulness of God; and of His fulness have all we received.” Whatever good any soul seeks, Christ is the highest good, and is all good. Let us turn our hearts away from false treasures and lay hold on Him who is the true riches. Further, Christ’ s blood is precious. Peter believed in Christ’ s atoning sacrifice for the sins of the world, and of each single soul therein. If you strike that element out of the work of our Lord, what remains, precious as it is, does not seem to me to so completely satisfy human necessities as to make Him the one all-sufficient and single treasure and riches of men’ s souls. And then there is the third precious thing, clustering round and flowing from Jesus Christ and His work-and that is, the “ exceeding great and precious promises,” which are given to us “ that by them we may be partakers of a Divine nature.” I presume that these promises referred to by the apostle are largely, if not exclusively, those which have reference to what we call the future state. And they are precious because they come straight to meet one of the deepest needs of humanity, often neglected, but always there-an ache, if not a conscious need. What about that dark, dim beyond? Is there any solid ground in it? Christ comes with the answer: “ I am the Resurrection and the Life; he that believeth on Me, though he were dead, yet shall he live.” Then it is not mist; then I can fling my grappling-iron into it and it will hold, and I can hold on to it. II. That which puts us in possession of the precious things is itself precious. So the apostle speaks, in his second Epistle, about “ like precious faith,” using a compound word, which, however, is substantially identical with the simple expression in the other verses. The only preciousness of that faith which the New Testament magnifies so greatly is that it brings us into possession of the things that are intrinsically precious. Suppose a door, worth half a crown. Yes! but it is the door of a storehouse full of bullion. Here is a bit of lead pipe, worth twopence. Yes, but through it comes the water that keeps a besieged city alive. And so your faith, worth nothing in itself, is worth everything as the means by which you lay hold of the durable riches and righteousness of Jesus Christ. Therefore cherish it. A cultivated mind is a treasure, because it is the key to many treasures. Refined tastes are treasures because they bring us into possession of lofty gifts. AEsthetic sensibilities are precious because they make our own a pure and ennobling pleasure. And, for precisely the same reason, high above the cultivated understanding, and refined tastes, and the artistic sense, ay, and even above the loving heart that twines its tendrils round another heart as loving, we rank the faith which joins us to Christ. III. The process which strengthens that faith is precious. My nominal text speaks about “ the trial of your faith” as being “ much more precious than of gold that perisheth, though it be tried with fire.” Peter meant that the process by which faith was tested, and, being tested, is purified and perfected, is a precious treasure. If Christ and what pertains to Him are our real wealth, and if our faith is the means of our coming into possession of our property, then everything that tightens our grasp upon Him, and increases our capacity of receiving Him, is valuable. Let us lay that to heart, and it changes all our estimates of this world’ s mistaken ill and good. Let us lay that to heart, and it interprets much. We do not understand life until we have got rid of the prejudice that enjoyment, or any lower thing, is the object of it. Let us understand that the deepest meaning of all our experience here is discipline, and we have come within sight of the solution of most of our perplexities. Sorrow and joy, light and darkness, summer and winter, sunshine and storm, life and death, gain and loss, failures and successes-they all have the one end, that we may be partakers of the wealth of His holiness. Let us try to clear our minds of the delusions of this world, and to rectify our estimates of true good. A very perverted standard prevails, and we are too apt to fall in with it. Many of us are no wiser than savages that will exchange gold for trash, and barter away fertile lands for a stand of old muskets or a case of fiery rum. Listen to Jesus Christ counselling you to buy of Him gold tried in the fire. Turn away from the fairy gold, which by daylight will be seen to be but a heap of yellow fading leaves, and cling in faith, which is precious, to Him who is priceless, and in whom the poorest will find riches that cannot be corrupted nor lost forever. (A. Maclaren, D. D.) Found unto praise and honour and glory at the appearing of Jesus Christ.- Perfect salvation These words have reminded me of a phrase which, twenty or thirty years ago, was constantly recurring in sermons of many of the younger and more ardent preachers of that time. They insisted that Christ had come to achieve for us what they described as a present salvation. There was a polemical element, too, in preaching of this kind, for the doctrine of a present salvation was asserted as though it were a part of the Christian gospel that had never been clearly apprehended; it was implied that most Christian people had thought of salvation as something future, something that could not be known on this side of death, while in fact we are to be saved, if saved at all, here and now. Those who preached a present salvation said in substance, “ Many of you Christian people have missed the power and glory which Christ came to make yours in this life, because you are always thinking of heaven and the life to come; your religion is unpractical, you do not see that Christ came to make an infinite difference in the whole life of man in this world, as well as to make eternal blessedness our inheritance in the next.” There is no need to preach like that now. None of us, I imagine, are too much occupied with thoughts of heaven and the life to come. Richard Baxter, as some of you remember, tells us that in the afternoon, when it began to be too dark to go on with his reading and writing, and before the candles were brought in, he used to sit quietly in the twilight meditating on the saints’ everlasting rest. This entry is longer than a Bible module can hold. The rest is at https://www.sermonindex.net/commentary/bi/ 1 Peter 1:10-12 Of which salvation the prophets have inquired and searched diligently.Salvation-the central subject of sturdy I. The prophets as examples to us in the study of salvation.1. The intensity of their study. The word here translated “ searched” is used by classic authors to describe hounds scouring the country to discover their prey. We read the Bible more from idle frivolous curiosity than from a sincere deep-rooted wish to catch a view of the blessed Messiah moving in Divine stateliness through its histories and doctrines. Another striking similitude is suggested-that of anxious miners excavating for gold. Two young men catch the gold fever; despite the tearful entreaties of parents, they resolve to emigrate to Australia. The first morning after their arrival they rise earlier and with less difficulty than they ever did at home, shoulder their tools, and start eagerly for the much-coveted quarries. They dig, loosen a portion of the rock, pick up the stones. Observe how carefully they examine them to see if there be perceptible a slight golden tinge, just enough to feed hope; and if they discover a grain or two of gold, how the discovery cheers their hearts, nerves their arms, and transfigures their countenances! Similarly the holy men of the Jewish Church dug into the fields of Divine revelation, scanned verse after verse, dissected the sacrifices and analysed the prophecies, in order to possess a few grains of truth, a little refined gold. 2. The subject of their study-salvation. Not “ after which salvation,” but “ of which, concerning which.” This is one difference between heathen philosophers and Jewish prophets: the former inquired after salvation without finding it, whereas the latter possessed salvation to start with, and possessing it they had no need to search after it, but concerning it and into it. And our first concern should be to possess salvation, to be in a state of personal safety through faith in the Redeemer. Then we may at our leisure institute investigations concerning it and into it. 3. The noble spirit of resignation they evinced in presence of intellectual difficulties which they were not able to surmount. They inquired diligently; but they understood but little. II. The apostles as examples to us in the proclamation of the gospel.1. The subject matter of their ministry. “ The things now reported unto you” -what things? “ The sufferings of Christ and the glory which should follow.” These are the only things worthy of a Christian pulpit. 2. The manner of their preaching. “ The things reported.” The things invented, devised, imagined? Oh no; the apostles were not inventors, but reporters; not poets, but historians; not philosophers, but witnesses. They were simply reporters, narrating, each one in his own way, the memorable events of that wonderful biography. And do they not furnish us with a much needed example? 3. The power which accompanied their preaching-“ with the Holy Ghost sent down from heaven.” Just as much electricity exists latent in the air on a serene, tranquil day as on a day of tempest when thunders roar and lightnings flash. What, then, is the difference? Not in the amount of electricity, but in the fact that in certain conditions of the atmosphere the electricity flashes into visibility, the latent fire bursts forth into flame. Similarly the Holy Spirit is as truly present in the Church today as in seasons of remarkable revivals, now as in the days of Whitfield, Wesley, and Rowlands. What is wanted is-for the Spirit to make His presence felt, for the Divine electricity to flash forth into lightnings. Pray for His manifestation; and then the weakest preacher among the tribes will be as the house of David, and the house of David as the angel of God. III. The angels an example to us in the wonder and adoration that should fill our minds in the contemplation of this salvation.1. What are the things here referred to? The answer is obvious-the same things which the prophets predicted and the apostles proclaimed. The burden of the study as of the song of these celestial beings is-“ the Lamb that was slain.” And if redemption in its various phases receives the attention and homage of angels, is it not deserving of our devout and worshipful meditation? 2. Into these things the angels desire to look. The word, it is said, might be rendered a little differently “ into which things the angels desire to look,” to look askance, to look one side as it were over the shoulder. What, then, is the idea? That salvation fronts not the angels, who consequently have to stretch the neck and look aside, as it were round the corners, to catch a glimpse of its glory. But so enraptured are they with the beauty they behold that they strive to see more and more, crowding into the churches to learn what they may of the “ manifold” -many-coloured-“ wisdom of God.” No; salvation does not front the angels, but it fairly and fully fronts the children of men. Shall we front it? What is our attitude towards it today? Have we our backs or our faces towards this salvation? His face is towards us; are our faces towards Him? (J. C. Jones, D. D.) The gospel meridian St. Peter here exalts the nature of that glorious reward which is to be the end of tried and purified faith-the salvation of the soul. I. Unfulfilled desires. This is a world of desire. We all crave for something we have not got. We crave for possessions and we crave for knowledge.1. Noblest desires are often unattained. It is not every one who seeks for selfish pleasure. What could have been a more noble aspiration than that of the prophets of old to realise the salvation of which they prophesied? They proclaimed a blessedness which, after diligent search, they discovered was not for themselves to enjoy. How often does God put a limit even to our highest aspirations! One has sought to gain a high knowledge of gospel truth; but his health has broken down. A missionary, in the full possession of manhood and strength, is murdered, and his work apparently crushed. It is the Lord’ s doing, but it seems strange in our eyes. 2. Legitimate curiosity, when exerted, affords scant satisfaction. It might be in accordance with human nature to inquire particularly into the plans and purposes of God; but the prophets of old expended their curiosity in vain. There is little purpose in investigating too closely the hidden purposes of God. God expects us to do His work, and not to inquire very minutely into the motives or ends of that work. II. Unenlightened instrumentalities. The prophets had to inquire respecting the salvation. We have here brought before us one of the mysteries connected with Divine work.1. God’ s instrumentalities are not perfect, it is not necessary that they should be so. The world expects the ministers of the gospel to explain all God’ s purposes, all the Divine plans, and to lay bare the whole current of future events. But even the prophets of old were not altogether wise. 2. God’ s instrumentalities do not always possess that which they announce to others. III. Unappreciated attainment. It is evident that the apostle introduces the desire of the prophets and the desire of the angels to realise the mysteries of revelation, not out of mere aimless illustration, but to remind his people of the little interest they felt, and at the same time to arouse in them a spirit of emulation. But how do we act with regard to them? Do we sell all that we have in order to make them ours? Do we sacrifice every thing else to enjoy them? Alas! the characters, and energy, and desire, and love of those who only had a shadow of good things to come ought to cause us to lie low with shame, and to pray for the stirring influence of the Holy Spirit to prick our thankless and unappreciative souls. (J. J. S. Bird.) The value of the Old Testament 1. Let me caution you against the ignorant frivolity which, professing to reverence the Scriptures of the New Testament, speaks slightingly of those of the Old. As well may you sever the light of the meridian from its dawn; or, cutting a sunbeam in two, retain only the nearer portion. 2. Another popular conceit of our day is, that there is but little use in studying the prophetic Word of God, or, at least, beyond what lies on the surface. This, you perceive, was not the temper of the prophets: They “ diligently inquired and searched.” Into these things “ angels long to gaze.” 3. If such be the interest felt by all that is wisest and holiest in earth and heaven, in whatever concerns the redemption of man, alas for those to whom this great salvation itself is offered, and who yet choose to live and die in the neglect of it! 4. Let the afflicted children of God take comfort from the consideration of what was foretold, and has been fulfilled, in regard to God’ s own Well-Beloved, the Author and Finisher of their faith, to whose image it is God’ s purpose, and the dearest ambition of their hearts, that they shall be in all things conformed. (J. Lillie, D. D.) The Bible as a grand moral painting I. The extraordinary subject. What is the subject? “ The sufferings of Christ and the glory that should follow.” Open this Book, spread out its pages, and what have you? A wide-spread canvas, on which is displayed this one great subject in every hue and form. This picture is divided into two parts. At one end you have “ the sufferings of Christ” ; at the other end “ the glory arising out of these sufferings.” The side on which the sufferings are depicted is full of incident, yet in dark shade. There you see the Babe. In one part, you see Him lying in a manger; in another, in the temple undergoing the painful rite of circumcision; and in another, in the arms of His affrighted mother fleeing into Egypt. But on the other end of the picture you have a striking contrast. Here is “ the glory that follows.” Here you see Him rising from the grave as the conqueror of death, the Prince of Life, and ascending to heaven amidst the rapturous shouts of an exulting creation. What glory will rise out of these sufferings! What new manifestations of God! What new motives to virtue! What new thrills of joy! Amongst the lessons which this extraordinary picture suggests we may mention three:-1. The malignant animus of sin. What produced these sufferings of Christ that you see depicted here? Sin. 2. The benign tendency of the Divine government. Glory comes out of these sufferings; good is educed from evil. This is God’ s work. As out of sin comes suffering, out of suffering shall come glory. 3. The issue of suffering virtue. The sufferings of Christ were the sufferings of virtue; and they issued in glory. And so it will ever be. Goodness, however persecuted and afflicted, shall yet ascend the throne. II. The distinguished artists. Who are the men that drew this wonderful picture? The text speaks of two classes; The prophets who prophesied of the “ grace that should come unto you” ; and the apostles who “ reported.” The prophets drew the dim and shadowy outline. The other class of artists are the apostles. “ The things” concerning Christ which the prophets “ did minister,” the apostles “ reported” ; they “ reported” them when they preached the gospel “ with the Holy Ghost sent down from heaven.” The apostles, as artists, had an advantage over the prophets: they had those outlines of our Saviour’ s history which the old prophets had drawn. And they had in connection with this, the living subject, Christ. He had appeared amongst them, they had seen Him, and talked with Him. They therefore tilled up the outlines of the picture which the old prophets had drawn. III. The inspiring genius. All real art implies genius. Genius to conceive the true and to embody it-creative and executive genius. Who was the inspiring genius of this painting? Peter tells us that in the prophets’ case it was “ the Spirit of Christ that was in them” ; and in the apostles’ case, “ the Holy Ghost sent down from heaven.” This appears clear from the very nature of the work. Before a being can draw a correct picture of another he must have two things-a correct image of the subject in his own mind, and the proper skill correctly to transfer that image to the canvas.1. The character of the subject. How did the prophets and apostles get a conception of Him whom they here depict?-a character so thoroughly unique, so entirely adverse to a priori impression and observation too! The highest virtue associated with the greatest suffering; the most despised man in personal connection with God. Things so contrary meeting in the same one life, render the idea of man creating such a history out of his own imagination all but absurd. The “ Spirit of Christ,” within them, gave them an image of some strange personage, but they knew not of whom. 2. The method of execution. A man may form a correct image of a person, and yet lack the artistic skill to transfer it to the canvas. The execution of the subject is, indeed, as unique as the conception. All mere human art is labour; effort is seen in every touch. But these men, in a few simple words about what they saw and heard, present the hero life-like in every point. The “ Spirit of Christ” that was in them, not only drew to their imagination the manifold aspect of His own being, but guided their pencil in every line, to portray the same. In human productions, both in literature and art, the author generally appears, and some times is offensively prominent. But not so here. IV. The illustrious spectators. “ Into which things the angels desire to look.” But why should they be so interested in it?1. Because it is suited to excite their intellectual natures. Anything extraordinary has a power to rouse the inquiring faculty. 2. Because it is suited to excite their religious natures. To a devout spirit nothing is more interesting or attractive than a manifestation of God. 3. Because it is suited to excite their benevolent natures. V. The glorious purpose.1. Look at the universality of the purpose. “ Not for themselves,” but “ unto us they did minister these things.” 2. Look at the blessedness of the purpose. “ Receiving the end of your faith, even the salvation of your souls.” (D. Thomas, D. D.) The study of salvation I. First, that the doctrine of salvation of God’ s people is a subject able to fill the contemplation of the divinest and wisest men. The prophets have a subject able to fill them; yea, more than they are able to conceive of to the full, which may serve for two uses. First, for humiliation, that we should be so barren-hearted and able to conceive so little of so Divine a subject. Secondly, for singular consolation to the godly. For by this it appeareth that they have an admirable portion in that such worthy men so much admire it. II. Secondly, that as any have more grace, so they are more heartily affected with the estimation and desire after the salvation of God’ s elect. Certainly, so long as we can admire anything more than the grace of God to His people, our hearts are void of grace. III. Thirdly, that when we go about anything that concerns salvation, especially our own salvation, we should here learn of the prophets to do it with all diligence. There are three sorts of men Satan doth in the Church bewitch.1. The first are they that will take no pains at all, nor trouble themselves to study about their religion and what belongs to their souls. 2. The second are they that, though they will study diligently, yet it is in by-studies, as matters of controversy, or the general knowledge of religion, or matter that may fit them for discourse, or the like. 3. Now a third sort there are that will not be drawn aside from the needfulest studies, as repentance, assurance, order of life, etc., but their fault is that they study not these diligently. For they soon give over and finish not their works either of mortification, or sanctification, or illumination, or preparation for salvation. (N. Byfield.) Salvation explored I. The party of explorers.1. Who they were-“ the prophets.”2. Divinely commissioned. “ The Lord of Hosts hath spoken it.”3. Divinely guided. “ What manner of time the Spirit of Christ, which was in them, did signify.” II. The ground explored. “ Salvation.”1. The limits of the field. “ So great salvation.” “ Eternal salvation.”2. The nature and object of their labours. “ Who prophesied of the grace that should come unto you.” III. The spirit in which the exploration was conducted.1. A longing to discover salvation.2. Mental activity. “ Searched,” etc.3. The work was continuous. “ Diligently.”4. Scrutiny. “ Searching what, and what manner of time,” etc. IV. The meritorious centre of this explored salvation. “ The sufferings of Christ.”1. It centres itself in a person.2. In a Divine person.3. In a suffering person. V. Their explorations carried the prophets to the grand reward of Christ’ s sufferings. “ And the glory that should follow.” (John Edwards.) The Scriptures sufficient for salvation A worthy sufferer of the name of Hawkes was under examination before one of Bonner’ s chaplains, of whom he ventured to inquire, “ Is not the Scripture sufficient for my salvation?” “ Yes,” replied the chaplain; “ it is sufficient for our salvation, but not for our instruction.” “ Well, then,” rejoined the honest but quaint martyr, “ God send me salvation, and take you the instruction.” Searching what … the Spirit of Christ … did signify- The Spirit of Christ and the prophets The testimony of the Spirit in the prophets was- I. To Christ Jesus. While the world sinned and slept, Infinite Love prepared its Saviour. II. To the sufferings of Christ. The theme of all Spirit-taught ministers. III. To the glory that should follow (R.V., glories). Christ’ s glories are-1. The well-earned reward of His griefs. 2. The majestic and fitting con summation of His mediatorial course; incomparable in its humiliation; peerless in its purity; and merging into the splendour of the final glory. 3. They mark the full approbation and delight in Him of the Eternal Father, sealing redemption with sublime approval. 4. They are the consolation of God, angels, and men. We never could have forgiven the Cross if the crown had not followed. 5. The Illuminated Gateway of the saints’ eternity. “ With Me where I am, that they may behold My glory.” 6. A blessed counterpart to His sorrows. Sufferings balanced with glories. For “ sin” and “ curse,” mediatorial holiness upon essential holiness. 7. They “ followed” and forever follow. When Calvary shall be seen far back like a distant ruddy star, the glory shall still spread around and onward, a measure less sea of brightness. (W. B. Haynes.) Testified beforehand the sufferings of Christ. The sufferings of Christ I. The sufferings of Christ.1. The person that suffered was God, and also man.2. The nature and extent of His sufferings. Corporeal and mental.3. The persons for whom the sufferings of Christ were endured.4. The design for which Christ suffered. That He might finish transgression, and make an end of sin. II. The glory that should follow. (The Congregational Pulpit.) The glory that should follow.-Three degrees of Christ’ s glory 1. His resurrection.2. His ascension.3. He shall one day come unto judgment, and bring all His servants to His glory. (John Rogers.) Through afflictions believers come to glory But how shall we come to glory? Even by the same way that our Head hath gone before us, by sufferings. It follows-1. That afflictions or persecutions are no ill sign, but rather of the way to heaven and glory; it should encourage us to suffer, seeing glory follows; and a great reward ensues thereupon. 2. That those who will suffer no affliction nor persecution for Christ and the gospel, but shifting themselves therefrom, aim at the glory of the world, are not in the way to glory, but shame hereafter will be their portion. (John Rogers.) Not unto themselves, but unto us they did minister.-Unselfish ministry Such is the Divine interpretation of the prophet’ s work. Their ministry was not for themselves, but for a later age. They must bear the burden of perplexity and disappointment, of hope deferred and doubts unresolved, in the sure confidence that others would enter into their labours. And, indeed, such confidence brings all the light which we need for courageous endurance. The crown of service is to know that the service, barren, perhaps, for the moment, will bear fruit in after time. Thus the words of the apostle are a voice of encouragement to all who catch a distant and interrupted vision of the later fulfilment of God’ s will. “ Not unto themselves, but unto you” this is the judgment which history addresses to us in recording the toils and aims of those to whom we owe our splendid inheritance in our national Church. They gave their best in thought and deed to the cause of God, and left the using to His wisdom. Now I wish to speak of our debt to the future. For, as we contemplate our gathered treasures, we cannot but ask to what use we shall put them, and so we pass on to the wider question of the office which we are called to fulfil for our children. The progress of human life imposes the duty of large forethought on each such succeeding generation with ever-increasing force. Thought advances with accelerated motion. We may check or we may further the expression of the vital energy. We may, by wilful and impatient self-assertion, delay the end which even in our ignorance we desire; or we may by wise humility become in perfect devotion fellow workers with God. Under this aspect the work of the Church is prophetic. Its ministers are set to provide that under every change of circumstances the Divine idea of life shall be presented in confortuity with the circumstances under which it must be realised; to watch with dispassionate regard the currents of popular thought that they may prepare a natural welcome for fresh voices of the spirit; to guard, to develop that which in the Divine order will be the ruling idea of the next generation.1. There is, I say, already among us a final perception of the unity of creation which it will be the health of our children to realise-a unity in Christ. Many of us have watched from the beginning the progress of the physical conceptions of the conservation and transformation of energy. We have apprehended with increasing clearness that nothing in the universe is isolated, and that we ourselves enter into all of which we are conscious. 2. There is again among us a growing acknowledgment of the unity of society which it will be the strength of our children to realise-a unity in Christ. Every one speaks of the present tendency towards democracy. The idea of democracy is not, if we look below the surface, so much a form of government as a confession of human brotherhood. It is the confession of common duties, common aims, common responsibilities. 3. There is yet more among us a feeling after a unity of humanity, a vaster, fuller, enduring human life, which it will be the joy of our children to realise-a unity in Christ. Such thoughts as these of an unrealised unity felt to be attainable, felt to correspond with the idea of creation given back to us in redemption, answer to the spirit of the age. They are in the air. They foreshow, that is, the truths which in the fulfilment of the Divine order are offered to us by the Holy Spirit. It is for the Church in the fulfilment of its prophetic office, even with imperfect and troubled knowledge, to welcome them, to give them shape, and to transmit them to the next age for the guidance and inspiration of its work. The truths lie, as I have said, in the gospel of the Incarnation. The urgent problems, the very dangers which rise before us, disclose in the central fact of all life-the Word became flesh-new depths of wisdom and consolation. We do not yet know the end-we have no power to know it-but we know the way-even Christ, who is able to subdue all things unto Himself. In that Presence we confess that the world is not a factory, or a warehouse, or a paradise of delights, but a sanctuary in which God’ s glory can be recognised and His voice still heard. But in spite of every burden of toil, of ignorance, of weariness, of suffering laid on sinful man, it is a sanctuary, full of the glory of God, in which each believer offers the worship of life and the sacrifice of his whole being. This light, this larger significance of things, this heavenly splendour of earth, this sense of opportunity, is even now borne in upon us on many sides, and it is the prophetic office of the Church to discern the signs of the fresh dayspring from on high, and prepare her sons to use the lessons of the new order. (Bp. Westcott.) Living for future generations Sometimes in worldly things this thought of living for a future generation comes with startling effect upon a worldly man. “ What am I toiling and moiling for? I shall soon be dead and gone, and these houses, lands, estates, debentures, shares, what not, will be for others!” Even in this there may be some far off touch of the Divine; for such men sometimes live in this respect unselfish lives-not for them the enjoyment of those soft luxuries they are gathering about them, but for their children and children’ s children. Not to themselves they minister-and so far we say there may be some soul of good even in this; only let us all remember that the best heritage we can ever leave to our children is that of a wise, pious, charitable example. (T. C. Finlayson.) Unselfish ministries self-remunerative The true preachers of the gospel, though their ministerial gifts are for the use of others, yet that salvation they preach they lay hold on and partake of themselves, as your boxes wherein perfumes are kept for garments and other uses, are themselves perfumed by keeping them! (T. Leighton.) Which things the angels desire to look into.-The doctrine of salvation, the study of angels I. The nature of the truth affirmed.1. The object of inquiry is-salvation and its concomitants: a salvation which consists in deliverance from condemnation, from the love and power of sin, and in restoration to peace and happiness; a salvation revealed in the Scriptures; a salvation the subject of prophecy; a salvation which, both in respect to its nature and the time of its accomplishment, engaged the most serious attention of the prophets; a salvation which rests, not on the merit or power of many, but on the grace of God; a salvation effected by the sufferings, death, and glory of our Lord Jesus Christ. 2. The persons engaged in this inquiry. The angels do not partake of body, nor organic eye, nor ear, nor other sense, yet they have powers equivalent to these faculties, even increased and extended; for they are represented as knowing the interior as well as the surface of things. They are as powerful as they are wise. They have been corrupted by no apostasy from God. They are true, just, benevolent, devout, they glorify God, and thereby completely answer the ends of their creation. They are, at the same time, as happy as they are good; they feel no pain, know no want; their perceptions are all pleasant, thoughts all elevated, employments all dignified. 3. The manner in which they conduct this inquiry. They “ desire to look into” them. Looking is a species or modification of seeing. It implies seeing, but it includes more. In seeing, the mind is often in a considerable degree passive; an object is brought before the eye, and it must be seen, although it may not be considered or attended to. In looking, the mind is not only active, but it puts forth all its powers with energy. The object is not brought to it, but it is sought for; and when it is found the eye is directed towards it, and kept fixed upon it, to the exclusion of other objects. When we speak of seeing, as applied to the mind, it means apprehension or discovery. Nothing is so laborious and fatiguing to the mind as fixed, intense thought; and very great must be the importance or charms of an object which can engage it. But such is the importance and such are the charms of the things of salvation to angels, that they not only bend their capacious minds to this subject, and prosecute it with fixed, intense, and eager thought, but they consider it as an object of pleasure; for they not only look, but they desire to look into the things which pertain to salvation. II. The credibility of this truth. It naturally excites surprise when we are told that angels, who have no immediate connection with salvation, should leave their native employments to investigate it with so much earnestness and solicitude. This, however, upon reflection, will be found to be a fact as reasonable as it is true.1. The things which pertain to salvation form an object the contemplation of which is peculiarly adapted to the capacities of angels. In the salvation of Christ there is a new revelation of God; a new display of Divine character and attributes; not to be discovered in any other thing or in any other way within the whole compass of the universe of God. An object so completely adapted to the talents and to the duties of angels imposes obligations upon them to inquire into its nature and properties, which without blame, they could not neglect. 2. The things which pertain to salvation form an object which is peculiarly calculated to attract the notice of angels. They, in visiting, age after age, the utmost bounds of the creation of God, must have seen mighty wonders unknown to man; yet, after all, there is something, if I may so express myself, in the nature and texture, in the magnitude and utility of salvation, which has not its equal in the whole universe of God. It is this, therefore, that justly attracts their notice, and leads them to bend their mighty minds to the investigation of a subject so singularly astonishing. 3. The things which pertain to salvation form an object the knowledge of which will be highly beneficial to angels. It reveals to them new attributes, and discovers new glories in the Divine character; it increases their piety and devotion; it will afford them new employments, and add to their usefulness; it will enable them to discharge better the duties of their high office of ministering to the heirs of salvation; and it will give them a sweeter voice and a loftier tone in performing the heavenly song, which ascribes blessing and power and dominion to Him that sitteth upon the throne, and to the Lamb forever and ever. 4. The things which pertain unto salvation form an object in attending to which angels serve God. When angels trace in salvation evidences of wisdom, power, and glory, far superior to those which appear in the other works of God; when they admire the wonderful events of the incarnation, atonement, and redemption, these new things which have happened in the earth, their reverence and love towards the Divine Being are thereby increased; they render homage to the Son of God; and, in so doing, they obey the commandment which God hath given; for when He brought His First Begotten into the world, He said, “ Let all the angels of God worship Him” ; and thus they serve Him with increasing diligence and zeal. III. The utility of this truth.1. It is calculated to rescue the doctrine of salvation from unworthy treatment, Yes! angels are captivated by the doctrines of salvation which men presume to neglect. 2. It should give the doctrine of salvation dignity in the eyes of men. 3. It indicates the manner in which the doctrine of salvation should be studied. 4. It should encourage perseverance in endeavouring to attain the knowledge of the doctrine of salvation. 5. The greatness of the privileges of those to whom the knowledge of salvation is offered. Jesus Christ is emphatically styled in the Scriptures the unspeakable gift of God; and surely to attain the knowledge of salvation through Him, must be the most important privilege that possibly can be enjoyed. (J. C. Jones. D. D.) Redemption, a study to the angels It cannot but be deemed remarkable that we should be so isolated from the rest of the universe. Here are millions of orbs brought within the range of our vision by the telescope. We cannot doubt that they are the abodes of rational creatures. Yet of the races that tenant these countless worlds we know absolutely nothing. One race only besides our own is introduced to us: and of that, the notices are quite too meagre to satisfy us. We see just enough of the angels to wish to see a great deal more. We “ desire to look” into their affairs, as they into ours. We are on safe ground in ascribing to them superior intelligence and ample knowledge. But the knowledge of a creature, whatever his rank, must necessarily be progressive. The angels, like ourselves, must learn things by the event-excepting when God may have been pleased to reveal His purposes to them. But, except through some special revelation, of which we have no hint, it was impossible they should foresee the extraordinary transactions which were to distinguish this orb from all the others scattered through the wide fields of space. From the very first, however, the Divine procedure on this planet would arrest their attention. How would it astonish them to witness the temptation. They had seen Satan and his fellow apostates cast down to hell: and yet he is now permitted to come to this newborn world, and to appropriate one of the lower animals to the atrocious purpose of seducing the happy pair from their allegiance. Is it fanciful to imagine that this event would fill the angels with amazement? that they would say one to another, “ How can these things be?” But something no less inexplicable would now inflame their curiosity. They had heard the threatening, “ In the day thou eatest thereof thou shalt surely die.” It came from lips which could not lie. And yet Adam and Eve do not “ die,” -i.e., they do not, on their transgression, “ return to the dust,” nor are they banished into outer darkness. Whether this was intelligible to them we do not know. The fall occurred before the birth of Cain. We are not certain that the angels had ever seen an infant. Among their own race we may with confidence affirm they had not. The difference between our race and their own, in this particular, could not fail to interest them. They were all created in the full maturity of their powers. In some way the seed of this woman is to bruise the serpent’ s head. Obscure as this intimation must have been, as well to the angels as to the guilty pair, it would unveil to them a new attribute of the Godhead. Up to this period, it would seem, they had known nothing of the Divine mercy. Its absence could be no defect in their eyes, for the idea of mercy was not yet born into the universe of creatures. What a discovery was this which now broke upon them! Truth, justice, goodness, holiness-with these attributes they were familiar. But of mercy they had never heard. Enfolded in the depths of His own infinitude, she had been from eternity awaiting the appointed day of her epiphany, her glorious manifestation to heaven and earth get even now that the period has come, she does not rise full-orbed upon the world, but mild and gentle, like the dawn, as befits the quality of mercy. But this shall suffice for angelic eyes. Though mercy never spake before, she needs no interpreter. These occurrences could not fail to stimulate the curiosity of the angels. They would watch with deep solicitude the course of the Divine administration towards our world. They would treasure every fresh intimation of the future deliverance to be effected by the seed of the woman. The presumption is, that during those forty centuries it was a perpetual study to them; and that as the beneficent scheme was gradually developed, it only increased their desire to look into its unfathomable mysteries.1. The first and chief of these is, to quote St. Pear’ s own words, “ the sufferings of Christ” : by which we may understand His entire work of humiliation from Bethlehem to Calvary. We must believe that the angels knew, long before the advent, that the Second Person of the Trinity was to be the Redeemer of the world. But it is not certain that they had any distinct conception of the Incarnation. “ Great is the mystery of godliness, God manifest in the flesh.” How could they have penetrated this mystery beforehand? There was neither precedent nor analogy to aid them in resolving it. Accustomed as they were to render co-equal honours to the Trinity, and especially to adore the Son in “ the possession of the glory which He had with the Father before the world was,” how could they think of Him as stooping to be “ born of a woman,” as coming into this revolted world as an infant, blending His Divinity and our humanity in an indissoluble unity? Imagine what a season of suspense those thirty years must have been to them which Jesus passed at Nazareth. How often would they visit the favoured village. In what vast encampments would they spread around it. As He emerged from His seclusion to enter upon His public ministry, their interest would become deeper and deeper still, until it found its culmination in the Cross. 2. Not only would the angels desire to look into the “ sufferings of Christ,” but into the application of redemption also. They were familiar with two types of character, perfect holiness and unmitigated depravity; and with two conditions of being, unalloyed happiness and absolute misery. Neither their own history nor, so far as we are informed, the annals of any other sphere supplied them with any example of a character in which these elements were commingled, or afforded any hint of a possible transition from one state to the other. They knew nothing of forgiveness, nothing of renewal. The sacrifice on Calvary now opens to them a new world, on earth as well as in heaven. They had, indeed, seen something of this before, for the efficacy of the great expiation reached backward to the fall. But its triumph was reserved for the new dispensation. And here they see His miracles of mercy-not less marvellous in their effects upon the souls of men than had been those of the Messiah upon their bodies. There must be much in the history of individual believers to awaken their sympathies, but still more in the general welfare of the Church. We may be sure that things have not always gone as they expected: that events have constantly occurred which were well nigh as inexplicable to them as to us. Must it not be a marvel to them that the Church, the purchase of Christ’ s blood, should have made its way so slowly and so painfully in the world? that at one time it should be poisoned With error; at another, frozen with formalism; at a third, debauched with secularity; at a fourth, fissured and rent with internal strife? 3. Here, in fact, is another of the themes which stimulate the curiosity of the angels, “ the glories which should follow.” They have seen the “ sufferings of Christ” : they would fain see His glory. They have seen-they see now-the sufferings of His Church: they would see its glory. They can, no doubt, frame a better conception of them than we can. And this very circumstance must increase their solicitude to witness the final result. They saw the first faint lineament of the august plan in Eden. They see also the preparation for it which is going on in heaven. No wonder that they long for its sublime consummation. If we inquire whence this curiosity on their part, we may easily conjecture some of the motives which prompt it. (1) Without dwelling upon that simple craving after knowledge which pertains to every created intelligence, we may refer to the aid which the angels derive from redemption in their study of the character and government of God. To any creature the knowledge of the Creator is the most important of all knowledge. To holy beings, no study can be so attractive. The angels, as already observed, have signal advantages for this study. But there is no volume open to them which yields so much information concerning God as redemption. Heaven cannot lack for evidences of the Divine wisdom; but if it would see this attribute in its glory, it must come down to earth. Its grand achievement is redemption. And what we affirm of His wisdom we claim also for His other moral attributes. Here “ mercy and truth meet together, righteousness and peace kiss each other.” Nowhere else has the Deity made so full, so august, so grateful, a revelation of Himself. (2) A second reason is to be found in their personal concern in the results of redemption. It is an opinion sanctioned by many eminent names in theology, that the good angels owe their confirmation in holiness in some way to the mediation of Christ. We read, e.g., of “ the elect angels.” We are told that God “ gathers together in one all things in Christ, both which are in heaven and which are on earth, even in Him.” And that “ all power is given Him in heaven and in earth.” There is another respect in which they are interested in this work. In the revolt of their associates, they become no less their enemies than the enemies of God. In all the plots and counterplots, the assaults and repulses, the victories and defeats, of this war of centuries, they have taken a conspicuous part. Their immediate personal concern in it, then, is a cogent reason why they should desire to look into the mystery which infolds it. (3) And this imports that their own happiness is involved in the issue. Merely to glance at this point, the benevolence of the angels must attract them to the study of redemption. They know what the happiness of heaven is. Here is a race whose destiny is undecided, the only race which is in this anomalous condition. Whatever the issue, it must be irreversible. The fate of millions of souls hangs upon the trembling balance. Is it for an angel to look upon such a scene with indifference? Reflections-1. Let us borrow from this scripture a single ray of light to set forth the quality of that scepticism which men of cultivated minds sometimes cherish respecting Christianity. Now, as of old, the gospel is “ to the Jew a stumbling block and to the Greek foolishness.” You stigmatise it as not only oppressive in its demands, but even irrational in its principles. Go to the angels for a lesson of humility. 2. There is a keen rebuke in this scripture for those who are living in the neglect of the gospel. (H. A. Boardman, D. D.) Salvation-mysterious and glorious I. Mysterious, and therefore a subject of angelic study.1. From its novelty.2. From the moral character of the race to be redeemed.3. From the manner of its accomplishment.4. From the mode of its promulgation.5. From the manner in which the tidings of this salvation, even when preached with the Holy Ghost sent down from heaven, are received by the children of men. II. Infinitely glorious.1. In its exhibition of the Divine character.2. In its transforming efficacy.3. In its diffusive nature.4. In the freeness with which its blessings are offered. (1) To all indiscriminately.(2) In perfect sincerity.(3) On terms easy, and within the reach of every individual. 5. In the perpetuity and fulness of its blessings. (James Floy, M. A.) The angels’ attitude towards the redemptive plan I. Close attention. II. Deep amazement. III. Warm admiration. IV. High delight. (A. Roberts, M. A.) Redemption the subject of admiration to the angels I. First, we are to mention those circumstances in the mystery of redemption which are probably the subject of adoring inquiry, or perhaps holy astonishment, to the angels of God.1. The first thing I shall mention is the Incarnation of the Son of God; the union of the Divine and human nature, by the Word’ s being made flesh. It is probable that this discovery was made to the angels gradually, as it was to men. There is one circumstance in the Incarnation itself, which is certainly as astonishing as any, That He was not only made flesh, but sent “ in the likeness of sinful flesh.” What so opposite to the nature of God as sin? And what so surprising, as that the Son of God, though without sin, yet should in all respects outwardly be like to sinners? that He should be taken for a sinner, treated as a sinner, and at last crucified as more than ordinary sinner? 2. Another circumstance which must afford matter for adoring inquiry to the celestial spirits, is the substitution of an innocent person in the room of the guilty, and His suffering from the hand of God. The angels had always hitherto seen innocence and holiness attended with peace and felicity, and they had seen the apostate spirits laid under an irreversible sentence of condemnation. What astonishment, then, must it have given them, what new views of the boundless sovereignty and unsearchable wisdom of the Most High must it have opened to them, when they heard Him saying, “ Deliver him from going down into the pit, I have found a ransom!” How often must they have been put to a stand, what to think of the severity and persecution, the contempt and opposition which Christ met with from those very sinners whom He came to save! But above all, how must they have been at a loss to comprehend His being exposed, not only to the contempt of man, but to the wrath of God! For “ it pleased the Lord to bruise Him, He hath put Him to grief.” 3. Another circumstance in the plan of redemption through Christ, which will afford matter of wonder to the celestial spirits, is the free justification of sinners, and their acceptance with God, through the imputed righteousness of Christ. Must not this appear a new and extraordinary plan to the angels, who, by personal and perfect obedience, retain the favour of their Creator, and who had been hitherto strangers to the influence and intercession of a mediator? who had seen no such thing take place when their brethren sinned (Hebrews 2:16). The holy angels will rather say, “ Let us step aside and see this great sight.” They will then see that there is no way more proper for maintaining the dignity of the Divine Government; nay, that it is the only way by which those who have been sinners can be received into favour. They will see and confess that there is no circumstance whatever that tends more to level the pride of the sinner’ s heart, and bring him to universal submission, and absolute subjection to the sovereignty of God. 4. Another circumstance in the mystery of the gospel which will be matter of wonder to the angels, is the application of redemption, or the manner and means of translating sinners “ from darkness to light,” and “ from the power of Satan unto God.” II. Practical improvement.1. What you have heard will contribute, I hope, to show the guilt of those who despise the gospel, and serve to remove the offence of the Cross. 2. You may learn from what has been said the encouragement that is given to sinners to return to God through Christ. 3. From what hath been said upon this subject, you may examine your title to partake of the holy ordinance of the Lord’ s Supper; or, in other words, your right to the favour of God and to eternal life. No disposition more suitable, none more necessary at a communion table than a grateful and admiring sense of redeeming love; 4. From what has been said, learn what is your most proper employment at the Lord’ s table. Adore and contemplate the riches of redeeming grace, that great theme which “ the angels desire to look into.” (J. Witherspoon, D. D.) Angels, students in the mysteries of redemption I. What those things are which the angels look into. They must of necessity be the things which the apostle had been speaking of, especially in the three preceding verses: the things of Christ.1. The Incarnation of Christ, or His coming into this world (1 Timothy 3:16) 2. The life of Christ. That perfect pattern of all that was excellent is often before their eyes. 3. The death of Christ. The love of it, in His dying for sinful man, must be to them subject of perpetual wonder and praise. 4. The doctrines of Christ. His admirable lessons of piety and virtue; His wise precepts and instructions; His wonderful revelations of the Divine will must be highly entertaining to them (Revelation 14:6). 5. The promises of Christ. II. The manner in which the angels look into these things.1. With wonder. 2. With the closest attention. 3. With reverence. 4. With delight. 5. With praise. III. The proof or reason of their doing so.1. The angels being employed so much about these things, seems to show that they desire to look into them. 2. These things concern angels as well as men. God is their Father as well as ours, and the portion of both. 3. God is glorified in and by these things. Their work is to glorify Him (Revelation 7:11; Psalms 148:2). 4. They are for the highest good of man, and therefore the angels desire to look into them. They have a generous concern for our welfare. 5. The subject matter of these things is such, as that the angels must needs desire to look into them. Never were greater things than those which Christ has revealed to us. Application:1. Since the angels look into these things, do you look more into them? 2. Since the angels look into these things, do you put a higher value upon them? 3. Since the angels look into these things, see that you have a saving interest in them, otherwise the angels that look into them will witness against you. (T. Hannam.) The angelic sturdy of redemption In order to ascertain what Peter means by the phrase “ which things,” we must look back to the antecedent context. It is plain, therefore, that the matters of angelic solicitude here referred to, are just the same as those of prophetic study; that is to say, the salvation of the gospel; or, as it is more minutely described in the eleventh verse, “ the sufferings of Christ, and the glory that should follow.” The text farther declares in what manner the angels study these subjects. In the holy of holies, the most secret shrine of the Jewish temple, stood the ark of the covenant, an apparatus in whose interior was deposited the canon of the Mosaic law, the blessings and the curses, the promises and the threatenings, of God’ s most holy word. Over the top of this ark was laid a covering or lid of massive gold, which was denominated the Mercy seat. It was a symbol of our Saviour’ s propitiation. Now, above the mercy seat were figures of cherubim, whose expanded wings overshadowed its circumferences, and whose many faces were all bent down in silent gaze upon the emblems underneath. They looked down, in the attitude of eager gladness and adoring wonder, upon the interposing medium which annihilated the presence and the power of the law. These cherubim, as the prophecies clearly show, represent the heavenly angels; and therefore we have here found, in the typical emblems of the Jewish economy, a literal picture of the doctrine of the apostle, that the pure spirits of the upper world bend down, in the attitude of learners, to explore “ the sufferings of Christ, and the glory that should follow.” But once more our text indicates not merely the posture but the spirit with which the angels engage in this contemplation. They desire to look into it. They are anxious, warm, eager, ardent in the matter. Their hearts, as well as their eyes, are bent on it; and, with intent, assiduous, and persevering zeal, they devote themselves to scrutinise it in all its depth, though it is unfathomable, and in all its extent, though it is limitless. I. We remark that the angels desire to look into “ the sufferings of Christ, and the glory that shall follow,” not by any means in consequence of ignorance in reference to the grand facts of the scheme of redemption. When Adam was expelled from Paradise, and an angel stationed at its gate to deter the guilty rebel from ever approaching the place whose sanctity he had profaned, we may imagine that that angel was aware of the hopes and consolations sealed up in the great promise, and knew man was not accursed forever. Angels visited in his tent the Father of the faithful, and knew that unto his off spring God had promised eternal blessings. Choirs of angels welcomed the incarnation of the Lord with strains of heavenly music. Doubtless, these blessed spirits knew the subject of which they sang so sweetly. Heaven’ s heralds knew they were greeting the human nature of Heaven’ s eternal King. However, it is proper to take notice of a text, which, at first sight, will rather appear to demonstrate that the angels are not deeply versed in the matters of fact connected with the redemption of Christ (Ephesians 3:9-10). But this passage by no means implies that it is the Church alone which enlightens the heavenly host in the glorious dispensation of the Gospel of Christ. The assertion of the passage is not that the heavenly host were in ignorance of that subject till the Church instructed them, but that they never learned the subject through the Church till the Church received, and professed, and obeyed the truth. The angels knew the mystery of redemption before the apostles went forth on the theatre of the world to preach salvation to every creature. But it was not till, from their lofty dwelling place in heaven, they saw the Gentile and the Jew alike being gathered into one fold of the one great Shepherd, that they knew, by the Church, the manifold wisdom of God. II. We remark that the angels desire to look into the sufferings and glory of Christ, because there they obtain the brightest display of the divine perfections. III. The angels desire to look into “ the sufferings of Christ and the glory that should follow,” because the eternal interests of mankind depend on these things, and because these eternal interests are at stake. When we analyse the motive which impels the angels to look into the mystery of redemption, it resolves itself not only into a reverential desire of studying the Divine perfections, but also into an anxious concern for the salvation of sinners. This concern is itself twofold, depending partly on the desire of the angels to see Christ glorified in the salvation of sinners, and partly on the benevolent affection of the angels to these sinners, whom they see in such imminent danger of everlasting destruction. IV. The angels desire to look into “ the sufferings of Christ, and the glory that should follow,” in other words, into the progress of the work of redemption, because the issue of that work will be the elevation of the church triumphant over the angelic race, in dignity, glory, and power. What strange and striking thoughts it must suggest to an angelic being to look upon a human creature, depraved, condemned, absorbed in the pleasures of sin, and at last falling a prey to death, who yet, in virtue of a previous union to Christ by faith, shall rise above the fetters of mortality, shall be elevated to the holiness and happiness of heaven. (Alex. Nisbet.) The angels’ desire to look into salvation It is thought to be a sign of weakness to bow down before the Cross. The context teaches a different lesson. The prophets, who were men of great mental gifts, were deeply interested in this “ salvation.” The apostle goes a step beyond. He declares that the angels desired to look into these sublime truths. I. The nature of these angels. The Scriptures have revealed but little about them. The Bible was not given us to reveal their nature, but to make known to us the plan of salvation. Yet there is something about the nature of angels which we may know by the study of ourselves.1. We have memory. History has a meaning to us. Our memories, at best, are very imperfect, but there are some things we never forget. Now, the memory of any one thing implies the possibility of a memory that will never forget. Now, angels, no doubt, have memories far more tenacious than ours. How this will add to their knowledge. 2. Then we have the power of connecting cause and effect, and the power of pure reason; and we have that still more marvellous power, imagination. Whither cannot imagination go? How much better are angels fitted by powers far more perfect than these to gather knowledge. 3. Then, again, we are hindered by our bodies-one-third of our time is taken up in eating and sleeping. Angels are free from all this. 4. Then consider how much more we know than we did fifty years ago. Yet the angels witnessed the birth of the worlds and systems of worlds. All history lays open before them. They know of God’ s providence. How much then these angels must know of God; I had almost said what do they not know of Him? II. Consider, that notwithstanding all this knowledge the angels were not satisfied because they did not understand the plan of salvation. They heard of this plan and were deeply interested. They “ desire to look into it.” With all their powers of investigation, with all their vast knowledge, here was a matter that they had not fathomed, and that they greatly desired to know. Yet scientists sometimes feel that they are so busy as to have no time to study this salvation. They are busy at studying the structures of crystals. Why angels know all about them. They saw the particles taking their positions. These men are busy in investigating the strata of the rocks. Why, the angels saw the upheaval of the rooks which so diversified and distorted the strata. They were there at the formation of the earth and have witnessed all the changes. All these things, which so deeply concern these scientists, are plain as A B C to these angels, who nevertheless, so desire to see into the plan of salvation, that subject which the scientists deem of so little importance. III. It is not revealed to us how angels sought to understand this matter. The visions concerning it came to the prophets, doubtless, as pictures. They did not fully understand all they saw. Moses, when he desired to see God, was told that no one could see the face of God and live. Another prophet saw a different picture, he saw Christ as a lamb led to the slaughter. Others saw still different pictures. Now I imagine that the angels, as the prophets traced the pictures they saw, would look over their shoulders to study this marvellous salvation. That word which is translated in the text, “ look into,” is a wonderful word. It means to look down into. It implies eagerness to see the bottom. (Bishop Simpson.) Angels studying redemption I. The things which the angels contemplate.1. Salvation.2. The grace of the gospel.3. The sufferings of Christ.4. The glory that should follow. II. The manner in which the angels contemplate these things.1. Attentively.2. Humbly and reverentially.3. With eager and prevailing desire. III. The instructions and admonitions which their contemplation of these things affords to us. The desire which angels manifest to look into these things, teaches-1. The dignity and the glory of the Son of God, who has furnished them with such subjects of contemplation, 2. The magnitude and importance of the work of redemption. 3. The means which we must use, in order to be influenced by them ourselves. We must “ look” into them-we must make them the subject of devout and studious contemplation. 4. The propriety and the duty of making them known to all mankind. 5. The criminality of those persons who treat the same things with indifference and neglect. (J. Alexander.) 1 Peter 1:13-16 Wherefore gird up the loins of your mind.Tighten the belt “ Wherefore,” for this reason, that your salvation was so great an object of interest to prophets and to angels, it becomes you to maintain your faith, your courage, and expectation to the end. “ Wherefore, girding up the loins of your mind.” The allusion is to the long loose garments worn by the Asiatics. I. The meaning then, is, be thoroughly courageous, genuine, sincere. Make your life compact by the girdle of truth. Avoid loose, unsubstantial convictions regarding spiritual and eternal things, Remember, however little the word of revealed truth is to you, it is God’ s greatest and best thought: that it is the divine record concerning yourself and His dear Son ought to make it of infinite importance to you. Therefore, “ gird up the loins of your mind.” Tighten the belt. You can do better work, run a better race, or be better ready for fight. Then shall you be fitted for the best service the King demands. Settled convictions of divine truth are of great value; they give stability, contentment, and influence. The girdle compact, and everything is made available for comfort and usefulness, you are stable and helpful when others are weak and vacillating. II. This, also, will induce sobriety, gravity, thoughtfulness. And, impressed with the magnitude and sustained by the certainty of divine truth, you will “ set your hope perfectly on the grace, or favour, that is to be brought unto you when Jesus shall come again,” to give eternal honour to His people. Stop, then; think, tighten your belt. Many are not ready for the sudden revelation of Jesus Christ. Are you? O, the supreme importance of being ready now, and each moment! III. “ Tell us how we shall do this girding.” Peter wrote these words in the shadow of the greatest truths: the Cross, and the possibility of your salvation. Think often of the Cross and its mystery of grace; it will fill your life with the mightiest motives. Think of the end of your faith, the salvation of your soul. Think; you are in possession of God’ s revelation, His best thought, the sunlight of your present joy and your future hope. Think; you are in fellow ship with Jesus Christ. Do it by much prayer. (J. Parker.) A seasonable exhortation 1. How full of their Lord were the minds of these holy writers! 2. How ardently these men expected the coming of the Lord! 3. It is equally noticeable that while apostolic men looked for the coming of Christ, they looked for it with no idea of dread, but, on the contrary, with the utmost joy. 4. Observe also, how constantly they were urging this as a motive! Peter never holds it out as a mere matter of speculation, nor exclusively as a ground of comfort; but as the grand motive for action, for holiness, for watchfulness. The teaching necessary for today is this: “ Gird up the loins of your mind,” brace yourselves up; be firm, compact, consistent, determined. Do not be like quicksilver, which keeps on dissolving and running into fractions; do not fritter away life upon trifles, but live to purpose, with undivided heart, and decided resolution. These are equally days in which it is necessary to say “ be sober.” We are always having some new fad or another brought out to infatuate the unstable. “ Be sober,” and judge for yourselves. Nor is the third exhortation unnecessary: “ Hope to the end.” Be so hopeful as to be “ calm mid the bewildering cry, confident of victory.” I. An argument. “ Wherefore.” True religion is not unreasonable; it is common sense set to heavenly music. The apostle begins by saying, “ Elect according to foreknowledge,” etc. Shall the elect of God be timorous? Shall those who are chosen of the Most High give way to despair? God forbid! There is an argument, then, in the first and second verses, forcibly supporting the precepts of the text. It well behoves the elect of God to choose His service resolutely, to abide in it steadfastly, and hope for its reward with supreme confidence. But next, Peter declares that the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ has “ begotten us again unto a lively hope by the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead.” O ye begotten of God, see that ye live as such! You are twice-born men; live not the low life of the merely natural man. You are descended from the King of kings; degrade not your descent! Your election and your regeneration call you to holy living. Further, the apostle goes on to say that you are heirs of “ an inheritance incorruptible, and undefiled, and that fadeth not away, reserved in heaven for you.” Courage, then, if this be your destiny: do not be cast down by the aboundings of sin, nor even by your own personal temptations. Then he goes on to say that you are “ kept by the power of God through faith unto salvation ready to be revealed in the last time.” If the power of God keeps me, shall I be hopeless? Shall I speak like one that has no hereafter to rejoice in? Further, the apostle goes on to say that we may be passing through needful trial, but it is only for a little while. Come, then, if this fire is to be passed through, let us gird up our loins to dash through it. Let us hope to be sustained, and sanctified as the result, and let no unbelieving fear cast a cloud over our sky. Is not this good argument? Nor is this all. He tells us that even while we are in trial we are still full of joy. Once more: the apostle goes on to say that the gospel which we believe, and for which we are ready to suffer, is a gospel that comes to us with the sanction of the prophets. It seems to me that with such men as Moses and David, Isaiah and Jeremiah, to support our faith, we need not be ashamed of our company, nor tremble at the criticisms of the moderns. II. The exhortation.1. “ Gird up the loins of your mind.” (1) That certainly teaches us earnestness. We brace ourselves for a supreme effort; and the Christian life is always such. (2) Does it not also mean preparedness? A true believer should be ready for suffering or service-ready, indeed, for anything. (3) It means determination and hearty resolution. By conflict throughout a whole life we come to our rest; and there is no other way. You cannot go round to a back door, and enter into heaven by stealth. You must fight if you would reign. Wherefore, gird up the loins of your mind. (4) Once more, the figure teaches us that our life must be concentrated. “ Gird up the loins of your mind.” We have no strength to spare; we cannot afford to let part of our force leak away. We need to bring all our faculties to bear on one point, and exert them all to one end. 2. “ Be sober.” (1) This means moderation in all things. Do not be so excited with joy as to become childish. Do not grow intoxicated with worldly gain or honour. On the other hand, do not be too much depressed with passing troubles. (2) Keep the middle way; hold to the golden mean. Make sure of your footing when you stand; make doubly sure of it before you shift. (3) Be clear headed. Ask that the grace of God may so rule in your heart that you may be peaceful, and not troubled with idle fear on one side or with foolish hope on the other. “ Be sober,” says the apostle. You know the word translated “ be sober” sometimes means “ be watchful” ; and indeed there is a great kinship between the two things. Live with your eyes open; do not go about the world half asleep. 3. “ Hope to the end.” Be strong in holy confidence in God’ s Word, and be sure that His cause will live and prosper. Hope to the end; go right through with it; if the worst comes to the worst, hope still. Hope as much as ever a man can hope; for when your hope is in God you cannot hope too much. But let your hope be all in grace. Do not hope in yourself or in your works; but “ hope in the grace” ; for so the text may be read. Hope, moreover, in the grace which you have not yet received, in “ the grace that is to be brought unto you at the revelation of Jesus Christ.” Bless God for the grace that you have not yet obtained, for He has it in store for you; yea, He hath put it on the road, and it is coming to you. III. Expectation. What you have got to hope for is more grace. God will never deal with you upon the ground of merit; He has begun with you in grace, and He will go on with you in grace, therefore “ hope to the end for the grace.” The grace you are to hope for is to be brought unto you at the revelation of Jesus Christ. He has been revealed once, at His first advent; hence the grace you have. He is to be revealed very soon in His second advent; hence the grace that is a-coming to you. “ My ship is coming home,” says the child. So is mine: Jesus is coming, and that means all things to me. But what can this grace be that will be received at His coming? Justification? No, we have that already by His resurrection. Sanctification? No; we have that already, by being made partakers of His life. What is the grace that is to be revealed at His coming? Just look at the chapter, anal you will read in the fifth verse, “ Who are kept by the power of God through faith unto salvation, ready to be revealed in the last time.”1. Perfect salvation is one part of the grace which is to be brought in the last time when Christ comes. When He comes there will be perfection for our souls and salvation for our bodies. 2. The second grace that Christ will bring with Him when He comes is the perfect vindication of our faith: “ that the trial of your faith, being much more precious than of gold that perisheth, though it be tried with fire, might be found unto praise and honour and glory at the appearing of Jesus Christ.” Today they sneer at our faith, but they will not do so when Jesus comes; today we ourselves tremble for the ark of the Lord, but we shall not do so when He comes. Then shall all men say that believers were wise, prudent, philosophical. Those who believe in Jesus may be called fools today, but men will think otherwise when they see them shine forth as the sun in the Father’ s kingdom. (C. H. Spurgeon.) Christian morality The great privileges we enjoy are here urged upon us as a reason why we should live like regenerate persons. I. The essentials of Christian character. They are-diligence, sobriety, and hope.1. Diligence. This virtue is here exemplified by a very striking figure. Christians are not to be like pompous peacocks, mere objects of beauty, strutting about over the green fields of earth. They are not to be languid and effeminate dreamers. They are to engage in the activities of manhood, and for this purpose must brace themselves with vigour. There is much to be accomplished. There is much to be learnt. There is much to be obtained. There is much to be endured. But the apostle is particular to remind us of the spiritual nature of this work - “ Gird up the loins of your mind.” The Christian life is not an outward thing. The mind is the battlefield. Here the battles are lost or won. How much does the mind require bracing up! It soon sinks into indifference and sluggishness, especially under trials or difficulties. A healthy soul results from moral discipline. We are to brace up our thoughts by wholesome restraint, our desires by a strong curb, our sentiments by calm deliberation. This requires patient and persevering diligence. 2. Sobriety. “ Be sober.” This does not refer to what we call temperance. It is that calm, quiet dignity which so well befits a Christian man, and which raises him above the flighty, giddy, thoughtless throng of worldly people. There is something noble in his character. 3. Patient hope. Here is a rebuke to the restless uneasiness at the trials of life which was the cause of writing this Epistle. II. The great Christian motive. “ The grace that is to be brought unto you at the revelation of Jesus Christ.” And is it not worth hoping for?1. Consider its greatness. It is not an earthly blessing-temporary, passing, and mingled with what is evil, sinful, and transitory. It is- (1) An eternal state. All our chief sorrows here are caused by change. (2) A perfect state. Life will be perfect; here most men only half live. Health will be perfect. Taste will be perfect. Employment will be perfect. And all the surroundings of this state will be perfect also. 2. Consider its fulness. There is no stint in the eternal life which is provided. The vastness of heaven is one of the mysteries we have to contemplate, but at present cannot understand. III. The great end of Christian development-holiness. All discipline has one object to carry out.1. Under the aspect of dutiful children. “ As obedient children,” etc. Here is a grand motive-the motive of love. 2. Under the aspect of similitude. We desire to be like those whom we love. Holiness, then, makes us like God. Without it we cannot be conformed to Him. Without it we cannot associate with Him. 3. Under the aspect of universality. “ In all manner of conversation,” i.e., in all your behaviour. Holiness is to pervade all things. (J. J. S. Bird.) The right influence of a Christian creed I. Mental activity. “ Wherefore gird up the loins of your mind.” First: That man has a mind. He has a thinking, conscious, undying spirit. This fact is attested both by philosophy and the Bible. Secondly: That this mind has a great work. There are some minds that are very inactive. Other minds are active, but it is the activity of children playing with toys. What is the real work of the mind? Rightly to culture self, to bless society, and to honour God. The figure implies-Thirdly: That the present condition of the mind is unfavourable to this work. What are those entangling robes? Wrong thoughts, earthly sympathies, carnal tendencies, moral indifferences, etc. “ Gird up the loins,” etc. II. Moral sobriety. “ Be sober.” It may include three things. First: Moral judiciousness. Judiciousness in our opinions, our affections, our expectations, and speech. Souls are often intoxicated with wild and extravagant sentiments. Second: Moral steadfastness. The soul should not reel to and fro like a drunken man; it should be steadfast. “ Stand fast in the liberty wherewith Christ has made you free.” Thirdly: Moral seriousness. Christian seriousness stands in sublime contrast both to gloom on the one hand and to levity on the other. III. Permanent hope. “ Hope to the end for the grace that is to be brought unto you at the revelation of Jesus Christ.” This language implies three things. First: That the perfection of our being is to be looked for in the future. Secondly: That our future perfection is to be obtained in connection with grace. “ Hope to the end for the grace that is to be brought unto you.” Thirdly: That the grace that is to ensure our perfection will be fully manifested at the appearance of ,Jesus Christ. “ The grace that is to be brought unto you at the revelation of Jesus Christ.” (D. Thomas, D. D.) Wise counsel I. The preparation. “ Gird up,” etc.1. Righteousness.2. Faithfulness.3. Truth. II. The consideration. “ Be sober.” There is such a thing, of course, as being drunk mentally or spiritually. A drunken man is very foolish, yet conceited; and he is quarrelsome, and hazardous, and he would lie down and go to sleep anywhere. III. The decision. “ Hope to the end.” Your hope is to be in the perfect work of Christ. “ Be not moved away from the hope of the gospel.” IV. The prospect. “ For the grace,” etc. (James Wells.) The place of mind in religion One thing is presupposed-St. Peter counted it self-evident-the mind has place in the things of God. Orthodoxy has too often warned off reason from the things of God. It has made it sacrilege to touch the Bible. What St. Peter rebukes is the slovenly, the untidy, the dissolute mind. He does not fear the practised, the disciplined, the intense intellect. The “ mind” of which he wrote was the rock-hewn element of thinking, equally available, for its highest processes and purposes, in palace and cottage, in philosopher and peasant. It needs not education in man’ s sense, classical or scientific, to gird its loins for the enterprise St. Peter has in view. That enterprise is the knowledge of a Father, in a Saviour, and in a Spirit. The enterprise is a personal knowledge, the girding up of the loins for it is a personal exertion. Shall we try to sketch one or two of the particulars of that girding?1. “ Lord, my heart is not haughty, nor mine eyes lofty.” In reference to all knowledge, what is the chief hindrance? Is it not vanity? Is it not the “ saying, We see?” Gird up the loins of your mind by a deep humility. “ Thou art near, they tell, me, O Lord: but I am so far off-so ignorant, so stupid, so sin bound-O quicken me.” 2. But next to it I would place its sister grace-which is patience. Patience; perhaps above all, for the reconciliation of apparently contradictory principles, and the harmonising of certain parts of Revelation with the character of God Himself the Revealer. Be willing to wait. Not indolently, not in indifference, but in a submissive waiting. 3. Hope. “ Hope to the end,” St. Peter says-“ Hope perfectly” are his very words-meaning doubtless, perseveringly and amidst all obstacles. And St. Peter makes hope very definite when he adds, “ for the grace that is being brought to us.” It cannot be that this scene of confusion should be forever. As God is true, as God is holy, as God is merciful, it shall not. We see not as yet how it shall be. But, where explanation fails, where reason fails, where revelation itself fails, hope fails not. (Dean Vaughan.) Be sober. Sobriety Sobriety is a virtue that keeps us not only from things unlawful, but moderates us in the use of things lawful, that we exceed not our bounds therein. These may be referred to two heads, pleasures and profits, which we are most subject to abuse. I. For the former, which is pleasure, thereto may be referred meat, drink, apparel, recreation, etc. All which we must use soberly to the glory of the Giver, our own good, and the good also of others.1. For our meat and drink, we must neither be excessive nor over-curious, as Dives who fared deliciously every day, making his belly his god. We must eat to live, and thereby be more fit for duty. 2. For our apparel, we must not exceed for the matter of it, nor for the fashion. God hath given it for necessity, comeliness, and decency. 3. For recreation, it must be sparing in time, place, measure, to make us more fit for our duty; for God hath not set us here to pamper the flesh, but to mortify the lusts thereof: not to play, but to do His work. II. For the latter, namely, profits, we must also be sober, both in getting and keeping them. We must not only use no unlawful means to get the world, but use the lawful means moderately, not filling ourselves with too many businesses, and following the same too eagerly, lest we neglect good duties, or be hindered from doing them as we should. (John Rogers.) Hope to the end.- The duty and discipline of Christian hope “ Girding up the loins of your mind, being sober, hope” is the accurate reproduction of the form of the original. “ Hope” is the principal exhortation, arid it is to be fulfilled by bracing up the mind and by sobriety. The Revised Version, which has partially shown this construction in its rendering, has given the more accurate “ perfectly,” instead of “ to the end.” It is a question, first, of the quality, and only after that of the duration of the hope. If our hope be perfect it will take care of itself in another respect, and be permanent. I. The object on which this Christian hopefulness is to fasten, like a limpet on a rock. “ The grace that is to be brought unto you at the revelation of Jesus Christ.” Here “ grace” means the sum of the felicities of a future life. That is clear from two considerations-that this grace is the object of our hope all through life, which only an object beyond the grave can be, and also that its advent is contemporaneous with the revelation of Jesus Christ. The expression, though unusual, is valuable because it brings out two things. It reminds us that whatever of blessedness we may possess in the future it is all a gratuitous, unmerited gift of that loving God to whom we owe everything. And then there is another thought suggested by this word, namely, the substantial identity of the Christian life here and hereafter. Grace is glory in the bud, glory is grace in the flower; and all which we hope for in the future is but the evolving of that which is planted in our hearts today, if we love Him, though it may have to fight with much antagonism to itself both without us and within. The inheritance is a hope, but the earnest of the inheritance, which is of the same stuff as the inheritance, is a present possession. Further, this grace is on its way to us. It is “ being brought,” as the margin of the Revised Version has it; or “ a-bringing,” as Leighton translates it. It is on its road as if some band of strong-winged angels had already left the throne, and, like them who bore the Holy Grail, were steadily flying nearer and nearer to us. With all the power of strong winds and waves lifting it on, it is bearing down upon us as a ship at sea. By all the passions and convulsions of earth the day of the Lord is hastened on its course. Further, this grace, which is on its way to us, is wrapped up in the revelation of Jesus Christ. It is brought to us encased in that revelation, like a fair jewel in a golden setting. When He who “ is our life shall be manifested,” says another apostle, then shall we also “ be manifested with Him in glory.” As in an old picture you will sometimes see a saint represented as standing near the Master with a glory encompassing him, that rays from the Christ, so our glory in the future is all to be hut the effluence and the reflection of His glory. Why should we let our hopes go trailing along the ground, like some poor creeping plant that the gardener has forgotten to put a stick to, when they might lift themselves to the heavens? Why should you ever feed your hopes upon the bread that perishes, and sometimes upon husks, when you may feed them on angels’ food? Why should you confine your hope within the limits of this world when it might expand to the width of that great eternity that lies there before you through which you may let your hope wander at will? Set your hope there, and then it will never be ashamed or confounded. II. The perfect hope which grasps the perfect object. “ Hope perfectly” would be the true rendering, it being a question not at all of duration but of “ quality.” There are all degrees of hope from the most doubtful “ peradventure” up to almost certainty. But there is always a kind of doubt and dread mingling with hope. A certain wistful look as of one who knows not what may be drawing on is ever in Hope’ s blue eyes; and “ hopes, and fears that kindle hope” are an indistinguishable throng. That is necessarily so, because here our hopes are fixed on contingent, external things, and are mostly born of our wishes rather than of reasonable probabilities. Therefore, this exhortation here, in effect, bids us lift our hopes higher, and set them on God that they may be sure. Are we letting our hearts lead our hopes astray after the will-o’ -the-wisps of earth, instead of ordering their march by the pole star of God’ s faithful promise? Does our hope leap up to lay hold on that cord let down from heaven, and by it to climb above the level of mutation and disappointment? III. The self-discipline by which the perfect hope is maintained. Girding up the loins of the mind and being “ sober” are the two great means to that end. The first of them enjoins concentration of mind and will, a determined effort to realise the future and persistently to hope in the teeth of all discouragement. Travellers, servants, soldiers have to brace up their robes and buckle them tight with their girdles. So we have to gather up our thoughts and cultivate the habit of fixed attention to unseen things. The loosely braced mind will be unable to cherish a lively hope; a man with his robes flapping about his feet cannot run. They hinder his stride, catch in the briars, get trodden on by rivals. There are many difficulties in the way of our Christian hope. It is hard to keep its light burning through the darkness of the night and the howling of the storm. Why, a man cannot have earthly hopes bright unless he concentrates his thoughts upon them. And how can our hope of heaven be clear, triumphant, unless we coerce our vagrant imaginations and loose flowing affections and by a dead lift and effort set our hopes in God? Wherefore, brace up the loins of your minds and hope. “ Be sober.” Rigid self-control and repression are needed for such a hope. The clear eye of hope cannot see the land that is very far off through the fogs that rise from the undrained marshes of our animal nature. In this sense, too, the flesh lusts against the spirit. But not only must bodily appetites be held well in hand, all desires that go out towards the present must be subdued. Hope follows desire. The vigour of our hopes is affected by the warmth of our desires. The warmth of our desires towards the future depends largely on the turning away of our desires from the present. (A. Maclaren, D. D.) Hope As we read this Epistle and drink in its spirit we become aware of something that lifts and enkindles; it is as if we were inhaling sea air, were basking in the glow of a genial warmth. The Peter of the Gospels was of an eager, sanguine disposition, and his hopefulness, while it was yet unchastened, repeatedly outran his real strength. The Pentecostal fire descends upon him, and he continues to be the same man, with the same basis and structure of character; but there has passed over him a refining and invigorating touch. He has become more truly a Peter; he has drawn strength from the Rock of Ages. He is “ the apostle of hope.” To speak of hope at all is to speak of what we instinctively recognise as a condition of fruitful effort, of anything like success or satisfaction, even in the affairs of ordinary life. To take hope from a man is to paralyse him morally; if he lives on in so dreary a condition we think of him as surviving himself. The teaching of Scripture may help us to distinguish and appreciate three characteristics of that hope which apostles would recognise as true.1. First, then, Christian hope, as St. Peter tells us, is seated “ in God” ; it is, as it has been called, one of the triad of virtues specially “ theological” ; it takes its stand on Divine revelation, it looks on to the attainment of Divine promises. It draws its life-blood from no mere surmise as to what is possible for humanity, in the race at large or in the individual, but from the manifestation of Divine truth and goodness in the Incarnate, whom St. Paul calls “ our hope” (1 Timothy 1:1), because our hope is grounded on Him and centred in Him. St. Paul, indeed, cannot think of hope without thinking of Christ; it is characteristic of him that the object of his “ earnest expectation and hope” should be the glorification of Christ in his body, whether by life or by death. So he elsewhere speaks of Christians as having been “ called in one hope” which grows out “ of their calling,” which derives all its force and charm from the act of grace that brought them into that sacred and supernatural fellowship. Christian hope, being rooted in faith, is, like faith, vivid, positive, and definite; it is, as St. Peter calls it, “ living,” because it is a fruit of the resurrection life of Jesus; it gazes with calm, trustful eyes, onward and still onward, into a future literally boundless, as illuminated by the person and the work of the one everlasting Redeemer; it is a “ hope of eternal life,” as based on Him. 2. A hope which is thus essentially religious, thus Christian from the root upwards, and impossible except on the terms of Christian belief, is strong enough to face all facts, even such as are unwelcome or austere. Certainly there will be temptations to unhopefulness; there must be the discipline of hopes deferred, of success marred, of apparent defeats and disappointments, of much that might tempt impatience to despair. A hope thus trained, while resting on august realities, is strong because it is not fanciful; it has realised the conditions of Christian life as an uphill march; it can afford to take full account of the gravest requirements of His service, who bids no one follow save where He Himself has trod; it does not dream of being exempt from anxieties, but it “ casts” the whole weight of them on “ the strong hand” of that good Father who has proved so well how much He “ careth for us.” 3. True hope is a great instrument of moral and spiritual discipline. When St. Peter is about to say, “ make your hope perfect,” he prefaces it with a call to sustained effort; we are to “ gird up the loins of our mind.” It is remarkable also that St. Paul does not merely exhort us to cherish hope, but to see that our hope is of the right kind, that it is such as is secured through endurance, and endurance as fortified by the encouragement, the quickening impulse to Christian exertion, which the pages of Scripture will supply (Romans 15:4). It is as if he had said, “ The further you advance in the spiritual life, the more will you need of strength to resist temptation, or to bear outward trials bravely, brightly, and patiently; and the more you can do this, the more of true hope will you acquire.” Thus we see that the hope which maketh not ashamed is always humble and always active. (W. Bright, D. D.) How and for what to hope The word “ wherefore” bases the exhortation upon all that has preceded, not merely upon the sentence immediately before it. I. The discipline needed for Christian hope. “ Girding up the loins of your mind, be sober.” Here are two practical injunctions, given as means towards a vigorous Christian hope. The first of these is too familiar to require many words. Girding up the loose garments was instinctively done before any kind of vigorous effort, whether it was pilgrimage, labour, or conflict. Elijah girded up his loins when he ran before Ahab’ s chariot. The soldier tightens his belt by another hole before the great struggle comes. The symbol, then, stands definitely here as expressing effort and concentration. There must be both, as Peter thinks, if there is to be any pulse of vitality throbbing under a Christian man’ s hope. And, says the apostle, thus making a concentrated effort to secure the vigour and clearness of hope, do another thing, “ Be sober.” Of course if I let my tastes, inclinations, desires, appetites, passions, run wild anywhere, there will be very little strength left me with which to hope for anything beyond. A man’ s mind is only capable of a given quantity of desire and expectation: and if he fritter it all away on the things seen and temporal, of course there will not be any left over for the things that are unseen. Every gardener knows that if he wants a tree to grow high he must pull off the side shoots, but if he likes to clip it at the top and take away the leader, it will grow nice and bushy down below. A man’ s mind obeys the same law. II. The characteristics and qualities of this Christian hope. As you are aware, our A.V. gives one translation of part of this verse, and the R.V. gives another. “ Hope to the end,” says the older. “ Hope perfectly,” says the newer and the better rendering. What are the imperfections that attach to men’ s hopes?1. The first glaring one which attaches to the world’ s idea of hope is that it is something short of, less reliable than, certainty. We have not sufficiently concentrated our effort, nor have we sufficiently washed our hands of earthly follies and filths, so long as there is one shade of difference between the certitude with which we know today and the confidence with which, trusting to Christ, we expect the remotest eternity in the most glorious heavens. 2. Then there is another imperfection from which it is our duty and our joy to be able to clear our Christian hope, and that is that men’ s hopes fluctuate according to their moods and their circumstances. But the Christian man’ s hope should have this for the very signature of its perfection, that it is altogether independent of the changes of external circumstances. Nay! rather it should be like the pillar of fire that was only a thin film of smoke while the sunshine blazed, but kindled at its heart as darkness fell, and in the murkiest night was brightest and most blessed. 3. Then there is another imperfection which the Christian hope is permitted to put away from it; and that is that most of our hopes have no ennobling, no staying, no stimulating effect upon our lives. What a man hopes for he waits for with patience, and the perfection of the Christian hope is measured roughly by this, the extent to which it is fruitful of all lowly, persistent adherence the most uncongenial, common place, and smallest duties. III. The object that is here proposes for hope. The apostle tells us to “ hope for the grace,” etc. There are three things we have to note here.1. The loftiest hope of the furthest eternity is the hope of grace. We usually keep that word in contradistinction to glory as expressive of the gifts of God which we receive here upon earth in our pilgrimage. But the apostle here goes even deeper than that, and says, “ Ah! it is all of a piece from the beginning to the end. The first gifts that a believing soul receives, whilst it is struggling here with darkness and light, are of the same sort as the eternal gifts that it receives when it stands before the throne, after millenniums of assimilation to the brightness and blessedness of Jesus Christ.” They are all grace; the gifts of earth and heaven are one in their source and one in their nature. 2. Further, says the apostle, this grace is “ being brought to you.” The light that set out from the sun centuries ago has not reached some of the stars yet, but it is on the road. And the grace that is to be given to us has started from the throne, and it will be here presently. We are like men standing in the crowded streets of some royal city through which the king’ s procession has to pass. If we listened we have heard the guns fire that told that He had left the palace; and He will sweep in front of us and sweep us up into His train before very long. The grace is “ being brought to us.” 3. And it is being brought not merely at, but “ in the revelation of Jesus Christ.” “ When Christ, who is our life, shall be manifested, then shall we also be manifested together with Him in glory.” The Christ in me will be manifested when Christ is manifested on His throne, and that will be my glory. If you can fancy a planet away out on the edge of our system, such as that one that welters in the fields of space, I know not how far from the central sun, and gets but a little portion of his light and warmth, and moves slowly in a torpid round; and imagine it laid hold of and borne right into the orbit of the planet next the sun, what a difference in its temperature, what a difference in the lustre and the light, what a difference in the swiftness of its motion there would be! We here are moving round a half-veiled Christ, and we get but little, and oh! we give less, of His light and glory. But the day comes when we shall be swept nearer the throne, and all the light that is manifested to us shall be incorporated within us. (A. Maclaren, D. D.) Christian hope I. Hope in its preliminary but indispensable conditions. II. Hope in its operation.1. Hope is natural to the human mind, nothing more natural. It is a sweet-scented flower growing in every poor man’ s garden; a perennial flower, never blooming so exquisitely as in the midwinter of adversity. 2. “ Hope perfectly.” By this St. Peter probably means the same as St. Paul when the latter speaks of “ the full assurance of hope,” an unfaltering persuasion in the mind that we have a personal interest in the “ inheritance reserved in heaven,” “ the salvation ready to be revealed in the last time.” “ When I live,” wrote Latimer to Ridley, “ in a settled and steadfast assurance about the state of my soul, methinks I am as bold as a lion; I can laugh at all trouble; no affliction daunts me; but when I am eclipsed in my comforts I am of so fearful a spirit that I could run into a very mouse hole.” Now, how to attain this perfection of hope, this full assurance? Evidently by constantly but legitimately exercising this grace according to the Divine word and testimony, for, like other things, it grows bright in use. 3. “ Hope unto the end.” Persevere in the face of difficulties, however colossal, “ for he that continueth to the end shall be saved.” Turn your face to the Sun, pitch your hope fixedly on the inheritance reserved for you up yonder, and the shadows will all fall behind you. III. Hope in its immutable foundation. 1. Our hope of salvation is based on Divine grace as brought to us in the past at the first revelation of Jesus Christ. 2. But not only has grace been brought to us in the past, but fresh supplies are being brought to us in the present. “ The grace that is a-bringing, that is being brought to you, as the revelation of Jesus Christ.” Grace came to the world in the person and work of Jesus Christ; it is still coming, a very present help in trouble, to God’ s people, whether that trouble be in the shape of sufferings or temptations. John Bunyan in his immortal dream beheld a fire which burnt on brightly notwithstanding all efforts to extinguish it. What was the explanation of this persistence? Oh, a man stood the other side of the wall continually pouring oil into it. “ Hope perfectly, unto the end,” for the gospel treasury of grace will never fail you. 3. But this hope looks forward to the future, to the final triumph of grace “ at the revelation of Jesus Christ.” Much grace has already been revealed; but eye hath not seen, nor ear heard, neither hath entered the heart of man the things God hath in store for His people. (J. C. Jones, D. D.) Hope as a power in moulding character I. The power of hope in human character. What makes the difference between human beings and beasts? Very largely, the presence of hope as a factor in character. “ The foxes have holes, and the birds of the air have nests.” So much the worse for them. Man is distinguished from the animals by the fact that you cannot so easily satisfy him. He may begin by living in the hole in the ground, or by lodging in the branches; but, by and by, that hole is not good enough. Something in man demands improvement. Hope is therefore one of the foremost elements in human character; distinguishing man as man, giving him a higher rank than all the rest of the animal creation. And as it is a necessary factor in character, so it is in human progress. Any conditions in human society which tend to repress hope are abnormal and unnatural, and hostile to man’ s well-being. Who is today at the bottom of society may, under the encouragement, of our republican institutions and freedom, rise until he occupies the highest position that the people can bestow. Hope presents a perpetual incentive to progress:-not an ignis fatuus, a will-o’ -the-wisp, beguiling us into mire and marsh, but impelling us continually onward to things higher and better. The hopes of boyhood do not satisfy manhood, and the hopes even of manhood do not satisfy maturer years; and so that which once beckoned you forward, as you reach up and move up toward it, keeps still ahead of you, and becomes a perpetual inspiration, urging you ever onward and upward. If hope, therefore, could be quenched or crushed, we could make no more advancement. Because hope is so important an element in character, and so essential to human development and progress, the Word of God lays such heavy stress on this essential element of all true manhood. No other grace seems more vital to a true Christian life than hope. Then see how hope helps us to bear trials. It surrounds us with a kind of “ elastic medium,” so that when the terrible afflictions of this life beat against us, they rebound from us. There is a power in hope that prevents the severity of their blows from utterly crushing us. II. What, now, are the objects set before the Christian hope? “ The grace that is to be brought unto you at the revelation of Jesus Christ.” Few of us ever think of this. When we speak of the grace that is revealed we think of what is already manifested, of Golgotha with its Cross, of Gethsemane with its agony. Peter is speaking of something future, not grace already manifested. “ The grace that is to be brought unto you at the revelation of Jesus Christ.” Jesus Christ’ s Incarnation was not a revelation. His divinity was rather hidden within the veil of His humanity: only now and then the glory of that divinity shone forth. When Jesus was here He was in disguise. God was only feebly and faintly manifested in the flesh, which obscured the glory. But when Christ conies a second time, no longer to make a sin offering, but to bring full salvation unto His people, then will be the revelation of Jesus Christ. He will come like the King in His glory. All the grace that comes to you from the hour of your regeneration to the hour of your complete sanctification is nothing in comparison with the grace that is to be revealed to you by Christ in the day when you are presented, faultless before the presence of His glory with exceeding joy. III. In view of the glorious hopes that the Bible inspires.” Girding up the loins of your mind, be sober, hope to the end for the grace that is to be brought unto you at the revelation of Jesus Christ.” Let us mark these subordinate phrases: “ Girding up the loins of your mind, be sober.” That they may not be entangled in thorns and briars, or be defiled by the dust and the filth of the way. And so the apostle says, “ Girding up the loins of your mind,” your affections, so that they may not be defiled by earthly things. John Wesley used to say, “ The child of God ought to be too proud to sin. When I think of myself as the disciple of Christ, born of the Spirit, I say, ‘ How can I sin against God?’“ Set your affections on things above; gird up your loins, and keep your white garments “ unspotted from the world.” And then “ be sober.” Now, it would do a pilgrim very little good if he gathered up his garments and did not maintain sobriety. He might fall in the dust of the way, bruising himself as well as defiling his robe. And so we must not only gird ourselves, but keep sober and clear-minded for the journey. IV. What a contrast between the objects of Christian hope and worldly hope! Contrast the reality of Christian hopes with the illusiveness of worldly hopes. And consider, once more, the permanence and reliability of the Christian objects of desire and expectation. We come to a limit in this world. The glory of your possessions and your achievements will all pale and grow dim when you face the last great destroyer. But, blessed be God, the point at which human hopes are utterly blasted is the point at which Christian expectations only arrive at their consummation. What should we care for the perishing treasures of this world? for the evanescent pleasures that charm for a moment, and then lose their power? (A. T. Pierson, D. D.) Hope Hope is mentioned in the text and in other parts of Scripture as a distinct grace or virtue, which the Christian should cultivate. I. I shall point out the distinctions between hope and faith.1. Faith and hope differ as to their extent. Faith relates to all things which Almighty God has revealed in Scripture, bad as well as good; whereas hope has only to do with the good things of our Heavenly Father. 2. Again, hope may be described as ever looking forward, and advancing from one blessed prospect to another, with its eyes bent upon God and the promises. But faith has to do with the present and past, as well as with the future. With past facts. 3. Once more, there is this great difference between hope and faith; that faith has to do with certainty, hope with uncertainty. You believe with full assurance, and it is a matter of faith that the righteous go to heaven. But that you individually are righteous, and shall finally go to heaven, is the subject of hope. Now the absolute necessity of this grace in your hearts will be at once evident, if you consider that it would interest you but little to be told of the felicities of heaven, had you no hope of ever attaining them. When you read of kings of the earth, of their royal appearance and great wealth, you at once feel that these things interest you but slightly, because they are so utterly beyond your reach. II. Now, let us illustrate the force and power of hope. Stories are told us of travellers journeying in other climes, who having wandered from their course, have by degrees found themselves involved in the intricacies of the wilderness without any probable chance of rescue. What so overwhelming as the feeling of utter loneliness which must press on the heart in the midst of unlimited sand? At such a time surely, a man may well give himself up as lost, and submissively lie down to perish. But there is a God beyond that sky and sun, Who has preserved men from worse dangers, and a hope springs up within his bosom, in the protection of that God. Hope cheers his soul, braces him to exertion, overcomes fatigue, and rescues from peril. He had no certainty of deliverance, but his hope was of sufficient power to make him persevere until he found the path, or was discovered by others and rescued. When the wife of the mariner sits at home solitary, what sustains her soul but the hope that all will be well? There can be no certain safety for him who is on the water; nothing, as we know, is so variable and treacherous as the waves and wind. When the prodigal child of God, like him in the parable, comes to himself and remembers his transgressions, what is to bring him to the feet of Almighty God but the hope of pardon? When the Christian soldier has taken his oath of service to Jesus Christ, and calmly considers the duties which are necessary to his reward, when he thinks of the enemies who encompass him, and of his own frailness and alienated affections, what can lead him to the contest and keep him undismayed? What but a sure and certain hope of Christ’ s continued assistance? Lastly: There is a moment, if possible more trying than all, when hope is the stay and anchor of the tossed soul. It is in that hour when even the most saintly may look forward with something of dread to the departure from earth. “ In hope of eternal life, which God Who cannot lie promised before the world began” ; my flesh, he thinks within himself, “ shall rest in hope” ; “ Thou wilt not leave my soul in hell; Thou wilt show me the path of life: in Thy presence is fulness of joy, and at Thy right hand are pleasures for evermore.” (J. M. Chaunter, M. A.) Hope ennobles the spirit It is pleasing to observe how the hopes of persons, by degrees, greaten their spirits from their childhood. The proper spirit of a noble man, a prince, or a king, is greater than that of an inferior person. And the reason is because as he comes to understand his quality, his spirit grows with his hopes of what he shall attain to; his very hopes greaten his spirit, ennoble him, and make him think of living like one that expects to be in such a state as that to which he is born. And such is the property of the Christian’ s hope. It not only makes him not ashamed, but it heightens and ennobles his spirit, makes him aspire high, and look forward to great things. (J. Howe.) Present the germ of future revelation I am well aware that the words of the original will bear the present signification. “ Hope perfectly for the grace which is being brought unto you by the revelation of Jesus Christ.” But after careful consideration I am convinced that the future sense is the right one, though the fact that the present is employed is full of significance, and discloses a fact which underlies the whole Word of God. The future revelation will be but the full unveiling of the present; just as in the creation round us were our eyes cured of their films, we should see a splendour which would reveal heaven. The whole life of what lives in the world has in it the germ of that full revelation; just as when you unfold one of the soft buds of spring, sheath within sheath of delicate leafage is found there, and in the heart of it all, visible only to the aided eye, is every petal, every stamen of the flower. The forms are already perfect in their microcosm, but the colours that are to blaze in the sunlight, and the odours that are to scent the air, wait the inspirations of the spring. The colour, which is the glory of a flower, glows only under the perfect conditions of its life. (J. B. Brown, B. A.) A perfect hope I. We note the remarkable designation here of the object of Christian hope-“ The grace that is to be brought unto you at the appearing of Jesus Christ.” Now, it is interesting to notice the various phases under which the future perfecting of the Christian life and felicity in heaven is set forth in the New Testament. Sometimes we read of the object of our hope as being the resurrection from the dead. Sometimes we read of the “ hope of righteousness” ; sometimes we read of the “ hope of eternal life” ; sometimes of the “ hope of the glory of God” ; sometimes of the “ hope of salvation.” But all these are but the many facets of the one jewel, flashing many coloured and yet harmonious light. Peter adds another general expression when he sums up the felicities and perfectness of that future life in this remarkable and unusual phrase, “ the grace that is to be brought.” “ Grace reigns through righteousness unto eternal life” ; and no man of the countless nations of the blessed can say, “ Give me the portion for which I have worked,” but all must bow and say, “ Give me from thine own loving heart that which I do not deserve,” “ the grace that is to be brought at the appearing of Jesus Christ.” Such, then, is the object of Christian hope, stated in its most general terms, a grace which includes resurrection, salvation, righteousness, eternal life, the glory of God, and that grace ever tending towards us, and that ever tending grace to be ours in its fulness, when Christ is manifested and “ we shall be manifested with Him in glory.” How different in its dignity, in its certainty, in its remoteness, which is a blessing-how different from the paltry, shortsighted anticipations of a near future which delude us along the path of earthly effort! II. Notice the enjoined perfection of Christian hope. What constitutes perfect hope? First, theft it shall be certain; and no earthly hope is so. If my anticipations are set upon contingent things they must vary with their objects. You cannot build a solid house on a quagmire; you must have rock for that. So, the only perfect hope is that which grasps a perfect certainty. Christian hope ought to be, if I might so say, screwed up to the level of that on which it is fastened. It is a shame that Christian people should be wavering in their anticipations of that which in itself is certain. Again, the perfection of hope lies in its being patient, persistent through discouragements, burning bright in the darkness, like a pillar of fire by night; and most of all in its being operative upon life, and contributing to steadfastness of endurance and to energy of effort. This is exactly what the feeble and fluctuating hopes of earth never do. For the more a man is living in anticipation of an uncertain good, the less is he able to fling himself with wholeness of purpose and effort into the duties or enjoyments of the present. But a perfect hope will be the ally and not the darkener of the brightness of the present. And if we hope as we should for that we see not, then shall we with patience wait for it. Here, then, is the sort of hope which it is laid upon us Christian people consciously to try to cherish, one which is fixed and certain, one which is the mother of patience and endurance, one which persists through, and triumphs over all trouble and sorrow, one which nerves us for effort and opens our eyes to appreciate the blessings of the present, and one which wars against all uncleanness, and lifts us up in aspiration and aim towards the purity of Jesus Christ. We are neglecting a plain duty and impoverishing ourselves unnecessarily by the want of a treasure which belongs to us, unless we are making conscious efforts for our increase in hope as in faith and charity. Think of the blessedness of living thus, lifted up above all the uncertainties that rack men when they think about tomorrow. Try to realise the blessedness of escaping from the disappointments which come from all earthward turned expectations. The brightest blaze of Christian hope may be on the verge of the darkness of the grave. III. Lastly, the discipline of Christian hope. “ Gird up the loins of your mind.” It suggests that there is a great deal in this life that makes it very difficult for us to keep firm hold of the facts, on which alone a perfect hope can be built. Unless we tighten up our belt, and so put all our strength into the effort, the truths of the resurrection which beget to a lively hope, of the great salvation wrought by Jesus Christ, of the meaning and end of all our trials and sorrows, will slip away from us, and we shall be left at the mercy of the varying anticipations of good or evil which may emerge from the varying circumstances of the fleeting moment. “ Be sober.” That means, not only gather yourselves together with a consecrated effort, but “ keep your heel well down on the necks of lower and earthly desires.” The fleshly lusts that belong to everybody must be subdued. That goes without saying. But, then, there are others more subtle, more refined, but not less hostile to the perfectness of a heaven-directed hope than are these grosser ones. We must keep down all the desires and appetites of our nature, both of the flesh and of the spirit. For we have only a certain quantity of energy to expend, and if we expend it upon the things of earth there is nothing left for the things above. If you take the river, and lead it all out into the gardens that are irrigated by it, or into the stream that drives your mills, its bed will be left bare, and little of the water will reach the great ocean which is its home. We may, if we will, be as certain of the future as of the past. We may, if we will, have a hope which maketh us not ashamed. We may have a great light burning steadily, like a lamp fed with abundant oil, and shielded from every wind. We may see His coming shining afar off, and be warranted in saying, not merely “ we hope,” but “ we know, that when He shall appear we shall be like Him.” This Christ-given hope is the only one that persists through calamity, old age, and death. (A. Maclaren, D. D.) The grace that is to be brought unto you.-Coming grace I. There is to be a revelation of Jesus Christ. He has promised to come; He has given His people the hope of His coming; His coming is necessary-1. For His own final and perfect glorification.2. For the complete salvation and glorification of His Church.3. For the full and everlasting destruction of His and its enemies.4. For the vindication of God’ s way and the exhibition of His glorious attributes to the world. II. What the revelation brings. Grace. The Lord keeps His best wine unto the last, but He certainly sets forth good wine even now. We may, and do, receive grace now. Now is the day of salvation. But with all the grace given now to believers, and notwithstanding its present variety, fulness, and freeness, and all that it does in Christ’ s people, they need yet more at His revelation.1. The grace of perfect vision of Him who is now unseen.2. The grace of perfect likeness to Christ.3. The grace of perfect acquittal.4. The grace of perfect avowal and recognition.5. The grace of perfect joy and glory forever. III. What influence this revelation should now exert.1. Spiritual readiness, in the loins of the mind girded, the thoughts collected, braced, prepared, and on the alert, with nothing left till the last (Luke 12:35-36). 2. Spiritual self-restraint, in sobriety; neither too elated nor too depressed. 3. Perfect hope; desiring, picturing, expecting the revelation and what it brings; hoping perfectly, never letting go hope, though the day seems far off. (Alex. Warrack, M. A.) Grace and glory We take grace as denoting in our text precisely what it ordinarily denotes in God’ s dealing with a sinner, and wish to show you that grace thus understood may become, or rather, produce glory. We will briefly examine into the twofold achievement of grace-deliverance from sin, and consignment to God’ s service.1. As to deliverance from sin, shall not we be borne out by the experience of every believer, when we declare that it is his happiness to overcome sin, and his misery to be exposed to its assaults? If this corruption were wholly eradicated, he might continually walk in the shinings of the countenance of his Maker, and feel, so to speak, the fresh and free air of a better land circulating around him, as he passed on in his pilgrimage. So that all the interruptions of happiness are to be referred to sinfulness, and happiness becomes uniform, or rather, advances uniformly towards perfection, just in proportion as the sinfulness is subdued, and the whole man given over to a holy dominion. And if this be a correct account of a believer’ s experience, it will show us that grace and glory are one and the same. It is to the operations of grace that we must ascribe all the progress I have made in overcoming sinfulness; and if this progress b¢ the same as progress in happiness, we proclaim that to the operations of grace must be ascribed all the happiness which a believer attains. And if it would thus be perfect happiness to realise to the full the renewing power of grace, how can we better describe perfect happiness than by supposing grace given without measure, and acting without rival? And if, yet further, perfect happiness be one ingredient of future glory, is not the gift of grace the gift of glory, and does not St. Peter address himself to the highest and most rapturous imagination when he bids us “ hope for grace at the revelation of Jesus Christ?” This will be yet clearer if you observe the period at which the grace will be received. The second advent of our Lord was unquestionably present to St. Peter’ s mind. It is on this grand consummation that apostles and holy men of old delight to linger, and from this that they fetch their motives and consolations. They well knew that whatever the happiness of separate spirits, however deep and beautiful their repose after the clang and din of warfare, there can be no perfection of felicity until the widowhood be over, and the soul dwell once more in the body. They looked for grace “ at the revelation of Jesus Christ,” because they knew with that revelation would come the resurrection of the saints, the body and soul both redeemed, both purified, both endowed with eternity. If, therefore, this consummation be glory, what is glory but grace completed? 2. We have thus far only treated of grace as producing deliverance from sin; but this is not the only achievement of grace; yet further we must consider it as consignment to the service of God. There are none but true Christians who at all fulfil the great end of their being, that of promoting the glory of their Maker; and it is not through the workings of any human principle that they propose to themselves so sublime an honour; there must have been an alienation of the affections, and a withdrawment of the heart from temporary interests. We know, indeed, that all things, wickedness as well as righteousness, one way or another, promote God’ s glory; but while the Almighty, in the exercise of His sovereignty, compels a tribute from the rebellious, that tribute is offered by none but the believer. It is, therefore, to grace, the principle imparted by God, that we ascribe every effort to promote God’ s glory; nothing can be presented to God which has not first been received from Him; according to the words of David-“ All things come of Thee, and of Thine own have we given Thee” ; and if it be the direct result of the workings of grace that we are led to consecrate ourselves to the service of God, then let grace have unrestrained operation, and, dust and ashes though we be, should we not become ineffably glorious? It will not be the robe of light which shall make us glorious, though brighter threads than sunbeams shall be woven into its texture; it will not be the palm and the harp that shall make us glorious, though the one shall have grown on the trees of Paradise, and the other have been strung by the Mediator’ s hands; we shall be glorious as ministering to God’ s glory glorious as the servants of the Almighty-glorious with more than an angel’ s glory, because entrusted with more than an angel’ s commission. This entry is longer than a Bible module can hold. The rest is at https://www.sermonindex.net/commentary/bi/ 1 Peter 1:17-21 If ye call on the Father.What the name Father implies 1. This condemns them that live wickedly and in their sins, and yet call God Father. They might as well say anything. If one should fight against the king and say he were a good subject; or say he is a man’ s servant, and yet doth nothing that he is bidden. 2. But dost thou unfeignedly desire to fear God- (1) In thy general calling as a Christian, to walk holily, righteously, and soberly? Fearest thou to offend God thyself, or to see Him dishonoured by others? Carest thou to please Him? Lovest thou to be in His presence? Dost thou conscionably hear His Word, and patiently bear His corrections? (2) In thy special calling art thou careful to glorify God, as a parent, child, master, servant, etc., not only in ceasing to do evil, but in doing good, yea, and labouring to do it well? Thou mayest comfortably and with good leave call God Father, and make account of Him so to be, which is the greatest privilege in the world. (John Rogers.) The judgment of the Father In saying “ if ye call on the Father,” the apostle did not mean for a moment to express any doubt; the “ if” simply introduces a premise on which a conclusion is to be based, as when St. Paul wrote, “ If ye then be risen with Christ, seek those things which are above.” There was no uncertainty as to whether the readers of the Epistle-Christianised Jews scattered abroad-were calling upon the Father, or more correctly, as to whether they were calling Him Father. That was just what they were doing, having learned to do so in their conversion to the Christian faith. They had always believed in a righteous, impartial Governor of the world-the God, namely, of Moses and the prophets, who was supremely the just One; and now, since their surrender to Jesus as their Master, and their acceptance of His Gospel, they had come to name this God, the Father. He whose throne was in the heavens, who hated iniquity and ruled with faultless justice, He was the Father. “ And if He be,” says the apostle, “ pass, I pray you, the time of your earthly sojourning, in fear.” A true word, a word spoken in utter sincerity, and representing what is fact, may yet prove very misleading-may convey or suggest something contrary to truth. If language be a vehicle of thought, it is far from being always an adequate or a safe vehicle. Now the word, “ Father,” we might anticipate, would speak alike to all. The relation which it designates is common enough. Yet how differently the word may affect different individuals, what different pictures it may conjure up before them! As to what it shall express to any of us, much will depend upon the kind of domestic experience we have had, upon the kind of home with which we are most familiar, in which our childhood and youth were spent. Oh, the world of grand and sweet meaning for you, in the word Father! What a solemn, noble, gracious sound it has! But here is another, upon whose ear it falls with no sound of music, in whose mind it is associated with harsh and tyrannical exercise of authority. It brings to his recollection a testy, passionate, wrath-provoking man, whose ways were hard to bear; or a man, cold, stern, austere, whose presence chilled and rather discomforted, or one who, while protecting and ministering, was uncertain in judgment-now weakly lenient, now unreasonably and unwholesomely strict. And St. Peter would seem to have apprehended that it might be thus with his readers, that in calling the Divine Governor, Father, they might scarcely be alive to all which the name implied; for he proceeds to indicate to them how it behoved them to be moved and affected by the sense of God’ s Fatherhood. “ Since you worship as the Father, Him, who without respect of persons judgeth according to every man’ s work, pass the time of your sojourning in fear.” And it is very likely that this conclusion of his rather surprised and staggered them. “ In fear!” they would exclaim, perhaps; “ should he not have written, on the contrary, ‘ in comfort and peace,’ ‘ in bright courage and hope’” ? Yes, yes, most surely; but then, it should inspire you also with a great awe, and if it do not, the whole meaning of the word Father cannot have been grasped by you; for the true Father is not merely the gracious Protector, Succourer, Provider, but the constant, persistent, earnest, unsparing Educator, also, whose love deals closely and inexorably with each child of the family, in desire for his due training and his best development. Now, as may have been the case with the people whom St. Peter addressed, we perhaps, are possessed with too poor and low an idea of fatherliness, and, more or less blinded by that idea, need to be reminded of what he saw and sought to inculcate, namely, that the Fatherhood of the Almighty is a very solemn reality, and serves to render life very serious. There is, I think, a widespread tendency to repose in it as involving rather less demand upon us for moral care and earnestness, as allowing us to be rather less particular about the cultivation of righteousness, rather less anxious concerning our spiritual condition and quality. “ Let us not be troubled greatly,” they say to themselves-“ let us not be troubled greatly if we are negligent and unfaithful, and do not amend or improve as we should; is not the Judge and Ruler the Father, and will He not therefore be gentle with us; may He not therefore, overlook much, and make things considerably pleasanter for us in the end than we deserve?” Are there not those who reason thus from the thought of God’ s Fatherhood? Yet did they consider and understand, the very thought in which they find relief, would rather set them trembling. For, see, what government is so close and penetrating as the government of a true father? Is there anything in existence to compare with it? How very much it takes cognisance of, to frown upon, and rebuke, which no other government notices! Parents will often punish severely, where the police would never interfere. The man whom the lad has to fear, when others show lenity, is his father, and because he is the father. A father’ s rule, again, a true father’ s rule, consists not merely in legislating and in punishing when laws are broken, but in studying to train toward obedience-to school and discipline, with the object of eliminating or checking what is wrong, and guiding and helping to the formation of right habits. He not only commands good conduct, and visits the opposite with his displeasure, but endeavours in every way, and by every means, to influence to goodness, and to educate the child on all sides, with whatever exercises and appliances may seem fitting, to the best of which he is capable. To this end, he watches over and pursues him. Do we not acknowledge, that to be at all careless about the training of our children, and their culture by us to better things, is to be unfatherly, and that the fondness which passes by a fault demanding correction, rather than draw forth tears and put to grief, is not true paternal love? If then there be a Divine Governor of mankind, all-holy and just, the principle and spirit of whose government is really paternal, is it not a profoundly serious thing for us men, in our state of confessed imperfection, with so much in us which as yet falls short of and is contrary to holiness? What hope can there be of rest or happiness, what hope of acquittal, for unrighteous souls, if God, the infinitely righteous, be the Father? Can He ever be content to tolerate them as they are, to leave them as they are, unvisited, unmeddled with? If He be indeed the Father, what chance can there be for one of us, of our not receiving according to our works? Do you not perceive the certainty, the inevitableness of due punishment upon the supposition of His Fatherhood? I think of the suffering that must yet be in store for such; for without suffering, how are these habits and sympathies of theirs to be worked out? and I know, methinks, that they will have to be worked out; that the great paternal love will not be able to refrain from them, or stay its hand until they are. (S. A. Tipple.) Fatherly judgment and filial fear “ Walk during the time of your sojourning here in fear.” How does that comport with the preceding glowing exhortation to “ perfect hope” ? How does it fit in with the triumphant words in the earlier part of the chapter about “ joy unspeakable and full of glory” ? Does it not come like a douche of cold water on such thoughts? Peter thinks they can co-exist; and, more singular still, that the same object can excite both. Nay! there is no perfect hope which does not blend with it this fear; and joy itself lacks dignity and nobleness unless it is sobered and elevated by an infusion of it. I. Here we have, first, a fatherly judgment. Mark the meaning and the limits of the fatherly and filial relation which is laid at the foundation of the exhortation of my text. “ If ye call on the Father” -he is speaking distinctly and exclusively to Christian people. Much has been said in recent days, and said in many aspects nobly, and with good results upon the theological thinking of our generation, about the Fatherhood of God. But, we are never to forget that that one word covers in the Bible two entirely distinct thoughts. In one aspect, God is the Father of the spirits of all flesh by their derivation of life from Him. But in another “ to as many as believed on Him to them gave He power to become sons of God.” And it is on the latter Fatherhood and sonship that the apostle builds the exhortation of my text. Well, then, further, the apostle here desires to guard us against another of the errors which are very common in this generation. The revolt against the sterner and graver side of Christian truth has largely found footing in a mistaken idea of the implications and bearing of that thought that God is our Father. That relationship has been thought to swallow up all others, and men have been unwilling to entertain the ideas of a righteous Governor, a supreme Law giver, a retributive Judge. And Peter brings the two ideas into juxtaposition, seeing no contradiction between them, but rather that the one necessarily involves the other. Is it not so in your own homes? Does your fatherhood swallow up your obligation to estimate the moral worth of your child, and to proportion your conduct accordingly? The judicial aspect is essential to the perfection of Fatherhood; and every family on earth mirrors the fact to those that have eyes to see. Mark, still further, the emphatic characteristics of this paternal judgment which are set forth in my text. It is “ without respect of persons.” Peter is going back on his old experience in that unique word. Do you remember when it was that the scales fell from his eyes, and he said, “ I perceive that God is no respecter of persons” ? It was in the house of Cornelius in Caesarea. Note, further, that this paternal judgment which comes on the child because he is a child, is a present one. “ Who judgeth,” not “ who wilt judge.” Ah! day by day, moment by moment, deed by deed, we are coming under the judicial light of God’ s eye, and the judicial force of His hand. “ The history of the world is the judgment of the world,” so the lives of individual Christians do record and bear the results of a present judgment of the present Father. Then mark, still further, what the thing judged by this present impartial Fatherly judgment is “ According to his work.” The text does not say “ works,” but “ work” -that is, each man’ s life considered as a living whole; the main drift and dominant purpose, rather than the isolated single acts, are taken into view. Now, from all this, there just comes the one point that I want to urge upon our hearts and consciences-viz., that Christian people are to expect, today and hereafter, the incidence of a Father’ s judgment. The Jews came to Jesus Christ once and said, “ What shall we do that we might work the works of God?” His answer made the same remarkable use of the singular instead of the plural to which I have drawn attention as occurring in this text-“ This is the work of God, that ye believe on Him whom He hath sent.” Yes! And if we, in any real sense, are doing that one work of God-viz., believing on Jesus Christ-our faith will be a productive mother of work which He will look upon and accept as an odour of a sweet smell, “ well-pleasing unto God.” There is a paternal judgment; and the works which pass it are works done from the root and on the basis of faith in Jesus Christ. II. We have here a son’ s fear. Now, fear is, I suppose, best explained as being the shrinking anticipation of evil. But, as the Old Testament has taught us, there is a higher and a lower form of that apprehension. In the higher it is sublimed into lowly reverence and awe, which fears nothing so much as being alienated from God. And that is the fear that my text would insist upon. The evil which a Christian man, the son of the Father, and the subject of His judgment, has most to apprehend-indeed, the only evil which he has really to apprehend-is that he may be tempted to do wrong. So this fear has in it no torment, but it has in it blessedness and purity and strength. It is perfectly compatible with all these other emotions of which the lower form of fear is the opposite; perfectly compatible with confidence, with hope, with joy-nay I rather, without this wholesome and restraining dread of incurring the displeasure of a loving Father, these exuberant and buoyant graces lose their chiefest security. The fear which my text enjoins is the armed guard, so to speak, that watches over these fair virgins of hope and joy and confidence that beautify the Christian life. If you wish your hope to be bright, fear; if you wish your joy to be solid, fear; if you want your confidence in God to be unshaken, cherish utter distrust of yourself, and fear. Fear only that you may depart from Him in whom our hope, and our joy, and our confidence, have their roots. That fear is the only guarantee for our security. The man that distrusts himself and knows his danger, and clings to his refuge is safe. This son’ s fear is the source of courage. The man whose whole apprehension of evil is dread of sin is bold as a lion in view of all other dangers. III. Lastly, here is the homecoming, which will finish the fear. “ The time of your sojourning,” says Peter. That thought runs through the letter. It is addressed “ to the strangers scattered abroad,” and in the next chapter he exhorts Christian people, as “ strangers and pilgrims,” to “ abstain from fleshly lusts.” Here he puts a term to this dread-“ the time of your sojourning.” Travellers in foreign lands have to light their fires at night to keep off the lions, and to set their guard to detect the stealthy approach of the foe, You and I, whilst we travel in this earthly pilgrimage, have to be on our guard, lest we should be betrayed. But we are going home. And when the child gets to the Father’ s house it does not fear any more dangers, nor need bolts and bars, nor guards and sentries. Why did God give us this capacity of anticipating, and shrinking from, future evil? Was it only meant that its red light should be a danger signal in reference to fleeting worldly evils? Is there not a far worse possibility before us all? Let me press on you this one question: Have you ever, in all the wide range which your fears of a future have taken, extended it so far as to face this question, “ What will become of me when I come into contact with God the Judge and His righteous tribunal?” You will come in contact with it. Let your fear travel so far, and let it lead you to the one Refuge. (A. Maclaren, D. D.) Judgeth according to every man’ s work. God an impartial Judge There is a verse in the Psalms which might not unfitly stand as a text for this whole Epistle of St. Peter. It is at the end of the 111th Psalm, in which David had been giving most high praise to God for His distinguishing mercy towards His own chosen people. “ The fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom: a good understanding have all they that do thereafter: the praise of it endureth forever.” As much as to say, that, great as the mercies are, which God has provided for His elect people, they are not such as ought for a moment to set us free from that godly fear, that religious and awful sense of God’ s unspeakable presence, which is the beginning, the crown, of all spiritual wisdom. It must be joined indeed with love, but we must never expect to turn it entirely into such love as we feel towards those who are dear to us here among men. In a word, the love and fear of God will grow up together in a religious and thoughtful heart; as we come to know more of Him as the greatest and best of fathers. Such is the Psalmist’ s account of the fear of God: and lest any person, having an eye to the infinite blessings of the gospel of Christ, made known to us but unknown to him, should imagine that this description of God’ s fear is now as it were out of date, I wish all Christians would observe how earnestly the very same lesson is taught in the New Testament also. Our Lord forewarns us whom we shall fear; Him, namely, who is able to cast both body and soul into hell. And observe, He speaks thus, not to those who were still at a distance from Him, but to His own chosen apostles and followers, to those whom in the same discourse He calls His friends and His little flock. Surely this one text is enough to do away with all presumptuous notions of any persons ever becoming so good, or so high in God’ s favour, as to do without the fear of God. It is true, St. John says, “ Perfect love casteth out fear,” but what fear? surely not religious reverence of the ever-present Almighty Father. St. Peter was in some measure afraid, lest the Christians to whom he was writing should so dwell on favours received, be so entirely taken up with the comfortable promises of the gospel, as to forget the fear of God, and the plain duty of keeping the commandments. As if he had said, It is our privilege to call God, Our Father which art in heaven. Christ Himself in His own prayer has authorised the faithful to do it. Here the irreligious pride of some men might presently come in, and tempt them to imagine that God is partial to them; that He favours them above others, and therefore they may take liberties; He will not be so strict in requiring an account how they have kept His laws. But St. Peter teaches us just the contrary: even as the last of the prophets, Malachi, had taught before, looking forward by the Spirit to a time when men, having greater privileges than ever, would be in danger of abusing them more than ever. “ If I be a Father, where is Mine honour?” How can you call the great God of heaven and earth by a name which brings Him so very near you, and not feel an awful kind of thrill, a sense of His presence in your very heart? More especially, when you add that which he takes notice of in the next place: that this our heavenly Father is one who “ without respect of persons judgeth according to every man’ s work.” This was in a great degree a discovery of God’ s nature and character made by the Gospel. Before the coming of our Lord and Saviour, neither Jew nor Gentile looked on the God of heaven as being impartial, and judging without respect of persons. As for the Gentiles, “ They thought wickedly, that God was even such an one as themselves.” Again, even God’ s own people, the Jews, were generally apt more or less to mistake the nature and meaning of the great favour which God Almighty had shown them for so many ages. They kept continually saying within themselves, “ We have Abraham to our Father” ; in such a manner as if they were sure of especial consideration to be had of them on that account merely; as if they might be looser in their conduct than other men. When, therefore, both Jew and Gentile were to be called into one great family in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ, one of the things most necessary to be taught was, “ God is no respecter of persons,” etc. This St. Peter had taught long ago to the Jews, when, by especial direction of the Holy Ghost, he had to convert and baptize Cornelius and his household; and now again he repeats the same instruction to the converted Gentiles themselves, lest they should abuse their own privileges, and fancy they were entitled to favour at the hands of the most holy God, merely for being on His side. Nor may we imagine that the apostle spoke to the men of those times only; the Christians of all times are in danger of the same kind of error: we are all too apt to indulge the childish imagination, that our own case has something particular in it: that God Almighty therefore, just and terrible as He is, will surely make exceptions in our favour. The reward, then, of those who shall receive God’ s blessing at last will be strictly in proportion, not to their deservings, but to their sincerity and steadiness in working. “ They will be justified,” as St. Paul says, “ by faith, without works of any law” ; yet, in another sense, they are justified by the works of the gospel law, not by faith only. God graciously accepts, not their bare nominal good meaning, but their good meaning proved by their works. And there is no respect of persons on this plan: because the faith meant is not a strong emotion; but it is the steady devotion of the heart to do the will of God our Saviour, and not our own will. Therefore, let us fear-for we have indeed great reason-lest, so much depending on our own works, those works be found at the last day to be nothing at all, or next to nothing. This consideration of itself is surely terrible enough; but there is one thing yet remaining, which makes it yet more alarming to the conscience: and it is that which St. Peter sets before us by his use of the word “ sojourning” in this passage. “ Pass the time of your sojourning here in fear.” As much as to say, “ Pass your time in fear, not knowing how short it may be.” The churchyards around us are fast filling; it may be our own turn next; and how far have we advanced, by the aid of God’ s Spirit, in that difficult work of putting off the mind of this world, and putting on the mind of Christ? Pass the time of your sojourning here in fear.-Fear of judgment to come, and of redemption accomplished Before the word “ fear” there are several reasons given for its exercise. We call God Father. He who applies such a name to God must fear if he thinks what this involves on his part. Especially when it is remembered that while He is a Father He is also a Judge strictly righteous and impartial. Succeeding it is another ground. We are redeemed. And our redemption has been effected by the most costly sacrifice-the blood of Christ. Those who believe that cannot but feel a peculiar obligation lying upon them. They must be Christ’ s in heart and soul and action. And they cannot but fear lest they should belie such a marvellous consecration. I. The sphere and operation of Christian fear. There are some to whom the importance attached to fear in this place and elsewhere seems in contradiction to the teaching of the Apostle John, who speaks of fear as being cast out by perfect love. But it is to be observed that it is perfect love to which this prerogative is assigned. But with imperfect love fear has an important sphere of action. It affords stimulus to imperfect love and pushes it on to perfection. Those whom the apostle exhorts to fear are the same whom he has exhorted to hope to the end. They are men to whom Christ is precious, who love Him and rejoice in Him with a joy unspeakable and full of glory. Fear existing along with such elements cannot even burden. It balances, sobers, solemnises, deepens, intensifies. But it is often urged that the actions which are stimulated by fear have no moral worth, that fear is but a form of selfishness, and that therefore no fruit produced by it, however well it may look to the eye, can be truly acceptable to God. This has a very specious look. It appears a particularly fine, exalted, spiritual doctrine. And it really is so in its main features. It is true; but it is only a half truth, and half truths are often the most dangerous of errors. What is the other half of the truth? Although fear in itself and by itself cannot produce truly good or spiritually right action, it yet performs a vital function in keeping the soul awake. Fear rings the alarm bell and rouses the conscience. It blows the trumpet of warning. It creates pause and opportunity for all better and nobler things to make themselves heard. It allows a man to become aware of the realities, and when he is once placed in contact with them the best things begin. Everything depends on being made earnest, sensitive, lifted into a sense of the eternal verities. The highest principles, righteousness and love, are often in the best of men forgetful and fickle. They are ensnared, oppressed, and bewildered many a time, and need the keen influence of fear to bring them to themselves again. II. Fear in relation to the father that judgeth. Fear is obviously far from being the main feeling towards God as a Father. Confidence and love are especially the feelings called out by the Fatherhood of God. But God says, “ If I be a Father, where is My fear?” God claims fear as a Father-reverence, no doubt, mainly-honour, awe in the realising of His infinitude; but something more than these, something else. For God as a Father judgeth. Did He not judge and condemn all sin He could be no true Father. Love must hate sin and show its hatred. Father is no weak, soft, indulgent word. It means love, and because it means love it means right, and undying opposition to evil, The Father judgeth without respect of persons. There is no other Father than the Father who judgeth. If I believe in a Father that judges, that will certainly rouse me up-it will waken my slumbering energies, it will cause me to look well to the state of my heart and life; but the word Father will always keep the thought of judgment from overwhelming me. III. In order to have a true Christian fear we must place together judgment by works and redemption by the blood of Christ. The thought of judgment to come is essential to the depth and the reality of life. Without this everything is left in chaos. Conscience is not satisfied, nor is reason. But what reason and conscience demand cannot but awaken fear. This fear is deepened and yet transformed by the thought of redemption. Redemption seems at first wholly opposed to judgment by works, far more than even the Fatherhood of God does. For what does the Scripture mean by redemption through the blood of Christ? It means that the Son of God took our place and bore us on His heart in living and dying; it means that the sacrifice of Christ is that moral vindication of law and right, that tribute to the holiness of God which God accepts as sufficient amends and reparation. By faith man falls in with this Divine arrangement, identifies himself with it and is reconciled to God. And this faith that accepts and trusts and frees from condemnation, also works by love. Salvation by faith and judgment by works are therefore no contradiction. It is judgment by faith taken in its flower and fruit. But do we not see how fear awakes in the view of such a wonderful redemption? There is something akin to fear raised in the soul by the sight of sublimity. The wide expanse of the sky filled with sun shine or peopled with worlds raises an awe sublime, but often weighing heavily on the soul. Vast fervent love indeed banishes fear. It is the one thing that does this. And yet such a love as this-so holy, so mysterious, so resolute, so devoted-love coming from such a height, and going down into such depths, cannot but awaken a certain awe. We are overawed by the brilliancy of the light. “ We fear the Lord and His goodness.” And then when a man thinks of being redeemed by such a sacrifice, when he tries to realise at what a cost redemption has been effected, does not a certain fear come over him lest he should prove miserably unworthy of it all? But let not this fear in view of redemption be deemed inconsistent with the joy and freedom which belong to the gospel. It is precisely the man who has that realising sense of redemption which makes him afraid of not proving worthy of it, who has also joy. These two, fear and joy, grow out of the same root of redemption. The more joy in Christ any man has, the more will he be afraid of not conforming sufficiently to Christ. (J. Leckie, D. D.) God will be served in fear If these words were not known for certain to be the words of Holy Scripture they would appear to many very severe, very unfit to win souls to God. “ What!” it would be said, “ are people to fear always? all people, those who are farthest advanced in true religion and in the comfort of the Holy Ghost? What, then, is to become of the natural cheerfulness of youth; of the enjoyments inseparable from even health and spirits, kind relations and friends; what of the testimony of a good conscience? All this and more is said by different sorts of persons against those who, following God’ s own method, would make them serious in the true scriptural way; by teaching them, and encouraging them in the true reverence. It may be of use to us if we consider what those tempers are which are most apt to make men impatient of being told to “ pass the time of their sojourning here in fear.” There is a certain time of life in which we are almost all of us, more or less, partakers of this pagan error of disliking all that is really serious, all that would impress us thoroughly with the fear and dread of Almighty God. When youth and strength are high, before we have tasted of our Father’ s severer discipline, we shrink from the sadder lessons of Scripture and the Church: we say to ourselves, “ Surely this world, so full of enjoyment, can never have been meant merely as a place for the exercise of hard and severe penitence.” If, then, any young person happen now to be listening to me, let me beseech him to be aware of this danger: to watch in himself that spirit of confidence and gaiety which, under pretence of mere youthful cheerfulness, would lead him to make light of God’ s most holy commandments. Let us only recollect ourselves, how it is with us at our prayers. Are we not too much inclined to say them over without seriously bringing before our minds the awful presence of Him to whom we pray? This too is one of the reasons why outward religion, the religion of the body, is of so very great consequence; viz., that it helps very much to keep and improve in our hearts the true and wholesome fear of God. Because in truth not only does nature teach us to express our feelings in such postures, but also these very bodies of ours, so fearfully and wonderfully made, are of purpose so framed as to have an influence in their turn on our souls. Soldiers, we know, in all armies, are made to march erect, and to be firm and straight in all their bodily movements; not merely for the appearance’ sake, but because the very attitude, in some unaccountable way, tends to make them bolder and firmer in mind; and in like manner there is no question, that kneeling and other humble gestures in devotion, practised not for form’ s sake, but in obedience to the Church, and in the fear of God, would cherish and improve that very fear in our hearts. Bishop Wilson has said, speaking of small instances of self-denial, “ Say not, It is a trifle, and not fit to offer in sacrifice to God.” And the same may be said of small occasions of nourishing the remembrance of Him; of short prayers frequently through the day, of turning every event and accident of life, not openly, but as much as may be in secret, into an opportunity for devout prayer and recollection. Godly fear I. The fear here recommended is a holy self-suspicion and fear of offending God, which may not only consist with assured hope of salvation, and with faith, and love, and spiritual joy, but is their inseparable companion, as all Divine graces are linked together. And, as they dwell together, they grow or decrease together. The more a Christian believes, and loves, and rejoices in the love of God, the more unwilling surely he is to displease Him, and if in danger of displeasing Him, the more afraid is he of it; and, on the other side, this fear being the true principle of a wary and holy conversation, fleeing sin and the occasions of sin and temptations to it, is as a watch or guard that keeps out the enemies of the soul, and so preserves its inward peace, keeps the assurance of faith and hope unmolested, and that joy which they cause unimpaired, and the intercourse of love betwixt the soul and her beloved uninterrupted. Certainly a good man is sometimes driven to wonder at his own frailty and inconstancy. What strange differences will be betwixt him and himself! How high and how delightful at some times are his thoughts of God, and the glory of the life to come; and yet how easily at another time base temptations will bemire him, or, at the least, molest and vex him! And this keeps him in a continual fear, and that fear in continual vigilance and circumspection. When he looks up to God, and considers the truth of His promises, and the sufficiency of His grace and protection, and the almighty strength of His Redeemer, these things fill his soul with confidence and assurance; but when he turns his eye downward again upon himself, and finds so much remaining corruption within, and so many temptations and dangers and adversaries without, this forces him not only to fear, but to despair of himself; and it should do so, that his trust in God may be purer and more entire. This fear is not cowardice. It does not debase, but it elevates the mind; for it drowns all lower fears, and begets true fortitude to encounter all dangers, for the sake of a good conscience and the obeying of God. From this fear have sprung all the generous resolutions and patient sufferings of the saints and martyrs. Because they durst not sin against God, therefore they durst be imprisoned, and impoverished, and tortured, and die for Him. II. The reason they have here to persuade to this fear is twofold.1. Their relation to God us their Father and their Judge. But as He is the best Father, so consider that He is withal the greatest and most just Judge. There is here the sovereignty of this Judge, the universality of His judgment, and the equity of it. “ Pass the time of your sojourning here in fear.” You are encompassed with enemies and snares; how can you be secure in the midst of them? Perfect peace and security are reserved for you at home, and that is the end of your fear. III. The term or continuance of this fear. It continues all the time of this sojourning life; it dies not before us: we and it shall expire together. “ Blessed is he that feareth always,” says Solomon; in secret and in society, in his own house and in God’ s. We must hear the Word with fear, and preach it with fear, afraid to miscarry in our intentions and manners. “ Serve the Lord with fear,” yea, in times of inward comfort and joy, “ rejoice with trembling” ; not only when a man feels most his own weakness, but when he finds himself strongest. None are so high advanced in grace here below as to be out of need of this grace; but when their sojourning shall be done, and they are come home to their Father’ s house above, then no more fearing. No entrance for dangers there, and therefore no fear. (Abp. Leighton.) The right feelings of the heavenly pilgrim I. The nature of tee Christian’ s life.1. His past condition. Whence has the pilgrim come? From the city of destruction. 2. His present state. He is a sojourner. 3. His future destination. II. The manner in which the Christian’ s life should be spent. In fear.”1. A fear of reverence. Contrast the Divine majesty with our meanness. 2. A fear of caution. 3. A fear of anxiety. It is better to err on the side of timidity than presumption. (Essex Remembrancer.) The awe of the redeemed I. Awe of the redeemed towards the redeeming God. “ If ye call on Him as Father.” Not simply appeal to Him, but acknowledge His relationship to you, admit His claims on you. II. Awe of the redeemed because of their recollection of the evil from which they have been redeemed.1. A consciousness of being redeemed.2. A consciousness of being redeemed from a habit of life that was evil.3. A consciousness of being redeemed from an evil habit of life that was inherited. III. Awe of the redeemed because of the cost by which they have been redeemed.1. This cost in contrast with the wealth of this world.2. This cost as revealed in Jesus Christ.3. This cost as known to the infinite heart of the Eternal God.4. This cost as approved by God.5. This cost as incurred for man’ s sake. IV. Awe of the redeemed because of the destiny to which they have been redeemed. Faith and hope in God. God the impregnable fortress, the enduring home. (U. R. Thomas.) The Christian’ s fear I. First, I would remind you of the awful nature of that “ father” on whom you profess to call.1. Engaging, indeed, is the title under which your religion addresses you. But that God, that Father, to whom you must one day go, is a Being so pure that even the heavens are tainted in His sight. 2. It is not only your appearance before Him on that distant day that makes your sojourning on earth so fearful; for every hour of your existence here this incomprehensible and unseen Being is about your path. No retirement by night is so dark but His eye can penetrate it; no walk by day so intricate but He can follow it; no secret of the soul so hidden but He can see it. II. To the nature of that heavenly Father, into whose inheritance we are invited, the text directs us to add the judgment to which we shall one day be summoned. III. The third argument which the apostle uses for religious fear is drawn from the means adopted through the blood of Christ for the everlasting salvation of our souls. IV. The nature of the world in which we dwell, and the weakness of the human heart. All the warnings that are given us, all the hopes that are held out to us, remind us of the danger of the state in which we dwell. The world, by professing to he Christian, is more dangerous; because it has lost the appearance of enmity, and has greater power over us by its failures. Look into your own heart, and, remembering yourself as a being designed for immortality, think on its wanderings, its coldness, its impurity, its inconstancy, and say if anything was ever so poor, so frail, so blind, so unprepared to meet its God! (G. Mathew, M. A.) The reverence due to God I. The nature of the fear which is here enjoined. Fear is a passion implanted in our nature to deter us from what is hurtful, and to guard us against danger. To lose the favour of the Almighty here, and be eternally deprived of His presence hereafter, are evils the most formidable to man. And while fear imprints these so deeply on the mind as to produce an anxious dread of incurring His displeasure, and a serious concern to gain His approbation, it becomes that religious regulating principle which is here enjoined. There is a natural fear of God impressed upon the minds of all. He has infused His fear into our minds, that, by this rational awe, He might deter us from those practices to which our corrupt nature too much inclines us, and, by the sword of justice, overrule our affections, too refractory to be otherwise reclaimed. It may be observed, farther, that the rational fear before us is equally remote from that excess of fear which gives rise to superstition, and that unwarranted defect of it from which profane levity proceeds. It is a sober cheerfulness, a manly seriousness, which become the servants of God. This demands no melancholy abstraction from the world; it condemns the indulgence of no innocent delight. But calm and temperate enjoyment is the utmost that is assigned to man. And hence religion wisely recommends a spirit cheerful but composed, equally remote from the humiliating depression of fear and the exulting levity of joy. The propriety of fear as a regulating principle, not only religion, but the nature of our present state, the business here assigned us, the instability of all things round, and the awful concerns of futurity, concur to establish and enforce. II. In what manner it should influence our conduct in the pilgrimage of life. To engage us to depart from evil and to keep the commandments is the direct tendency of religious fear. Calling forth our vigilance and circumspection, it will admonish us of latent dangers, and lead us to a faithful discharge of every duty and a serious preparation for eternity. Its influence will be habitual and steady. In every state, and at all times, the serious impression will be felt, by producing in our lives a constant fear of God, a virtuous deportment in the world, and a holy reverence for ourselves. Let us first consider its influence on our religious duties. To form right notions of the Deity, cherish suitable affections, and express these by acts of religious worship and a holy life, form the chief parts of piety. But not to the more immediate acts of public and private devotion will this influence be confined; it will extend to every act of religious obedience, and to everything sacred. It will form the constant temper of the true Christian, and direct the habitual tenor of this life. Nor is this destructive to human enjoyment. The restraints it imposes are curbs on vice; but real pleasure they extend and improve. It is rational enjoyment which they prescribe, in place of momentary bliss. III. Motives to engage all to live here in fear.1. The nature of our present state and our future prospects calls upon us thus to fear. Can we rest in security where all is changing? Can we not be apprehensive where all things cause alarm? We stand on the brink of a precipice, from which the slightest breath may drive us headlong. Is this a place, is this a time, to swell in fancied security, riot in unlawful pleasure, and indulge in unbridled joy? 2. By living in fear we will escape unnumbered evils. From thoughtless inattention fatal dangers arise-fatal not only to our worldly prosperity, but to the far more important concerns of the soul. 3. It will promote the rational enjoyment of life. Always to tremble destroys felicity, but cautious fear improves and extends it. To the man that feareth always, no accident happens unexpected; no good gives immoderate joy, nor no evil unnecessary alarm. 4. It will demonstrate our attachment to Jesus, and lead to the fulfilment of the vows you solemnly came under at the table of your Lord. 5. It leads to happiness eternal. The time is at hand when fear shall no more disquiet. (D. Malcolm, LL. D.) Fear of terror There is a fear towards God that might be denominated the fear of terror. It is the affection of one who is afraid of Him. There is in it the alarm of selfishness. It is at all times connected with a view of one’ s own personal suffering; and the dire imagery of pain, and perhaps irreversible wretchedness, is perhaps that which chiefly gives dismay and disturbance to his soul. It carries in it no homage to the sacredness of the Divinity, yet is aggravated by a sense of that sacredness; because then God, regarded as a God of unappeasable jealousy, is deemed to be intolerant of all evil; and the guilt-stricken soul, in looking up to the holiness of the Lawgiver, looks forward to its own destruction in that everlasting hell where the transgressors of the law find their doom. Now it is obvious that, while haunted by a fear of this sort, there can be no free or willing or generous obedience. There might be a service of drudgery, but not a service of delight; such obedience as is extorted from a slave by the whip of his overseer, but not a free-will offering of love or of loyalty. It is reserved for the gospel of Jesus Christ to do away this terror from the heart of man, and yet to leave untarnished the holiness of God. It is the atonement that was made by Him which resolves this mystery, providing at once for the deliverance of the sinner and for the dignity of the Sovereign. But while this view of God in Christ extinguishes one fear-the fear of terror-it awakens another and an altogether distinct fear-the fear of reverence. God is no longer regarded as the enemy of the sinner; but in thy Cross of the Redeemer, where this enmity was slain, there is full demonstration of a moral nature that is in utter repugnancy to sin. Now that we have entered into reconciliation, we hear not the upbraidings of the Lawgiver for the despite which in former days we have done unto His will. But the office of the gospel is to regenerate as well as reconcile; and every disciple who embraces it is met with the saying, “ This is the will of God, even your sanctification.” Such is the wide difference between these two affections; and, corresponding to this, there is a difference equally wide between the legal and the evangelical dispensations. Under the former economy, the alternative to do this and live is, that if you fail in doing this you will perish everlastingly. Now let this be the great stimulus to the performance of virtue, and then think of the spirit and of the inward character wherewith they are impregnated. It is, in fact, a character of the most intense selfishness. It is the fear of terror which goads him on to all his obedience, and compels him to act religiously. For such a religion as this it is not needed that he should have any capacity of moral principle. It is enough if he have the capacity of animal pain. He is driven along, not by the feelings of his spiritual, but by those of his sentient nature. Now it is not so with the economy of the gospel. The gate of heaven is thrown open at the outset to its disciples, and they are invited with confident step to walk towards it. God holds Himself forth not as a Judge who reckons, but as a Father who is reconciled to them. (T. Chalmers, D. D.) Sojourners on earth 1. Our life is a sojourning on earth.2. This sojourning hath a time.3. This time must be passed.4. This passage must be in fear.5. This fear must be of a Father.6. He is so a Father, that He is our Judge. (Bp. Hall.) Not redeemed with corruptible things.-Redemption I. Consider, with grateful emotion, the merciful and important fact of man’ s redemption.1. On all hands it is acknowledged that redemption implies the pardon of sin, but the dominion of sin must also be subdued. 2. Are you redeemed from a vain conversation, from a useless form of religion, from an unspiritual profession of faith in the gospel, from trifling and unprofitable behaviour, from the course of this world? II. Consider the utter inadequacy of human means to have accomplished this great redemption. III. The efficacious means whereby this great redemption has been accomplished. Learn-1. The necessity of faith.2. Beware of entertaining unscriptural views of redemption. (Essex Remembrancer.) Christianity a redemptive power I. It is a redemption from bad character.1. Sin is a worthless life. A vain conversation.2. It is a worthless life transmitted. II. It is a redemption by a costly sacrifice.1. By the sacrifice of a life.2. By the sacrifice of a most perfect life. III. It is a redemption ordained before all time.1. Unsought.2. Unmerited.3. Absolutely free. (D. Thomas, D. D.) The things of this world are insufficient to redeem from Spiritual bondage:-The reasons hereof may be these:1. God hath no need of any of these things, and they are His already (Psalms 24:1; Psalms 50:10). 2. Our soul is an immortal and incorruptible thing, a creature that hath a beginning, but never shall have end. 3. Sin is a transgression against an Infinite God, and so deserveth an infinite punishment. 4. Many times even for a trespass committed against men, these things will not be taken for a recompense. 5. These often, when God sends some bodily judgment, are unable to do men any pleasure, nor can at all pacify God. 6. These cannot redeem a man’ s bodily life and save it from death, nor can they prolong a man’ s life an hour beyond his appointed time; much less can they redeem his soul. 7. These cannot purchase wit, learning, eloquence for those that want them, much less sanctification and grace. (John Rogers.) Vain conversation received by tradition.-Children infected by parental traditions I. Divers sorts of evils have broken into the life of man by the traditions of fathers, as-1. Gross errors in opinion.2. Divers superstitions in their life, as were the traditions of the Pharisees.3. Children learn divers sins only, or chiefly from their parents. II. If any ask why the traditions of parents should be so infectious.1. Because they are cast into the natures of the children in the youngest years, and so are the more infectious because they were first seasoned with them. 2. Because of the affection children bear to their parents, and their opinion of their sufficiency. 3. Because they are continually conversant with them, and so see no other or no better precepts or examples. III. The use may be for instruction, both to parents and children.1. Parents should be humbled under the consideration of the misery they bring upon their children, both by propagation and tradition. 2. Children should also learn from hence (1) Not to rest wholly upon the tradition of parents, anal to know it is not a sufficient rule to warrant their actions. (2) What good is commended especially of the good fathers, those we should embrace, and the rather for their sakes. 3. Shall not this evidently confute their gross folly, that so much urge the traditions of the fathers? 4. Are men so zealous for the tradition of their fathers of the flesh; and shall not we be much more zealous for the traditions of God Himself delivered in His Word? His counsels are all perfect; there can be no defect in them; and further, no parents can afford us such acceptation, or reward for obedience. (N. Byfield.) Vain conversation The mind of man, the guide and source of his actions, while it is estranged from God, is nothing but a forge of vanities. St. Paul speaks this of the Gentiles, that they became vain in their imaginations, and their foolish heart was darkened, their great naturalists and philosophers not excepted. And thus the Lord complains by Isaiah of the extreme folly of His people (Isaiah 44:20), and by Jeremiah, that their hearts are lodges of vain thoughts (Jeremiah 4:14), and these are the true cause of a vain conversation. The whole course of a man’ s life out of Christ is nothing but a continual trading in vanity, running a circle of toil and labour, and reaping no profit at all. Now, since all a man’ s endeavours aim at his satisfaction and contentment, that conversation which gives him nothing of that, but removes him further from it, is justly called vain conversation. Let the voluptuous person say upon his death bed what pleasure or profit doth then abide with him of all his former sinful delights. Let him tell if there remain anything of them all, but that which he would gladly not have to remain, the sting of an accusing conscience, which is as lasting as the delight of sin was short and vanishing. Let the covetous and ambitious declare freely, even those of them who have prospered most in their pursuits of riches and honour, what ease all their possessions or titles do then help them to, whether their pains are the less because their chests are full, or their houses stately, or a multitude of friends and servants waiting on them with hat and knee. And if all these things cannot ease the body, how much less can they quiet the mind! It is a lamentable thing to be deluded a whole lifetime with a false dream. Would it not grieve any labouring man to work hard all the day, and have no wages to look for at night? It is a greater loss to wear out our whole life, and in the evening of our days find nothing but anguish and vexation. Let us then think this, that so much of our life as is spent in the ways of sin is all lost, fruitless, and vain conversation. And as the apostle says here, you are redeemed from this conversation, this imports it to be a servile slavish condition, as the other word, vain, expresses it to be fruitless. And this is the madness of a sinner, that he fancies liberty in that which is the basest thraldom; as those poor frantic persons that are lying ragged and bound in chains imagine that they are kings, and that their irons are chains of gold, their rags robes, and their filthy lodge a palace. (Abp. Leighton.) The precious blood of Christ.- The precious blood of Christ I. What preceded it. Blood of lambs, bulls, and goats, without number, and through all ages. Types most costly. Prophecies grand and minute. II. The prodigies which attended the shedding of this blood. On previous occasions, when sacrifices had been offered, there were tokens of God’ s favourable notice-Abel, Noah, Abraham, Gideon, etc. But when was it heard that the sun was clothed as in sackcloth, that the rocks were rent, the earth shaken, etc. III. Where it was presented (Hebrews 9:7; Hebrews 9:12). The very life laid down was taken up, and is lived on again in heaven in circumstances of the highest glory and honour. IV. What it prevents. Condemnation, wrath, curse. This blood will ward off all harm from those who trust it. Will not suffer Satan or death to destroy any who are sheltered beneath it. V. What it procures.1. For man generally. (1) All temporal blessings.(2) The offer of salvation. 2. For believers-redemption, even the forgiveness of sins (Ephesians 1:7). VI. What it produces. The blood of Christ is omnipotent. It prevails over guilt, fear and care. It casts down pride, casts out the reigning power of sin, and introduces happiness, holiness, humility, and hope. VII. What it will perpetuate, and secure forever to all believers. Abidance before the throne of God, union with the redeemed of all ages, service in the heavenly temple, the absence of sorrow, death, and sin. (J. Cox.) The precious blood of Christ 1. Worlds in which there is no evil and no danger of evil arising would not be supplied with means of prevention or of cure; but in our planet we have remedies for almost all the ills which flesh is heir to, and there are laws of compensation which show that the God of love does not impose want and destitution willingly. Here, then, where even the juice of the seawort is a cordial, and “ its ashes feed the spark of life,” where the nightshade stops the painful vibration of the nerves, and brings sweet sleep upon eyelids which have become stiff in unseasonable wakefulness; here, where crowding insects cleanse and scavenge our earth and her firmament, and where everything has its use; here we have for the removal of sin the precious blood of Christ. 2. A ruler who never punishes his rebellious subjects, and who so pardons as to reproach his own government and laws, will spread evil by his so-called goodness, and will be cruel in his apparent kindness. The problem to be solved is, How can God be just, and yet the Saviour of the sinner? The solution of this problem is found in the precious blood of Christ. 3. Christ, according to the Scriptures, is the Word made flesh. The blood of Christ is the blood of the flesh in which God was manifest. All blood is precious-precious the blood of Abel, the blood of the persecuted prophets, etc., but there is no blood so precious as the blood of Christ. 4. Among the many things which we value, there is nothing which we so prize as the offerings of disinterested love: these surpass in interest, if not in value, the products of our labour and the blessings which we inherit as a birthright, or which reach us through the ordinary channels of Divine providence, and of our political and social institutions. Now “ greater love hath no man than this, that a man lay down his life for his friends.” The blood of Christ is a double illustration of disinterested love: for while the Son gives Himself for us, the Father gives the Son to be the Saviour of the world. 5. How marvellous in their variety and character are the effects of the blood of Christ! It brings Jehovah forth from His secret place with the light of love in His countenance, it arrests the course of the law in its pursuit of the sinner, it magnifies the law, it restores access to God, it cleanses, justifies, and redeems unto God. Never was blood like this. 6. There are different standards by which we value precious things. Some things are valuable because of their utility, and other things because of their singularity and rarity and beauty, but how few things are beautiful and rare and useful! Precious stones are beautiful and rare, but their utility is small; and the precious metals are valuable as currency, but not comparable to iron or even to coal. When, however, rarity is combined with utility, and an important service is to be rendered by one being or by one thing, how precious that being or thing becomes! The one medicine, a specific for some dire disease, the one means of escape in the hour of peril, the forlorn hope of an army, the only son of a widowed mother, are examples. This entry is longer than a Bible module can hold. The rest is at https://www.sermonindex.net/commentary/bi/ 1 Peter 1:22-23 Seeing ye have purified your souls The individual and social influence of religion I. The individual influence of religion. “ Ye have purified your souls.” This implies that personal corruption is an obstacle to beneficial influence over society, and that, in order to benefit others, we must first become pure ourselves. This purifying process is brought about-First, by the influence of “ the truth.” Sanctify them through Thy truth. The Word of God is like the sun, showing everything in its true colour; and its whole tendency is to purify the heart, by opposing all evil and promoting all good. Secondly, by the influence of the Spirit. “ Through the Spirit.” Thirdly, by the influence of obedience. “ In obeying.” This combines the work of man in union with the “ truth” and Spirit of God in the purification of his heart. II. The social influence of religion. “ Ye have purified your souls … unto unfeigned love of the brethren.” The spirit of love is essential to the welfare of every society. There is no unfeigned love of the brethren but from the purified soul. First, the spirit of selfishness is obliterated from the purified soul. Secondly, the purified soul is God-like in its nature and influence. “ Be ye holy, for I am holy.” “ God is love.” Thirdly, the feelings of the purified soul are always loving and compassionate. (H. E. Thomas.) Love one another with a pure heart fervently. Brotherly love The obedience and holiness mentioned in the foregoing verses comprehend the whole duties and frame of a Christian life towards God and men; and having urged that in the general, he specifies this grace of mutual Christian love as the great evidence of our sincerity and the truth of our love to God, for men are subject to much hypocrisy this way, and deceive themselves. They can come constantly to the church, and pray, it may be, at home too, and yet cannot find in their hearts to forgive an injury. I. The due qualifications of brotherly love.1. Love must be unfeigned. It appears that dissimulation is a disease that is very incident in this particular. St. Paul hath the same word (Romans 12:9), and St. John speaks to the same effect (1 John 3:18). He requires that our love have that double reality which is opposed to double dissembled love; that it be cordial and effectual; that the professing of it arise from truth of affection, and, as much as may be, be seconded with action; that both the heart and the hand may be the seal of it rather than the tongue. When after variances men are brought to an agreement, they are much subject rather to cover their remaining malices with superficial verbal forgiveness than to dislodge them and free the heart of them. This is a poor self-deceit. As the philosopher said to him who, being ashamed that he was espied by him in a tavern in the outer room, withdrew himself to the inner, “ That is not the way out; the more you go that way, you will be the further within it” ; so when hatreds are, upon admonition, not thrown out, but retire inward to hide themselves, they grow deeper and stronger than before. 