In the year 1879 when sailing north of Scotland, which is a very rocky coast, and therefore specially dangerous, I asked the captain if he knew where the rocks were; he replied, "No, but I know where they are not." The night was dark, the sea was rough, but he was calm and undisturbed. I felt at the moment there was a moral in his words and behavior for me, and for all Christians. We are mariners. We are passing over an ocean with rocks and shoals, and often with billows swelling high, and the night dark. We, therefore, need a sure chart for our guidance, showing us the track where "the rocks are not." We have that chart in the sure word of God, which is indeed a light pointing out the path in the sea along which we may safely steer our vessel, and we be without danger or dismay, knowing that God will care for us, and save us from disaster, if sailing according to the chart He has given us.

In order to sail to the heavenly port, we must first see and own our deep need as sinners, and flee to the refuge which infinite love has provided for us in the atoning death of Him who is now the Captain of salvation. Being thus saved, the heart is to be won in view of the price paid for our redemption, and by the love which paid the price. The soul, being thus saved, becomes satisfied with Him who saves. Then it is his or her meat to do the will of God, in other words, to keep the ship in the track of His revealed mind,-in "the paths of the sea," plainly laid down in the chart of His infallible word. When the heart is thus with God, and the purpose is simply to do His will,-to sail strictly according to His expressed thoughts, He will care for the frail little vessel so that it will ride the troubled sea safely along, and will come into port without any serious mishap or loss. Those who thus sail may suffer, for the enemy is on the lookout for any who sail according to the divine chart; but that does not interfere with their safety, but may increase their speed toward the desired haven.

On that dismal night, in the North Sea, two vessels, not far from us, were lost. Perhaps if those in command had the wisdom, skill, and care of our Captain (Turpin) they might have been saved. We should remember as Christians, that though we have a new nature, being born of God, yet we have the old nature also; and if we allow our love to grow cold, and the word of God ceases to have its true place with us, in this way the reins slip out of the hands of the new nature into the hands of the old nature, and we know well in what direction it will drive us. Christ and His word are not enough for a soul in that state; nay more, they are, or may be, really loathed, as the Israelites loathed the manna suited for them on the way to the goodly land. A person in this condition, begins to look around for something to meet the cravings of the nature which now holds the reins, and he sees that professors of religion, church-members, are enjoying all sorts of worldly amusements, and belonging, even ministers, to the different secret societies; and he begins to ask, Why may I not do the same? He soon persuades himself that there is no harm in these things. Next, he is sailing his barque in these waters. Should there not be entire shipwreck, the person may yet, through grace, sorrowfully see and feel the dishonor he has done to the Lord. The full amount of loss will be seen at "the judgment seat."
But it may be so with some that they have to own that their love has waxed cold, and that the things of Christ have lost their freshness for them, and that they have a drawing to these worldly things, and may be, with some honesty, asking what they are to do. Dear souls, your way is plain as to what you must do, if you wish to pass over life’s sea in safety, and not come to grief and loss. You have simply to go to God just as you are, and tell Him all your backslidings of heart, and all your hankerings after worldly associations, and amusements. Hide nothing from Him. Honestly confess all. Cast yourselves on His grace, and its provision in Christ; and thus you will recover your lost treasure, joy and delight in the things of God, and then, as a happy consequence, your desire for worldly pleasures and company will be gone, and you will be able exultingly to sing,

"I have seen the face of Jesus!
Tell me not of ought beside;
I have heard the voice of Jesus!
All my soul is satisfied! "

Being thus graciously delivered, and the joy of God’s salvation being restored to you, you might ask yourselves, Could we have asked the blessing of God on those worldly things to which we inclined? Could we have asked Him to go with us into those things and places? Or could we have expected Him to meet with us there, and given us sweet communion with Himself, thus telling us that He was pleased to have us there? Surely in your very worst state of soul you would have had to answer, No. Rather you would have wished to hide your desires and ways from Him. It is hard for one who has known the truth to silence conscience. But now being restored, and finding Christ, as before, to be an ample and satisfying portion, you can say to the votaries of earthly pleasures, "What, alas, charms you, charms us no more. We have returned to something sweeter and truer, and abiding,-forever abiding." Praise God. You can now join those who are crossing the ocean according to the heaven-given Chart in singing what the devoted Thomas Kelly wrote nearly a hundred years ago:-

"Led by faith, we brave the ocean;
Led by faith, the storm defy;
Calm amidst tumultuous motion,
Knowing that the Lord is nigh:
Waves obey Him;
And the storms before Him fly.

"Rendered safe by His protection,
We shall pass the watery waste,
Trusting to His wise direction,
We shall gain the port at last;
And with wonder
Think on toils and dangers past."

O beloved, let us ever keep before us what it cost to sever us from the world. The apostle Paul writes that the Lord Jesus "gave Himself for our sins that He might deliver us from this present evil world, according to the will of God and our Father " (Gal. 1.4). Then, how could we, with the agonies of the cross before the eyes of the mind and heart, and the word of God in our hands, go into " the evil " of that from which we have been separated at such a cost! "Be not conformed to this world" is written in our inspired Guide-book. Christians, let us sail our ship where it tells us the rocks are not. R. H.

The man that has seen Christ, has seen the greatest wonder that God can shew him; only he has seen but little of Christ yet, for it will take eternity fully to exhibit His glories.

The Throne of God and of the Lamb.

The Lamb is the well-known title of Christ in the Apocalypse, the book of the future. It expresses the patience of His humiliation, even to the death of the cross; but it characterizes Him still in glory. Even when the apostle is told of the Lion of the tribe of Judah having prevailed to open the book, the vision assures him that it is a " Lamb, as it had been slain."

The connection between the humiliation and glory is familiar to us. Because of that wondrous humiliation "God has highly exalted Him, and given Him a Name which is above every name, that at the name of Jesus every knee should bow, of heavenly, earthly, and infernal beings, and that every tongue should confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father" (Phil. 2:9-11).

This is His personal exaltation, and as Man. He has descended and is now ascended up, far above all heavens, and sits upon the Father’s throne, waiting there until His foes are made His footstool. All things are to be put under His feet, though as yet we do not see this.

The Kingdom of the Son of Man, His millennial reign, is that in which this is accomplished. He has then a throne which He can share with others, as the Father’s throne He cannot (Rev. 3:21); and the saints reign with Him a thousand years.

But while the Father thus glorifies His Son, for the Son His personal exaltation is not the object. He takes the Kingdom to bring all things into eternal order, and thus bring in the rest of God. Having done this, the Kingdom in this form is given up; its object is achieved; "and when all things shall be subdued unto Him, then shall the Son also Himself be subject to Him who put all things under Him, that God may be all in all" (i Cor. 15:28).

We can in this way understand both why the Kingdom lasts for comparatively so short a period, and yet why it occupies so large a place in the field of prophecy. In the Old Testament, save in Isaiah’s promise of a new heavens and earth, we never get beyond it. And even in the New, while that promise is expanded for us in the sweet picture with which we are all familiar (Rev. 21:1-8), yet that which follows of the New Jerusalem goes back immediately, as to the time of view, to the millennium again. Only in this way could the leaves of the tree of life be for the healing of the nations (22:2).

Beyond the thousand years the city itself abides, for it is eternal; and here is for us the fullest view that the book of Revelation affords with regard to the eternal state. Yet it is both brief and enigmatic; and the eyes that have been upon it for many generations have ever yearned to see more clearly what is portrayed in it.

But upon this we do not mean to dwell at present. We are following, as we may, the Christ of God through all that changes into the changeless blessedness. What can we know of it? Little, perhaps, indeed; but we may at least distinguish some things that need to be, and where Scripture seems clear enough to save us from any presumptuous speculation in the matter.

For many-and some even of those who are theoretically clearer-the millennium has been practically too much identified with the eternal condition. It has given too much its character to eternity; while, on the other hand, I think it will be found that sometimes that which is eternal has been thought of as millennial.

The millennium, with that which immediately follows and connects with it, is a period of formation, -of labor, not of rest. First, things are set in order morally and spiritually; then physically also. It applies also to the earth solely; not (in the higher sense of the word) to heaven. The "new heavens" are firmamental, the heavens of the second creative day.

Now, as to the reign, when it is said of the saints that they reign with Christ a thousand years, we might naturally think that they would cease to reign, then, after this. Yet we find it said of those in the heavenly city, "they shall reign for ever and ever," (or "the ages of ages ") the strongest expression used for eternity. And this may remind us that before the thrones are seen set up as to the earth (chap. 20:4), and before even the Lamb has taken the book in heaven (chap. 5:7), we have seen thrones around the throne of God (chap. 4:4) and those occupying them who afterwards sing the song of redemption, and are therefore redeemed men (5:9). Is there not here implied plainly a reign which, as it begins before the millennial reign, will not be limited by it?

As to the Lord Jesus, "all authority " is already His "in heaven and on earth " (Matt. 28:18), and yet He has not taken His throne as Son of Man. He is on the Father’s throne, which is not divided nor circumscribed by that "Kingdom of His dear Son," into which already He has "translated" us (Col. 1:13). Thus we cannot limit Christ’s reign by the Kingdom of the Son of Man. And when He shall have delivered up the Kingdom to God, even the Father, "that God may be all in all," will that "Kingdom of the Father" more exclude His sovereignty? If all authority be His now, has it shut out the Father? Will the Kingdom of the Father any more shut out the Son?

If we need a more direct answer to such a question, we shall find it in what is said of the heavenly city, that " the throne of God and of the Lamb shall be in it." It is but one throne:two there could not be; and it is characterized in this way, as the " throne of God and of the Lamb." That which speaks of the lowest depths of humiliation gone into is joined with the incommunicable Name of glory:it is added to that to which no addition would seem possible. God accepts this addition; yet not as if it were the acceptance of anything extraneous to Himself:nay, in it He is become manifest in a glory before which the hosts of heaven prostrate themselves in adoring wonder. In the Lamb God has found the expression of Himself He has been ever seeking,-the means of pouring out unhindered the fulness which shall make His creatures full:and thus from the throne of God and of the Lamb issues the stream of the water of life.
That it is the "throne of God" declares at once that here we have before us what is eternal:not dispensational, not temporary. "That God may be all in all," the Lamb has brought Him down to the lower parts of the earth, and taken humanity up to the height of heaven. The Lamb is henceforth the "Lamp " of divine light; as "the Lord God Almighty and the Lamb are the temple " of the city, the unveiled Presence in which worship shall be alike free and necessary. The mystery of the Person of Christ is the assurance that in no way whatever can God and the Lamb be separated ever.

But what an overwhelming thought it is, humanity united thus to Godhead, the Crucified upon the throne of God? And we, whom He has taken up from the depths in which He found us, to declare in us the fulness of divine self-sacrificing love,-we are following on to see Him where He is, with eyes at last able to behold His glory; changed ourselves into His likeness! (Concluded.) F. W. G.

"And upon His head were many crowns." (Rev. 19:12.)

(Continued from page 65.)

CHAPTER XIII. Bridegroom.

It is not of the Bride that we are now desiring to speak, but of the Bridegroom; but the one so implies the other that we are compelled to the course we have been pursuing. The recurrence of the type so frequently in the Old Testament, even from the beginning of the history, is full proof of how dear to Him is the thought of the relationship. Assuredly we shall not give these up from any preconceived idea that they ought not to be there. They are there, and speak so plainly for themselves, pictures though they may be only, that no unprejudiced mind can avoid seeing them.

Take Rebekah:and if Isaac be a type of Christ, and, in the twenty-second of Genesis, received back "in figure" from the dead (Heb. 11:19), how is it that we find next Sarah, the mother (Rom. 9:5) passes away, and then Rebekah takes her place in Sarah’s tent as bride of the risen heir. Of the kindred already, she is called by a special messenger (as the Church by the Holy Spirit) to cross the desert in his company to meet her yet unseen Lord.

Take Asenath; and Joseph too is betrayed by his brethren, brought down to the prison-house and brought up out of it to be the Saviour of Egypt (the world); and then he must have a Gentile bride, while his brethren are strangers to him.

Take Zipporah (the "bird"-the heavenly bride); and again Moses is away from and rejected by his brethren when he finds her by the well-a Gentile too-and marries her.

Are such things, so fit in themselves, so fitting to their place in the history, mere casual happenings, which we may use, if we will, for illustration, but must not seriously press as having any design from God? Surely if design may be recognized anywhere without a label, we may recognize it here.

Now it is not contradictory to all this, and cannot be, to find that Old Testament saints looked for a city which has foundations; or even to believe, as I have long done, that this city and the New Jerusalem, the Bride of the Lamb in Revelation, are the same thing. Once let us realize that the "city," however identified in some sense with its inhabitants, is yet in fact the habitation and not the inhabitants, and the difficulty begins to clear. The Bride-City may contain more than the Bride, as even the writer whose views I am referring to allows. The throne of God and of the Lamb are in it; and the twelfth of Hebrews distinctly shows us "the city of the living God, the heavenly Jerusalem," apart from both "the church of the first-born ones,"and "the spirits of just men made perfect."* * In the tract to which I have been referring the names of the twelve tribes on the gates of the city and those of the twelve apostles on the foundations are taken alike to show the Israelitish character of the city itself, and the "portion " of the twelve as judging the twelve tribes of Israel (Matt. 19:28) shows these to be " separated off from the Church," the body of Christ. He even declares that " the Lamb is the special title of the Lord Jesus in relation to Israel, and the elect of Israel"! No wonder that it should be also discovered that "the Gospels are the conclusion of the Old Testament history, and not the commencement of Church teaching; except, of course,"-and how important the exception!-"so far as Christ crucified is the foundation of all blessing."*

"God has prepared for them a city" does not in this case imply necessarily what it is quoted for; and we may adapt the writer’s own words otherwise than he would allow. "This holy Jerusalem may contain"-the saints of the Old Testament; "but it is not necessary on this account that we should identify them."

Turning from all this now, how blessed to think of this Bridegroom character of the Lord Jesus! It should be plain that it expresses His personal joy of love, in a way that the " Head of the Body " cannot, because it expresses a very different thing. A whole book of the Old Testament has been given to the expression of this relation of the Lord Jesus,-no doubt, in the first place to Israel; but capable of application all through to the higher and heavenly. Perhaps we have not a New Testament book of this character, for the same reason that we have not a New Testament psalm-book. It would rather belittle than truly represent it; if it were not, at least, to be a book too large for human handling. Christian psalmody finds in all else that has been written its material of praise. Its "song of songs" must also transcend utterance. And perhaps must be learned otherwise than any book of this kind could avail for.

Thus it is, after all, that one can say so little of what the Lord’s Bridegroom character means. We see that all the nearest, sweetest human relationships are taken up to image forth these more wondrous spiritual ones. And Bridegroom and Bride, always remaining in the first freshness of the sabbatic morning of their beginning, speak of a mutual abiding for one another, which is the revelation of a sufficing love, such as we are surely learning by the way as we go to meet Him, but which in the first moment of His presence will manifest itself as it had not been before.

In the moment of her presentation to Isaac, Rebekah took a veil and covered herself. We can but do so in the anticipation of that time.

" What have I to do any more with idols?" (Hosea 14:8).

Hast thou heard Him, seen Him, known Him?
Is not thine a captured heart?
"Chief among ten thousand" own Him,
Joyful choose the better part.

Idols once they won thee, charmed thee,
Lovely things of time and sense;
Gilded, thus does sin disarm thee,
Honey’d lest thou turn thee thence.

What has stripped the seeming beauty
From the idols of the earth?
Not the sense of right or duty,
But the sight of peerless worth.

Not the crushing of those idols,
With its bitter void and smart,
But the beaming of His beauty,
The unveiling of His heart.

Who extinguishes his taper
Till he hails the rising sun?
Who discards the garb of winter
Till the summer has begun?

‘Tis the look that melted Peter,
‘Tis the face that Stephen saw,
‘Tis the heart that wept With Mary,
Can alone from idols draw-

Draw, and win, and fill completely,
Till the cup overflow the brim.
What have we to do with idols,
Who have companied with Him?

O. R.

1 Kings 13:

The ten tribes under Jeroboam had not only revolted from the authority of the son of Solomon, but had established centers of idolatrous worship at Bethel and Dan. Here was not only rebellion but apostasy, a most shameful return to the abominations of Egypt, from which they had long since been rescued.

God’s faithful love even for such people, and His care for the holiness of His Name, leads Him to send a message, by one of His prophets, from the land of Judah to the idolatrous king of Israel at Bethel. He was to deliver His message of coming judgment. This was accompanied by special manifestations of God’s power; the altar was rent, and the king’s outstretched arm was withered, and only restored by the prophet whom he would have smitten.

Seeing the power of God manifest, the king changed his attitude. He invites the man of God to come to his house for refreshment and a reward. Mark, the king is not broken and penitent; he simply wishes to take the edge off the prophet’s denunciation, and there could be no more effectual way than by getting him to accept his hospitality and a reward. Unquestionably there is much of this kind to-day. The world can endure strong language if it is not accompanied by corresponding conduct. But what must the impenitent think of those who preach most solemnly of the lost condition of men, of their enmity against God, the impossibility of their doing aught to please Him-and then taking up a collection, soliciting help from those whom they have declared to be Christ’s enemies!

The prophet is firm, and refuses the reward and the refreshment, and according to divine instruction betakes himself homeward. "There is a time to embrace and a time to refrain from embracing." We are sure the king must have felt, even if he did not acknowledge, the solemnity of the prophet’s words, backed by his conduct. Ah! the world may smile at those who walk apart from it, and have nothing to do with it to dull the effect of their warning, but it feels their testimony all the more keenly. Well does Satan know this.

So far the prophet has acted, to outward appearance, in faithful devotedness. He is now to be subjected to another test. There was an aged prophet, with some remains perhaps of past enjoyment of divine things, but utterly out of the current of God’s thoughts, and in a place of disobedience. On hearing of what had occurred, he goes after the prophet of Judah. A false position covets companions. Alas, it is one of the characteristics of disobedience. Doubtless this was the motive-perhaps not fully known-which induced the old prophet to go after the man from Judah.

He finds him "sitting under an oak." For some reason, instead of getting away as rapidly as possible from the ungodly place, the man of Judah has slacked his pace, and is even taking his ease in what Bunyan would call "enchanted ground."

There are no trifles in Scripture, and without forcing the meaning here, it seems evident that the prophet had lowered the tone of his testimony. He had not done this publicly. In fact, when approached by the old man he replies well-nigh as vigorously as he had to the king. But strong words are not always indicative of the true state of soul. In fact, sometimes we may seek to make up in intensity of language what is lacking in fervency of heart. Why is he sitting down in the enemy’s country? Does it not tell more loudly than words that his soul was not shrinking from the defilement of the place?

May we not pause here and ask ourselves a few serious questions? "They are not of the world even as I am not of the world." Do we feel this in our souls, or is it a doctrine with us? Coupled with the doctrine there may be certain lines of behavior understood as consistent. Certain amusements are to be eschewed; certain practices are reprobated. How about the state of the mind? On what is it feeding? Ah brethren, do we not know something of that relaxation of the inner man that answers to sitting under the oak?

Let it be remembered that such times often succeed seasons of special faithfulness. The enemy knows us. Perhaps conscience has stirred us up to a pitch of faithful testimony beyond ordinary; we have stood for God among His enemies, and now alone, with no one to see, there is the casting off the unusual armor, and a little indulgence of self is allowed.

There was nothing wrong in sitting under the oak. It was what it indicated as the state of heart.

Just here comes the attack. But notice that it requires all the ingenuity of falsehood to ensnare the prophet. The old prophet claims that he too has had a word from the Lord, rather from an angel, to allow the man of Judah to retrace his steps. Might he not have answered somewhat in the language of Paul to the Galatians, "Though we or an angel from heaven"? That the man from Judah could be deceived by a word as from God shows how far his soul had drifted. He goes back, to receive from the same lips the sentence of his doom. It is a solemn fact that if we want it we can find,-Satan will help us find-scriptures that can be perverted to suit our wishes.

May we be kept from all temporizing, and guard most closely our hearts. " Keep thine heart with all diligence, for out of it are the issues of life."

What a solemn picture is that of the dead prophet, the ass and the lion. The ass could have carried him swiftly, the lion could not have hurt him, had he abode in the path of obedience.

(Jer. 14:21.)