2. It must be pure, with a pure heart. Call it good fellowship or what you will, all the fruit that in the end can be expected out of unholy fellowship in sinning together is to be tormented together, and to add each to the torment of the other. The mutual love of Christians must be pure, arising from such causes as are pure and spiritual, from the sense of our Saviour’ s command and of His example (John 13:34). They that are indeed lovers of God are united; by that their hearts meet in Him as in one centre: they cannot but love one another. Where a godly man sees his Father’ s image, he is forced to love it. And as the Christian’ s love is pure in its cause, so in its effects and exercise. His society and converse with any tends mainly to this, that he may mutually help and be helped in the knowledge and love of God. 3. We must love fervently, not after a cold indifferent manner. Let the love of your brethren be as a fire within you, consuming that selfishness which is so contrary to it and is so natural to men. Let it set your thoughts on work to study how to do others good. Let your love be an active love, intense within you, and extending itself in doing good to the souls and bodies of your brethren as they need and you are able. II. “ Love of the brethren.” In this is implied our obligation after a special manner to love those of the household of faith, because they are our brethren. There is in this fervent love sympathy with the griefs of our brethren, desire and endeavour to help them, bearing their infirmities, and recovering them too, if it may be; admonishing and reproving them as is needful, sometimes sharply, and yet still in love; rejoicing in their good, in their gifts and graces, so far from envying them that we be glad as if they were our own. You are brethren by the same new birth and born to the same inheritance, and such an inheritance as shall not be an apple of strife amongst you, to beget debates and contentions: no, it is enough for all, and none shall prejudice another, but you shall have joy in the happiness one of another, seeing you shall then be perfect in love, all harmony, no difference in judgment nor in affection, all your harps tuned to the same new song, which you shall sing forever. Let that love begin here which shall never end. (Abp. Leighton.) The life of love and purity I. Mutual love the duty of the pure. II. Purity, obedience, love are the signs of a new life which the Christian is living. III. The forces out of which this new life grows are deathless.1. “ Seed” - (1) Appears insignificant.(2) Is often hidden,(3) Is vital and vitalising. 2. “ Incorruptible.” Truth itself never dies, nor love. IV. The Word of God is the imperishable means by which these forces of life are brought into the very soul of man. (U. R. Thomas.) Christian brotherly love I. Brotherly love illustrated.1. The objects and elements of this love. (1) It is called “ the love of the brethren,” “ brotherly “ kindness,” as contradistinguished from that “ charity” which has for its object the whole race of man (2 John 1:2). (2) This circumstance, which necessarily limits this principle as to its range, gives it greater comprehension of elementary principles and greater intensity of influence and activity of operation. It includes goodwill in its highest degree; but to this it adds moral esteem, complacential delight, tender sympathy. 2. The distinctive characters of Christian love. (1) “ With a pure heart.” (a) The leading idea here is genuineness-sincerity. It must be real love, not affected or put on (Romans 12:9; 1 John 3:18). (b) It includes freedom from all low, selfish motives and ends. (2) “ Fervently.” (a) This term conveys the idea of constancy. A Christian brother, when he acts like himself, “ loves at all times.” No change of circumstances, especially to the worse, on the part of its object, should affect it except in the way of increasing it. (b) The word also conveys the idea of intensity and power. Our Christian love should be so fervent as that “ many waters” of neglect, infirmities, offences, petty injuries, “ shall not quench it,” or even damp its ardour. And it should manifest its strength, not merely by overcoming opposing obstacles, but by making exertions and sacrifices. (3) There is one character which it is of peculiar importance that our mutual affection as Christians should be distinguished by-it should be love like Christ’ s (John 13:34). His love was free and ready, considerate and wise, laborious and expensive, generous and self-sacrificing; looking to all their interests, but chiefly to their highest interests; not forgetting that they had bodies, but chiefly concerned about their souls; and such should be our brotherly love. II. Brotherly love recommended.1. The intimate and indissoluble mutual relation between Christians as brethren, arising out of their intimate and indissoluble common relation to God as their Father, is a strong motive to the cultivation and exercise of Christian brotherly kindness. 2. The common character to which all Christians have been formed by the agency of the same Spirit, and the instrumentality of the same Word, is another strong motive. (J. Brown, D. D.) Catholic charity I. Its necessity.1. The injunctions of Christ (John 13:34-35; John 15:12; Matthew 5:24; Matthew 25:34-35; Matthew 25:41-42). 2. The teachings of His apostles (Romans 13:8-10; Galatians 5:22; 1 Corinthians 13:1-13.; 1 John 4:7; 1 John 4:16; 1 John 4:20, etc.). II. Its extent.1. To all mankind. The more general it is, the more Christian and the more like God’ s love. 2. The more special objects of our love ought to be those who agree with us in a common faith (Galatians 6:10)-i.e., all Christians, as Christians, and because such. To love those that are of our way, humour, and opinion, is not charity, but self-love; ‘ tis not for Christ’ s sake, but our own. III. Its excellence.1. It is the image of God, and of all the graces renders us most like our Maker, for God is love and the lover of men. And is it not a glorious excellency that makes men like the fountain of all perfection? 2. It is the spirit of angels, glorified souls, and the best of men. 3. Love is an eminent branch of the Divine life and nature (1 John 4:7-8). 4. Love is the bond and type of Christian communion. 5. Love is the most Catholic grace, and upon that account the most excellent, since that which promotes the good of the whole is better than any private perfection. 6. Love commends Christianity to those without, and cleanseth the profession of it from many spots it hath contracted. IV. The means of attaining this excellent and catholic temper.1. Directions. (1) Acknowledge worth in any man. Whatever is good is from God, and He is to be loved and owned in all things, as well in the paint upon the butterfly’ s wing as in the glorious uniform lustre of the sun; in the least herb under our feet as well as in the stupendous fabric of the heavens over us. And moral perfections are to be acknowledged, as wall as these natural ones. And we must take care that we make not our relish the measure of worth and goodness. Say not this is excellent because it is agreeable to your particular palates, and that on the other hand is vile because it is distasteful to your genius. Let us, then, be so ingenious as to own the virtue and the goodness that is in all parties and opinions; let us commend and love it. (2) Be much in the contemplation of the love of God. He that knows how much God hath loved him, hath a mighty reason to love his brother (1 John 4:11). (3) Make the great design of religion yours; and know that the intent of that is, not to teach us systems of opinion, but to furnish our minds with encouragements of virtue and instances of duty; to direct us to govern our passions and subdue our appetites and self-wills, in order to the glory of God, the good of societies, and our own present and eternal interests. (4) Study the moderate, pacific ways and principles, and run not in extremes. Both truth and “ love are in the middle. Extremes are dangerous. 2. Considerations. (1) Love is part of religion; but opinions, for the sake of which we lose charity, are none. The first I have proved already, and for the other we may consider that religion consists, not in knowing many things, but in practising the few plain things we know. (2) Charity is certainly our duty, but many of the opinions, about which we fall out, are uncertainly true; viz., as to us. The fundamental points of faith are indeed as firm as the centre, but the opinions of men are as fluctuating as the waves of the ocean. The root and body of a tree is fast and unshaken, while the leaves are made the sport of every wind. And colours sometimes vary with every position of the object and the eye, though the light of the sun be an uniform splendour. The foundation of God standeth sure, but men often build upon it what is very tottering and uncertain. The great truths of religion are easily discernible, but the smaller and remoter ones require more acuteness to descry them; and the best light may be deceived about such obscure and distant objects. The apostle tells us that we know but in part (1 Corinthians 13:9), and makes confidence an argument of ignorance (1 Corinthians 8:2). (3) Christian love is necessary, but agreement in opinions is neither necessary nor possible. (4) Errors of themselves are infirmities of the understanding, and not enormities of the will, for no man is willing to be deceived. So that they ought not to be the objects of our hatred but our pity. We all are pilgrims in our way to the Jerusalem that is above. If some will go in this path, some in the other, these in a circuit, and those amongst the rocks, we may be sure it is because they know not the danger and inconveniences which they choose. (5) We ought to make allowance for education, authority, and fair pretences, which have a mighty power, even over honest minds, and do often unavoidably lead them into error. For let us consider how easily we receive the first impressions, and how deeply they sink into our souls. (6) In many things we err ourselves; and, therefore, shall have need of the charity of others. 3. Cautions. (1) Beware of inordinate admiration and love of any sect. When we passionately admire a party, we are apt to despise them that differ from it. (2) Avoid eager and passionate disputes. In these charity is always lost, and truth seldom or never found. If thou art desirous to prevail with thy friend to lay down his opinion, assault him not by the fierceness of disputes; for such attempts will but raise his passion, and that will make him stick the closer to his error; but shine upon him with a calm light, insinuate thy better principle by modest and gentle suggestions. (3) Beware of zeal about opinions, by which I mean all the propositions of less certainty or consequence. (4) Beware of censuring and affixing odious names and consequences upon the persons or opinions of others. (Joseph Glanvil.) Christian love What is that love of which our Lord and His apostles speak? Not only, or primarily, kind feelings or generous impulses. Not certainly the sentimentality which breathes itself out in sighs and raptures. Not merely the fond attachment which clings as the rose against the trellis. But, above all things, service-self-denial and self-giving. To put another’ s well-being before our own, not because it is pleasant to do it, but because it is right. To make another the pivot around which the wheel of activity revolves. To check the hasty word, the unkind speech, the damaging criticism. I. The marks of such love.1. Unfeigned. Dissimulation is a disease very antagonistic to Christian love. How subtly we are tempted to maintain appearances because of some ulterior gain. Our politeness is often but skin deep. Our smiles assumed for a purpose. Our words smoother than butter, whilst our hearts are drawn swords. 2. Pure. “ Hearts may be cemented by impurity, by ungodly conversation and society in sin, as in uncleanness or drunkenness.” 3. Fervently. “ On the stretch.” Our love seldom gets beyond “ temperate,” and never to boiling point. II. The efficient cause of such low. “ It will come through obeying the truth.”1. We must know the truth. Put two burnished mirrors opposite each other, and there will be no glow of light on either; but if a candle stand between, the beams of light are flung to and fro, to an extent impossible to either or both alone. So the mere contact of Christian with Christian will not necessarily produce the burning heart, unless there be also between them the Truth of God. 2. We must also obey the truth. Do, and you shall know. Obey, and you will love. 3. As we obey the truth, we shall be purified by it. Young men cleanse their way by taking heed to the Divine Word. III. The divine origin of the life within. It is “ not of man, or of the will of the flesh, but of God.” (F. B. Meyer, B. A.) Christian love I. Purity.1. The word for “ purified” is not that denoting the infusion of virtue, but that which signifies the expulsion from the soul of all defilement, and especially of selfishness. Worldly philosophies and religions only required external lustration-the purification of the life; Christianity inculcates inward sanctity-the purification of the soul. 2. The way to effect this is by believing obedience to the truth as revealed in the Gospel. Christian truths, different from the truths of mathematics and of art, exert a sanctifying influence on the heart. This is the main purpose of their revelation. But how do they accomplish this object? By being obeyed. 3. Truth is only the wire along which the electric current flows from the spirit of God to the spirit of man, only the vehicle to convey holy influences direct from the Holy Ghost to the human soul, which influences set up a spiritual ferment within, making the impurities rise like scum to the surface, finally to be cast off altogether. What, then, is the result of this refining, purifying process? “ Unfeigned love of the brethren.” A new word has been ostentatiously introduced into recent literature, namely, “ altruism.” What is its meaning? That man should think more and care more for others than for himself, that he should be ready to sacrifice himself, if need be, for the sake of others. This idea is couched in more intelligible, because simpler, language in the text. II. Unfeignedness. “ Unfeigned love of the brethren” -genuine love, without dissimulation, free from hypocrisy.1. We read of “ faith unfeigned,” that is to say, faith which is firm and solid to the core. Faith is oftentimes hollow, simulated. “ Faith unfeigned” -faith that will move forward through all the miry bogs of infidelity, that will brave the storm and stress of life. 2. “ Love unfeigned” -what then is this? Love which will not give way under trial, that will suffer a burden to be put on its back. III. Fervour.1. This implies that our love of the brethren should be powerful enough to overcome all sinful obstacles in our own nature, to burn up all the relies of selfishness in our own souls, so that we may find our supreme delight in serviceableness to our fellow men. 2. It is further implied that our love should be so intense as to overcome all national and sectarian differences. “ Love one another fervently,” of whatever nation you may chance to be. (J. C. Jones, D. D.) Fervent love of the brethren I. The work accomplished. “ See ye have purified your souls.” There is the beginning of all. Many men are disposed to work from without, and not from within; but the Spirit works from within. Men think that if they whitewash the sepulchre it is enough. No, it must be cleansed. See to it then, and “ keep thy heart with all diligence; for out of it are the issues of life” and death. II. The instrument of its accomplishment. “ Ye obey the truth.” God works by instruments in the order of His providential creation and government. God has appointed, in order to the purifying of men’ s souls, a divinely constituted means. We have the word of truth, the incorruptible seed of which His people are born again. III. One special result of this work. “ Unfeigned love of the brethren.” (H. Stowell, M. A.) Fervently The word thus translated means extended, or on the stretch. It conveys the idea of a constant tension such as is supplied in machinery by a steel spring. In one department of a sewing machine all depends on the thread being kept constantly tight, so that the moment any slackness occurs, the loose portion is picked up instantly and without fail. If that operation were left dependent on the watchfulness and quickness of a human operator, it would entirely fail. The worker would grow weary, would forget, would hasten to tighten the thread after the time was past, and all would go to wreck and ruin. But by entrusting the watch and the work to a bent elastic steel wire, an absolute infallibility is secured. The watcher never forgets, the worker never wearies. The work is done perfectly, and always done at the right moment. The spring is always on the stretch and never misses. Though it is obliged to watch the slackening, and pull the thread instantly tight, a hundred times a minute, all day long for twenty years, it never once forgets or fails. The precept requires a love of this sort watching and working in a Christian’ s heart. If you need to remember your duty every time that a sudden injury occurs, you will not be in time with the soft answer that turns away wrath. Before love has gathered itself up, and determined on its course, the opportunity will be past. The disciple of Christ will appear as irascible, passionate, and revengeful as other men. There must be a spring-a law of love set once for all as a faculty of the new heart, that will operate instantaneously and uniformly. (W. Arnot.) Being born again.-Regeneration I. The nature of regeneration.1. A change of qualities or dispositions: not a change of the substance of the soul. 2. A supernatural change (John 3:5). 3. A change into the likeness of God (2 Corinthians 3:18). 4. A universal change (2 Corinthians 5:17). 5. A lasting change. (1) The mind is savingly enlightened. In the knowledge of God, sin, self, Jesus Christ, vanity of world (Psalms 119:96). Spiritual things (1 John 2:20). (2) The will is renewed (Ezekiel 36:26). Cured of its utter inability to will what is good. Imbued with a fixed aversion to evil (Galatians 5:17). Endowed with an inclination and propensity to good. (3) The affections are rectified and regulated. (4) The conscience is renewed. (5) As the memory wanted not its share of depravity, it is also bettered by regenerating grace. It is strengthened for spiritual things. (6) There is a change made on the body, and the members thereof, in respect of their use; they are consecrated to the Lord (1 Corinthians 6:13; Romans 6:13), “ servants to righteousness unto holiness” (Romans 6:19). (7) This gracious change shines forth in the conversation. A new heart makes newness of life. II. Why this change is called regeneration, a being born again. It is so called, because of the resemblance between natural and spiritual generation, which lies in the following particulars.1. Natural generation is a mysterious thing: and so is spiritual generation (John 3:8). 2. In both, the creature comes to a being it had not before. 3. As the child is passive in generation, so is the child of God in regeneration. 4. There is a wonderful contexture of pasts in both births. Oh the wonderful contexture of graces in the new creature! 5. All this, in both cases, has its rise from that which is in itself very small and inconsiderable. 6. Natural generation is carried on by degrees. 7. In both there are new relations. The regenerate may call God Father; for they are His children (John 1:12-13), “ begotten of Him” (1 Peter 1:3). They are related, as brethren, to angels and glorified saints; “ the family of heaven.” 8. There is a likeness between the parent and the child (2 Peter 1:4). 9. As there is no birth without pain, so there is great pain in bringing forth the new creature. The soul has sore pains when under conviction and humiliation. (T. Boston, D. D.) The new life 1. Unlike man’ s mortal life, this new moral life is independent of the earth. The productions of the earth cannot support it; the blasts and the storms of the earth cannot destroy it. 2. Unlike man’ s mortal life, this new moral life is ever progressive. Like the trees of the forest and the beasts of the field, man’ s mortal life reaches a culminating point and then dies out. Not so with this new moral life. 3. Unlike man’ s mortal life, this new moral life is essentially a blessing. Man’ s mortal life may become, and often is, a curse. (D. Thomas, D. D.) Born again A man shall never have occasion to curse the day of his new birth. (J. Trapp.) A new creature In passing from nature to grace you did not pass from a lower to a higher stage of the same condition-from daybreak to sunshine, but from darkest night to dawn of day. Unlike the worm which changes into a winged insect, or the infant who grows up into a stately man, you became, not a more perfect, but a “ new creature” in Jesus Christ. (T. Guthrie, D. D.) Not of corruptible seed, but of incorruptible.- The incorruptible seed I. Christianity must satisfy the intellectual requirements of every age.1. In order to this, Christianity in its statements, historical and doctrinal, must be in perfect accord with the demonstrations of science in the various departments of knowledge to which it devotes itself. 2. To be perpetuated as the religion of the race, Christianity must not only harmonise with the conclusions of the intellect in other provinces, but must continue to offer new problems of its own. The moment the Bible will be an understood book, it will be a moribund book. And what it proves itself to be to individual man in innumerable eases, that it claims to be to man universal. Let the ages be yet cultivated with greater diligence and trained to a higher point in knowledge than anything we have so far witnessed, and the Gospel has its questions for them, problems which will utterly baffle the finest cultured minds. This assuredly is one element which contributes powerfully to its perpetuity, that the intellect can never minster it. 3. But in a religion which claims perpetuity you would further expect it would stimulate the understanding into greater activity, and infuse new life into all its pursuits. That is to say, it must become the prime factor in the history of the world. Christianity does exercise restraint, not upon progress but upon retrogression; not upon truth but upon sin; not upon the intellect but upon the spirit which is now working in the children of disobedience. It checks the spirit of the nineteenth century, it spurs its science. II. If Christianity is to live forever, it must meet the moral requirements of every age.1. This implies that it must accord with the distinct dictates of our moral nature. 2. Another requisite, in order to its perpetuation, is that it be in advance of the moral performances of any particular age. 3. Christianity, to endure forever, must enter into the morals of the world as a refining element. War-ferocity-butchery-is that your civilisation? demand our opponents. We answer, Certainly not; that is barbarism. That is not Christianity, but its opposite, and a cogent reason why Christianity should not be thrown aside till they at least have been exterminated. III. If the gospel is to endure to the end of time, it must continue to meet the spiritual wants of man. If it do not this it is inevitably doomed to extinction.1. As a sinner, man needs a Saviour. The sinner finds true inward rest in the atonement of the Gospel, the sense of guilt is cancelled. 2. As a creature he needs God. Cast a glance over the history of the world; everywhere the great want is God. What then can give us God? Science does not profess to be able to give Him. Professor Huxley says that the state of mind becoming men of science on this subject is a sort of know nothingarianism or Agnosticism. Well then, if science cannot do it, is there any religion besides Christianity that can? Mahometanism declares the unity and supremacy of God. But to say that God is, and that He is the supreme Ruler, is one thing; to bring Him to the conscious enjoyment of the soul quite another. The religion of India strives to bridge the gap; but instead of communion between man and God, it ends in the absorption of man in God. But however much we desire communion, we quite as much dread absorption. These meet only a fragment of our nature. But Christianity meets the whole man; it presents God to our contemplation in Him in whom “ all the fulness of the Godhead dwelleth bodily,” and to our consciousness by the indwelling of the Holy Ghost. As long as man is a sinner needing a Saviour, and a creature needing a God, Christianity will live in the grateful affection of myriads of our race. (J. C. Jones, D. D.) 1 Peter 1:24-25 All flesh is as grass.Change and continuance “ What is wanting here?” said a courtier to an illustrious prince, as they stood together, the spectators of a most splendid triumph in the city of Rome. To him who spake, there appeared to be nothing wanting. The gaiety and splendour of the spectacle were in his sight complete. The supreme power represented by the entire body of the senate was there. The spoils taken from the enemy, filling many carriages and piled upon movable platforms, were there. The ministers of justice, clad in official costume, and bearing the insignia of their office, were there. And there was the victorious general, attired in the triumphalia and crowned with laurels. “ What is wanting here?” “ What,” answered the prince, as he watched the procession pass along, and in passing pass away, “ What is wanting? This is wanting, continuance.” The procession would pass along the appointed route, and then all would be dispersed, and the triumph would be a thing of the past. All thoughtful men feel seriously, if not sorrowfully, the changeful character of all the things which we see and handle on this earth. Where is continuance upon this planet? God has established the earth, and it abideth, but what beside abideth? Yea, even the earth is doomed to be burned up; and while it abides, great changes are continually occurring, even in the crust of the earth, and in the waters which fill its hollow places. And where continuance would be most valued, and where one should have expected it, even there it is not. The difference between poor men and rich men, famous men and men without renown, is just the difference between grass and the flower of grass; but as both grass and the flower of grass wither, so it is appointed unto all men once to die. There are things, however, which continue, good and precious things with which men have to do, and one of these things is mentioned in our text. Let us examine it. Words are lasting things. The breath which inspires them perishes, the lips which form them return to dust, the instruments which inscribe them are destructible, but words spoken and heard, written and read, have a boundless life and an immeasurable power. A good word may continue to enlighten, to invigorate forever and forever. All this is true of the words of man, but still more enduring in all their effects and influences are the words of the Lord. Many words has God spoken to us men. Among these words of God there is one communication which, on account of its singularity and importance, is called “ the Word of the Lord,” and which, by reason of its pleasantness and graciousness, is called “ the gospel.” Now, the Word of the Lord endureth forever, and this is the Word which by the gospel is preached unto you. It lives in God’ s mind; it lives, in fact, as a thing done and a provision completed; and it lives in the life of those who have been born again.1. The nature of God, as revealed to us in the Scriptures, is the nature from which a gospel might be expected. 2. The gospel, so far as we appreciate it, and so far as we understand the thirsts and wants of human nature, is an all-sufficient gospel for man. 3. A gospel less than the gospel of the grace of God must have left some thirst unslaked, or some necessity unmet, or some wound unhealed, or some tears unwiped away; and while those tears were falling, that wound smarting, that want craving, that thirst burning, there could not have been the experience and enjoyment of complete salvation. 4. A gospel more real and substantial, or more worthy of the world’ s acceptation, could not have issued even from God. 5. And this gospel is abiding, because it is the incorruptible seed of life everlasting. The old spiritual nature is impregnated with the seed of a new man, a Divine seed and incorruptible, the seed of the truth of the gospel; and the man who has thus received the gospel enters upon a new and eternal life. The gospel now lives in a living mind, and in a living heart, and in a living character; it repeats itself in the believer; and as the character and mission of Jesus Christ may be learned from the written life of Christ, so the gospel may be learned from the spiritual life of him who believes it. Let us now indicate the practical bearing of this doctrine.1. The text magnifies the gospel. Let us be devoutly careful to preserve its gloriousness in our own eyes. And in order to do this we must reverence the gospel. 2. The text shows that the gospel is intended to be to us personally, and thereby furnishes us with a test of our religious state. The gospel is intended to be the germ of a Godlike life within us, and if it fail of this, it fails of its chief effect. 3. The text points out that in which is continuance; let us take care to handle perishable things as perishable, and to demean ourselves toward the gospel as everlasting. 4. The text suggests the strongest motives for the immediate and universal preaching of the gospel. Flesh is as grass. The man whose days are as grass is dying daily. And it is only here, while he is breathing out his brief life, that his nature can be impregnated with this incorruptible seed. 5. The text encourages us to sustain, and in all respects to provide for, the continuous preaching of the gospel. One after another the preachers of the gospel enter that valley, and are seen no more. But what do they leave behind? The sanctuaries in which they ministered? Yes; but something more. The flocks they tended? Pleasant memories? Yes; but much more. They leave that gospel, written not on tablets of stone, but upon the fleshy tablets of the heart; they leave that gospel more than written-they leave it in many hearts, a seed with a germ of Godlike and eternal life in it; they leave it as a new man, in many who have been born again by it as by incorruptible seed; they leave it in the rich experiences and holy activities of the new man; they leave it in a state imperishable, and they may leave it without anxiety. (S. Martin.) Autumn: life’ s contrast The form of thought here used illustrates a common principle in the operation of the human mind-that principle of contrast by which one thing suggests its opposite. Life is made up of contrasts. The secret of this influence of contrast lies in man’ s twofold nature, allied on the one side to the frail and perishing, on the other to the stable and enduring; one hand grasping dust and ashes, the other seizing upon the very throne of God; the outward eye seeing only what fades and passes away, the inward eye beholding glories which nothing can destroy or dim. There is something beyond the reach of change and decay and mortality-God’ s truth, as it has been revealed to man; God’ s promise, which by His Son He has made-this cannot fail. It will outlast all the forms of outward life, and all the splendours of nature; and, though heaven and earth pass away, it shall not pass away. The connection of the text makes it more emphatic. The apostle had been speaking of Christ’ s resurrection, and of the faith and hope which this fact excites; and he alludes to the wasting away of all material things, so as to fix attention more joyfully on the soul’ s undying nature. He leaps from the vessel that is sinking with all earth’ s treasure in the sea of time, to the firm shore of immortality. Let the grass then wither, and the glory of man fade away. God willing, we would not have the present scene to be our permanent dwelling. The transient and the abiding in the nature and experience of man this is, indeed, a contrast which it well becomes us to consider. The great mistake that human beings make is in regarding perishable things as though they were imperishable, and so fastening on them the feelings and expectations which belong only to the imperishable. Christianity does not forbid us to have any regard for what is perishable and passing away. Jesus Christ brought no ascetic religion into the world. He does not bid us dig a cave, and hide ourselves from all that is bright and gladsome around us, fleeting though it be. But what He and His apostles insist on is, that we shall graduate and proportion our interest in all things according to their worth. To put in its right light the contrast, I would bring out, suppose some inhabitant of that upper world-as it is thought departed spirits may-to lift the curtain, and look in upon these scenes in which we mingle. To one whose eye looks from his high station, how small and obscure this lower world, the dim, narrow entrance way to the more glorious mansions of the Father’ s house! He knows that authentic tidings of the great region He dwells in, have reached the ears of that crowd of mortals who move along through this entry of the spiritual world. As the sickly generations of creatures advance, the angel spectator scans the occupations in which they engage. What a thrill of amazement shoots through his breast to observe such multitudes living as though these narrow earthly steps to the great temple beyond were themselves the whole universe, studiously averting their eyes from the gate that leads to the immense splendours of the inner sanctuary. One is wholly absorbed in giving free scope to sense and appetite and superficial fancy. Another seems taken up entirely with swelling his pile of gold. He bends steadily down over it, and, as he stoops, gives up the lustre of heaven for its glitter. But yet another sight that angelic witness as surely beholds, and oh, there is not a pleasanter sight beneath the sun than that of a rich man for this world and for the world to come; yea, of a man who rejoices more than an old alchemist over the supposed discovery of the philosopher’ s stone, at the opportunity to transmute his temporary into everlasting treasure. Here surely the principle is illustrated aright in a contrast just and holy. This, then, without further illustration, is the lesson of our text. Be not deceived in your estimate. Distinguish the things that differ. Observe the contrasts that God has established. Is the New Testament true? Shall these great scenes of judgment and doom, according to the deeds of the flesh, be soon ushered in? Make not, then, the enormous miscalculation of leaving so vast an element out of your account. Even in this life, the contrast between things earthly and things heavenly sometimes demonstrates itself in striking results. The distinct consequences of diverse characters are especially marked, as men advance in life towards old age; and the rewards and retributions already bestowed seem to anticipate the judgment day. As I walked through the lanes of yonder growing forest, on our beautiful common, the dry leaves crushing under my feet, and the sinking sun taking his last look at the bare boughs of the trees, I met a man on whom the blow of grief had descended as sorely as upon any, and with oft-repeated stroke. A new sorrow had just fallen on his grey head and long-diseased, emaciated frame. He spoke of faith. He spoke of loyalty to God and duty. He spoke of heaven as though it were near. He said nothing of being hardly dealt with, nor hinted aught about not understanding why he should be selected for such trials, but seemed to think there was nothing but God’ s mercy and kindness in the world. But he seemed to me, as I looked upon him, to have an inward stay that would hold him up when all earthly props had fallen to the ground. For once, the contrast between earth and heaven was revealed to my mind; and the dissolving emblems of mortality under my feet, and the cold, shifting mists over my head, were transformed from sad tokens into symbols of hope and joy. (C. A. Bartol.) The death of a servant of God Two doctrines naturally arise from this text- I. That man and his glory are fading and withering. All flesh is grass.1. It is weak, and low, and little as grass. Mankind is indeed numerous as the grass of the field, multiplies, replenishes, and covereth the earth; but like grass, it is of the earth, earthy, mean, and of small account. Alas, the kingdoms of men which make so great a noise, so great a figure, in this lower world, are but as so many fields of grass compared with the bright and glorious constellations of stars, made up of the holy and blessed inhabitants of the upper regions. Proud men think themselves like the strong and stately cedars, oaks, or pines, but they soon find themselves as the grass of the field, liable to be nipped with every frost, trampled on by every foot, continually insulted by common calamities. 2. It is withering, and fading, and dying as grass; having both its rise and maintenance out of the earth, it hastens to the earth, and retires to its root and foundation in the dust. In the morning, perhaps, it is green and growing up, its aspect pleasing, its prospect promising; but when we come to look upon it in our evening work we find it cut down and withered. If it be not cut down by disease or disaster, it will soon wither of itself; it has in it the principles of its own corruption. Is all flesh grass? All, without exception of the noble or the fair, the young or the strong, the well-born or well-built, the well-fed or well-bred? Is all grass, weak and withering? (1) Then let us see ourselves to be grass, and humble and deny ourselves. Is the body grass? Then be not proud, be not presumptuous, be not confident of a long continuance here; forget not that the foot may crush thee. Grass falls; let me not be such a fool as to lay up my treasure in it. Is the body grass? Then let us not indulge it too much, nor bestow too much time and care and pains about it, as many do, to the neglect of the better and immortal part. After all, we cannot keep it from withering, when its day shall come to fall. (2) Let us see others also to be as grass, and cease from man, because he is no more than thus to be accounted of. We are now to consider, not common men, but men of distinction, and to see them withering and falling. 3. Let us inquire, What is the glory of man in this world? There is indeed a glory of man which is counterfeit, and mistaken for glory. Solomon says, “ For men to search their own glory is not glory” (Proverbs 25:27). The glory men commonly pursue and search for is no glory at all. Is beauty and comeliness of body the glory of man? So they pass with some who judge by the sight of the eye; but at the best they are only the goodliness of grass; they are a flower which death will certainly cut down; or the end of time will change the countenance; either wrinkled age, or pale death. We should therefore make sure the beauty of grace, the hidden man of the heart, which neither age nor death will sully. Is wealth the glory of man? Laban’ s sons thought so when they said concerning Jacob. Of that which was our father’ s hath he gotten all this glory (Genesis 31:1). But this also is a fading flower, Is pomp and grandeur the glory of a man? That also withers away. Great names and titles of honour are written in the dust. Give me leave to show you some instances of the glory of a man. (1) Is a large capacity of mind the glory of a man? (2) Is learning to be reckoned the glory of a man? (3) Is tenderness and humility, modesty and sweetness of temper, the glory of a man? (4) Is the faithful discharge of the ministry of the gospel the glory of a man? (5) Is great usefulness the glory of a man, and a delight in doing good? Well, here is the glory of man; let us be ambitious of this glory, and not of vain glory. See true honour in the paths of wisdom and virtue, and seek it there. This is honour that comes from God, and is in His sight of great price. 4. Having seen this flower flourishing, we are now to see it withering. As to himself, this glory is not lost, is not stained, by death; it is not like worldly honour, laid in the dust, and buried in the grave; no, this flower is transplanted from the garden on earth to the paradise in heaven, where it shall never fade. The works of good men follow them, but they forsake us, and we are deprived of the benefit of them. II. Though man and glory are fading and withering, yet God and His word are everliving and everlasting. The glory of the law was done away, but that of the gospel remains. The glory of ministers falls away, but not the glory of the Word they are ministers of. The prophets, indeed, do not live forever, but the words which God commanded them did, and will take hold, as words quick and powerful.1. There is in the Word of the Lord an everlasting rule of faith and practice for us to be ruled by. (1) It is our comfort that Christianity shall not die with our ministers, nor that light be buried in their graves. (2) It is our duty not to let our Christianity die with our ministers, hut let the word of Christ contained in the Scriptures still dwell in us richly. 2. There is in the Word of the Lord an everlasting fountain of comfort and consolation for us to be refreshed and encouraged by, and to draw water from with joy, and an everlasting foundation on which to build our hopes. (Matthew Henry.) Man compared to grass We are like “ grass.”1. We are like grass in our relation to the earth. 2. We are like grass in the frailty of our nature. 3. We are like grass in the uncertainty of our lives. The blade dies in all seasons. 4. We are like grass in the unnoticeableness of our dissolution. Blade after blade withers and dies, and the landscape appears as ever. (D. Thomas, D. D.) The fleeting and the durable I. The transitory nature of all the things which appertain to this our earthly state. “ All flesh is grass,” etc.1. How affectingly is this sentiment verified in the personal endowments of man, beauty and strength! Survey that animal structure, once so lovely, when it is wrinkled by the hand of time; when it is withered by the action of disease; when it is blasted by the stroke of death. Survey these melancholy changes which await the sons and daughters of Adam, and you will feel the propriety of the sentiment in the text. 2. The wisdom of man, no less than his beauty and strength, serves as an example of the sentiment in the text. In the present age we are accustomed to denounce the systems of former generations as fanciful or crude, and to smile when we hear them dignified by the names of philosophy and science; boasting at the same time that the perfection of philosophy and the arts have been reserved for our own age. Alas! for us, generations will arise that will look back on the nineteenth century, and in their turn laugh at the rudeness of our inventions, the infancy of our science, and the blunders of our philosophy. The fact is, that all knowledge merely human is destined to pass away (1 Corinthians 13:8). 3. We may also adduce as an example of the truth in the text the passing away of all those things which constitute the elegancies and decorations of civilised life; all that is designed to gratify the taste and imagination. Whatever the pencil of the painter has portrayed; whatever the chisel of the sculptor has wrought out; whatever the skill of the architect has raised; whatever the imagination has devised of rare and ornamental in furniture, dress, or manners-all must serve in its turn to show that the goodliness of man is as the flower of the field. 4. I must not omit to bring forward riches as furnishing a verification equally strong of the sentiment of the text. 5. These remarks apply with equal propriety to that idol of many hearts-fame. The historian’ s pen, the poet’ s muse, the tablet of marble and brass, all the means which have been employed to perpetuate a name, have only served as a comment on the text. 6. Power and dominion, desired by some and envied by others as the most abiding of human things, are only exemplifications on a larger scale of the truth affirmed in the text. Empires rise and fall; sceptres change hands, thrones are overturned, and one dynasty succeeds another. 7. One other illustration of the affecting sentiment of the text yet remains. The great globe itself, the habitation of fallen man, is destined to pass away! II. The durability of that dispensation of truth with which Jehovah has blessed the world. By the Word of our God I understand Messiah’ s dispensation, the gospel of the Son of God, with all the fulness of its grace and truth.1. It is proved that this Word of our God shall stand forever, in spite of all that can be effected to the contrary by persecution. Evangelical truth has outlived the memory of her once mighty foes; has overturned the monuments reared to commemorate her own destruction; and, clothed in celestial radiance and power, has gone on from conquering to conquer! 2. The course of events has shown that the Word of our God shall stand forever, notwithstanding the hostility of infidel men. The religion of Christ Jesus may be compared to an exceeding strong citadel, erected on the summit of an everlasting rock. They alone tremble for its security who are ignorant of its impregnable strength. 3. As a confirmation of the position in the text, that the Word of our God shall stand forever, we may with holy exultation advert to that spread of the Christian religion which has taken place in our day. 4. I may mention as a further proof that the Word of our God shall stand forever, that holy energy with which it is still accompanied. (J. Bromley.) The withering work of the Spirit (with Isaiah 40:6-8):-In every one of us it must be fulfilled that all that is of the flesh in us, seeing it is but as grass, must be withered, and the comeliness thereof must be destroyed. The Spirit of God, like the wind, must pass over the field of our souls, and cause our beauty to be as a fading flower. There must be brought home to us the sentence of death upon our former legal and carnal life, that the incorruptible seed of the Word of God, implanted by the Holy Ghost, may be in us, and abide in us forever. The subject is the withering work of the Spirit upon the souls of men. I. Turning then to the work of the spirit in causing the goodliness of the flesh to fade, let us, first, observe that the work of the Holy Spirit upon the soul of man in withering up that which is of the flesh, is very unexpected. You will observe that even the speaker himself, though doubtless one taught of God, when he was bidden to cry, said, “ What shall I cry?” Even he did not know that in order to the comforting of God’ s people, there must first be experienced a preliminary visitation. Many preachers of God’ s gospel have forgotten that the law is the schoolmaster to bring men to Christ. It cannot be that God should cleanse thee until He has made thee see somewhat of thy defilement; for thou wouldst never value the precious blood if thou hadst not first of all been made to mourn that thou art altogether an unclean thing. The convincing work of the Spirit, wherever it comes, is unexpected, and even to the child of God in whom this process has still to go on, it is often startling. We begin again to build that which the Spirit of God had destroyed. Having begun in the Spirit, we act as if we would be made perfect in the flesh; and then when our mistaken up-building has to be levelled with the earth, we are almost as astonished as we were when first the scales fell from our eyes. The voice which saith, “ Comfort ye, comfort ye My people,” achieves its purpose by first making them hear the cry, “ All flesh is grass, and all the goodliness thereof is as the flower of the field.”2. Furthermore, this withering is after the usual order of the Divine operation. If we consider well the way of God we shall not be astonished that He beginneth with His people by terrible things in righteousness. Observe the method of creation. What was there in the beginning? Originally nothing. “ The earth was without form and void; and darkness was upon the face of the deep.” There was no trace of another’ s plan to interfere with the great architect. So it is in the new creation. When the Lord new creates us, He borrows nothing from the old man, but makes all things new. He does not repair and add a new wing to the old house of our depraved nature, but He builds a new temple for His own praise. 3. I would have you notice that we are taught in our text how universal this process is in its range over the hearts of all those upon whom the Spirit works. “ All flesh is grass; and all the goodliness thereof” -the very choice and pick of it-“ is as the flower of the field,” and what happens to the grass? Does any of it live? “ The grass withereth,” all of it. The flower, will not that abide? So fair a thing, has not that an immortality? No, it utterly falls away. So wherever the Spirit of God breathes on the soul of man, there is a withering of everything that is of the flesh, and it is seen that to be carnally minded is death. If the work in us be not the Spirit’ s working, but our own, it will droop and die when most we require its protection. 4. You see, then, the universality of this withering work within us, but notice the completeness of it. The grass, what does it do? Droop? nay, wither. The flower of the field: what of what? Does it hang its head a little? No, according to Isaiah it fades; and according to Peter it falleth away. There is no reviving it with showers, it has come to its end. Even thus are the awakened led to see that in their flesh there dwelleth no good thing. 5. Let us further notice that all this withering work in the soul is very painful. As you read these verses do they not strike you as having a very funereal tone? This is mournful work, but it must be done. All that is of nature’ s spinning must be unravelled. It was a great merry for our city of London that the great fire cleared away all the old buildings which were the lair of the plague, a far healthier city was then built; and it is a great mercy for a man when God sweeps right away all his own righteousness and strength, when He makes him feel that he is nothing and can be nothing, and drives him to confess that Christ must be all in all, and that his only strength lies in the eternal might of the ever-blessed Spirit. 6. Observe that although this is painful it is inevitable. Why does the grass wither? Because it is a withering thing. “ Its root is ever in its grave, and it must die.” How could it spring out of the earth and be immortal? The seeds of corruption are in all the fruits of manhood’ s tree; let them be as fair to look upon as Eden’ s clusters, they must decay. Moreover, it would never do that there should be something of the flesh in our salvation and something of the Spirit; for if it were so there would be a division of the honour. It gives me great joy when I hear that you unconverted ones are very miserable, for the miseries which the Holy Spirit works are always the prelude to happiness. 7. It is the Spirit’ s work to wither. Better to be broken in pieces by the Spirit of God than to be made whole by the flesh! What doth the Lord say? “ I kill.” But what next? “ I make alive.” He never makes any alive but those He kills. He never hems those whom He has not wounded. II. Now, concerning the implantation. According to Peter, although the flesh withers, arid the flower thereof falls away, yet in the children of God there is an unwithering something of another kind. “ Being born again, not of corruptible seed,” etc. “ The Word of the Lord endureth forever,” etc. Now, the gospel is of use to us because it is not of human origin. If it were of the flesh, all it could do for us would not land us beyond the flesh; but the gospel of Jesus Christ is super human, Divine, and spiritual. In its conception it was of God; its great gift, even the Saviour, is a Divine gift; and all its teachings are full of deity. Now this is the incorruptible Word, that “ God was made flesh and dwelt among us” ; that “ God was in Christ, reconciling the world unto Himself, not imputing their trespasses unto them.” This is the incorruptible Word, that “ whosoever believeth that Jesus is the Christ is born of God.” Do you receive it? Then the Holy Spirit implants it in your soul. Do you leap up to it, and say,” I believe it” ? Then you possess the living seed within your soul. And what is the result of it? Why, then there comes, according to the text, a new life into us, as the result of the indwelling of the living Word, and our being born again by it. Now observe wherever this new life comes through the Word, it is incorruptible, it lives and abides forever. (C. H. Spurgeon.) Man and his glory-the grass and its flower These verses institute a comparison and bring out a contrast between the natural life and the spiritual. Every son of man is born into one life, and every son of God is born again into another. There is a mystery in every man, but a greater mystery in every Christian. Nature is deep, but grace is deeper. The two lives brought into contrast here are the natural life of man in the body which soon fades away, and the new life of the regenerated which will forever flourish. These two lives are not in all their aspects opposite, for the same person may at the same time possess both. He holds them, however, by different tenures: the first or natural life will soon depart, but the new or spiritual life will be his forever. The analogy employed is exact and full and beautiful-“ All flesh is as grass, and all the glory of man as the flower of grass.” Man is like the grass, and his glory like its flower. Life is short, and the period of its perfect development is shorter still. The history of a man consists of a gradual growing to maturity, and a gradual declining to the grave. Such is his best estate, when no accident cuts him off in mid-time of his days. But if this is true of the flesh-the sensitive nature which man has in common with the brutes-what shall be said of all his distinguishing features as a moral and intelligent being? Although the mere flesh is evanescent, what of the glory wherewith his Maker has crowned his head? The text has two things to say of this glory-the first, that it greatly excels in worth and beauty the animal structure on which it grows; the second, that it is still more short lived. If all flesh be as grass, all its glory is only as the flower of grass. The flower is indeed the glory of the grass, but it comes up later and withers earlier. What shall we say, then, of all that is peculiar to man-of all that distinguishes him from the beasts of the field-of that human face divine, and that articulate speech, and that calculating mind, which mark him off as chief of God’ s creatures here and ruler of His world? Can the glory of man be compared to the herbage as well as his sentient nature? No; for though it is more brilliant while it lasts, it is sooner over. Beauty of form is one of the distinguishing glories of humanity. It has pleased God our Father so to arrange the features of our frame, and so to constitute our minds, that we count them comely. We admire the flower of the herbage, and devoutly see in it the Creator’ s wisdom. Shall we not look with deeper interest on a lighted human countenance, and see in that glory of man a glory to the Lord? This glory does not last long; it is a flower-fragrant, attractive; but it withers soon. The flower is later blown and earlier faded than the frail green stem that bears it. But the beauty of the new creature in Christ does not fade like a flower. It is an interesting speculation-although it can be nothing more-to imagine the beauty of man unfallen. The peculiar sweetness sometimes imparted to the countenance of an ordinary person by the sudden influx of a “ great peace” in periods of spiritual revival suggests the probability that we lost by sin an external loveliness so great that we lack now the power of conceiving fully what it was. But, great though the loss be, Christians sorrow not over it as those who have no hope; for their gain is greater. Where sin abounded to mar, grace will much more abound to renew. Whatever is lost by sin is more than restored by redemption. The risen Christ is glorious, and risen Christians will be like Him. Humanity redeemed will be humanity perfect. I would fain realise the beauty of the resurrection body, as well as the spiritual purity of the saints in light. (W. Arnot.) The Word of the Lord endureth forever. The living and enduring Word On what grounds does the apostle assign to the gospel exclusively this high character, that it endureth forever? I. The righteousness which the Gospel reveals for justifying the ungodly is everlasting. Mankind are guilty before God; and what blessing is so necessary as justification? Of what avail are rank, power, wealth, learning, and even Church privileges, of which so many boast, for acceptance with God? What, then, is the glory of the self-justiciary? It is fading and transient as the flowers of the field. And what presumption in sinful mortal man to hold up any of these things, or all of them put together, if that were in his power, as his righteousness, in direct opposition to the declared will of his Creator and Lord. Is the God who made him to be dictated to by him? No. That Word, fixing the mode of acceptance, endureth forever, while the glory which man opposes to it shall wither, and leave its worshippers covered with confusion. The certainty and the perfect reasonableness of this result must impress us more deeply if we consider the character of the righteousness which the Word of the Lord reveals and establishes. It is absolutely perfect, for it includes obedience to both the precept and the penalty of the law of God; it is divinely excellent, for it was performed by the Son of God, who condescended to assume our frail nature that He might perform it; it is the most glorious production of Divine wisdom and love: it hath magnified the law and made it honourable; it hath thus propitiated God and abolished death. II. The vital principle which the Word of God inspires is imperishable. The only life which we derive from Adam is feeble, terrestrial, mortal. Its activities, aims, and enjoyments correspond to its nature and origin. They all centre in things worldly and perishing. The gospel is “ the ministration of life.” The Lord Jesus conveys by it the influences of His quickening Spirit into the soul that was alienated from God and absorbed in earful, and produces in it the new creature, even faith working by love. The truth which the Word testifies concerning Christ being thus known and believed becomes the principle of a new life, the activities of which appear in the outgoings of the soul towards Him in trust, hope, love, gratitude, submission. By the illuminations of His Word Christ lives in that soul, and exerts a mighty power over all its faculties-a power which inspires it with His own views, spirit, and aims. Actuated by the vital principles which His words create-for His words are spirit and life-the mind connects all things with Christ and with God, converts them into means of instruction, into motives to love and obedience, into materials for praise. It regards its most common mercies as the fruits of Divine bounty, the expressions of the Divine goodness and care. It submits to privations and afflictions, and endures them as the salutary discipline of a wise father; and the most ordinary occurrences it contemplates as the dispensations of Him who makes “ all things work together for good” to them that love Him. The relations, then, and pleasures, and pains, and intercourse, and pursuits, and occurrences which are peculiar to the present transient state, and which are so insignificant in themselves, because the state to which they belong is so fluctuating and evanescent, rise into dignity and importance, from the influence which the Divine Word exerts on the mind in which it lives, and become the means at once of present fellowship with God and of training up an immortal spirit for a holy and blessed eternity. Now this vital principle, so excellent in itself, is imperishable. In the present state, indeed, its power is small, its activities are feeble and irregular, and, of course, its influence is very limited. But let us recollect that it is only very lately since it came into being, and that it exists in the midst of much which is most hostile to it, and which continually opposes its growth. It shall exist, and notwithstanding the bleakness of the soil in which it is planted, and the noxious exhalations which rise around it and the storms which assail it, shall wax stronger and stronger; for the seed is the Word of the Lord which liveth and abideth forever. III. The honour to which the Gospel raises believers, and the beauties with which it adorns them, are unfading. It dignifies them with intimate relations to Christ, introduces them into God’ s favour, exalts them to be His sons, gives them access with confidence to His gracious presence, a claim on His protection and care, and makes them kings and priests unto God. And these are not only enduring, but ever-increasing honours; at least their transcendent excellence and glory shine with increasing lustre, and the longer and the more fully they are enjoyed they are the more highly valued, and their power to ennoble and to bless is more abundantly experienced and more humbly and gratefully acknowledged. They are enduring, for the loving kindness of God, which is the sum of them all, is immutable, and the charter which conveys them is irrevocable, for it is confirmed by the blood of Christ and the oath of God. IV. Every hope which is founded on this word shall be more than fulfilled. What blessed hopes does it authorise and encourage the believer to cherish!-the hope that God will never fail him nor forsake him, that the Divine Spirit shall be his guide and comforter, that his heavenly Advocate shall secure to him mercy and grace in every time of need, that the Lord will perfect that which concerneth him. Oh! are not these glorious hopes, not only worthy of intellectual and immortal beings, but hopes which ennoble and purify and bless them! Can the greatest and best portion of worldly good which human heart ever ventured to anticipate bear comparison with them for a single moment? And that hope rests on a sure foundation. It is built on the living and imperishable Word of Him who is eternal and almighty, whose name is Faithful and True, and sooner shall heaven and earth pass than one iota or tittle of His Word remain unfulfilled. (James Stark, D. D.) The Word of God a living thing I. The Word of God is the seed of life. It is a principle having life and energy, which sown in man’ s heart grows there, expands, and bears fruit to such an extent that the whole man is transformed into a new creature, and henceforth lives to God. It is not so often a broad outline of Christian truth that strikes its root into the conscience as some word or two; some thought; some blessed promise, such as 1 John 1:7; some touching invitation, like Matthew 11:28; some alarming note of warning, as Luke 13:3; some fearful description, as 1 Timothy 5:6. In the private history of almost every one amongst us who has dared to confess Christ there has been, previous to that step, a time of reading and of praying over the Word of God. Schoolboys in their private rooms, trembling, it may be, at their fellows’ laugh, clerks in their intervals of business, a wife in her husband’ s absence at his daily work, soldiers and sailors, have placed the Bible on their tables, read, prayed, applied the Word, made it their own, and so been “ born again of this incorruptible seed,” etc. II. The Word of God liveth and abideth forever; and if we need to receive it into our hearts as the seed of life, so have we need to cherish it there as the support of life-of that life which, beginning here, goes on throughout eternity. Distinctly and forever shall we think of and see before us the Lamb who has redeemed us to God by His blood. Distinctly and forever will His holy law stand out as the law by which we tried to live on earth and by which we cannot fail to live in heaven. (F. Morse, M. A.) Human changes and the Divine unchangeableness Human changes and the Divine unchangeableness-this is the subject suggested by our text. Its first clause is an utterance of the despondency which comes over us as we contemplate the frail lives of men. The second clause answers that despondency by affirming that the Word of the Lord is not changeful like the thought of man, but enduring as God Himself. The third clause declares that in the gospel we have the abiding Word of God; and the whole passage is intended to illustrate the foregoing declaration that faith in the gospel makes men as immortal as God; we are “ born again, not of corruptible seed, but of incorruptible, by the Word of God, which liveth and abideth forever.” Now the Bible is not a despondent book. Prophets and apostles give expression to our despondency only to correct and to console it. I. The first consolation our text has for this depression is that it contrasts with our frailty the Word of the Eternal God. It matters little that the worker passes if his work endures. If we had but as firm a faith in “ the Word of God” as we have in the results of human investigation, if we were as earnest in the Divine work as in our own, despondency would be at an end. Piety will never be checked, faith will never languish, because “ all flesh is as grass, and all the glory of man as the flower of grass.” For piety is bent on serving God, and faith receives God’ s revelation; and though “ the grass withereth and the flower thereof falleth away,” “ the Word of the Lord endureth forever.” II. The next thought suggested by our text is that man’ s changefulness illustrates the eternal purpose of God. The Divine intention is brought out in His dealing with the fleeting generations of men; it becomes venerable in retrospect, while it is ever revealing itself in the freshness of a progressive history. An unvarying history would be a history of death; we gain a vaster idea of permanence by advance than we could ever gain by the continuance of unchanging forms. “ One generation passeth away, and another generation cometh; but the earth abideth forever” -depository of God’ s creative energy. Another spring sees the grass revive; the trees look down on the renewed face of the earth. So, though men die, humanity endures; the same in its great necessities, the same in its sense of dependence and obligation, with quenchless aspirations ever rising; there is an abiding human heart. And humanity finds the same eternal God, the same object of piety, the inspirer and rewarder of faith, the fountain of an everlasting hope; finds the same salvation, the same Saviour-“ Jesus Christ, yesterday and today the same, and forever.” There is development in humanity as there is evolution in nature; and this development witnesses to the abiding God, who needs ages to work out His will and reveal His eternal purpose of goodness and grace to waiting man. III. It is not of the eternity of God or of God’ s rule over the world that our text speaks; it is “ The Word of the Lord,” which “ endureth forever,” We need a revelation; an unrevealed were an unknown God. And yet how can we dream of abiding truth in a changing humanity? As mankind advances will not men’ s thoughts vary concerning even such fundamental things as moral obligation, the character of virtue, the objects of our devotion, the very being of God? The answer is, there will be development in the Christian faith; a fuller apprehension of its truths, a deeper sympathy with its spirit, a larger experience of its power, a broader application of it to the varying wants of men. But it will be from the old founts that the new inspirations will be drawn; men will turn to Christ and His gospel in every social complication, every conflict of faith, every spiritual need. The world’ s morals must be Christian morals; the world’ s religion the Christian faith. We are able to apply the test of history to this prediction. What book is there, eighteen hundred years old, which has the interest for all sorts and conditions of men the gospel has? We look inward, and we find the reason of its perpetuity to lie in its appeal to what is deepest in the soul of man. IV. The enduring Word of God is the pledge of our endurance. “ Being born again, not of corruptible seed, but of incorruptible, by the Word of God, which liveth and abideth forever.” The gospel has been “ the salt of the earth,” preserving it from decay. Under it the world has renewed its youth, and its last days shall be its best. The love and righteousness, which are first revealed to our faith as ever abiding in God, and then are formed in Us-graces of character as well as objects of faith-are the only things that can endure. The man in whom they are not is dead while he liveth; the man in whom they are shall live, although he die. (A. Mackennal, D. D.) The enduring Word I. We have here a divine gospel; for what word can endure forever but that which is spoken by the eternal God? II. We have here as everliving gospel, as full of vitality as when it first came from the lips of God, as strong to convince and convert, to regenerate and console, to sustain and sanctify, as ever it was in its first days of wonder working. III. We have an unchanging gospel, which is not today green grass and tomorrow dry hay, but always the abiding truth of the immutable Jehovah. Opinions alter, but truth certified by God can no more change than the God who uttered it. IV. Here, then, we have a gospel to rejoice in, a Word of the Lord upon which we may lean all our weight. “ Forever” includes life, death, judgment, and eternity. (C. H. Spurgeon.) The Word of the Lord everlasting I am glad to have deliverance like this, so distinct, so comprehensive, and at the same time so authoritative. Men sometimes ask us what it is that we mean when we speak so positively about the Word of the Lord. In one phrase, we answer, we mean the glad tidings of great joy which are unto all people, that unto them was born on a given day in a city of David a Saviour, who was Christ the Lord. This emphatically is the Word of the Lord. The facts which relate to the sufferings of our Redeemer and the facts which relate to His subsequent acts of everlasting glory are a message from God unto man. And the predictions, the narrations, the explanations, the invitations, and the promises altogether make up what the apostle is here designating; put altogether, they constitute the glorious gospel of the blessed God. The adversaries of the Christian faith tell us that our old gospel will presently be disproved. Strange, if it is to come to nothing, that it has survived for nineteen centuries already! I. It is secure, whatever may be the efforts of possible persecution. I do not say that you will not have apparent triumphs on the part of the persecutors. False brethren will fall away, but God’ s truth, somehow or other, will still survive, and He to whom that truth pertains and whose Word we are speaking will make it good in spite of opposition, and make it good in the oppressions of His faithful servants, strengthening them with strength in their souls, turning curse into blessing, and making the wrath of man to praise Him, whilst the remainder of that wrath He will restrain. II. The old gospel is in no danger whatever from the intellectual opposition of our modern infidels. Here and there we have the sound of triumph on the part of our adversaries. Reading their literature, as some of us do, we find those triumphs much more frequent perhaps than some of you may suppose; but what are the triumphs? They are not triumphs over the old gospel as it came down from heaven. You have had things incorporated with Christianity which God never put there-they are disproved; you have had opinions foisted upon the gospel from the traditions of men-they are being detached; you have had interpretations of Holy Scripture which are undoubtedly untrue-you have had them put to silence. But need I say that such victories are not against us? They are on our side! To get rid of error is to get rid of so much dead weight; and although the discomfiture of a Christian man, when the traditions which he has maintained are taken from beneath him, may not be that which he likes, yet such discomfiture is so much clear gain to the Christian cause, and that clear gain it will go on to acquire. III. The old gospel is in no danger from the discoveries of our scientific men. I know of no statement so popular amongst the foes of the Christian faith as this, that the teachings of our sacred books are at variance with the teachings of the natural sciences; at variance, for example, with the teachings of astronomy, of archaeology, and especially of geology. Not one of those sciences whispers a coming contradiction to your Bibles; not one of them foretokens a coming time when you will have either to give up that book or to deny indisputable facts. IV. The old gospel is in no danger from the advancement of civilisation. How is civilisation advancing! What a power is that of our commerce, our literature, our science, our art, our philanthropy, our moral and intellectual philosophy! There is much about it to be admired; it softens asperities, conciliates antagonism, refines the manners, elevates the character, combines and consolidates into one the entire family of man. Wondrous is the good which it has been doing, and wondrous is the good of which it is itself the representative and the embodiment. Tell us that civilisation will be the destroyer of Christianity! Why, abstract from your modern civilisation that which Christianity has imparted to it, and you have just that which very presently, by common consent, would be buried and out of sight. Why, it is the very child which your Christianity has brought forth; it is the very creation of which Christianity in her pure exuberance is instrumentally the creator. You might just as well think of this great superstructure in which we are assembled existing without a foundation as to think of modern civilisation existing without Christianity. V. The old gospel is in no danger from the ulterior necessities of humanity. There may be species of human necessity that have never yet come to light in our acquaintance with mankind; and there may be species that never will come to light, except it be in some further and advanced stage of the history of our race. The capacities, the susceptibilities, and the activities of the human soul are perfectly wonderful. Give to that human soul the opportunity, the means, and the appliances which may be requisite, and where is the man that will tell me what deeper depths of the emotional he may evince, what mightier forces of the intellectual he may disclose, what intenser sympathy with the diabolical he may display, and what more glowing apprehensions of the immortal he may manifest? Abide by your old gospel with an unfaltering faith. Let that time come, and be it present to your eye now, when there shall be powers of investigation to which there is no parallel now; there will be the message to the man who possesses that power of investigation-Go and investigate the great “ mystery of godliness.” Be your power what it may, it will find its occupation there. Be it so, that there shall be a capability for apprehension to which there is no parallel now: the commandment will be-Go and take the “ unspeakable gift” of God, and try and find the occupation for your apprehension there. Be it so that there is guilt perpetrated-and who can tell after what we see ourselves what forms of guilt may be perpetrated?-be it that guilt is perpetrated at which even the devil stands aghast: there is “ the blood that cleanseth from all sin” ; let the sinner go and be cleansed and pardoned by that. Be it so that there will be unparalleled sympathy with and aspiration for the immortal; let the man who is the subject of such aspirations go and try to understand the “ far more exceeding and eternal weight of glory.” Oh! there is no danger for the old gospel! You may have philosophy sublimated, until that with which we are familiar shall be as nothing side by side with your philosophy; transcendently superior will be the glorious gospel of the blessed God, and so far from being inadequate to man’ s requisitions then, it will supply, with an amplitude which is imperial, all that shall be required. So far from being effete and obsolete, it will exist with living and with royal power; so far from being, as we are told, an exploded superstition, an exhausted fountain, an ancient, decrepit, infirm, unavailable messenger of good, there it will be, in all the vigour of its youth, proclaiming salvation through the blood of the Lamb, and declaring to mankind in its highest elevation there is a higher elevation still. “ Behold, the fear of the Lord, that is wisdom; and to depart from evil, that is understanding.” This Word of the Lord wilt be all adequate to the necessities and the requirements of humanity. (W. Brock.) The Word of God everliving How wonderfully has the Lord provided for the continuance of the vegetable world; He causes the plant to scatter broadcast a multitude of seeds, and bids the winds convey them far and wide. The fowls of the air are commissioned to bear berries and fruits to their proper soils, and even to bury them in the earth; while scores of four-footed creatures, engaged in storing up food for themselves, become planters of trees and propagators of plants. Seeds bear a charmed life about them; they will germinate after being buried for centuries; they have been known to flourish when turned up from the borings of wells from the depth of hundreds of feet, and when ponds and lakes have been dried the undrowned vegetable life has surprised the beholders by blossoming with unknown flowers. Can we imagine that God has been thus careful of the life of the mere grass of the field, which is the very emblem of decay, and yet is negligent of His Word, which liveth and abideth forever? It is not to be dreamed of. Truth, the incorruptible seed, is ever scattering itself; every wind is laden with it, every breath spreads it; it lies dormant in a thousand memories; it preserves its life in the abodes of death. The Lord has but to give the word, and a band of eloquent men shall publish the gospel, apostles and evangelists will rise in abundance, like the warriors who sprang from the fabled dragon’ s teeth; converts will spring up like flowerets at the approach of spring, nations shall be born in a day, and truth, and God the Lord of truth, shall reign forever. (C. H. Spurgeon.) This is the Word which by the gospel is preached.-The same gospel for us 1. The same Word of the Lord-the same glorious gospel-is now preached to you. And it is this day as young and fresh, and strong and imperishable, as ever it was. It “ abideth forever.” And the flesh is still as frail, and all the glory of the flesh still as fleeting, as of old. There is no spot on this round earth where we can escape the admonition and the rebuke to our levity and pride. It startles the wayfarer in the bright savannas of the south, and amid the sands of the desert and the icy desolation of the pole. It whispers from the green mounds of western forests, and is repeated by the billows of ocean as they roll above the multitudes that have gone down to slumber in the silent depths. There is no hope for man, save only what is provided by that Word of the Lord which in the gospel is preached unto you. 2. But remember that even this mighty Word has power to bless and save only as it is believed and obeyed. Alas! how is this simple truth wilfully forgotten by multitudes who may yet be said to be exemplary in their attendance on public ordinances! 3. Let me ask those of you who profess faith in the gospel whether your obedience of the truth is such as purifies your souls from all filthiness of the flesh and of the spirit; whether, in particular, it has tended in any measure to a brotherly love unfeigned. (J. Lillie, D. D.) . 1 Peter 2:1-3 Wherefore laying aside all malice.Malice laid aside I. That regeneration and the low of sin cannot stand together, it must needs be accompanied with a new life. Do vines bear brambles? II. That there is no perfection here to be attained, for even the best have sin dwelling, though not reigning, in them. III. That it is no easy thing to be a Christian. IV. That under those corruptions here named all others are included. V. That most of those here mentioned are inward corruptions which we must as well avoid as the outward. (John Rogers.) Renovation I. What is to be laid aside? “ All malice, guile, hypocrisies, envies, evil speakings.” These are only a few specimens of the many lusts which are to be cast out, if we would enter the kingdom of heaven. If a child has swallowed poison I could not expect that wholesome food would confer any benefit upon him-the poison must be first removed; and if these poisonous evils lodge in your hearts and be not repented of, they prevent the Word of God having its proper effect, they effectually neutralise it. II. The special reason why these are to be “ laid aside.” The fact of their being “ newborn babes,” the apostle urges as a reason why they should put away all these evils. This reason is a very efficacious one. If you are born again, what have you to do any more with the old habits of corruption? III. What is to be desired? “ The sincere milk of the Word.” IV. For what is the “ sincere milk of the word” to be desired? “ That ye may grow thereby.” (H. Verschoyle.) A catalogue of sins to be avoided I. It is exceedingly profitable to gather special catalogues of our sins which we should avoid, to single out such as we would specially strive against, and do more specially hurt us. II. The minister ought to inform his flock concerning the particular faults that hinder the work of his ministry where he lives. It is not enough to reprove sin, but there is a great judgment to be expressed in applying himself to the diseases of that people. III. The apostle doth not name here all the sins that hinder the Word, but he imports that in most places these here named do much reign, and marvellously let the course of the Word. IV. It should be considered how these sins do hinder the Word. (N. Byfield.) Malice.-Malice is an old grudge upon some wrong done, or conceived to be done to a man, whereupon he waits to do some mischief to him that did it. Anger is like a fire kindled in thorns, soon blazeth, is soon out; but malice, like fire kindled in a log, it continues long. This is often forbidden (Ephesians 4:31; Colossians 3:8).1. We ought to take heed of the beginnings of unadvised anger. God is slow to wrath, and so should we be. 2. If we be overtaken (as a right good man may) take heed it fester not, grow not to hatred; heal it quickly as we do our wounds. The devil is an ill counsellor. (John Rogers.) The venomous disposition There are plants which may be said to distil venom of their own accord. The machineel tree, for example (by no means uncommon in the West India Islands), affords a milky fluid which blisters the skin as if it were burnt with a hot iron; and indeed so dangerous has the vegetable been accounted, that if a traveller should sleep under its shade it was once popularly believed he would never wake again. The venomous disposition of these plants has its representative in the human family. There are persons to be met with who are so spiteful as to cause pain the moment you come into contact with them. Their lips distil malice, and it seems the object of their life to inflict malignant wounds. If you trust them your happiness will sleep the sleep of death. (Scientific illustrations.) All guile.- Guile It is meant of guile that is between men and men in their dealings with each other, as in buying, selling, letting, hiring, borrowing, lending, paying wages, doing work, partnership, etc.; when men would seem to do well, but do otherwise; when one thing is pretended, but another practised. We are not born for ourselves, but for the good of each other; we must not lie one to another, seeing we are members one to another, as it were monstrous in the natural body to see the hand beguile the mouth, etc., and yet how common is this sin! how doth one spread a net for another! not caring how they come by their goods, so they be once masters of them. (John Rogers.) Guile in small matters as well as great to be avoided “ All” -this is added to show (lest any should think none but guile in great matters or measure forbidden here) that there is a thorough reformation required. Therefore it will not serve any man’ s turn to say, “ My shop is not so dark as others; I mingle not my commodities so much as such and such; I never deceived in any great matters.” All guile must be abandoned by a Christian who cares for his soul. A Christian must show forth the truth of his Christianity in his particular calling, in his shop, buying, selling, etc., that men may count his word as good as a bond, that they dare rest on his faithfulness, that he will not deceive. (John Rogers.) Hypocrisies.-Preservatives against hypocrisy 1. Keep thyself in God’ s presence; remember always that His eyes are upon thee (Psalms 16:8; Genesis 17:1). 2. Thou must pray much and often to God to create a right spirit within thee; for by nature we have all hypocritical hearts (Psalms 51:10). 3. Keep thy heart with all diligence, watching daily and resisting distractions, wavering thoughts, and forgetfulness. Judge thyself seriously before God (James 4:8; Matthew 23:26). 4. In all matters of well-doing be as secret as may be (Matthew 6:1-34) both in mercy, prayer, fasting, reading, and the like. 5. Be watchful over thy own ways, and see that thou be as careful of all duties of godliness in prosperity as in adversity, in health as in sickness (Job 27:9-10). 6. Converse with such as in whom thou discernest true spirits without guile, and shun the company of known hypocrites. 7. Be not rash and easy to condemn other men for hypocrites, only because they cross thy opinions, or humours, or will, or practice. It is often observed that rash censurers that usually lash others as hypocrites fall at length into some vile kind of hypocrisy themselves. (N. Byfield.) Hypocrisy Hypocrites are like unto white silver, but they draw black lines, they have a seeming sanctified outside, but stuffed within with malice, worldliness, intemperance; like window cushions made up of velvet, and perhaps richly embroidered, but stuffed within with hay. (J. Spencer.) Hypocrisy ineffective Coals of fire cannot be concealed beneath the most sumptuous apparel, they will betray themselves with smoke and flame; nor can darling sins be long hidden beneath the most ostentatious profession, they will sooner or later discover themselves, and burn sad holes in the man’ s reputation. Sin needs quenching in the Saviour’ s blood, not concealing under the garb of religion. (C. H. Spurgeon.) Envies.- The hatefulness of envy I. Consider the subject persons in which it usually is. It is found most in natural men (Titus 3:3), yea, in silly men (Job 5:2). This was the sin of Cain (Genesis 4:1-26). yea, of the devil himself. II. Consider the cause of it. It is for the most part the daughter of pride (Galatians 5:26), sometimes of covetousness (Proverbs 28:22), and often of some egregious transgression, such as in Romans 1:29, but ever it is the filthy fruit of the flesh (Galatians 5:25). III. Consider the vile effects of it, which are many.1. It hath done many mischiefs for which it is infamous. It sold Joseph into Egypt (Genesis 37:1-36), and killed the Son of God (Matthew 27:8); 2. It deforms our natures, it makes a man suspicious, malicious, contentious, it makes us to provoke, backbite, and practise evil against our neighbours. 3. It begins even death and hell, while a man is alive (Job 5:2). It destroyeth the contentment of his life, and burns him with a kind of fire unquenchable. IV. It is a notable hindrance to the profit of the Word, and so no doubt it is to prayer and all piety, as evidently it is a let of charity (Philippians 1:15). (N. Byfield.) All evil speakings.-Rules against evil speaking He that would restrain himself from being guilty of backbiting, judging, reviling, or any kind of evil speaking, must observe such rules as these. I. He must learn to speak well to God and of godliness. If we did study that holy language of speaking to God by prayer, we would be easily fitted for the government of our tongues toward men: we speak ill to men because we pray but ill to God. II. He must study to be quiet and not meddle with the strife that belongs not to him; resolving that he will never suffer as a busybody in other men’ s matters (1 Thessalonians 4:1-18; 1 Peter 4:15). III. He must keep a catalogue of his own faults continually in his mind. When we are so apt to task others it is because we forget our own wickedness. IV. His words must be few, for in a multitude of words there cannot want sin, and usually this sin is never absent. V. He must not allow himself liberty to think evil. A suspicious person will speak evil. VI. He must pray to God to set a watch before the doors of his lips. VII. He must avoid vain and provoking company. When men get into idle company the very complement of discoursing extracteth evil speaking to fill up the time; especially he must avoid the company of censurers, for their ill-language, though at first disliked, is insensibly learned. VIII. He must especially strive to get meekness, and show his meekness to all men (Titus 3:1-2). IX. If he have this way offended, then let him follow that counsel, “ Let his own words grieve him” (Psalms 56:5); that is let him humble himself seriously for it before God by hearty repentance; this sin is seldom mended, because it is seldom repented of. (N. Byfield.) Pernicious and evil speaking abundant Alas, evil speaking floods the world as some weeds cover the fields in early summer! My heart was made sad in some journeys last year as I saw many large tracks of grain almost hidden by a yellow sea of flowering weeds. For the time you think it is not possible that any of the corn can come to perfection. Even there, however, a harvest is reaped; but the harvest would have been heavier if the fields had been clean. Evil speaking, like one dominant weed, covers the surface of society, and chokes in great measure the growth of the good seed. Christians, ye are God’ s husbandry-ploughed field; put away these bitter things in their seed thoughts and in their matured actions, that ye may be fruitful unto Him. If the multitude of words spoken by professing Christians in disparagement of their neighbours were reduced first by the omission of all that is not strictly true and fair; and next by the omission of all that is not spoken with a good object in view; and next by the omission of all that, though spoken with a good intention, is unwisely spoken, and mischievous in its results;-the remainder would, like Gideon’ s army, be very small in number, but very select in kind. The residuum would consist only of the testimony of true men against wickedness, which truth and faithfulness, as in God’ s sight, compelled them to utter. (W. Arnot.) As newborn babes, desire the sincere milk of the Word.- Christian childhood and its appropriate nourishment I. The similitude by which Christians are here represented.1. This may relate to the commencement of the spiritual life at regeneration, as compared with its subsequent growth in this world. Not only has this life a beginning here, after the natural birth, but it begins like that, in a small, feeble, and almost imperceptible manner. 2. But this childhood may relate to the whole state of the spiritual life in the present world as compared with its future manhood. II. What that growth is which the scripture is calculated thus to promote though the whole course of our mortal existence.1. In knowledge. At first this principle is weak in its perception of the things of revelation. It begins with those parts of Scripture which lie nearest to human observation, and in which the Bible most accommodates itself to human ignorance. It proceeds to those passages suited to an awakened and quickened state of feeling. 2. In purity. The mind naturally conforms itself to the sentiments with which it is conversant. 3. In heavenly mindedness. To that world from which the Scriptures Came, and about which they frequently treat, they insensibly draw the devout peruser. They facilitate the withdrawment of our minds from this world by the transitoriness which they attach to all earthly excellences, and by making them to stand for signs of others, yet greater and better, in the celestial economy. Hence our elevation is effectively promoted. 4. In peace and tranquillity of mind, amidst all the disturbances and ills of life. What book is, or can be, like the Bible, for its perpetual reference of all things here to a Divine superintendence? 5. In fine, the Scripture is calculated to promote the growth of every grace of the Spirit necessary to complete the Christian character. It feeds repentance by the evil it discloses in sin; it feeds Divine love by the excellence it portrays in God, rectifying the misconceptions of the carnal mind; it feeds faith by the representation of its objects, and by the impression it makes of its innate majesty and authority on the devout peruser of its pages. In like manner it feeds hope, patience, resignation, zeal, and every other grace which branches out of the principle of spiritual life, and completes the character of the man of God. III. What that state of mind is which Christians are required to cultivate in order to secure this great benefit from the Scripture.1. There must be the removal of what would otherwise prove fatal impediments. James inculcates the same duty under a different metaphor (1 Peter 1:21). He compares the Word to a fruit bearing plant, requiring a clean and friendly soil for its growth. The weeds of evil dispositions must be eradicated, or its roots will not spread, nor its virtue disclose itself. “ Purify your hearts,” therefore, he adds elsewhere, “ ye double minded. Be ye doers of the Word,” etc. 2. These impediments being removed, we must cherish and promote the spiritual appetite. The appetite of the infant for its appropriate supply is natural. The spiritual appetite, to be analogous to it, must have several properties. (1) It must be earnest. The child cries, is impatient for its designed support; and it is not an idle, cold, sluggish desire after the aliment provided for spiritual growth that will subserve our growth. “ My soul breaketh,” says David, “ for the longing it hath to Thy statutes.” (2) It must be specific and suitable. No toys and gew-gaws, no gifts of gold and silver, no, nor even of the most delicious food, will compensate the infant for the absence of its natural support. Thus we must take heed not to substitute for the truth of Scripture the sentiments of men, though set forth with all the advantages of learning and eloquence. (3) It must be constant, The infant tires not of its proper food, but finds in it all it wants both nutritive and delicious. Nor must we tire of the Word of God, nor seek for a greater variety than it presents. It contains within itself all that is necessary for life and godliness, for comfort and improvement. (J. Leifchild.) God’ s newborn babes and their food I. Our condition as God’ s little ones. “ Newborn babes.” This world is but the nursery in which the heirs of God are spending the first lisping years of their existence, preparatory to the opening of life to full maturity yonder in the light of God.1. This word should teach us humility. Our best pace and strongest walking in obedience here is as but the stepping of children in comparison with the perfect obedience of glory, when we shall follow the Lamb whithersoever He goeth. All our knowledge here is but as the ignorance of infants, and all our expressions of God and of His praises but as the first stammerings of children, in comparison with the knowledge we shall have of Him hereafter. It becomes us, therefore, not to exercise ourselves in great matters, or in things too high for us, but to quiet ourselves as a child that is weaned of its mother. Not surprised, if unnoticed or unknown; not angry, if treated with small respect; not discouraged, if face to face with incomprehensible mysteries. 2. This word should also teach us hope. There is no young thing so helpless as a babe. But He who has appointed the long months of babyhood has also provided the love and patience with which mother and father welcome and tend the strange wee thing which has come into their home. And shall God have put into others qualities in which He is Himself deficient? Shall He have provided so carefully for us in our first birth, and have provided nought in our second? Your weakness, and ailments, and nervous dread, and besetting sins, and hereditary taint of evil habit and dulness of vision, will not drive God from you, but will bring Him nearer. 3. This word should also teach us our true attitude towards God. Throw yourself on Him with the abandonment of a babe. Roll on Him the responsibility of choosing for you-directing, protecting, and delivering you. If you are overcome by sin, be sure that it cannot alienate His love, any more than can smallpox, which has marred some dear tiny face, prevent the mother from kissing the little parched lips. II. Our food. “ Long for the spiritual milk which is without guile” (R.V.). There is nothing which so proves the inspiration of the Scriptures as their suitableness to the nurture of the new life in the soul. As long as that life is absent, there is no special charm in the sacred Word: it lies unnoticed on the shelf. But directly it has been implanted, and whilst yet in its earliest stages, it seeks after the Word of God as a babe after its mother’ s milk; and instantly it begins to grow. III. How to create an appetite for the Word. “ Desire.” One of the most dangerous symptoms is the loss of appetite. And there is no surer indication of religious declension and ill-health than the cessation of desire for the Word of God. How can that appetite be created where lacking, and stimulated where declining?1. Put off the evil that clings to you. 2. Remember that your growth depends on your feeding on the Word. 3. Stimulate your desire by the memory of past enjoyment. “ If so be that ye have tasted that the Lord is gracious.” (F. B. Meyer, B. A.) Spiritual development The text urges three important elements of holy living. I. Soul mortification-“ Lay aside all malice,” etc. This is a sacrifice. It does not come natural to the human soul. It demands effort. It is not an immediate attainment, but demands a period of growth. The series of worldly developments here alluded to are important marks of fallen men, and at the same time are painful disfigurements to professing Christians.1. There is malice-i.e., ill-feeling of every kind. Under malice may be ranged political animosities which disturb the kindly relationship of men; unreasoning prejudice; the desire to injure those whom we dislike; bitterness, etc. 2. There is guile. This includes deceit. 3. There is hypocrisy-pretending a fictitious goodness which we do not possess. I take it that this includes cant, boasting, parade of religion, etc., for the word is not hypocrisy, but hypocrisies. 4. Envies. Again in the plural, for there are different kinds of envy. 5. Evil speakings. The failing here alluded to goes far to cause all the bitterness of worldly society. II. Soul development. There must be not only casting out of the evil, but also the taking in of what is good. The first requirement for development is to be brought into a state fit for growth. III. Soul incitement-“ Since ye have tasted,” etc. The first taste creates a desire for a more abundant supply. (J. J. S. Bird, B. A.) Soul evolution I. That soul advancement is an evolution - “ That ye may grow thereby.” That is, the growth of the whole soul-all its faculties, forces, and germs of power. Growth implies-1. Inner life. A dead thing cannot grow. Sometimes education is spoken of as if the mind were a vessel into which a certain amount of information is to be poured until the mind is filled. Sometimes, as if the mind were a stone, on which the instructor was to act as a lapidary, and polish it into some beautiful form. Hence we hear so much of accomplishments, painting, drawing, music, etc. Sometimes, as if the mind was arable land, to be ploughed and in which to plant seed to germinate and develop. Philosophically, nothing can grow in the soul. It is the soul itself that grows. 2. An inner life of latent power. A thing may have life, and nothing within for future development. Not so with the soul; it has boundless possibilities. 3. A life possessing developing conditions. II. That soul evolution involves soul hunger. “ As newborn babes desire [R.V., long for] the sincere [R.V., spiritual] milk.” Vegetable life grows without a desire; so, indeed, with animal life. But if the soul is to grow, it must desire it intensely.1. The hunger must be for natural nutriment. 2. The nutriment must be of the best kind-“ Sincere [R.V., spiritual] milk.” What is the best kind? The “ truth as it is in Jesus.” (D. Thomas, D. D.) The milk of the Word I. Healthy appetite: or, in other words, an earnest desire for spiritual nourishment.1. It is of prime importance that we have a real craving for spiritual truth, for Christ will benefit us only as we appropriate Him. 2. We should further cultivate a discriminating taste. The babe’ s taste guards it against unwholesome food; it covets nothing but the mother’ s milk. So ought we to acquire a sensitive palate in respect of spiritual things, a palate able to discriminate between the precious and the vile. Is not the vitiated taste of many hearers of the gospel a symptom of a long-standing disease? 3. We should further habituate ourselves to desire strong meat, to digest well the great fundamental doctrines of the gospel. This then is the first requisite of orthodoxy, namely that we possess vigorous, healthy digestive organs. Gospel truth must be mixed with faith in them that hear it; that is to say, they must possess healthy organs, able to supply the spiritual secretions necessary to convert what we read and hear into part and parcel of our spiritual life. II. Healthy food; or, in other words, God’ s truth as contained in Holy Writ.1. The milk of the Word. The great verses of the Bible are like so many breasts, from which we are to suck in the spiritual aliment necessary to our well-being. Do you know what it is to eat words, and especially God’ s words? The process is as real as eating bread and meat, and the results are much more abiding. “ Thy words were found, and I did eat them” : he converted them into an integral part of his spiritual nature. 2. “ The milk of the Word,” or rational milk. Rational milk in contrast to the rites and ceremonies both of the Jewish and heathen religions. Christians are to live more by mind and less by the senses. 3. “ The sincere-unadulterated-milk of the Word,” that is to say, milk free from all deleterious admixtures. III. Healthy growth. “ That we may grow thereby unto salvation.” In this Epistle salvation is used technically for salvation in the future, salvation full, complete, perfect. Now what does this growth unto salvation imply?1. For one thing it implies growth in knowledge, for spiritual enlightenment is an essential factor in salvation. 2. Growth unto salvation further implies growth in holiness. “ Having laid aside all sin, and all malice, and all evil speaking.” Other religions forbid particular sins; but whilst prohibiting one class of sins, they tolerate other classes. Mahometanism, for instance, prohibits drunkenness; seldom does a Mahometan get intoxicated. But whilst prohibiting drunkenness it licenses adultery. And by thus flinging away sin from us our spiritual palate will gradually recover its normal, healthy tone; we will relish the unadulterated milk of the Word more than our ordinary food and drink. (J. C. Jones, D. D.) The Christian life in some of its characteristics It is agreed that religion, subjectively considered, is life. “ He that hath the Son hath life.” If a man has religion, it is life in him. But it is finite life, limited and dependent. It requires for its continuance outside support and supply. Turning now to this life let us take note of some of its characteristics.1. And, first, all life grows. This may not he apparent to the eye, but it is to the reason. Growth is the most unambiguous and decisive sign of life. A swelling bud, a beating pulse-this is proof. Life and growth go together as inevitable antecedents and consequents; and where there is growth, there is increment. This does not necessitate augmentation in size. It is not untrue to fact or absurd to say of a thing growing that it is growing small. Many a tree, many an animal, not a few persons of our acquaintance, are not as large as they formerly were. 2. Wherever there is growth, there is eating. The plant eats; down in the ground at the end of the rootlets we find spongioles, and these are mouths. In transplanting a shrub or tree the thing we care for is not to destroy these mouths, If true of vegetable life that it lives by eating, it is more obviously true of animal life. Do you say that in many of the lowest forms of sentient life we find no mouths? True apparently; but the bodies of such invertebrates abound in absorbents that serve the same purpose. 3. That nothing eats without an appetite. The etymology of this word (appetitus) gives as its striking meaning a seeking for, longing after. In vegetable life we have the analogue of appetite; for we find that every root, trunk, branch, is elongating itself in pursuit of its required supply. The tree in the thick forest extends itself to get up into the light and heat; and the stray vegetable in the cellar does the same to get out of the dark and cold just where the light and warmth have been pouring in. This power to elongate and reach its supply is one of the most interesting phenomena in the vegetable kingdom. Nor is it otherwise among animals. Their power to help themselves is itself a department of science, and awakens the deepest interest. Besides the power of elongation to get supply, they have the power of locomotion. Appetite unsupplied is hunger, one of the most intense forms of physical unrest; and impels to the most intense exertions to get relief. But what next after appetite? You say that our series of organic facts cannot end in appetite; you say it must have its correlative supply. You add that there is a wonderful law in nature ordaining in every grade of life that there shall be as many forms of reciprocal supply as there are subjective wants. For every mouth there is the required morsel, and, in general a superabundant supply. In man this law bears sway in a three-fold form, for he has in him three lives: life of body, brain, and soul. The physical life grows by eating what the physical appetite craves; the supplies here are found in the outward physical world. This life can live and grow on bread alone. The intellectual life grows by eating what the intellectual appetite craves; the supplies here are found in the truths of fact and principle discoverable in the world of science. The moral and spiritual life grows by eating what the moral and spiritual life craves; here the supplies are found in all the verities that appertain to the soul in relation to God and the immortal life. Having these three forms of life, and, in natural order, these three forms of growth, eating, and appetite, and, having these three forms of supply, man can have three forms of satisfaction: he can be physically, intellectually, and morally supplied and at rest. Therefore he can have three forms of health. He can be whole in body, mind, and soul; or he can be ailing in one department of his being, and well in other respects. In order to perfect health in each life there must be a perfect working of the functions of each in possession of a perfect supply. A man can have as many forms of hunger, starvation, and death by starvation, as he has lives. The inference here is inevitable, that if a man has in him three lives, and, in his prerogative of free will, can make each growthful or not, according as appetite is fed or not fed, then man has in him the power of a three-fold suicide. Thus far we have been considering life as it develops normally. In its various grades we find it growing according to a natural law inlaid in the constitution. We find it interfered with only by encroachment and want of supply. Unfallen human life observed this law in the primeval garden. But this adherence to law in an orderly unfolding did not continue. Sin entered, and with it a new factor, disease. It is an easy consequence of sin, itself wholly unnatural; it belongs to that category of thorns and thistles, toil and sweat and birth pangs, visited upon the race as instruments of probationary discipline and culture. This prepares us to notice the benignity of nature in providing not only for normal but as well for abnormal wants. Not only does she provide for hunger, thirst, rest, to repair waste and recover tone, but she is a storehouse of remedies for disease. There are provisions not only for life when exhausted by expenditure, but when assailed and wounded by assault. It is well known that animals when ill either refuse to eat, or, eating, select a medicinal diet. Such food is found in those forms of supply abounding in nature that are repelled in a state of health. Disease sharpens an instinctive appetite for them, and impels to a search for them. Man as a physical being, diseased, like all animals, finds himself dependent for cure on medicinal remedies stored in nature. There is a more subtle force in man, and a more destructive one, than disease, and whose proper seat is the soul. It is sin: what disease is to the body, sin is to the spiritual powers of man. The spheres in which these destructive forces work greatly differ, but such is the organic connection between them that we are quick to see the natural alliance of sin and disease. As in physical disease there is a suppression of appetite for common food, and a search for a medicinal diet, so in man’ s apostate condition and severance from God there is disclosed in the remains of his fallen nature, in the intuitions of reason and the instincts of a guilty conscience, a longing after some form of deliverance that has an expiatory value. Sin itself seems to evoke a longing for a remedy that will destroy it. A sick man wants health, and if lie finds it at all, he finds it in nature’ s stores; a lost man wants salvation, and if he finds it at all, he finds it in Christ crucified. Mark here the point of critical interest: when the sinner in the consciousness of his need turns to Christ and believes on Him, he is born again. In this change, his third life has been taken off the creature as having a supreme interest and placed upon God where it originally belonged; and so, being in Christ Jesus, the man, dead in trespasses and sins, is made alive from the dead. But the new man that is born in him is, to use the apostle’ s figure, a babe in Christ. There exist still in the converted man the remains of the old nature, and these remains are summed up by the apostle and called the old man. And now what have we? A marvellous phenomenon! a man with four lives in him. The physical and intellectual lives remain; then we have the new life, the babe in Christ, called the new man; finally we have a fourth life in the remains of the old life, called by St. Paul the old man. In the soul of the renewed man then we find two lives; and let us mark their relation to each other. In the first place, the new man though a babe holds the ascendency. He is so much the creation of the Spirit that we can say of him that he is the child of a King. In his minority in this world he has to retain his throne by warfare. In the text, St. Peter, addressing believers, urges them to exercise the appetite, characteristic of newborn babes, in their longing for the spiritual milk of the Word which is without guile, that they may grow thereby. He assumes the existence of life, and life that is to grow by eating in compliance with an awakened appetite. The reign of law is supreme in all growth. All the characteristics of life in the lower kingdoms of nature reappear here in the spiritual sphere. We have seen that all appetite, wherever found, finds its corresponding supply in its environment. This is true of the life of the believer. That life is Divine in its origin from heaven, and in its nature spiritual; therefore corresponding to it is an objective supply equally Divine and spiritual. But you ask, How about the old third life, now called by the apostle the old man, and which we have seen to be living a dying life? Does it grow? I reply that the old man still lives, but, struck with death, is in a mortal decline; there is growth too; but in proportion as the new man grows strong, he grows weak. If the new life is stationary, the old life holds its own; if it is retrograde, the old life waxes and regains ascendency, “ sin reigns.” But you say that if the old life lives in any form, even a lingering death, it must have food, and what is it? This is a vital question; can we find an answer? We have seen that the new life is in spirit totally unlike the old life, and cannot therefore live on the same diet, unless it is mixed. Here we fall upon the great source of weakness among believers-adulteration of food. The Divine plan for the new life is that it should live and grow “ on spiritual milk, which is without guile.” The word “ spiritual” here does not refer to the Holy Spirit as the originator of this diet, but to the Spirit of the new life itself, with which this diet is perfectly congruous. The new life is spirit, and has a diet fitted to it as such; but the diet must be without guile, unadulterated, the pure Word of God. When the new life has this food, and only this food, and enough of it, it hastens on to full growth. Instances abound in the Church of persons of signal excellence in whom this life has had a luxurious exposition. But this food, so nutritious and medicinal to the new man, is innutritious and destructive to the old man. The Divine plan is to kill the old life by the natural process of starvation. It is said that in certain soils clover will not grow under butternut trees; the roots of the butternut extract from the soil all the elements the clover lives on, and so the clover starves and dies. It is by this same law of death by starvation that the old life in believers is to end its career. But the painful fact is that its law is not obeyed. Strange as it may be, believers do not insist that the spiritual milk they drink shall be without adulteration. They allow a mixed diet-elements introduced that are agreeable to the old man. When the diet is half and half, when both the old and the new man can sit at the same table and partake of the same food with equal pleasure, neither is satisfied; both live a stunted life. It is just here that we find an explanation of the mystery of the weakness that abounds in Christian living. Believers half live, because fed on a diet half of which is prepared for the old life. They consult with flesh and blood. They are self-indulgent; and the self they indulge is the old self. They hanker after forbidden food. In them the old life is robust and well to do, the new is pinched and emaciate. Why is this? Because the Divine law of growth in the text is not heeded. Believers are not studious as to their diet. They do not live on the spiritual milk of the Word, and insist that it shall be without guile. They are too tender and sympathetic with the old self. Vigorous self-denial is here demanded. This order is never introverted. It is always the new man in us that drives out the old; and to have the strength required to do it he must have for his diet the spiritual milk of the Word, which is without guile. (C. B. Hulbert.) The Word compared to milk 1. The Word is compared to milk in respect of the plainness of it to young children, which is therefore opposed to strong meat, that is, harder points, and mysteries of religion, so especially for the nourishing nature thereof. 2. It is also compared to milk for the sweetness of it. The Word is sweet to a newborn Christian. 3. Besides, as milk is a general food for all rich and poor, so is the Word the common food of all Christians, the means of their edifying. (John Rogers.) The simultaneous outgoing of evil and incoming of good Observe the relation in which the negative and the positive stand to each other. Although the precept about putting off first meets our eye on the page, the act is not represented as taking precedence in point of time. It is neither first put off the evil and then admit the good, nor first take in the good and then get quit of the evil. The language of the text determines that the two acts are strictly simultaneous. The form of the sentence is, “ Laying aside these, desire this.” This is scientifically correct as well as scripturally true. The coming of Christ unto His own, to the throne of a human heart, “ is like the morning.” And how does the morning come? Is it first that the light comes and then the darkness departs? or first the darkness departs and then the light advances? It is neither. As the light advances the darkness recedes. The processes are strictly simultaneous, but in nature the advance of light is the cause and the departure of darkness the effect. Such, also, is the rule in the spiritual sphere. It is indeed true that evil must depart to let in the good, but it is the advance of the good that drives the evil before it. Christ is the stronger who overcomes the strong and casts him out and reigns in his stead. To take in the milk and retain also the envies and evil speakings will give neither comfort nor growth. The effort to mingle these opposites mars the happiness of many a life, and distorts all its testimony for the truth of the gospel. (W. Arnot.) Desire As in children, all speak and work at once-hands, feet, mouth. The Greek word signifieth vehemently to desire. (J. Trapp.) The sincere milk of the Word Guileless, unmixed milk, not sugared or sophisticated with strains of wit, excellency of speech, etc. (J. Trapp.) Appetite for Divine things wanted The Rev. Mr. Walker, of Muthil, was preaching in a neighbouring parish. Next day he was met by one of the resident landowners, who explained to the reverend gentleman that he had not been hearing him on the Sabbath afternoon, as he felt he could not digest more than one sermon. “ I rather think,” said Mr. Walker, “ the appetite is more at fault than the digestion.” (C. Rogers, LL. D.) That ye may grow thereby.-Christian growth I. Christians are to “ grow” -“ grow unto salvation.” This implies present immaturity-that they have not yet reached “ the measure of the stature of the fulness of Christ.” Their hope is ofttimes indistinct and tremulous, even when it is not averted from its appropriate object. Their holiness is stained by innumerable defilements of the flesh and the spirit. Their fear dissolves into a carnal security or a worldly dissipation. Nor does “ brotherly love continue.” But if they are Christians indeed all these elements of the new creature exist at least in the germ. Growth may be slow, and, for a time, even imperceptible. Obstructed by the remaining constitutional taint of the old nature, it may be hindered also by unfavourable circumstances, by the diseases incident to childhood, or through neglect of the appropriate means of growth. But the tendency is there, and that tendency is to be fostered by Christian education. II. The particular means here specified by which this growth is to be promoted is “ the sincere milk of the Word.” III. But, in order to the profitable use of even the pure milk of the Word, there are certain conditions prerequisite.1. There is, first, the necessity of spiritual life. Without it, as there can be no growth, so neither is there any desire after the means of growth, 2. If the soul is to enjoy the full benefit of the provisions of grace it must also be careful of its spiritual health, avoiding all occasions of disease, and especially maintaining a constant guard against the evil tendencies of its own constitutional taint. 3. When the soul has thus been “ purified of malice and wickedness,” one unfailing sign of its healthy condition is a “ desire” -an earnest desire-for the nutriment of the Divine Word. 4. If we would grow by means of the Word it is important that we use the Word for that end. IV. The motives by which this exhortation is enforced.1. In this growth itself there is blessing enough to be its own motive and great reward. There are other considerations, however, suggested by the text. Observe- 2. The introductory word, “ wherefore,” literally “ laying aside, therefore,” etc., referring back to the illustrious attributes of the Word, as these had been set forth at the close of the first chapter. It had there been magnified as the Word of the Lord, as the incorruptible seed, as the living, abiding, everlasting Word. Seeing, then, says Peter, this precious Word decays not, grows not obsolete, and can as little be exhausted as it can be superseded by the word of man or of angel, what remains but that ye “ follow on to know” it, “ give yourselves wholly” to it, and drink deep, drink daily, drink forever of the Divine fountains. This might the rather be expected of them as- 3. In the third place, they had already experienced the regenerating power of the Word, “ as newborn babes.” This is not so much a comparison as a reason. If, moreover, they remember still that they are but children, what more natural than that they should be ambitious to grow? 4. And finally, as they had been made subjects of the gospel’ s regenerating power, so they had likewise tasted the sweetness and blessedness of its revelations. “ If so be” -or if indeed, as you profess, and as I fully believe-“ ye have tasted that the Lord is gracious,” good, kind. You “ tasted,” and you are well aware that you did no more than taste, “ of the heavenly gift,” of that which shall be the eternal satisfaction and joy of all the redeemed. With what confidence, then, in your ready compliance may I not say, Open your mouths wide and the good Lord will fill them. Enlarge to the uttermost both your capacities and your desires, and you will still find this cup of blessing, this river of God, as full as at the first. (J. Lillie, D. D.) Soul growth I. It involves young life. There is no growth without life, and old life grows not. Soul growth consists in the simultaneous and harmonious development of all the powers of the mind under the inspiration and direction of supreme love to God. II. It involves suitable aliment.1. The Word must be taken into the soul by hearing and reading. 2. The Word must be digested by the soul by reflection and prayer. 3. The Word must be incorporated in the soul by holy activities and habits. III. It involves a healthy appetite.1. The soul must have an appetite for truth before it will take it. 2. The soul must have an appetite for the genuine truth before it will get the right nutriment. (Homilist.) Growth by the Word I. The great end to be sought after. “ That ye may grow.” The newborn babe is a fit emblem of the Christian. He is one who has in him the principle of a higher life, and therefore the capacity of growth.1. In what is it the Christian is to grow? In all that constitutes the new nature which he has received of God. (1) The foundation of the Christian life is laid in the knowledge of Jesus Christ. (2) On this there must be a superstructure of virtue and moral goodness reared, and the advancement of the one must keep pace with that of the other. 2. This growth is a gradual process. We must be prepared for fluctuations and vicissitudes in our spiritual condition. 3. Whenever this growth takes place it will be discernible. Not directly, or in itself. A child grows without being in the least degree sensible of it. Nor can even the keenest onlooker see the child grow. The fact that it has grown is discovered from the comparison of what it is now and what it had been at some period more or less distant in the past. Even so it is with Christian growth. II. The means by which this great end is to be secured.1. The truth of God is revealed to us as being adapted to nourish the life of God in the soul. 2. We are to desire God’ s Word in order that we may grow thereby. It is very possible to desire Divine truth for other reasons and other ends than this. It is quite possible to desire to read Holy Scripture because we have been accustomed to do so, or because this wonderful book is very pleasant to read, and touches every part of our intellectual nature. But we must use it intelligently, perseveringly, to secure the great end.1. Have we any right to call ourselves babes in Christ, children of God, born again? If not, then simply we cannot grow. Dead things, stones, cannot grow. 2. Ought not the necessity of growing to be more deeply felt, and the duty on which it depends to be more faithfully discharged? (W. L. Alexander, D. D.) Retaining infantile ideas What man amongst us would consent to be dressed in the garb of his infancy, and to be sent forth into the world dandled in the arms of bearers and habited in the long clothes of his babyhood? But so far as spiritual knowledge and attainments are concerned men are only too willing to retain their infantile ideas, and to resent any attempt to lead them to larger and loftier conceptions of truth, to a more robust and manly faith. (J. Halsey.) The influence of food on spiritual growth Spiritual growth and development are required of us, and spiritual growth and development are a matter of spiritual diet. Buckle, in his “ History of Civilisation,” shows how the characters and dispositions of the various races of men are affected by the food they eat. The broad general truth of this is obvious. The gross feeders are slow thinkers, and the difference in the intellectual qualities between the Eskimo with his blubber and the Frenchman with his cutlets and claret is as great as the difference between the foods themselves. We are what we are-physically, mentally, and to a great extent even morally-mainly in virtue of our diet. If we were to be always subsisting on babies’ food, farinaceous powders and sopped rusks, we should never grow into a stalwart manhood. At the same time you do not expect elevation and refinement of thought from the gourmand and the epicure. The man who con fines himself to the elements of thinking limits himself to the infantile stages of growth, to their helplessness and dependency. (J. Halsey.) Spiritual growth to be sought They take a pride in cultivating their physical nature, in developing their muscle and sinew to the highest efficiency; they will even go into severe training to achieve this end; but in the spiritual sphere the toothless, flabby, milk-imbibing infant is their ideal. (J. Halsey.) Thinking aids growth And it is in that thinking faculty that resides your power of growth. The machine can never be anything else or anything better than it is unless human thought be brought to bear upon it. You cannot teach a machine anything, and because it cannot think it cannot grow. The instinct in the animal is always mere instinct. It never grows. The instinct whereby the bee makes its cell today is the same as that of its ancestors who sipped honey in primeval Eden. The ox is as bovine today as when it first appeared upon the stage of existence. Not one solitary idea has ever entered its brain during all those perhaps hundreds of thousands of years. It has never been able to think itself out of the animal groove, to lift itself, by force of its own will, one step in the scale of creation. But in virtue of his thinking faculty man’ s capacity for growth is illimitable. If he will only use it, cultivate it, develop it, no bounds can be set to its power to expand and elevate him. (J. Halsey.) Appropriate aliment The relation of growth to nutrition is a law of the universe. Every description of life has its appropriate aliment, and only as it is provided with this will it grow; and if you were a farmer you would find that you could not raise your corn and other crops without first charging the soil with silica and ammonia and phosphates, and other elements essential to the building up of the tissues of the plant. The religious manhood is built up no otherwise. It is purely a question of nutriment. (J. Halsey.) Deep Christian knowledge to be desired You have seen on a summer’ s evening the gnats gliding upon the smooth surface of a great river. What do they know of the river’ s wealth, of the beautiful gardens of aquatic weeds, of the shoals of silvery fish and other forms of life that teem in the clear depths beneath? Such is the knowledge of the universe that many Christian people possess, and that they think it right to possess. They skim the surface, but are careful not to wet their wings, and to go no deeper than the guardians of orthodoxy assure them it is safe. (J. Halsey.) A sermon for men of taste “ If so be ye have tasted that the Lord is gracious.” “ If, if” -then this is not a thing to be taken for granted. “ If” -then there is a possibility that some may not have tasted that the Lord is gracious. “ If, if” -then this is not a general but a special mercy, and it becomes our business to inquire whether we are comprehended in that company who know the grace of God by inward experience. I. First, then, taste is prominent in the text.1. The taste here meant is doubtless faith. Faith, in the Scripture, is all the senses. It is sight (Isaiah 45:22); hearing (Isaiah 55:3); smelling (Psalms 45:8); touch (Mark 5:30-31). Faith is equally the spirit’ s taste. “ How sweet are Thy words to my taste! yea, sweeter than honey to nay lips.” We shall have an inward and spiritual apprehension of the sweetness and preciousness of Christ as the result of living faith. 2. The taste here meant is faith in one of its highest operations. To hear Christ’ s voice as the very voice of God in the soul will save us, but that which gives the true enjoyment is the aspect of faith wherein Christ, by holy taste, becomes assimilated to us; we feed on Him; He becometh part of us; His living Word sustaineth us, and His precious blood cheereth us as generous wine. Do you ask, “ In what respect does faith taste that the Lord is gracious?” It is faith operating by experience. 3. Faith, as exhibited to us under the aspect of tasting, is a sure and certain mark of grace in the heart. It is a sure sign of vitality. Man, by nature, is dead in trespasses and sins. Or, to put it in another light, if men have a taste of Christ, it is certain evidence of a Divine change, for men by nature find no delight in Jesus. 4. This taste, where it has been bestowed by grace, is a discerning faculty. If thou canst live upon a gospel which leads thee to depend upon thyself, thou hast no spiritual taste, or else thou wouldst loathe, as much as ever Egyptian loathed to drink of the waters of Nile when turned into blood, to drink of any river which flows from created springs; thou wouldst only drink of the cool stream of the river of life which rises at the foot of the throne of God and flows around the base of Calvary, where Jesus shed His blood. Say, soul, dost thou love Jesus only? Is He all thy salvation and all thy desire, and dost thou repose wholly and solely in Him? For if not, then thou hast no spiritual taste, and thou hast no reason to believe that thou belongest unto Jesus Christ at all. 5. Faith as a taste is not Simply a discerning but a delighting faculty. Men derive much satisfaction from the organs of taste. I pray you delight yourselves in Christ! Let your faith so taste Jesus as to make you glad. Let your joy be as the joy of harvest, and sing ye with Zechariah, “ How great is His goodness, and how great is His beauty! Corn shall make the young men cheerful, and new wine the maids.” 6. This taste of ours is in this life imperfect. As old master Durham says, “‘ Tis but a taste!” We have not yet rested beneath the vines of Canaan; we have only enjoyed the first fruits of the Spirit, and they have set us hungering and thirsting for the fulness of the heavenly heritage. We groan within ourselves, waiting for the adoption. 7. Though ours is an imperfect, we thank God it is a growing taste. We know that sometimes in the decline of life the taste, like the other powers of manhood, decays; but, glory be to God, a taste for Christ will never decay. II. Men who have thus tasted of Christ have special sins to avoid and objects to desire.1. We first dwell upon evils to be avoided. 2. The apostle, having told us what to avoid, tells us what to eat and drink. “ As newborn babes desire,” etc. The Christian man should desire pure doctrine; he should desire to hear the gospel plainly and truthfully preached-not in the words which man’ s wisdom teacheth, but in the words which the Holy Ghost teacheth. It is a sign of declining health in a Christian when he does not love the means of grace. (C. H. Spurgeon.) Christian experience exemplified I. Define Christian experience so far as expressed in the language of the text. Tasting supposes life; where there is no spiritual life there can be no spiritual taste. Tasting implies reception, and this is requisite in order to appreciation. They who savingly prove the gracious character of God are such who have the inward evidence of it. Religion is not a matter of speculation, but of experience; not of form, but of hallowed feeling. Such participation is no criterion of extraordinary proficiency in Christianity; it is essential to its existence. II. The exemplification of such experience of religion in the soul.1. “ If so be ye have tasted that the Lord is gracious,” what thanks do you owe Him? 2. “ If so be ye have tasted that the Lord is gracious,” be gracious like Him. 3. “ If so be ye have tasted that the Lord is gracious,” you know what you are to hope for. Proofs hitherto of His love are pledges for the future. 4. “ If so be ye have tasted that the Lord is gracious,” think what is expected from you. Grow in spiritual stature. The more ample the crop the more delightful to the husbandman and to every beholder who feels an interest in what is excellent. 5. “ If so be ye have tasted that the Lord is gracious,” pity those that have not. (Essex Remembrancer.) A gracious experience of God I. We may consider the goodness of God. He is said to be gracious, or of a bountiful, kind disposition. The graciousness of God is always sweet; the taste of that is never out of season. God is gracious, but it is God in Christ. Though God is mercy and goodness in Himself, yet we cannot apprehend Him so to us, but as we are looking through that medium, the Mediator. His grace is all in Christ. Let us therefore never leave Him out in our desires of tasting the graciousness and love of God, for otherwise we shall but dishonour Him and disappoint ourselves. II. Ye have tasted. There is a tasting exercised by temporary believers spoken of in Hebrews 6:4. That is merely tasting, rather an imaginary taste than real; but this is a true feeding on the graciousness of God; yet is it called but a taste in respect of the fulness to come. Jesus Christ being all in all unto the soul, faith apprehending Him, is all the spiritual senses. Faith is the eye that beholds His matchless beauty, and so kindles love in the soul, and can speak of Him as having seen Him and taken particular notice of Him. It is faith that touches Him and draws virtue from Him, and faith that tastes Him. In order to this there must be a firm believing of the truth of the promises, wherein the free grace of God is expressed and exhibited to us-a sense of the sweetness of that grace being applied or drawn into the soul, and that constitutes properly this taste He that hath indeed tasted of this goodness, oh, how tasteless are those things to him that the world calls sweet! As when you have tasted something that is very sweet, it disrelishes other things after it. Therefore can a Christian so easily either want or use with disregard the delights of this earth. III. The inference. If ye have tasted, etc., then lay aside all malice and guile, and hypocrisies and envies, and all evil speakings, Surely if you have tasted of the kindness and sweetness of God in Christ, it will compose your spirits and conform them to Him. It will diffuse such a sweetness through your soul that there will be no place for malice and guile; there will be nothing but love, and meekness, and singleness of heart. As the Lord is good, so they who taste of His goodness are made like Him (Ephesians 4:32). Again, if ye have tasted, then desire more. This is the truest sign of it. He that is in a continual hunger and thirst after this graciousness of God has surely tasted of it. “ My soul thirsteth for God,” saith David (Psalms 42:2). He had tasted before; he remembers that he went to the house of God with the voice of joy. This is that happy circle wherein the soul of the believer moves. The more he loves it the more he shall taste of this goodness, and the more he tastes the more he shall still love and desire it. But observe-If ye have tasted that the Lord is gracious, then desire the milk of the Word. This is the sweetness of the Word, that it hath in it the Lord’ s graciousness, gives us the knowledge of His love. This they find in it who have spiritual life and senses, and those senses exercised to discern good and evil, and this engages a Christian to further desire of the Word. (Abp. Leighton.) The test of taste Peter is here quoting from Psalms 34:8 : “ O taste and see that the Lord is good.” The passage actually runs-“ O taste and see that Jehovah is good,” and Peter does not hesitate for a moment to apply the passage to the Lord Jesus. I. A royal dainty. “ The Lord is gracious.” Jesus is full of grace. Once tasted, this grace is remembered.1. The Lord is gracious in His person, nature, and character. He would never have been Immanuel, God with us, if He had not been gracious. 2. We have found Him exceeding gracious in the manner of dispensing His salvation. He is most free, spontaneous, and generous in His gifts of grace. 3. As He is gracious by nature and gracious in manner, so is He gracious in His gifts. How gracious was He when He gave Himself for us! What priceless boons follow therefrom! He gave us pardon and life. Where sin abounded, grace doth much more abound. Since we have come to know our Lord, how gracious have we found Him to be! “ He giveth more grace.” Oh, the wonders of free grace in its continuance and perseverance! Truly “ the Lord is gracious.” 4. The Lord is gracious, for He hears prayer. 5. Some of you have been favoured with choice times, “ as the days of heaven upon the earth.” You have climbed the mount and been alone with God. Oh, the rapture of intimate fellowship with God! 6. Possibly your experience has been of a sadder kind; you have backslidden, and He has restored you in His grace. But you do not know how gracious the Lord is. 7. Remember that He is preparing us for a glory inconceivable. Everything is working out His perfect design. II. But now think of a special sense which is exercised in tasting that the Lord is gracious. Faith is the soul’ s taste by which we perceive the sweetness of our Lord and enjoy it for ourselves. In answering the question, What is meant by taste? I would bid you notice the likeness of the word “ taste” to another, namely, “ test.”1. Taste is a test as to things to be eaten. We prove and try an article of food by tasting it. Even so we do not speculate upon the grace of God, but “ we have known and believed the love which God has toward us.” 2. In order to spiritual taste there must be apprehension. We must have some idea of what being gracious means, and some conviction that this is truly the character of our Lord Jesus. The clearer the knowledge the more distinct the taste may become. 3. After apprehension must come appropriation. Martin Luther saith, “ And this I call tasting, when I do with my very heart believe that Christ hath given Himself unto me, and that I have my full interest in Him, that He beareth and answereth for all my sins, transgressions, and harms, and that His life is my life. When this persuasion is thoroughly settled in my heart, it yieldeth wonderful and incredible good taste.” Appropriate Christ, I pray you. Let each one take Him to himself, and then you will know what tasting means. But taste further means appreciation. You may have a thing within yourself and yet not taste it, even as Samson’ s lion had honey within its carcase, but he was a dead lion, and so could not taste it. A man may get the gospel into his mind, but never taste it. It wants a living man, and a living appropriation, and a living appreciation, or else the royal dainty is not tasted. Have you ever enjoyed the truth that the Lord is gracious? Jesus is all in all to all who are in Him. III. A searching question. “ If so be that ye have tasted that the Lord is gracious.”1. This is a very simple elementary question. I may not know what a dish is made of, but I may have tasted it for all that. I may be grossly ignorant of the mysteries of cookery, but I can tell whether a dish is sweet to my taste. I put it to every one here, whether babes or strong men Have you tasted that the Lord is gracious? 2. However simple is the question, it goes to the root of the matter; it takes in the whole ease of a man’ s soul. Do you know Christ by personal reception of Him? If not, you are in an evil case. Oh, that you would come to the feast! Oh, that you would eat that which is good, and let your soul delight itself in fatness! 3. Every man here must answer that question for himself. We cannot in this matter be sponsors for one another. Tasting is an operation which must be performed by the individual palate. There is no other method of practising it. Let me tell you when we have tasted the graciousness of the Lord. This entry is longer than a Bible module can hold. The rest is at https://www.sermonindex.net/commentary/bi/ 1 Peter 2:4-5 To whom coming, as unto a living stone.Coming-always coming The Christian life is begun, continued, and perfected altogether in connection with the Lord Jesus Christ. Sometimes when you go a journey, you travel so far under the protection of a certain company, but then you have to change, and the rest of your journey may be performed under very different circumstances, upon quite another kind of line. Now we have not so far to go to heaven in the guardian care of Jesus Christ, and then at a certain point to change, so as to have somebody else to be our leader, or some other method of salvation. No, He is the author and He is the finisher of our faith. We have not to seek a fresh physician, to find a new friend or to discover a novel hope, but we are to look for everything to Jesus Christ, “ the same yesterday, and today, and forever.” “ Ye are complete in Him.” I. Here is a complete description of the Christian life. It is a continuous “ coming” to Jesus. Notice that the expression occurs in connection with two figures. There is one which precedes it in the second verse, namely, the figure of a little child fed upon milk. Children come to their parents, and they frequently come rather longer than their parents like; it is the general habit of children to come to their parents for what they need. Just what your children began to do from the first moment you fixed your eyes on them, and what they have continued to do ever since, that is just what you are to do with the Lord Jesus Christ. You are to be always coming to Him-coming to Him for spiritual food, for spiritual garments, for washing, guiding, help, and health: coming, in fact, for everything. You will be wise if, the older you grow, the more you come, and He will be all the better pleased with you. If you will look again at your Bibles, you will get a second illustration from the fourth verse, “ To whom coming as unto a living stone,” etc. Here we have the figure of a building. A building comprises first a foundation, and then the stones which are brought to the foundation and are built upon it. This furnishes a very beautiful picture of Christian life. II. Now to answer the question, what is the rest way of coming to Christ at first?1. The very best way to come to Christ is to come with all your needs about you. If you could get rid of half your needs apart from Christ, you would not come to Jesus half so well, for your need furnishes you with motives for coming, and gives you pleas to urge. Suppose a physician should come into a town with motives of pure benevolence to exercise the healing art. What he wants is not to make money, but to bless the townsmen. He has a love to his fellow men, and he wants to cure them, and therefore he gives notice that the poorest will be welcome, and the most diseased will be best received. Is there a deeply sin-sick soul anywhere? Is there man or woman who is bad altogether? Come along, you are just in a right condition to come to Jesus Christ. Come just as you are, that is the best style of “ coming.” 2. If you want to know how to come aright the first time, I should answer, Come to find everything you want in Christ. I heard of a shop some time ago in a country town where they sold everything, and the man said that he did not believe that there was anything a human being wanted but what he could rig him out from top to toe. Well, I do not know whether that promise would have been carried out to the letter if it had been tried, but I know it is so with Jesus Christ; He can supply you with all you need, for “ Christ is all.” 3. The best way to come to Christ is to come meaning to get everything, and to obtain all the plenitude of grace which He has laid up in store and promised freely to give. III. What is the best way to come afterwards? The answer is-Come just as you used to come. The text does not say that you have come to Christ, though that is true, but that you are coming; and you are to be always coming. The way to continue coming is to come just in the same way as you came at first. (C. H. Spurgeon.) Christ a living stone I. Christ the sure foundation. Without Christ the Bible is meaningless, the world hopeless, heaven charmless. You might as well have a summer without a gleam of light, without the smell of flowers, or the song of a bird, as have a life without Jesus Christ. You might as well have a year without a summer, nothing but barrenness and death, as to have a life without Jesus Christ. You might as well have a night without a morning, as to live in this world, and die, and be buried without Jesus Christ. You might as well speak of the astronomy of the world and leave out the sun, as speak of history, philosophy, and creation, and leave out Jesus Christ. In Christ, and in Him alone, the real and the ideal meet. Christ was the perfect, the symmetrical Man, the true centre of redeemed humanity. II. Christ rejected by many. He reveals character; He makes men declare themselves; He is the touch stone that draws worth and develops worthlessness. Come near to Christ, and if you have the elements of nobility you will be drawn toward Him; if you are worth less you will hate Him. III. A startling contrast-God’ s judgment of Christ as compared with that of men: “ Chosen of God, and precious.” God knew Him, and He knew God as it is impossible for men to know Him; and this is the judgment which God here gives. IV. In order to receive the blessing of Christ’ s life, we must come to him. God’ s promise includes God’ s condition. (R. S. MacArthur.) The living stone I. The church or spiritual temple in its foundation.1. Jesus Christ is here set forth as the foundation of the Christian Church. 2. The apostle here seems to violate the rules of rhetoric and elegant composition by attributing life to a stone. God’ s thoughts were so infinite that the laws of grammar stood in constant need of expansion to receive them. 3. “ Disallowed indeed of men, but chosen of God.” This Divine choice does not refer primarily, if at all, to God’ s eternal election of His Son to be the foundation of the Church, but to His choice of Him in consequence of His holy life and atoning death. The disallowing by men and the choosing by God were simultaneous processes. God chose Him, not arbitrarily, but on account of fitness after trying Him. II. The Church or spiritual temple in its superstructure.1. What then is the first step you should take to be built into the walls of this spiritual edifice? This-you must come to Jesus Christ. “ To whom coming” ; or, as the words might be rendered, “ To whom coming close up,” “ to whom coming very near” -so near as to be in personal contact with Him, nothing whatever intervening. You must remove all the earth and brush away every grain of sand, and build your house on the clean face of the rock, with nothing whatsoever between. 2. “ To whom coming close up, as unto a living stone,” then it follows that “ ye also, as living stones, are built up a spiritual house.” The word for “ stones” here suggests-I do not say it positively means, but it suggests stones dressed, smoothed, and polished, fitted to their place in the walls of the spiritual edifice-the root of the English word lithograph. Young people, and old, you will not do to be built into the walls of this temple in the rough, as you come from the quarry of the world. The Holy Spirit alone can prepare you for this. III. The Church or spiritual temple in its service.1. “ A priesthood.” So there is a priesthood in the Christian Church. The whole body of believers forms the Christian priesthood. 2. “ An holy priesthood.” A learned priesthood? No. An educated priesthood? No. No; an holy priesthood. 3. “ To offer up spiritual sacrifices, acceptable to God by Jesus Christ.” “ Spiritual sacrifices” : what are these? Singing? Yes. Praying? Yes. Preaching? I am glad to believe it. Under the law material sacrifices were required-oxen, sheep, doves; but under the gospel only those sacrifices which proceed from a regenerate heart, and which testify to the gratitude and devotion of an emancipated spirit. God condescends to accept the offering for the sake of the love which inspires it. What else is necessary? That we present all by, or, as in the Welsh, “ through” Jesus Christ. Our sacrifices must ascend to the throne through Him; and as they go through Him they are beautifully filtered and refined. (J. C. Jones D. D.) Disallowed indeed of men.- Christ disallowed Disallowed lie was, indeed, of men: they called Him the carpenter’ s Son, a Samaritan, winebibber, deceiver; they would have no other king but Caesar; with them Barabbas was meeter to live than He. What was the cause? They looked for one that should come as an earthly prince, to deliver them out of the hands of the Romans; but His kingdom was not of this world. They looked also for one that should have upheld their customs, laws, and traditions; but the date of them was out. Again, how came they to this height of disallowing Him? At the first of ignorance and blindness, but after of malice; so men grow (when they desire not to amend and see the truth) from one degree of wickedness to another. (John Rogers.) Ye also, as lively stones, are built up.-Living stones Religious art finds its culmination in the temple of the ancients and the cathedral of the moderns. Higher than this it cannot reach. That the temple made a profound impression upon the minds of the apostles, that its association interpenetrated their religious life and coloured their teaching, we have unmistakable evidence. In his Epistle to the Ephesians Paul seizes hold of the idea to illustrate the stability, the growth, and the grandeur of the Church. It is precisely the same idea which Peter had in his mind. The idea is a grand one, and it has had a fascination for more than one of the great men of the Church. To mention only one instance, it has given to us the immortal work of John Howe, “ The Living Temple.” Let us look at it. Rising slowly in the midst of the world, noiselessly and unobserved by the majority of men, are the fair proportions of a temple in comparison with which the grandest conceptions of man are but blurred and broken lines of beauty. Century after century has contributed its quota to the pile, and during the unborn ages it will continue to increase in symmetry and perfection, until with the last man the edifice will be complete. The text reminds us that believers are the living stones of this living temple. Let us pay a visit to the temple, and look upon the stones that are being built into it. I. As soon as we approach our attention is arrested by some huge, unshapely blocks of stone, sharp angled, and disfigured here and there with mud. We glance hastily up at the superb building before us, re-examine the stones, and then in some wonder ask our guide, “ What possible use can these be put to?” Touching the stone tenderly with his fingers, the master builder replies that there is no better material built up in the whole fabric than this. Despite their roughness and shapelessness, these stones, he says, possess a nature which yields readily to the tools and skill of the workmen. Do we understand the teaching? Have we not in our Church fellowship met with men and women freshly hewn from the world’ s quarry, with such angularities of character, with such imperfect knowledge, with such lack of grace, that we have begun to question if such rough material could be used for anything but stumbling blocks in the cause of Christ? It may have been, even, that we have treated them with indifference, if not with contempt, and denied them the assurance of a brother’ s sympathy. Forgetting “ the hole of the pit from whence we have been digged,” we have despised these little ones for whom Christ died. Let us be consistent with ourselves. We profess to believe in spiritual capacities and capabilities, and we cry each day out of the depths of our weakness and ignorance, “ Lord, help us.” In what lies the difference between us and them? Are not their souls endowed with the satire faculties, the same capabilities, spiritually, as ours? But if we have seen anything of the operation of Divine grace upon the heart, we surely have seen enough to lead us to the belief that there is no limit to its power, that it can fashion the roughest into symmetry and grace. The tinker of Elstow is transformed into the immortal dreamer. Ah, surely bitter must be our humiliation if by our spiritual pride we mar the beauty and usefulness of our Christian life, and see those whom we have despised outstripping us in service, and bearing more vividly upon them the imprint of Divine favour. Proceeding in our examination of the stones, we have one pointed out to us as being of great importance. II. Examining it we find that while it bears evident marks of the workmen’ s tools, it is only a large plain block of stone, with no pretension to ornament whatever. We acknowledge at once its solidity, but have to ask an explanation of its use. We are led to a part of the building where the first stones are being laid in the freshly excavated earth, and there we are told that these plain blocks of stone are used for the wall foundations. “ What!” we exclaim, “ are they to be hidden out of sight, and their worth never to be appreciated?” “ True,” replies our guide, “ they are hidden, and the thoughtless dream not of them; but the architect knows their value. They serve a grand purpose; upon them depends the strength, aye, and the beauty of the building, too.” Unspeakable comfort this to many a lonely, toiling Christian. Look at that mother, the object of her children’ s lavish affection-their most trusted adviser in times of difficulty and doubt. But she is unknown to the world and fame. Men do not know that the strength and nobility of character which they have been accustomed to admire in her son, has a foundation in her life and heart. Let us take courage, therefore, and labour on in the dark a little while longer. We cannot pass by these pillars without stopping a minute or two to admire their strength and various beauty. III. In these pillars we see grace, strength, and utility combined. To be a pillar in the Temple of God is the highest honour to which we can reach. Do we covet their position, their fame, or their worth? Then we must drink of the cup they have drank of, and be baptized with the baptism they were baptized with. That the Church has had such pillars, and will continue to have them, is her strength and hope. “ Ah! more ornamental than useful,” we exclaim, as we are called to look at some stones covered with filigree work, or highly finished carving. “ A judgment somewhat hasty and thoughtless,” replies the architect. “ See, this stone you have despised because of its ornament is fashioned for a keystone, and its utility will be enhanced by its beauty. This other, with all its marvellous delicacy of carving, has a sound core, and is fashioned for the capital of one of these pillars. It will add grace to the pillar, and will sustain part of its load.” Hasty and thoughtless judgments are, alas! too frequent among professing Christians. By some zealous workers the men and women of culture are despised as being necessarily more ornamental than useful. They are not seen to be enthusiastic in the service of the Master, and forthwith, without a moment’ s calm thought, they are spoken of rather as hindrances than helps in the cause of righteousness. Have we been tempted to think so of anyone? Let us see to it that we have not been doing great injustice to a keystone or a capital in God’ s Temple-living stones, perchance, not only more beautiful than we, but vastly more useful also. Some of the most zealous and humble Christian workers are to be found among the men and women of culture today. And not only is it so, but they do a work that the less cultured cannot do. Like the carved capital or keystone, they can catch the eye of the careless or sceptical men of culture and compel them, by the force of their intrinsic worth, to investigate the claims of religion. “ How beautiful is the polish on this stone! How it reveals the beauty of the granite! How it flashes back the sunlight! Such is our exclamation over a stone which our guide regards with a look of mingled tenderness and delight. “ Very beautiful,” he replies, “ but at what cost!” and then he explains to us the hard pressure, the constant friction, and the other processes to which it had been subjected before it took on this lustrous beauty. Just so. We have a friend in whose Christian life there is a sparkle, a heavenly beauty, as exceptional as it is delightful. Would we know the secret? Then let us look into his past life. Sorrow came to his heart suddenly, overwhelmingly. “ Made perfect through suffering!” How difficult the lesson! Instinctively we shrink from pain. Truly, pain is a mystery. “ Hold, hold!” cries the stone to the polisher when the cold water and rough sand are thrown upon it, and the heavy polishing plane passes over it for the first time. “ Hold, hold! Why this rough treatment? What wrong have I done? Have I not already suffered at the hands of workmen?” “ Peace, foolish stone,” cries the polisher. “ Dost thou not know that there are yet roughnesses in thy nature to be rubbed down, and wilt thou grudge the pain? Dost thou not know that I will bring to light thy hidden beauty by this process? Thou wilt become a mirror to catch the faintest smile of heaven if thou wilt but suffer it to be so now.” IV. “ What mean these quantities of small stones lying here and there? Is it possible that they can be used in the great building?” To which question our instructor replies, “ The temple could not be built without them. There is not only a place for them, but there are places which nothing but they can fill. Unseen by the eye, these small stones supplement the deficiencies of the larger ones, and there would be many an interstice through which the wind and rain would penetrate were it not for these insignificant-looking stones.” Little children living stones in God’ s temple! Sweet thought! What parent does not clutch at it with unspeakable joy? The fact may well fire the zeal and intensify the love of every parent and teacher of the young in pouring out their souls labouring for their weal. We would do well to ponder-1. In the first place, it is quite possible for the living stones to be deceived with regard to their position and importance. 2. In the second place, a true view of our own hearts, as well as of the importance of Christian service, will lead us to cast ourselves at the Master’ s feet, saying, “ Choose my place for me.” (W. Skinner.) The Church the temple of God I. It is organised after a divine plan.1. This is the leading plan in the world’ s history. 2. This plan, though unknown by men, is being worked out by them. II. It is compacted together into a necessary unity. Supreme love for a common Father, unbounded confidence in a common Christ, life consecration to a common cause, are the indissoluble bonds of union. This union is-1. Independent of local distances.2. Independent of external circumstances.3. Independent of ecclesiastical systems.4. Independent of mental idiosyncrasies. III. It is the special residence of the eternal spirit. There is more of God to be seen in the true Church than anywhere else under heaven. In nature you see His handicraft, in saints you see His soul. (D. Thomas, D. D.) Living stones The only idea which I think can be legitimately connected with purity of matter, is this of vital and energetic connection among its particles; and the idea of foulness is essentially connected with dissolution and death. Thus the purity of the rock contrasted with the foulness of dust or mould is expressed by the epithet “ living,” very singularly given the rock in almost all languages; singularly I say, because life is almost the last attribute one would ascribe to stone but for this visible energy and connection of its particles; and so of water as opposed to stagnancy. (J. Ruskin.) Cohesion in God’ s spiritual house The apostle assumes, as a matter of course, that if one is in Christ, one is also in His Church. Detached stones are mere rubble. There is contact, cohesion, mutual attachment and support in these “ living stones” of God’ s spiritual house. Based on the “ living stone,” the bedrock of the Church, they grow together into God’ s glorious human temple. (G. G. Findlay.) Mind the temple is not built without you Travellers sometimes find in lonely quarries, long abandoned, or once worked by a vanished race, great blocks squared and dressed, that seem to have been meant for palace or shrine. But there they lie, neglected and forgotten, and the building for which they were hewn has been reared without them. Beware, lest God’ s grand temple should be built up without you, and you be left to desolation and decay. (A. Maclaren.) Living stones Tyndall, speaking of the frozen crystals in snowflakes, says: “ Surely such an exhibition of power, such an apparent demonstration of a resident intelligence in what we are accustomed to call ‘ brute matter,’ would appear perfectly miraculous. If the Houses of Parliament were built up of forces resident in their own bricks, it would be nothing intrinsically more wonderful.” (Hours of Exercise on the Alps.) An holy priesthood.- The priesthood of the laity Christians are a royal priesthood; they are united together in the Church to be a holy priesthood to offer up spiritual sacrifices acceptable to God by Jesus Christ: the joy of priesthood should be the tasted joy of every member of the Church of Christ. True it is that in its fullest sense there is but one priest-Jesus, the anointed of the Father. No other priest can be, since He ever lives and ministers in His priesthood. But He ministers as priest under two conditions-in heaven in His glorified human body: on earth in His mystical body-the Church. When He was on the earth “ in the days of His flesh,” He ministered to men through His natural body. In it He interceded for them with God, and instituted and offered the holy Eucharistic sacrifice. By it He spake to them God’ s words, and did among them God’ s works. But when His body was taken up into heaven, it could not be the instrument of His priesthood on earth. So He created His mystical body-the Church. Thus the Church, as the mystical body of Christ, is the extension of His natural body, and so is the fulness of Christ, As, then before His ascension, Christ ministered on earth in His natural body, since His ascension He ministers on earth in His mystical body. Hence His Church is a sacerdotal society. It is a kingdom of priests, because its members are the ministers of Christ’ s priest hood. Its priesthood is not one existing side by side with, nor is it supplemental to, the one priesthood of Christ. It is not the delegated representative of an absent Lord fulfilling priestly ministries on His behalf; it is the organism of a present Lord. It is the organism whereby Christ intercedes with God for men in prayer and Eucharist on earth, and by which He teaches men God’ s faith, and ministers to them God’ s grace. This sacerdotal vocation and character is not the exclusive possession of any one section of the mystical body of Christ-it is common to all Christian men. Each member of the mystical body of the Great High Priest is himself a priest unto God. But he is a priest called on to minister in the unity and in the order of that mystical body. Each member in it is placed in his position in its structure to fulfil the ministry proper to him as the organ of the whole body. The priestly character is common to all, but all are not called to the same measure of priestly ministries or gifts. The priesthood of the laity is recognised by the Church in confirmation. Christians are born to priesthood in the sacrament of regeneration as sons of the second Aaron, just as Aaron’ s sons were born to the priesthood of Israel. But as in Israel of old those thus born were at a given age solemnly consecrated and commissioned to execute the priest’ s office; so in the Church of Christ the regenerate are consecrated, commissioned, and dowered, for the lay priesthood in the sacrament of confirmation. This priesthood of the laity has, as priesthood always has, a two-fold aspect-Godward and manward. The Church, as a sacerdotal society, has primarily to minister to God-to offer up spiritual sacrifices acceptable to God by Jesus Christ. The first duty of the lay priesthood is by cooperation with the consecrated ministers of the Church to offer to God continual worship in Christian sanctuaries. Closely allied with the ministry of worship is the ministry of intercession. He whose soul ascends to God and rests in God in adoration will share with God His love to men, and, sharing this love, he will breathe it out in intercession. Moreover, as God’ s priest, the layman is called to minister to man for God in active service. He has his place in that great mediatorial system by which God wills to give to men the two great gifts of truth and grace. Each Christian Churchman is here in a position of grave responsibility. All wealth is a trust held by each for all. And, in addition to this, as the priest of God, the layman is called on to do what he can to bring his fellow men into the knowledge of the truth as he knows it, and with those gracious conditions of life in which he is privileged to live. He must be an evangelist-the bearer to others of the good tidings in the joy of which he is privileged to live. Let me conclude with two cautions bearing on this question of lay priesthood.1. Avoid individualism in its exercise. Priesthood is an official status; it exists in the body of Christ, and can only be rightly exercised according to the will of God in the unity of that body. All its ministries must be performed “ decently and in order.” God is not the author of confusion, but of peace, in all churches of the saints, “ and peace is,” as St. Gregory of Nyssa teaches us, “ the harmony of ordered union.” 2. The one motive of the layman in his priesthood must always be to reveal to men and to bring them to submit to the One Priest, the Lord Jesus Christ, as He ministers in and through His Church. No one can rise to the realisation of his lay priesthood except he be one who, in the unity of the Church, tastes and sees the goodness of the Lord. (Canon Body.) The Church the priesthood of God I. The persons of whom this priesthood is composed. The apostle is here writing, not to Church officers, but to individual Christians scattered throughout the world. Why should they be represented as a priesthood?1. On account of their entire devotedness to Divine service. 2. On account of their free access to the Divine presence (Ephesians 2:18; Hebrews 10:19-22). II. The character by which this priesthood is distinguished. “ Holy.” Moral holiness is resemblance to Christ-the spirit of supreme love to the Father and self-sacrificing love for man. III. The service to which this priesthood is consecrated.1. The sacrifices are spiritual.2. Mediatory. (D. Thomas, D. D.) The Christian priesthood The priesthood of the law was holy, and its holiness was signified by many outward things, by anointings, and washings, and vestments; but in this spiritual priesthood of the gospel, holiness itself is instead of all these, as being the substance of all. The children of God are all anointed and purified, and clothed with holiness. There is here the service of this office, namely, to offer. All sacrifice is not taken away, but it is changed from the offering of those things formerly in use to spiritual sacrifices. Now these are every way preferable; they are easier to us, and yet more acceptable to God. How much more should we abound in spiritual sacrifice, who are eased of the other! But though the spiritual sacrificing is easier in its own nature, yet to the corrupt nature of man it is by far the harder. He would rather choose still all the toil and cost of the former way, if it were in his option. A holy course of life is called the sacrifice of righteousness (Psalms 4:6; and Philippians 4:18; so also Hebrews 13:16), where the apostle shows what sacrifices succeed to those which, as he hath taught at large, are abolished. In a word, that sacrifice of ours which includes all these, and without which none of these can be rightly offered, is ourselves, our whole selves. Now that whereby we offer all spiritual sacrifices and even ourselves, is love. That is the holy fire that burns up all, sends up our prayers, and our hearts, and our whole selves a whole burnt offering to God-and, as the fire of the altar, it is originally from heaven, being kindled by God’ s own love to us, and the graces of the Spirit received from Christ, but, above all with His own merits. The success of this service; acceptable to God by Jesus Christ. The children of God delight in offering sacrifices to Him; but if they could not know that they were well taken at their hands, this would discourage them much; therefore this is added. He accepts themselves and their ways when offered in sincerity, though never so mean; though they sometimes have no more than a sigh or a groan, it is most properly a spiritual sacrifice. No one needs forbear sacrifice for poverty, for what God desires is the heart, and there is none so poor but hath a heart to give Him. But meanness is not all. There is a guiltiness on ourselves and on all we offer. Our prayers and services are polluted. But this hinders not, for our acceptance is not for ourselves, but for the sake of one who hath no guiltiness at all, “ acceptable by Jesus Christ.” In Him our persons are clothed with righteousness. How ought our hearts to be knit to Him, by whom we are brought into favour with God and kept in favour with Him, in whom we obtain all the good we receive, and in whom all we offer is accepted! In Him are all our supplies of grace and our hopes of glory. (Abp. Leighton.) The true priesthood, temple and sacrifice I. First, all those who are coming to Christ, daily coming nearer and nearer to Him, are as living stones built up into a temple.1. They are called a spiritual house in opposition to the old material house in which the emblem of the Divine presence shone forth in the midst of Israel, that temple in which the Jew delighted, counting it to be beautiful for situation and the joy of the whole earth. When we become holy, as we should be, we shall count all places and all hours to be the Lord’ s, and we shall always dwell in His temple because God is everywhere. 2. We are a spiritual temple, but not the less real. The Lord has a people scattered abroad everywhere, whose lives are hid with Him in God, and these make up the real temple of God in which the Lord dwelleth. Men of every name and clime and age are quickened into life, made living stones, and then laid upon Christ, and these constitute the true temple, which God hath built and not man, for He dwelleth not in temples made with hands; that is to say, of man’ s building, but He dwelleth in a temple which He Himself hath builded for His habitation forever, saying, “ This is My rest forever; here will I dwell, for I have desired it.” 3. This temple is spiritual, and therefore it is living. A material temple is dead, a spiritual temple must be alive; and so the text tells us, “ Ye also as living stones.” 4. We are a spiritual house, and therefore spiritually built up. Peter says, “ Ye are built up” -built up by spiritual means. The Spirit of God quarries out of the pit of nature the stones which are as yet dead, separating them from the mass to which they adhered; He gives them life, and then He fashions, squares, polishes them, and they, without sound of axe or hammer, are brought each one to its appointed place, and built up into Christ Jesus. 5. We are a spiritual house, and therefore the more fit for the indwelling of God who is a Spirit. It is in the Church that God reveals Himself. If you would know the Lord’ s love and power and grace you must get among His people, hear their experiences, learn from them how God dealeth with them, and let them tell you, if ye have grace to understand them, the height, and depth, and length, and breadth of the love of Christ, which passeth knowledge, for He manifesteth Himself to them as He doth not to the world. Hath He not said, “ I will dwell in them and walk in them” ? II. In addition to being a temple, God’ s people are said to be a priesthood. Observe that they are spoken of together, and not merely as individuals: they make up one indivisible priesthood: each one is a priest, but all standing together they are a priesthood, by virtue of their being one with Christ.1. This stands in opposition to the nominal and worldly priesthood. 2. This priesthood is most real, although it be not of the outward and visible order; for God’ s priests become priests after a true and notable fashion. 3. We are priests in the aspect of priesthood towards God. You are to speak with God on man’ s behalf, and bring down, each of you, according to the measure of your faith, the blessing upon the sons of men among whom you dwell. 4. And you are priests towards men also, for the priest was selected from among men to exercise necessary offices for man’ s good. The priest’ s lips should keep knowledge, and if ye be as ye should be, ye hold fast the faith once delivered to the saints. 5. This is to be your function and ministry always and in every place. You are a holy priesthood; not alone on the Lord’ s day when ye come into this house, but at all times. III. Consider the sacrifices which we offer-“ spiritual sacrifices, acceptable to God by Jesus Christ.”1. We offer spiritual sacrifices as opposed to the literal. 2. This sacrificing takes various forms. “ I beseech you, brethren, that ye present your bodies a living sacrifice.” You are to present yourselves, spirit, soul, and body, as a sacrifice unto God. You are also to “ do good and to communicate, for with such sacrifices God is well pleased.” To Him also you are to “ offer the sacrifice of praise continually, the fruit of your lips giving glory to God.” To the Lord also you must present the incense of holy prayer; but all these are comprehended, I think, in the expression, “ I delight to do Thy will, O God.” (C. H. Spurgeon.) The doctrine of sacrifice The theory of sacrifice seems to be intuitively inherent in all religions. The sacrifice of the life and death of Christ is the one essential foundation of every acceptable offering which can be made to God. God never requires what we cannot offer. He never asks a sin or trespass offering from us. You and I could not offer that. But He asks what we can give, a sweet-savour offering, as a testimony of our gratitude and love. Not a sin offering. As far as Christ’ s work was propitiatory, it stands absolutely alone: “ He offered one sacrifice for sin.” But though no sufferings, no work, no worship, no service of ours can propitiate, God still requires from us offerings of another character. These are called “ spiritual sacrifices,” which we are “ ordained” to offer. There is no more attractive form in which a devout life can appear than that of a constant oblation to God, of all that we are, have, or do. Let the thought of sacrifice be inwoven into the texture of your life. Study to turn, not your prayers alone, but your whole daily course and conversation, into an offering. Surely the thought that God will accept it if offered in union with the merit of His Son, is enough to give stimulus to the sacrifice; to open purse, and hand, and heart. You can please Him if you give, strive, work in His name. To please God. What a privilege to lie open to us day by day, and hour by hour! What a condescension in our heavenly Father, when we consider the strictness of His justice, the impurity of our hearts, and our manifold falls, to admit of our pleasing Him, or to leave any room for our touching His complacency. We may have this dignity if we offer all in Christ. We need not go far to seek the materials of an acceptable offering; they lie all around us; in our common work; in the little calls of providence; in the trivial crosses we are challenged to take up; nay, in the very recreation of our lives. If work be done (no matter how humble) in the full view of God’ s assignment of our several tasks and spheres of labour, and under the consciousness of His presence, it is a sacrifice fit to be laid upon His altar. If we study the very perversity of our enemies with a loving hope that we may find something of God and Christ about them yet, which may be the nascent germ of better things; if we try to make the best of men, and not the worst, treating them as Christ treated them, we may thus redeem an hour from being wasted, and sanctify it by turning it into a sacrifice to God. If you should obey an impulse to divert some trifle meant for self and luxury to Christ’ s poor and charity, here, again, is a sacrifice, sweet smelling before God, which will buy the better luxury of His smile and love. And if you regard time as, next to Christ and the Holy Spirit, the most precious gift of God; if you gather up its fragments and put them into God’ s basket by using them for holy things and thoughts-this, too, grows into a tribute which God will accept. It is the altar which sanctifieth the gift. Apart from Christ and Christ’ s sacrifice, no offering of ours is redolent of the sweet savour, For our best gifts are flecked and flawed by duplicity and evil. (A. Mursell.) Christians are priests Christians, you are priests. Be like Christ in this,1. Wherever you go carry a savour of Christ. Let men take knowledge of you, that you have been with Jesus; let it be plain that you come from within the veil, let the smell of your garments be as a field which the Lord hath blessed. 2. Carry a sound of Christ wherever you go. Not a stop, Christians, without the sound of the gospel bell! Even in smallest things, be spreading the glad sound, Edwards says, wherever a godly person enters, he is a greater blessing than if the greatest monarch were entering. So be it with you. (R. M. McCheyne.) To offer up spiritual sacrifices.-The Christian’ s sacrifices 1. The offering up of our bodies and souls, and all that is in us to serve God; having neither wit, will, memory, nor anything else, but for the Lord’ s use. It is meet we should offer this sacrifice, for it is His by right of creation, redemption, and continual preservation. 2. The sacrifice of a contrite and broken heart. 3. Prayer and praise. 4. Alms, mercy to all in hunger, thirst, sickness, prison, especially to the household of faith. (John Rogers.) 1 Peter 2:6 It is contained in the Scripture.Wherein the Scriptures exceed all other writings I. They were inspired all of the Holy Ghost (2 Timothy 3:17; 2 Peter 1:21), so were no other writings. II. They contain a wisdom far above all that can be had by the princes and men of this world (1 Corinthians 6:7). III. They were penned by more excellent men than any other writings: the greatest, wisest, holiest men-Moses, David, Solomon, prophets, evangelists, apostles, etc. IV. They have such properties as no other writings have: they are more perfect, pure, deep, and immutable than any man’ s writings. These contain all things necessary unto faith and a good life (2 Timothy 3:16-17). V. If we consider the effects that must be acknowledged to the praise of the scriptures, no writings can describe God so fully to us, do so bring glory to God; no Scripture but this can convert a soul (Hebrews 4:12-13; Psalms 19:11; Psalms 119:14-15; Psalms 119:27). (N. Byfield.) I lay in Sion a chief cornerstone. The Divine foundation I. Jesus Christ is the foundation stone, or the fundamental truth of Christianity.1. Jesus Christ is the cardinal truth of the Christian system.2. Jesus Christ is the central truth of Christianity.3. Jesus Christ is the all-comprehensive truth of Christianity. Christ is Christianity. What is meant by it? Two things.(1) First, that Jesus Christ is essential to His religion. Plato is not essential to Platonism. Suppose that nothing was known of the birth, life, and death of Plato, that his writings came down to us anonymously, it would make but very little difference to his students. And what is true of Plato as a philosopher is also true of Cakyamouni, Confucius, and Mahomet, as founders of religions. Their personalities form no integral portion of their systems. Plato said, “ Accept my ideas” ; Christ said, “ Accept Me.” Cakyamouni said, “ This is the way, by renunciation” ; Christ said , “ I am the Way.” They, each and all, put the centres of their systems outside themselves; but Christ put the centre of His in His own person. (2) But, secondly, the phrase, Christ is Christianity, means precisely the same as when we say that the tree is the branches. The tree throws itself out into branches, and it must be patent to all that there can be no more in the branches than there is already in the tree. II. Jesus Christ is the cornerstone, or the harmonising truth of Christianity.1. He is the Cornerstone of the religions of the world; that is to say, in Him and the religion He instituted all other religions meet and are unified. 2. Jesus Christ is the Cornerstone of Christian doctrines; in other words, in Him they find the principle of their reconciliation. 