This remarkable language is used by the prophet at a time of chastening under the hand of God -a chastening which was richly deserved by the people. He acknowledges the righteousness of God in it, but in connection with that confession appeals to His unchanging character. He does not merely appeal to God’s mercy and love; nor does he use the people’s low condition as the great motive with Him. Rather, his appeal is to His throne, the throne of His glory. Righteousness and judgment are the foundation of that throne. Should He fail to uphold, to preserve His blood-bought people-that throne of glory would be disgraced. What holy boldness, what effectual intercession! It is similar to that of Moses, when Israel had provoked the Lord to anger (Num. 14:) and He threatened to cut them off from being a nation,-" Then the Egyptians shall hear it; "or like Joshua’s plea at Ai (Josh. 7:), "What wilt thou do unto thy great name?"

Yes, beloved brethren, our salvation and eternal security are indissolubly linked with the throne of God’s glory. We often need chastening and reproof, but as soon would the throne of God be disgraced, as one of the least or most unworthy of His people perish. What security is ours! What rest!

" Our hearts have peace that can never fail,
‘Tis the Lamb on high, ore the throne."

Let the walk, partake of that stability. "Wherefore we receiving a kingdom which cannot be moved, let us have grace whereby we may serve God acceptably, with reverence and godly fear."

Matt. 9:27-31 inclusive.

This is the principle, or law, of God’s activity in His saints, as well as of His grace to sinners. In the scriptures before us we have a perfect and beautiful illustration of it, as to the latter class, and in the seventeenth chapter, of the want of faith on the part of the former.

The blessed Master had returned to His own city -Nazareth-and had "forgiven the sins,"and healed "the man sick of the palsy," cured "the woman diseased with an issue of blood twelve years," raised the dead "daughter of a certain ruler," and "His fame had gone abroad into all that land;" so that when He departed thence, two blind men followed Him, beseeching Him to "have mercy on them." These, no doubt, had heard of the wonderful works wrought by Jesus, because " His fame had gone out into all that land," and in their extreme need, knowing full well this need, they were ready and willing to believe that He who could raise the dead must also be able to open their eyes. Therefore they came to Him, into the house, and the Lord knowing their thoughts, reading their hearts, said unto them, believe ye that I am able to do this? Do what? They had not told Him their desire, they had not asked Him to return their sight, but only to "have mercy on us,"-Ah! but He knows what we desire before we ask Him. Then touched He their eyes, saying, " According to your faith be it unto you," "and their eyes were opened." This is what they were expecting, what they desired and all they desired. It was "the end of their faith." "They received the end of their faith," even the opening of their eyes. On the same principle, the end of their faith may be the salvation of their souls (i Peter 1:9).

Now faith is not an act of our own wills, as many imagine, but it is the gift of God. "Every good gift and every perfect gift is from above, and cometh down from the Father of lights " (James 1:17). "By grace are ye saved, through faith, and that not of yourselves, it is the gift of God" (Eph. 1:8). ‘’ Think soberly, according as God hath dealt to every man the measure of faith " (Rom. 12:3). Now the question will arise, how does God deal to us the measure of faith? Just as He gave the manna to Israel:" Every man gathering according to his eating," or his appetite for it. So God deals to us the measure of faith. As we desire it, as we require it, as we will receive and use it according to His will. He cannot give faith for that which is not according to His purpose. His purpose now is for salvation to man; a new life, a new creation by the Holy Spirit. To this end He measures to His saints as they need all requisite gifts by the Holy Spirit. He does not give faith for physical wants beyond that which is ordained under natural law; because He is not now dealing with the race on this ground. He did do this in the beginning of this dispensation for the establishment of the truth in the world; so that no excuse should be possible to unbelief; but now, when the testimony of physical miracles has been sufficient to this end, His real purpose of salvation in grace, through faith, is working out His will according to His own eternal purpose. We are therefore not authorized by the word of God to have faith for or expect physical miracles; though the spiritually miraculous is before our eyes in every soul born of God. He is now through grace, by faith, taking out of the already judged world a people for His Name (Acts 15:14). Sanctifying, separating them from the world to Himself; to His fellowship, His society, His association!

Faith then being the gift of God, it may be said to be the instrument by which God calls men into this association. " If any man will do His will, he shall know of the teaching whether it be of God or whether I speak of Myself." So spake the Lord to the Jews as recorded in John 7:17. Also, "He that is of God, heareth God’s words:ye therefore hear not, because ye are not of God" (John 8:47). Subjection then is man’s part in salvation. Willing subjection. A heart for the truth, God’s truth, the source of truth; the highest truth there is for man. A lover of the truth. Any man thus willing, "shall know of the teaching." Of such were the two men who came to the Lord in the ninth of Matthew. He drew them to Him, into the house, and through faith, granted them the desire of their hearts. Their eyes were opened.

Opening the eyes lets in the light. So also is it in spiritual things. The light of heaven flows in through the open eyes of faith. God opens the eyes of every willing, subject soul. As in the beginning of the new creation life, so is it to the end, " According to your faith so be it unto you." We get on in heavenly things as we are willing to receive from God. He is always waiting to be gracious unto us, and His gifts are only limited by our desire for them. We gather the manna for our own eating, as much as we may; but no more than we use. It is gathering from day to day. It cannot be kept over. All not consumed spoils. No nourishment can be had from it. Christian progress, growth in grace, is from freshly feeding on the heavenly Manna every day, so that "to them that have, more shall be given," and we go on in "grace upon grace."

When the blind men were restored to their sight, Jesus commanded them that no man should know about it. But on the contrary, "they spread His fame throughout all that country! " They couldn’t help it. It was more than poor human nature could keep hidden. Their hearts were full to bursting; and out of a full heart the mouth will speak:Hence they spread His fame throughout all that country. That is what all true Christians will do, cannot help doing, when their eyes are fully open and "the light of the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ" is poured from heaven into their souls. Then they will sing, by the Spirit, with all saints:-

" Our hearts are full of Christ, and long
Their glorious matter to declare!
Of Him we make our loftier song,-
We, cannot from His praise forbear:
Our ready tongues make haste to sing
The glories of the heavenly King."

J. S. P.

Finally, my brethren, rejoice in the Lord." There are two words in this opening to which I wish to call your attention. One is the word "finally," and the other is " Lord." The apostle at the time of writing them, was in the hands of the Roman emperor, a prisoner for the cause of the gospel. Looking back over his course he might recall countless hardships that he had suffered, perils on land and sea, poverty, hunger, thirst, imprisonment and beating. He had met with opposition also in the Church as well as outside. Those who should have been helpers, had forsaken him. Some preached Christ of envy and strife. Past, present, and future, except to the eye of faith, were as gloomy as possible, and yet he says, after all these things," rejoice; " and not, mark you, "rejoice in the Saviour," but "rejoice in the Lord."

Let me emphasize the difference a little; for the use of the latter title on this occasion is indeed much sweeter. It would be no great wonder for one in such circumstances to turn away from them all to rejoice in the Saviour. Surely this would be the soul’s great satisfaction, but it betokens a loftier flight of faith to rejoice in the Lord, One who might have removed the trial, but left it on. Perhaps some reader of this paper has had a hard struggle all his life with poverty; perhaps another has been given up by friend and relative, to lead a lonely life in this vale of sorrows; perhaps another has toiled long and labored hard in the vineyard, to find his toil rewarded but with abuse and scorn, or indifference. To such the undercurrent of Paul’s exhortation may be searching:You know the Christ so well, that, (realizing His power to remove all these things,) you can yet rejoice in the Lord, specifically as Lord, perfect Master of every circumstance. "Though He slay me yet will I trust Him," blessed be God! rejoice in Him too. Such is the cry of those who know Him best.

"The spirit of praise is the spirit of power," and yet at the same time there must be a practical guarding against the enemies we have to meet. Jehoshaphat with his singers in the forefront of the battle had his warriors behind them. So the apostle goes on to say, "Beware of dogs, beware of evil workers, beware of the concision." Like the snapping", snarling animals that rove in packs through the streets of eastern cities, when night settles down, so these enemies swarm round us as we pass through this busy world, and our singing serves but to gather them more thickly to the attack. There is nothing Satan dislikes so much as rejoicing in the Lord, and he will do anything that he can to stop it. If his dogs cannot drown it with their howling, his concision will set up an imitation song to attract the attention away from it.

It has been thought by some, that the dogs, evil workers and concision all refer to one and the same class of people, but then it would seem that in that case the verb would not be repeated after each. It is true, however, that the concision are the class of whom they are in especial danger, as this is emphasized by the context.

It is interesting to notice how there seems to be a trinity of evil to oppose the good. The lust of the eyes, of the flesh, and the pride of life is a common example, while we may notice the three motives suggested to Eve, the three temptations of our Lord; the three kinds of bad ground in the parable of the sower, and in this chapter, the threefold cord opposing. As if to meet this latter trinity, believers are here represented in three ways, worshiping God in the Spirit, exulting in Christ Jesus, and having no confidence in the flesh. They who worship God in spirit and in truth, "for the Father seeketh such to worship Him," they who have found Christ Jesus exult in Him, for did they not, it would be proof they had not found Him; and because they know such an One has had to die for them, they realize how degraded their condition, and, in the "Sinless," their sin, not realized as such till they had seen Him, is really brought to light. No wonder it is then that the apostle tells us, that he had cast aside his own righteousness on account of Christ, and that he counted all things but loss, for the excellency of the knowledge of Christ Jesus his Lord.

Let us consider for a little the motive which actuated him. It is literally rendered the "projecting out (beyond all things) of the knowledge of Christ Jesus," and again he adds with lingering emphasis "my Lord." The word which I have translated "projecting out" is the same as is used for "promontory." Did you ever see a promontory? Do you know how it projects out beyond all things? I suppose that those who have seen the North Cape never forget it. It towers up so majestically a thousand feet above the sea. How puny are the waves at its foot! How the eye returns again to dwell upon it! How it absorbs the whole attention! So to the apostle is the person of the Christ. He is his Lord.

He is his Master. He is the One to whom his whole soul goes out in loyal devotion. The "shout of a king "is in his heart, and casting aside as it were his fisher’s coat, impatient of the slow progress of the boat, he steps forth on the deep to meet Him. Let us look for evidence. " For whom I have suffered the loss of all things."

Here we have a practical proof of what he asserts. Sometimes we delude ourselves with the idea that He projects out beyond all things while it is very manifest to those around us, that it is not so. They see us devoting so much time to ourselves, to our personal comfort, that they naturally come to such a conclusion. But then, we console ourselves with the thought that after all this is due to the exigencies of the time, and that our heart is all right. But how about "the projecting out beyond all things." Alas! do not exigencies then do so? Paul let exigencies go. "For whom I have suffered the loss of all things." What a word for us to-day! How salutary! especially if we consider the words which he adds, "And do count them but dung that I may win Christ."

In a certain sense it may be much easier to suffer the loss of all things, than to keep them. Our conscience may demand that we give them up. It may say, "You will be denying the faith if you do not! " and so we may let them go, and then when they are gone cry out, as did God’s people of old, "Would to God we had died by the hand of the Lord in the land of Egypt, when we sat by the flesh pots and we did eat bread to the full." Is that our spirit? Alas! then we never gave up. It was a case of tearing from our reluctant hands, things which we were loath to yield. We saw the angel of the Lord standing with drawn sword across our path and we fled back. How sorrowful for us when we remember that Christ, in all His beauty, stood to welcome us upon the other pathway.

But let us ponder still and ask God to search our hearts:"I do count them but dung" says the apostle. Not much yearning after them there, was there? "I do count them but dung." He does not say, mind you, "I would count them as dung" with a suppressed "if it were necessary." It is necessary for the acquisition of the blessed Object before him. With him there was no desire to keep anything. His eye was single and his one desire was to strip off everything that might incommode him in the race. And so he ran. Beloved! do we so run? Can we repeat the following lines from our hearts?

"Yes, He is mine! and nought of earthly things,
Not all the charms of pleasure, wealth, or power;
The fame of heroes or the pomp of kings,
Could tempt me to forego His love an hour.
Go! worthless world,’ I cry, ‘ with all that’s thine,’
Go! I my Saviour’s am, and He is mine."

Passing over the next verse let us now consider a little that very familiar one:"That I may know Him and the power of His resurrection, and the fellowship of His sufferings, being made comfortable unto His death."

The first clause of this verse is worthy of much meditation. Did not the apostle Paul know the Lord? He whose whole soul had been singing with delight, even in the most adverse circumstances? He presses on to know Him. Later on we learn that he stretches forward (as a racer) towards the mark. Did you ever know of anybody doing that, who only had a short distance to run? How strongly then this verse should speak to us. What an unbounded Elysium there is yet to enter upon. We had thought some time, after some glad vision, some close communion, that we had really seen the Lord; but no! it was only a clouded view, a far away prospect, for we realize that our knowledge has come nowhere near that of the apostle, and he still pressed on to know Him. The glorious light on the road to Damascus had been passed. The song in Philippi’s jail had been sung, stormy seas had been crossed, the dead had been raised by that Mighty Name; through sickness, the cohorts of the adversary, hunger, thirst, and beatings he had gone, and still the tireless racer stretches forth towards the goal, the blessed knowing of his Lord and Saviour.

And how about us, brethren? We should press on with greater vigor than the apostle, for we have further to run, but do we? We should look more eagerly for His return, for the night is more advanced, but do we? We might almost see Him coming "skipping upon the hills," but do we, oh! do we? Here is a question well worthy of consideration. How grand to stand for Him, in these days of declension, a faithful and true witness. What a crown of glory we are letting slip from our hands if we do not!

"That I may know Him and the power of His resurrection." Here is an additional clause to consider. Far off on a lonely mountain of Judea in the dark season of night, I see a few frightened disciples fleeing like sheep before a band of men with torches, gathered to take prisoner the Lord of Glory. Ashamed of his cowardice, one of them at last seeks out the palace of the High Priest, and tremblingly warms his hands within. The other night (do we know anything about other nights?) he had been very valiant, with the foe far away, but now all is changed. He is a broken reed shaken with every gust of wind. Once he had heard that Voice, now so meekly answering His enemies, hush the angry tempest on Galilee. He had seen the dead arise from the grave at its bidding. " Lord though all men forsake Thee yet will not I forsake Thee," he had cried, and that same night with oaths and cursing he denies Him. Alas, for human strength and resolution! Alas, for poor man!

A few weeks pass and we see that same frightened flock publishing His blessed name to the whole world. They are no longer fearful, no longer trembling, but with earth and hell against them, they stand undaunted, undismayed, glorying in the name of Jesus. But what had wrought this wondrous change? Why, Christ had risen. Death had yielded up its Prey and they now preached Jesus and the resurrection. What a mighty power it was! but oh brethren, it is one thing to be able to talk about it, and another thing to know its power, to feel it in our lives. What a passport to true blessing and godliness in every thing if we knew more that the One who died on the cross is now, for us, seated at the right hand of the Majesty in the heavens! And it is so, yes, it is so!

" And the fellowship of His sufferings, being made conformable unto His death."

Before speaking of this clause directly, I want to notice a point which although not in exact connection with it, is suggested by it. Until the Lord was taken from them, they knew but little of the fellowship of His sufferings, and the reason is good to think upon. During all the time of the Lord’s presence with them, He was the object of all man’s hatred and malice. They shared but slightly in it. Let me indicate the reason by an illustration. I was burning some sulphur one day in a room with the blind pulled down. It burned with a slightly visible flame. I then happened to let the sunlight in and on looking down thought my sulphur had gone out. On pulling down the blind however, I saw that it was burning as steadily as ever. I experimented several times with the same result. Where the sun shone the sulphur flame could not be seen. And so it was when Christ the blessed Light of the world shone among us, the rays of those lights soon to fill the world were swallowed up in His glory, and men saw them not. Dear brethren, to-day we also can behold His glory, "the glory of the Only-begotten of the Father full of grace and truth," and although 1800 years have passed since then, reading its story we bow our heads, and say from our hearts, "Truly this was the Son of God."

In closing this meditation here, I would ask the reader to join with me in petitioning that our hearts may be so filled by His beauty and glory that truly from our hearts we also may desire some sweet fellowship of His suffering. It is easy to write, it is easy to read, it is easy to be momentarily stirred by emotion, but what we need is that our lives may be wholly dominated and controlled by motives such as Paul’s were that we may bear fruit unto life eternal.

"Blest with this fellowship divine,
Take what Thou wilt I all resign,
While as the branches to the vine,
Saviour, I cling to Thee,

"Blest be my lot whatever befall,
Who can affright or who appal?
While as my God, my Rock, my All,
Saviour, I cling to Thee."

F. C. G.

" Woe to the rebellious children, saith Jehovah, that take counsel, but not of Me; and that make leagues, but not of My Spirit, that they may heap sin upon sin." (Isa. 30:50:)

It is a solemn thing to read such words as these, and still more so to think how applicable they may be to ourselves. Even as children of God, the proneness of our hearts is to act according to our own judgments; for the flesh in the Christian is not a whit better than in any other man. Whenever there is a listening to ourselves, we may be sure the same character of evil is at work that the Spirit of Jehovah was rebuking in Israel.

What for Israel was going down into Egypt is to us the taking counsel, not of God, but of natural wisdom, in any difficulty. It was the same fleshly wisdom which Israel sought; and of this, Egypt is the symbol in the ancient world. No country in the early history of men, was so distinguished for the wisdom of nature as Egypt. In later days, Greece and Rome sprang up, but that was long after that time to which this vision applied as a historical fact. They were at first little more than a number of contentious hordes. No such wisdom was found anywhere to the same extent as in Egypt. The great Assyrian who invaded Israel was characterized not so much by wisdom as by vast resources and appliances in the way of strength. Egypt depended mainly on good counsel, as if there were no living God,- on the counsel of man, sharpened by long experience, for it was one of the oldest powers that attained eminence. Accordingly, as they had been versed in the state-craft of the ancient world, they had an immense reputation for their familiarity with means of dealing in national difficulties. . . . Israel when threatened by the Assyrian sought the help of Egypt:I am speaking now of the literal fact when this prophecy first applied. Though it did bear on the days of Isaiah, yet the character of the prophecy shows that it cannot be limited to that time:only a very small part was accomplished then. But between the two terms of Israel’s past and future unfaithfulness, in turning to the wisdom of the world in their troubles, there is a serious lesson for us in the pressure of any trial that concerns the testimony of God. The tendency is immense to meet a worldly trial in a worldly way. That you cannot meet the world’s efforts against you by spiritual means is what one is apt to think:so there is the danger of recourse to earthly means for the purpose of escape. What is this but the same thing that we find here? And yet who that feels for the children of God and for the truth but feels the danger of this? Be sure, if we do not feel the danger, it is because we are ourselves under the world’s influence. The feeling of the danger, the dread of our own spirits, the fear lest we should meet flesh by flesh, is what God uses to make us look to Himself. God will never put His seal on self-dependence; on the contrary, the great lesson the whole life of Christ teaches is the very reverse. He lived for* the Father:so "he that eateth Him, shall live for* Him."*"On account of," J. N. D’s translation:and in foot-note, " For the advantage of ". . . I do not believe to be the sense of the passage. Perhaps ‘by reason of.’ "*

It is in dependence upon Another, even Christ, as our object, that the joy and strength and wisdom of the Christian are found. This we gather before the difficulty comes. Then " I can do all things through Him who strengthened! me." Where we often fail is through acting from impulse. If we think to plan, instead of praying in real subjection to God, we need to fear for ourselves. What is rendered in 2 Tim. 2:i "intercession," and in i Tim. 4:5 "prayer," means such intercourse with God, as admits of confiding appeal to Him. We can thus freely and personally speak to Him about all things, now that through the one Mediator we know Him as a Saviour-God, who has first spoken to us in grace and given us the access we have into this grace wherein we stand. Is it not then an outrage on the God who has thus opened His ear to us if we look to fleshly means? and yet who does not know that this is the very thing to which, perhaps, more than any other, the wise and prudent are prone.

In this way it seems that the moral lesson of this chapter is to be seen-it is taking counsel, but not of Jehovah. Hence God caused the land of Egypt to become the means of deeply aggravating their evil. "Woe to the rebellious children, saith Jehovah, that take counsel, but not of Me; and that cover with a covering, (or, as some prefer, that make leagues), but not of. My Spirit, that they may add sin to sin; that walk to go down into Egypt, and have not asked at My mouth; to strengthen themselves in the strength of Pharaoh, and to trust in the shadow of Egypt. Therefore shall the strength of Pharaoh be a shame, and the trust in the shadow of Egypt a confusion. For His princes are at Zoan, and His ambassadors are come to Hanes. They shall all be ashamed of a people that cannot profit them, that are not a help nor profit, but a shame and also a reproach." "His princes " mean those of God’s people, as the next chapter proves decisively. The prophet’s irony thus expresses itself.

"The burden of the beasts of the south. Through the land of trouble and anguish from whence [come] the lioness and the lion, the viper and the fiery flying serpent; they carry their riches upon the shoulders of young asses, and their treasures upon the bunches of camels, to a people [that] shall not profit. For Egypt helpeth in vain, and to no purpose:therefore have I called her Rahab (or arrogance) that sitteth still."

Not man’s pride, but God’s guidance avails for His people.

If we examine the New Testament for our guidance in these difficulties, we shall find just the same truth. If the apostle is speaking merely about the ordinary trials of each day, we have the same lesson in other words. Thus he tells us, we are to let our moderation be known unto all men, the Lord being at hand; that, instead of being careful or anxious about anything (not that we are to be careless, but not to be careful in the sense of anxiety), our requests should be made known unto God with thanksgiving.

Our strength, it is said, is in quiet confidence. Christians have a right to expect God to appear for us:He has entitled us to count on it. We may be perfectly sure, it matters not what the circumstances are:even supposing there has been something to judge in ourselves, if one tell it out to God, will not He listen? He cannot deny Himself. He must deny him that slights the name of Christ. Where He now puts to shame, it is in our self-will:so far from putting shame on such being a proof that He does not love them, it is precisely the proof that He does. But at the same time, let men venture to go beyond what God sees good for the discipline of His child, He soon takes up the rod:and there can be more terrible than when the adversary exceeds the chastening that is just, gratifying his hatred towards them. For God will rise up in His indignation deal with them according to His own majesty; even the grace of the gospel does not set aside that. For instance, see in the second epistle to Timothy 4:14. If Persons bearing the Lord’s name are carried away by their fleshly zeal, and fight against the truth of God, or those charged with the of that truth, God may use them for dealing with the faults in His people. God knows how to bring down His people where their looks are high because of anything in themselves, or that may conferred upon them. But when the limit of rebuke is exceeded, woe be to those that gainst them, covering their own vindictiveness envy under God’s name. It is evident the very grace of gospel makes it to be so much the more conspicuous; for it sounds so much the more that God should thus deal in the midst of all that speaks so loudly of His love. The gospels also bring out in the words of our Lord Himself the wickedness of fighting against what god is doing even by poor weak disciples. This is the great lesson for us:we are not to consult our own hearts, or have recourse to the strength of man. When we flee to the various resources of the flesh, we slip out of our proper Christian path. Whereas the strength of God has indeed shone in that foundation-pattern in which all the blessing of grace to sinners is contained; and it always takes this form for a Christian, and that is death and resurrection. There may very likely be a great pressure of trial; there may soon appear a sinking down under it; but as surely as there is the semblance of death, there will be the reality of resurrection by and by. Let no one be disheartened. The cross is the right mold for the blessing of the children of God. When we were brought to Him, was it not after the same sort? We knew what it was to have the horrors of the conviction of sin; but God was going to bring us for the first time into a place of special blessing.

It has always been so with His own. We find it in the case of Abraham, and in proportion to the greatness of blessing is the force of sorrow that precedes it. Isaac was given when Abraham was a hundred years old, and Sarah as good as dead. There was death, as it were, and he had to wait for a son. Even after the birth and growth of .the child of promise, he had to surrender him-to offer up his only son to God. Directly that the singleness and truth of His heart was proved, and that the sacrifice in principle was offered up, the angel of Jehovah arrests his hand. How much sweeter now, when Isaac was, as it were, the child of resurrection! And so it is with all our blessings; it matters not what they may be. There must be the breaking down of our feelings, the mortification of self in a practical way, if we are to know what God is in blessing:our blessings are cast in the mold of death and resurrection.- Exposition of Isaiah, Kelly, p. 292.)

"And upon His head were many crowns." (Rev. 19:12.)

(Continued from page 39.)

CHAPTER XIII. The Bridegroom.

The Church as the Body of Christ speaks, then, as we have seen, of service in subjection and fellowship with the Head. In the Bride we find it in a new aspect, in which, while association with Christ is just as prominent, there is rather the thought of rest than of activity; or it is the heart that is awake and in activity, Christ is seen as the Beloved of the heart, and in known and enjoyed relationship, its entire satisfaction and delight.

The " Body " is not the equivalent of the " Bride," and we miss much if we accept the one as substitute for the other. The incompatibility of the Church filling both these places has been, however, lately pressed, and that the members of Christ’;? Body are not the Bride, but part of the Bridegroom Himself. But surely, if these are both figures, there is no incompatibility here, and it is only by joining different aspects of truth in an incongruous manner-"part of the Bridegroom "-that they are made to appear so. Scripture does not so connect them, and to put things in this way is only an unconscious self-entanglement of thought.

It has been also represented that the Church was a "mystery hid in God" during Old Testament times, and that this is inconsistent with there being and types of it in the Old Testament, such as Rebekah, for instance, has been taken to be:for types teach, and were meant to teach doctrines, and the mystery is not said to be hidden in Scripture, but in God. But this is to overlook the plain statement of the apostle, where after a direct quotation of Gen. 2:24, ("the two shall be one flesh ") following an application of the preceding history of Adam and his wife, he says:"This is a great mystery; but I speak concerning Christ and the Church" (Eph. 5:32). Now here the mystery of the Church as the Bride of Christ is found at the very beginning of the Old Testament.

Types by themselves teach nothing:they need the removing of the veil that is over them before they can be anything more than just history, ordinance, or what is upon the face of them. If Scripture were full of them, they would still be hid in God until it pleased Him to give the key to unlock their meaning. The distinction sought to be made is therefore quite unfounded.

It is true, that, as to the Body of Christ, the Old Testament, as far as we are aware, has no hint of it; while with regard to the Bride there are types from the very beginning. But not only so, the figure of marriage is used again and again with reference to the relation between Jehovah and Israel, as a people brought into intimate and unique attachment to Himself; and this both in the history of the past, and in the prophecy of the future. This was, therefore, no mystery hid in God,-no secret to be brought out at an after-time,-and cannot refer to the Church which is Christ’s Body. Thus in Jeremiah (31:31-34) God speaks of the covenant made with their fathers, when He took them by the hand to bring them out of the land of Egypt, as of a marriage contract:"which my covenant they brake, although I was a husband to them, saith the Lord." And in Hosea (chap. 2:) God judges them for their wanderings from Him as adultery, while He prophesies the return of the nation to her " first husband " as the result of His dealings with her in the time to come:"I will visit upon her the days of Baalim, wherein she burned incense to them, and decked herself with her earrings and her jewels, and went after her lovers, and forgot Me, saith the Lord. Therefore, behold, I will allure her and bring her into the wilderness, and speak comfortably unto her. And I will give her vineyards from thence, and the valley of Achor as a door of hope; and she shall sing there as in the days of her youth, and as in the day when she came up out of the land of Egypt."

Then comes the renewal, but in a more intimate way, of the old relationship. "And it shall be at that day that thou shalt call Me Ishi, and shalt no more call Baali:for I will take away the names of Baalim out of her mouth, and they shall be no more remembered by their name."

The change of title here is significant. "Ishi" and "Baali" both are used for "husband"; but the latter is strictly "lord, master," and implies simply the wife’s subjection; whereas "ishi," "my man," as with similar words in other languages, goes back to creation and the fundamental fitting of man and woman to each other, so that there should be real fellowship or kinship in the relation. The connection with the substitution of the one title for the other as to the true God and the dropping of the very names of the "Baals," the false gods, out of Israel’s mouth, is therefore easy to be understood. They had only known God hitherto in the far off place of "master," not in the reality of His glorious nature, not in the affectionate intimacy which He sought. BJ Thus there was nothing to hinder their being drawn away to "other lords" which had usurped His place. But now, in the future which He here contemplates, all would be changed, so as to make stable the relationship:"And I will betroth thee unto Me for ever; yea, I will betroth thee unto Me in righteousness and in judgment, and in loving-kindness and in mercies; I will even betroth thee unto Me in faithfulness "-or " steadfastness"-"and thou shalt know the Lord."

Here, then, is the end of all wanderings:and now "Thou shalt no more be termed Forsaken; neither shall thy land be termed Desolate; but thou shalt be called Hephzibah,"-" My delight is in her,"-"and thy land Beulah " (married):"for the Lord delighteth in thee, and thy land shall be married" (Isa. 62:4).

Here it is plain that to Israel, God’s earthly people, it is that these promises belong. It should be as plain, surely, that the "Bride of the Lamb," united to Him in heaven before He comes forth to the judgment of the earth (Rev. 19:), is not Israel, and that the "new," the "heavenly Jerusalem," "Jerusalem which is above," (Rev. 21:; Gal. 4:26) cannot be the Old Testament city, even in the fullest glory of her glorious time to come. Thus there are certainly two " Brides" contemplated in Scripture, a heavenly and an earthly one; and the objections made against this are really of no force whatever. For instance, where it is said:"The Bride in Isaiah, Jeremiah, and Hosea is Israel, or at any rate the elect of Israel; those who were partakers of the heavenly calling in Israel." Surely nothing could well be more contrary to Scripture than this. Was it with partakers of the heavenly calling that God made a covenant when He took them by the hand to lead them out of the land of Egypt? Was it the elect in Israel who broke that covenant, though Jehovah was a husband to them? Was it these to whom He gave a writing of divorcement, and put them away? Is it a heavenly land, that is no more to be called Desolate, but Beulah (married)? Is it to an elect heavenly people that it is said, "Turn, O backsliding children:for I am married unto you; and I will take you, one of a city, and two of a family, and will bring you to Zion "? If these questions cannot be answered in the affirmative, then assuredly, whatever the New Testament Bride may be, the Old Testament one is not the same.

The writer allows even that "all the promises to Israel as a nation were earthly," and such are the promises here:they are national; although it is true that only those can enjoy them who undergo that spiritual change which our Lord emphasizes as needed by any who enter the Kingdom of God. As Isaiah says (4:3, 4):"And it shall come to pass that he that is left in Zion, and he that remaineth in Jerusalem, shall be called holy, even every one that is written among the living in Jerusalem; when the Lord shall have washed away the filth of the daughters of Zion, and shall have purged the blood of Jerusalem from the midst thereof, by the spirit of judgment and by the spirit of burning."

In the forty-fifth psalm the divine-human King, Messiah, is seen as the Bridegroom of Israel, and as to its being an earthly scene that is set before us in it there can be surely no question made. It was to such a Bridegroom that the Baptist testified (John 3:29); and the parable of the virgins doubtless speaks of the same. In the whole prophecy (Matt, 24:, 25:) Israel is prominent, the Church coming in only in that part of it which assumes that parabolic form in which the "mysteries of the Kingdom," "things kept secret from the foundation of the world," had been before declared. And the virgins going forth to meet the Bridegroom, have been inconsistently taken by many to be the same as the Bride. To set this right in no wise affects the doctrine, if it does not rather make it clearer. At least the conformity with the Old Testament is plain, and with the position that Matthew holds as the connecting link between the Old Testament and the New.

In the passage in Ephesians before referred to there is much more than an illustrated appeal to wives and husbands in view of Christ’s relationship to the Church. That relationship is stated in a very definite way in antitypical parallelism to that of the first Adam and the woman divinely given to him. Adam, we are distinctly told in Romans (chap. 5:14) "is the figure of Him that was to come." Christ is called in Corinthians (i Cor. 15:45) "the last Adam." But notice the contrast also, which here as always, in one way or other, obtains between type and antitype:"the first Adam was made a living’ soul; the last Adam was made a quickening Spirit." The same parallel, yet contrast, is seen in this passage in Ephesians:"Christ loved the Church and gave Himself for it, that He might sanctify and cleanse it with the washing of water by the Word, that He might present it to Himself a glorious Church, not having spot or wrinkle, or any such thing, but that it should be holy and without blemish." It was God who presented Eve to Adam:it is Christ who as the fruit of His own self-sacrifice presents the Church to Himself.

It is certain that here Christ is looked at as in a higher,-and so in some sense a contrasted-way, repeating the story of the second of Genesis. But that is not all:the apostle goes on to say:"So ought men to love their wives as their own bodies:he that loveth his wife loveth himself; for no man ever yet hated his own flesh, but nourisheth and cherisheth it, even as the Lord the Church. For we are members of His body; [we are]* of His flesh and of His bones." *The repetition of the "we are," or some equivalent of it, is necessitated by the insertion here of the preposition έκ ("out of") which separates the first statement from the latter one.* Here two things are brought together which, in different ways show the ground of the Lord’s care. We are members of His body:nearer to Him than that can nothing be. But this is by the baptism of the Spirit, and implies a prior, anticipative, originative work that shall prepare for it. The baptism of the Spirit effects union; but with whom then can He unite Himself? Now comes the answer:"we are of His flesh and of His bones."

But this carries us back at once to the Old Testament type again, and we hear Adam, after the whole of nature besides has failed to furnish a helpmeet for him, and when God to provide one has brought forth the woman out of his side,-we hear Adam saying, "This is now bone of my bone, and flesh of my flesh." Her origin is from him, though not in the way of nature, but of divine power. And now again has been produced by a mightier act of divine power, a people who have received their spiritual origin from the last Adam, out of His death-sleep, who is not only a living Spirit, but a "Spirit giving life." The earthly history has found its complete fulness of meaning.

And thereupon follows the saying, whether it was Adam’s or not, which the apostle quotes and applies in the end of his exhortation:"for this cause shall a man leave his father and his mother, and shall cleave unto his wife:and they shall be one flesh." The argument and justification for those apparently foreign unions, is founded upon that original fitting of the woman to the man which was made by God Himself the basis of origin of the whole family relationship. Thus it retains its place as prior to and beyond all other.

But the apostle’s application is that with which we have here to do. He says of it:" This is a great mystery; but I speak concerning Christ and the Church."

The mystery here then is spiritual, while God has manifested His interest in it by writing it out in natural hieroglyphics, impossible to be interpreted until He be pleased to give the key. "All these things happened unto them for types, and are written for our instruction, upon whom the ends of the ages are come." F. W. G.

(To be continued.)

Child of my tenderest love, I know thy care;
Seek not to bear alone what I would share,
Strange though it seem to thee, I laid it there
With My own hand.

The burden presses sore, My child, I know,
Ofttimes thy bitter tears will overflow;
And thou dost wonder why I leave it so,
And yet love thee!

Think not I laid this on thee willingly,
Or that in wrath, I seek to punish thee.
Ah! no; My child is very dear to Me;
‘Tis for thy good.

Child of My love come near to Me, and I
Will help thee understand the reason why
I mixed for thee this cup of agony,
And caused thee pain.

Sometimes of late, I’ve missed thee from My side,
First in the morning, then at eventide.
Shall it be ever thus? Oh! wilt thou hide
Thyself from Me?

Have I not shown My readiness to bear
My portion of thy grief, thy pain, thy care?
Tell Me, My child, canst thou refuse to share
My sympathy?

It was for thee I left My home above,
Suffered on earth, then died, that I might prove
My true, unchangeable, undying love.
Could I do more?

Wilt thou not come, and find in Me thy rest?
Wilt thou not stay, and lean upon My breast?
Wilt thou not trust that My way is the best,
Child of My love?

Bring Me thy heaviest woes, and thou shalt see
How they will lose their weight when shared by Me;
Thou wilt prove the sweetness of My sympathy,
Child of My love. T. P.

Ques. 1. – What may we ask Christ our Lord for, and what God the Father?

Ans. – Cold exactness Is not so valuable in prayer, as ardent desire and simple faith. And yet there is a propriety In presenting certain petitions to our Lord and others to the Father. Doubtless many a Spirit-taught soul Is guided unintelligently. In general, all that pertains to the Church, its testimony, order, and ministry would be referred directly to the Head of the Church. Thus Paul, when afflicted and apparently hindered in his ministry, appealed to the Lord. Equally, when it is the need of the child, or confession or supplication, the Father would be addressed.

There should ever be care not to allow the thought that our Lord Jesus Is more accessible than the Father, – "the Father Himself loveth you;" and on the other hand, that the Lord la not equal with the Father.

In this connection also we may be allowed to point out a confusion in addressing the Godhead which surely It would be pleasing to our God to correct. It Is painful to hear the expression, " O Lord our Father," and thanks to the Father that He died for us.

Ques. 2. – Would you explain from God’s word what Is the nature of the meeting commonly called "The Prayer Meeting."

What place is there in it for teaching or exhortation, or for the preaching of the gospel?

If It is a prayer-meeting, should we not go with the expectation and desire that it should be really that? How is It that so few pray, of those who attend this meeting?

ANS.- The mariner of life in New Testament times was, of necessity, far simpler than in ours. While they had meetings in which either prayer, teaching, or exhortation might be prominent, there is no distinct mention of what we would call a prayer, or a reading meeting exclusively.

The general exhortation as to meetings-"not forsaking the assembling of ourselves together as the manner of some Is" (Heb. 10:25) -would be our warrant for meeting together for prayer or for any other godly purpose. There cannot be the least doubt, that prayer has a prominence In the descriptions of Christian life that is too often forgotten. " They continued steadfastly in the apostles’ doctrine and fellowship, and in breaking of bread, and In prayers" (Acts 49:42). This gives the general practice of the early Church. When special needs arose, as In the case of Peter’s imprisonment, there was unceasing prayer for His release, and at a meeting evidently for that purpose, he presented himself after his miraculous deliverance (Acts 12:1-19), particularly verse 12). At Philippi (Acts 16:10), we have what is the nearest approach to the thought of an exclusive prayer-meeting. This passage at any rate shows that prayer was the prominent feature at a meeting where even such a teacher as (he apostle Paul was present. We would gather from these and other scriptures, together with the general tone of the New Testament, that while there was no special meeting so designated, the prayer-meeting was the characteristic feature of the gatherings of God’s people.

And what could be more natural? They were weak and helpless, and felt it; Ignorant, and knew whence wisdom came. Certainly they would pray, both as individuals and as companies of Christians. Our shame Is that we feel our weakness and Ignorance so little, and that, we have little doubt, lies at the root of the lack of prayer and Its answer. If we feel this, surely we can take courage to believe God is awakening us.

As to the remedy, it must be a divine one which awakens the saints to a sense of their need. We do not believe any arrangements of man can do this. We may call it a prayer meeting, but that will not make it one. Felt need, earnest desire, a simple faith,- these will make the gatherings of the saints real seasons for prayer. We do not believe that any rule, written or understood, can give its true character to this meeting. The Spirit of God must be unhindered in His holy work of leading us in prayer, praise, exhortation, or whatever may be called for.

On the other hand, we believe with our correspondent, that there is great danger of neglect of united prayer. Surely, with all the occasion there is for it, it becomes us to be much in believing prayer for "grace to help." Sad it is indeed, with all our needs, personal and corporate, with all the Lord’s work that should be done,-to see saints sit mute, or engage in what seems so little to be the "effectual fervent prayer of the righteous." How is it, in our assemblies, the voice of some is never heard in prayer? May there not be a subtle pride at the root of this- the feeling that we cannot pray as long or as eloquently as others? God forbid that such thoughts should prevail. The Pharisees, "fora pretense," made long prayers, and all those prayers recorded in the New Testament, even our Lord’s matchless one in John 17:, are brief; while many a needy one uttered his petition in a sentence or two:"Lord, help me;" "Lord, save me; " " Thou Son of David, have mercy on me." We long to see a spirit of deep earnestness in every saint, that will express itself in such pungent brief petitions. May there be thus many brief prayers, rather than a few lengthy ones. Far be it from us to criticize. Thank God for much real prayer; but do we not all feel our lack in this matter?

Where there is a real spirit of prayer, it will unquestionably be a prominent feature of the meeting; but how sweetly will a suited word of exhortation and encouragement suit with the prayer. As to a word of gospel at a meeting for prayer, it would hardly be suitable, unless the unconverted were present in such numbers as to warrant our turning particularly to them. We are to remember that the strongest testimony to the unsaved is the manifest presence of God in the midst of His gathered people. (1 Cor. 14:23-25.)

May our God awaken us as to our need in this matter, stirring us up to true prayer as never before. What joyous thanksgiving would soon mingle with the supplications!

Daniel, as his name suggests, is the Gentile prophet. In this book we are in the times of the Gentiles. It is, as you see, the fourth in the list, corresponding thus to the book of Numbers, the wilderness or world book. We have not to do primarily with Israel at all.