3. Jesus Christ is also the Cornerstone of Christian Churches; in Him is their one point of union. III. Jesus Christ is the sure foundation. “ Whosoever believeth in Him shall not be confounded.”1. Jesus Christ is the sure foundation, the one truth which maintains its ground notwithstanding the fierce assaults made upon it from time to time. 2. He is a sure foundation for us to build thereupon the hope of everlasting life. (J. C. Jones, D. D.) The cornerstone I. Stability. The cornerstone upholds and is the strength of the building. So it is in the Church, whether viewed collectively, or as composed of individual Christians. Strength is in Christ alone. II. Beauty. Cornerstones give beauty and ornament to a building. They are often graceful and rich, and curiously wrought; and the other and ordinary stones of the building get comeliness from the very relation in which they stand to the cornerstones. Now Christ is the beauty of the spiritual temple. III. Unity. Cornerstones are the medium by which the walls of a house, with all the several stones which compose those walls, are united in one building. Take away the cornerstones, and the sides of the house would be separated from each other. The stones of which the walls are built may be of different sizes, and of different degrees of value or beauty; yet so long as they are held together by the cornerstone, the house is one house; nor is there any stone in it however small or common but that stone is necessary to the unity of the house. It cannot be spared. Such is Christ as the precious cornerstone of the spiritual temple. (A. C. Price.) The chief cornerstone I. The foundation is called here “ a chief cornerstone.” Jesus Christ is the alone Head and King of His Church, who gives it laws, and rules it in wisdom and righteousness. “ Elected,” or chosen out for the purpose, and altogether fit for it. Isaiah hath it, “ A stone of trial or a tried stone.” As things amongst men are best chosen after trial, so Jesus Christ was certainly known by the Father, as most fit for that work to which He chose Him before He tried Him, as afterwards, upon trial in His life and death and resurrection, He proved fully answerable to His Father’ s purpose in all that was appointed Him. He was God, that He might be a strong foundation; He was man, that He might be suitable to the nature of the stones whereof the building was to consist, that they might join and cement together. “ Precious,” inestimably precious, by all the conditions that can give worth to any: by rareness and by inward excellency. II. The laying of this foundation. It is said to be laid in Zion; that is, it is laid in the Church of God. And it was first laid in Zion, literally, that being then the seat of the Church and of the true religion. He was laid there in His manifestation in the flesh, and suffering, and dying, and rising again; and afterwards, being preached through the world, He became the foundation of His Church in all places where His name was received. He saith, “ I lay” ; by which the Lord expresseth this to be His own proper work, as Psalms 118:23. And it is not only said, “ I lay,” because God the Father had the first thought of this great work, but also to signify the freeness of His grace in giving His Son to be a foundation of happiness to man, without the least motion from man, or motive in man, to draw Him to it. This, again, that the Lord Himself is the layer of this cornerstone, teaches us the firmness of it. Psalms 2:6, “ I have set My King upon My holy hill of Zion” ; who then shall dethrone Him? “ I have given Him the heathen for His inheritance, and the ends of the earth for His possession” ; and who will hinder Him to take possession of His right? III. The building on this foundation. To be built on Christ is plainly to believe in Him. It is not they that have heard of Him, or that have some common knowledge of Him, or that are able to discourse of Him and speak of His person and nature aright, but they that believe in Him. Much of our knowledge is like that of the poor philosopher, who defineth riches exactly, and discourseth of their nature, but possesseth none; or we are as a geometrician, who can measure land exactly in all its dimensions, but possesseth not a foot thereof. And truly it is but a lifeless unsavoury knowledge that men have of Christ by books and study, till He reveal Himself and persuade the heart to believe in Him. There is in lively faith, when it is infused into the soul, a clearer knowledge of Christ and His excellency than before, and with it a recumbency of the soul upon Him, as the foundation of its life and comfort; a resolving to rest on Him, and not to depart from Him upon any terms. IV. The firmness of this building. “ He that believeth on Him shall not be confounded.” This firmness is answerable to the nature of the foundation. Not only the whole frame, but every stone of it abideth sure. It is a mistake to judge the persuasion of perseverance to be self-presumption. They that have it are far from building it on themselves, but their foundation is that which makes them sure; because it doth not only remain firm itself, but indissolubly supports all that are once built on it. In the prophet whence this is cited it is, “ Shall not make haste,” but the sense is one. They that are disappointed and ashamed in their hopes, run to and fro, and seek after some new resource; this they shall not need to do who come to Christ. V. The greatness and excellency of the work intimated in that first word, “ Behold,” which imports this work to be very remarkable, and calls the eyes to fix upon it. The Lord is marvellous in the least of His works; but in this He hath manifested more of His wisdom and power, and let out more of His love to mankind, than in all the rest. Look upon this “ precious stone,” and behold Him not in mere speculation, but so behold Him as to lay hold on Him; for we see He is therefore here set forth, that we may believe on Him; and so not be confounded, that we may attain this blessed union, that cannot be dissolved. All other unions are dissoluble. A man may be plucked from his dwelling house and lands, or they from him, though he have never so good a title to them; may be removed from his dearest friends, if not by other accidents in his lifetime, yet sure by death, the great dissolver of all such unions, and of that straitest one, of the soul with the body; but it can do nothing against this union, but on the contrary perfects it. (Abp. Leighton.) Christ the one foundation St. Peter, when arraigned before Annas and Caiaphas, had reminded them of that passage (Psalms 118:22) which speaks of a stone cast aside by the builders as unfitted for their purpose, but afterwards, by the Lord’ s own act, chosen out to be “ the head of the corner.” The sacred irony of this contrast had evidently taken hold of his mind. In the context here he has been referring to that passage in combination with one of Isaiah’ s (Isaiah 28:16), and applying both to the Lord Jesus, as identified with that Lord of whom another Psalmist had said, “ O taste and see that the Lord is gracious.” He now quotes from Isaiah, applying the title of “ cornerstone” to his Master, just as St. Paul says (1 Corinthians 3:11; Ephesians 2:20). What does this ancient and sacred image, thus borrowed by St. Peter and St. Paul from the stores of Hebrew prophecy, convey to us Christians? When Isaiah was drawing near to the close of his public life, a worldly and irreligious party had risen to influence and temporary command in the kingdom of Judah. Their aim was to strengthen it by a secular policy, with an Egyptian alliance for its basis. Their thoughts, if put into modern shape, would run somewhat as follows: “ Judah must be set free from the bondage of a narrow clerical interest: it is essentially a kingdom, existing side by side with other kingdoms; its needs, its emergencies, are like theirs; it must, perforce, do as they do. It must therefore shake off the tyranny of meddlesome preachers, who can only look at secular matters from their own theological point of view, and pretend to school practical men like children, with a dull iteration of precept upon precept. We have outgrown all that; it is time for common sense to reign. We know how to make safeguards for the throne and for the country, which will enable us, so to speak, to be on friendly terms with death, exempt from the peril of destruction; when the overflowing scourge shall pass through, it shall not come to us.” Isaiah turns round upon them as the minister of Him who scorneth the scorners. “ No,” he says, “ your hopes are vain; your covenant with death shall be cancelled; your hiding place is a refuge of lies, and the hailstorm and the rising flood will sweep it away. The scourge, when it comes, will simply trample you down. But I will tell you where a refuge can be found; there is a stone laid by God for a sure foundation, a stone tried and precious; he that trusteth to it shall not make haste, shall not be shaken from his foothold.” This refers first to that sacred character of the house of David, which belonged to it as destined to culminate in David’ s future preeminent Son, and in the fuller sense to that Son in His own Person, as realising all that could be indicated by the glorious titles of “ the Emmanuel, the Wonderful, Counsellor, Mighty God.” Because He was one day to appear, the pious in Judah would rest their hopes and stay their souls on Him. And this should be, in a far more effective sense, the experience of those who know the Christ as having come. Consider a few of the senses in which He makes good this title of cornerstone. How, do we think, did the first preachers to the heathen win converts? By appealing to men’ s deepest sense of need, to the felt necessity of a centralising, consolidating principle for human life.1. Two things, at least, we must secure, if life is not to be a failure. (1) One is, something certainly true, a truth to stand by amid uncertainties. As we advance in our earthly journey, perplexities gather round on all sides. Life has not verified our first expectations; it raises questions which it does not answer; there is a confusion of theories; but where is that which we can depend upon, and grasp firmly, looking life and death in the face? The answer is in the words of Jesus, “ I am the Truth.” (2) Man also needs a power of moral and spiritual rectification. He believes Christ is all-precious, because He can and does help them to become pure and single-hearted, high in aim and active in duty. 2. These two great questions well answered by the acceptance of Jesus Christ, one sees how in His relation to the several doctrines and institutions of His Kingdom, He sustains the character of the One Foundation. (1) It is so in regard to doctrines. (2) He is also the foundation of all His ordinances. All the instrumental agencies whereby He waits upon the soul-the means, as we call them, or channels of His grace-derive their efficacy from Him; nay, more, it is He who is the real though unseen Minister in them all, the true Celebrant, Baptizer, Absolver, Ordainer, the sovereign Priest of His Church. 3. If Christ be, in these ways, the foundation of our spiritual life, in all its aspects, should He not be also the foundation of all that we do? (W. Bright, D. D.) The cornerstone I. Jesus Christ is the cornerstone, uniting Jews and Gentiles.1. Jews and Gentiles met in His Person. He was of the seed of David according to the flesh, a Jew of the Jews, His genealogy complete and flawless right up to Abraham. But as we carefully survey the stream of His ancestry, we here and there discover Gentile blood flowing as tributaries to it. It is rather remarkable that the only women mentioned in the line of His pedigree are of Gentile blood and soiled character. 2. Jews and Gentiles had also a place in His ministry. The Jewish Rabbis never looked over the Wall of Separation, never gave a kindly thought to the great world without, lying in wickedness, seething in misery. Jesus Christ, however, distinctly purposed from the first to bring Jews and Gentiles into one community an idea absolutely original. 3. As Jesus Christ united Jews and Gentiles in His person and teaching, so tie has also joined them in the Church He established. Today we behold Jews and Gentiles, the civilised nations of the earth and the newly reclaimed barbarians of the South Sea Islands, reclining under its refreshing shade. II. Jesus Christ is the cornerstone, uniting men and angels.1. Jesus Christ has united men and angels in His person. He is our countryman, cry the angels, the Lord from heaven; but He is our kinsman, men make reply. He belongs to us by the ties of citizenship, say the angels; but He belongs to us by the ties of blood, answer men. Thus angels and men can legitimately claim a share in this Son of Jesse. 2. He represents men and angels in His teaching as being one in Him. 3. Men and angels are brought together in unity in His Church. III. Jesus Christ is the cornerstone, uniting God and man.1. Both meet in His person. 2. He brought God and man together hi His ministry. The great, one might say the central doctrine of His preaching is the Fatherhood of God, and the corresponding sonship of man. 3. In the Church of Christ God and man are welded together in the bonds of closest friendship. God is reconciled to man in the sacrifice of His Son, and now He is reconciling men to Himself. Sinners are being brought into line with the cornerstone, and thus into union with God. (J. C. Jones, D. D.) Jesus Christ the cornerstone 1. Jesus Christ is the cornerstone of religious doctrine. He was the Son of the God of truth; He was truth Himself, and He came into the world to bear witness to the truth. By His personal ministry and by the ministry of His apostles, He revealed to the fallen children of men the things which belonged to their peace. 2. Christ is the cornerstone of morality. During the whole period of His ministry He afforded a constant example of perfect obedience to the moral law. Every duty which it became Him as a man to fulfil towards men He discharged no less punctually than those obligations of which the immediate object was God. 3. Jesus Christ is the cornerstone of salvation. Through Him we are justified, sanctified; through Him we receive the inheritance of eternal life. (T. Gisborne, M. A.) The cornerstone The figures woven into this passage are architectural. They do not, however, touch the imagination as much now as they did when they were first drawn; for we have been misled with regard to the truths they are designed to illustrate, by the degradation that has befallen the cornerstones which we plant. The cornerstone is not a foundation stone with us. It might just as well be put at the middle of the wall as at the corner; at the top as at the bottom; and, for that matter, it might as well be put in the tower as in the wall. It is merely a ceremonial cornerstone, made to contain a few records, giving the date, the time, and what not, belonging to the building. But there are real cornerstones yet. When builders have dug down and found the bottom level, and desire to lay a foundation which no fire can reach, no water undermine, no weight sway, and lay broad and vast stones, then these stones have a marked relation to the integrity of the whole building above. If they are weak, or easily displaced, the foundation will be unstable; and when that gives way, the superstructure, no matter how carefully it may be built, will follow it. There was, however, another kind of cornerstone in former times-namely, a massive slab, which, standing upright, united to itself firmly the two side walls, and so bound together the building laterally. Both of these terms are in our text, and both of them are applied to Christ, who is represented as not only bearing up the whole structure of piety as a foundation, but binding it together as a cornerstone, or the head of the corner, so that, vertically and laterally, the building takes hold and sustains itself by the foundation and the cornerstone. This passage teaches that as a building rests upon its foundation stones, so every Christian rests upon Jesus Christ. They are not merely connected with Him: they rest upon Him. So do they rest upon Him, that if He were to be removed from them all their religious experience would fall, as a wall would go down if its foundation stones were taken out of the way. I. I first ask you to mark the distinction which exists between a mere general dependence upon God, and a conscious personal life in Christ Jesus, for that is the distinction which demarks between the school of what may be called the naturalists in religion, and of evangelical Christians. It is one thing to be a believer in God’ s government; it is another thing to hold company with God-to behold Him, to love Him, and to commune with Him, to twine your life about Him. II. I remark, secondly, that this direct, intimate, hourly, and daily living with Christ, is the thing which the Gospel proposes as its characteristic aim. Morality is a good thing. A man without it certainly cannot be a Christian, although he may not be one with it. Moralities are mere day labourers, who dig out the roots and clear off the weeds, and get the ground ready for something else. Morals do but plough the soil-piety is the fruitful stein, and love the fair flower which springs from the soil. It is only love that can find out God without searching. Upon its eyes God dawns. Love is that regent quality which was meant to reveal the Divine to us. It carries its own light, and by its own secret nature is drawn instantly towards God, and reflects the knowledge of Him back upon us. When love hath brought forth its central vision of the Divine, and interpreted it to all the other faculties, then they, in turn, become seers, and the soul is helped by every one of its faculties, as by so many eyes, to behold the fulness of God. III. I remark, thirdly, that it is deemed by men very delusive, and by some wise men utterly impossible, in this mortal state, for a man to live by faith in an invisible being, so that Christ shall seem to be a present companion to him. You might as well attempt to root up an oak of a hundred years’ growth as attempt to eradicate my faith in Christ present with me-Christ living with me, and I with Him, so that my life is joined to His. Imagine that I stand, tearful and tremulous, yet joyful, by the side of a magnificent picture, which electrifies me, which touches all the great fountains in my nature, causing them to rise and overflow; which translates my mind, and purifies it. As I stand looking at such a picture, a man comes to me and says, “ What are you gazing at, sir?” I begin, in broken language, to tell him what effect the picture is having upon me; and he looks at me with astonishment, and says, “ Well, it may be that it affects you so, but it does not stand to reason; for it is natural to suppose that if it affected you so, it would affect me in the same way; and I do not have any such feelings as you profess to have. I am sure I would not pay a sixpence for the thing.” There I stand trembling before the picture; he reviles it, because his sensibilities are all materialised. Next there comes to me a utilitarian-one of those men who think nothing good unless it be useful, and with whom use means that which is good to sell or to eat. “ Is it possible,” he says, “ that this picture can operate upon your feelings? It makes no impression upon me whatever. I do not see how it can do such a thing. If you were to tell me that it was one of Raphael’ s great productions, and that it was worth five or six thousand dollars, I should understand that it had some value. You are a little touched, are you not?” Then a bloated sensualist comes to me, and says, “ I would give more for one flagon of wine than for all the old painted rags on earth.” He and I live in different worlds. But if none of these could be made to understand my feelings in the presence of a picture, how much less can they know the reality and glory of my feelings before that more glorious revelation of heavenly beauty which shall remain unrolled forever and forever, and which, as I stand before it, causes everything in me of faith, and hope, and joy, and love, to cry out! IV. Need I speak of the preciousness of your saviour? Need I call to your remembrance the experiences in which He has manifested Himself to you? Do you not remember those days of struggle and distress, through which you passed, and that day of hope and joy which succeeded them, when Christ dawned upon you, and you felt that your troubles were over, and your resistance to His will was ended, and you cried out, “ My Lord and my God!” and He raised you to His bosom? Has He not revealed Himself to you, saying, “ I am with you; I will never leave you nor forsake you” ? The manifestation of Christ to us takes away from trouble all its sting. By and by we shall strand, every one of us, in the narrow passage of death, and there is but one Pilot there. If He comes, bright and shining, from the dark waters of the troubled sea, how sweet and precious will He be to the dying soul that has loved Him, and longed to see Him! (H. W. Beecher.) Faith’ s sure foundation I. The foundation of the believer’ s faith. “ He that believeth on Him.” The foundation of the believer’ s faith is Christ Jesus Himself. But in what sense am I to believe in Jesus Christ?1. I reply, first, as God’ s appointed Saviour of men. “ Behold I lay in Zion a sure foundation.” We trust in Christ Jesus because God has set Him forth to be the propitiation for sin. 2. We also believe in the Lord Jesus because of the excellency of His person. We trust Christ to save us because we perceive Him in every way to be adapted by the nature and constitution of His person to be the Saviour of man kind. 3. Another ground of our reliance upon Christ is that He has actually finished the work of our redemption. There were two things to be done. The first was the keeping of the law on our behalf: that He has performed to the uttermost, even as He said to His Father, “ I have glorified Thee on the earth, I have finished the work which Thou gavest me to do.” We see our Lord also doing the other part of His work, namely, suffering in consequence of our sin, and our faith becomes fully established. 4. One other truth must be mentioned, seeing that our Lord is now no longer dead, we feel it more easy to place our confidence in Him because He ever liveth to see to the completion of our salvation. A living faith delights in a living Saviour. This is the seal of all that went before. II. The manner of this believing. How do we believe in Jesus Christ? Now, we have not to go a single inch to find an instructive illustration of what faith in Jesus is. The verse before us is connected with building.1. If, then, you want to know what it is to believe on Jesus, it is relic upon Him as a stone lies upon a foundation when the mason puts it there. Faith is leaning, depending, relying. 2. A stone rests wholly on the foundation. That is faith: resting upon Christ wholly and entirely, looking to Him for everything that has to do with our salvation. Genuine faith in Christ does not trust Him to pardon sin, and then trust itself to overcome sin. No, it trusts Christ both for the conquest of evil and for the forgiveness of it. 3. The stone laid on the foundation comes closer to that foundation every day. When a house is finished there still goes on a measure of settlement, and you are glad if it settles all in a piece together. Every day the stone is brought by its own weight a little closer to the foundation; may every day’ s pressure bring you and me closer to Christ. Oh, that the pressure of our joys and griefs may press us nearer to our Lord! 4. A well-built stone gets to be one with the foundation. In the old Roman walls the mortar seems to be as hard as the stones, and the whole is like one piece; you must blow it to atoms before you can get the wall away. So is it with the true believer: he rests upon his Lord till he is one with Jesus by a living union, so that you scarce know where the foundation ends and where the upbuilding begins; for the believer becometh all in Christ, even as Christ is all in all to him. III. The evil which will never come upon the man who believeth on Jesus. The text says, “ He shall not be confounded,” and the meaning of it is, first, that he shall never be disappointed. All that Christ has promised to be He will be to those who trust Him. And then comes the next rendering-you shall never be confounded. When a man gets to be ashamed of his hope because he is disappointed in it, he casts about for another anchorage, and, not knowing where to look, he is greatly perplexed. If the Lord Jesus Christ were to fall through, what should we do? No, Jesus, we shall not be confounded, for we shall never be disappointed in Thee, nor made ashamed of our hope! According to Isaiah’ s version, we shall not be obliged to “ make haste” ; we shall not be driven to our wit’ s end and hurried to and fro. We shall not hurry and worry, trying this and that, running from pillar to post to seek a hope; but he that believeth shall be quiet, calm, assured, confident. He awaits the future with equanimity, as he endures the present with patience. Now, the times of our special danger of being confounded are many; but in none of these shall we be confounded. Let us just turn them over in our minds. There are times when a man’ s sins all come up before him like exceeding great armies. All your thoughts, words, and deeds, your bad tempers and rebellions against God-suppose they were all to rise at once, what would become of you? Why, even then, “ he that believeth on Him shall not be confounded.” The depths have covered them, there is not one of them left. He that believeth on the pardoning Saviour shall not be confounded, though all his sins should accuse him at once. The unbelieving world outside labours to create confusion. The scientific discoverers, the possessors of boastful culture, and all the other braggers of this marvellously enlightened nineteenth century are up in arms against the believers in Jesus. Faith in Jesus can be justified before a synagogue of savans, it deserves the respect of a parliament of philosophers. To trust the Son of God incarnate, whose advent into this world is a fact better proved by history than any other that was ever on record-to trust oneself upon His atoning sacrifice is the most reasonable thing that a man can do. He that believeth on Him shall not be confounded by human wisdom, for God hath long ago confounded it and turned it into foolishness. But the world has done more than sneer; it has imitated Cain and sought to slay the faithful. There they stand. The lions are loose upon them. Do they cry for mercy, and treacherously deny Christ? They are feeble men and women; do they recant and leave their Master? Not they. They die as bravely as ever soldier fell in battle. Well, but there will come other troubles to Christians besides these, and in them they shall not be confounded. They will be tried by the flesh; natural desires will break forth into vehement lustings, and corruptions will seek to cast them down. Will believers perish then? No. He that believeth in Christ shall conquer himself, and overcome his easily besetting sins. There will come losses and crosses, business trials and domestic bereavements. What then? He shall not be confounded; his Lord will sustain him under every tribulation. At last death will come to us. We may not be able to shout “ victory” ; we may be too weak for triumphant hymns, but with our latest breath we will lisp the precious name. They that watch us shall know by our serenity that a Christian does not die, but only melts away into everlasting life. We shall never be confounded, even amid the grandeurs of eternity. (C. H. Spurgeon.) 1 Peter 2:7-8 Unto you therefore which believe He is precious.Jesus precious to true believers I. The persons, together with their faith, to whom Jesus is precious.1. The grace of faith, which renders Jesus precious to the soul, is not the faith of assent, or such a faith by which men credit the testimony of Jesus through the gospel. 2. It is not only a believing of Christ, but a believing in Christ-the soul’ s receiving of, and resting upon Him alone for righteousness, pardon, and salvation. 3. That faith works by love (Galatians 5:6). (1) This faith is ever attended with an affectionate desire of the company of Jesus Christ (Son 4:6; Psalms 4:6; Job 23:3; Isaiah 26:8). (2) With delightful thoughts of Him (Psalms 139:17). (3) With cheerful service to Him (Psalms 119:4-5). (4) Such as believe in and love the Lord Jesus in sincerity, are tender of His name and honour. (5) They are afraid to offend Him. (6) True faith in Christ, and sincere love to Him, are ever attended with the soul’ s longing to be more and more like Him-in humility, in patience, in service, in resignation, and in holiness. (a) It is such a faith as is the act of a living soul; for these believers, to whom Christ is precious, are said to be “ new born.” (b) Those to whom Jesus is precious are such as have “ tasted of His grace.” (c) They are described by their living by faith on Christ-“ to whom coming.” II. Upon what account is Jesus precious to them that believe? I answer, in general, that it is from His suitableness to them, their relation to Him, and the benefits they receive from Him. But, more particularly-1. Jesus is precious to believers, in the constitution of His person, which is very wonderful. 2. On account of His excellent qualifications and rich anointing for His work, as Mediator between God and men. 3. On account of the discharge of His offices of Prophet, Priest, and King, in order to the salvation of His people. 4. On account of the relations that He stands in to them that believe. He is their Head of influence, and they are members of His spiritual Body. He is their Shepherd. He is their best Friend-loving, tender, compassionate, sincere, sympathising, and constant. He is their great Physician and Healer. 5. On account of the display of His transcendent love and riches of His grace in order to their salvation. 6. He is most precious to believers, as whatsoever makes any of the creatures lovely, desirable, and precious one to another, is originally in Him; it is in them as a cistern, but in Christ as an inexhaustible fountain. (1) Is beauty one ground of the creature’ s delighting in each other? The Lord Jesus excels them all (Psalms 45:2). (2) Does wisdom recommend any creature to the affection of another? The Lord Jesus is the Wisdom of God. He not only governs the world in wisdom, but as a Prophet He teaches men to know God and Himself, which is eternal life. (3) Does usefulness in any creature bespeak the affections and esteem of others? Jesus Christ is more than all the creatures put together; He is all things to His people-their light, their life, their food, their strength, their clothing and ornament, their riches and honour, their guide and leader, their healer, their advocate and intercessor, and all in all. (4) Does a meek and quiet spirit, attended with patience and humility, commonly win the esteem of fellow creatures? Jesus Christ excels them all in these most desirable endowments; He is a perfect pattern of humility and meekness for all His disciples. (5) Does faithfulness to any trust win the love and esteem of one to another? This is eminently found in Jesus Christ (Hebrews 3:2). (6) Does sincere and ardent love in anyone call for the love and esteem of Others? The Lord Jesus excels them all; no creature can possibly love another at such a rate as He has done; His love is strong as death, many waters cannot quench it. And it is as free as it is great and uncommon. III. How do believers show that Christ is precious to them?1. By choosing Him for their own, and careful endeavour to clear up their interest in Him. 2. By their frequent and delightful thoughts of Him (Psalms 139:17). 3. By earnest desires of His presence, communion with Him (Job 23:3; Psalms 42:1-2). 4. They yield to Him the seat and habitation of their very hearts (Ephesians 3:17). 5. By making use of Him, for all the ends that God the Father has appointed Him. 6. By their sincere love to Him. (1) They love to think of Him, and their love inclines them to think and speak honourably of Him. (2) They love His image wherever they can perceive it (Psalms 16:3). (3) They love His Word (Job 23:12; Romans 7:22). (4) They highly esteem His ordinances, and the places and means where they may enjoy Him. (5) They are careful to keep His commandments (John 14:21). (6) They desire to be more and more like Him (Romans 8:29). (7) They rejoice in Him, and all He is made of God to them (Philippians 3:3). (W. Notcutt.) Christ precious to believers I. First, this is a positive fact, that unto believers Jesus Christ is precious. In Himself He is of inestimable preciousness, for He is very God of very God. He is, moreover, perfect man without sin. The precious gopher wood of His humanity is overlaid with the pure gold of His Divinity. He is a mine of jewels and a mountain of gems. He is altogether lovely, but, alas! this blind world seeth not His beauty. II. Why is Christ precious to the believer?1. Jesus Christ is precious to the believer because He is intrinsically precious. But here let me take you through an exercise in grammar; here is an adjective, let us go through it. (1) Is He not good positively? Election is a good thing; but we are elect in Christ Jesus. Adoption is a good thing; but we are adopted in Christ Jesus and made joint heirs with Him. Pardon is a good thing; but we are pardoned through the precious blood of Jesus. And if all these be good, surely He must be good in whom, and by whom, and to whom, and through whom are all these precious things. (2) But Christ is good comparatively. Bring anything and compare with Him. One of the brightest jewels we can have is liberty. If I be not free, let me die. Ay, but put liberty side by side with Christ, and I would wear the fetter for Christ and rejoice in the chain. Besides liberty, what a precious thing is life! “ Skin for skin, yea, all that a man hath will he give for his life.” But let a true Christian once have the choice between life and Christ-“ No,” says he, “ I can die, but I cannot deny.” (3) And then to go higher still-Christ is good superlatively. The superlative of all things is heaven, and if it could be possible to put Christ in competition with heaven, the Christian would not stop a moment in his choice; he would sooner be on earth with Christ than be in heaven without Him. 2. Still, to answer this question again: Why is Christ precious to the believer more than to any other man? Why, it is the believer’ s want that makes Christ precious to him! The worldling does not care for Christ, because he has never hungered and thirsted after Him; but the Christian is athirst for Christ, his heart and his flesh pant after God. This is the one thing needful for me, and if I have it not, this thirst must destroy me. Mark, too, that the believer may be found in many aspects, and you will always find that his needs will endear Christ to him. 3. Look at the believer, not only in his wants, but in his highest earthly state. The believer is a man that was once blind and now sees. And what a precious thing is light to a man that sees! If I, as a believer, have an eye, how much I need the stun to shine! And when Christ gives sight to the blind He makes His people a seeing people. It is then that they find what a precious thing is the sight, and how pleasant a thing it is for a man to behold the sun. From the very fact that the Christian is a quickened man, he values the robe of righteousness that is put about him. The very newborn powers of the Christian would be very channels for misery if it were not for Christ. But, believer, how precious is Christ to thee in the hour of conviction of sin, when He says, “ Thy sins, which are many, are all forgiven thee.” How precious to thee in the hour of sickness, when He comes to thee and says, “ I will make all thy bed in thy sickness.” How precious to thee in the hour of trial, when He says, “ All things work together for thy good.” How precious when friends are buried, for He says, “ I am the resurrection and the life.” How precious in thy grey old age, “ Even in old age I am with thee, and to hoary hairs will I carry you.” How precious in the lone chamber of death, for “ I will fear no evil, Thou art with me, Thy rod and Thy staff comfort me.” But, last of all, how precious will Christ be when we see Him as He is! All we know of Christ here is as nothing compared with what we shall know hereafter. (C. H. Spurgeon.) Christ precious to believers I. What Christ is to His people. The Revised Version reads the text, “ For you therefore which believe is the preciousness.” His very self is preciousness itself. He is the essence, the substance, the sum of all preciousness. Many things are more or less precious; but the Lord Jesus is preciousness itself, outsoaring all degrees of comparison.1. How do believers show that Christ is thus precious to them? (1) They do so by trusting everything to Him. Every believer stays his hope solely upon the work of Jesus. Our implicit faith in Him proves our high estimate of Him. (2) To believers the Lord Jesus is evidently very precious, because they would give up all that they have sooner than lose Him. Tens of thousands have renounced property, liberty, and life sooner than deny Christ. (3) Saints also find their all in Him. He is not one delight, but all manner of delights to them, All that they can want, or wish, or conceive, they find in Him. (4) So precious is Jesus to believers, that they cannot speak well enough of Him. Could you, at your very best, exalt the Lord Jesus so gloriously as to satisfy yourself? (5) Saints show that in their estimation Christ is precious, for they can never do enough for Him. It is not all talk; they are glad also to labour for Him who died for them. Though they grow weary in His work, they never grow weary of it. (6) Saints show how precious Christ is to them, in that He is their heaven. Have you never heard them when dying, talk about their joy in the prospect of being with Christ? (7) If you are not satisfied with these proofs that Christ is precious to believers, I would invite you to add another yourself. Let every one of us do something fresh by which to prove the believer’ s love to Christ. Let us invent a new love token. Let us sing unto the Lord a new song. Let not this cold world dare to doubt that unto believers Christ is precious; let us force the scoffers to believe that we are in earnest. 2. In thinking Christ to be precious, the saints are forming a just estimate of Him. “ He is precious.” For a thing to be rightly called precious, it should have three qualities: it should be rare, it should have an intrinsic value of its own, and it should possess useful and important properties. All these three things meet in our adorable Lord, and make Him precious to discerning minds. 3. The saints form their estimate of Him upon Scriptural principles. “ Unto you therefore which believe He is precious.” We have a “ therefore” for our valuation of Christ; we have calculated, and have reason on our side, though we count Him to be the chief among ten thousand, and altogether lovely. (1) Our Lord Jesus is very precious to us as “ a living stone.” As a foundation He is firm as a stone; but in addition, He has life, and this life He communicates, so that we also become living stones, and are joined to Him in living, loving, lasting union. A stone alive, and imparting life to other stones which are built upon it, is indeed a precious thing in a spiritual house which is to be inhabited of God. This gives a character to the whole structure. (2) Our Lord is all the more precious to us because He was “ disallowed indeed of men.” Never is Christ dearer to the believer than when he sees Him to be despised and rejected of men. (3) He becomes inconceivably precious to us when we view Him as “ chosen of God.” Upon whom else could the Divine election have fallen? But He saith, “ I have laid help upon one that is mighty; I have exalted one chosen out of the people.” The choice of Jehovah must be divinely wise. (4) Note well that the apostle calls Him “ precious,” that is, precious to God. We feel abundantly justified in our high esteem of our Lord, since He is so dear to the Father. (5) Moreover, we prize our Lord Jesus as our foundation. Jehovah saith, “ Behold, I lay in Sion a chief cornerstone.” What a privilege to have a foundation of the Lord’ s own laying! It is and must be the best, the most abiding, the most precious foundation. II. What it is in the saints which makes them prize Christ at this rate. It is their faith. “ Unto you therefore which believe He is precious.” Faith calls Him precious, when others esteem Him “ a root out of a dry ground.”1. To faith the promises concerning Christ are made. The Bible never expects that without faith men will glorify Christ. 2. It is by faith that the value of Christ is perceived. You cannot see Christ by mere reason, for the natural man is blind to the things of the Spirit. 3. By faith the Lord Jesus is appropriated. In possession lies much of preciousness. Faith is the hand that grasps Him, the mouth that feeds upon Him, and therefore by faith He is precious. 4. By faith the Lord Jesus is more and more tasted and proved, and becomes more and more precious. To us our Lord is as gold tried in the fire. Our knowledge is neither theoretical nor traditional; we have seen Him ourselves, and He is precious to us. 5. Our sense of Christ’ s preciousness is a proof of our possessing the faith of God’ s elect; and this ought to be a great comfort to any of you who are in the habit of looking within. 6. Christ becomes growingly precious to us as our faith grows. If thou doubtest Christ, He has gone down fifty per cent in thine esteem. Every time you give way to scepticism and critical questioning you lose a sip of sweetness. In proportion as yea believe with a faith which is childlike, clear, simple, strong, unbroken, in that proportion will Christ be dearer and dearer to you. III. What believers receive from Him. Take the exact translation, “ Unto you that believe He is honour.”1. Honour! Can honour ever belong to a sinner like me? Worthless, base, only fit to be cast away, can I have honour? The Lord changes the rank when He forgives the sin. Thou art dishonourable no longer if thou believest in Jesus. Thou art honourable before God now that He has become thy salvation. 2. It is a high honour to be associated with the Lord Jesus. 3. It is a great honour to be built on Him as a sure foundation. A minister once said to me, “ It must be very easy for you to preach.” I said, “ Do you think so? I do not look at it as a light affair.” “ Yes,” he said; “ it is easy, because you hold a fixed and definite set of truths, upon which you dwell from year to year.” I did not see how this made it easy to preach, but I did see how it made my heart easy, and I said, “ Yes, that is true. I keep to one fixed line of truth.” “ That is not my case,” said he; “ I revise my creed from week to week. It is with me constant change and progress.” I did not say much, but I thought the more. If the foundation is constantly being altered, the building will be rather shaky. 4. It is an honour to believe the doctrines taught by Christ and His apostles. It is an honour to be on the same lines of truth as the Holy Ghost. 5. It is an honour to do as Christ bade us in His precepts. Holiness is the truest royalty. 6. It will be our great honour to see our Lord glorified. (C. H. Spurgeon.) Practical trust in Christ the highest honour Unto you therefore who believe is the honour.” I. Practical trust in Christ gives man the noblest character. What is true nobility or honour? Disinterested love is the spring and essence of a noble character, this is the soul of the hero. Where it is not, though a man be sage, statesman, poet, king, he is contemptible. How does a man get this? By practically trusting in Christ-in no other way. II. Practical trust in Christ gives man the highest fellowships. But into what society does practical trust in Christ introduce them? First, into the society of sainted sages-the great and good men of all lands and times. Secondly, into the society of holy angels-the firstborn of the Eternal. Thirdly, Into the society of the great God Himself. III. Practical trust in Christ gives man the sublimest possessions. (D. Thomas, D. D.) The honour of believing in Christ Many will doubtless feel some regret at the loss in the Revised New Testament of the familiar words, “ Unto you therefore which believe He is precious.” The marginal reading of the Revised Version is even preferable to that of our text, “ For you therefore which believe is the honour.” Men object to be told that they must believe in order to know the truth, the power, the value of Christianity.1. Faith is the condition of all knowledge. The student of natural science believes that there are hidden secrets of nature, laws unknown as yet, which will be revealed to patient investigation. Because he believes this, he laboriously toils and patiently waits. 2. Faith is the condition of all enterprise. It is because men believe, not merely in the possibility, but in the probability of the success of an undertaking that they are willing to engage in it, and even to incur toil and risk. 3. Nay, more, faith is the condition of existence. We eat because we believe that food is necessary and will nourish us. We rest at home or walk abroad because we believe in the stability of nature’ s laws and the goodwill of our fellow men. 4. Faith, which is the condition of everything else, itself rests on conditions, and compliance with those conditions involves the believer in much “ honour.” It depends on knowledge, on experience, i.e., on evidence. 5. Nor does faith rest on evidence simply, but on an emotion, on the feeling which the evidence excites, and on the will which is thereby awakened and influenced. 6. What, then, is the faith in Christ which is the condition of this honour? What do we believe about Jesus Christ? What are we called upon to believe, and on what evidence? (1) Ascending from the lower to the higher, we believe first in Jesus Christ as the ideal man. (a) Faith in the perfect humanity of Christ brings with it the assurance of immortal life and of undying sympathy. (b) And as we think of Him living still, we feel assured of His sympathy with us. For His perfection was not something inherent in Himself, something necessary and unavoidable, but a perfection attained through conflict and suffering. (2) From the belief in the perfect humanity of Jesus Christ we rise to a higher faith in His Divinity, His Deity. For we find that He stands alone in His sinlessness, in His perfection. This is, I believe, the real genesis and growth of true faith in Christ. It is through His humanity that we rise to the conception of His Deity. “ The person of Christ is the perennial glory and strength of Christianity.” (3) The faith attained through looking at Christ, meditating on Christ, reasoning about Christ, is developed and perfected by experience. Experience is the test of faith, of its value or worthlessness. The strongest faith, that which cannot be shaken, is that which rests on personal experience. Unto you that believe is the honour. What honour? I. It is the honour of building on a foundation which can never give way. It is the safety of having an unfailing refuge in which to hide. We have an experience of which nothing can rob us, and a hope that maketh not ashamed, which will never disappoint, as the anchor of our soul. “ Unto you that believe is the honour.” II. Man’ s highest honour is to render homage to perfect love and righteousness and the truest homage imitates that before which it bows in reverence. Dishonouring Christ, men dishonour themselves. Many may admire a picture which only one could paint, and the consciousness of inability would prevent them from attempting to emulate the artist whose work fills them with delight and wonder. But if the artist were to offer to enable us to do what he had done, and assure us of his power to do so by the example and experience of numbers who had been taught by him, should we Hot gladly accept such an offer? Such an offer Christ makes to every one. He sets before us in His life a purity, a nobility, a righteousness which we cannot attain by ourselves, but which He can and will help us to attain. III. The honour is that of testifying to the power and grace of this Saviour and Friend of man, the honour of making Him known to others. We can only do this as we believe in Him ourselves, and our life must prove our faith. (A. F. Joscelyne, B. A.) Christ is our honour The doctrine from these words is this, that Jesus Christ is an honour to all believers.1. He is the author of honour to them. 2. He is, and ought to be, the object of honour from them. He honours them, and they do and should honour Him. I. How is the Lord Jesus the author of honour to all true relievers? We use to say concerning the king, that he is the fountain of honour, that is, all his subjects that are men of honour derive their honour from him. Others give them honour, but it is he that makes them honourable. Now King Jesus is He, and He alone, that is the fountain of honour to all true believers.1. He hath Himself an honourable esteem of them. They are persons of honour, even the meanest of them, in His account (Isaiah 43:4). 2. His will is that every one else should be in this like Himself, in having an honourable esteem of them. As when the king bestows a degree of honour upon a person, makes him a knight, or a lord, or an earl, he expects others so to regard him; so it is here (Esther 6:3; Esther 6:6-7). How much soever they may be despised by others, they are the excellent of the earth in His eye because they are so in Christ’ s eye (Psalms 16:2). 3. He hath done that for them which in the account of men may and doth deserve that honour. What is it that tie hath done for them that may be the ground of men’ s honouring them? (1) One ground of honouring men is upon the account of their personal excellences and endowments; some are honourable for their learning and knowledge in arts and sciences; some for their, wisdom and prudence in the management of secular affairs; in the field, as soldiers; in the senate, as counsellors. Now if so, the people fearing God deserve honour indeed, for they have better knowledge than others. They from the least even to the greatest know God. And whence have they that knowledge but from Christ, who gives them an understanding? (1 John 5:20) They have wisdom also, another sort of wisdom-wisdom from above in soul affairs. (2) Upon the account of their great usefulness in their particular places and stations; in court or camp, for peace or war. By their prayers, fetching down mercies, keeping off judgments, as Moses. By their pattern, they are the lights of the world. (3) Upon the account of their honourable relations wherein they stand. He that is himself in honour reflects honour upon all that are related to him. Now what are the relations of true believers? They are all the children of God, and how but by faith in Jesus Christ? (Galatians 3:16; John 1:12) And is not that a high honour? To be a servant, even the meanest, to men of honour, carries honour in it (Psalms 116:16). Nay, they are His friends, admitted to His secrets, acquainted with His counsels (John 15:15). As Hushai was a friend to David (2 Samuel 15:37). Zabud to Solomon (1 Kings 4:5). (4) Some are honourable on account of their honourable hopes. Young heirs are honoured for their inheritance sake, though as yet under age. (5) Some are honourable on account of their honourable offices and employments (Revelation 1:5)-kings and priests, so He makes them. (6) Others are honourable on account of their honourable name (James 2:7). The word Christian is from Christ; all this honour have all His saints (Psalms 149:9). II. What kind of honour is it that true believers have from Jesus Christ? It hath these properties.1. It is real honour. Other honours are but a shadow, a dream, a fancy. This hath substance in it (Proverbs 8:21). 2. It is righteous honour. Other honours which the honourable men of the earth have are oftentimes unrighteous-unjustly given, and unjustly taken. 3. It is heavenly honour. Other honours are from below, this is from above; other honours are upon earthly accounts, this upon heavenly. The birth of a believer is heavenly, his endowments heavenly. 4. It is harmless honour. Other honours often hurt those that have them, puff them up with pride, as Haman, but so doth not this. 5. It is unsought honour. What endeavours are there to obtain other honours, what struggling, what bribing and waiting! 6. It is unfading honour. It is honour that lasts, it is everlasting. III. What may we learn from this subject?1. We learn what to think of the great and glorious majesty of heaven and earth. His name, and His Son’ s name, is certainly upon this account to be adored by us and by all His creatures, angels and men. For what? For His infinite love and free grace in condescending in this manner to a remnant of Adam’ s seed, so as to put all this honour upon them. 2. We learn what to think of those who are not believers; all the ignorant, careless, unregenerate generation: certainly they have no part nor lot in this matter. They are none of those that God will honour. 3. We learn what is the true way to true honour. It is in our nature to desire it. But the misery is, we mistake our end, and consequently our way. We take those things to be wealth and pleasure and honour that are not so, and that not to be so which is so, and we pursue accordingly. 4. We learn what is our duty towards those to whom Christ is an honour. Certainly it is our duty to see them truly honourable, and to love and honour them accordingly (2 Kings 20:12-13). 5. We learn what is their duty to whom Christ is an honour. To make it their business to honour Him all they can. Why is He to be honoured? He is worthy that it should be so. It is the Father’ s will it should be so (John 5:22-23; Colossians 1:18-19). It will be our own benefit and comfort, living and dying. We shall be no losers, but gainers by it. Wherein are we to honour Him? In general-let Him be precious to you. Have high and honourable thoughts of Him. Speak high and honourable things concerning Him, as Paul did. Do nothing to displease and dishonour Him, but everything contrary (Philippians 1:2). (Philip Henry.) The preciousness of Christ 1. He is precious as a Redeemer from sin. The believer appreciates salvation, because he knows what it is to be lost. 2. He is precious as a manifestation of God. 3. Look at His mission. He enters into my sin and poverty to pity and to aid. 4. He is the central glory of heaven. Human loves are not extinguished, but they will be subordinated to Him. (J. M. Buckley, D. D.) The preciousness of Christ I. In what this preciousness consists.1. I would mention, first, the difficulty of securing the possession of the Saviour. He is freely offered “ without money and without price.” Yet “ all men have not faith.” The reason is, that there are difficulties in the way of their believing, which is one cause why we may say that Christ is precious. 2. There are few who possess this invaluable gift; not, indeed, that there is not in Christ a sufficiency for all, but Christ can only be received in one way-by faith. You may try to discover the Saviour by your works, but you cannot find Him. 3. There is a great demand for the Saviour; not, indeed, amongst the worldly, the frivolous, the luxurious and selfish, the sensual and profane. But the demand is amongst those who are convinced of their sin. 4. There are advantages accruing to the possessor, which can leave no doubt of the preciousness of Christ. His blood is precious; His intercession is precious; His righteousness, His Word, His doctrine. II. Who experience this preciousness? Gold is valueless to the infant. Pearls are as nothing to swine. And, alas! the precious blood of Jesus is to many as an unholy thing.1. To the openly profane, Christ is as nothing. 2. The men of the world can see nothing in Christ in which they should rejoice; but they do see their lusts forbidden, and their lives condemned (Titus 2:11-12). 3. The luxurious experience no comfort in Christ. He who had “ not where to lay His head” is a continual reproof to them. 4. Nor is Christ more precious to the formalist (Romans 10:3-4). 5. It is to the believer, and to the believer alone, that Christ is precious. It is the believer who has felt the burden of sin. He can say, “ Thanks be unto God for His unspeakable gift.” (1) Meditate on His name-Jesus, Saviour I How much does that word convey to a believer’ s heart! (2) Consider how precious to us is the sympathy of Jesus (Proverbs 18:24; John 13:1). (3) Call to mind the power and strength of our Redeemer. We know that we are surrounded by enemies, that we are subject to misrepresentations, to persecutions for righteousness’ sake. But Jesus, the mighty God, is on our side, and we become “ more than conquerors through Him who loved us.” (4) Again, behold the righteousness of Jesus. (H. M. Villiers, M. A.) Christ precious to the believer I. Christ is precious to believers on account of what He is in himself. II. Christ is precious to them who believe on account of what He has done for them. III. Christ is precious unto them who believe, on account of what He has done in them. IV. Christ is precious unto them who believe, on account of what He is still doing both for them and in them. V. Christ is precious to them that believe, on account of what He has promised and pledged Himself to do for them hereafter. (D. Dickson, D. D.) Christ precious to them that believe I. The character of them that believe.1. This is the peculiar privilege of those who are Christians indeed, whereby they are distinguished from others. “ All men have not faith” (2 Thessalonians 3:2). Many there are who impose upon themselves, and vainly suppose that they believe, because they entertain some speculative opinions about religion. 2. Those who believe possess not only a peculiar but an important privilege. Faith is everywhere represented in the Word of God as a Divine and powerful principle, which is of unspeakable moment to the eternal interest of men. 3. Those who believe are endowed with a useful principle. True saving faith in Jesus Christ is not a dormant disposition, but a vigorous and active grace, attended with the happiest effects. It unites to Jesus Christ. It purifies the heart from the love and power of sin. It is the source of all holy obedience to God; it worketh by love, and is fruitful in all good works. II. The distinguishing evidence which is peculiar to you that believe. (W. McCulloch.) The Christ of experience This is a recognition of the practical religious value of the Christ-of what He is to those who have put Him to experimental tests. All the qualities that constitute preciousness are in Him, in a degree of excellence that imagination cannot overcolour, that even love cannot exaggerate.1. In respect of rarity, He is the only Saviour of men; the “ one Mediator between God and man” ; the only hope of sinful souls. 2. In respect of beauty, He is the perfection of all moral excellence. 3. In character He is ideally good, pure, devout, benevolent, loving. 4. His work, as the Redeemer of men, realises our very loftiest conceptions-first, of moral philosophy; next, of spiritual holiness; next, of self-sacrificing love. 5. In respect of serviceableness, of personal beneficial relations to men, as their Redeemer from sin, His preciousness transcends all our words or thoughts. (1) We might apply a comparative test, and put the preciousness of Christ into comparison with all other possessions of our human life. How does our practical judgment estimate Him? Or we might subject Him to a comparative estimate with other good men; His character with that of all other saints; His teaching with that of all other prophets; His redeeming work with all other schemes for human improvement. How instinctively we give Him the transcendency! (2) Our estimates are largely influenced by the judgments of others. Let us think, then, of the estimate put upon Christ’ s character and work by other moral beings. Is it not significant of His excellence that He attracts the most readily and attaches the most profoundly the holiest and noblest natures? (3) The conclusive appeal, however, is to the conscious experience of our own religious souls: “ If so be we have tasted that the Lord is gracious.” This is the ground upon which myriads of religious men, men whose knowledge is limited, whose theology is confused, whose reason is easily baffled, who are able neither to defend their Christianity, nor theoretically to understand it, justly trust in Him. They have personally come to Christ; He has consciously quickened the life and the love of their souls; they “ know that they have passed from death unto life,” that “ whereas once they were blind, now they see.” His Divine presence witnesses in their souls. In some mystic way He is their daily Saviour, and Sanctifier, and Comforter. I. Is not Christ precious to us when we grope and stumble at the mystery of God, when we feel that “ the gods of the heathen are no gods” ? When we cannot by any searching of our own find out God; when a thousand possibilities of ignorance and superstition torment us with vague and nameless fears; what a marvellous revelation of light and power of assurance it is when Jesus Christ puts before us His great teaching of God; when, with the strong confidence, and in the quiet ways of perfect knowledge, He tells us of the Father! Upon the conceptions of God which Jesus Christ has taught us our religious life rests. These ideas are the practical inspirations of what we are and do. In the sore feeling of our rebelliousness and guilt we go to Him, as the prodigal to his father, to ask the generous forgiveness of His fatherly love. In the helplessness of our need we cast ourselves upon the care of Him who clothes the lily and feeds the raven. Whether true or not, this conception of God is the greatest, the most inspiring, the most satisfying thought ever presented to men; the highest, purest, most endearing that the world has known. II. How precious the Christ is when the sense of sin is quickened within us, when we awaken to the grave culpability of its guilt, when we realise its essential antagonism to the Divine holiness, its transgression of God’ s inviolable law, the imperative necessity of its dread penalty of death! The moral sense, the conscience within me, that which makes me a moral being, demands atonement for sin as much as my safety does. Mere security is no moral satisfaction to a righteous being. I could not be happy in the salvation of Christ if I were saved as a man is saved who breaks prison, or to whom the prison doors are illicitly opened; if I were saved at the cost of a single righteous principle. How unspeakably precious, then, the Christ when He is “ set forth as a propitiation for sin,” “ who Himself bare our sin in His own body on the tree.” “ He loved me, and gave Himself for me.” True or not true, it is, to say the least, a theory of forgiveness, the most perfect and satisfactory to all the feelings of our moral nature. III. How precious again is the Christ in our struggle with practical evil, as we fight with lusts, resist temptation, overcome worldliness, subdue selfishness, or mourn over failures and falls! How assuring and helpful His perfect life, His promised grace, His ready and tender sympathy! But for Him we should have despaired in our degradation and helplessness. Again we say, this conception of Him, true or not, is practically the greatest moral force that we feel. Therefore He is precious to us, because He enables the moral redemption of our soul. IV. How precious the Christ is in times of great sorrow; when we stand by open graves, and “ refuse to be comforted because those whom we love are not” ! How He comes to us, as He came “ from beyond Jordan to Bethany” ! How He talks with us about “ the resurrection and the life” ! How He weeps with us in the silence of ineffable sympathy! V. And how precious He is in our own mortal conflict; when “ the shadow feared of man” falls upon ourselves; when “ heart and flesh fail” ; when human love falls away from us, and we hear its receding voices as we go forward alone into the dark valley! “ Into His hands we commit our spirit” ; “ His rod and staff comfort us” ; His hand clasps ours; He leads us through the darkness into the eternal light and life. (H. Allon, D. D.) Christ precious to believers I. That Jesus Christ is now precious to believers. Notice attentively how personally precious Jesus is. There are two persons in the text: “ Unto you that believe He is precious.” You are a real person, and you feel that you are such. You have realised yourself; you are quite clear about your own existence; now in the same way strive to realise the other Person. “ Unto you that believe He is precious.” You believe in Him, He loves you; you love Him in return, and He sheds abroad in your heart a sense of His love. Notice, too, that while the text gleams with this vividness of personality, to which the most of professors are blind, it is weighted with a most solid positiveness: “ Unto you that believe He is precious.” It does not speak as though He might be or might not be; but “ He is precious.” If the new life be in thee, thou art as sure to love the Saviour as fish love the stream, or the birds the air, or as brave men love liberty, or as all men love their lives. Tolerate no peradventures here. Mark, further, the absoluteness of the text, “ Unto you that believe He is precious.” It is not written how precious. The text does not attempt by any form of computation to measure the price which the regenerate soul sets upon her Lord. The thought which I desire to bring out into fullest relief is this, that Jesus Christ is continually precious to His people. Unto you that believe, though you have believed to the saving of your soul, He is still precious; for your guilt will return upon your conscience, and you will yet sin, being still in the body, and thus unto you experimentally the cleansing atonement is as precious as when you first relied upon its expiating power. Nay, Jesus is more precious to you now, for you know your own needs more fully, have proved more often the adaptation of His saving grace, and have received a thousand more gifts at His blessed hands. II. Let us think how Christ is today precious to you. To many of you there is as much in Christ undiscovered as you have already enjoyed. As surely as your faith grasps more, and becomes more capacious and appropriating, Christ will grow in preciousness to you. Ask, then, for more faith. III. Because Jesus is precious to believers He efficaciously operates upon them. The preciousness of Christ is, as it were, the leverage of Christ lifting up His saints to holiness. Let me show you this.1. The man who trusts Christ values Christ; that which I value I hold fast; hence our valuing Christ helps us to abide steadfast in times of temptation. 2. Notice further: this valuing of Christ helps the believer to make sacrifices. Sacrifice making constitutes a large part of any high character. He who never makes a sacrifice in his religion may shrewdly suspect that it is not worth more than his own practical valuation of it. 3. Moreover, this valuing of Christ makes us jealous against sin. He who loves the Redeemer best purifies himself most, even as his Lord is pure. 4. High valuing of Christ helps the Christian in the selection of his associates in life. If I hold my Divine Lord to be precious, how can I have fellowship with those who do not esteem Him? You will not find a man of refined habits and cultured spirits happy amongst the lowest and most illiterate. Birds of a feather flock together. Workers and traders unite in companies according to their occupations. Lovers of Christ rejoice in lovers of Christ, and they delight to meet together; for they can talk to each other of things in which they are agreed. IV. Christ being thus precious, His preciousness becomes the test of our Christianity. (C. H. Spurgeon.) The precious Saviour There are very few people who would not agree with the apostle when he says that Christ is precious to believers. But when one comes a little closer, and asks professing people why He is precious to them, and in what degree, the answers to this question are vague. It is not of Christ Himself that most professors will speak. Some will say they need His righteousness, others that they hope in His death; but ah! the genuine child of God alone can say, from the very bottom of his heart, “ To me Christ is precious.” Christ’ s righteousness cannot be separated from Himself, and nothing but faith in a living, reigning Jesus will save the soul. But now, to apply the subject more directly, we shall briefly notice a few characteristics in believers themselves which seem to show that to them Christ is precious.1. Innumerable marks might be given, but here is a distinguishing one-Christ is the object nearest to a believer’ s heart. He dwells in the soul, nearer than any creature more closely entwined round the heart strings than aught beside. 2. The second mark of the believer’ s value for the Lord Jesus is, that he puts no society in comparison with His presence; no other company has such power to refresh and comfort and purify the soul. 3. The third proof of the estimation in which Christ is held by His people is that, for His sake, and for the love they bear Him, they give up all known sins. 4. The fourth proof that we shall now mention is that where Jesus is precious His ordinances are highly prized-we shall value His Word, alone and in the family, as well as in the house of God. And so also with His house, His table, His Sabbath. 5. Again, God’ s people are precious to the believer. 6. Another mark that Christ is precious to believers is that they are longing for His second coming. The way to heaven is to be in Christ; and heaven is to be with Christ. (W. C. Burns.) Christ precious to all true believers “ To you therefore which believe, He is precious.” The illative particle “ therefore” shows this passage as an inference from what went before; and the reasoning seems to be this: “ This stone is precious to God, therefore it is precious to you that believe. You have the same estimate Of Jesus Christ which God the Father has; and for that very reason He is precious to you, because He is precious to Him.”1. He is precious to all the angels of heaven. Angels saw, believed, and loved him in the various stages of His life, from His birth to His return to His native heaven. Oh, could we see what is doing in heaven at this instant, how would it surprise, astonish, and confound us! Do you think the name of Jesus is of as little importance there as in our world? Do you think there is one lukewarm or disaffected heart there among ten thousand times ten thousand, and thousands of thousands? Oh no! there His love is the ruling passion of every heart and the favourite theme of every song. 2. He is infinitely precious to His Father, who thoroughly knows Him, and is an infallible judge of real worth (Isaiah 42:1). And shall not the love of the omniscient God have weight with believers to believe Him too? And now what think you of Christ? Will you not think of Him as believers do? If so, He will be precious to your hearts above all things for the future. Oh precious Jesus! are matters come to that pass in our world that creatures bought with Thy blood, creatures that owe all their hopes to Thee, should stand in need of persuasion to love Thee? What horrors attend the thought! (1) None but believers have eyes to see the glory of Christ. The god of this world, the prince of darkness, has blinded the minds of them that believe not, lest the light of the glorious gospel of Christ should shine into them. (2) None but believers are properly sensible of their need of Christ. They are deeply sensible of their ignorance and the disorder of their understanding, and therefore they are sensible of their want of both the external and internal instructions of this Divine Prophet, but as to others they are puffed up with intellectual pride, and apprehend themselves in very little need of religious instructions, and therefore they think but very slightly of Him. (3) None but believers have known by experience how precious tie is. They, and only they, can reflect upon the glorious views of Him, which themselves have had, to captivate their hearts forever to Him. (S. Davies, M. A.) Christ more than precious “ When asked by a member of his family as to his hope he answered: ‘ I am a sinner saved by grace,’ and added, ‘ Jesus!-Oh, to be like Him!’ At another time he said: ‘ To you that believe He is precious.’ Then with stronger voice he broke forth into holy rapture and exclaimed: ‘ Precious, precious, more than precious!’ The writer of this notice, highly honoured with the friendship of the family, saw Mrs. Simpson a few minutes after the bishop had spoken these words, While her heart was breaking, she murmured amid her sobs, ‘ Precious, precious, more than precious!’ She might well say: ‘ No one knew him as we did at home. He was so good and kind. We thought he would be spared to us a little longer.’ Then she turned again to his comforting words about his Lord: ‘ Precious, precious, more than precious.’ They sound as a refrain after his ‘ Psalm of life.’” (Memoir of Bishop Simpson.) Where Christ is valued He will be made known If He is precious to you, you cannot help speaking about Him. We remember, in a house which we used to visit, an ornament under a glass shade which delighted the children. It was a gilt casket, with a cameo on the top, and inside a nugget of gold, the ore in its rough state. It had been brought from Australia, and was kept locked up and rarely seen. No one was the richer for that gold. There are many saved ones now who have the priceless nugget, the living Christ, whom they would not part with for worlds; but He is bidden in the deep recess of their soul, and no one is the richer. You must breathe out and pass on that name of Jesus; there is in it a living power, more than that of the philosopher’ s stone, of turning all into gold. The preciousness of Christ I like what was said by a child in the Sunday school, when the teacher said, “ You have been reading that Christ is precious; what does that mean?” The children were silent for a little while, but at last one boy replied, “ Father said the other day that mother was precious, for ‘ whatever should we do without her!’“ This is a capital explanation of the word. You and I can truly say of the Lord Jesus Christ that He is precious to us, for what should we do, what could we do without Him? Them which be disobedient. Disobedience the converse of faith is eminently worthy of notice that over against “ believe” in 1 Peter 2:6 stands, not its exact correlative “ unbelieving,” but “ disobedient.” They who receive Christ believe: you would expect to read conversely, they who reject Him are unbelieving; but instead, you read that they are disobedient. People raise a great debate upon the question whether a man is responsible for his belief, and whether he can be condemned for not believing. Quietly this debate is all quashed here by the representation that unbelief is disobedience. Unbelief is indeed the root, but the outgrowth is disobedience. (W Arn.) The stone which the builders disallowed.-Christ rejected by the Jews 1. To show that God had purposed the salvation of His Church and building of His kingdom by a way that the wise men of the world never dreamed of. 2. That their malice might appear to their punishment, and God’ s power in resisting them. 3. To show that great men are not always the greatest maintainers of the truth, but often great enemies and hindrances thereto. Uses:1. This serves to teach us not to stand upon great men’ s opinion, approving and disallowing upon their testimony or example. 2. To magnify the power and wisdom of God, that hath used to build His kingdom, not only without the help, but against the will of great men. (John Rogers.) The stone which the builders disallowed I. A great opportunity missed. Who are the builders? All the sons and daughters of men. But there are blind builders that reject the “ chief cornerstone.” They cannot perceive the glory of the largest and divinest truth. The causes of this blindness are manifold worldliness, prejudice, and intellectual pride. The immediate cause is ever a superficial spirituality, however it may be produced. II. True greatness ignored and neglected. The neglect suffered by the prophet in his own age is proverbial. He lets in the glory from the eternal into this half-blind world until it becomes a pain, and he is accused of being the enemy of his generation. We pride ourselves that such a history is a thing of the past, that we enlightened ones honour our prophets. It is for a future generation to discover whether we have done so. “ Demos” is emphatically the builder today. Is the democracy laying the foundations of its temple on the “ cornerstone” of Divine and eternal truth? But there is ever great danger that “ the spirit of the age” may ignore the divinest message that is delivered to it. III. The certain supremacy of truth. The divinest truth must ultimately become the “ chief stone of the corner.” False prejudices are powerful, and may seem for a time all supreme. Truth is God, and God is truth. The eternal energies have the world in their grip, and “ He must reign forever and ever.” IV. The words find their ideal fulfilment in Jesus Christ. Unspeakably magnificent was the opportunity lost by the Jewish nation. God guard us from similar blindness! May the Christ be apprehended by us in all the fulness of His glory, so that we may not be ashamed when He appears to reign. (John Thomas M. A.) A stone of stumbling, and a rock of offence.- Jesus, the stumbling stone of unbelievers I. The result of the unbelief, and the opposition of men, upon the Lord Jesus Christ.1. First came the Jew. He had the pride of race to maintain. Were not the Jews the chosen people of God? Jesus comes preaching the gospel to every creature, He sends His disciples even to the Gentiles: therefore the Jews will not have Him. But the opposition of His countrymen did not defeat the cause of Christ; if rejected in Palestine, His word was received in Greece, it triumphed in Rome, it passed onward to Spain, it found a dwelling place in Britain, and at this day it lights up the face of the earth. 2. Next arose philosophy to be the gospel’ s foe. But though it made terrible inroads for a while on the Church of God, in the form of gnostic heresy, did it really impede the chariot wheels of Christ? The stone from the sling of Christ has smitten the heathen philosophy in the forehead, while the Son of David goes forth conquering and to conquer. 3. After those days there came against the Church of God the determined opposition of the secular power. All that cruelty could do was done; but what was the result? The more the Christians were oppressed, the more they multiplied; the scattering of the coals increased the conflagration. 4. Since that period the Church has been attacked in various modes. The Arian heresy assaulted the deity of Christ, but the Church of God delivered herself from the accursed thing, as Paul shook the viper into the fire. Be of good courage, for brighter days are on the way. There shall come yet greater awakenings, the Lord, the avenger of His Church, shall yet arise, and the stone which the builders disallowed, the same shall be the head stone of the corner. II. The consequence of this opposition to the opposers.1. When men stumble at the plan of salvation by Christ’ s sacrificial work, what is it that they stumble at? (1) Some stumble at the person of Christ. Jesus, they will admit, was a good man, but they cannot accept Him as co-equal and co-eternal with the Father. (2) Some stumble at His work. Many cannot see how Jesus Christ is become the propitiation for human guilt. (3) Some stumble at Christ’ s teaching; and what is it they stumble at in that? Sometimes it is because it is too holy: “ Christ is too puritanical, He cuts off our pleasures.” But He denies us no pleasure which is not sinful, He multiplies our joys; the things which He denies to us are only joyous in appearance, while His commands are real bliss. We have found some object to the teachings of Christ because they are too humbling. He destroys self-confidence, and He presents salvation to none but those who are lost. “ This lays us too low,” saith one. Still I have known others object that the gospel is too mysterious, they cannot understand it, they say. While again, from the other corner of the compass, I have heard the objection that it is too plain. Do not cavil at it. What if there be mysteries in it? Canst thou expect to comprehend all that God knoweth? Be thou teachable as a child, and the gospel will be sweet to thee. (4) We have known some who have stumbled at Christ on account of His people, and truly they have some excuse. They have said, “ Look at Christ’ s followers, see their imperfections and hypocrisies.” But wherefore judge a master by his servants? 2. What does the stumbling at Christ cost the ungodly? I answer, it costs them a great deal. (1) Those who make Him a rock of stumbling are great losers by it in this life. What anger it costs ungodly men to oppose Christ! Some of them cannot let Him alone, they will rage and fume. Concerning Jesus it is true that you must either love or hate Him, He cannot long be indifferent to you, and hence come inward conflicts to opposers. (2) Ah, what it costs some men when they come to die! If you oppose Him you will be the losers, He will not. Your opposition is utterly futile; like a snake biting a file, you will only break your own teeth. (C. H. Spurgeon.) Dangerous to stumble A bridge is made to give us a safe passage over a dangerous river; but he who stumbleth on the bridge is in danger to fall into the river. (J. Trapp.) 1 Peter 2:9-10 But ye are a chosen generation.The true Israel I. “ Ye are a chosen generation” -the word “ generation” here meaning not contemporaries but the offspring of one common parent, the offshoots of one original stock.1. The Israelites were a special “ generation,” having sprung from Abraham as their common progenitor. Similarly, believers are a distinct “ generation” of men, being all born of one God, and animated by the self-same Divine life. Consequently a striking family likeness prevails among them. 2. The Jews were, moreover, a “ chosen generation” -called out of the darkness of Chaldaean idolatry to the marvellous light of Divine revelation. And so it is with believers now, 3. “ Ye are a chosen generation, that ye should show forth the praises-the excellences-of Him who hath called you.” The mistake of the Jews was to take for granted that they were chosen to show forth their own excellences. Their election they converted into food for pride. Let us remember the Church is a generation to show forth the excellences of God. Through good men, not necessarily great men, does God reveal His character; through holy men, not necessarily able men, does He make known the benevolence, the uprightness, the genial warmth of His nature. II. “ Ye are a royal priesthood” -a phrase borrowed from Exodus 19:6.1. The Jewish nation was a nation of priests, its fundamental idea being religious, not secular. This idea is now embodied in the Christian Church. Every believer is now a priest, having a right to enter into the Holiest of all. 2. “ A royal priesthood.” “ Ye are kings and priests” -kings over yourselves and priests unto God. 3. “ Ye are a royal priesthood, to show forth the excellences of Him who hath called you.” By your holy conversation, upright demeanour, you are to show forth the character of your God. III. “ Ye are a holy nation.”1. The Israelites in Egypt were a “ chosen generation,” but not a “ holy nation.” Not till they were established in their own land, with laws and a king of their own, did they develop into a nation. Believers, scattered in the world, without mutual recognition, might be of the right seed; but not till they attach themselves to a Christian institution, variously termed the kingdom or the Church, do they become a nation. 2. “ A holy nation.” God set the Israelites apart from all the world. He made them what all nations ought to be-holy. True, they did not live up to their profession; but in theory, in ideal, they were holy. 3. As a people bound together for the purposes of holiness, we should show forth the excellences of our God. As a holy nation, scattered amongst all the nations of Europe, we ought to propagate the principles of God’ s kingdom. IV. “ Ye are a peculiar people.”1. “ Ye are a people.” The Israelites were brought out of Egypt a host of undisciplined slaves, capabilities of great things slumbering within them, but only half civilised. But after forty years’ pilgrimage in the wilderness, God was able to form them into a people, and settle them in the land promised unto their fathers. And in our natural state, we cannot be said to be a people in the true sense of the word, bound together by rational and spiritual ties. As individuals you can hardly be said to really exist till you believe. “ Of Him ye are in Christ Jesus.” Ye were not before, but now ye are-you live in the higher ranges of the soul. Before you only lived in your animal nature-you did not live the distinctive life of man. But through union with Christ first, and with the Church afterwards, you fulfil the idea of your being, you live in the higher faculties instead of the lower, having higher purposes and different interests from the rest of the world. 2. “ Ye are a peculiar people,” the word “ peculiar” here being used in its etymological, not its colloquial sense, as meaning property, not singularity. “ These people have I formed for Myself-they are My very own.” 3. But mark, we are God’ s, purchased at a great price, in order that we may tell forth with a loud voice His praises. The word for “ show forth” means literally “ to proclaim to those without what has taken place within.” Here Israel failed. Let the Christian Church beware of committing the same mistake-God has purchased us to be His special possession, on purpose that we should proclaim to the world lying in darkness the excellences of His love in the Gospel of His Son. We must either send or carry the light to the heathen. (J. C. Jones, D. D.) The Christian estate I. The state of Christians, “ a chosen generation;” so in Psalms 24:1-10. The psalmist there speaks first of God’ s universal sovereignty, then of His peculiar choice. As men who have great variety of possessions have yet usually their special delight in some one beyond all the rest, and choose to reside most in it, and bestow most expense on it to make it pleasant; so doth the Lord of the whole earth choose out to Himself from the rest of the world a number that are a chosen generation. “ Generation.” This imports them to be of one race or stock. They are of one nation, belonging to the same blessed land of promise, all citizens of the New Jerusalem, yea, all children of the same family, whereof Jesus Christ, the root of Jesse, is the stock, who is the great King and the great High Priest. And thus they are a “ royal priesthood.” They are of the seed royal, and of the holy seed of the priesthood, inasmuch as they partake of a new life from Christ. Thus, in Revelation 1:5-6, there is first His own dignity expressed, then His dignifying us. There is no doubt that this kingly priesthood is the common dignity of all believers; this honour have all the saints. They are kings, have victory and dominion given them over the powers of darkness and the lusts of their own hearts, that held them captive and domineered over them before. This royalty takes away all attainders, and leaves nothing of all that is past to be laid to our charge, or to dishonour us. Believers are not shut out from God as they were before, but, being in Christ, ale brought near unto Him, and have free access to the throne of His grace. They resemble, in their spiritual state, the legal priesthood very clearly.1. In their consecration. The levitical priests were washed; therefore this is expressed (Revelation 1:5), “ He hath washed us in His own blood,” and then follows, “ and hath made us kings and priests.” 2. Let us consider their services, which were diverse. They had charge of the sanctuary, vessels, lights, and were to keep the lamps burning. Thus the heart of every Christian is made a temple to the Holy Ghost, and he himself, as a priest consecrated unto God, is to keep it diligently, and the furniture of Divine grace in it; to have the light of spiritual knowledge within him, and to nourish it by drawing continually new supplies from Jesus Christ. The priests were to bless the people. And truly it is this spiritual priesthood, the elect, that procure blessings upon the rest of the world, and particularly on the places where they live. 3. Let us consider their course of life. We shall find rules given to the legal priests, stricter than to others, of avoiding legal pollutions, etc. And from these, this spiritual priesthood must learn an exact holy conversation, keeping themselves from the pollutions of the world: as here it follows: “ A holy nation,” and that of necessity; if a priesthood, then holy. II. The opposition of the estate of Christians to that of unbelievers; we are most sensible of the evil or good of things by comparison. Though the estate of a Christian is very excellent and, when rightly valued, hath enough in itself to commend it, yet it doth and ought to raise our esteem of it the higher, when we compare it both with the misery of our former condition, and with the continuing misery of those that abide still and are left to perish in that woeful estate. We have here both these parallels. The happiness and dignity to which they are chosen and called, is opposed to the rejection and misery of them that continue unbelievers and rejectors of Christ. III. The end of their calling. That ye should show forth the praises, etc. To magnify the grace of God the more, we have here:1. Both the terms of this motion or change, from whence and to what it is. 2. The principle of it, the calling of God. (1) From darkness. The estate of lost mankind is indeed nothing but darkness, being destitute of all spiritual truth and comfort, and tending to utter and everlasting darkness. And it is so, because by sin, the soul is separate from God, who is the first and highest light, the primitive truth. And the soul being made capable of Divine light, cannot be happy without it. And as the estate from whence we are called by grace is worthily called darkness, so that to which it calls us deserves as well the name of light. Christ likewise, who came to work our deliverance, is frequently so called in Scripture, not only in regard of His own nature, being God equal with the Father and therefore light, but relatively to men: “ The life was the light of men.” There is a spirit of light and knowledge flowing from Jesus Christ into the souls of believers, that acquaints them with the mysteries of the kingdom of God, which cannot otherwise be known. And this spirit of knowledge is withal a spirit of holiness; for purity and holiness are likewise signified by this light. Then from this light arise spiritual joy and comfort, which are frequently signified by this expression. There are two things spoken of this light, to commend it, “ His marvellous light;” that is-it is after a peculiar manner God’ s-and it is marvellous. All light is from God, the light of sense, and that of reason; therefore He is called the Father of lights. But this light of grace is after a peculiar manner His, being a light above the reach of nature, infused into the soul in a supernatural way, the light of the elect world, where God specially and graciously resides. Now this light being so peculiarly God’ s, no wonder if it be marvellous. And if this light of grace be so marvellous, how much more marvellous shall the light of glory be, in which it ends! Hence learn to esteem highly of the gospel, in which this light shines unto us; the apostle calls it therefore the glorious gospel. Surely we have no cause to be ashamed of it, but of ourselves that we are so unlike it. (2) The principle of this change, the calling of God. “ He hath called you.” Those who live in the society and profess the faith of Christians, are called unto light, the light of the gospel that shines in the Church of God. Now this is no small favour, while many people are left in darkness and in the shadow of death, to have this light arise upon us and to be in the region of it, the Church, the Goshen of the world; for by this outward light we are invited to the happy state of saving inward light, and the former is here to be understood as the means of the latter. This is God’ s end in calling us, to communicate His goodness to us, that so the glory of it may return to Himself. As this is God’ s end, it ought to be ours, and therefore ours because it is His. And for this very purpose, both here and elsewhere are we put in mind of it, that we may be true to His end and intend it with Him. This is His purpose in calling us, and therefore it is our great duty, being so called, to declare His praises. All things and persons shall pay this tribute, even those who are most unwilling; but the happiness of His chosen is, that they are active in it, others are passive only. (Abp. Leighton.) The Church of Christ I. The divine origin of the Church.1. “ An elect race.” Separated, called, chosen, quickened. Not a casual result out of ordinary forces. II. Her function in the world-“ a royal priesthood.” Here king and priest are blended to show the power and function of the priesthood. We plead with man for God and with God for man: the regal kings are the saints of God. III. The beauty of her character-a holy nation.” With us holiness frequently is a bundle of negation, an emptiness; but holiness is a cluster of positive glories, the glory of courage, the gleam of tenderness, the radiancy of mercy. IV. Her preciousness to God. “ A peculiar people.” His delight, joy, resting place. It is easy to depreciate. It takes a wise man to see the background as well as the figure on it. If the Church can be chosen, royal, priestly, beauteous, dear to God, she wants no earthly help. V. Her work in the world-“ that ye may show forth the excellencies of Him Who called you out of darkness into His marvellous light.”1. Every quickened soul has its own story to tell. There is a gospel according to you and me. The truth of God is the gathering up of all these gospels. 2. We have the power to utter praise. 3. We have the motive-gratitude for deliverance from darkness. (R. Glover, D. D.) The glory of the Church as a commonwealth I. The glory of the Church in its characteristics. A people for God’ s own possession. First, by acquirement-“ He gave,” etc.; second, by endearment-“ He loved,” etc. II. The glory of the Church in its mission. Here is its great purpose-“ That.” This throws us back on the thought in the word “ elect” -chosen for what end, choice for what uses? The purpose is:1. A great manifestation. “ That ye may show forth.” Tell out by word and deed some great message. 2. A great manifestation of the true greatness of God. “ The excellencies of Him.” The virtues, the glories of God; what (1) a lofty theme;(2) boundless theme;(3) sacred theme. 3. A manifestation of the excellencies of God in blessing men. “ Who called you out of darkness into His marvellous light.” The Spirit of God calls from (1) the darkness of ignorance;(2) the darkness of guilt;(3) the darkness of dread. The Spirit of God calls to (a) the “ marvellous light” of truth; (b) the “ marvellous light” of holiness; (c) the “ marvellous light” of love; (d) the “ marvellous light” of heaven. III. The glory of the Church in its present condition as contrasted with the past history of its members. “ Which in times past” -the mention of this is to kindle gratitude, to inspire humility, to awaken watchfulness. (Homilist.) A royal priesthood.-Every baptized man a priest of God I. It is amongst the most common, and certainly not the least dangerous, of the mistakes of the present day to identify the Church with the clergy, as though the laity were not to the full one of its constituent parts. I am indeed a minister of the Church, but not on that account more a member of the Church than any of those amongst whom I officiate. We are not speaking of what that community may be by practice, but only of what it is by profession; and of what it would be if it acted up to the obligations taken on itself. Let a parish of nominal Christians be converted into a parish of real Christians, so that there should not be one within its circuit who did not adorn the doctrine of the gospel; and what should we have but a parish of priests to the living God? We call it a parish of priests, because we can feel that it would be as a kind of little sanctuary in the midst of country or city, which might elsewhere be deformed by great ignorance and profligacy. There would be no trenching upon functions which belong exclusively to men who have been ordained to the service of the temple; but, nevertheless, there would be that thorough exhibition of Christianity, which is amongst the most powerful of preaching, and that noble presentation of every energy to God, which is far above the costliest of sacrifices and burnt offerings, And you will easily see that, in passing from a parish to a nation, we introduce no change into our argument! We only enlarge its application. We cannot tell you what a spectacle it would be in the midst of the earth, if any one people as a body acted on the principles of Christianity; but we are sure that no better title than that of our text could be given to such a people. Neither is it only through the example they would set, and the exhibition they would furnish of the beneficial power of Christianity, that the inhabitants of this country would be as the priests of the Most High, You cannot doubt that such a nation would be, in the largest sense, a missionary nation, Conscious of the inestimable blessing which Christianity had proved to its own families, this people would not send forth a single ship on any enterprise of commerce, without making it also a vehicle for transmitting the principles of religion. II. But consider next: certain of the consequences which would follow, if the priestly character were universally recognised. We begin with observing that the members of the church watch its ministers with singular jealousy, and that faults which would be comparatively overlooked if committed by a merchant or a lawyer, are held up to utter execration when they can be fastened on a clergyman. We might press them home with the question, are not ye priests? You may be forgetful, you may be ignorant of your high calling; but, nevertheless, you belong incontrovertibly to “ a royal priesthood” ; and if there be avarice amongst you, it is the avarice of a priest; if there be pride amongst you, it is the pride of a priest; if there be sensuality amongst you, it is the sensuality of a priest. We are quite persuaded that men vastly underrate, even where they do not wholly overlook, the injury which the vices of any private individual work to the cause of God and religion. III. If you were to regard yourselves as the priests of God, you could not be indolent with respect to any enterprise of Christian philanthropy. You have been appointed to the priesthood that you may “ show forth the praises of Him who hath called you out of darkness into His marvellous light.” If ye be priests of Christianity, for what end can you have been consecrated, if not that you may disseminate the religion which you have embraced as the true? (H. Melvill, B. D.) The sacred in the secular The New Testament knows no such thing as different degrees of consecration to God’ s service for different men. A man is no more consecrated to the work of God when he is made a clergyman than he was before as a layman. He is simply consecrated to a special department of that work; to the department, namely, of the Word and Sacraments. But, in fact, the ministry of Christ takes in much more than this. The word “ ministry” means simply service; and in this sense all Christian people belong to the Christian ministry. We are all ordained to it in Holy Baptism. In which department of this one great ministry a man is to work-whether in the department of the Word and Sacraments or in what may be called the department of temporal supplies-this is a question which the man must settle for himself; but whether or not he shall serve in the ministry of Christ at all, this is not an open question for anyone. It has been settled. One man may go to the altar, and another to the counting room; but the man who goes to the counting room has no better right to be selfish than the man who goes to the altar. Many people in entering the Church think not to do anything in particular, but to keep out of danger; not to battle for the truth, but simply to “ flee from the wrath to come.” In the most solemn manner they pledge themselves wholly to God’ s service, and yet seem to have no idea of serving anyone but themselves in what they call their secular sphere; that is, in by far the greater part of their inner and outer life. What is worse than all, the Church does not seem shocked at the inconsistency. If pleasure have been a man’ s aim in the world, pleasure may continue to be his aim in the Church; only in the Church his pleasures must be innocent. They may be selfish, but they must be innocent. If the man’ s aim in the world was to amass wealth just for selfish uses, he may pursue that aim quite as safely in the Church, and perhaps a trifle more successfully; only his methods must be honest. If he has no ambition in this direction; if he says, “ I have enough to supply my wants, I have no desire for further gains, I will retire from work and live on what I have” ; the selfish indifference is likely enough to be taken as a mark of Christian moderation. “ I have enough.” No matter for others. No matter that want, myriad voiced, is crying from altar and from hearthstone. Suppose that a clergyman should talk in this way: “ I am now fifty years old; I have for many years been in receipt of a large salary; I have, by God’ s blessing, been able to lay up enough of it to maintain me the remainder of my days; I will stop preaching.” The inconsistency in that case would shock people. Why not the same inconsistency in the case of a layman? Simply because of the unscriptural distinction between religious and secular in a Christian’ s life and work. A gospel which does nothing more than simply provide Christian manners for selfish lives will never do. Only the gospel which directs all human motives to the one supreme end, of serving God; which proclaims the priesthood of all believers, and the sacredness of all spheres of duty and of life; only this is the true gospel of the kingdom, and only this can win the world. (J. S. Shipman, D. D.) An holy nation.-Corporate holiness On first hearing these words, we may think that they have more of a Jewish than a Christian sound. Undoubtedly they have a Jewish application. Three times over, at the least, it was declared to the Jews by God: “ Ye are a holy nation” ; “ Thou art an holy people to the Lord thy God” ; and certainly they were so. It was both their glory and their condemnation. But, besides that we cannot think that any blessing conferred upon the Jews is withheld from Christians, these words were expressly spoken by St. Peter of Christians-of Christians as a body, and they declare one of the great blessings resting upon them, a condition of their individual and personal blessings, one which they could not forget or deny without great injury to themselves. I propose to draw out this great truth, the truth, I mean, of the corporate holiness of Christians, a holiness of which, by being incorporated into Christ, they are made to partake together; and separation from, or loss of, which is death. See how this is brought out, not merely by the apostles, but by our Lord Himself. It is remarkable how the words and the symbols of our Lord all pointed to the disciples as a body; how He called them the salt of the earth; called them friends; how He addressed them as His flock, His household, as a vine branches at least of it, for He was the Vine, and they all lived in Him. Observe how St. Paul enlarges the same idea, using his favourite image of a body; the whole body living in Christ, and Christ in it; how he speaks of Christians as a family, a peculiar people, a Temple of God; nay, addresses them all as saints, though we know that several of them personally could not claim the title of holy. Still, in virtue of their having been made members of a spiritual body, they were sharers of the Spirit that dwelt in the whole body until they had utterly cast it from them and were reprobate. Even their children were declared in this respect to be holy; they themselves were said to be “ called with an holy calling,” “ partakers of the Divine Nature” ; not some only, but all. What the exact nature of this corporate holiness pervading the whole body is, I do not attempt to describe beyond saying that it is union with Christ. Only it is not a fiction, not merely a title, it constitutes a real consecration to God and the participation of a real gift, which cannot be done despite to without danger of sacrilege. Let us try to grasp this truth. It brings into full light and gives reality to the relation of each Christian to Christ. There is not a baptized soul to whom we may not say, “ God hath chosen and called you by a holy calling in His Son; He hath sealed you, as He has consecrated the whole body, with the spirit of promise” ; and if in that soul there is any power of making a true response, we use the strongest engine in our hands to quicken it to newness of life. See the power of this argument in effecting a true conversion. The first prerequisite in a converted soul is repentance. Must it not deepen that repentance for one to feel that all along, up to that time (in whatever measure it may be so) he has been sinning against grace, resisting his holy calling, dishonouring Christ? See, too, how this truth tends to check that narrow spirit which leads many pious people to form themselves into small parties of those like minded with themselves; thus, not merely rending the body of Christ, but frequently fostering a temper of much uncharitableness and self-assumption. (A. Grant, D. C. L.) A peculiar people.- A people proper to the Lord That is a people proper to the Lord which He Himself hath purchased, whom He keeps under His protection, to whom also He reveals His secrets: His undefiled. In the flood He saved His Church, when all others were drowned. No marvel, though the Lord set such store by His Church, seeing He hath been at such cost therewith, as to redeem it with the blood of His Son, and to give His Spirit thereto, to sanctify and make it like Himself. The lands we purchase are dear to us; we are God’ s purchase.1. If we be so peculiar and choice to the Lord, how choicely should we walk; how should we set as great store by the Lord and His commandments, as He hath done by us! 2. This is a comfort that God makes such special reckoning of His; therefore, though we have many and mighty enemies, yet we need not fear. 3. Terror to the wicked. How dare they hurt or persecute any of these little ones, lest their angel he let loose to destroy them (Judges 5:23)! (John Rogers.) A peculiar people The word “ peculiar,” by which the thought is expressed in English, we derive directly through the Latin, and the use of the term in the secular life of the Romans will throw light on its meaning here in the spiritual sphere. The system of slavery prevailed in the Roman Empire. It interpenetrated all society. An elaborate code of laws had sprung up to regulate its complicated and unnatural relations. The slave, when he fell into slavery, lost all. He became the property of his master. But if he served faithfully, law and custom permitted him to acquire private property through his own skill or industry. A man might, for example, hire himself from his owner, paying him so much a day. He might then employ himself in art or even merchandise, and, if successful, might soon accumulate a considerable sum. Some slaves in this manner purchased their own liberty and raised themselves to a high position. Now the savings of a slave, after satisfying the demands of the master, were called his “ peculium.” The law protected him in his right to this property. It may be supposed to have been very dear to the poor man. It constituted his sole anchor of hope. He cherished it accordingly. From this a conception and expression have been borrowed to show the kind of ownership that God is pleased to claim in the persons who have been won back to Himself after they were lost. (W. Arnot.) A peculiar people A people of purchase; such as comprehend, as it were, all God’ s gettings, His whole stock that He makes any great reckoning of. (J. Trapp.) “ A purchased people” (margin, A.V.):-Suppose you go out and make some purchase. You pay down the price and get the receipt, and tell the seller to send it home to you at once. The day goes by and it does not come. Weeks go by and it does not come. You send to the shop a message, “ What are you doing with what I bought?” They reply, “ We sent it up.” “ Well, it has not arrived.” “ Then the errand boy has kept it on the way; we suppose he is using it for himself for a bit before he gives it over to you.” You do not make purchases on these terms. How often God’ s own people are like that errand boy! You have been bought with a price. Have you sent yourself home to the purchaser, or have you kept yourself on the way? “ I keep myself to myself,” people will say. That is the last thing a Christian ought to do; he ought to give himself away to God at once. (Hubert Brooke, M. A.) Show forth the praises of Him.-Mirrors of God The Revised Version, instead of “ praises,” reads “ excellencies” -and even that is but a feeble translation of the remarkable word here employed. For it is that usually rendered “ virtues” ; and by that word, of course, when applied to God, we mean the radiant excellences and glories of His character, of which our earthly qualities, designated by the same name, are but shadows. It is, indeed, true that this same expression is employed in the Greek version of the Old Testament in Isaiah 43:1-28, in a verse which evidently was floating before Peter’ s mind: “ This people have I formed for Myself; they shall show forth My praise.” I. Here we get a wonderful glimpse into the heart of God. Note the preceding words, in which the writer describes all God’ s mercies to His people, making them “ a chosen generation, a royal priesthood, a holy nation” ; a people “ His own possession.” All that is done for one specific purpose-“ that ye should show forth the praises of Him who hath called you out of darkness.” Now that aim has been put so as to present an utterly hard and horrible notion. That God’ s glory is His only motive may be so stated as to mean merely an Almighty selfishness. But if you think for a moment about this statement, all that appears repellent drops away from it, and it turns out to be another way of saying “ God is love.” Because what is there more characteristic of love than an earnest desire to communicate itself and to be manifested and beheld? That is what God wants to be known for. Is that hard and repellent? Why does He desire that He should be known? for any good that it does to Him? No; except the good that even His creatures can do to Him when they gladden tits paternal heart by recognising Him for what He is, the Infinite Lover of all souls. But the reason why He desires most of all that the light of His character may pour into every heart is because He would have every heart gladdened and blessed forever by that received and believed light. The Infinite desires to communicate Him self, that by the communication men may be blessed. II. There is another thing here, and that is a wonderful glimpse of what Christian people are in the world for. “ This people have I formed for Myself,” says the fundamental passage in Isaiah already referred to, “ they shall show forth My praise.” It was not worth while forming them; it was still less worth while redeeming them except for that. But you may say, “ I am saved in order that I may enjoy all the blessings of salvation, immunities from fear and punishment, and the like.” Yes, certainly! But is that all? I think not. There is not a creature in God’ s universe so tiny but that it has a claim on Him that made it for its well-being. That is very certain. And so my salvation is an adequate end with God, in all His dealing, and especially in His sending of Jesus Christ. But there is not a creature in the whole universe, though he were mightier than the archangels that stand nearest God’ s throne, who is so great and independent that his happiness is the sole aim of God’ s gifts to him. Every man that receives anything from God is thereby made a steward to impart it to others. So we may say, “ You were not saved for your own sakes.” One might almost say that that was a by-end. You were saved-shall I say?-for God’ s sake, and you were saved for man’ s sake? Every yard of line in a new railway when laid down is used to carry materials to make the next yard; and so the terminus is reached. Even so Christian people were formed for Christ that they might show forth His praise. Look what a notion that gives us of the dignity of the Christian life, and of the special manifestation of God which is afforded to the world in it. You, if you set forth as becomes you His glorious character, have crowned the whole manifestation that He makes of Himself in Nature and in Providence. What people learn about God from a true Christian is a better revelation than has ever been made or can be made elsewhere. III. Lastly, we have here a piece of stringent practical direction. The world takes its notions of God, most of all, from the people who say that they belong to God’ s family. They read us a great deal more than they read the Bible. They see us; they only hear about Jesus Christ. “ Thou shalt not make unto thee any graven image” nor any likeness of the Divine, but thou shalt make thyself an image of Him, that men looking at it may learn a little more of what He is. If we have any right to say that we are a royal priesthood, a chosen nation, God’ s “ possession,” then there will be in us some likeness of Him to whom we belong stamped more or less perfectly upon our characters; and just as people cannot look at the sun, but may get some notion of its power when they gaze upon the rare beauty of the tinted clouds that lie round about it, if in the poor, wet, cold mistiness of our lives there be caught, as it were, and tangled some stray beams of the sunshine, there will be colour and beauty there. A bit of worthless tallow may be saturated with a perfume which will make it worth its weight in gold. So our poor natures may be drenched with God and give Him forth fragrant and precious, and men may be drawn thereby. Nor does that exclude the other kind of showing forth the praises, by word and utterance, at fit times and to the right people. But above all, let us remember that none of these works can be done to any good purpose if any taint of self mingles with it. “ Let your light so shine before men that they may behold your good works and glorify” -whom? you?-“ your Father which is in heaven.” (A. Maclaren, D. D.) Showing forth the excellences of Christ I. The sphere in which we are to serve God. In “ His marvellous light.” There is-1. The light of His truth (Psalms 118:29; Psalms 119:105; Psalms 119:130).2. The light of His favour (Psalms 4:6; Numbers 6:26).3. The light of His holiness (Ephesians 5:8; 1 John 1:7). II. In what does this service consist?1. In a life of gratitude (Hebrews 13:15; Ephesians 5:20).2. In a life of testimony (1 John 1:1-3; Philippians 2:15-16).3. In a life of godliness. Show forth the excellences of Christ (2 Corinthians 4:10; Philippians 1:11). III. What are the chief hindrances to that service?1. Some are afraid to begin, lest they should fall back (1 Corinthians 1:8; Jude 1:24; Psalms 56:13).2. Some are hindered by a feeling of shame (Mark 8:38; Romans 1:16).3. Others are idle, because they do not see their resources (Philippians 4:13; Ephesians 1:3). (E. H. Hopkins.) Christians must be real and true There is a headman of a kraal in Natal, South Africa, who does not object to his people becoming Christians, but who decidedly objects to their becoming bad Christians. This is how he puts it to natives who profess conversion: “ If you become better men and women by being Christians, you may remain so; if not, I won’ t let you be Christians at all.” (Christian World.) Showing forth God’ s excellences The picture of a dear friend should be hung up in a conspicuous place of the house; so should God’ s holy image and grace in our hearts. (J. Trapp.) A living doxology A child of God should be a visible beatitude for joy and happiness, and a living doxology for gratitude and adoration. (C. H. Spurgeon.) Called out of darkness into His marvellous light.-Darkness and light I. The darkness from which the soul has been delivered.1. It is a darkness which involves the loss of truth, the light and life of the soul, and of the soul itself. 2. This darkness carries with it a heavy load of guilt. 3. This darkness, as regards the moral nature, is woe and misery. II. The marvellous light to which the soul is admitted.1. Its nature.2. Its source.3. Its effects. (Homilist.) Out of darkness into light I. What from.1. The power of Satan.2. Moral confusion.3. Impurity.4. Spiritual loss-ignorance.5. A state of misery.6. A state of danger.7. God calls us out of this darkness; and if we do not obey His call we “ love darkness rather than light, because our deeds are evil.” But let us count the cost of such a choice. II. What to.1. God’ s kingdom.2. Moral order.3. True wisdom.4. Spiritual purity.5. Heaven in prospective. III. What for.1. That we may be obedient to His will, and follow the example of Christ-God’ s ideal of perfected humanity. 2. To live as His children, and render unto Him a loving, loyal service, bearing His gentle yoke with cheerfulness and meekness, and so recommend the service of God by our conduct before men, that they shall be drawn to God by our example. (W. Harris.) Spiritual darkness and light It is very desirable that Christians should realise both what they have been and what they are; both the degradation and disadvantages of the condition from which they have been delivered, and the dignity and privileges of the condition into which they have been called. Peter contrasts the two conditions of life by characterising the one as “ darkness” and the other as “ marvellous light.” Perhaps it may help in some degree to give vividness to his thoughts if we recall an incident in the history of Israel in Egypt. One of the plagues sent on the Egyptians-the last but one, and probably the severest, except the last-was a darkness which might be felt. The humblest hut of an Israelite was far preferable to the palace of Pharaoh. When we regard this as a figure of what still exists, there are everywhere two peoples dwelling side by side, one of which is enshrouded in a darkness more dismal than that which lay upon the Egyptians, while the other is enjoying a far more pleasant light than was in the dwellings of the Israelites. There are two conditions of life which divide between them all human society-a state of nature and a state of grace. And these two states are as opposite as night and day. God’ s people know both conditions, for they have been delivered out of the one and brought into the other. The world lieth in darkness; there is darkness in our natures, a darkness which hides the light, which turns away from it, although the light may be shining all around it. This darkness extends to the whole spiritual nature, and affects its observation, sentiments, and actions, after the manner that physical darkness affects the senses, sensations, and emotions of the body; broods, for example, over and within the intellect of man. It hides from him, in consequence, one vast region of most important truth, and it does not allow him to attain what is the highest kind of knowledge. There is a natural world with which natural sense and intellect are competent to deal, but it does not follow that there is not also a spiritual world with which they are incompetent to deal. This is what Scripture testifies. Natural things do not need to be spiritually discerned, spiritual things do. We may know, indeed, much about even many of these things in a natural way; we may become versed in the controversies of theology, we may be able to discourse learnedly of the Divine attributes-on redemption, on regeneration, and kindred themes-but so may a blind man theorise and discourse on optics or painting. A true perception of spiritual things, however, is as impossible to the merely natural man as a true perception of light and shade and colour is to the bodily blind. Let us not suppose that this spiritual blindness is a slight misfortune. There can be none greater. Physical blindness only excludes the perception of some of the works of God, and from enjoyment of some of His gifts; spiritual blindness deprives us of the perception and enjoyment of God Himself, and of all living insight into His ways and dispensations. God can easily and richly compensate a man for the want of knowledge of anything finite; but what compensation can there be for the want of knowledge of His own perfections, and especially of His love and mercy in Jesus Christ, when that knowledge is the highest good, true, and eternal life? Spiritual blindness is the most awful blindness; blindness as to what is alone essential, and as to all that is essential; blindness which involves loss of the truth, the light and the life of the soul, the loss of the soul itself. The darkness of which Peter speaks presses not merely on the intellect of man, it extends also to his will, and affects his whole moral life and dignity. It involves moral as well as intellectual blindness, wickedness not less than ignorance. For one thing, this darkness, implying as it does love of the darkness and aversion to the light, is not only a cause of sin, but is of itself a grievous sin. Our rejection of this light can only be because while it is pure we are impure; while it is Divine love, there rages in us selfish and carnal passion; and, in short, that through perversity of heart, we will not recognise God to be what He is, or acknowledge His claims to our admiration, gratitude, and services. This darkness is itself sin, but it also calls forth and shelters all other sin. The evil in us is not only unchecked, but fostered, and every passion which prompts to wicked action is allowed a most dangerous advantage. Spiritual darkness thus tends to spread and deepen into outermost moral darkness and corruption. But yet, further, the darkness of man’ s merely natural state is, as regards the intellect, ignorance and blindness; and, as regards the will and moral life, a guilt and sin. As regards our moral nature, it is guilt and misery. Light and enjoyment are always associated; darkness and sadness are as naturally joined. It is pleasant to the eyes to behold the light of the sun. Gladness seems to shrink away in proportion as light is withdrawn. The happy rejoice in the light, but the sorrowful seek to be in darkness; night is the season of terrors, of dismal clouds, and of a million fancies and gloomy forebodings. Here, too, outward darkness is a symbol of the inward. So long as a man is in the spiritual darkness of his natural state, so long as he is not cheered by the light from the countenance of a reconciled God and Father, he cannot be happy. God has so made each human heart that it can only find true satisfaction in Himself, and when it lives under the light of His approval. Happiness must be something real, permanent, and elevating, not something fleeting, delusive, and degrading. And it is only this true happiness which I say cannot be where God is ignored, where the light of His presence is not recognised, and the blessings of His presence are not felt. I have dwelt long on the state and condition of life which Peter calls darkness, but I may touch so much the more briefly in consequence on that which he calls “ marvellous light.” For darkness and light are contrasted, and not only cannot be understood except as contrasted, but whatever is truly said about either implies something true about the other. Therefore, as you have already had explained to you how the darkness of which Peter speaks is in one ignorance and error, in another sin and unrighteousness, and in yet another disquiet and unhappiness, so you may, without further explanation, conclude that the light of which Peter speaks must be knowledge and truth in the intellect, obedience and holiness in the moral life, and joy and happiness in the heart. “ Marvellous” light! So St. Peter most appropriately calls it. It is marvellous in its source, a marvellous light of Him who is called the Father of Lights. It comes from no earthly luminary, but directly from Himself, specially revealed through His Son Jesus Christ, conveyed to the soul by the Divine genius of His own Spirit, freely given to whom, in His wisdom, He will; so given, that many a poor, uneducated man can see what the wise of this world are blind to. It is marvellous, too, as appearing after such darkness; the nature of the light of the world is very marvellous, although, owing to its commonness, we seldom think how marvellous it is. But a prisoner brought from long confinement in a darkened dungeon, or a blind man restored to sight, will not fail to appreciate it aright. It is those who have just been brought out of the darkness of the state of nature into the light of a state of grace who feel most vividly how marvellous the light of the Father is. It is marvellous, also, in its own nature; marvellous for its exquisite beauty, and marvellous because it is so pure and penetrative. It reveals to men sins and shortcomings in their own hearts of which the light of nature had awakened no suspicion, and causes evils of all kinds, even the most secret and subtle, to be seen in their real hatefulness. It is marvellous in the extent of its disclosures, in rendering clear and intelligible to us the wonders of redemption, and marvellous in its power of diffusing light and happiness. It is exceedingly marvellous in its issues, for it is this light of grace which shineth more and more unto the perfect day, and ends as the light of heavenly glory. I have still to remind you that, according to the teaching of the apostle, those who have passed from the darkness to the marvellous light are bound to show forth the praises, or-as may be more accurately rendered-the excellences of Him to whom the change is due. They have not worked their own way out of the darkness into the light, but God has had compassion on them. The final end of redemption, as of creation, is to show forth the glory of God. It becomes every rational creature, and it becomes still more every partaker of redemption, to act on this truth. But what will doing so imply? Clearly this at least, that we are not ashamed to honour His name, or defend His cause with our lips; that we are willing to declare His perfections when we can do so; that whenever a word in season tending to exalt the character or justify the ways of God can be uttered by us with good effect, we are ready and glad to utter it. But not less certainly it means also that whatever excellence of nature or grace God has imparted to us, we should so use it as that the glory should redound to the Giver, and the wealth of His excellences be seen in the richness of His love to us. It implies that we should consecrate our talents to His services, dedicate to Him our reasons, imaginations, affections, and souls, and strive to render and keep them as worthy of Him as we can. (Prof. R. Flint.) Darkness and light I. Our original condition as sinners. In darkness. II. The gracious change produced. “ Called out of darkness into marvellous light.” III. The results of being thus called. “ That ye show forth God’ s praises.”1. By extolling His mercy (Psalms 103:3-5; Psalms 103:11-13). 2. By exhibiting His image (Ephesians 5:8; 1 Thessalonians 5:5-6). 3. By obedience to His authority (2 Corinthians 10:4-6). 4. And by zeal for His glory (2 Corinthians 10:17; Galatians 6:14). IV. The improvement.1. Consider the state of the sinner before God, as in darkness of soul. 2. The only way of deliverance is by the death and obedience of Jesus Christ, as made known by the gospel. 3. Also let the Christian learn from this subject his great obligations to God, and consider what ought to be his conduct. 4. But especially let him see to whom the glory of so much mercy belongs. (T. B. Baker.) The gospel a light Why is this a marvellous light? I. Because it is a light upon spiritual realities. The sun can light up landscapes, but where is the light which can reveal man to himself and God to man? We need another light-a light above the brightness of the sun.1. The gospel throws a marvellous light upon sin. 2. Upon the holiness and awfulness of Divine law. 3. Upon the elements which are requisite to a perfect reconciliation to God. II. Because it is a light upon spiritual destinies. Man can throw no light on his own future. He can but speculate and hope. The gospel distinctly deals with the mystery of time to come.1. Judgment.2. Rewards and punishments.3. Duration.4. Service. The fact that the gospel claims to be a marvellous light shows-(1) That the world is in a state of marvellous darkness.(2) That the diffusion of the gospel is a diffusion of light.(3) That all who believe the gospel should walk as children of the day. (J. Parker, D. D.) Refusing light Is it not strange that any will refuse to receive this light? If anyone would persist in living in a dark cave far away from the light of the sun, with only dim candles of his own making to pour a few feeble, flickering beams upon the gloom, we should consider him insane. What shall we say of those who persist in living in the darkness of sin, with no light but the candles of earth’ s false hopes to shine upon their souls? (R. Miller.) Opened eyes There is an old legend dating back to the seventh century, of St. Modabert, who had such sympathy for his blind mother that he one day rushed forward and kissed her eyes, and her sight came immediately to her, and she rejoiced in the beauties of nature as they shone about her. Whether the legend contains any truth it matters not; but it certainly gives us a very striking illustration of the kiss of Christ’ s love as it opens the eyes of the penitent believer, and reveals to him the riches and beauty of the pardon of all sin, and makes him a dweller in the kingdom of our God. (G. W. Bibb.) The superior light of the gospel In the old dispensation the light that broke through clouds was but that of the rising morning. It touched the mountain tops of the loftiest spirits; a Moses, a David, an Elijah; caught the early gleams while all the valleys slept in the pale shadow, and the mist clung in white folds to the plains. But the noon has come, and from its steadfast throne in the very zenith, the sun which never sets pours down its rays into the deep recesses of the narrowest gorge, and every little daisy and hidden flower catches its brightness, and there is nothing hid from the light thereof. Children of light There are children of light and children of darkness. The latter shun the bright, the pure azure shining sky of truth with all its loving beams. Their world is like the world of insects, and is the world of night. Insects are all light shunners. Even those which, like the bee, labour during the daytime, prefer the shades of obscurity. The children of light are like the birds. The world of birds is the world of light-of song. Nearly all of them, says Michelet, live in the sun, fill themselves with it, or are inspired by it. Those of the south carry its reflected radiance on their wings; those of our colder climates in their songs; many of them follow it from land to land. (Scientific Illustrations and Symbols.) Which in time past were not a people.-Consider what you were In that he sets before them the time past, and what they were; note, that for a people to look to their beginnings is of singular use. As for us, who since Christ’ s coming are admitted to the same privileges with the Jews. This serves-1. To make us humble and take down our pride.2. To stir us up to thankfulness.3. To strengthen our faith to believe in God forever afterwards, and for all blessings needful to salvation. (John Rogers.) The people of God The apostle is speaking of believers not individually, but collectively. He says of them that in their former condition they “ were not a people” ; that is, they had no organised existence. The present condition of the Jews may supply us with an illustration. They are now “ not a people.” They exist as individuals, and in a state of distinctness from all the nations amongst which, in their calamitous dispersion, they are scattered; but they have no national existence-no king, no country, no organisation, no government, no political being. Just so the great community of believers-God’ s spiritual commonwealth-had no being; for the members who now compose it stood in no covenant relation to God, and they had no bond of union, no spiritual incorporation among themselves. Reverse the statement and you have their present condition. For, in the first place, all believers, by virtue of their faith in Christ, are in covenant with God. God and believers walk with each other in amity. Whereas once there was alienation and enmity, there is now mutual love. They have taken Him to be their God, and He has taken them to be His people. And then, secondly, being in covenant with God, all believers are in union with each other. This second conjunction flows by a necessary consequence from the first; for, being reduced under one sovereignty, they necessarily compose one community. While they were estranged from God, they were estranged from one another. Now of this commonwealth of the faithful, many things may be said.1. God places Himself at its head. As He stands in close connection with every individual member of it, so He establishes a connection, not less close, between Himself and all the members collectively. He originates the community, and He governs it. 2. It is composed of all believers. This great community excludes from its fellowship none whom Christ does not exclude from salvation. All the saints are your fellow subjects in that kingdom. Not all the saints on earth simply, but the saints also in heaven. 3. The blessings of the new covenant constitute its privileges. These blessings consist in whatever is obtained through the blood of Christ; all “ spiritual blessings in heavenly places,” or heavenly things; things, that is, which have a heavenly origin and nature, and a tendency to prepare us for heaven. Hence all believers are justified and sanctified. 4. Heaven is the place of its perfect development, and its everlasting home. It is never seen as a whole on earth. Here it has never existed otherwise than in detachments, and separated portions. And these never stay long. God’ s people are gathered out of the world, collected into little fellowships, trained, sanctified, and then drafted away to the great meeting place of the redeemed. (E. Steane, D. D.) 1 Peter 2:11-12 As strangers and pilgrims abstain.Abstaining from fleshly lusts “ Dearly beloved, I beseech you.” There is a faculty of reproving required in the ministry, and sometimes a necessity of very sharp rebukes. They who have much of the spirit of meekness may have a rod by them too, to use upon necessity (1 Corinthians 4:21). But surely the way of meekness is that they use most willingly; with ingenious minds, the mild way of sweet entreaties is very forcible; they prevail as the sunbeams, which, without any noise, made the traveller cast off his cloak, which all the blustering of the wind could not do, but made him rather gather it closer and bind it faster about him. Now this word of entreaty is strengthened much by the other, “ Dearly beloved.” Scarcely can the harshest reproofs, much less gentle reproofs, be thrown back, that have upon them the stamp of love. “ Abstain.” It is one and the same strength of spirit that raises a man above the troubles and pleasures of the world, and makes him despise and trample upon both. Explain what these fleshly lusts mean, then to consider the exhortation of abstaining from them. Unchaste desires are particularly called by this name, but to take it for these only in this place is doubtless too narrow. That which seems to be the true sense of the expression here, takes in all undue desires and use of earthly things, and all the corrupt affections of our carnal minds. To abstain from these lusts is to hate and fly from the very thoughts and first motions of them; and if surprised by these, yet to kill them there, that they bring not forth; and to suspect ourselves even in those things that are not sinful, and to keep far off from all inducements to the polluted ways of sin. It was a high speech of a heathen, that “ he was greater, and born to greater things, than to be a servant to his body.” How much more ought he that is born again to say so, being born heir to a crown that fadeth not away? Again, as the honour of a Christian’ s estate is far above this baseness of serving his lusts, so the happiness and pleasantness of his estate set him above the need of the pleasures of sin. The philosopher gives this as the reason why men are so much set upon sensual delights, because they know not the higher pleasures that are proper to the soul. We are barred fellowship with the unfruitful works of darkness, to the end that we may have fellowship with God and His Son Jesus Christ. This is to make men eat angel’ s food indeed, as was said of the manna. The serving of the flesh sets man below himself, down amongst the beasts, but the consolations of the Spirit and communion with God raise him above himself, and associate him with the angels. But let us speak to the apostle’ s own dissuasives from these lusts, taken-1. From the condition of Christians: “ As strangers.” If you were citizens of this world, then you might drive the same trade with them and follow the same lusts; but seeing you are chosen and called out of the world, and invested into a new society, made free of another city, and are therefore here but travellers passing through to your own country, it is very reasonable that there be this difference betwixt you and the world, that while they live at home, your carriage be such as becomes strangers; not glutting yourselves with their pleasures, but, as wise strangers, living warily and soberly, and still minding most of all your journey homewards, suspecting dangers in your way and so walking with holy fear, as the Hebrew word for a stranger imports. 2. The apostle argues from the condition of these lusts. It were quarrel enough against “ fleshly lusts which war against the soul,” that they are so far below the soul, that they cannot content, no, nor at all reach the soul; they are not a suitable, much less a satisfying good to it. Although sin hath unspeakably abused the soul of man, yet its excellent nature and original does still cause a vast disproportion betwixt it and all those base things of the earth, which concern the flesh and go no further. But this is not all: these fleshly lusts are not only of no benefit to the soul, but they are its pernicious enemies; “ they war against it.” And their war against it is all made up of stratagem and sleight, for they cannot hurt the soul, but by itself. They promise it some contentment, and so gain its consent to serve them, and undo itself. They embrace the soul that they may strangle it. (Abp. Leighton.) The stranger here I. In what respects the real Christian is a stranger in the world.1. The language of the Christian is strange to the world. Take, for instance, those simple words which sum up in one comprehensive sentence so much of the faith and hope of the true Christian, “ The God of all grace.” This is an expression so rich in its associations to a faithful mind, that the subject can never be exhausted. But how few, if any, ideas does an unfaithful person attach to it? or take the language which a true Christian uses to express his ideas of the corruption of human nature, and the necessity of the new birth. The wondering ignorance displayed by Nicodemus affords an apt illustration of the strangeness of Christian language in every age, to a yet unchristian heart. 2. The manners of the believer are strange to the world. Doth in business and pleasure. “ They think it strange that ye run not with them to the same excess.” 3. The most remarkable and chief difference between the world and the Christian, is to be found in their religion. There is a religion of the world outward and formal. The religion of the believer is promotive of humility and self-distrust. II. Now so marked a difference in sentiment must perpetually be making itself manifest in his conduct.1. He feels himself a stranger only sojourning here for a time, and then passing away. He does not permit himself to be entangled in the affairs of this life, or so engrossed therewith as to find in them his chief happiness. 2. Again, he feels himself a stranger in a land which he believes to be full of danger; and therefore he is one that walks warily. 3. It is another consequence of the believer’ s strangeness sojourning in a strange land, that he is attracted to all them that love the Lord Jesus in sincerity and truth. There is a common sympathy between them; and no truer test can be given of God’ s children than that, in spite of their lesser differences, they love one another. 4. But if such be the feeling with which they regard each other, what must be their affection for their native land, and for that special spot within it which is called by the magic name of home? Whatever may be the counteracting force of outward circumstances, the heart still yearns for home! 5. With these expectations as an abiding principle, he can withstand the powerful seductions of the world, sit loosely affected by its most innocent and useful engagements, “ waiting” for his summons to return home, “ ready to depart and be with Christ, which is far better.” (T. B. Paget, M. A.) The plea against disorderly passions I. Indulgence in disorderly passions is becoming neither to our present condition nor to our destiny. II. The influence of disorderly passions is hostile to our own inward life. They war against reason, memory, imagination, conscience, affection, and hope. III. Freedom from these passions will make our outward life a social blessing.1. Our outward life is closely scrutinised. “ They behold.” 2. Our outward life is readily calumniated. “ Speak against you.” Gossip and slander are eager. 3. Our outward life should be beautiful. No human loveliness, no natural scenery so influential as “ good works.” Souls ought to have a grandeur, a richness, a variety transcending all the fascination of flowers, all the glory of mountains, all the majesty of the sea, The noblest beauties are “ the beauties of holiness.” 4. Such outward life glorifies God. (1) Directly. For it is a tribute of praise to Him.(2) Indirectly. For it leads others to praise Him, A holy example is often “ the gate beautiful” by which men enter into the city of God and go up to the knowledge of Him anal communion with Him. (Homilist.) Employed away from home In military monarchies it has always been the policy to employ the soldiers far from home. When the Austrian Empire was a conglomerate of many nationalities, German regiments were sent to campaign in Italy, and Italians served in Germany. When the men had not a home to care for, they were more completely at the disposal of their leaders. This is Peter’ s idea here. Christians are not at home in the world. There is less to distract them. They should be better soldiers of Jesus Christ. The more loose their hearts are to the earth, the more firm will be the anchor of their souls on high. Conversely, the more they are attached to their home in heaven, the less will they be entangled with the wealth and the pleasures of the world. (W. Arnot.) Fleshly lusts, which war against the soul.-The passions I. In order to understand the nature of the passions, we will explain the subject by a few preliminary remarks.1. An intelligent being ought to love everything that can elevate, perpetuate, and make him happy, and to avoid whatever can degrade, confine, and render him miserable. This, far from being a human depravity, is a perfection of nature. By “ fleshly lusts” St. Peter doth not mean such desires of the heart as put as on aspiring after real happiness and true glory. 2. An intelligent being united to a body, and lodged, if I may speak so, in a portion of matter under this law, that according to the divers motions of this matter he shall receive sensations of pleasure or pain, must naturally love to excite within himself sensations of pleasure, and to avoid painful feelings. This is agreeable to the institution of the Creator. This observation affords us a second clue to the meaning of the apostle: at least it gives us a second precaution to avoid an error. By fleshly lusts he doth not mean a natural inclination to preserve the body and the ease of life; he allows love, hatred, and anger to a certain degree, and as far as the exercise of them doth not prejudice a greater interest. 3. A being composed of two substances, one of which is more excellent than the other; a being placed between two interests, one of which is greater than the other, ought, when these two interests clash, to prefer the more noble before the less noble, the greater interest before the less. This third principle is a third clue to what St. Peter calls “ lusts,” or passions. What is the meaning of this word? The Scripture generally uses the word in two senses. Sometimes it is literally and properly put for flesh, and sometimes it signifies sin. St. Peter calls the passions “ fleshly” in both these senses; in the first because some come from the body as voluptuousness, anger, drunkenness, and in the second because they spring from our depravity. II. This is a general idea of the passions; but as it is vague and obscure, we will endeavour to explain it more distinctly.1. The passions produce in the mind a strong attention to whatever can justify and gratify them. The most odious objects may be so placed as to appear agreeable, and the most lovely objects so as to appear odious. Certainly one of the noblest advantages of man is to reason, to examine proofs and weigh motives, to consider an object on every side, in order on these grounds to regulate our ideas and opinions, our hatred and our love. The passionate man renounces this advantage, and never reasons, in a passion his mind is limited, his soul is in chains, his fleshly passions war against his soul. 2. Having examined the passions in the mind, let us consider them in the senses. To comprehend this, recollect that the passions owe their origin to the Creator, who instituted them for the purpose of preserving us. When an object would injure health or life, it is necessary to our safety that there should be an emotion in our senses to effect a quick escape from the danger; fear does this. A man struck with the idea of sudden danger hath a rapidity which he could not have in a tranquil state, or during a cool trial of his power. It is necessary, when an enemy approaches to destroy us, that our senses should so move as to animate us with a power of resistance. Anger doth this, for it is a collection of spirits. Such are the movements excited by the passions in the senses, and all these to a certain degree are necessary for the preservation of our bodies, and are the institutions of our Creator; but three things are necessary to preserve order in these emotions. First, they must never be excited in the body without the direction of the will and the reason. Secondly, they must always be proportional. I mean, the emotion of fear, for example, must never be except in sight of objects capable of hurting us; the emotion of anger must never be except in sight of an enemy, who actually hath both the will and the power of injuring our well-being. And thirdly, they must always stop when and where we will they should. When the passions subvert this order they violate three wise institutes of our Creator. The motions excited by the passions m our senses are not free. An angry man is carried beyond himself in spite of himself. A voluptuous man receives a sensible impression from an exterior object, and in spite of all the dictates of reason throws himself into a flaming fire that consumes him. The emotions excited by the passions in our senses are not proportional; I mean that a timorous man, for example, turns as pale at the sight of a fanciful as of a real danger; he sometimes fears a phantom and a substance alike. A man, whose God is his belly, feels his appetite as much excited by a dish fatal to his health as by one necessary to support his strength and to keep him alive. The emotions excited by the passions in the senses do not obey the orders of our will. The movement is an overflow of spirits, which no reflections can restrain. This is what the passions do in the senses, and do you not conceive that in this second respect they war against the soul? They war against the soul by the disorders they introduce into that body which they ought to preserve. They dissipate the spirits, weaken the memory, wear out the brain. They war against the soul by disconcerting the whole economy of man, and by making him consider such sensations of pleasure as Providence gave him only for the sake of engaging him to preserve his body as a sort of supreme good, worthy of all his care and attention for its own sake. They war against the soul because they reduce it to a state of slavery to the body, over which it ought to rule. 3. If the senses were excited to act only by the presence of objects, if the soul were agitated only by the action of the senses, one single mean would suffice to guard us from irregular passions; that would be to flee from the object that excites them. But the passions produce other disorders, they leave deep impressions on the imagination. When we give ourselves up to the senses, we feel pleasure, this pleasure strikes the imagination, and the imagination thus struck with the pleasure it hath found recollects it, and solicits the passionate man to return to objects that made him so happy. 4. Let us consider, in fine, the passions in the heart and the disorders they cause there. What can fill the heart of man? A prophet hath answered this question, and hath included all morality in one point, “ My chief good is to draw near to God” (Psalms 73:28); but as God doth not commune with us immediately while we are in this world, but imparts felicity by means of creatures, He hath given these creatures two characters, which, being well examined by a reasonable man, conduct him to the Creator, but which turn the passionate man aside. On the one hand, creatures render us happy to a certain degree-this is their first character: on the other, they leave a void in the soul which they are incapable of filling-this is their second character. This is the design of God, and this design the passions oppose. They remove us from God, and by removing us from Him deprive us of all the good that proceeds from a union with the supreme good, and thus make war with every part of ourselves, and with every moment of our duration. War against our reason, for instead of deriving, by virtue of a union with God, assistance necessary to the practice of what reason approves, and what grace only renders practicable, we are given up to our evil dispositions, and compelled by our passions to do what our own reason abhors. War against the regulation of life, for instead of putting on by virtue of union to God the easy yoke, and taking up the light burden which religion imposes, we become slaves of envy, vengeance, and ambition; we are weighed down with a yoke of iron, which we have no power to get rid of, even though we groan under its intolerable weightiness. War against conscience, for instead of being justified by virtue of a union with God, and having “ peace with Him through our Lord Jesus Christ” (Romans 5:1), and feeling that heaven begun, “ joy unspeakable and full of glory” (1 Peter 1:8), by following our passions we become a prey to distracting fears, troubles without end, cutting remorse, and awful earnests of eternal misery. War on a dying bed, for whereas by being united to God our death bed would have become a field of triumph, where the Prince of life, the conqueror of death, would have made us share His victory, by abandoning ourselves to our passions we see nothing in a dying hour but an awful futurity, a frowning governor, the bare idea of which alarms, terrifies, and drives us to despair. III. Now let us examine what remedies we ought to apply.1. In order to prevent and correct the disorders which the passions produce in the mind, we must observe the following rules- (1) We must avoid precipitance and suspend our judgment. (2) A man must reform even his education. In every family the minds of children are turned to a certain point. Every family hath its prejudice, I had almost said its absurdity; and hence it comes to pass that people despise the profession they do not exercise. To correct ourselves on this article we must go to the source, examine how our minds were directed in our childhood; in a word, we must review and reform even our education. (3) In fine, we must, as well as we can, choose a friend wise enough to know truth, and generous enough to impart it to others; a man who will show us an object on every side when we are inclined to consider it only on one. 2. Let us now lay down a few rules for the government of the senses. Before we proceed, we cannot help deploring the misery of a man who is impelled by the disorders of his senses and the heat of his constitution to criminal passions. Such a man often deserves pity more than indignation. However, though the irregularity of the senses diminishes the atrociousness of the crime, yet it cannot excuse those who do not make continual efforts to correct it. To acknowledge that we are constitutionally inclined to violate the laws of God, and to live quietly in practices of constitutional heat, is to have the interior tainted. Certainly the best advice that can be given to a man whose constitution inclines him to sin, is, that he avoid opportunities, and flee from such objects as affect and disconcert him. Three remedies are necessary to our success in this painful undertaking: to suspend acts, to flee idleness, to mortify sense. 3. The disorders produced by the passions in the imagination, and against which also we ought to furnish you with some remedies, are like those complicated disorders which require opposite remedies, because they are the effect of opposite causes, so that the means employed to diminish one part not unfrequently increase another. It should seem at first that the best remedy which can be applied to disorders introduced by the passions into the imagination, is well to consider the nature of the objects of the passions, and thoroughly to know the world; and yet, on the other hand, it may truly be said that the must certain way of succeeding would be to know nothing at all about the world. We hazard a fall by approaching too near, and such very often is the ascendancy of the world over us that we cannot detach ourselves from it though we are disgusted with it. Let us endeavour, then, to preserve our imagination pure; let us abstain from pleasures to preclude the possibility of remembering them; let retirement, and, if it be practicable, perpetual privacy, from the moment we enter into the world to the day we quit it, save us from all bad impressions, so that we may never know the defects which worldly objects would produce on our passions. This method, sure and effectual, is useless and impracticable in regard to such as have received bad impressions on their imagination. People of this character ought to pursue the second method we mentioned, that is, to profit by their losses, and derive wisdom from their errors. When you recollect sin, remember the folly and pain of it. 4. To heal the disorders which the passions produce in the heart, two things must be done. First, the vanity of all the creatures must be observed, and this will free us from the desire of possessing and collecting the whole in order to fill up the void which single enjoyments leave. Secondly, we must ascend from creatures to the Creator, in order to get rid of the folly of attributing to the world the perfection and sufficiency of God. (J. Saurin.) Fleshly lusts There is, I fear, a large body of our fellow creatures by whom those “ fleshly lusts” are regarded as affording the only tangible benefits of their existence. Too little touched by the spirit of piety to derive any delight from the abundant sources of religious contemplation; too devoid of those kind affections which constitute the charm of domestic intercourse, to receive any satisfaction from the society of their family and friends; and too narrow and unimproved in mind to find interest in any intellectual pursuit, they are no sooner freed from the confinement imposed upon them by their business than they turn, as to their only relief for the tedium of inactivity, and the only means of enjoyment for which they have any value, to the gross gratification of their animal appetites. But, however general such a course of life may be, it is decidedly unchristian. Even under the most favourable circumstances, though a man should abstain from all gross excesses, and scrupulously respect those limits of external decency, he cannot act upon the principle of habitual self-indulgence, without being guilty of violating one of the most clearly expressed duties of the gospel. His religion demands of him a course of conduct the very reverse of that which he pursues (1 John 2:15-16; Romans 8:5, etc.; Matthew 16:24). Those precepts of self-denial and mortification which we find inculcated in the gospel, did not originate with the gospel. They made a part of the system of every distinguished moral teacher among the heathen themselves. Even the wise, and the scribe, and the disputer of this world could perceive, that voluptuousness and sensuality were most miserably unworthy the attention of the human soul. The grounds on which I would exhort you to abstain from “ fleshly lusts,” are those suggested by St. Peter, “ they war against the soul.”1. They are hostile to the intellectual faculties of the soul. No man, whose avocations demand of him any great and frequent stretch of mental exertion, is ignorant of this fact: and we find those instructors of youth, who merely treat of worldly arts and sciences, and treat of them in a worldly manner, almost invariably inculcate on their pupils, as one of the indispensable requisites of eminence, the practice of a strict and almost ascetic temperance, for the sake of securing to themselves the possession of the full, free, and active use of the powers of their own minds. Such precepts derive their reasons from the very constitution of the human frame. If the body suffers from excess, the mind becomes proportionately affected. It receives its impressions slowly and indistinctly, from the derangement of the channels through which it holds communion with the external world; and it revolves, compares, and decides upon them doubtfully and inefficiently, from the lassitude and exhaustion of the machinery with which it acts. 2. They are also inimical to the moral qualities of the soul. If the generous affections are not cultivated by exercise, they dwindle away and perish. If the selfish affections are allowed to act without restraint, they acquire a frightful and gigantic development. As we live to ourselves and for ourselves, we become gradually absorbed in our own selfish views and interests. As we pamper our appetites, the objects they delight in acquire consequence in our estimation. As we devote ourselves more and more to our own personal gratifications, we can less and less endure that those gratifications should encounter any opposition; till, at length, we prove blind and insensible to every claim but those of our own overweening will, and only regard our fellow creatures with favour, as they minister to our passions, or with enmity, as they cast impediments in their way. Where are we to look, among the dissolute children of the world, for instances of permanent attachment, of disinterested friendship, of long-cherished gratitude, and of self-sacrificing tenderness? Are such things among the fruits and flowers found to flourish in that tract which they cultivate with so indefatigable a pursuit of the pleasures of this life, and so fatal an oblivion of the treasures of the next? No, that false light of cordiality, which glows so brightly during the convivial hour, becomes extinguished as the vapours of the goblet which enkindled it are dispersed. Let any individual, even the most cherished of their society, suffer a reverse of fortune, and he will put these maxims to the proof. Let him be the deer which is stricken, and he will find himself abandoned by the herd. 3. Such gratifications are not only pernicious to the intellectual faculties and moral qualities of the soul, but they affect its temporal existence. They disorder and destroy the earthly tenement in which it is contained. They wear away, and overstrain, and often suddenly rend asunder those fine fibres, by which it is confined to its present transitory home. 4. Finally, according to the clearly declared principles of the Christian faith, we know that they are most pernicious to the eternal interests of the soul (Romans 8:7; 1 Timothy 5:6; Romans 8:6; Galatians 5:24; Romans 8:13). Indeed, if we look with an unprejudiced eye on the terms and conditions of the gospel covenant, we shall find that no course can be more destructive to the eternal interests of the soul than the course pursued by the voluptuary. This earth is not designed to be a house of feasting; life is not meant to be a holiday festival; we are sent into the world as a place of discipline and preparation, in which our souls may be educated for a more glorious state of being; and the allurements which address us, the difficulties we have to combat with, and the restraints we are bound to lay on our inclinations, constitute the very means by which our souls are so prepared, and disciplined, and educated. But we sometimes hear the sensualist assert that it cannot be very criminal to yield to such temptations, because it is natural to do so. This I utterly deny. They are, on the contrary, diametrically opposed to nature. The excesses of the voluptuary are only natural if we regard him as a being in the lowest possible state of demoralisation, as an anomaly in the creation, as a monster possessing passions without conscience and appetites without reason. But to the man who is complete in all the essentials of humanity, it is anything but natural that he should abandon himself to such a course of life. His reason opposes it; his moral sense opposes it; his regard for his personal health and welfare opposes it: so thoroughly indeed does every higher principle of his nature oppose it, that he must drown reflection; he must close his eyes against all experience; he must, in short, forcibly extinguish those moral and intellectual lights which God, in His mercy, has given him as his guides, before he can pursue such habits without repugnance, without being painfully oppressed by the sense of his own sin and folly, and without spending one-half of the day in mourning over the excesses of the other. (W. Harness, M. A.) A fight for life The flesh aims to damn the soul. It is in this conflict as Caesar said in the battle he had once in Africa with the children and partakers of Pompey, that in other battles he was wont to fight for glory, but there and then he was obliged to fight for his life. Remember thy precious soul lies at stake in this conflict. (Christopher Love.) Distinctive lusts Men that reject religion in favour of indulgence, do not stand any chance of permanent prosperity. Such men are like gipsies, that, by some freak of fortune, are turned into a magnificent mansion, well built, well furnished, and well stored with works of art. These gipsies go to work and break to pieces the exquisitely carved furniture, pull down the rare pictures, and strip the house of all the valuable things in it, and burn them, in order to make their pot boil, and thus to serve their lower nature, until, by and by, the whole building is desolate, and bleak, and barren. And men who reject religion and serve their passions are doing the same thing. They are kindling those lower fires at the expense of everything broad, and fine, and beautiful in their higher nature. (H. W. Beecher.) Destroyed by lust I can remember the time when flowers, pictures, beautiful laces and music set stirring always some strong emotion within me, in which it seemed that I saw hidden away in a crystal cell in the depths of my own strange heart, the shining form of a white-robed Soul maiden, who cried out to me, “ Ah! cannot you make your life as pure and beautiful as the flowers and the music, that so you may set me free?” But I chose the ignoble part, and gave myself up body and soul to the greed for gain. And often in the hour when, tempted by an evil thought, I turned to do some shameful or selfish action, I seemed to see the white arms of the Soul maiden uplifted in piteous entreaty to heaven, until at last the time came when her voice was silent, and when I knew that I had thrust her down and down into a darkness whence she would never again come forth. (A Dead Man’s Diary.) Destructive nature of fleshly lusts That word “ war” is full of meaning. It gives the idea of the march of an army against a city, as of the Greeks to surround and capture Troy-an assault which began with open war and ended by the stratagem of the wooden horse, from which the armed warriors descended into the heart of the city at dead of night. Of course we should all admit that excessive indulgence in any appetite injures the body, and especially the organs through which the sin against the whole fabric has been committed. But we may not all realise how destructive these fleshly lusts are to the inner life. They attack and conquer it, and lead it into captivity, impairing its energies, sullying its purity, lowering its tone, and cutting off the locks of moral strength. Remember, then, when tempted to yield to some unholy prompting, even though you only indulge the thought and wish, you are exposing yourself to a certain diminution of spiritual force, which will inevitably cripple your endeavours, and show itself in failure and defeat. No act of sensual indulgence is possible without inevitable injury to our true selves. It may be forgiven, and put away, through the forgiveness of God, by the blood of Jesus; but the soul can never be quite what it would have been had the temptation been overcome, and the grace of self-restraint exercised. How many there are around us, eminently fitted by their gifts, to lead the hosts of God, who, like Samson, grind in the prison house, making pastime for their foes, because they have been mastered by appetites which they should have controlled, as the horseman his fiery steed. Is there not a deep spiritual truth in the notion of the savage warrior, that the strength of a fallen foe enters the arm which has smitten him to the dust? Indulge the flesh, and you are weak, Curb it by self-restraint, and you are strong. (F. B. Meyer, B. A.) Fleshly lusts are the soul’ s adversaries These desires that belong to the flesh are adversaries of the soul. There is a difference between a war and a battle. It is not a random stroke; it is warfare on a plan. A battle may be won, and yet the victor be overcome ere the war be over. The first French emperor gained several great battles in the Russian campaign; but his army was not only vanquished, it was almost annihilated in the end. It is thus that certain appetites and passions, although once and again overcome by a resolute will, return to the charge, and watch their opportunity: It is not a battle, and done with it: the vanquished foe often enslaves his conqueror. A young man in modern society must do battle for his life with strong drink. He can taste it freely and stop in time. He despises the weak who seek safety in flight and abstinence. He knows what is good for him, and will not allow himself to be overcome. He obtains a good many victories, and counts himself invulnerable. But the wily foe persists. By little and little a diseased thirst is generated. The enemy now has an accomplice within the castle gates; and in the end the strong man, like Samson with his eyes out, grinds darkling in his enslaver’ s prison. (W. Arnot.) Inward lusts Not only acts of sin breaking out in the body, but the inward lusts that are in the heart, though they should never break out, for even the heart and soul is flesh as well as the body, and fleshly, even corrupt and sinful, as the sinful lusts of unbelief, impatience, hardness of heart, hypocrisy, rebelling against that which is good, weariness in well-doing, pride, anger, envy, self-love, covetousness, uncleanness, uncharitableness, etc. (John Rogers.) Having your conversation honest among the Gentiles.-Christians are to live godly, even among the wicked It is our duty not only to live godly among the godly, but even among the wicked; we must not follow a multitude to do evil. True, it is no easy thing with the cruel to live mercifully, with the hurtful to live helpfully, with the profane to live holily; yet it is to be attained unto, and we must labour for it.1. This rebukes such as severing themselves from all company, because they would not be tainted nor troubled with men’ s ill manners, betake themselves to a solitary, hermit’ s life. We are not born for ourselves, but for our parents, country, God’ s Church, etc. Besides, it is no such mastery for a man to avoid all occasions, as to live among occasions, and not be tainted with them. 2. It rebukes those that be for all companies. In good company they will be sober, in ill as the company is, will swear with swearers, lie also and dissemble when they be with such, so thinking that they may hold with the hare and run with the hound; like the chameleon they change themselves into all colours; but these are none of God’ s honest men, they are not for His turn, as if He were not the God of all places and times. Let such know that they have rotten and unsanctified hearts. But how should a man do, to live well among such? As they that live where the plague is, use preservatives; so must we daily pray God to keep us in a continual hatred of sin, considering the happiness of them that hold out. Think of Noah, Lot, Abraham, and their commendation; observe the judgments that fall upon bad men, and think what will be hereafter. Again, avoid familiarity with them; we cannot touch pitch and not be defiled, walk on coals and not be burnt. 3. It rebukes such Christians as living among such, walk not so holily as they should, but if they do not approve of, yet consent to their bad behaviour, without dislikes, especially being with their betters. 4. If God would have us live well among the wicked, what would He then in the midst of all good means? What, then, is their sin, and where shall they appear, that break out and live badly in the midst of the means of good, the ministry of the Word, etc.? What would these do, if they were far from such means? 5. It rebukes those that professing religion more than ordinarily, yet remember not with whom they live, but as if they were only among the good, which would hide all their frailties, or interpret them to the best, not as if they were among the wicked, that seek occasion against God’ s servants, that desire no better booty than the fall of a professor, etc. (John Rogers.) The witness of a pure life “ Having your conversation honest.” Both terms need some explanation. In modern English, conversation means the talking of two or three persons with each other; but the sense in this text is, the whole habit and life course of a person-his character and temper and conduct in presence of his fellows. At all times, and in all circumstances, walk circumspectly, for you never know who may be looking on. The modern meaning of honest is, that you do not cheat in a bargain; but as used here, and in ancient times generally, it signifies beautiful-first a material and then a moral winsomeness. These two terms in conjunction convey the precept, Let all the circumference of your life shine in the beauty of holiness. Alas! bid this dull earth shine like a star of heaven! To have commanded the house of Israel to shine as a light to surrounding nations, would have been an impossible requirement, if the precept had not been mated with a promise. But as the record runs, it is a reasonable service that is demanded (Isaiah 60:1). This precept given by Peter is on both its sides the echo of Isaiah’ s words. A light is needed because darkness reigns around. Peter desiderates a beautiful life among the Gentiles; and Isaiah expects that, when Israel basks in the favour of God, the Gentiles shall come to their light. It is a characteristic of true faith that it has positive hope. It does not despair even when things are at the worst, for it trusts in God. It is not enough that the primitive disciples should repel surrounding, assailing evil, and hold their own. They expect to make aggression and to gain a victory; to turn scoffs into hymns of praise, and enemies of Christ into zealous disciples: “ That, whereas they speak against you as evil-doers,” etc. It is not by the loudest debate and profession that these conquests can be made. It is not by what Christians say, but by what Christians are, that they can win the neighbourhood. The call is not so much to give evidence, as to be witnesses. Still further the precepts run down into detail. Submission to magistrates is prescribed as a Christian duty. Considering the time and the circumstances, this is a remarkable feature of the New Testament. The gospel fosters liberty; but does not suggest insurrection. Witness the emigration of the persecuted Puritans from England to America. These men would not resist constituted authority; but neither would they allow themselves to be crushed by a despot, as long as a remedy, which they could with a good conscience adopt, lay within their reach. The results will tell with decisive effect on the future condition of the human race. Ordinances of man should be obeyed, but they stand not on the same level with ordinances of God. (W. Arnot.) The Church in relation to the world The relation in which Christians stand to those who are not Christians is of vital importance to understand and feel (Psalms 39:1; Nehemiah 5:9; Titus 2:7-8). These and like references inculcate the duty of conserving the Christian name and the glory of God. That the Christian character should be perfect for the sake of its own beauty is a truth worthy of prayerful solicitude at all times; but the Christian character is more than a garment to be observed-it is an influence to be imparted to others. I. We begin with the fact that we are watched by those who are of opposite tendencies. We are under daily examination. There are those who take a greater delight to look at an eclipse of the sun for five minutes than to enjoy its light for a lifetime. But if there were no light in the sun there could not be an eclipse. So with men of worth; the contrast between the excellent and the not excellent fixes the eye of envy upon them, but where excellency is it cannot be altogether ignored. Young Christians, bear with me, and suffer the word of exhortation. You are not sufficiently alive to the fact that your Christian life is under a perpetual scrutiny. Not only that, but efforts are made to draw you aside from the way of peace. An honest conversation means a life true in every part to the great pattern set before us in the gospel. II. Let us further consider the influence of the Christian character for the good of others. “ Glorify God,” etc. Too frequently it is supposed by some that because they cannot take a prominent part in gospel services, and thereby possibly become instrumental directly in the conversion of souls, their lives are comparatively unobserved and useless. Let us remove this notion. As there is not a single ray of light, or drop of water, or breath of air, which does not contribute to the vast system of light, of water, and of air, so there is not a single Christian example which does not minister in the circle of the Church and lead to higher results.1. Men will feel the need of the change which they see in us. 2. Men will feel the need of the peace which we enjoy. 3. Men will feel the need of the prospect which cheers us. We have a good hope through grace. 4. And lastly, the influence of the Christian life leads to the highest results. It may be that today we think so much of self that we cannot rise to the highest point in our life. The highest degree of Christian excellence is the service and glory of God. To realise this we must look beyond ourselves, and beyond those to whom we may bring salvation; and beyond any benefits faith may confer on either them or us, to God. He will manifest Himself in the day of visitation, when we shall see and feel that our life is intended to reach even to Himself. In the day of visitation all matters will be seen in their true light. The text is a warning to the world as well as to the Church. That any soul, however degraded, should delight in making the sins of others his prey, passes comprehension. What, a vulture, with only a taste for carrion! A sense of guilt endeavours to fix all eyes on the sins of others to avoid personal detection. The sins of others will help no man in the day of judgment. (T. Davies, M. A.) The power of a consistent walk The Rev. Dr. Stalker once related the following incident in an address on “ Religion in Common Life” : “ A lady went to him with a request to join his church. She and her husband were foreigners and Roman Catholics, but had lapsed from all church going for ten or eleven years. One night their servant went home rather late from a meeting. Upon pressure being brought to bear upon her, this servant acknowledged that she had that night been convicted of sin, and stayed behind to speak about her soul. The lady resolved to watch the girl for the next fortnight. Such a change in her temper and diligence was observable that, at the end of the fortnight, the mistress asked where the meeting was held, and went on the next Sabbath evening, with the result that both she and her husband were converted. The servant’ s consistent walk was more powerful than anything she could have said, so true is it that example is better than precept.” Beautiful behaviour êáëçí , good, or comely. The deeper view of Greek philosophy represented immorality and ugliness, and morality and beauty as convertible ideas. (J. Muller.) Inconsistency noticeable The whole complexion of a negro is less noticed than a single stain on the features of a white countenance. (Wm. Jay.) They speak against you as evildoers.-The transgressions of Christians Amongst the numerous attempts to throw doubt upon the evidence of our religion, not the least successful has been suggested by the imperfections of those who profess them selves the disciples of its Author. I. That the objection itself is on several accounts delusive. It is drawn, not from any difficulties inherent in religion or its evidence, but from a supposed insufficiency of its influence and effects. Christianity itself never supposes its followers to be without fault, that its influence can secure unerring obedience to its own laws. So far from this, indeed, “ it is impossible,” according to its own language, “ but that offences will come.” II. One great reason why the lives of Christians do not always correspond to their religion, is that freedom of mind and action, with which our Creator has endowed us, and which is absolutely necessary to creatures responsible for their conduct. Impelled by passions impatient for gratification, and surrounded with temptations, frequently perplexed with difficulties between duty and inclination, and sometimes deceived by appearances; can it be a just subject of wonder, if the love of the present sometimes prevail over the expectation of the future, or the delusions of pleasure for a while withdraw the mind from the prospect of its consequences; if we violate the laws which we confess to be just, and practise what our religion condemns? III. These defects in the conduct of individuals appear also the more striking when compared with the purity of the rules by which our actions ought to have been directed, and with the weight of the sanctions by which those rules are enforced. IV. Another plausible basis for the same censure may be laid in the opposite characters of virtue and vice. Virtue is always modest, peaceable, and silent; vice often forward, loud, and conspicuous. V. Christians, again, have been severely censured on account of the numerous divisions and distinctions amongst them. It would be unreasonable to expect that mankind should differ in their opinions on almost every other subject, and yet should be all agreed on this; on a subject which is of all others the most interesting, the most extensive, and the most complex. To this let us add the effects of the weakness and folly, of the vanity and ambition, of the enthusiasm or the hypocrisy of various individuals amongst us, and we shall be able to account very satisfactorily for the multiplicity of our tenets and parties. VI. Such as these are the censures that have been thrown upon Christianity and its professors. But as far as they have any foundation in truth, the only adequate refutation is an amendment in our own morals, a regulation of our lives, more agreeable to the principles that we profess. (W. Barrow, D. D.) Christians maligned I. “ Whereas they speak against you as evildoers.” This is in general the disease of man’ s corrupt nature, and argues much the baseness of it-this propensity to speak evil one of another, either blotting the best actions with misconstructions, or taking doubtful things by the left ear; not choosing the most favourable, but, on the contrary, the very harshest sense that can be put upon them. All these kinds of evil speaking are fruits that spring from that bitter root of pride and self-love, which is naturally deeply fastened in every man’ s heart. But besides this general bent to evil speaking, there is a particular malice in the world against those that are born of God, which must have vent in calumnies and reproaches. These evil speakings of the world against pious men professing religion, are partly gross falsehoods invented without the least ground or appearance of truth. Then again, consider, how much more will the wicked insult upon the least real blemishes that they can espy amongst the professors of godliness. And in this there is commonly a three-fold injury-they strictly pry into and maliciously object against Christians the smallest imperfections and frailties of their lives, as if they pretended to absolute perfection. Men are apt to impute the scandalous falls of some particular Christians to the whole number. It is a very incompetent rule to make judgment of any man by one action, much more to measure all the rest of the same profession by it. They impute the personal failings of men to their religion, and disparage it because of the faults of those that profess it. II. “ Having your conversation honest among the Gentiles.” As the sovereign power of drawing good out of evil resides in God, and argues His primitive goodness, so He teacheth His own children some faculty this way, that they may resemble Him in it. He teacheth them to draw sweetness out of their bitterest afflictions, and increase of inward peace from their outward troubles. The sharp censures and evil speakings that a Christian is encompassed with in the world, are no other than a hedge of thorns set on every side, that he may not go out of his way, but keep straight on in it, not declining to the right hand nor to the left; whereas if they found nothing but the favour and good opinion of the world, they might, as in a way unhedged, be subject to wander out into the meadows of carnal pleasures that are about them, which would call and allure them, and often divert them from their journey. And thus it might fall out, that Christians would deserve censure and evil speakings the more, if they did not usually suffer them undeserved. III. “ That they may glorify God in the day of their visitation.” He says not, They shall praise or commend you, but, “ shall glorify God.” It is this the apostle still holds before their eyes, as that upon which a Christian doth willingly set his eye and keep it fixed, in all his ways. He doth not teach them to be sensible of their own esteem as it concerns themselves, but only as the glory of their God is interested in it. “ In the day of visitation,” The beholding of your good works may work this in them, that they may be gained to acknowledge and embrace that religion and that God, which for the present they reject; but that it may be thus, they must be visited with that same light and grace from above, which hath sanctified you. (Abp. Leighton.) The wicked speak ill of God’ s children The more sincere any is in professing the truth, the more the wicked naturally hate him. Thus have God’ s children ever been ill-spoken of (Matthew 5:11; Genesis 21:9; Galatians 4:30; 1 Kings 18:17; 2 Kings 9:11; Ezra 4:5-16; Nehemiah 6:5-6; Esther 3:8; Acts 24:14; Matthew 11:19; Luke 11:15; John 8:48; Acts 2:19; Acts 6:11).1. Seeing the wicked are so apt to speak evil, we should give all diligence to look so to our ways as to give them no just occasion. 2. Think it not strange to be ill spoken of; it is the nature of the world thus to do, as for the birds to fly, and we must not be discouraged at it, and say, “ I have striven to do as well as I can, and yet I am ill spoken of; I cannot tell what to do,” and so faint and melt as wax. Oh, no; but let it be as a whetstone to sharpen you on more (2 Samuel 6:22). 3. This might make men not too ready to believe reports, and think ill of men by and by upon flying reports, seeing the world are so apt to speak wrongfully, especially of God’ s children. 4. For them that be ill speakers of God’ s servants, they cannot bear a worse badge, as ill a sign as can be of any; for if he be translated from death to life that loves the brethren, what then he that hates them? He is no true member of the Church, nor led by David’ s spirit (Psalms 15:1-5; Psalms 16:2), but is of Ishmael’ s generation, and will be cast out as he. How shall they escape the curse threatened (Isaiah 5:20; Proverbs 17:15)? (John Rogers.) Your good works, which they shall behold.-The ministry of good works All religion which does not lead to a life of good works is a counterfeit. It is bad money, which will never pass current at the court of heaven. It may bear the name of Christ, but it lacks His mind and spirit. It hinders the progress of the gospel, and is one of the worst enemies of His kingdom. On the other hand, a life fruitful in good works brings honour to our Father in heaven. It manifests His wisdom in the free salvation which He bestows. It prepares the way in many a heart for the reception of the truth, and kindles in many others a desire to walk more closely with God. Let me give a single example, from the writer’ s personal knowledge, of the effect of a consistent, holy life. A wealthy tradesman in London was most zealous and self-denying in his labours and liberality in the Lord’ s work. Each year he gave away many thousands of pounds, and a large part of this anonymously. I had it from this man’ s own lips that in early life he was saved from infidelity by noticing the holy, godly, blameless walk of a young banker’ s clerk. Who can tell the countless benefits that thus arose to the Church of Christ through the consistent life of that young man? There are one or two points as to the life of good works on which it is needful to dwell. I. What is the preparation for such a life? How can anyone hope to enter upon such a course, and then persevere in it?1. Your first duty is to embrace the blessed hope of life which is in Christ Jesus. As the shipwrecked man must first lay hold of the rope or get into the lifeboat that so he may escape destruction and get safe to shore, and then can again enter upon the works of his calling, so must you first accept the free invitation of Christ in the gospel, and reach the shore of peace and reconciliation with God. Believe in the readiness and power of Christ to save you. Rejoice that He welcomes you to His care, and will keep you by His power. Then you may go forward, and will not fail. A life of good works will be a necessity to you. You possess a new motive. A spirit of grateful love to God will fill your breast. You will keep His commandments, and do those things that are pleasing in His sight. 2. Moreover, you will possess a new power. In the strength of the Spirit you can do those good works which are pleasing to your Father in heaven. Be sure, therefore, that you begin your course aright. Begin in humility and faith. II. In what way may you best carry out in daily practice a life devoted to good works? Take a sample of “ a good work,” one that we know to have been truly such from the lips of Christ Himself. You remember Mary in the house of Simon the leper (Mark 14:6; Mark 14:8-9). Here was every element of a good work. It was done to Christ Himself, and out of love to Him. It was a costly work, for the ointment was very precious. It was a lowly work. Both hands and hair were used in anointing the Lord’ s feet. It was a work of personal service. She did not do the work by another, but herself ministered to Christ. It was a work which spread a sweet savour around, and thus of benefit to those in the house. It was a work which brought honour to the Lord, which pointed to His death of suffering, and which was abundantly recompensed in the gracious words which Christ spoke of her. III. Let me add that there is a four-fold ministry of good works in which each Christian should seek to excel.1. There is the ministry of home life. This stands in the first rank of duty. The lamp which the Lord hath lighted should give light to all that are in the house where it is found. The most commonplace duties ought to be done before God, and thus become an acceptable sacrifice. The care of children, the work of the house, the use of the needle, the rising in the morning, attention to the wants and comforts of each member of the family-such ordinary things as these may afford scope for self-denial, for manifesting an unselfish spirit, and in many ways for proving the sincerity of our Christian profession. No less important is it that a diligent guard should be set over tongue and temper, over infirmities and irritabilities, over clouded looks and wayward passions, over doing little things which ought not to be done, or over doing right things in a wrong way. 2. There is the ministry of glad, willing, freehanded gifts. Of whatever we possess we are but stewards. It belongs not to us, but to Him who gave it into our charge. Let there be real self-denial. Above all, never forget that a ready, cheerful spirit is especially pleasing to God. 3. There is the ministry of personal work and effort in the Lord’ s vineyard. Give not only money, but the gold of time to do work for God, for His Church, for the souls of poor and rich, of sick and strong, of young and old. 4. Lastly, there is the ministry of fervent prayers and intercessions. Of all agencies this is the most powerful. There are those who by sickness and extreme poverty can do little or nothing in the way of personal service, who yet by true, believing prayer may bring down rich benefits on Christ’ s Church. And those who can both work and give yet fail to employ the very greatest talent, if they neglect constant intercession on behalf of others. (G. Everard, M. A.) Trite revenge Be revenged by shining. (Toplady.) Looking for one thing and finding another “ Which they shall behold,” while they pry and spy into your courses (as the Greek word imports) to see what evil they can find out and fasten on. (J. Trapp.) Glorify God in the day of visitation.-How God is glorified by us I. By knowledge, when we conceive of God after a glorious manner. Seeing we can add no glory to God’ s nature, we should strive to make Him glorious in our own minds and hearts. And we may, by the way, see what cause we have to be smitten with shame to think of it, how we have dishonoured God by mean thoughts of Him. II. By acknowledgment, when in words or works we do ascribe excellency unto God, as-1. When in words we magnify God and speak of His praises, and confess that He is worthy to receive honour, and glory, and might, and majesty (Revelation 4:11; Psalms 29:1-11; Psalms 86:9). 2. When men confess that all the glory they have above other men in gifts or dignity was given them by God (1 Chronicles 29:11; 1 Chronicles 29:13). And thus we make God the Father of glory, as He is called (Ephesians 1:17). 3. When the praise of God or the advancement of His kingdom is made the end of all our actions, this is to do all to His glory (1 Corinthians 10:31). 4. When we believe God’ s promises, and wait for the performance of them, though we see no means likely for their accomplishment. Thus Abraham (Romans 4:1-25). 5. When we publicly acknowledge true religion, or any special truth of God, when it is generally opposed by the most men. 6. When men suffer in the quarrel of God’ s truth and true religion (1 Peter 4:16). 7. When on the Sabbath men devote themselves only to God’ s work, doing it with more joy and care than they should do their own work on the week days (Isaiah 58:13). 8. When men do in particular give thanks to God for benefits or deliverances, acknowledging God’ s special hand therein. Thus the leper gave glory to God (Luke 17:18; Psalms 11:3-4). 9. By loving, praising, and esteeming of Jesus Christ above all men; for when we glorify the Son we glorify the Father (John 1:14; John 11:4). 10. When we account of and honour godly men above all other sorts of men in the world. III. By effect, when men make others to glorify God. Thus the professed subjection of Christians to the gospel makes other men glorify God (2 Corinthians 9:13). So the fruits of righteousness are to the glory of God (Philippians 1:10). So here the good works of Christians do make new converts glorify God; so every Christian that is God’ s planting is a tree of righteousness that God may be glorified (Isaiah 61:3). So are all Christians to the praise of the glory of God’ s grace, as they are either qualified or privileged by Jesus Christ (Ephesians 1:7). (N. Byfield.) The day of visitation. Conversion the day of visitation I. Conversion is the work of God.1. Let them which have felt this work acknowledge God in it, and give Him all the glory. 2. They that be yet without it, let them not defer it as a small matter to the last, as if they could convert themselves when they list, but humbly seek it of God in attending on His ordinances. II. It is God’ s great mercy to convert a sinner. This is the greatest mercy that can be bestowed: to be delivered from sickness into health, from prison into liberty, from poverty to riches, from death to life. Let those that have obtained it give glory to God. III. A man can never glorify God till God thus visit and convert his soul. IV. When a man is converted he will glorify God; yea, he cannot choose but in heart admire God’ s goodness and love, and in his life seek to glorify Him. Then will he also do all he can to gain others (Luke 22:32). V. Even such as have been ill-speakers of the truth and God’ s servants may yet be converted and prove good Christians (Acts 2:13; Romans 6:17; 1 Corinthians 6:9; Titus 3:3).1. Never despair of them that be very bad, but pray for them, and give them good counsel. 2. This may be an exceeding provocation to the worst, that they may prove good and be saved, as unlikely as it is. 3. Yet let none instead of good take hurt by this, and heart to go on in sin, seeing the worst may become converts. They shall find God a just and severe revenger of such proud despisers and presumptuous sinners. (John Rogers.) 1 Peter 2:13-16 Submit yourselves to every ordinance of man.The limits of subjection to civil rulers What if the rulers themselves be wicked men, and the government itself a tyranny?1. Let it be considered that there is probably no government, not even that of the worst slave plantation, that is not on the whole to be preferred to anarchy, or no government at all; and that, therefore, the argument from the uses of government never quite fails. 2. There is no question whatever that, when human government errs and transcends the limits prescribed by its very nature and the ends of its being, forbidding what God has commanded, or commanding what God has forbidden, our duty in every such case is to hearken unto God more than unto men. In the conflict of authorities the higher authority must rule. 3. The Christian law does not strip a man of whatever civil rights his country’ s law allows him, nor does it prohibit him from defending those rights in any lawful way (Acts 16:37; Acts 22:25; Acts 25:11). 4. These things being understood, the apostle’ s rule may safely be taken as absolute and universal in its application. Reverencing still the dark and distorted shadow of the Divine sovereignty, they will leave it to His all-controlling providence, and to outraged humanity, to redress the wrongs of nations. (J. Lillie, D. D.) The duty of submission to authority I. All authority of every kind is from God, and is to be regarded as such. The Word of God goes further, and says, “ that there is no power but of God.” Nor is this truth confined to the case of kings and their subjects; it applies to every authority whatever; all the relations in life, and our obedience, is due simply because it is the will and ordinance of God. II. The persons who receive this their authority from God are but men. Now man in his natural state is full of corruption, pride, selfishness, unrighteousness, covetousness, maliciousness. It is therefore to be calculated upon, and God contemplated this when He gave the precept, that the persons who are in authority should abuse it in some way or another. And therefore it is nowhere written: Children, obey good parents; servants, obey kind masters; subjects, obey a good government; there is no such limitation, but quite the contrary, “ not only the good and gentle, but also the froward.” If those in authority abuse or neglect their trust, they will assuredly have to give account to God; but our duty is to submit, while using all lawful means to be delivered from unjust treatment. (John Tucker, B. D.) Submission to rulers I. An authoritative command of obedience, “ Submit your selves.” II. The object, to which this obedience must be yielded, “ Every ordinance of man.” III. The division of this ordinance of man into supreme and subordinate. “ Submit to the King, as supreme; and to governors” sent by Him, as subordinate. IV. The duty of all governors, and the end of all governments expressed, and that is, “ The punishment of evil-doers, and the praise of them that do well.” V. The motive, which enforceth this exhortation and command: submit to them “ for the Lord’ s sake.” (Bp. E. Hopkins.) Subjection to authority I. No subjection is due to an unlawful and usurping power, upon God’ s command, and for conscience sake. II. Upon prudential and self preserving principles, submission may sometimes be yielded to the lawful commands of an unlawful and usurping power. III. We ought to obey the commands of the lawful magistrate, in those things which are in themselves necessary to be done and our indispensable duty, and that, not only out of conscience to God, but also out of conscience to man. IV. If the thing commanded be indifferently lawful, and appear so to us; that is, if it be in its own nature such as we may either do it, or not to do it without sin; then are we to be determined by the magistrate’ s commands to do what he requires, and to abstain from what he forbids. V. If the thing be indifferently lawful in itself, but appears doubtful unto us, and we cannot resolve ourselves whether it be lawful or evil, I think we are obliged, till we receive clearer light and information, to take that part of the doubt which the magistrate commands us, as being the safest and most satisfactory to conscience. VI. If the thing enjoined be in itself sinful and unlawful, or at least appear so unto us, then take these two following rules-1. We ought not, upon any pretences or inducements whatsoever, to yield active obedience to such a command. 2. Though we may not yield active obedience to the unlawful commands of our superiors, yet we are bound to yield passive obedience to them. VII. We ought, in no case whatsoever, to resist and rebel against the lawful powers which God hath set over us; yea, though they should use their power unlawfully; for whosoever resisteth the power, resisteth the ordinance of God; and they that resist shall receive to themselves damnation. (Bp. E. Hopkins.) Submission to government 1. The reasonableness of this apostolical precept is suggested by the terms used to convey it; for why “ rulers and governors,” unless it be indeed their office to rule and govern, our duty to submit and obey? 2. But that there should be government, and that men should obey it, is the will and appointment of God. 3. A third reason assigned for obedience to government is the benefit derived from it to the community. It is instituted for the protection of good men by the punishment of evil ones. 4. A fourth reason for the precept inculcated is the honour of Christianity. (Bp. Horne.) Bad riders to be obeyed You will say the doctrine is unreasonable, and of tyranny there can be no end if it be unlawful to resist it. Perhaps, if we only lay aside for a moment our passions and prejudices, we shall see how much better God has provided for our happiness than we ourselves should do.1. For, if you allow to subjects a power of taking arms and deposing their princes, who is to be judge when there is a sufficient reason for exerting such power? Men will never judge fairly and impartially in their own cause. 2. It should be considered that, although government may sometimes be bad, rebellion will generally be worse. “ The wrath of a king,” says the Scripture, “ is as the roaring of a lion,” he may destroy some; but “ the madness of the people” is as the raging of a tempestuous sea when it has burst its bounds; it overwhelms all. Compare the mischief said to be done, or designed, by our unfortunate Charles I with the bloodshed, the devastations of the great rebellion, from the horrors of which the nation was at length obliged to seek protection by reestablishing the government that had been east off. 3. But respecting the principle of obedience, and the inconveniences to which it may sometimes subject us, we do not sufficiently rely upon the providence or the promises of God. The Scriptures teach us that as He setteth a righteous prince over a people that fear and serve Him, so He often sendeth an unrighteous one to punish a wicked nation. (Bp. Horne.) Civil authorities have their authority from God Water may be made to assume different forms, in fountains and cascades, and be made to flow in different channels or aqueducts by the hand of man; but the element itself, which flows in them, is from God. So again, marble may be hewn by man’ s hand into different shapes; under the sculptor’ s chisel it may become a statue, a frieze, or sarcophagus, but the marble itself is from the quarry, it is from the creative hand of God. So it is with the civil power. The form which power may assume, and the person who may be appointed to exercise it, may be ordinances of man, but the authority itself is from God. (C. Wordsworth.) Any kind of government better than none There was a law amongst the Persians that when their governor was dead there should be a lawlessness for five days after, that every man should do what he list; now for those five days there was such killing and robbing, and such destroying one another, that by the time the five days were over, they were glad of government again. So that any kind of government is better than no government; but happy is that people that live under a good government, where justice flows from the Supreme as head, and is conveyed by subordinate ministers unto the people. (A. Burgess.) That with well doing ye may put to silence.- On silencing objections against Christianity I. What was that cavil and objection against Christian religion which the apostle here hath respect unto, and would have silenced? From 1 Peter 2:13-14 we learn that it was that old clamour, that Christian religion was an enemy to government, and the professors of it seditious persons. This was indeed the very masterpiece of Satan’ s policy; by this he wrought the condemnation of the blessed Jesus, and even constrained Pilate to give sentence against Him (John 19:12-13). And by the same artifice he hoped also to destroy His religion, and to root the profession of it out of the world. II. By what means the apostle would have this done. There is not a more excellent way to take off all scandals against religion than the exemplary lives of those that profess it. But the notion of well-doing here is that honest and regular, that ready and conscientious subjection to government, that he had pressed in the preceding verses. And it is certainly the most effectual way.1. All men have not parts to examine what the principles of a religion are, or to understand what the natural consequences from them be; and many that can do this are idle, or cannot spare time to do it, and all these will go that near way of judging a religion to be such, as they behold the professors of it to be. 2. Actions are commonly more convictive, then principles and professions. III. The great reason and argument upon which He presses it.1. This is God’ s will, because He knows this to be so very much for the good and happiness of the world. 2. The maintaining His own appointment and institution. 3. For the credit of His holy religion. (H. Hesketh.) Why it is so hard to cure ignorance and silence ignorant men 1. Because it is natural to them to be hateful and hating others, and it is a hard task to overcome a natural disposition in man (Titus 3:3). 2. Because the unregenerate mind of man is full of objections, and the devil supplies them with cavils. 3. Because many withhold the truth in un righteousness; they love darkness and lies, and therefore resist the power of the truth. 4. Because they encourage one another in an evil way; they observe that the great men of the world, and many that are in reputation for wisdom, are scorners as well as they; they think they may revile securely. 5. Because many ignorant persons, when they are confuted, yet are so foolish that they will wilfully persist in their objections, though they cannot reply against the answer, yet they think if such and such were there, that have more experience and learning, they would make good what they say. 6. Because malice hath no ears; they hate the truth and godly men. If it be not as they say, yet their malice would fain have it so, and if it may disgrace the godly, they care not whether it be true or no. 7. Because many times God gives them over to such a reprobate sense, that through custom and evil surmises, they think verily they do not much amiss to oppose and hate such persons. This was the case of such as reviled and persecuted the apostles, they thought they did God good service. Uses- (1) Therefore we should not wonder if we see this daily come to pass that men of all sorts should reproach the good way of God so unjustly, so pertinaciously. (2) It shows that godly men had need to be circumspect, and that they which will confute ignorant men must strive to be thoroughly furnished with wisdom of words and abundance of good works. (3) It shows that ignorant persons are in a lamentable case, that so wilfully run towards the gates of death and ruin, that are so hardly cured of this spiritual blindness. (4) It imports that self-willed Christians that cannot be advised are to be reckoned in the rank of these fools, what show soever they make of a better estate. (5) It does comfortably import that when one is teachable, and hates reproaching, and will do or say nothing against the truth, and uses the means to get the knowledge and love of the truth, that such a person is escaped from the congregation of these fools, and is in some measure enlightened with true wisdom from above. (6) It may warn all that love their own souls, hereafter to take heed, to avoid wilfulness and self-conceitedness. (N. Byfield.) The vices of Christians detrimental to the general interests of religion I. The vices of believers afford an argument to infidelity. The vices of believers are not the consequences of religion, but of its abuse or neglect; the corruption of Christian manners cannot be at all compared with the enormous wickedness of the heathen nations; those excesses, which seem more peculiarly the offspring of Christianity, were the real production of ignorance and superstition. Unbelievers are not the only persons whom our misconduct may fatally mislead. II. Even in professed Christians there is a cold or contemptuous neglect of public worship, and of revealed doctrines, which is often defended on the same pretence: that it does not appear that they have either of them any actual influence on the conduct of those who regard them most scrupulously. Belief in the doctrines of religion, and attendance on its solemnities, have plainly a natural tendency to awaken our sense of those duties which the Being, whom we adore, has commanded, and to quicken our pursuit of those virtues, which it is the end of revelation to promote. And though it must be acknowledged that these means, however wisely adopted, partake in the imperfection of everything relating to man, and often fail of their ends; yet is it far from being certain that they fail so frequently, or so considerably, as the objection supposes. Religious observances, it is true, cannot divest us of our natural frailty; but they certainly give us awful ideas of the moral Governor of the world, and have a peculiar tendency to encourage that serious disposition of mind which will best secure us from great or frequent excesses. III. The vices of believers not only furnish a pretence to the infidelity of some, and the irreligion of others, but spread also a very dangerous snare in the plainer paths of moral virtue. The force of example on the minds and manners of mankind is universally acknowledged. Interest, inclination, and duty, the laws of man, the laws of nature, and the laws of God, are in vain united to resist its progress: every principle of action is perverted by the magic influence of prevailing fashion. As therefore the consequences of our conduct on the belief and manners of those around us are thus important in themselves; as they cannot be prevented by any prudence, nor averted by the sincerest repentance; they surely form a motive to goodness, which no thinking man can overlook, and no generous man will disregard. (James Fawcett, B. D.) As free, and not using.-Freedom and law Freedom is one of those words which need no recommendation: it belongs to the same category as light, order, progress, law. It is one of the ideas which, in some sense or other, mankind accepts as an axiom; as a landmark or principle of healthful life which is beyond discussion. What do we mean by freedom? We mean the power of a living being to act without hindrance to the true law of its life. I. Christ has given men political or social freedom. He has not indeed drawn out a scheme of government, and stamped it with His Divine authority as guaranteeing freedom. Yet with our Lord there came the germs of political liberty. When individual men had learnt to feel the greatness and the interest of life; the real horizon which stretches out before the soul’ s eye beyond the grave; the depths of being within the soul; its unexhausted capacities for happiness and for suffering; the reality and nearness of God, of His Divine Son, of our fellow citizens the blessed angels; the awful, inexpressible distinction of being redeemed from death by the blood of the Most Holy, and sanctified by the Eternal Spirit; it was impossible not to feel also that each man had, in the highest sense, rights to assert and a bearing to maintain. Thus a Christian was a free man, simply because he was a Christian. It has often been alleged that, as a matter of fact, our Lord left the great despotisms of the world for a while untouched. Jesus Christ taught, He was crucified, He rose, He ascended. But the Caesar Tiberius still sat upon the throne of the Roman world. There never was a more odious system of personal government than that of the Roman Emperors; the surviving forms of the extinct republic did but make the actual tyranny which had succeeded it more hard to bear. Yet it was of such an Emperor as Nero that St. Paul wrote (Romans 13:1); and St. Peter (1 Peter 2:13-14). And in the same way apostles advise Christian slaves to give obedience to their masters as unto the Lord; to obey, not with eye service, as if they had only to do as much as might be insisted on by a jealous owner, but with singleness of heart, as men who throw every energy into their work. It may be asked, How are such precepts compatible with the assertion that Christ gave us political freedom? The answer is that He gave us a moral force which did two things. First, it made every Christian independent of outward political circumstances; and, secondly, it made the creation of new civil institutions only a question of time. II. Christ gave men also intellectual freedom. He enfranchised them by the gift of truth. He gave truth in its fulness; truth not merely relative and provisional, but absolute and final. Until He came the human intellect was enslaved. It was enslaved either to degrading superstition, or to false and one-sided philosophies. When Christ, in all the glory of His Godhead and His Manhood, had enthroned Himself in the soul, He taught men to think worthily of the greatness of God and of the greatness of man, notwithstanding man’ s weakness and corruption. He freed men from all the cramping influences of local philosophies, of local teachers, of petty schemes and theories for classes and races. He led men out into the great highways of thought, where, if they would, they might know the universal Father, manifested in His Blessed Son, as the Author of all existence, as its object, and as its end. Certainly our Lord has given us a body of Truth, which we can, if we like, reject, but which it is our happiness to believe. What He did for men in this way is embodied in His own teaching, in the writings of His apostles, and in the creeds of the universal Church. These are to intellectual liberty what law is to social liberty. They protect, they do not cramp it. They furnish a fixed point, from which thought may take wing. III. Christ has made men morally free. He has broken the chains which fettered the human will, and has restored to it its buoyancy and its power. What had been lost was more than regained in Christ. Not merely was the penalty of old transgressions paid, so that man was redeemed from a real captivity: but the will was reinvigorated by a Heaven-sent force or grace, once more placing it in true harmony with the law of man’ s life (Romans 6:18). Here it is objected that moral freedom is not worth having if it be only a service after all. “ You talk of freedom,” men say, “ but you mean rule. You mean restrictions upon action; restrictions upon inclination; restrictions upon speech. You mean obligations: obligations to work; obligations to self-discipline; obligations to sacrifice self to others; obligations to all the details of Christian duty.” You are right: certainly we do. A Christian lives under a system of restrictions and obligations; and yet he is free. Those obligations and restrictions only prescribe for him what his own new heaven-sent nature would wish to be and to do. Whatever a Christian may be outwardly, he is inwardly a free man. In obeying Christ’ s law he acts as he desires to act: he acts according to this, the highest law of his life, because he rejoices to do so. He obeys law; the Law of God. But then he has no inclination to disobey it. He is, as St. Peter says, a servant of God; but then, as he would not for all the world be anything else, his service is perfect freedom. (Canon Liddon.) Freedom and servitude It often happens that apparent contradictions disappear when we reach a purer and higher range of life. Many of the things which perplex us when children, and seem to our eyes to be inconsistencies on the part of our parents, now appear, when we look back on them with the clearer vision of later years, to be not only consistent, but perfectly justifiable. And may that not be the same in all the regions of life? Of course it might be said on a superficial view, that servitude and freedom were inconsistent with one another. But in the larger life I gather that it is not so. The apostle at all events speaks as though a man might be perfectly free, and at the same time be living a life of servitude. I. The first law almost of existence is that which expresses itself in the struggle for freedom. Would you not say that the child that was born but yesterday is very much like a man that has just been drawn out of the water after drowning? All the struggle, all the painful symptoms you notice in that drowned man are the efforts of life, so to speak, to recover itself, and to take possession of those conditions under which its existence alone can continue. The child, in the same way, is not yet, as it were, adjusted to the conditions by which it is surrounded, and the earlier stages of life are the struggle to lay hold of the conditions in which it finds itself. Thus I should say the struggle of all early life is the struggle to get possession of the right of life. And this will become more apparent if we ask ourselves what we mean by freedom. Freedom is the educated capacity to live according to the capacity of our being. The least reflection will show us that this is true. Take, for example, what we know perfectly well, that our struggle as a child turns upon the conception that that is the meaning of freedom. When you take your child and say, “ It is now time that it began to learn those little physical exercises, whether you call them calisthenics or dancing classes.” You say to yourself: “ The child is not yet in possession of its full power. These exercises are to give it mastery over itself with regard to its physical organisation, and we are trying to give it such a mastery that it may be able to use all its physical power according to the order, law, and condition of that physical framework.” It is the same when you come to the mental region. The man who thinks freely thinks truly, and a man only thinks freely according to the law and order of thought; and when you take your lad and say, “ It is time you were educated,” and send him to school, you do so because you know that exactly as physical training is to make him master of his own frame, so the mental training is to make him master of his own intelligence. It is the same thing in social life. The awkwardness which you see in your children is just that which arise out of the fact that they are not self-possessed. But when they go into society and are trained they become, by the education of mixing with their fellow men, possessors of themselves, and what you call ease, manner, grace, is only that the man is master of himself, that the self-consciousness which disturbs his own happiness has vanished in entering into his rightful heritage of being a self-possessed individual. Look at it from the religious point of view. It is also true that religion comes to set a man free. Religion is the great coordinating power of the moral and physical forces of life. It is that which gives us power over ourselves. It sets us free from false conceptions. “ Stand fast in the liberty wherewith Christ hath made you free,” means, “ Stand fast in the possession of principles which clear your mind from false conceptions.” The bulk of men are not to be charged with being slaves of the grosser or more vulgar passions, but they are very much the slaves of false conceptions of life. The competition for wealth, the desire to achieve physical ease, free from the anxieties of life-these things rise up in men’ s minds, and are fostered by the conditions of society, and man is the victim of a false idea of life. Christianity is sent surely to emancipate men from that, to show men what the real significance of life is, that those are little weaknesses in us which betray us into conditions and surroundings which make us less and lower than we ought to be. Therefore Christianity would not be a complete or valuable system if its only idea were that we should negative the positive sins in the world. No, we must reorganise humanity upon noble lines, make man master of himself and give him a true conception of life, that conception of life which God intends him to take. II. The second stage is the stage of service. As truly as the earlier stage is the stage of struggle, so it is true equally that the second stage is a stage of service. It is true in our ordinary life. There is no difference, as I take it, between the religious point of view and the purely natural point of view. The man who is educated to freedom only reaches that freedom in serving. It is true in the fields of nature: you only bring a thing to maturity in making it of service the corn shall grow by slow degrees. That is the process by which it struggles into its freedom. It struggles first for bare existence and then for conditions under which it may reach its maturity; but the moment that maturity is reached the harvest is come, it has reached the condition of life in which service is absolutely imperative to it. This wheat grain means the law of service; therefore the moment its maturity is acquired it is acquired in order that it may be utilised. This is true with regard to human life. How we dreamed of what we would do when we were twenty-one! And yet, now that the twenty-one years are passed, the man’ s only freedom is service. He is not content to be a free man. Set him free and he is miserable. It comes in the gentle dawn of new emotions, which lead him to form his own little home nest. He has parted with freedom to dream of domestic life, a life in which he has pledged himself to service in the great citizenship of the world. Perhaps you are going to make your son a surgeon; you send him to his long training, in which his eye is skilled to perceive the symptom and meaning of every disease, to keep his nerve steady. The very moment the seven years of training are past, what is it that is springing up in his soul? The consciousness of power. But what does that lead him to? The necessity of service. Trained, we must use our powers. Make a man free in his whole nature, and you will make him thirst to lay down those powers for the service of his fellow men. Christ was free, but look at that life of our Lord: precisely because it was free, the whole of it was consecrated to service-so much so that to Him the only idea of human existence was this, that the powers of it should be used in the service of men. “ I am among you as one that doth serve.” III. The connection between these two principles is the important thing. It is not simply that we are to live a life of service, nor that we are to seek to be free men. It is because we do not see that there is an indissoluble connection between the two that we sometimes blunder in many of the matters submitted to us. It is the free man who can yield the true service. That is what we want to get hold of. It is not that we want to make men serve one another by compulsion. That would be of no value at all. You do not want the enforced service of your wife or child. What you ask is free service. You speak of a man’ s freedom because all his actions are free; he is a free man in the use of his powers. You speak also of the charm and the graciousness wherewith a thing is done. The meaning of it is that it is the homage of a free man. There is a difference between the attitude of the slave and the splendid homage of a free man. Make men conscious of their freedom, let them feel that what they do is the free homage of the free men, and you will have from them what is worth more than all the tyranny of law. (Bp. Boyd Carpenter.) False notions of liberty in religion and government destructive of both I. State the true notion of Christian liberty.1. A. freedom from the power and dominion of sin and the devil, and the curse of the moral law. 2. A freedom from the ritual ceremonies of the Mosaic law and the spirit of bondage to fear, abrogated by our Saviour. 3. A free use of all things that are in their nature indifferent; that is, things concerning which the law has made no determination; leaving us at our own choice, either to act or not to act. II. Instance some of the abuses of this liberty, wherein it may be so perverted as to be made a cloak of maliciousness.1. As to principles. It would be endless to recount all the blasphemies, heresies, and errors maintained under this specious pretence. 2. Secondly, to their practice. Which we shall find to be a true transcript of their principles. For such a freethinker, if he be consistent with himself, must be a free actor too. He is equally without guide or governor, owes as little allegiance to his prince, as faith to his God; he is a rebel against both; sets up his own will as the supreme measure of his actions, for which he is answerable to nobody but himself. III. Prove the absurdity, as well as wickedness, of such abuses of our liberty. Upon what bottom would these lawless men found their liberty? By what authority do they these things? Or who gave them this authority? Whence was it? From heaven or of men? They own the authority of neither. But they still insist, it is their natural right, as free-born men; whereby none is subject any further than compact and content obliges him. What do they mean by this so much talked of natural right? Is it essentially, and independently inherent in themselves, or communicated by another? If they say the former, can anything belonging to a dependent being be itself independent? If the latter, who is that other who so communicated this right? Who can communicate a natural right, but the author of nature? To speak strictly, no being has any natural right but God; who by virtue of creation has a natural essential right to the obedience of His creatures. But those creatures themselves have naturally no right to anything, unless it can be proved that they had a natural right to be created. IV. The happy consequences of true liberty, and the misery and slavery of the mistaken notions about it. Having shown the absurdity and wickedness of this false principle in itself, as utterly inconsistent with reason and religion, gospel and law, the contrary position must be irrefragably true, and entirely agreeable to the laws of God and man; and there needs not much argument to prove that the effects must resemble the causes, and that happiness and prosperity, peace, and freedom must be the natural product of subjection to certain laws; and shame and misery, confusion and slavery, of their immunity from all. (H. Sacheverell, D. D.) On freedom of thought 1. The great purpose for which the powers and the liberty of thought were bestowed was for the discovery of truth; for the discovery of those speculative truths which conduct us to the love of God, and of those practical truths which enable us to be the ministers of good to man. When, therefore, freedom of thought is employed as means to these its destined ends, it is a virtuous principle, and he who feels it is acting from some of the most respectable motives of his nature. He is acting, in the first place, in conformity to the laws of his constitution, and has the secret voice of conscience applauding him amid every difficulty of his progress. He is acting, in the second place, with the dignity that belongs to the character of man; and, while the world around him is swayed either by the prejudices of antiquity, or by the idler prejudices of novelty, he stands as the superior to all the prejudices which influence lower minds. 2. When freedom of thought is employed as an end in itself, it is a principle which arises from very different causes, and is productive of very different effects. There is naturally much admiration due to that strength and independence of mind which can detect error, or which can discover truth; and there is accordingly, much sincere admiration paid to it. It is in this admiration that the danger and the snare consist. Because freedom of thought has been the great instrument of the discovery of truth, it is hastily concluded that all this is due to the freedom of thought itself rather than to the effects produced. If you feel that opinions are valuable in your estimation, not because they are free but because they are true, then go on, in the sight of God and of man, to the true honours of your moral and intellectual being. It is in this discipline you can acquire for yourselves permanent fame. But if in the employment of the powers of thought you look only to your own distinction, and care not for the ends for which they were given, pause, I beseech you, before you advance farther. (A. Alison.) Free will Liberty, freedom! The young heart bounds at the thought. It speaks of the unloosing of chains, the free roaming of the uncaged soul the full freedom of the will. Man was born, created to be free; full freedom is his original endowment, the condition of his nobility of soul, his distinction from the irrational creatures, the image of God in which he was created. As contrasted with necessity, it is as indestructible as in Almighty God who created it. What then is the freedom which the prophets foretold, which Jesus said that He would give the glorious liberty of the sons of God? Christ freed us from the yoke of sin by the freedom of righteousness: He freed us from the dominion of concupiscence by the freedom of the Spirit and the dominion of love and grace. “ Tell me,” says Socrates to a disciple, “ thinkest thou that freedom is a great and glorious possession alike to a man and a state?” “ Most exceedingly.” “ Whoso then is ruled by bodily pleasures and on account of them cannot do what is best, thinkest thou that he is free?” “ Not at all.” “ For to do what is best seemeth to them to be free; and so then, to have those who should hinder so doing to be unfree?” “ Certainly.” “ The incontinent seem then to you to be unfree?” “ Assuredly.” “ And they seem to you not only to be hindered from doing the best things, but to be constrained to do the foulest?” “ Both alike.” “ But what sort of masters deemest thou those to be, who hinder what is best, constrain to what is worst?” “ The worst.” “ And what slavery thinkest thou the worst?” “ That to the worst masters.” “ The incontinent then are enslaved to the worst slavery?” concludes Socrates. “ I think so.” You know how with one consent heathen philosophers said, “ The wise man alone is free.” “ He alone is indeed free,” says Philo, “ who taketh God alone for his commander.” “ The good man alone is free; for the evil man, though he deny it, is the slave of as many lords as he has vices.” “ Lust cometh, and saith, ‘ Thou art mine, for thou covetest the things of the body. In such or such a passion thou soldest thyself to me; I counted down the price for thee.’ Avarice cometh and saith, ‘ Thou art mine; the gold and the silver which thou hast is the price of thy slavery.’ Luxury cometh and saith, ‘ Thou art mine; amid the wine cups I purchased thee; amid the feasts I gained thee.’ Ambition cometh and said to thee, ‘ Thou art surely mine. Knowest thou not, that to that end I gave thee command over others, that thou thyself mightest serve me? Knowest thou not, that to that end I bestowed power on thee, that I might bring thee under mine own?’ All vices come, and one by one they chant, ‘ Thou art mine.’ He whom so many claim, how vile a slave is he!” From this slavery Christ came to set us free. “ If the Son shall make you free, ye shall be free indeed.” But then are we not still under a law? and, if we are under a law, how have we that freedom which youth especially longs for? Is then lawlessness the only freedom? Men admire what is called “ the reign of law,” throughout the boundless realms of God’ s creation. So did they idolise the beauty of the conception, that they are jealous even of Almighty God Himself, and would not have Him, by any higher law of His love, suspend His usual modes of His operation, Law then is some thing beautiful. Even in human things, what in sights and sounds so thrills through us, as when many voices or minds through obedience to a law become as one? What are all these deeds of united heroism, when all lay “ with their back to the field and their feet to the foe,” or that inscription, “ To Lacedaemon tell, that here, obeying her behests, we fell,” but the wills of many, obeying, to the death, minds without them whose will they reverenced? And cannot Almighty God make us love a law, which is the transcript of His perfections, the law of love; a law which responds to the law of our better nature within; which brings our whole being into harmony with itself, with our fellow beings and with Him. (E. B. Pusey, D. D.) Liberty, its use and safeguards I. Liberty.1. Earliest references. No doubt the reference, in the first place, is to that liberty of the gospel which distinguished it from Judaism or the old Mosaic law. Then came the gospel, that more spiritual and manly dispensation, with its great rush of liberty. Law gave way to principle, pupilage to manhood, contracted interests to worldwide fellowship. But with that freedom came danger: the danger of excess, of self-assertion, of even licence. 2. But this early application and experience was no uncommon or exceptional one. It was an example and an illustration of a very common danger and a very common experience. The early Christians were tempted to excess, not because they had been Jews and had become Christians, but because they were men of like passions with the rest of mankind. (1) There is a great freedom open to man, but a freedom which does not belong to man completely nor at once. Within certain wide limits, man has a great area of freedom. Physically, socially, providentially, man cannot do all he likes, but within a wide area he has a liberty so great that few of us in our daily life are ever brought up sharply by obstacles and reminded that we are hedged about by hindrances. It is only when we attempt the impossible or the extraordinary. (2) Now, this liberty, great as it is, is not attainable at once; we enter upon it gradually, often slowly. There is childhood turning to manhood, the wider area of liberty becomes at the man’ s disposal; but this is reached only after the lapse of the years of childhood, and boyhood, and youth. Or again, look at what is called success in life, when the man becomes more and more his own master, and the resources of life become more and more his; but this, too, is gained in the vast majority of cases, after years of toil. Or, once more, take political freedom. But here, too, liberty is gained not so much at once or by leaps and bounds. (3) Thus we have seen that a great freedom is open to man, and that this freedom is not attainable at once, but rather gradually. The question now presents itself as to the extent of that liberty. As regards the individual. He has liberty, even when he treads upon forbidden ground. It is true that sooner or later the violated law will vindicate itself. Nevertheless, he is free to violate these laws. So with regard to the rights and interests of others. Beyond a certain point, his fellow men will step in and restrain his liberty of action, and by pains and penalties contract his freedom. But up to this point the individual has a wide field for the exercise of even his selfishness. Once more, with regard to God. It is true man cannot thwart the great sweep of God’ s providence. Yet, right or wrong, good or evil, wisdom or folly: these he can choose. And the great patience of God in allowing man to disregard Him is one of the great solemn facts of life. Man’ s liberty is great, and the wonder is not at man’ s lack of freedom; it is rather the other way: how fully and to what an extent he can act as if he were his own master. 3. But with this liberty comes the temptation to misuse it, to abuse it, to make it an occasion of evil rather than of good; and this individually, socially, religiously. Individually, by giving rein to the passions, turning liberty into licence. Socially, by defying the opinions and claims of others. Religiously-or rather, irreligiously-by ignoring God and His claim to our obedience, setting up self as the one great object of worship. And so liberty becomes a cloak of maliciousness and an occasion of evil. II. The use and safeguard of liberty.1. The conditions of the problem are two fold. There must be respect for freedom and the recognition of liberty on the one hand; and on the other, reckless and malicious use of freedom must be counteracted. These are the two sides of the problem which must be kept in view. Extreme methods violate both these. On the one hand, if mere restraint be adopted, the result must be a reduction of liberty. If, on the other hand, the absence of all restraint be allowed, the result will be the destruction of all true freedom. 2. What, then, is to be done if liberty is to be preserved, and yet not abused? Three conditions must be fulfilled: (1) There must be respect for freedom, not the depreciation of it, if anything the enhancing of it. (2) But that freedom needs to be guided towards noble ends to become a great spontaneous power which of itself will influence the life aright, and direct it towards what is high, and generous, and good. This is the more necessary the more freedom is granted. Side by side with freedom, if it is not to be abused, must be developed the spirit of voluntary acquiescence in what is right and a conscientious desire for what is best. (3) The third condition is the sense of responsibility; that as each gift, power, opportunity has its corresponding responsibility, so has this freedom; that the greater the freedom, the greater will be the responsibility for its use. 3. Now, this is just what Christianity has done. At a critical period in human history, when the old order of tyranny and corruption was crumbling, and the ground was being prepared for the growth of liberty, Christianity came, implanting great principles, awakening the consciousness of wrong, and stirring up the love of what is right, and true, and good. Thus, as the old restraint of the law passed away, the new spirit of personal responsibility, that great spiritual force, came to men; and just because Christianity was this spiritual force, it could do what no other power did. It could do without the old Jewish economy, it could sap the foundations of tyranny, it could be the promoter of liberty. It is this action of Christianity which is illustrated in St. Peter’ s words. See how naturally, instinctively, and comprehensively he deals with the question of liberty. “ As free” -as if he said, “ You are free, you have been made free, you have a right to be free. The old bondage of the law is gone, gone forever, and the freedom which is yours has been brought to you by Christ. It is nothing less than a God-given possession.” But every possession has its accompanying responsibility; the free man is not the same as the irresponsible man, In fact, our responsibility increases with our powers, our possessions, our gifts, our opportunities. What, then, is the great principle and power which is to direct each one in the use of this liberty? It is the great sense that while you are free, you are yet not free. You are to act “ as the servants of God.” Liberty is recognised, but a service is presented as well; but one which is not enforced, it can be given or refused. But these two, liberty and service, are connected by a sense of responsibility: and that a responsibility which recognises the claims of God upon them. It is just that which imparts dignity, and power, and great gladness to duty, when it is thus seen in the light of the great and glorious service of God. For it is only as we use our liberty and all our powers in obedience to God that we can hope and accomplish much. While we stand, or try to stand, alone, while we reject God as the great end of our service, our powers are feeble, and our acts work little good, great evil, and weariness or dissatisfaction takes the heart out of our labour. But when we bring our liberty and all our powers into the service of God, all we have and all we are and all we do become connected with what is best, and, falling in with the great work of God, we become not only doubly free, but doubly useful and doubly strong. (A. Boyd Carpenter, M. A.) Christian freedom Liberty is the essence of Christianity. No one knows what it is to be quite “ free” till he is a real Christian.1. A converted man, by the fact, at once is “ free” from his past. It is “ cast into the depths of the sea.” It is gone “ away into a land not inhabited,” to be mentioned no more! That is “ liberty!” O how large, and how sweet. To know that the entail of the past is all cut off. Therefore the converted man is “ free,” too, from thousands of chains which bind other men. He is “ free” from death. To him death is only a liberator. All it can do is to unshackle his spirit from the thraldom of his body. The grave cannot hold him. Satan himself-the great captivator-is a captive. 2. He is in freedom from his present self. Sin does not rule in him any more; the world no longer fascinates, the flesh no longer drags him down. He has gone up far above those things. He walks his higher path, a path where the whole man can expand itself; a path worthy of his immortality, at large, satisfying, infinite! And beyond all this, that “ man in Christ” has now “ free” access to God. He can go up any moment, under any circumstances of life, and he can tell his Father. All this must go to make freedom. Who, then, is the “ free” man, but he whom the Lord makes free? (J. Vaughan, M. A.) Christian liberty There is not anything in the world more generally desired than liberty, nor scarce anything more generally abused. The apostles, therefore, especially St. Peter and St. Paul, the two chiefest planters of the Churches, endeavoured early to instruct believers in the true doctrine, and to direct them in the right use of their Christian liberty so often in their several epistles as fit occasion was offered thereunto. And we may further observe concerning these two apostles that St. Paul usually toucheth upon this argument of liberty as it is to be exercised in the case of scandal; but St. Peter oftener, as in the case of obedience. From which words I gather three observations, all concerning our Christian liberty, in that branch of it especially which respecteth human ordinances, and the use of the creatures and of all indifferent things. Either1. In the existence of it, as free. 2. In the exercise of it, “ and not using your liberty for a cloak of maliciousness.” 3. In the end of it, “ but as the servants of God.” The first observation: We must so submit ourselves to superior authority, as that we do not thereby impeach our Christian liberty, “ as free.” The second this: We must so maintain our liberty, as that we do not under that colour either commit any sin or omit any requisite office, either of charity or duty, “ and not using your liberty for a cloak of maliciousness.” The third this: In the whole exercise, both of the liberty we have in Christ and of the respect we owe unto men, we must evermore remember ourselves to be, and accordingly behave ourselves as those that are God’ s servants, “ but as the servants of God.” The sum of the whole three points in brief this: We must be careful without either infringing or abusing our liberty at all times, and in all things to serve God. Now then to the several, points as they lie in the text. “ As free.” Which words have manifest reference to the exhortation delivered three verses before the text. Submit yourselves to public governors, both supreme and subordinate, be subject to your own particular masters, honour all men with those proper respects that belong to them in their several stations; but look you, do all this, not as slaves but as free, do it without impeachment of the liberty you have in Christ. First, this liberty is purchased for us by the blood of Christ, and is therefore usually Called by the name of Christian liberty (John 8:36; Galatians 5:1). Secondly, is revealed unto us outwardly in the preaching of the gospel of God and of Christ, which is therefore called the law of liberty (James 1:25; James 2:12). And thirdly, is conveyed unto us inwardly and effectually by the operation of the Spirit of God and of Christ, which is therefore called a free spirit (Psalms 51:12; 2 Corinthians 3:17). Now this liberty, so dearly purchased, so clearly revealed, so firmly conveyed, it is our duty to maintain (Galatians 5:1). A thing whereof it behoveth us to have a special care, and that for weighty respects. First, in regard of the trust reposed in us in this behalf. Every honest man taketh himself bound to discharge with faithfulness the trust reposed in him. Now these two, the Christian faith and the Christian liberty, are of all other the choicest jewels whereof the Lord Jesus Christ hath made His Church the depository. Especially since we cannot so do, secondly, without manifest wrong to Christ; nor, thirdly, without great dishonour to God. Not without wrong to Christ. St. Paul therefore disputeth it as upon a ground of right. “ Ye are bought with a price, be ye not the servants of men” (1 Corinthians 7:22). You cannot dispose yourselves in any other service without apparent wrong to Him. Neither only do we injure Christ by making ourselves the servants of men, but we dishonour God also, which is a third reason. For to whom we make ourselves servants him we make our Lord and God. The covetous worldling therefore, by serving mammon, maketh mammon his god. Yea, and our own too, which may stand for a fourth reason. “ Ye see your calling, brethren,” saith the apostle (1 Corinthians 1:26). He would have men take notice of their Christian calling, that so they might walk worthy of it. Now by our calling we are free men (Galatians 5:13). And being so, we infinitely abase ourselves and disparage our calling, when of free men we become slaves. Leo the Emperor, therefore, by special and severe constitution, forbade all free men within the empire sale of their liberties, calling it facinus in those that were so presumptuous as to buy them, and no less than folly, yea, madness in those that were so base as to sell them; not without some indignation at the former laws for suffering such an indignity to be so long practised without either chastisement or restraint. And if he justly censured them as men of abject minds, that would for any consideration in the world willingly forego their civil and Roman liberty, what flatness of spirit possesseth us if we wilfully betray our Christian and spiritual liberty? Whereby, besides the dishonour, we do also, with our own hands, pull upon our own heads a great deal of unnecessary cumber. For whereas we might draw an easy yoke, carry a light burden, observe commandments that are not grievous in the service of God and of Christ, by putting ourselves into the service of men we thrust our necks into a hard yoke of bondage. Besides these, that do it thus by open assault, I would there were not others also that did by secret underminings go about to deprive us of that liberty which we have in Christ Jesus, even then when they most pretend the maintenance of it. We oftentimes betray away our own liberty when we might maintain it, and so become servants unto men, when we both might and ought to keep ourselves free. Which fault we shall be the better able to avoid when we shall know the true causes, whence it springeth; which are evermore one of these two, an unsound head or an unsound heart. Sometimes we esteem too highly of others, so far as either to envassal our judgments to their opinions, or to enthral our consciences to their precepts, and that is our weakness; there the fault is in the head. Sometimes we apply ourselves to the wills of others, with an eye to our own benefit or satisfaction in some other carnal or worldly respect, and that is our fleshliness; there the fault is in the heart. This latter is the worst, and therefore in the first place to be avoided. The most and worse sort, unconscionable men, do often transgress this way. There is, I confess, much reverence to be given to the writings of the godly ancient fathers, more to the canons and decrees of general and provincial councils, and not a little to the judgment of learned, sober, and godly divines of later and present times. But we may not build our faith upon them as upon a sure foundation. What is Calvin or Luther, nay, what is Paul or Apollos, but ministers by whom ye believed? That is to say, instruments, but not lords of your belief. To do God and ourselves right, it is necessary we should with our utmost strength maintain the doctrine and power of that liberty wherewith Christ hath endowed His Church, without either usurping the mastery over others, or subjecting ourselves to their servitude, so as to surrender either our judgments or consciences to be wholly disposed according to the opinions or wills of men, though of never so excellent piety or parts. We must so maintain our liberty that we abuse it not, as we shall, if, under the pretence of Christian liberty, we either adventure the doing of some unlawful thing, or omit the performance of any requisite duty. “ As free, and not using your liberty for a cloak of maliciousness.” The apostle’ s intention in the whole clause will the better appear when we know what is meant by cloak and what by maliciousness. The Greek word ἐπικάλυμμα, which is nowhere else found in the whole New Testament but in this verse only, signifieth properly any covering, as the covering of badgers’ skins that was spread over the tabernacle is in the Septuagint’ s translation called ἐπικάλυμμα. And it is very fitly translated a cloak, in respect of that notion wherein the word in our English tongue is commonly used, to note some fair and colourable pretence, wherewith we conceal from the knowledge of others the dishonesty and faultiness of our intentions in some things practised by us. It is a corruption very common among us; whatsoever we are within, yet we desire to make a fair show outwardly. We are loth to forbear those sins which we are ashamed to profess, and therefore we colour them and cloak them that we may both do the thing we desire and- yet miss the shame we deserve. You see what the cloak is; see now what is maliciousness. Κακία is the word, which is properly rendered by malice or maliciousness. And as these English words, and the Latin word malicia whence these are borrowed, so likewise κακία in Greek is many times used to signify one special kind of sin, which is directly opposite to brotherly love and charity, and the word is usually so taken, wheresoever it is either set in opposition to such charity or else ranked with other special sins of the same kind, such as are anger, envy, hatred, and the like. And if we should so understand it here, the sense were good; for it is a very common thing in the world to offend against brotherly charity under the colour of Christian liberty, and doubtless our apostle here intendeth the remedy of that abuse also. Yet I rather conceive that the word maliciousness in this place is to be taken in a larger comprehension for all manner of evil and of naughtiness. To use liberty for an occasion to the flesh, and to use liberty for a cloak of maliciousness is the very same thing, and it is a very great sin. For the proof whereof I shall need to use no other arguments than the words of the text will afford. First, every act of maliciousness is a sin; and, secondly, to cloak it with a fair pretence, maketh it a greater sin; but then, thirdly, to use Christian liberty for the cloak giveth a farther addition to it and maketh it a greater sin. First, it is a sin to do any act of maliciousness. Nor so only, but it is a hurtful thing, and of a noxious and malignant quality, as leaven souring the whole lump of our services to God. But if men will need be hypocrites, and must have a cloak for their maliciousness, they might yet at least bethink themselves of somewhat else of lighter price to make a cloak of, and not to use to so base a purpose so rich a stuff, as is this blessed liberty which the Son of God hath purchased with His most precious blood. As in nature, so in morality, by how much better anything is in the right use of it, by so much is it worse in the abuse. Now we see how great a sin it is thus to abuse our liberty it will be needful in the next place to inquire more particularly wherein this abuse consisteth, that so we may be the better able to avoid it. We are therefore to know that Christian liberty may be abused for a cloak of maliciousness these four ways following: First, we may make it a cloak of maliciousness if we hold ourselves by virtue thereof discharged from our obedience, either to the whole moral law of God or to any part of it. Great offenders this way are the libertines, who quite cancel the whole law of God under the pretence of Christian liberty, as if they that were in Christ were no longer tied to yield obedience to the moral law, which is a pestilent error and of very dangerous consequence. The law considered as a rule can no more be abolished or changed than can the nature of good and evil be abolished or changed. It is our singular comfort then, and the happiest fruit of our Christian liberty, that we are freed by Christ, and through faith in Him from the covenant and curse of the law; but we must know that it is our duty, notwithstanding the liberty that we have in Christ, to frame our lives and conversations according to the rule of the law. The second way whereby our liberty may be used for a cloak of maliciousness is when we stretch it in the use of things that are indeed indifferent beyond the just bounds of sobriety. It belongeth to every sober Christian advisedly to consider, not only what in itself may lawfully be done or left undone, but also what in godly wisdom and discretion is fittest for him to do, or not to do, upon all occasions, as the exigence of present circumstances shall require. He that without such due consideration will do all he may do at all times, under colour of Christian liberty, he shall undoubtedly sometime use his liberty for a cloak of maliciousness. It may be done a third way, and that is by using it uncharitably, which is the case whereon I told you St. Paul beateth so often. When we use our liberty so as to stumble the weak consciences of our brethren thereby. He that will have his own way in everything he hath a liberty unto, whosoever shall take offence at it maketh his liberty but a cloak of maliciousness by using it uncharitably. The fourth and last way, whereby we may use our liberty for a cloak of maliciousness is by using it undutifully, pretending it unto our disobedience to lawful authority. And so I pass to my last observation. The observation was this: In the whole exercise both of the liberty we have in Christ and of those respects we owe unto men, we must evermore remember ourselves to be, and accordingly behave ourselves as those that are God’ s servants; in these last words, “ But as the servants of God,” containing our condition and our carriage. For the first, We cannot imagine any consideration, that may be found in any service in the world, to render it desirable, which is not to be found, and that in a far more eminent degree, in this service of God. If justice may provoke us, or necessity enforce us, or easiness hearten us, or honour allure us, or profit draw us to any service, behold here they all concur. First, It is the most just service, whether we look at the title of right on His part or reasons of equity on ours. It is, secondly, the most necessary service. Necessary, first, because we are born to serve. We have not the liberty to choose whether we will serve or no; all the liberty we have is to choose our master. It is necessary, secondly, for our safety and security, lest, if we withdraw our service from him, we perish justly in our rebellion. It is necessary, thirdly, by our own voluntary act, when we bound ourselves by solemn vow and promise in the face of the open congregation at our baptism. It is, thirdly (which at the first hearing may seem a paradox, yet will appear upon further consideration to be a most certain truth), of all other the most easy service, in regard both of the certainty of the employment and of the help we have towards the performance of it. He that serveth many masters, or even but one, if he be a fickle man, he never knoweth the end of his work. It is some ease to know certainly what we must do; but much more to be assured of sufficient help for the doing of it. It is, fourthly, the most honourable service. He goeth for the better man that serveth the better master. It is, fifthly and lastly, the most profitable service. We are indeed unprofitable servants to Him, but sure we have a very profitable service under Him. These things among others the servant of God may certainly reckon upon as the certain benefits of his service wherein his Master will not fail him if he fail not in his service-protection, maintenance, reward. And he that will be God’ s servant in truth, and not only in title, must perform all these to his heavenly Master. Reverence is the first, which ever ariseth from a deliberate apprehension of some worthiness in another more than in a man’ s self, and is ever accompanied with a fear to offend and a care to please the person reverenced; and so it hath three branches, whereof the first is humility. From which fear of offending a care and desire of pleasing cannot be severed. Obedience is the next general duty. Servants be obedient to your masters. We are to show our obedience to our heavenly Master yet further by submitting to His wholesome discipline when at any time He shall see cause to give us correction. The third and last general duty is fidelity. “ Who is a faithful and wise servant?” “ Well done, thou good and faithful servant,” as if the wisdom and goodness of a servant consisted in his faithfulness. The first whereof is heartiness in His service. There are many servants in the world that will work hard and bustle at it lustily for a fit and so long as their master’ s eye is upon them, but when his back is turned can be content to go on fair and softly and fellow like. This entry is longer than a Bible module can hold. The rest is at https://www.sermonindex.net/commentary/bi/ 1 Peter 2:17 Honour all men.Various political duties I. Personal courtesy. It is our duty to make manners a part of religion.1. Respect.2. Consideration. Put yourself in others’ ways and plans and difficulties.3. Kindness. II. Affectionate brotherhood. It is only reasonable we should “ love the brotherhood,” for we are-1. Sharers of the same discipline.2. Heirs of the same blessings.3. Travellers along the same road. III. Dutiful worshippers. “ Fear God.” IV. Sanctified loyalty. “ Honour the King.”1. Independently of the ruler’ s character.2. Independently of personal distinction. (1) Loyalty is the essential of national well-being.(2) Loyalty is the secret of national happiness.(3) Loyalty is the principle of national prosperity. (J. J. S. Bird, B. A.) Honour all men First, the duty, what it is, and then how that duty is either extended or limited in regard of the object. The duties are honour and love. The first, by opening the duty, and what we are to do. The next, by inquiring into the obligation, and why we are so to do. The last, by examining our performance, and whether we do therein as we ought to do or no. And first of the former precept, Honour all men. Honour, properly, is an acknowledgment or testification of some excellency in the person honoured, by some reverence or observance answerable thereunto. Thus we honour God above all as being transcendently excellent, and thus we honour our parents, our princes, our betters, or superiors in any kind. The word honour in this place imports all that esteem or regard, be it more or less, which is due to any man in respect of his place, person, or condition, according to the eminency, merit, or exigency of any of them respectively, together with the willing performance of such just and charitable offices upon all emergent occasions as in proportion to any of the said respects can be reasonably expected. In which sense it is a possible thing for us to honour, not only our superiors that are over us or above us, but our equals too that are in the same rank with us, yea, even our inferiors also that are below us or under us. And in this latitude you shall find the word honour sometimes used in the Scriptures, though not so frequently as in the proper signification. You have one example of it in the seventh verse of the next chapter, where St. Peter enjoineth husbands to give honour to the wife as to the weaker vessel. It was far from his meaning doubtless that the husband should honour the wife with the honour properly so called, that of reverence or subjection, for that were to invert the right order of things and to pervert God’ s ordinance. In like manner we are to understand the word honour here in the text, in such a notion as may include all those fitting respects which are to be given to equals and inferiors also, which is a kind of honour too but more improperly so called. And then it falleth in, all one with that of St. Paul (Romans 13:7). “ Render therefore to all their dues, tribute to whom tribute is due, custom to whom custom, fear to whom fear, honour to whom honour.” Now we see in the meaning of the words both what duty we are to perform and to whom. It may next be demanded upon what tie we stand thus bound to honour all men? I answer-there lieth a three-fold tie upon us, to wit, of justice, of equity, of religion. A tie of justice first, whose most proper office it is to give to every one that which of right appertaineth to him. It is a thing not unworthy the observing that all those words which usually signify honour in the three learned languages do either primarily signify or else are derived from such words as do withal signify either a price or a weight. Now by the rules of commutative justice the price of every commodity ought to be according to the true worth of it. A false weight is abominable, and so is every one that tradeth with it; and certainly that man maketh use of a false beam that setteth light by his brother whom he ought to honour. The next tie is that of equity. “ Whatsoever you would that men should do unto you, do ye even so to them, for this is the law and the prophets.” We care not how much honour cometh to ourselves from others, how little goeth from ourselves to others. Let every man therefore in God’ s name take to himself that portion of honour and respect that is due to him, and good luck may he have with his honour. Provided always that he be withal sure of these two things first, that he take no more than his due, for this is but just; and then, that he be as willing to give as to take, for that is but equal. He that doth otherwise is partial and unreasonable. And thus we are tied in equity to honour all men. There is yet a third tie, that of religion, in respect of that image of God, which is to be found in man. All honour is in regard of some excellency or other, and there is in man no excellency at all of and from himself, but all the excellency that is in him is such only as God hath been pleased to put upon him. And that excellency is two fold-natural and personal. The natural excellency is that whereby man excelleth other creatures. Personal that whereby one man excelleth another. Of the natural first which ariseth from the image of God stamped upon man in his creation. Besides this natural, God hath put upon man a personal excellency which is an effect of His Providence in the government of the world, as the former was of His power in the creation of it. And here first beginneth the difference that is between one man and another. We have seen hitherto both the duty and obligation of it. What are we to perform, and why? We come now to examine a little how it is performed among us. Slackly and untowardly enough no doubt as all other duties are. Are there not some first, who are so far from honouring all men as the text requireth that they honour no man at all, at least, not as they ought to do? No, not their known superiors? But how much less then their equals or inferiors? There are others, secondly, that may perhaps be persuaded to yield some honour to their betters (that may be but reason) but that they should be bound to honour those that are not so good men as themselves, or at the most but such like as themselves are they see no great reason for that. But there is no remedy; St. Peter here telleth them that must be done too. There is a third sort that corrupt a good text with an ill gloss as thus. The magistrate shall have his tribute, the minister his tithe, and so every other man his due honour, if so be he carry himself worthily and as he ought to do in his place, and so as to deserve it. In good time! But I pray you then, first, who must judge of his carriage and whether he deserve such honour, yea or no? But, secondly, how durst thou distinguish where the law distinguishes not? Where God commandeth He looketh to be answered with obedience, and dost thou think to come off with subtleties and distinctions? Least of all, thirdly, with such a gloss as the apostle hath already precluded by his own comment in the next verse, where he biddeth servants to be subject to their masters, not only to the good and gentle but to the froward also, and such as would be ready to buffet them when they had done no fault. Such masters sure could challenge no great honour from their servants. But tell me, fourthly, in good earnest, dost thou believe that another man’ s neglect of his duty can discharge thee from the obligation of thine? Lastly, when thou sayest thou wilt honour him according to his place if he deserve it, dost thou not observe that thou art still unjust by thy own confession? For where place and merit concur there is a double honour due (1 Timothy 5:17). There is one honour due to the place and another to merit. (Bp. Sanderson.) The honour of humanity It has been observed that more attention is commonly given to the specific than to the general precepts of Holy Scripture. Thus, in the verse there is a particular precept, to “ honour the king,” which has attracted more notice than the wider principle “ honour all men.” The reason is this: The vast field of action which opens before us, when contemplating a general precept, is so fatiguing to the imagination, that we are tempted to give up the task of considering it in something like despair. Nor is this the only reason for the practical disadvantages of general, as compared with specific precepts. As morality is too often taught, these general precepts are rested upon considerations too abstract to exert a real influence upon average men. A general precept, like that before us, must be based on an energetic conviction, in order to give it the needful vividness and force. Of this the precept before us is an eminent illustration. We only bring it down from the neglected region of moral proprieties, we only learn its living and working power, and give it a clothing of flesh arid blood, when we place it in the light of the great Christian doctrines of which it is the practical and animated expression. What is honour? It is, first of all, a sentiment which prompts us to acknowledge, and to do homage to, some form of truth. It must spring from a sense of merit of some kind in the object which provokes it; and, therefore, it must begin from within. Honour, then, in the first place, is a genuine movement of the soul; but, secondly, it is often a substantial expression of that movement in the outward visible world of sense. Whether it be embodied in a gesture, or in a title, or in a gift of money, it is at bottom an acknowledgment of superior worth, attaching, it may be, to an individual, or to an office, or to an institution. It is a practical expression of the sentiment of honour, quickened into activity by a worthy object. When, then, St. Peter says that we are to “ honour all men,” he means, no doubt, that if opportunity arises we are to give practical expression to the disposition to honour them. But he means, first of all, that this disposition should itself exist. And it is here that we reach the point at which the need is felt of basing the precept upon a conviction. Why should we thus be disposed to “ honour all men” ? It is clear that if man is left to himself, he is by no means disposed to “ honour all men.” Why is he bound to make head against this natural inclination? Is it in deference to a sense of self-interest? to a belief that courtesy is a cheap thing, which if it does not make friends, yet keeps clear of making enemies? No! The honour which the apostle prescribes is not an insincere conventionalism, but a true expression of inward respect. Are we then to honour all men in deference to the mere instinct of race? You say that, at least, in this case man should honour his brother man as a reproduction of himself. Does then one brute, nay, the most intelligent of the brutes, honour other brutes? There is nothing in a second animal, who is a mere reproduction of my animal self, which properly commands this tribute of honour; while there is much in him which might incline me to refuse it. But here comes a teacher who repeats the injunction under a new formula. Humanity is the god of Positivist thinkers; man is the highest being whom the consistent philosophy of experience can consent to recognise. Man in his collective capacity, the organism “ humanity,” is to be worshipped by each individual man. And from this new cultus, we are told, there is to flow forth a morality, which, in its spirits and its objects, shall be enthusiastically human; against which, as we are further assured, the inferior ethics of Christendom, weighted with the dogmatic teaching of the creeds, will struggle in vain for supremacy in the Europe of the future. But what is the real meaning of this cultus of humanity? Taking humanity as an actual whole, it is to worship that, in which the immoral decidedly preponderates over the moral, the false over the true, the bad over the good. I. What, then, are the motives which should lead a Christian to honour all men?1. The first is, that all men are made in the image of God. “ God created man in His own image, after His likeness.” This image and likeness consist in the fact that, first of all, man is an intelligent being, conscious of, and able steadily to reflect upon, his own existence; and, next, that his will is free. In each of these respects he is unlike any one of the lower creatures; in each he is like God. All men are endued with an immortal, conscious, self-determining principle of life. Or rather that principle is each man’ s true self, around which all else that belongs to him is clustered, and to which it stands in the relation of a property, or it may be of an accident. 2. Our Lord’ s death upon the Cross is a second reason for honouring all men. His death was indeed a true sacrifice offered to the justice and majesty of God, but it was also an act of homage and honour to the worth of the human spirit. It was to enlighten the conscience of man, it was to purify man’ s soul from the stains, and to free it from the burden of sin, it was to restore man to his true and native dignity among the firstborn of creation, that our Saviour died. 3. From these two motives a Christian will gather a third, which must lead him to honour all men, both in feeling and in act. I refer to the capacity of every man, be he who or what he may, while in this world, for improvement, for goodness. This generous faith in humanity is a creation of the gospel. The glory, the sinlessness, the ineffable majesty of the ascended Christ is the measure of the hopes of man. And from that throne of His in the highest heavens there descends upon the race which He has ennobled, and which He yearns to glorify and to save, an interest, a radiance in Christian eyes, an inheritance of a title to honour, which has made the precept of the apostle one of the main factors of the moral life of Christendom. II. But is the precept to be understood literally? Does “ all men” mean all members, all classes of the human family? Let me ask, in return, Why not? Let us look at some of the barriers which have been raised against man’ s universal right to honour by the prejudices of man.1. There is, first of all, and, morally speaking, lowest of all, the barrier of wealth. Wealth honours wealth; income pays respect to income; but it is wont to cherish, in its secret heart, an unmeasured contempt for poverty. To believe that a man with £60 a year is just as much deserving of respect as a man with £6,000, you must be seriously a Christian. 2. A second barrier is the spirit of station or of class, founded whether upon success in life, or upon the circumstances of birth. That an aristocracy has, in God’ s providential government of society, distinct and great functions to perform, is a position which is not for one moment to be denied; since the experience of history seems to show that society creates a higher class by a natural process, and we in England know how largely such a class may, if it will, serve its country. But when it develops an exclusive spirit, which divides humanity into two sections, those within and those without the imaginary barrier, it comes into collision with the teaching of the gospel. The Divine image, expressed in man’ s intelligence and freedom; the atoning blood, giving the measure of man’ s preciousness in the eyes of God; the glorified manhood of Jesus, revealing to man his capacity for glory;-these are the privileges of no class or station; they are the right and the possession of humanity. 3. A third barrier is that of race or country. Patriotism, no doubt, has its providential purpose; and the instinct of race is but an expansion of the instinct of the family. Both are based upon a natural foundation and have a Divine sanction; but in their exaggeration both may foster sentiments which are crimes against humanity. When we hear of the African savage who a few months since floated his canoe in a lake of human blood, that he might fitly observe his father’ s obsequies, we may for a moment look hard at the precept to honour all men. Yet, all crime being, in the eyes of absolute justice, strictly relative to opportunities, it may well be that this pagan prince stands higher before heaven than do you or I, when we lose our tempers in conversation, or say our prayers without thinking of the solemn work in which we are engaged. 4. The absence of intelligence is often held to constitute a fourth barrier against this honour of man as man. To make intelligence, in the sense of cultivated intellect, the real test of a claim to honour, would secure such honour to Voltaire, and (may we not add?) to Satan, while denying it to the apostles of Christ. To make intelligence, in the sense of the common faculty which is capable of reflecting on self and of knowing God, the ground of that claim, is to own that a debt of honour is due to the whole human family. The precept before us, however, is not adverse to our recognising the specific titles to honour which individuals or classes may possess. It only insists upon a broader basis of such right to honour than that which any of these titles suggest. It is entirely in harmony with the honourable recognition of moral worth, because moral worth enriches and intensifies what is best in humanity, namely, the freedom and power of man’ s will. It does not force us to condone either the wilful propagation of error or the guilt of crime. It does not imply indifference to the interests either of truth or virtue. III. The practical bearings of this suggestive precept are so numerous that it will be necessary to confine ourselves to the following, by way of conclusion.1. “ Honour all men” is a fitting motto for the spirit of much of our study. 2. Here is the Christian rule for social intercourse. Honour high station, honour authority, honour genius, honour courage, honour even success, if you will; but do not limit your honour to these things. If you honour the representative men of humanity, those who embody and intensify its great qualities or interests, do not forget that that which you honour in them is shared in a measure by all. 3. Lastly, in this precept we may discover the true spirit of Christian works of mercy. All the plans which Christian charity really devises and sets on foot are based on the principle of respect for man. Christian charity relieves poverty, not as conferring a favour, but as satisfying what is in some sense a right-the right of humanity to live, and to ask in God’ s name at the hands of property the means of livelihood. (Canon Liddon.) The honour due to all men There is no need of argument to prove the kindliness of Christianity, compared with every other system of belief. Its regard for life and its sympathy with human weakness may be seen upon the surface of every Christian land. To this we owe our hospitals and refuges, and all the multitude of charitable institutions which mitigate human suffering. But it is by no means sufficient merely to notice this as a fact. It is of great moment that we search into the principle from which it springs, and that principle is shortly but forcibly brought out in the precept of St. Peter-“ Honour all men.” Now it is important that we should see why this precept was confined to Christianity. It was so, first, because its teaching made it for the first time possible, truly, and with reason, to fulfil it. Before this, dark shades rested upon the nature of man. Different qualities of man might be honoured, but right reason could scarcely honour man-poor, fallen, wretched, debased man. So it was of old. But so it was not after Christ our Lord had come upon the earth. His incarnation has dispelled this darkness. For it clearly showed that the sin which dwelt in man and mocked him, by pretending to be a part of himself, was no true part of himself. For in that very humanity, the Son of God had tabernacled without spot of sin. But besides this Christianity alone made all men brothers. Its blessed communion makes all equal, not by putting down the distinctions of earth, confounding the ranks of society, but by raising the manhood in each of us to its true worthiness, by teaching the master to treat the servant “ not now as a servant” but “ above a servant,” as a “ brother beloved” ; by showing all that as “ partakers of the benefit,” as members of Christ, they have a unity which the petty distinctions of earth cannot dissever; a true dignity, which its seeming degradations cannot obscure. See, then, how great a part of Christianity is contained in this precept. How growth in its spirit is a necessary and certain accompaniment of growth in true, living, practical religion, as it stands opposed to the sickliness of sentimentality. But to see this still more clearly, look at the example of our Master, Christ; see in Him the perfection of this grace. How did He look at man? Who ever saw so far into all the feebleness, uncertainty, and wickedness of those who came around Him, as He did whilst He walked up and down this crowded wilderness? Who ever read the hidden evil of men’ s hearts as He did? Yet, how did He look upon all? Was there one over whom, as being a man, He did not yearn; was there one sharer of humanity whom, as man, He did not honour-one lost one whom He did not “ seek,” and was not ready “ to save” ? And this was the secret of His deep tenderness towards sinners, His unwearied forbearance-His most compassionate love, His sympathy with every; one of the fallen but redeemed race. And we, if we would have these graces in our measure, must seek for their spring head-we must strive for this great power of “ honouring all men” -of seeing in all the true manhood; seeing in all the true value of life; earnestly believing that in all is that which Christ our Master took unto Himself, and in taking to Himself sanctified and purified and made capable of a true and real worthiness. And if we would make any progress in this high grace, we must not hide from ourselves the difficulties which will surely beset its exercise. For these are many and great and will be too much for us, if without counting the cost, we endeavour to encounter them. First, there is selfishness, that deep root of inner corruption which is the absolute antagonist of such a spirit-for this, which leads every man to “ mind his own things,” to grasp at everything within his reach, to rate himself, his own plans, his own pleasures, first, must of necessity rob him of the power of “ honouring others.” But besides selfishness, there is the whole current of worldly society to be withstood. In spite of the great healing which the gospel of Christ has wrought, its waters are still bitter and turbulent, and they flow for the most part right against the stream of heavenly things.1. Then let me say, if you would “ honour all men,” begin by truly honouring yourselves. A true Christian honour of ourselves leads us to feel most deeply the taint and degradation of the sin which dwells in us, which is so unworthy of our redeemed station. Instead of feeling self-sufficient, we see that only in Christ, only as one of the ransomed family, as dwelt in by Him, as justified through Him, can we have hope. And thus we join ourselves to our brethren in Christ; we and they are one in hope, only we know more of our own loss and misery than we can know of theirs: and therefore we are lowly, and honour them in Christ, their God and ours. So also does a Christian honour of ourselves oppose itself to vanity. How to such an one can the ignorant applause of his fellows be anything but a mockery? Again, his reverence for the redeemed manhood in himself makes him fear lest sensuality should cloud it; lest it should be turned into the heaviest curse by separation from Christ. This makes him most tender of the welfare of the souls of others-he yearns over them; he would “ eat no meat while the world lasteth,” rather than make “ a brother to offend.” 2. And as honouring ourselves is the first rule that I would give, so the second is-seek to practise yourselves in honouring others. God has so formed us that our spiritual and moral cure is to be wrought by the blessing of His grace upon our practical efforts. We must gain tender, sympathetic hearts, hearts which indeed honour our brethren, not by cultivating abstract sensibilities, but by practising kindly actions. (Bp. S. Wilberforce.) Honour all men “ Honour all men Honour the king.” It is the same word in both cases. Honour is the thing due to king and to man. But in the Greek the tense is different; honour all men as various occasions arise for it; but in the other three cases the object and the occasion are known; give present love and fear and honour to a visible brotherhood, and a present God, and a known ruler. It is as though the apostle prefaced the special precepts with this more general one. Honour all men everywhere; nothing is to annul this, the charter of the whole redeemed race; but specially love the Christian brotherhood, and fear the God so visibly present among them, and honour the appointed king.1. Man is honourable among the creatures of God for his knowledge and power of thought. By the light of God that is in him, man sees God in the world of matter and life. The finger point of the most wise Artificer is upon every part. 2. But that which is at once the glory and the shame of man, is his power to choose, his will. 3. And this power of action is also a power of obedience to the law of God. 4. And, lastly, man is immortal. “ God is not the God of the dead but of the living.” We are immortal, for the hope of a future life, awakened and fostered by our Lord, cannot be meant to end in a delusion. Honour all men, then; honour those to whom God has given the discerning soul, and the deciding will, and the guiding conscience, and the inheritance of eternal life. (Abp. Thomson.) Honour all This was one of the rules which St. Peter gave to the Christians of his day. They were placed in the midst of Jews and heathens, On every side there were enemies, slanderers, persecutors; they were surrounded by foolish men living in fleshly lusts, froward and hard tempered-and yet with all this they were to honour all men. These were not excluded. It is a common thing for men to say that the rich and the clever despise the poor, ignorant, hard-working classes below them. Often that way of speaking is false. There are many exceptions to it. But often, we must confess with pain, it is true. Younger men among those classes have their favourite words of contempt by which they try to set themselves up above others, and to mark off those who are as much heirs of God’ s kingdom as they are themselves, as people to be laughed at or insulted. And so they do not honour all men. And this want of the will to honour affects all relations of life. It disturbs the peace and happiness of families. No position of life affords greater opportunities for exercising kindness than that of the master or mistress of servants-the employer of workmen. And yet everywhere we find the duties of that position neglected. Men do not “ honour” those who are thus placed, by the providence of God, in dependence on them. Do not think that this commandment is easier for one class of men to perform than for others. Those who look up to most other men as being above them in rank and riches, are just as faulty in this matter as the haughtiest and highest. Many of you must feel in your heart of hearts that all the time when you have seemed outwardly most respectful, there has been no reality, no truthfulness in it. You have honoured not the man, but his money, or his station, or his opinions, or you have hoped to gain some thing from him, or you have been afraid of his displeasure. And that want of true honour which we note in these instances is seen yet more in the acts and the speech of poor men, too often even towards each other. Go into the streets and courts of any of our great cities; listen to the disputes which are to be met with at every corner, and what strikes one most is the abuse and scorn which men of the same class, who are fellow workers often, and have a common interest, pour out upon each other. They show no respect, no consideration, no “ honour.” One step further we must go to reach the worst form of the evil. In all ranks of society you will find men who ought to know better, who pride themselves on reading their Bibles, and keeping out of the sins of their neighbours, and caring for their own souls. They, we might think, will surely “ honour all men,” and that not with a false show of honour, but in earnest. A man’ s knowledge of the Bible may serve not to make him truer, better, severer in judging himself, but to give him greater cleverness in picking out texts against his neighbours. He loves to think of himself as chosen, saved from hell, and sometimes seems almost as if he liked to think also of other men as going the wrong way, so that he sees them led captive by the devil without any effort to save them, without doing anything to gain their affection and respect. I do not say that this evil is universal. Can you not imagine what a man would be in whose soul the words, “ honour all men-all without exception-the youngest, the poorest, the most sinning,” had been traced as with the finger of God, never to be blotted out? Would there not be in such a man an unequalled courtesy, a gentleness and yet openness of speech which would win all men’ s confidence? I can think of such an one in any station of life, as a man himself to be loved, trusted, honoured, Read St. Paul’ s Epistles, take that single letter even, which he wrote to Philemon, and tell me if you do not find there precisely such a character as that which I have tried to describe. See how he behaves to governors and kings and centurions, and captains of ships and gaolers and peasants, and everywhere you find the same freedom from all violence and selfishness and rudeness. And this, doubtless, was the secret of the wonderful power which he had over the hearts of other men, winning their respect even in spite of them, gaining affection and love from the roughest hearts which seemed at first dead to all such feelings. But there is a higher example in this matter, even than St. Paul’ s. Was there not in Jesus of Nazareth one Who was meek and lowly in heart, taking upon Himself the form of a servant that He might save all who were willing to come to Him? Here then, once for all, is an example of the width and depth of this commandment of God. And this which supplies the example furnishes also the motive. Do not think that St. Peter would have enforced the rule of honouring all men on those grounds on which we sometimes try to persuade our children or our dependents to be respectful. It was not because that was the way to lead a quiet life, to get on in the world: to gain the favour of the great, to avoid persecution and ill-will; but much rather because Christ had taught him to think of a Father in heaven, who was inviting all men to become His children; because he believed that Christ had come to redeem all men, to manifest Himself as their brother and their friend. How could he despise those whom the Lord had not despised? How could he refuse to honour one for whom Christ had not refused to suffer and to die? (Dean Plumptre.) No man to be despised No nobler tribute could be paid to a memory than that which was written of the martyred bishop, Pattison, by one of his simple converts in the Southern seas-“ He did not despise anyone, nor reject anyone with scorn, whether it were white man or black man; he thought of them all as one, and he loved them all alike.” (Canon Duckworth.) The respect due to human nature Among the many blessings of Christianity, I regard as not the least the new interest which it awakens in us towards everything human, the new importance which it gives to the soul, the new relation which it establishes between man and man. Christianity has as yet but begun its work of reformation. Under its influences a new order of society is advancing, surely though slowly; and this beneficient change it is to accomplish in no small measure by revealing to men their own nature, and teaching them to “ honour all” who partake it. The soul is to be regarded with a religious reverence hitherto unfelt. There is nothing of which men know so little as themselves. Men have as yet no just respect for themselves and of consequence no just respect for others. The true bond of society is thus wanting, and accordingly there is a great deficiency of Christian benevolence. It may be said that Christianity has done much to awaken benevolence, and that it has taught men to call one another brethren. Yes, to call one another so, but has it as yet given the true feeling of brotherhood? Do we feel that there is one Divine life in our own and in all souls? Here is a tie more sacred, more enduring, than all the ties of this earth. Is it felt, and do we in consequence truly honour one another? Sometimes, indeed, we see men giving profound respect to their fellow creatures; but to whom? To great men; to men distinguished by a broad line from the multitude. But this is not to “ honour all men,” and the homage paid to such is generally unfriendly to that Christian estimate of human beings for which I am now pleading. The great are honoured at the expense of their race. They absorb the world’ s admiration, and their less gifted fellow beings are thrown by their brightness into a deeper shade, and passed over with a colder contempt. To show the grounds on which the obligation to honour all men rests, I might take a minute survey of that human nature which is common to all, and set forth its claims to reverence. But leaving this wide range, I observe that there is one principle of the soul which makes all men essentially equal, which places all on a level as to means of happiness, which may place in the first rank of human beings those who are the most depressed in worldly condition. I refer to the sense of duty, to the power of discerning and doing right, to the inward monitor which speaks in the name of God, to the capacity of virtue or excellence. This is the great gift of God. We can conceive no greater. Through this the ignorant and the poor may become the greatest of the race; for the greatest is he who is most true to the principle of duty. The idea of right is the primary revelation of God to the human mind, and all outward revelations are founded on and addressed to it., He in whom the conviction of duty is unfolded, becomes subject from that moment to a law, which no power in the universe can abrogate. He forms a new and indissoluble connection with God, that of an accountable being. He begins to stand before an inward tribunal, on the decisions of which his whole happiness rests; lie hears a voice, which, if faithfully followed, will guide him to perfection, and in neglecting which he brings upon himself inevitable misery. We little understand the solemnity of the moral principle in every human mind. Did we understand it, we should look with a feeling of reverence on every being to whom it is given. I proceed to observe that, if we look next into Christianity, we shall find this duty enforced by new and still more solemn considerations. This whole religion is a testimony to the worth of man in the sight of God, to the importance of human nature, to the infinite purposes for which we were framed. Men viewed in the light of this religion are beings cared for by God, to whom He has given His Son, on whom He pours forth His Spirit and whom He has created for the highest good in the universe, for participation in His own perfections and happiness. I estimate political revolutions chiefly by their tendency to exalt men’ s conceptions of their nature, and to inspire them with respect for one another’ s claims. (W. E. Channing.) Honour all men Honour in a narrower sense is not universally due to all, but peculiar to some kinds of persons. Of this the apostle speaks (Romans 13:8). We owe not the same measure of esteem to all. We may, yea, we ought to take notice of the different outward quality or inward graces and gifts of men; nor is it a fault to perceive the shallowness and weakness of men with whom we converse, and to esteem more highly those on whom God hath conferred more of such things as are truly worthy of esteem. But unto the meanest we do owe some measure of esteem, first, negatively. We are not to entertain disdainful thoughts of any, how worthless and mean soever. We are also to observe and respect the smallest good that is in any. Although a Christian be never so base in his outward condition, in body or mind, yet they who know the worth of spiritual things, will esteem the grace of God that is in him, in the midst of all these disadvantages, as a pearl in a rough shell. The Jews would not willingly tread upon the smallest piece of paper in their way, but took it up, for possibly, said they, the name of God may be on it. The name of God may be written upon that soul thou treadest on. It may be a soul that Christ thought so much of, as to give His precious blood for it; therefore despise it not. Wheresoever thou findest the least trait of Christ’ s image, if thou lovest Him, thou wilt honour it. Or if there be nothing of this to be found in him thou lookest on, yet observe what common gift of any kind God hath bestowed on him, judgment, or memory, or faculty in his calling, or any such thing, for these in their degree are to be esteemed, and the person for them. Or imagine thou canst find nothing else in some men, yet honour thy own nature, esteem humanity in them, especially since humanity is exalted in Christ to be one with the Deity. Account of the individual as a man. The outward behaviour wherein we owe honour to all, is nothing but a conformity to this inward temper of mind; for he that inwardly despiseth none but esteemeth the good that is in the lowest, or at least esteemeth them in that they are men, will use no outward sign of disdain of any. He will not have a scornful eye nor a reproachful tongue to move at any, not the meanest of his servants, nor the worst of his enemies; but, on the contrary, will acknowledge the good that is in every man, and give unto all that outward respect that is convenient for them and that they are capable of, and will be ready to do them good as he hath opportunity and ability. (Abp. Leighton.) The duty of honouring all men All mankind are to be honoured-1. Because all men are the children of one Almighty Father, and were made originally in His glorious image.2. Because all men were made of one blood.3. Because all men are gifted with the same common immortality.4. Because all men have been redeemed by one common Saviour.5. Because all men are susceptible of the same spiritual and everlasting life. (H. Stowell, M. A.) The honour due to all men I. To different classes.1. Superiors. (1) In office.(2) In rank and station.(3) In talent and attainments. 2. Equals (Romans 12:10). 3. Inferiors. I remember to have heard a friend once say, after passing and noticing a poor man, “ When I meet a human being I always wish to consider that I meet a brother.” II. To different characters.1. The good. “ Go and do likewise.” You cannot honour a good man more than by treading in his steps. 2. The bad. (1) By sincere pity and kind concern.(2) By advice and counsel.(3) By your prayers.(4) By readiness to do them good. III. Different ages.1. Old age. The ancient Spartans were famous for the respect they paid to the aged; so that it was not unusual to say, “ It is a pleasure to grow old in Lace demon.” Let this pleasure be enjoyed by the aged among us. 2. The young are to be honoured by tender and faithful solicitude for their welfare; by a concern for the right formation of their characters, and the fixing of right principles in their minds. And if they are yet under authority, by affectionate care of them, their persons, their morals, their company, their habits, and especially their souls. IV. Different situations and circumstances.1. The afflicted. Bear one another’ s burdens. Mutual sympathy is mutual honour. 2. The prosperous. You will honour yourself, as well as your neighbour, when you rejoice in his prosperity, and feel your own happiness increased by witnessing his. 3. The perplexed. Feel for and assist them. 4. Relations and strangers, countrymen and foreigners, those who belong to our own party or denomination and those who belong to others, all have some claim upon us. More especially let us honour an upright conscience wherever it exists, although its conclusions may be different from our own. (Essex Remembrancer.) The value of man Both creation and redemption teem with evidences that God sets a high value on His creature man. All the relations and uses of minerals, plants, and animals have been arranged for man’ s benefit; for no other creature is capable of observing or turning them to account. But the grandest evidence of the value which God sets on man appears in the mission, ministry, and sacrifice of Christ. So high in heaven was the estimate of even ruined man, that when no other price could buy the captive back the Son of God gave Himself, the just for the unjust. Value highly immortal beings made in their Creator’ s likeness, and capable yet of living to His praise. We act according to our estimates. Estimate humanity aright in the habit of your hearts, and your conduct will fashion itself naturally accordant, as a river finds its way to the sea. Value the whole man, and not merely a part. In particular, and for obvious practical purposes, value his soul as well as his body, and his body as well as his soul. So did Christ; and therefore so should we. The body’ s sufferings did not occupy His attention to the neglect of the soul’ s sins; the soul’ s sins did not occupy His attention to the neglect of the body’ s sufferings. (W. Arnot.) Value all men There is no respect of persons with God, and there should be none with men. When you fail to value aright any man or class of men, you are fighting against God, and will certainly be hurt. Nothing is gained by a false estimate of the value of any man. The circles of Providence, like the celestial bodies, correct aberrations, and right themselves as they go round. Value the young. How precious these germs are! They will be the men and women of the generation when we become children again. Value the poor and ignorant. In that state Christ valued you, believer. He did not pass you because you were worthless. Value the rich. He is as precious as the poor, and will be as worthy, if he is redeemed, when he walks with his Redeemer in white. Value the vicious. Although they wallow in a deep mire today, they have fallen from a high estate, and may yet regain it. That poor staggering drunkard is worth more than worlds, if he were won. They who hope in Christ should not count any case hopeless. Value yourself. Do not hold yourself cheap, ye who may have Christ for your brother and heaven for your home. (W. Arnot.) Honour all men 1. As made in the image of God.2. As capable of heaven.3. As having some special talent to trade with. (J. Trapp.) The poor-two ways of treating Dr. Joseph Parker says there are two ways of accosting a poor man-one which tells him he is a man and another which only tells him he is poor.Dignity of man M. Boudon, an eminent surgeon, was one day sent for by the Cardinal du Bois, prime minister of France, to perform a very serious operation upon him. The cardinal, on seeing him enter the room, said to him, “ You must not expect to treat me in the same rough manner you treat your poor miserable wretches at your hospital of the Hotel Dieu.” “ My lord,” replied M. Boudon with great dignity, “ every one of those miserable wretches, as your Eminence is pleased to call them, is a prime minister in my eyes.” (J. Percy.) Respect for manhood It is said of Burns the poet, that walking along the streets of Edinburgh with a fashionable acquaintance, he saw a poorly dressed peasant, whom he rushed up to and greeted as a familiar friend. His companion expressed his surprise that he could lower himself by speaking to one in so rustic a garb. “ Fool!” said the poet, with flashing eye, “ it was not the dress, the peasant’ s bonnet and hodden gray, I spoke to, but the man within-the man who beneath that bonnet has a head, and beneath that hodden gray a heart better than a thousand such as yours.” (J. C. Lees, D. D.) Honour all At this time the great majority of human beings was neglected and despised by the wise and learned, as well as dishonoured and oppressed by the rich and powerful and governing classes. With feelings of reverence and awe the traveller gazes, not only on the crumbling shrine and hallowed dust of Iona, but on the ruins, accursed and hopeless though they be, of wicked Nineveh and proud Babylon. But here is a ruin in which God once dwelt, and in which He desires yet again, and eternally, to dwell. Surely it is not for those whom grace, and grace alone, has saved from a like degradation, to exult over the desolation, or even to pass it by with indifference. “ Honour all men” -if not for what they have made themselves, at least for what the Creator and Redeemer designed them to be. Honour that kindly thought of God toward them by striving, as best you may, for its realisation. And, when all your efforts seem to prove abortive, still honour it, and the objects of it, by your prayers and tears. (J. Lillie, D. D.) Love the brotherhood.-Love the brotherhood As the clouds which soar in the air are to the universal mass of waters, so are the brotherhood of God’ s renewed children to the whole human family. Of mankind these brothers are in origin and nature; but they have been drawn out and up from the rest by an unseen omnipotent law.1. Love to the brotherhood is an instinctive emotion. It is not an accident, but a nature. It springs in renewed hearts, as love of her offspring springs in a mother’ s breast. It is the result not of an artificial policy, but of a natural law. The new creature exercises instincts as well as the old. 2. The Lord Jesus was not satisfied with the measure of this affection which existed among His followers during His personal ministry. “ That they all may be one,” was His prayer; “ Love one another,” was His command. 3. Those who are destitute of this affection themselves are acute enough to observe the want or weakness of it in Christians. 4. Brotherly love among Christians, when it really exists, honours the Lord and propagates the gospel. It has convinced many who resisted harder arguments. 5. It is the most pleasant of all emotions to the person who exercises it. 6. Love of the brotherhood is the command of God, and, consequently, the duty of men; but another thing goes before it to prepare its way. Before you can love the brotherhood, you must be a brother. It is the new creature that experiences this hallowed affection. (W. Arnot.) The brethren and the brotherhood (with 1 Peter 1:22):-There is a great difference between loving “ the brethren” and loving “ the brotherhood.” “ The brotherhood” is the society of “ the brethren” -the Church. Each needs the other. “ The love of the brotherhood” divorced from “ the love of the brethren” will always lead to superstition, to an undue reverence for form and custom, to some sort of tyranny. “ The love of the brethren” separated from “ the love of the brotherhood” will always minister to foolish divisions, to confusion of faith, to ecclesiastical anarchy. St. Peter, who said “ Love the brotherhood,” said also “ Love as brethren.”1. We ought to love the brethren. Religion is for men. The mission of the Church is to help everybody who needs help. There is constant need of humanising the work of the Church, that is, of emphasising the supreme purpose for which the Church exists-to make the world better. 2. On the other hand, while we ought to love the brethren, we ought also to love the brotherhood. Christ Himself directs us to “ hear the Church.” The customs of the ancient society, the ways of the Church, ought not to be readily laid aside. The probability is that the brotherhood is wiser than any of the brethren. (Bp. Hodges.) Love the brotherhood Now of the obligation of this duty there are two main grounds-goodness and nearness.We must love the brotherhood for their goodness. All goodness is lovely. There groweth a love due to every creature of God from this, that every creature of God is good. Some goodness God has communicated to everything to which He gave a being: as a beam of that incomprehensible light, and a drop of that infinite ocean of goodness, which He Himself is. But a greater measure of love is due to man than to other creatures, by how much God hath made him better than them. And to every particular man that hath any special goodness in him there is a special love due. He that hath good natural parts, if he have little in him that is good besides, yet is to be loved even for those parts, because they are good. He that hath but good moralities only, leading a civil life, though without any probable evidences of grace appearing in him, is yet to be loved of us, if but for those moralities, because they also are good. But he that goeth higher, and by the goodness of his conversation showeth forth the graciousness of his heart, deserveth by so much a higher room in our affections than either of the former, by how much grace exceedeth in goodness both nature and morality. Since then there is a special goodness in the brethren in regard of that most holy faith which they possess, and that blessed name of Christ which is called upon them, we are therefore bound to love them with a special affection. The other ground of loving the brotherhood is their nearness. The nearer, the dearer, we say; and there are few relations nearer than that of brotherhood. But no brotherhood in the world is so closely and surely knit together, and with so many and strong ties, as the fraternity of Christians.1. We are brethren by propagation. Children of the one eternal God, the common Father of us all, and of the one Catholic Church, the common mother of us all. And we have all the same elder brother, Jesus Christ, the firstborn among many brethren. 2. We are brethren by education - foster brethren; as Herod and Manaen were. They that have been nursed and brought up together in their childhood for the most part have their affections so seasoned and settled then that they love one another the better while they live. 3. We are brethren by covenant, sworn brothers at our holy baptism, when we dedicated ourselves to God’ s service as His soldiers by sacred and solemn vow. Do we not see men that take the same oath pressed to serve in the same wars and under the same captains? 4. We are brethren by cohabitation. We are all of one house and family; not strangers and foreigners, but fellow citizens with the saints, and of the household of God. Lastly, we are brethren by partnership in our Father’ s estate. Co-partners in the state of grace; all of us enjoying the same promises, liberties, and privileges whereof we are already possessed in common; and co-heirs in the state of glory, all of us having the same joy, and everlasting bliss in expectancy and reversion. Having all these obligations upon us, and being tied together in one brotherhood by so many bands of unity and affection, I presume we cannot doubt but that it is our bounden duty thus to love the brotherhood. There remaineth now no more to be done but to look to our performances that they be right. Not but that we may make a difference between one brother and another in the measure and degree of our love, according to the different measures and degrees, either of their goodness considered in themselves or of their nearness in relation to us. (Bp. Sanderson.) Love the brotherhood No one will deny that these emphatic words express a great leading principle of the gospel. But in order to respond, in heart and conduct, to this teaching of St. Peter we must understand what the brotherhood is; we must know something of its institution; we must be assured of its continued existence; we must be instructed in the purposes which it has to fulfil, and in the powers and privileges with which it is endowed. On all these points the first Christians had a more perfect, because a more practical, knowledge than Christians in general have now. To them the brotherhood was not an abstract speculation, but a thing of life and reality. They were required to consider it, act towards it; and they did so. But now the case is different, In the present state of the Christian world the generality of Christians have no practical acquaintance with the brotherhood as such; at least they are not conscious of any. It is to them a thing invisible, inaudible, unapproachable; and so indeed they call it. They cannot therefore act towards the brotherhood as a whole, but only towards individuals. When they see a man leading a holy life, sound in the faith, they love him as a brother in the Lord. And they do well. But it is one thing to love a brother, or a number of brethren, as individuals, and another thing to love the brotherhood itself. And the difference is most important. For on the one hand, though we should love numberless individuals, on account of their personal graces, yet this would never lead us on to the love of the brotherhood as such; whereas if we begin by loving the brotherhood, then our love will manifest itself towards all those who belong to it. But we are to observe another vast difference, in a practical point of view. Consider the many good offices which Christians are encouraged to seek at each other’ s hands, and of which they stand so greatly in need in their present condition as strangers and pilgrims upon earth-exhortation, admonition, edification in the truth, guidance, governance, consolation, reproof, intercession, cooperation. All these most necessary offices would, if faithfully discharged, keep alive in us a constant sense of mutual dependence, and quicken mutual love. But how lamentably are they neglected. And why are they neglected? We think of each other not as members and representatives of our holy brotherhood, but as individuals. The feelings of love which would lead us to seek whatever help we severally require, are not indeed destroyed in us; but for the most part they now spring from nothing deeper than our own opinion (based on our own limited experience) of each other’ s character; and therefore one while they are powerless, bearing no fruit at all, and another while they are mischievous and their fruit unwholesome. What, then, is to become of those strong affections which are ever seeking some object whereon to rest in peace and security? He who knows our wants, has also abundantly provided for them. He has taught us not to place our hope of guidance and protection in this man or that, or in any number of men; but to seek a nobler alliance, and make a more exalted choice. It is not the might, nor the multitude, nor the wisdom, nor the talents, nor the piety of men, which He hath set before us as the best object of our present love and confidence; but it is communion with Himself our Heavenly Father, and with the holy angels, and with the spirits of the just made perfect, and with all good men on earth, by the Holy Ghost, in the mystical body of Christ. Here is an object worthy of our hearts, and able to satisfy their wants; here is the brotherhood which St. Peter bids us love-the great Christian brotherhood, the communion of saints, the Church of the living God. But this brotherhood being so high and holy a thing, how and where can it be seen on earth? The first Christians loved the brotherhood in its outward and visible parts-in its members, its ministers, its sacraments, its ordinance, and its laws; loved it, I say, and sought it, revered, believed, obeyed it, for the sake of the Awful Presence which they knew to be dwelling in it, and acting by and through it. In its weak, despised, and suffering appearance, they saw the marks of the Lord Jesus, the humiliation of His Cross; in its energy and holiness, its victories and conversions, they beheld the power of His resurrection. Him they beheld in all its ways and works; and therefore all its ways and works were precious in their sight. No wonder that they loved the brotherhood; for in its prayers, its sacraments, its ministry, they heard the prevailing intercession, the pardoning voice, the life-giving truth-they saw the dispensing hand, the protecting arm, the all-judging eye, the gracious yet most awful form of their ascended Saviour. In a word, they saw in it His chosen representative-the Apostolic Church, by which He completes on earth His three-fold office of Prophet, Priest, and King. So when those early believers came themselves to be admitted into this glorious brotherhood, though men were the instruments by whom the gate of baptism was opened to them, yet were they well assured that their election was of God. Well might they set themselves in earnest to follow their heavenly profession, knowing the grace to which they had been called, labouring to make their calling and election sure, trembling at the bare imagination of letting slip so great salvation. For truly they found themselves in the midst of heavenly sights and heavenly sounds, which many prophets and kings bad desired to see and hear, but had not seen or heard: they found themselves called to the enjoyment of those promises which the saints of old had seen afar off. Such was the Christian brotherhood to the first followers of Christ, when its members were few, its outward condition weak, despised, oppressed. Now it has gone forth into all lands, and gathered into itself many people, and it is oppressed no longer. Is it then to us the same inestimable treasure which it appeared to the first Christians? Alas! far otherwise. The world, in drawing near to it, has too often flung over it the shadow of its own bad principles and unrighteous practices, and thereby has partially obscured its brightness. Many even of its own children regard it rather as a useful instrument of man than as a great unsearchable mystery of God, But still, we humble trust, the presence of the Lord abideth in it. Still it has peace and plenteousness for those who will repose in it with calm believing hearts. Only let us have faith to use the light and strength which yet remains-and more may perhaps be given us. Only let us “ love the brotherhood” in the day of its humiliation, and show our love by eschewing those things that are contrary to our profession, and following all such things as are agreeable to the same; and then, unworthy as we are, we may even be allowed to contribute something, if it be but a prayer, towards the renewal of its life and vigour. (R. Ward, M. A.) Fear God. Fear God There are two principal species of fear, as we may readily perceive by consulting our own emotions-the fear of apprehension, and the fear of respect. The first has for its foundation that evil which he who is feared can inflict; the second arises from the high idea we have of him for whom we entertain this sentiment. The first is exercised towards a being who, we suppose, has the will and the power to hurt us; the second is felt when, apprehending nothing from his anger, we entertain esteem and veneration for him.1. Let us commence with the fear of respect. This is always felt by the true believer. Can he avoid feeling it, when he views on one hand the splendour of the perfections of God, and on the other his own littleness and baseness? 2. With respect to the fear of apprehension, which has as its foundation the evils which God can inflict on us, it is of two different kinds; we may fear to offend and displease God, and we may fear to be punished for it. When the former is the motive of this fear, it is called filial fear, because it is the sentiment of an affectionate child towards its parent. This fear has as its source love and gratitude. 3. With respect to the other kind of fear of apprehension, that which is founded only on the dread of future punishment, it is (considered absolutely and in itself) neither morally good nor evil. Not morally good, since we see it every day felt by the most wicked, and since the devils themselves tremble under it. Not morally evil, since it is a sentiment that reason would require; since God has used the threatenings of this punishment to deter men from sin. It becomes morally good only when united with filial fear. It is morally evil when accompanied with love of sin, with distrust, and despair. It then acquires the name of servile fear. (H. Kollock, D. D.) The fear of God 1. There is, first of all, a fear of God which to me appears to be a reproduction, measure, or colour of the national life, different as the nations differ. I believe it to be impossible to bring a Frenchman and a German, or a Scotchman and an Irishman, or any two men that reach back into a radical difference of race, to regard God in the same way. 2. But, in our own nation, where so many nativities centre, the idea of God and the consequent fear of God differ very greatly. The first and lowest form is a fear of God as a gaoler and executioner, who stands and waits until that sure detective, Death, shall hunt the criminal down and bring him into court. The pagan, on this plane of belief, is wiser than the Christian. He says boldly that the doer of this is the evil spirit, and so he tries to be on good terms with him. But wherever such a fear has a real place in the soul of man or woman, African, Indian, or Saxon, in that soul the love of God, or even a true fear of God, is utterly out of the question. It destroys every fair blossom of the soul; it leaves nothing to ripen, nothing beautiful even to live. 3. Then, to the eye of the resolute Christian thinker-who dares not, as Coleridge has said, “ love even Christianity better than the truth, lest he shall come to love his own sect better than Christianity, and at last himself better than all” -there is another form of the fear of God, not the best by far, but far better than this utterly slavish fear. I mean that in which God becomes the embodiment of pure bargain, exacting from us to the uttermost penny whatever is due. Here God appears with tie guards and sanctities of the law about Him, self-imposed and self-respected. The man need not contract the debt if it does not please him, but if he does contract it he must pay, or another must pay for him. Then the Son of the Great Creditor gives His own body to the knife, and bears the intolerable agony instead of the debtor. This entry is longer than a Bible module can hold. The rest is at https://www.sermonindex.net/commentary/bi/ 1 Peter 2:18-25 Servants, be subject to your masters.Submission enjoined The word here rendered servants means not slaves in the strict sense of the term, but domestic servants-hence the exhortation is the more applicable to our own age and country. I. Their duty.1. “ Servants, be subject to your masters in all fear.” Let not the service you render be constrained and forced, but ready and joyous, remembering that, however humble, it is ennobled by religion. 2. But to what extent are they to submit? Has God placed you under a master who is exacting and ungenerous? act worthily of your profession, and show that master that there is something real in religion. 3. A cogent reason is assigned. “ For this is thank-worthy” -literally grace-“ if a man for consciousness of God endure grief, suffering wrongfully.” II. The example of the Lord Jesus is set before us as the ground on which the submission should be practised. (Thornley Smith.) The duty of servants I. Their duty. Be subject. Keep your order and station under your masters, and that “ with fear” and inward reverence of mind and respect to them, for that is the very life of all obedience. Do faithfully to your utmost that which is entrusted to you and obey all their just commands, and suffer patiently even their unjust severities. But, on the other side, this does not justify nor excuse the unmerciful austerities of masters. It is still a perverseness in them, as the original word is here, and must have its own name, and shall have its proper reward from the sovereign Master and Lord of all the world. II. The due extent of this duty. “ To the froward.” It is a more deformed thing to have a distorted, crooked mind, or a froward spirit, than any crookedness of the body. How can he that hath servants under him expect their obedience when he cannot command his own passion, but is a slave to it? And unless much conscience of duty possess servants, more than is commonly to be found with them, it cannot but work a master into much disesteem with them when he is of a turbulent spirit, a troubler of his own house. The Christian servant, however, who falls into the hands of a froward master will not be beaten out of his station and duty of obedience by all the hard and wrongful usage he meets with, but will take that as an opportunity of exercising the more obedience and patience, and will be the more cheerfully patient because of his innocence, as the apostle here exhorts. All men desire glory, but they know neither what it is nor how it is to be sought. He is upon the only right bargain of this kind “ whose praise is not of men, but of God.” If men commend him not he accounts it no loss, nor any gain if they do, for he is bound for a country where that coin goes not, and whither he cannot carry it, and therefore he gathers it not. That which he seeks in all is that he may be approved and accepted of God, whose thanks are no less to the least of those he accepts than a crown of unfading glory. Not a poor servant that fears His name and is obedient and patient for His sake but shall be so rewarded. III. The principle of this obedience and patience. “ For conscience towards God.” This imports, first, the knowledge of God and of His will in some due measure, and then a conscientious respect unto Him and His will so known, taking it for the only rule in doing and suffering.1. This declares to us the freeness of the grace of God in regard to men’ s outward quality, that He doth often bestow the riches of His grace upon persons of mean condition. He hath all to choose from, and yet chooses where men would least imagine (Matthew 11:25; 1 Corinthians 1:27). 2. Grace finds a way to exert itself in every estate where it exists, and regulates the soul according to the particular duties of that estate. A skilful engraver makes you a statue indifferently of wood or stone or marble, as they are put into his hand; so grace forms a man to a Christian way of walking in any estate. There is way for him in the meanest condition to glorify God and to adorn the profession of religion; no estate so low as to be shut out from this; and a rightly informed and rightly affected conscience towards God shows a man that way and causes him to walk in it. 3. As a corrupt mind debaseth the best and most excellent callings and actions, so the lowest are raised above themselves and ennobled by a spiritual mind. An eagle may fly high and yet have its eye down upon some carrion on the earth; even so a man may be standing on the earth, and on some low part of it, and yet have his eye upon heaven and be contemplating it. “ For conscience.”1. In this there is, first, a reverential compliance with God’ s disposal, both in allotting to them that condition of life, and in particularly choosing their master for them, though possibly not the mildest and pleasantest, yet the fittest for their good. 2. In this there is, secondly, a religious and observant respect to the rule which God hath set men to walk by in that condition, so that their obedience depends not upon any external inducement, failing when that fails, but flows from an inward impression of the law of God upon the heart. 3. In this there is a tender care of the glory of God and the adornment of religion. 4. There is, lastly, the comfortable persuasion of God’ s approbation, as is expressed in the following verse, and the hope of that reward He hath promised. “ Knowing that of the Lord ye shall receive the inheritance, for ye serve the Lord Christ” (Colossians 3:24). (Abp. Leighton.) The conduct of servants I. Religion brought into the little things of life. It does not merely include duties unto kings, but duty towards lesser lords. We may learn from this-1. That religion applies to all classes and conditions of men. Each state of life has its own little kingdom, its own little world. 2. That nothing is too insignificant to be brought under the power of Divine direction. II. Principle superseding compulsion. In this verse the apostle establishes one of the most important principles of morality-that our obligations to relative duties are not to be gauged by the character of the person to whom they are performed.1. It is not utility that should regulate our conduct. The will of the world is to discard that which is not useful or profitable. 2. It is not comfort that is to direct our lives. 3. It is not force that is to drive. 4. It is neither the fear nor the love of man that moves. III. Obedience independent of circumstances. Masters, like kings, differ. Some are reasonable and kind, others are unreasonable and bitter. Is a servant only to serve them who are fair and kind? By no means. The reason is explained when we come to realise that the present is of very little moment to show who serve Christ. (J. J. S. Bird.) Suffering wrongfully.- Endurance of wrong It may be asked whether the advice of St. Peter to submit quietly to wrong does not destroy manliness and force of character if it is acted on? Does it not tend to create a race of effeminate, spiritless men? This question involves another. In what does moral strength consist? It is sometimes taken for granted that moral strength must catch the eye, must inflict itself on the imagination; that it must be something bustling, demonstrative, aggressive; that it must at least have colour, body, muscle, to recommend it. This is not the ease. Moral strength, in its very finest forms, may be the reverse of all this; when it makes no show, and is passive, it is often at its best. Many a man who can act with great courage in moments of great personal danger, in a struggle with a brigand, or in a burning house, cannot go through an illness as bravely and patiently as a little girl. The hardest thing often is to do nothing, to await the approach of danger or of death, and yet not to lose nerve and self-possession. No moral strength in the whole history of mankind ever equalled that which was displayed on Calvary, where all that awaited Him was present from the first to the mind of the Divine victim, “ who, when He was reviled, reviled not again; when He suffered He threatened not, but committed Himself to Him that judgeth righteously” (1 Peter 2:23). Nothing that has been said will be so greatly misconstrued as to be taken to imply that cruelty, tyranny, oppression, can be agreeable to the mind of God. He permits these things among men from time to time, just as He permits much else that is evil for His own wise ends. He brings good out of them, yet He condemns them. By and by He will punish them. Nowhere is it implied in the Bible that the systems involving the oppression of man by man have vested rights in the moral universe, or that the circumstances which permit it are even tolerable, unless they are perpetuated for very different purposes indeed. The days will come when Englishmen will look back to the abolition of the slave trade by the English Parliament as a greater title to glory than was Trafalgar or Waterloo; as among the very greatest in the course of our history. Wilberforce and Clarkson will rank even before those celebrated commanders, to whose courage and genius, under God, we owe the independence of our country. Among yourselves there are probably some who, for conscience toward God, endure grief, suffering wrongfully. There are no slaves, thank God, on English soil, but there are multitudes of persons in positions of dependence whose lives can easily be made miserable by the cruel ingenuity of their betters, and too often for no worse crime than that of obeying a higher sense of right. Every rank in society has its petty tyrants and its secret confessorships; to suffer wrongfully for conscience toward God is the monopoly of no one class. Here is a cadet of a noble family who will not consent to a transaction which he knows to be unjust, and he is cut off with a shilling. There is an apprentice or clerk in a large city house who will not abandon the duties or restraints of a Christian life in deference to pressure or abuse or ridicule from his companions, and he has a hard time of it. Yonder is a governess who has learnt a higher estimate of life and duty than her wealthy and ostentatious employer; or a clergyman who feels too keenly the real character of Divine revelation and the tremendous issues of life and death to acquiesce in some popular but shallow misrepresentation of the gospel which makes his people comfortable without bringing them nearer to God. These, and such as these, must, “ for conscience toward God, endure grief, suffering wrongfully.” Law can do but little for them; the province of law lies outside the spheres of the heart and the conscience; the whole world of motive is beyond it. But religion can do much, or rather everything, by pointing to the crucified and risen Prince of that vast company in all ages who have cared less to avoid discomfort than to be true to known truth and duty; by pointing to the unapproached bitterness of His sorrow, and to the completeness and splendour of His triumph. (Canon Liddon.) The blessings of injustice Where shall we look for an explanation of God’ s permission of prevalent injustice and wrongful suffering in the world? Some have sought an explanation in the circumstance that all have sinned, and therefore all deserve to suffer. This affirmation is undoubtedly true, yet it offers no kind of solution to the problem. Nor does the promise of the ultimate termination of all evil in the world, or the promise of the future reversal of all present injustices, or the final recompense of the righteous, offer a perfect solution of the mystery of present wrongful suffering. All these promises shed some light of comfort on the mystery; they also help the sufferers to endure their wrongful sufferings gloriously; but they do not explain why the patient endurance of such wrongful sufferings is permitted by, and especially acceptable unto, God. And perhaps no sufficient explanation is possible in our present darkened and limited condition of existence. And, for anything we know to the contrary, the present exercise of simple faith may be, through all eternity, of such unspeakable value to man that injustice and wrongful suffering may be permitted by God chiefly for the sake of the training and development of simple, victorious faith. There is, however, another blessing of injustice which lies within our ken and is perfectly manifest. It is the splendour of spiritual character, which is engendered by injustice and wrongful suffering; and which, as far as we can see, is never engendered in any other way. As the finest gold is the gold most heated in the furnace, so the finest souls are the souls whose furnace in life has been the hottest. Without burning and welding, human souls inevitably continue gross and feeble. If when we commit a fault and are buffeted for it we take it patiently, there is no glory in patience like that. The finest spiritual glory requires a furnace heated with injustice and wrong to make its splendour and its strength appear. The very injustice which is a curse to the soul of him who commits it is transfigured by patient endurance into a blessing and a glory to the soul of him who suffers it. Not those who merely suffer, but those who suffer wrongfully, have perfect fellowship with the sufferings of Christ. And the patient endurance of such sufferings, because of the strength and glory which it imparts to the souls of His greatest children, is acceptable and well-pleasing unto God. (Canon Diggle.) Gratitude for wrongful suffering The words imply-1. That man has a conscience.2. That conscience sometimes leads to suffering.3. That sufferings that spring from the following out of a good conscience are reasons for gratitude. “ This is thank worthy.” I. Because they involve the highest moral triumph. It is a triumph-1. Of the spiritual over the material.2. Of the right over the expedient.3. Of the Christly over the selfish. II. Because they open up within the man the highest sources of happiness. III. Because it identifies the sufferer with the illustrious men of all times. (D. Thomas, D. D.) Suffering wrongfully A minister was asked by a Quaker lady, “ Dost not thee think that we can walk so carefully, live so correctly, and avoid every fanaticism so perfectly, that every sensible person will say, ‘ That’ s the kind of religion I believe in’ ?” He replied, “ Sister, if thee had a coat of feathers as white as snow, and a pair of wings as shining as Gabriel’ s, somebody would be found somewhere on the footstool with so bad a case of colour blindness as to shoot thee for a blackbird.” (King’s Highway.) Ye take it patiently.-Patience Patience is the endurance of any evil, out of the love of God, as the will of God. The offices of patience are as varied as the ills of this life. We have need of it with ourselves and with others; with those below and those above us, and with our own equals; with those who love us and those who love us not; for the greatest things and for the least; against sudden inroads of trouble, and under our daily burdens; disappointments as to the weather or the breaking of the heart; in the weariness of the body or the wearing of the soul; in our own failure of duty or others’ failure towards us; in everyday wants or in the aching of sickness or the decay of age; in disappointment, bereavement, losses, injuries, reproaches; in heaviness of the heart or its sickness amid delayed hopes, or the weight of this body of death, from which we would be free, that we might have no more struggle with sin within or temptation without, but attain to our blessed and everlasting peace in our rest in God. All other virtues and graces have need of patience to perfect or to secure them. Patience interposes herself and receives and stops every dart which the evil one aims at them. “ Patience is the root and guardian of all virtue” ; impatience is the enemy of all. Impatience disquiets the soul, makes her weary of conflict, ready to lay aside her armour and to leave difficult duty. Impatience, by troubling the smooth mirror of the soul, hinders her from reflecting the face of God; by its din it hinders her from hearing the voice of God. How does it shake faith to be impatient of evils, either in the world or in the Church, or those which befall a person’ s own self! How does impatience with others’ defects chill love, or impatience with even our own failings and shortcomings extinguish hope! To be impatient at blame is a blight to humility; at contradiction, destroys meekness; at injuries, quenches long suffering; at sharp words, mars gentleness; at having one’ s own will crossed, obedience. Impatience at doing the same things again and again hinders perseverance; impatience of bodily wants surprises people into intemperance or leads them to deceive, lie, steal. “ In patience,” our blessed Lord tells us, “ possess ye your souls.” By patience we have the keeping of our own souls; we command ourselves, anal our passions are subdued to us; and “ commanding ourselves, we begin to possess that which we are.” Patience, then, is the guardian of faith, the fence of love, the strength of hope, the parent of peace. Patience protects humility, keeps meekness, is the soul of longsuffering, guides gentleness, strengthens perseverance. Patience makes the soul to be of one mind with God, and sweetens all the ills of life. It casts the light of heaven upon them and transforms them into goods. It makes the bitter waters sweet; the barren and dry land fruitful. Desolation it makes a loneliness with God; the parching of sickness to be the fire of His love; weakness to be His strength; wounds to be health; emptiness of all things to have things from Him; poverty to be true riches; His deserved punishments to be His rainbow of mercy; death to be His life. (E. B. Pusey, D. D.) Patience under oppression Writing, probably from Rome-certainly in one of the closing years of his life-St. Peter saw the great tendency of social and political circumstances around him towards that great outbreak of violence against the worshippers of Christ which is known in history as the first persecution, in which he and St. Paul laid down their lives. He is anxious to prepare the Asiatic Christians for the trials which are before them. Then, as now, there were bad Christians who fell under the just sentence of the criminal law, and St. Peter reminds them that there is no moral glory in suffering that which we have deserved, even though we take our punishment uncomplainingly. “ What glory is it if, when ye be buffeted for your faults, ye shall take it patiently?” But he knows also that aggravated sufferings awaited numbers of inoffensive men and women, whose only crime would be that they were worshippers of the meek and lowly Jesus, and centres of light and goodness in a corrupt and demoralised society. When the storm burst, as it would burst, they might be tempted to think that the government of the world was somehow at fault in this award of bitter punishment to virtuous and benevolent persons, conscious of the integrity of their intentions-conscious of their desire to serve a holy God-to do any good in their power to their fellow creatures. Accordingly, St. Peter puts their anticipated, trials in a light which would not, at first sight, present itself, and which does not lie upon the surface of things. “ If, when ye do well, and suffer for it, ye take it patiently, this is acceptable with God.” There is a peculiar moral glory in patience under unmerited wrong, if not according to any human, yet certainly according to a Divine, standard. “ This is acceptable with God.” Now, many men have said, and more, perhaps, have thought, about such teaching as this, that it is a splendid paradox. That a criminal should suffer what he has deserved satisfies the sense of justice. That a good man should suffer what he has not deserved violates the sense of justice; and if he submits uncomplainingly he acquiesces in injustice. Nay, he does more: he forfeits the independence-the glory-of his manhood. The precept to take it patiently is, in a word, objected to as effeminate and anti-social. Now, here it must be remarked, first of all, that for serious Christians this question is really settled by the precepts and example of our Lord Himself. “ Even hereunto were ye called, because Christ also suffered for us, leaving us an example,” etc. In His public teaching our Lord made much of patient submission to undeserved wrong. He pronounced those men blessed who suffered for righteousness’ sake. Not in exemption from suffering, but in truthful endurance, would His true followers find their peace. “ In your patience possess ye your souls.” Nay, more. Christians, He says, are to welcome such trials. They are to meet the persecutor half way. They are to do good to them that hate them, to pray for their persecutors, etc. And in perfect harmony with this teaching is His own example. Well, it is this sinless being who is also the first of sufferers. Nothing was wanting, humanly speaking, to make patience impossible. The natural sensitiveness of His tender frame, the ingenious appliances of torture, such as a crown of thorns pressed down upon the head and the temples, the coarse brutality of His executioners, the vivid consciousness of the sufferer sustained from moment to moment, might well have exhausted patience. And what His mental sufferings must have been we may infer distantly from the agony in the garden. But St. Peter directs especial attention to the insults to which our Lord was subject, and which may have tried His patience even more than the great sorrows of His soul or the tortures of His body. “ When He was reviled He reviled not again; when He suffered He threatened not, but submitted Himself to Him that judgeth righteously.” No complaint, properly speaking, escaped Him. Certainly, He asked the soldier who struck Him on the face for the reason of the act. He for a moment broke His majestic silence in His compassion to this poor man’ s insensibility to natural justice, and perhaps also in order to show that if when suffering more He did not complain, it was not because His feeling was dulled, but only what was due to patience. For Christians, then, I say, the question whether patience under undeserved wrong is right-is a duty-is not an open question. It has been settled by the highest authority-our Lord Jesus Christ Himself. From His teaching there is no appeal In His example we Christians see the true ideal of human life. “ As He is, so are we in this world.” And yet if, for Christians, the question is not an open one, the very authority which settles it enables us to see some reasons for the decision. Indeed, our Lord teaches us by His sufferings more than in any other way. By these He reveals to us the love of God: by these He points to the value of heaven. These sufferings are the measure of the gravity of our sins, of the miseries of hell, of the solemnity of life. But beyond this our Lord gives us lessons about pain. The existence of pain in the world is a fact which has from the earliest ages attracted and perplexed human thought. What is it in itself? It is a certainty both to feeling and to thought, and yet it is beyond analysis; and its inaccessibility to any real examination adds to its mysteriousness with all thoughtful minds, and increases the anxious interest with which it is regarded. It is ubiquitous: it is importunate: it meets us everywhere: it leaves us today only that it may return tomorrow. In this vast district of human experience deism sees, however reluctantly, an unexplained libel upon the character of God-atheism a hideous flaw, which, however bound up with the order of nature, impairs and disintegrates it. The Greeks talked much of a Divine Nemesis, a word which has played a great part in human thought; but Nemesis was not merely Divine justice overtaking human crime: it was also a malignant envy which grudged man his power or his good fortune, and which humbled him accordingly. Heathendom saw that there was a connection between pain and conscience. It had very indistinct ideas of the nature of this connection. What it was exactly revelation must say. Accordingly in the Old Testament there is one predominating aspect of the moral use of misfortune and pain. It is the punishment of sin. The righteousness of God is the great feature of the Jewish revelation of God. God is power; God is intelligent; but above all else God is righteousness. And it is in accordance with His righteousness-not, observe you, as the caprice of an arbitrary will, but in deference to the unalterable necessities of our self-existing moral nature-that He inflicts pain and misfortune as punishment for sin. This faith that pain justly follows misdoing, because God who governs all is righteousness and could not have it otherwise, runs through the Old Testament. It dictates the law: it is illustrated again and again in the history: it is the keynote to more than half the Psalms: it supplies the prophets with their greatest inspirations. But although it is true that sin is followed by punishment, because God is righteousness, it does not follow that all human suffering in this life is a punishment for sin. Against this idea the Old Testament itself contains some very emphatic protests. Thus the Book of Job has for its main object to show theft Job’ s misfortunes are no real measure of his sins. And when Psalmists could say, “ It is good for me that I have been in trouble,” or “ The Lord hath chastened and corrected me, but He hath not given me over unto death,” or “ All Thy waves and storms are gone over me,” it is clear that already a new light was breaking upon the world. But it was by our Lord that the cloud was fully lifted from this great district of human experience, so that we are now able to map it out, and to discover its bearings, and turn it to practical account. Our Lord does not reverse what the old dispensation had taught as to the penal object of a great deal of human pain, but He also rules that much pain is strictly a discipline-a Father’ s discipline of His children. Pain may thus be a token of favoured sonship; and, if so, then to pass through life without pain may be anything but an enviable lot. “ If ye be without chastisement, whereof all are partakers, then are ye bastards and not sons, for what son is he whom the father chasteneth not?” Pain thus need not be an enemy: it may be a friend in disguise: at least it may become so. Why should it not be welcomed? This is the voice of Christian teaching. Why, like the natural elements, fire and water, should it not be taken in hand and conquered and made the most of? Why should we not get out of it all the disciplinary and purifying virtue that we can, and so turn the scourge into a blessing? And if the question be asked by some anxious soul, “ How am I to know? Is this unjust humiliation, or this insult, or this loss of means, or this illness, or this heartache, a punishment for past sin or a tender discipline?” the answer is, “ Conscience must itself reply.” Here, then, is the answer to the criticism on St, Peter’ s precept, to which I was referring just now. There may be cases in which the interests of truth and righteousness-the interests of others-may make resistance to oppression a duty. They are rare, indeed. As a rule, trouble and pain are to be taken patiently as coming from God, inflict them who may. The early Christians were men who felt they had nothing to do either with the legal government of the Roman Empire or with the moral government of the universe. All that they knew was that they had to suffer for being what they were, and for believing what they did believe. The only question with them was how to suffer. And as for society, society has been again and again purified, regenerated, saved, by the passive endurance, as distinct from the active struggles, of its very best members. And let me make two remarks in conclusion. In this glad acceptance of undeserved pain we see one of the central forces of the Christian religion by which, as a matter of fact, it made its way among men eighteen centuries ago and ever since. Literature, social prestige, political influence, were all against the Church; but in the long run the old empire was no match for a religion which could teach its sincere votaries, generation after generation, to regard pure suffering as a privilege, as a mark of God’ s favour, as a pledge of glory. Depend upon it patient, cheerful acceptance of suffering is a great force which achieves more than many active energies that command the attention of mankind. And if this way of taking the troubles which are laid upon us supplies Christianity with its force, so it secures to human life its best consolations. We live in an age of progress. The circumstances under which we pass life are being brought more and more under the control of man; but is there less suffering in the wend than there was a hundred years ago? Looking to the present state of the world, is there likely to be? I fear not. Even science, which does so much for us, shifts the scene of suffering, rather than diminishes its area. What is taken away by one hand is returned by the other. If disease is assuaged, life is prolonged under conditions which, in an unscientific age, would have been fatal to it, and which necessarily involve suffering. And human nature does not change. The same principles and passions and dispositions which, needlessly or intentionally, inflict suffering on others are at work now, although their operation is limited by improvements in human society. Some of us may be young and lighthearted, and may not yet know what real trouble and pain mean. We shall know in time. The lesson comes to most men early enough in life, whether inflicted by others or, as more frequently, direct from above. The important point is to be prepared for it when it does come, to see in it the hand of our Father in heaven, to thank Him for treating us thus as children, for punishing, for purifying us here, that He may in His mercy spare us hereafter. (Crown Liddon.) The duty of patience under injuries I. What is implied is this duty.1. The not entertaining the impression of injuries with acrimony of thought and internal resentment. 2. The not venting any such resentment in virulent vindictive language. II. Whence it is that this duty comes to be so exceedingly difficult.1. From the peculiar provoking quality of ill language. 2. Because nature has deeply planted in every man a strange tenderness of his good name, which, in the rank of worldly enjoyments, the wisest of men has placed before life itself. For, indeed, it is a more enlarged and diffused life, kept up by many more breaths than our own. III. By what means a man may work himself to such a composure and temper of spirit, as to be able to observe this great and excellent duty. And here, when we consider what obstructions are to be conquered and removed, we must acknowledge that nothing under an omnipotent grace can subdue the heart to such a frame. To discommend this, of returning railing for railing, slander for slander, both to our practice and affection, I shall fasten only upon this one consideration; namely, that it is utterly useless to all rational intents and purposes.1. The first reason that would induce a man, upon provocation, to do a violent action by way of return, should be to remove the cause of that provocation. But the cause that usually provokes men to revile, are words and speeches; that is, such things as are irrevocable. Such a one vilified me; but can I, by railing, make that which was spoken, not to have been spoken? Are words and talk to be reversed? Or can I make a slander to be forgot, by rubbing up the memory of those that heard it with a reply? 2. Another end, inducing a man to return reviling for reviling, may be by this means to confute the calumny, and to discredit the truth of it. But this course is so far from having such an effect, that it is the only thing that gives it colour and credibility; all people being prone to judge, that a high resentment of a calumny proceeds from concernment, and that from guilt; which makes the sore place tender and untractable. 3. A third end for which a man may pretend to give himself this liberty is because in so doing he thinks he takes a full and proper revenge of him that first reviled him. But certainly there is no kind of revenge so poor and pitiful; for every dog can bark, and he that rails makes another noise indeed, but not a better. (R. South, D. D.) Of patience The word patience hath in common usage a double meaning, taken from the respect it hath unto two sorts of objects somewhat different. As it respecteth provocations to anger and revenge by injuries or discourtesies, it signifieth a disposition of mind to bear them with charitable meekness; as it relateth to adversities and crosses disposed to us by Providence, it importeth a pious undergoing and sustaining them. That both these kinds of patience may here be understood, we may, consulting and considering the context, easily discern. I. Patience, then, is that virtue which qualifieth us to bear all conditions and all events by God’ s disposal incident to us, with such apprehensions and persuasions of mind, such dispositions and affections of heart, such external deportments and practices of life as God requireth and good reason directeth. Its nature will, I conceive, be understood best by considering the chief acts which it produceth, and wherein especially the practice thereof consisteth; the which briefly are these:1. A thorough persuasion, that nothing befalleth us by fate, or by chance, or by the mere agency of inferior causes, but that all proceedeth from the dispensation or with the allowance of God. 2. A firm belief that all occurrences, however adverse and cross to our desires, are well consistent with the justice, wisdom, and goodness of God. 3. A full satisfaction of mind that all (even the most bitter and sad accidents) do (according to God’ s purpose) tend and conduce to our good. 4. An entire submission and resignation of our wills to the will of God, suppressing all rebellious insurrections and grievous resentments of heart against His providence. 5. Bearing adversities calmly, cheerfully, and courageously, so as not to be discomposed with anger or grief; not to be put out of humour, not to be dejected or disheartened; but in our disposition of mind to resemble the primitive saints who “ took joyfully the spoiling of their goods,” who “ accounted it all joy when they fell into divers tribulations.” 6. A hopeful confidence in God for the removal or easement of our afflictions, and for His gracious aid to support them well; agreeable to those good rules and precepts: “ It is good that a man should both hope and wait quietly for the salvation of the Lord” ; “ Rest in the Lord, and wait patiently for Him” ; “ Wait on the Lord, be of good courage, and He shall strengthen thine heart.” 7. A willingness to continue, during God’ s pleasure, in our afflicted state, without weariness or irksome longings for alteration. 8. A lowly frame of mind (that is, being sober in our conceits of ourselves, sensible of our manifold defects and miscarriages; being meek and gentle, tender and pliable in our temper and frame of spirit; being deeply affected with reverence and dread toward the awful majesty, mighty power, perfect justice and sanctity of God; all this wrought by our adversity, effectually, according to its design, softening our hard hearts, mitigating our peevish humours. 9. Restraining our tongues from all discontentful complaints and murmurings, all profane, harsh expressions, importing displeasure or dissatisfaction in God’ s dealings toward us, arguing desperation or distrust in Him. 10. Blessing and praising God (that is, declaring our hearty satisfaction in God’ s proceedings with us, acknowledging His wisdom, justice, and goodness therein, expressing a grateful sense thereof, as wholesome and beneficial to us) in conformity to Job, who, on the loss of all his comforts, did thus vent his mind: “ The Lord gave, and the Lord hath taken away; blessed be the name of the Lord.” 11. Abstaining from all irregular and unworthy courses toward the removal or redress of our crosses; choosing rather to abide quietly under their pressure, than by any unwarrantable means to relieve or relax ourselves. 12. A fair behaviour toward the instruments and abettors of our affliction; those who brought us into it, or who detain us under it, by keeping off relief, or sparing to yield the succour which we might expect; the forbearing to express any wrath or displeasure, to exercise any revenge, to retain any grudge or enmity toward them; but rather even on that score bearing goodwill, and showing kindness unto them. 13. Particularly in regard to those who, by injurious and offensive usage, do provoke us, patience importeth- (1) That we be not hastily, over easily, not immoderately, not pertinaciously incensed with anger toward them. (2) That we do not in our hearts harbour any ill will, or ill wishes, or ill designs toward them, but that we truly desire their good, and purpose to farther it as we shall have ability and occasion. (3) That in effect we do not execute any revenge, or for requital do any mischief to them, either in word or deed; but for their reproaches exchange blessings (or good words and wishes), for their outrages repay benefits and good turns. 14. In fine, patience doth include and produce a general meekness and kindness of affection, together with an enlarged sweetness and pleasantness in conversation and carriage toward all men; implying that how hard soever our case, how sorry or sad our condition is, we are not therefore angry with the world, because we do not thrive or flourish in it; that we are not dissatisfied or disgusted with the prosperous estate of other men; that we are not become sullen or froward toward any man because his fortune excelleth ours, but that rather we do “ rejoice with them that rejoice” ; we do find complacence and delight in their good success; we borrow satisfaction and pleasure from their enjoyments. II. The example of our Lord was indeed in this kind the most remarkable that ever was presented, the most perfect that can be imagined; He was, above all expression, “ a man of sorrows and acquainted with grief” ; He did undertake, as to perform the best works, so to endure the worst accidents to which human nature is subject; His whole life being no other than one continual exercise of patience and meekness, in all the parts and to the utmost degrees of them. (Isaac Barrow, D. D.) Patience in tribulation I. The special beauty of Christian behaviour. “ This is the grace or beauty.”1. The disciple of Christ does not act from motives of expediency, but from principle. 2. The disciple of Christ does not pursue pleasure or ease, but duty. II. The exciting motive which prompts the attainment of this character. He will know that he is pleasing God. He will realise that God is the avenger. III. The natural argument to be specially considered. “ For what glory is it,” etc. This is an urgent and important warning and caution. It urges discrimination and self-examination with regard to our sufferings. (J. J. S. Bird.) Acceptable with God.-Thanks from God “ This is acceptable with God.” And the Greek might bear such a rendering as this: “ God says, Thank you.” Yes, so it is. If in some great house some poor servant, or if in a school some persecuted child, will dare, for God’ s sake, to choke back the passionate outburst of indignation, and to endure grief, suffering wrongfully, there is a thrill of delight started through the very heart of God, and from the throne God stoops to say, “ Thank you.” The hero explorer may be thanked by his country and his Queen, but the weakest and obscurest saint may receive the thanks of the Almighty. (F. B. Meyer, B. A.) Even hereunto were ye called.-God has ordained his people to undergo troubles in this world God has ordained that all His shall suffer troubles, therefore we are to look for them, and bear them patiently. Through many afflictions we must enter into the kingdom of heaven. God knows how ill we can bear prosperity, but are ready to surfeit thereof, as children do of sweetmeats. Standing waters gather mud. As the Israelites in their journey to Canaan suffered much, so must we in this tabernacle, before we come to heaven; thus is God pleased to exercise us for His own glory and our good. Uses:1. We must not think the worse of any because of their afflictions, or conclude them to be bad men and hypocrites, which was the fault of Job’ s friends. 2. We must not think the better of ourselves for prosperity. God can afford the dogs the bones, the things of this world. 3. We must not dislike ourselves for our afflictions. It is an argument of God’ s love, not of His hatred (Hebrews 12:6). To have afflictions and to profit thereby is the sign of a happy man. 4. We must prepare for afflictions, not dreaming for ease; they are the better borne when looked for. 5. We must bear them patiently, as being of God. 6. We must bear them thankfully, as whereby we are furthered in holiness. 7. We must bear them joyfully, in respect of the eternal happiness and immortal glory we shall be shortly brought to. 8. If the children of God get not to heaven but through many sorrows, what shall then become of the wicked and ungodly (1 Peter 4:18; Jeremiah 25:29; Jeremiah 49:12)? (John Rogers.) Christ also suffered for us, leaving us an example.-Christ’ s sufferings in Gethsemane “ He suffered for us” ; it was during His agony in the garden that our Lord appears to have been most deeply penetrated with the sense of His afflictions. I. The intensity of those sufferings which our Saviour experienced in the garden of Gethsemane; and, II. What His conduct under those sufferings ought to teach us. There is, perhaps, no circumstance of the gospel at which our reason is so inclined to cavil, as the affliction which our Saviour then experienced. We cannot understand how it is possible that the Messiah, who is “ one with the Father,” should be thus liable to grief, and thus deeply moved at the prospect of His approaching persecutions. Our difficulty here results from our utter inability of forming any notion of the infinite magnitude of the Divine power, We can understand that in the Majesty of the Deity, He should hold pain and sorrow as His subjects; but we cannot understand His rendering Himself subject to them. We are unable to conceive that exercise of His power by which He manifested Himself as entire a master of His own infinite attributes, and withdrew Himself, as it were, from the sustaining succours of His eternal Godhead, that, as a man, He might suffer for our redemption. Yet this is what our Saviour did. If we were merely to confine ourselves to temporal views, and exclude all consideration of the spiritual cause of our Lord’ s sufferings, it may even then be with truth affirmed that such an accumulation of woes was never brought to bear at one moment on one man. He knew to a certainty that He had no deliverance to look for; that Judas, His companion, would betray Him; that the princes and rulers would condemn Him; that the people would reject Him and save Barabbas; and that His enemies would heap their persecutions upon Him to the last. In the mere anticipation of what He was about to undergo, our Redeemer had full cause for the agony which He experienced and expressed in the garden of Gethsemane. But, with such aggravations suggested by His own prophetic spirit as no other man ever knew, Jesus was cut off by the very sublimity and holiness of His character, from a source of succour which, under similar circumstances, has often afforded relief to other men. If they do not actually extract the sting of human suffering, they serve to divert the thoughts, and thus to allay the pain of it. But what are those passions? They are either a sullen pride which will not allow the afflicted under any circumstances to confess themselves subdued; or a fierce resentment which induces them to baffle the malice of their enemies by opposing a mask of obstinate insensibility to every attack; or an empty vanity which leads them in the lowest depths of wretchedness, and on the very borders of the grave, to angle for the applauses of the world by putting on a light appearance of unconcern. But whatever support such feelings might afford to others, they could have afforded none to Jesus in the hour of His agony. They are repugnant to the dispositions by which His gentle heart was animated. But it may be conceived that Jesus, under all His troubles, might still have found relief in the consciousness of His innocence. If there are occasions when this reflection may prove a source of secret comfort to the sufferer; there are others when it serves as the severest aggravation to his misery. If an elder brother who had mercifully interposed to save the children of their common parents from destitution, who had succeeded in placing them in a prosperous condition, should, after all, detect them conspiring with his enemies to malign and ruin him, would it be any consolation to reflect that he had not deserved such treatment at their hands? Even so must the consciousness of His innocence have affected the heart of Jesus. It must have been the most galling addition to the weight of those oppressions which were heaped upon Him by His countrymen. The consideration that they, who would be the authors of His oppressions, ought to have been bound together by the remembrance of His loving kindnesses, as His firm protectors, must have struck far deeper into His heart than ever the soldier’ s spear wound in His side could pierce. But not only on His own account: His compassionate nature would grieve for others; for His disciples, whom the profession of the faith in His name should render obnoxious to the enmity of their friends, and expose to persecution. But, as yet, we have only surveyed our Saviour’ s agony in the garden as resulting from human feelings. We will now proceed to regard it as affected by those views which would have been suggested by the religious aim of His approaching passion. Our Saviour, by His death upon the Cross, was about to pay the price of the transgressions of the whole world. He was about to suffer for our sins; and those sins for which His death was demanded, would naturally engage His contemplations. He would now see before Him the multitude of those offences for which a sacrifice was to be offered; the heinousness of them; the outrage that they were against the majesty of God; the ruin, the destitution which they had spread over the face of the earth; and the weight of the punishment they deserved. The bare idea of any one of those wicked acts which are daily committed by the cruel or the impure, is hateful to every innocent mind. What horror then must necessarily have filled the soul of our Saviour when, not singly, but in their aggregate amount, those mortal offences were brought before His holy view, as He estimated the extent of the ransom which was due, and which He had Himself undertaken to discharge? But our Lord thus “ suffered for us,” says St. Peter in my text, “ leaving us an example that we should follow His steps.” The lessons which His sufferings ought to teach us:1. We should learn from them to submit ourselves in every condition of life with an unreserved obedience to the will of the Almighty. 2. We should learn from our Lord’ s conduct never to despair of the loving kindness of our Heavenly Father, but to rely upon His unfailing goodness; to look to Him for succour and relief; and to feel assured that, if He see not fit to remove our cause of sorrow, He will, in His infinite mercy, answer our prayers for assistance, by vouchsafing to our souls the ability to support it. 3. We should learn humility from the example of our Saviour’ s sufferings. 4. We should learn from our Lord’ s example the extent of that Christian love which, as His disciples, we are bound to bear our fellow creatures. Our Lord suffered for us. He exhibited, in dying for us, the fulness of that brotherly charity with which our hearts should glow towards each other. He condemned every affection which emanates from a selfish and ungenerous source, by His willing immolation of Himself for the sins of the world that had condemned Him. His thus dying for us teaches us not only the value we ought to set upon our own salvation, but the value we ought to set upon the salvation of others. (W. Harness, M. A.) Christ our example The first reason for the gift of the Incarnate Son to a perishing world, is that He might be a sacrifice for its sin. The second reason is, that He might be an ensample of godly life to those who believe in Him. We sinners cannot invert the order, and say that He was given, first as our example, and secondly as our sin offering before God. For we cannot imitate Him until He has redeemed us from the power and guilt of sin; the first need of a sinner is pardon and moral freedom, the second, the ideal of a new life. I. Why we need such an example at all. Let us ask ourselves what it is which makes human nature radically different from that of any of the creatures that surround us. The great characteristic of man is the possession of free will. The growth of the human body indeed is as little within man’ s control as is that of an animal. But human character, and so much of the bodily life as bears on character, is as much under our control as are the canvas and the colours under that of a painter. Our passions, our inclinations, our thoughts, our sympathies, our antipathies, our habits, are at the disposal of our wills; we are what we have gradually made ourselves. Man, then, is an artist. And as an artist he needs not merely the material out of which to mould some expression of thought, but an example, an ideal, to copy. It may indeed be asked whether it will not do as well to obey a precept as to copy an example. Example, it is said, is vague; precept is explicit. Precept is active; it seeks you out and addresses you. Example is passive; it lets you imitate if you will. Example merely says, “ This may be done because it has been done.” Precept says, “ Do it.” No, you especially who, as parents or masters, are responsible for influence on others; assuredly, no. Example goes further than precept. Precept leads us to the foot of a precipitous mountain, and it cries, “ Scale that height.” But example whispers: “ Mark what I do, and then do it; it cannot be hard for you since it is easy for me, Look how I step over that crevice, and rest on this projecting foothold, and tread lightly and quickly along that insecure bit of the path. Watch me; keep close to me. Then all will be well in the end.” II. We do then need an example, and our Lord has satisfied this need of our nature and completely. In Him we have before us an example which is unique. He passed through life in the humblest circumstances: yet He belongs to the human race. He alone in the world is the universal man; He is the one man who corresponds to that ideal of humanity of which there are traces in the minds of all of us; He is the great example.1. That which strikes us, first of all, in the example which He has left us, is its faultlessness. We are startled by His own sense of this. He never utters one word to the Father or to man which implies the consciousness of a defect. “ I do always those things that please the Father.” “ The prince of this world cometh, and hath nothing in Me.” Was this an illusion, or did it correspond with the fact? He was surrounded by jealous observers. He could reckon on no forbearance, no generosity, no equity, in His opponents. Yet He passed their criticism unscathed. “ Which of you,” He could say, “ convinceth Me of sin?” And there was silence. In this sinlessness He is, although our model, yet beyond our full reach of imitation. The best of men knows that in his best moments he is beset by motives, or thoughts, or inclinations, from which Christ was utterly free. But this does not destroy, it rather enhances, the value of our Lord’ s example. In all departments of thought and work, the ideal is, strictly speaking, unattainable by man; yet man should never lose sight of it. 2. We are struck by the balance and proportion of excellences in our Lord’ s human character. As a rule, if a man possesses some one excellence in an unusual degree, he will be found to exhibit some fault or shortcoming in an opposite direction. Our finite and fallen nature exhausts itself by an effort in a single direction; it would almost seem bound to atone for a temporary success by some compensating failure. Of this want of balance in excellence, of this exaggeration in particular forms of excellence which entails an accompanying defect, there is no trace in our Lord. Read His life over and over again, with this point in view; and nothing will strike you more than its faultless proportions. In so vast a field, take one illustration out of many: the balance which He keeps between severity and tenderness. 