The scene is laid in distant Babylon, which has usurped the place of Jerusalem and with Nebuchadnezzar as king, instead of one of the descendants of David. We have the concerns of the nations of the earth, but just so far as they refer to God’s purposes.

There are many very instructive features in this book. Let us notice that just as the book of Numbers has in one of its earliest chapters that which characterizes, or should do so, the people as seen in that book-in the place and testimony of the Nazarite-so you have in the first chapter of Daniel the Nazarite place. When you come to the putting of the children of God in the world, and to the question as to how we are to walk in it, what is the first great principle that is to guide us? Numbers tells us.

In the sixth chapter of that book, a man to be a true pilgrim, a true and faithful witness for God in this world, must be a Nazarite; he must be separated from that by which he is surrounded. Abraham was the typical pilgrim, and he was the man who lived in a tent, isolated from others. In like manner, Lot is presented to us as the child of God typically linked with the world, defiled by it, his testimony destroyed and he himself saved only as by fire.

Nazariteship is the only power by which we can walk in this world for God, if we are to be a testimony for Him. If His name is to be honored by us, it must be absolutely by our separation from everything that would defile, degrade, and drag us down. How often has the lamp of testimony been quenched by the Lord’s people being mingled with the world, by our living here as those who have interests and objects in common with the world.

I say again, in Numbers you have the key-note of the whole book in that chapter on the Nazarite-separation in the midst of defilement. And here in the book of Daniel, the book where the world is going to lift its head and show its power, where we are going to have spread before us the history of the Gentile nations, the very key to it all is, the Nazariteship of Daniel and his brethren in the court of the king of Babylon. Think of that young man taken from Jerusalem-Jerusalem itself all in ruins -transferred to the very courts of the king of Babylon, the first nation of the earth; Babylon itself the first city of the earth, with all that would attract, all that would appeal to the natural man, and he himself there introduced not into some humble inferior position, but to be one of the attendants about the king himself; to be in the very line of promotion, to make a success of his life. And what does he do? The first thing he does is to cut the line that would link him with the throne of Babylon; he separates himself absolutely from everything that partakes of the character of Babylon. " Daniel purposed in his heart that he would not defile himself with the portion of the king’s meat;" and in that purpose of heart I trace the success-if 1 may use such a word-of his life down here for God. In that separation from the dainties of the king of Babylon, the pleasures and the allurements of that world-city,-I trace the secret of those wondrous revelations that God gave to Daniel.

For an illustration of the same thing take John in the book of Revelation, where he has opened up to him a still wider vision, where his eye takes in not only the earth, but the heavens, not only time but eternity; takes in the whole range of God’s dealing with men, and His purposes in connection with His blessed Son. What is the key-thought of that book? "I was in the island that is called Patmos, for the word of God and the testimony of Jesus." Separate from all the glory and power of this world, John the lonely prisoner, in isolation, sees visions which no mortal eye can see; hears words that none but the anointed ear can hear, and opens to us the revelation of all the ways of God, introducing us into eternity itself.

Do you want to understand prophecy? Do you want to stand upon the pinnacle from whence you can look over all the kingdoms of this world, and the glory of them? Do you remember One who stood upon the mountain top and looked over all that glory, all that splendor of this world and its kingdoms, unmoved, un-attracted by it? It was the blessed Son of God; and when Satan pointed out all to Him, and offered to put it into His hands, that blessed One, the true Nazarite, in heart separate from it all, would have none of it until His Father gave it to Him. So, I say, the Nazarite heart, the Nazarite position, the Nazarite separation in heart from the things of the world that would defile and clog, is the only proper spirit in which to come to and understand prophecy.

Prophecy is for the heart. I know nothing more deadening, nothing more injurious to our spiritual welfare than to be occupied with prophecy in a cold intellectual way. Look at the apostle Paul in the eleventh chapter of Romans. He has been unfolding God’s dealings with Israel and with the Gentiles in the ninth, tenth, and eleventh chapters. He has been quoting Scripture proof-texts as to prophecy, foretelling the time when Israel as a nation will be restored to the Lord; but, it is his heart that has been kindled by these things. His heart takes them up, and as he gets through with his subject, he bursts out in praise, "O the depth of the riches both of the wisdom and knowledge of God! " If we are in true Nazarite spirit occupied with these prophetic subjects, we will find that they introduce us into the sanctuary of God Himself, to be occupied with Himself, praising and worshiping.-(Extracted from one of the Lectures which are being published in "TREASURY OF TRUTH.")

The glory of the gospel is its freeness. Without any "works of righteousness," the helpless and guilty sinner who believes in Jesus is justified and has eternal life. All efforts or struggles to gain salvation are a dishonor to Him who

"fought the fight alone"

and won the victory for His people. Of this we need scarcely be more than reminded in taking up a subject that speaks not of rest, but of conflict, and is the legitimate result of the rest obtained through the gospel.

But there is a conflict which though, alas! frequent is neither necessary nor proper for the Christian to be engaged in-not necessary unless his own neglect has made it so. We mean that conflict with the flesh, with sin in us, which comprises so much of the history of God’s dear people. It will be remembered that the first mention we have of Amalek as a hostile power is in connection with the strife and chiding of the children of Israel at Meribah, because they had no water. " Then came Amalek and fought with Israel at Rephidim " (Ex. 17:7-16). It was when they began to murmur, to be discontented with their pilgrim way through the wilderness, that the "lusts of the flesh" began to war against them. The connection of a passage upon this point in Deuteronomy is significant. (Chap. 25:17-19) "Remember what Amalek did unto thee by the way, when ye were come forth out of Egypt, how he met thee by the way, and smote the hindmost of thee, even all that were feeble behind thee, when thou wast faint and weary.

Feebleness of a spiritual nature is always blameworthy. Here was a mighty host, brought up out of Egypt, and in the eye of God, yea, and to sight, "there was not one feeble person among their tribes" (Ps. 105:37). Their feebleness was shown in the lack of faith and earnest purpose to press forward. The stragglers in the rear were attacked by the enemy; had they been pressing forward they would have had the vigor to resist such an attack, and at the same time it would not have been offered. Their bold front would have compelled the enemy to keep his distance.

So is it at all times. When in the vigor and joy of faith we press forward," forgetting the things which are behind," the eye fixed on Christ, the very first appearance of the lusts of the flesh will be met with such firmness that there will be little need for those fierce hand-to-hand conflicts with it, which, as we said, make up so much of the record of our lives.

The subsequent history of Amalek affords much material for careful thought upon this subject. It will be found that they were not, in the full sense of the word, inhabitants of the land of Israel’s inheritance, though they did dwell-some of them-in the south of Canaan (Num. 13:29), the border district next the wilderness. Strictly they were children of the desert and did most of their fighting there.

Broadly, then, it is when "as living in the world " that we are more particularly exposed to the attacks of what answers to Amalek. On the other hand they did make raids into the land, alone and in conjunction with other enemies, but it was always when Israel had been unfaithful. Let us look briefly at some of these attacks.

They were the allies (Judges 5:14)* of Jabin, king of Hazor and of Sisera, in the memorable resuscitation of the northern foe who had been so effectually extirpated by Joshua 130 years previously. *As this may not be evident to many, we add a note that the Revised Version renders the verse referred to, "They whose root is in Amalek," describing the situation of Ephraim as in chap. 12:15. We are not clear as to this rendering. The LXX. renders it, "Ephraim rooted them out in Amalek." Most certainly the presence of the name is suggestive, and the spiritual meaning of what has been said is clear.* Spiritual foes never "die," except to faith, and only remain dead as that faith is in exercise. The whole book of Judges is a sad comment upon the failure of the people to go forward and to hold fast what they had gained. On the contrary, they departed from the living God, and so He must let them taste the fruits of their own ways. "Thine own wickedness shall correct thee, and thy backslidings shall reprove thee:know, therefore, and see that it is an evil thing and bitter, that thou hast forsaken the Lord thy God, and that My fear is not in thee" (Jer. 2:19). Solemn words indeed which may well be prayerfully pondered by any tempted to depart even in thought from the fullest communion with our God.

We shall see presently what Jabin seems to signify, and only mention here that this second conflict with him is complicated with the league of Amalek. Wherever failure comes in, there we find not merely error to contend with, but the flesh in league with it. When one who has known God takes up any untruth, we have not simply to disabuse his mind of his error, but, alas! to overcome the pride of his flesh which ‘has now leagued itself with that error.

In like manner, when the Midianites who had been "vexed," for their corruption of Israel with their abominations (Num. 25:16-18; 31:2-12), were permitted to make such a fearful inroad upon Israel, and to settle upon the land as locusts, Amalek was with them. Midian may suggest by its name – "strife"-that warring of the lusts in the members which is so common in the world. And now they are leagued with Amalek their natural allies, to make the bondage more complete and intolerable. Barak and Gideon are the champions who can meet such allied hosts and conquer them.

King Saul met his doom with Amalek. He began well (i Sam. 14:48), but when sent to completely extirpate them, spared the best "to sacrifice to the Lord." Saul is the man after the flesh, and he will spare the flesh. It is David who is the true and final victor (i Sam. 27:8)-type of Him who triumphs over the flesh by displacing it. So much is this the case that when David slipped and had leagued himself with the Philistines, Amalek came in and carried all he had captive (i Sam. 30:i).

We trust that what is suggested here will open up a subject for the thoughtful reader who will develop it from Scripture-the rise and progress of Amalek as an enemy of God’s people. But we must pass on to that which is the theme more directly before us.
The conflict in the seventh of Romans is one which should soon be over. The walk in the liberty and power of the Spirit is the secret of deliverance from the power of the flesh. But there is another conflict, in Ephesians, which is a constant and necessary exercise of soul. To be warring with Amalek is a sign that spiritual decrepitude has come in; to contend with the "seven nations" of Canaan is the mark of spiritual vigor. ."We wrestle not against flesh and blood, but against principalities, against powers, against the rulers of the darkness of this world, against spiritual wickedness in high places;" or, as more correctly, " against the universal lords of this darkness, against spiritual [hosts] of wickedness in the heavenlies."

Not to delay long over a simile familiar doubtless to all our readers, we simply mention here the well-known correspondence between the conflict in Ephesians and that in the book of Joshua. It is not the fact, which all would doubtless accept, that we would dwell on, but the application of that fact to some lessons which we believe may be fairly gathered from the account of those conflicts.

We will briefly gather up the teachings of the first part of the book which lead to the conflicts. The land is first of all given to them and then they are encouraged to go in and fight for it, to take possession of that which is their own. " Be strong, and of good courage " is the word here (chap. i). Next, the spies go over to Jericho-faith which looks at difficulties, not for discouragement, but for guidance, and finds opportunities thus to be the bearer of good news to any who may desire it (chap. 2:). Following this, we come to that which is the great type of the book- the passage of the Jordan, death and resurrection with Christ. Here the ark goes first; Christ must be alone in that which has stopped the waters of death and of judgment for His redeemed. Then His people follow; and in the two heaps of stones, in the bed of the river and at Gilgal,-we have, respectively, our identification with Christ in His death and resurrection. Gilgal is our making this truth a practical reality to ourselves, in order to learn the great lesson of "no confidence in the flesh." Gilgal is the place of power; when we are there the enemy quails; the people, as it were, enter into a new covenant with God. Here the manna ceases, and they eat the stored corn of the land,-treasures of Christ in glory laid up for His people’s food. At Gilgal they are brought face to face with the "Captain of the Lord’s host" (chaps, 3:-5:).

It is the entrance, in somewhat of reality and spiritual power, into these preliminary lessons which makes possible the subsequent course of victory corresponding with Joshua’s career. Alas! beloved brethren, have we not all cause for confession, as we smoothly glide over the surface of these amazing themes? We can talk, perhaps, quite well of "death and resurrection," "Gilgal," "old corn of the land," but are they substantial realities to our souls? If so, we are prepared to go on into actual conflict. And it is here that we would seek to point out more particularly what suggested the theme of this paper.

Jericho means "fragrance," and it typifies this world in its attractiveness, which lies at the very gateway to the land. Spiritually, there cannot be any attainment in the true knowledge of our inheritance as long as the world attracts us. Hence it is of immense importance, particularly for the young Christian, that the world should be no longer an object of attraction. If it is, it will shut out Christ’s things. It is the great hindrance to-day to growth. We would most urgently and affectionately press upon our younger brethren the importance of this subject. " Love not the world," was written to the young men who were strong (i John 2:).

As to the manner of conflict here, there are unquestionably lessons of much value to be gleaned from the history. Doubtless, the mutual exclusiveness is a point to be pondered. The gates of Jericho were straitly shut up, "none went out and none came in." How often does the Christian leave a way open, in his heart or thoughts, if nowhere else, for intercourse with the spirit of the world. So did not Paul when he could say, "God forbid that I should glory, save in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ, by whom the world is crucified unto me, and I unto the world" (Gal. 6:14).

But there was to be no direct conflict until divine power threw down the walls. Everything emphasized the fact that all was of God; they had no power of their own. The priests were to blow the jubilee-trumpets and the ark was to be borne around the walls accompanied by the host. It was, typically, bearing Christ about and proclaiming His coming. Obedience, patience, and human weakness were emphasized by the compassing of the walls seven days. At the time appointed they fall, and vigor of faith has full play for unsparing judgment of evil.

We pass on quickly to Ai and Achan to notice the former rather than the latter. Of Achan it must suffice to say that he seems to set forth that spirit which would take some glory to itself (gold) which all belongs to God, and would in the very hour of triumph over evil make some compromise with it. The Babylonish garment was the first enemy, if we may so speak, before which Israel fell, and to Babylon itself they went at last. "He that hath an ear, let him hear." (Chap. 6:)

Now Ai is the exact opposite of Jericho. It means "a heap of ruins," and presents the world as an object to be despised rather than to be allured by it. One who has truly and fully conquered Jericho, has turned it into Ai, and yet we can never treat this foe with contempt. The lesson here is plain:first of all it discloses unjudged sin, which always leads to presumption; secondly, when this is judged-the troublers detected-the whole power of Israel must go against the enemy which had been regarded as already conquered. And in the ambuscade and retreat, we learn the humiliating lesson which should have been fully learned at Gilgal.

If Jericho speaks loudly to the young Christian, does not Ai have a voice for the more mature? Such may take it for granted that the world is powerless to overcome them, and yet, with some root of pride unjudged, are really under its power. They may congratulate themselves on having put off much in the way of dress, occupation, pleasure-seeking,-that linked them with it; and under that plain exterior, that unworldly manner, they may, Achan-like, be hiding that which compromises them before ‘God. "Lord, is it I?" (Chaps, 7:and 8:)

When Ai has been conquered, at cost of much pains, and a great sense of weakness, a distinct step in advance has been taken. But one more test must be made before the tide of victory can rise so high as to sweep the whole land. There are the " wiles of the devil."

The plot of the Gibeonites was so transparent that one would be tempted to think,-did we not remember self,-that it must fail. In Ai they learned to have no confidence in their strength; the Gibeonites teach them they can have none in their wisdom. Perhaps it is more humbling to give up our wisdom than our strength. The position of this assault of Gibeon seems to indicate this. And yet had there been the least exercise of discernment, the faintest bit of recollection, it would have been impossible for them to hearken to the Gibeonites.

They showed their old shoes; Joshua could have replied, "Forty years did we wander in the wilderness, and our feet did not swell." They put forward their bread, and he could have replied," We received fresh bread every morning." They could not be pilgrims seeking God, for He never let such grow weary, or feed on stale food. Let us note this:the true pilgrim is marked by freshness. How much have God’s people loaded themselves down with the unequal yoke of Gibeon – alliances which in many cases must be respected, as where it is a personal’ link with an unsaved person by marriage. From much that would call itself the Gibeonite league it may be possible even yet for saints to free themselves, as in business, political, or ecclesiastical relationships. But enough has been said to indicate the lesson of Gibeon. (Chap. 9:)

One thing may be noted now:they are back at the camp at Gilgal. They seem to have learned at last the abiding lesson of "no confidence in the flesh." Have we not here distinct progress? Human thoughts, human strength, human wisdom have been all tried, and found wanting, and we come back to that which we should have learned at the first. Alas! we usually learn by experience, and not, as with Israel, does one lesson on a given point suffice:we need many.

But from chapter 10:a change takes place. The enemy, strong enough singly, now combines his forces, and will sweep from the land this invader. But now that they have learned their lesson of weakness, the combined forces are but "meat for them," they only serve to magnify the power of God. What a sweep of victory there is in the next three chapters! Here is the conflict at last where a holy joy can be felt, as one after another the "armies of the aliens are put to flight."

We enter but briefly into this latter portion, merely pointing out the salient features of the campaign. First, there is the conflict in the south. At the risk of being thought fanciful, we would suggest that as the subsequent inheritance of Judah, and as the land turned toward the sun, the south is connected with the thought of revealed truth. The truths of the Bible must first be recovered, and here we meet not the infidel, but the one who professes’ to know and love the Bible, but who makes use of it to support his false doctrines. Adonizedek is leader of this southern league; and his name, by its similarity to Melchizedek, "king of righteousness," while the first means "lord of righteousness,"and both being king of the same place (apparently), would suggest that imitation of truth which is ever the mark of error. Under the southern sky of Bible light and knowledge, how much deadly error holds sway. We will name but a few:Adventism, Annihilationism, Restorationism, and the like. These all profess to believe the Bible and quote it in support of their errors, but faith must and can dislodge them. For a most helpful and suggestive treatment of this whole subject, we would refer the reader to the notes in the Numerical Bible, at this point.

There is no faltering now, and we have many a touch that is most suggestive. Note how all terror has fled. Joshua says, "Come near, and put your feet upon the necks of these men." Where is the faith that will do this? Oh, for fearless faith that will meet error, and drive it from its professed hold upon the Bible!

Lastly, we come to the northern league, whose conquest completes the general occupation of the land. Jabin, we are told, means "understanding." And if the southern league typify that error which uses the word of God:the northern, as turned away from the sunlight, would suggest that side of error which denies the word of God, and flourishes upon the independence of human thought. It is commonly called rationalism, and lays its cold hand upon all knowledge, and even upon the word of God itself, and robs them for us of God Himself. Who that has been in the icy grasp of this northern foe, but knows his dread power. Infidelity, the deification of human reason, is this Jabin.

Blessed be God, this foe has no terrors for faith. " Suddenly " does the leader of God’s host fall upon him, scatter his forces, and destroy his power of recovery. Would that we might see such victories today! Man’s reason is exalted, is made the supreme judge of all truth, even of God’s revealed word. Where is the man of faith?

Thus we have, imperfectly indeed, traced the believer’s conflict, from the struggle with Amalek, the flesh, onward to the world, in Jericho, till learning his lessons, he can meet Satan himself in his strongest citadel and vanquish him.

"For the weapons of our warfare are not carnal, but mighty through God, to the pulling down of strongholds; casting down imaginations, and every high thing that exalteth itself against the knowledge of God, and bringing into captivity every thought to the obedience of Christ" (2 Cor. 10:4, 5).

1 Cor. 6:19, 20.

I am not mine. Christ Jesus gave
His precious life, my soul to save;
My mortal body also is,
By right of purchase, even His.

Lord, I am Thine:Thy temple fill
With incense of Thy holy will,
And grant that I may ever be
Responsive to Thy ministry.

Forbid, dear Lord, that I refuse
To rightly use, or e’er abuse
That which, in grace, Thou lendest me
To glorify and honor Thee.

I am not mine! Be this my song-
My joy, that I to Christ belong;
He paid the price, in blood, for me,
And owns me for eternity.

G. K.

"And upon His Head Were Many Crowns." (Rev. 19:12.)

(Continued from page 8.)

CHAPTER XII. Head of the Body.

We read nothing of any " Body of Christ " (in the sense in which we are now considering it), until Christ is a man in heaven. Figure, as of course it is, the appropriateness of the figure depends upon this, that it is a relationship to Christ as Man of which it speaks. Being a figure, we are to examine its force as such, as Scripture develops it, expecting to find in it the instruction which all figures have:for, as in Israel’s history, the ‘’ things that happened to them " (not merely can be used in a typical sense, but) " happened to them for types" (i Cor. 10:ii), so we may be sure also that in nature everywhere, according to the design of God, the clothing of the natural is but the veil of the spiritual; nor shall we " materialize too much ‘’ by allowing the glory of the light to shine through its earthly tabernacle.