3. Consider again a feature which runs through His whole character: its simplicity. In nothing that He says or does can we detect any trace of contrivance or of aiming at effect. He takes the illustrations which come ready to His hand, or which meet His eye: the birds of the air, the rain, the red and lowering sky, the lily, the grain of mustard seed, the corn, the ruined tower of Siloam. On these He grafts this or that fragment of eternal truth. We cannot enrich His teaching by any additions. Our crude efforts could not but disfigure its incomparable beauty. As with His words, so is it with His actions. He acts with a view to the glory of God the Father, and with a view to nothing else. Hence a directness and transparency in His conduct, which we feel in every detail of it. 4. One further point to be remarked in our Lord’ s example is the stress which it lays upon those forms of excellence which make no great show, such as patience, humility, meekness, and the like. As we read the gospels, we are led to see that the highest type of human excellence consists less in acting well than in suffering well. It is this side of His example of which St. Peter is thinking as being so useful to the Christian slaves to whom for the moment he is writing (verse23). Christ had before Him a purpose of infinite beneficence; that of recovering man to God and to endless happiness. Yet in carrying it out He met with scorn, resistance, hatred, persecution. Yet no unkind or impatient word falls from Him. He bears in silence the contradiction of sinners against Himself. He prays, “ Father, forgive them.” He is obedient unto death. “ Leaving us an example, that ye should follow His steps.” “ Yes,” it is said, “ it is a beautiful, a transcendental picture; and if Christ were merely man, we might perhaps imitate Him! But then He is God as well as man; and this seems to remove Him from the category of beings whom man can imitate. His theological glory in the fourth gospel is fatal to His moral value as a human model in the first three.” The difference between Jesus Christ and ourselves is indeed infinite; it is the difference between the Creator and the creature. And yet He is also truly man; and for the purposes of imitation the truth of His manhood secures all that we require. For the purposes of imitation, He is practically not more out of our reach than is a father of great genius and goodness out of the reach of his child. Certainly we cannot imitate Jesus Christ when He heals the sick, or raises the dead. But we can enter into and cherish the spirit of those high works of mercy. We can do the natural kindnesses which are akin to them. And there are deeds and words of His which we can copy in the letter as well as the spirit. Indeed, the objection has been already solved by the experience of eighteen centuries. The imitation of Christ is the perpetual source of saintly effort in the Church of Christ. Generation follows generation, looking unto Jesus. One man says, I will imitate His patience; and another, I will copy His humility; and a third, I would practise, though afar off, His obedience; and a fourth, His love for men; and another, His simplicity; and another, His benevolence; and another, His perpetual communion with the Father; and another, His renunciation of His Own will. When one point is gained, others follow. Thus, little by little, “ Christ is formed,” in the characters of His servants. This imitation of our Lord is not a duty which we are free to accept or decline. “ The elect,” says St. Paul, “ are predestined to be conformed to the image of the Son of God.” If there is no effort at conformity, there is no true note of predestination. A devoted layman of the Church of England said on his deathbed, that, on reviewing his life, the omission which he chiefly deplored was that he had not made a daily effort to study and imitate Jesus Christ as He is described in the gospels. Is not this a common omission even with serious Christians? Should we not do what we may, while yet we may, thus to follow in the footsteps of the Perfect Man? (Canon Liddon.) The Christian ideal “ The Christian is the noblest type of man,” says our Christian poet; and, assuredly, if the Christian be, in any extent, a reflection of the spirit of Christ, this language must be true. Whatever the grace we seek to inculcate we may find in Him a perfect illustration. Amid all life’ s trials, perplexities, temptations, and requirements we can have no law so suited to every occasion as this: “ Let the same mind be in you which was also in Christ Jesus.” I. An unconscious and indirect evidence of this is the frequent use of the term “ Christlike” as an epithet descriptive of the noblest type of human character. II. The essential difference between the morality which the world professes to honour and that of the gospel, is to be found in the endeavour of the latter to reflect the mind of Christ as it actually exists. I do not mean, of course, the morality of pure selfishness-if it be worthy the name of morality at all-which is all that numbers would acknowledge, but that which is cultivated by those who would develop a character higher than the Christian-the morality of the “ Religion of Humanity,” and of those who hang on its outskirts, approaching more or less nearly to its ideas. What is it, and how does it differ from that which the Church of Christ commends to the acceptance of men? It is clear that up to a certain point there is no outward difference. The law of truth, righteousness, sobriety is common to both. Further, the morality outside the Church is different from that which was in the world before the gospel, in that it has incorporated with its precept that law of gentleness, mercy, self-forgetfulness which was first set before men in the life of the Lord Jesus. Here, then, is likeness so great, that there are some only too eager to conclude that they are the same. These are the graces for which we seek lofty aims, pure desires, gentle thoughts, loving deeds. What can Christianity do more? Alas! has it not failed even to do as much? Without entering at length into the controversy here, it is at all events clear to those who will look beneath the surface, that this is not Christianity. The characteristic of the Lord was that the zeal of God’ s house had eaten Him up. In other words, the central idea of His life was to please God. It would be misleading in the very highest degree to describe a life out of which this ruling idea of the Saviour’ s conduct, this inspiration of His whole being, was omitted as Christlike. The difference is an essential one. It goes to the root of the whole being, affects every motive, touches every principle, regulates the whole ambition of the soul. III. One of the first and most frequent charges against the teaching of the Church is, that it encourages a selfish type of religion. A grave impeachment this, and one which, if sustained, certainly indicates a separation from the spirit of Christ. It is a mere truism to say that there is no feature more prominent in His entire ministry than that of unselfishness. The one ruling thought of His life on earth was the salvation of others, and the sacrifice of Himself for this end. And as with His life, so with His teaching; it was full of emphatic warnings repeated against selfishness. This certainly, is lost sight of in too many of the current representations as to the nature of salvation. How often is the stress of exhortation laid upon happiness, whether here or hereafter, rather than upon holiness as the supreme object of Christian endeavour! Nay, how often is the idea of salvation almost restricted to this one point of deliverance from the wrath of God and the sentence of the law! IV. In the distinctness and prominence given to the thought, that the object of the Gospel is to change the condition of men only by a change amounting to an entire renewal of heart in the men themselves, is to be sought the true answer to the suggestion that the Church is only fostering a higher type of selfishness. Looked at thus, salvation is the richest blessing which can be conferred upon man. It means salvation from himself-from the evil heart of unbelief which makes him depart from the living God; but which also places him in selfish antagonism to his fellowmen; from the sway of passions which scorn all restraints of right and duty; from the curse of a restless, discontented, repining, ambitious heart. The effect of a work like that can be only to purify and ennoble the character. Its polar star is no longer happiness but duty, and duty defined for it by its understanding of the will of God. V. The question which is of grave and critical importance, is whether the Church is earnestly working to this ideal, and seeking to enforce it upon men. It is not to be denied that there are those whose only desire is for safety, and who wish to secure even that at the least possible cost, and that they do very much to awaken the prejudices of men by the representation they give of Christian life. It is, in truth, little better than a ghastly caricature. They are not distinguished from others by nobility of character, generosity of spirit, tenderness of heart, active and sympathetic charity. They are not courageous in their assertion of principle, still less are they foremost in the exposure and condemnation of wrong. They have not keen instincts of justice, still less have they strong impulses of benevolence. If they try to reach the average standard of service, they never exhibit a spirit of self-denying devotion. Yet with all this there may be unctuous words on their lips, and occasionally an apparent spiritual excitement. But the conscience is not sensitive; the heart is not tender; perhaps there is not an intelligent conception of what religion ought to be. If we could probe their principles and motives, we should probably find that they had accepted the selfish conception of religion. They want to be sure for eternity, and they endeavour to obtain this assurance by a rigid conformity to their ideas of the Divine requirements. This entry is longer than a Bible module can hold. The rest is at https://www.sermonindex.net/commentary/bi/ 1 Peter 3:1-7 Likewise, ye wives, be in subjection Wifely subjection Here is required of wives subjection towards their husbands; though God made them in many things equal, yet in wisdom He thought meet to make some little inequality, and appointed the husband to be the superior and head, and so to rule, and the wife to be subject to him; yet not so but that he hath his rules to bound his rule, that it exceed not (1 Corinthians 11:8-9; 1 Timothy 2:13). Neither is this without reason; for if all were equals in the commonwealth there would be confusion; and if all bells were of a bigness, and all the strings of an instrument of one size, there would be a harsh sound, and no melody: so, were there not some small inequality between husbands and wives, there could not but be contention. It is God’ s order that wives be subject, as it is His order the sun should shine, the earth bear fruit, the heavens cover us. Accordingly, God hath provided to make man the stronger, woman the weaker vessel, that he might be the fitter to rule, and she (feeling her own weakness) the more willing to be ruled. (John Rogers.) A quarrelsome wife There were times when the Rev. Andrew Fuller could be exceedingly severe. He was once spending a few days in a family where the husband and wife were not very happy together, chiefly, I believe, owing to her tyrannical spirit, fostered by perverted views of Divine truth, making her by no means remarkable for kindness to her husband. One evening, having heard Mr. Fuller preach, according to the fashion of the school to which she belonged she remarked: “ Ah, sir, we are poor creatures and can do nothing.” “ You are quite mistaken, madam,” replied Mr. Fuller, “ you can do a great deal.” “ Why, what can I do?” asked the lady, somewhat excited. “ Why, madam,” replied he, with a tone and manner which can only be imagined by those who knew him, “ you can quarrel with your husband.” The lady said no more. (Baptist Messenger.) If any obey not … they also may … be won.-Wives must be subject even unto bad husbands Not only must wives be subject that have good husbands, but even they which hath infidel husbands, unkind, irreligious; for they are their husbands, whom they have chosen, and are now in covenant to God withal, and which God hath laid out for them as a blessing or cross. If any shall say, This is very hard, let such know, that Christians must do difficult things. Every bungler can make good work of good, straight timber, but he that can make good work of that which is crooked and knotty is worthy commendation. (John Rogers.) Unconscious influence The case supposed is one that would occur again and again while Christianity was making its way among the pagan nations. A Christian woman would find it very difficult to win over her pagan husband by direct efforts; she would be thrown back upon the silent influence of her chaste, holy, unselfish conduct and conversation; and the apostle intimates that she should expect this to be a sanctified energy which God would use to accomplish the desire of her heart. A fable is told of a mountain island of lodestone that stood up in mid-ocean, and attracted on every side the ships that sailed over the seas. As soon as ever they came within the line of its influence they were insensibly seized, gradually at first, then ever more swiftly they were drawn, until at last they dashed to destruction on the rocky coast. The Christian should be an influence for Christ on every side of his nature, seizing every barque that sails by on the ocean of life; seizing it by the power of Christian character and Christian consistency, and drawing it into the harbour of God’ s love and service. I. It may be well to illustrate what is meant by our unconscious influence, and to exhibit its importance and value. As we meet together in society, how distinctly tone is recognised and felt! Beyond the influence we can exert on each other by our actions, there is the power of our very presence, an atmosphere around us which we carry with us wherever we may be. You can be a growing power, more decidedly and wholly influencing others for good, as by watchfulness and earnest culture you grow in personal religious worth. II. Consider the sphere in which the power of this our unconscious influence will be most felt. It will be felt everywhere. It is a necessity of our being that we should exert it. It belongs to us, and flows forth from us as freely as the fragrance of the violet wherever the violet is found. Yet such influence is most felt at home. Much ought to be done by the young Christian’ s direct efforts for the happiness and salvation of the household; but the very freeness of life in the home makes such labour difficult, and often there are circumstances which make it impossible to speak the word. So, in your first religious Sphere, you may be thrown back upon the importance of the influence silently exerted by your character. In a home some will be dependent on you, whatever your place may be; the children, younger children, or the servants. These will be very easily affected by the tone and spirit of your life; and they will be very keen to watch for the spirit they know is in harmony with the professions you make. In another way those on whom you depend in the home will be reached by you. On the side of your submissions and obediences you will win power over them. Holy, loving children have been honoured as the means of winning their parents for Christ. And home life includes a circle of friendships; you are not called by your Christian profession to separate yourselves from such circles; but you should carry into such society a fragrance of Christian purities and charities that may ever flow out to bless those with whom you meet. III. On what the efficiency of this influence will depend.1. It will depend on our cultivation of Christian graces, and that work includes the repression of all our constitutional infirmities, whether of temper or spirit, and the mastery of all habits that are relics of our sinful states. 2. It will depend on the consistency of our Christian conduct. 3. It will depend on constancy in religious duties. (R. Tuck, B. A.) The attractive power of Christian character We adopt the opinion that “ the Word” is used in two distinct senses, and we read the passage thus: If any obey not the gospel, they also may without preaching be won by the character and conduct of the wives. The subject before us is this: The gospel reproduced in character and conduct, a means of saving sinners from the error of their ways. In discussing this subject, however, let me guard against even the appearance of underrating the written and the preached Word. Without “ the Word,” what revolutions would this void create! The “ Word” withdrawn from Christendom would rend the finest pictures, and pull down the most splendid buildings, and take the salt from the best literature, and bury in oblivion the highest science, and darken the brightest homes, and devastate the fairest countries, and undermine all righteous thrones, and send back some civilised nations to barbarism, and bring a huge shadow of death over the whole world. Without “ the Word” mankind are without gospel, without light and life. I. “ The Word” received produces a distinctive character in him who accepts it. This is alike its object and tendency. “ The Word” reveals the one living and true God-the Father, Son, and Holy Ghost-as the redeeming God, and shows that God is reconciling the world unto Himself. Now, the man who receives “ the Word” is translated from darkness to light, he is transplanted from an ungenial to a friendly soil, and he admits to his nature elements which, combining with whatever is Divine within him, will produce a new man and effect a new creation. II. The character which “ the Word” produces is of a nature to attract and win. The character begotten by “ the Word” is-1. Strong. It has in it all the constituents of complete spiritual power, intelligence touching the highest subjects, faith in God, hope of the greatest and most enduring good, love of the purest and most fervent flame, immutable and everlasting principles of action. 2. The character formed by “ the Word” is also genial. There is in it the attractiveness of beauty and of pleasantness, as well as of power. The basis of that which is genial in the Christian character is love. 3. This strong and loving character is also reasonable, it is conformed in all points, to rational principles. It has within it none of the elements which constitute the fanatic or visionary. Imagination creates not this character, but faith in a Divine revelation; and that revelation presents nothing contrary to reason. III. The influence of this gospel-formed character is felt most where association is most frequent and contact most close. The text points to a home as the sphere of Christian influence, but it also directs our attention to woman as influential there, and it leads our thoughts to the presence of unbelief in the family. This suggests two things: firstly, that there is often evangelistic work to be done in families of which Christians are part; and secondly, that this work may be extensively wrought by Christian women. Christian men and women, whatever your hands may find to do beyond, neglect not the home. IV. Believers of the Word may accomplish the end of preaching by being doers of the Word in the face of unbelievers. The great want of the world at the present time, is the Christianity of the New Testament translated into action. The demand for Christians is more urgent than the demand for churches. Men would see works that they may believe our words. (S. Martin.) Won by behaviour A high-born, cultured lady was converted during one of the London missions, and it was a genuine conversion. Immediately she separated herself from the world, revolutionised her household, altered her gay attire; and instead of the theatre or concert or ballroom night after night she was found at the mission service, the prayer meeting, or Bible reading. At first it embittered and angered her worldly husband, but eventually he yielded to what he termed “ a new caprice.” When he found out that his beautiful wife was really in earnest, he persecuted her, and stung her with bitter reproaches, which, unfortunately, too frequently aroused her passionate temper, or occasioned an angry retort. One day God used her husband’ s bitter words to teach her a great lesson. “ When your Christ can do something more for you, Isabel,” he said, “ I may let Him try to do something for me-not before.” “ Wherein do I fail most?” she asked. “ In your temper and tongue, which are sourer than when I first knew you.” “ Is this really so?” she asked herself when alone. “ If so, O God, forgive me” was the sob which burst from her lips. “ What! is it possible that my hastiness may perhaps be keeping my husband from God? Away with it, Lord I Give me, I pray Thee, victory over all sin.” God answered her prayer, but the testing time had yet to come. When her husband found persecution no longer irritated her, he let jealousy get the better of him-jealousy of the little delicate lad, their only child, who monopolised so much of his mother’ s time, and filled a large place in her loving heart, One evening when Mr. N-returned home irritable and morose-perhaps the worse for wine-she was singing softly, “ There’ s a beautiful land on high,” and the patient little sufferer had just said, “ I’ d like to be there, mother, if I could take you with me,” when Mr. N-entered the nursery, and said, irritably, “ Put that child down, Isabel; Norton has come home with me to dine.” “ Our little laddie is worse, Edgar,” she said. “ May I not stay with him?” “ No,” and taking him roughly from her knee he handed the child to the nurse. “ All nonsense about his being worse.” But, as he spoke, a loud moan escaped the little lad’ s lips. His father had caught his head accidentally’ against the corner of the table, and he cried out to go back to his mother again, “ The child is not hurt much, Isabel; leave him at once, and come and attend to my guest.” With an aching heart, Mrs. N-obeyed, trembling lest the blow might prove serious. Before dinner, however, was over, she was summoned to the nursery. The child was worse. Both the doctor and physician had been sent for, and they shook their heads at his condition. In the midst of the confusion and excitement, Mr. N-went out with his friend, heedless of the message which had been sent to him from the nursery, lie did not return until long after midnight. But about midnight his little child died. Isabel N-was childless. There she knelt alone by the bedside of her little darling’ s lifeless form. Would it be possible to describe her feelings or to understand the conflict through which she was passing? The Refiner was looking on-watching intently to see the effect of the fire through which He was causing His child to pass. Would it burn up the dross? Would it subdue the will? A few minutes later her husband’ s step was heard in the hall, and Mrs. N-knew the butler would tell his master all that had happened. The grief-stricken woman listened for him to come to her at once, but she heard him enter the library and shut the door; and, in the stillness which followed, she cried unto the Lord for guidance and strength. Pride said, “ Let him come to you-he has wronged both you and the child” ; but love said, “ Go to him-be the first to forgive.” Love conquered, thanks be to God. Mr. N-was sitting by the table, his head buried in his hands, when he heard the library door open, and in another moment felt his wife’ s soft warm arms encircling his neck, and her lips pressed to his heated brow, while a voice of gentle sweetness said, “ Jesus has taken our darling to be with Him, Edgar; but I will love you more, dear.” No stinging reproaches-no hard hasty words-not even a tender rebuke. The man could hardly believe he heard aright. What a miracle! What wonderful love! Yes, and the love broke his heart. “ Come upstairs and see our boy, Edgar.” Without speaking he followed her; and while the two knelt alone in that still room and her tremulous voice pleaded that the sorrow might be sanctified, and that one day they too might join their little one in the Better Land, the proud, stubborn man yielded his heart to his God. When he arose he said, calmly, “ Isabel, Christ has done so much for you, dear, that I mean to ask Him to do as much for me. There is something in Christianity after all.” (Mrs. Walter Searle.) Chaste conversation coupled with fear.-Christian womanhood The “ chaste conversation coupled with fear” seems to signify purity in an atmosphere of fear, the tremulous grace which is “ afraid of the very shadow of wrong.” The “ beholding” is in the original a remarkable word. It seems to point at “ initiation” into a world of goodness before unknown to the husband. The selfish rhetorician Libanius, who had some Christian acquaintances, is said to have exclaimed: “ What wives those Christians have!” A missionary to China has heard Christian women say: “ Until we became Christians we never really knew that we were women.” (Bp. Wm. Alexander.) The Christian woman Let our thoughts be guided by this twofold proposition:-1. For the unfolding of woman’ s character, and the balancing of her spirit, Christianity supplies the only sufficient impulse and guide. 2. Christianity exhibits no more perfect illustration or achievement than in the completed proportions of her spiritual life. The first epoch of trial in woman’ s life begins when the period of education ceases. It is a period of dependence, in the first place, with most women-dependence on parents-but still not the less irksome for that, if the woman, with a consciousness of strength, sees the parent worn and anxious with excess of labour; or if, with willingness for effort which her position or social prejudice forbids, she sees her every want met only by reluctant and grudged supplies. It is a period of uncertainty; for it looks straight out upon all those contingencies that determine her future lot-a lot for which she is not so much to lead or choose as to wait and weigh the perils of being chosen, or to learn the calm fortitude that conquers neglect with dignity. It is a period of highly wrought sensibility. The emotions have swelled, from the babbling brook that kept its quiet way within the banks of youth, into the rushing river of impetuous passion. It is a period of comparative irresponsibleness; and who shall say that irresponsibleness is a blessing, when we know so well how occupation dispels morbid introspections, and how daily strain upon the muscles fortifies timid and tremulous nerves? It is not true, I think, of any other condition of human discipline, more than this one, that nothing short of a personal acquaintance with Christian trust can satisfy its wants. Two other and different resources, indeed, the young woman has: and we need not wander far to search for proofs how often She tries their value. They are her womanly pride, and the excitements of society. What will Christianity do? It concentrates the aimless and restless purposes of woman on the one grand object of a personal acceptance with God. It takes off the load, which no human spirit can bear and be cheerful, by its promise of forgiveness for what is lacking, and by its encouraging assurance that when once the life is consecrated to God no single act or thought of good can fail of fruit in the spiritual harvests of eternity. It offers her what the mind of youth more than anything else craves-a friendship at once unchangeable and trustworthy as the heavens; and so it opens the gates of the city of God straight into her closet of prayer, and, when the world looks most inhospitable, shows her friendly angels ascending with her supplications, and descending with counsel and compassion, between her Bethel and her Father. It not only quickens her to a new fidelity in all the homely ministrations of the house where she lives, towards brothers and sisters, parents and servants; it opens to her the lowly door of poverty; it draws her, by cords stronger than steel, to the unclad orphan and the bedside of sick wretchedness; it stimulates her invention, it exhausts her economy, it plies her fingers, it inspires her intercessions for the instruction of poor children’ s ignorance, and the redemption of their despair. Another task still Christianity solemnly charges upon woman in her youth. It bids her by every separate obligation of her discipleship be true to immaculate virtue in her intercourse with companions, and in the bestowment of her favour. Would to God that some angel from His own right hand would reveal to her the power she controls for the redemption of those horrible vices that defile and intoxicate the land! for then she might take up her benignant ministry as an apostle of holiness, persuading the tempted by her unbending principle, as well as bearing her own profession incorruptibly. It is time to advance to a later stage of the Christian woman’ s experience. If her moral power is so decisive at the time when life has devolved upon her the fewest responsibilities, and neither age nor station has vested in her any adventitious authority, it is only more commanding yet when she has taken up the complicated relations of marriage, and assumed the spiritual governance of that lesser church, that sacred seminary-the family. The chief enemies to her Christian simplicity-and thus to the symmetry of her own character, as well as the integrity of her influence-are social ambition, an appetite for admiration, the passion for indiscriminate excitement, and, in other constitutions, a dull servitude to the routine of mechanical tasks. 1. By social ambition I mean the vulgar appetite for those external distinctions which are even more dangerous to woman than to man, because of the inherent natural aristocracy of her nature. A wife or mother who suffers it to be her supreme exertion to rise in the public consideration has already parted with that artless sincerity which is the chief grace of her womanhood. 2. Appetite for admiration. Could some searching census register the number of those who are kept aloof from the love of God by this foolish vanity alone, should we dare to look into the swelling catalogue? Could some magic reflection be added to mirrors, so that, while they show back the adjustment of garments, they should also reveal the emptiness of soul, what dismal disclosures would startle the sleeping conscience! 3. Passion for indiscriminate excitement. What hold has religion taken of that mind which never rests in its insatiable craving for some public spectacle-is never satisfied except when it is preparing for some scene of social display, or exulting over its conquests? There is no noble type of womanhood that does not wear serenity upon its forehead. 4. On the other hand, in constitutions of an opposite inclination, female life is apt to degenerate, if not inspired by religion, into a tame routine of narrow domestic cares, dwarfing the spirit to its own contracted limitations. The very nature of woman requires animation for its health. Religion, with its infinite mysteries, its deep and stirring experience, its boundless duties, offers that needed stimulus-offers it to the obscurest and the lowliest. The Christian wife and mother is a Christian in the spirit by which she orders her household and nurtures her offspring. Too many mothers make their first request for their sons that of the mother of Zebedee’ s children-that they may sit on thrones of wealth and power. What wonder if those sons are worldlings, are hypocrites, are criminals? Too many train up their daughters with no loftier aim than to be beautiful brides, or the centres of meretricious observation at summer watering places, or to value a husband by his income, or not to be over nice in their judgment of men, because they are not expected to be virtuous like women. Infamous effrontery towards God! And thus I have come, finally, to what may be briefly established-that Christianity exhibits no more perfect achievement than in the completed character of a spiritual womanhood; for, passing on one stage later yet, we find the united result of a life’ s discipline and a heavenly faith in the Christian woman’ s old age. Providence has not withheld that confirmation of the power and beauty of religion from our eyes. We feel new confidence and truth, new love for goodness, new zeal for duty, new trust in God, new gratitude to Christ, when we look on her ripened holiness; and, as her strength faints before the power of decay, behold the crown of immortality descending almost visibly upon her head! I cannot so well finish this account of a Christian woman as by repeating the following touching, simple memorial of his wife written by one of the statesmen of England-Sir James Mackintosh-in a private letter to a friend: “ She was a woman,” he writes, “ who, by the tender management of my weaknesses, gradually corrected the most pernicious of them. She became prudent from affection; and, though of the most generous nature, she was taught frugality and economy by her love for me. During the most critical period of my life she preserved order in my affairs, from the care of which she relieved me. She gently reclaimed me from dissipation, she propped my weak and irresolute nature, she urged my indolence to all the exertions that have been useful or creditable to me, and she was perpetually at hand to admonish my heedlessness and improvidence. To her I owe whatever I am-to her whatever I shall be. In her solicitude for my interest, she never for a moment forgot my character. Her feelings were warm and impetuous; but she was placable, tender, and constant. Such was she whom I have lost; and I have lost her when a knowledge of her worth had refined my youthful love into friendship, before age had deprived it of much of its original ardour. I seek relief, and I find it in the consolatory opinion that a benevolent Wisdom inflicts the chastisement as well as bestows the enjoyment of human life; that superintending goodness will one day enliven the darkness which surrounds our nature, and hangs over our prospects; that this dreary and wretched life is not the whole of man; that a being capable of such proficiency in science and virtue is not like the beasts that perish; that there is a dwelling place prepared for the spirits of the just; that the ways of God will yet be vindicated to man.” (Bp. Huntington.) Let it not be that outward adorning.- The influence of Christianity on dress To lay down rules for the regulation of dress, applicable to all circumstances, all ranks, all ages, is impossible. To fix the cut of the coat, the shape of the bonnet, were a hopeless and, indeed, ridiculous task. All that we can do is to lay down certain principles, distinctly asserted in, or clearly deducible from, the gospel. I. Christian principles forbid all dress which is not honestly procured. That dress is dishonestly procured for which you know you cannot pay, or the payment of which is effected by dishonourable means, by falsehood, by embezzlement, or fraud. It is not in the higher circles only that temptations to obtain dress by dishonest methods occur. The servant maid must ape her mistress; but the wages she receives are not equal to the demands of her pride. But even if every tradesman’ s bill is punctually paid, still you are guilty of dishonesty if the money thus expended be drawn from other channels in which, in justice to yourselves, or to your families, it ought to flow. You are unjust to yourself if you starve either the body or the mind to decorate the person. II. Christian principles forbid that dress which is immodest. The author of my text, in another Epistle, charges the women that they adorn themselves in “ modest apparel.” “ A prudent woman,” says Mr. Jay, “ will avoid whatever would appear light and wanton. The apparel of a woman professing godliness should not be the attire of a woman of the world, much less the attire of a harlot. Females sometimes wear a label on which indecency and indelicacy are written, and then appear to be offended because observers can read. I would not always infer too much from these outward hints; but, in the name of a blush, on what principle can we explain the invention and adoption of certain modes? I describe nothing.” Intimately connected with modesty in dress is health; and when it is considered how many thoughtless females have fallen the untimely victims of disease introduced into the frame by the general scantiness, or the partial distribution of their attire, I am persuaded the allusion will not be deemed improper. III. Christian principles forbid that dress which is unbecoming your station. It is obvious, by a comparison of the text and parallel passages with the general scope of Scripture, that costly attire is not forbidden where the ability of the person is fully equal to its purchase, without injury to any other claims. The virtuous woman is highly commended in the Proverbs, who, through her industry, clothed all her household in scarlet, and herself with silk and purple. Moreover, the good of society requires persons to dress, in some degree, according to their rank and station. But it is excess that the apostle censures. IV. Christian principles forbid that dress which requires an undue consumption of time. I will not recount the days and years of valuable time which some females spend in cutting, adjusting, adorning, altering, and improving the articles of their dress, till the world of novelties is ransacked and the invention at a stand: I will not number up the hours, or tell the years the aggregate would make, devoted to the toilette, with peevishness and impatience, till every ringlet is properly adjusted, every plait suitably apportioned, and every gem placed to the best advantage at the expense of religion and humanity, and to the ruin of both body and soul! V. Christian principles forbid that dress which, by its singularity or extravagance attracts peculiar attention. The desire to court observation-the ambition to be singular-the hope of being admired, is the essence of pride, and in this vice both the extremes of finery and of plainness will be found to meet. “ Keep thy foot when thou goest into the house of God.” Surely, look well to thy attire is included in this injunction. VI. That dress is forbidden by Christian principles which seriously occupies and absorbs the powers of the mind. And yet how many females are there the range of whose information is bounded by these limits-the topics of whose discourse are derived from this subject-who understand no science but that of shapes and colours-are acquainted with no art but that of decoration and display-and are conversant in no history but that of modes and fashions. It yet remains that I should produce some considerations by which the observance of them may be enforced. VII. These principles should be enforced-1. By a consideration of the sources whence your dress proceeds. As clothes cannot impart moral qualities or mental endowments to the wearer, so they are little to be gloried in on another account: they are derived from the lowest sources, and composed of the meanest materials. Nay, more than this, is not the dress on which you pride yourself the memorial of your shame? But for sin it had never encumbered the limbs, nor occupied for a moment’ s space the care of the unspotted mind. 2. By a comparative view of its intrinsic worth. In a time of universal famine how many jewels would you give for a single loaf of bread? In a raging fever how many diamonds would you sacrifice for a moment’ s ease? In a parched desert how many embroidered robes would you exchange for a cooling draught? Why, then, should such enormous sums be expended in glimmering pebbles and sparkling dust? Compare them with your books-your Bibles-your souls-all neglected for their sake! Arise to correcter sentiments and nobler aims. Make the Bible your looking glass, the graces of the Spirit your jewels, the temper of Jesus your attire. 3. Consider the estimation in which dress is held by the wise and good. With them it always occupies its proper place, which is an inferior one; and wherever it rises to excess and glare, indicating the vanity and pride of its possessor, it excites their pity and contempt. 4. The estimation in which you will hold dress in the hour of death and in an eternal world. (T. Raffles, D. D.) Dress St. Peter does not prohibit absolutely the plaiting of the hair, the wearing of gold, and the putting on of apparel; but he desires that the precedence be given to higher and better things. I. Let us not hesitate to say that there is nothing in Christianity, rightly understood, which prohibits a woman from endeavouring to dress well and to look well. There is no religion in a mean, unattractive garb. Years ago there lived two Greek philosophers, Diogenes and Plato. Plato, who was a man of wealth and taste, had handsome carpets. Diogenes preferred living in a tub, and saying disagreeable things, under the impression that he was “ faithful.” One day he came, in an ill temper, into his brother philosopher’ s drawing room; and stamping on the carpets, cried out, “ I trample on the pride of Plato!” “ Yes,” said Plato, quietly,-“ and with greater pride.” Is there not something of this pride in “ unworldly.” dressing? Cannot a woman show her Christianity without making herself conspicuous by singularity? But we will take a step farther. We have said that Christianity does not prohibit attention to dress. We wilt now say that Christianity requires of a Christian woman to make the best of herself. God the Creator delights in beauty-beauty of form and hue and outline and arrangement; and surely He would have us, His creatures, delight in beauty also; and surely anyone who shows a marked inattention to the comeliness of outward things, shows himself, so far, out of harmony with the Divine mind. II. The Christian woman will always subordinate the outward to the inward. But she will want rules to guide herself by. She will not be extravagant in the money she spends upon her dress. If her personal appearance be a talent, so also is her money: and both have to be considered. Another talent, which a Christian woman will think much of, is her time. The highest praise as to dress, which a right-minded woman would desire, would be to have it said of her by the passers-by, “ I did not notice her dress; but I noticed herself; and she seemed an unaffected, modest, genuine Christian lady.” (G. Calthrop, M. A.) Female adornment I. The capacity of woman for adornment.1. We say that the female form is adapted for adornment. 2. We say that the female nature is adapted for adornment. Can kindness, gentleness, meekness sit with so good a grace on a man as on a woman? Is not sweetness of temper reflected in every look, and does it not beautify and glorify every feature? II. The directions for women’ s adornment. (J. J. S. Bird, B. A.) Female adorning Here, in the Word of life, we have fallen upon a text that deals with female attire, condemning one style of adorning, and commending another. God loves beauty of every kind, both the beauty of nature and the beauty of holiness. How do we know that? Because everything that He makes is beautiful. The works of nature are beautiful on all sides, and on all sides alike beautiful. It is not a bright exterior, and a rough ungainly interior; it is not a polished side to the public road, and a slovenly rubble wall on the shaded side. Nor is the most elaborate design or the most exquisite colour reserved for the most enduring objects. The snow crystals, and the frosted tracery on the windows, are as perfect in design and execution as the monarchs of the forest that outlast fifty human generations. Man is the chief of God’ s works, and enjoys most of His care. He was made most beautiful, but has disfigured himself by sin. When His best work was damaged, the Creator did not give it up, and give it over. He framed a plan to restore. He desires to have His own image renewed. A man of feeble intellect, in the north of Scotland, was wont, like most of his class, to be very slovenly in his appearance. To this weakling the gospel of Christ came in power. He accepted God’ s covenant love, and found himself a child of the family. Soon after this change the minister met him on a Sabbath morning, and was struck with his unwonted cleanness, and the efforts he had made in his own fashion to ornament his person. Accosting him kindly, the minister said, “ You are braw today, Sandy.” “ He was braw Himsel’ the day,” replied Sandy reverently; meaning that Jesus, when He rose from the grave on the first day of the week, was arrayed in the Divine glory and the beauty of holiness. The Lord on high, who rejoices to receive the little ones, would, methinks, be pleased to see Sandy’ s Sunday clothes, and to hear Sandy’ s simple answer. Peter in this text undertakes to tell how the uncomely may be rendered beautiful. Here is the true adorning; and it is for us, for all. Still deeper goes the apostle’ s thought when he arrives at the details of the recommended ornaments. “ Not that outward adorning of plaiting the hair, and of wearing of gold, or of putting on of apparel” ;-what then? “ Let it be the hidden man of the heart.” There is a whole Christ in every disciple who lives up to his privileges, as there is a whole sun in the cup of every flower that opens to his shining. When this ornament is worn in the heart within, its beauty is seen on the outward life. In general, a likeness of Christ is in the life of a Christian; and, in particular, “ a meek and quiet spirit.” When, in the processes of art, a new and beautiful colour is about to be transferred to a fabric, the hardest portion of the task sometimes is to discharge the dyes that are already there. A terrible process of scalding must be applied to take out the old ere you can successfully impart the new. In like manner, the anger and pride and selfishness that have first possession present the greatest obstacle to the infusion of a meek and gentle spirit into a man. If there be a royal, there is certainly no easy, road to this consummation. It is a striking, bold, and original conception, to propose that an ornament should be hidden in the heart. Ordinarily, we understand that an ornament, from its very nature, must be worn in a conspicuous position. When it is hidden, how useful and valuable soever it may be, it ceases to be an adorning. But in the spiritual sphere the law is reversed. Meekness is spoiled when it is set up for show. This ornament, moreover, is incorruptible. This epithet is peculiarly relevant. With the exception of the metals and minerals, ornaments are, for the most part, perishable commodities. Rain soils them; the sun burns their beauty out, In the accidents of life they are worn or torn, or stolen or lost. The rose and lily that bloom on the cheek are not perennial; the wrinkles of age are creeping on to drive them off and take their place. All these adornings are corruptible. This text recommends one that will never fade. Age makes it mellower, but not less sweet. As it is not a colour of the decaying body, but a grace of the immortal spirit, it will pass unharmed through the dark valley, and bloom in greater beauty on the other side. It will make the ransomed from among men very comely in the eyes of angels, when they stand together round the throne, and serve their common Lord. One grand concern with buyers is to obtain garments that will last-garments whose fabric will not waste, and whose colours will not fade. Yet another quality is noticed of the recommended adorning-it is costly. In the sight of God, and of the godly, it is “ of great price.” In the market of the world, alas! we, like inexperienced children, are often cheated. We pay a great price for that which is of no value. We are often caught by the glitter, and accept a base metal for gold. He who counts this ornament precious knows its worth. The righteousness of the saints is dear to God in a double sense. It is both beloved and costly. (W. Arnot.) Women’ s dress Common sense, sustained by Christian principle, will ever reveal what your dress ought to be. The coarse dress is not necessarily the fulfilment of the admonition of the apostle Peter. A young woman is not to affect the repulsive robe of the nun, as if that were religion; nor to dress in the drab of the Society of Friends, as if that were humility; she is to dress as becomes her station, and her rank, and her position. We may depend upon it, it is far more conducive to the universal welfare that the highest classes should dress as becomes them, than that they should lay it all aside, and dress like the Society of Friends. What would become of all the lace, silks, and warehouses in the City of London, and in Manchester, and Nottingham, and Glasgow, and other places; what would become of all the mills that are employed; if men were to try to form, what cannot be formed in character, in wealth, or in industry-a universal dead level? All that Peter insists upon, and all that we require is, that the young woman shall dress as becomes her position in life; good taste, which is always a quiet, never a gaudy thing; and Christian principle regulating her in this: and that the aged woman shall be sober, autumn never trying to deck itself in the flowers of summer, nor cold and dreary winter putting on what is not natural-all the splendours and the glories of June; and young and old recollecting this beautiful thought, “ Behold the lilies of the field; they toil not, neither do they spin; yet Solomon in all his glory was not arrayed like one of these.” (J. Cumming.) The hidden man of the heart.-Soul clothing To clothe the foot in costly apparel, and the upper part with rags, were absurd; so to bestow cost in clothing the body, but none on the soul. The soul is immortal, must live forever; it was created according to God’ s image, and now the soul is most deformed with sin, and so hath need of clothing, especially seeing God, who is of pure eyes, cannot behold it but with detestation. The Church is all glorious within, and such as would be indeed members of Christ, and heirs of heaven, must look for inward sanctity. This is the most costly apparel that can be, of God’ s own making, and which none but His children wear. This is apparel for all sexes, ages, degrees, and callings, whatsoever, and which doth well become and fit each of them. This is never out of season, never out of fashion; it fits in youth, in age, in life, in death, and is to be worn by night as well as by day, in sickness as in health, yea, is then in great account, when other apparel is laid aside, and not regarded; yea, this apparel we carry with us out of this world, when we leave our gay robes behind us; and this apparel lasts ever, being the better for the wearing. (John Rogers.) Latent goodness and latent evil If we translate this into modern language, we might say, “ The latent good and evil in man.” The heart stands for the source, back of all else, from which our life flows. What we love most, that we are. Wherever our deepest longing goes, there we are going. But this profound tendency of the soul is often a hidden tendency. It is “ the hidden man of the heart.” There is in every man a great deal more of good and of evil than we see. Inside of the visible man, whose face and form we see, there is an invisible man of veins and arteries, and another invisible man of nerves, and a third invisible man of bones; and from the co operation of these proceed the actions of the visible man. What we see in nature is only the visible outcome of what we do not see. So, in the processes of the human soul, what we know proceeds from hidden sources which we do not know. What do I mean by the formation of Christian character? I mean that a man may deliberately choose to be pure, honest, truthful, generous, religious, and that he can turn this choice at last into a habit, so that it shall be natural to him to do right, rather than to do wrong. What he did at first by an effort, and with difficulty, he now does without any conscious effort, and easily. Now, all these instincts, whether original or acquired, are wholly hidden from our knowledge. They are latent until they are called out by some occasion; then they show themselves spontaneously. Some are near the surface, and appear on all occasions; others are deep down, and appear only on special occasions. The moral cowardice in the apostle Peter, which could make him deny his Master, was latent, and Peter could not believe it possible that he should act thus. Circumstances develop latent goodness as well as evil. You are living among neighbours whom you do not know very well. But they seem to you commonplace, or perhaps worldly. But some calamity befalls you. This event brings out the goodness which was lying latent in your neighbours’ hearts; latent because nothing appealed to it. How kind they are now! how self-sacrificing! But the sickness of your child was not the cause of this sympathy, but merely the occasion of its manifesting itself and becoming developed. It did not make, it only revealed, these kindly thoughts of many hearts. Just so the great calamities and dangers of a nation arouse as by an electric touch the heroism and self-sacrifice that there may be in the people. Cincinnatus steps from behind his plough; William Tell from his mountain home; Washington from his comforts; to serve his country in council or battle. But “ the times which try men’ s souls” do not make Washingtons and Tells-they only test them and call out their latent virtue. Woe to the nation, woe to the man who is not equal to the test when it comes! If the test does not cause them to rise, it makes them fall. How many examples there are to prove the existence of this latent evil! We have seen a young man go from the pure home of his childhood, from the holy influences of a Christian community. He leaves his home and comes to the city to engage in business. He trusts in his own heart, in his own virtuous habits. But there is latent evil in his heart, there is a secret selfishness, a hidden and undeveloped sensualism, which is ready to break out under the influences which will now surround him. He becomes a lover of pleasure; he acquires a taste for play, wine and excitement. In a year or two, how far has he gone from the innocent hopes and tastes of his childhood! The latent evil that was in him has come out under the test of these new circumstances. Meantime, another young man, apparently no better than he, has, under the same circumstances, developed the seeds of virtuous and holy purposes, and has become a man of unshaken integrity and virtue. Why this difference? You cannot trace it to education, for their education was similar, you cannot account for it by the influence of circumstances, example and outward temptations; for these were the same in both cases. The difference was in the latent character of the two boys. One in the depths of his soul was then a sensualist; was then a worldly and selfish boy. The other, with no better outward habits, had in reality an inward principle of goodness. And circumstances merely developed the latent good and evil of the two. The fact of latent goodness is as true and important as that of latent evil. If our inmost purposes are right; if we have kept our heart with all diligence; if we have habitually trusted our souls to God, then we have a stock of latent goodness, ready and equal for any occasion which may come to call for it. We need not fear, then, that we shall not be able to meet any emergencies. An unsuspected strength will then manifest itself, a courage and faith for which we dared not hope will triumphantly reveal itself. What, then, is the practical conclusion from these facts? It is that we should both distrust ourselves and trust ourselves; that we should pray. “ Lead us not into temptation,” yet “ count it all joy when we fall into temptation.” If we are already conscious of our weakness, we may not need the trial which is sent to show us our weakness. But if, nevertheless, God sends the trial, then it was necessary that we should be tried, and let us count it all joy that it has come. If it brings out an amount of latent evil of which we were not aware, then it is well that we should become thus acquainted with our own depths of sinfulness. The disease must be brought out before it can be cured. But if the temptation, on the other hand, reveals and quickens powers of inward virtue and resolution, then let us bless God for this latent goodness which He shows us. (James Freeman Clarke.) The hidden man The point is, that one should not expend the whole of life on making the outside beautiful, but that one should see to it that the inside is adorned also. You are not to cheat the soul of all its gems and virtues for the sake of making yourself attractive exteriorly by adornments of that kind. It is not for that general subject, however, that I have selected She passage, but for this phrase, “ the hidden man.” You will have been struck in reading, how much this dual life is insisted upon in the New Testament, especially how much use the apostle Paul makes of it. There are two elements running side by side in his philosophy; one the outward, another the inward. The outward man perishes day by day, the inward man is renewed day by day, says the apostle; and he dwells in various phrase on that duality, the inward life, and the outward or physical life. Everywhere there is this reciprocal action, the world on the mind, and the mind on the world. The sense, the physical body, is the instrument by which the world acts upon our hidden man, and by which the hidden man acts back again upon the world. Through the exterior world the soul is thus the recipient of treasures. The soul is like a prince who receives embassies from all the provinces round about; presents and tribute come to him from the uttermost parts of the earth. The air, the storms, all human occupations, all governments, individual men and combinations of men, pleasures-all bring influence to this potentate, the hidden man of the soul. Then, in turn, the soul sends forth energy, speech, will; and as the tide that swells and fills the harbour, then reflows and seeks again the great ocean, so the flux and reflux of force between mind and the physical world is a greater though an invisible and silent tide. The laws of the physical world are almost sterile until they are touched by the human will. Natural laws could give us metals in their foaming, bubbling states, but they never made a knife or a sword. Nature made trees, but never made a house. Nature has made germs, man has made the harvest. All the great laws that make summer and winter and the intermediate seasons, all the laws that are called natural, all the laws that spring from political economy, all those laws which are said, in one respect, to be natural laws, are not natural laws until some human spirit sits astride upon them and directs them. Now, the relative proportion between this receiving and the outgoing power determines character. It is the critical line both as respects quantity and quality. Those who live by their senses, controlled by objects to be seen or heard or felt from without, live animal lives. They are savages. Then come those who, receiving much, only give forth the energy of their passions-not intellectual energy, not moral, not aesthetic. They give forth simply the energy of selfishness, of pride, of vanity, of ambition, of avarice, combativeness, or destructiveness. It is the lower tier of the human, and the upper tier of the animal that is affected in them, and that gives forth some voice or fruit. Then come those who give action, the men who have industries, that dig, that hew, that build, converting impressions and the result of knowledge from without into energies by which they give the fruit of physical combinations and constructions. This includes the vast mass of the respectable people of the globe today. They are constructors and workers. Then there are those who are over and above all this activity, for the upper always owns the lower. He who gives thoughts can also give construction, though he who gives only construction cannot give thought. The upper always carries within it the privileges and the fruit of the inferior, or of all that is below it. So that the next rank are those who give forth thought and emotion, that have it in their power to thrill their time, or to augment it, to build it up, to defend it; men who live in the higher range of their faculties, and give the fruit reaped from these higher fields, higher and richer. Then come those who, over and above all activities, in physics and even in intellect, have a reserved life which has never had expression except through hymns and psalms, the voice of the teacher and the inspirations of the poet-the utterances of those who have given to knowledge a higher character and a winged form. They are sensitive, open to the subtle inspirations that move in the higher realms, and are men who live by faith or by the higher forms of imagination, not by sight nor by the physical fruitfulness of the human body. In regard to this relative activity of different classes, what they receive and what they give forth, it may be said that it determines, not simply individual rank or life, but it determines also the philosophy or the character of different religions. Take, for instance, the contrast between Judaism and Christianity. Judaism was a recipient religion; Christianity is a projecting religion. The Oriental mind generally receives; the Occidental mind gives forth. A word as to the relative productiveness of these two elements. The productiveness of the mind is generally in increasing ratio from the lowest to the highest; the effectiveness of its outgo is generally in the inverse relation or ratio. Man can more easily turn that which is inspired in his animal range and nature into an external influence and substance, than he can that which belongs to his highest nature. How much of thought there is in cultivated men! How much of thought that goes forth in language! But how much more thought that never rides in the chariot of language! How much men think day by day that is only thinking! In my orchards today there are, I think, on single cherry trees more than a million blossoms; and probably all but about a hundred thousand of those will drop without a cherry having formed under them. Men are like such trees. They breed thoughts by the millions, that result in action only in the scores and the hundreds. Waves of feeling rise, roll through the mind, and leave no more effect behind them than the waves of unknown seas that have rolled solitary for centuries by day and by night. How much there is of purpose that is blighted and barren! How much there is in goodness, how much in sweetness, how much in love, that runs the circuits and touches all the shores of human possibility, but never comes out nor shows itself! How many there are doomed by necessity, like fragrant trees in the great tropical wildernesses-fragrant for ages, but neither brute, beast, nor man ever smells their sweetness! How many there are that live in society who are capable of issuing sweetness that should be of influence, and that should make a very summer round about them, but there is no channel, and they die without opportunity! The great hidden soul had no tongue, nor possibility of using it if it had one. This hidden man, then, may be called in respect to those things that are the highest and the best in this life, the silent man; for we can say least of the things most worthy to be expressed; and this great silence may be said to determine character and condition very largely. They that know how to repress the lower and the evil that is generated within, are on the platform of morality ascending towards spirituality; and those that ascend to the highest forms can express but little. Yet they have, as it were, a palace within themselves, out of which in days of trouble or trial come forth inexhaustible stores of strength and of consolation. It is the hidden man which is at once the glory and the shame of mankind-the rich of thought and pure of purpose whose life perhaps can bring forth but little outward fruit, but who store up for the eternities grand knowledges, impulses, and actions; and, on the other side, the men who maintain an external decorum, but are full of all uncleanliness. This hidden man is more beautiful than any of you think, and more horrible. The saint dwells in many a bosom, not far removed from the very angels of the throne itself. Devils inhabit the heart of many and many a “ respectable” man. Oh! bring out your silent man, make him speak, unroll what is written in his thought. How many men could hold up their faces then? And how many men who have produced nothing for the market, not much for the neighbourhood, little for the uses that are common on earth; that have neither the pen of the ready writer, nor the tongue of the orator, nor the wings of the poet, are rich unto God! They dwell in their meditations, and their imaginations remain untranslated into human language or into human conditions, but they are rich rewards God. This is a subject that is full of practical meaning; we ought so to coordinate the receiving to the giving-the income to the outgo that we shall strengthen and make better both of them. So ought men to organise their lives that they shall be fertile without, and fruitful and rich and abundant also within. (H. W. Beecher.) The hidden man I. It reminds us that it is the inward life that makes the man. The “ hidden man” is not what first meets the eye that constitutes a person’ s individuality. It is what his will-led, taught yet ignorant, prejudiced yet biassed, free yet trammelled, great yet little-determines. II. We are reminded that this inward man far exceeds that which is outward and visible.1. It exceeds it in value. A man would not take the kingdom for his body. Youth or age, beauty or vileness, do not alter the intrinsic nature of the man. Often indeed do we see the noblest spirits inhabit the most unseemly bodies, while those who possess outward beauty are infamous in their lives. As to the stupendous contrast, in value, of the soul over the body, it is impossible to define any just description. A priceless jewel wrapped in a worthless piece of paper is only a faint representation of the contrast which exists between them. 2. The inner man again is the responsible part of our human nature. The body is but the agent. 3. Compare again for one moment the elements of which they are severally composed. The outward, visible man is dust. The soul or living essence is the breath of the living God. Its influence at once exalts the body to the highest step of material creation. III. We may consider that this inward life is as the text describes it-a “ hidden” life. No human eyes can penetrate the veil which hides it from view. It is in our own hearts we live, in our souls we exist, and in our own hearts we must die. It would be mockery to bring the outside world into our inside existence. It would be bad for us, and bad for the world, if we did not live in a hidden world. Thank God that even our sins are hid. IV. We would warn you that this hidden life is no secret from God. V. That this inner man deserves and demands more careful cultivation than it generally receives. Now, in order to effectually cultivate the heart, there must be-1. A continuous course of introspection. 2. There must be self-communion. 3. There must be the admission of Christ as a guest. It is in the heart that Christ must dwell. (Homilist.) Religion an inward principle When religion is styled “ the hidden man of the heart” this language cannot imply that it is totally concealed from the observation of the world. Effects may be visible, while the principle whence they proceed is removed from our view. A beautiful river, which highly adorns the country through which it flows, will not fail to engage the eyes of every beholder. Yet the source of it may not be the object of our sight. In like manner the fruits of pious dispositions can be witnessed by all. But the dispositions themselves fall not within our notice. The words convey this idea, that genuine religion consists in the inward temper. From this view of it some instructive lessons may be deduced.1. Religion does not so essentially depend upon any particular mode of faith or worship as some may suppose. 2. This subject teaches us that it is highly unbecoming and presumptuous in men to decide with rashness on the religious character and state of their neighbours. Fallible as we are we cannot read the motives of individuals; and much goodness may exist, which, from various causes, has few or no opportunities of being witnessed by the eye of man. 3. If religion be “ the hidden man of the heart” it cannot exist, and still less can it flourish without the agency of God accompanying our diligence, watchfulness, and self-denial. 4. Religion, being “ the hidden man of the heart,” cannot easily be in danger from causes altogether external; nor is it amenable to human laws, nor dependent on human patronage. 5. Since religion is a principle, the inseparable alliance between the possession of its spirit and our happiness, both present and future, is placed in a new and striking light. The happiness of man cannot be independent on the mind. The purest happiness of the mind will be the happiness of heaven, and the degree of it will be greatest in the cases of those whose religion is most eminently “ the hidden man of the heart.” (J. Kentish.) The best clothing It is Tertullian’ s counsel to young women: “ Clothe yourselves with the silk of piety, with the satin of sanctity, with the purple of modesty; so shall you have God Himself to be your suitor.” (J. Trapp.) Meekness A garment that will never be the worse for wearing, but the better. (J. Trapp.) Beauty beneath ugliness A woman, famous as one of the most kindly among leaders of the best American society, once said: “ If I have been able to accomplish anything in life it is due to the words spoken to me in the right season when I was a child by an old teacher. I was the only homely, awkward girl in a class of exceptionally pretty ones, and being also dull at my books, became the butt of the school. I fell into a morose, despairing state, gave up study, withdrew into myself, and grew daily more bitter and vindictive. One day the French teacher, a grey-haired old woman, with keen eyes and a kind smile, found me crying. ‘ Qu’ as-tu, ma fille?’ she asked. ‘ Oh, madame, I am so ugly!’ I sobbed out. She soothed me, but did not contradict me. Presently, she took me to her room, and after amusing me for some time, said, ‘ I have a present for you,’ handing me a scaly, coarse lump, covered with earth. ‘ It is round and brown as you. “ Ugly,” did you say? Very well, we will call it by your name, then. It is you! Now, you shall plant it, and water it, and give it sun for a week or two.’ I planted it and watched it carefully; the green leaves came first, and at last the golden Japanese lily, the first I had ever seen. Madame came to share my delight. ‘ Ah,’ she said, significantly, ‘ who would believe so much beauty and fragrance were shut up in that little, rough, ugly thing? But it took heart and came into the sun.’ It was the first time that it ever occurred to me that, in spite of my ugly face, I, too, might be able to win friends, and to make myself beloved in the world.” (Great Thoughts.) The hidden man “ Why do you not wear richer apparel?” once asked a familiar friend of Edward I. “ Because,” said the sensible king, “ I cannot be more estimable in fine than I am in simple clothing.” Exterior adornment insufficient Those who adorn only the exterior, but neglect the inner man, are like the Egyptian temples, which present every kind of decoration upon the outside, but contain within, in place of a deity, a cat, a crocodile, or some other vile animal. (Clement of Alexandria.) Inner attractiveness the most desirable Plain women, far from underrating beauty, are apt to place too high a value upon it. Their own lack of comeliness is their lifelong sorrow. They do not realise that the women who are most ardently and lastingly loved by men are seldom very beautiful. Prettiness wins admiration; something much deeper and more subtle inspires and retains affection. No woman need be ugly. If there is a soul in her body it has but to begin betimes to show through, From her earliest girlhood the thought she thinks, the feelings to which she gives way, the tones she utters, the wishes she indulges, are sculpturing lines in her face that are capable of making a beauty all her own-lines whose writing will remain when bloom fades and sparkle falls. This entry is longer than a Bible module can hold. The rest is at https://www.sermonindex.net/commentary/bi/ 1 Peter 3:8-9 Finally, be ye all of one mind.Christian unity I. What unity is.1. It is a mutual agreement. 2. It is a mutual care of the common interest. If there be ever so much agreement in opinion and judgment, yet if the interests are divided it is not unity. 3. The terms of union and all the means of it must be lawful. Otherwise it is not unity, but conspiracy. II. The advantages of unity.1. It is the safety of all societies. 2. Unity best serves the purposes of religion. I need not say that dissensions destroy the beauty and charity of religion, that thereby God is dishonoured. 3. It is the perfection of all political virtues, and for the most part of the Christian virtues also. Good government, wholesome laws, mutual security, arts and sciences, trade and commerce, are all the children of union. And as unity is the perfection of political, so it is for the most part of Christian virtues also. The apostle tells us that love is the fulfilling of the law (Romans 13:10). And then for these other Christian virtues, peace, humility, forgiveness, patience, contentment, charity, these do all as naturally flow from unity as a stream does from its fountain. III. The relation that is between unity and charity. I cannot express this better than in St. Augustine’ s similitude. If there be a thorn in the foot, the back bends, the eyes search, the hands are ready, and all parts are quick and active to relieve the member that is grieved. And this is the just resemblance of that charity that arises from unity. The whole body feels the smart and needs of a suffering member. IV. Some considerations that may engage us to the love and practice of unity and charity.1. The practice of these virtues recommends our religion to the world; that is, it gives people occasion to respect it, and speak well of it, and the least of it is that it gives them no just occasion to speak ill of it. 2. The practice of these virtues makes us like God. 3. It is the state of heaven. Unity and charity are immortal graces; they live at God’ s right hand, and are part of the employment and the happiness of the other world. (Thos. Wagstaffe.) Unity between Christian people I. Wherein does unity between Christian people consist? Leighton suggests that St. Peter here describes five graces, of which love is the root or stalk, having two on either side: on the one side, like mindedness and compassionateness, on the other side, tender-heartedness and humble-mindedness. II. How is unity between Christian people manifested? III. What is the method for attaining this unity?1. There is a direction as to detail of speech. Refrain from- (1) The malicious.(2) The false. 2. There is a deep and wide precept applying to the whole of life. IV. What are the motives for being all and doing all that will insure this unity.1. The Christian man is called to inherit blessing. 2. The cultivation of the spirit that promoted social unity ensures the summon bonum of the individual life. 3. Relationship to God is the great determining condition and motive in all that leads to true Christian unity. (1) God knows what we are doing.(2) God cares for what we are doing. (U. R. Thomas.) Christian unity Not that he would have these Jews to be of one mind with the idolatrous and profane Gentiles amongst whom they lived; but that, being believing Jews, they would all agree together in the matters of faith and religion of Christ, that they would all embrace the Lord Jesus, the only Foundation; and that some only should not look for salvation by Him, some by the law, and some by both, but that all should seek unto Him alone. And as they were thus to agree in matters of faith, so also in their civil affairs, avoiding contention and strife. (John Rogers.) Avoiding divisions Beware of two extremes that often cause divisions.1. Captivity to custom.2. Affectation of novelty. (Abp. Leighton.) The social ideal All of one mind, cemented into a holy unity by a common sympathy. Ministering to the saints. Pitiful to the weak, erring, and poor. Courteous to equals. Calm and forgiving under abuse and injury. Seeking peace. Living under the smile of God. Where in all the world can we discover such a community of Christians? It were a fair vision, worth going far to see, An oasis in the desert. A snatch of celestial harmony amid the jarring discords of human selfishness. The New Jerusalem descending from God out of heaven. Yet nothing less than this is the Christian ideal, as it is also that which our Lord died to secure. And it would well become us, if, without waiting for others, each one would adopt the injunctions of these verses as the binding rule of daily life. This would be our worthiest contribution to the convincing of the world, and to the coming of the kingdom of our Lord. And it would spread. And does not the apostle’ s use of the word “ finally” teach us that all Christian doctrine is intended to lead up to and inaugurate that life of love, the bold outlines of which are sketched in these words? (F. B. Meyer, B. A.) Oneness of mind This oneness of mind does not demand the monotony of similarity, but unity in variety. Not the oneness of a hop pole, or of a pile of hop poles; but of the plant which, with tendril, leaf, and fruit, rears itself aloft in the summer air. Not the oneness of a brick, or of a pile of bricks; but of the house, in which so many different materials and contrivances combine to shelter human life. Not the oneness of a child; but of a family of children who differ in age, character, temperament, and chosen pursuits, but are one in love and tender sympathy. (F. B. Meyer, B. A.) Having compassion one of another.-Sympathy We have got into a strange way of thinking about that word “ compassion.” It seems to imply a sense of superiority in the person who experiences the emotion for which it stands. We talk about sympathising with people in misfortune; but how do we set about it? I ant afraid the usual way is to go to some one in distress and say something like this: “ You poor thing; I am so sorry for you.” And then, if it is a kind of distress that appeals to our superior power for help, we give a little alms, or we do some little act of kindness before we go away, and dismiss the subject from our thoughts. But if it is grief that excites our sympathy, we too often make matters worse by offering consolations in which we do not half believe, such as saying it is all for the best, or time will wear it out. It is easy enough to say that other people’ s misfortunes are all for the best. But is it always true? Should we like to be told so in a case of our own? Everything that happens is for the best in the wise counsels of our Father in heaven. But it is for us to turn it to the best account. The true sympathy is to enter into the feeling one’ s self, and share it with the one to whom it properly belongs. And if we believe in the structure of Christ’ s body, of which we call ourselves members, we must know that what belongs to one belongs to all-“ And whether one member suffer, all the members suffer with it,” etc. The sympathy suggested by St. Peter’ s word is a comprehensive feeling. It is not limited to any one kind of experience, such as grief or pain. It must diffuse itself throughout the whole capacity of loving hearts. Let it once but take possession of us all and see how all jangling discords will subside before its gentle touch. There will be no more room for envy, hatred, and malice, and all uncharitableness. Let us seek this precious stream of harmony at the fountainhead. Let the love of Christ constrain us to be of one heart and one soul. And now, as to the thoroughness of this sympathy, it must be a partaking of the results of every impression made upon each other. There is nothing truer than the common saying that habit is a sort of second nature, and we all know that we have it in our power to contract very much such habits as we wish. This fact is at the bottom of all our plans for bringing up our children, that is to say, if we try to bring them up after any sensible plan at all. Some of us are naturally more disposed to personal affection than others. And these take more kindly, as the saying is, to the exercise of a general sympathy with humanity at large. It is well for such persons if they do not rest satisfied with the emotion alone and pride themselves on being holier than their hard-hearted brethren. But the fact of being less disposed to feel for other people is no excuse for not trying to do it. We may cultivate it like any other habit, only far more effectually by the grace of God, till it almost seems natural to us to have compassion one of another. I remember urging this once upon a man, hard and unloving by nature, who had trouble in his family, and his answer struck me very forcibly. “ I see,” he said, “ you want me to force sympathy in a hot bed.” And that is just one of the ways in which it may be done, and as a tender plant it will repay the greatest care. But, perhaps, all this while, you have no very clear idea what I mean by sympathy. It seems to me that it is another way of expressing a very common idea-that of doing as you would be done by. It is the putting of one’ s self into the person of another-so far as it is possible or right to do so. That is to say, so far as it comes within our province as brethren, members of the same family of God-nay, more than that, of the same body of Christ-to care for each other’ s concerns. Think of it when your friends are cross and you are tempted to answer them back-think of it when they are tired and you would worry them into your activity, or when they are cheerful and eager for some enjoyment and you would depress them with your selfish cares. Think of it again when you are judging of other people’ s conduct under trials to which you have never been exposed, and when words of thoughtless censure or bitter scorn are welling to your lips. (H. C. Atwool, M. D.) Christlike compassion A good many years ago there lay in the streets of Richmond a man dead drunk, his face exposed to the blistering noonday sun. A Christian woman passed along, looked at him, and said, “ Poor fellow!” She took her handkerchief and spread it over his face, and passed on. The man roused himself up from his debauch, and began to look at the handkerchief, and lo! on it was the name of a highly respectable Christian woman of the city of Richmond. He went to her, he thanked her for her kindness, and that one little deed saved him for this life, and saved him for the life that is to come. He was afterwards Attorney-General of the United States; but higher than all, he became the consecrated disciple of Jesus Christ. (T. De Witt Talmage.) Love as brethren. Brotherly love I. Some qualities of brotherly love.1. It is a peculiar and Divine principle.2. It is comprehensive and universal.3. It should be sincere and fervent.4. It must be constant and permanent. II. The way in which it should be manifested.1. It will produce unanimity.2. It will lead to the exercise of compassion and sympathy.3. It will be regulated by Christian courtesy.4. It should be manifested by Christians in their uniting in social exercises of devotion, and in the public worship of God. (Essex Remembrancer.) Pity Notwithstanding the many clear marks of wisdom and goodness which are found in creation, it must be confessed that the present world abounds with misery. How few can be found whose welfare is not more or less dependent on the will or humour of others; considering how much easier it is to injure than to promote human happiness, who can believe that the common Parent of all would have so little tenderness for His offspring as to leave them in a world thus constituted, without some better defence and stronger security than that of reason. But observe how admirably both the accidental and the necessary defects of reason are supplied by the active, uniform, instinctive principle of pity. For by giving to all men this principle, and placing them in a state of mutual dependency, God hath plainly constituted them the guardians of each other’ s welfare. This tender affection is accordingly found so essential an ingredient in the composition of our nature, that the absence of it is termed inhumanity-a word which carries with it the deepest infamy. For it marks the outrage which nature suffers before it can take place. Interest or passion may put men upon acts of cruelty, and these acts by degrees may be formed into habits. And it were well if certain nations, among the most civilised in other respects, were more sensible of this danger. Nor is it any excuse to say that, for the safety of society, actions must be punished with severity. For though all this be true, yet is anyone so much a member of the community as to forget that he is a man? Or does sound policy require that the celestial justice should be transformed into an infernal fury, and employed in a Christian country in torturing malefactors by arts and inventions which are truly diabolical? As errors and corruptions in religion and government may account for these instances of national cruelty, so those of education may generate in particulars the same barbarous spirit. The veriest caviller must admit, unless he is stout enough to combat conviction, that benevolence and pity are qualities as proper to the whole species as modesty and chastity are peculiar to the one half of it. When God was pleased to place us in this state of trial, to render it the more supportable He gave men social and benevolent affections. And when He is pleased to admonish them by the mouth of His inspired apostle to be pitiful or compassionate, it is only referring them to those very feelings with which He has impressed, to those very faculties with which He has endowed them. (J. Mainwrigg, B. D.) Be courteous.- Christian courtesy The apostles are not only careful to lay the foundation, but to build up. How comprehensive this whole verse, “ Cherish fervent charity,” and discover it in acts of pity or courtesy, according to circumstances. By courtesy we are to understand “ a considerate regard to the feelings and accommodations of others, resulting from a principle of Divine love, and discovering itself by a corresponding behaviour in all the various circumstances of our ordinary intercourse with mankind.” I. Simplicity and Godly sincerity. The courtesy of the world is an imposing form, a delusive shadow, an artificial mode or fashion which persons acquire under the discipline of their dancing master. II. Disinterestedness. The courtesy of the world is selfishness disguised. III. Uniformity. The courtesy of the carnal mind is a sickly, humorsome, capricious thing, altogether incapable of persevering exertion. IV. It is invariably associated with humility. In honour preferring one another. The men of the world do this in appearance. It is not the habit which properly belongs to them; it is the costume of a better country than that which claims them for its own; a foreign dress, which, like the traveller in his journey, they find it convenient to assume; a mere cloak worn in public to cover the deformity of their natural disposition. The courtesy of those who follow Jesus is the unaffected expression of a poor and contrite spirit. V. To this may be added vigilance. It watches for opportunities of exertion, yet is not troublesome-not officious. It originates in a certain kindness of heart which may be called the wakefulness of love. Lessons:1. Courtesy is a duty of more than human obligation. A breach of good manners is therefore not merely a departure from an arbitrary rule imposed by the fashion of the world, but a breach of charity. It is a violation of the law of love. 2. Courtesy to man is perfectly consistent with faithfulness to God. A good soldier of Jesus Christ must bear his testimony against sin; but our subject prescribes the manner only of so doing. 3. Man cannot practice Christian courtesy till he has renounced the world; for the world is not the school in which true politeness can be acquired. To be kind to the evil and to the unthankful is a lesson of heavenly wisdom. (J. Summerfield, M. A.) Minor morals When the writer was a boy, there was in his neighbourhood a stable where a troublesome horse was kept. This horse had a most inveterate habit of kicking. His owner, however, took care always to explain that though his horse was a furious kicker, “ it did not mean anything.” Poor consolation certainly to anybody who received a kick-that the horse had no particular ill-will to him! It was just a way it had! Since we grew up to manhood, we have discovered that the quadruped in question was the type of many bipeds. Some Christians have a genial disposition which falls like sunshine on all around them. Such a man was Wilberforce; we wish there were more of this class-“ Gentle unto all men, apt to teach; patient.” “ He is a good man at bottom, but has a troublesome temper,” is a character which has many representatives in the Church. And for such the apology is usually made that “ it is just their way!” Their way, forsooth! and is that all that grace is doing in them? There is certainly much to annoy in this world of ours. We are engaged, for instance, in some matter of business which requires concentration of thought, when we are interrupted by a visitor whose errand is of the most commonplace description. We feel a rising irritation at the unreasonable intrusion, but the text, “ Be pitiful, be courteous,” forces us into complacency, and we are the better for the lesson. Or we are enjoying that very pleasant thing, a busy leisure, say on some quiet Saturday evening, when some acquaintance for whom we have no particular esteem looks in, “ just to pass an hour or two, knowing that we were not likely to be engaged.” This is a little provoking, no doubt, and we are apt to give our visitor a very cold shake of the hand, till, “ Be pitiful, be courteous,” sounds in our conscience, and we perhaps discover at the close of the evening that we have had a valuable opportunity both for giving and getting advice. Did either of those visitors intend to annoy us? No, by no means. The inconvenience in both cases arose from ourselves, and not from our visitors. How very unreasonable, therefore, would it have been in us to get angry at them, and send them away smarting under some cutting words, in all likelihood to be our enemies forever after! One advice we would give; it is the result of experience. If you really are so engaged that you cannot afford a visitor a few minutes’ conversation, tell him so. Do it plainly, frankly, politely; and you may be sure that he will be thankful to you for preventing him intruding unreasonably on your time. We pass, however, to another class of cases. We remember hearing it said of the manager of a bank, who died many years ago, that he could say “ no” with a better grace than most men could say “ yes.” He spoke what was painful in the least painful manner possible. How much does usefulness in the world depend on manner! Often have we seen a harsh manner destroy much good. And living examples there are everywhere of Christian men who would have done much good but for that abominable manner of theirs. No doubt there is an opposite extreme-a silky, whining, namby-pambyism, which in the eyes of all sensible people is despised as silly and suspicious. This, however, is much rarer than the bad manner-the icy coldness, or suspecting distance, or rudeness of the rough Christian. Some years ago a friend of ours was in an omnibus passing from the heart of our city to one of the suburbs. The omnibus stopped to pick up a passenger, who, from being welcomed by the others, was evidently well known and esteemed. Our friend admired the hearty old man, who had a kind word for everybody; and his kind words were evidently considered compliments, though spoken in broad Scotch. From some words that dropped from him, he was evidently a man of unusual talent, and a Christian. Our friend wondered who he could be, and all the more as the unknown, with the most polite attention, gave a poor servant girl some information which she desired about a house she had been told to call at. Who could this lovable yet mysterious stranger be? It was Dr. Chalmers. The genial old man had room in his large heart for sympathy and kindness to all. If we are to do good to all as we have opportunity, we must abound in kind words. Passing along the street a few days ago, we saw a little child who had tripped his foot, and fallen down. He was crying over his distress. We lifted him up, instinctively saying, “ Poor little fellow!” These little words of sympathy were very cheap, but they brushed away his tears, and spread sunshine over his face again. The poorest on earth can say a kind word to his struggling brother or sister; and who can tell the good that may be done by a single kind word? It may cheer an inquiring sinner; it may send a faint believer on his way rejoicing. (D. Dickson.) Christian courtesy The words “ courtesy” and “ courteousness” are derived from the term “ court,” and are used, in their primitive sense, to describe that refinement of manners which prevails in the palaces of princes and distinguishes the intercourse of the great; and because, from the corruption of courts, those who move in them have often used the manner and phraseology of respect when feelings directly the reverse have been rankling in the heart, the terms themselves have been associated in many minds with all that belongs to flattery, insincerity, and falsehood. Courtesy unquestionably refers to all that belongs to affability of manner in intercourse with one another; but Christian Courtesy involves along with it the internal principle from which that affability should proceed. All true courtesy presupposes the principle of benevolence, or goodwill towards men; a desire to promote, and complacency in, the happiness of others. It has been called “ benevolence in trifles” -a care in little things, in words and manner and acts, by minute attention, to guard the feelings and to consult the comfort and happiness of others. It comprehends a readiness to conform to their tastes and habits in matters of indifference, an obvious preference of their accommodation to our own; a solicitude to avoid whatever may give pain, when no principle forbids; and, in short, a constant endeavour to prevent pain and impart pleasure. I. Let us, then, examine some different aspects of courtesy. Towards superiors it is respect and deference; towards inferiors it is condescension and civility; towards equals it is bland and affable attention. Or we shall see better what it is by looking at its opposites. Christian courtesy stands opposed to gross defects and errors in the behaviour. In relation, for instance, to superiors, it is opposed not only to impertinence and presumption, but to obsequiousness. In relation to inferiors it stands opposed to coldness, to neglect, to pride, to positive contempt of them altogether, or a disregard of their feelings. In relation to equals it stands opposed to moroseness, or an unwillingness to be conciliated; to sullenness, or a kind of settled gloom of countenance and carriage; to impertinence of remark and rudeness of reply; to inattention of two kinds, inattention either positive or negative that is, either to do something for others, or kindly to receive what is done for us. It stands opposed to whatever is eccentric, or the indulgence of what is not tolerated by the general usages of society. It stands opposed to fretfulness-that is, the art of determining never to be pleased, and the want of disposition even to appreciate the sacrifices made for the very purpose of promoting their pleasure. Finally, it stands opposed to pride-to pride of family, to pride of intellect, to pride of money, to pride of accomplishments, and to the worst of all pride-the pride of spiritual pretensions. It is to be observed that the possession of this virtue in full play implies two things. It implies that benevolence exists in the mind of the individual as a principle; not merely as a fluctuating feeling, according to the flow of the spirits and the circumstances of the day, but as a principle-that is, the steady purpose of the reason, based upon the remembrance of the relation of man and man, and a just regard to the will of God. It implies, secondly, that it is so regular as to be habitual; that an occasion of failure from a sudden irruption of what remains, either of unsanctified or incurable depravity, is felt and lamented; that an endeavour to repair the injury accompanies the neglect; and that the principle is reestablished in the moment of the judgment regaining the ascendency. Let us now observe more particularly the sphere in which this virtue is to act and to display itself; of course, this is commensurate with our social relations, but we may mention some a little more particularly.1. It should be seen in the family, and should regulate the intercourse of kindred. Here it is the mode of manifesting love, properly so called; and it preserves and purifies affection, by requiring that its expression be respectful and delicate; it keeps it from being disordered and debased by vulgar familiarity; it prompts to little ingenious devices, by which it is sustained. 2. But, further, the virtue to which I refer should be seen in the Church. As far as the present condition of society allows, it will promote among the members of a church the expression of interest and sympathy. 3. Again, it should accompany the Christian into the world. In the transaction of business a Christian should be distinguished by a readiness to oblige, and a carefulness to observe whatever may diffuse pleasure and give satisfaction. In social and familiar intercourse it requires to be often and habitually observed. But I remark, more particularly, that in argumentative conversation courtesy is eminently required. It should make us fair in argument, just to objections, calm in reply, capable of combining affability of manner with firmness of opinion, and respect for conscience with opposition to mistake. It should lead us to despise a spirit of personality. But two observations still remain. (1) I wish it, then, not to be supposed that Christian courtesy extinguishes all strong feeling, and forbids the excited and powerful expressions of benevolence. Goodwill towards man implies no approval of his vices; love to humanity does not destroy distinctions of character. (2) Neither is it to be supposed that courtesy to others involves a forgetfulness of what we owe to ourselves, or a just sense of what others owe to us. There are two extreme opposites to which the man whose courtesy is Christian and conscientious cannot go; and, therefore, his character may sometimes be mistaken. He cannot give, as is said in Scripture, “ flattering words” -that is one extreme. And he cannot return “ railing for railing” -that is another. In this descriptive account of courtesy it may not be amiss to make a remark, suggested by our Lord’ s conduct. It is to be distinctly noticed that in all His allusions to publicans and sinners He never uttered anything against them like the language He employed towards the Pharisees; it was their profession of religion, in connection with their vices, which called forth His terrible rebuke. Now, from this circumstance we learn that in the exercise of courtesy a greater degree of it may be expressed towards decidedly worldly characters than towards inconsistent professors of religion. II. The obligations under which we lie to the cultivation of this Christian grace.1. In the first place, it rests upon the very same authority with every other part of the Divine law. God has expressly enjoined it; and we are thus, at once, in possession of the most infallible of all arguments to vindicate its propriety. 2. Secondly, to Divine authority we join Divine example. Our Lord during His incarnation exemplified this virtue. 3. In the third place, to the example of our Divine Master we add some of the examples of eminent saints. Abraham, when he stood up before his dead and “ bowed himself to the people of the land” ; Solomon’ s bearing towards the Queen of Sheba, rising and paying her distinguished regard; many of the prophets, from their deportment to the kings, though armed with messages to which the monarchs had to bow; but, above all, Paul-Paul, the most distinguished for zeal as an apostle, was the most remarkable for courtesy as a man. 4. I conclude this part of the subject by simply repeating a few passages of Scripture, which either especially inculcate or obviously involve the exercise of the duty. I merely enumerate them: “ Be gentle towards all men.” “ Let all wrath, and anger, and clamour, and malice, and evil speaking, be put away from you; and be ye kind one to another, with brotherly love, in honour preferring one another.” “ Look not every man on his own things, but every man also on the things of others” ; that is, avoid selfishness, and cultivate courteousness and reciprocal sympathy. “ Let each man please his neighbour to his good for edification.” “ Let your speech be always with grace.” “ Give honour to whom honour is due.” “ Honour the king.” “ Honour all men; love the brotherhood.” “ Give none offence to any man, neither to Jew nor Gentile, nor to the Church of God.” “ Let love be without dissimulation.” III. Inducements to the exercise.1. Now, in the first place, in relation to this virtue of courteousness, we may begin with the very lowest by remarking that an inducement to the cultivation of courtesy towards others arises from the pleasure we experience when it is exercised towards ourselves. We cannot help being conciliated by attention when it seems to be sincere. It prepossesses us in favour of a person. It removes prejudices which we entertain. 2. Secondly, the consciousness of the power should lead us to reflect that others may be acutely pained by little omissions and acts of which it is possible we were not aware at the moment, and by which we meant no evil. 3. In the third place, another inducement, equally worthy the attention of persons professing godliness, arises from the effect which a courteous or an opposite behaviour may have upon men of the world. “ Let not your good,” says the apostle, “ be evil spoken of.” This want of courtesy often has the effect of destroying the influence of distinguished excellence, 4. Lastly, in looking at a character distinguished by this virtue in its real principle, as well as in its manifestation, we cannot but be impressed with the worth to which it conducts and the dignity it confers. It sup poses-in its higher state and more perfect exercises-it supposes a very great degree of self-government, a noble superiority to little weaknesses, by which many are characterised. 5. In fine, we should discover an inducement to this duty in the charm with which, when sincere, it embellishes existence. If all mankind were perfect in the principle and expression of courtesy, the world would be the scene of perfect and exalted felicity. (T. Binney.) True courtesy, and how to attain to it I have sometimes seen in the neighbourhood of large towns streets of houses half-built; the foundations have been laid, the walls run up, the roof put on; but the mere shell is there, with no window frames, no flooring laid on the joists, no paper on the walls, etc. It seems to me that there are many men and women whose lives have been built up by religion about as far as these unfinished houses. They have sterling goodness, they are sober, the foundation is there; but oh! for a little paper and furniture to add comfort and softness, some of the graces of life, and especially the grace of Christian courtesy. I. Distinguish true courtesy from false imitations of it.1. We must distinguish true Christian courtesy from snobbishness. Many people think that to be courteous means to bow down to a man who has a longer purse, a better coat, or bluer blood than they have. 2. Again, we must not mix up this grace with the mere observance of certain elaborate and artificial rules of etiquette, which men who are occupied all day long with hard work, and who are naturally simple and direct in their way of life, dislike. 3. Courtesy is the natural result of grasping the second great principle of the Christian religion, “ Thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself.” Grasp the thought that your neighbour has as much claim to your respectful consideration as you have yourself, and you will become courteous. This consideration will be tempered by a further feeling, produced by the actual position of the person towards whom it is extended. Towards woman the consideration is tempered with tenderness, and becomes chivalry. Towards great leaders in state, religion, literature, art, it is qualified by respect. II. Point out plainly our deficiencies in it. Are husbands always courteous towards their wives? There is a neglect, it is to be feared, of this virtue sometimes among Christian Churches. Nonconformists and Church people are not always courteous to one another. Then there is often discourtesy in politics. But why should we impute wrong motives to political opponents? Lastly, is there not room for more courtesy between class and class? Is there not something of an aggressive tone in the “ I-am-as-good-as-you” manner of some of us towards those who are richer than ourselves? Of course, you are as good, if by “ good” you mean that your soul and your rights are as precious in God’ s sight. But why needlessly flaunt this in the face of those who have no desire to question it? Those who are poor need not be servile nor blunt. “ Be courteous.” III. How shall we attain to this spirit of Christian courtesy? The only true way of attaining to it is by living in the Spirit of Jesus Christ. (C. H. Irwin, M. A.) Christian courtesy The precept of the text does not, indeed, belong to the highest order of Christian precepts. It does not rank with self-denial, purity of heart, patience, forgiveness of injuries, love of the brethren, love to Christ Himself, and heavenly mindedness; yet it enjoins a duty of very great importance, and of everyday use. The demands for courtesy are continually occurring. Every person with whom we have intercourse may give an occasion for the observance or neglect of it. It is, moreover a duty which every man has it in his power to perform. It costs nothing. I. The nature of courtesy as a Christian duty. II. Its beneficial effects on society. III. The strength which it adds to Christian principle. Courtesy, as a Christian duty, is, in fact, nothing more or less than a particular exercise of Christian love. It is one of the outward acts wherein is manifested that disposition of heart which the new commandment of Jesus Christ inculcates. Yet, as courtesy is but the out ward expression of that inward excellence, it may be shown by those in whose hearts the grace of love does not dwell. The very same things to which love would prompt may be done on lower grounds, and from inferior motives. Indeed, the perfection of good breeding is simply this, that it makes a man seem to be what love causes him to be indeed. But then, where the principle of Christian love is wanting, the courtesy which springs from mere good breeding is very partial and very irregular-sometimes it falls short of the mark, at other times it goes beyond it; towards inferiors it is often scanty in its attentions; towards superiors, excessive. “ The poor,” says Solomon, “ useth entreaties, but the rich answereth roughly.” This is but too true where the intercourse between these two grand classes of mankind is regulated by no higher law than the law of politeness. But it is the character of Christian love in no case to behave itself unseemly. Shall I answer such a one roughly because he wears a coarser garment or feeds on meaner fare? Politeness may not forbid it; but Christian love surely will. There is another irregularity in the courtesies of politeness which is not found in those of love. It is one main office of courtesy to keep in check those petulant tempers which, wherever they are not checked, create uneasiness and give offence. Now, if there is any place where it is peculiarly important that a man should restrain these tempers, it is at home. Yet good breeding, which leads a man to curb his sullen humours when he is abroad, by a strange contradiction suffers him to let them loose at home. And here I would observe that the good which is done by Christian courtesy is also done by the imitation of it. The counterfeit, when well executed, passes current, and produces the same effect as the sterling coin. It is here just the same as in the case of almsgiving; the alms which are given from ostentation do the same good as those which are given from love. It makes a great difference to the giver, but none at all to the receiver. Take courtesy on the very lowest ground: suppose there to be nothing of Christian love in it, yet think what it prevents that is contrary to love. Many a quarrel has arisen, and many a deadly feud been caused by the mere absence of courtesy. Where courtesy prevails, no affronts are offered, no feelings are wounded; nothing is said or done which can provoke to wrath. And the benefits hence arising are incalculable. But the most important view of courtesy is that which we proceed, in the third place, to consider, viz., the strength which it gives to Christian principle. Here, however, I must premise that it must be a Christian principle itself before such a principle can be strengthened by its exercise. It must proceed from love, or it cannot strengthen love. And in making this inquiry we may observe that where courtesy is not there is reason to suspect that love is wanting also. It is true some minds are cast in a rough mould, and cover much substantial kindness under a rough exterior. It is pity it ever should be so; and when it is so, the reality of Christian love appearing in so questionable a shape is not lightly to be taken for granted. Is the grace of God to do nothing for a man? These are considerations well worth being weighed by those who would excuse their want of courtesy upon the plea of a naturally rugged temper. It behoves such to examine themselves whether they be in the faith. Courtesy alone is not sufficient to prove a man a true Christian.1. In the first place, then, is your courtesy irrespective of persons, shown to the poor as well as to the rich? 2. Does not your courtesy sometimes go beyond the mark, as well as fall short of it? Does it not sometimes degenerate into flattery or a hypocritical gentleness? If, on fairly considering these questions, you have good reason to conclude that the spirit of Christian love does indeed dwell in you, be thankful for so excellent a gift, and let it exercise itself in truthful courtesy as much as possible. By every such exercise the principle of love itself is strengthened. Such is the very law of our nature. And though this courtesy does not of itself take so high a rank as the other graces which have been mentioned, though it is a very familiar, and may be thought trivial thing, yet it has this advantage, that the opportunities which it affords for the increase of love are far more numerous than those which can be obtained from any other source. They are continually occurring. Rut two things are to be remembered. It has been already shown that love must be formed in the heart before it can be exercised. From what source, then, does love proceed? It springs front faith in the Lord Jesus Christ, and from nothing else. But though I say this, I would observe, in the last place, that I do not mean by so speaking to shut out the continued agency of the Holy Spirit in strengthening the principle of love, nor the necessity of prayer for the supply of that Spirit. (J. Fawcett, M. A.) Christian politeness 1. There is a reciprocal action between an outward deportment and the radical condition of the heart. Religion is real refinement. It is not surface work, but begins within, with the motives of the heart. It acts outward, and then reacts inward, as the root shoots upward into the branch, and then, by pruning the branches, the life of the root in turn is improved. As Demosthenes said of oratory, so may we say of religion-action is of the first and last importance. 2. A great deal of Christian kindness is pent up by solid stiffness of life, and so inoperative. Therefore, manners should be studied. A spring of pure water may be obstructed by leaves and twigs, and so is the stream of inward affection clogged by outward hindrances in its manifestation. 3. Considerateness is an essential element of Christian politeness. “ Be pitiful, be courteous.” It is because your neighbour is weaker and ready to halt that you “ make straight paths,” etc. (Hebrews 12:13). (Hugh S. Carpenter, D. D.) True courtesy General Lee was in the cars going to Richmond one day, and was seated at the end farthest from the door. The other seats were filled with officers and soldiers. An old woman, poorly dressed, entered at one of the stations, and, finding no seat, and none having been offered to her, approached the end where the general was seated. He immediately rose and gave her his seat. Instantly there was a general rising, each one offering his seat to the general. But he calmly said, “ No, gentlemen, if there was no seat for the infirm old woman, there can be none for me.” The effect was remarkable. One after another got out of the ear. The seats seemed to be too hot for them. The general and the old lady soon had the car to themselves. The Hon. Daniel Webster was walking with a friend in Washington, when a coloured man passing by bowed very low to him. Mr. Webster returned as deep an obeisance. “ Do you bow in that way to a darkey?” asked his friend. “ Would you have me outdone in politeness by a negro?” replied the great statesman. And in his reply there is great wisdom. None of us can afford to be outdone in this by one of either a poorer or richer position. Good manners There has been for many years now in England a depreciation of the courtesies of manners as old-fashioned and out of place. We agree with Locke, “ Good manners are the blossoms of good sense, and, it may be added, of good feeling too.” Up-right and down-straight people need not diminish these excellent qualities, but they might often remember that politeness is not all French polish. (W. M. Statham.) The reward of courtesy A few years ago, a couple of gentlemen, one of whom was a foreigner, visited the various locomotive workshops of Philadelphia. They called at the most prominent one first, stated their wishes to look through the establishment, and made some inquiries of a specific character. They were shown through the premises in a very indifferent manner; and no special pains were taken to give them any information beyond what their own inquiries drew forth. The same results followed their visits to the several large establishments. By some means they were induced to call at one of a third or fourth-rate character. The owner was himself a workman of limited means; but, on the application of the strangers, his natural urbanity of manner prompted him not only to show all he had, but to enter into detailed explanation of the working of his establishment. The gentleman left him not only favourably impressed towards him, but with a feeling that he thoroughly understood his business. Within a year, he was surprised with an invitation to visit St. Petersburg. The result was, his locomotive establishment was removed there bodily. It was an agent of the Czar who had called on him. He has recently returned, having accumulated a princely fortune, and still receives from his Russian workshops a hundred thousand dollars a year, and has laid the foundation of the largest fortune in this country: and all are the results of civility to a couple of strangers. When Zachariah Fox, the great merchant of Liverpool, was asked by what means he contrived to realise so large a fortune as he possessed, his reply was, “ Friend, by one article alone, in which thou mayest deal too, if thou pleasest-civility.” Politeness During the American War of Independence an old lady, who had a store in Philadelphia, used to say that the most profitable thing she kept in her shop was politeness, it drew the very children to her even better than sweeties. What was it that gave Miss Nightingale such powerful control over the soldiers and seamen in the hospitals during the Crimean war, so that they would have done any thing for her in their power; and in her presence they would not have uttered a single coarse, vulgar, profane, or improper word. It was, no doubt, largely owing to her refined, cultured, polite manner, dominated by a truly Christian spirit. The true gentleman does not indict pain It is almost a definition of a gentleman to say that he is one who never inflicts pain. He is mainly occupied in merely removing the obstacles which hinder the free and unembarrassed action of those about him, and he concurs with their movements rather than takes the initiative himself. He care fully avoids whatever may cause a jar or a jolt in the minds of those with whom he is cast-all clashing of opinion, or collision of feeling, all restraint, or suspicion, or gloom, or resentment; his great concern being to make every one at their ease and at home. He has his eyes on all his company; he is tender towards the bashful, gentle towards the distant, and merciful towards the absent. He guards against unseasonable allusions, or topics which may irritate. He has no ears for slander or gossip, is scrupulous in imputing motives to those who interfere with him, and interprets everything for the best. (J. H. Newman, D. D.) True politeness Here is an illustration of true politeness exhibited by both classes of society. One day, in hastily turning the corner of a crooked street in the city of London, a young lady ran with great force against a ragged little beggar boy, and almost knocked him down. Stopping as soon as she could, she turned round and said, very kindly, to the boy, “ I beg your pardon, my little fellow; I am very sorry that I ran against you.” The poor boy was astonished. He looked at her for a moment in surprise, and then, taking off about three-quarters of a cap, he made a low bow and said, while a broad, pleasant smile spread itself all over his face, “ You can have my parding, miss, and welcome; and the next time you run agin me, you may knock me clean down, and I won’ t say a word.” After the lady had passed on he returned to his companion and said, “ I say, Jim, it’ s the first time I ever had anybody ask my parding, and it’ s kind o’ took me off my feet.” (E. J. Hardy, M. A.) Politeness is the oiled key that will open many a rusty lock. (J. C. Lees, D. D.) Small courtesies not overlooked When the Duke of Wellington was ill, the last thing he took was a little tea. On his servant’ s handing it to him in a saucer, and asking him if he would have it, the Duke replied, “ Yes, if you please.” These words were his last words. How much kindness and courtesy are expressed by them! He who had commanded the greatest armies in Europe did not despise or overlook the small courtesies of life. How many boys do! What a rude tone of command they often use to their little brothers and sisters, and sometimes to their mothers! This is ill bred, and shows a coarse nature and a hard heart. In all your home talk remember “ if you please.” Among your playmates don’ t forget “ if you please.” To all who wait upon you and serve you, believe that “ if you please” will make you better served than all the cross or ordering words in the whole dictionary. Don’ t forget three little words-“ if you please.” Politeness and its place Sir Arthur Helps had the happy faculty of putting expressions of wisdom into a few words. It was he who said, “ Familiarity should not swallow up courtesy.” Probably one half of the rudeness of youths of this day, that later in life will develop into brutality, is due to the failure of parents to enforce in the family circle the rules of courtesy. The son or daughter who is discourteous to members of the family because of familiarity with them is very likely to prove rude and overbearing to others, and very certain to be a tyrant in the household over which he or she may be called on to preside. There is at this day undeniably among the rising generation a lack of courteous demeanour in the family. Of all places in the world, let the boy under stand home is the place where he should speak the gentlest and be the most kindly, and there is the place above all where courteous demeanour should prevail. The lad who is rude to his sister, impertinent to his mother, and vulgar in the house, will prove a sad husband for a suffering wife, and a cruel father to unfortunate children. The place for politeness, as Helps puts it, is where we mostly think it superfluous. Goodness spoilt by rudeness Goodness with rude manners is in fact like a coquette; or a beautiful river that dives into dark coves and reappears; or a star with two faces; or an instrument that plays sweet and angry tunes by turns. (Good Words.) Not rendering evil for evil.-Do not retaliate The old law of an eye for an eye is repealed, in favour of that nobler legislation which bids us do good to those that hate us, and pray for them who despitefully use and persecute us. Let us be like the rock on the wilderness march, which when smitten yielded water to the thirsty hosts. (F. B. Meyer.) Railing for railing To render railing for railing is to think to wash off dirt with dirt. (J. Trapp.) Fire does not extinguish fire Fire is not extinguished with fire, but with water; likewise wrong and hatred, not with retaliation, but with gentleness, humility, and kindness. (Chrysostom.) Good for evil While George Wishart in 1512 was descending the steps of Cowgate, Dundee, from preaching to the plague-stricken people, one of the priests, who determined to get rid of him, stood ready to strike him. George knew he meant no good. “ Friend, what would you?” and quick as thought wrested the dagger from the would be murderer’ s hand, and flung it on the ground. The bystanders now cried with indignation, “ Kill him, kill him, the murderer, the assassin!” and, drawing their dirks, they rushed on the priest. “ Stay, friends, harm him not.” And George Wishart bravely stood between the angry men and the scowling priest, who slunk against the wall, saved by the one he had sought to kill, whilst the reluctant citizens allowed him to get away unhurt. Called, that ye should inherit a blessing.- The work and wages of the Christian worker I. To bless is the Christian’ s work, for thereunto is he called.1. The first thing to be noted with regard to this blessing as the calling of the Christian is that it is conceived of not as a mere matter of words and form, but as something real and effective. In order to bless we must not only have goodwill, but we must also have sufficient power and suitable means at our command. Whom the Lord blesses he is blessed. And the manner of our blessing must be as His. Whom we bless must receive from us the blessing, and to do this we must bless him from the house of the Lord, with the Lord’ s blessing. 2. Again, to bless is to do something more than to bestow a gift. The multitude which pressed around Jesus and received from Him abundant food out of the five loaves and two fishes had obtained a precious gift, but it was a blessing in the true sense only to those who afterwards confessed before Jesus: Thou art the Christ the Son of the living God. The gift may be merely material; the blessing must be spiritual. The Lord blesses that man in whose soul He reveals His Son. These, then, are the leading characteristics of the blessings of the Lord-it is real and effective, and it is spiritual. Our Lord’ s life on earth from first to last was one continuous act of blessing as thus understood. And now as He is, so are we in this world. As Christ was called to bless, and has, in the fulfilment of His calling, blessed us, so we are called to follow in His steps, and bring to others the blessing which we ourselves enjoy. To continue Christ’ s work in the world, to be Christ’ s representatives upon the earth, this is at once the highest and the most comprehensive description of the Christian’ s rank and position. Seeing, then, that this is our heavenly calling, we ought to consider it, so that we may accomplish our calling, and by word and deed bless as we have been blessed. “ Our calling” -the phrase is well understood in the affairs of everyday life. Whatsoever a man’ s calling may be, upon that he is expected to concentrate his attention. The slave of Satan is diligent in doing his master’ s will, he yields his members as instruments of unrighteousness unto sin. Surely we must show a like diligence in our heavenly calling by yielding ourselves to God and our members as instruments of righteousness unto God. Our calling is to bless, and this calling we realise just in the measure in which we surrender ourselves to God, and put all our powers at His disposal, to be used by Him as instruments in His work of grace and salvation. II. We are called to bless, and we are encouraged to labour on in our calling by the assurance that we shall not miss the inheritance, We are called to bless that we may inherit a blessing. In the keeping of God’ s commandments there is a great reward. Simply to be called of God is to receive a blessing. But for the encouragement of the worker in the presence of those who render him evil and rail upon him, so that in his mission of blessing he may not become weary in well doing, the apostle assures him that even over and above the blessedness of being called to bless, there is blessing in store for him-an inheritance of blessing of which he shall have certain foretastes here and full experience in the bliss of heaven’ s rest. What is the blessing which those who bless inherit here and now?1. There is, first of all, the joy that comes from the assurance that we are obeying the command of Christ and realising His expressed desire. 2. Then, again, there is the joyful experience of a growing likeness to Christ. It is the truest joy of the disciple’ s heart to know that he is being conformed unto the image of the Saviour who is so dear to him. 3. And now, finally: What is the blessing which those who bless hope yet to enjoy amid the bliss of heaven? The fulness of the inheritance is entered upon only when all differences between us and the Heir have ceased. And in order that this consummation may be attained unto, we must go on prosecuting our calling, which is to bless as He blessed, who went about doing good, yearning over the unthankful and the evil whom He had come to seek and to save. (John Macpherson, M. A.) 1 Peter 3:10-11 He that will love life.The true life worth living The text is a quotation from a psalm (Psalms 34:12). The quotation in the original is slightly varied in the old Greek translation, and by St. Peter. One is tempted to wish that the R.V., instead of adopting “ he that would love life,” had just added a few letters to the Authorised translation. We should then read, “ he that willeth to love life,” that is, “ he whose deliberate will it is to love life; he who sets himself to love a life, which is true life.” Let us, then, address ourselves to the question now so often asked, “ Is life worth living?” I. What is meant by life? There are two words in the New Testament which, from the necessities of our language, are alike rendered “ life.” One of these words, βίος, signifies the principle of animal life, the things by which that life is preserved or gladdened, and the span of time through which it is continued. The other word belongs to a higher sphere, ζωή. It is the new life; which may be stunted or strengthened, as grace is used or abused; and which, after the resurrection, is to be clothed upon with a fitting framework. The question, then, for us as Christians really is, not whether life, in the New Testament sense of the word, ζωή, is worth living, but whether existence, βίος under mere animal or external conditions, is worth living? The last, no doubt, is an intricate question, and much may be said in favour of a reply in the negative. We may be reminded of the transitoriness of human existence. The vanity of our expectations may be appealed to, the compression of the successive objects of hope in the iron grasp of the coarse hand of necessity. The loss of those we love is a condition of advancing years. And this is accompanied by the protracted humiliation of the breaking up of the machine, by the sure martyrdom of gout, or of some other bodily torture. With this comes weariness of life. Much, very much, may of course be justly urged in mitigation of this pessimism. “ Life rightly used,” exclaimed a great statesman, “ has happiness for each of its ages.” The sweetnesses of domestic love; the pleasures of human society and friendship; the overplus of health over sickness and pain; activities, expectations, little surprises that come to the weariest lot; the air, the sky, the sunshine;-these, and a thousand like things, are woven into a contexture of no funereal tint. “ We bless Thee for our creation, preservation, and all the blessings of this life.” II. But about the answer to the question, is existence elevated into life worth living? We as Christians can make no doubt.1. Present acceptance makes life worth living. “ A tranquil God tranquillises all things, and to see His peacefulness is to be at peace.” 2. There are times of exquisite pleasure in communion with God. These compensate for the languor of old age and for the slow “ martyrdom of life.” 3. Nor must we forget the pleasure which there is in work for God. The study of Scripture is a perpetual delight for those who pursue it. The Church’ s sacramental life is full of joy. The teaching of the young, the ministry to the sick, the gathering in of the fallen, the adornment, the quickening, the elevation of service and worship, have pleasures of their own which give animation and variety to life. But what is to be said of one form of sorrow inseparable from true religion-the sorrow of repentance? “ That kind of sorrow is its own consolation” ; “ He has given a new kind of tears upon earth, which make those happy who shed them.” “ Oh that we could understand that the mystery of grace gives blessedness with tears!” 4. That life is worth living is, above all, proved by the view which Jesus took of it. Does He not say of Himself, “ My delights were with the sons of men” ? He is in some measure (if we may reverently say it) like a great artist, when, after the preparatory toil and thought, his idea stands out before him in its definite unity and beauty, and he cannot rest for joy until it smiles before him in marble, or is fixed in the music of deathless lines. No doubt human life is tragic and pathetic, yet there is a magic smile on the face of the drama after all. (Bp. Alexander.) The way to secure good days I. A reasonable desire. We have, in common with the beasts the intense desire to preserve our lives, a natural shrinking from death; and it would be easy to show you the important place of this universal sentiment in the Divine economy. It is indeed the basis of society; the secret of man’ s right relations with his brother. For his jealousy in guarding the treasure of his own life makes him careful to preserve the treasure of life for his brother. But it may be thought that the supreme interest which the Christian has in the life to come should make him indifferent to the continuance of this life. But that notion belongs to extravagant sentiment, and has no countenance from Bible teachings. It is only morbid feeling that leads to ill-speaking of present scenes and opportunities. But St. Peter uses another expression for the befitting Christian desire. A man should hope for “ good days” : days filled up with goodness, in the sense of good doings, and consequent good enjoyings. Ours cannot be “ good days” unless we enjoy a fair measure of health, have useful occupation, and the pleasure of loving friendships. II. This reasonable desire attained. The apostle lays down three conditions, and they are all thoroughly practical.1. He who would see good days will have to rule his speech: “ let him refrain his tongue from evil, and his lips that they speak no guile.” If we would see how this “ ruling of our speech” stands related to “ seeing good days,” let us think how many of the misunderstandings and separations and troubles of our lives have come out of hasty, unwise, unkind, impure speeches. 2. He will have to order his conduct. And that involves work of two kinds, each closely related to the other. As soon as we take our life into our hands, and resolve to get it into fair shape, we find there is much to cut off. The attaining of good ever goes along with the clearing out of evil. And this makes the moral conflict of our lives. We must be doing good, seeking good, filling up our lives with good, that evil cannot even squeeze in edgeways. Activity in goodness is our safeguard. Temptation gains its effective power upon the idlers. 3. He will have to tone his relations. “ Let him seek peace, and ensue it.” By peace we must understand peaceableness, the spirit of the peacemaker, gentle, considerate, charitable. (The Weekly Pulpit.) Let him refrain his tongue from evil. The words of our lips Most important among Christian duties is control of the tongue, and yet it is much neglected. Many who would hesitate to do a foolish or wicked thing do not scruple to say what is both unwise and wrong. I. Let us guard against the unkind word of every class. II. Another which we must guard against is the discontented word. Count up God’ s mercies and blessings every day, and you cannot murmur. III. Let us guard against the untruthful word of every kind. A lie is no less a lie because it is printed in a prospectus, or written up in a shop window. (H. J. Wilmot Buxton, M. A.) The evil of the tongue “ From evil.” This is a large field, the evil of the tongue; but I give it too narrow a name: we have good warrant to give it a much larger-a whole universe, a world of iniquity; a vast bulk of evils, and great variety of them, as of countries on the earth or creatures in the world. There be in the daily discourses of the greatest part of men many things that belong to this world of evil, and yet pass unsuspected, so that we do not think them to be within its compass, not using due diligence and exactness in our discoveries of the several parts of it, although it is all within ourselves, yea, within a small part of ourselves, our tongues.1. Profane speech, that which is grossly and manifestly wicked; and in this part lie impious speeches, which directly reflect upon the glory and name of God; blasphemies and oaths and cursings, of which there is so great, so lamentable abundance amongst us; and to these join scoffs and mockings at religion, also impure or filthy speaking, which either pollutes or offends the hearers, and is the noisome breath of a rotten, polluted heart. 2. Consider next, as another grand part of the tongue, uncharitable speeches, tending to the defaming and disgrace of others; and these are likewise of two sorts-open railings and reproaches, secret slander and detraction. The former is unjust and cruel, but it, is somewhat the less dangerous because open. It is a fight in plain field; but truly it is no piece of a Christian’ s warfare to encounter it in the same way. But the other kind, detraction, is more universal amongst all sorts, as being a far easier way of mischief. The former are the arrows that fly by day, but this is the pestilence that walketh in darkness; it spreads and infects secretly and insensibly, is not felt, but in the effects of it; and it works either by calumnies altogether forged and untrue, of which malice is inventive, or by the advantage of real faults, of which it is very discerning, and these are stretched and aggravated to the utmost. 3. Vain, fruitless speeches are an evil of the tongue. Not only those they call harmless lies, which some people take a pleasure in and trade much in, light buffooneries and foolish jestings, but the greatest part of those discourses which men account the blameless entertainments one of another, come within the compass of this evil; frothy, unsavoury stuff, tending to no purpose nor good at all. 4. Doubleness and guile; so great a part, that it is here particularly named a part, though the evil of it is less known and discerned; and so there is in it, as I may say, much terra incognita; yet it is of a very large compass, as large, we may confidently say, as all the other three together. What of men’ s speech is not manifestly evil in any of the other kinds is the most of it naught this way; speech good to appearance, plausible and fair, but not upright; not silver, but silver dross, as Solomon calls it (Proverbs 26:23); each, some way or other, speaking falsehood and deceit to his neighbour; and daring to act thus falsely with God in His services; religious speeches abused by some in hypocrisy, as holy vestments, for a mask or disguise; doing nothing but compassing him about with lies, deceiving indeed ourselves, while we think to deceive Him who cannot be deceived and will not be mocked. But to add something for remedy of these evils in some part discovered-for to vanquish this world of evils is a great conquest-it must begin at the heart, otherwise it will be but a mountebank cure, a false, imagined conquest. The weights and wheels are there, and the clock strikes according to their motion. A guileful heart makes guileful tongue and lips. It is the work house, where is the forge of deceits and slanders and other evil speakings; and the tongue is only the outer shop where they are vended, and the lips of the door of it; so then such ware as is made within, such and no other, can be set out. In like manner, a purified heart will unteach the tongue all filthy, impure speeches, and will give it a holy strain; and the spirit of charity and humility will banish that mischievous humour, which sets so deep in the most, of reproaching and disgracing others in any way, either openly or secretly; for it is wicked self-love and pride of heart whence these do spring, searching and disclosing the failings of others, on which love will rather cast a mantle to hide them. Be choice in your society, sit not with vain persons, whose tongues have nothing else to utter but impurity or malice or folly. But frequent the company of grave and godly persons, in whose hearts and lips piety and love and wisdom are set, and it is the way to learn their language. Use a little of the bridle in the quantity of speech. Incline a little rather to sparing than lavishing, for “ in many words there wants not sin.” In the use of the tongue, when thou dost speak, divert it from evil and guile by a habit of and delight in profitable and gracious discourse. Thus St. Paul makes the opposition (Ephesians 4:29): Let there be no corrupt or rotten communication; and yet he urges not total silence, but enjoins such speech as “ may edify and minister grace unto the hearers.” And are not such discourses much more worthy the choosing than the base trash we usually fill one another’ s ears with? An excellent task for the tongue is that which David chooseth, “ And my tongue shall speak of Thy righteousness, and of Thy praise all the day long.” Were the day ten days long, no vacant room for any unholy or offensive or feigned speech! And they lose not who love to speak praise to Him! for He loves to speak peace to them; and instead of the world’ s vain tongue liberty, to have such intercourse and discourse is no sad, melancholy life, as the world mistakes it. (Abp. Leighton.) Speak no guile.- Veracity One of the attributes by which the Most High specially desires Himself to be known by His intelligent universe is absolute and unchanging veracity. Whatever He reveals to us He would have us receive as the pure and simple verity. Whatever He has promised, though heaven and earth should pass away, He will assuredly perform. In this attribute of inviolable truth God commands us to be imitators of Him. He wills us never to utter anything but the exact verity. In the commandment given to our race by Moses it is written, “ Thou shalt not bear false witness.” In the text, as in other places, He has promised His special favour to those that speak no guile. Our Lord Himself has declared that liars are the children of the devil; for he is a liar, and the father of lies. It is manifest that these teachings have not been without effect wherever the Bible has been openly and plainly spread before the people. Wherever the Word of God is freely circulated, and generally read, a barefaced and habitual liar is rarely to be met with among men who lay any claim to the respect of their fellow citizens. While, however, such cases are rare, I fear that indirect, and what are termed minor variations from strict veracity, are by no means uncommon. The law of absolute veracity would require that we should utter nothing but the perfect verity. We are, however, limited in comprehension, and imperfect in knowledge. To this our imperfection the law of God has respect, and it requires of us no more than our nature can perform. But some one may ask, Are we obliged to tell every one whom we meet all that we know and all that we are thinking about? Do we violate the law of veracity because we do not make a confidant of every companion, or reveal all our thoughts even to our most intimate friends? We may ask ourselves, and it would be well if we asked ourselves much oftener, whether it is or is not our duty to speak. If we decide, either from moral or prudential reasons, that it is our duty to be silent, it is clear that the law of veracity has no command to utter. If we, on the other hand, decide that it is our duty to speak, then the law pronounces its decision, and forbids us to speak anything but the truth. But the inquiry may arise, Are we always obliged, when we speak, to speak the whole truth? If we intend to convey the impression that what we say is the whole truth, when we know that it is only a part, we violate the law of veracity. If we have no such intention, but merely relate the fact as a fact, without any design to create any other impression, then we are innocent. The same law applies to promises. A promise is the expression of our intention to do something, with the design of creating in another the expectation that it will be done. Simply to express an intention is not to make a promise. If, in the course of ordinary conversation, I happen to mention my purpose to leave town tomorrow, this is not a promise, for I did not intend to create an expectation. If I not only say that I am going, but enter into an engagement with another to accompany him, this constitutes a promise. We are morally bound to fulfil the expectation which we have voluntarily created. If a moral obligation exists, it must be fulfilled. If a doubt remains, we must decide against ourselves, or leave the question to the decision of others. In no other manner can we retain our love of veracity unimpaired. By the habit of deciding doubtful cases in our own favour, selfishness gains the victory over our love of truth, and, before we are aware of it, we become reckless of our obligations and regardless of the sanctity of our word. And here, again, it may be asked-for questions on this subject seem to be almost innumerable-Are we bound to fulfil to the letter every promise which we make, even when it is without any condition? I would not say even so much as this. The very object for which the promise was made may have become unattainable, and of course the whole engagement falls to the ground. But if I break an engagement from idleness, or because I prefer at the moment to read some book which happens to interest me, I am guilty. It is of no avail to say my friend will excuse it: this may be, but it alters not the fact that I have trifled with my conscience, degraded my moral nature, and sinned against God. All this should plainly teach us several important lessons. In the first place, a promise should always, if possible, be definite, and distinctly understood by both parties. Again, if there be from a necessity a contingency, this contingency should be as accurately defined as the promise itself. And, lastly, when we are in doubt respecting the validity of any obligation-that is, when there is a conflict in our minds between the claims of veracity and those of interest and convenience-it is always safe to decide in favour of veracity. This may, it is true, cost us trouble, and sometimes apparently useless trouble, but it will confirm our virtue and teach us practical wisdom. Such, then, is the law of God, revealed to us in the Scriptures. But, let us ask, Is this law obeyed? Let us glance at a few of the occasions which give rise to the violation of the precept, and we shall see how easily men are seduced into disobedience to the law of God.1. The inordinate love of wealth gives occasion to frequent violations of the plainest precepts of veracity. When large profits can be secured by falsehood, I am told that, in our large commercial centres, lying and even false swearing are matters of daily occurrence. The common adulteration of articles of traffic comes under the same condemnation. Men take every means to give to a worthless compound the appearance of a general product, and then solemnly declare it to be what they know it ,is not. Or we may come to facts which transpire every day, in every city and village in our land. The seller represents his goods as of the very best quality, and offers them to the buyer at a price which he declares to be scarcely above cost. The buyer, on the other hand, considers the quality inferior, the price unreasonable, and, at most, is willing to purchase only on a very long credit. The bargain is at length concluded, the goods are delivered, and the parties separate. All at once the language of these men is suddenly transformed. The seller is rejoicing that he has disposed of his merchandise at so handsome an advance, the buyer that he has received so good an article at so low a price. 2. Idle curiosity gives occasion to a large amount of false speaking. Many persons have an insatiable desire to know all the affairs of their neighbours, their likes and dislikes, their domestic arrangements, their opinions on all matters and of all persons, and thus to worm themselves into the most secret recesses of their confidence. This is commonly done from no malicious design-for such persons are commonly good natured-but from mere childish inquisitiveness. To accomplish our purpose, however, not a little management is necessary, and we are obliged to pretend to know already much of which we are entirely ignorant. This is the first departure from truth. We obtained our knowledge under the injunction of secrecy. But a secret which does not belong to us is not easily kept, for this intense desire to know is always accompanied by an equally intense desire to tell. We must reveal it to our intimate friends; and here is departure from truth the second. Or, again, we may meet with another person as inquisitive as ourselves, in whom we dare not confide, and whose prying curiosity we can elude in no other way than by falsehood or prevarication; here is departure the third. Thus the habit grows upon us. 3. Another frequent occasion for falsehood is found in the fear of speaking or acting at variance with received conventionalities. We express joy when we feel none. We counterfeit sadness when we suffer no sorrow. We use the expressions that are in vogue without any regard to the truthfulness of their application, but merely because we hear them used by others. Many a family has become habitual liars by the daily repetition of these conventional falsehoods. Children know that such language is false, and they must have more than usual virtue if they are not fatally corrupted. But some one will say, To do as you advise, and avoid the errors against which you have cautioned us, would require great care and intense watchfulness in all our conversation. We should be obliged to think before we speak, abandon many of the ordinary topics of discourse, and be content to improve men rather than amuse them. Be it so. In this we shall only follow the examples of better and wiser men. It was the prayer of David, “ Set a watch, O Lord, over my mouth; keep the door of my lips.” But you will say, To obey these precepts with strictness, to speak nothing but the simple verity, and utter only what God will approve, would render us very peculiar. The world lieth in wickedness, and how can a child of God live in it, and not be peculiar? Wicked men imitate the example of the father of lies; and can we be imitators of the God of truth without being peculiar? Was there ever a being on earth so peculiar as Jesus of Nazareth, the Author and Finisher of our faith? Unless the teachings of Christ exert their effect on our intercourse with our fellow men, what do we more than others? and how shall the world be the better or the wiser for our having lived in it? But, you will say, this is a lesson most difficult to be learned. It requires that we should be always on our guard, watching over ourselves with a vigilance such as we had never imagined. The gospel of Christ has provided for us all needful assistance. The cure must be performed in the inmost spirit, and the Spirit helpeth our infirmities. (F. Wayland.) Eschew evil.-The evil of sin This we must eschew, as the bullet shot out of a gun, or to be stricken with a sharp sword; we must abhor it, as a toad or poison; we must abhor it with a deadly, an utter hatred, and accordingly avoid it most carefully. (John Rogers.) Why sin must be avoided 1. God is thereby dishonoured (1 Samuel 15:23). 2. God’ s wrath is provoked, and that must needs be dangerous (Psalms 106:29; Jeremiah 7:17). 3. God hates it and such as commit it (Psalms 5:4; Deuteronomy 28:15; Leviticus 26:14) 4. It brought misery into the world, with shame and confusion upon all, and hath always been the cause of all evils. 5. It bringeth eternal destruction both of body and soul. (John Rogers.) All sins to be eschewed 1. We are to eschew all evil, even the least. 2. All persons are to eschew the same, not the greatest excepted; God’ s law binds them, be they princes, magistrates, ministers, etc. They should eschew it most, for by their example they do most hurt. 3. At all times. Some things be in season at one time, some at another, but sin is never in season. 4. In all places. God is the God of all places, neither can any place change the nature of sin. Thou must eschew sin as well abroad as at home; in thy house, chamber, shop, as well as at church. 5. All kinds of sin are also to be avoided. Error in judgment and wickedness in conversation, evil against God, our neighbours, or ourselves. 6. We must also avoid evil under what colour or pretence soever it comes. (John Rogers.) Dangers in life to be avoided I think we ought to buoy for ourselves in our course, as we buoy a harbour. Off this shoal a black buoy floats, and says to those who sail by, as plainly as if it spoke in all languages, “ Keep to the right here” ; and over against it floats another, and says, “ Keep to the left here.” Now, in life’ s ocean, wherever we know the quicksands are, wherever we have once been stranded, let us sink the buoy and anchor of memory, and keep to the right or the left, as the shoal may be. (H. W. Beecher.) Eschew evil and do good In an old English work entitled, “ Warwick’ s Spare Moments,” we find the following excellent remarks: “ When I plant a choyse flower in a fertile soyle, I see nature presently to thrust up with it the stinging nettle, the stinking hemlocks, the drowzie poppie, and many noysome weeds, which will either choake my plant with excluding the sunne, or divert its nourishment to themselves; but if I weed but these at first, my flower thrives to its goodnesse and glory. This is also my case when I endeavour to plant grace in the fertile soyle of a good wit; for luxurious nature thrusts up with it either stinging wrath, or stinking wantonnesse, or drowzie sloath, or some other vices, which robb my plant of its desired flourishing, but these being pluckt up, the good wit produceth, in its time, the faire flower of virtue. I will not, there fore, think the best wits, as they are wits, fittest to make the best men, but as they are the purged best wits. The ground of their goodnesse is, not the goodnesse of their wit’ s ground, the good weeding and cleansing it. I must first eschew the evill ere I can doe good; supplant vices, ere I can implant virtue.” And do good.-Christians must be doers of good 1. It is good and amiable of itself, as the Lord is. 2. God commands it, who is our Sovereign Lord and King. 3. All promises in Scripture of good things, here and hereafter, are made to well doing (Leviticus 26:1-46; Deuteronomy 28:1-68). 4. This brings us peace of conscience in this world. 5. This brings us to eternal happiness in the world to come (Matthew 7:21; John 5:29; Romans 2:10). 6. It is the glory of a man when he is dead. (John Rogers.) The extent of well-doing required 1. We must do all good that we can, and our places require, having respect unto all God’ s commandments (Psalms 119:6; Luke 1:6; 2 Kings 23:25). 2. We must do good at all times. Aguish fits of goodness, as before the Communion, or in afflictions, etc., God cares not for; He will have us to be ever doing some good. 3. We must do good in all places; not in the church only, but everywhere. 4. So in all companies we must do good, or take good; if we cannot do what we would, we must do What we can; it is some good to keep away evil. 5. We must do good to all persons, all duties towards God-publicly, privately, on His Sabbaths, on other days; so towards our families, neighbours, friends, superiors, inferiors, equals. We must do good as occasion offers itself, yea, towards our enemies, 6. We must do good in our general calling as Christians, by a holy conversation agreeable to our profession, and by our counsels, exhortations, admonitions, reproofs, prayers. We must do good also in our particular callings, as magistrates, ministers, husbands, wives, parents, masters, etc. 7. We must do good also, though it be hard and difficult so to do. If one way will not serve the turn, whereby to bring to pass our religious purposes, we must set upon another, as Luke 5:18. 8. We must do good, though we have no thanks for our labour, yea, though we have ill-will and hard measure. 9. We must do good also, though we have few encouragements and small company (Joshua 24:15). 10. We must do good while we may, while life and means last, yea and constantly. 11. We must also do the same in a particular faith, and in uprightness of heart, declaring the same by the reformation of our lives; and this must be in obedience to God, aiming at His glory, and not seeking ourselves, either in our profit, pleasure, or credit, etc., all which must be done willingly. (John Rogers.) Do good All are doing good or evil. Men are sowing to the flesh or to the spirit. Every man is working iniquity or righteousness. To do good is Godlike. The Most High has never left Himself without witness, in that “ He did good and gave us rain from heaven and fruitful seasons, filling our hearts with food and gladness.” We ought to be like God. Because God is holy, and perfect, and beneficent, we ought to be pure, and upright, and useful. To live for the good of others makes us like Christ. He went about doing good. He is our Pattern as well as our Redeemer. Then we are often commanded to be doing good. Here are a few words of Scripture: “ Trust in the Lord, and do good” ; “ Depart from evil, and do good” ; “ Love your enemies, bless them that curse you, do good to them that hate you” ; “ As we have therefore opportunity, let us do good unto all men” ; “ To do good and to communicate forget not: for with such sacrifices God is well pleased” ; “ To him that knoweth to do good, and doeth it not, to him it is sin.” Our redemption by Christ was to this very end (Titus 2:14). It is well to have some rules for doing good. Here are some:1. Set your heart on doing good. Be instant in season and out of season. Be in dead earnest. 2. Begin at once. The opportunity is never wanting. 3. Study how to do good. Read God’ s Word and the lives of good men and see how others did good. Ingeniously find out right ways, the best ways, of working. 4. Pray for Divine direction. God is all-wise. Beseech Him to use you for His glory and the good of men. 5. Never despise the day of small things. I have been at the heads of some of our noble rivers, and a barrel would have held all the waters they sent forth in an hour. One grain of wheat has in a few years been so multiplied as to produce millions of bushels in a year. 6. Be not afraid of trials. They are sure to come, but go on. Expect opposition, but do not needlessly provoke it. 7. Aim high. Earnestly covet the best gifts and the largest success. He who strives to do but little will commonly do less. Plan great things. 8. Keep your heart with all diligence. Watch against pride, and vanity, and self-seeking. 9. While you love God supremely, love all men fervently. Cherish the purest and most kindly feelings. 10. Give no just cause of offence. Be not morose or censorious. Meddle not. Be not a critic, nor a judge, nor a busybody; but be the servant of all men for their good. 11. Never discourage others in their good works. 12. Not only work your self, but set others to doing good according to their ability. “ He who makes a king is greater than a king.” He who incites another to a life of usefulness, doubles his own. 13. Be prepared for delays, disappointments, and discouragements. God may design to cure your hot haste and rashness by subjecting you to many hindrances. 14. Be diligent. Be always at it. He that soweth bountifully, shall reap also bountifully. Blessed are they that sow by all watercourses. 15. Cheer fully and trustfully leave all issues with God. Duty is yours. Results are the Lord’ s. 16. Always do the best you can under the circumstances. If you cannot run, walk; if you cannot walk, crawl; if you cannot crawl, your strength is to sit still. But let nothing fail through your inadvertence, or unbelief, or vanity, or cowardice, or prayerlessness. 17. Waste no time on unwise plans and impracticable schemes. Be sure you are right, then go ahead. Prove all things. Learn to discriminate. All is not gold that glitters. 18. Beware of all superstition. God has no pleasure in fools. We cannot honour Him in things whereof we ought to be ashamed. Follow divinely sanctioned methods of doing good. 19. Guard against fanaticism. God has no use for our delusions. Mild enthusiasm is a great foe to better piety. Like a fire in a forest, it burns up all the tender plants of righteousness. 20. But never confound pure, humble, intelligent zeal with its counterfeits. Superstition and fanaticism are from beneath, holy zeal is from above. Be keenly alive and ready to every good work. 21. Count nothing of much value in comparison of the soul. 22. Obtain and retain a deep sense of the great price put into your hand to do good and to lay up treasure in heaven. In the great gospel harvest, he that reapeth receiveth wages and gathereth fruit unto life eternal. 23. Put a high estimate on the value of time and opportunity. “ I have lost a day” ought to be a dreadful sound in the ears of any mortal. Be on the alert. 24. Keep your eye on the person and grace of Christ. Without Him you can do nothing. He is our wisdom and strength and righteousness and sanctification and redemption. None ever followed Him too closely nor relied upon Him too exclusively. (W. S. Plumer, D. D.) Seek peace, and ensue it.-On seeking peace I. What we are obliged to do.1. To reform our hearts and lives. We must subdue our lusts and bridle our passions, and govern our tongues, and conduct ourselves by the holy laws of our religion. 2. To obey our superiors as far as lawfully we can. 3. In those things in which we dissent from others we are to judge for ourselves only, and not for others. 4. That we be very diligent in the search after truth, as well as sincere lovers of it. 5. That we preserve in our minds a difference between the great things of religion and the smaller things relating to it, and let them have a proportionable regard and esteem. 6. That we endeavour to be exemplary in all those things in which we are all agreed. 7. We must put as favourable a construction upon things and judge as charitably of all men as they are capable of. 8. We must be careful that we give no offence to our weak brother in things that are indifferent. 9. Let us often consider how great mercies we enjoy, and with all thankfulness bless the holy name of God. This method will divert our complaints into praises, and greatly tend to the peace of the Church. 10. Let us put up our fervent prayers to God for the peace of the Church and State: to God, who maketh men to be of one mind: to God, who is the God of peace and unity and love. II. Some of the advantages of peace and unity, and its tendency towards our happiness. Peace and unity hath given us the advantage of waiting upon God without distraction; it strengthens us against a common enemy and commends our holy religion to those who are strangers to it. It abates from the care and burden of our superiors and secures our rights and properties. It is at once our glory and our defence, and the summary of all the blessings of this lower world. It encourages all worthy and useful undertakings, and makes us formidable to those who wish us evil. Applications-1. It is evident from what hath been said that our irregular heats and disputes are to be imputed to our lusts. 2. This may serve for the reproof of those among us who by their profligate lives and their intemperate speeches, their rash censuring and notorious uncharitableness, lay a foundation for new quarrels and contentions. These are the men that trouble the world. 3. Let me exhort you all to comply with my text. But what words shall I make use of to persuade you to unity and concord? (1) I cannot forbear to tell you that it is your interest as well as your duty to seek peace and ensue it. (2) I might exhort you to it for your brethren’ s sake also. (3) I pray and beseech you for the Lord’ s sake also: for His sake who hath commanded it; for His sake who came to restore it to the world, who is the great Mediator, and came to reconcile us to God, and to one another. (Bp. Kidder.) How we must seek peace 1. By living innocently and harmlessly with our neighbours.2. By living helpfully, and doing good in our places.3. By passing by such small wrongs as are done unto us.4. By parting with some of our right to have peace. Herein we must not stand upon terms, though haply it were fit an adversary should come to us, as being younger, inferior in place, or who first gave the cause of offence. (John Rogers.) Why we must seek peace 1. Because it is so pleasing to God. He is the God of peace; He gave His Son to make peace; and He loves that we should live in peace, and therefore gives us the gospel of peace and spirit of peace; yea, He so likes it that He pronounces them blessed that help it forward. 2. This shall be a sign that we are taught of God, and whereby our prayers will become the more acceptable (1 Timothy 2:8). 3. This is most comely (Psalms 133:3). 4. Great is the profit hereof. 5. If we live in peace, we are fit to do good to one another; else we can do no good, but evil. (John Rogers.) 1 Peter 3:12 The eyes of the Lord are over the righteous.God’ s different regards to saints and sinners I. The two sorts of persons here spoken of.1. The righteous. They have a true love to all God’ s commandments, and will not allow themselves in anything which they know to be contrary to the will of God. 2. Those that do evil. Good men sometimes may do evil, through ignorance, or the power of temptation; but this is not the bent of their minds: when sensible of it, they are sorry for it. The persons here spoken of are of a different spirit; they are evil-doers in the strict sense of the word. Iniquity is their practice and delight. II. How the Lord stands affected both to the one and to the other.1. His eyes are over the righteous; which implies- (1) His knowledge of them, their condition and circumstances (Psalms 139:2-3). (2) His affection to them. The eye of human creatures is apt to be very much where the heart is (Psalms 146:8; Psalms 11:7). (3) His providential care of them. He acts for their benefit-to guide, guard, and deliver. 2. His ears also are open to their prayer. This implies- (1) That prayer is the common practice of the righteous (Ephesians 6:18). (2) That this their practice is pleasing to God. (3) That it is a wise and reasonable practice, as it hitherto has been the practice of all good men. 3. His face is against him that doeth evil. This signifies, in general, that He is displeased with such persons (Psalms 7:11). This implies- (1) That He observes them and their actions; therefore, His face is against them, because He sees and knows them to be evil-doers. (2) That their conduct is highly offensive to Him. (3) That He will certainly treat them as enemies, if they do not repent and reform (Proverbs 28:9). Conclude with some reflections.1. We may see that happiness is the certain consequence of holiness, and misery as certainly the fruit of sin. 2. We may hence take occasion to reflect on the folly of sin, and the wisdom of being religious. 3. This shows us that good men have a great deal of reason to hope in the most threatening external circumstances; and that bad men have much to fear, even in the most prosperous circumstances. 4. Consider seriously what is said in the words of our text, and let it influence your choice and conduct. (T. Hannam.) The Divine attentiveness to the righteous Let us consider, first, who are the persons spoken of as “ righteous” ; secondly, what is the consolation and the assistance which they expect from heaven. You might say, if the eyes of the Lord are over only the righteous, who shall presume to hope for His favourable regard? But you well know that the term “ righteous” in Holy Scripture is not always used to signify a faultless perfection. They who love and fear God, who strive earnestly to obey and please Him, are frequently denominated righteous. Their righteousness, indeed, is ever very defective; but they are called righteous, because it is their prevailing quality to be so. These, St. Peter assures us, are the objects of God’ s paternal regard. With regard to the eyes of the Lord spoken of in the text, we may observe that Scripture mentions them in three different ways.1. First, an eye of knowledge, which extends to all things without exception. This is over not only the righteous, but the wicked also, and over all creatures. 2. God looketh with an eye of displeasure (Amos 9:4; Amos 9:8; Ezekiel 9:10). The eyes of the Lord are over the wicked, observing all their evil doings, and preparing for them the correction which they deserved. 3. There is another aspect of the Deity contrary to that last mentioned; namely, of love and favour, with which He regards His faithful servants (Deuteronomy 11:12; 1 Kings 9:3). Great indeed must be the blessedness of being thus looked upon by the eyes of God. It is not a mere contemplative view, but infinitely powerful in operation. The sun in the firmament is a faint resemblance of it; when He enlightens, warms, animates all earthly things on which his rays descend. But here I must acknowledge that sometimes the outward circumstances of the righteous are calamitous; as if God did not look upon them, as if He had forgotten them. The eyes of the Lord may be over the righteous, whatever be their condition. St. Peter adds, “ And His ears are open unto their prayers” (Psalms 50:15; Matthew 7:7; Matthew 7:11). But God does not always answer the prayers of the righteous in their own time and manner, and this sometimes tempts them to imagine that He is averse to their prayers. If God do not at present grant your requests, it does not follow that He hears them not, or that He is not inclined to do you good. But it may not be the fit time; or, lastly, because He reserves His blessings as the recompense of assiduity and perseverance in praying. But another objection may be urged: Do we not find several examples in Scripture of God refusing to the most holy persons the fulfilment of their prayers (Deuteronomy 3:26; 2 Corinthians 12:8)? There are two different ways in which God hears our prayers. One is, according to our wishes; the other, according to our real and final good. We are in adversity and affliction, and we cry unto God for deliverance, which He does not vouchsafe to us. But by this trial He awakens our slumbering zeal, He revives our fainting piety. Has not God, then, done better than their prayers desired? But let us carefully remember that this merciful kindness of the Lord is not promised to all men without regard to their fitness for it. “ The eyes of the Lord are over the righteous, and His ears are open to their prayers,” “ but the face of the Lord is against them that do evil.” “ God heareth not sinners.” (S. Partridge, M. A.) 1 Peter 3:13 And who is he that will harm you? The harmed and the unhatched The primary sense of these words is this: A man’ s best safeguard is benevolence; if we are ourselves inoffensive in our behaviour, others will be less likely to injure us; in proportion as we are anxious to do good, we shall be less likely to suffer evil. It is true, indeed, that the main scope of the argument is to show the manifold blessings which even in this world attend on the righteous. We are taught that he who will love life, and see good days, is to refrain his tongue from evil, etc. We are taught to eschew evil and do good: to seek peace and ensue it. And why? Because God’ s favour is thus secured to us, and man’ s enmity in a great measure disarmed. “ For the eyes of the Lord are over the righteous,” etc. The believers were to suffer; but they could take no harm. “ Who is he that will harm you, if ye be followers of that which is good?” Wonderful question! in its very calmness and simplicity. Who shall harm you? What, when the whole world was leagued in a malignant confederacy against them! “ Who shall harm you?” What, when there was everything to harm them! Ignominy, torture, famine, the sword, dishonoured life or violent death. Neither, again, did they affect insensibility under their sufferings. How, then, were they sustained? They were sustained by God’ s holy Spirit, and by a reliance on their Master’ s infallible promises, and by an undoubting confidence in the life to come. Such is the application of the text with reference to the time at which it was written, and the circumstances of the first promulgators of the blessed gospel of Christ Jesus. With respect, again, to ourselves, it is far more directly true that no one “ will harm us, if we be followers of that which is good.” I do not mean that there no longer remains any opposition whatever between the spirit of Christianity and the spirit of the world. But I believe that these adversaries, be they who they may, will not be able to do him any essential injury. I believe, also, that a steady and consistent godliness will go far ultimately to convert enemies into approvers, and rob all opposition of its sting. But, again, if we may trace an intimate connection between holiness and happiness, between physical and spiritual advantage-not invariably, perhaps, as to outward circumstances, because such a law, if altogether universal, might foster mistaken notions of God’ s providence, while it would be incompatible with a state of probation-the converse proposition, or the inseparable union of vice and wretchedness, of impiety and fatal damage both to body and soul, must be still more obvious to every man. We might well alter the text, and ask, “ Who is he that can do us any benefit, if we be not followers of that which is good?” If you are followers of that which is evil, you harm yourselves to the uttermost, and render even your temporal felicity an impossible thing. You may possess all the elements of felicity; but you so vitiate them that they become powerful only for your destruction. The noblest gifts of nature and of fortune you turn absolutely into curses for yourselves. For, take any endowment which God’ s loving kindness may bestow, and see what becomes of it in the hands of the wicked. Is it health, and a vigorous constitution, and the prospect of long life? These advantages are transmuted into instruments of perdition, by inducing a more entire neglect of the concerns of eternity. Is it strength of will, energy, and decision of character? That decision only plunges men into crime with a more headlong zeal, with a more desperate recklessness. Is it acuteness of perception and an abundant measure of intellectual capacity? Alas, this superiority of understanding serves to make men more subtle in confounding truth and falsehood, in perverting right and wrong, in beguiling and destroying themselves with their own frightful sophistries. Is it beauty of person? Yet, ah! who has not had opportunity of seeing that personal beauty without religious principle is the most dreadful of all snares, the most terribly fatal of all possessions? Is it wealth, and station, and influence? Yet these things without holiness only enable men to spread mischief and profligacy around them, and dig for their own souls a deeper place in the pit of hell. The scorpion lash is made of our own vices. That which harms us is sin; they who harm us are those who would debauch our principles, and corrupt our moral feelings, and teach us to take right for wrong and wrong for right, good for evil and evil for good. Finally, then, as to all others, if you pretend to care for the happiness of mankind, labour strenuously for their spiritual improvement. As to your family and those about you, aim not so much to make them clever or accomplished, as to make them religious and upright. (J. S. Boone, M. A.) The safety of the righteous man from injury and harm I. The following of that which is good is the ready way to preserve us from violence and hurt, because this inoffensive and religious deportment commands the respect and love of those who are not enemies to piety and virtue. II. The following of that which is good, the habitual practice of religion and charity, will shelter us against harm and wrong, because it entitles to those promises, whereby God has assured His servants, that so far as shall be suitable to His glorious designs in governing the world, and gracious purposes towards them, He will protect them against the malice of those who intend or attempt their hurt (2 Chronicles 16:9; Psalms 91:1-4; Psalms 121:5-7; Isaiah 25:1; Isaiah 52:4; Isaiah 54:14; Isaiah 45:17; Proverbs 16:7).1. God sometimes accomplishes His promises of protection to His servants by changing the hearts and dispositions of their bitterest enemies, so that they become favourers and friends (Proverbs 21:1). Esau (Genesis 32:7; Genesis 32:11); Egyptians (Exodus 11:3). 2. God preserves the honest followers of that which is good from harm, by so chaining up and overawing the malice of their enemies, that however their inward hatred remain, yet they do not manifest it by outward injuries (Genesis 31:42; Exodus 34:24). 3. As the enemies of the righteous are often constrained to conceal their malice; so, when God thinks it fit to interpose His power, He screens the righteous from the most furious assaults of their open hatred and wrath, Red Sea; Saul and David; Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego; Mordecai. III. The following of that which is good, though it does not always mollify the hearers, nor manacle the hands of men, yet it does that which is much better, viz., it turns the greatest injuries of their most deadly enemies to their profit and advantage. This effect it produces sometimes in their temporal, but always in their spiritual and eternal interests (Romans 8:28). Conclusion:1. We are informed from the truth already cleared, of the most certain, the most innocent method of securing ourselves and our interests against oppression and wrong, viz., the sincere following of that which is good (Isaiah 32:17; Isaiah 23:18; Isaiah 33:16; Proverbs 18:10). 2. Seeing God has taken the followers of that which is good under His protection, this should fill their hearts with joy and courage, and banish from them sinful and disquieting sadness and fear, even when their enemies are most powerful (Isaiah 26:1; Psalms 5:11-12; Psalms 27:1-3). 3. The consolation which this doctrine yields to the sincerely good is much enhanced while he considers that the greatest injuries are turned by the sovereign providence and grace of God to their benefit, sometimes in their temporal, and always in their spiritual and eternal interests. 4. Since the safety of our persons and interests from oppression lies chiefly in the following of that which is good, it should endear unto us religion and virtue, and powerfully dissuade us from ungodliness and vice. 5. Since the harming of those who are the followers of that which is good is so unreasonable in itself, and such a perfect contradiction unto God, who is the great Patron of holiness, this should make men both ashamed and afraid to be guilty thereof. 6. Though they who, after serious examination of their ways, see their own uprightness, need not suspect the same because of those evils they meet with from the world, yet persecution, as all other afflictions do, fairly invites us to search and try our heart and behaviour, that so we may know, whether or not by our turning aside from that which is good, we have provoked God to expose us to the spite and violence of men. (David Ranken.) The godly protected It may justly be asked whether this is consistent either with experience or with other passages of Scripture, seeing that piety appears to have practically no power in subduing enmity or destroying its injuriousness. We cannot deny that in a great variety of cases, religion, so far from disarming hostility and securing goodwill, exposes a man to insult and persecution. The man may not be altogether a follower of that which is good; there is much even in the best which requires to be amended, and which must be disapproved of by a heart-searching God. Now you will have gathered from these observations, with regard to the apparent non-fulfilment of the promise of our text, that it is attributable to a defective performance. In the question before us St. Peter unequivocally intimates that where such is the experience there must have been some deviation from the strict path of duty. And we would therefore contend for the literal truth of the words of our text, notwithstanding all which may elsewhere be said of the persecutions attendant on righteousness. And first we observe, that it is in the power of God, without visible interference with the fixed order of things, to bring about such results as seem good to His wisdom. It is not needful that He should suspend any known laws or work by any strange processes. He can effect whatsoever He wishes to accomplish by touching some secret spring, or putting some hidden force into action, while all along there shall be nothing apparent but the ordinary operations of effects and causes. This may be specially true with regard to the human heart; on which, beyond all doubt, God can mysteriously work, and yet give no outward signs of supernatural agency. If God have the human heart thus entirely at His disposal, He may evidently cause it to lay aside lust, and may turn its affections into a different channel, without anything of violence, and without open restraint to its designs and its desires. The wicked man may not be converted to righteousness; there may not pass on him that great spiritual change which would necessarily lead him to give friendship where before he had given hatred; and nevertheless there may be a soothing of the irritated feelings, a dethronement of his anger, and even a substitution of something like favour for dislike, of which perhaps he cannot himself give account. The cases are far from uncommon, in which God thus secretly diverts or disarms enmity. It is just the same with countries or communities as with individuals. In the case of the Israelites, their history is little more than a practical demonstration of the truth of our text. At any point of their history, if you find the nation endangered by enemies, you infer at once that there has been disobedience and idolatry; whilst, on the other hand, if you find them living in conformity with God’ s laws, you may conclude, without further examination, that the national condition was prosperous and flourishing. We would not indeed overlook the peculiarities of the Jewish Dispensation; therefore we do not take what happened to the Israelites as precisely the model of what may be expected by ourselves. But we know that God acts on general principles, and we therefore believe that the high road to national prosperity, under one dispensation, must, in the main, be also the high road to it under any other. Let the laws of a nation be laws framed in the spirit of the Bible; laws which discountenance vice in its every form and patronise piety; let the upholding of Christianity be proposed by rulers and pursued by people as the great end to which all others should be postponed; let there be at all times a public recognition of the supremacy of God, and the paramount importance of obedience to His statutes, and of His inalienable right to the homage, the love, and the services of His creatures, and we may affirm of this nation that it is a “ follower of that which is good,” just as might anyone be a follower who is “ adorning in all things the doctrines of the Saviour.” Yea, and if a nation did this, we believe that it would as much insure itself prosperity as did the Jews when obeying the laws which were given to them by Moses. May it not be that the enmity of the world is allowed to injure and harm the righteous man, just because he has been remiss in the duties of righteousness; because there has been some portion of conformity to the present evil world, or some undue attachment to a perishable good? And let it, too, be learned, from the words under review, that there cannot be a greater delusion than the thinking to produce or preserve peace with men by means which must hazard the favour of God. Think not to avert danger except by braving it. Do all you can to please men, except by displeasing God. And be sure that the attempt to secure human favour at the expense of Divine will always issue in the loss of both. The traitor to his God becomes, sooner or later, the scorn of his fellow men. Remember, for your consolation, that in this, as in every other respect, God hath made your interest at one with your duty, so that Divine favour shall be the best security for human. And there are more hurtful enemies than angry relations and unprincipled opponents. A man’ s foes may be those of his own household-ay! of his own heart-the lusts, the passions, the desires of corrupt nature. These are the enemies with which the Christian has the hardest struggle, and through which he is exposed to the greatest danger. But if he be a “ follower of that which is good” ; if he be sincere in his wishes and earnest in his efforts to be “ holy even as God is holy,” he will gradually be enabled to keep those enemies in check, and find that grace has the mastery of nature. Those who speak most of the strength of their passions are often those who take least pains to resist them. In fact they make that strength an excuse for submission, whereas God would put bands on that strength if they were honest and desired to overcome. There approaches another enemy-one emphatically described as “ the last enemy-death.” Can this enemy be stayed from doing harm to the Christian? Why, it is beautiful to observe how Christians, who have felt a dread of death, have found their anxiety depart as the foe drew nigh. They have been “ followers of that which is good,” striving to cast all their care upon God, believing that He careth for them. Therefore, as death approached it appeared less harmful, and they who feared him most, but whom the fear only made more fervent in prayer, are enabled to look him calmly in the face, and even cheerfully resign themselves to his embrace as to that of a friend. (H. Melvill, B. D.) The advantage of imitating the good There is something in a meek and holy carriage that is apt, in part, to free a man from many mischiefs which the ungodly are exposed to. It will be somewhat strange to rage against the innocent. I. The carriage, “ followers of that which is good” ; the Greek word is imitators. The Word of God contains our copy in its perfection, and so the imitation of good, in the complete rule of it, is the regulating of our ways by the word. But even there we find, besides general rules, the particular tracks of life of divers eminently holy persons, that we may know holiness not to be an idle imaginary thing, but that men have really been holy; though not altogether sinless, yet holy and spiritual in some good measure; have shined as lights amidst a perverse generation. Why may we not then aspire to be holy as they were, and attain to it? Would you advance in all grace? Study Christ much, and you will find not only the pattern in Him, but strength and skill from Him to follow it. II. The advantage, “ Who is he that will harm you?” In the life of a godly man, taken together in the whole frame of it, there is a grave beauty or comeliness, which oftentimes forces some kind of reverence and respect to it even in ungodly minds. Though a natural man cannot love them spiritually, as graces of the Spirit of God, yet he may have and usually hath a natural esteem of some kind of virtues which are in a Christian, and are not, in their right nature, to be found in any other, though a moralist may have somewhat like them. Meekness, and patience, and charity, and fidelity-these and other suchlike graces do make a Christian life so inoffensive and calm, that, except where the matter of their God or religion is made the crime, malice itself can scarcely tell where to fasten its teeth or lay its hold; it hath nothing to pull by, though it would; yea, oftentimes, for want of work or occasions, it will fall asleep for a while. Whereas ungodliness and iniquity, sometimes by breaking out into notorious crimes, draws out the sword of civil justice, and where it rises not so high, yet it involves men in frequent contentions and quarrels. (Abp. Leighton.) Doing good, as security against injuries from men I. The qualification supposed is, that we be “ followers of that which is good.” But what is that? The apostle does not go about to define it, but appeals to every man’ s conscience to tell him what it is. It is not anything that is controverted, which some men call good and others evil, but that which is universally approved by heathens as well as Christians, that which is substantially good, and that which is unquestionably so. It is not zeal for lesser things, about the ritual and ceremonial part of religion, and a great strictness about the external parts of it, but a pursuit of the weightier things of the law, a care of the great duties of religion, mercy, and justice, and fidelity; those things wherein the kingdom of God consists-righteousness and peace. II. The benefit and advantage which may reasonably be expected from it, and that is, security from the injuries of men: “ Who is he that will harm you?” etc. The apostle doth not absolutely say none will do it, but he speaks of it as a thing so very unreasonable and so unlikely that it will not often happen. And this will appear-1. If we consider the nature of virtue and goodness, which is apt to gain upon the affections of men, and secretly to win their love and esteem. True goodness is inwardly esteemed by bad men; it carries an awe and majesty with it, so that bad men are very often restrained from harming the good by that secret reverence which they bear to goodness. 2. If we consider the nature of man, even when it is very much depraved and corrupted. There is something that is apt to restrain bad men from injuring those that are remarkably good-a reverence for goodness, the fear of God, and of bringing down His vengeance upon their heads; and many times the fear of men, who, though they be not good themselves, cannot endure to see them oppressed, especially if they have found the real effects of their goodness in good offices done by them to themselves. 3. If we consider the providence of God, which is particularly concerned for the protection of innocency and goodness. III. And yet we are not to understand this saying of the apostle, as declaring to us the constant and certain event of things without any exception. For good men are sometimes exposed to great injuries of which I shall give you an account in these following particulars-1. Sonic that seem to be good are not sincerely so, and when they, by the just judgment of God, are punished for their hypocrisy, in the opinion of many goodness seems to suffer. 2. Some that are really good are very imperfectly so, have many flaws which do very much obscure their goodness; they are “ followers of that which is good,” but they have an equal zeal for things which have no goodness in them, or so little that it is not worth all that bustle which they make about them, and will contend as earnestly for a doubtful opinion as for the articles of “ the faith which was once delivered to the saints,” and will oppose a little ceremony with as much heat as the greatest immorality. In these cases it is not men’ s goodness which raiseth enmity against them, but their imprudent zeal and other infirmities which attend it. 3. The enmity of some men against goodness is so violent and implacable that no innocency can restrain their malice. Against these the providence of God is our best safeguard. 4. The last and chief exception is that of the cross, when the sufferings and persecutions of good men are necessary for the great ends of God’ s glory, for the advancement of religion, and the example and salvation of others. (Abp. Tillotson.) The practice of virtue the greatest security against our enemies I. If a man be a follower of that which is good, ‘ tis probable no man will have any desire to harm him. II. If we be followers of that which is good, ‘ tis certain no man, whatever his will be, shall have any power to do us any real harm.1. The providence of God does in a peculiar manner watch over the righteous, to preserve them under all events. 2. The enemies of a righteous man cannot do him any real harm, because they cannot take from him anything wherein his true and proper happiness consists. 3. Whatever loss a good man sustains in the world upon the account of his concern for truth and virtue, shall be abundantly made good to him in that which is to come; and consequently ‘ tis so far from doing any real harm, that it ought rather to be accounted a gain than a loss. (S. Clarke, D. D.) The protection of God So long ago as the time of William Penn the efficacy of arbitration was demon strafed. He proposed to come to America without any weapons, and treat with the worst savages. Charles II. scoffed at him and said, “ What: venture yourselves among the savages of North America! Why, man, what security have you that you will not be in their war kettle within two hours after setting your foot on their shores?” “ The best security in the world,” said William Penn. “ I doubt that, friend William,” said the king. “ I have no idea of any security against these American cannibals but a regiment of good soldiers with their bayonets and muskets: and I tell you beforehand, with all my goodwill for you and your family, to whom I am under obligations, I will not send a single soldier with you.” “ I want none of your soldiers,” said William Penn. “ I depend upon something better.” “ On what?” asked the king. William Penn answered, “ On the Indians themselves, and their moral sense, and the protection of the Almighty God.” And it is a fact in American history that for seventy years the red men kept that treaty, and it was not broken until the white men broke it. Good still left unharmed I have fallen into the hands of the publicans and sequestrators, and they have taken all from me. What now? let me look about me. They have left me the sun and moon, fire and water, a loving wife, and many friends to pity me, and some to relieve me, and I can still discourse; and, unless I list, they have not taken away my merry countenance, and my cheerful spirit, and a good conscience: they still have left me the providence of God, and all the promises of the gospel, and my religion, and my hopes of heaven, and my charity to them too: and still I sleep and digest; I eat and drink; I read and meditate; I can walk in my neighbour’ s pleasant fields, and see the varieties of natural beauties, and delight in all that in which God delights, that is, in virtue and wisdom, in the whole creation, and in God Himself. (Bp. Jeremy Taylor.) Followers of that which is good.- Personal goodness I. Its prospectiveness.1. A desire for future good.2. An expectation of future good. II. Its sociality. It has a community of-1. Paramount interest.2. Leading aims. III. Its reasonableness.1. Our nature was made for goodness.2. Christ came into the world to give us goodness.3. God works to make us good.4. The great struggle of our nature is to be good. IV. Its reverence. Genuine religion is modest, devout, meek. (Homilist.) 1 Peter 3:14-17 But if ye suffer for righteousness’ sake.The sufferings of Christians I. Why Christians must expect to meet with persecution or suffering in the world. II. Real Christians are happy even in the midst of their present sufferings. This will appear, if we consider the object, the nature, and the foundation of the Christian’ s happiness.1. His happiness is placed beyond the reach of accident, and the fear of change: a God reconciled through Jesus Christ is the supreme object of his happiness and desire. 2. As the object, so is also the nature of the Christian’ s happiness, such as to justify the assertion that he is happy in the midst of external sufferings. Did the ultimate happiness or salvation of believers depend on any temporary frame or feeling, many of the most eminent saints might often be pronounced miserable. No! the Christian’ s happiness is founded on the eternal purposes and love of God; and this constitutes at once its security and perfection. (Thomas Ross, LL. D.) Suffering for righteousness I. Suffering is supposed, notwithstanding righteousness, yea, for righteousness; and that, not as a rare accident, but as the frequent lot of Christians. Think not that any prudence will lead you by all oppositions and malice of an ungodly world. Many winter blasts will meet you in the most inoffensive way of religion, if you keep straight to it. Look about you, and see if there be any state of man or course of life exempted from troubles. The greatest are usually subject to the greatest vexations, as the largest bodies have the largest shadows attending them. Take what way you will, there is no place or condition so fenced but public calamities or personal griefs find a way to reach us. Seeing then we must suffer whatever Course we take, to suffer for righteousness is far the best. What Julius Caesar said ill of doing ill, we may well say of suffering ill, “ If it must be, it is best to be for a kingdom.” But I shall prosecute this suffering for righteousness only with relation to the apostle’ s present reasoning. His conclusion he establishes.1. From the favour or protection of God. The eyes of the Lord being over the righteous for their good, and His ear open to their prayer. 2. For the other argument, that the following of good would preserve them from harm, it speaks truly the nature of the thing, what it is apt to do, and what, in some measure, it often doth; but considering the nature of the world, its enmity against God and religion, it is not strange that it often proves otherwise. But if thou knowest who it is whom thou hast trusted, and whom thou lovest, this is a small matter. What though it were deeper and sharper sufferings, yet still, if ye suffer for righteousness, happy are ye. II. That a Christian under the heaviest load of sufferings for righteousness is yet happy, and that he is happier even by those sufferings.1. All the sufferings of this world are not able to destroy the happiness of a Christian, nor to diminish it; yea, they cannot at all touch it; it is out of their reach. If all friends be shut out, yet the visits of the Comforter may be frequent, bringing glad tidings from heaven, and communing with him of the love of Christ and solacing him with that. Banishment he fears not, for his country is above; nor death, for that sends him home into that country. 2. But if in other sufferings, even the worst, the believer is still a happy man, then more especially in those that are of the best kind, sufferings for righteousness. Not only do they not detract from his happiness, but they give accession to it; he is happy even by suffering. (1) It is the happiness of a Christian, until he attain perfection, to be advancing towards it; to be daily refining from sin, and growing richer and stronger in the graces that make up a Christian, a new creature; to attain a higher degree of patience, and meekness, and humility; to have the heart more weaned from the earth and fixed on heaven. Now as other afflictions of the saints do help them in these things, their sufferings for righteousness, the unrighteous and injurious dealings of the world with them, have a particular fitness for this purpose. (2) Persecuted Christians are happy in their conformity with Christ, which is love’ s ambition. A believer would take it as an affront that the world should be kind to him, that was so cruel to his beloved Lord and Master. (3) Suffering Christians are happy in the rich supplies of spiritual comfort and joy, which in times of suffering are usual; so that as “ their sufferings for Christ do abound, their consolations in Him abound much more.” (4) If those sufferings be so small that they are weighed down even by present comforts, and so the Christian is happy in them, how much more doth the weight of glory that follows surpass these sufferings! Now these sufferings are happy, because they are the way to this happiness and the pledges of it. (Abp. Leighton.) The wrongful suffering of good men I. The fact that good men often suffer for their goodness from their fellow men. Peter uses the phrase “ but and if,” not because the suffering he describes is infrequent, but because it may not be absolutely universal, and because the reflections on which he is dwelling might seem to have made such suffering impossible For-(1) It might seem as though the promised guardianship of God would have ensured security to good men. But, no. Or (2) It might seem that an upright, benevolent life would have won the gratitude and kindness of one’ s fellows. But, no. “ If you would follow the Church in her history, it will be by the track of her blood; if you would see her, it is by the light of the fires in which her martyrs have been burned.” II. The inspired direction for men in such wrongful suffering.1. Fearlessness.2. Consecration to Christ.3. Intelligent conviction.4. Conscientiousness.5. True triumph. “ All may not be able to wield the sharp sword of argument, but all can wear the silver shield of innocent lives.” III. The lofty privilege of those who suffer for righteousness’ sake.1. They are blessed.2. Their suffering is better than that of those who suffer for wrong doing.3. Their suffering brings them into intimate fellowship with the Man of Sorrows. IV. The impossibility of men who in this spirit suffer wrongfully being really injured. To all wrongful treatment by the mean, envious, or malicious, the true Christian can say, “ You may embarrass my circumstances, undermine my health, filch my reputation, shorten my mortal life, but you cannot ‘ harm’ me.” (U. R. Thomas.) The causes of the world’ s hatred of Christians They are many and obvious.1. For instance: The man of God should be an embodied conscience. The one endeavour of ungodly men is to drown the remonstrances of conscience. For this they plunge into gaiety, or business, or exploration; for this they hurry from scene to scene; for this they studiously avoid all that savours of God or His claims. But in a holy life they meet with a devout and constant recognition of those claims, coupled with a faithful endeavour to fulfil them. There is an embodiment of righteousness without them, which arouses into instant and unwelcome activity those convictions of their duty which they have done their best to quell. 2. The pride of heart which resents superiority in another. The envy which grudges the influence that goodness always attracts. The malice which broods over the contrast that purity presents to impurity, until the fact of its doing so bulks as a positive injury. All these strong passions of the unrenewed heart, like Pilate and Herod of old, become friends in their common antagonism to the saintliness which intrudes upon their privacy and menaces their peace. 3. Besides, there is always an aggressiveness in true Christianity which arouses strong resistance. (F. B. Meyer, B. A.) Happy are ye. The blessedness of those who suffer for righteousness I. The patient suffering for righteousness’ sake is the giving obedience to one of the commandments of Jesus Christ, and that upon the doing thereof depends the truth of their Christianity in this life, and their salvation in the next (Matthew 10:37-38; Matthew 16:21-25; Mark 8:31-38). II. The cheerful endurance of those evils which befall the Christian in professing the truths of God and obeying His commandments, is an instance of the most heroic virtue, and a happy proof of the sincerity of his piety and faith. It is the most glorious victory over ourselves, our own passions and fears, and that natural inclination which prompts us to secure our life and the conveniences thereof. III. The Christian’ s being engaged in the state of persecution, and his valiant endurance of the same, is a happy indication of God’ s special favour to him, and esteem of his fortitude and uprightness (Acts 9:15-16; 1 Peter 4:16; Philippians 1:28-29; Acts 5:40-41). IV. As God lovingly calls true Christians to the honour of suffering for His name, so he graciously reckons himself to be honoured by their religious courage and fidelity in the doing thereof (John 21:18-19; 1 Peter 4:14). V. The constant integrity of the good man, under all his sufferings for righteousness, creates in him that inward pleasure and peace of mind which is the constant and genuine effect of holiness and virtue, and of the soul’ s being conscious to itself of its own innocence. And it likewise obtains for him these supernatural joys and assistances, which in the hour of temptation flow in from the Holy Ghost (2 Corinthians 1:3-5; 2 Corinthians 12:9-10; 1 Peter 4:14). VI. That which is a very considerable proof of the blessedness of those who endure in the spirit of patience and penitence, those sufferings which meet them in the way of their duty; they powerfully contribute to purify their souls from remaining corruption, and to perfect them into the highest degrees of holiness (Isaiah 27:9; Hebrews 12:10-11; 2 Corinthians 4:16). VII. That which, without the possibility of a reasonable contradiction, clears and completes the evidence for the truth of the happiness of these pious ones, who suffer for righteousness’ sake, is: that they are secured of the blessedness of heaven, that though it be future, yet with respect to it St. Peter might very well say in the present tense, “ Ye are happy” (Matthew 5:10; Matthew 19:29; James 1:12). Conclusion:1. From the truth of the fore-said doctrine, viz., the happiness of those who suffer for righteousness’ sake, we see the lamentable ignorance and error of carnal and worldly minded men. 2. We learn from the evidence of this great truth, that it is our wisdom, as well as duty, to adhere unto righteousness and truth, even in the time of the most terrible threatenings and persecution. 3. The suffering Christian is taught hereby, that instead of repining against the Divine Providence on account of his sufferings, he ought rather to magnify God, that He graciously affords him the blessed opportunity and means of knowing his own sincerity, of promoting the Divine glory, of partaking of unspeakable spiritual joys, and of being advanced to the most eminent holiness in this life, and happiness in the next. 4. Serious reflection on the felicity of those who suffer for righteousness’ sake would be very useful to mitigate the sorrow of those whose dearest friends may at any time be involved in persecution for their keeping the faith and a good conscience. 5. The belief of this truth should stifle our revenge against our most malicious persecutors; seeing we know that, however evil their intention may be, yet the persecution itself through God’ s grace, turns about in the end to our inexpressible advantage. 6. It is comfortable to observe that the happiness asserted of the sufferers for righteousness is not restricted to any particular instance either of righteousness or suffering. 7. The happiness of those who suffer for righteousness’ sake affords a very powerful motive and encouragement to patience and constancy, in the time of the hottest persecution. (David Ranken.) Be not afraid of their terror.-This is commonly explained as the terror which their menaces might excite; but considering the undoubted reference to Isaiah 8:12-13, it seems probable that St. Peter means such terror as dismays those who do not fear God supremely. (Canon F. C. Cook.) Unnecessary terror The earthworm meets threatened danger in a most unphilosophic way. Directly it feels a slight shock in the earth it will hasten to the surface, because it attributes that to the proximity of its enemy the mole. The knowledge that the worm can easily be panic stricken has been acquired by the lapwings (Vanellus) , and these birds use it for their own advantage and the destruction of their victim. The lapwings settle down on fields recently ploughed, where they can find an ample supply of worms, and striking against the ground with their feet, induce the worms to come to the surface under fear that the shock is caused by the mole. As fast as the worms come in fear to the surface they are snapped up by the lapwings. Thus by endeavouring to escape an imaginary danger, the worm encounters a real one. There are many creatures, far higher in intelligence than the poor worm, who follow exactly the same panic-stricken policy in the supposed presence of danger. All weak natures, in fact, ale naturally impelled to adopt it. Hence amongst mankind, for want of self-control and discretion, half our miseries, and often our doom, may be traced to acts caused by the dread of a danger which has existed only in our fears. (Scientific Illustrations.) Be not afraid of their terror I. Christian courage in not being sinfully afraid of those evils which men may threaten us with, for righteousness sake, is a duty frequently recommended to us in scripture, and timidity or irregular fear forbidden (Isaiah 8:11-12; Matthew 10:28; Luke 12:5; Philippians 1:27-28; Jeremiah 1:5-7; Ezekiel 2:6; Revelation 2:10; Revelation 21:7; Revelation 12:8). II. The being sinfully afraid of persecution, or the wrath of man, is extremely unworthy of a Christian.1. A Christian is the sworn soldier of Jesus, and Jesus has expressly obliged him by an unalterable statute to take up his Cross and follow Him through the most terrible dangers and inconveniences. 2. The Christian professes to believe in an Almighty God, the best friend and sorest enemy; and in Jesus Christ who cheerfully suffered the greatest evils for his sake; and that there is an everlasting life both of happiness and misery, to be bestowed upon men, according to their final constancy or apostasy. 3. The Christian may continually look upon the glorious example of Jesus, the Author and Finisher of our faith; and upon the great cloud of witnesses or martyrs, who feared not the wrath of man, nor loved their lives unto the death. III. Holy fearlessness and magnanimity is, under God, a strong guard to the Christian’ s uprightness and piety; whereas fearfulness and pusillanimity do woefully endanger and betray them (Daniel 3:16-18; Acts 20:24; Acts 21:13; Proverbs 29:25; John 12:42). IV. The enemies of the Church of God are so entirely subjected to His providence, and the Church, upon the other hand, is so watchfully regarded by the same providence, that the Church’ s enemies cannot injure it without the divine permission, or extend their persecutions against the righteous beyond the limits which God has fixed (Psalms 37:32-33; John 19:10-11; John 7:30; Luke 22:52-53). V. The highest pitch to which the malice of the most implacable and powerful adversaries of truth and piety can arrive is, to molest and ruin the faithful professors and friends of the same, in their outward, bodily and transitory state (Matthew 10:28; Luke 12:4). Conclusion:1. That we may attain to Christian fortitude and intrepidity in the time of persecution, it will be necessary for us with a humble importunity to make our addresses to God, that He would be graciously pleased to endue us therewith (Colossians 1:11). 2. If we would not be afraid of men, let us use our utmost endeavours to get our hearts possessed with the awful and holy fear of God; and then we will find by happy experience that the latter fear drives away the former. 3. They whose hearts are inflamed with the love of God, are strongly fortified against the impressions of sinful fear and cowardice, when wrathful persecutors either threaten or attack them (Son 8:6-7). 4. The exercising a lively faith about the glory and happiness which is provided in the world to come for those righteous persons, who valiantly endure all these persecutions, would inspire the Christian with invincible fortitude, fill his soul with a noble contempt of men’ s terror, and carry him forward triumphantly in the way of his duty, notwithstanding the fiercest opposition of enraged and powerful men (Hebrews 11:1-40). 5. They who would not be sinfully afraid of human terror, who would not for the fear of it deny any known truth, or neglect any known duty: let them entertain just sentiments concerning the good and evil things of this present world, the advantages and disadvantages, the honour and dishonour, the pleasures and pains thereof; taking care that they do not overrate them, and that they do not place their happiness in the enjoyment of the former, nor their misery in suffering the latter. 6. It would be very useful to the Christian, for preserving him from cowardice, that he had continually before his eyes the most glorious example of Jesus Christ, the Captain of our salvation, and the heroic bravery and patience of the saints. For then he would be ashamed basely and sinfully to turn his back upon these dangers, which not only his Lord and General, but also his fellow soldiers did boldly encounter and overcome. (David Ranken.) One fear drives out another There seems here a reminiscence on Peter’ s part of words heard long before: “ Be not afraid of them that kill the body, and after that have no more that they can do.” “ Let not your heart be troubled, neither let it be afraid.” How may we obtain this lion heart, which knows no fear in the presence of our foes? There is but one answer possible. Expel fear by fear. Drive out the fear of man by the fear of God. “ Sanctify the Lord God in your hearts.” How often we see fear expel fear. The fear of being burnt will nerve a woman to let herself down by a water pipe from the upper storeys of a house in flames. The fear of losing her young will inspire the timid bird to throw herself before the steps of man, attracting his notice from them to herself. The fear of the whip will expel the horse’ s dread of the object at which it has taken fright. Oh for that Divine habit of soul which so conceives of the majesty, and power, and love of God, that it dares not sin against Him, but would rather brave a world in arms than bring a shadow over His face. “ So did not I,” said a sincere and noble man, “ because of the fear of God.” (F. B. Meyer, B. A.) Neither be troubled.-Deliverance from trouble 1. The ordinary causes of astonishment and perplexity of spirit in the time of adversity are these- (1) When the evil a person lies under was wholly unexpected. (2) When a man in his calamity is quite forlorn and destitute, has no friend to condole his misery, nor to support him under it. (3) When the evil is lasting and invincible, such as the miserable patient can reasonably propose to himself no deliverance from. 2. These grounds of perturbation are not to be found in those afflictions which the righteous meet with for righteousness sake. (1) Persecution of one kind or other is what the true Christian may expect, and so forearm himself (Luke 9:2; John 15:20; John 16:20; John 16:33; Mark 10:29-30; Acts 14:22; 2 Timothy 3:12). (2) The righteous, in the extremest heat of persecution, are not entirely forsaken; but even then they have a great and faithful friend, viz., the Almighty God, who commiserates their distress, bears the heaviest end of the burden, and encourages them under all their troubles (Psalms 91:15; Isaiah 43:2; Isaiah 49:13-16; 2 Corinthians 4:9; Hebrews 13:5). (3) The calamity with which the righteous are afflicted for righteousness’ sake is not past hope and remedy. No; they are fully assured of deliverance from it, if not after the manner which they desire, yet in the way which is best for them (Psalms 34:19; Psalms 91:14-16; 2 Chronicles 1:9-10; 2 Timothy 4:16-18). I. God can deliver His Church and people while they are in the extremest dangers and difficulties (2 Peter 2:9). II. In such cases He hath very often delivered them.1. Some of these deliverances were accomplished, not by prodigious and amazing strokes of Divine power in suspending or transcending the force and course of natural causes, but by gentle and ordinary means, gloriously conducted by the wise providence of God (Exodus 2:1-25; 1 Samuel 23:1-29; Esther 6:1-14). 2. Whereas it is said that we are no more to look for miracles, I answer that it is presumptuous to limit the Holy One of Israel, peremptorily to set bounds to the infinitely wise and powerful God where He has not expressly set them to Himself. 3. Let this matter be as it may, yet I hope it will be granted that God is still the God of salvation; that “ His hand is not shortened that it cannot save,” etc.; that He even is the Lover and Protector of truth and righteousness and the Helper of the helpless; that He can abate the pride, assuage the malice, and confound the devices of the Church’ s enemies; and, finally, that He can raise up deliverers to the persecuted when and where it was least expected. III. There are the strongest reasons for their believing that at length God will deliver them one way or other.1. He will deliver them by a temporal deliverance, if that be most agreeable to His wise counsels, to the methods of His providence in governing the world and His Church, and to their true and greatest welfare. 2. If He think it not proper to remove sufferings from them, He will remove them from suffering. IV. By hearkening to this counsel of St. Peter the Christian will exceedingly consult the peace of his own mind.1. Excessive and irregular sorrow is of itself a very great calamity; it enfeebles the soul; at once it increases a man’ s affliction and disables him from bearing the same (Proverbs 15:13; Proverbs 18:14). 2. As for anxiety of mind, it distracts and disquiets those who are under its dominion after a most miserable manner. 3. Who can express the misery of those who, in the time of persecution, give way to anger, revenge, impatience, and murmuring? By their blustering passions they raise a perpetual storm within, and are like the troubled sea which cannot rest. 4. Whereas, if they who are persecuted for righteousness sake do wisely follow this direction; if, instead of abandoning themselves to immoderate grief and to pernicious impatience, they maintain a holy cheerfulness of spirit, patience, and contentedness of mind, and cast all their care upon God; then they will find, to their unspeakable comfort, that the blessed fruits of this prudent and religious practice are these: a reviving and supporting cordial to their hearts; an admirable and sweet repose within, while there is nothing but storm without; and that vigour of soul which will enable them bravely to bear up under the heaviest load of adversity. V. Special motives and considerations for which the Christian should avoid any of those particular inward troubles or disorders of mind to which he is liable in the state of persecution, if he be not upon his guard and continually supported by the grace of God.1. Anxious and disquieting thoughtfulness and sorrow are very expressly forbidden the Christians (Matthew 6:25, etc.; John 14:1; John 14:27; John 16:33; Philippians 4:6; 1 Peter 5:7). 2. An undisturbed, well-grounded, and governed quietness and alacrity of spirit under sufferings is the highest pitch of faith, and a signal honour done to the attributes and promises of God. Whereas dejecting sorrow and anxious perplexity of mind is too great a proof of the want or weakness of faith, and a tacit reproach to God. 3. This holy cheerfulness and tranquillity of mind does exceedingly become the servants of God, especially in the time of persecution, and the opposite temper of irregular sorrow and anxiety is extremely unsuitable. 4. The Christian will entertain a horror at immoderate sorrow and anxiety of mind when he seriously considers the dreadful spiritual inconveniences and evils which may follow thereupon, if they be not prevented by the singular goodness of God. (1) Excessive sorrow and anxiety are apt to create in those over whom they prevail an indisposition to the exercise of several graces and duties, the exercise whereof is nevertheless highly necessary in the conjuncture of persecution and distress, viz., faith and dependence on God, resignation, prayer, thanksgiving, etc. (2) Though the persecuted and afflicted Christian has much need of Divine consolations from the Word of God and the immediate influences of His Spirit, yet excessive sorrow and anxiety do exceedingly stand in the way of his partaking of these consolations. (3) Immoderate sorrow and anxiety expose those over whom they prevail to many other dangerous evils and inconveniences. These sinful infirmities incline men to be weary and faint under the cross, to be over-desirous of shaking it off, and to hearken to sinful overtures for that effect. (David Ranken.) Sanctify the Lord God in your hearts.-God sanctified in the heart “ Sanctifying the Lord God” means, not making Him holy, for He is already most holy, but regarding Him as holy, treating Him, the idea of Him, and all that is His, sacredly, and in a manner different from that in which we regard all other things and ideas. Then, further, it means treating Him as thus holy, not only in our outward deeds or words, but in our secret hearts, where men do not see us nor know what passes in us. And we must remember, moreover, that when the Apostle says, “ Sanctify the Lord God in your hearts,” he does not only give us a negative rule, as though he said, “ Think of God no otherwise than reverently,” but he gives us a plain affirmative one, “ Ever have the thought of Him before your pure minds, and take care that it be a holy, reverent, and most sacred thought.” To sanctify the Lord God in our hearts, therefore, is to keep up by every means in our power a holy regard of Him. And again, sanctifying the Lord God in our hearts must surely, as a Christian precept, have a more specific meaning, for not only do we believe that the great God is, from the very force and meaning of His Being and omnipotency, present always and everywhere, but we believe that the Deity, the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit, are in some more signal and more mysterious way present and indwelling in the hearts of those who have been made children of God and inheritors of the kingdom of heaven. This sanctifying of the Lord God in our hearts forms, as it were, the real safeguard and sanctification of our imaginations. It will serve to keep holy much within us which is very apt to run wild. For consider what a large portion of our lives there is of which we take little or no account at all, which we think little of as it passes, nor remember when it is past. Consider, for instance, in any day for what a small proportion of the hours we can give an account or recall the true and real occupation of our imaginations and feelings. It is in this respect, then, that the “ sanctifying of the Lord God in our hearts” becomes so signally important. This we may maintain always. In activity and repose, by night and by day, in all seasons and circumstances, the sacred thought of God before us, God with us, will abash every thought and feeling which is at variance with His will. Is it of fear of men and their ill-treatment of us? How can such fear remain or be effectual with us if we habitually remember who and what He is, who is all-powerful and all-present? Is it a thought of unholiness or impurity? How can it stand and not perish from our minds if they are accustomed by constant effort to represent to themselves hourly the sanctity of God, who dwelleth in them? Is it a thought of unkindness, ill-opinion, disrespect? How, again, can it live in a heart which is continually recalling itself to remember that the Lord God, who is infinitely great and infinitely good, dwells within it? Is it a feeling of vexation or impatience when things do not go exactly as we would have them, or when bodily pain or distress assails us? How soon will that heart check and calm its impatience, which is habitually taking pains to keep the sacred thought of God before it-God in His sanctity, His majesty, God who dwelleth in our hearts! (Bp. Moberly.) God reverenced in the heart I. Sanctify the Lord God. He is holy, the fountain of holiness. It is He alone who powerfully sanctifies us, and then, and not till then, we sanctify Him. We sanctify Him by acknowledging His greatness and power and goodness, and, which is here more particularly intended, we do this by a holy fear of Him and faith in Him. II. In your hearts. We are to be sanctified in our words and actions, but primarily in our hearts, as the root and principle of the rest. He sanctifies His own people throughout, makes their language and their lives holy, but first and most of all their hearts. It fears, and loves, and trusts in Him, which properly the outward man cannot do, though it does follow and is acted on by these affections, and so shares in them according to its capacity. III. This sanctifying of God in the heart composes the heart and frees it from fears.1. The fear of God overtops and nullifies all lesser fears: the heart possessed with this fear hath no room for any other. It resolves the heart, in point of duty, that it must not offend God by any means; yea, rather to choose the universal and highest displeasure of the world forever than His smallest discountenance for a moment. 2. Faith in God clears the mind and dispels carnal fears. It is the most sure help. “ What time I am afraid,” says David, “ I will trust in Thee.” It resolves the mind concerning the event, and scatters the multitude of perplexing thoughts which arise about that: What shall become of this and that? What if such an enemy prevail? No matter, says faith, though all fail, I know of one thing that will not; I have a refuge which all the strength of nature and art cannot break in upon or demolish, a high defence, my Rock in whom I trust. (Abp. Leighton.) Sanctifying the Lord in the heart What is meant by “ sanctifying the Lord” ? The phrase occurs elsewhere (Isaiah 29:23; Leviticus 10:3; Numbers 20:12; Ezekiel 36:23). They sanctify Him who give Him His due, who treat His claims as real and absolute, who look away from all other powers, from all imagined resources or grounds of confidence, to Him as the origin and centre of their existence.1. St. Peter was thinking immediately of apprehended suffering, and this at the hands of men, unconsciously acting as the instruments of a Master who saw fit thus to “ prove” the patience and fidelity of His servants. But a great deal of actual suffering, apprehended or really imminent, comes apart from such instrumentality, or, at any rate, is only indirectly connected with human wills. For instance, suppose we learn that a severe outbreak of disease, infectious and perilous to life, is among us. Should we be likely then to be scared by the terror of such a prospect? or should we have faith enough to sanctify in our hearts, as Sovereign and Lord of all things, the Redeemer who healed sickness in others and accepted crucifixion for Himself? Could we suppress unworthy agitations, adopt all reasonable precautions, and make daily acts of faith in the spirit of Psa 91:1; Psalms 91:6? But again, we know that very often our fears enormously exaggerate real evils, and very often we are haunted by fears which are altogether imaginary. Why not simply take the Lord at His own word, and put aside faithless “ anxiety about the morrow” ? 2. Remember, further, that the drama of spiritual life and death can be performed on a humbler stage, under conditions devoid of any impressive brilliancy. A youth, let us say, goes out from some quiet country home into an area which presents new tests to his moral and religious fidelity; the scene may be a college or a workshop, a messroom or house of business-it matters not; suppose he falls in with a bad set; suppose he is mercilessly laughed at if found to persevere in religious habits; suppose that he is accused of self-righteousness, or even of self-interest; suppose that, whether in rough or in polished phrase, the creed of his boyhood is called an obsolete delusion, fit only for those who are content to be tutored by the clergy; is there nothing here like a fiery trial? How will he stand it? Will he begin the downward course by “ assuming a vice although he has it not,” affecting an indifference to religion beyond what he really feels? Suppose that, on the contrary, he retains that holy fear of God, and perseveres in his duty, just “ as he did aforetime” (Daniel 6:10): what will be said of him above? That, young as he is, he is playing the man; that he is responding to grace, and “ witnessing a good confession” ; that he is “ sanctifying Christ in his heart as Lord.” 3. And once more: when we are depressed and anxious as to the prospects of the Church and of the faith; when unbelief is increasingly aggressive, confident of speedy success; when prejudices against that truth of which the Church is the pillar and ground work reappear in all their old force, unallayed by explanations or by conferences; when large masses of European society seem possessed with a spirit of revolutionary lawlessness, which fears God as little as it regards man; then the problem appears too hard, the task too onerous, the promised success past hoping for. But the history of the Church may remind us that as we certainly are “ not better than our fathers,” so we are not undergoing trials from which they were wholly exempt. But as they could and did fall back, so must we fall back on the invincible conviction that the cause is God’ s after all. Let the Most High look to it. (W. Bright, D. D.) Be ready always to give an answer.- The true Christian apologist Some thirty years after this letter was written to the Christians, amongst others, of Bithynia, another letter was written about them from the Roman governor of Bithynia to his imperial master at Rome. The answer to that letter is also preserved. The magistrate asks advice, and the emperor gives it, as to the treatment of these Christians. Such questions as these were presenting themselves: Is the name itself of Christian to be a crime apart from any proof of accompanying offences? Is recantation to be accepted in exemption from punishment? Hitherto his practice has been to give time to reply to the interrogation. He has brought out the images, the emperor’ s image among them; and if the accused would repeat after him a form of adoration of the heathen gods, and if he would add execration upon the name of Jesus Christ, he has dismissed them; if not he has ordered them for execution. Trajan replies that he entirely approves the course adopted. No search had better be made for Christians; if accused and convicted they must still be allowed the alternative of recanting, but in default of thus purging their crime they must take the consequences. Anonymous informations, he adds, as it were in a postscript, are not to be attended to; they are a bad precedent and quite out of date. I make no apology for recalling these few well known particulars of a famous letter, as giving great reality to the position of Christians in the age and even in the very region in which St. Peter here writes. It is quite plain that the account which St. Peter speaks of as likely to be demanded of them is a judicial proceeding, and that the answer which he bids them to have ready is the plea of guilty or not guilty when they are asked-and know too well what it means-“ How say you, are you Christians or not Christians?” There are persons in this London to whom the straightforward dealing, creditable to them on the whole, of Pliny and Trajan with those Christians of Bithynia would have presented an alternative of intolerable embarrassment. Such direct demands for a “ Yes” or a “ No,” to the inquiry, “ Christian or no Christian?” are out of date; they would make no allowance for the intellectual difficulties of the nineteenth century; they are too rough and peremptory for us; we are balancing, we are waiting to settle a hundred things ere we get to this. Of course we do not worship images, of course we shall utter no anathema of Jesus Christ, but to go to the stake for Him, to be sent to Rome to be executed for Him-no, no. You must not suppose us indifferent to the difficulties of the age; you must not suppose anyone undervalues the difficulties of believing or exaggerates the satisfactoriness of the evidence. It is not so. But neither can we consent to throw back or to throw forward the whole question of Christian or not Christian, as though we might live and die without settling it for ourselves either way. Be very glad that we do not incur the sharper alternative of the great first struggle between Heathenism and Christianity, that we find ourselves in days of public toleration and mutual civility imposing no condition of faith or speech upon those who would buy or sell in the market place or eat and drink at the banquet tables of the world. We will look into this; and we are struck before all else with the title given to our Christian possession. The account demanded of one of those Christians of the first age in Bithynia was not of their opinions, not of their doctrines, not even of their beliefs, it was of their hope. St. Peter, wishing to animate these Bithynians into a readiness to make answer at the bar of some emperor or proconsul, “ I am a Christian,” goes to the root of the matter by calling their Christianity a hope. He says to them in that word, “ Remember Jesus Christ brought life and immortality to light by His gospel. Keep Him and you have a sure, a blessed hope through Him who loved you; part with Him, and you are thrown back at the very best upon the one guess among many of a heathen philosophy.” That hope which was the secret of courage in days when to be a Christian was to be in danger of being a criminal under a capital charge is no less the one thing needful when the answer must be given with no penal consequences in the counting houses and drawing rooms of Christendom. It is the hope which attracts; it is the hope which animates; it is the hope which convinces and which persuades. It may be doubted whether hope occupies quite the place it ought to have in the Christianity of this generation. We hear much of duty, much of effort, much of work, much of charity, and something of self-denial; but these things are often found in almost absolute isolation from peace and joy in the “ good hope through grace” ; much time is given to controversial or speculative theology, little to the actual anticipating and foretasting of the powers and glories of a world to come. And this silence springs from the secret or half-avowed thought, it is out of date; it was the privilege, or it was the fancy of days gone by. These things ought not so to be. If a man would settle it with himself quite in the early days of his believing that he means to look for the life of the world to come on the definite ground of the atonement and promise of his Master and only Saviour Jesus Christ, and if he would have out this treasure every morning, handling, admiring, cherishing it, so that it should never be out of his thought or out of his heart and soul, and so that he should positively intend to carry it with him to and through the grave and gate of death, then there would beam in his very countenance such a light of hope as would make young men and old take knowledge of him that he knew Jesus Christ and was on his way to Him; ready always, such would be the result, to make his defence to every one that put him on his trial concerning the hope that is in him. Oh! be able to tell these unsatisfied questioners that you have a hope-a hope that serves as your anchor, a hope that keeps you steady amidst the swelling and surging waves of circumstance; a hope that makes you happy; a hope that quickens and concentrates energy; a hope which enters within that veil, which hangs and must hang here between the visible and the invisible! Be able to say and to mean this, and then you will be Christian apologists in the best of senses, not excusing the inquirer, which would be a fatal indulgence, one iota of definiteness which we feel regarding the personality and regarding the inspiration of the Saviour, but making him feel that there is a ready access and a joyous welcome for him “ to enter with boldness into the holiest by the blood of Jesus Christ.” We end with the two words with which St. Peter ends this verse. Ready, he says, to defend your hope “ with meekness,” to defend your hope “ with fear.” Oh! what mischief has arisen to the acceptance of the gospel, and so to the salvation of souls, by the neglect of these two rules on the part of Christian apologists! Make answer, but let it be for a hope which is first in you, and let it be also with “ the meekness” of one who knows himself dust and ashes, and with the reverence of one who feels God near, and sees in the man opposite to him a soul for which Christ died. (Dean Vaughan.) A reason of the hope that is in you.-The nature and reason of the Christian’ s hope I. What is the Christian’ s hope? Hope is the desire of some attainment, attended with expectation or conviction that the object of desire is attainable. It is, therefore, an operation of the mind, which involves the action of reason and judgment. It is a mental state in contrast to despair, where all expectation of success is extinguished. But the Christian’ s hope is distinguished from all other by its object and end. The object of the Christian’ s hope is heaven, as a state of holiness and communion with God. II. What is the reason of the Christian’ s hope?1. He has felt himself to be a lost sinner. Christ came to seek and to save them that were lost. Not against their will, but by their own consent. Therefore we see that provision is made for enlightening the mind, so that it may be led to an intelligent choice. 2. He feels that he has fled to Christ for salvation. He is a Saviour, and is embraced and loved and honoured as such. 3. The true Christian finds a third reason to encourage a hope that he is personally interested in the gospel plan of salvation, in the effects of this faith on his life. (R. H. Bailey.) The true Christian defence I. The need of a defence or apology. Religion is always the thing in the world that hath the greatest calumnies cast upon it, and this engages those who love it to endeavour to clear it of them. This they do chiefly by the course of their lives; yet sometimes it is expedient, yea, necessary, to add verbal defences, and to vindicate not so much themselves as their Lord and His truth, as suffering in the reproaches cast upon them. Christian prudence goes a great way in the regulating of this; for holy things are not to be cast to dogs. But we are to answer every one that asks a reason or an account, which supposes something receptive of it. We ought to judge ourselves engaged to give it, be it an enemy, if he will hear; if it gain him not, it may in part convince and cool him; much more should he be one who ingenuously inquires for satisfaction, and possibly inclines to receive the truth, but is prejudiced against it by false misrepresentations of it. II. All that we have to give account of is comprised here under this-“ the hope that is in you.” Many rich and excellent things do the saints receive, even in their despised condition here; but their hope is rather mentioned as the subject they may speak and give account of with most advantage, both because all they receive at present is but as nothing compared to what they hope for, and because, such as it is, it cannot be made known at all to a natural man, being so clouded with their afflictions and sorrows. And, indeed, this hope carries its own apology in it, both for itself and for religion. What can more pertinently answer all exceptions against the way of godliness than this, to represent what hopes the saints have who walk in that way? If you ask, Whither tends all this your preciseness and singularity? Why cannot you live as your neighbours and the rest of the world about you? Truly, the reason is this-we have somewhat farther to look to than our present condition, and somewhat far more considerable than anything here; we have a hope of blessedness after time, a hope to dwell in the presence of God, where our Lord Christ is gone before us; and we know that as many as have this hope must purify themselves even as He is pure. The city we tend to is holy, and no unclean thing shall enter into it. The hopes we have cannot subsist in the way of the ungodly world; they cannot breathe in that air, but are choked and stifled with it; and therefore we must take another way, unless we will forego our hopes and ruin ourselves for the sake of company. III. The manner of this. It is to be done with meekness and fear; meekness towards men and reverential fear towards God. “ With meekness.” A Christian is not to be blustering and flying out into invectives because he hath the better of it against any man that questions him touching this hope; as some think themselves certainly authorised to rough speech, because they plead for truth and are on its side. On the contrary, so much the rather study meekness for the glory and advantage of the truth. “ And fear.” Divine things are never to be spoken of in a light way, but with a reverent grave temper of spirit; and for this reason some choice is to be made both of time and persons. The soul that hath the deepest sense of spiritual things and the truest knowledge of God is most afraid to miscarry in speaking of Him, most tender and wary how to acquit itself when engaged to speak of and for God. IV. The faculty for this apology. “ Be ready.” In this are implied knowledge and affection and courage. As for knowledge, it is not required of every Christian to be able to prosecute subtilties and encounter the sophistry of adversaries, especially in obscure points; but all are bound to know so much as to be able to aver that hope that is in them, the main doctrine of grace and salvation, wherein the most of men are lamentably ignorant. Affection sets all on work; whatsoever faculty the mind hath it will not suffer it to be useless, and it hardens it against hazards in defence of the truth. But the only way so to know and love the truth and to have courage to avow it, is to have the Lord “ sanctified in the heart.” Men may dispute stoutly against errors, and yet be strangers to God and this hope. But surely it is the liveliest defence, and that which alone returns comfort within, which arises from the peculiar interest of the soul in God, and in those truths and that hope which are questioned: it is then like pleading for the nearest friend, and for a man’ s own rights and inheritance. This will animate and give edge to it, when you apologise, not for a hope you have heard or read of barely, but for a hope within you; not merely a hope in believers in general, but in you, by a particular sense of that hope within. (Abp. Leighton.) A reasonable hope There is a play upon the words in the original which it is difficult to transfer into English. “ Be always ready to give a justification to those who ask you to justify the hope that is in you,” or, “ to show a reasonableness of the hope that is in you to those that ask you a reason for it.” The Bible is a book of hope. The gospel is a glad tidings of hope. The religion of Jesus Christ is preeminently a religion of hopefulness; it differs in this respect from other religions. Now and then a glimmer of light shines from ancient philosophy, as in the writings of Socrates; but, for the most part, the religions of paganism, though they may be religions of reverence and of duty and of fidelity and of conscience, are not religions of faith or of hope. Now, the message of Christ enters into the world bright with hope. It comes to men as a ship comes to shipwrecked mariners on a desert island; it comes as the bugle blast comes to men starving in a beleagured city; it comes with the same note of rescue in it that the besieged at Lucknow heard in the Scotch pibrochs sounding across the plains. Now, Peter, recognising that the Christian religion is a hopeful religion, and that the Christians are to walk through life with the brightness of hope shining in their faces-Peter says: “ You must have a reason for this hope; it must not rest merely in your temperament. You must have a reasonable ground for your hope; and when men who have not a hopeful temperament, and men who have a wider view of life than you have, and see the evils that infest society and life-when they come to you with their dark vision, and their dejected spirit, it is not enough for you to say, ‘ I am hopeful’ ; it is not enough for you to say, ‘ Look on the bright side of things’ ; you must be prepared to tell them what reason you have for hope, what is the ground of your hopefulness.” Let us see what are the grounds for our hopeful ness for ourselves, our families, or nation, and the world. In the first place, then, we believe in God. We believe that He knew what He was about when He made the world; and that He made the world and made the human race because the product of that making was going to be a larger life, a nobler life, and therefore a more blessed and a more happy life; that in the very beginning, when He sowed the seeds, He knew what kind of harvest was going to grow out of it, and He was not one that sowed the seed of tares, but one who knew that the wheat would over balance the tares in the last great harvest. We believe that He is a God of hope. He understands life better than we do; He understands the tendencies that are at work in society and government better than we do. With all that understanding, with the clear vision of the dark side of things as well as the bright side of things, He has an invincible hope for the future, and we borrow our hope from His hopefulness, and, because of His hope, we, in our ignorance, hope also. He has given definiteness to this hope. He has put before us unmistakably in human history not only what He hopes, not only what He desires, but what He expects, and what He means the human race to be. We look upon humanity and we say, “ What is man?” And we go down to the savage, and look at him: “ No, he is not man.” And we go to the prison house: “ No, these are not men; they are the beginnings of men, they are men in the making, but they are not men.” We look out upon society, with its frivolity and its fashion and its pride and its vanity and we say, “ No, this is not yet man.” We look out into the industrial organisation, and see men hard at work for themselves and for one another, and we say, “ This is not our ideal of man.” We go into statecraft, but we do not find our ideal of man in the politician and statesman. We look along the paths of history; it is not to be found in the general or the monarch. It is not even in the father and the mother, though we come nearer to it then. And finally we come to the New Testament, we come to the life of Christ, and we say, “ This Jesus of Nazareth was above all others the Son of Man.” He stands as the ideal of humanity. He is the pattern and the type of what God means man shall be. And then we hear the voice of God saying, “ You also are to become as He was, sons of God” ; and from all the radiance of Christ’ s face, and from all the glory of Christ’ s character, we borrow inspiration and hopefulness, because this is what God hopes we shall become. Moreover, we see-dimly, it is true, and imperfectly, but we see-by faith, more and more, God entering into human life; we see Him moving upon human souls, and we see Him shaping them according to His ideal and according to His purpose. We look on human life, with its carnage, with its wrestling, with its battle, with its selfishness, with its corruption-ay, with its grave and its decay; we see civilisations perishing and literatures perishing, we see nations buried deep, and yet we say: This is but the carboniferous period; this is but the movement of the chaos; there is a God that is brooding on this chaos; there is a law in all this antagonism and battle of life; God is in human history, as God is in human hearts and lives; God is bringing order out of the chaos, and a new-created world will spring up at His command. Oh, our hope is not in princes or potentates, or leaders or politicians-it is in a God that is at work in humanity! Churches, creeds, nations may disappear, but human character will grow and grow, because God is begetting men and working out His own conception of manhood, because all these things are the instruments through which He is accomplishing a definite creation-not moulding men from without, but entering into men and fashioning them from within. And so we believe God is not only using all these outward instruments environing man, but He is entering into him and lifting him up, as the mother lifts the child, little by little. But this, you say, is hope for the world at large. “ How about myself personally? How about my little life? How about my baby and my cradle? I do not care so much about the universe, as I do about my cradle and my baby.” There are no large things with God, and there are no little things with God. There are no large things in life, and there are no little things in life. It is a small rudder that directs the course of the ship. And we believe in a God that is not merely brooding over the whole globe, but that is determining the fall of every leaf and the shaping of every limb; in a God that not merely deals with nations in the mass, but that broods and watches above every cradle and every soul. Some one of you will say, “ How can you believe this? Looking out into life, and seeing what it is, can you escape the conclusion that many things are going wrong, and much is running to evil?” Ah! I do not think you see what life is. This entry is longer than a Bible module can hold. The rest is at https://www.sermonindex.net/commentary/bi/ 1 Peter 3:18-20 Christ also hath once suffered for sins.The great atonement I. The glorious person who suffered for sin and sinners. II. The sufferings by which he made atonement for sin.1. Sin was the procuring cause of them.2. His human nature was the immediate subject of them. 3. They were the sufferings of a Divine person.4. They were not imaginary but real.5. The sufferings of Christ were necessary.6. Vicarious.7. Grievous.8. Voluntary.9. By them the justice of God was fully satisfied. 10. Though they are long since finished, they have the same merit and efficacy that ever they had. III. The end of Christ’ s sufferings.1. How, or in what respects, sinners may be said to be brought to God. Their being brought to God- (1) Implies their being brought into a state of reconciliation and favour with God. (2) It implies their having access into the gracious presence of God. (3) It implies their being admitted to communion and fellowship with God. (4) Sinners are brought to God when they attain to likeness and conformity to God. (5) Sinners may be said to be brought to God when they forsake the service of sin, and cordially engage in the service of God. (6) Sinners are brought to God, in the fullest sense, when they are brought to the full enjoyment of Him in heaven. 2. What influence the sufferings of Christ for sin have on the bringing of sinners to God. By the sufferings of Christ all grounds of controversy between God and sinners were legally removed (Colossians 1:20). (D. Wilson.) The sufferings of Christ I. Their reality. Christ suffered from-1. Privation.2. Satanic hostility.3. Unkindness.4. Misunderstanding. II. Their atoning nature.1. The character of Christ.2. The doctrine of substitution.3. The solitariness of the sacrifice, (1) Nothing more is needed.(2) Nothing more will be given. III. Their design. “ That He might bring us to God” -1. In penitential sorrow.2. To obtain mercy and peace.3. With entire self-surrender.4. Unto God’ s immediate presence. Lessons:1. There is hope and help for all.2. Christ is the way of access to God. (M. Braithwaite.) The saints coming home to God by reconciliation and glorification The scope of the apostle in this place is to fortify Christians for a day of suffering. In order to their cheerful sustaining whereof, he prescribeth two excellent rules.1. To get a good conscience within them (1 Peter 3:16-17). 2. To set the example of Christ’ s sufferings before them (1 Peter 3:18). The sufferings of Christ for us is the great motive engaging Christians to suffer cheerfully for Him. I. The sufficiency and fulness of Christ’ s sufferings intimated in that particle [once]; Christ needs to suffer no more, having completed that whole work at once. II. The meritorious cause of the sufferings of Christ, and that is sin, “ Christ once suffered for sins” ; not His own sins, but ours. III. The admirable grace and unexampled love of Christ to us sinners. “ The just for the unjust” ; in which words the substitution of Christ in the place of sinners is plainly expressed. Christ died not only for our good, but also in our stead. IV. The final cause or design of the sufferings of Christ. “ To bring us to God.”1. What Christ’ s bringing us to God imports. (1) That the chief happiness of man consisteth in the enjoyment of God: that the creature hath as necessary dependence upon God for happiness, as the stream hath upon the fountain. (2) Man’ s revolt and apostasy from God (Ephesians 2:12). (3) Our inability to return to God of ourselves; we must be brought back by Christ, or perish forever in a state of separation from God (Luke 15:5). (4) That God’ s unsatisfied justice was once the great bar betwixt Him and man. (5) The peculiar happiness of believers above all people in the world: these only shall be brought to God by Jesus Christ in a reconciled state; others, indeed, shall be brought to God as a Judge, to be condemned by Him. All believers shall be solemnly presented to God in the great day (Colossians 1:22; Jude 1:24). They shall be all presented faultless before the presence of His glory with exceeding joy. 2. What influence the death of Christ hath upon this design. (1) It effectually removes all obstacles to it.(2) It purchaseth (as price) their title to it. (John Flavel.) The Saviour’ s mission I. The character of the Saviour’ s mission.1. It was one that involved Him in suffering.2. It was one of innocent suffering.3. It was one unconquered by suffering. II. The purpose of the Saviour’ s mission.1. We are away from God.2. We can be restored to God. (1) In thought.(2) In will.(3) In resemblance.(4) In filial fellowship and friendship. 3. God Himself brings us back by Christ. III. The extent of the influence of the savior’ s mission. (U. R. Thomas.) Christ’ s sufferings I. The due consideration of Christ’ s sufferings doth much temper all the sufferings of Christians, especially such as are directly for Christ. It is some ease to the mind in any distress, to look upon examples of the like or greater distress, in present or former times. It diverts the eye from continual poring on our own suffering; and when we return to view it again, it abates the imagined greatness of it. The example and company of the saints in suffering, is very considerable, but that of Christ is more so than any other, yea, than all the rest together. Therefore the apostle, having represented the former at large, ends in this, as the top of all (Hebrews 12:1-2).1. Consider the greatness of the example; the greatness of the person “ Christ.” There can be no higher example. Since thus our Lord hath taught us by suffering in His own person and hath thus dignified sufferings, we should certainly rather be ambitious than afraid of them. Consider the greatness and continuance of His sufferings, His whole life was one continued line of suffering from the manger to the Cross. Art thou mean in thy birth and life, despised, misjudged, and reviled, on all hands? Look how it was with Him, who had more right than thou hast, to better entertainment in the world. But the Christian is subject to grievous temptations and sad desertions, which are heavier by far than the sufferings which the apostle speaks of here. Yet even in these, this same argument holds; for our Saviour is not ignorant of those, though still without sin. If any of that had been in His sufferings, it had not furthered but undone all our comfort in Him. 2. Consider the fitness of the example. As the argument is strong in itself, so, to the new man it is particularly strong; it binds him most, as it is not far fetched, but a home pattern; as when you persuade men to virtue by the example of those that they have a near relation to. 3. Consider the efficacy of the example. “ He suffered once for sin,” so that to them who lay hold on Him, this holds sure, that sin is never to be suffered for in the way of strict justice again, as not by Him, so not by them who are in Him. So now the soul, finding itself rid of that fear, goes cheerfully through all other hazards; whereas the soul perplexed about that question, finds no relief in all other enjoyments: all propositions of lower comforts are troublesome to it. II. Having somewhat considered these sufferings, as the apostle’ s argument for his present purpose, we come now, to take a nearer view of the particulars by which he illustrates them, as the main point of our faith and comfort. Here are two things to be remarked, their cause and their kind.1. Their cause; both their meritorious cause and their final cause; first, what in us procured these sufferings unto Christ, and, secondly, what those His sufferings procured unto us. Our guiltiness brought suffering upon Him, and His suffering brings us unto God. 2. We have the kind of our Lord’ s sufferings: “ Being put to death in the flesh, but quickened by the Spirit.” “ Put to death.” This is the utmost point, and that which men are most startled at-to die; especially a violent death. “ In the flesh.” Under this second phrase, His human nature and His Divine nature and power are distinguished. But the “ Spirit” here opposed to the “ flesh,” or body, is certainly of a higher nature and power than the human soul, which cannot of itself return to re-inhabit and quicken the body. “ Put to death.” His death was both voluntary and violent. That same power which restored His life could have kept it exempted from death; but the design was for death. He therefore took our flesh, to put it off thus, and to offer it up as a sacrifice, which, to be acceptable, must of necessity be free and voluntary; and, in this sense, He is said to have died even by that same Spirit, which here, in opposition to death, is said to quicken Him; “ Through the eternal Spirit, He offered Himself without spot unto God.” And yet it was also expedient that His death should be violent, and so the more penal, to carry the more clear expression of a punishment, and such a violent death as had both ignominy and a curse tied to it, and this inflicted in a judicial way; that He should stand, and be judged, and condemned to death as a guilty person, carrying in that person the persons of so many who would otherwise have fallen under condemnation, as indeed guilty. “ Quickened.” For all its vast craving mouth and devouring appetite, crying, Give, give, yet was the grave forced to give Him up again, as the fish to give up the prophet Jonah. The chains of that prison art strong, but He was too strong a prisoner to be held by them. That rolling of the stone to the grave was as if they had rolled it towards the east in the night, to stop the rising of the sun the next morning; much farther above all their power was this Sun of Righteousness in His rising again. That body which was entombed, was united to the spring of life, the Divine Spirit of the God-head that quickened it. (Abp. Leighton.) The sufferings of Christ Suffering is universal in the world. It comes from the first wailings of the infant to the last enfeebled cry of old age. It is found in the silent endurance of weakness and in the bold struggle of strength. It is in every station and rank of life. It is so various in its manifestations, that it seems as if we took a new lesson in it every day. To pass it by, to try to deny it, to make the ignoring of it a victory over it, is very short-sighted policy; it is what we would do with no other fact of like universal significance and power. And therefore, when Christ begins His gospel with the fact of suffering, we are at a loss whether to admire most the wisdom or the love of the method; together the boldness and the reasonableness of what He does startle us into asking the secret of One who could thus utilise the world’ s greatest enemy, and turn in defence of mankind the very weapons which have so long wrought their destruction. The man who taught to his fellow men the uses of destructive fire was the hero of ancient mythology; the men who have bridled the lightnings, and chained the forces of air and water, are the great names of modern civilisation. But what shall we say of Him, who stopped not with the powers and material of the earth, but, going into the heart and life of man, found there the fact of suffering, and out of that formed the cornerstone of His kingdom? who, out of the cries and groans to which we close our ears, made the praises of God resound through the world? In this bold action the first element of strength is, that all suffering is traced to one source. Suffering is made to flow from sin. Christ suffered for sin, suffered as a criminal, suffered because of sin, under the weight of sin. The wisdom of Christ, the singleness of His purpose, the central power of His action, start out before us then; and we feel that He was indeed one who was fitted to deal with the great fact of human suffering, as He could thus put His finger on the very place whence it all flowed. It is only by getting at the true nature of a difficulty that we are able to conquer it; the new and deeper knowledge opens ways of approach unthought of before. There stood in proud seclusion the steepest peak in the Alps. Men looked at it, and said that human foot could never scale its heights. Bolder spirits tried every way which they could devise, approached it from all sides but one; and they succeeded in reaching certain points, but still there towered above them that inaccessible point. At length a wiser, more experienced eye was turned to that very side which had been pronounced evidently impossible; and, as he thus faced what had seemed the most despairing side of the problem, he saw that the strata of the earth below, broken sharp off in the upheaval of that majestic peak, furnished a series of steps which made the passage possible directly to the summit; and now every year even unexperienced feet make their way over the path thus opened. If any of us stand wondering how the mountain of our own or the world’ s suffering shall be conquered, and have never seen the path opened on the side of man’ s sin, have tried every way but the fight against sin, have shed tears over every calamity but the depravity of our nature, have done everything but confess our sins in the sight of God, nay, have dismissed that as too dark and hard a side of the problem for us to face, now let the way opened by One who knew the secrets of our nature and of the generation of that mountain of suffering,-let that way be the one for our feet to follow. One of our greatest troubles, under the suffering which we feel ourselves or see in the world, is, that it does not seem to come upon the right people. But when this great Master approaches this very fact of suffering, as the one which He will use in His work, we have reason to expect a word of authority from Him on this most distressing feature of it. And it is here; “ the just for the unjust,” Christ suffered. That runs through all His life, the thought that it was the very sinlessness of His life that made Him able to do the work for sinful men, that made Him able to take up the load of sin. The fact that He came from the Father, and was ever bound to the Father, was the very thing that made Him able to call men back to the Father. It is the privilege of strength to suffer for weakness. As it does so, strength is glorified; it conquers weakness, it spreads the power of its own life, it becomes strength in its right place. Only the mighty can help; and, as He thus helps, we look to His might as the reason for it, and through the work for us we find our Saviour. It is not gratitude alone-that, indeed, moves us as we think of what He did for as-but it is the opening of the source of strength by which He was able to do it. We come to Him through gratitude; and, as we reach Him, we find Him one who is mighty to save, because He could bring us near to God. This shows us the meaning and power of the last clause of our text. The apostle has been saying that Christ’ s sufferings were so like the sufferings of the disciples, that they could feel the sustaining power of them. But here it is not likeness, it is dependence, that is brought out. These sufferings were to bring to God the very men who were now exhorted to imitate them. Never were they to forget that they had been brought to God by those sufferings. They had opened His love. They had drawn to Him who was able to reveal God to them. They had made the world a different place, one that had the power and presence of God as well as of man in it; never were they to forget that. But, as they remembered it, it would affect their lives, and change the whole character of them. The mystery of life’ s power would be made theirs. They, too, would have but one object-to bring men to God. Never was there a time when the suffering of the world was so keenly felt as it is today. A philanthropic age needs the Cross, men anxious to alleviate the sufferings of the world need to have their own hearts broken for their sins, and all of us need to cling to these events of the suffering and death of Christ, and to feel that they contain the very power of our lives within them-the power of forgiveness and redemption, the power of happiness, the power of true labour, the power of the life eternal for this world and for the world that is to come. (Arthur Brooks.) The unrepeatable sacrifice The sufferings of Christ were in many respects peculiar: I. They were officially undertaken and endured. The designation by which the Redeemer is here distinguished, and the emphatic statement whereby He characterises His sufferings must be taken together-“ Christ once suffered for sins.” Suffering is no uncommon thing; “ Man is born to trouble.” But Christ was not an ordinary man. Here then is a marked distinction between His and all merely human suffering. Man was not made man for the purpose of suffering; on the contrary, it is the result, the penalty, of his sin; but the very end for which the Christ became man was that He might suffer. In this sense, therefore, it may be said that He “ once suffered” -the entire of His sufferings from the very first lay before Him. To us it is a merciful provision which leaves us in ignorance of future ills. “ Christ once suffered.” His sufferings stand alone. Where can we find a just comparison for them? Here then is another peculiarity. The statement is that “ Christ suffered for sins.” Were His sufferings the consequence of His own desert? Had this been so, His bitter enemies would not have failed to convict Him of sin; but His challenge in this respect was never answered. The sufferings of Christ were expiatory, substitutionary and vicarious. What was the doctrine of atonement under the law? Was it not that the innocent suffered for the guilty, and that on account of this suffering the guilty might go free? Hence the care in selecting the sacrificial victims that they might be without blemish or defect. How far from satisfying the requirements of such language as this is the view that would reduce the death of Christ to the mere result of a life of disinterested and self-sacrificing benevolence employed in turning men to righteousness; the seal of His doctrine, and a distinguished example of passive virtue! II. To set forth the design of Christ’ s sufferings, and to aim at its accomplishment in bringing men to God. Let us reflect upon the connection between sin and suffering, as viewed in relation to Christ’ s suffering for sins.1. Apart from personal interest in the sufferings of Christ, suffering regarded as the result of sin-suffering for sin-is a fact, the most terrible and unrelieved in the experience and history of our world. Men may quarrel with the suffering while they hug the sin, but the connection is there. Science may be invoked, and art and artifice may be employed to make sinning physically safe; but all this cannot remove or alter the fact-the goads are there. 2. To those who have a personal interest in His sacrifice, Christ’ s suffering for sin takes away the sting of suffering. 3. The removal or lessening of sin must ever be the most effectual way of removing or lessening suffering. That is a spurious philanthropy which seeks to depreciate the gospel. (J. W. McKay, D. D.) The sufferings of Christ I. The character of the sufferer, and of the persons for whom he suffered.1. Christ hath suffered, the just for the unjust. The expression intimates the perfect purity of His nature. But the expression, “ the just,” intimates not only the perfect purity of His nature, but also the perfect purity of His life. His life was as pure as His nature. “ He did no sin, neither was guile found in His mouth.” 2. He suffered for the unjust. As the term, “ just,” expresses the perfect purity, both of the nature and of the life of the Saviour; so the term, “ unjust,” must express the impurity, both of the nature and of the life of those for whom He suffered. II. What he who is the just hath done for the unjust, he hath once suffered for their sins.1. This language intimates, that Christ the just One hath suffered. He suffered in His body. He was wounded, bruised, scourged, crucified. He suffered in His character. Crimes were laid to His charge which His righteous soul abhorred. He suffered in His soul. Satan tempted Him; His friends forsook Him; God hid His face from Him. 2. The language intimates that Christ the just One, hath suffered for the sins of the unjust. Why, then, if Christ had no sin in His nature, no sin in His life-why did He suffer? Why did not His perfect sinlessness screen Him from all evil? To answer these questions, we must have recourse to the doctrine of the substitution and atonement of Christ, and then to such questions it is easy to give an answer. 3. The language intimates that the just suffered only once: Christ hath once suffered for sins. The expression “ once,” denotes the perfection of His atonement. 4. The language intimates that Christ suffered once for sins voluntarily. He is the just One, the equal of Jehovah, and who could have compelled Him to suffer? Or, if it had been possible to compel Him, His sufferings would have possessed no value. III. The design of the just suffering for the unjust, that he might bring them to God. (Wm. Smart.) Christ’ s sufferings; or, the basis of evangelism I. They were endured once. He hath “ once suffered.” The word “ once,” is capable of being taken in two senses. The sense of actuality: that is, the mere expression of the fact that He had suffered. Or, it may be taken in the sense of onlyness. “ Once for all” :-“ never again,” as Bengel has it, “ to suffer hereafter” (Hebrews 4:28). Taken in this sense, two ideas are suggested:1. That nothing more for the purpose is needed. His sufferings are sufficient. 2. That nothing more for the purpose will be vouchsafed. “ There remaineth no more sacrifice for sin.” II. They were endured by a just person. The “ Just.” Christ was “ without sin.” He was at once the foundation, standard, and revelation, of eternal rectitude. III. They were endured on behalf of the unjust.1. This is a proof of His amazing love. “ Scarcely for a righteous man will one die,” etc. 2. This is an encouragement for the greatest sinner. “ The unjust” of all grades and types of wickedness. IV. They were endured to bring the unjust to God. “ That He might bring us to God.”1. Legally: They remove all governmental obstructions to reconciliation. 2. Morally: They remove the enmity of the human heart, and are the means of uniting the soul in love to its Maker. 3. Locally: Although God is everywhere, yet in heaven He is specially seen and enjoyed. V. They were endured to the utmost extent. “ Being put to death in the flesh, but quickened in the spirit.”1. Here is the death of His human nature;-“ the flesh.” “ He suffered even unto death.” 2. Here is the revivication of His human nature by the Divine Spirit:-“ quickened in the Spirit.” The subject furnishes-First: Encouragement to suffering Christians. Secondly: A rebuke to those who limit the provisions of the gospel. Redemptive mercy is not for a favourite few:-it is for the unjust. Thirdly: A lesson to the impenitent. What ingratitude is yours! (D. Thomas, D. D.) Christ’ s sufferings I. The highest instance of undeserved persecution.1. We see that suffering is not necessarily a mark of sin.2. We see that sufferings are not necessarily the sign of a bad cause.3. We see that sufferings are not always a sign of defeat. II. We have a distinct and direct statement of Christ’ s substitutory sacrifice. III. We have a reference to the object of Christ’ s accomplishing this object-“ To bring us to God.” We can only appreciate this suggestion by realising what is implied in being away from God. For man to be away from God is as if a flower were separated from its root, a babe from its mother. IV. We have the great mystery of Christ’ s death alluded to-“ Put to death in the flesh, but quickened in the spirit.” Our Lord’ s soul could not die; no more can man’ s soul die. (J. J. S. Bird, B. A.) The sufferings of Christ our atonement and our example I. Our atonement. Christ’ s sufferings.1. Unique (á̓́ðáî), once for all.2. Propitiatory. “ For sins.”3. Vicarious. The just for the unjust.4. Effectual. “ That He might bring us to God.” II. Our example. (F. Dobbin, M. A.) The sufferings of Christ I. The sufferings of Christ are here asserted. II. The meritorious cause of them is assigned. III. A material circumstance relating to his sufferings is taken notice of. IV. The opposite characters of Christ, and of those for whom he suffered, are laid down. V. The great design of his sufferings is declared.1. The ends of Christ’ s sufferings are various. (1) That He might set us an example of patience and resignation to the Divine will, under the troubles and difficulties of this life. (2) To teach us self-denial and mortification. (3) That He might exercise tender compassion towards us, under our trials and sorrows. 2. But the great end of His suffering for sins, the just for the unjust, was to bring us unto God. Application;1. Our hearts should be greatly affected with the representation which has been made unto us of the love of Christ. 2. How should we hate and abominate sin! 3. Let us draw nigh to God. 4. All our approaches to God should be through Jesus Christ. (S. Price.) The design of Christ’ s sufferings I. The person who suffered. It was “ Christ, the just.”1. His official character. The word Christ properly means one anointed or consecrated to some sacred office. 2. His personal character-“ the just.” II. The sufferings He endured. “ For Christ also hath once,” etc.1. The nature of His sufferings. “ Christ suffered, being put to death in the flesh.” 2. The period of His sufferings. 3. The object of His sufferings. 4. The issue of His sufferings. He was “ quickened by the Spirit.” III. The design He accomplished. “ That He might bring us to God.”1. The natural state of fallen sinners. 2. The personal efficacy of Christ’ s atonement. It “ brings us to God.” (Sketches of Four Hundred Sermons.) The just for the unjust.- The just suffering for the unjust I. The nature of Christ’ s sufferings.1. Intense.2. Ignominious.3. Voluntary. II. The purposes of Christ’ s sufferings. “ That He might bring us to God.” ! 1. By His atoning sacrifice, thereby removing every obstacle in the way of the sinner’ s access to God. 2. By the operations of His Holy Spirit. 3. By the prevalency of His intercession. (W. J. Brock, B. A.) Christ’ s sufferings for us We accept the life and the death of Christ as an atonement, as a substituted suffering, the just for the unjust; but we do not feel that He was a sufferer only when He was on earth, and that His suffering then was all the suffering that was needful to the salvation of the world. It was the nature of Christ to suffer for sinners. He was embodied in the physical form that we might judge of what that nature was in the past, and what it was to be in the future, for the atoning nature of God existed from all eternity, and is going on to all eternity. The Lamb was historically slain in the time of Christ; but long before the coming of Christ there was the Divine atoning love, there was the vicarious suffering of the Saviour. And now, although no longer humbled in the flesh, Christ has not lost that peculiar element and attribute of the Divine nature-namely, substitution, imputation, vicariousness. Still He suffers in all our sufferings. He is afflicted in all our afflictions.1. Sin becomes exceedingly sinful when judged by such a test as this. There is nothing that the whole world revolts at more than at flagrant ingratitude. 2. It is the presentation of such a Saviour as this that makes confession easy to pride. There are a thousand things that hinder men that have done wrong from forsaking their wrong-doing. But if God be for you, who can be against you? If the bosom of Christ’ s love is open, and is a refuge to which you may fly for safety, why should you not avail yourself of it? 3. When we stand, at last, in Zion and before God, and look back upon our past career, how inevitable will it be that every one shall turn disgusted from the thought of his own strength, and that we shall take our crowns and cast them at the feet of Christ, and say, “ Not unto us, not unto us, but unto Thy name be the praise of our salvation!” The patience of God, the gentleness of God, the forgiveness of God, the sufferings of God for us-these will stand out in such illustrious light in that day that every one wilt be filled with joy, and gratitude, and triumph, and new pleasure in the consciousness that it was of God that he was saved, and not of himself. (H. W. Beecher.) Christ the substitute I. The need of pardon, suggested by the word in our text-“ sins.” Unless you come to know and feel your need of a thing, you will never desire or welcome it. If I wished to convince you that you needed pardon, from your father, for instance, in an ordinary matter, I should first have to show you your offence. I am afraid many young people do not feel their need of pardon in a far higher sense. I wish I could write the word “ sins” on your hearts today. This is one of the greatest words in all the Bible-in all the world. It tells about our offences against God-about our breaking of His holy law-about the evil we have done against our loving Father in heaven. And when once we come to get a sight of our sins as against God, we never can rest until we have got His pardon. II. The gospel way of pardon. Some people think it is enough to ask pardon. Others think the way of pardon is to be sorry for their sins. Others think the way of pardon is trying to be as good as they can-saying their prayers, and striving to do what is right. Now the gospel way of pardon, though it might be said to include all these, is yet different from them all. It is very simple. It is very shortly told. I have heard an esteemed Edinburgh minister tell of his visiting an aged Christian man on his deathbed, and saying to him, “ Is it not a happy thing that we have the gospel set forth in so few and in such simple words?” The old man looked up and said, “ One word, sir!” His friend said, “ What is the one word?” He replied, “ Substitution!” The whole gospel in one word-substitution! If anyone were to ask me, “ What is the way of salvation?” and I wanted to put it as shortly and as fully as possible, I would say, “ It is the immediate, present acceptance of Christ as the substitute on the authority of God’ s word and offer.” There is a touching story told regarding a body of men who had taken part in a rebellion, and were sentenced to have every tenth man of their number shot to deter others from doing what they had done. Among these were two, a father and son. We can fancy we see the men drawn up in a long line. Fixing, perhaps, on the first man by lot, he is marked out for death, and every tenth man thereafter, counting from him. The father and son stand together, and as the son runs his eye along the line he discovers that his father is a doomed man. He realises what it will be to have their family left without a head, his mother a widow, the old home stripped of its light and joy, and, quick as thought, he steps in where his father stood, and falls in his stead. He becomes his father’ s “ substitute,” and, if you ask the father in after years how he was saved, with the tear in his eye and a quivering voice, he will tell you he was saved by a substitute-that substitute his most loved and loving son. This, then, is what I want to bring out as the most important thing. The gospel way of pardon is by substitution-by One taking the place of another, by the Just taking the place of the unjust-the Good taking the place of the evil-the just Jesus, the good Jesus, taking the place of the unjust and the evil. God is just and holy, as well as merciful and loving. He is a King and Judge, as well as a Father. The authority of His law must be maintained. His justice must be vindicated. The law in its precept and penalty must be satisfied. It must be perfectly obeyed; and in the event of disobedience, the penalty of the broken law-death-must be suffered, either by each man himself, or by another in his room. We have all disobeyed, and so there is no hope for any one of us, except in the obedience and death of Christ. I would come to each of you and say, “ You are lost, and unless you get pardon you will be lost forever. The Lord Jesus Christ is willing to be your substitute now and here, and in God’ s name and on the authority of His own Word I offer Jesus Christ to be your substitute. Here is One willing to take your place. Will you have Him? If you take Him you are saved, you are pardoned.” When visiting our Jewish Mission Schools at Pesth, the capital of Hungary, a few years ago, I heard the truth on which I have been dwelling strikingly brought out by one of the pupils. The lesson was about the crucifixion of Christ, and the teacher asked, “ What connection have we with the work and death of the Lord Jesus?” A young Jew held out his hand, as being prepared to give an answer, and said, “ It is just as if we had the merit; it is just as if we had been crucified!” III. The results of pardon-that is to say, the consequences of being pardoned through the substitution of another-through the Lord Jesus taking our place.1. The first thing that follows gospel pardon is safety. There is no more danger. There is no condemnation to them who are thus in Christ Jesus. 2. There is happiness. (1) This is the secret of happy living. A young friend, who had been in much anxiety about her soul, was shown into my study one night. Her face was quite radiant. It was such a change from what had been before that I could not help asking, “ What has happened tonight?” The brief but expressive answer was, “ I have taken Him to be my substitute!” That explained all. (2) This is the secret of happy dying. Dr. Carey, the great Indian scholar and missionary, tells of his visit to one of the wards in an Indian hospital. On a bed, in a corner of the room, lay a dying soldier. Stepping gently up to him, he knelt at his bedside, and whispered into his ear, “ My dear brother, are you afraid to die?” Looking up with a smile, the dying man answered, “ Oh, no, sir; I have died already!” He meant that Jesus, his substitute, had died for him, and he had not to die, but only to fall asleep in Jesus. 3. There is gratitude-thankfulness. 4. There is love. 5. Lastly, there is service. It is told of the Duke of Orleans , father of Louis Philippe, the last king of the French, that on one occasion he was out riding, followed by his servant, who was also on horseback. The Duke had crossed an old bridge over a rapid stream in safety, but when his man servant was following, the bridge gave way, and horse and rider were thrown into the river. In a moment the Duke leaped from his horse’ s back, plunged into the stream, and with considerable difficulty succeeded in saving the drowning man and bringing him to land. Need I describe the scene that followed? All dripping as he was, you might have seen the grateful servant prostrated at his master’ s feet, promising the gratitude and service of a lifetime, and asking what he could do to serve one who had done so much for him. You know the story of “ The Heart made Captive” -the slave bought with British gold, who vowed he would never serve his purchaser. But when he learned that the stranger had bought him to set him free, there were no bounds to his love and gratitude, and no limits to his service. When asked as to the secret of his constant and devoted service, there was but the one answer, “ He redeemed me! he redeemed me!” Such is the secret of all right-hearted service done for Christ, as well as of all holy living. “ He is my substitute. He suffered for me. He died for me. Lord, what wilt Thou have me to do? What shall I render unto the Lord for all His benefits unto me?” (J. H. Wilson, D. D.) The just for the unjust I. That Christ suffered should make suffering Christians patient. Not that I would make light of trials; far from it. I know they are often bitter and so long continued as to put a sore strain on clinging faith. Remember there is a ministry of suffering. The very trials of our life are ordered by a wiser will than ours, and are parts of a Heavenly Father’ s discipline. As the stress of the storm strains the ship and shows where the weak parts are, so by our trials God would show us the weak points in our character, that we may strengthen what is weak and supply what is wanting. II. Christ’ s sufferings were for his people and on account of their sins. A man leaps overboard from the deck of a steamer on the broad Atlantic, and you think him a fool or a madman. But wait a little; why did he do it? He saw a sailor on the bulwarks overbalance himself and fall over the ship’ s side, and he, a strong swimmer, leaped overboard to save him. And if you found that that drowning man had in time past often reviled the one who in his sore need risked his own life to deliver him, how could you find words to express your sense of the nobleness of such self-sacrificing conduct? And do you not think that the man thus plucked from the jaws of death would be heartily ashamed of his past reproaches, and would nevermore cease to love his deliverer? Is not this something like the case of the sinner and his Saviour Christ? III. Consider now the object with which the saviour suffered. It was “ that He might bring us to God.” This plainly implies a state of alienation and estrangement. O man, how far off hast thou wandered! How deep the enmity, how dire the distance between thee and thy God! How shall the awful gulf be bridged which thy sins have opened between thy God and thee? You now see how false is the common notion which many have of religion. They regard it as a thing to be turned to when one comes near to die-as a sort of desperate remedy to be taken when one can do no better. On the contrary, religion is a walk of fellowship with God; a thing for the daily round of duty; a life of obedience flowing from love and gratitude for redemption; a life unselfish, Christ-like, God-glorifying. (Wm. McMordie, M. A.) Put to death in the flesh, but quickened by [in] the Spirit.-The quickening influence of suffering The main idea is of course a comparison between the experiences of our Lord and those of His suffering followers. The sacred writer was striving to the utmost to sustain and comfort them under the severe stress of persecution through which they were passing. “ Take heart,” he seems to say; “ your sufferings are not exceptional; they run in the Divine family; even our Master was not exempt from them; He also suffered in the flesh; but His sufferings did not stay His blessed ministry; nay, they even augmented His sphere of usefulness; ‘ He was quickened in spirit,’ in which also he went forth to herald His accomplished work in regions to which, but for death, He had not obtained access. So shall it also be with you. Your sufferings shall not clip your wings, but add to your powers of flight. The things which happen to you shall fall out rather to the furtherance of the gospel; and it is through death that you must pass up to share His glorious resurrection and imperial power.” (F. B. Meyer, B. A.) The resurrection of Christ No man ever yet came out of a great work the same as he went into it; he has always lost something, and gained something. A great effort for a noble purpose taxes a man’ s strength; but it builds up character, confidence, and reputation. A great effort for a selfish purpose drains a man’ s moral resources, he has to surrender nobler considerations and higher purposes; but it leaves him better off in the things of this world, with a larger fortune, and a greater command of earth’ s luxuries. It is this process of gain and loss to which our attention is called in the review of Christ’ s death and resurrection. It was a great transaction, nothing less than the attempt to overthrow the reign of sin and suffering in the world. The character and success of the great work would be largely indicated by the effect on Him who undertook it; the question which all must ask is, What part of Him gained, and what part of Him lost? As that is known, it ought to determine whether it is a work in which we wish to join. Flesh and spirit were both strong in Christ through all His life. Then came the contest with sin and suffering, and the body succumbed. It suffered, and went down into the grave. When its work was through, the spirit, which had never been daunted, which had relied upon the Father in its darkest moments, had an opportunity to show its strength. It was the spirit of the Son of God. It belonged to Him who was the incarnate Son of God; and it must take that same body, and show its own power, and do what the flesh had been unable to do. The spirit must assert itself: it must be seen to be the lifeguard of the body; it must be evident as the great protecting, rescuing power. And when that was once done, there was no defeat. What had been lost by the flesh had been more than made up by spirit, and the great transaction was a victory. Can we wonder, then, at the Christian’ s joy at Easter? It is not as a single event by itself that the resurrection stirs our hearts: it is because it is connected with the whole nature of our being, with the whole work of Christ’ s life, and with the mysteries of our existence, and of the world forever. We see spirit triumphing over flesh everywhere; not always, but on every side and in all departments, giving us the hope and key to this great fact. A poor weakened body labours under pain and disease for years; but the mind grows brighter day by day, and the spirit becomes more refined. It sometimes seems as if spirit could do anything; and it can, if it is the right spirit. It is its duty to animate the flesh, and it shows itself able to do it; and time after time it manifests its ability far above and beyond all the powers of flesh, making that flesh do things for which it has seemed to have no capability. Now let it be the perfect spirit, the spirit of the Son of God, and directly in a line with all our experiences is that resurrection from the dead. We find no hope of the resurrection but in the greatness of Christ, in His intimate and personal connection with the Father. It was the Father’ s witness to His being the Son of God; in that He has raised Him from the dead. Spirit is nobler than flesh. Place two men side by side, one of whom has always lived for the flesh, the other of whom has always tried to find the spiritual side of everything, and of every event with which he has come in contact. The former weighs you down with his grossness. His talk of the pleasures of the table, his gossipy narration of things that have taken place, his dull, unimaginative dealing with all that happens, his narrow interests and selfish aims, they are dreadfully unsatisfying and wearisome. The other always seems to be buoyant with joy and hope of something better. He hates all grossness enough to drop it out of his life; and yet, with a sympathy with all souls, he finds gleams of hope in those of whom the world can say nothing but evil. You know the two types of men, and of the approaches to them in every degree and form, from your daily experience with those about you; you know it still more from the experiences within you. Every transaction upon which you enter has its two sides-it can exalt the flesh and kill the spirit, or it can kill the flesh and exalt the spirit. You may come out of a successful business or social career with all that the flesh can possibly give you, and find that the virtues of the spirit-the unselfishness, the purity, the honour, the thought of better things have been put out of existence; you are quickened in the flesh, you are put to death in the spirit. Here again we see that the resurrection of Christ was not an isolated fact, and did not stand alone. It gathers to itself all the words of the Sermon on the Mount, all the exhortations of nobleness of life, and living above this world, which had been dropping from Jesus’ lips ever since He began His ministry. They cannot stand alone; they ask a great completion, a victory on their side, that they may have power, and not meet with discouragement. It seems as if Christ would say, “ I appreciate how great a weight of conduct I have put upon you; I would help you bear it. I know how the forces of the flesh press on every side; a greater force of the spirit shall be with you through Me. See what the spirit can do to the flesh, and be encouraged in every battle.” The power of a risen Saviour is to show itself in spiritual lives. Do you say that this may demand the giving up of certain things? Then let them go; be “ put to death in the flesh,” if you can but “ live in the spirit.” That was Paul’ s desire: “ If by any means I might attain to the resurrection of the dead.” It was a matter of present attainment in the triumph of the spirit day by day; and for that we too are to labour, if our Easter joy and songs do indeed mean all that they say. We saw that this greatest feature of Christ’ s resurrection was based on the fact that no man comes out of a transaction the same as he went into it. The same fact can lead us to the most complete participation in that resurrection, to which our minds are always turned. Are we to rise as He did? Had it hope for victory to any beyond Himself? We never come out of the great transaction of life the same as we went into it. We begin with spirit in the infant body, so unable to provide for itself. Then the flesh grows and asserts itself, until at length its hour of weakness comes, and, in the failure of disease or of old age, it loses its power, and sinks once more into the earth. What happens then, we ask? We never have any doubt as to that question about Christ. We find a clearer view and statement of His nearness to the Father coming out each day, as His life goes on. More and more He is bound to Him, until at last, in the great occasion of His death, it is not surprising that the trained and strengthened spirit conquers and raises Him. We can all tell of lives that have so followed Him, have so learned of God’ s presence and love in the world through Jesus Christ that at every step in life their spirits have grown stronger, and without effort, nay, of necessity, our hearts include them in the Easter rejoicing, because we know which side of them the great transaction of life strengthened. (Arthur Brooks.) He went and preached unto the spirits in prison.- The gospel preached to the dead Who is here spoken of? He. The form of the expression resembles that in our Creeds. “ He suffered and was buried. He descended into hell.” The text does not say that the flesh of our Lord was put to death nor that His spirit was quickened. It states that He was Himself put to death qua flesh, and Himself quickened qua spirit. The flesh denotes His living body and animal soul; the spirit denotes here not the Holy Spirit nor the proper Deity, but the higher principle of the human spirit life, which was especially united to the Deity of Christ. He who is very God and very man, one person in two natures, did suffer death-in which nature?-not in His Divine nature-that is impassible-but in His human nature, which is passible. In the whole of His tripartite humanity? Not so: in a part of it, even in the flesh, and having there suffered death He, the same person, was quickened in the life, which never for a moment was quenched, of His own spirit. In that highest compartment of His human nature He experienced a transition to a new mode of existence, which issued in the resurrection of His incorruptible body. Meanwhile in the intermediate state-between the crucifixion and the resurrection, He, the Lord of Life, neither slumbered nor slept. His activity of philanthropy never ceased. Through the gates of death in the new life of the disembodied spirit He went, He made a journey. He the Crucified One, His body still hanging on the tree, passed away from the Cross of Calvary to the place of custody, where the souls of the departed were in confinement. These spirits in prison are they who, when they were in the flesh, in the midst of a universal apostasy saw not the signs nor felt the shadow of the coming judgment, nor heeded the voice of the righteous preacher, and therefore perished in their sins and in the flood. Their bodies were buried in the deep of the Deluge, and their spirits were carried into the deeper abyss of Hades. To these imprisoned souls was revealed in Hades the presence and the form of one like unto the Son of Man, clothed in human spirit. Thus disembodied and spirit ensphered the Son of God to the departed souls of the antediluvian world made a journey-and made a preachment. What was that preachment? Did He, in whom death could work no moral change, speak in His disembodied spirit to disembodied spirits, as He spake in the flesh to men in the flesh? Did He, the Apostle on earth of His Father in heaven, continue to pursue His Divine mission in Hades? There is a palate in this same Epistle which, rightly considered, makes it evident that St. Peter believed that to the dead in Hades the gospel itself had been proclaimed. To what class or classes of the dead it was proclaimed he does not specify; by whom it was proclaimed he does not specify; but, if we compare the two statements in the same Epistle-(1) that “ Christ went and preached to the spirits in custody,” and(2) that “ to the dead also the gospel was preached” -we must conclude that, according to St. Peter, our Lord in the world of spirits, between His own crucifixion and resurrection, announced “ glad tidings of great joy.” It is certain that the offer of salvation formed a part at least of His Divine message. And it is likely that this offer was made to all. Why not? Was not this their first opportunity of hearing of the great salvation wrought for all believers? There are some who have thought that the substance of our Lord’ s preaching in Hades was of two kinds-that to some He preached salvation, to others perdition; that to the irreclaimably lost He preached a concio damnatoria. Surely this could not be; such a theory could never be in harmony with what we know of His Divine mission. Far better, and far more true, is it to suppose that He preached Himself, the One Saviour, to all alike. Not that all to whom He preached were alike susceptible of the message of glad tidings; because the multitude of the antediluvian unbelievers had indeed died in their sins, but still had so died in a very unequal measure of sin. To the class of incorrigible sinners the preaching of Christ in Hades would, we may believe, be in vain. They had sinned away their receptivity of the Divine message. They listened, indeed, from their sullen prisons to the heavenly Herald of mercy, and, as they listened to Him, they learned that He had died for the sins of the whole world, that He had died even for their sins, but at the same time they knew of themselves that He was not their present Saviour but their future Judge. Thus they would stand before the Preacher self-convicted and self-condemned. I conclude by mooting the question whether this interpretation of the text after all involves any abnormal teaching; whether, in fact, it is an exception to the general rule of Christian doctrine. It seems to me that there are some few passages in Scripture which indicate the broad theory that all men of all ages, who in this life never had the opportunity of hearing of Christ and of His salvation, will not perish hereafter for lack of that opportunity given some time, but failing this world will find that opportunity in the world to come; and if they are equal to it, if by patient continuance in well-doing here they are able to meet it, then they will embrace the gospel, and become par takers of the kingdom of heaven, if not as princes and rulers in Israel, yet as subjects. From this interpretation of the text an inference may be drawn. If Christ, through all His several stages of existence, was a forerunner and pioneer to His apostles and faithful followers, it may be that as the Personal Head of the Body Mystical did in that unseen world preach the gospel to departed spirits, so some or many of His living members, as they have disappeared one by one behind the veil, have also in their turn, and after His example, preached the same gospel there. If this idea is akin to truth, then it is possible that “ through the ages all along” the gospel which St. John calls “ the gospel of the ages” has not been hidden, but preached to such departed spirits as never heard, nor could hear, the glad tidings when they were in the flesh, and that it is not from lack of opportunity that any soul perishes. (Canon T. S. Evades, D. D.) The spirits in prison St. Peter is urging his readers to endurance under suffering. He sets before them the example of Christ. He suffered not only unjustly but for the unjust. “ That He might bring us to God” -us, the erring and straying, the sin-bound and self-exiled. This is the starting point. St. Peter expatiates in the field thus entered. He bids us contemplate the effect of Christ’ s suffering upon Himself. He bids us contemplate the two parts of His humanity-the flesh and the spirit. Death dissolved the compound. He was “ put to death” as regards the one; He was “ made alive” as regards the other. It is as though the dropping of the one gave new energy to the other. He had spoken in the days of His flesh of being “ straitened” till the great “ baptism” was accomplished. There was a compression in that enclosure of flesh and blood which would be taken off instantly by its removal. While the lifeless body was hanging for its last hour on the tree, He, the living spirit, was using the new liberty in a special office and mission-He was on a journey-He was making Paradise itself a scene of activity-“ in the spirit,” St. Peter says, “ He went and preached to the spirits in prison.” St. Peter defines with great precision the objects of this unearthly visitation. They are “ spirits in prison” -they are dead men fast holden in Divine custody, as guilty aforetime of a great disobedience, which sealed their fate here, and swept them promiscuously into a condition which men must call “ judgment.” These “ spirits” were “ disobedient once” -and the tense suggests an act of decisive and definite disobedience-“ at the time when the long suffering of God was waiting in the days of Noah.” They were “ judged” for their disobedience to this call-men, from the side of flesh and time, could not say otherwise than that these men had died in their sins-but a miracle of mercy sought them out, after long ages, in their prison house-the “ three days” of Christ’ s sojourn “ in the heart of the earth” were used, of special grace, in their evangelisation-in the sight of men they lie still under judgment, but in spirit, according to God, they have been quickened into a supernatural life. Let us see if there is anything elsewhere in Scripture that will help us in bearing up under the weight of this remarkable disclosure. Yes, St. Paul has something very like it in his discourse on the communion-where he says that, for dishonouring this holy sacrament, many of the Corinthians not only “ are weak and sickly,” but even “ sleep” -have been, as he goes on to say, “ judged of the Lord,” not only with “ divers diseases,” but with “ sundry kinds of death” -and goes on to explain to them that, when thus “ judged,” punished even with death itself, they are “ chastened” lest they should be “ condemned” -death itself, judicial death, may be but a “ chastening” to save from that “ condemnation” which yet (the same verse says) is for “ the world.” What is this but St. Peter’ s “ judged, according to men, in flesh,” yet “ living, according to God, in spirit” ?-a judgment, not of condemnation, but of “ chastening” unto salvation? Before we pass to our last words of counsel, let us throw the light of St. Paul and St. Peter upon some of those darkest passages in the history of the Old Testament which seem to consign to a disproportionate doom men of a single sin, or men sinning half under compulsion. Take such an instance as that of the disobedient prophet-a man lied to by another prophet-and failing, under that persuasion, to keep the safe rule, what God has said to thee thyself is more true, for thee at least, and more concerning, than that which God is said to have said, in correction of it, or in repeal of it, to another. That man, for that yielding, is executed, within the day, under God’ s death warrant. But is there any man to tell us, on the word of God, that the disobedient prophet is among the lost-that his is so much as one of the “ spirits in prison” ? “ Judged according to men in flesh” -judged so far as the body, and the life of time, goes-for is it not judgment to be cut off hastily from this life of the living, and by a sentence written for evermore upon the page of God?-not necessarily “ condemned with the world” -“ living” possibly all the time, and to live, according to God the Judge, and in that higher part of the man, which is “ spirit.” How many of the supposed injustices of God’ s dealing may have their reconciliation and their justification in this hint of the apostle’ s-in this more profound study of the Scriptures! Use the text thus, and it has life in it. Let it open to thee just a glimpse of realities out of thy sight! (Dean Vaughan.) Christ in the flesh and in the spirit Christ dealt with the living in the body, with the spirits in the spirit. (A. J. Bengel.) Spirits in prison I. That there are human spirits actually in the prison of hell.1. A prison is a scene of darkness. Impurity, remorse, despair, constitute “ the blackness of darkness forever.” 2. A prison is a scene of guilt. 3. A prison is a scene of bondage. Chains of iron confined the miserable culprit. 4. A prison is a scene of thoughtfulness. Hell is a dark realm of thinkers. But there are two features connected with hell that distinguish it from all the prisons on earth. (1) It is self-erected. Each prisoner constructs his own prison.(2) It is spiritual. The spirit is in prison. Earthly prisons cannot confine the soul. II. That there are human spirits who have been in the prison of hell for centuries. Christ preached to them, by Noah, when on earth. Peter speaks of them now as being in hell. What period of time has elapsed between this lengthened suffering, however, impresses me with two considerations-1. The fearful enormity of evil. 2. Man’ s capacity for endurance. Diseases soon break up the body; time withers the patriarchal oak, crumbles the marble; and “ the waters wear away the stones” of the mightiest rocks; but, through ages of agony, the soul lives on! III. That there are human spirits who have been in the prison of hell for centuries, to whom the gospel was once preached. Christ was “ in the world” before His incarnation. The fact that there are spirits in hell to whom the gospel was once preached suggests two very solemn considerations:1. That there is no necessary connection between hearing the gospel and salvation. “ He that heareth My words, and doeth them not,” etc. 2. That the final misery of those who have heard the gospel must be contrary both to the disposition and agency of Christ. (D. Thomas, D. D.) The spirits in prison I. Their state.1. Disembodied.2. Immortal. II. Their condition.1. A prison is a place of gloom.2. A place of restraint.3. A place of punishment.4. A place of confinement for trial. III. Their history.1. They had the gospel preached to them.2. God’ s long suffering waited for them. Applications:1. Let not disobedient men doubt the certainty of future punishments.2. Let not sinners question the justice of future punishment.3. Let not the wicked be emboldened by numbers.4. Let not the righteous be discouraged by their fewness.5. Let not those who are alarmed despair. (Essex Remembrancer.) The longsuffering of God waited. The patience of God The term applied here to the Almighty represents Him as we are not very apt to think of Him, i.e., as having before Him all the evil, of every kind, in His children, and bearing it; our ingratitude, our disobedience, our folly, our fickleness, our obstinacy, our selfishness, our wilfulness, our sensuality, our irreverence, our vanity-the whole dark and diversified mass of our sin. The catalogue of its shapes and degrees is well-nigh inexhaustible, yet it does not exhaust His patience. We have, it is true, as men and women, our disapprobations and even our little indignations at wrong-doing. But what marks a special contrast between them and the Divine displeasure is this, that as they gain in strength our human antipathies toward transgression are apt to grow hot and hasty. We want to see judgment against evil works executed speedily, forgetting that it was only just now that we began to see them to be evil works. Our brother trespasses against us, and, not considering that he is our brother, moulded of just such clay and subject to just such infirmities as ourselves, we cry out for the magistrate and the prison, if not the lash; and sometimes because there is no lash in the jailer’ s hand, we take one up with our tongue. This is the impatient spirit that vitiates so many of our remonstrances against our neighbours’ crimes. Let us give a little wider reach to the treatment of the subject by contemplating the patience of God in its sublime delay, its slowness as men count slowness, in bringing about the most beneficent ends. He shows us this patience first as the Maker of things. You find it in the unhurried order of the natural creation; the slow building and furnishing of the outer worlds; the slow succession of geologic ages; the slow procession in ascending ranks, one only so little above another, of the races of plants and animals, affording an epoch for a reptile or a fern; the ‘ slow preparation of the planet for its final purpose in the rearing of an immortal family, the revelation of the spiritual glory of the Divine Man in the flesh, and the manifestation, by that incarnation, of a new earth with the sons of God for its kings and priests. We rise from the physical to the moral world. Take the broadest divisions of the human family-races and nations. From their beginnings in the East, as an eastern shepherd leads out his flocks, the Everlasting Father has brought His tribes out of their native sheepcotes and stationed them here and there over the globe. Vast territories, with fertile soils and blooming vegetation, with the wealth of navies and harvests in their bosom, were waiting to receive them: and some are waiting still. God waited His own good time for occupying them with human industry. Nor is this the chief exercise of His patience. One after another these nations have broken away from their Creator’ s commandment. For each one of them He kindled the light of conscience or of revelation, to show them the way, and they shut their eyes upon it. This entry is longer than a Bible module can hold. The rest is at https://www.sermonindex.net/commentary/bi/ 1 Peter 4:1-6 Christ suffered in the flesh.Ecce Homo The Redeemer of the world is in one sense infinitely above us; but in another sense He is actually beside us. His sympathy is as true as His sovereignty. I. Try to understand what the sufferings of Jesus were. “ He suffered in the flesh.” No one can read the Gospels without seeing indications of those sufferings.1. There can be no doubt that Jesus was exempted from many of the physical ills from which we suffer. We can only think of Him as healthy, not only because of His birth, but because the exacting nature of His self-forgetful work required a perfect physique. Besides this, we must remember that many of our physical sufferings we bring on ourselves. Idleness, self-indulgence, artificial modes of life, irregularities, are the causes of many of the ills which flesh is heir to; but the life of Jesus was exquisite in its simplicity and unstained by a single vicious propensity. And this reminds us further that He could not have suffered, as we do, from a sense of personal sin, from the remorse which follows after our utterance of an unkind word, or the indulgence of an evil propensity, or from the tumult of passion which rises up within a sinful heart. Yet He was a sufferer. “ He was a Man of Sorrows, and acquainted with grief.” “ Himself took our infirmities, and bore our sicknesses.” But besides these His whole life was a martyrdom. His sensibility, not only to physical pain, but to mental and moral agony, must have been exquisite. 2. Think, too, of His utter loneliness. His was the solitude of a holy soul surrounded by sinners; of a heavenly spirit in contact with things earthly and sensual; of a mind whose higher thoughts not a single being on earth could appreciate; whose truest objects in living and dying as He did none could comprehend. 3. That expression, “ in the flesh,” reminds us of His uncongenial surroundings. He lived and died among a despised people, and was regarded as an outcast even by some of them! Often must He have felt as the Jews did when, exiled from home and fatherland, they hanged their harps upon the willows, and wept as they remembered Zion, saying, “ How can we sing the Lord’ s song in a strange land?” II. How these sufferings were endured by Him.1. It is evident that He accepted them as God’ s appointment for Him here. “ The cup which My Father hath given Me shall I not drink it?” indicates His attitude to trouble right through. If a day’ s ministry brought Him no result, He did not repine; if His own nation rejected Him, He meekly accepted the result, though with unutterable sorrow over the issues of it to them; if the Cross was to be faced, He went forth willingly to Calvary, there to die-the just for the unjust-to bring us unto God. 2. Notice also that our Lord never allowed Himself to be absorbed in His own sorrows. He was always ready to enter into other people’ s joys and griefs, whatever His own sorrows might be. He is not so absorbed in the joys of heaven that He will not listen to the faltering cry of the lowliest penitent. I have known some sufferers who have been armed with the same mind. Their unselfishness has been sublime. Their couch of pain has proved the centre of joy and peace to those who circle round them. III. But how can we do this? (A. Rowland, LL. B.) Christ’ s sufferings I. Christ suffered in human nature. His sufferings in the flesh were-1. Great, corporeal, social, mediatorial.2. Ignominious. Poverty, obloquy, persecution, crucifixion. II. Christ suffered for men. III. Christ suffered with a spirit which men should cultivate.1. Profoundly religious.2. Self denyingly philanthropic. IV. The possession of this spirit is the power to deliver us from moral evil. (D. Thomas, D. D.) Sin pierced Use sin, as Christ was used when He was made sin for us; lift it up, and make it naked by confession to God. And then pierce-1. The hands of it, in respect of operation, that it may work no more.2. The feet of it, in respect of progression, that it go no further.3. The heart, in respect of affection, that it may be loved no longer. (J. Trapp.) Arm yourselves likewise with the same mind.-Conformity with Christ I. The high engagement to this conformity. “ He suffered for us in the flesh.” We are the more obliged to make His suffering our example, because it was to us more than an example; it was our ransom. This makes the conformity reasonable in a double respect. It is due that we follow Him, who led us as the Captain of our salvation; that we follow Him in suffering and in doing, seeing both were for us. What can be too bitter to endure, or too sweet to forsake, to follow Him? Were this duly considered, should we cleave to our lusts or to our ease? Should we not be willing to go through fire and water, yea, through death itself, yea, were it possible, through many deaths, to follow Him? Consider, as this conformity is due, so it is made easy by His suffering for us. Our chains which bound us over to eternal death being knocked off, shall we not walk, shall we not run, in His ways? II. The nature of this conformity, to show the nearness of it, is expressed in the very same terms as in the pattern; it is not remote resemblance, but the same thing, even “ suffering in the flesh.” But that we may understand rightly what suffering is here meant, it is plainly this, “ ceasing from sin.” So that this “ suffering in the flesh” is not simply the enduring of afflictions, which is a part of the Christian’ s conformity to His Head, but it implies a more inward and spiritual suffering. It is the suffering and dying of our corruption, the taking away of the life of sin by the death of Christ: the death of His sinless flesh works in the believer the death of sinful flesh, that is, the corruption of His nature, which is so usually in Scripture called “ flesh.” “ Ceased from sin.” He is at rest from it, a godly death, as they who die in the Lord rest from their labours. Faith so looks on the death of Christ, that it takes the impression of it, sets it on the heart, kills it unto sin. Christ and the believer do not only become one in law, so that His death stands for theirs, but one in nature, so that His death for sin causes theirs to it (Romans 6:3). III. The actual improvement of this conformity. “ Arm yourselves with the same mind,” or thoughts of this mortification. Consider and apply the suffering of Christ in the flesh, to the end that you with Him suffering in the flesh, may cease from sin. Think that it ought to be thus, and seek that it may be thus with you. “ Arm yourselves.” There is still fighting, and sin will be molesting you; though wounded to death, yet will it struggle for life, and seek to wound its enemy; it will assault the graces that are in you. You may take the Lord’ s promise for victory in the end; that shall not fail; but do not promise yourself ease in the way, for that will not hold. If at sometimes you be undermost, give not all up for lost; he hath often won the day who hath been foiled and wounded in the fight. But likewise take not all for won, so as to have no more conflict, when sometimes you have the better in particular battles. Now the way to be armed is this, “ the same mind.” How would my Lord Christ carry Himself in this case? And what was His business in all places and companies? Was it not to do the will and advance the glory of His Father? Thus ought it to be with the Christian, framing all his ways, and words, and very thoughts, upon that model, the mind of Christ, and studying in all things to walk even as He walked; studying it much, as the reason and rule of mortification, and drawing from it, as the real cause and spring of mortification. (Abp. Leighton.) Cardinal truths I. The cardinal truth of Christianity Christ hath suffered for us.” II. The Christian’ s cardinal duty-“ Christ having suffered for us, arm yourselves with the same mind.”1. Arm yourselves with the same mind as to the method of conduct. 2. Arm yourselves with the same mind as to the purpose in view. III. The Christian’ s daily course of life-that we should no longer live, etc. (J. J. S. Bird.) Christ the grand necessity of man I. Christ’ s “ mind” is the weapon with which man is to fight his way on to moral perfection. His moral perfection is here taught. But to reach this what a battle man has to fight! By the “ mind of Christ” we are to understand, of course, not His mere intellect, great as it was, nor His conscience, sublimely pure though it was; but the moral spirit that inspired and directed all His intellectual and moral powers. By His “ mind” we mean, in one word, His moral character. Now this is the weapon by which alone man can win victories over evil, and obtain the crown of life, namely, conformity to the “ will of God.” Doctrines will not do it, however Scriptural; religious rites will not do it, however studiously observed. Who is the man in our world the most successful in putting down wrong? Not the legislator, however just the laws he enacts; not the moralist, however cogent his arguments and powerful his rhetoric; but the man who has the “ mind of Christ” as his armour. II. Christ’ s “ sufferings” are the argument for the employment of this weapon. First, the sufferings of Christ were “ in the flesh.” He was in the flesh, but not flesh. Secondly, Christ suffered “ in the flesh” in order to establish human holiness. “ That he no longer should live the rest of his time in the flesh to the lust of men, but to the will of God.” (D. Thomas, D. D.) The rest of his time in the flesh.- “ The rest of his time in the flesh” Who can tell how long that may be for any one of us? The sands run swiftly through life’ s hour glass. The shadow hastens to go down upon the dial. The waves eat away so quickly the dwindling shoal of land which crumbles beneath us. The Christian finds nothing in such thoughts to make him sad. Every milestone marks the growing nearness of his home. The waves cannot be crossed too swiftly by the eager traveller. Before us lie the ages of eternity, filled with a blessedness of personal enjoyment and rapturous ministry which defy tongue to tell or mind to picture. But the blessed future must not divert our thoughts from the duties to be discharged during the rest of the time which we are to spend in the flesh. We must not be dreamers, but warriors. To arms! Arm yourselves with the same mind; and when we ask, “ What mind?” we are told to arm ourselves with the mind that took Jesus to His death. In a venerable old church at Innsbruck, famous for containing the tomb of the great Emperor Maximilian, there is a magnificent bronze statue of Godfrey of Boulogne, the illustrious crusader. His head is covered with a helmet, and on the helmet rests a crown of thorns. Of course, there was a meaning in the mind of the artist other than that with which we now invest the strange conjunction. He doubtless designed to represent the sacred cause for which that helmet was donned. But we may discover an apt symbol of the teaching of our apostle, who unites in these verses the armour of the Christian soldier, and the recollection of Christ’ s suffering in the flesh. This witness of the sufferings of Christ first takes us to the Cross; and after gazing reverently on that spectacle of love, we are brought to a point where two ways diverge. And the only way of discovering and maintaining the right path is to imbibe the spirit of that wondrous death; nay, to bind it around us as a talisman of victory. “ In hoc signo vinces.” (F. B. Meyer, B. A.) The right use of the residue of our time I. Negatively. “ Not to the lusts of men!” This does not mean that we are to neglect our bodily interests. What are the lusts? Animal instincts grown to a dominant force. II. Positively. “ To the will of God.” This implies-1. That God has a will.2. That God has a will concerning men.3. That God’ s will is revealed. What is the will of God concerning men? First, it is His will that we should believe in Christ (John 6:29; 1 John 3:23). Secondly, it is His will that we shall be purified from sin. “ This is the will of God, even your sanctification” (1 Thessalonians 4:3). Thirdly, it is His will that we should cultivate a practical gratitude for all the blessings of life (1 Thessalonians 5:18). Fourthly, it is His will that every man shall be saved (1 Timothy 2:4). (D. Thomas, D. D.) The time in the flesh I. Our time in the flesh is chequered. II. Our time in the flesh is short. III. Our time here is uncertain. IV. Our time here is important. (Homilist.) To the lusts of men. Men’ s lusts opposed to God’ s will 1. To live after the lusts of men and to the will of God are opposite each to other as light and darkness. 2. We cannot at one and the same time both walk after our lusts and live to God’ s will. One lust loved, sufficient to condemn. 3. In the course of sanctification, we must begin at renouncing our own will, and the lusts of men. None sow a plant till weeds be pulled up; none put on new apparel till they have put off their rags. 4. It is not sufficient that we renounce our lusts and evil, except we yield obedience to the will of God. 5. It is not one action or two whereby a man is discovered what he is, but his constant course of walking or living. (John Rogers.) The flesh rightly used The flesh itself, under the calm subduing influence of your purer spirit, will become a dignified servant in waiting on its superior. Good gardeners know a better way of conquering the wild thorn than by uprooting and destroying it. They set it in their garden. They graft it on some queenly rose. Then the wild thorn expends its energy not upon itself, but upon that which is above itself; and as a reward is crowned with a glory which itself could not possibly produce. (G. Calthrop.) To the will of God.-Will of God 1. It is a good will.2. A holy will.3. A just will.4. An impartial will.5. A practicable will.6. A supreme will.7. An obligatory will. (John Bate.) Living to God’ s will I. This is the lesson of man’ s past evil life.1. Sadness. (1) Enough of sin, because of its-(2) Degradation to self.(3) Injuriousness to others.(4) Rebellion against God. 2. Hope. (1) Forgiveness for time past.(2) Deliverance from time past. II. Notwithstanding bad men’ s wonder at good men’ s conduct, what Peter said two thousand years ago is true today. The thoroughly corrupt man finds it impossible to understand the Christly man.1. He thinks his conduct strange, and so, perhaps, ignores him altogether.2. Or he thinks his conduct strange, and is aggravated by it.3. Or he thinks his conduct strange, and it leads him to inquire. This is the good effect. III. Both Christ’ s judgment and Christ’ s Gospel are for all. (U. R. Thomas.) God’ s win The perfection of a man’ s nature is when his will fits on to God’ s like one of Euclid’ s triangles superimposed upon another, and line for line coincides. When his will allows a free passage to the will of God, without resistance, as light travels through transparent glass; when his will responds to the touch of God’ s finger upon the keys, like the telegraphic needle to the operator’ s hand; then man has attained all that God and religion can do for him, all that his nature is capable of. The will of God What a glorious contrast to the will of the flesh is “ the will of God” ! This was the food of Jesus. To do this He came to earth. It was the fire cloud that lit His pathway, the yoke in carrying which He found rest, the Urim and Thummim, which dimmed or shone with heavenly guidance. There is no course more safe or blessed than to live in the will of God. God’ s will is good will. Where the will of God lies across the wilderness pathway, there flowers bloom, and waters gush from rocks of flint. Sometimes the flesh rebels against it, because it means crucifixion and self-denial, but under the rugged shell the sweetest kernel nestles, and none know the ecstasy of living save those who refuse the broad, easy road of the lusts of men, to climb the steep, upward path of doing the will of God from the heart. (F. B. Meyer, B. A.) 1 Peter 4:3-5 The time past of our life may suffice us.The consideration of misspent time an incentive to repentance 1. The time spent in sin, we know how much it is, but what is behind we know not. The devil is sure of his part, but what God shall have, whether half or a quarter, so much is uncertain. If we knew we should live twenty years more to serve God as we have done twenty years in sin, God should have but the half, but we know not whether we shall live twenty days. Should we then defer? 2. Time is very precious, above gold and silver, and hereof we have squandered a great part. 3. There is no time to be spent in sin, but we are to serve God in holiness and righteousness all the days of our life. Therefore, having robbed Him of some of His due, is it not well He will take this that remains? 4. Whatsoever time is spent till we return to God is all going out of the way; and if a man hath gone out of the way but till eight or nine o’ clock, assuredly that is more than enough. 5. Whatsoever time is spent that way is but doing that that must be undone again and repented of. Is not a little of this too much? Who will willingly so do his work that it must be ravelled out again? 6. All that is done this way is for the devil, our sworn enemy, for whom even the least is too much; for the flesh, to which we owe nothing; and for the world, which is our deadly enemy. 7. It is all done against God, to whom we owe all; and is it not then sufficient we have wronged Him so far? 8. And all is against our own souls; and have we not wounded them enough already? (John Rogers.) Departed years What is time? Without regard to philosophic niceties, I may say that it is limited duration, vouchsafed to man for moral purposes, through the mediation of Christ. I. As a portion of probationary existence. “ Time past of our life.” Take three views of the years that have departed.1. Look at what they have given us. 2. Look at what they have taken away from us. The warm impulses and tender sensibilities of childhood and youth. Precious gifts are these! What friends are gone! 3. Look at what they have left us. They have left us life, reason, memory, religious privileges, augmented responsibility, wider memories, and greater power for good and evil. Many precious germs of blessedness. II. As a course of wrong moral conduct. The apostle intimates that those to whom he wrote had, during the past years, “ wrought the will of the Gentiles.” During the time past of their lives they had not been passive but active. What was this will of the Gentiles? The will of corrupt humanity. Nothing more, nothing less. Every wheel in its vast and complicated machinery is moved and ruled by this. It is true that this will works in different men with different instruments and under different phases of character. Its language in some is vulgar, in others classic; in some obscene, in others refined.1. That this will is generally the ruling power in the first stages of man’ s history. 2. That there is a danger even of good men yielding to its influence. III. As an argument for immediate improvement. “ For the time past of our life may suffice,” etc. The urgency of this will appear from two considerations.1. The will of God ought to have swayed with an absolute power from the commencement of our responsible life. 2. All the time that has been spent in neglect of this has been spent in contracting guilt and increasing our exposure to ruin. (D. Thomas, D. D.) The voice of the past Life! What mystery is wrapped up in life! How great the power needed to originate it! What transcendent worth be longs to human life! to- I. “ Our life.” “ Our life” is redeemed life. It was great to speak a world from nought; greater to create moral life and fashion it after the Divine original; greatest to redeem. II. “ The past of life.” How little we know of the past-taking the word in its comprehensive relationship to the world! As question of history we know something of the world’ s civilisation, science, art, human laws, etc. But what do we know of the individual experience of mankind-its joys and sorrows? But there is a past for which God holds us responsible-an individual past. III. “ The time past of our life.” Nothing that I have is my own. I belong to God, in body, soul, and spirit. I am, therefore, accountable to Him for my time. Life is God’ s loan to man, and time man’ s “ life rent of the world.” In the great day we are to stand before God to give an account of our stewardship. The “ life rent” which the great Proprietor claims is service. He has put us into His beautiful world to make it more beautiful by adding moral to material beauty. If we fail to render this service we shall lose our life, in a sense which human language is not adequate to express. “ And now what have we to say with respect to this strange, solemn thing-Time?-that men do with it through life just what the apostles did for one precious irreparable hour of it in the garden of Gethsemane-they go to sleep! What opportunities have we lost! What privileges forfeited! What work for God neglected!” The secret of all the failures which have been enumerated is expressed by the apostle in one word, self-will-“ the will of the Gentiles.” Man doing his own will is the history of the world’ s sin and woe. Adoption into the family of God does not exempt us from its insidious workings. “ The God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ” asks us to let the past “ suffice to have wrought the wilt of the Gentiles,” to renew our early vows, our first love, to be henceforth inspired with the holy ambition to be “ conformed to the image of His Son.” To attain unto this we must yield our wills to God. What are we living for?-for God or for self? (A London Suburban Minister.) The old year and the new Look at the qualities that are here forbidden. Lust, lasciviousness, drunkenness, carousings-all these are especially mentioned; and the apostle declares that the time past suffices. You have had experience enough in regard to those things; it is time to leave them. There are multitudes of men that are sacking their very constitution; for whatever may be the opinions of men as to the morality of lascivious conduct, there can be no doubt as to the folly of it. And what shall I say of the concurrent danger of drunkenness, or excessive indulgence of the appetite? Surely I need not point out how base the life of a man is whose whole being circles around about that carnal, animal appetite; upon whom the habit is growing, and, like a maelstrom, swings into its centre, destroying everything that is pure and beautiful that comes near it. It sacks and ransacks the whole nobility of a man. The time past is sufficient for such things. But then there are a great many men that do not consider themselves either lascivious or drunkards. Nevertheless, carousings are familiar to them. What an ignoble way of living to make the whole of life consist, not in building up, but in the commerce of the lower feelings, and the prostitution of the sanctities of friendship to make the friendship of the cup, in all that wild excitement which breeds no single new idea, cleanses no single passion, throws light upon no single element of beauty, but is pure buoyancy of the flesh and the enjoyment of animal life! Higher than these, but still under the ban, are all forms of life where feeling and endeavour are concentrated upon frivolous social enjoyments, with their very selfishness and vanity and pride. I would not restrict the enjoyment of the young, except it trenched upon higher and nobler obligations. I love elasticity of spirit, overflow of pleasantry. All these things I believe belong to life; and just as much under the gospel as outside of it-yea, more. Now in regard to these passions, and the lower forms of intense self-indulgence particularly, the apostle is speaking here, and says, “ The time past ought to suffice.” All these wastes and degradations ought to cease absolutely. They shut out a man’ s reason. They shut out his best nature. They stand in the way of the accomplishment of the final ends of life. There are times when all these indulgences may be left. The time past gives men sufficient experience and knowledge, both of their uselessness and of their wastefulness, and also of their peril; and that is the time when men should stop and say, “ Well, I have had enough of that, now and forever.” Time enough to bring the higher qualities of your mind to sit in judgment over the lower. The conscience is Chief Justice. Call up those criminal appetites. Let them hear the judge decide, and follow the decision. The time past is sufficient for knowledge and for judgment. That which is true of these lower passions and appetites is lust as true of the higher and inanimate one of a frivolous, self-indulgent, wasteful life that proposes nothing, but dances on from hour to hour, with no more purpose than the butterflies or the insects of a summer day have. The time past is sufficient. Now, allow me to ask you: Are there not in your life some things palpitating, fresh and warm in your bosom, that you know to be wrong in your career? Is it not time for a change? And if your faults are superficial, if they are simply faults of temper, or of balance in the development of your life outwardly, is there nothing in your home life, is there nothing in your friendship life, is there nothing in your business life, judged by the canons of morality, and still more judged by the higher forms of supreme duty, that needs to be changed? Are you the chief occupant of your own self? or are there vermin that dwell in the cracks and crevices and partitions of the soul house? And if there is something more than faults, if there is something that lies deeper, ought you not, above all, for this to make a solemn pause? Be manly, and take a nobler view of what a man is born for, and of what his duty is to himself, to his fellow men, to society, to God, and to eternity; and form a judgment of your self for the old year; and on that deliberate personal investigation of facts and dispositions in your own case put the question to yourself, “ Have not I carried this thing far enough?” If you will do that, you will have taken one step; and will you follow that up by proposing to yourself a deliberate decision? Now, in all these changes that are going on in the human soul it is too often the case that a man says, “ I mean to try it; but I am not going to expose myself to ridicule, because I may not be able to carry this thing out; and if I don’ t, well, nobody will know it, and I will be no worse off than I was before.” That is to say, you leave a door of retreat open for yourself. I would not give the turn of my hand for a man’ s purpose who says he is going to change, but leaves all the old influences at work, and all the means of escape from his resolution at command. It is an illusion, and it is the repetition of these things that discourages men finally, and makes them believe they cannot reform and cannot do what they ought to do. If you are going to make a decision, do it on business principles. As all resolutions are so fugitive, so unstable, and as experience has shown that they are so unless when a man wants to correct a habit, commit yourself. What is the effect of committing yourself? Your pride and your vanity now work toward you and for you, whereas otherwise they would work against you. It is going with the current, instead of against it; with the wind, instead of against the wind. Therefore, hedge yourself; trust in somebody. Now is the time for thought; now is the time for purpose; now is the time for declaring your purpose; now is the time to begin. Whatever changes are necessary, will you make them now? (H. W. Beecher.) A sinner changed by grace I. The walk of a natural man described. He works “ the will of the Gentiles,” and lives in sin. II. The great change that the grace of God makes in a natural man. The change we mean is far more than the mere reformation of a sinner’ s life; it is an inward, supernatural change wrought by the Spirit of God, and by means of the gospel of Christ (Romans 1:16). III. The reasonableness of this change.1. Sin is a dreadful waste of precious time.2. Sin is a useless thing.3. Sin is extremely hurtful and dangerous to ourselves and others.4. Sin is highly dishonourable to the blessed God.5. A life of sin is directly contrary to our Christian profession. IV. The usage which a changed person may expect to meet with from a wicked world. Now, here observe that where such a change as this takes place it is visible; for if the world did not see it, they could not hate it. The change cannot be hid. Carnal companions will be deserted; places of vain amusement forsaken. This will excite hatred. “ The carnal mind is enmity against God,” and everything godly and Godlike (Romans 8:7). (G. Burder.) Christian consistency I. The world silently condemned by the Church. This is often done not so much positively as negatively. It is very peculiar, for they condemn them without saying a word, simply by “ not running into the same excess of riot” ; and this, it seems, is exceedingly well understood by the worldly party. Noah condemned the world by what he did, as well as by what he said; every stroke of his hammer was a sermon. The marked avoidance of the prevailing sins and follies of the world is often felt to be a powerful condemnation of them. But why should Christians thus refuse to mingle themselves up with the evil of the world?1. Love to Christ requires it. “ Forasmuch, then, as Christ hath suffered for us in the flesh, arm yourselves, therefore, with the same mind.” 2. The painful remembrance of the past prompts it. “ The time past may suffice to have wrought the will of the Gentiles.” It is always a sad thought to the Christian to look back upon his past devotedness to the sins of the world. 3. Christian consistency requires it. “ Let every one depart from iniquity.” A wicked life in a Christian is an indignity committed upon his Master in the disguise of a friend, and an outrage against the gospel. It seems to declare either that this religion tolerates immorality, or that it has not sufficient authority to enforce its own laws. 4. Your own highest interests demand it. II. The Church censured by the world.1. In their thoughts. “ They think it strange that ye run not into this excess of riot” ; but pardon me if I say they would think it stranger if you did. They may dislike you now, but they would certainly despise you then. “ They think it strange.” Why? Because they know nothing of the high standard of excellence which Christians possess; nor of the elevated principles by which they are actuated; nor of the superior sources of pleasure which are open to them. The Christian and the worldly man have both reason to wonder at each other. The worldling wonders that the Christian loves Christ so much: the Christian wonders that the worldling loves Him so little. 2. In their speeches. They speak evil of you, and contemptuously, as precise, formal, unsocial, repulsive. The Jews spoke evil of the prophets; Ahab spoke evil of Micaiah: “ I hate him, for he always prophesies evil of me.” The disciples were “ a sect everywhere spoken against.” 3. In their writings. Pliny wrote to the Roman emperor to complain of the Christian converts, as addicted to a morose and severe superstition. Infidel and irreligious men have indited many a sarcasm against the Christian cause. 4. By their conduct. That is, towards Christians, whom they persecute in various ways. III. The judgment of God concerning both. “ Who shall judge both quick and dead.”1. The certainty of the judgment. “ They shall give an account.”2. The speediness of the judgment. “ He is ready to judge.”3. The universality of the judgment. “ The quick and dead.”4. The consequences of the judgment. The awards of eternity are final, and they are extreme. (The Evangelist.) Counteracting the good God’ s law is a guide which conducts surely to the goal. His precepts are nought but communications of free favour. But what does the blinded world see in these precepts, testimonies, and statutes? First, we are told, it surprises, seems unaccountable to them, that believers run not in their ways. They put on an air of astonishment when you decline doing so. “ Why then,” they ask, “ do you refuse? Thousands upon thousands are on this side, and among them so many men of note, so many prominent members both in Church and State!” But we are told they blaspheme all who are not moved from their stedfastness. Their blasphemy consists, first, in their accusing God’ s true witnesses of blasphemy. They stand up and say, “ This man ceaseth not to speak blasphemous words against this holy place and the law” ; or, this is the man “ that teacheth all men everywhere against the people, and the law, and this place” (Acts 6:13; Acts 21:28). They abide by the old slander, “ We have found this man a pestilent fellow, and a mover of sedition among all the Jews throughout the world, and a ringleader of the sect of the Nazarenes” (Acts 24:5). To the righteous acts of the pious man unworthy motives are attributed, and he is made a mark for the arrows of evil tongues, solely because he seeks the good of Israel all his life long. If he rest in the promises of God, even these are made the subject of mockery! But such blasphemy and pretended surprise is very painful to the righteous, and a real snare to their feet, out of which they do indeed need to be helped. How often are the weak, and even the apparently strong in faith, induced for a time to run with those who make either a mock or a sport of sin! Yes, verily, nothing short of almighty grace will suffice to enable a man calmly to take on himself the dishonour with which his Lord was dishonoured, and to bear with a chivalrous courage the contempt and shame which, for Christ’ s name’ s sake, the world heaps upon him! (H. F. Kohlbrugge, D. D.) The pleasures of a holy life inexplicable to the ungodly The Roman soldiers, at the sacking of Jerusalem, entered the temple, and went into the Sanctum Sanctorum; but seeing no images there, as they used to have in their own idolatrous temple, gave out in a jeer that the Jews worshipped the clouds. And thus because the pleasures of righteousness and holiness are not so gross as to come under the cognisance of the world’ s carnal senses (as their brutish ones do), therefore they laugh at the saints, as if their joy were but the child of fancy, and they do but embrace a cloud instead of Juno herself, a fantastic pleasure for the true; but let such know that they carry in their bosom what will help them to think the pleasures of a holy life more real, and that the power of holiness is so far from depriving a man of the joy and pleasure of his life, that there are incomparable delights and pleasures peculiar to the holy life, which the gracious soul finds in the ways of righteousness. (J. Spencer.) Excess of riot A strong and expressive metaphor, especially in countries where, after violent rain, the gutters are suddenly swollen and pour their contents together with violence into a common sewer. Such is the apostolic figure of vicious companies rushing together in filthy confusion for reckless indulgence and effusion in sin. (C. Wordsworth.) Amusements to virtue are like breezes of air to the flame: gentle ones will fan it, but strong ones will put it out. (D. Thomas, D. D.) Pleasure must first have the warrant that it is without sin; and then the measure, that it is without excess. (T. Adams.) 1 Peter 4:7-11 The end of all things is at hand. The end of all things I. The solemn truth here announced.1. The end of your earthly engagements is at hand.2. The end of your worldly enjoyments is at hand.3. The end of trial and sorrow to the godly is at hand.4. The end of our privileges and opportunities is at hand.5. The end of our probation is at hand. II. The important considerations founded on this truth.1. Be sober.2. Be watchful.3. Be prayerful. (Pulpit Studies.) The end of all things at hand “ The end of all things is at hand.”1. This is literally true of all those objects which we see or which are obvious to any of our senses. They are temporal; they have had a beginning, they shall have an end. The material universe, in all its beauty, forms but a single link in the plans of that adorable Being who is without beginning of days or end of time; and its whole duration is but a single step in the march of that government which is from everlasting to everlasting. 2. The end of all things earthly is at hand, so far as we are concerned with them, or take an interest in them, because we shall soon leave them all behind. To each of us the time is short. Our days are but an hand’ s breadth. Shall we devote ourselves to pursuits we must so soon abandon? Shall we heap up treasures in this world as if it were our eternal home, when we know not at what moment we shall be summoned to bid a last adieu to all things earthly? 3. The end of all things is at hand, because all the objects of time and sense are frail and fluctuating; human society, in all its relations and interests, is full of change; and the world itself, with everything fair and excellent that it contains, is constantly fading and dying around us. And now what practical lessons ought we to learn from the view we have thus taken of ourselves, as dying creatures, and of this as a fading world? Surely we ought to give heed to the exhortation, “ Be ye therefore sober and watch unto prayer.” Shall we not subdue and restrain within the strictest bounds of temperance those appetites and passions which belong only to these dying bodies, and which, if indulged, will destroy our souls? But the subject should teach us lessons of devotion as well as of soberness. “ Watch unto prayer.” Shall we forget that awful eternity on whose very threshold we daily walk, or fail to recognise our relations to that adorable Being whose glorious perfections will so soon break in unclouded splendour upon our souls? Forbid it, reason, duty, conscience; forbid, Parent of our mercies. (W. J. Armstrong.) The nearness of eternity I. The end of all things is at hand. Nothing abides around you. Like the stream which wanders through the valley, everything is flowing by. A single year is often sufficient to change the whole complexion of life. The Christian contemplates, if with awe, yet in peace, the breaking up of all human schemes, and societies, and pleasures, and gains, and losses. He anticipates the wreck, but he feels himself to be in the ark. II. The practical influence of this consideration.1. Sobriety of mind is that temperate use of all earthly things, and that moderate estimate of their worth, which disposes the Christian rather to detach his affections from present objects, than to be inordinately excited by them. The near view of eternity peculiarly assists him in this moderation as to worldly enjoyments. 2. Prone, however, to be misled by his senses, he feels the necessity of incessant watchfulness. “ Be ye therefore sober, and watch.” His natural love of ease, his reluctance to self-denial will but too readily dispose him to adopt the theory rather than the practice of sobriety. Hence it becomes his duty to be ever vigilant over his own spirit, to examine candidly the actual habit of his mind; to watch diligently lest he act inconsistently with his professed principles; lest the world exert an undue influence over his heart; lest self-delusion put him off his guard. 3. But the apostle directs believers to connect this sobriety and this vigilance with prayer. Indeed prayer is the only source of this sobriety and this watchfulness of mind. The brightest impressions fade from the soul if they are not renewed continually by the grace and blessing of God. Hence prayer is to the Christian the very life and health of his soul. (G. S. Noel, M. A.) The nearness of eternity There is a great contrast between the believers of the apostolic age and ourselves. The voyager detects the near proximity of land by the fresh land breeze which breathes in his face, wafting the sounds and scents of forest, or prairie, or heather covered hill. So through these Epistles we inhale another atmosphere than that with which we are so familiar in Christian societies. We live in the world and pay occasional visits into the unseen and eternal; they lived in the unseen and eternal, and paid periodic necessary visits into the world. We conform to the world; they were transformed by the daily renewing of their minds. We read the society papers, discuss society gossip, send our children into society, and strive to hold our own in dress and appointments with the cream of society around us; they, on the other hand, were thought strange and ridiculous, because they lived amongst men as “ the children of the resurrection.” Surely the contrast is not to our credit, although we vaunt our fancied superiority. (F. B. Meyer, B. A.) Waiting for the end The warning of the apostle meant one thing to the Jew, another to the Christian. To the Jew it meant that the end of his nation, as a nation, had come. It meant that all the types and signs of the Messiah had been fulfilled in Christ, the true Light had appeared, and the shadows must flee away. But for the Christian the text moans more. For each of us, in one way or another, it is true that “ the end of all things is at hand.” Yes, of all things which belong to this life.1. The end of earthly greatness, or wealth, or pleasure, is at hand. We read of our most famous heroes, conquerors, statesmen, and all we can see of them is a tomb in our calm cathedral. When the famous General and Conqueror Churchill, Duke of Marlborough, was old they used to beguile the tedious hours by reading aloud the history of his own campaigns. Then he would turn to the reader and ask the question, “ Who commanded?” He had forgotten all the glories of Blenheim, and of Ramillies, of Oudenarde, and Malplaquet. I saw but lately a lock of King Charles I’ s hair, that is all that remains of the martyr king of England. The end of earthly greatness is at hand. 2. Again, the end of earthly friendship and connections is at hand. 3. Next, the end of our opportunities is at hand. Ah! make the most of your chances; once lost, they come not back again. Wisely did the old Greeks write upon the walls of one of their temples, “ Know thy opportunity.” 4. Once more, the end of our time of trial and waiting is at hand. Peter bids us prepare ourselves for that great beginning which commences when this life is ended. He bids us to be sober, to be watchful in prayer, to have fervent love for one another, and to show it in deeds as well as words. You would not expect the flowers to grow in your garden if the weeds were allowed to have the upper hand. Neither can you expect the graces of the soul to flourish if your body is your master. And not only should we be sober in our bodily passions, but in our words. There are many good people, sober people in other things, who are very intemperate in their talk. And again, we need to be sober in our religion, especially in these days. I do not mean that we are to be idle and indifferent, but we need not be noisy. Next, we are bidden to watch unto prayer. (H. J. Wilmot Buxton, M. A.) Be ye therefore sober.-Soberness and watchfulness I. The solemn fact, by the mention of which it is evidently the design of the apostle to arouse thought, to set the religious imagination on the full stretch of all its powers. “ The end of all things is at hand.” Different interpretations have been put upon this expression. Some understand it of Christ’ s coming at the end of the world; others only the dissolution of the Jewish ecclesiastical polity, then about to receive its last blow at the hands of the armies of Vespasian. The predicted accompaniments of the destruction of Jerusalem were so overwhelmingly awful, that, for all practical purposes to the men of that generation, the event might as well have been the winding up of the present economy-the termination of the life of all human kind. And we see at once the force of the motive drawn from this reference to “ the end of all things.” It is to make us connect with everything belonging to our present state the idea of unsettledness; to keep our hearts from growing to particular places, or being bound up with particular forms of happiness; to make us feel that everything we love or look upon, in the present state, is waning, shifting, and of doubtful life. Oh! surely the anticipation of future good things should elevate, purify, solemnise, bless. It should teach moderation. It should incite to diligence. II. Consider what duties devolve upon us in view of these expected consummations.1. “ Be sober.” The expression may be taken in many ways. For instance, we are to be sober in the use of God’ s providential gifts. It is constantly assumed, in Scripture, that all habits of luxurious living, all undue con cessions to the desires of the lower nature, have an injurious effect upon character. They tend to impair the delicacy of the religious susceptibilities. They induce a dislike and reluctance to spiritual employments. They incapacitate for sympathy with distress and need. They tend to degrade and sensualise the whole man. 2. Again, the text may be considered as warning us to be sober in our aims of life; to keep clear of an entangled, perplexed, and cumbered spirit; not to raise the scaffolding of our worldly hopes too high, nor to have too many buildings going on at the same time. The reason for the admonition is to be found in the tendency of these overheated contests in the race of life to enslave, and pervert, and unspiritualise the best affections of the heart. 3. Further, I think the text would teach us to be sober in our griefs-whether in time of sickness, or sorrow, or adversity, or bereavement. III. “ And watch unto prayer.” The exhortation to “ watch” supposes danger, weakness, a proneness to fall asleep, or the near presence of a foe. The text seems to point especially to certain dangers or hindrances we are liable to in the exercises of devotion: we are to “ watch unto prayer.”1. Thus we are to watch against weariness, and coldness, and faintings of heart in prayer. If prayer be the soul’ s strength, the heart’ s repose, the world’ s antidote, the devil’ s dread, why is it that we pray, not only so languidly, but so little? It is therefore languidly, because little. We do not tarry long enough in the exercise to realise that without which prayer is no prayer-namely, mental communion with the Infinite, something in our heart felt to be reciprocated and returned by the heart of God. To watch against the stealthy encroachments of the world, we shall do well to be early with our devotions. 2. Again, we should watch against the distracting influence of an over-anxious and careful spirit in prayer. A perplexity, a disappointment, a fancied grievance, a slight difference with a friend, an issue hanging in suspense, a feared evil which may never come-any one of these, if not watched against, may rob us of all peace in devotion for days together. But we must learn to drive these intruders from the altar, as Abraham drove the fowls away. A Christian is to commit his way unto the Lord, and all his way-his burden, and all his burden. And having cast his care upon the Lord, he leaves it where it is cast. 3. Further, we must watch against any unsubdued tendencies to evil in our own hearts, in prayer. These tendencies may show themselves either in act or in spirit; and, in either case, will raise up a cloud between us and the eternal throne, which no prayer can pass through. 4. Lastly, I would regard our text as an exhortation to watch against Unbelief in prayer; against any allowed misgivings of Christ’ s love to pity or of His infinite ability to save. (D. Moore, M. A.) Christian sobriety There are sins of the spirit as well as sins of the flesh which the truly sober man will abstain from. The temperance commended in the New Testament is no one-sided, one-limbed virtue. It forbids the lust of wealth, and an extravagant devotion to business, and an inordinate indulgence in recreation, as truly as it forbids excess in drinking or gluttony in eating. It commands a wise self-government and a strong self-restraint in relation to all earthly pursuits and enjoyments and honours. The Puritanism that still lingers amongst us does not think too much about the quality, but it does think too little about the quantity of pleasure that is pursued. It is too often overlooked that probably people are spiritually damaged more by the extravagant amount than by the questionable character of their recreations. We prescribe some and we permit others; but discrimination as to the quality needs to be supplemented by an equal care as to the quantity. The exhortation of the apostle could be enforced by many facts from modern experience. Some wander away along the path of excessive pleasure-taking, and so the name is legion of those who, if they confessed truly, would have to say- “ The world is too much with us; late and soon Getting and spending, we lay waste our powers.” (C. Vince.) Watch unto prayer.- Watchfulness and prayerfulness In explaining this injunction we shall show the importance of a watchful and prayerful spirit by considering the innate disposition of the human heart. I. The first characteristic of man’ s sinful disposition, requiring watchfulness upon the part of a Christian, is its spontaneity. This is that quality in a thing which causes it to move of itself. The living spring spontaneously leaps up into the sunlight, while standing water must be pumped up. Were man reluctantly urged up to sin by some other agent than himself, there would be less call for watchfulness. But the perfect ease and pleasure with which he does his own sinning calls for an incessant vigilance not to do it. The imperfectly sanctified Christian needs not to make a special effort in order to transgress. Can religion in the heart conquer sin in the heart if we do not bring the two into close contact and conflict? II. A second characteristic of man’ s sinful disposition, requiring watchfulness and prayerfulness in the Christian, is the fact that it can be tempted and solicited to move at any moment. How easily is the remaining sin in us drawn out into exercise by tempting objects, and how full the world is of such objects! A hard word, an unkind look, a displeasing act on the part of another, will start sin into motion, instanter. Wealth, fame, pleasure, fashion, houses, lands, titles, husbands, wives, children, friends-in brief, all creation-has the power to educe the sinful nature of man. Consider what inducements to forget God, and to transgress His commandments, come from the worldly or the gay society in which we move. Is not the powder in the midst of the sparks? If unwatchful and prayerless, it is inevitable that we shall yield to these temptations. III. A third characteristic of man’ s innate disposition, requiring watchfulness and prayer, is the fact that it acquires the habit of being moved by temptation. It is more difficult to stop a thing that has the habit of ,notion, than one that has not, because habit is a second nature and imparts additional force to the first one. This is eminently true of sin, which by being allowed an habitual motion becomes so powerful that few overcome it. The cravings of unresisted sin at length become organic, as it were. For though the will to resist sin may die out of a man, the conscience to condemn it never can. The “ ruin” of an immortal soul is no mere figure of speech. There is no ruin in the whole material universe to be compared with it, for transcendent awfulness. The decline and fall of the Roman Empire was a great catastrophe; but the decline and eternal fall of a moral being, originally made in the image of God, is a stupendous event. (J. T. Shedd, D. D.) Watchfulness associated with prayerfulness The word “ watch” is a military term. It teaches us that the same alacrity and watchfulness which distinguish the soldier on duty and the sentinel at his post ought to characterise the Christian; and, as you know, the safety of an army, the chance of a victory, the success of a campaign may all be endangered without watchfulness on the part of the soldier and the sentinel. A like contingency may befall the Christian who is not watchful. Now, I would say, there are three ways in which this watchfulness is to be exercised. There is to be watchfulness over ourselves, watchfulness against our enemies, and watchfulness that we get Divine assistance to help us in our struggles. I would liken the Christian to a general commanding a besieged fortress, who has to watch that he may keep down mutiny within the garrison, who has to watch that he may repel the assaults of the enemy assailing the garrison from without, and who has to watch that he may get assistance from friends who are advancing to help him. And now notice, there is to be prayer in addition to watchfulness. Prayer is the breath of the soul, the life of the spirit, without which you can no more conceive of the Christian existing than of an eye seeing without light, or an ear hearing without being subjected to the sense of sound. Prayer is to the soul of the Christian what his senses are to his body. He not more surely tells his natural wants and gets them relieved, looks upon the beautiful objects in nature, holds intercourse with his friends, and feels himself in contact with the material world by means of his senses, than he tells his spiritual wants and gets them relieved, and holds intercourse with the Former of his body and the Father of his spirit by the exercise of prayer. And what is calculated to enhance the value of prayer is this, that while my senses permit me to look upon many beautiful objects, and urge me to possess them, because they are not mine, I am not permitted to enjoy them; whereas there is not a single possession within the wide domain of the spiritual world that is not placed at my disposal by prayer. If the Christian be weak, then he is strengthened by prayer. If he be in doubt, then his doubts are removed by prayer. If he be in difficulty, his difficulties are surmounted through prayer. But I have to tell you, in order to issue in such gracious results, prayer must be possessed of certain qualities.1. And here I would say, first of all, prayer must be intelligent. In all cases, our first prayer needs to be, “ Lord, teach us to pray.” 2. Further, I have to say, besides being intelligent, prayer must be humble. “ God resisteth the proud, but giveth (and, of course, in answer to prayer) grace unto the humble.” 3. But, besides being intelligent and humble, prayer must be offered in faith. Just as you cannot get your diseased bodies cured without submitting to the prescriptions of your physician, which implies faith in his skill, so you cannot get your sick souls healed without faith in the Saviour’ s willingness and ability to heal. You must approach Him as David did-and this implies faith-when he prayed: “ Heal my soul, for I have sinned against Thee.” 4. Further, I would say prayer must be in earnest. It is only the fervent, effectual prayer of the righteous man that availeth much. God only promises to answer earnest, importunate prayer. 5. I observe finally, here, that prayer must be constant. We have thus looked at these words separately. We will now look at them in their relation to each other. Like those other two features of our religious character-faith and works-which act and react upon each other, so that in proportion to the strength of our faith will be the number and excellency of our works, so in proportion to our spiritual watchfulness will be our prayerfulness. This, I hold, must be so from the necessity of the case; for the man who watches over himself is the man who discovers his own failings, the obstacles that impede his progress in the life of faith, and the number, the strength, and the power of his spiritual adversaries. What is the reason of the vast number of petitions that are presented to the Commons House of Parliament? Why, the inhabitants of these islands have watched the working of the British Constitution, and they have discovered that they have wants to be relieved, and grievances to be redressed, and think the Commons of England in their wisdom can relieve these wants and sweep away these grievances, and hence the table of the House is being constantly flooded with petitions. Well, the Christian watches and discovers his own weakness and liability to fall, the number, the vigilance and wiles of his spiritual foes, and he prays for Divine help to overcome them all. He watches, and, as a necessary consequence, prays. Indeed, such is our condition that we do not simply need to watch and pray to resist temptation, but to watch and pray that we may not enter into it, for there is every reason to believe that, were we to enter into it, we would yield to it; so that the only true course is, avoid it, and pass away. (J. Imrie, M. A.) Watch unto prayer Strange words for Simon Peter to use! For him, the impetuous, the thoughtlessly self-confident, to say, “ Be sober,” seems a strange contradiction. Well were it for us if our failures led to a similar recovery. Human nature is impatient; we would overleap all barriers, and plunge at once into the full transport of enjoyment, just as the soldier prefers the dash of a sudden assault to the tediousness of a regular siege. Delay looks to us like defeat, like sure disappointment. Why should we have to wait when God might conclude all in an instant? Surely, though the Saviour has ascended up on high, there is enough of tits influence left in the world to sustain our courage for a little further delay. Why, with such precious gifts around us, should we avariciously demand the bestowal of all His store? It is “ the patience of the saints” that God is looking to; He would see what we can bear for His sake, how long we can stay without doubting the sureness of His Word. I deny not the tryingness of waiting, but in that the real benefit of waiting consists. We fret for peace in the world, and men try, in one way or other, to force the current of the river and spread the fertilising waters over tracts so high that the forced stream cannot stay in the upland where they wish it to remain. Some would crush out the violence of nations and put down war by the sheer force of superior strength. The remedies to be used are-1. Be sober. The universe cannot bend itself to your will, therefore look not for too great results. 2. Pray. The only instrument which man possesses for hastening on the triumph of good, the only reliable argument for converting the world, the only channel for peace to ourselves, is prayer. 3. Watch unto prayer. How is it that men become disheartened and cease to pray? The wish is uttered with all earnestness, but it is the convulsive effort of a moment, not sustained, nor followed up. And often the prayer is heard, but the suppliant heeds it not. Watchers see where others notice nothing, their senses are more acute. Act on the firm faith that every earnest prayer is heard, and then you will receive insight enough to trace the coming answer. Wait for it if it comes not at once; it will surely come, it will not tarry. Blows that would crush others will only prove the buoyancy of your faith. Failure in business, beggary, friendlessness, will not prevent your knowing the riches of contentment and of spiritual blessings. (G. F. Prescott, M. A.) Watching in relation to prayer How often it happens that when night comes a man prays rather from force of custom than from a sense of need. He has no prescribed form of prayer, and yet he finds himself continually repeating the same things. His supplications lack variety and force and definiteness. He is “ as one that beateth the air.” This comes in a great measure from the fact that he does not “ watch unto prayer.” He has taken little notice of his own spirit, and therefore he knows not his own weakness and his own necessities. The events of the day are not so remembered as to give form and colour and life to his evening supplications. The prayer that suits one day cannot effectually serve for all other days. Changes in ourselves and in our circumstances call for changes in our petitions. If a man pass through the day observing himself and increasing his self-knowledge, his devotions cannot always keep in old formal and familiar ruts, but they must sometimes flow with new vigour along the new channels which the new facts have made for them. We frequently confess that we know not what to pray for. Sometimes this ignorance is a weakness for which we are to be pitied. We cannot tell what tomorrow will bring forth, and therefore cannot tell what special grace to pray for. But sometimes our ignorance is our sin. We know not what to ask for because we have not by watching acquired the wisdom which guides supplication. (C. Vince.) Watching for answers to prayer When an archer shoots his arrow at a mark he likes to go and see whether he has hit it, or how near he has come to it. When you have written and sent off a letter to a friend you expect some day that the postman will be knocking at the door with an answer. When a child asks his father for something he looks in his face even before he speaks to see if he is pleased, and reads acceptance in his eyes. But it is to be greatly feared that many people feel when their prayers are over as if they had quite done with them. Their only concern was to get them said. Sailors in foundering ships sometimes commit notes in sealed bottles to the waves for the chance of their being some day washed on some shore. Sir John Franklin’ s companions among the snows, and Captain Allen Gardiner, dying of hunger in his cave, wrote words they could not be sure anyone would ever read. But we do not need to think of our prayers as random messages. We should therefore look for reply to them, and watch to get it. (J. Edmond, D. D.) Fervent charity. The preeminence of charity I. What charity is. It is not easy to find one word which adequately represents what Christ and His apostles meant by charity. Charity has become identified with almsgiving. Love is appropriated to one particular form of human affection, and that one with which self and passion mix inevitably. Philanthropy is a word too cold and negative.1. Let us define Christian charity in two sentences. (1) The desire to give. Let each man go deep into his own heart. Let him ask what that mysterious longing means which we call love, whether to man or God, when he has stripped from it all that is outside and accidental, when he has taken from it all that is mixed with it and perverts it. Not in his worst moments, but in his best, what did that yearning mean? I say it meant the desire to give. Not to get something but to give something. And the more irrepressible this yearning was, the more truly was his love. To give-whether alms in the shape of money, bread, or a cup of cold water, or else self. But be sure sacrifice in some shape or other is the impulse of love, and its restlessness is only satisfied and only gets relief in giving. For this, in truth, is God’ s own love, the will and the power to give. (2) The desire to bless. It wishes the well-being of the whole man-body, soul, and spirit, but chiefly spirit. And the highest love is the desire to make men good and Godlike; it may wish, as a subordinate attainment, to turn this earth into a paradise of comfort by mechanical inventions; but far above that, to transform it into a kingdom of God, the domain of love, where men cease to quarrel and to envy, and to slander and to retaliate. “ This also we wish,” said St. Paul, “ even your perfection.” 2. Concerning this charity we remark two points. (1) “ Fervent.” Literally intense, unremitting, unwearied. Give us the man who can be insulted and not retaliate, meet rudeness and still be courteous; the man who, like the Apostle Paul, buffeted and disliked, can yet be generous and make allowances and say, “ I will very gladly spend and be spent for you, though the more abundantly I love you the less I be loved.” That is “ fervent charity.” (2) It is capable of being cultivated. When an apostle says, “ Have fervent charity among yourselves,” it is plain that it would be a cruel mockery to command men to attain it if they could do nothing towards the attainment. How shall we cultivate this charity? Now I observe, first, love cannot be produced by a direct action of the soul upon itself. You cannot love by a resolve to love. That is as impossible as it is to move a boat by pressing it from within. Love is a feeling roused not from ourselves, but from something outside ourselves. There are, however, two methods by which we may cultivate this charity. (a) By doing acts which love demands. It is God’ s merciful law that feelings are increased by acts done on principle. Let a man begin in earnest with I ought, he will end, by God’ s grace, if he persevere, with the free blessedness of I will. Let him force himself to abound in small offices of kindliness, attention, affectionateness, and all those for God’ s sake. By and by he will feel them become the habit of his soul. By and by, walking in the conscientiousness of refusing to retaliate when he feels tempted, he will cease to wish it; doing good and heaping kindness on those who injure him he will learn to love them. (b) By contemplating the love of God. You cannot move the boat from within, but you may obtain a purchase from without. You cannot create love in the soul by force from within itself, but you may move it from a point outside itself. God’ s love is the point from which to move the soul. Love begets love. It is easy to be generous and tolerant and benevolent when we are sure of the heart of God, and when the little love of this life, and its coldness and its unreturned affections are more than made up to us by the certainty that our Father’ s love is ours. II. What charity does. It covereth a multitude of sins.1. In refusing to see small faults. That microscopic distinctness in which all faults appear to captious men who are forever blaming, dissecting, complaining, disappears in the large, calm gaze of love. And oh! it is this spirit which our Christian society lacks, and which we shall never get till we begin each one with his own heart. What we want is, in one word, that graceful tact and Christian art which can bear and forbear. 