This at once reminds us that the Lord compares His body with the temple of God, "Destroy this temple, and in three days I will raise it up:He spake of the temple of His body " (John 2:19 and 21). And this is directly in the line of John’s testimony, that "The Word was made flesh and tabernacled among us; and we beheld His. glory,-glory as of an Only-begotten with the Father, full of grace and truth "(chap. 1:14). Here it is said, "was made flesh,"not because He assumed nothing but a human body, but because in taking flesh, He came within the sphere of human observation and knowledge,- here the direct revelation of His glory "began:He was in the world and the light of it.

The body prepared Him was as the instrument of His Spirit by which His words and works made known the unique obedience which proclaimed Him the Second Man; while over all, through all, shone, in strange yet blessed harmony with this, the higher glory. Thus the body of Christ was the tabernacle or temple of God on earth.

Now the apostle, speaking of the responsibility of Christians, as flowing from their relationship to Christ, uses the same figure and connection of thought. The Church, as baptized by the Spirit of God, is one body, and that the body of Christ (i Cor. 12:13,27). Christians are also the temple of God for the same reason, the Spirit of God dwells in them (chap. 3:16). These thoughts are here no further connected, but in another place in the same epistle (chap. 6:15-20) he does connect them further, and applies them to the individual Christian and to his body as indwelt by the Holy Ghost. "Your bodies," he says, "are members of Christ . . . Do ye not know that your body is the temple of the Holy Ghost, which is in you, which ye have of God, and ye are not your own? For ye are bought with a price; wherefore glorify God in your body."

Here in the Christian, as in Christ, the body is the temple of God, He being glorified in it by the devotion to Him of those members in which humanity even in its highest faculties is manifested. The practical life glorifies Him, not only in the character exhibited in it, but this as the fruit of divine grace acting in virtue of Christ’s blessed work, and by the Spirit of God.

It is not, of course, of the Church that the apostle is speaking, but of the individual; and therefore it is that he says that "your bodies are the members of Christ"-he could not go further. Yet the basis is the same, the being "joined to the Lord" by the Spirit; and the individual is thus in the same way the temple of God as the whole Church is. Thus far, at least, the individual represents the whole, the "living stone " represents or shows the nature of the whole building.

As the "body prepared" Him was that in which the Word was manifested, and the Life, thus seen, became "the Light of men," so now in the night of His personal absence, He has a Body in which (though not in that original brightness) the same Light shines. Thus the Body of Christ is always spoken of as here, in the place of manifestation. The Church is "the epistle of Christ, read and known of all men, written with the Spirit of the living God upon fleshy tables of the heart,"-written with the rays of that glory hidden from the world, but to faith unveiled:"for God who caused the light to shine out of darkness, has shined in our hearts, to give out the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ" (2 Cor. 3:-4:6). Thus "we have the mind of Christ" (i Cor. 2:16):in the body of Christ, as energized by His Spirit, and controlled by the unseen Head in heaven, the life of Christ continually renews itself on earth. For the body speaks of living activities, of an organic unity in which communion is wrought out in the ministry of every member to the whole:for no member of a body liveth to itself, and the love of Christ to His own is reproduced in the mutual service which is love’s outflow, and for which He who knows best our interests has provided by the variety and inequality of the gifts He has given, that we may be bound the more together by our mutual dependence.

Such is the Church which is Christ’s body, in the thought of it which Scripture gives. The hindrances to realization of this, Scripture dwells upon also fully, and we are made to feel them painfully and continually. But these do not come within our purpose to consider now; as, indeed, it is not even the Church itself which is the object before us, but Christ in His relation to it. This, while it is in Him unspeakable condescension and grace, is even thus His glory forever, and shall fill the hearts of all the hosts of heaven with His praise. Yea, "unto God" shall "be glory in the Church by Christ Jesus, throughout all the generations of the ages of ages" (Eph. 3:21, Gk.).

In Corinthians the Church is contemplated in its order, fellowship, and service. It is the Body of Christ (i Cor. 12:27), and therefore Christ is its Head, but the Head is not explicitly brought before us, save incidentally, "nor again the Head to the feet, I have no need of you." I apprehend no difficulty in applying this to Christ. The Church is, in that divine purpose which is the glory of divine grace, His "fulness:" the Head must have a body; and it is because of this wonderful relationship, that it is said, where speaking of the unity of the body notwithstanding its many members, "so also is the Christ." Some are beginning to apply even this to the Church exclusively-"the anointed Body." And they tell us even that, its being the complement of Christ is not the idea of Scripture, and that, if here we take in Christ, the eye and ear which the apostle instances as parts of the body would belong to the Head; but even in Ephesians and Colossians the "Body is looked at as complete in itself, though deriving" from Christ. Nay, even "the force of ‘He gave Him to be Head over all things to the assembly which is His body," is said to be only "that He might in all things have the pre-eminence-be chief." " All these things," it is finally urged, " are only human figures;" " we have been materializing too much."

Now it is granted, at once, that the "body of Christ," as applied to the Church, is a figure, and therefore also the Lord’s headship. They are figures of realities, to convey which all words are feeble. To materialize them would be profanity; but to take them as language the most suited that could be found to make us know what may be known and what God would have us know,-to take them at their fullest worth, therefore, instead of diminishing that worth, and so casting slight upon the communication of the Spirit who gave them,-this is what surely becomes us. The apostle himself assures us that we do " see by means of a mirror, in an enigma " (i Cor. 13:12, Gk.). Must we not, therefore, scan the more closely, look the more heedfully into, all the words of the enigma?

Now, it is certain, the apostle vises these terms, "head" and "body," very distinctly and determinately, in reference to the relationship between Christ and the Church. They are words not once merely, or casually used. We can see, indeed, that the figure fails before the full reality:for the body has to grow up to the stature of the Head (Eph. 4:15), and from the Head all the body maketh increase to the upbuilding of itself (16). Yea, Christ nourisheth and cherisheth the Church:for we are members of His body (5:29, 30). And in Colossians we have a similar statement (2:19).

Thus the Body does surely "derive from the Head; "but that does not show that Headship of the body does not (so we are told) express authority. Certainly it is the very thing which in relation to the body the head would express; and this is, I think, why the apostle can speak of the eye and ear as in the body rather than the head. For eye and ear are not the governing part:the hearing ear goes with the spirit of obedience; it is the very part anointed with the blood in the Old Testament to express this. While the Church sees also, and is governed intelligently. But the head presides – governs. The crown is put on the head. To say, "not even the head* to the feet" is to say as much as can be said. *If the body is " complete in itself," and Christ is not here the head, what is this "head of the church," (if it mean any thing) which is not Christ?*

Again, " wives submit yourselves unto your husbands as unto the Lord:for the husband is the head of the wife, even as Christ is the Head of the Church" (Eph. 5:23). Will it be said that here there is no question of authority?

Mere authority, it is true, does not give the proper thought of headship, which springs out of relationship, with common interests, and generally implies a representative character. Head and body, while of course they may be contrasted with one another as such, are yet in union so intimate that any completeness of one without the other could only be the completeness of a corpse. Scripture certainly does not contemplate it as to the Church in Corinthians, as we have seen. It is negatived three times over by "the Head to the feet," so also is the Christ,"and "ye are the body of Christ."

We might leave the passages in Ephesians and Colossians to speak for themselves; only it is good to realize how God in them would lift us up as much as possible to the height of His glorious thoughts. Thus in Ephesians (1:22, 23), "He put all things under His feet, and gave Him to be Head over all things to the Church which is His body, the fulness of Him that filleth all in all." There are the words, but how are we to interpret them? That Christ should be Head over all things,- that is not difficult to understand if He be what He is, the Creator of all things, the One for whom all was created, the One by whom all things subsist, and, yet again, the One who has been pleased to link Himself eternally with this creation of His Joy the manhood which He has assumed. But the apostle says, "Head over all things to the Church:" why and how "to the Church"? That cannot mean to limit what is absolute. It cannot mean (what would be a small thing to say in such connections as we have here) that to the Church God has made Him preeminent in all things,-even if that were the meaning of "Head over all." No, but this headship over all shows the fulness of His resources for that to which He is Head in such sort* that it is His Body. *ητις έστί τό σπμα αύτoύ.* The Head over all is Head to a people so by the Spirit united to Him, that they are one with Him as a body is with its head; thus His fulness, as the head must have a body in order that there should be a complete man. Yet, most marvelous to say, He who is in relation to this Body as His fulness, is Himself divine and filling all in all!

We can trace these thoughts in Colossians also, though with characteristic difference of presentation:"For in Him dwelleth all the fulness of the Godhead bodily, and ye are complete in Him, who is the Head of all principality and power . . . the Head, from which all the body, by joints and bands having nourishment ministered and knit together, increaseth with the increase of God " (Col. 2:9, 10, 19).

It has been said by some one that we never read of the body of Christ in heaven:and true that is, surely, of the whole present time. The Church is not yet in heaven, and is never spoken of as part here, part there. The condition of the dead is not the question, though every saint absent from the body is present with the Lord. But against the Church the gates of hades cannot prevail; and it remains upon earth until caught up to meet the Lord in the air, completed then by the recovery of all the many that in the meanwhile have been removed by death.

Till then the Body will not have reached the full stature of its blessed Head, so as to be perfectly fitted to Him, a work which is now being carried on by the continual energy of the Spirit of God, working by the gifts of His grace to accomplish this result. When this is accomplished, we cannot for a moment suppose that what has been carefully wrought out will come to an end, and serve no eternal purpose. We might as well think that our own bodies, perfected by the change of the living or by resurrection from the dead, will then have fulfilled their purpose and be laid aside forever. Into the future of each we are indeed given to see little; but this should no more in one case than the other, hinder our belief in that future. We feel also that we can evidently infer from the service of the body here, a good deal as to its future purpose. What the body is to us now, that (only perfected) will it be to us forever. May we not as rightly infer that what the Body of Christ is to Him now, that (only perfected, for perfected we know it is to be) it will be to Him forever? And we have seen the actual link in meaning between our bodies and His:the scripture figures given us of God for our instruction may be counted on to instruct and not deceive us.

The body is the servant of the mind, and in all its parts speaks of special adaptation to its various needs. As we think of it often, and prove it in the diseased and maimed conditions which are the result of sin, we may deem it little beside a hindrance to the activity of the soul-a clog upon it. Yet the simple fact that we are destined to an eternity in the body should make us dismiss such hasty inferences. The body is, as we are at present constituted, a necessity even to the work of the mind itself in many ways; and the mind trains it, disciplines it, as well as uses it according to its will.

In how much may one apply this to the Body of Christ, while of course fully remembering how entirely it is of grace, not of necessity, that He is found in such relationship as this implies with men His creatures. Here, indeed, how often seeming an obstruction to His will, the light of life how little shining out of us so as to be His commendatory "epistle" in the world, the Body how little, as to display, the temple of His glory yet! Still, the very discipline of His hand upon us, the experience of a grace which abides with us and does not give us up, the learning however slowly and imperfectly, something of His path, His cup, His baptism, all this assures us, of what His word reveals-a purpose to have us with Himself and for Himself, a drilled, disciplined, at last perfected "Body," through which His Spirit will work out purposes of His love, of which as yet we can know little, but which will reveal a special, divinely given oneness with Himself, in which He will be glorified, His heart satisfied, as He sees in it the fruit of the travail of His soul. And to God shall be glory in the Church by Christ Jesus, through all the generations of the age of ages. Amen. F. W.G.

(To be continued.)

"When I sit in darkness, the Lord shall be a light unto me . . He will bring me forth unto the light, and I shall behold His righteousness." (Micah.)

The best of life is near its close,
For there is light at eventide;
Faith’s estimate of Christ’s the cause,
And to the last will He abide.

Life has not all been bright afore;
My day has mostly been a night,-
Life’s good was blighted to the core,
The star of hope my only light.

And was this God’s permissive will?
I bow, and wonder, and adore;
Life’s sea ‘s now calm; He said," Be still."
And He will guide to the blest shore.

No goodness in myself I see;
What faltering in the darksome way!
All is of grace through Christ to me,
And grace has turned my night to day.

And soon He’ll come who is the Light,
The Sun will rise and never wane;
Life’s day will then be always bright,
The child of day, "in life shall reign."

And should I not in flesh remain
Until He come, but fail and die,
The Word affirms," To die is gain,"
What gain to be with Him on high!

And when He comes and gives a "shout,"
His dead will "rise," be " caught " away,
With those "alive," the Lord to meet,
And with Him be in endless day.

Oh, blessed be His peerless name,
What joy to see Him face to face!
While waiting here, I’ll spread His fame,
And lastly shout," Saved, saved by grace!’

R. H.

The clear and soul-stirring blast of Gideon’s trumpet had drawn around him a very large and imposing company; but this company had to be tested. It is one thing to be moved by the zeal and energy of some earnest servant of Christ, and it is quite another thing to possess those moral qualities which alone can fit a man to be an earnest servant himself. There is a vast difference between following in the wake of some devoted man of God, and walking with God ourselves – being propped up and led on by the faith and energy of another, and leaning upon God in the power of individual faith for ourselves.

This is a serious consideration for all of us. There is always great danger of our being mere imitators of other people’s faith; of copying their example without their spiritual power; of adopting their peculiar line of things without their personal communion. All this must be carefully guarded against. We specially warn the young Christian reader against it. Let us be simple, and humble, and real. We may be very small, our sphere narrow, our path very retired; but it does not matter, provided we are precisely what grace has produced and occupying the sphere in which our blessed Master has set us, and treading the path which He has opened before us. It is by no means absolutely necessary that we should be great, or prominent, or showy, or noisy in the world; but it is absolutely necessary that we should be real and humble, obedient and dependent. Thus our God can use us, without fear of our vaunting ourselves; and then, too, we are safe, peaceful, and happy. There is nothing more delightful to the true Christian, the genuine servant of Christ, than to find himself in that quiet, humble, shady path where self is lost sight of, and the precious light of God’s countenance enjoyed-where the thoughts of men are of small account, and the sweet approval of Christ is everything to the soul.

Flesh cannot be trusted. It will turn the very service of Christ into an occasion of self-exaltation. It will use the very name of Him who made Himself nothing in order to make itself something. It will build up its own reputation by seeming to further the cause of Him who made Himself of none. Such is flesh! Such are we in ourselves! Silly, self-exalting creatures, ever ready to vaunt ourselves, while professing to be nothing in ourselves, and to deserve nothing but the flames of an everlasting hell.

Need we marvel at the testing and proving of Gideon’s companions? All must be tested and proved. The service of Christ is a very solemn and a very holy thing; and all who take part therein must be self-judged, self-distrusting, and self-emptied; and not only so, but they must lean, with unshaken confidence, upon the living God. These are the grand qualities that go to make up the character of the true servant of Christ, and they are strikingly illustrated on the page of inspiration which now lies open before us.

Let us proceed with the narrative.

" The people that are with thee are too many for me to give the Midianites into their hands … therefore go to, proclaim in the ears of the people, saying, Whosoever is fearful and afraid, let him return and depart early from mount Gilead. And there returned of the people twenty and two thousand; and there remained ten thousand" (Judg. 7:2,3).
Here the first grand test is applied to Gideon’s host – a test designed to bring out the measure of the heart’s simple confidence in Jehovah. A coward heart will not do for the day of battle; a doubting spirit will not stand in conflict. The same principle is set forth in Deuteronomy 20:8:"And the officers shall speak further unto the people, and they shall say, What man is there that is fearful and faint-hearted? let him go and return unto his house, lest his brethren’s heart faint as well as his heart."

Faint-heartedness is terribly contagious. It spreads rapidly. It withers the arm that should bear the shield, and paralyzes the hand that should wield the sword. The only cure for this malady is simple confidence in God, a firm grasp of His faithfulness, a child-like trust in His word, true personal acquaintance with Himself. We must know God for ourselves, in such a way that His word is everything to us, and that we can walk alone with Him, and stand alone with Him in the darkest hour.

Reader, is it thus with thee? Hast thou this blessed confidence in God-this solid hold of His word? Hast thou, deep down in thy heart, such an experimental knowledge of God and His Christ as shall, sustain thee even though thou hadst not the support or sympathy of another believer under the sun? Art thou prepared to walk alone in the world?

These are weighty questions, and we feel the need of pressing them upon the Church of God at the present moment. There is a wide diffusion of the precious truth of God, and numbers are getting hold of it. Like the blast of Gideon’s trumpet, so the clear testimony which has widely gone forth of late years has attracted many; and while we quite feel that there is real ground for thankfulness in this, we also feel that there is ground for very serious reflection indeed. Truth is a most precious thing, if it be truthfully found and truthfully held:but let us remember that in exact proportion to the preciousness of the truth of God so is the moral danger of trafficking therein without a self-judged heart and an exercised conscience. What we really need is faith-unfeigned, earnest, simple faith, which connects the soul, in living power, with God, and enables us to overcome all the difficulties and discouragements of the way. Of this faith there can be no imitation. We must either possess it in reality or not at all. A sham faith will speedily come to the ground. The man who attempts to walk by faith, if he have it not, must speedily totter and fall. We cannot face the hosts of Midian unless we have full confidence in the living God. " Whosoever is fearful and afraid, ‘let him return." Thus it must ever be. None can go to battle save those who are braced up by a faith that grasps the unseen realities of eternity, and endures as seeing Him who is invisible. May this faith be ours, in larger measure, beloved reader.

It is full of instruction for the heart to notice the effect of the first test upon the host of Gideon. It thinned his ranks amazingly. "There returned of the people twenty and two thousand, and there remained ten thousand." This was a serious reduction. But it is far better to have ten thousand that can trust God than ten thousand times ten thousand who cannot. Of what use are numbers, if they be not energized by a living faith? None whatever. It is comparatively easy to flock around a standard raised by a vigorous hand; but it is a totally different thing to stand, in personal energy, in the actual battle. Nought but genuine faith can do this; and hence when the searching question is put, "Who can trust God?" the showy ranks of profession are speedily thinned.

But there was yet another test for Gideon’s companions. "And the Lord said unto Gideon, The people are yet too many; bring them down unto the water, and I will try them for thee there:and it shall be, that of whom I say unto thee, This shall go with thee, the same shall go with thee; and of whomsoever I say unto thee, This shall not go with thee, the same shall not go. So he brought down the people unto the water:and the Lord said unto Gideon, Every one that lappeth of the water with his tongue, as a dog lappeth, him shalt thou set by himself; likewise every one that boweth down upon his knees to drink. And the number of them that lapped, putting their hand to their mouth, were three hundred men:but all the rest of the people bowed down upon their knees to drink water. And the Lord said unto Gideon, By the three hundred men that lapped will I save you, and deliver the Midianites into thine hand:and let all the other people go every man unto his place " (7:4-7).

Here then we have another great moral quality which must characterize those who will act for God and His people, in an evil day. They must not only have confidence in God, but they must also be prepared to surrender self. This is a universal law in the service of Christ. If we want to swim in God’s current, we must sink self; and we can only sink self in proportion as we trust Christ. It is not, need we say, a question of salvation; it is a question of service. It is not a question of being a child of God, but of being a proper servant of Christ. The thirty-one thousand seven hundred that were dismissed from Gideon’s army, were just as much Israelites as the three hundred that remained; but they were not fitted for the moment of conflict; they were not the right men for the crisis. And why? Was it that they were not circumcised? Nay. What then? They could not trust God and surrender self. They were full of fear when they ought to have been full of faith. They made refreshment and comfort their object instead of conflict.

Here, reader, lay the true secret of their moral unfit-ness. God cannot trust those who do not trust Him and sink self. This is pre-eminently solemn and practical. We live in a day of easy profession and self-indulgence. Knowledge can, now-a-days, be picked up at very small cost. Scraps of truth can be gathered, second hand, in all directions. Truth which cost some of God’s dear servants years of deep soul-ploughing and heart-searching exercise, is now in free circulation and can be intellectually seized and flippantly professed, by many who know not what soul-ploughing or heart-exercise means.

But let us never forget – yea, let us constantly remember – that the life of faith is a reality; service is a reality; testimony for Christ, a reality. And further let us bear in mind that if we want to stand for Christ in an evil day – if we would be men for the crisis, genuine servants, true witnesses – then verily we must learn the true meaning of those two qualities, namely, confidence in God, and self-surrender.

There is something peculiarly striking in the fact that out of the many thousands of Israel, in the days of Gideon, there were only three hundred men who were really fit for conflict with the Midianites; only this small band fit for the occasion. This truly is a suggestive and admonitory fact. There were hundreds of thousands of true Israelites-truly circumcised sons of Abraham-members of the congregation of the Lord, who were by no means up to the mark, when it was a question of war to the knife with Midian-a question of genuine confidence in God and self-surrender. We are safe in saying that the men who were morally fitted for the grand crisis in the day of battle were not one in a thousand. How solemn! Not one in a thousand who could trust God and deny self.

Christian reader, is not this something worthy of deep and serious thought? Does it not, very naturally, suggest the inquiry as to whether it is otherwise at this moment? Is it not painfully evident that we live in a day in the which little is known of the blessed secret of confidence in God, and still less of the exercise of self-surrender? In point of fact, these things can never be rightly separated. If we attempt to divorce self-surrender from confidence in God, it will land us in the deep and dark delusions of monasticism, asceticism, or ritualism. It will issue in nature trying to subdue nature. This, we need hardly say, is the direct opposite of Christianity. This latter starts with the glorious fact that the old self has been condemned and set aside by the cross of Christ, and therefore it can be practically surrendered, every day, by the power of the Holy Ghost. This is the meaning of those fine words in Colossians 3:, " Ye are dead, and your life is hid with Christ in God." He does not say, "Ye ought to be dead." No; but "ye are dead." What then? " Mortify your members which are on the earth." So also in the profound and precious teaching in Romans 6:, " How shall we that are dead to sin, live any longer therein? Know ye not, that so many of us as were baptized unto Jesus Christ were baptized unto His death?" What then? " Likewise reckon ye also yourselves to be dead indeed unto sin, but alive unto God through Jesus Christ our Lord."

Here then lies the secret of all true self-surrender. If this be not understood and practically entered into, it will simply be self in one form trying to subdue self in an other. This is a fatal delusion. It is a snare of the devil into which earnest souls are in imminent danger of falling, who sigh after holiness of life, but do not know the power of accomplished redemption, and the indwelling of the Holy Ghost-are not built upon the solid foundation of Christianity.

We specially warn the reader against this insidious error. It distinctly savors of monasticism or asceticism. It clothes itself in the garb of pietism and sanctimoniousness, and is peculiarly attractive to a certain class of ardent spirits who long for victory over the lusts, passions, and tendencies of nature; but, not knowing how to attain it, are turning their back upon Christ and His cross, and betaking themselves to the resources of a spurious religion.

It is against this most mischievous and delusive system that the apostle warns us, in Colossians 2:,"Let no man," he says, "beguile you of your reward in a voluntary humility and worshiping of angels, intruding into those things which he hath not seen, vainly puffed up by his fleshly mind, and not holding the head, from which all the body by joints and bands having nourishment ministered, and knit together, increaseth with the increase of God. Wherefore if ye be dead with Christ from the rudiments of the world, why, as though living in the world, are ye subject to ordinances "-such as,." touch not; taste not; handle not; which all are to perish with the using -after the commandments and doctrines of men? Which things have indeed a show of wisdom’ in will worship, and humility, and neglecting of the body; not in any honor to the satisfying of the flesh" (Colossians 2:18-23).

We deem it needful to say thus much lest any of our readers should at all mistake us on the subject of self-surrender. We desire it to be distinctly understood that the only possible ground of self-surrender is the knowledge of accomplished redemption, and our union with Christ through the power of the Holy Ghost. This is the essential basis of all Christian conduct. In short, a known salvation is the basis; the Holy Ghost indwelling, the power; and the word of God, the directory of all true self-surrender.

But what did Gideon and his companions know of these things? Nothing, as Christians now know them. But ‘ they had confidence in God, and further, they did not make their own refreshment or comfort their object, but simply took it up by the way asa means to an end. Herein they teach a fine lesson even to those whose privilege it is to walk in the full light of New Testament Christianity. If they, in the dim twilight in which they lived, could trust God, and surrender self for the moment, even in measure, then what shall we say for ourselves who, with all our light and privileges, are so ready to doubt God and seek our own things?

Is it not painfully evident that, in this our day of light and privilege, there is but little moral preparedness for the path of service and conflict which we are called to tread? Alas! alas! we cannot deny it. There is a deplorable lack of genuine trust in the living God, and of the true spirit of self-surrender. Here, we may rest assured, is the deep secret of the whole matter. God is not practically known and habitually trusted; self is exalted and indulged. Hence our unfitness for the warfare, our failure in the day of battle. It is one thing to be saved, and quite another thing to be a soldier; and we cannot shake off the painful conviction that, in this day of widely extended profession, the proportion of work men and warriors would not be found a whit greater than it was in the days of Gideon and his companions. The fact is, we want men of faith, men whose hearts are fixed and their eyes single; men so absorbed with Christ and His cause that they have no time for aught beside. We greatly fear that, if the double test which was applied to Israel in the days of Gideon, were to be applied now to those who stand on the very highest platform of profession, the practical result would not differ very materially. C. H. M.

Deut. 2:7; Neh. 9:21.

These words tell us of the abiding faithfulness of Israel’s God, yea, our God. Their history as a people across the desert serves only as an occasion to display more fully what God was. He it was who sent a Saviour and delivered them. In the wilderness they commence their journey as His people, but the journey for them in the end was long and testing; their path was one which could only be enjoyed as they walked daily in communion with Him and obeyed His word; and this is how they commenced the journey; when there was neglect of this in any stage of their history, the flesh in some way manifested itself, and murmurings and complainings took the place of the songs of joy with which they started. (Ex. 15:)

The flesh, even in a believer, can never enjoy a path of faith and daily walk with God. This is fully demonstrated in Israel. Many times their hearts turned away from Him,-"the Rock of their salvation." The forty years tell us what a miserable thing the flesh is. The book of Exodus (chaps. 15:-20:), also Numbers and Deuteronomy witness this fact, as well as Psalms 78:, 105:, 106:

The mixed multitude were a source of trial to them the whole way. They did not leave Egypt wholly behind them when they entered the wilderness, for the mixed multitude came up with them (Ex. 12:38; Num. 11:14). Oh, that our gospel preaching had always that power with it which leads souls out fully, and causes a clean break with Egypt (the world). But with us, alas! as with Israel, it is often not so. Here their history is given as an example, (i Cor. 10:)

We are informed this "mixed multitude fell a lusting, and Israel also wept again." When the eye and heart get away from God, grace is soon forgotten, and, as with Abraham and Israel, after the face turns toward the south country (Egypt-Gen. 12:9), then the feet soon follow (Isa. 30:1-7).

Let us look at a few examples from their history. They said,-

1. "We remember the fish we did eat in Egypt freely:the cucumbers, and the melons, and the leeks, and the onions, and the garlic:but now our soul is dried away:there is nothing at all, beside this manna (Christ) before our eyes " (Num. 11:4-6).

2. " It was well with us in Egypt " (Num. 11:18).

3. " Why came we forth from Egypt "(Num. 11:20)?

4. "Would God we had died in Egypt" (Num. 14:2).

5. "Were it not better for us to return to Egypt " (Num. 14:3)?

6. "Let us make a captain and return to Egypt" (Num. 14:4).

7. "Because the Lord hath hated us, He hath brought us forth out of Egypt" (Deut. 1:27).

Who would ever have thought such to be the language of a redeemed people, a people that had beheld the signs and wonders they had, a people who had sung such a memorial song as they had just before? (Ex. 15:) Yet such is the case; the flesh is still the flesh, and will be till the end.

But to walk with God, in a path of simple faith, and enjoy our abiding portion, in a glorified Christ above, we need to be reminded, again and again, by the Spirit, through the word of God, that there is nothing good in the flesh. (Rom. 7:18.) It is enmity to God (Rom. 8:7). Sin is condemned in the flesh (Rom. 8:3), and we are to reckon ourselves dead to it (Rom. 6:ii). What a lesson for each believer! a lesson we all need to learn when we enter a path in which the renewed man finds enjoyment in the precious things of Christ!

But they cross the desert, they reach the end of the journey, and ere they enter the goodly land, the land that flowed with milk and honey, Moses, their divinely appointed leader, reviews for them the past, goes over the whole history, and adds, "The Lord thy God hath blessed thee in all the works of thy hand; He knows thy walkings through this great wilderness:these forty years the Lord thy God hath been with thee; thou hast lacked nothing." Did they need water to quench their thirst? The smitten rock poured forth its refreshing stream. Did they need bread to eat? He gave them bread from heaven. Did they need clothing? Their clothes waxed not old, neither did their feet swell-"they lacked nothing." His goodness, His love, His compassions were new every morning; and Nehemiah, at an after time, repeats to their children also, "They lacked nothing" (Neh. 9:21).

We will now pass on to another scene and at another time, the wilderness with all its varied lessons, is a thing of the past, and we will glance at the condition of things in the land, not now so much a time of weakness and failure, but one of triumph, and peace, and blessing, as was witnessed in the bright days of Solomon. We will pass over the history that intervenes, in which, however, God’s faithfulness is marked at every stage, and in time every obstacle is overcome, every enemy set aside, and the king of peace ascends the throne. The nation, the object of God’s special care, enters into the consummation of blessings intended for it. There is one day, and only one, ever to eclipse it, the day yet future, when Solomon’s Son and Solomon’s Lord, will display His power and glory in His kingdom, which Solomon’s but faintly foreshadowed. The reader will do well to take a glance at the first ten chapters of i Kings, and then he will see the order and progress of this time.

In chapter 1:the false king is set aside, and Solomon the true king, by the appointment of the father, is anointed.

Chapter 2:12, "Then sat Solomon upon the throne of David his father, and his kingdom was established greatly."

In chapter 3:we have Solomon in the wisdom and power of God in the kingdom.

Chapter 4:20, "Judah and Israel were many, as the sand which is by the sea in multitude, eating and drinking and making merry." "And he had peace on all sides round about him" (ver. 24).

The whole of chapter 4:is a wondrous picture of a future time not far distant,-a time that will reach on and touch the border line of eternity, and in verse 27, it is said, "they lacked nothing;" hence of the historic past and the prophetic future it can be truly said, "they lacked nothing." Blessed sufficiency! blessed fulness! and all this fulness treasured up for us now in the Christ above!

Next, we will notice briefly the same lessons of grace, love, and care, as manifested in the wondrous days of His humiliation here below in connection with those that walked with Him. He entered the path in lowly grace, and called the various ones from their several occupations; Matthew sitting at the receipt of customs, hears a voice, "Follow Me." He obeys; "leaves all, and follows Him." Simon and Andrew likewise, as they were busy at their nets, hear His voice, "Come ye after Me, and I will make you to become fishers of men; and straightway they forsook their nets, and followed Him." James and John were mending their nets, and the same voice calls them, " and they left their father Zebedee in the ship with the hired servants, and went after Him" (Mark 1:26-20).

Thus they leave their several occupations to be with Him (Mark 3:14), to serve Him, and to preach His word. They walked with Him, they served Him, they preached the word of the kingdom, no stated salary was promised them; this they were not to look for nor expect. Theirs was to be a path of faith; one in which, at its every stage, and all its various demands and needs, they were to look to and trust the One who had called them. All the resources of heaven and earth were at His disposal, as of old, the key of all those vast storehouses of Egypt was in the hands of Joseph; and Pharaoh directed all who were in need to "go to Joseph." So Jesus, our Joseph, held the key, and does still.

Did He fail them? Did He neglect them at any time? Surely not! He watched them at every step with an unwearied love and care,-blessed Master He was. He noticed the press at times and called them aside, to rest awhile (Mark 6:31). If money were needed at times, His grace touched the hearts of the women from Galilee, and they minister unto Him (Luke 8:1-3). At other times the sea was made to serve Him, and the fish delivered up the required means to meet the need; "for Me and thee" (Matt. 17:24-27). How soul-refreshing to trace His ways of grace when He was here among men, and at the close of such a life He asks them, "When I sent you out without purse and scrip, lacked ye anything? And they said, Nothing" (Matt. 10:9-14; Luke 22:35).

In this review we get the highly exalted path of a servant to profit by in this our time as then. True, our Lord is gone up on high, and is now Head of the Church, yet He still calls and sends forth His servants, some to go into "all the world to preach the gospel;" to others the Chief Shepherd says, "Feed My sheep," "feed My lambs." They are as those whom He called when on earth, to be with Him, serve Him, and trust Him in every stage of such a path of service and not another. At every step of such a path, whatever the needs may be, there must of necessity be faith. Look, in every need, straight up to the Head of the Church. In John 15:16, we learn the work each is expected to do-"bring forth fruit," and then the blank check is signed and left for the servant to pursue his path of faith, and fill in for what is required-"That whatsoever ye shall ask of the Father in My name He may give it you."

There will be encouragement needed to seek His face day by day. (Ps. 27:8.) Are there demands made? They are to turn not to the world, nor yet to the Church; but wholly to Him; "go tell Jesus"! Study the example of Paul, the man of faith, in i Cor. 9:, where he sets forth so clearly and fully the believer’s responsibility in those matters, yet he adds, "Neither have I written these things that it should be so done to me." Faith shuts the servant up to the Lord alone. There are and will be times of testing, for the Lord is zealous of His pleasant fruit, and loves the faith that trusts and clings to Him; yet the Holy Spirit, through the apostle, has written, "My God shall supply all your need, according to His riches in glory in (Gk.) Christ Jesus."

And when this path of faith ends, the path of toil and labor, and the general review takes place, we will remember all the way, and when He again asks the question, "Lacked ye any thing?" what a tale this will tell! What a response will be given! Every servant, as he looks back and renders up his account, will exclaim, "Nothing, Lord, nothing!" What a prospect! What a day! A. E. B.

1 Corinthians 15:13-23.

This portion of the word of God is the Holy Spirit’s emphasis on the work of Christ in making atonement for His people. A clear apprehension of Christ risen from the dead is therefore of the utmost importance, as that which, through, of course, the instrumentality of the Spirit, discovers to and establishes in the soul an active sense of that glorious peace which Christ has made through the blood of His cross, and which He Himself is, and that, too, abidingly (Col. 1:20; Eph. 2:14). In raising Christ our Lord from the dead our God has stamped indelibly the atoning work of His beloved Son.

"As Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness, even so must the Son of Man be lifted up" (John 3:14, 15). Here is divine emphasis put on the need there was for Christ’s death. But if it "behooved Christ to suffer," it equally behooved that He should "rise from the dead the third day." He could not have entered "into His glory" otherwise (Luke 24:46, 26). Here we get the risen Lord Himself emphasizing the need of His resurrection, as before we found Him putting emphasis on the need of His death. It is in the power of resurrection that He places the heavenly credentials, that repentance and remission of sins should be preached in His name among all nations, in the hands of His ambassadors. (2 Cor. 5:20.) All that had to be still waited for was the "Power from on High" (Luke 24:49)-a Power which in due time was blessedly manifest. (Lev. 23:15, 16; Acts 2:)

The types and shadows which of old spoke of Christ and His glorious work whereby He should answer all questions affecting the holiness and righteousness of God, making atonement for the sins of His people, types and shadows now interpreted for us by the Holy Ghost sent down from heaven, are not confined to the Jewish ritual alone; they are found in "Moses, and in the Prophets, and in the Psalms," concerning Him.

But let us examine briefly one or two of these precious types and shadows, viz.-

The golden candlestick, Aaron putting off the linen garments, and the cherubim of the mercy-seat.

In the light of the golden candlestick (Ex. 25:31-40), we get the Holy Spirit. The candlestick was outside the veil, where without it all would be darkness. (Ex. 26:35; 27:21.) And if its light be a type of the Spirit, as it surely is, how blessed to see that the Holy Spirit, illuminating the darkness, already speaks of the resurrection and ascension of Christ!

But there is another point equally worthy of our attention.-Its seven branches (or perhaps, 1+6)- Branch and branches, as in Isaiah 11:i, 2-display beautiful carvings of almond blossoms all over them. This fact at once reminds us of Aaron’s rod which, on a memorable occasion (Num. 17:), "brought forth buds, and bloomed blossoms, and yielded almonds." The rod was a mere branch of the almond-tree, and cut off from the tree was dead. Christ was "cut off out of the land of the living," was "cut off and had nothing." (Is. 53:; Dan. 9:26.) Here was life out of death – resurrection. "Christ also hath once suffered for sins, the just for the unjust, that He might bring us to God, being put to death in the flesh, but quickened by the Spirit" (i Pet. 3:18).

On the day of atonement, Aaron is seen to put off his linen garments. Why? The work is completed. (Lev. 16:23.) On the resurrection morning, as recorded in Matthew and Mark, Mary Magdalene, and Mary the mother of James and Salome are invited to behold the "place " where the Lord lay; in Luke and John it is the "linen clothes" that the early visitors are invited to behold. The "place" is empty, and the "linen clothes" are left there as a token of the Lord’s resurrection and consequently of atonement completed.

After the "linen garments " were divested by the high-priest, he came forth to continue whatever shall be sweet savor to God. (Lev. 16:24, 25.) After the "linen clothes" are seen in the "place where the Lord lay," is there not sweet savor in the Lord’s communion with His own then (Luke 24:30,41-43; John 21:5-12), and ever since? Is there not, both in Leviticus and in Luke and John more than a hint of that Melchizedek sustenance and joy, which are so essential to an endless life, communicated (John 20:22) to the children of faith! Christ is all.

Again, in Matthew it is, although the "angel of the Lord," one whose "countenance was like lightning"- almost the language applied to the Lord Himself in Rev. 1:16, and Dan. 10:6 – who stills the fears of the early visitors at the tomb. In Mark it is a "young man " who does so (chap. 16:5, 6). This is beautifully characteristic of this gospel, for who is fitter for service than a young man?

Then we hear the voice of the suffering Saviour, exclaiming in anticipative sorrow-"He shortened my days. I said, O my God, take me not away in the midst of my days! " (Ps. 102:23, 24).

In Luke we see "two men" standing by the women in shining garments (Luke 24:4-8), whose object is to awake them, as it were, by refreshing their memory with the Lord’s own words. "And they remembered His words." I hope to refer to the "two men " further on.

But in John, the gospel of the Godhead of Christ, the gospel in which the deity of Christ is the theme, and full access into the Holiest found, from beginning to close, because, as we have learnt, there is no rending of the veil in John’s gospel-faith finding the veil rent as it steps on to its glorious threshold- in this gospel, then, "two angels," are seen by Mary Magdalene, the intensity of the love of whose heart for her Lord and Saviour rivets her to the sacred spot where, though Peter and the "other disciple, whom Jesus loved," might go, she would abide, weeping. The position of the angels is significant. They are " in white, sitting, the one at the head, and the other at the feet, where the body of Jesus had lain" (John 20:12). Here the angels are sitting, as if to indicate that of which the cherubic figures of the mercy-seat (Ex. 25:18-22; Lev. 16:14) spoke in type was now accomplished in fact. But the angels could not satisfy Mary’s heart. Their question of "Woman, why weepest thou? " hinted rather of Eden (Gen. 3:6), where the "woman be-being deceived, was in the transgression" (i Tim. 2:14). The angels’ question is repeated by the Lord Himself, but is followed by another that goes to the root of the matter, "Whom seekest thou? " Ah, well He knew she sought Himself, the adorable Person, "whom God has set forth a mercy-seat through faith in His blood " (Rom. 3:25). He called her by name, for she was graven on the palms of His hands (Is. 49:16). Such was her joy that she would have thrown her arms about Him – that could not be:"Touch Me not; for I am not yet ascended to My Father:but go to My brethren, and say unto them, I ascend unto My Father, and your Father; and unto my God, and your God. " Blessed message! and so appropriately given and borne!

The transfiguration, so fittingly omitted in John, is very precious as recorded in Mark 9:Here, as I take it, the unsealed eyes of His own are privileged to gaze upon the High-priest, in His holy garments, anticipative of His assumption of that glorious place foretold of Him by the Voice in the psalm (Ps. 110:4). For it is as risen from the dead that Christ is here regarded, and in Mark it is distinctly stated – "He charged them that they should tell no man what things they had seen till the Son of man were risen from the dead." Was there not a divine reason for this? "The Holy Ghost was not yet given, because that Jesus was not yet glorified." Peter "wist not what to say," and so the flesh would act to dishonor the Lord. Through its zeal would it build, ostensibly for the Lord. How much of this sort of thing is going on to-day, while the Holy Sprit is quenched, grieved, and resisted in the "great house" of profession, and the living word itself equally set aside!