2. Love covers sin by making large allowances. In all evil there is a “ soul of goodness.” Most evil is perverted good. Now there are some men who see all the evil, and never trace, never give themselves the trouble of suspecting the root of goodness out of which it sprung. There are others who love to go deep down and see why a man came to do wrong, and whether there was not some excuse or some redeeming cause, in order that they may be just. Just, as “ God is just, and the justifier of him that believeth in Jesus.” Now human life, as it presents itself to these two different eyes, the eye of one who sees only evil, and that of him who sees evil as perverted good, is two different things. Take an instance. Not many years ago a gifted English writer presented us with a history of ancient Christianity. To his eye the early Church presented one great idea, almost only one. He saw corruption written everywhere. In public and in private life, in theology and practice, within and without, everywhere pollution. Another historian, a foreigner, has written the history of the same times, with an intellect as piercing to discover the very first germ of error, but with a calm, large heart, which saw the good out of which the error sprung, and loved to dwell upon it, delighting to trace the lineaments of God, and discern His Spirit working where another could see only the spirit of the devil. And you rise from the two books with different views of the world: from the one, considering the world as a devil’ s world, corrupting towards destruction; from the other, notwithstanding all, feeling triumphantly that it is God’ s world, and that His Spirit works gloriously below it all. You rise from the study with different feelings: from the one, inclined to despise your species; from the other, able joyfully to understand in part why God so loved the world, and what there is in man to love, and what there is, even in the lost, to seek and save. Now that is the “ charity which covereth a multitude of sins.” It understands by sympathy. It is that glorious nature which has affinity with good under all forms, and loves to find it, to believe in it, and to see it. And therefore such men-God’ s rare and best ones-learn to make allowances, not from weak sentiment, which calls wrong right, but from that heavenly charity which sees right lying at the root of wrong. 3. Lastly, charity can tolerate even intolerance. St. Paul saw even in the Jews, his bitterest foes, that “ they had a zeal for God, but not according to knowledge.” St. Stephen prayed with his last breath, “ Lord, lay not this sin to their charge.” Earth has not a spectacle more glorious or more fair to show than this-love tolerating intolerance, charity covering, as with a veil, even the sin of the lack of charity. (F. W. Robertson, M. A.) Fervent charity I. A description of charity.1. A sincere love to God as the spring of our love to our Christian brethren. 2. Charity comprehends such a habit of benevolence in the soul as disposes us to wish all good to others in all their capacities, in respect either of their souls, their bodies, their reputation, or their estate. 3. Wherever this benevolent principle is it will discover itself by a readiness to assist and relieve all men, especially those who stand in need of our help, according to our abilities. 4. That our charity may be complete, and deserve to be called fervent charity, it must extend to all men, even to our enemies. II. Some arguments to improve and strengthen all tendencies in us to charity.1. Fervent charity of all other things is most beneficial to society, nay, it is absolutely necessary to the good order, peace, and happiness of every society. And in this respect charity well deserves to be called the bond of perfectness. 2. The exercise of charity is agreeable to our natures. By being charitable we gratify the noblest of our inclinations and appetites. 3. It naturally follows from the former argument that the exercise of charity is the most delightful exercise we can choose for ourselves. (1) This satisfaction doth not only just accompany a charitable action, but it is permanent, and endures as long as our lives. (2) This pleasure and joy that attends charitable actions doth herein exceed all fleshly delights, that it is then at the highest when we stand in most need of it. 4. To be charitable, to wish, and to do good to others, is the most God-like qualification that we are capable of. 5. Another argument to excite us to the exercise of charity is taken from the command of Christ, the author of our religion. This is a very powerful consideration when we reflect what He hath done for us, and upon the example which He hath left us for our imitation. 6. We all partake of the same human nature, and are all born for society, so I might persuade to charity from this consideration, that we are all the children of the same heavenly Father, we have all the same Saviour, we have all one faith, and we expect to attain to the same perfect happiness in the end. 7. Let us exercise charity that we may adorn our Christian profession, and cause it to be well spoken of in the world. 8. To persuade us to exercise fervent charity among ourselves, let us consider that charity is the main part of the Christian religion, and as we shall be found to have or want charity, so must we stand or fall in the great day of judgment. Charity is the most acceptable sacrifice we can offer or service we can perform to God. It is said to be the fulfilling of the whole law. (P. Witherspoon.) Dissuasives from uncharitableness I. Your own character and habits.1. Remember that you have the very same feelings which led to those faults you usually rail at, to their vices whose vices you condemn. Did vanity lead them to folly? that same vanity dwells with you. Did pride overthrow them? pride dwells royally with you. Did selfishness make them mean? are not you selfish? Did their appetites seduce them? are not those same seducers at work in your bosom? 2. But there is an additional reason for forbearing uncharitable censures in the multitude of your actual overt transgressions. They may not, to be sure, be of the same kind as those which you unfeelingly reprehend. Are they slovens? Perhaps you are wasters. They may be fickle whom you blame, you may be obstinate. If we looked as sharply at ourselves as we do at censured persons we might find their faults matched in every point in ourselves. 3. Even this, however, does not exhaust the point in hand. For in weighing relative guilt circumstances are always to be considered. Men may be so situated that a foible will be less excusable in them than a vice in others. While you freely rail at all around you perhaps God is putting you down, with all your proud morality, as the less excusable creature of the two. You may have a better mind, you may have been better trained, you may have been better educated, you may be in better circumstances, you may be surrounded by the influence of better associates, you may have ten restraints to others’ one, they may have ten temptations to your one. 4. The fourth particular is the remembrance of our past mischiefs as a motive for leniency of judgment. II. The indignation experienced in view of evil is in a large proportion of cases selfish, and sometimes hypocritical and detestable, in the sight of God. I suppose that the feeling of condemnation is frequently more wicked than the thing condemned.1. The first bill purporting to be a true indignation at evil has the plainest marks of a clumsy counterfeit. The feeling has no respect whatever to the moral qualities of the evil it chastises. It is simply an outcry raised to contrast our own excellences with the censured evil. Some men inveigh against squandering because they are economical. Some rail at parsimony because they are open handed. Some cry out at indolence that men may note their industry. 2. On the success of this device may issue another counterfeit of moral indignation. They are clamorous against evildoers to hide the fact that they themselves are such. 3. Vociferous indignation is not unfrequently the mere creation of fashion and of sympathy with bad feelings. Each clamours because all the rest do. 4. A seeming virtuous indignation is often only an ebullition of wounded pride and vanity. Is there a misstep from virtue? The guardian angel weeps, mercy flies swiftly to the penitent, and Christ says, “ Neither do I condemn thee, only go, and sin no more.” Not thus do fellow mortals of like passions. All the slights and petty offences, all the ignoble strifes of envy and sensitive vanity, are raked out of the embers, and the bitter taunt is but the revenge of these covered with the garb of virtue. A hated rival is down, a haughty head a little higher than mine is in the dust, superior beauty is humbled, the wearer of better clothes, the recipient of more pointed attentions, the immovable rival, the one who once said this or that of me-these are the real archers lurking in the ambush of virtuous or religious indignation which bend the bow and infix the venomous shaft. 5. Revenge is almost invariably cloaked under the guise of moral indignation. And of this, as of almost all that I have mentioned, it may be said, the uncharitableness of the censor is often more malignantly guilty than the offence of the sinner. III. Reasons against censoriousness and uncharitableness springing out of the feelings and affections of the victim.1. Severity exercised without pity tends to provoke rather than reform the transgressor. That man is the most influential against vice who, to a hearty abhorrence of it, adds a cordial desire to rescue the evildoer. Uncharitableness promotes evil, while pity reforms it. 2. Then, me thinks, our pity should flow out with our indignation in view of the sufferings often of those whom we scourge. There is something peculiarly touching in that vice and crime which prevail among the ignorant and neglected. Multitudes have had no childhood instruction. Others have been too fatally taught by renegade parents. Look in, then, upon the motley throng of ignorant and vicious. Are they happy? Does the fulness of the cup of pleasure take away the necessity of pity from you? Of all the sun shines on, none need pity more than those whose career of vice and crime is near to its close. Suffering has made every feature haggard, and there is war in every limb, anguish in every nerve, and groaning at every bone. Want torments them. Their own demoniac passions scorch them. (H. W. Beecher.) Fervent charity I. The exhortation.1. The Apostle urged upon the Christian converts the importance of charity. It was the exercise of a grace, and not merely good temper, upon which he insisted. 2. This love is a Divine virtue. Philanthropy may exist in the sphere of nature, but love, in this higher sense, can only exist in the sphere of grace. This charity is a Divine thing, the work and a fruit of the Spirit in the soul. 3. This charity was to be kept “ fervent.” It is a word which implies great earnestness and intensity (Luke 22:44). It was to be some thing very unlike cold propriety. The metal was to be kept glowing, and the chill of selfishness warded off. It was to be continuous in its exercise, and its exercise was manifold. 4. The sphere of this charity: “ among yourselves,” that is, among Christians. As natural love, as a rule, is governed by propinquity, so is spiritual. This “ fervent charity” was to be exercised primarily amongst those who had the closest union, inter se, through their union in Christ. 5. The Apostle marks the momentousness of his precept: “ above all things.” II. The result of its fulfilment.1. The interpretations that the love in question is God’ s love for man, or Christ’ s love in His Passion, cannot certainly be accepted, though, of course, true in themselves. It is quite evident that the Apostle is speaking of the effect of mutual love. 2. The word “ cover” does not simply mean “ hides,” the sins leaving them where they were, but causes their remission, in fact, obliterates them. 3. Whose sins does the text refer to? 4. Charity covers over our sins in the sight of God, because charity is to sin what water is to fire-it puts it out. It is written of St. Mary Magdalene, “ Her sins which are many are forgiven her; for she loveth much.” Love is the soul of contrition. An act of fervent charity can obliterate the sins of a life. It is the solvent of guilt and of penalty. But repentance does not purchase pardon. It is the condition of receiving it, not its source. Christ gives remission of sins in ways of His own appointment. 5. Charity also covers the sins of others. It has a way of seeing the good in people rather than the bad: “ Charity thinketh no evil” (1 Corinthians 13:5). (W. H. Hutchings, M. A.) The greatness of love Love is like gravitation, the great attracting power, keeping all things in their place. Without gravitation the universe would become a chaos, without some measure of love society would be impossible. The world could perhaps rub along somehow without philosophy, but I defy it to do so without love, as animals can exist without light but not without warmth. Love is the water of life, of which whosoever will may take freely without money or price; it is the heaven springing stream which quenches all thirst, removes all impurities, and also, as in the case of Naaman, the very simplicity of the means causes the proud to disdain it. But like the grand and wonderful simplicity of the laws of nature, fulfilling themselves in the greatest and least phenomena, so is the law of love, prompting equally the widest public service man can perform and the smallest act of private friendship. No matter how deformed or twisted a man’ s way of thinking if love once gets access to him, for, like water, it will find its level in the most crooked as in the best proportioned vessel. Like snow falling so quietly and equally on all manner of objects, however mean or base, creeping in at every crevice, so also is love, its voice not heard in the streets, covering a multitude of sins, insinuating itself into every cranny that selfishness leaves open. (P. H. Sharpe.) Above all things-love It were better to dispense with all else in the Christian’ s character and work than to miss love, though, in point of fact, where this is in operation all that is likely to impress and touch men must be present also. This love must, of course, go forth in its sympathies and activities to all the world, but it should begin at home. We must have love among ourselves as believers in the same Lord before we can presume to speak of our love to the great world of men around. Nor must it be a platonic love, a love of the cold light of reason, it must be fervent, at boiling point, on full stretch, going to the farthest extents of love, and in doing so learning the breadths and lengths of the unsearchable love of God. (F. B. Meyer, B. A.) Love must be fervent The manner or kind of love required is a large, continued, stretched out, constant love. As a cloth folded up is in a little room, but when it comes to be cut is stretched out into many men’ s uses, so our love must be stretched out to many persons, to many duties; as in giving and doing good to body, soul, goods, good name, and that not sparingly, but liberally, so in forgiving both much and often, neither must this be only when we can well do it, or when we have nothing else to do, but when it is against our profit, pleasure, ease, etc., so as we neglect not ourselves too much, and thereby more pleasure may be done our neighbours than hindrance come to us. (John Rogers.) Charity shall cover the multitude of sins.-Love covereth all sins It is strange that this verse should have been so often misunderstood. This is closely parallel with that last verse in St. James, “ Brethren, if any of you do err from the truth, and one convert him; let him know, that he which converteth the sinner from the error of his way, shall save a soul from death,” and, as a necessary part of that conversion, “ shall hide a multitude of (that converted man’ s) sins.” “ Love shall cover multitudes of sins” from God and man. Only observe carefully, not our own sins; never, in any sense, does love do that; but other men’ s sins, love, by silence and by veiling, hides from man; and by prayer and by converting, hides from God. And yet, in all ages of the Church, and in every Church, people have built from my text the fallacy, that a man’ s charities are, in some way, a set off against his sins. So some people of the world take a satisfaction every day, that, if they are living rather too gay lives, they are kinder than others who are called serious. It is often put thus, that Christ’ s righteousness covers our unrighteousness, i.e., in other words, that His obedience is accounted to us in place of our disobedience. But I would much rather say that Christ Himself-His own immensity-comes in and covers us. Then the view of you, passing through Him, comes out to the eye of God a beautiful object. It is all white, the dark places are not seen. And when I think of the immense amount of evil, which now, and at the day of judgment, will thus be hid, never to be seen by God, through that interposition of Jesus Christ, what an emphasis may it throw into the words, “ Love shall cover the multitude of sins.” We are, therefore, never nearer to Christ than when we are making ourselves, in any way we can, the coverers of sin. Now there is a way by which a man can cover sins from God. In the same sense in which I can convert a man I can cover that man’ s sins from God. Your mission as a Christian is to be a coverer of sins. There is seldom a greater thing done in this world than when we can manage anyhow to put a sin out of sight. Therefore, let me offer to you one or two rules respecting this high duty. If you know anything to anyone’ s detriment, hold it as a sacred deposit, to be used religiously. Do not tell it unless the necessity be urgent, or the utility great. Never tell of a man what you have not first told to the man. Never think that you can make yourself great by making another less. Make a principle of always putting in the foreground persons’ good qualities. If a fault be mentioned, see and mention the extenuating circumstances, the palliating considerations. Look out for them, and you will find them. (J. Vaughan, M. A.) Charity covering a multitude of sins And wherefore does the apostle inculcate this precept so earnestly? It is not that the duties of self-denial and humility, of soberness and prayer, can be dispensed with in the formation of a truly Christian character; it is not that charity alone will suffice to atone for our deficiencies in other respects; but charity is the distinguishing mark of a Christian spirit; our Lord Himself has said that “ by this should His disciples be known.” I. First, for the force of the apostle’ s injunction, “ Above all things have fervent charity among yourselves.” I have before called charity a disposition of the mind; and it is of importance that we should remember that it is such. Our grand errors on this point arise from our mistaking the effects for the cause; in making no distinction between particular acts of a charitable nature, and that disposition which produces them. When the favour of God, the present blessings of this life, and the eternal joys of another, are promised to charity, it is not such and such special acts of benevolence which shall be so signally rewarded; but it is the earnest inclination to benefit our fellow creatures, and the continual and diligent habit of doing good which are of such high price before God. Our conduct will, of course, have more or less influence upon the good and the happiness of mankind, according to the circumstances under which we act, and the situation which we occupy in society. But though a charitable disposition may in one case have a wider sphere of action than it has in another, still the disposition itself is altogether independent of these external circumstances. The desire to benefit mankind may be as sincere and as fervent in him whose means are limited, as in the richest and the most powerful of the sons of men. And though the practical consequences of that disposition may not be as extensively felt in the one case as in the other, still God regards the sincerity and the fervency of that love, which prompts us both to labour and to endure, in such sort, as the particular duties of our station may require. Two truths are to be deduced from what has been said: first, a few acts of a charitable nature do not necessarily prove the existence of a charitable spirit in him who performs them-because these may be prompted by very different motives, and because true charity is not exemplified merely on a few particular occasions, but in the general tenor of our conduct, and in the habitual discipline of our tempers. The second truth we learn is this: no man can possess a spirit of genuine charity who does not seize every opportunity of being actively beneficial to his fellow creatures; and so many opportunities are there of this kind, which every one, even the poorest among us, must possess, that it is easy for any man, who will take the trouble of examining into the tenor of his daily intercourse with those around him, to determine whether he indeed possesses “ that most excellent disposition of charity, without which whosoever liveth is counted dead before God.” II. But, in the second place, the apostle says, in the text, that charity “ shall cover the multitude of sins.” Now it is evident, from the definition which we have just given of this disposition of the heart, that they cannot be the sins which we commit against our fellow creatures that charity shall cover; for did we possess this grace in perfection, we should not trespass against our fellow creatures at all. True charity would lead us to the unfailing fulfilment of all the duties which we owe to our brethren. It is equally certain that charity towards men cannot atone for our sins against God; for though the love of our neighbour be a characteristic badge of our Christian profession, though it is vain to pretend our love towards our Heavenly Father, whilst we hate our fellow creatures; though the second commandment necessarily springs from the first, and is like unto it in its nature, still it cannot be made in any degree to supersede it. It can only mean, therefore, that charity will cover, or conceal, and forgive the sins which they commit against us. And this will appear yet more evidently if we consider, in the first place, from whence St. Peter quotes this proverbial expression; and in the next, if we attend to the general object of this Epistle. First, then, we must remark that these words are quoted by St. Peter from the Book of Proverbs. In the twelfth verse of the tenth chapter, the wise man says, “ Hatred stirreth up strife, but love covereth all sins.” Here the opposite line of conduct which is suggested by hatred and love is sufficient to guide us to a right interpretation of the passage. The one stirreth up strifes, it dwells upon them, and rouses them up afresh, and does not allow them to be forgotten. But the contrary disposition of love covereth all sins; it is desirous that offences should be hidden and die away, and instead of enmity and dissension, is anxious for peace and goodwill, and mutual forbearance. It follows, then, that as St. Peter introduced into his Epistle this latter part of the proverb, he intended it to be understood in the same sense in which it stood in the original language of Solomon. This is, moreover, still further confirmed if we regard the general tenor of St. Peter’ s Epistle. It seems to have been one of his principal objects to reprove and reform those dissensions and disputes, which, even in those early days, prevailed in the Christian world. (T. Ainger, M. A.) Love covers sins The whole conception may have been based on the filial act of Noah’ s sons, of whom it is recorded that they took a garment, and laid it upon both their shoulders and went backward, and covered their father’ s drunken sin.1. Love forgives. We are to be imitators of God in the swiftness and completeness of His forgiveness. 2. It avoids giving occasion for sin. It has been said that if you have a favourite horse, which always takes fright and shies at a certain point in the road, you are careful to come along another road, if possible, or to coax him, by speaking to him kindly, to go by without fear. So if you are aware that a certain subject will always invoke an outburst of hot temper in your friend, true love will lead you to avoid it. You will not needlessly incite to sin if you know how to avoid giving the first inducement. 3. It is quick to discern some generous construction to put upon the fault, or to quote some consideration to weigh in the opposite scale. “ True, he was unpardonably dull and slow, but then how trustworthy and reliable.” “ Yes, he was very irritable and abrupt; but, then, remember what a strain he has been under lately in his business, not leaving the factory or counting house till late at night, and going back early in the morning, with no recreation or respite.” “ Granted, that he is now becoming soured and crabbed; but, then, what a glorious man he was in those earlier days, when he stood in the breach.” “ Are you sure that there is not some other explanation possible for his action?” In some such ways as these, Christian love argues with itself and others, and, as the result, many a sin is hindered on its way, and many a fault condoned. 4. It rebukes with great tenderness. There are eases where duty demands public censure. The sore must not lie covered up lest it prove to be deadly. It must be lanced or it cannot be cured. But the lancing is done with exquisite tenderness. The wrong-doer is reproved, rebuked, and exhorted, hut with all long-suffering (1 Timothy 4:2). The man overtaken with a fault is restored in the spirit of meekness (Galatians 6:1). (F. B. Meyer, B. A.) Charity covering faults “ Dear Moss!” said the Thatch on an old ruin, “ I am so worn, so patched, so ragged; really, I am quite unsightly. I wish you would come and cheer me up a little; you will hide all my infirmities and defects, and through your loving sympathy no finger of contempt or dislike will be pointed at me.” “ I come!” said the Moss; and it crept up and around, and in and out, till every flaw was hidden, and all was smooth and fair. Presently the sun shone out, and the old Thatch looked glorious in the golden rays. “ How beautiful the Thatch looks!” cried one. “ How beautiful the Thatch looks! “ cried another. “ Ah!” cried the old Thatch, “ rather let them say how beautiful is the loving Moss, that spends itself in covering all my faults, keeping the knowledge of them all to herself, and by her own grace making my age and poverty wear the garb of youth and luxuriance.” (Great Thoughts.) Use hospitality one to another.- Uugrudging hospitality To God the intention of the heart is all-important. He loveth a cheerful giver. He takes such delight in doing good that He has no sympathy with anything like reluctance. Not that hospitality should necessarily he profuse; for, if it be, it is difficult to maintain, besides reminding the guest that he is regarded as a stranger; only that which is done should be done freely, gladly, with the whole heart. There is no hospitality so grateful as that which makes the stranger feel at home, because there is nothing forced or restrained, and he is permitted to feel completely at his ease. (F. B. Meyer, B. A.) The warmth of hospitality If the two hands be plunged, one in water at the temperature of 200°, and the other in snow, and being held there for a certain time are transferred to water of the intermediate temperature of 100°, this water will appear warm to one hand and cold to the other-warm to the hand which has been plunged in the snow, and cold to the hand which has been plunged in the water at 200°. The anomaly is easily explained. The sensation of heat is relative. When the body has been exposed to a high temperature, a medium which has a lower temperature will feel cold, and when it has been exposed to a low temperature, it will feel warm. Now this fact will suggest, by analogy, a way for testing hospitality. It is not uncommon to hear a man speak about the warmth of somebody’ s hospitality. Perhaps that same “ warmth” seemed very much like coldness to us. How are we to explain the difference in the sensations of our friend and ourselves? Simply by remembering that hospitality, like heat, is a relative thing. A man who has just come out of the cold house of Mrs. Niggard will feel the tepid house of Mrs. Moderate to be quite a warm, hospitable place. On the other hand, a man who goes to Mrs. Moderate’ s house after a prolonged stay at the genial mansion of the generous Lady Bountiful, will feel that establishment to be rather chilly in its hospitality. (Scientific Illustrations.) As every man hath received the gift.-Gifts I. The number and variety of spiritual gifts in the Church. The term “ gift” represented by nine different words in the Greek, occurs in three different shades of meaning, viz., “ a present,” “ an offering to God,” and “ a personal endowment.” The last is evidently the gift of our text.1. Every believer has a gift, and his own gift (Luke 19:13; Matthew 25:15). The little wheels in an engine, the little stones in a building, and the little gifts in the church, occupy a place for which the larger would be quite unsuitable. An organism is healthy only when all its members perform their functions; and efficiency in the whole is the gross result of efficiency in every part. 2. The gifts of the Church are a revelation of the manifold grace out of which they spring. “ Gifts,” the most general class, such as wisdom, knowledge, and faith, are referred to the Father. “ Administrations,” a more limited class, as healing, prophesying, and speaking with tongues, are referred to the Son. “ Operations,” the smallest class, such as miracles, discerning of spirits, etc., are referred to the Holy Ghost. Individual character determines largely individual spiritual gifts. A ray of light passing through a crystal heptahedron is broken up into seven different colours, one of which is appropriated by each of its seven sides. So entering the prism, the Church, the white light of the Spirit is analysed into its various elements, and each soul appropriates the particular one that suits it. The gifts acquired are thus as various as the cast of the acquiring minds. II. The meaning and purpose of the bestowal of spiritual gifts on the Church. “ Ministering it among yourselves.” This is a noble thought.1. It implies that we study our gifts, and so make no mistake as to the work we are fitted to do. This is a matter of great importance. The navigation of a ship will be bad with children at the ropes, and a landsman at the helm. A ministry without ministerial gifts is a machine incapable of moving, even if the power were there. 2. It implies that we train and cultivate our gifts so as to use them at their best. He would be an eccentric farmer who allowed his land to lie untilled because the soil was rich. It is the richest land and the highest gifts that, being cultivated, will yield the best return. The indwelling of the Holy Spirit is the Alpha, but not the Omega, of qualification for spiritual work. The apostles had this to begin with, yet were all carefully trained by Christ, and Paul warns Timothy to “ stir up” his gift. 3. Our gifts in their most highly cultivated form are all to be used for the common good. “ Among yourselves.” The perfection of reciprocity exists in the religious life (Matthew 5:23; Matthew 7:12). There is no place for selfishness in it; the peculiar quality of it being the look outward, instead of inward (Philippians 2:4; 1 Corinthians 10:24). The selfish soul shrivels and dies, and the maimed and weakened Church suffers in all its functions. It is incredible the moral power that is lying dormant in the Church. The power once latent in steam and inaccessible is now evoked by the millions of horsepower daily. This entry is longer than a Bible module can hold. The rest is at https://www.sermonindex.net/commentary/bi/ 1 Peter 4:12-16 Think it not strange.Not so strange “ Think it not strange!” But it does seem strange that the waters of a full cup should be wrung out to the saints, whilst sinners walk on the sunny side of the hedge! Strange to find some of the sweetest and noblest of God’ s children racked with agony, dying of cancer, beset with poverty, misunderstanding, and hatred. And yet it would be stranger still if it were not so. Let us look into the considerations which rob suffering of its strange ness. I. This world is in revolt. Is it to be wondered at that the servants of the Divinely designated Prince should experience rough treatment at the hands of the rebel forces? It could not be otherwise. II. Along this way the Master went. III. This is the way home. If we were universally beloved, and no voice were ever raised in hatred or calumny, we might truly question whether we were at all on the heavenward track. As mountain climbers after a snowstorm can tell the path by the line of posts placed at intervals along the mountain side, so may Christians tell that they are on the track of the Church by the antagonism manifested against their religion in Jesus Christ. IV. There is an object in such suffering. It is carefully designed by the skill of the great Artificer. There may have been many a previous secret prayer for growth in grace and usefulness, and the answer has come in the use of fire, file, and hammer, wielded by God, though furnished by the hatred of the sons of men. There is no other way of eliminating much of the selfish dross of our natures. V. Herein we partake of Christ’ s sufferings. His life in us meets the same treatment as it did in Him. Ah, it is good to share anything with Him. Sweet things are bitter when He is absent, and bitter things sweet if He is near. VI. Look on to the end. His glory shall be revealed! His sufferings quicken our anticipations of that blessed day. Too much comfort might make us think ourselves at home, so that we might not so ardently reach out our hands towards our coming glories. VII. We are compensated for such suffering by the presence of the Spirit of glory. When such suffering lies heavily on the soul, God sees to it that it is no loser. What is lost from without is replenished from within. As water is thrown on the fire from the one side of the wall, a bright angel on the other pours in oil through a tiny aperture, till the flame breaks out as coals of juniper. Ah, what compensations are ours! The Jews who walk the streets of Tangier and other Moorish towns, the hatred of all the people, are said to have exquisitely furnished rooms within their ordinary looking dwellings, where they surround themselves with every luxury. So, as the spiritual man turns from the hatred of man to the special bestowments of God, he is compensated a hundred fold, When we have least human love, we have most of God’ s. (F. B. Meyer, B. A.) The proper temper of Christians in affliction I. The sufferings of Christians are neither “ strange,” in themselves, nor so to be reckoned by them.1. The nature of their principles accounts for opposition from men of the world. These are principles of holiness. They condemn, by contrast, the men of the world. Christians must cease to be what they are, or the world cease to be what it is, for them to escape persecution. 2. The genius of their dispensation renders probable a greater share of outward ills to them than to the saints of the Old Testament. They have a fuller revelation of the mind of God, and are put more upon future hopes, and less upon present things. “ Prosperity was the promise of the Old Testament; adversity of the New” (Mark 10:30). 3. The partial renewal of their character calls for a corrective discipline. The buddings of evil dispositions require nipping frosts to check their growth. II. All the sufferings of Christians are intended for trials to “ try” them.1. They detect the presence of sin, as fire brings out the latent dross in metals. 2. They make manifest the sincerity of our profession. Persecutions and afflictions keep the church from being overrun with hypocrites. 3. They purify and improve our Christian virtues. III. Christians ought to “ rejoice,” notwithstanding all their sufferings, and even because of them. “ Think it not strange, but rejoice,” etc.1. They increase our spirituality. The overflowing of the Nile distressed Egypt for a time, but when it retired, left behind it fertility and abundance. 2. They furnish ground for the comfortable assurance of a gracious state. If the storm that uproots others leaves us standing, it gives evidence of being well-grounded in faith. 3. They enhance our future glory. Application:1. Let this check the over anxiety of some Christians to avoid affliction, or to prevent themselves, if possible, from feeling it. 2. Let the subject correct our judgment respecting affliction. 3. Be brought by affliction to enter more deeply into the sufferings of Christ. 4. Let sympathy with others in their sufferings be promoted by our own. (The Evangelist.) Trials no strange thing Men are apt to fancy, in their misfortune, that it exceeds the usual measure, or comes in an extraordinary shape. They aggravate their suffering by surprise and disappointment. They make exaggerated estimates of it by self-tormenting reflections. It is too heavy to bear. We could submit to anything better than this. It is “ strange” that the “ fiery trial” should scorch just in this or that place, or should consume what they were specially anxious to preserve. It is “ strange” that I should be prevented, deprived, disabled. “ Strange” you call it.1. And this word of yours implies, in the first place, that you are on the whole graciously dealt with; that the order of things which encircles you, and carries you forward, is on the whole merciful. For why else should you find fault with what afflicts you, as if it were a departure from that order? The hand of Providence-how much oftener it is open to give, than clenched to strike! Do you not prove yourselves unreasonable, there fore, if you chide with it, when it withholds your desire or admonishes you with its unwelcome dispensations? And this is one side of our subject that is worthy of attention. But there is another. It is, that the afflictions of life, though few when set by the side of the innumerable kindnesses that are so continuous as to be unregarded, are yet neither uncommon nor light. They form a regular part of the great system of heavenly appointments, in which we, with our changing circumstances and vanishing life, are included. They are more impartial than they are supposed to be. They spare none. They are not to be bought off by the opulent, nor fought off by the strong. “ Think it not strange,” so run the words of the apostle, “ concerning the fiery trial that is to try you.” 2. You there read what is the design in view. It is to prove and not to destroy you. You are tempted by pleasures and prosperity to see if you are weak enough to be seduced. You are searched by hurts and deprivations to see if you are strong enough to endure. If you are sick, secure the inward health that knows neither the fever of passion nor the consumption of care. If you are poor, learn to feel that everything else is destitution, if compared for a moment with the incorruptible wealth of conscious integrity, and the thoughts that turn confidingly towards God, and the substance that no reverses can make less. (N. L. Frothingham.) Trial no strange thing to the Christian It is said by the wise man in the book of Ecclesiastes-“ That which hath been, is now; and that which is to be, hath already been; and God requireth that which is past.” The assertion here is, that of there being great uniformity in the dealings of God; so that the history of any one generation is little more than the repetition of that of any other. From such a description of the dealings of God, it would follow that there cannot be anything “ strange,” at least not to those who live in a remote age of the world; for nothing can happen to them, which has not often happened before, and for which therefore they might not have been prepared by due attention to the experience of others. The case is evidently very different with ourselves and the earlier converts to Christianity, the difference being much the same as between the later and the earlier inhabitants of the world. We can appeal to the history of many ages for the workings of Christianity; we can show its predictions fulfilled, and its promises verified, in the progress of events and the experience of the Church. But the first converts were obliged, in a great degree, to take all upon trust. With them the whole was matter of experiment. There was therefore great room, as it would seem, for what was “ strange” in their case, though not in our own. With us, the experience of a Christian may be mapped out beforehand. His own experience may not be an exact copy of that of any one of his predecessors in the faith; but there shall be nothing in it which has not been experienced before, the parallel to which may not be found in the history of any other believer, and therefore nothing which ought to come upon him unexpectedly, or to take him as it were by surprise. But it was not thus with the earlier Christians. They were themselves to furnish experience for those who came after; but had scarcely any power of appealing to the experience of those who went before. And yet in one great particular, it appears from our text that there is no difference betwixt the earliest and the latest converts, so far as the foreknowledge of God’ s dealings is concerned. With ourselves it amounts almost to a truism, that “ they who will live godly in Christ Jesus shall suffer persecution,” and that “ through much tribulation we must enter into the kingdom of heaven.” It were expecting God to change the established course of His dealings, to expect Him not to chasten where He loves, and therefore to “ think it strange concerning the trials which are to try us.” But can the same be said of the earliest Christians? Had they not embraced the religion of One, who was promised by the auspicious title of “ Prince of peace” ; whom seers of old had beheld in visions, glowing and tranquil and beautiful? And might they not therefore have justly expected that their lot would be one of freedom from trouble? No, saith the apostle; a “ fiery trial” can be no unlooked for thing. I. Now the first thing which I would argue from this alleged absence of “ strangeness” from the dealings of God, is that there were more points of correspondence than of difference between the Christian and the Jewish dispensations. It is true that they could not co-exist, but not because they were in any measure opposed the one to the other. The dawn and the noon tide cannot co-exist; yet the one does not so much displace the other, as it is that other in a more advanced stage. The Mosaic economy was the Christian in its dawn, or in its bud, presenting the same truths, though in a more shadowy form, and proposing the same way of salvation, though with less clearness and precision. The Christian dispensation superseded the Jewish, but only in the manner in which history supersedes prophecy. And this must necessarily have been the case, if you only consider how God had from the first determined the plan of our redemption, and virtually announced it ere Adam was driven from Paradise. There was not one method of being saved in one age, and another in another, so far as the method of reconciliation is concerned; neither can there be thought to have been any such variation, so far as the method of application is concerned. In all ages there has been the same necessity for a renewal of nature in order to a meetness for the kingdom; and therefore must it be supposed that in all ages the dealings of God with a view to these ends have borne in the main the same features. But undoubtedly God had from the first made sorrow one of His chief engines in weakening attachment to the things of time and sense, and directing the affections towards heaven. Was it therefore for a moment to be expected, that because there came a dispensation of greater light, a dispensation of substance in place of shadow, sorrow was to depart and no longer to be used in preparing men for heaven? And, indeed, without tracing accurately a sameness in the dealings of God, we might venture to say that the discipline of affliction is indispensable in the case of depraved creatures like ourselves. It is not that under this economy, but not under that, sorrow is a wholesome thing for those whose nature is corrupt; it is rather that in every condition and estate, man cannot do without affliction, if he is to be kept up to the task of preferring the future to the present. Hard it may be, bitter it may be, but “ strange” it can never be, that whilst “ the heart is deceitful above all things and desperately wicked,” God should constantly verify the saying, “ Many are the afflictions of the righteous.” “ Are ye not men?” might be the address of the messenger of God: “ are ye not sinners? and is it not your sanctification which is proposed? Oh! then, ‘ beloved, think it not strange concerning the fiery trial which is to try you, as though some strange thing happened unto you.’” II. But possibly these remarks on what we may call the necessity for affliction, and therefore on the truth that it ought never to seem “ strange,” hardly clear up the point which is presented by our text. The case of those addressed by St. Peter is not that of men exposed to trouble in its ordinary sense, but of those on whom was coming a great onset of persecution. The “ fiery trial which was to try them,” was to result from the efforts of the enemies of Christianity to destroy by violence what they could not disprove by argument. What is strange, if it be not strange that heaven’ s best gift should be received with loathing; that the very remedy, which at an immeasurable cost God prepared for the evils which have pressed on this creation, should meet not only with scorn, but hatred; that they whom it is designed to benefit, should agree with themselves to cast it out from the earth? Yet the apostle does not hesitate to tell them in our text, that nothing “ strange” had happened to them, when a “ fiery trial” arose and they had to maintain their profession in the face of persecution and death. We close with this statement of St. Peter, and we wish you to see whether it may not be vindicated by almost self-evident reasons. The results which Christianity proposes, and which beyond all question it is calculated to effect, are those of a widespread peace and a dominant happiness: but the processes, through which it would work out these results, are those of self-denial and restraint, of mortified passions and curbed affections; and they who would be quite in love with the results, may be quite at war with the processes. There is not after all, anything surprising in persecution, whether in the bold shape it assumed in early days, or the more modified which it exhibits in later; it is, we might almost say, but a natural result of the rejection of Christianity-whether of the open rejection of the sceptical, or of the more covert of the indifferent. Doctrines which are not embraced must be disliked, when they are doctrines which would bind us to practices, which conscience secretly pronounces to be right, but which inclination vehemently opposes; and disliking the doctrines, men must also dislike those who hold them, for every believer is a reproach to the unbeliever, condemning by his example those whom it does not excite to imitation; and there is only a step from dislike to persecution. Persecution is but dislike in action the effort to remove what annoys by reproving. Then till Christianity be universal, persecution, in some form or other, is unavoidable. It is not the product of a dark age, rather than of a light; it is the product of human nature-the same in its corruption, acted upon by a system the same in its holiness. III. But we cannot suppose that St. Peter used these remarkable words, in order merely to correct an erroneous impression which had been made on the minds of the first Christians-an impression as to the likelihood that Christianity would disarm rather than provoke opposition: we may further believe that he designed to offer a topic of consolation and support-to suggest what ought to reconcile the suffering to their lot. “ You ought not,” St. Peter seems to say, “ to be amazed or confounded; you are called to no affliction which others have not sustained; and where there is nothing but what has been experienced, why should there be surprise, as though it were unexpected?” And truly the distressing thing to a believer would be, if he were able to show that God’ s dealings with himself were quite different from what God’ s dealings with His people had ordinarily been. Suppose the registered course of God’ s proceedings had been, that where there was belief in His Word there was comparative freedom from trouble, so that religion and temporal happiness went hand in hand: what fearful thing would it then be, for a Christian to find himself in trouble! It would not be the amount of the trouble, so much as its strangeness, that would overwhelm him. His inference would be-“ Surely I am not one of the people of God: if I were, He would not deal with me in so unusual a manner.” Or, to take what might be thought a more supposable case: let righteousness and peace of mind be almost invariably found together, so that a righteous individual is seldom, if ever, disquieted with doubts and apprehensions: if, then, a Christian feels himself depressed and cast down, his hopes darkened through the suggestions of his great adversary the devil, do you not see that the bitterest thing in his portion would be, not the depression, but the consciousness of this depression being a “ strange thing” in a believer, and therefore almost an evidence of his not being a believer at all? But now take the opposite, which is the actual case, namely, that the Christian has nothing strange to undergo, nothing befalling him but what is common to believers; and do you not perceive that this very circumstance is full of consolation, and ought to do much towards producing in him patience and resignation? The tempest may rage, the sword may glitter, the destroyer may ravage; but he is calm, he is confident, because he can never “ think it strange concerning the fiery trial which is to try him, as though some strange thing had happened unto him.” IV. And now, lastly, there is yet another remark which, in a practical point of view, is perhaps of greater importance than the foregoing. It may be questioned whether our translators have given the exact meaning of the original, in saying, “ Think it not strange.” The more literal meaning is, “ Be not strange in fiery trial.” It is not so much an opinion, as a deportment, to which the apostle has respect. What he enjoins on Christians is, that when the fiery trial came, they were not to receive it as an unexpected thing; they were not to be like strangers, but rather to show that they had been waiting the onset, and had prepared themselves to meet it. An old writer justly says, “ Things certainly fall the lighter upon us when they first fall upon our thoughts.” Arm yourselves therefore beforehand; it is hard to have your weapons to seek, when the foe is upon you. (H. Melvill, B. D.) The Christian’ s persecutions I. The connection of religion with trial-“ Do not wonder at the burning which is to try you.” It is no wonder; it is a natural consequence.1. Is it likely God would commit the keeping of His honour and glory into the hands of untested witnesses? 2. Is it likely that God would give the work of saving souls to untried emissaries? 3. Is it likely God would admit to His eternal kingdom unproved citizens? By no means. II. The connection between trial and suffering-“ The burning.” What more potent picture of suffering than that which is expressed by this terrible word? III. The connection of suffering with joy. Strange apparent inconsistency!-“ Think it not strange, but rejoice.” We may gather-1. That anything which brings us into harmony with Christ is to be desired. Suffering brings us into sympathy with Him. We appreciate the sacrifice which His atonement entailed when we feel something of its consequences. 2. That the only true way to triumph is through the vale of tears. Christ became Conqueror through submitting. IV. The connection of joy with glory-“ For the spirit of glory and of God resteth upon you.” (J. J. S. Bird, B. A.) The fiery trial which is to try you.-Afflictions are trials 1. To try whether we have any truth of grace in us, whether we be sound or hollow. 2. To try what measure of grace we have, whether as much or more or less than we thought. 3. To purify and refine that measure of true grace that is in us. In the days of peace and prosperity, the best men are subject to gather soil, as standing waters putrefy, bodies without exercise prove full of gross humours. (John Rogers.) But rejoice.- A rejoicing heart A heart rejoicing in God delights in all His will, and is most surely provided to the most firm joy in all estates; for, if nothing can come to pass beside or against His will, then cannot that soul be vexed that delights in Him, and hath no will but His, but follows Him in all times and in all estates-not only when He shines bright on them, but when they are clouded. That flower that follows the sun, doth so even in cloudy days-when it doth not shine forth, yet it follows the hidden course and motion of it: so the soul, that moves after God, keeps that course when He hides His face; is content, yea, is glad at His will, in all estates, conditions, or events. (Abp. Leighton.) Partakers of the sufferings of Christ.-Participation in the sufferings of Christ It is strange what a power there is in suffering to unite in deepest intimacy those who have nobly borne it together. It would seem as if the affections could never be welded so firmly as when they have been exposed to the fiery solvent of adversity. Perhaps it is that we never so truly understand each other as when great and common trials sound the depths of our nature, and show to each what is in brother’ s heart. Or it may be that love is strengthened most of all by the trials and hardships endured for the sake of its object. The survivors of the wreck who can recall the days and hours of danger and exposure, of alternating hope and despair, which they bore together; the remnant of the forlorn hope, who have stood side by side while shot and shell were raining death around them; or the few brave and true hearts who together have struggled through the protracted and terrible siege, and whose friendship is cemented by a thousand associations of sympathy and endurance, cannot choose but feel in each other a deeper than common interest. Now, some such thought as this may have been present to the apostle’ s mind when he congratulated his suffering fellow Christians on the fact that they were partakers of the sufferings of Christ. The secret depths of that sorrowing heart they could better understand in virtue of the approximation to His grief which their own hearts had felt, and a fuller appreciation of His ineffable love could be theirs, when by experience they had learnt something of that penalty of suffering and sacrifice which for them He so willingly had paid. Instead, therefore, of regarding it as a “ strange thing” that theirs should be a lot of suffering and trial, it would rather have seemed unnatural had it been otherwise. But it is not all kinds of suffering in which we have community with Jesus. There are sorrows, obviously, of which the infinitely pure and holy Saviour could have no experience, and in the endurance of which no man can appropriate the consolation of fellowship with Christ. Let us endeavour, therefore, to find out what sort of suffering for sin is possible to a pure and holy nature. How far may suffering for sin be really noble and worthy? What elements must we eliminate from suffering caused by sin in forming our ideal of suffering purity?1. One element of suffering for sin, and that a most bitter one, of which Christ could have no direct experience, is conscious guilt. With all godly sorrow Jesus sympathises, but He knows nothing, and never can, “ of the sorrow of the world that worketh death.” 2. Another element in suffering for sin, of which a perfectly holy nature could have no experience, is a personal sense of Divine wrath. Betwixt the experience of a guilty soul writhing under the frown of God, and His, even in His darkest hour of sorrow, there is an impassable gulf. 3. Nor, finally, though Christ “ tasted of death for every man,” could He ever experience personally that which constitutes to the sinner the very bitterness of death-the fear of what comes after death. On the contrary, death to Jesus was an escape from protracted banishment to endless and unutterable union with His Father. It was the passing from a world in which all had been to Him toil and weariness and woe, to one on which the sweet memories of an eternity of joy were resting. Death to Jesus, in one word, was but a going home.1. I now go on to inquire what kind of suffering for sin may be conceived of as noble and worthy, and so not impossible to a pure and holy nature. (1) Amongst these kinds of suffering I notice, first, that which a pure and holy nature must feel from the mere contiguity of evil. The mere spectacle of sin, the life-long contact of the sinless with the vile-implied on His part bitter suffering. To man or woman of pure mind and tender conscience it would be intolerable to be forced to read through an obscene book; what agony of mind then-what pain and distress of spirit more unendurable than sharpest bodily tortures-would be involved in a similar lifelong contact with sin, not recorded merely, but hideously displayed in act! (2) Another element of Christ’ s suffering for sin, in which, as we grow in kindred purity of nature, we shall learn to participate, is the reflected or borrowed shame and pain which noble natures feel for the sins of those with whom they are closely connected. Christ was not a mere spectator of the world’ s sin, He was deeply implicated in the fortunes of the guilty, related to them by the closest ties of kindred and affection. There is a borrowed humiliation which we feel from the sins of those who are dear to us; there is a keen and cruel pain which pierces a good and generous heart in the contemplation of a brother’ s wickedness, and which is second only, and in some respects not second, to the agony of personal guilt. (3) Once more, Christ suffered for sin, not only as bearing relatively its guilt, but also as its victim. In the persons of those He loved, sin transmitted to Him a borrowed humiliation; but it hurt Him more deeply than thus, for it rose up against Him, to hate and assail and destroy Him. And this to such a nature as His was the saddest thing of all. (J. Caird, D. D.) Participation in Christ’ s sufferings It has often been said that the Christian faith gives dignity to every kind of suffering. If we may so speak, the light shines from Christ’ s Cross as a fringe of glory upon every cloud which environs human life. You have given up that false notion which belonged rather to the heathen age, that the gods would not visit in pain or suffering those who were their special favourites. It is the other way in Christian conception. According to the Christian, those whom the Lord loveth He chasteneth. “ Think it not strange the fiery trial which is to try you” -that is coming for this purpose to put your life to the test, but see how far your faith needs consolidating, how far your love needs being drawn forth as often love only can be in the hours of sorrow. But he rises higher than this. He seems to say: “ Do not merely look upon suffering as a certain ministry for good, but that he that suffers may be brought into the charmed circle of fellowship with Christ.” But we are met at once by the thought: Are not the sufferings of Christ wholly unique in character? Are they not such that none may share them? I. In what sense is it true that the Christian can have a partnership with the sufferings of Christ? In the first place it is not of the ordinary sorrows of life that the apostle is speaking; because he does not speak respecting the sufferings which Christ shares with us, but rather of certain sufferings which we share with Christ. There is all the difference in the world between those sorrows which are rather the sorrows of humanity, and which Christ, in becoming man, of necessity became a participator in, and those sufferings which belong to the Christian life, and which only Christian lives can share with Christ. And I think that just as those sorrows cannot be in any fair sense called the sufferings peculiarly of Christ, so the whole analogy of similar passages in the New Testament shows us that the apostle is speaking of the sufferings which we suffer as Christians. What, then, does he mean? If we exclude the sorrows of life which are common to all mankind, if we exclude the special sufferings of Christ on the Cross as our Redeemer, what are the sufferings which we are privileged to share with Christ? In one sense the work of Christ was complete; He wrought a perfect and complete work upon the Cross. But, on the other hand, there is a real sense in which the work of Christ is not complete. Christ may, if I may use the figure, be supposed to have formed a great steel plate, on which every line and letter is engraved, but still the work of striking off the impressions is left for the Church of Christ to do. He formed every feature of the Christian character which was to be stamped upon mankind; He wrought all that great and glorious work which was the great picturing of Divine love in the eyesight of man; but having wrought that, He left it to His disciples to carry forth that image to the world, and they were to impress it upon the characters of men; they were, in fact, to work out that which Christ had left them to work. He had given them the rule, they were to work out the examples; He had given them the great completed seed, they were to sow it into the hearts of men. Christ’ s Church is built up in suffering. There is not a truth which is incorporated in our creeds, there is not a single aphorism of Christianity which is dear to your hearts that has not been consolidated by the blood of suffering men and women. But there is another sense in which we may also share the sufferings of Christ. All Christian life is progressive. Against all the knots, and against all the awkward angles of character, the grace of God has to contend, and in contending with these it is purging out the evil and implanting the good. And as Christian life is thus progressive, so the capacity of sharing a certain order of Christ’ s sufferings is growing within us. If a pure-minded person were made by necessity to go through the obscene details of the police records, even physical agony would be preferred to that. And just so he who feels that his spiritual life is growing, that the sanctifying influences of the Spirit make him more enamoured of purity and more hostile to evil, begins to understand what intense pain Christ must have endured in daily contact with sin; and so he becomes a partaker in that degree of the sufferings of Christ. The judiciousness of the apostle’ s language is to be seen in this: he says, “ Rejoice, in so far as” (and no further) “ you are partakers of the sufferings of Christ.” That is to say, he shows to them that their cause of rejoicing can only lie in this-their consciousness that they are suffering with Christ. He who feels that the spiritual life within him is growing may know that in proportion as he is conscious of that pain which sin must bring to the pure in heart he is able to share somewhat in the sufferings of Christ. II. What, then, are the sources of the joy? These we have partly anticipated. The joy, and that which the apostle wishes the Christian to rejoice in, is precisely the thought that he is suffering with Christ. The faithful servant will feel that the hours are not merely wasted, but are positively dishonestly employed that are not being used in his master’ s service; and thus the Christian feels that his hours are not, indeed, his own, but belong to his Master; and even if those hours must be employed in pain, if constant conflict against the powers of evil be that which he is called upon to endure, he can rejoice, for it is for his Master. Not that he is indifferent to sorrow, but that he feels the sorrow is glorified by the fact that it is for Christ. And just as thus it is a joy to him to rejoice in suffering for Christ, so also is it so because he sees in it a witness of his own progress. Do I find sin a greater pain, do I find that the presence of it causes more agony than before? Then I am glad, for at least I can so far feel that I am growing in the image of Christ; I would rather feel sin to be ten thousandfold the agony it was before than that I should live a life which is utterly indifferent to Christian progress. And there is yet another reason of joy. The love which the Christian has is that which the apostle assumes. But what is one of the first features of love? Is it not to be linked with the object it loves? We always long to appropriate that which we love, because there is the straining desire of the soul to be drawn nearer to the object of its love. And so the Christian feels that the desire of his love is to be linked with Christ. And where is the link? Look round the world and answer, where can the link with Christ be? Is it in joy? I know no joy as long as sin reigns in the world. Is it to be found in the mere amusements of life? These are impossible. The only law by which the soul of man can be linked with Christ is the law of suffering; it is the very law of our physical being, it is the very law of society, it is the very law of God’ s universe, because of the strange distortions which sin has introduced, that all love is a bond in suffering. Not one has suffered; not one has loved without feeling that love and suffering are always co-relatives in life. It was not because your life was easy and smooth together that you loved one another so intensely; it is because you have fought together, because you have struggled together, because you were partners in the same sorrow and in the same care. And not merely thus; those who have suffered the same loss, for example-see what a freemasonry of love that establishes! But it is not merely this; it is more. It is not merely the same loss you are suffering. “ For the zeal of Thine house hath eaten me up; and the reproaches of them that reproached Thee are fallen upon me” ; but the sorrow which men endure together in establishing the same cause, is not that a link which binds them fast? None have suffered for Christ without loving Christ the more, and none have loved Christ the more without feeling Christ’ s love the more, and none have felt Christ’ s love the more without feeling that He has stooped down to their very side to be near them. (Bp. Boyd Carpenter.) Let none of you suffer as a murderer.- Righteous and evil suffering I. The apostle distinguishes between deserved and undeserved suffering. Many of the early martyrs brought on their own deaths through incautious and foolish utterances, or want of that meekness which ought to characterise a professor of the gospel. II. The apostle urges the higher responsibilities of professors of the gospel. They possess a higher standard of moral conduct than the worldling. III. The apostle reminds us of the terrible end of the finally impenitent. The shipwrecked mariner who has lashed himself to a spar, and is striving frantically to reach the shore, is far more likely to be saved than the sailor who stays on the burning vessel. (J. J. S. Bird, B. A.) A busybody in other men’ s business.-The busybody It is very common to compare ourselves with other men, and to draw flattering conclusions from the fact of their conduct being marked by more of open flagitiousness than our own. Yet it may be the very grossest of self-deceptions. The degree of criminality must evidently depend, not only on the sin committed, but on the amount of temptation and the measure of resistance. I am not necessarily better than another, unless better under precisely the same circumstances; and it is impossible for me to know and to judge what all those circumstances are. It is not necessary that we suppose the busybody to be equally criminal with the murderer and the thief, but at all events there must be much greater criminality in the busybody than we are accustomed to suppose; otherwise an apostle would hardly have so combined offenders as they are combined in our text.1. Now it is certainly far from the design of the Christian religion to separate us one from another, to shut us up in our individual capacities, and confine our attention to our individual interests. Christianity, on the contrary, enjoins universal brotherhood and love; brotherhood and love, which are entirely at variance with the supposition that we take no concern in the affairs of our neighbour. The great general rule, in this as in every case of Christian casuistry, must evidently be fetched from the motive by which we are actuated. If it be honestly our aim to promote the Divine glory by promoting the good of our fellow men, we can scarcely go wrong, whether in the measure or the manner in which we concern ourselves in the affairs of other men. Whensoever there is opportunity of doing good to another, whensoever, more especially, his soul may be benefited through our instrumentality, then and there indeed it were worse than absurd to suppose it playing the busybody’ s part to concern ourselves in his affairs. Let no one, therefore, think to shelter himself under the plea that non-interference is a duty, and thus excuse himself from all public endeavour at discountenancing vice, defending truth, relieving misery, or propagating Christianity. It is at a far remoter point that interference becomes sinful. And we may begin our investigation by stating that probably St. Peter had respect to a species of meddling, which is sufficiently common, though hardly thought criminal. The one compound word in the Greek (for there is but one), which is rendered by us “ a busybody in other men’ s matters,” might be more literally rendered-a bishop in another man’ s diocese; as though what the apostle specially wished to denounce were that interference with constituted authorities, whether civil or ecclesiastical, which in those days and countries exposed men to punishment Just because those in power bring not forward the precise measures which these men think the best, they will break at once into injurious expressions; as though they must be better judges of what is good for an empire, who have no means of looking into all the intricacies of the machine, than others who are placed at the wheel, and have the power of observing the most secret springs. But it is a more private sort of meddling with which the busybody is generally occupied; he, or she, is prying into family secrets, as well as into state, and presuming to adjust the affairs of neighbours as well as the intricacies of government. The man who, unasked, obtrudes his opinions on others in matters in which they alone have any concern, who infringes the liberty of others where they have undoubted right to follow their own inclination, who sets up on every occasion for a teacher of others, as though he must be wiser and better informed, who is always for adjusting his neighbour’ s business, and is so disinterested that he will do it at the neglect of his own: such an one-one who is guilty whether in any or in all of these particulars-is emphatically a “ busybody in other men’ s matters.” The woman who plays the spy upon her neighbours, as though she were the constituted inspector of themselves and their households, who is not easy except she knows every particular of their domestic arrangements, who, if she have a visit to pay, is sure to talk over the affairs of the family she last left, only leaving herself time to find out something to tell at the house to which she goes next, who is critical alike upon character and upon dress, so that she will pronounce with equal fluency what people ought to do and what they ought to wear: such a woman is undeniably a “ busybody in other men’ s matters.” 2. But now you will inquire what great criminality, after all, attaches to the busybody, or with what show of justice he can be associated with those whom even human laws sternly reprobate and punish. (1) The busybody violates justice; because, by meddling with other men’ s affairs, does his best to deprive them of their office, which is certainly to manage their own business. (2) The busybody, again, is conspicuous in arrogance; for he who is always obtruding his advice is always proclaiming himself wiser than others. (3) The busybody neglects himself, and those affairs which are specially his own. (4) And who does more harm than the busybody? Half the dissensions in a neighbourhood are his or her work. The parties into whose affairs the busybody pries are naturally incensed or irritated by the interference; and in this feeling is evidently laid the foundation of enmity. Besides, what is found out by the inquisitiveness of the busybody is sure to be propagated by the industriousness of the tale bearer; so that the secrets of families become public talk, and chief friends are separated by injurious reports of things which were perhaps never done, or remarks which were perhaps never made. There is another assassin besides he who kills the body-he who wounds the reputation; and who does this more than the busybody? (H. Melvill, B. D.) A hint to meddlers Some people do not understand how to cooperate for public ends without interfering with the privacy of domestic life. The seals teach a good lesson in this respect. They can work together at proper times; but they honour the sanctity of home. They live sociably, and in great numbers frequent the same localities. Although, in the sea, these animals cooperate in numerous herds, and protect and valiantly defend each other, once emerged from their favourite element they regard themselves on their peculiar rock as in a sacred domicile, where no comrade has a right to intrude upon their domestic tranquillity. If one of them approach this family centre, the chief-or, shall we say the father?-prepares to expel by force what he considers a foreign aggression; and there invariably takes place a terrible combat, which only ends in the death of the lord of the rock, or in the compulsory retreat of the indiscreet stranger. This proceeding is well worth the attention of every busybody. It is full of sense, and shows a discrimination between public cooperation for the common good, and officious interference in private life, which would do credit to even human beings. (Scientific Illustrations.) Mind your own business “ Come, hurry up!” said the second hand of a clock to the minute hand; “ you’ ll never get round in time if you don’ t. See how fast I’ m going,” continued the fussy little monitor, as it fretted round on its pivot. “ Come, hurry up!” said the minute to the hour hand, utterly oblivious of being addressed by the second hand. “ If you don’ t be quick you’ ll never be in at the stroke of one.” “ Well, that’ s just what our young friend there has been saying to you.” At this point the clock pealed forth the hour as the hour hand continued, “ You see we’ re all in time-not one of us behind. You take my advice: Do your own work in your own way, and leave others alone.” Moral-Mind your own business. (Great Thoughts.) 1 Peter 4:16-19 Yet if any man suffer as a Christian.The two-fold sorrow One often hears it insinuated that a godly life is free from care and sorrow, but those persons do much harm who would cheat people into becoming religious by any such delusive hopes. All have troubles, but it makes a very great difference whether we sorrow with God or without Him. Let us now consider some of the sorrows of righteousness and compare them with the no less certain sorrows of unrighteousness. We divide the sufferings of the Christian into, first, those which spring from his struggles with outer things; secondly, those arising from his own nature-the world within. Every one knows how the first professors of Christianity had to suffer when that religion was in its infancy, and paganism or indifferentism was the creed of respectability. They were tortured, thrown to wild beasts, “ butchered to make a Roman holiday.” The men of noble aims find their lot a sad and lonely one still. They are smiled at as enthusiasts, sneered at as hypocrites. And then there is the pain which is felt by every one who bravely contends against the besetting sins of his inner life. Oh, who can escape from himself-this slothful, vain, selfish, lustful, envious self? To conquer this is indeed a struggle. But do not fancy for a moment that the sorrows of unrighteousness are at all less real. Suppose a man did gain the whole world at the trifling cost (as he might think it) of his own soul, what then? We know that Alexander was troubled because he had not another world to conquer, and is there not such a thing as satiety, monotony of success, and the want of not having a want? Ruined homes and cursed lives proclaim the penalties of unrestrained passions. The sufferings in this world of the murderer, thief, evil-doer, with death for wages, are at least as great as those of the Christian to be followed by God’ s gift of eternal life. Certainly it is difficult to resist our unholy natures, to tame rebellious passions; but there is one thing even more difficult, and that is to endure the misery which their unrestrained indulgence invariably brings along with it. Suffer we all must; but surely it makes a great difference whether God’ s love is seen through our sorrow, or we have the additional misery of feeling that we are in rebellion against our Heavenly Father, and that, therefore, the whole constitution of the world is against us. (E. J. Hardy, M. A.) The character and privileges of a Christian I. His character.1. A Christian is one who fully and cordially believes the testimony that is given concerning Christ. 2. A Christian is one who permanently obeys the commandments of Christ. 3. A Christian is one who receives his faith and holiness, and his desert in them, by the Spirit of Christ. II. His privileges.1. A Christian is justified from the guilt and condemnation of sin. 2. A Christian possesses friendship and constant inter course with God. 3. A Christian possesses the certainty of victory over death. 4. A Christian has the prospect of perfect and immortal happiness and glory. (J. Parsons.) The Christian described I. The origin of the name (Acts 11:26). II. The commonness of the appellation.1. In one aspect this commonness is astonishing, and should be convincing. “ This is the finger of God.” 2. In another view this commonness is reasonable. 3. In another view the commonness of the name is lamentable. The word Christian was once very significant and distinguishing. But, alas! in numberless instances now, it is not distinguishable at all. III. The real import of this title.1. A Christian is one who has a relation to Christ; not a professed, but a real relation-not a nominal, but a vital relation-yea, a very peculiar and preeminent relation, arising above every other you can mention; spiritual in its nature, and never ending in its duration; and deriving the possession and continuance of every enjoyment from Christ. 2. A Christian is a lover of Christ’ s doctrine. 3. A Christian is a lover of Christ’ s person. 4. A Christian is a copier of Christ’ s example. 5. A Christian is a dependent on Christ’ s mediation. 6. A Christian is expectant of Christ’ s coming. (W. Jay.) Glorify God on this behalf.-The pious sufferer exhorted to glorify God I. What is implied in suffering as a Christian.1. To suffer in the character of a Christian. Where piety has its seat in the heart it will appear in the life, to be seen and identified by all (Matthew 5:13-16). 2. To suffer for discharging the duties of a Christian. Christianity frees its possessors from the slavery of custom; they are governed by the high principles of religion. 3. To suffer in the spirit of a Christian (Luke 21:19). II. Why characters who thus suffer should not be ashamed.1. Because they suffer innocently.2. They suffer in a good cause.3. They suffer from the purest motive.4. They suffer for a blessed Master.5. They suffer in imitation of the brightest examples. III. Their duty under suffering circumstances, viz., to “ glorify God on this behalf.”1. Devoutly acknowledging Him and His gifts (1 Chronicles 29:11-12; confessing Him “ worthy to receive honour, glory, might, and majesty” (Revelation 4:11). The very circumstance of their suffering should prompt them to this. 2. By firmness in the day of trial. Let nothing shake their firmness (1 Corinthians 15:58); but imitate the example of the disciples, who continued with their Lord in His temptations (Luke 22:28-29). 3. By a faithful and patient endurance of suffering. IV. To this act of glorifying God, they are encouraged from-1. The declarations and promises He has made. These are many, great, and various (Isaiah 41:10; Isaiah 43:1; Isaiah 34:2; Isaiah 54:17; Matthew 10:32; James 1:12; Revelation 2:10; Revelation 22:7). 2. The honour it will confer upon them. Improvement:-1. Let us examine our experience by this test.2. Let us encourage ourselves in the Lord.3. Let us pray for our persecutors. (Sketches of Four Hundred Sermons.) 1 Peter 4:17-19 Judgment must begin at the house of God.The Church’ s visitation How we may know when some judgment approacheth. God usually, before any heavy judgment, visits a people with lesser judgments.1. “ This, and this have I done,” saith the Lord, “ and yet ye have not returned unto Me” (Amos 4:6-7). There be droppings before the ruin of a house. 2. Again, usually before some great calamity, God takes away worthy men, “ the councillor, and the captain, and the man of war” (Isaiah 3:2-3). This is a fearful presage that God threateneth some destruction, for they are the pillars of the church and the strength of the world; for they keep away evil and do good by their example and by their prayers many ways. 3. God usually visits a people when some horrible crying sins reign amongst them, as- (1) Atheism.(2) Idolatry.(3) When divisions grow amongst a people. Union is a preserver. 4. Again, when sin goes with some evil circumstances and odious qualities, which aggravate the same in the sight of God, as when sin grows ripe, and abounds in a land or nation. (1) When it is impudent; when men grow bold in sin, making it their whole course and trade of life. (2) When sin grows common and spreads far. It is an ill plea to say, Others do so as well as I. Alas! the more sin the more danger. (3) When there is a security in sinning, without fear of the Almighty, as if men would dare the God of heaven to do His worst. 5. Unfruitfulness threateneth a judgment upon a people. When God, the great husbandman in His Church, sees that upon so great and continual cost bestowed upon us, we remain yet unfruitful, He will not suffer us long to cumber the ground of His Church. 6. Decay in our first love is a sign of judgment approaching. (R. Sibbes.) Difficulties in the pursuit, despair in the neglect, of salvation I. That the conduct of God to His Church is such, that “ judgment” may be said to “ begin at the house of God,” and “ the righteous” to be “ scarcely saved.”1. The Church is here often subject to persecution. 2. The Christian life is a painful course of exertion and warfare. 3. Many serious apprehensions and fears are felt by the people of God respecting their final salvation. 4. “ The righteous is scarcely saved,” as, to be saved, he must endure to the end. II. We proceed to the solemn inquiry, which the apostle infers from such a conduct of the Lord toward His servants; “ What shall be the end of those who obey not His gospel? where shall the ungodly and the sinner appear; if judgment begin at the house of God; if the righteous be scarcely saved?”1. Now if these require such a process of afflictive correction and purification, what shall be the doom of those who experience none; those who live without God? If His corrective dealings were so severe, what will be His severity, when justice alone, without mercy, shall preside? 2. The saints are prepared for glory by a course of privations and endurances; by learning to deny themselves: what then may be expected by those who never aimed at following the will of God as their rule? those that live at large after the desires of the flesh and the mind. 3. If the righteous had so many fears and anxieties regarding their state; what then shall be the portion of those who had no such fears, who lived in a reckless disregard of all that is most serious? 4. The followers of Christ, in the midst of all their difficulties, endure to the end: but if thus only are they saved, what shall be the doom of those who persevered in an opposite path? acquiring only, at every step, fresh degrees of obduration, a more fixed habit of resistance to the will of God! “ Where shall they appear?” (R. Hall, M. A.) The Church’ s visitation I. The Church of God is His own house.1. God hath two houses, the heavens, which are called His house, because He manifests His glory there, and the Church here below, wherein He manifests His grace. Yea, the whole world, in a sort, is His house, because He manifests His power and wisdom in it; but heaven and His Church, in a more peculiar manner; and that in these respects- 1. Because God by His graze hath residence in His Church. (2) Because by the means of salvation-the Word and sacraments there administered-He doth feed His Church, as in a house. (3) A man rests and takes contentment in His house; so God takes His best contentment in His Church and people; they are the most beloved of all mankind. (4) As in a house we use to lay up our jewels and precious things; so God lays up in His Church whatsoever is precious-His praises, His graces, yea, whatsoever is good and of high esteem, that He bestows upon His Church and people. 2. God provides for His Church as His own house. First, a man provides for his family; so doth God provide for His Church. And as a man protects his house from all enemies, so will God protect His Church and people, and be a wall of fire, and a defence round about them. 3. The heart of true Christians is God’ s private closet. And as in every house or building, there are some open places, and some private closets, etc., so is it here. God hath His private chamber, and His retiring place, which is the heart of every true Christian. II. The house of God needs visiting and purging.1. Such is the weakness of man’ s nature, that evil things soon discourage us; and good things, except we wrestle with our spirits, prove a snare to the best. Even the Church of God, after a long time of peace, is apt to gather corruption, as water doth by standing, and as the air itself will do if it have not the wind to purge it. 2. Most certain it is that the Church of God cannot be long without some affliction, considering that it is now in a state of pilgrimage, absent from God, in another world as it were. III. God will come to visit and purge His house when need is. He afflicts His own people before others, because-1. They are of His own family, and are called by His name (Numbers 6:27). Now the disorders of the family tend to the disgrace of the governor of it. 2. The gospel suffers much through the sins of professors. 3. The sins of the godly are more heinous than others. (1) Committed against more light.(2) More benefits and favours.(3) Sacrilege.(4) Idolatry. IV. God appoints a particular time for His visitation.1. The time of visiting the Church of God is from Abel to the last man that shall be in the earth. The whole days of the Church are a time of persecution. 2. The Church is afflicted when the light of the gospel hath most clearly shined. 3. Now is the time of the Church’ s affliction. V. Judgment must begin at the house of God. God begins with His own Church and people-1. Usually because He uses wicked men and the enemies of His Church for that base service, to correct and punish them. 2. To take away all excuse from wicked men. 3. That His children might be best at last. 4. That when He sends them good days afterwards, they might have the more taste and relish of His goodness. (R. Sibbes.) Afflictions amongst the people of God I. Afflictions must begin with God’ s servants. Jacob’ s house first, afterwards the Egyptians, felt the famine; first the Israelites were oppressed, afterwards the Egyptians; the Jews were first carried into captivity, but afterwards the Assyrians were destroyed by the Medes and Persians.1. In respect of their sins, they are full of terror ere they can get any comfort, and when they have obtained it, it is often eclipsed, and they go mourning. 2. They are subject to many sicknesses, grievous pains, diseases, losses, crosses, disgrace, persecution at the hand of the wicked, etc. (1) To humble them for sin past. (2) To fetch them into the way from wandering, and teach them obedience. (3) To humble them. (4) To mortify their lusts, wean them from the world, and quicken them to duty. (5) Hereby also God showeth that He will not bear with sin in His dearest servants. (6) To confute the devil, and show that God’ s people serve Him not for wages. (7) To show them their happiness is to come, and that if God thus school His servants, that then He will deal severely with the wicked, so that this may be a looking glass to them. II. It is of necessity that God’ s servants must here suffer troubles.1. In respect of God’ s will. He hath appointed us thereunto. 2. In respect of our necessity. Sin is so riveted into us, and in our very nature, as it must be no easy thing to pluck it out from us. (John Rogers.) God’ s judgment of the world I. The human world morally is divided into two grand sections.1. “ The house of God.” All good men are members of one great family, They have one Father, one Elder Brother, one spiritual life, and one common home. 2. Those who “ obey not the gospel of God.” II. These two sections are alike subject to suffering.1. The best men, in their greatest suffering, feel that their sufferings are deserved. 2. That they are disciplinary. III. The suffering of the one is far more terrible than that of the other.1. The one has resignation to the Divine will; the other has not.2. The one has peace of conscience; the other has not.3. The one has the hope of a better life; the other has not.4. The one has fellowship with the Father; the other has not. Learn:-1. The transcendent importance of moral character.2. The fallacy of judging from appearances.3. The influence of the gospel upon man’ s destiny. (Homilist.) Judgment beginning at the house of God The stormy shower lighteth first on the high hills, and having washed them, settleth with all the filth in the valleys. (J. Trapp.) Judgments of grace It is necessary to distinguish the judgment of grace from the judgment of wrath, and temporal punishment from eternal. (J. P. Lange.) What shall the end be of them that obey not.-What is the doom of those who die impenitent I. Not annihilation.1. Future punishment of some kind seems essential to the moral government of God. 2. The fact of there being various degrees in punishment makes it impossible for that punishment to be annihilation. 3. All that is said about the sinner’ s doom shuts out the idea of annihilation (Luke 12:4-5; Matthew 13:41-42; Mark 9:43). II. Not merely a temporary punishment. The most general argument brought against eternal punishment is that it is opposed to the perfect justice of God. “ The punishment,” they say, “ being eternal must at last exceed the sin.” In order to understand aright the nature of the sin, you must bear in mind the being against whom the sin is committed. It is against Jehovah, the Infinite One, and against one to whom we are under infinite obligations. “ But,” say others, “ God is infinitely merciful, and the very idea of eternal suffering is opposed to that attribute.” it may be according to your idea of that mercy, and yet not against that mercy itself. Remember God is as just as He is merciful. That mercy can permit eternal suffering is proved by the fact that it does in the case of Satan and the rebel angels. There will be nothing in hell to refine or alter the sinner. Hell fire is no “ refiner’ s fire,” to purge the dross away. (A. G. Brown.) The ultimate destiny of the wicked The question concerns those who “ obey not the gospel.” Observe, the gospel is not to be treated as a mere subject for study; although a more noble subject comes not within the reach of man. Nor as a means of mere excitement. It is not a book for entertainment, such as a tale, a poem, a drama. The gospel is a statute, a law to be obeyed; it comes with the highest authority. Unless it is translated into our lives, and embodied in our actions, it is a curse. I. The question in the text is one that it is impossible to determine with certitude. No less than three theories have been propounded, in order to render an answer to this tremendous problem’ s utter extinction-eternal torment- ultimate restoration. II. Certitude on such a subject is of no vital importance.1. Genuine religion is the one thing essential for man. 2. Genuine religion is independent of any certitude of the future. 3. Whilst genuine religion is independent of any certitude of the future, it is dependent upon the knowledge of some things, and these things are clearly revealed. (1) Our great moral obligations.(2) Our means of spiritual improvement. (Homilist.) The end of the ungodly This is a verse of implication. It affirms nothing, but by its own species of argument causes us to gather some very striking lessons. I. We have implied the meaning of religion. “ Obedience.” This is God’ s due as-1. Creator.2. Father.3. King. II. We have implied the law on which obedience is to be founded. “ The gospel of God.” The gospel is the revelation of good-1. On account of its Author.2. Purport.3. Practical influence. III. We have implied that the punishment of the unbeliever will be severe. The answer, left here as a great hiatus, is fully given in other parts of Scripture-1. In the threats which it utters.2. In the examples it affords.3. In the logical course of sequence. IV. We have implied a warning to the sinful. They stand on the brink of an awful precipice, in which at any moment they may fall. V. We have implied a consolation to the righteous. If their lot here is hard, it is nothing to that in store for the disobedient. Sin may be pleasant for a season, but it brings forth death. (Pryce Thomas.) The end of the disobedient I. That there is an end to the unconverted. II. That this end is fraught with fearful contingencies. III. That the nature of this end demands urgent and careful consideration. IV. That this end is shrouded, even to the most earnest investigation, in obscurity. (Homilist.) The sin and danger of not obeying the gospel I. The great privilege of having the gospel.1. It is good news, the best news that ever reached our fallen world-news sent from heaven, news of a reconciliation for a fallen world. 2. Though it was intended for universal man and suited to meet all his spiritual wants, yet through the supineness of the Church its universal proclamation has been withheld, and millions of our fellow creatures left without it. But we are blessed with it in all its purity, freeness, and fulness (Psalms 16:6; Hebrews 4:2). II. The great sin of not obeying the gospel. It is not enough to go and hear the gospel, to converse about it, to approve it, unless we obey it (Titus 2:11-14). III. The awful consequences of not obeying the gospel.1. It will be the end of their hope and happiness, but not of their existence. 2. It will be to die, not only under the curse of the law, but under the gospel. (Pulpit Studies.) The ungodly’ s misery I. The seeming prosperity of the wicked shall have an end. See what a fearful judgment follows the wicked! That which he sins for-his honour, riches, delights-all shall vanish and come to nothing. II. The happiness of the wicked is momentary, their misery endless. When we are tempted to any sin or unlawful course, consider thus with ourselves: “ Shall I, for a pleasure that will end, have a judgment that shall never end? For the favour of men that will fail, shall I lose the perpetual favour of God? Shall I, for a little profit, lose my soul eternally?” I beseech you therefore, whenever you are solicited to sin, for profit or pleasure, etc., set before your eyes the perishing condition of these things, and the everlastingness of that judgment which attends upon them. III. Those that obey not the gospel.1. Sins against the gospel are sins against those attributes wherein God will glorify Himself most, as His grace, mercy, loving kindness, etc. 2. Sins against the greatest light are most sinful. 3. Another aggravation of sins against the gospel is that they sin against the better covenant. (R. Sibbes.) The criminality and the consequences of unbelief I. The criminality of your disobedience. This will appear if you consider-1. The excellency and importance of that gospel which you have hitherto disbelieved. 2. The source in which your unbelief has originated. (1) Immoral conduct.(2) Inattention and inconsideration.(3) Worldly mindedness.(4) Self-righteousness. 3. The motives and appeals which your unbelief has resisted. (1) Birth in a Christian family(2) Afflictive dispensations.(3) Conversion of ungodly companions.(4) Impressions and convictions. 4. The injurious influence which your unbelief may have produced on the minds and destiny of others. II. The ruinous consequences of your disobedience.1. You are now in a state of condemnation. 2. You are in the greatest danger of being suffered to continue in impenitence and unbelief. What will be your condition in the next world? (J. Alexander.) If the righteous scarcely be saved.-The righteous scarcely saved, and the misery of the wicked To be saved is what the generality of persons in the world wish for. I am satisfied that the genuine sense of our text hath a particular reference to temporal salvation from calamity, for the copulative particle “ and” makes a connection between it and the foregoing verses, where we have the apostle speaking unto God’ s people about their suffering for the cause of Christ. He tells them of judgment beginning at the house of God, by which we are to understand affliction and calamity, wherewith God exercises His people. But the text need not be particularly confined to this sense, but may hold good with respect to eternal salvation.1. That the people of God are a righteous people. They are called so in the text, not that they are so in themselves or by nature. They are righteous in the righteousness of Christ, who is called the Lord our Righteousness (Jeremiah 23:6; 1 Corinthians 1:30). A principle of righteousness is planted in them at their conversion, from whence flows a righteousness of conversation (Luke 1:6). 2. That the people of God shall be saved. Our text plainly supposes it, though while in the world they are persecuted. Now what is it for them to be saved but to be delivered from sin and misery, and brought into the enjoyment of eternal glory by Jesus Christ. “ Israel shall be saved in the Lord with an everlasting salvation.” (1) They shall be delivered from sin and misery. From sin, both from the guilt, filth, power, and being of it. (2) They shall be brought to the full enjoyment of eternal glory; and their bodies shall also be saved. 3. That though the righteous be saved, yet it is with abundance of difficulty. In temporal calamity the Lord may suffer things to run to the very last extremity before He appears for His people’ s salvation. Now their being scarcely saved is not for want of power in God, for “ He is able to save to the uttermost,” nor is it for want of will, for He win give grace and glory (Psalms 84:11), nor is it for want of an appointment, for He hath not “ appointed them to wrath, but to obtain salvation by our Lord Jesus Christ” (1 Thessalonians 5:9); but the difficulty lies in the things they meet with in the way to salvation. (1) At their entrance into the way to heaven they meet with abundance of difficulty. The gate of conversion is strait, and a crowd of oppositions meet them at their entrance. Many temptations does Satan lay before young converts, and such a mighty advantage has he against them, their corruptions being strong and grace weak, that they find it a very hard thing to escape. The world also, sometimes with its charms and sometimes with its frowns, bears hard upon the poor creature, so that if he escape being entangled it is with great difficulty. (2) In their progress on the way to heaven they meet with so many oppositions that they are but scarcely saved. The way to heaven is but a narrow way. God’ s people, like those in the shipwreck with Pard, escape all safe to land, yet it is with a scarcely, they get over the turbulent sea of this world. Oh, the snares that are laid for them! (3) At their exit out of the world they meet with abundance of difficulty, so that though they be saved, yet it is with a scarcely; their enemies would not suffer it if they could hinder it. When their souls are ready to take their flight into another world, then is Satan most busy to hinder their salvation. Now though it be impossible for him to hinder their salvation, yet he may so molest them as to make it difficult to obtain salvation, so that they shall find they are but scarcely saved. This further appears-(1) From the frequent apprehensions they have of their being in danger of hell and destruction. (2) This is further evident from the fears there are in the people of God about their salvation. 4. That as it is impossible for the ungodly and sinner to be saved as such, so their misery is unspeakable. Where shall the ungodly and sinner appear? (1) Negatively, I shall show where they shall not appear. Not in heaven. Not in the presence of God, for the foolish shall not stand in His sight; He hateth all the workers of iniquity. Not among the righteous. Sinners shall not stand in the congregation of the righteous. Where, then, shall the wicked appear? (2) Positively, they shall appear in hell. “ The wicked shall be turned into hell, and all the nations that forget God.” They shall appear at the awful tribunal of God, before His judgment seat. And are the righteous scarcely saved? Hence learn- 1. That going to heaven is not so easy a thing as some imagine. It is not an empty profession of religion that will serve the turn. 2. Are the righteous scarcely saved? Hence we learn what a miserable disappointment many meet with, who, instead of getting to heaven, fall into hell. 3. If the righteous be scarcely saved, then we may from hence learn the miserable condition of the wicked in the other world, who are not saved. (1) O ye sleepy, secure sinners! where will you appear? (2) O ye drunkards! where will you appear-you that waste your time and estates, that spoil your constitution, and abuse the good creatures of God? (3) O ye fornicators and adulterers! where will you appear? (4) O ye sabbath breakers! where will you appear? (5) O ye swearers! where will you appear? (6) O ye scoffers at religion! where will you appear? (J. Sedgfield.) If so-what then “ Scarcely saved” points out the difficulty of salvation. It is no light thing to be saved; omnipotent grace is needed. It is no trifling thing to be lost, but it can be done by neglect. I. The fact. “ The righteous scarcely are saved.”1. From the connection we conclude that the righteous are saved with difficulty because of the strictness of Divine rule. 2. From the experience of saints we come to the same conclusion. They find many saving acts to be hard, as, for instance- (1) To lay hold on Christ simply, and as sinners.(2) To overcome the flesh from day to day.(3) To resist the world, with its blandishments, threats, and customs.(4) To vanquish Satan and his horrible temptations.(5) To perform needful duties in a humble and holy spirit.(6) To reach to gracious attainments and to continue in them.(7) To pass the tribunal of their own awakened and purified conscience, and to receive a verdict of acquittal there. 3. From the testimony of those who are safely landed (Revelation 7:14). II. The influence from the fact. “ Where shall the ungodly and the sinner appear?”1. If even the true coin is so severely tested, what will become of the “ reprobate silver” ? 2. If saints scarcely reach heaven, what of the ungodly? What can they do who have no God? What can they do who have no Saviour? What can they do who are without the Spirit of God? What without prayer, the Word, the promise of God, etc.? 3. If saints are so sorely chastened, what will justice mete out to the openly defiant sinner? III. Another inference. Where will the mere professor appear? If the truly godly have a hard fight for it-1. The formalist will find ceremonies a poor solace.2. The false professor will be ruined by his hypocrisy.3. The presumptuous will find his daring pride a poor help.4. He who trusted to mere orthodoxy of creed will come to a fall5. Height of office will do no more than increase responsibility. IV. Another inference. Then the tempted soul may be saved. It seems that even those who are truly saints are saved with difficulty; then we may be saved, though we have a hard struggle for it. V. Another inference. How sweet will heaven be! There the difficulties will be ended forever. There the former trials will contribute to the eternal bliss. (C. H. Spurgeon.) The salvation of the righteous difficult I. The character of the persons here spoken of.1. The righteous. (1) None are such legally (Romans 3:10; Job 9:15).(2) They are such as have believed in Christ, are pardoned and justified (Romans 3:25-26). 2. The ungodly sinner. They are such as remain in their native, unconverted state. Particularly they are such- (1) Over whom Satan exercises an uncontrolled dominion (Ephesians 2:2).(2) Alienated from the love of God (Ephesians 4:18).(3) Rebellion against God (Romans 1:28-32).(4) Neglecting, perhaps rejecting, the only way of salvation by Jesus Christ (Hebrews 2:3; Hebrews 10:28-29). II. The difficulty of the salvation of the righteous.1. The text admits that the righteous shall be saved; their salvation is certain upon their being found faithful unto death. (1) The testimony of Scripture secures it (2 Timothy 1:12; 2 Timothy 4:17; 1 Peter 1:3-5. This is the purpose of God concerning them (2 Thessalonians 2:13). (3) It was the ultimate end of Christ’ s sufferings (Hebrews 2:10). (4) Of His ascension into heaven (Hebrews 6:20). (5) God hath promised it (Revelation 2:10). (6) The work of salvation in the righteous is already begun (Philippians 1:6). 2. Nevertheless, their salvation is here represented as being with difficulty obtained. (1) This difficulty is not owing to any deficiency in the love of God, which is universal (John 3:16). (2) Nor in the death and merit of Christ, which are infinite (Hebrews 2:9; 1 John 2:2). (3) Nor in the influence of the Spirit (John 14:16-17; John 16:7-8). But it is owing chiefly- (4) To the difficulty of the work they have got to do (Titus 2:11-14). (5) The opposition they meet with from the world. (6) The influence of evil example which abounds in the world (John 15:19). (7) The opposition they meet with from Satan (1 Peter 5:8). (8) The remains of corruption within. (9) The instability of some Christians (James 1:8), and the apostasy of others (1 Timothy 1:19-20). III. The certain and dreadful misery that awaits the ungodly sinner. The question in the text relating to such may refer-1. To a time of popular calamity (Luke 21:25-26).2. To death (Psalms 9:17).3. To the day of judgment. Let the wicked tremble for the consequences of their conduct. Should they live and die such, their destruction is inevitable. (T. Hannam.) The difficulty of salvation Let us consider the solemn truth assumed-“ If the righteous be scarcely saved.” The meaning of this is that the righteous are saved with difficulty, or, as Steiger well expresses it, “ it costs believers much to remain steadfast in their endurance of trials and to glorify God.” The radical cause of the difficulty is with the righteous-original sin. The external causes of the difficulty are around believers-the world, which is in league with their infected nature, and offers corresponding objects to all its evil propensities. It is readily admitted that they are surrounded also with the helps of the Church. Now to notice the particular causes of such difficulty. Observe, first, that the faith of the righteous, which is always imperfect, has, like a physical power, a constant tendency to decrease in strength and firmness through its exercise being neglected. The temptations to such neglect are many and great. The righteous, for the most part, are leading a busy life. Hence they are tempted not to find time for the exercise of faith. Besides, sensible things ever surround them, try to press into their souls by every avenue of their senses, and exclusively, fill their affections and engage their thoughts; hence their disinclination to exercise faith would be proportionately increased. True, if the righteous are exposed to temptation to neglect the exercise of faith, they have incentives to attend to the duty. One incentive is a sense of sin. Another incentive is special temptation, or trouble, or difficulty, which often besets them, and urges them to look to their Saviour for deliverance or support. A third incentive is the impulse of the Holy Spirit, inciting thoughts of Christ. Further, the faith of the righteous is liable to decrease in strength and stability, through their failure to properly seek its nourish meat. Thus may their faith decline and waver through defect in spiritual appetite or neglect of spiritual food. And their exposedness to this may hardly be obviated by the frequent calls they may have to the healthy and invigorating exercises of devotion. Again, the faith of the righteous is liable to decrease in strength and firmness, through being exposed to attacks from the unbelief of their fallen nature, called in Scripture the evil heart of unbelief. Natural unbelief, therefore, needs to be much watched and prayed against, and an increase of faith to be much encouraged and prayed for. But further, the danger which their faith is in does not only arise from the unbelief of their fallen nature, but from the encouragement which such unbelief meets with in the world-ah! and the professing Church. For infidelity in sonic degree, practical or avowed, is everywhere manifest. The manner of such injury to their faith will be different at separate times. Sometimes, to notice the two extremes, when it is violently assailed by doubts within and infidel expressions and actions without, its injury will be sudden and apparent, like that of a plant which in spring is smitten with the blast of the east wind, so that one hour its roots are firm and its leaves green, the next its roots are loose, and its leaves dried up and withered. At other times, when its exercise or its nourishment is neglected through a worldly spirit, its injury will be gradual and imperceptible, like that of a plant which, while it is left uncultivated, has a worm at its roots. The righteous are saved with difficulty, secondly, because, in consequence of the general causes mentioned, their holiness is exposed to some degree of failure. It is exposed to this through decrease of faith, like the fruit of a tree through injury of its root, and also, like faith, through its exercise and nourishment being neglected. The holiness of the righteous is exposed to failure in measure through temptations. Again, the holiness of the righteous is exposed to failure through trials. Further, the righteous are saved with difficulty, because they are exposed to failure, in measure, in holiness, through difficulty in certain parts of obedience. It is no easy matter for the righteous, depraved as they are in nature, to perform their various duties in their entirety. But even this is not all; some duties which the righteous have to perform are especially difficult, through their direct opposition to their natural tendencies. I mean such as are involved in the following sayings of the Master:-“ If ye forgive men their trespasses, your Heavenly Father will also forgive you. But if ye forgive not men their trespasses, neither will your Father forgive your trespasses” (Matthew 6:14). Now I have two inferences to draw from this solemn subject.1. The first is, if the righteous are thus scarcely saved, must not many professors of religion be in a sad mistake? 2. The second inference is that the righteous have great cause for earnest striving that the evidences of their conversion may be clear to themselves and to others. 3. In a word, let them “ work out their own salvation with fear and trembling,” and “ give all diligence to make their calling and election sure.” (C. H. Coleman.) The salvation of the sinner impossible 1. The faith in Christ of the righteous is maintained with difficulty. But the ungodly and sinners have no living faith in Christ at all. Thus they not only have not faith and seek not after it, but they yield themselves to be bound and fettered in infidelity. Yet without faith is it not impossible that the ungodly and sinners should be saved? 2. I observe, the holiness of the righteous is maintained with difficulty in resisting and overcoming the evil dispositions which are inherent in their fallen nature. But the ungodly and sinners are entirely destitute of holiness in principle and in practice. How, then, can the ungodly and sinners be meet for heaven? 3. The righteous often find it difficult to bear their trials with Christian consistency, being liable to impatience and irritability, through want of watchfulness in trials comparatively light and transient, and strongly urged to discontent and resistance of will, through distrust of God and failure in spiritual firmness, in trials severe and lasting. But the ungodly and sinners almost always, under any trials, allow themselves in discontent, bad temper, and resistance, whether the trials come the more evidently from God or from man. But the ungodly and sinners being thus refractory under trials, how is it possible that they can be finally saved? 4. The righteous frequently experience great difficulty in performing some of the harder duties of the Christian life. But the ungodly and sinners neglect them altogether. If they render bodily service, they render no spiritual service to God. How is it possible, then, that the ungodly and sinners can find favour before the judgment seat? (C. H. Coleman.) Salvation difficult to the Christian-impossible to the sinner I. Why the salvation of the righteous is difficult. The difficulty in the salvation of either the righteous or the wicked turns not on any want of mercy in the heart of God. It is not because God is implacable and hard to be appeased. Again, it is not in any lack of provision in the atonement to cover all the wants of sinners. But, positively, one difficulty is found in the nature of God’ s government, and in the nature of free agency in this world. God has so constituted man as to limit Himself to one mode of government over him. This must be moral, and not physical. That physical omnipotence which sweeps the heavens and upholds the universe could find no difficulty in moving lumps of clay so small and insignificant as we. But mind cannot be moved as God moves the planets. Physical force can have no direct application to mind for the purpose of determining its moral action. Such being the case, the great difficulty is to persuade sinners to choose right. God is infinitely ready to forgive them if they will repent; but the great problem is to persuade them to do so. God may and does employ physical agencies to act morally, but never to act physically. There are a great many difficulties in the way of converting sinners, and saving them when once converted. One class of these difficulties is the result of an abused constitution. When Adam and Eve were created their appetites were doubtless mild and moderate. They did not live to please themselves and gratify their own appetites. Their deep and all engrossing desire and purpose to please God was the law of their entire activities. Sin introduced another law-the law of self-indulgence. Every one knows how terribly this law tends to perpetuate and strengthen itself. Their appetites lost their proper balance. No longer subordinate to reason and to God, they became inordinate, clamorous, despotic. Now in order to save men, they must be restored to a state in which God and reason control the free action of the mind, and appetite is held in due subjection. Here is the difficulty. Some have formed habits and have confirmed them until they have become immensely strong, and it becomes exceedingly difficult to induce them to break away. The rescue must be effected by moral, not by physical means, and the problem is to make the moral means powerful enough for the purpose. Again, we must notice, among the difficulties in question, the entanglements of a multitude of circumstances. I have often thought it well for Christians that they do not see all their difficulties at first. If they did, its discouraging effect might be disastrous. The great difficulty is living to please self rather than God. It is wonderful to see how much this difficulty is enhanced by the agency Satan and sin have had in the framework of society. It would seem that a bait is held before every man, whatever his position and circumstances may be. There is a man chained to a wife who is a constant source of temptation and trial to him. There is a wife who sees scarce a peaceful moment in all her life with her husband-all is vexation and sorrow of spirit. Many parents have children who are a constant trial to them. They are indolent, or they are reckless, or they are self-willed and obstinate. Their own tempers perhaps are chafed, and they become a sore temptation to a similar state of chafed and fretted temper in their parents. On the other hand, children may have equal trials in their parents. Who but God can save against the power of such temptations? Many children have been brought up in error. Their parents have held erroneous opinions, and they have had their moral constitution saturated with this influence from their cradle and upwards. How terrible such an influence must inevitably be! Or the business of their parents may have been such as to miseducate them. When the mind gives itself up to self-indulgence, and a host of appetites become clamorous and impetuous, what a labour it must be to bring the soul into harmony with God! How many impulses must be withstood and overcome l how great the change that must be wrought in both the physical and moral state of the man! No wonder that the devil flatters himself that he has got the race of depraved men into his snares and can lead them captive at his will. Many are not aware of the labour necessary to get rid of the influence of a bad education. Ofttimes the affections become unhappily attached, yet the attachment is exceedingly strong, and it shall seem like the sundering of the very heart strings to break it off. Sometimes we are quite inadequate to judge of the strength of this attachment, except as we may see what strange and terrible means God is compelled to use to sever it. Oh, what a work is this which Christ undertakes that He may save His people from their sins! How strange and how complicated are the difficulties 1 Who could overcome them but God? Again, the darkness of nature is so great and so gross that it must be an exceedingly great work to save them from its influence and pour the true light of God through their intelligence. Indeed, Christians never know themselves except as they see themselves in God’ s own light. Finally, the greatness of the change requisite in passing from sin to real holiness-from Satan’ s kingdom into full fitness for Christ’ s, creates no small difficulty in the way of saving even the converted, Remarks: We see why the Scriptures are so full of exhortations to the Christians to run, run, and especially to run by rule. They must, however, give all diligence. A lazy man cannot Bet to heaven. To get there costs toil and labour. For his will must be sanctified. The entire voluntary department of his being must be renovated. The Christian is also commanded to watch-not to close his eyes for a little more sleep and a little more slumber. We see, also, why the Christian is to pray always. We may also see why Christians are exhorted to separate themselves from the world. Mark, also, why Christians are exhorted to spend the time of their sojourning here in fear, and to walk softly and carefully, as before God, through all the meanderings of their pilgrimage. When candid men come to consider all these things-the human constitution, the tendency to unbelief, the impulses towards self-indulgence, and the strength of temptation-they cannot but see that there is abundant occasion for all those faults in Christian character and conduct which they are wont to criticise so stringently. Yet often, perhaps commonly, wicked men make no allowance for the faults of Christians, but assume that every Christian ought to be spotless, while every sinner may make so much apology for his sin as quite to shield his conscience from conviction of guilt. II. Show how and why the salvation of the wicked is impossible. Vitally important to be considered here is the fact that the governmental difficulty in the way of being saved, growing out of your having sinned, even greatly, is all removed by Christ’ s atonement. The difficulty in the way of saving sinners is not simply that they have sinned, but that they will not now cease from sinning and believe on the Lord Jesus Christ. The salvation of sinners is therefore impossible.1. Because it is impossible for God by any means He can wisely employ to persuade them to desist from sinning. It may not be wise for God to bring all the moral power of His universe to bear upon the sinner in this world. If this were wise and practicable, it might avail-for aught we can know; but since He does not do it, we infer that He refrains from some wise reason. Certain limitations are fixed in the divine wisdom to the amount of moral influence which God shall employ in the case of a sinner. It is in view of this fact that I say God finds it impossible to gain the sinner’ s consent to the gospel by any means that He can wisely employ. 2. Again, the sinner cannot be saved, because salvation from sin is an indispensable condition of salvation from hell. The being saved from sin must come first in order. If salvation implies fitness for heaven, and if this implies ceasing from sin, then, of course, it is naturally and forever impossible that any sinner can be saved without holiness. 3. The peace of heaven forbids that you should go there in your sins. What sort of happiness, congenial to his heart, could the sinner hope to find there? And now will heaven let you in? No. Nothing that worketh abomination can by any means go in there. 4. Besides, it would not be for your own comfort to be there. You were never quite comfortable in spiritual society on earth. 5. The justice of God will not allow you to participate in the joys of the saints. His sense of propriety forbids that He should give you a place among His pure and trustful children. III. If, then, the sinner cannot be saved and go to heaven, where shall he appear? The question is a strong negation. They shall not appear among the righteous and the saved. This is a common form of speaking. Nehemiah said, “ Shall such a man as I flee?” No, indeed. Where, then, shall the ungodly and the sinner appear? In no desirable place or position-certainly. Not with the righteous in the judgment, for so God’ s Word has often and most solemnly affirmed. It is asked, Where shall the ungodly appear? I answer, Certainly not in heaven, nor on the heavenly side. (C. G. Finney.) Saved with difficulty I. The people of God will be saved with difficulty.1. Owing to their strong remaining corruptions. 2. To their long and inveterate habits of sin. 3. To the strong and numerous foes that oppose his march. 4. A great amount of labour will be requisite to push him forward in his heavenly pilgrimage. 5. There will await him many other dangers, of which he can have yet no conception. II. But “ where shall the ungodly and sinner appear?” All the difficulties, and more yet, that obstruct the way of the Christian heavenward, are surely before the man who has not commenced his route thither.1. The man who is not a Christian has yet to enter upon the way. 2. He may have yet more corruptions. He may have taken a more wayward course. 3. But his iniquities must all be uprooted. 4. He has more foes, in addition to those planted in the way of the Christian. 5. He must do more labour than if he had set out earlier. 6. The same, and more yet dangers await him than await the Christian. Remarks:1. Would I have the sinner despair, lie down and die? Will not heaven be worth all the efforts he has yet to make? 2. Oh, then, how anxious should sinners be to commence the great work of their salvation! 3. How anxious, too, should the Church be that sinners might live! (D. A. Clark.) The difficulties that are to be encountered in the way of salvation That the righteous should scarcely be saved seems hardly reconcilable with the grace and deign and promises of the gospel. Did not Christ come to save sinners? I. In what sense the righteous are said to be scarcely saved. That may be understood two ways.(1) With respect to accidental difficulties arising from the particular circumstances of times and persons. For the difficulties of religion are not alike in all times, nor to all persons; for they are not like a geometrical measure, which is always exactly the same; but rather like a voyage at sea, which is to be managed by the same compass and to the same port; hut it sometimes proves calm and pleasant, and at other times stormy and tempestuous. Which chiefly happens when a religion appears new, or goes about to reform the old; for then it is sure to meet with all the opposition which the passions and interests and prejudices of partial men can raise against it. For the time is come that judgment must begin at the house of God; and if it first begin at us, what shall the end be of them that obey not the gospel of God? i.e., Christ hath foretold desolation and ruin to come upon the Jewish nation. Sincerity and constancy are the necessary conditions of salvation, which may be tried much more in some than it is in others. We must all have the same journey’ s end if we hope to get to heaven, but some may meet with a freer road, and a calmer season, and better company, in their journey than others. But herein mankind are apt to be deceived, as though all the difficulties lay in a suffering condition; whereas a soft and careless life is rather more dangerous to their souls, because persons are less apt to suspect their danger. The temptations of the suffering side are apt to awake the sleepy powers of the soul, whereas the gentle and easy condition of life often lays them asleep. But this is not all; for there are many things which make it more difficult to some than others, which are of another nature. Some tempers are more flexible and pliable than others; more capable of hearkening to reason, and more apt to reflect on their own actions; whereas others are naturally stiff and obstinate, who stick fast to an opinion or prejudice which they have once taken up. Some, again, are very easily convinced of a fault, but very hardly reclaimed. Again, some have had the advantage of a pious and religious education. For although the difficulties be not alike in all, yet, of one kind or other, they are such as cannot be overcome by ourselves without the power of Divine grace exciting, preventing, and assisting of us. (2) Having thus showed what difficulties there are which arise from the different circumstances of times and persons, I am now to consider those which arise from the terms of salvation, which are common to all persons and times. Here we must suppose salvation to be the thing aimed at as the chief end or happiness of such men, and here are two kinds of difficulties to be inquired into.(1) Such as are implied in the general pursuit or happiness. For happiness is not a thing of chance or necessity, but a matter of choice and design. (1) That happiness did consist in one uniform design of life, i.e., that a man must choose one proper and chief end to himself, and so order his thoughts and actions that he may attain it. (2) That there must be a careful and attentive mind to pursue this design. (3) That any man who desired to be happy must, above all things, take pains about himself. (4) That those who consulted most the ease and pleasure of mankind were forced to put men upon some hard and unpleasant things to make anything like happiness to consist in pleasure. For they cast off all riot and excess, because the pain which followed exceeded the pleasure; and therefore they made temperance and chastity necessary to the true pleasure of life. So that all were agreed that it was impossible to attain to anything that looked like happiness without some real difficulty, which was necessary to be undergone, although the success Were uncertain. (2) Let us now consider the difficulties relating to salvation, or that happiness which Christians expect. And here I shall show- (1) It is more reasonable to expect difficulties in the way of salvation. For the more excellent and desirable the happiness is, the more it is worth the while for us to take pains about it; especially when there is a certainty of attaining it (2) The difficulties in our way to salvation are not such but we may reasonably hope to overcome them; i.e., if we set ourselves about it; otherwise a very mean difficulty will appear too great for us. And there are two things to show that we may hope to overcome them.(1) That the most difficult duties are in themselves reasonable to be performed by us. (2) That God offers His gracious assistance for the performance of them. II. And this helps us to reconcile the difficulty of salvation with the easiness of the terms of the gospel. For that which is not only hard, but impossible to us, in our own strength, may, by the mighty power of Divine grace, become not only possible but easy to us. III. And from hence we see what encouragement there is still for us to hope to be saved, if we be righteous. There is none for the ungodly and sinner. “ But what is it,” some may say, “ to hear that the righteous are scarcely saved, when we are so conscious to ourselves of our own unrighteousness?” (Bp. Stillingfleet.) The difficulties of salvation This imports not any uncertainty in the thing itself as to the end, in respect of the purpose and performance of God, but only the great difficulties and hard encounters in the way, “ fightings without, and fears within.” All outward difficulties, however, would be us nothing, were it not for the incumbrance of lusts and corruptions within. Were a man to meet disgraces and sufferings for Christ, how easily would he go through them, yea, and rejoice in them, were he rid of the fretting impatience, the pride, and self-love, of his own carnal heart! And many times, after much wrestling, he scarcely finds that he hath gained any ground: yea, sometimes he is foiled and cast down by them. And so in all duties the flesh is dragging downwards! When he would mount up, he finds himself as a bird with a stone tied to its foot; he hath wings that flutter to be upwards, but is pressed down with the weight fastened to him. What struggling with wanderings and deadness in hearing, and reading, and prayer! And what is most grievous, is, that, by their unwary walking and the prevailing of some corruption, believers grieve the Spirit of God, and provoke Him to hide His face and withdraw His comforts. How much pain to attain anything, any particular grace of humility, or meekness, or self-denial! And if anything be attained, how hard to keep and maintain it against the contrary party! How often are they driven back to their old point! If they do but cease from striving a little, they are carried back by the stream. And what returns of doubtings and unbelief, after they thought they were got somewhat above them, insomuch that sometimes they are at the point of giving over, and thinking it will never be for them! And yet, through all these, they are brought safely home. There is another strength than theirs, which bears them up and brings them through. But these things, and many more of this nature, argue the difficulty of their course, and that it is not so easy a thing to come to heaven as most imagine it. (Abp. Leighton.) A solemn appeal I. Consider the appeal in its reference to temporal calamities.1. The righteous are saved, when the existence of the Church is preserved. 2. The righteous are saved personally, when their lives are preserved. 3. The righteous are saved, while the life and welfare of their souls are secured, whatever may otherwise befall them. II. Consider the appeal in its reference to spiritual and eternal salvation.1. The righteous are scarcely saved- (1) Because their salvation could not be purchased but at the greatest conceivable expense. (2) Because the purchased redemption could not be applied but by supernatural power. (3) Because even when salvation is thus attained, it is not persevered in without the same supernatural aid, and the utmost diligence. (4) Because after death is the judgment. The righteous shall be saved, but it will be scarcely when the matter comes to a scrutiny of sterling evidence. 2. It remains now to ponder the inference which the apostle chiefly designs to impress on our minds, “ If the righteous scarcely be saved, where shall the ungodly and the sinner appear?” It is as if he had said, How certain their doom! (1) How certain! “ Where shall they appear?” Not surely in a saved state. This is the simple answer to the question. (2) How dreadful must it be! The abrupt and pungent form of expression suggests the horrors of their doom. (3) How reasonable will be their doom! For this, too, the question strongly implies, not only as an appeal to reason, leaving themselves to decide, but as an allusion to the mode of procedure in courts among men. “ Where shall the ungodly and the sinner appear?” On what ground shall they stand? What can they plead in their own behalf at the bar of the eternal Judge? Inferences: 1. What construction ought to be put on the little difference made between the righteous and the wicked in the dispensations of Providence. This has often been mistaken by the former (Psalms 73:1-28), and abused by the latter, as if religion were of no value. A real distinction exists, and will eventually be manifested. The ungodly have no reason to glory, indulging atheistical thoughts because of the sufferings of the godly. 2. What views ought to be entertained of spiritual salvation? It is not that easy trifling matter which many take it to be. “ Who then can be saved?” 3. Propose this question to yourselves in a less limited form, “ Who can be saved?” Through the grace of God, all sinners, even the chief. But, who will be saved? Only those who live a life of faith, and make their calling and election sure. (The Christian Magazine.) The difficulty of salvation The way to come to salvation is full of difficulties-1. Because there is much ado to get Lot out of Sodom, to get Israel out of Egypt. 2. Again, it is hard in regard of the sin that continually cleaves to them in this world, which doth, as it were, shackle them, and compass them about in all their performances. 3. Besides, it is a hard matter in regard of Satan; for he is a great enemy to the peace of God’ s children. Pharaoh after the Israelites. 4. Then, by reason of great discouragements and ill-usage which they find in the world from wicked men. 5. Besides this, scandal makes it a hard matter to be saved; to see evil courses and evil persons flourish and countenanced in the world. 6. This, likewise, makes the way difficult; we are too apt to offend God daily, giving Him just cause to withdraw His Spirit of comfort from us, which makes us go mourning all the day long; wanting those sweet refreshments of spiritual joy and peace we had before. When Christ wanted the sweet solace of His Father upon the Cross, how did it trouble Him? (R. Sibbes.) Why God will have the righteous with such difficulty saved God will have it thus to sweeten heaven unto us. After a conflicting life peace is welcome; heaven is heaven indeed after trouble. We can relish it then. Because God will discard hypocrites in this life, who take up so much of religion as stands with their ease and credit in the world, avoiding every difficulty which accompanies godliness, but, so they may swim two ways at once, go on in their lusts still and be religious withal. This they approve of. Therefore, God will have it a hard matter to be saved, to frustrate the vain hopes of such wretches. Alas! it is an easy matter to be an hypocrite, but not to live godly. (R. Sibbes.) The righteous scarcely saved Peter means this, “ If Christians have such a hard tug to get into heaven, there is no chance at all for anybody else.” The soul that has long been driving before the winds of pleasure cannot so easily turn round and cut the wind’ s eye. If religion were something you could wear like a cane in your hand, or a band of crape on your hat, or if it were portable, in the shape of a Bible or Psalm book that you could carry under your arm, it would not seem so hard; but to have it as a principle in the soul, looking over your shoulder when you write out your ledgers, coming in to make suggestions when you are making a trade, breaking over the walls of Sunday, and running by your side from Monday morning to Saturday night, verily that seems a troublesome religion. How many postpone conversion because they think that it is so easy to become religious-they can begin at any time! They can shed sin as naturally as a bird his feathers, or a tree its bark. One crack of the whip of resolution will frighten out the drove of their iniquities. No! no! St. Peter himself was “ scarcely saved.” It was not until every passion of his soul was in agony of earnestness that he fastened on to life. Oh, if in this instance it required the girding up of the soul in order to obtain the hope and joy of Christ’ s salvation, what shall become of those who make no effort, reach forth no strong prayer, lay hold of no Bible promise, and sleep when peril stands at the helm? If the righteous be “ scarcely saved,” where will the ungodly and sinner appear? But after pardon is obtained, there are batteries of strength which must be passed on our way into the heavenly harbour. All the Christian’ s foes are marshalled under three sturdy generals-the World, the Flesh, and the Devil. Business, entrenched behind counters, and bales of goods, and safes, attempts the overthrow of our souls. Disappointments fret, and fraud exasperates us, and meddlesome curiosity makes our lip curl. Gains lift us up, so that losses can better hurl us down. The Christian has to contend against temptations which made Adam disobey, and Abraham lie, and Moses get angry, and Job swear, and David sin against chastity, and Peter deny his Master. Satan makes assault. Having gathered skill by six thousand years of chicanery in making devotion profane, and integrity lie, and honesty cheat, and humility proud, and generosity tight-fisted, he knows just where to strike the Christian. Bad spirits are ever on the wing, coming to us on steps of sunshine, and floating on the dark wave of midnight, seated on the wings of the morning, and dropping with the evening dew. Guns cannot shoot them, swords cannot pierce them, fire cannot burn them, cold cannot freeze them. They fly with wings tireless, eye dimless, swifter than arrows, deadlier than plagues, cutting like hail, drowning like surges, crushing like rocks. Who can resist them? Only that arm which clasps God’ s arm, and that heart sustained by God’ s heart. If, with heavenly shield and sword, the righteous are only scarcely saved, where, where shall the ungodly and the sinner appear? (T. De Witt Talmage.) Scarcely saved The victorious general in the hour of triumph has not unfrequently reason to remember how nearly, through oversight or miscalculation, he had lost the day: a little more pressure on this wing or that, a trifling prolongation of the struggle, a few minutes’ further delay in the arrival of reinforcements, and his proud banner had been dragged in the dust. The pilot guiding his barque safely into port sometimes knows how through lack of seaman ship he nearly made shipwreck. And the successful merchant remembers crises in his history when he found himself on the brink of ruin, when the last straw only was wanting to precipitate the catastrophe. Men who have won the prizes of life have cause to wear their honours meekly when they recall the errors of judgment, the lack of courage, the acts of rashness, the ignorance, the credulousness, the hesitation, which so nearly deprived them of fame and fortune. Our religious history furnishes parallels to these narrow escapes on the lower level. (W. L. Watkinson.) Commit the keeping of their souls to Him.-The saint’ s hiding place in the evil day Wherein consider-1. That the state and condition of God’ s children is to suffer.2. The dispensation of that suffering, they suffer not at all adventures, but according to the will of God.3. Their duty in this estate, namely, to commit the keeping of their souls to God. In the duty we have these particulars comprehended-1. An action, to commit.2. An object, what we must commit, the soul.3. The person to whom, to God.4. The manner, in well-doing.5. The reason which should move us hereunto, implied in these words, as unto a faithful Creator. Observe-1. That the state of God’ s children is to suffer, yea, to suffer of God; for sometimes He seems to be an enemy to His dearest servants, as unto Job. But chiefly they are in a militant estate here. (1) Why God’ s children must suffer here. Because they live among those that they cannot but suffer from, wheresoever they live. (2) They must suffer also in regard of themselves; for the best of us all have many lusts to be subdued, and a great deal of corruption to be purged out, before we can come to heaven, that holy place into which no unclean thing can enter. In the best estate there will be suffering one way or other. Then, suspect thyself to be in a bad estate, for every true Christian suffers in one kind or other, either from without or within. We must be conformable to our Head before we can come to heaven. But the dispensation of our suffering is according to the will of God. God’ s will concerning our suffering is permissive in respect of those that do us harm; but in regard of our patient enduring injuries, it is His approving and commanding will. We are enjoined to suffer, and they are permitted to wrong us. It seems, then, there is some excuse for those that persecute the saints. They do but according to God’ s will; and if it be so, who dares speak against them? It is not God’ s commanding will, but His suffering will. He useth their malice for His own ends. But observe further, that we never suffer but when God will. This entry is longer than a Bible module can hold. The rest is at https://www.sermonindex.net/commentary/bi/ 1 Peter 5:1-4 The elders which are among you I exhort.Elders exhorted 1. In that he, an elder, exhorts them, elders, note that ministers are fittest to teach ministers and to judge of their actions. When we dislike anything in a minister, it were wisdom to ask the judgment of some godly minister before we censure. 2. In that he requireth nothing at their hands but what he himself did, note that the most forcible way of teaching, whether private or public, is, first, to do that in our own persons which we require of others. He is an ill captain that bids his soldiers go fight, himself in the meantime tarrying behind. 3. In that he beseecheth, note his modesty and humility. (John Rogers.) The office, spirit, and reward of a faithful ministry The apostle Peter, after various exhortations to strengthen the brethren, turns at the close of his Epistle to his fellow ministers, and gives them his parting counsel. St. Peter calls the Church “ the flock of God.” It is not man’ s flock, but God’ s, which He hath purchased with His own blood. Our Saviour spoke of the Church as His flock-My sheep, My lambs-and Himself as the Good Shepherd. Each believer will have his own history. There will be peculiarities in it, not found in any other-in what way he wandered; where Jesus found him-in the house of God, on the bed of sickness, at the grave of some one dear to him as his own soul. When thus brought home to the fold, he becomes one of those sheep to whom Jesus gives eternal life. He feels that he is not his own, that he has been bought with a price and can no longer live to his own will, but to the will of Him that loved him. But though thus made one of the flock of Christ, the believer has not yet reached heaven; he must be fed, cared for, guided on his way there, and it is for this end, as well as to add to this flock, that the office of the ministry was instituted. Jesus so loves the souls of men, for whom He died, that He commits them only to those who love Him, and will feed His flock. Having thus considered the office of the ministry, let us consider the spirit in which it is to be exercised-not of constraint, but willingly, of a ready mind, neither as lording it over your charge. There may be a constraint in taking upon us this office and ministry, but it is such a constraint as St. Paul had when he said, “ Necessity is laid upon me; woe is unto me, if I preach not the gospel! The love of Christ constraineth me.” We may shrink from it from a sense of our utter insufficiency for such a work. Isaiah said, “ I am a man of unclean lips, and I dwell among a people of unclean lips.” There may be a shrinking from the work from these causes, and at the same time a willing and ready mind. The constraint St. Peter speaks of is where there is no heart for the work, where there are secular motives of base gain or ambition. Where there is this constraint, a penurious, stinted service will be rendered. Christ praises the angel of the Church of Ephesus for labour unto weariness. This is what Christ praises in His servants. Neither as being lords over God’ s heritage, the Church. Our Saviour had warned His apostles against the spirit of ambition which was found in the world. “ You know,” He said to them, “ that the great ones of this world exercise lordship over men, but it shall not be so among you.” And last of all in the qualifications of the Christian minister, we are to be examples to the flock in word, in manner of life, in love, in faith, in purity. Having thus considered the office of the ministry, and the spirit in which it is to be exercised, let us now notice the reward of the faithful minister. “ And when the Chief Shepherd shall appear, ye shall receive a crown of glory which fadeth not away.” The service of Christ in the ministry of the gospel is not without its reward. It has its reward, not only in prospect, after it is finished, but by the way, in the life which now is. Our work brings us in contact with Divine truth, which grows upon us in interest and delight, so that we are overmastered by its power and glory. This truth raises the soul above itself on the wings of faith and hope, and makes us heavenly minded, which is life and peace. There is a satisfaction growing out of the nature of our work, so that the labour itself is its own exceeding great reward. Our work, again, brings us into a loving sympathy with the Man of Sorrows. The gospel we preach began first to be preached by the Lord Himself. And as He was grieved at the unbelief and hardness of heart of those who heard Him, as He wept over Jerusalem, so does every faithful minister of Christ mourn over those who obey not the gospel and neglect its great salvation. (J. Packard, D. D.) Address to the young elders It is quite plain that St. Peter is here addressing distinctively not elders in age, but eiders by office. Age might enter then, more than now, into the question of fitness; nevertheless, what made a presbyter was not age, but ordination. And when we see gathered together a goodly band of youthful ministers, we do well to say to them, Remember, you have an office given you which reckons not by years, but by graces; you have to walk the aisles of your church, to tread the streets of your parish, as men (in one sense) prematurely old-as men of that truest dignity, which consists not in wealth, not in rank, not even in age, but in bearing Christ’ s commission. St. Peter counts this so honourable an office that he will claim even for himself none higher. Another apostle, his friend and chosen brother, describes himself in like manner in two of his writings, only as “ the elder” (2 John 1:1). They well knew, both of them, the higher compulsion of sympathy, above anything that mere power or official dignity can exercise.1. I will say a word upon the dedication. The Christian clergyman is a dedicated man. Do you heartily believe that your motive in asking ordination is honest, truthful, pure? Is it the choice of your heart? Do you mean to give your life to it? You must not be satisfied with that sort of average ambiguous twilight state which the world considers good enough for a lay Christian. 2. Thus the dedication passes on into the commission. You dedicate yourselves to Christ, and He gives you His commission. It would be absolutely intolerable to one who knows himself to have to feel, when he robes himself in his vestry for the exercise of one of his clerical functions, that he is volunteering his counsels for that time to a body of rational spiritual beings who have just as good a right to teach him. Bearing this well in mind, still we say, Without Christ’ s commission we could not speak: with it a dying man may be bold to speak to dying men. 3. Next to the sanctity, the twofold sanctity, of the office, let me strongly urge upon you its Divine humanity. The secret of all influence is, Be human. One word of genuine kindness, of hearty compassionate sympathy, will be worth ten thousand expositions of your claim to reverence: it will open hearts otherwise barred against you, and, letting you in, will let in Christ after you. And as in your intercourse, so also in your preaching. Let it indeed assert strongly the direct revelation and inspiration of your gospel. But in the application of this Divine gospel, speak as a man to men; speak as one who knows its necessity to himself, as one who knows the nature, the life, the heart, to which he has to offer it, and has learned, not from hooks but from men, what is that heart sickness too, and eager inward thirst, to which Christ his Lord came to minister, and has of His infinite mercy set him to minister in His absence, in His presence! 4. Need I say, then, in the fourth place, that the Christian ministry is a work? It is no pastime. It is no outside perfunctory propriety. It is a work. Be able to say, I am an elder of Christ’ s Church, and therefore my time, my strength, nay life, is the Church’ s, is Christ’ s. 5. Who shall deny then this other avowal-that the ministry is a difficulty? Do you suppose, ye who pass by, that a clergyman’ s ordination sets him above the most trying snares of world, flesh, or devil? 6. Then let me record, for your encouragement, this one other characteristic-the ministry an honour, a privilege, and a blessing. There is a special coronet for the faithful presbyter, over and above that which he shall share with the lowliest of the redeemed. In this life if is his, if he be earnest in his work, to enjoy a gratitude scarcely given to another-the gratitude of lives remodelled, the gratitude of souls saved. (Dean Vaughan.) Peter exhorting the elders I. A well-equipped soldier.1. An elder. (1) In age.(2) In knowledge.(3) In experience.(4) In position. 2. A witness. Of Christ’ s- (1) Suffering; (2) Atonement;(3) Love;(4) Sympathy;(5) Humanity. 3. A partaker-of the glory which shall be revealed. “ Come ye blessed of My Father,” etc. II. A humble-minded saint. This was not one of St. Peter’ s early characteristics. But he had learnt by experience to form a true opinion of his real position in the sight of God, and of the many infirmities which pertain to fallen humanity. This chastened spirit is particularly manifested-1. By the position assumed. “ Fellow elder.” There is no assumption of extra wisdom or superior knowledge. 2. By the method of his teaching. Not “ I command, decree,” “ enforce” ; simply “ I exhort.” He would suggest, remind, urge on. What a heavenly spirit! (J. J. S. Bird, B. A.) A witness of the sufferings of Christ.- A witness and a partaker I. A witness of the sufferings of Christ. So far as possible, let us be witnesses with Peter.1. An eyewitness of those sufferings. In this we cannot participate, nor need we desire to do so. 2. A faith witness of those sufferings. (1) He had personally believed on Jesus at the first.(2) He had further believed through after communion with Him. 3. A testifying witness of those sufferings. (1) He bore witness to their bitterness when borne by Jesus.(2) He bore witness to their importance as an atonement.(3) He bore witness to their completeness as a satisfaction.(4) He bore witness to their effect in perfect salvation. 4. A partaking witness of those sufferings. (1) In defence of truth he suffered from opposers.(2) In winning others he suffered in the anguish of his heart.(3) In serving his Lord he suffered exile, persecution, death. What he witnessed in all these ways became a motive and a stimulus for his whole life. II. A partaker of the glory to be revealed. It is important to partake in all that we preach, or else we preach without vividness and assurance.1. Peter had enjoyed a literal foretaste of the glory on the holy mount. We, too, have our earnests of eternal joy. 2. Peter had not yet seen the glory which shall be revealed, and yet he had partaken of it in a spiritual sense: our participation must also be spiritual. Peter had been a spiritual partaker in the following ways: (1) By faith in the certainty of the glory.(2) By anticipation of the joy of the glory.(3) By sympathy with our Lord, who has entered into glory. 3. Peter had felt the result of faith in that glory. (1) In the comfort which it yielded him.(2) In the heavenliness which it wrought in him.(3) In the courage with which it endowed him. (C. H. Spurgeon.) Partaker of the glory that shall be revealed.-Partaking as well as preaching ‘ Tis a very sad thing when preachers are like printers, who compose and print off many things, which they neither understand, nor love, nor experience; all they aim at is money for printing, which is their trade. It is also sad when ministers are like gentlemen ushers, who bring ladies to their pews, but go not in themselves-bring others to heaven, and themselves stay without. (Ralph Venning.) Feed the flock of God. True office bearers in the Church I. Their duty. Feeding, leading, controlling, protecting. II. Their motive.1. Negatively. (1) Not constrainedly.(2) Not covetously.(3) Not ambitiously. 2. Positively. (1) Voluntariness.(2) Sympathy. III. Their hope.1. “ The crown” -symbol of dignity. 2. “ Of glory” -not tinselled or tarnished, but unalloyed. 3. “ That fadeth not away” -imperishable. IV. Their spirit.1. Mutual subjection.2. Perfect humility. V. Their help. “ Grace” -the favour of God, the greatest and mightiest inspiration of souls. (U. R. Thomas.) The discharge of the ministry I. The duty enjoined. Every step of the way of our salvation hath on it the print of infinite majesty, wisdom, and goodness; and this amongst the rest, that sinful, weak men are made subservient in that great work of bringing Christ and souls to meet, and that the life which is conveyed to them by the word of life in the hands of poor men, is by the same means preserved and advanced. Oh, what dexterity and diligence, and, above all, what affection are needful for this task! Who would not faint in it, were not our Lord the Chief Shepherd, were not all our sufficiency laid up in His rich fulness, and all our insufficiency covered in His gracious acceptance? II. The discharge of this high task we have here duly qualified. The apostle expresses the upright way of it both negatively and positively.1. There be three evils he would remove from this work-constrainedness, covetousness, and ambition-as opposed to willingness, a ready mind, and exemplary temper and behaviour. (1) We are cautioned against constrainedness, against being driven to the work by necessity, indigence, and want of other means of subsistence, as it is with too many, making a trade of it to live by; yea, making it the refuge and forlorn resource of their insufficiency for other callings. This willingness should not arise from any thing but pure affection to the work. (2) Not for filthy gain, but purely from the inward bent of the mind. As it should not be a compulsive motion from without, so it should not be an artificial motion by weights hung on within, avarice and love of gain. The former were a wheel, driven or drawn, going by force; the latter little better, as a clock made to go by art, by weights hung to it. But there should be a natural motion, like that of the heavens in their course. (3) The third evil is ambition, and that is either in the affecting of undue authority, or the tyrannical exercise of due authority, or to seek those dignities that suit not with this charge. 2. “ But being ensamples” : such a pattern as they may stamp and print their spirits and carriage by, and be followers of you as you are of Christ. And without this, there is little or no fruitful teaching. III. The high advantage. “ And when the Chief Shepherd shall appear,” etc. Thou shalt lose nothing by all this restraint from base gain, and vain glory, and worldly power. Let them all go for “ a crown” -that weighs them all down, that shall abide forever. Oh, how far more excellent:-“ a crown of glory,” pure, unmixed glory, without any pride or sinful vanity, or any danger of it-and a crown “ that fadeth not,” of such a flower as withers not. May they not well trample on base gain and vain applause, who have this crown to look to? They that will be content with those things let them be so; they have their reward, and it is done and gone, when faithful followers are to receive theirs. (Abp. Leighton.) Feed the sheep I thought that I was passing by a sheepfold, where the shepherds seemed extremely busy. But they were occupied entirely with the gate and the hurdles, and had turned their backs on the sheep. The pasture was bare and brown, little better in some places than a sandy waste; the water was muddy, and full of dead leaves. The sheep were few in number-thin, emaciated, and looked scarcely more than half alive. “ What are you doing, friends?” I asked of the shepherds. “ Our master told us to feed his sheep,” they replied. “ We want to attract those sheep out on the mountain side; they are his too.” “ And what are you doing to attract them?” “ Do you not see? We are gilding the gate and the hurdles, in the hope that, when the sun shines on them, those outside sheep will be attracted by curiosity. Then when they come inside we can feed them.” “ And why do you not feed those that are inside?” “ Oh, they are in; they are safe enough! They can pick up food for themselves. We have not time to attend to them as well as attract the outsiders, and the latter business is by far the most important. We have a further attraction also: we play on the shepherd’ s pipe. The outside sheep often come round to listen.” “ But, friends, it is for the sheep inside that my concern is awakened. Your Master said, ‘ Feed My sheep.’ Your gilding and music will never feed them.” “ Oh, no; those are for the sheep outside. We do feed them inside. Look, here is grass, and there are turnip troughs.” “ Do you call it grass? Parched, poor, uninviting stuff! My good friends, these troughs want cleansing and filling.” “ Do you think we have any time for that? We must attend to these other things.” “ Surely not to the neglect of the main thing? To what are you attracting these sheep? To what are you dooming the others? Attraction to starvation is not a very attractive idea.” “ Then you would have us to spend all our time on the sheep inside, and never gather the others in at all?” “ By no means. I would have you to attract the outsiders; but I would have them attracted by fresh food and clear water, not by golden hurdles and shepherds’ pipes. Trust me, the true way to attract lost sheep is by letting them see that the found sheep are better off than they are.” “ That is exactly what we are trying to do. Therefore we gild the hurdles to entice them to come and look into the fold.” “ And when they come and look in, you show them-what? A bare patch of ground, and a few half-starved sheep. My poor mistaken friends, the day is coming-ay, and fast too-when you will stand alone behind your gilded hurdles; for the fold will be left empty. The sheep will either be starved to death, or will have dragged their emaciated limbs to other fields than yours, where there is yet green grass left, and the fountain of living water is fresh and pure. Will you put down the paint pot and lay aside the reed, and begin at once to clear out the water and refill the troughs? It is not yet quite too late. It soon will be.” Does the parable need interpretation? Will the shepherds listen? (Emily S. Holt.) Taking the oversight thereof.-Ministerial oversight It is not enough for ministers to preach, yea, sacredly and diligently, but they must besides take a particular oversight of their flock, and looking into the conversation and behaviour, and applying themselves accordingly in admonition, exhortation, comfort. If a minister know any of his people riotous or profane, he must rebuke them; if any out of the way, admonish them; he must hearten them that be in a good course to go on still, and must comfort them that languish under their sins, temptations, and fears; in a word, deal with every one as the cause requireth.1. This rebukes those ministers that be absent from their people usually or continually. How can these take care of them that come not at them but rarely, except they could indent with the devil, never to trouble their people, or tempt them in their absence. 2. It rebukes those also that living among their people, yet care not thus, but think themselves discharged that they meet them at Church on Sunday, and then preach them a sermon, whereas all the week after they consider not of them. (John Rogers.) Not for filthy lucre.-God’ s servants-their ruling motive You cannot serve two masters-you must serve one or other. If your work is first with you, and your fee second, work is your master, and the Lord of work, who is God. But if your fee is first with you, and your work second, fee is your master, and the lord of fee, who is the devil; and not only the devil, but the lowest of devils-“ the least erected fiend that fell.” So there you have it in brief terms-work first, you are God’ s servants; fee first, you are the fiend’ s. And it makes a difference, now and ever, believe me, whether you serve Him who has on His vesture and thigh written, “ King of kings,” and whose service is perfect freedom; or him on whose vesture and thigh the name is written, “ Slave of slaves,” and whose service is perfect slavery. (John Ruskin.) Gold a contemptible motive for service The noblest deeds which have been done on earth have not been done for gold. It was not for the sake of gold that our Lord came down and died, and the apostles went out to preach the good news in all lands. The Spartans looked for no reward in money when they fought and died at Thermopylae; and Socrates the wise asked no pay from his countrymen, but lived poor and barefoot all his days, only caring to make men good. And there are heroes in our days also, who do noble deeds, but not for gold. Our discoverers did not go to make themselves rich when they sailed out one after another into the dreary frozen seas; nor did the ladies, who went out to drudge in the hospitals of the East, making themselves poor, that they might be rich in noble works; and young men, too, did they say to themselves, “ How much money shall I earn?” when they went to the war, leaving wealth and comfort, and a pleasant home, to face hunger and thirst, and wounds and death, that they might fight for their country and their queen? No, there is a better thing on earth than wealth, a better thing than life itself, and that is, to have done something before you die, for which good men may honour you, and God your Father smile upon your work. (C. Kingsley.) Too much money for a clergyman Mr. Fletcher, of Madeley, was once offered a living in a small parish in the county of Durham; the duty was light, the stipend £400, and the surrounding country very charming. Mr. F. thanked the donor for his kind offer, but at the same time declined it, saying, “ There is too much money for me, and too little labour.” Neither as being lords over God’ s heritage.-Ministerial authority 1. Ministers must not exercise civil authority and temporal power over their people, but use a spiritual rule over them, by teaching them, etc., and ruling them by the Word of God. 2. Ministers must not carry themselves proudly and disdainfully. 3. Nor must a minister rule them with violence (Ezekiel 34:18). (John Rogers.) Not lords Bernard of Clairvaux wrote to Pope Eugene, “ Peter could not give thee what he had not; what he had he gave: the care over the Church, not dominion.” Ensamples to the flock.-Power of example Of Mr. Henry Townley, who died in 1861, Dr. Henry Allon, his pastor, said in his funeral sermon: “ I doubt whether a holier man than Henry Townley has ever lived … I have often, in his presence, felt humbled and awed at his manifest sanctity and consecration. I never remember to have left him without shame and penitence, and prayer that God would forgive my shortcoming, and make me like him.” When the Chief Shepherd shall appear.- The Chief Shepherd’ s appearance I. The style and character here appropriated to our Divine Redeemer.1. “ Shepherd.” (1) He has received His Church as a charge from the hand of the Father. (2) He ‘ has ransomed the sheep with His most precious blood. (3) He lives to gather the wanderers into His fold, by the power of His Spirit and the instrumentality of His Word. 2. “ Chief Shepherd.” (1) His infinite dignity. (2) His official supremacy. (3) The preeminent qualities He possesses, for the office with which He has been invested. (a) The comprehensiveness of His knowledge. (b) His almighty power. (c) His exquisite tenderness and sympathy. (4) To Him all the subordinate agents in His kingdom are responsible. II. This chief shepherd is about to appear.1. This fact is most certain. 2. The circumstances of His second coming will be marked with peculiar splendour. III. The recompense which will be awarded at that solemn hour, to those who have faithfully fulfilled the duties of the office of under shepherds.-1. The beautiful imagery employed by the apostle to exhibit this recompense-“ a crown of glory that fadeth not away.” 2. What are the substantial truths couched under this imagery? (1) The approbation of his Master.(2) The visible tokens and pledges of ministerial success.(3) His own personal exaltation and felicity. Learn:1. The vast importance of the Christian ministry as an ordinance of God for the present and everlasting welfare of His Church. 2. The true honour which is due, and ought to be presented, to those who have faithfully discharged this office on earth, and especially when their course has terminated. (G. Clayton.) The Chief Shepherd I. The title which is here given to Christ as the Chief Shepherd. The very name of “ shepherd” is full of lustre and beauty, of condescension and grace. And whilst other names describe the different parts of Christ’ s work, and the various principles of Christ’ s character, this seems to combine them all. As Prophet, He was to teach His Church, to convey to it the lessons of Divine wisdom; as Priest, He was to make atonement for the sins of His people; as King, He was to rule over them in the gentleness and sanctity of His sway; but as He is the Chief Shepherd, we have the wisdom and goodness which instructs, the grace and mercy which unfolds, the power which rules, the authority which legislates, all in one.1. He is called the Chief Shepherd. In relation, without doubt, to the inferior and subordinate shepherds. For the universal Church, in all its subdivisions, is His vast sheepfold, and the ministers of religion are the shepherds in subordination to Him. And, according to the manners of the East, and in ancient and early times, there was one-the Chief Shepherd whose own the sheep were. It is in reference to this, that Christ, in the passage before us, is called “ the Chief Shepherd.” 2. It describes, also, the dignity of His person, and the glory of His perfections. In every respect He is chief-chief among the angels, having a name as much more excellent than they, as His nature is more excellent than theirs. He is first among the priests: Adam was a priest, Abel, Enoch, Abraham, Melchisedec, and Moses were priests; and then come the descendants of Ham in their rank and order; but Christ is Chief Priest. So He is among the prophets; He infinitely transcended Moses. He is so among the kings; “ King of kings and Lord of lords,” the blessed and only Potentate, whose power and splendour overwhelms them all. And so He is among the shepherds-the Chief Shepherd, the Alpha and the Omega, the beginning and ending. 3. He is Chief Shepherd also in having set a perfect example of a shepherd’ s duty in watchfulness, care, and love. What instructions He delivered; with what authority, dignity, and power! 4. And, finally, He is called Chief Shepherd on account of His exaltation and majesty in the heavenly world. He has a name above every name, that at the name of Jesus every knee should bow. II. The appearance which He shall hereafter make in glory; and the word “ appear” denotes that He is now hidden. The God of this world has blinded the eyes of many, that they neither see nor believe. And as it respects bodily vision, He is hidden also from His own people; for we walk by faith and not by sight.1. But the passage before us speaks of His appearance; He is to be made manifest. As the heavens were opened at the baptism, and the Holy Ghost descended visibly in the shape and appearance of a dove, so are the heavens hereafter to be opened, and the Chief Shepherd will appear and descend again. 2. And respecting the time of this appearance, it is reserved in the bosom of heaven, as a deep secret-not one of the holy angels is permitted to know-not one of the spirits of the just made perfect, have any more apprehension of the time of the second advent than you or I have. 3. Respecting the purpose of His coming. It is not to teach, to suffer, and to die; this He did once, and will do it no more. He will come, it is said, without a sin offering unto salvation; He will come to accomplish the resurrection of all the dead. 4. And as to the manner of the Advent. I take it that all which was seen and heard at Sinai, the greater revelation of Divine power and justice, when the sign of the Son of Man was seen in heaven, and Jerusalem was overturned, is but a faint type and foreshadow of that which shall then be. Oh, all miracles, all prodigies of Divine power, which have taken place from the beginning of the world to this day, will be as nothing amidst all the miracles which shall then be accomplished. It will be a day of God emphatically, in which it will he seen what God can do. 5. And now let those of us who are in the ministry learn what we are to look for. Contempt there may be from men, but there will be honour of God. (J. Stratten.) Ye shall receive a crown of glory.-The faithful minister I. I shall describe the nature, qualifications, and duties of the ministerial office as stated in the context.1. I shall consider the duties which this figurative description of the pastoral office implies. (1) It is incumbent on a Christian shepherd to feed the flock. And what is the provision with which he is to feed them? Food for the mind and heart, suited to their condition as rational beings, as fallen sinners, and as immortal creatures, the truth as it is in Jesus. (2) Inspection of the state of the flock is another duty implied in this figure. We should know the circumstances of our people, the sorrows which oppress, the cares which perplex, the sins which beset them, and the difficulties which embarrass them, in order that we may give to each “ a portion of meat in due season.” (3) Protection of his flock is also the duty of a shepherd. Is not Satan perpetually going about as a roaring lion, seeking whom he may devour? Is not the spirit of the world ever watching for an opportunity to devastate the interests of piety in our churches? Are there not heresies ever lurking about the pastures of truth? (4) Affectionate tenderness is generally associated with the character of a shepherd. (5) A faithful minister will enforce all his instructions by his example. 2. The apostle states in a negative form the manner in which the duties of the pastoral office are to be entered upon and discharged. (1) A minister is not to take upon him the oversight of flock under constraint, but with a willing mind. (2) We are forbidden to take the oversight of the flock for the sake of filthy lucre. (3) A Christian minister is not to lord it over God’ s heritage. He has no dominion over the conscience; his power in the church is ministerial, not legislatorial. II. I shall consider his subordination and responsibility to Christ. These are implied in the expression, “ the Chief Shepherd.” It is needless to say that this refers to our Divine Lord. This epithet implies-1. His superiority to all others. They are mere men of the same nature as their flocks; He in His mysterious and complex person unites the uncreated glories of the Godhead with the milder beauties of the perfect man. They (in a good sense of the term) are hired pastors; He is the great Proprietor of the sheep. They partake of the infirmities of the people; He is holy, harmless, and undefiled. They are encompassed with ignorance, and with the best intentions often err in the direction of the church. Unerring wisdom characterises all His dispensations. They possess affection for their flock, but the warmest bosom that ever glowed with ministerial love is as the frigid zone itself compared with the love of His heart. They are weak, and are often ready to sink under the multiplied cares of office; but though the government is upon His shoulder, He fainteth not, neither is weary. They are mortal, and continue not by reason of death; He is the “ blessed and only Potentate, who only hath immortality,” and reigns, as Head over all things to His Church, not “ by the law of a carnal commandment, but by the power of an endless life.” 2. This epithet implies the authority of Christ. He, in this respect, is the Chief Shepherd. It is exclusively His right to rule in the Church, to regulate all its concerns and all its officers. III. Turn we now to contemplate the faithful minister’ s glorious reward.1. The reward will be bestowed when the Chief Shepherd shall appear. 2. But I must consider of what the reward is to consist. “ He shall receive a crown of glory that fadeth not away.” (1) The figure implies honourable distinction. The crown was an emblem of honour. The faithful pastor will no doubt be singled out amidst the solemnities of the last day, and occupy a station where every eye will behold him. He will receive a public testimony of approbation from the Chief Shepherd. (2) Perfect felicity is evidently implied in this figurative description of a minister’ s reward. The crown of victory was worn on days of public rejoicing, and he who wore it was considered the happiest of the festive throng, and the centre of the universal joy. He received the congratulations of the admiring multitude as having reached the summit of human happiness. The apostle, therefore, intended to include the idea of perfect happiness in his beautiful illusion. The holy pastor shall partake, in common with his people, of all those sublime felicities which the Father hath prepared for them that love Him. (3) Eternal duration is ascribed by the apostle to the honour and happiness promised in the text. (J. A. James.) 1 Peter 5:5-7 Likewise, ye younger, submit yourselves.Counsels to the younger I. Submission.1. The younger are to submit to the elders. Are you young in years, or in the experience of the Christian life? Be not wise in your own conceit, but be willing to receive the advice of your superiors. 2. All are to be subject one to another. II. Humility. “ And be clothed,” or rather, “ clothe yourselves with humility.”1. Humility is a garment to be put on. And what garment is more beautiful than humility? 2. A reason is assigned. (1) “ God resisteth the proud.” (2) But to the humble-the lowly minded-God gives grace, or favour, pouring it down upon them in richest plenty. 3. Humble yourselves, therefore, says the apostle, and this shall be the result: “ He will exalt you in due time.” III. Trust in God; casting all your care upon Him, for He careth for you. Humility is closely allied with confidence.1. Let us look at the import of this exhortation. It is to trust our heavenly Father with ourselves and all our concerns. 2. And here is our warrant for the great privilege: “ He careth for you.” (Thornley Smith.) All of you be subject one to another.-Mutual respect There is a general complaint in our day that reverence is rapidly becoming extinct. The sentiment of respect is gone; each one stands upon his own powers and his own right. I suppose all of us, in a certain degree, recognise the truth of this charge against our own time. We may ask ourselves whether this feeling of personal independence is not in itself a good which may make amends for many losses that accompany the acquisition of it. But any consolation which we might derive from this last reflection is checked by another. Can we claim this sentiment of personal independence as at all characteristic of ourselves? Is it not fading along with the one which appears to contend with it? Is there not less of self-reliance than there was? I. But a sentence like this, if we felt it to be indeed a command, “ All of you be subject one to another,” -would not that be something more than these speculations about the decline of reverence in an age or a country? That speaks to me. It tells me of a temper which ought to exist in society, which would preserve it; but of a temper which is first of all to be cultivated in myself-which cannot by possibility be diffused through a mass, except as it is formed in the heart of a man. We may look at once to the root of the matter and see whether our respect is merely the effect of the circumstances and accidents in which we live; whether it depends on some external conventional witness of propriety; whether it has been merely taught us by the precept of men; or whether it proceeds from an under source, and is kept alive by springs within, which the Spirit of God Himself is renewing continually. The Bible and Christianity are continually forcing this thought upon us, that nothing can stand which has not a foundation; that if we wish any social edifice to bear the winds and rain, we must dig deep and build it upon a rock; that the passion of the heart for external things and forms, though it looks strong, is not a safe one-not one upon which we can depend. To this point then the apostle brings us. He recognises the relation of younger to elder as a very deep relation, involving duties, calling for subjection. With this natural relation he connects others equally real, though not equally acknowledged. But he has no hope that his admonitions will be heeded unless the principle which lies beneath them is apprehended. “ All of you be subject one to another.” This reverence is not one grounded ultimately upon differences of position or differences of age. Unless each man cherishes it toward every other man; unless he feels that there is a grandeur and awfulness in the fellow creature who is not distinguished from him by any external signs of superiority at all, who has all the external signs of inferiority-unless he feels that there is (the word is a strong one, but it is St. Peter’ s and we cannot change it) a subjection due to every such man, that a positive deference is to be paid him-he will not keep alive the other kind of respect, it will assuredly perish. The old oriental notion that royalty is mysterious, and that when it casts away mystery it ceases to obtain respect, is unquestionably grounded on a great truth. St. Peter does not deny the mystery, but he finds this mystery in the being of man himself; every one he meets is the shrine of it; every beggar carries in him that which an archangel cannot look into, which can be described in no words, measured by no human standards. Try to think of that man as having a whole world within him, unknown to you, unknown to him, which is yet a more wonderful world than this which his eyes and yours look upon; nearer to the centre from which this external one receives its light and heat. Try to think so! But will the trial succeed? Is there any chance of forcing ourselves into so strange a state of feeling? Is not this sympathy with people utterly different from ourselves a special gift to a few individuals, commonly women rather than men? And is it not more properly called pity than reverence? II. St. Peter meets these questions in the second part of the text: “ Be clothed with humility.” St. Peter knew-no one better-that it is not in station nor in mere example to make a man humble. He was a fisherman, yet he was proud. He conversed with our Lord for three years. He was low, but he aspired to be high. He might be spurned by the people of Judaea as a Galilean, or by the Romans as a Jew; but perhaps he should set his foot upon the necks of both; he should have some goodly place in his Master’ s kingdom, if not the highest place of all. The self-confidence was brought to the test and fell. What darkness closed in upon him then and shut out all the past and the future! What light was really coming to him through that darkness-a light that illuminated past, present, and future! Such phrases as these, then, which occur so often in the New Testament, “ Put on Christ,” “ Having the mind of Christ,” “ Be clothed with humility,” which are often cast aside as mere figures of speech, oriental modes of thought, were the most accurate, the most exactly corresponding to his inward experience, which the apostle could use. III. It introduces and explains the third clause of the text, “ For God resisteth the proud, but giveth grace to the humble.” “ How shall I be rid of this pride, it is so natural, so ingrained?” This must have been St. Peter’ s question very often; it must be ours. At last he found the answer. It was a terrible one. It was an everlasting one. When he was proud he was not sinning against a rule, a precept; he was resisting God. Every act of pride was nothing more than doing battle against Him; refusing to be ruled and moved by Him. And all humility meant nothing else but yielding to His government-but permitting the Spirit of Christ to hold that spirit which He had redeemed, and claimed for His own. And when a man is once bowed to the conviction that he is not meant to be what his Master and King refused to be, that it is not condescension in him to be on a level with those to whom the Prince of the kings of the earth levelled Himself, “ God giveth grace.” All the powers of the universe are then conspiring with him, not pledged to crush his wild Titanic ambition. IV. St. Peter then could transfer his own hardly won experience to the Church, and could say in his Catholic Epistle to the dispersed of that time, to the dispersed through all time, “ All of you be subject one to another.” So he asserted the true condition of a society while he took down the conceit of its separate members; so he exalted each of these members in the very act of depressing him. V. Generally this rule of being subject one to another, when applied to a society, implies that we should respect the opinions, habits, individual peculiarities, hereditary prepossessions of every man with whom we have to do; that we should take it for granted he has something which we need; that we should fear to rob him of anything which God has given him. This respect for him does not come from our caring more for him than for truth. It is part of our homage to truth. There is a danger of making him less true, of alienating him from truth, through our desire to attach him to ourselves. And therefore that same subjection one to another must make us resolute to maintain all truth so far as we have grasped it; vehement in denouncing all the habits of mind which, we know from ourselves, are unfavourable to the pursuit of truth, and undermine the love of it. And so this submission to man, which is in very deed submission to God, will preserve us from all servility; from that kind of deference to the judgment of individuals or of multitudes which is incompatible with genuine manliness, because it is incompatible with genuine reverence. (F. D. Maurice, M. A.) Seniors should not be over-exacting There are occasions when it is very helpful to our composure and equanimity to look at our debtor account, and not merely at the credit side. We may have a real claim to another’ s deference, and still may be in many respects inferior to him. It is right that the younger should defer to and honour the elder; but it is equally right that the elder should not insist too much upon bare seniority. For others may be in their best bloom and vigour, while we are already in the decline of both. And let us not forget that with all our eldership we are but of yesterday. (J. A. Bengel.) Be clothed with humility. Humility illustrated and enforced I. Humility illustrated.1. When St. Austin was asked what was the first grace of a Christian, he answered, humility: what the second, humility: what the third, humility. This grace is more fundamental to the nature of all true religion than any other grace whatever. The foundation of repentance is laid in an abasing sense of our guilt. The reason why men are not humble is, that they do not see the greatness of God. It is the effect of all knowledge to humble us, by producing a sense of our distance from the object which we contemplate: the farther we advance in knowledge, the more this distance widens on our view: hence where an Infinite Being, God, is the object of contemplation, there must be infinite scope for humility in His worshippers. The gospel is peculiarly adapted to produce this feeling: this is its very end and effect: “ no flesh shall glory in His presence; the Lord alone shall be exalted in that day.” This effect arises from the very constitution of the gospel; as it is a revelation of the free grace of God to sinners, without any respect to moral or natural differences of character. II. The motive by which such a temper is recommended.1. “ God resisteth the proud.” The expression is very emphatic; He sets Himself in battle array against him; marks him as an object of peculiar indignation. It is not so said of any other temper. When the heart is filled by pride, nothing but spiritual barrenness and hardness can ensue. In a word, the proud are equally disqualified for the duties of Christianity here, and for the blessings of glory hereafter. 