This brings us to the consideration of the "two men " alluded to before. The "two men" who were seen with Jesus on the Holy Mount (2 Peter 1:16-21), if carefully compared as they appear in Luke 9:30-32; 24:4, and Acts 1:10, will be seen to be symbols of the divine testimony to the all-sufficiency of the word of God-Moses (the law) and Elijah (the prophets) were the "two men " who were with Christ on the Mount and who talked with Him, the subject being "His decease which He should accomplish at Jerusalem." This is surely the wondrous theme of the word of God. The "two men" witnessed His resurrection and stamped it with the seal of His own words. The "two men" witnessed His ascension, rebuking the "men of Galilee" for gazing "toward Heaven." It is the living and unfailing word of God which they, and we too, must look into to learn all about Him and His coming again. This living and abiding "Volume of the Book," read in the sanctuary in the "light of the seven-branched Candlestick," as another has put it, will give us burning hearts, for thus indeed shall we hear Him talking with us by the way.

Blessed be God! He has defeated Satan’s devices to nullify and render void the atonement. The enemy’s devices are recorded for us in Matt. 28:11-15, and in the arrogant utterances of the "Higher Criticism" of our own day. Yes, indeed, our blessed God has perfectly safe-guarded by type, shadow, and prophetic voice the invulnerable glories of a full and perfect atonement. Let the attacks of the enemy be ever so furious, " nevertheless the foundation of God standeth sure "(2 Tim. 2:19). Men may try as energized by Satan to lay another foundation; but the One that "liveth and was dead" is God’s foundation, our joy, and our hope. Now, "Unto Him who loveth us, and has washed us from our sins in His own blood, and made us a kingdom, priests to His God and Father, to Him be glory and the might to the ages of ages." J. M.

And upon His Head Were Many Crowns." (Rev. 19:12.)

(Continued from page 329, Vol. 15:)

CHAPTER XI.

Head and Heir of all things.

That title which Isaiah gives to the "Child born "-the "Father of eternity "-leads us on to consider His relation to that eternal state of which He is Author. Here we shall find, indeed, in some sort an opposite line of thought to that which we have just had before us; and yet in fullest accord with it. For if, in what we have looked at, Christ has been seen seeking and working for the Father’s glory, until He can give up to Him the Kingdom, which He has taken to bring all things into agreement with His blessed will, it is surely in perfect accord with this to find that Christ is Himself the Center of all the thoughts and purposes-the counsels of the Father. As in communion with the Son we have had the Father before us, so now in communion with the Father have we the Son. Our joy it is and wondrous privilege to be brought into communion both "with the Father and with His Son Jesus Christ."

The Son is as the Word the Revealer of God, and, as the Word made flesh, the Revelation also. Creation, as brought into being by the Word, proclaims in broken and reflected rays the glory of its Creator. This is that house of God of which the tabernacle in Israel was a figure, and which the Son is "over" (Heb. 3:1-6). Even in this from the beginning He has been already serving, and to what service does it not pledge Him in result! For, as over it, and the Revealer, He must maintain the glory of that revelation, amid all the frailty incident to the creature; and it would not be the creature, if it were not frail, nor could other than frailty and dependence suit it.

Moreover, the higher the structure is carried,-the more complex and wondrous it becomes, the frailer it is; the more it climbs Godward, the greater the depth to which it may fall; the more richly the ship is laden, the more is the treasure which is in it exposed to wreck.

The service undertaken here by the Son is a service of love. Revelation is for the creature, not for God. The glory revealed in it is not to increase the wealth of the Revealer, but of him to whom it is revealed. God is not making gain out of His creatures, nor are they increasing His wealth at their own cost. "If thou hast sinned, what doest thou against Him? and if thy transgressions be multiplied, what doest thou unto Him? if thou be righteous, what givest thou Him? or what receiveth He at thy hand?" Nay, love alone can count its riches in assuming such burdens. And God is love; and His glory is in the out-flow of His goodness; and of this Christ is the only complete expression. What simpler then than that Christ-not simply the Son of His love, but the Son become Man-is the end for which all creation exists? Divine love, as it is exhibited, confirmed, glorified in Him, is the only possible key to the mystery of our being.

Sin has come in, and we think naturally very different thoughts from these. "I knew Thee, that thou art a hard man, reaping where thou hast not sown, and gathering where thou hast not strawed," is said in all human languages, in accents of assured conviction. Even the Cross, the most wonderful manifestation of divine love that could be made has been darkened and profaned by such blasphemous accusations. But the answer has been given by the lips of the patient Sufferer Himself, whose lifting up avails and shall avail, to draw men unto Him, and so to God. Yea, "He died for all, that they which live should no more live unto themselves, but unto Him who died for them, and rose again."

He has vindicated then afresh His hereditary title as "Son over the house of God;" and having finally consecrated it as a temple of praise for ever, He will abide the Head of it. For this is the "mystery of God’s will, according to His good pleasure which He purposed in Himself, for the administration of the fulness of times, to head up all things in Christ; both which are in heaven and which are on earth; even in Him, in whom we also have obtained an inheritance" (Eph. 1:9-11, Gk.).

We must not confound this with millennial Kingship, or with anything which is to pass away. The "fulness of times" is not simply the last of probationary ages, but that to which they all pointed and led the way. Headship is not the same as rule over, after the manner of a king, but implies a closer, natural, and, so to speak, organic relationship. The head is the representative and interpreter of that to which he is head, and which would be defective in a terrible way without it. Such is Christ’s Headship over creation; and Ephesians here completes the doctrine of the two epistles which precede and connect with it as positional epistles-Romans and Galatians. The three are an ascending series, reaching in Ephesians their highest point and thus the widest view. For in Romans and Galatians His Headship is confined to man, and thus He is the second Adam of a new creation. That by itself would shut out angels; but they are not to be shut out, and the Lord’s title here would necessarily include these also.

In the third chapter we find accordingly that "every family"-so it should be translated-"in heaven and earth is named"-or gets its title- "from the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ." That is, the relationship of God to Christ as Man, affects His relationship with all His intelligent creatures. It could not surely fail to be so. Christ’s own place in relation to men must in some way avail for more than men; and the heading up of creation in Christ must bind it to God in a manner unspeakably different from its original relationship as creation merely. The character of man so commonly remarked on as a microcosm,-his nature thus putting him in relation to every part of the universe of God-becomes in this way a matter of highest and tenderest interest, as we realize this to be the nature assumed by the Son of God.

That He is the Son has here also its significance, as we see, and how the original and divine relationships shine through the acquired ones. Wonderfully accordant it all is, with all its surpassing blessedness. How "all things were created for" Christ, as well as "by" Him, we can clearly see (Col. 1:16); as well as how, not merely by His power, but in the link of such relationships, "by Him all things consist" (ver. 17).

Thus the Son is the "Heir of all things" (Heb. 1:2); and sonship and heirship go together, not merely among the dying sons of men who, under death because of sin, leave their possessions to others; but sonship and heirship go together in things that are eternal, and where again that which is divine shines through and interprets the creaturely and temporal. The thoughts of God reflect Himself and spring out of His affections-out of the depth of His nature. Would only that there were more ability to receive and trace out what His word, the key of all, has opened so for us! Let us remind ourselves that it is in this very connection that we are assured that, "according to the riches of His grace, He has abounded towards us in all wisdom and thoughtfulness,* having made known to us the mystery of His will."

*I cannot find a better word to express here the idea of phronesis, which the common version translates, most unsuitable surely, "prudence." Others give "intelligence," but being on God’s part toward us, this also seems hardly adequate.*

Yes, God has thought of us, indeed, as those whom He has called unto the fellowship of His Son Jesus Christ, and is training to be His co-heirs in His inheritance. Shall we not respond to His care and seek to grow more into "the mind of Christ"?

How tenderly are our thoughts drawn towards these glories of His by the reminder of our own personal interest in them. As here, where the mystery of His will to head up all things in Christ being spoken of, we are straightway reminded, "in whom also we have obtained an inheritance." At the close of this chapter again, "He has made Him to be Head over all things to the Church which is His body." In Colossians we find, in the verses most characteristic of the whole epistle (chap. 2:9, 10):"For in Him dwelleth all the fullness of the Godhead bodily; and ye are complete"-filled up-"in Him, who is the Head of all principality and power." Such things as these, which assuredly we should most shrink from putting together, the word of God unites as if to challenge our attention by such connection; as if to make it impossible to possess ourselves of what is our own, without exploring the glories of Christ so linked with it. F. W. G.

(To be continued.)

Do you believe God? If God be God, whatever He shall plan for us, is positively and surely the best; and could our eyes, at this moment, see by the light of eternity instead of time, we would always choose for ourselves that which God has chosen for us. "Jesus said unto him, what I do thou knowest not now, but thou shalt know hereafter" (John 13:7).

Twice it is recorded in 2 Samuel 2:that David "inquired of the Lord," as if to attract our attention to this in a special way; because immediately afterwards he takes a most important step, and no inquiry of the Lord is mentioned. Saul had perished, and "David inquired of the Lord, Shall I go up into any of the cities of Judah? And the Lord said unto him, Go up. And David said, Whither shall I go up? And He said, Unto Hebron. So David went up thither," and his wives and his men with him.

But note what happens next. "And the men of Judah came, and there they anointed David king over the house of Judah." There is no waiting to inquire of the Lord, and no appeal to the other tribes, at least, so we are bound to infer. And a step is taken that is manifestly not of God, because not according to His word. David was not marked out to be king over the house of Judah, but to be king "over Israel."

And the two humble inquirings of the Lord, pointedly mentioned just before, surely are meant to call attention to the lack of any such inquiring here. It reminds one of Paul being ensnared at Jerusalem. David was now amid his friends. When humbly inquiring his way, step by step, he was still an exile; but now, as it were, at home again, it would seem that both he and the men of Judah acted by impulse, and not by the Spirit of God. And the consequences that follow are full of warning and instruction.

Abner made Ish-bosheth king over the other tribes, and war ensues; and acts of vile treachery and murder mark those years. And not until over seven years after is David anointed king over all Israel.

Surely all this had its influence towards the final rending of the ten tribes from Judah. And the later history of David’s career shows the same spirit at work in him. When being brought back to his throne after the overthrow of Absalom, David’s failure in this line is more signal than before. He now impatiently challenges the men of Judah for not being more forward to welcome him back when the other tribes were making demonstrations in his favor. The result is bitter words between the men of Israel and the men of Judah, because of Judah doing what David had himself incited them to do. "The king is near of kin to us," was the men of Judah’s plea.

Let us beware of sectarian thoughts! David’s failure in these two cases, and the consequences-for war ensued again in this latter case-are full of solemnity and full of warning and instruction. What far-reaching results may ensue from one step taken, at an important juncture, and especially by one whose responsibility is great, without inquiring of the Lord!

May the lesson be deeply impressed upon our hearts! and may we be well assured that any step taken without God must have an evil result!

To instruct even the unconverted child in the Scriptures is always of great value. It is like laying a fire well, so that a spark alone is needed to kindle it into a flame. It is a good and wholesome thing for Christians to be most particular in the training of their children in a thorough knowledge of the word of God. W. K.

Real, deep knowledge of the ways of God is always accompanied by humility. There is no greater mistake, nor one more unfounded in fact, than the supposition that spiritual intelligence puffeth up; knowledge may-mere knowledge. But I speak of that spiritual understanding in the Word, which flows from the sense of God’s love, and seeks to spread itself, if I may so say, just because it is divine love, W. K.

Ques. 23.-What is the teaching of James 5:13-15, and is it scriptural now to anoint with oil ?

Ans.-Without doubt the Lord can and often does, heal His people in answer to prayer, either with or without the use of means. To deny this would be to limit His power. But we believe it is only too easy to get one-sided or distorted views of the whole question of bodily healing. To demand it as a right belonging to us as redeemed is, we believe, spiritual pride or gross ignorance. Paul called it a mercy (Phil. 2:27). To link these mortal bodies with Christ's risen glorious bodies, save as indwelt by the Holy Ghost, is practically to deny that the saint is subject to death, and involves grave doctrinal error. To "seek to physicians" rather than to the Lord, argues unbelief and self-will at the same time. And yet in the midst of all the erroneous views of the subject, there is unquestionably a "right way."

Bodily sickness is the governmental result of sin; it is frequently inflicted under the chastening hand of God as a result of sin, and its removal would indicate the forgiveness of the sin governmentally. This is evidently the thought in the passage before us. It follows that before there can be any thought of healing, we must know the reason of our affliction. If we were more exercised as to the cause of our affliction than how we can escape it, there would be at least one condition of recovery.

We would by no means claim that all sickness is the result of some special failure. Instead of being for correction, it may have been sent as a preventive (2 Cor. 12:), or as a reminder that we are in the body, and can suffer and be sanctified by it How many a sick bed is a pulpit from which most telling sermons have been preached.

When there is a discernment of the reason for the chastening and a bowing under God's hand, we can then, in submission to His will, humbly ask to be healed. It would be proper to send for-alas! not the elders of the assembly in a full sense, for the assembly is in ruins, and her elders are scattered abroad- but for godly persons of faith who. entering into the sin and its confession, might unite their prayers with the afflicted one for recovery.

In this connection, we can see that such acts of healing would be rather of a private nature. We could not expect that God would set the seal of His public approbation upon a Church in ruins. Pentecostal days, and the fresh energy of the Holy Ghost have gone.

As to anointing with oil, it seems to be an administrative act, and more in keeping with an unfailed condition than the present state. After all, it is the prayer of faith that saves the sick.

Continued from page 304.

I now turn to the interpretation of 2 Thess. 1:, 2:There is in the latter chapter an (I think I may say) acknowledged mistranslation, of which the true and undoubted sense gives the key to the whole passage. I refer to ver. 2, " as that the day of Christ is at hand." It should be, were present. The word is used for, and translated in two different places, "present, "in contrast with things to come,-"things present and things to come." It is always its sense in Scripture. What the Thessalonians were troubled and upset in their minds by, then, was that they had been led by false teachers (pretending to the Spirit, and even alleging letters of Paul to this effect) to suppose that the day of Christ was actually come. The violence of persecution was very great, and as the day of the Lord is in effect spoken of as a day of terror and trial in the Old Testament, these false teachers had profited by this to persuade them it was there. The apostle with divine wisdom sets them morally right in the first chapter, as to their feelings and sentiments as to this, before entering, in the second, into positive instruction as to the fact of the Lord's coming. He shows them the folly (since Christ Himself was to appear for that day) of supposing that it was His own people and faithful ones He was going to make suffer and cast into distress and tribulation. No; it was His enemies and theirs who would be in affliction in that day, and they themselves in rest and peace. The very righteousness of God would assure this. It was a righteous thing with God to recompense tribulation to them that troubled them, and to His troubled ones rest, when Christ shall be revealed -for that is what brings in the day. It was only shown by their tribulations, that He counted them worthy of His kingdom that was to come with His appearing. This is the whole force of the apostle's reasoning :the Lord Himself was to bring in the day; it could not, when come, be a day of distress for His people, but evidently for His enemies and their persecutors.

In the second chapter he proceeds to unfold to them the real order of the events, and especially in connection with the place they had in them.

Here, again, we meet a question of criticism, but it affects very little the reasoning of the apostle. Some would change here the authorized English version, and read, "But we beseech you brethren, concerning the coming," etc., instead of," by the coming." The preposition itself is used in both ways, but its constant force with words of beseeching is "by " (sometimes "for," which has no place here). The force of the apostle's reasoning is this:that as they were to be gathered together to Christ, they could not be in the day which was to come by His appearing; they were to go out to meet Him in the air, and hence could not be in the judgments of that day, its trials or its terrors.

The apostle had taught them in his first epistle that they were to be caught up to meet the Lord in the air. Hence he could refer to it as a known truth. The saints were not to await the coming of the day of the Lord on the earth, but to go up to meet Him in the air, and be forever with Him. Did He appear ? they, we know, would appear with Him. But here he speaks of what they ought to have remembered, that they would go up before the day, and hence they could not possibly be in their actual state here on earth, if the day was come. The Church's connection with the return of the Lord was to go up to meet Him in the air, to be gathered unto Him. The "day "was entirely another thing; it was vengeance from His presence. Neither could the day therefore come before the objects of vengeance were there. An apostasy would come, and the man of sin would be revealed, whom the Lord would consume with the breath of His mouth, and destroy by the appearing (the manifestation or display) of His presence.

We have, therefore, two things :the coming of Christ, and the public epiphany of His presence. From other scriptures also we know these to be distinct, exactly in this way-Christ's coming, and the manifestation of it ; for when He appears, we shall appear with Him (Col. 3:4)-hence must be with Him, caught up before even He appears at all. With the one (the coming) the saints are directly connected, by being gathered together to Him; with the other, (the day) because of His appearing He will execute judgment against the ungodly. They will be punished with everlasting destruction from the presence of the Lord, and from the glory of His power. But He will come to be glorified in His saints, and admired in all them that believe; that is, they will be in the display of this glory in that day. They will appear with Him in glory-be like Him. Now it is quite certain they will not appear with Him when they are caught up to meet Him in the air. Thus it is not merely particular expressions, though these are clear and forcible, but the bearing, and object, and course of reasoning of the whole chapter, which shows the distinction of the rapture of the saints before Christ appears, and the coming of the day when He is admired in them.

What is important to remark is the entire difference of relationship in which the saints are put with Christ-we belong to Him, go to meet Him, appear with Him, are glorified together. The practical result is, not merely to clear up a question of dates and of time, but to change the whole spirit and character of our waiting and Christ's coming. We wait for Him to come and take us to Himself,-the full realization of our heavenly calling. There are no events connected with our relationship with Christ. We have no need of judgment to participate in blessing under Him; we go out of the midst of all events to meet Him above. The Jews and the world are delivered by judgments. Hence they must await the course of events and the full ripening of evil on earth for judgment, for the day will not come before. Hence, we find in the Psalms the appeal for judgment and the times of it, the declaration of the overwhelming character of evil, and the cry to God to show Himself, and render a reward to the proud. The Church on earth has no need to seek this; she belongs to Christ, and will be caught up to heaven out of the evil.

I add a few words on another passage suggested to me as one by which difficulties have been created in some minds, really desirous of the truth. I mean the connection of chap. 4:and 5:of i Thessalonians. I confess it does not affect my mind in any way; but as it does that of others, it is well to notice it. The difficulty, if there be any, arises from a serious confusion in the minds of those who make it – the very confusion into which the Thessalonians were led, namely, taking tribulation for the day of Christ. For the day of Christ, Christ must appear. Let us only keep this clear in our minds, and all these difficulties vanish.

The Thessalonians looked so earnestly for Christ's coming, with no further knowledge of the manner or order of it, that they thought believers who had died (and perhaps even died for Christ), would not be there to meet Him. This mistake the apostle corrects. He tells them that they must not grieve as those without hope, that they would not be left out of the cortege of glory, for Christ would bring them with Him. He then explains to them the manner, and shows that it is by their resurrection which would take place even before the living ones are changed ; and when this is also wrought by divine power, all would go up to meet Him in the air, and so they would be forever with the Lord. This parenthetically explains the manner by express revelation. They will go up to meet Him; subsequently, as we have seen from Colossians, appear with Him when He appears. The parenthetical part merely gives the association of the saints with Christ Himself, which is our proper portion. But he had said, as a general truth, in answer to their fears, that God would bring them with Christ. This leads him naturally to the general subject. He had no need to speak of times and seasons:The Thessalonians knew perfectly that the day of the Lord so cometh as a thief in the night, and when they (the world) say Peace and safety, sudden destruction would come upon them, as travail upon a woman with child. He adds, "But, brethren, ye are not in darkness that day should overtake you as a thief :ye are all children of the day." It is alleged that the apostle could not have said that the day would not overtake them as a thief, if they were not to feel liable to be in some sort overtaken by it. Now, if the teaching of the apostle be examined, even in this place there is no possible ground for this, for the day of the Lord Christ must appear. But he had just taught them that they were to be caught up to meet Him in the air and be brought with Him. That is, he had taught them what made it impossible to suggest that the day could overtake them in any way or manner whatever. They were of the day, so to speak, as he indeed says," Ye are the children of the day," "Let us who are of the day." This passage says nothing of not being in the tribulation – we have treated that point already ; but the objection confounds the tribulation and the day which really closes it. The tribulation is Satan's power (though God's judgment in woe); the "day "is Christ's, which makes it His day, and in which Satan is bound. The passage speaks not at all of the tribulation; but it does speak of the day of the Lord, and with instruction as to the portion of the saints, which shows that can have in no way to do with them. They "are of the day," and to come in its power. The day will overtake the world as a thief:but it will not overtake you, for you are of the day. J. N. D.