2. “ But,” as it is added, “ He giveth grace to the humble.” The same words are used by the apostle James, with the additional expression, “ He giveth more grace.” The humble feel their poverty, and pray for grace; and their prayers are heard. III. Let us, then, seek and cherish this grace, the only temper that can make us shine before God, the only one that can render us blessings to each other. The apostle exhorts us to “ be clothed with humility.” Men always use and wear their clothing, and we are to be clothed with this grace as a permanent vesture. It should pervade every part of our character; all the faculties of the mind: it should regulate the understanding, the will, and the affections. And then all other graces will shine the brighter through the veil of humility: it will shed a cheering influence on all. (R. Hall, M. A.) The loftiness of humility This is St. Peter’ s command. Are we really inclined to obey it? For, if we are, there is nothing more easy. Whosoever wishes to get rid of pride may do so. Whosoever wishes to be humble need not go far to humble himself. But how? Simply by being honest with himself, and looking at himself as he is. The world and human nature look up to the proud successful man, One is apt to say, “ Happy is the man who has plenty to be proud of. Happy is the man who can divide the spoil of this world with the successful of this world. Happy is the man who can look down on his fellow men, and stand over them, and manage them, and make use of them, and get his profit out of them.” But that is a mistake. That is the high-mindedness which goes before a fail, which comes not from above, but is always earthly, often sensual, and sometimes devilish. The true and safe high-mindedness, which comes from above, is none other than humility. Better to think of those who are nobler than ourselves, even though by so doing we are ashamed of ourselves all day long. What loftier thoughts can man have? What higher and purer air can a man’ s soul breathe? The truly high-minded man is not the proud man, who tries to get a little pitiful satisfaction from finding his brother men, as he chooses to fancy, a little weaker, a little more ignorant, a little more foolish, than his own weak, ignorant, foolish, and perhaps ridiculous, self. Not he; but the man who is always looking upwards to goodness, to good men, and to the all-good God; filling his soul with the sight of an excellence to which he thinks he can never attain; and saying, with David, “ All my delight is in the saints that dwell in the earth, and in those who excel in virtue.” And why does God resist and set Himself against the proud? To turn him out of his evil way, of course, if by any means he may be converted and live. And how does God give grace to the humble? Listen to Plutarch, a heathen; a good and a wise man, though; and one who was not far from the kingdom of God, or he would not have written such words as these: “ It is our duty,” he says, “ to turn our minds to the best of everything; so as not merely to enjoy what we read, but to be improved by it.” And we shall do that by reading the histories of good and great men, which will, in our minds, produce an emulation and eagerness which may stir us up to imitation. We may be pleased with the work of a man’ s hands, and yet set little store by the workman. Perfumes and fine colours we may like well enough: bat that will not make us wish to be perfumers, or painters: but goodness, which is the work, not of a man’ s hands, but of his soul, makes us not only admire what is done, but long to do the like. “ And therefore,” he says, “ he thought it good to write the lives of famous and good men, and to set their examples before his countrymen. And having begun to do this,” he says in another place, “ for the sake of others, he found himself going on, and liking his labour, for his own sake; for the virtues of those great men served him as a looking glass, in which he might see how, more or less, to order and adorn his own life.” “ Indeed, it could be compared,” he says, “ to nothing less than living with the great souls who were dead and gone, and choosing out of their actions all that was noblest and worthiest to know. What greater pleasure could there be than that,” he asks, “ or what better means to improve his soul? By filling his mind with pictures of the best and worthiest characters, he was able to free himself from any low, malicious, mean thoughts, which he might catch from bad company. If he was forced at times to mix with base men, he could wash out the stains of their bad thoughts and words, by training himself in a calm and happy temper to view those noble examples.” So says the wise heathen. Was not he happier, wiser, better, a thousand times, thus keeping himself humble by looking upwards, than if he had been feeding his petty pride by looking down, and saying, “ God, I thank Thee that I am not as other men are” ? If you wish, then, to be truly high-minded, by being truly humble, read of, and think of, better men, wiser men, braver men, more useful men than you are. Above all, if you be Christians, think of Christ Himself. (C. Kingsley, M. A.) On humility I. I shall mention some of the cases in which humility of soul will show itself.1. The natural powers of the human mind will be spoken of with modesty. 2. When he thinks of his graces and attainments, the Christian is clothed with humility. 3. Another genuine expression of humility is a ready acknowledgment of our constant dependence. II. I shall recommend the practice of humility.1. That “ he who humbleth him self shall be exalted,” holds good with regard to our connections amongst our fellow men, 2. The advantages of this grace are not confined to temporal consequences; they extend to a future and eternal state. 3. The inhabitants of heaven are celebrated for this grace; and any who are unfurnished with it cannot be members of their society. 4. To recommend the cultivation and practice of this grace, remember our blessed Lord exemplified it in the whole of His conduct. III. I shall direct to an improvement of this discourse.1. Though the language of the text speaks of humility as something that is external, “ Be clothed with humility,” nevertheless, if the heart is not humbled, all is empty show. 2. Let it be remembered that this grace is needful in every rank and condition of life. 3. Consider the exhortation, “ Be clothed with humility,” as given by the apostle Peter; and it will direct us to a very particular improvement. “ Be clothed with humility.” This grace is not only a robe of ornament, but a shield of defence. When it adorns the heart and life, it defends the head also in the day of battle. (Robert Foote.) Humility I. The nature and the effects of humility.1. Humility, as it relates to our own private thoughts and judgment, requires that we should entertain no better an opinion of ourselves than we deserve. To judge too severely of ourselves, and to fancy we are guilty of faults from which we are free, cannot be humility, because there can be no virtue in mistake and ignorance. Only as we have all a propensity to extenuate our defects, and to overrate our good deeds, it is safest to correct this bent by forcing the mind somewhat towards the contrary way, and frequently to review our failings, and the many causes which we have of rejecting all conceited thoughts. The imperfections common to human nature are these: Mortality; a stronger propensity to evil than to good; an understanding liable to be frequently deceived, and a knowledge which at the best is much confined. The infirmities peculiar to ourselves are those defects either in goodness, or in knowledge, or in wisdom, by which we are inferior to other persons. To be sensible of these faults, is humility as it relates to ourselves: to overlook them is pride. 2. True humility, as it influences our behaviour towards our Maker, produces a religious awe, and banishes presumption and carelessness and vainglory. 3. Between an unmanly contempt and disregard of ourselves, with an abject fear and blind reverence of others, which is one extreme, and a conceited, overbearing insolence, which is the other extreme, true humility proceeds, always uniform and decent. The humble person never assumes what belongs not to him; he desires to possess no more power, and to receive no more respect from others than is suitable to his own character and condition, and appointed by the customs of society. He is not a rigid exacter of the things to which he has an undoubted right; he can overlook many faults; he is not greatly provoked at those slights which put vain persons out of all patience. II. The motives to the practice of it.1. Humility is a virtue so excellent that the Scriptures have in some sort ascribed it even to God Himself. Humility consists principally in a due sense of our defects, our transgressions, our wants, and the obligations which we have received. Therefore such humility cannot be in God, who possesses all perfections. But there is a part of humility, as it relates to oar behaviour towards men, called condescension; and this is sometimes represented in Scripture as a disposition not unworthy of the Divine nature. 2. The example of our Saviour is an example of every virtue, particularly of humility. 3. In the behaviour of the angels, as it is revealed to us in the Scriptures, we find that part of humility called condescension, or a cheerful submission to any offices by which the good of others may be promoted. Hence we learn to think it no disgrace to be, as our Lord says He was, the servant of all. In truth, we cannot be more creditably employed. 4. It is affirmed in many places of Scripture, that humility secures to us the favour of God, and will bring down His blessing upon ourselves and our undertakings. 5. Humility usually gains the esteem and love of men, and consequently the conveniences, at least, the necessaries of life. Since all love themselves, they will probably favour those who never provoke, insult, deride, or injure them, who show them civility, and do them good offices. The humble person, therefore, takes the surest way to recommend himself to those with whom he is joined in society, to increase the number of his well-wishers and friends, and to escape or defeat the assaults of detraction, envy, and malice. 6. The most certain present recompense of humility is that which arises from its own nature, and with which it repays the mind that entertains it; and a very valuable recompense it would be, though it were the only one allotted to this virtue. A humble person neither hates nor envies anyone; therefore he is free from those very turbulent vices which are always a punishment in themselves. He is not discomposed by the slights or censures of others. If he has undesignedly given some occasion for them, he amends the fault; if he deserves them not, he regards them as little. He is contented with his condition, if it be tolerable; and, therefore, he finds satisfaction in all that is good, and overlooks, and in some measure escapes, all that is inconvenient in it. He has a due sense of his unworthiness and defects; by which he is taught to bear calamities with patience and submission, and thereby to soften their harsh nature, and to allay their violence. 7. Lastly: from the account which we have given of humility, we may draw this conclusion, that it is not, as the haughty are inclined to imagine, an unmanly and sordid disposition. It is indeed a virtue so remote from meanness of spirit, that it is no bad sign of a great and exalted mind. On the contrary, if we would know what meanness of spirit is, and how it acts, let us look for it amongst the proud and insolent, and we shall not lose our labour. (J. Jortin, D. D.) Christian humility ” - I. Wherein consists the grace of Christian humility.1. Humility is directly opposed to pride. As pride consists in having high thoughts of oneself, so humility consists in having low apprehensions of ourselves. Pride is the child of ignorance, humility the offspring of knowledge. They are not opposite errors, between which truth and goodness lie, but the former is a vice, the latter is a virtue; the one is the feeling generated by the belief of a lie, the other is the temper of mind produced by the reception of the truth. Humility may be considered in a twofold point of view, as it respects God and as it respects our fellow creatures, but in these different aspects it is not two virtues, but the same correct estimate of our character and condition influencing our conduct towards God and man. Humility consists in a due sense of our dependence. Pride can only exist in a fancied state of independence; a feeling of obligation wounds; that of constant dependence mortifies pride. Yet man is entirely a dependent being. We derive everything from God: “ In Him we live and move, and have our being.” If we are humble, it will be a pleasing thought to us, that God has unlimited control over us, that we owe everything to Him, and that He has an indisputable right to order our affairs according to the good pleasure of His will. In the discharge of duty, in prosperity and adversity, in circumstances of perplexity, or in all our plans for the future, we shall not lean to our own understanding, nor rely upon our own strength, but rather trust in the Lord with our whole hearts, we shall acknowledge Him in all our ways, and look up to Him for the direction of our steps. But we are not only dependent on God, we are so in a subordinate sense on our fellow creatures. While society is formed of different ranks and orders, there is an intimate union between them, and a constant dependence of the parts on each other. The higher cannot do without the lower ranks, and the latter are almost equally dependent on the former. 2. Humility consists of a proper estimate of our relative importance. As it respects God we are as nothing before Him; He is the high and lofty One who inhabiteth eternity; from everlasting to everlasting He is God; boundless in might, infinite in all His perfections. Humility towards men will consist very much in a due estimate of our relative importance, not only to each other, but in the view of the Divine Being. Whatever nominal distinctions are recognised in the world, humility will feel that God has made of one blood all nations that dwell upon the earth. What are the mole hills of distinction, the little elevations of human society, when we contemplate it in the mass? or what are they in the estimation of God, who is no respecter of persons? Humility will not put an extravagant value on the distinctions of earth; it will be kind and courteous to all, and in all the suffering and misery it may be called to contemplate in others, it will feel the irresistible force of the appeal, Am I not a man and a brother? It will be ready to render to all their due, tribute to whom tribute is due, fear to whom fear, honour to whom honour. 3. Humility will also consist in a low estimate of our knowledge. “ Be not wise,” says the apostle, “ in your own conceit.” In all the distinctions of society there are none in which vanity and self-conceit are so cherished as in that of human literature. Now humility will moderate our estimate of what we know; it will teach us that literary distinction arises far more from adventitious circumstances, over which we have no control, than from any native superiority of mind; and that many of those whom the providence of God has precluded from the cultivation of their minds would, with equal advantages as ourselves possessed, have far outstripped us in the acquisition of knowledge. Humility will cherish a conviction of the imperfection of our faculties. It will feel on every side the bounds of human knowledge: the voice of God saying, “ So far shalt thou go and no farther.” 4. Humility consists in a correct estimate of our moral condition. (1) We are not only subjects of the Divine government, but we are guilty creatures, under the condemnation of the law of God. Whatever the pride of man may suggest, “ we are all gone out of the way, we are altogether become filthy, there is none that doeth good, no not one.” Humility rightly estimates this moral desolation. It thus prepares the mind for the revelation of God’ s mercy, to welcome the glad tidings of a Saviour, and to submit to the Divine method of forgiving sins. And if through grace we are brought to depend on Christ for salvation, humility will characterise every subsequent estimate of ourselves. (2) A proper estimate of our moral condition will express itself appropriately towards our fellow men. II. We must enforce the cultivation of humility upon you by various considerations.1. It is in its own nature necessary to a reception of Christianity. 2. Humility is also an essential part of religion. Our hearts cannot be right with God until we apprehend His majesty and our own meanness-until we realise our entire dependence on Him-until, with humble and imploring faith, we are looking to the Saviour for salvation, and disposed to say, “ Lord, I believe, help Thou mine unbelief.” Humility is equally necessary to our perseverance in the Divine life: the dependence on God it generates is the vitality of our religion; the self-diffidence it creates is our best security. 3. God has put peculiar honour on humbleness of mind, while He has expressed His detestation of the opposite spirit. “ Every one proud in heart is an abomination to the Lord.” “ A high look, and a proud heart, and the plowing of the wicked, is sin.” But, on the contrary, He everywhere commends an humble spirit; it is the disposition of mind He delights to favour. “ Though the Lord be high, yet hath He respect unto the lowly.” 4. This virtue is enforced by the conduct of our Lord. 5. Humility is an undying grace; it will flourish more perfectly in heaven. All the saints and angels are clothed in this appropriate garb of a creature. Let us, then, cultivate a quality of character which will abide with us through eternity, which will constitute a portion of the bliss of heaven; it will enlarge our happiness on earth, and eminently meeten us for future glory. (S. Summers.) Humility The word itself and its history are interesting. “ There are cases,” says Coleridge, “ in which more knowledge, of more value, may be conveyed by the history of a word than by the history of a campaign.” Now take this word humility. It was not a new word when the New Testament was written. It had been used for years. Only it is striking that almost without exception the word humility, used before the time of Christ, is used contemptuously and rebukingly. It always meant meanness of spirit. To be humble was to be a coward. Where could we find a more striking instance of the change that the Christian religion brought into the world, than in the way in which it took this disgraceful word and made it honourable? To be humble is to have a low estimation of one’ s self. That was considered shameful in the olden time. Christ came and made the despised quality the crowning grace of the culture that He inaugurated. Lo! the disgraceful word became the key word of His fullest gospel. He redeemed the quality, and straightway the name became honourable. Think what the change must have been. Think with what indignation and contempt men of the old school in Rome and Athens must have seen mean spiritedness, as they called it, taken up, inculcated and honoured, proclaimed as the salvation of the world, and Him in whom it was most signally embodied made the Saviour and King of men. Ah, it seems to me more and more that it must have been very hard for those early disciples to have believed in Christ. But let us see, if we can, what the change was that Christianity accomplished, and how it came about. The quality that Christianity rescued and glorified was humility. Humility means a low estimate or value of one’ s self. But all values are relative. The estimate we set on anything depends of course on the standard with which we compare it.1. Now Christianity’ s great primary revelation was God. Much about Him it showed men, but first of all it showed them Him. He, the Creator, the Governor, became a presence clear and plain before men’ s hearts. His greatness, His holiness, His love-nay, we cannot describe Him by His qualities, for He is greater than them all-He, by the marvellous method of the Incarnation, showed Himself to man. He stood beside man’ s work. He towered above, and folded Himself about man’ s life. He entered into men’ s closets and took possession of men’ s hearts. And what then? God in the world must be the standard of the world. Greatness meant something different when men had seen how great He was; and the manhood which had compared itself with lesser men and grown proud, now had a chance to match itself with God, and to see how small it was, and to grow humble about itself. Just imagine that when you and I were going on learning our lessons, doing our work, exercising our skill here on the earth, and proud of our knowledge, our strength, and our skill-just suppose that suddenly Omniscience towered up above our knowledge, and Omnipotence above our strength, and the Infinite Wisdom stood piercing out of the sight of our ignorant and baffled skill. Must it not crush the man with an utter insignificance? What is the use of heaving up these mole hills so laboriously close by the gigantic mountainside? But if the revelation is not only this; if it includes not only the greatness but the love of God; if the majesty that is shown to us is the majesty of a father, which takes our littleness into his greatness, makes it part of itself, honours it, trains it, does not mock it, then there comes the true graciousness of humility. It is not less humble, but it is not crushed. It is not paralysed, but stimulated. The energy which the man used to get out of his estimate of his own greatness he gets now out of the sight of his father’ s, which yet is so near to him that, in some finer and higher sense, it still is his; and so he is more hopeful and happy and eager in his humility than he ever used to be in his pride. This is the philosophy of reverence and humility as enrichers of life and mainsprings of activity. 2. This is one, then, of the ways in which Christ rescued and exalted humility. He gave man his true standard. He set man’ s littleness against the infinite height of God. The next way that I want to speak of is even more remarkable. He asserted and magnified the essential glory of humanity. He showed us that the human might be joined with the Divine. Thus He glorified human nature. Ah, if a man must be humbled, and is exalted by his humility, when he sees God, surely when he sees the possibility of himself, there is no truer or more exalted feeling for him than to look in on what he is, and think it very mean and wretched by the side of what he might be, what his Lord has shown him that he was made for. Christ makes us humble by showing us our design. There is nothing more strange, and at the same time more truthful, about Christianity than its combination of humiliation and exaltation for the soul of man. If one wants to prove that man is but a little lower than the angels, the son and heir of God, he must go to the Bible. If he wants to prove how poor and base and Satan-like the soul of man can be, still to the Bible he must go. If you want to find the highest ecstasy that man’ s spirit ever reached, it is the Christian saint exulting in his God. Do you want to hear the bitterest sorrow that ever wrung this human heart? It is that same Christian saint penitent for his sin. I think we cannot but see the beauty of a humility like this if it once becomes the ruling power of a changed man’ s life, this humility born of the sight of a man’ s possible self. It has in it all that is good in the best self-respect. Nay, with reference to the whole subject of self-respect this seems to be true, that the only salvation from an admiration of our own present condition, which is pride, is to be found in a profound respect for the best possibility and plan of our being, which involves humility. So it is the sight of what God meant us to be that makes us ashamed of what we are. And it is the death of Christ for us, the preciousness that He saw in our souls making them worthy of that awful sacrifice, it is that which lets us see our own soul as He sees it in its possibility, and so lets us see it in its reality as He sees it too, and put our pride away and be humble. (Bp. Phillips Brooks.) Clothed with humility The image of the “ clothing” -a word which is used only in this place in the Bible-is thought to have reference to a particular kind of white vestment which used to be worn by slaves. And it was made very long and large, that it might cover not only all the other dress, but the whole figure; and so it may be considered that the believer, remembering well that he is the follower of Him who “ came not to be ministered unto but to minister,” should place all he has and all he is under the folds of a mantling “ humility,” and array himself in a servile robe. But let me caution you not to think that “ the clothing of humility” has anything to do with that robe of which the Bible speaks as “ the wedding garment.” It has nothing to do with it, except that God invariably makes this the lining for that. That is something from without a man; this is from within. That is saving; this is evidential. Now I am persuaded that the first way to grow humble is to be sure that you are loved. The education of almost any child will teach you that if you treat that child harshly, you will make his little heart stubborn and proud; but if he feels that you love him, he will gradually take a gentler tone. So it is with the education through which we are all passing to the life to come. The first thing God does with His child is to make the child feel that He loves him. There is nothing which will stoop a man into the dust like the gentle pressure of the feeling “ I am loved.” The forgiven David, the woman at Jesus’ s feet, Peter under the look, John in the bosom. Let me advise you further. If you desire to cultivate that posture of mind, accustom yourself, force yourself to do acts of humiliation-whatever is most against your natural taste. There is a still deeper feeling without which you will never have on that “ robe of humility” -you must often sit and receive the droppings of the Holy Ghost. You must meditate with open eye on the meek, humble face of Jesus. You must be in union with Christ. There is a false “ humility” than which none can be more destructive to the character. It is of three kinds. There is “ humility” of external things-in a mortification of the body. But it is a cloak, not a robe-a look, a posture, a ceremony. There is another counterfeit which Satan makes and calls “ humility.” It is what St. Paul calls in his Epistle to the Colossians a “ voluntary humility” -people thinking themselves unworthy to come to God. And there are those who do not know it, but who, like Peter, are under an appearance of “ humility,” indulging contemptuous pride. “ Thou shalt never wash my feet.” “ I am not good enough to be saved. I am not worthy to come to the Lord’ s Supper. I cannot believe God loves me.” (J. Vaughan, M. A.) Humility explained and enforced Humility is that Christian virtue without which no other can exist, and by which every other is beautified, for, whilst the flowers of all the Christian graces grow in the shade of the Redeemer’ s Cross, the root of them is humility. I. Humility becomes us as creatures. It may also be remarked that the temptation to pride, and consequently the exercise of humility, has very much to do with a comparative view of ourselves and others. It is not in the superiority which we possess over the inferior creatures that we are apt either to exaggerate the difference or to forget that it is from God, but it is in the little advantage which one man may happen to possess above another, whether in mental endowments, bodily powers, or worldly wealth. It is this minor distinction, the comparative difference between man and man, which excites envy in one party and creates haughtiness in another. But the judgment of humility is according to truth. This is the spirit of humility which, like the flower blooming in the valley, delights the eye of the contemplative, who, forgetting the gaudier plants of the garden, finds nothing to charm him so much as the simple beauties of nature. II. Humility becomes us as sinners. III. Humility becomes us as disciples of Christ.1. They must retain a humbling remembrance of past sins. Those sins, though forgiven by Jehovah, must not be forgotten by them, that they may see what they are in themselves, and understand how much they owe to redeeming love. 2. The Christian must also continually watch the state of his heart. 3. Whatever measures of holiness the Christian attains to, he must always remember that by the grace of God he is what he is. Thus all boasting is excluded, for he has nothing but what he has received. 4. There will always, whilst we are on the earth, remain much to be done, much to be attained. Every grace will be defective in measure and mixed with infirmity. The most faultless disciple will here find cause for humiliation. Conclusion: 1. What a delightful character is the man of distinguished humility. He may not have the glory in which the patriot, the hero, or the martyr is enshrined, but he is adorned with the beauties of holiness; he carries about with him the majesty of goodness, if not the dominion of greatness. 2. Learn from this subject to beware of false humility. True humility is diffident and retiring; it is not like the scentless flower, which turns its face to the sun throughout his course, as if for the purpose of being seen, but it is rather like the modest violet, which hides itself in obscurity, and sends forth fragrance from its deep retirement. It employs no herald, it unfolds no banner, it blows no trumpet, but, whilst conferring substantial benefits, it desires to be like the angels, who, while ministering to the heirs of salvation, are unseen and unknown by the objects of their attention. 3. Learn also, while you avoid false humility, to labour for that which is real. Let the young labour for this. Christian humility will teach you the most willing obedience, the most genuine affection, the most respectful demeanour towards your parents, and it will excite you to the most anxious endeavours for the promotion of their happiness. Let not the old neglect this spirit of humility. Do not aggravate the sorrows of your evil days by pride, by peevishness, or by discontent. When almost every leaf is gone from the rose of life, let not its thorns remain. Let parents manifest much of this temper in the treatment of their children. Always endeavour to persuade before you attempt to compel. This is the way to grow in grace, for “ God resisteth the proud, but giveth grace unto the humble.” (T. Gibson, M. A.) Christian humility In looking into the nature of humility, we discover that it does not involve meanness or servility. It is not pusillanimity. It contains no element that degrades human nature. It is not the quality of a slave, but of kings and priests unto God. It is a necessary trait in all finite character, and therefore it is perfectly consistent with an inviolable dignity and self-respect. I. In the first place, humility is becoming to man, because he is a creature. Shall a being who was originated from nonentity by almighty power, and who can be reduced again to nonentity by that same power, swell with haughtiness? II. In the second place, humility is becoming to man, because he is A dependent being.1. All his springs are in God. He is dependent for life, health, and all temporal things. He is dependent, above all, for spiritual life and health and all the blessed things of eternity. 2. Man is dependent not only upon his Creator, but also upon his fellow creature. III. In the third place, man should be humble because he is a sinful being. Considering the peculiar attitude in which guilty man stands before God, self-abasement ought to be the main feeling in his heart, for, in addition to the infinite difference there is originally between himself and his Maker, he has rendered himself yet more different by apostasy. The first was only a difference in respect to essence, but the last is a difference in respect to character. How strange it is that he should forget this difference, and, entering into a comparison of himself with his fellow men, should plume himself upon a supposed superiority. The culprits are disputing which shall be the greatest at the very instant when their sentence of condemnation is issuing from the lips of their Judge! There is still another consideration under this head which strengthens the motive for humility. We have seen that the fact of sin furnishes an additional reason for self-abasement because it increases the distance between man and God; it has also made him still more dependent upon God. Nothing but pure and mere mercy can deliver him. But nothing interferes with the exercise of mercy like pride in the criminal. A proud man cannot be forgiven. It involves a self-contradiction. If there be self-asserting haughtiness in the heart, God can neither bestow grace nor man receive it. IV. A fourth and most powerful reason why man should be clothed with humility is found in the vicarious suffering and atonement of Christ in His behalf. Feeling himself to be a condemned sinner, and beholding the Lamb of God “ made a curse for him” and bearing His sins in His own body on the tree, all self-confidence and self-righteousness will die out of his soul. (G. T. Shedd, D. D.) Humility with the fruits of it I. To explain the nature of humility. Humility consists in a low opinion or esteem. Now the opinion which we form of ourselves is either absolute or comparative, and whichever way we judge it is very certain that a low opinion best becomes us, and is most suitable to our nature and state.1. First, if we judge of ourselves absolutely, without comparing ourselves with any others, humility and truth too requires that our opinion should be very moderate and low. We know but little, and we live, alas! to little good purpose. What a mixture of corruption is there with every grace, and what a sully of sin in every duty! Again, as to the happiness of our state, what mortal does not feel that he is miserable? Pains and diseases afflict our bodies, crosses and disappointments perplex our circumstances, the gloom of melancholy gathers about the heart, and sorrows overspread the whole world. 2. Humility consisteth in having a low opinion of ourselves as compared with others, whether with God or with our fellow creatures. II. To set before you the good fruits of humility. To this grace we may apply these words of the prophet, “ It taketh root downward and beareth fruit upward” (Isaiah 37:31), and the deeper the root is laid, the larger and fairer will the fruit be.1. Meekness is one pleasant fruit which grows upon humility, and to this we may join the kindred grace of peaceableness or quietness of spirit (1 Peter 3:4). 2. Patience is another good fruit of humility, with which we may join the kindred grace of submission. Now patience has respect either to God or man. (1) Patience in respect to God consisteth in a quiet submission to His afflictive providences without murmuring. (2) If we further consider patience as it respects men, as it is opposite to fretfulness at their faults and follies, this also is the fruit of humility; for if we were as sensible of our own follies as we should be, we should more patiently bear with the faults and follies of others. 3. Self-denial is another good fruit of humility, and how necessary a duty that is you will learn from those words of Christ (Luke 9:23). We surely esteem the body at too high a rate when we pamper it to the hurt of the soul. 4. The last good fruit of humility which I shall here speak of is contentment. The humble man remembers that, be his worldly condition what it will, it is unspeakably better than he deserves. III. To urge upon you the exhortation in our text by a few motives. “ Be ye clothed with humility.” For-1. Consider how high an approbation God has expressed of this grace, and how hateful pride is to Him. 2. Consider what a lovely and engaging example of humility Christ hath set us. 3. Let me recommend humility as a necessary part of your preparation for heaven. (D. Jennings.) Humility and its greatness I. Let us examine the source and ground of humility. This is drawn from the knowledge of God and from the relation in which we stand to Him. Hence, where the knowledge of God is absent, the exercise of humility becomes impossible. Humility begins with the knowledge of God, and advances to the knowledge of ourselves. Thus we see at our first step that it consists of something we gain, not of aught we lose. The humble man is rich in his humility, for he has gained that which the proud man has not. Pride is the instinct of ignorance. But we must take another step, and ask how it is that the knowledge of God, instead of puffing a man up with the conceit of an acquisition, only produces humility and the most prostrate lowliness of mind. It might be answered, because the knowledge itself is but a gift freely bestowed; it is a revelation, not a discovery, and therefore implies in itself the obligation of a receiver towards a donor. This is true, but a more complete reply is, that humility is produced by the impressiveness of the majesty and greatness of the Divine Being as revealed to us in His matchless perfections and infinite glory. This knowledge of the glory of God is not a work of nature but a gift of grace. This new knowledge becomes a test whereby we measure ourselves. We cannot help this self-application, since, in knowing God, we have gained a new idea altogether. And it is in the immense difference between what God is and what we are that Christian humility originates and grows. Then, when we read the inspired history of man, lowliness is increased. For there we are told not alone of the immortal spirit breathed into man, but of the Divine likeness in which we were first created, even in the image and similitude of God. And now, standing amid these wonders of revelation, with the wretched experience of ourselves as we are fresh and full upon us, there is not a truth which does not deepen our awe by the very wonderfulness of the realities to which we find ourselves related, and with which we stand in daily contact. For here is the wonder, that true humility grows out of self-respect. No man living has so high a conception of the dignity of human nature as the Christian. II. From the source and nature of Christian humility let us consider its practical outgoing. Here, again, we must take the side turned towards God first; otherwise we shall be out of order. What are the characteristic feelings and what the corresponding acts which a profound humility produces in our intercourse with God? In the first place, it produces an absorbing and unmeasured admiration. In speaking of so great a being as God, adoration may perhaps be the better word, so long as it is understood to be the adoration not of fear but of love-the adoration of desire, of grateful affection, and of fervent praise. And then, out of adoring praise to the redeeming God by whom we live, arises simple trusting faith in Him. From praise and trust combined there will arise also implicit obedience. For admiration and trust exalt to the highest degree the glory of the Being admired and trusted. Then how can God be wrong in any way? and if right, then every word of His must be kept as a seal of our acceptance. And now we shall see how these three sentiments of adoration, trust, and obedience necessarily affect our relation towards our fellow men. Gentle manners, gentle looks, gentle words ever considerate of other men’ s feelings, make the true Christian a natural gentleman, and invest him with an intuitive politeness which is but the outgoing of the Divine life within. (E. Garbett, M. A.) Be clothed with humility I. Let us be clothed with humility before God. God delights in it; it is the “ ornament which in His sight is of great price.” A lady applied to a celebrated philanthropist on behalf of an orphan child. When he had bidden her draw on him for any amount, she said, “ As soon as the child is old enough I will teach him to thank you.” “ Stop (said the good man), you are mistaken; we do not thank the clouds for rain-teach the child to look higher and thank Him who gives both the clouds and the rain.” That was being clothed with humility before God. II. Let us be clothed with humility before the world-the proud and gainsaying world. This is the way in which we are to be lights to it add salt in it. Humility does more than argument. If it irritates, it impresses and convinces. An aged patriarch was tauntingly asked by a boastful young Pharisee, “ Do you suppose that you have any real religion?” “ None to speak of,” was the dignified answer, and it went sharp as a javelin into that young Pharisee’ s bosom. III. Let us be clothed with humility before each other. “ Yea, all of you be subject one to another.” This is hardest of any-this wants more humility than either of the preceding. Mr. Newton’ s favourite expression to his friends was, “ I am not what I ought to be, I am not what I wish to be, I am not what I hope to be, but by the grace of God I am not what I once was.” (James Bolton.) The garment of humility No garment sits so well on human nature, and no ornament so gracefully conceals its deformity, as humility. Yet there is no dress which we find it more difficult to assume. There is something in our imperfect and unsanctified nature which revolts at the very idea of submission, condescension, and inferiority. I. What is meant by being clothed with humility. To cultivate this grace we need only contemplate ourselves as we really are, examine out’ true condition, look at our selves in the mirror of truth and righteousness, and we shall come away humbled to the dust. II. Some advantages to be secured by being humble. God’ s commandments have nothing arbitrary about them. Whatever He ordains is for our good.1. Humility is the great qualification for the reception of knowledge and for entrance into the kingdom of heaven. A proud man will neither learn anything from his neighbour nor receive anything from his God. If a man thinks he knows enough already upon any given subject, he is not likely to learn much more. Humility opens the pathway to all knowledge. By it our minds become docile so that they are prepared to receive every new form of truth. And if we cherish this spirit, may we not learn from all around us? Humility also prepares for the reception of the Divine kingdom into the heart. 2. Humility is essential to the growth of the soul in holiness and grace. All true spiritual progress is the work of God. If he do not yield to the power and grace of God, how can He fashion him after His own will? Humility, then, prepares us to feel our inability to do any good thing of ourselves, and to look for all in God. Humility opens the pathway to honour and glory (Isaiah 57:15). 4. Humility is associated with the purest happiness. Humility in man helps him to maintain a serenity and calmness amidst all the storms of life. (Harvey Phillips, B. A.) Two kinds of clothing A new suit of clothes! That’ s a subject in which you all take an interest. When a boy enters the army or navy he puts on a new suit of clothes, blue or red, and that reminds him that he is bound to serve his queen and country, and that he must not disgrace his uniform. I am going to speak to you today about some different kinds of clothing, some good, others bad. First of all, let us think of the clothes which God makes for His beautiful world. He clothes the grass of the field. Every tree has a different shaped dress and a different shade of colour. Even in the winter, when the trees look so bare and cold, they are still clothed by God. Trees have two sets of leaves, one set for the summer, the other for the winter. And God clothes the beasts and birds and gives each exactly the sort of dress which he re quires. You have all seen the mole hills in a field, and sometimes you have caught a glimpse of the mole himself. Well, God has clothed him in a dress like black velvet, which is just fitted for his home underground. The animals which live in cold regions have a warm clothing of fur, and those which live among snow and ice are white, so that their enemies may not easily see them. Now let us think about ourselves. In the Bible we hear of two kinds of clothing, the best and the worst. St. Peter says, “ Be clothed with humility” ; that’ s the best clothing. In the hundred and ninth Psalm we are told of a wicked man who “ clothed himself with cursing as with a garment” ; that’ s the worst clothing. Now I have noticed that very often when children are growing up into big lads and girls, there is a great change in their manners. Did you ever hear the old fable of the donkey who found a lion’ s skin? The donkey covered himself with the skin, and tried to play the lion and frighten the people. But some of them spied his long ears, and recognised his well-known voice, and he was soon stripped of his lion’ s skin and driven away. Now, my boys, if you are tempted to put on a suit of clothes which does not become you, if while still boys you put on the habits of a man, and of a bad man into the bargain, remember the fable of the ass in the lion’ s skin. But when a child has outgrown the good clothing of humility and put on a full suit of pride, there comes another evil from it. He often gives up his prayers and his Bible. I told you that the Bible speaks of the worst kind of clothing; it tells us of a man who “ clothed himself with cursing as with a garment.” I take cursing there to mean all sorts of bad language. The old Greeks tell us a story about the death of Hercules. That strong hero had shot his enemy, Nessus, with a poisoned arrow, and the garment of the slain man was all stained with poisoned blood. Before he died Nessus gave his clothing to the wife of Hercules, telling her that it would make her husband love her always. It came to pass after a time that she gave the fatal garment to her husband, and no sooner had he put it on than the poison seized upon him, and when, in his agony, he tried to put off the clothing, it clung all the tighter, and so he died, killed by his own poison. So it is with the man who clothes himself with a garment of cursing or bad talk; it clings to him and poisons him, body and soul. There are several other kinds of clothing of which I might warn you. One of these is self-righteousness. I have seen a man with a very glossy black suit of clothes, very carefully buttoned up, and at first sight he looked most clean and respectable. But when I came to look more closely, I found that his linen was anything but white and clean. His respectability was all outside. If your clothes are old and worn out or do not fit you, what must you do? You must get a new suit. Well, there are some kinds of clothing which we should cast off as soon as possible. If any of you have put on bad habits, filthy clothing, such as pride, or falsehood, or bad talk, you must change your clothes. Cast off the old garment, and go down on your knees, and ask God for Jesus Christ’ s sake to give you a new dress. (H. J. Wilmot-Buxton, M. A.) Work tends to humility I cannot but think that one of the truest ways in which Christianity has made humility at once a commoner and a nobler grace has been in the way in which it has furnished work for the higher powers of man, which used to be idle, and only ponder proudly on themselves. Idleness standing in the midst of unattempted tasks is always proud. Work is always tending to humility. Work touches the keys of endless activity, opens the infinite, and stands awe struck before the immensity of what there is to do. Work brings a man into the great realm of facts. Work takes the dreamy youth who is growing proud in his closet over one or two sprouting powers which he has discovered in himself, and sets him out among the gigantic needs and the vast processes of the world, and makes him feel his littleness. Work opens the measureless fields of knowledge and skill that reach far out of our sight. Is not this what you would do for a boy whom you saw getting proud-set him to work? He might be of so poor stuff that he would be proud of his work, poorly as he would do it. But if he were really great enough to be humble at all, his work would bring him to humility. He would be brought face to face with facts. He would measure himself against the eternal pillars of the universe. He would learn the blessed lesson of his own littleness in the way in which it is always learned most blessedly, by learning the largeness of larger things. And all this, which the ordinary occupations of life do for our ordinary powers, Christianity, with the work that it furnishes for our affections and our hopes, does for the higher parts of us. (Bp. Phillips Brooks.) Humility There are some sins which have resisted every influence but that of Christianity, and over which even the gospel itself seems to obtain a precarious triumph. One of these is pride. To be proud is not only to be what Christianity condemns, but something essentially inconsistent with the first principles of its teaching, and with the special type of character which it seeks to create. Heathenism showed it no such antipathy. Unless it made itself specially ridiculous by trading on obviously false pretences, it was considered a becoming and reasonable tiring. It is not difficult to understand how this should have been so. Pride, to be seen in its objectionable light, must be seen in connection with those truths about God and human nature which Christianity first made known to the world. It is only when it stands in their company it appears as Scripture represents it. How Christianity dethrones this idol of self we know very well. It reminds us that the great thing is not what a man has, but what he is. It reveals in the Person of Christ the true standard of moral excellence. Pride has to come down from its pedestal and take its place in the dust. We see we are not only wrong, but responsible for being wrong. We have been following false ideals. It seems almost impossible to conceive how a proud man can ever have been truly convicted of sin, or brought to receive the salvation of Christ as a free, unmerited gift. It seems more difficult still to believe that such an one is living by the faith of the Son of God, receiving as a sinner daily forgiveness, and as having nothing being indebted to Him for all things. It is hardly to be wondered at that the world should be sceptical of our Christian profession when it sees so much that directly contradicts it. Are we disposed to retract the confession which we made so sincerely when we cried for mercy, that of all sinners we are the chief? This entry is longer than a Bible module can hold. The rest is at https://www.sermonindex.net/commentary/bi/ 1 Peter 5:8-9 Be sober, be vigilant.The advantages of moderation in the enjoyment of sensual pleasure Christianity in its precepts and commands, as well as in its doctrines, is precisely suited to our nature and our necessities.1. The temperate man preserves his health of body, health of mind, and alacrity and vigour both of the one and of the other. 2. Moderation in the enjoyment of sensual pleasure enhances the very enjoyment of that pleasure in various ways. The moderate man knows nothing of that languor and disgust which generally treads on the heels of the voluptuary, so frequently embittering his pleasures, rendering them insipid to him, and so seldom allowing him to enjoy them completely. How much more taste does the moderate, the industrious man find in the simplest meats, in the most natural drinks, than the intemperate have in all the delicacies of luxury! And how completely he enjoys the innocent pleasure it offers! He has no need artificially to prepare nor previously to devise means for sharpening his pallid appetite and render himself susceptible of pleasure. 3. Moderation in the enjoyment of sensual pleasure exalts and dignifies the mind. It in a manner spiritualises it; by divesting it of the degrading that is connected with mere animal gratification; by teaching us to use it as a means to higher ends. Thus may we connect spiritual and sensual pleasures together, and give a value to the latter by the former. All then becomes to us the gift of our gracious Father in heaven, the effect and demonstration of His all-comprehending love, and the pledge of still greater benefits and pleasures in the world to come. (G. J. Zollikofer.) Christian sobriety is all that duty that concerns ourselves in the matter of meat, and drink, and pleasures, and thoughts; and it hath within it the duties of-1. Temperance.2. Chastity.3. Humility.4. Modesty.5. Content. (Bp. Jeremy Taylor.) Ready for temptation “ I fell in an unguarded moment; the temptation came so suddenly.” How often such excuses are made! But why were we off our guard? Because we live in spiritual things too much like the Saxon king who earned for himself the inglorious surname of the Unready. (King’s Highway.) Our vigilance must be comprehensive Many a city has been taken on its strongest side, which was counted so strong that no watch was kept, even as no danger was dreaded there. We think that we are not exposed to one particular form of temptation; let none be too sure of this; and in resisting one form of evil, never let us forget that there are others in the world. Fleshly sins may be watched against, and yet room be given in the heart for spiritual wickedness, pride, self-righteousness, and the like. The victories gained over the lusts of the flesh may minister to those subtler mischiefs of the spirit: and our fate may be like that of the hero in the Maccabees, who was crushed by the falling elephant himself had slain. There is a white devil of spiritual pride as well as a black devil of fleshly lusts; and if only Satan can ruin us, it is all the same to him by what engines he does it; it is all the same to him whether we go down into hell as gross and carnal sinners, or as elated self-righteous saints. Set a watch, therefore, all round your heart; not on one side only, but on all; for you can never be sure on which side temptation will assail. (Archbp. Trench.) Watch against little sins The truly pious is never at rest in his mind but when he stands upon his guard against the most minute and unobservable encroaches of sin, as knowing them upon this account more dangerous than greater; that the enemy that is least feared is usually the soonest felt. For as in the robbing of a house it is the custom for the sturdiest thieves to put in some little boy at the window, who being once within may easily open the doors and let them in too, so the tempter, in rifling the soul, despairs for the most part to attempt his entrance by some gross sin, and therefore employs a lesser, that may slide into it insensibly; which yet, little as it is, will so unlock the bars of conscience that the most enormous abominations shall at length make their entrance and take possession of it. Let no man measure the smallness of his danger by the smallness of any sin; for the smaller the sin the greater may be the stratagem. Some have been choked by a fly, a crumb, a grape stone; such contemptible things carry in them the causes of death; and the soul may be destroyed by sinful desires, idle words, officious lies, as well as by perjuries, blasphemies, and murders. Those who consider in how many ways a soul may be ruined, will not count it scrupulosity to beware of the least and slenderest instruments of damnation. (R. South, D. D.) Watch against our old sins The embankment is weak where it once gave way; and though the breach has been repaired, it must be diligently watched. The flames have been put out, but the ashes are still smouldering; and, if the wind rises, the fire may burst forth anew. The rebellion has been put down; but though its armies have been scattered and its prince dethroned, many traitors lurk in secret places, watching for opportunities to renew the struggle. Our old sins are conquered, but not quite killed. (Newman Hall.) The devil, as a roaring lion.-The devil a roaring lion There is a lion at your doors-such an one as hath none to equal him in power and in fierceness. Are they active in pursuit of prey? He is infinitely more so. They go but a little distance from their dens, but his circuit is the world itself. Other lions roam abroad at certain seasons only-night is their busy time; but “ when the sun ariseth they gather themselves together and lay them down in their dens” (Psalms 104:22). But this spiritual lion is perpetually in motion. The day and night are both alike to him. Other lions are bloodthirsty and savage; but he hath no measure in his fury. He cannot possibly be satisfied unless all men are his prey. But mark some other points of contrast which show how far more terrible this lion is than the lions of the forest. They are visible, can be more easily avoided; but he is an invisible being. He springs upon his prey unseen and unsuspected. The natural lion attacks his prey by open violence; but this spiritual lion deals rather by secret craft. The natural lion seeks only to devour the body; the spiritual lion aims at the destruction both of soul and body in hell. The natural lion’ s strength is far greater than the strength of man, yet man has found out ways of overcoming him; but no power, no skill, no contrivances of man can enable him to overcome the spiritual lion our text speaks of. How then may this roaring lion be resisted and overpowered? Our text returns an answer to it. St. Peter is evidently speaking to believers, who, having been snatched already out of Satan’ s jaws, have now only to resist him to the end. How is a poor sinner, who “ has been carried captive by Satan at his will,” to “ escape out of the snare” ? Now to this the whole gospel is an answer. Why, you must look to the Cross. “ For this cause the Son of God was manifested, that He might destroy the works of the devil.” It is a most important question for the true believer, “ How am I to resist this fearful adversary of my soul? Though I must not hope, on earth, to be free from his temptations, yet how am I to tread him under my feet?”1. He exhorts us to sobriety-“ Be sober.” “ Be moderate-be self-denying-make not provision for the flesh to fulfil the lusts thereof.” Let the Christian but entangle himself in things of this life, and Satan has him at a great advantage. 2. “ Be vigilant.” They then who have such a watchful and unwearied enemy have need to be upon the watch themselves. Let your eye but rove a little towards some forbidden object, and he will take occasion from it to inflame your heart with evil passions. Once say of any sin, “ Is it not a little one?” and suffer yourself, on that ground, to indulge in it-immediately the lion is upon you! He will make this breach much wider, and it will “ increase unto more ungodliness.” We must not go to sleep ourselves under the notion that the Lord will guard us. It is the wakeful, not the slothful servant who has a warrant for God’ s protection. 3. But the apostle’ s third direction is one of such immense importance that we can neither be “ sober” nor “ vigilant” without it. He bids us be “ steadfast in the faith.” Let us keep but faith within our bosoms, and we keep Satan at a distance off. We are proof against the lion. Yet a little while and we shall remove out of the lion’ s reach. In the meanwhile, if there is a lion seeking to devour, there is another Lion standing on our part; for it is under such an emblem that our mighty Saviour hath vouchsafed to represent Himself. He is “ the lion of the tribe of Judah” (Revelation 5:5). (A. Roberts, M. A.) The roaring lion I. Satan’ s perpetual activity. Only God can be omnipresent; hence, Satan can only be in one place at one time. Yet, if you consider how much mischief he doeth, you will easily gather that he must have an awful degree of activity.1. We know that he is to be found in every place! Wherever the breath of life is inhaled, the poisonous miasma of temptation is a thing familiar. 2. Then, remember, that as he is found in all places, so you have often found him in all your duties. You have sought to serve God in your daily avocations, but strong temptations, furious suggestions of evil, hath followed you there. When we wished to be wrestling with the angel of God, we have had to contend with the fiend of hell. 3. We must observe also how ready Satan is to vent his spite against us in all frames of heart. When we are depressed in spirit-perhaps some bodily illness has brought us low, our animal spirits have ebbed and we feel ready to sink, then that old coward Satan is sure to attack us. On the other hand, if we are joyous and triumphant, then Satan knows how to tempt us to presumption-“ My mountain standeth firm, I shall never be moved” ; or else to carnal security-“ Soul, take thine ease, thou hast much goods laid up for many years” ; or else to self-righteousness-“ My own power and goodness have exalted me.” Or else, he will even attempt to poison our joys with the spleen of evil forebodings. 4. And ah! remember how well he knows how to turn all the events of Providence to our ill. Here comes Esau, hungry with hunting; there is a mess of pottage ready, that he may be tempted to sell his birthright. Here is Noah, glad to escape from his long confinement in the ark; he is merry, and there is the wine cup ready for him, that he may drink. Here is Peter; his faith is low, but his presumption is high; there is a maiden ready to say “ Thou also wast with Jesus of Nazareth.” There is Judas, and there are thirty pieces of silver in the priestly hand to tempt him, ay, and there is the rope afterwards for him to hang himself withal. II. Satan’ s roarings.1. Perhaps Peter here alluded to the roaring of persecution. How Satan roared with persecutions in Peter’ s days! There were racks and gibbets; there was the sword for beheading and the stake for burning; there was dragging at the heels of the wild horse; there was smearing over with pitch and then setting the body still alive to burn in Nero’ s garden. There was nothing for the Christian then but banishment and imprisonment; these were the lowest penalties. 2. But there is another kind of furious attack, the roaring of strong and vehement temptation. This some of us have felt. Do you know what it is to be caught hold of by some frightful temptation which you detest, grid yet the clutch of the hand is seconded by an arm so terrific in its strength that it drags you right on against your will. 3. Satan can roar also in the Christian’ s ears With blasphemies. Oh! the terrors which Satan has sometimes caused to God’ s people by saying, “ Ah, you are not a child of God, or you would not have so vile a nature.” Whereas you never thought it at all. It was his suggestion, not yours; and then, having laid his sin at your door, he has turned accuser of the brethren, and has sought to cast down your faith from its excellency, by making you imagine that you had committed the unpardonable sin. Now, if he roars against you, either with persecution or with temptation, or with diabolical insinuations, take the language of our apostle here-“ Whom resist steadfast in the faith,” etc. III. Satan’ s ultimate aim-“ Seeking whom he may devour.” Nothing short of the total destruction of a believer will ever satisfy our adversary. If the battle were between Satan and man, then, indeed, woe to us! We might quit ourselves like men and be strong, but before this giant all the host of Israel must flee. But the battle is not ours; it is the mighty God’ s. Yea, and Christ Himself must be defeated, the glory of His Cross must be dimmed, the crown of sovereignty must be snatched from His head, ere one of those for whom He died should ever be given up to the power of His adversary. IV. What we should do in order that we may overcome this adversary.1. “ Whom resist, steadfast in the faith.” But how resist him? “ Steadfast in the faith.” Seek to obtain a clear knowledge of the doctrines of the gospel, and then get a good grip of them. This will make you strong. Then take hold of the promises of God, which are yea and amen in Christ Jesus. 2. But there is another word added for our comfort “ Knowing that the same afflictions are accomplished in your brethren that are in the world.” This is well sketched by John Bunyan. “ As Christian was going along the exceedingly narrow pathway, with a deep ditch on one side, and a dangerous quag upon the other, he came to a stand, and he had half a thought to go back; and then again he thought he might be half way through the valley; so he resolved to go on. And while he pondered and mused, he heard the voice of a man as going before him, saying, ‘ Yea, though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil, for Thou art with me.’ Then he was glad, and that for these reasons. He gathered from thence that some who feared God were in this valley as well as himself; that God was with them, though they perceived Him not; that he hoped to have company by and by. So he went on, and called to him that was before, but he knew not what to answer for that he also thought himself to be alone.” “ I did not think that anybody ever felt as I feel.” And though I tell you these things, and know that many of you have heard Satan roar, I am compelled to confess that I have frequently said in my own heart “ I do not believe that any other man ever had this temptation before me.” Well, this text stands to refute our supposition, “ The same afflictions are accomplished in your brethren that are in the world.” (C. H. Spurgeon.) The personality and agency of evil spirits When an army is on active service, there is no effort which its commander will spare, to get accurate information about the army which is opposed to him. He uses all the means in his power: and his emissaries are content to run the most fearful risks; that he may learn what is the number of the force arrayed against him; what is its position, what its probable movements. And if any skilful spy could so far penetrate the councils of the hostile commander, as to be able to procure a sketch of his plan for conducting the campaign, we can all understand that such a plan would be worth almost any price. For to be forewarned is to be forearmed. It is part of our religious belief, that a host of beings, with power and skill far more than human, are hourly exerting all their power and all their skill for our eternal ruin. It is a part of our religious belief, that at the head of this host of foes there is one miserable, yet powerful being: a being inconceivably malignant, crafty, wretched: whose great desire is to dishonour God, and to make us human beings as sinful and as wretched as himself. Now there is no doubt at all, that we have all to contend with a certain amount of lurking unbelief in regard to those evil spirits of which we are to think. You will find men who will tell you that the existence of Satan and his angels is an antiquated doctrine, fitted for a ruder age, but not suited to our growing intelligence: they will tell you that it is not to be supposed that God would suffer such beings to exist and to assail us: and that all that was said by Christ and His apostles with regard to evil spirits must be understood as having been said in compliance with the vulgar way of thinking. As to the notion that the Almighty would not suffer such, why, there is no greater difficulty in understanding why He permits evil spirits, than in understanding why he permits evil men. And we know that God not only allows evil men to exist; but allows them to tempt and mislead other human souls to evil. And as for the notion that Christ and the apostles in speaking of evil spirits were merely complying with the vulgar way of thinking-merely to put that notion plainly before our minds is enough to set it aside. See what it comes to. That there are no evil spirits: that people, however, generally fancied there are: and that our Saviour, for fear of shocking their prejudice, gave in to that foolish error, and countenanced it. Now, is that conceivable? Would that have been worthy of Him who is the Truth? In leading our spiritual life, we have to contend with real, personal beings, striving to lead us wrong: there is something more against us than merely the force of circumstances, and the current of events in a fallen world; these are seconded and used by real persons of the greatest power and craft. Ought we not to seek to know something of the nature and the wiles of our great adversaries? We all know that the Bible contains many references to evil spirits, unclean spirits, or devils: and in the New Testament there is very much more frequent mention of evil angels than of good angels. For whatever advantages we may ever derive from the aid of good angels, we gain by the direct intervention of God: and we are not to think of making any application to any good spirit for his help. But it is different with evil spirits. Against them we are called personally to guard. We may, by our own evil thoughts and ways, tempt them to tempt us. To them we may open our hearts. And them we may by God’ s grace resist, and drive away. We are exposed to great perils from them, against which we need to be guarded. But the thing of practical moment for each of us, is the manner in which they make their attack upon us. And it is not too much to say that we may be quite sure that they will attack us in the most crafty way. And will not the most crafty way of an evil spirit be the way in which we least expect him? Satan is too cunning to present himself in his own black colours when he can veil himself in a more engaging form. Do you think a fraudulent trader would go about proclaiming that he was a rogue, and theft if you dealt with him he would be sure to cheat you? If a man were trying to get you to buy his bad wares, would he be likely to take pains to tell you how bad they were? No: the evil one and his angels are not weak enough to announce to us how evil they are, and how bent upon our destruction. It is in our own growing worldliness of spirit-our own disposition to put off the care of religion to the more convenient season which never comes-in our own temper of careless easy mindedness, forgetful of the awful realities of heaven and hell, and vaguely trusting that through God’ s mercy things will somehow go right for eternity with little thought or pains on our part-it is in symptoms like these that we may read the fearful indications that the devil and his angels are working too successfully upon our hearts. I do not mention the stimulus of unholy passion, of covetousness, of envy. You fancy that the bitter, angry spirit that grows up within you at some slight offence is but the working of your own natural temperament: ah, you do not know how it may be encouraged by some dark being, specially devoting himself to the task. In brief, it is reasonable and right for us to suspect the presence and influence of an evil spirit, in every temptation we ever feel to sin or error: in every intellectual process that would cast doubt upon God’ s revealed religion, in every impulse that would prompt to any deed or any thought that varies from the mind and example of our blessed Saviour Himself. Not by the mere natural working of our fallen mind does the evil suggestion arise: but weaving in with that, mysteriously cooperating with that, reinforcing and aggravating that, comes the baneful influence from the prince of perdition! And yet, though this truth be most awful, it is salutary: it is one which it is good for us to reflect upon. Is there not something here to fill us with the greater detestation of sin: to lead us to the more resolute battling with temptation? Think that every time you sin, you are doing the very thing that your most malicious enemy wishes you to do! Is not that a motive to hate sin: to battle with temptation? (A. K. H. Boyd, D. D.) Of the being, enmity, fierceness, and cunning of the devil Satan allows you as much religion as you please for the carrying on of his designs; and yet, if you please, you may have none at all. Some who are easily to be won, he tempts to downright villainy, only helping out their dull wits to more exquisite and genteel achievements. Others who are more cautious of notorious sins he draws to offences which seem less, but are equally serving his interest. I. That there is a devil was the opinion of the heathen themselves that ever acknowledged a God. But most commonly they were mistaken in the nature of his being, and altogether as to his origin and power. Now as the agreement of all nations in the confession and worship of a God is a powerful argument to prove the same, so the same agreement in the general notion of this malignant being may be of the like force. And truly it seems agreeable to reason that since there is so much evil in the world there should be some sovereign patron of it. He also that shall consider the impetuous current of wickedness which has run down throughout all ages from the beginning of the world, which could never flow from infinite mercy and goodness, hath reasons sufficient to convince him that there must of necessity be some powerful being which manages this kingdom of darkness; some chief promoter of evil and subtle contriver of our ruin. II. That satan is our inveterate adversary, with the origin of his malice, and the reasons of God’ s permission and sufferance. It is very natural to those that are ambitious, when their designs of rising are thwarted, but much more when they are also degraded from that high and happy estate they once enjoyed, to fall into the deepest extremity of malice and eagerness of revenge, not only towards that power that frustrated their ends, but also with an endeavour to hinder all those who are in any possibility of obtaining that felicity which they by their rebellion have lost. And this is the case of the angels that fell. But since their power is still subject to God, how comes it to pass that He tolerates so vehement an adversary both to His honour and the works of His hands? Besides His unsearchable will and pleasure, I may presume to offer two reasons.1. In relation to the lapsed spirits themselves. God determining not to inflict His utmost wrath upon them till the great day of judgment (2 Peter 2:4; Jude 1:6). 2. In relation to mankind. God purposing to advance those only to His kingdom whom neither the principalities nor powers of the air could shake, nor any subtle allurements could draw aside. III. From experience and ordinary observation we may conclude, that there must of necessity be some such enemy by whose instigation chiefly and not altogether by the propensity of our own natures we commit most sins.1. If we consider the nature and quality of most sins, how unanswerable to that earnestness with which men commit them, we shall find that the incitement proceeds, not so much from their own inclinations, or the fairness of the objects, as the secret subtle suggestions of Satan. 2. From that general and otherwise unaccountable averseness to religion, and other miscarriages in the duties thereof, which we cannot but charge ourselves withal. (J. Cooke, M. A.) The devil I have heard divines say that it is very hard to convince men of the existence of a devil, that they scarcely know whether they are convinced of it themselves. I think they are mistaken. An opinion, a fear, a fancy-call it what you will-must have prevailed long, must have taken possession of men’ s minds, before it could find its way so readily to their lips. Are there no other signs? Does not each man complain of some incubus which he wants to throw off? One may find it outside of him; if he could have better or less stupid beings to work with, all would be well. Another feels as if it were altogether within him. It is a miserable solitary strife, of which no one knows anything but himself. Intelligent travellers and zealous missionaries know that in barbarous countries the difficulty is not to convince men of this doctrine, but of any other. We may acknowledge that our Lord’ s words were none of them directed to prove the existence of evil spirits. He found their existence acknowledged. Sickness, pain, death, were the demonstrations to the hearts of men of their presence. What has been said of Christ’ s words is true also of His acts. He who encountered sickness, madness, death, was certainly not setting forth the power of evil spirits. He was proving their weakness. He was, say the Evangelists, “ casting them out.” When the apostles went forth to preach, they too had no occasion to persuade men of the existence of evil powers. That was assumed; the Jews and Gentiles were agreed so far. Their theories were different; the witness which the facts of this world and of their own experience bore to their consciences was essentially the same. Can there be a deliverer from these evil powers?-that was the only question which it was important to get answered. The apostles went into all lands to proclaim that there was such a Deliverer. They said that Christ had overcome the diseases of men here upon earth; that by death He had overcome death; that He was every hour overcoming some principality and power in high places, which was claiming men as subjects and captives. This was their gospel. Having such a one, they spoke of necessity concerning the principalities and powers. But the apostles, like their Master, used the singular number as well as the plural. They too were obliged to speak of an adversary, of a tempter. The moment the complete unity of the Divine Nature was proclaimed-the unity of the Father with the Son in one Spirit; the moment that men had been baptised into this perfect, loving, all-embracing Name, they must be told, “ There is an adversary of this Name, a self-seeking, self-concentrated, self-worshipping adversary, who is seeking to draw you out of communion with it, and therefore out of communion with each other. You must be sober, for he seeks to make you drunk with the pleasures of this life, with your own self-conceit, that you may lose all thoughts of your Father’ s house. You must be vigilant, for he seeks to stupefy you with opiates, to keep you asleep.” St. Peter felt that a picture as living as this was necessary, that his next words might not be idle words: “ Whom resist, steadfast in the faith.” Once believe that you have an adversary-that the conflict is not a sham one, and you can repulse him. You have not to win a position, but defend one. You belong to God. You can tell the adversary that you owe him no allegiance; that you scorn his promises and his threats; that it is your Father’ s good pleasure to give you His kingdom of heaven, and that you do not choose to exchange it for the kingdom of hell. The members of the Christian Church were very likely to take up the notion that they and the world around them were under quite different laws; that they were not subject to the passions which other men were subject to; that they were out of the range of the influence of the evil spirit. A more plausible delusion, or a more perilous one, cannot be imagined. An apostle had no higher duty than to shatter it. He was to assure his disciples that the privilege of their brotherhood in Christ exempted them from no assault which threatened those who had not asserted that privilege. This advantage he had, that being one of a society, of a brotherhood, he felt that his enemy was the enemy of his brethren, and the enemy of that world which he wished to claim as part of his family. He was fighting for all men when he was fighting for himself. (F. D. Maurice, M. A.) The roaring lion Dr. Livingstone tells us of an African native who was struck down and torn by a lion, that periodically the dreadful pains returned to the old wound, as if again the monster gnawed at the bone. So was it, I think, with Peter. The old lion had struck him down and fixed his teeth in his prey. Snatched from the jaws of the destroyer by David’ s greater Son, yet the scar throbbed with vivid reminders of the peril, and brought again before him the memory of his great deliverance. Let us turn and look upon this terrible man slayer. I. Here is a very real enemy. He is an old doctor, as Latimer calls him, and well versed in arts and crafts; but his master stroke has been reserved for these times. There is a fable of a fox that caught its prey by pretending to be dead. That is the last of Satan’ s devices. A hundred years ago everything was put clown to him-storms, earthquakes, eclipses, plagues, diseases; there was ascribed to him a power and activity that were almost infinite. Thanks to science, she has cast the devil out of the hailstorm and the thundercloud, and has taught us at least some of the laws which regulate these things. So he has altered his tactics, and with a humility which his betters might imitate he has announced his own decease. “ I am dead” -saith the devil-“ indeed there is no devil. I am passed away with witchcraft and ghosts and all the silly nonsense of the dark ages.” No, no. We have a more sure word of prophecy to which we do well to give heed. This old adversary is as real for you and for me as he ever was. As real for us as he was for Adam, or for Job, or for Judas. Your adversary-says the apostle, as if he had marked us out for his prey. We dare not ignore him. We dare not make light of him. He tracks our steps and seeks us as his prey. Be sober, be vigilant. II. He is a mighty foe. The glimpses we have of him in the Bible reveal one of vast dominion and of amazing power; probably of all God’ s creatures one of the first in the order of time and highest in rank; amongst the foremost of the angels that do excel in strength. There is a majesty about him as of one conscious of vast power. Think of his triumphs. Away up in the mountain caves is the den of the lion, the mouth and floor of it all strewn with the bones of his victims; Skulls and ribs lie thickly scattered. But what a sight it were to look into the den of this old lion the devil, and to see the mischief that he hath wrought! III. He is a subtle foe. Think of his knowledge of human nature. How perfectly he understands us! As an old Puritan says, “ He taketh the measure of every man’ s foot; and then he fitteth him instantly.” Therefore let us put up a double guard on the side of our weakness. Be sober, be vigilant, and, most of all, be sober and be vigilant where the peril threatens most. It is then that the devil can do most harm when he finds a traitor wish within the soul-into whose ear he can whisper, a traitor that he can bribe. And not only of our besetments does he make use. Our very virtues he tries to turn into handles for his malice. Here is a pleasant, genial, good-hearted fellow-ah! the devil leads him on and tumbles him into the ditch of self-indulgence, or fetcheth him away by evil company. This man is thrifty and saving: and the devil elbows him on year after year until he casts him into that horrible pit of miserliness. This man is generous, but the devil puffs him up with the sense of his importance. This man is very humble, and the devil pushes him down so far in the valley of humility that he begins to climb up the other side and is proud of being so humble. This man is resolute and determined, and the devil eggs him on until he is overbearing and tyrannical. And this man is modest and retiring, and the devil keeps him lazy and useless by assuring him that he has no gifts. He can do almost as much with our virtues as with our vices. For all conditions and for all circumstances the tempter has his attack. Turn to the great temptation of the Lord Jesus Christ. Then, again, he seeks to turn our very mercies to our mischief. The lusciousness and beauty of the fruit in Paradise is made to awaken Eve’ s desire; and when she wished for it, lo! there it was hanging within reach. He is a cruel foe. A lion for his might, he is also a lion for his savage cruelty. His name is Apollyon, the destroyer. To worry if he cannot overthrow; to annoy if he cannot destroy. “ Oh, sir,” said one to me one day, as gentle and loving a man as ever lived, “ I loved my wife better than my life, but when I was drunk it was as if the devil was in me, and I always began knocking her about. I beat her one night so that she could eat nothing but spoon meat for eleven days. And then when I saw what I had done I had to get drunk again just to forget it.” He is a cruel monster, a hard master, driving his poor slave to lowest depths. IV. Lastly, this old lion can be overcome. “ Be sober, be vigilant.” The first word suggests our peril from over-eagerness. People who go rushing into anything and everything, rush into the lion’ s den and thrust their heads into his very mouth. There are some people that the old lion must hunt for, bat the over-eager he can get by lying still. Be sober. Take a right estimate of things. Measure things by God and by eternity. Don’ t be too thirsty-that is the meaning of the precept-too thirsty for pleasure; too thirsty for money; too thirsty for honour; too thirsty for your own way in everything. Travellers tell us that there are certain places where you may generally trace the steps of the old lion and expect to find him waiting about. They are the drinking places, where he can spring upon his prey in a moment. Be sober. And yet be vigilant. The too anxious are in peril; but so are the too careless. Be vigilant. But is that all? What is the good of telling the little lamb to be sober and vigilant when the old lion is about? We must go further back and further forward for the instructions as to our safety. “ Humble yourselves, therefore, under the mighty hand of God.” Be so little and so weak that you have no faith in yourself at all-and creep for your safety in under that mighty hand. “ Casting all your care upon Him, for He careth for you.” Beneath that hand I cannot know a fear. Here am I as within a fortress whose walls can neither be scaled nor undermined. That Presence alone is our safety. “ Whom resist, steadfast in the faith.” Be bold because thine hand is in the hand of thy God. (M. G. Pearse.) The devil and humanity I. We have here the devil at work in humanity. He is “ going about,” not outside men, but in men, going about in the regions of human thoughts, human passions, human impulses, human activities. “ He worketh in the children of disobedience.” As a worker-1. His inspiration is malignant. “ He is a roaring lion.” He is not a sleeping lion, nor a lion crouching down, satiated with food, but a lion roaring with hunger, savage for food. 2. His purpose is destruction. “ Seeking whom he may devour.” The devil is a devourer physically. The devil is a devourer spiritually. He is a devourer of purity of heart, peace of conscience, confidence in and fellow ship with the everlasting Father. The devil is a devourer socially. He is a devourer of domestic harmony, social order, prosperity, and peace. The devil is a devourer politically. He is a devourer of civil freedom, national progress, inter national harmony. II. We have the devil here counteracted by humanity. Three things are necessary to counteract him-1. Thoughtfulness-“ Be sober.” This does not mean mere physical sobriety, although, of course, it includes that-it means sobriety of soul, a state of mind opposed to all volatile excitement. Were men to think whence they came, what they are, whither they are tending, the devil would not easily influence them. 2. Diligence-“ Be vigilant.” Be vigilant in building up moral fortresses around your soul, so as to resist his entrance. 3. Steadfastness-“ Whom resist, steadfast in the faith.” Is it wise in a town to ignore the pestilence that has entered its streets and carried death to its homes? How infinitely more unwise is it to ignore this roaring lion! (D. Thomas, D. D.) The devil and humanity I. What the devil really is in relation to men. First, He is an “ adversary.” Secondly, He is a malignant “ adversary,” ravenous and savage. Thirdly, He is a prowling adversary. “ Walketh about.” He is always on the move. He walks about the markets, the governments and churches of the world; about the public streets and secluded alleys, and about the chambers of every human soul. He has no rest. II. What men really should be in relation to the devil.1. They should be serious. “ Be sober.” As calm, serious, and self-possessed as a soldier who waits the blast of the trumpet for war. 2. They should be watchful. “ Be vigilant.” He is wily, always plotting. 3. They should be resisting. “ Whom resist.” Do not yield an inch, but advance. 4. They should be reflective. “ Knowing that the same afflictions are accomplished in your brethren.” (D. Thomas, D. D.) The same afflictions are accomplished.-The wide diffusion of trials a motive to steadfastness Ordinarily, if we speak of afflictions, or sufferings, you presently think of the bereavements or sorrows which fall to us through the dispensations of Providence. But the apostle, when he here uses the term, is speaking only of spiritual assaults-of the attacks of Satan, acting on the corruptions of our nature, and soliciting us to sin. Are these indeed afflictions to us? Happy the man who, though he have to reckon among his sore things “ persecution, and peril, and nakedness, and sword,” can yet say, “ The sorest thing of all is, that I am continually wrought upon by an invisible foe, who, seconded but too readily from within, places me in peril of deserting my profession and dishonouring my Saviour.” Yes, the greatest affliction to us should be the not finding affliction in sin. What is there to encourage the Christian warrior in the knowing that the same afflictions are the lot of others as well as himself? Really at first sight, and with reference more especially to the assaults of the devil, it might be said that this was calculated to discourage us. It seems almost like investing Satan with omnipresence, to exhibit him as afflicting simultaneously the whole body of Christians. Suppose it were the registered course of God’ s proceedings that there should be comparative freedom from the assaults of Satan, so that the “ roaring lion” were not allowed to come against the Christian. What a fearful thing it would then be for a believer to find himself attacked by the devil! It would not be the amount of the attack, so much as the unusualness, that would distress him. His inference would be-“ Surely I am not one of the people of God: if I were, He would not deal with me in so uncommon a way.” Or, if again, in place of exemption generally from spiritual assault, there were any one form of temptation which was seldom allowed to visit the righteous; would not the being invaded by this form distract the godly man, not because the form itself might be more terrific than he had known before, but because, being novel, it would seem to bring proof that he had deceived himself with regard to his spiritual condition? But now take the opposite, which is the actual case, namely, that the Christian has nothing strange to undergo. Do you not perceive that this very circumstance will do much to encourage him to resist the devil and keep steadfast in the faith? The believer has perhaps to undergo a large measure of domestic trial; death makes frequent inroads into his family; his circumstances become straitened; his children requite him with ingratitude; but he looks into the history of the righteous, and he finds that there is nothing singular in his portion. Or again-and here, it may be, Satan has the greatest advantage-the believer has seasons of spiritual darkness; and he loses all comfortable sense of love of God and the atonement made by Christ. But is he peculiar in this? Has nothing like this been experienced by the believer? He turns to the Book of Psalms. What does he find? Unmingled joy? unclouded assurance? Oh, no! he finds constant alternations, as though night followed day-depression succeeded in necessary order to exultation. There is, however, one more, and an equally important view, which may justly be taken of the passage before us. If we are to resist the devil with good prospect of success, we must prepare to resist the devil; and, in order to this preparation, we should be observant of what has happened and is happening to others. An old writer justly says, “ Things certainly fall the lighter upon us when they first fall upon our thoughts.” It is the being taken by surprise which makes sorrow so hard; and we want you not to be taken by surprise. Oh, the experience of the Church is not an experience which merely proves the frequency of trouble; it proves also the advantageousness of trouble; it proves that affliction “ yieldeth the peaceable fruit of righteousness to them that are exercised thereby” ; it proves that the devil may be resisted; that, with all his subtlety, and malice, and might, he is more than matched by the believer, who takes to himself the whole armour of God. And for this simple truth we would gain, if we could, a strong hold upon your minds. The devil is not irresistible-not one of his temptations is irresistible. Will ye, then, yield, as though it were useless to withstand? Your brethren, in whom the same afflictions have been accomplished, met the devil and vanquished him, but not in their own strength; and you, too, may vanquish the devil. The promised aids of the Holy Spirit-aids which no Christian seeks in vain who seeks in faith-will always suffice to carry you safely, yea, triumphantly through the conflict. What warning, then, is there, that we slumber not at our post! what encouragement that we shrink not from conflict! (H. Melvill, B. D.) Sympathy with saints and martyrs When people are sick, and in bad pain, we know how apt they are to imagine, Surely never anyone was so afflicted as I am. Thus St. Peter encourages his suffering brethren, when a time of trouble was coming on; much as St. Paul had before encouraged the Corinthians. “ There hath no temptation taken you, but such as is common to man” : nothing that is beyond human strength, assisted by the grace of the Holy Ghost, to bear. This is the answer to those who think the commandments of the gospel too strict, too pure to be obeyed. “ Your Father which is in heaven will give the Holy Spirit to them that ask Him.” And if that be not enough, look at the lives of the saints: look and see how good and penitent persons, from time to time, have really been helped to keep these commands which you think too hard, and to resist these temptations which you think too strong. On the other hand, that roaring lion, who is ever seeking whom he may devour, will be busy encouraging in you just the contrary of these good thoughts. If you are in trouble he will try to make you feel as if no other person was ever in so bad a condition. If he can, he will persuade you that all or a great part of your trouble arises from such and such a person’ s ill-usage, and so he will make you spiteful and envious. Other persons, who are not so ill-used, may do well to be forgiving and meek: but your case, he will whisper, is really too hard, too bad. What is the use, they will say, of such exact goodness? you may as well give it up; for you see it does not save you from ill-usage and suffering. Thus the enemy moves us to discontent, when we are afflicted or ill-used: but still more does He encourage us to sin, when we are in strong temptation from our own passions, or the evil example of others. He will at such times set us on thinking, that surely our passions are stronger than other men’ s, and therefore there is more excuse for our giving way to them. This is how the devil would beguile us, and a very serious temptation it is: he would have us believe, either that there never were any saints, any persons really good and holy, or that if there have been any, they were such by a kind of miracle. To be afflicted, then, is a mark of Christian brotherhood: it is a token that we belong to God’ s family. If anyone were quite exempt, he would almost feel it unfair: might he choose, he would rather take his share, relieving, if so it might be, his brethren. Or take the case of comrades and fellow soldiers-what sort of a spirit is he thought to have who draws back and spares himself when the rest are entering upon labour and danger? And here comes in the other word, by which, as I said, St. Peter in the text would stir us up to a godly jealousy of the saints. The word I mean is “ accomplished.” Their afflictions are accomplished, ours but just beginning. To conclude: whereas the apostle’ s word is, that whatever we suffer, the same afflictions are accomplished “ in our brethren that are in the world,” we understand that when they are once out of the world, there is an end of their affliction and care forever. 1 Peter 5:10 The God of all grace.Triple perfection The Revised Version makes two changes of some importance in this passage. The word “ settle” is removed to the margin. And the form of the whole passage is changed from that of a prayer to that of an assurance: “ The God of all grace shall Himself perfect, stablish, strengthen you.” It may be taken as a revelation. I. First of all, what God actually is-a “ God of all grace” ; that is, of grace for all men, and of every kind of grace. Its contents may perhaps be defined best as unmerited goodwill, showing itself in act or waiting in perpetual eagerness for an opportunity to show itself. Now it is one of the peculiarities of the Christian religion that it represents God as in eternal possession of such grace, and as always ready and disposed to exercise it towards man. Other religions are apt to confine the goodwill of the God within the limits of the country, or the tribe, or the association of tribes, or to represent the God as gracious only to some men, although ungracious and His heart entirely closed against others. To all our dull questionings whether God really loves us, the one reply the New Testament makes is simply that He is “ the God of all grace,” in such a sense that no higher degree of grace on the one hand, and on the other no defect or arbitrary restraint of grace, can be conceived of Him.1. That reply is worth lingering upon, in order that we may teach ourselves more confidently to adore. Through all nature it is easy to trace God’ s grace or effective goodwill towards man, nor is it necessary to suppose that it is altogether confined to man. That He Himself feels pleasure at the beautiful things He makes, whether they spring into being as the product of a fresh creation or evolve their glories out of some “ closely packed germ,” may be inferred from the phrase in Genesis In the shapes of the leaves, the colours of the flowers, and all the fragrance of the garden, it is possible to see not only the skill of the Creator in providing for the vital purposes of nature, but His generosity also in weaving beauty and use in His processes and decking His handiwork with glories that are almost superfluous but for pleasure. 2. It is much the same with history, God’ s providential administration of the world. Grace of every kind and degree, of patience, and discipline, and spiritual help, may be traced all through it, vindicating the interests of righteousness, leading men on to ever clearer moral perception and completer moral attainment. To that statement it is questionable whether any exception can be taken. On the part of some men, indeed, it is customary to hold that the testimony is divided, that whilst in certain places the race has declined and fallen, in others only has it risen and advanced. But there is a distinction, of primary importance in human affairs, which does not seem to warrant such a conclusion. Man’ s progress through the centuries appears at times to be confused and slow. But that is exactly what might have been expected from man; and if any long period is taken, and his condition at the close compared with his condition at the beginning, as far as morality and the highest and innermost interests of the man are concerned, it will not be easy to question either that the progress has been very real and great, or that the cause of it all has been the overflowing grace of God. 3. But no manifestation of that grace in any other sphere can compare with its manifestation in religion. “ Who hath called us unto His eternal glory by Christ Jesus.” This states that the grace is so great as to be able to satisfy itself with nothing less than that we should be with God, partakers of His nature and sharers through eternity of His glory. Of course the apostle added “ by Christ Jesus,” for no Christian with the thought of God’ s grace in his mind can keep it separate long from its companion thought of the Saviour. For that there are at least two reasons. Whenever a man wants to know the heart of God, the best mode is to dwell upon the kindliness and patience and love of the Saviour amongst men, to trace them all back to the Divine source from which they come, and to regard them as but sparks and emanations, dulled in their passage earthwards, of the ever-glowing Love that sits upon the throne of the heavens. Secondly, and chiefly, the gift of Jesus Christ is at once the most magnificent and the most irrefragable proof Jehovah could give that His grace is like His justice, without defect and without limit. II. Let us turn now to the revelation the verse contains of what man may become.1. The same second phrase, “ called to His eternal glory,” sets it forth in part, but is almost too ideal dud even inconceivable for exposition. For what the glory of God is, in the sense in which the word is used here, His own state of blessedness, the eternal beatitude that fills and surrounds Him, of necessity no man can tell. It must include all the gratifications that pure spirit is capable of receiving, with no liability to interruption or loss, and with all kinds of associated joys, each of which exceeds man’ s highest imagination. And all this glory is to be ours-the discord and strife of our natures forever quieted; the whole moral nature beatified, perfected, assimilated to God. In that respect, too, the Christian religion does not believe in limitations. 2. The other part of the revelation of what man may become can be more easily understood. God “ shall Himself perfect, stablish, strengthen you,” writes the apostle; and he may also have added “ settle you.” The first word implies such adjustment as issues in exact fitness to relationship-the making a man precisely what he ought to be in regard of his attitude towards God, towards his fellow men, towards his own conscience and sense of duty. The second word means radically power to resist and stand firm; and the third, power of effective strength by means of which conquests are made and obstacles overborne. The last word, “ settle,” denotes the laying of a firm foundation, like the rock of which our Saviour speaks, whereon if a man build, his house will be able to defy the vehemence of wind and weather. There is thus a triple perfectness, set before us and even pledged to us in this verse, as the revelation of what man may become; fitness to all moral relationships, strength to resist every assault of Satan, power of progress and triumph which nothing can hinder, and all this resting upon, nay, built into a foundation so firm that the might of hell cannot shake it. There are, however, two or three facts frequently familiar to the thought of every one, which make the prospect opened up by St. Peter very blessed, but sometimes very dubious. The one is our almost constant consciousness that the motives of our best acts are mixed, some right, but others in every way unworthy. That “ alloy of impure motive” -at times it seems to be a defect we cannot escape from, “ tainting our best moments,” turning men’ s mistaken praise into the parent of humiliation and self-reproach. But that is not the worst. Moralists teach that the range of man’ s duty is “ co-extensive within the range of his moral consciousness” ; or, in other words, that the standard at which he aims should contain the completeness of everything, which his conscience when most sensitive recognises as dutiful and right. Two miserable results immediately follow. Every one knows that his performances day after day insist upon lingering a great way behind his standard; and every one must occasionally fear that the standard itself has shrunk, because the conscience has been dulled by past trifling and sin. The emphatic positiveness of this verse will not, however, permit itself to be overlooked. And instead of giving way to doubt and questioning the possibility of our perfecting, it is better that we should set ourselves to find out how such a blessing may be certainly ensured and enjoyed. St. Peter does not hesitate in his teaching or qualify his words in any way. He says distinctly that only God can do it for us, and that He will do it because His grace is complete and full. We must therefore get the Spirit of God into our hearts by trust in Him, and become possessed of Him, or the thing remains of necessity hopeless. There are indeed at the present day, as there have ever been, strong tendencies to look in other directions for the power that will confer the greatest benefit upon society anal upon the individual. Sometimes it assumes the shape of the study of some form of art or branch of science, of devotion to an impossible equality or an unreasonable hierarchy, of a kind of progress that slaughters the unit and passes on to a remote and general triumph, of culture, or combination, or the coercion of the will. Doubt, however, is long-lived and hard to kill; and still it may be our fears are whispering to us, Can He perfect me, and will He? It is almost certain that Peter was an old man when he wrote these words; and an old man’ s counsel and assurance, especially when they are based upon his own actual experience, are not to be despised. In his youth and earlier manhood he had lacked steadfastness. If, therefore, reason and experience have any validity at all, there is no room left for doubt. It is an argument in which no possible flaw can be found; the grace of God is not liable to exhaustion or abatement, and therefore whatever it has actually done for others it can do for us. The God of all grace will do it for us. That grace of His will go with us wherever we go, constantly compassing us about, sustaining our hearts, preparing us for blessedness. (R. W. Moss.) The God of all grace Our first experience in reading this verse is amazement that borders on bewilderment. The whole is a perfect blaze of diamonds. Keep your eyes upon the verse, and see what words we have: “ God,” “ all grace,” “ called,” “ eternal glory,” “ Christ Jesus,” “ dominion forever.” And, as if these were not enough, we find also perfection thrown in as well: “ make you perfect.” And these marvellous words daze us all the more because of their contrast to that which has gone before. “ The devil,” “ a roaring lion,” “ suffering,” “ adversary,” “ God,” “ grace,” “ eternal glory,” “ perfection.” Now we will seek to put the words in order, and link them together. And observe that, though this text reads as a prayer, it is really a promise. Instead of the first word being “ but,” it should be “ and.” In the previous verses the Holy Ghost has been telling us what we have to do. Now He tells us what God has promised to do. We must never separate the things that God has joined together. If God says in one line, “ Work out your own salvation with fear and trembling,” He says in the next, “ for it is God that worketh in you.” And so, if here I am told that I am to be sober and vigilant, and that I am to resist a roaring devil, and I say, “ How can it be? It is more than I can do,” He who bids me do it tells me what He will do: “ And He Himself shall perfect, strengthen, and stablish you.” The words, you see, are beginning to fall into order. But there is one important point which I question whether many of you have seen, because in nine cases out of ten that sentence, “ after that ye have suffered a while,” is linked with the last clause of the verse, whereas it belongs to the first; and if you look you will see what a difference it makes. The God of all grace who hath called us, after that we have suffered a while, to His eternal glory, will Himself, whilst we are suffering-during this little interval that lies between the grace and the glory-so sanctify the suffering, that it shall perfect, stablish, strengthen, settle us. The sufferings come between the grace and the glory. I. Who shall rise to the height of this first expression, “ the God of all grace” ? It does not mean that God is gracious in His tendency, or simply gracious by His nature, but that He Himself is the reservoir, the home, the source, the supply, of grace in all its manifestations. Need I recapitulate them to you? Divine choice with all its inscrutable mysteries. Redemption by a dying Christ. Justification also in all its wondrous harmony between mercy and perfect equity. Yes, and regeneration too, with its heaven-born purity, and its new-created tendencies within the soul. All these are covered by the word “ grace.” These things are only different manifestations of one and the same sublime attribute. But, when I mention these, I have only just touched the spray of the wave. There are deeps that lie beneath in this expression, “ the God of all grace,” for it contains all the graces which the soul must possess before it can enter eternal glory. Most certainly there must be the grace of repentance. The cry of “ God be merciful to me” is a cry that comes down from heaven before ever it can break from my lips. “ The God of all grace.” But repentance must ever be followed by faith. It is the gift of God. Then there are other graces yet to be manifested. “ Faith worketh by love.” But love is born of God, for God is love, and if I love Him, it is because He first loved me. But no man can see the Lord apart from holiness. How can this poor, sin-stained man become holy? And the answer is, that it is the Spirit of the Lord that worketh holiness; and so, whilst He is the God of all manifestations of grace, He is the God of all the graces that I possess. But I have hardly begun yet with this enumeration. This text covers much more, for it includes all the supplies of grace that are needed along the road. It is a weary road: I need refreshing grace. It is a sorrowing path, because it is a sinful one: I need comforting grace. As a wandering sheep, I need restoring grace. Being weak as a babe, I need upholding grace. And everything that a saint can need from the moment of my new birth to that ecstatic instant when I stand before His eternal glory, without spot or wrinkle, lies centred in God. II. This God of all grace calls us to eternal glory. Let us begin at the beginning. He has called you. The call that is intended here is, as Archbishop Leighton beautifully puts it, that call which goes deeper than the ear, touches the heart within, throws open the door, and admits the Christ. And consequently you will find that the word “ called” becomes the title of the true Christian. A man of God is one who has been called. But how is he called? It is “ unto His eternal glory in Christ” ; not simply, mark you, for Christ’ s sake. That is true, but it is not the truth here taught. He has called us to eternal glory “ in Christ.” He called Christ into glory, and, when He called Christ into glory, He called me, because I am in Christ. The call that I receive is a call that sounds in the Son’ s ear. It is a call “ to His glory.” We share His blessedness. God’ s glory is Himself. There is nothing more glorious about His glory than Himself. The only way in which God can glorify Himself is to reveal Himself. Come, lave thy spirit in the eternal blaze of Deity. Come, be at home with Me. That one word “ glory” covers all joy, all blessing, all bliss. God has called us unto His eternal “ glory.” But this is only the beginning of the theme. You have to put the word “ eternal” into the scale. It is not a call for an age or for a millennium. Oh, fools that we are to weep our eyes out over earth’ s sorrows, and to grumble our spirits into wretchedness because of a passing moment of care! III. He allows a little interval of suffering which is itself full of blessing. Ah, we too often want to leave that bit out, “ After that ye have suffered a while.” The call comes, but the glory does not come immediately after the call. The suffering is part of the call, as well as the glory. It is not a haphazard thing that comes in. It is all a part of the plan. When God calls you to glory, He calls you to come to glory through a little while of suffering. How this takes away all the acidity of one’ s sorrows! It is part of the road to the eternal glory. It is just as much included in the plan as all the rest, And then, you see, it says that it is only a “ little” while. Really the word “ while” is not there. It is “ after ye have suffered a little” ; and you can choose, if you like, whether it means degree or duration. You say, “ But why can I not go to heaven at once?” The answer is found in the last line of our text. He Himself will “ make you perfect, stablish, strengthen, settle you.” He will do it through this little interval of suffering. He will perfect you. Ah, there is nothing about us that is not imperfect. There are many little rents in us, and the Lord allows us to go through this little while of suffering so that He may repair the imperfections. Bad as you are, you would be worse if you had less trouble. There is not here, today, a child of God who is not the richer and the holier for the little while of suffering. The next word is “ stablish,” and that implies fixity. Oh, we are very prone to fluctuation. Some times nothing but a heavy heart will give weight to a character, and so God says, “ I cannot let that light and frivolous child remain like a piece of thistledown floating at the dictation of every breath of air. I must pass him through a little while of suffering.” That is stablishing. The word “ settle” does not appear in the R.V. The last word there is “ strengthen,” and the meaning of the word is “ made powerful to resist attack.” There is the devil. He is roaring. Do you think you can resist the great adversary? Never! But the Lord steps ill, and says, “ If I bid you meet the roaring lion, I will pass you through a little season of suffering which shall repair and stablish you, and put spiritual thews and sinews into you, so that in My strength you may overcome.” (A. G. Brown.) Grace all in all I. First, we are taught that the true conversion of the soul to God is a divine work, a work which the mercy of Heaven must begin, and the power of heaven carry forward, otherwise it never can be performed.1. As to the source from whence conversion proceeds. St. Peter distinctly acknowledges it to be of God; he refers expressly to Him as the Author of that great change which had taken place in his own soul, and in the souls of those to whom he was writing. Consider in how many ways grace must be bestowed upon us in order to our salvation: we want grace to draw us, grace to enable us to believe, grace to strengthen us, grace to make us persevere; grace was wanting to contrive the scheme of our redemption; grace to carry it into execution, and grace to finish that glorious work. 2. As to the manner in which we are made partakers of this inestimable mercy: it is by calling “ God, who hath called us.” Here is another proof that this change is “ not of the will of man, but of God.” He makes ready, and He invites; we ourselves have no more to do with the preparing of that rich provision which is made for our souls in the gospel, than the guest has with the feast set before him by some hospitable entertainer. Nay, we have not naturally even the wish to partake of it. 3. As to the means by which it is accomplished: it is “ by Jesus Christ.” That the children of God are called, that they are converted, that they are justified, that they are sanctified, that they shall be glorified, is all owing to, is all accomplished by, our blessed Lord and Saviour. 4. As to the end to which it leads: that end is God’ s eternal glory. It is “ His,” His own glory, His brightest gift, His choicest possession: it is that gift of God which Christ shed His precious blood to purchase. It is “ eternal” ; it is not like our poor fleeting pleasures; not like earthly riches, which make themselves wings and flee away; not like the pomps of this world, of a fashion which is always changing; but a glory which is without change, without end; a sun of brightness which shall never set. II. That they in whom this work of grace is going on, called as they are to eternal glory, are by no means to consider themselves as free from sufferings or trial; on the contrary, the apostle seems to speak of these things as if they were certain to befall them; or rather, I should say, he addresses his converts as being, for the present, actually under tribulation.1. They find their spiritual good thereby promoted.2. They find that when trouble is nigh, God is also present.3. They find not only that their troubles will soon be over-past, but far over-paid. III. That what grace has begun we should be very earnest that the same grace will perfect. This is the blessing which the apostle asks for in his prayer. And now let me address-1. Those who are under the influence of that grace of which the apostle is speaking; who have felt its power in turning them from their sins, in drawing them to Christ for salvation. (1) Learn to prize the grace you have received; remember from whom it cometh; at what a price it was purchased; remember how it is conveyed to your souls by that blessed Spirit whose office it is to sanctify all the elect people of God, (2) Be careful how you quench or slight it; do nothing contrary to its suggestions; endeavour to do all things according to its guidance. (3) Endeavour to improve it; strive to show that you have not received the grace of God in vain; do not “ take the beginning of a Christian life for the end of it, and sit down at the entrance,” when you ought rather to be pressing forward on the way; go on from strength to strength; aim high. 2. I would address myself to those whose consciences tell them they are as yet strangers to this grace, or, at least, are not living under its power. (1) Oh, I will not endeavour to set before you the vanity of a life spent in search of things temporal; there must be some moments of seriousness. Point to that glory which you think so little about, and in preference to which you choose earthly things as your portion. (2) Let me also remind you that to this glory, with all its brightness and all its reality, and all its eternity, you are invited. (F. Lear.) The God of all the graces You know that the word “ grace” has many meanings, both in the original language of the verse and in our own language. As we use it familiarly, it is often “ beauty.” So that we have it, “ The God of all beauty.” And when you are admiring the gracefulness of some human form, in its finished delicacy; or looking upon the loveliness of nature-never forget that He is “ the God of beauty.” Let us look at it in another of its meanings. “ Grace” is, properly, a free gift, arid since every good thing is utterly undeserved by us, every good thing is of “ grace.” All that raises and gladdens life-all goes to make “ the grace of God.” But we generally accept the word as having reference to spiritual good, For instance, we take it as relating to the Christian virtues, “ the fruits of the Spirit” ; and we call them “ the graces.” And He is “ the God of all the graces.” Now, there are some “ graces” that, at this moment, you feel that you particularly need. Remind yourself, and remind God, that He is the God of that “ grace” ; that it is all His: His to give; a part of His province; an attribute of His sovereignty. But “ grace” is more distinctly the pardon of sin. The pardon of sin is a “ grace” ; a privilege; not purchased-by anything we can say, or do, or think, or pray, or believe. But pardon is not all you want. From the spiritual cradle to the gate of heaven, it is all of “ grace.” You may safely, then, reason thus: “ Lord, Thou didst call me. Thou didst it of Thy free favour. Therefore carry on, and perfect Thine own work.” And in life, as it goes on, your providences want their “ graces.” And every providence requires its own appropriate and comforting “ grace.” Sorrow and joy, bodily health and sickness, successes and disappointments-all want their own proper, rectifying, effectual “ grace.” (J. Vaughan, M. A.) Who hath called us unto His eternal glory.-Glory I. What, then, is the destiny of the saints? God has “ called us unto His eternal glory.” “ Glory!” does not the very word astound you? Think of glory for us who have deserved eternal shame! Glory for us poor creatures who are often ashamed of ourselves!1. This glory has been promised. What said David? (Psalms 73:24). 2. It is to this glory that we have been called. We are called to repentance, to faith, to holiness, we are called to perseverance, and all this that we may afterwards attain unto glory. We have another Scripture of like import in 1 Thessalonians 2:12. 3. And we are not only called to it, but glory is especially joined with justification (Romans 8:30). If you are justified by the righteousness of Christ, you shall be glorified through Christ Jesus, for thus hath God purposed, and so must it be. Do you not remember how salvation itself is linked with glory? (2 Timothy 2:10). The two things are riveted together, and cannot be separated. 4. The saved ones must partake of the glory of God, for this are they being prepared every day (Romans 9:23). This is the process which commenced in regeneration, and is going on in us every day in the work of sanctification. We cannot be glorified so long as sin remains in us; we must first be pardoned, renewed, and sanctified, and then we are fitted to be glorified. 5. Thus, then, it seems we are called to glory, and we are being prepared for it; is it not also a sweet thought that our present fellowship with Christ is the guarantee of it? (Romans 8:17). “ No cross, no crown” : but he that has shared the battle shall partake in the victory. 6. I have not yet done, for there is a text, in Hebrews 2:10, which is well worthy of our consideration: we are to be brought to glory. We might despair of ever getting into the glory land if we had not One to bring us there, for the pilgrim’ s road is rough and beset with many foes. 7. This glory will be for our entire manhood, for our body as well as for our soul. It will be rendered perfect. The body of a child will be fully developed, and the dwarf will attain to full stature. The blind shall not be sightless in heaven, neither shall the lame be halt, nor shall the palsied tremble. The deaf shall hear, and the dumb shall sing God’ s praises. II. Wherein doth this destiny consist?1. Reckon that glory to a saint means, first of all, purified character. God’ s Holy Spirit, when He has finished His work, will leave in us no trace of sin; no temptation shall be able to touch us, there will be in us no relics of our past and fallen state. 2. Next, I understand by “ glory” our perfected manhood. Hero we are but in embryo: our minds are but the seeds, or the bulbs, out of which come the flower and glory of a nobler manhood. Your body is to be developed into something infinitely brighter and better than the bodies of men here below: and as for the soul, we cannot guess to what an elevation it shall be raised in Christ Jesus. 3. Further, by “ glory” and coming to glory I think we must understand complete victory. 4. An invaluable ingredient in true glory is the Divine approval. One approving glance from the eye of Jesus, one accepting word from the mouth of the Father, will be glory enough for any one of us. 5. But this is not all: children of God will have the glory of reflecting the glory of God. When any of God’ s unfallen creatures shall wish to see the greatness of God’ s goodness, and mercy, and love, they that dwell in heaven will point out a glorified saint. Whenever any spirit from far off regions desires to know what is meant by faithfulness and grace, some angel will reply, “ Go and talk with those who have been redeemed from among men.” Oh, this shall be our glory, that God shall shine through us to the astonishment of all. 6. In certain cases a man’ s glory lies in his relationships. If any of the royal family should come to your houses you would receive them with respect; yes, and even as they went along the street they would be spied out, and passers-by would say, “ That is the prince!” and they would honour the son of our good Queen. But royal descent is a poor business compared with being allied to the King of kings. 7. Then there will be connected with this the fact that we shall be connected with Jesus in everything. For do not you see it was because of our fall that Christ came here to save men; when He wrought out a perfect righteousness, it was all for us; when He died, it was all for us; and when He rose again, it was all for us? And what is more, we lived in Christ, we died in Him, we were buried in Him and rose in Him, and we shall ascend into heaven to reign with Him. 8. And yet this is not all, for there in heaven we shall dwell in the immediate presence of God. We shall dwell with Him in nearest and dearest fellowship! All the felicity of the Most High will be our felicity. 9. Highest of all our glory will be the enjoyment of God Himself. He will be our exceeding joy: this bliss will swallow up every other, the blessedness of God. “ The Lord is my portion,” saith my soul. “ Whom have I in heaven but Thee? and there is none upon earth that I desire beside Thee.” Our God shall be our glory. 10. Yet bear with me, I have left out a word again: the text has it, “ Unto His eternal glory.” Ay, but that is the gem of the ring. The glory which God has in reserve for His chosen will never come to an end: it will stay with us, and we shall stay with it, forever. It will always be glory, too; its brightness will never become dim; we shall never be tired of it, or sated with it. III. What influence should all this have upon our hearts?1. I think it ought to excite desire in many here present that they might attain unto glory by Christ Jesus. 2. This ought to move us to the feeling of fear. If there be such a glory as this, let us tremble lest by any means we should come short of it. 3. If we are right, how this ought to move us to gratitude! What a contrast to our deserts! 4. It should move us to a dauntless courage. If this glory is to be had, do we not feel like the heroes in Bunyan’ s picture? Before the dreamer there stood a fair palace, and he saw persons walking upon the top of it, clad in light, and singing. Around the door stood armed men to keep back those who would enter. Then a brave man came up to one who had a writer’ s ink horn by his side, and said, “ Set down my name” ; and straightway the warrior drew his sword, and fought with all his might, until he had cut his way to the door. Will you not draw your swords and fight against sin till you have overcome it? (C. H. Spurgeon) After that ye have suffered a while.-The consolations and sufferings of the believer, and their effects upon his character I. The consolation here set before us. “ God hath called us unto His eternal glory by Christ Jesus.” In such wonderful terms the Word of God expresses the blessed remedy which His mercy hath provided for the evils of man’ s fallen state; and you cannot fail to observe how much more they express than a mere relief from such evils. It is a call to a state of actual happiness. It is a call to a state of positive excellence or holiness. It is, finally, a call to a state which we have no language to describe, nor material of thought to imagine-namely, a state of “ glory.” II. The course through which you must pass. “ After that ye have suffered a while.” Men have sometimes made it an objection against the goodness of God, that there is so much suffering in this world. This they might do with more reason if they could show that men are innocent in this world and deserve no correction, or even that they are, willing to be prepared for the happiness of another world and need no such calls to serious consideration; but, in the present sinful state of fallen man, the very goodness of God requires that there should be suffering. That suffering is indeed, in justice, the punishment for sin, but at the same time it is, in mercy, the corrective of our wanderings. “ God hath called us to His eternal glory” ; but how little do men naturally care even for eternal glory, so long as they can find their pleasure elsewhere? The very bounties of their Creator unhappily rather drive them to a greater distance from Him, instead of drawing them nearer. He needs to wither these comforts, or to interrupt our enjoyment of them, before we can see their insufficiency and remember the better blessings awaiting us. It is generally, in short, only after we have “ suffered a while,” that we think of “ the eternal glory” to which God hath called us. You cannot indeed be supposed to wish for “ afflictions, or to welcome them as your choice. This is always your best consolation under them, that they are neither sent idly nor borne uselessly. They not only serve to show you more dearly the true value of the eternal glory which awaiteth you, but also to prepare your souls the better for its enjoyment. In this view they bring a blessing which compensates for their evil. III. The effect to be produced both by your consolations and sufferings as Christians, viz., that you may be “ made perfect, stablished, strengthened, settled.” (J. Brewster, D. D.) The Church’ s present and future I. The church’ s present lot. “ After that ye have suffered a while.” It seems a strange thing to say that there is a necessity for suffering while here. The Church’ s lot is not here intended to be anything else; not that it is always the same in amount of suffering, but that it never is wholly free from it. The suffering may be inward or it may be outward. But mark, the apostle says it is “ a little while.” We read of “ much” tribulation and “ great” tribulation, but here it is for a little. “ Our light affliction which is but for a moment.” Perhaps it may seem long to us. II. The church’ s perfection, completion, or consummation through means of suffering. “ Make you perfect, stablish, strengthen, settle you.” “ Make you perfect.” As if thus-“ Make you perfect” : that is to say, “ stablish, strengthen, settle you.” “ Perfect.” The word is, literally, “ fully equip you,” equip you as a soldier is equipped for warfare. There are many things that go to equip a soldier: not merely his armour, not merely his sword and his shield, but his bodily frame. Now the word first of all is a full fit out, and a full equipment, so that he shall in the end, when the process is completed, be fully ready for that which is before him. “ Make you perfect” is the meaning of every trial.1. “ Stablish” is more exactly rendered by “ firm,” “ consolidate,” “ make firm.” This, I should say, is the first part of the threefold part of the process which these three words describe: the consolidation of the Christian character, making him firm in all parts of his spiritual frame. 2. Strength. There is strength as well as consolidation needed. There are many things that are firm and consolidated that are not strong. God’ s object is to make us strong. 3. The third thing here specified is settling, that is, firmly rooting and grounding, so that we shall not be moved. These words describe the process that is going on through the discipline which God is exercising through every son that He receiveth. (H. Bonar, D. D.) Suffering and perfection Peter speaks of our “ having suffered a while,” and then being made “ perfect.” What a consolatory juxtaposition have we here-suffering first, and perfection afterwards. To make me enjoy heaven, He causes me to weep a while here. Music is all the more delicious when preceded by discord; peace is the more prized after war; health after sickness; and life, in all its beauty and vigour, will be only truly enjoyed “ after that we have suffered while.” Thanks to Peter for that little word “ awhile.” It is not always “ night.” It shall be day when the sun gets up. It shall not be always suffering with us. No-no; already the handkerchief is shaken out, wherewith tears are to be wiped away. (John Macfarlane, D. D.) An apostolic prayer It is the first duty of Christian minister to endeavour to convert sinners to God. The second object of the Christian ministry is the improvement of those already converted. Those trees of righteousness are not only to be planted in the garden of the Lord, but to be watered also. I. The character of jehovah. He is called “ the God of all grace.” II. As operation. “ Who hath called us to His eternal glory by Christ Jesus.” This glory is eternal. A future state of being is intended to develop all our spiritual excellences, and therefore it is called glory. III. We have here a prayer. “ But the God of all grace, who hath called us unto His eternal glory by Christ Jesus, after that ye have suffered a while, make you perfect, stablish, strengthen, settle you.” Peter here has a pleonasm which shows how earnestly he felt it in his own mind; he was deeply impressed, but could hardly find words to express his meaning and desire. “ Do for you exceeding abundantly above all that ye can ask or think.” There are, however, in this prayer three things which we may distinctly observe.1. First, it includes much progress ill religion: “ Make you perfect.” Christians should never be satisfied. In your secular affairs you wish not only to go on, but to prosper. Why not show the same concern in your religious affairs? A little does not satisfy you in temporals, why should it in spirituals? especially since the latter is much more necessary and desirable; and you are commanded not only to have the Spirit, but to be “ filled with the Spirit.” 2. Another thing to be observed in this prayer is confirmation. For it is to little purpose to gain unless you retain also. “ Stablish, strengthen, settle you.” 3. But observe, thirdly, the Divine agency necessary for this. Peter not only admonishes, but prays for them. Who is to make them so? “ Why,” said he, “ the God of all grace, who hath called us to His eternal glory.” Who is to be the finisher but He who is the Author? “ He who hath begun a good work in you will perform it unto the day of Jesus Christ.” “ He shall fulfil in you all the good pleasure of His will, and the work of faith with power.” IV. Consider the concession. “ After that ye have suffered a while.” First, a suffering state is to precede their finishing their course with joy. Yes, before you reign with Him you are to suffer with Him. In the beginning of the gospel the sufferings of Christians arose much from persecution. I have known persons who have probably suffered more than many of the martyrs. The martyr has had public excitement; these have suffered in obscurity: the martyr’ s sufferings have soon ended; but here the melancholy experience stretches out from week to week, and even from year to year. These sufferings are needful: God, who loves His people infinitely, would not allow them to suffer without some gracious design. Yes, the fallow ground requires the ploughshare to prepare it for the seed. Even the vine needs the pruning knife, that it may bring forth fruit. (W. Jay, M. A.) Stablish, strengthen, settle you.- The good and means of establishment Some think these words are spoken in the way of a promise from God; others think they are spoken in the way of prayer to God.1. The mercy and blessing prayed for. It is expressed in four words: “ Perfect, stablish, strengthen, and settle you.” The first word, which we render “ perfect,” should, I think, be translated otherwise. It is the same word that is used in Matthew 4:21 and Mark 1:19 for mending of their nets; and the same that is used in Galatians 6:1 : “ You that are spiritual ‘ restore’ such an one with the spirit of meekness” ; and it signifies such a restoring as is of unjointed members. Now these Christians being scattered, the apostle prays that God would please to joint them again. Thus the God of all grace, after you have suffered and been shattered, bring you into order, restore and repair you. It is a great blessing of God, and worthy of all our prayer, to be established and settled in the truth and good ways of God. Settling grace and mercy, in opposition both to outward and inward trouble, is a great mercy and well worth praying for. 1. First, it is a great mercy and blessing for a nation or kingdom to be in a settled state and condition outwardly; for it is the mercy promised, and promised mercies are no small mercies (Jeremiah 24:6; Jeremiah 32:37; Jeremiah 32:41; 2 Samuel 7:16). 2. Secondly, as it is a mercy for a nation to be settled and established, so for the Church of God; for when the Church hath this rest, then it is edified, walking in the fear of the Lord and in the comfort of the Holy Ghost (Acts 9:31). Establishment is the mercy promised to the Church also (Isaiah 2:2). It is that mercy and blessing which the apostles laboured for continually (Acts 14:21). This they also prayed for; and therefore as the Apostle Peter shuts up his Epistle with this prayer for the dispersed Christian-Jews, so the Apostle Paul doth close up his Epistle to the Corinthians with the same desire and prayer for them (2 Corinthians 13:1-14) And Romans 16:25. And as it is the mercy prayed for, so sometimes it is made the signal mercy whereby the Church is declared to be the Church of Christ: “ Whose house ye are,” saith the apostle to the Hebrews, “ if you hold fast the confidence of your rejoicing stedfast to the end.” 3. But especially it is a great mercy for a particular soul to be settled in the truth and established in the good ways of God. It is the ground of all our fruitfulness: ye know how it is with a tree or plant, though in itself it be never so good, yet if it be not settled in the earth it bringeth forth no fruit: if the plant be good and the soil good, it may bring forth good fruit; but if you be always removing it from one place to another, it cannot bring forth fruit. It is the bottom of all our praises. The birds do not ordinarily sing till they be set; they do not usually sing flying; but when they are fixed: so saith David, “ My heart is fixed, O God, my heart is fixed” ; and what then? then saith he, “ I will sing and give praise” ; but not till then. And what is the reason that many pass so many years of their lives in doubtings and fears, never praising God for any love or mercy to them? but because they are unsettled in their spiritual estate and condition. It is the beginning of our perseverance: then I begin to persevere when I begin to settle and to be established. As instability is the beginning of apostasy, so settledness is the beginning of perseverance. It is that good thing which pleaseth God exceedingly. God was so pleased with Jehoshaphat upon that account that He passed by his infirmities, even because his heart was fixed and established (2 Chronicles 19:2). And it is also the character of a good and gracious person, whereby he is distinguished from the ungodly of the world. A good man lives and dwelleth at the sign of a settled conversation; he is planted by the rivers of water (Psalms 1:1-6); the wicked are as the chaff that is driven to and fro, not settled, not planted. II. It is worthy of all our prayers. It is a great blessing, and worthy of all our prayers, to be settled and established in the good ways of God. It is that mercy, grace, and blessing which we all need. It is God only who doth give out this grace, it belongs unto Him alone to establish nations, churches, and persons. He is able to establish those who do come to Him for it: “ Now to Him that is of power to establish you,” etc. (Romans 16:25). He is willing to do it: “ But the Lord is faithful, who will establish you and keep you from evil” (2 Thessalonians 3:3). He is engaged to do it, for He hath promised to do it, as hath been proved already, and it is His prerogative: “ Now He which establisheth us with you in Christ, and hath anointed us, is God” (2 Corinthians 1:21). What shall we do, then, that we may be established?1. As for a nation or Christian state. It must first settle religion, for religion is the mainmast, and if that be not strengthened all the tackling will be loose (Isaiah 33:23). Then must there be care taken for a succession of godly magistrates. And therefore let them and all the people remember the good counsel of Jehoshaphat (2 Chronicles 20:20). 2. As for a Church. If particular churches would be settled and established, they must have all the officers and ordinances of Christ then; as a ship under sail, with all its sails out, is beautiful and doth move evenly, so shall they also do. Oh, that churches therefore would take heed of these great sins, pride, and covetousness, which will always keep them in an unsettled condition. But especially it is the duty of all the churches to pray much for this great mercy of establishment (Isaiah 62:6). 3. As for particular persons. Wouldst thou be established in the truth and good ways of God? Then observe what those things are which do make others unsettled, and take heed thereof. Surely either it is because they do want primitive breakings; for the stony ground comes to nothing at the last, though it hath much joy at the first, because it wants depth of earth. The stick that is thrust into the earth is more easily pulled up than the plant which is rooted in the earth. So are all those who have no root in themselves. Or because they take up great resolutions without answerable pre-deliberations; whereas we know that the needle must play about the polar point before it comes to stand and settle; he that would hit the mark must take his level before he parts with his arrow. And if men resolve before they have fully considered, they will ere long be unresolved again. Or because men do not walk by a settled rule: he can never be settled that doth not walk by a settled rule. So long as I want the Divine counsel of the Word, my heart is like a vagrant that is most unstable, said Bernard; for whilst I am not subject to God, I am contrary to myself. Or because they are divided in their own hearts. A double-minded man is unstable in all his ways-a heart for the world, yet a good mind to Christ; how is it possible but they should be most unsettled? Or because they are too confident of their own strength and judgment: whereas the only way to be firm and stedfast is to be sensible of one’ s own infirmity. Or because men do forsake the ministry which Christ hath given to the churches for their edification, perfection, and establishment (Ephesians 4:11-14). Or because they have too fair an opinion of those that are erroneous, thinking that they may be godly, though they be never so unsound in their judgments. Or because that men do not improve their Christian communion for the life and power of godliness, but for light only, and discoursing notions: whereas Paul saith (1 Timothy 6:20-21). Or because they have not been built on the rock Christ, but on some sandy foundation: whereas the Psalmist saith, “ He set my feet on a rock, and established my goings” (Psalms 40:2). But what shall I do that I may be more settled in regard of my judgment, and that I may be established in the present truth? Get a clear and distinct understanding in the things and truths of the gospel: labour, not only to know, but to get a clear and judicious apprehension and clearness in the truths of Christ. Be sure that you do not make any impression the rule and square of your judgment; judge not doctrines by impressions. “ We have a more sure word of prophecy, whereunto ye shall do well that you take heed, as unto a light shining in a dark place” (1 Peter 1:19). The Word of God without is my rule, the light within is my help to understand that rule; but if I judge of doctrines by impressions of the Word on my heart I can never be settled; therefore take heed of that. Get into the house of God; God’ s house is an house of establishment; there He commandeth His blessing, and life forever more; there the Lord hath promised to make men pillars for stedfastness (Revelation 3:12). Whatever truth you know do not only know it in a spiritual way, but put the same into practice; the way to be established in the truth is to walk therein (Colossians 2:6-7). But what shall I do that 1 may be more settled in my life and established in the good ways of God? You must be very sensible of your own unsettled ness, and be humbled for it; he is not far from establishment that is very sensible of his own unsettledness. Labour for a solid and a serious spirit: a serious spirit and an established heart go together (Proverbs 4:26). Be sure that you do not live upon your condition itself, but on the God of your condition; that is perpetual which hath a perpetuating cause. The more delight and contentment that you find in the good ways of God, the more your hearts will be fixed, established, and staked down to them; comfort and establishment go together (2 Thessalonians 2:17). Do you desire to be fixed and established? labour more and more, then, to make your way to heaven easy and comfortable to you. (W. Bridge, M. A.) Christian stability, strength, and establishment Through “ suffering,” and alter the “ suffering” will come four things: “ Make you perfect, stablish, strengthen, settle you.”1. By the first, I understand theft God will knit you together, one part with another. So that, as we say of anything which is entire and unbroken, “ It is perfect,” so it will be with you. Your mind, your affections, and your soul, and your body one-living for the same end, living the same life, by the same Christ. Yourself one man, a whole, “ perfect.” 2. Then, made one with yourself, His one Spirit animating the whole being, He will “ stablish” you, give you firmness and stability. Now is not it exactly what you want? Not feelings, principles-“ stability.” You shall feel your foundation under you deeper than the everlasting hills! 3. He will fulfil His beautiful promise. “ Will He plead against me with His great power? No; but He will put strength into me.” You will become-that which in such a world as this you need-that which is the secret of all peace, of all decision, of all usefulness in life-a strong character. 4. And so we travel to the highest, the last, and the best-“ He will settle you.” He will give you rest. Heaven has been beautifully defined “ the rest of desire.” But how is “ settling,” rest? To “ settle,” is to repose upon your foundation; to “ settle,” is to have an attraction, and to that attraction always to point. The ship “ settles” to her anchor; the mountains “ settle” to their base; the magnet “ settles” to its pole. So God will “ settle” you on Christ. And not only that. Every brick put into the wall, every storey added to a well-built house, “ settles” the whole structure. In like manner God, enabling you to add work to work and usefulness to usefulness, will so “ settle” you, by your increase, while He “ builds you up in your own most holy faith” ; and then “ settled” on Christ, in Christ, to Christ, for Christ, with Christ, you will not be the restless creature you once were; you will not need to go about here and there for satisfaction, for you have a resting place, and in that place of your rest you will understand the wisdom and the order of the arrangement and the exquisite completeness of the Divine plan. (J. Vaughan, M. A.) A New Year’ s benediction Peter turns from exhortation to prayer. Having exhorted believers to walk stedfastly he bends his knee and commends them to the guardian care of Heaven, imploring upon them one of the largest blessings for which the most affectionate heart ever made application. I. What the apostle asks for all to whom this epistle was written. He asks for them: perfection, establishment, strengthening, settling.1. Perfection. Indeed, though this be a large prayer, and the jewel is a diamond of the first water and of the finest size, yet is it absolutely necessary to a Christian that he should ultimately arrive at perfection. What were a Christian if he were not perfected? Have you never seen the human face divine starting out from the chiselled marble? You have seen the exquisite skill of the sculptor, and you have said within yourself, “ What a marvellous thing will this be! what a matchless specimen of human skill!” But, alas I it never was completed, but was left unfinished. And do you imagine, any of you, that God will begin to sculpture out a perfect being and not complete it? Hath God taken us as unhewn stones out of the quarry, and hath He begun to work upon us and show His Divine art, His marvellous wisdom and grace, and will He afterwards cast us away? Oh, the prayer shall be fulfilled. After that ye have suffered a while, God shall make you perfect, if He has begun the good work in you. But it must be after that ye have suffered a while. There is no way of ridding you of your dross and your tin but by the flames of the furnace of affliction. 2. Let us now proceed to the second blessing of the benediction-establishment. What is a Christian man better than the flower of the field, which is here today, and which withers when the sun is risen with fervent heat, unless God establish him? Oh, may God fulfil to you this rich benediction, that your goodness may not be as the morning cloud and as the early dew which passeth away; may every good thing that you have be abiding. May your character be not a writing upon the sand, but an inscription upon the rock. But mark, we cannot have this blessing until after we have suffered a while. It is of no use our hoping that we shall be well-rooted if no March winds have passed over us. The young oak cannot be expected to strike its roots so deep as the old one. 3. Now for the third blessing, which is strengthening. Ah, this is a very necessary blessing too for all Christians. There be some whose characters seem to be fixed and established. But still they lack force and vigour. Oh, may God strengthen you this year! But remember, if He does do so, you will then have to suffer. “ After that ye have suffered a while,” may He strengthen you. There is sometimes an operation performed upon horses which one must consider to be cruel-the firing of them to make their tendons strong. Now, every Christian man before he can be strengthened must be fired. He must have his nerves and tendons braced up with the hot iron of affliction. 4. And now I come to the last blessing of the four-“ settling.” I will not say that this last blessing is greater than the other three, but it is a stepping stone to each; and, strange to say, it is often the result of a gradual attainment of the three preceding ones. “ Settle you!” Oh, how many there are that are never settled! The tree which should be transplanted every week would soon die. Nay, if it were moved, no matter how skilfully, once every year, no gardener would expect fruit from it. How ninny Christians there be that are transplanting themselves constantly, even as to their doctrinal sentiments! Stand firm and steadfast by that which ye have been taught, and ever seek the spirit of the Apostle Paul, “ If any man preach any other gospel than that which we have received, let him be accursed.” If, however, I wished you to be firm in your doctrines, my prayer would be that you may be especially settled in your faith. You believe in Jesus Christ the Son of God, and you rest in Him. But sometimes your faith wavers, then you lose your joy and comfort. I pray that your faith may become so settled that it may never be a matter of question with you whether Christ is yours or not, but that you may say confidently, “ I know whom I have believed, and I am persuaded,” etc. Then I pray that you may be settled in your aims and designs. See what niche it is that God would have you occupy. Stand in it, and don’ t be got out of it by all the laughter that comes upon you. If you believe God has called you to a work, do it. Be not weary in well-doing, for in due season ye shall reap if ye faint not. Be ye settled. But you will not be settled unless you suffer. You will become settled in your faith and settled in your aims by suffering. II. The reasons why the apostle peter expected that his prayer would be heard.1. Did not unbelief whisper in Peter’ s ear, “ Peter, thou askest too much. If thou hadst said, ‘ Lord, make them holy,’ had it not been a sufficient prayer” ? “ No,” saith Peter, “ I am sure I shall receive what I have asked for, for I am in the first place asking it of the God of all grace.” Not only the God of the little graces we have received already, but the God of the great boundless grace which is stored up for us in the promise, but which as yet we have not received in our experience. “ The God of all grace” ; of quickening grace, of convincing grace, of pardoning grace, of believing grace, the God of comforting, supporting, sustaining grace. Surely when we come to Him we cannot come for too much. 2. Unbelief might have said, “ Ah, Peter, it is true that God is the God of all grace, but He is as a fountain shut up, as waters sealed.” “ Ah,” saith Peter, “ get thee hence, Satan; thou savourest not the things that be of God. It is not a sealed fountain of all grace, for it has begun to flow.” “ The God of grace hath called us.” Calling is the first drop of mercy that trickleth into the thirsty lip of the dying man. Calling is the first golden link of the endless chain of eternal mercies. If God has called me, I may ask Him to establish and keep me; I may pray that the bush may burn, but not be consumed. Dare I ask that to life’ s latest hour I may be faithful to God, because God is faithful to me? Yes, I may ask it, and I shall have it too; because the God that calls will give the rest. 3. But I think there is a stronger reason coming yet: “ The God of all grace, who hath called us unto tits eternal glory.” Has God called me to heaven, and is there anything on earth He will deny me? If He has called me to dwell in heaven, is not perfection necessary for me? May I not, therefore, ask for it? If He has called me to glory, is it not necessary that I should be strengthened to fight my way thither? May I not ask for strengthening? 4. The last reason why the apostle expected that his benediction would be fulfilled was this: “ Who hath called us to His eternal glory by Christ Jesus.” It is not a hard thing to believe that Christ’ s blood was sufficient to purchase every blessing for me. If I go to God’ s treasury without Christ, I am afraid to ask for anything, but when Christ is with me I can then ask for everything. (C. H. Spurgeon.) 1 Peter 5:12 Silvanus.Silvanus I. The importance of subordinate work. A chief man “ accustomed to pull the stroke oar,” yet content in his relation to an apostle to occupy a lower position. Silvanus could not write letters like Peter, but he could carry them when written. Those who can do great work in the Church are but units, those who are fitted for subordinate work millions. It is difficult to say what is important and what subordinate. The tiny rivet is just as important as the piston. The folks in the rear looking after the supplies, of whom one never reads in the despatches, are just as essential as those in the front. Be not too proud to be subordinate. Silvanus was content to be a satellite of somebody all his life long. II. The importance and obligation of persistently doing our work though nobody takes any notice of it. Silvanus did not sit still with his “ hands in his pockets” simply because nothing was said about him, no notice taken of him. Keep “ pegging away,” noticed or unnoticed. This man did so through years of oblivion. And yet after all his services were noticed: we are talking about them nineteen centuries afterwards. III. An example of a character we can all emulate. “ A faithful brother.” A great genius, a wise philosopher, an eloquent preacher? No, a faithful brother. It may be a foolish brother, but faithful. We can all emulate that, whatever our opportunities. If we are faithful, men will know where to have us, will know we shall not shirk obligation, will not scamp our work. (A. Maclaren, D. D.) Exhorting and testifying.-Testimony and exhortation I. In that the apostle testifieth by sound arguments that they were in the right way, note that it is needful for everyone to know and be well assured of the religion he professeth, that it is the truth of God, for there be many religions, yet but one truth; miss that, and perish. We must not go by guess in our religion.1. This rebukes those that take occasion, because there be so many religions, therefore they will meddle with none, but take their ease and tarry till all agree. 2. It rebukes those that profess a religion, as all do, but know not whether it be truth or not, and have no ground from the Word for the same. 3. As it is our duty to testify and prove our religion, so it is yours to know and acknowledge it, that if an angel should come and inform you otherwise, you might not give ear to him. II. They that know the truth ought so highly to esteem it, and be so thankful to God for it, as they never suffer themselves to be removed therefrom, whether for hope of gain or fear of trouble, etc. We must buy the truth, nor sell it. III. In that the apostle takes such care with those that now stood in the truth to hold them therein, note that it is a hard matter for those to hold out steadfast that have begun to do well, for our heart is deceitful, the devil is subtle and strong, and there are also many seducers, many baits, many discouragements, etc. IV. In that his Epistle consists in testifying by sound reasons for the confirmation of their judgments, and then of the exhortation for the whetting on of their affections, note that both parts are necessary to preaching, the one still to accompany the other. People must make use and account of both, regard doctrine for knowledge, and suffer exhortation for practice. (John Rogers.) An apostolic testimony and exhortation “ I have written briefly,” says Peter. But his letter, in comparison with the other epistles of the New Testament, is longer than many of them. He regards it as short when measured by the greatness of its theme. For all words which are devoted to witnessing to the glory of God revealed in Jesus Christ must be narrow and insufficient. So in that word “ briefly” we get a glimpse of the apostle’ s conception of the transcendent greatness of the gospel which he had to proclaim. I. Peter’ s testimony. Now there is a very beautiful, though not to superficial readers obvious, significance in this testimony. “ This is the true grace of God.” What is meant by “ this” ? Not merely the teaching which he has been giving in the preceding part of the letter, but that which somebody else had been teaching. Now these churches in Asia Minor to whom this letter was sent were in all probability founded by the Apostle Paul, or by men working under his direction. And here Peter puts his seal on the teaching that had come from his brother apostle, and says, “ The thing that you have learned, and that I have had no part in communicating to you, this is the true grace of God.” We have an interesting evidence, all the stronger because unobtrusive, of the cordial understanding between the two great leaders of the Church in apostolic times. But, apart altogether from that thought, note two things-the one the substance of this witness bearing, and the other Peter’ s right to bear it. As to the substance of the testimony-“ grace” is properly love in exercise towards inferior and sinful creatures. And, says Peter, the inmost significance of the gospel is that it is the revelation of such a love as being in God’ s heart. Another meaning springs out of this, That same message is not only a revelation of love, but it is a communication of the gifts of love. And the “ true grace of God” is shorthand for all the rich abundance and variety of the sevenfold perfect gifts for spirit and heart which come from faith in Jesus Christ. Thus this gospel of the Divine Christ that died for our sins, and lives to give His Spirit to all waiting hearts-this Is the true grace of God. It is very needful for us to keep in view always that lofty conception of what this gospel is, that we may not bring it down to the level of a mere theory of religion, nor think of it as a mere publication of dry doctrines. Further, what right had this man to take this position and say, “ I testify that this is the true grace of God” ? He was no great genius; he did not know anything about comparative religion, which is nowadays supposed to be absolutely essential to understanding any one religion. Well, there are two or three answers-one peculiar to him, and others common to all Christian people. The one peculiar to him is, as I believe, that he was rightly conscious that Jesus Christ had bestowed upon him the power to witness, and the authority to impose his testimony upon men as a word from God. In the most inartificial and matter-of-course way Peter here lets us see the apostolic conception of apostolic authority. We Christian people have a right to authority based on personal experience. If we have plunged deep into the secrets of God, and lived closely in communion with Him, and for ourselves have found the grace of God, His love, and the gifts of His love coming into our lives, then we too have a right to go to men and say, “ Never mind about me; never mind about whether I am wise or foolish. I do not argue, but I tell you I have tasted the manna, and it is sweet; I have drunk of the water, and it comes cool and fresh from the rock. One thing I know-that whereas I was blind, now I see.” If we testify thus, and back up our witness with lives corresponding, some who are wholly untouched by a preacher’ s eloquence and controversialist’ s arguments will probably be led by our attestation to make the experiment for themselves. II. Further, notice Peter’ s exhortation. According to the right rendering, the last clause is, “ in which stand fast.” The translation in the Authorised Version, “ in which ye stand,” gives a true thought, though not the apostle’ s intention here. For, as a matter of fact, men cannot stand upright and firm unless their feet are planted on the rock of that true grace of God. It is no use talking to men about steadfastness of purpose, stability of life, erect independence, resistance to antagonistic forces, unless you give them something to stand upon. And the only standing ground that will never yield, nor, like the quicksand with the tide round it, melt away-we do not know how from beneath our feet, is “ the grace of God.” However, that is not what the Apostle Peter meant. He says, “ See that you keep firmly your position in reference to this true grace of God.” The text exhorts us against ourselves and against the temptations of the world, which are always present with us, and are far more operative in bringing down the temperature of the Christian Church and of its individual members than any chilling that arises from intellectual doubts. And how are we to obey the exhortation? Well, plainly, if “ this” is the revelation of God in Jesus Christ, “ the true grace of God,” which alone will give stability to our feet, then we “ shall not stand fast” in it unless we make conscious efforts to apprehend, and comprehend, and keep hold of it in our minds as well as in our hearts. Again, try to keep heart and mired in contact with it, amidst distractions and daily duties. Try to bring the principles of the New Testament consciously to bear on the small details of everyday life. Be sure that you desire, and put yourself in the attitude of receiving, the gifts of that love, which are the graces of the Christian life. And when you have got them apply them, “ that you may be able to withstand in the evil day; and having done all, to stand.” (A. Maclaren, D. D.) The true grace of God. The gospel of the grace of God I. The economy of the gospel is, throughout its constitution and influence, a grand display of Divine grace.1. We must first direct you to the announcements of the gospel as to the methods by which blessings are meritoriously secured. 2. We have also to direct you to the announcements of the gospel as to the influence by which blessings are actually imparted. 3. We are also to notice the announcements of the gospel as to the nature of the blessings themselves which are enjoyed. 4. We must also notice the announcements of the gospel as to the extent to which these blessings are to be diffused. II. The economy of the gospel, as a grand display of divine grace, impresses important demands upon all to whom it is proclaimed.1. The gospel, as “ the true grace of God,” should be cordially believed. 2. The gospel, as “ the true grace of God,” must be steadfastly adhered to. 3. The gospel, as “ the true grace of God,” must be zealously diffused. (James Parsons.) True grace Grace, in scriptural language, denotes, in general, free favour to the unworthy, to the guilty. Accordingly the gospel, which proclaims salvation freely to all, is here denominated “ the grace of God.” Now the gospel may be considered in three views. First, and most characteristically, it may be contemplated as a promise of life and salvation through Jesus Christ, fraught with the richest blessings. Again, the gospel may be viewed as a testimony, in which the messengers of the Lord of Hosts, as faithful witnesses, announce certain great facts, appealing to the judgment of God as that which shall confirm the truth of their testimony, as well as avenge the guilt and disobedience of such as slight or gainsay it. Lastly, the gospel is frequently represented as a promulgation of privilege, involving, of course, a prescription of duty, pointing to the hope of man, explaining the plan of salvation through the Cross of Christ, and inculcating upon all the necessity of immediately embracing this way of life, and availing themselves of that “ grace which reigns through righteousness unto eternal life, by Jesus Christ our Lord.” Obviously the apostle, in our text, while he doubtless includes the first of these considerations, is viewing the gospel immediately in the two last as an exhortation inculcating duty, and as a testimony proclaiming truth and inviting men to improve it. And he employs both expressions to indicate his own earnestness in the address, as well as the deep interest which they had in acting upon it. We exhort and testify, then, with Peter, and with all the apostles, that the method of redemption proclaimed in the gospel, by sovereign mercy reigning through the Cross of Christ, is the “ true grace” by God, that alone which is founded in fact, which can yield satisfaction to the reflecting mind; and that all other plans of salvation which men have invented, however specious they may appear or confidently they may have been put forward, as calculated to honour God and magnify His mercy, will prove delusory, and, if persisted in, destructive. I. There are those who expect ultimate salvation on this principle, that God from his great goodness will overlook sin, and decline to push it as a matter of course. This is an opinion which hardly any of you will avow, and perhaps none of you will advocate. Yet it is congenial to the corrupted mind, has been not only adopted, but argued by others, and, there is reason to fear, is secretly entertained by very many. “ The sinners of My people say,” is the testimony of God concerning the Jews in the time of Amos, “ the evil shall not overtake or prevent us.” And, again, saith God by Zephaniah, “ The men that are settled upon their lees say in their hearts, The Lord will not do good, neither will He do evil.” And, at an earlier period of their history, this is represented by Moses as language which might be justly ascribed to them, though equally indicative of cattishness and of impiety, “ I shall have peace, though I walk in the imagination of mine heart, and add drunkenness to thirst.” Such impunity, indeed, would be amazing “ grace” on the part of God-i.e., free favour to the guilty. But is it “ true grace” ? Is it such grace as can be imputed to Him without impiety? Assuredly not. It is totally incompatible with His revealed characters. For if He be “ the Lord, the Lord God merciful and gracious, longsuffering and slow to wrath, abundant in goodness,” it is also testified of Him that He is “ abundant in truth, and will by no means clear the guilty.” It is irreconcilable with the dictates of right reason; for, as the poet says, “ A God all mercy is a God unjust.” And it is opposed to the honour and interests of the Divine government. What would be the consequences? How fearful, how sweeping, how disastrous! II. There are many who would not be thought to adopt this hypothesis of necessary impunity to the unbelieving and impenitent transgressors of every class, arising from the goodness of God, and yet conceive that he will accept of external rites and oblations, of religious forms and observances, as a compensation for the neglect of duty, and for the violation of his holy law. Upon this principle, it is obvious, every institute of paganism is constructed. Nay, the Jews, who ought to have known better things, were impressed with this belief. Accordingly, amid the perpetration of their crimes and the denunciations of their prophets, they cried out, not only without trembling apprehension, but with boastful confidence, “ The temple of the Lord, the temple of the Lord, the temple of the Lord are we!” And is there not reason to fear that there is too great a leaning to forms, under the clearer light of the gospel, and among all parties of Christians? Do you not see, from day to day, some of one class, for example, though sunk in carelessness or addicted to vice, deluding themselves with the hope that penance and prayer, the confession and the mass, rites and ceremonies the most frivolous and unintelligible, can atone for guilt, propitiate God, and save the soul? Nay, among the disciples of a purer faith and simpler institute, may we not detect an undue dependence upon the mere ceremonial of service? Now were Jehovah to accept of appearances instead of realities, of forms instead of actual services, and of heartless obedience instead of holy conduct, this might be accounted grace indeed. But is it such grace as we dare impute to God? Is it “ true grace” ? Is it such that you would venture to rest your eternal all upon it? I hope not. And if you did you would act a part the most foolish, and entirely contrary to the most explicit testimonies of Scripture. The very question is proposed, and the answer given, in the Book of Micah (Micah 6:6-8). III. But, abandoning the hope of salvation exclusively by external rites, there are some who think that this is to be attained by human obedience alone, and by such obedience as man can render in his present sinful and imperfect state. That God prefers the obedience of life to mere ecclesiastical rites is certain. But the obedience of man-in its best form, you know-is greatly defective. How little is there of enlightened view, how little of holy principle, how little of filial love, how little of disinterested regard, how little of Godlike aim, is there in the services of the best! Verily they are sinfully imperfect in every view. Were God, then, to condescend to accept these sinful and imperfect services as the ground of hope, how liberal, how generous would He appear! But would this, I ask, be “ true grace” -grace such as we may ascribe to Him, and as the Scriptures represent to be the principle of His moral government? Unquestionably not. Can God accept that which is greatly or altogether without holy principle, without godly spirit, without honourable aim? Much more, can He render immortality as the recompense of obedience so essentially and criminally defective? IV. Some, however, conceive that, though they dare not depend upon their own righteousness alone, yet, as aided and supported by the righteousness of Christ, it may justly become the ground of their hope, and be considered as the true grace of God. And were this foundation conceded, were this plea admitted, there would be grace on the part of God-grace in the appointment of the Saviour-grace in the obedience and atonement of the Saviour, and grace in the acceptance of human merit (if so proud a name may be attached to so poor a thing), as the price of “ eternal redemption.” But this is not the “ true grace” of God; for, I ask you, where in Scripture is our Saviour’ s righteousness spoken of as only a secondary thing, subordinate to human worth? Where is it represented under the degrading character of a make weight, of a certain supplementary provision to human infirmity, of a sort of accessory to human goodness, of an authorised appendage to human merit? Is it not, on the contrary, uniformly asserted to have done all-to have, in the emphatical language of the prophet, “ finished transgression, made an end of sin, made reconciliation for iniquity, sealed the vision, and confirmed the covenant?” V. Finally, there are those who, rejecting this heterogeneous admixture, and every other ground of dependence that is human, rely for acceptance and salvation solely upon the grace of God, as it “ reigns through the righteousness of Christ unto eternal life.” This is the view given in Scripture. Hear how the Apostle Paul speaks on this subject, in a way greatly analogous to the passage before us, and calculated to throw light upon it: “ Being justified by faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ, by whom also we have access by faith into this grace wherein we stand, and rejoice in hope of the glory of God.” This is, indeed, “ the true grace of God” -the grace of redemption pure, and free, and rich, and high, and infallible: pure, without any intermixture of human merit; free, springing from the sovereign good pleasure of Jehovah alone, and from no necessary impulse of His nature, or controlling necessity or incidental exigency of His government; rich, exceedingly abundant in every respect, applicable to all, adequate for each, and fraught with the noblest blessings to our fallen race; high, grand in its conception, glorious in its character, admirable in its provisions, heavenly in its results; infallible, on which we may rest without the fear of disappointment, and in which we can rejoice without the dread of delusion. In particular, this is the only plan of salvation which places the Divine generosity in the most unexceptionable and attractive light, while it satisfies justice, condemns sin, secures the honours of the Divine law, extends the reign of goodness, and brightens the glories of the moral empire of God. (John Mitchell, D. D.) 1 Peter 5:13 The Church that is at Babylon, elected together with you, saluteth you.The Church in Babylon The Revised Version omits “ the Church,” and substitutes “ she” ; explaining in a marginal note that there is a difference of opinion as to whether the sender of the letter is a community or an individual. All the old MSS., with one weighty exception, follow the reading, “ she that is at Babylon.” That the sender of the letter is a church, symbolically designated as a “ lady,” seems the natural meaning. Then there is another question-Where was Babylon? An equal diversity of opinion has arisen. In my own opinion “ Babylon” means Rome. We have here the same symbolical name as in the Book of Revelation, where it is intended primarily as an appellation for the imperial city, which has taken the place filled in the Old Testament by Babylon, as the concentration of antagonism to the kingdom of God. I. We have here an object lesson as to the uniting power of the gospel. Just think of the relations which, in the civil world, subsisted between Rome and its subject provinces: the latter, with bitter hatred in their hearts to everything belonging to the oppressing city, having had their freedom crushed down and their aspirations ruthlessly trampled upon; the former, with the contempt natural to metropolitans in dealing with far off provincials. The same kind of relationship subsisted between Rome and the outlying provinces of its unwieldy empire as between England, for instance, and its Indian possessions. And the same uniting bond came in which binds the Christian converts of these Eastern lands of ours to England by a far firmer bond than any other. The separating walls were high, but, according to the old saying, you cannot build walls high enough to keep out the birds; and spirits, winged by the common faith, soared above all earthly made distinctions and met in the higher regions of Christian communion. Now our temptation is not so much to let barriers of race and language and distance weaken our sense of Christian community, as it is to let even smaller things than these do the same tragical office for us. And we, as Christian people, are bound to try and look over the fences of our “ denominations” and churches, and recognise the wider fellowship and larger company in which all these are merged. II. We note, further, the clear recognition here of what is the strong bond uniting all Christians. Peter would probably have been very much astonished if he had been told of the theological controversies that were to be waged round that word “ elect.” The emphasis here lies, not on “ elect,” but on “ together.” It is not the thing so much as the common possession of the thing which bulks largely before the apostle. In effect he says, “ The reason why these Roman Christians that have never looked you Bithynians in the face do yet feel their hearts going out to you, and send you their loving messages, is because they, in common with you, have been recipients of precisely the same Divine act of grace.” By the side of these transcendent blessings which they possessed in common, how pitiably insignificant all the causes which kept them apart looked and were! And so here we have a partial parallel to the present state of Christendom, in which are seen at work, on one hand, superficial separation; on the other, underlying unity. The splintered peaks may stand, or seem to stand, apart from their sister summits, or may frown at each other across impassable gorges, but they all belong to one geological formation, and in the depths their bases blend indistinguishably into a continuous whole. Their tops are miles apart, but beneath the surface they are one. III. Then, lastly, we may find here a hint as to the pressing need for such a realisation of unity. “ The Church that is in Babylon” was in a vary uncongenial place. Thank God, no Babylon is so Babylonish but that a Church of God may be found planted in it. No circumstances are so unfavourable to the creation and development of the religious life but that the religious life may grow there. An orchid will find footing upon a bit of stick, because it draws nourishment from the atmosphere; and they who are fed by the influx of the Divine Spirit may be planted anywhere, and yet flourish in the courts of our God. But it also gives a hint as to the obligation springing from the circumstances in which Christian people are set, to cultivate the sense of belonging to a great brotherhood. Howsoever solitary, and surrounded by uncongenial associations any Christian man may be, he may feel that he is not alone, not only because his Master is with him, but because there are many others whose hearts throb with the same love, whose lives are surrounded by the same difficulties. If thus you and I, Christian men, are pressed upon on all sides by such worldly associations, the more need that we should let our hearts go out to the innumerable multitude of our fellows, companions in the tribulation and patience and kingdom of Jesus Christ. (A. Maclaren, D. D.) Marcus my son.- Marcus my son I. The working of Christian sympathy. Mark was a full-blooded Jew when he began his career. “ John, whose surname was Mark,” like a great many other Jews at that time, bore a double name, one Jewish, “ John,” and one Gentile, “ Marcus.” But as time goes on we do not hear anything more about “ John,” nor even about “ John Mark,” which are the two forms of his name when he is first introduced to us in the Acts of the Apostles, but he finally appears to have cast aside his Hebrew, and to have been only known by his Roman name. And that change of appellation coincides with the fact that so many of the allusions which we have to him represent him as sending messages of Christian greeting across the sea to his Gentile brethren. And it further coincides with the fact that his gospel is obviously intended for the use of Gentile Christians, and, according to an old and reliable tradition, was written in Rome for Roman Christians. All of which facts just indicate two things, that the more a man has real operative love to Jesus Christ in his heart the more he will rise above all limitations of his interests, his sympathy, and his efforts, and the more surely will let himself out, as far as he can, in affection towards and toils for all men. This change of name, though it is a mere trifle, and may have been adopted as a matter of convenience, may also be taken as reminding us of a very important truth, and that is, that if we wish to help people, the first condition is that we go down and stand on their level, and make ourselves one with them, as far as we can. And so Mark may have said, “ I have put away the name that parts me from these Gentiles, for whom I desire to work, and whom I love; and I take the name that binds me to them.” You must become like the people that you want to help. II. The history of Mark suggests the possibility of overcoming early faults. We do not know why he refused to bear the burden of the work that he had so cheerily begun. When he started he did not bargain for going into unknown lands, in which there were many toils to be encountered. He was willing to go where he knew the ground. At all events, whatever his reason, his return was a fault, or Paul would not have been so hard upon him as he was. And the best way to treat him was as the apostle did; and to say to Barnabas’ indulgent proposal, “ No! he would not do the work before, and now he shall not do it.” That is often God’ s way with us. It brings us to our senses, as it brought Mark to his. We do not know how long it took to cure Mark of his early fault, but he was thoroughly cured. The man that was afraid of dangers and hypothetical risks in Asia Minor became brave enough to stand by the apostle when he was a prisoner, and was not ashamed of his chain. And afterwards, so much had he won his way into the apostle’ s confidence, and made himself needful for him by his services, that the lonely prisoner, with the gibbet or headsman’ s sword in prospect, feels that he would like to have Mark with him once more, and bids Timothy bring him with himself, for “ he is profitable to me for the ministry.” Let no man set limits to the possibilities of his own restoration, and of his curing faults which are most deeply rooted within himself. Hope and effort should be boundless. So we may win victories on the very soil where formerly we were shamefully put to the rout. III. Take another lesson-the greatness of “ little” service. We do not hear that this John Mark ever tried to do any work in the way of preaching the gospel. His business was a very much humbler one. He had to attend to Paul’ s comfort. That needed some self-suppression. It would have been so natural for Mark to have said, “ Paul sends Timothy to be bishop in Crete, and Titus to look after other churches; Epaphroditus is an official here, and Apollos is a great preacher there. And here am I, grinding away at the secularities yet. I think I’ ll ‘ strike,’ and try and get more conspicuous work.” Or, he might perhaps deceive himself and say, “ more directly religious work,” like a great many of us that often mask a very carnal desire for prominence under a very saintly guise of desire to do spiritual service. That was self-suppression. But it was a clear recognition of what we all ought to have very clearly before us, and that is, that all sorts of work which contribute to one end are one sort of work; and that at bottom the man that carried Paul’ s books and parchments, and saw that he was not left without clothes, though he was so negligent of cloaks and other necessaries, was just as much helping on the cause of Christ as the apostle when he preached. IV. Take as the last lesson the enlarged sphere that follows faithfulness in small matters. What a singular change! The man that began with being a servant of Paul and of Barnabas ends by being the evangelist, and it is to him, under Peter’ s direction, that we owe what is possibly the oldest, and, at all events in some aspects, an entirely unique, narrative of our Lord’ s life. For quite certainly, in God’ s providence, the tools do come to the hand that can wield them, and the best reward that we can get for doing well our little work is to have larger work to do. The little tapers are tempted, if I may use so incongruous a figure, to wish themselves set up on loftier stands. Shine your brightest in your corner, and you will be “ exalted” in due time. (A. Maclaren, D. D.)