"And upon His Head Were Many Crowns." (Rev. 19:]2.)

(Continued from page 300.)

CHAPTER X. The King.

There is a title given to the Lord in Isaiah (chap. 9:6) which, while it has been taken to establish error on the one hand, seems on the other hardly to have been realized in its fulness of meaning by those most orthodox. It is that of "Everlasting Father," which is given in the margin of the Revised Version as (more literally) "Father of eternity." It is given to Him as One upon whose shoulder is the government in Israel, but of the increase of whose government and peace there shall be no end; and the titles given Him show His capacity for this rule. He is no ordinary king, but the "Wonderful "-"a phenomenon," says Delitzsch, "lying altogether beyond human conception or natural occurrence." Then He is the " Counselor," whose purposes in their deep unfathomable wisdom need and admit no help from others; who find, on the other hand, in Him their wisdom. For, thirdly, He is El-gibbor, "the Mighty God,"* infinite in resources, almighty in execution of His will; and then Abi-ad, the "Father of eternity," and "Prince of peace," which is the enduring effect. *Compare chap. 10:21 ;Deut. 10:17; Jer. 32:18.*

But what, then, does this mean, " Father of eternity " ? It is an inconceivability, says a recent commentator; for "eternity has no author." But the eternal state-eternity in that sense-has an Author; and it is just the glory of Christ, and coming here most perfectly in place among His other glories, that He is the Author of it. It is here that His "counsel " comes into full manifestation; it is here that the might of His Deity is seen in execution of His counsel; it is of this, finally, that peace is the necessary and abiding result. He it is who brings in that which endures forever, because in it divine love can rest in full satisfaction, eternity being only the seal of that perfection in which it can rest.

Thus Christ is the Father of eternity. The incorruptible seed of it was Himself, the corn of wheat dying that it might not abide alone. But it is when power is in His hand openly and His kingdom is established that it will be seen fully how "the times of restitution " have been waiting for Him, and what this implies for One with whom restitution is not bringing back that which has passed away, but the bringing in of that which cannot pass away.

The prayer that our Lord taught His disciples was not, as it has been often misconceived, "Father, may Christ's kingdom come." It was "Father, Thy kingdom come." And we need to recognize the difference in order to realize what Christ's own kingdom means. There has been put forth recently a view of this which will illustrate what I mean. It has been maintained that as it needs the double type of David and Solomon to give Christ's kingdom in its double character as that in which, first of all, enemies are subdued, and then peace prevails, so the millennial reign in which, to the last, enemies are being subdued, could only answer to the first part of this, the David-reign, and the Solomon-reign of peace would come after the millennium and be of long continuance. The millennium, it was argued, was neither in duration nor character a sufficient reign for Christ:it could only be the introduction to this, and the kingdom of peace itself must stretch far beyond this.
Now it is not my purpose to enter into the discussion of this, which it would seem a brief examination of Revelation would be enough to set aside ; while the apostle's words in i Cor. 15:completely contradict it. For "when He shall have delivered up the kingdom to God even the Father" is "when He shall have put down all rule and all authority and power. For He must reign till He hath put all enemies under His feet. . . . And when all things shall be subdued under Him. then shall the Son also Himself be subject to Him who put all things under Him, that God may be all in all."

Thus the very idea of the Lord's reign as Man is this subduing of enemies and bringing things back to God. When this is accomplished, all is accomplished. He has no ends of His own beside. As He taught His disciples to pray for the coming of the Father's kingdom, so when he takes the throne, it is to bring it in. Every thing being settled according to God, He hastens to lay down the scepter which as Man He had taken up,'' that God may be all in all." He would not delay a moment the perfect blessing for which He has toiled, nor allow any other principle than that for which the "body prepared" was taken, " Lo, I am come, to do Thy will, O God."

This will prepare us for the better consideration of our Lord's Kingship, so little understood, as it seems, by many who yet accept it as a fact, and look on to see Him take possession of His throne and share it with His people. Rule is for Him service still, and power taken is power to serve with. If in grace He has linked us with Himself in this, it is important to know the character of what is before us. Service we see, then, to be the suited preparation for a rule which will still be service, for love is the spirit of service, and cannot be separated from it.

In those anticipations of Christ with which the history of the chosen people furnishes us, the King came after both priest and prophet. Sacrifice being that upon which for sinners all must be founded, the priest was the first link between God and the people,* until the failure of Eli and his family causes a change. *Moses, no doubt, preceded Aaron; and in Moses, prophet, priest, and king were in some sense united. But this was almost necessarily the character of him whom God first used to separate the people to Himself. Having consecrated Aaron according to the divine command, he in this respect retires behind Aaron.* The ark goes into captivity for awhile, and when it returns is still in retirement. The prophet Samuel is raised up as an extraordinary instrument for awhile, and even offers sacrifice; but this only shows that there is no proper restoration. The people clamor for a king.

The need of a king had been long realized. God anticipates it even in Moses' day. Throughout the times of the Judges, though priests were there, and sometimes prophets, the judge had to be raised up as a temporary expedient for the lack of a king. "In those days there was no king in Israel :every one did that which was right in his own eyes."

Saul too, though, a king, is but a temporary expedient, yielded to the will of the people. With David
only does the true king appear; and then for awhile Israel becomes a united and prosperous nation. But this also does not last:it is"only the shadow yet, and not the substance; and to this the slow years are passing on.

His hands who have laid the foundation of the house, his hands must finish it (Zech. 4:9). The priest must be upon the throne (6:13). Priest, prophet, king, each separately too weak, must unite in one for the accomplishment of the divine purpose. Love must meet the demands of righteousness, and take the veil from the face of God, before power can be put forth in a way worthy of God who is Love and righteousness. At the Cross, righteousness and power are both against the blessed Sufferer. After resurrection, and in the gospel, the King is hidden in God, that He may have a people conformed to His own likeness. Then at last, power must return to righteousness; what cannot be conformed must be destroyed:they shall gather out of His kingdom all things that offend and them that work iniquity.

Yet even so, and though now there is power manifest, it is not as we might imagine-as most have imagined. There is not a general day of judgment and swift rooting out of evil to the uttermost, but a Kingdom of patient, however determinate rule, which persists for a thousand years. For a thousand years the lesson is given of the hopelessness of evil and the inherent curse that abides in it. The veil that has been over the nations is removed, and men are face to face with eternity and with God. The hands that bear rule were stretched out on the Cross for men, and there is no longer for any the possibility of denial or of ignorance of it. Satan is bound also for a thousand years; and, save in the heart of man, there is indeed "no adversary or evil occurrent." Death seems also, except for open rebellion, to have disappeared. Thus Paradise might seem to have come again for men; and no more with innocent ignorance of evil, but with the accumulated lessons of multiplied generations. If sin were but ignorance-were but deceivableness – were but circumstantial – now its dead hand must be dropped off of man and nature. "For the heavens rejoice and the earth is glad; the sea roars and the fulness thereof; the field is joyful, and all that is therein; then shall all the trees of the wood rejoice before the Lord:for He is come,-for He is come to judge the earth:He shall judge the world with righteousness, and the peoples with His truth" (Ps. 96:11-13).

Such is the picture of the future for man with which the Old Testament closes; and had we only this we should most certainly believe that this would be the final condition, or passing at least peacefully and surely into that " heaven and earth in which dwelleth righteousness " of which Peter, borrowing from Isaiah, speaks. Who could imagine any further disaster to a world which had already endured so many ? or think that this new Eden was destined to pass away like the one of old ? and that any of those so blessed, so warned, so instructed, to whom faith might seem to have passed already into knowledge, could listen once more to the voice of the tempter, and fall from within view of an opened heaven into a hell as real and manifest ?

Yet it is the New Testament that assures us that this will be. "When the thousand years shall be ended, Satan shall be loosed out of his prison, and shall go forth to deceive the nations that are in the four corners of the earth, Gog and Magog, to gather them together to battle, the number of whom is as the sand of the sea. And they went up upon the breadth of the earth, and compassed the camp of the saints about and the beloved city; and fire came down from heaven and devoured them."

Thus comes to an end the last trial of man-perhaps of the creature-that shall ever be permitted. We may wonder, no doubt, why this is; but we may be sure, beforehand, that infinite wisdom, holiness, and love are in it, if God is in it. The Saviour of sinners is the King over all the earth, at the time when this last judgment of the living takes place; and He is "the same, yesterday, to-day, and forever." It is a permitted trial and exposure of those who through the long blessing of that wondrous time have hardened their hearts against all the goodness that appealed to them in it. It is the convincing proof that the condition of man is not the fruit of ignorance or of circumstances, but of sin for which he is fully, and as judged by his own conscience, accountable. "Ye will not come unto Me, that ye might have life," is the Lord's own judgment of the men of His day. And here the end of confidence in the creature is reached absolutely. In God alone is help or hope.

After this last judgment of the living, the heavens and earth as now existing pass away, the judgment of the wicked dead at the "great white throne "takes place, and a new heaven and earth begin which are eternal. But events even such as these are not our present theme, but Christ Himself, though in such various relationship as all this implies; and we must now turn back to consider more particularly in this way our Lord's Kingship.

There is no doubt or difficulty with any Christian as to Christ's being King. It is a theological common-place that He is so. But as to what Isaiah, long before His coming, proclaimed of Him in the passage we were first of all looking at, "upon the throne of David, and upon his kingdom, to order and to establish it"-echoed and confirmed as this is by so much elsewhere – many Christians have still very great difficulty. It seems to them as if the title put upon His cross in the three languages of the world could only be given Him by enemies or detractors, and to take it seriously as His would only be (however unintentionally) to dishonor Him thereby.

Low and carnal thoughts there have been also as to a millennial reign, from the time of the early "Chiliasts," who imported into it the Jewish conceptions of Messiah's Kingdom with a large measure of their grotesque materiality. In very recent days, as in the present, there are those who would see in a renewed earth "the fairest nook of heaven," and bring down all the heavenly promises to earth-fulfillments. It seems almost needless to say, however, that Scripture keeps earth and heaven always distinct:and that as the earthly promises have their home in the Old Testament, so have the heavenly ones theirs in the New. But Christ is the center and heart of both, and by reason of our interest in Him, we too, though Christians, have connection with Israel and the earth. To His own apostles the Lord promised that they should " sit upon twelve thrones, judging the twelve tribes of Israel" (Matt. 19:28); and that is "when the Son of Man shall sit upon the throne of His glory." When in heaven also John sees the " Lion of the tribe of Judah " take the book of the future, he records that in the praise of the redeemed that follows they say " We shall reign on the earth " (Rev. 5:10). And "to him that overcometh," the Lord Himself says, "will I grant to sit with Me upon My throne, even as I also overcame, and am set down with My Father upon His throne" (3:21).

This involves no taking up the earthly conditions again, whether for Him or ourselves. We have seen what this millennial kingdom means for Him, that the earth is put into His hands, in order to bring it back out of its long alienation, and subdue it to God. The "rod of iron," which is the symbol of its rule, (though a Shepherd's rod) dashes the rebellious in pieces like a potter's vessel (Ps. 2:9). This is again one of His promises to the overcomer to give him such power as this (Rev. 2:26, 27); but the character of it shows that it has to do only with a limited and peculiar time, and not with what is eternal. He is in this acting as the "Father of eternity," to give things their eternal order.

Israel will be then under the new covenant, which secures for them abiding blessing. None shall have need to say to another, Know the Lord; for they shall all know Him, and in His character as Saviour also:"for," He says, "I will be merciful to their unrighteousness, and their sins and iniquities will I remember no more." Yet we shall make a great mistake if we think of this as if it implied a spiritual level such as in Christianity. In its way, it will doubtless be more perfect, but earthly and not heavenly, with no hostile world to meet, no cross to bear, no strangership in it. These are all the necessary result of their very blessing. Harder it is to think of the old ritual in measure restored, the temple and its services, and with the glory as of old, but now extending itself over the whole city of God-"a cloud and smoke by day, and the shining of a flaming fire by night" (Isa. 4:5). Ezekiel sees it entering and filling the new temple (Ezek. 43:2-5), and hears of a "prince " who offers his sin-offering as of old, and has his inheritance and his sons (45:22; 46:16). Notice, that he is not the "King ; " and how all this, and the presence of the glory as of old, puts quite away the thought, if we ever had it, of any dwelling of Christ upon earth in this day of which Ezekiel prophesies.

He will reign,-and "on the throne of David "; so Scripture positively says:but this does not mean that heaven has become but another name for earth, still less for the land of Israel; it does not mean that the infinite glories of the Christ of God are to shrink into those merely of a mightier David or a wiser and more resplendent Solomon. The Old Testament conception of Messiah must be enlarged by the New Testament; not the New Testament one contracted to the measure of the Old. Only in this way, indeed, shall we find the Old Testament itself attain its complete meaning, when transfigured by a light not its own.

We have to remember also that the millennium is not eternity, nor the final rest of God. It is not the seventh day, the Sabbath of creation, but the sixth, the man and woman set over the earth to "subdue " and "hold it in subjection." The idea of a millennial sabbath is a foolish one upon the face of it; for God's sabbath can never be broken up again, could never be measured by a thousand years ! No doubt, people have felt the incongruity, who have proposed to enlarge it, according to the "year-day " principle, to 360,000 years. That looks longer and more fitting, but only from a human standpoint; God's rest can only be eternal; and the close limitation to a thousand years has its lesson for us in this very way. It tells us that in taking the millennium as sabbath-rest, we are taking the temporal for the eternal, and the misconception, so fundamental as it is, must cling to all our thoughts of it.

Thus it is that we naturally expect as to it a spiritual development that, as to the earth, (and the millennium applies only to earth,) we shall not find in it, and not finding which, we shall be tempted to overlook or deny the plainest facts as to it, or to "spiritualize" what is too low to suit our notions of what ought to be. Yet how can we imagine for a moment an eternity for a "rod of iron," or (as this implies) the subduing of enemies ? how can we spiritualize such things as these ?

No, the millennial earth is not yet ready for it to be said, "The tabernacle of God is with men, and He will dwell"-or "tabernacle"-"among them." That will be true as to the new earth, but we must not misplace it; and to misplace it, how much will be involved in this !

The millennium is a grand preparation-time. Even as to the heavenly saints, their joys and glories cannot be measured from this side of things. As to Israel and the nations, however blessed under the manifest rule of Christ they may and must be, it is for them only a preparation for eternity,-such a preparation as the centuries up to it, have been for the heavenly saints. And then, let us remember, it is a preparation still for earth, though for the new earth; and that means much-how much, we have none of us perhaps realized.

Over the millennial earth a heavenly King will rule, with a heavenly company of redeemed men by grace His associates and ministers; " upon the throne of David," but not in the palace of Solomon; and though with manifest and absolute power, yet with self-imposed restraints, both as to the manifestation and the exercise of this, such as the probationary and educational character of things implies, and a careful reading of the Old Testament will (I believe) make plain to one who reads it in view of this.

How blessed to turn to such a picture of that Kingdom as the 72:psalm, for instance, exhibits ! How different from any thing that hitherto has been seen on earth ! But the New Testament alone it is which, if it does not say so much about the Kingdom, yet puts before us the king with the "crown with which," we may say, in a true and blessed sense, " His mother has crowned Him " (Song 3:ii). For He is the Son of Man, and born of woman, and this is a glory won from His humiliation. From a deeper humiliation He has won another crown more glorious, and a crown with which His people crown Him with delight, "Emmanuel," God with us, even "Jesus, who hath saved His people from their sins." F. W. G.

(To be continued.)

The Inward and Outward Conditions of the Servant of Christ, and some of the Paradoxes of Faith.

(2 Cor. 6:4-10.)

"In all things approving ourselves as the ministers of God, in much patience, in afflictions, in necessities, in distresses, in stripes, in imprisonments, in tumults, in labors, in watchings, in fastings; by pureness, by knowledge, by longsuffering, by kindness, by the Holy Ghost, by love unfeigned, by the word of truth, by the power of God, by the armor of righteousness on the right hand and on the left, by honor and dishonor, by evil report and good report:as deceivers, and yet true ; as unknown, and yet well known; as dying, and, behold, we live; as chastened, and not killed; as sorrowful, yet always rejoicing; as poor, yet making many rich; as having nothing, and yet possessing all things."

The above remarkable portion is primarily a revelation of the character of the ministry of the apostle Paul himself. Of no one else, save of his like-minded associates, could these expressions be taken as collectively true in an absolute sense;-circumstances vary, and all are not apostles. And yet they give a standard of devotedness for all time, from which no true servant of Christ should shrink. Nor let the thought of service be confined to the comparatively few who "labor in word and doctrine," but let it rather take in all those manifold activities of the body of Christ in which each member has a share. With this threefold thought of ministry, apostolic, special, and general,-we will endeavor to glean a few thoughts from the pregnant passage before us.

For it is indeed full to overflowing with thoughts that press for utterance from the heart of Paul, checked and held in because of the state of the Corinthians hitherto, but now, under the combined influences of the obedience of the saints, and a view of Christ in glory, expanded and set free. He would unbosom himself to them, and show them the jealous care he had for the preservation of that ministry he had received of the Lord Jesus," Giving no offense in any thing that the ministry be not blamed."

Next to the exuberance of thought, we are struck with the terse, epigrammatic style – indeed each thought finds expression in almost a single word, finely suggestive of the girded loins becoming the soldier-servant, and reminding us of the staccato in music, giving the emphasis of a heart in melody, and as well the bugle-call to those who would follow his lead.

And yet a slight examination will convince us that these words are not thrown together in a haphazard way, but present to us, in orderly connection and development, the circumstances and states of the Lord's servant. Let us endeavor to trace this order, or at least to gather words of warning, comfort, and encouragement from the passage as a whole.

It will be noticed that the first expression," much patience," is followed by a series of nine words describing the circumstances under which the patience, or rather endurance, is exercised.

Next follow eight words descriptive of what relates to the inward state rather than the outward circumstances, making with patience nine subjective conditions, if we may so speak.
We have thus two series of nine words each, relating respectively to the person and his circumstances. It is well to note that there is but one preposition used in the Greek, and not two, as in our authorized version-"in" and not "by" should be connected with each word.

Following, we have three phrases governed each by the preposition "by," and consisting of pairs of words, – "on the right hand and on the left," "by honor and dishonor," "by evil report and good report."

Closing, we have a series of seven paradoxes – shall we call them ?-where apparently contradictory expressions are linked together in pairs, giving us a complete and varied view of the experiences of a servant of Christ.

Returning now, we are tempted to point out some striking features in the numerical arrangement of these words. Those that speak of the inward state come first, in connection with patience, though the nine that speak of outward circumstances are linked with the patience, showing that theory and practice can never be divorced-that the inward state should always be connected with the outward circumstances.

There are nine of these words, which seem to fall into groups of three, in giving us thus an intensified three. (The same is true of the other group of nine). We have patience, pureness, and knowledge; long-suffering, kindness, and the Holy Ghost; love unfeigned, the word of truth, and the power of God. It will be found that the first of each of these series is suggestive of a similar thought, only increasing in intensity,-first, endurance, of circumstances; second, longsuffering, of persons; third, love unfeigned, far stronger than longsuffering. In like manner, the second words of each series correspond-first, pure-ness, entirely subjective; second, kindness, equally relative; third, the word of truth, a divine testimony. So also the last words will be found correlated – knowledge, the Holy Ghost, the power of God. What an ascending climax we have here,-and what divine instruction ! There must be knowledge, but that must be by the Holy Ghost, if there is to be the power of God.

But looking again at these groups, we have as the first requisites for the exercise of ministry, endurance, pureness, and knowledge. "Endure hardness as a good soldier of Jesus Christ." The keynote of all ministry is endurance. We are not to receive, but to give. How many enter upon a line of service and after a few discouragements, give up. They began to serve-in the Sunday-school, in tract distribution, in gospel ministry, and they found no encouragement; they met with rebuffs. Is a soldier on parade ? or is he to endure the hardships of an arduous campaign ? O, brethren, let us be stirred to endurance ! let us not be easily discouraged ! How significant it is that the nine words descriptive of the circumstances of trial are linked with that word endurance. At these we will look later.

"When the host goeth forth against thine enemies, then keep thee from every wicked thing "(Deut. 23:9). "Keep thyself pure" (i Tim. 5:22). These scriptures, from Old and New Testaments, emphasize that personal state described here by "pureness," which is an absolute essential to all ministry. Neglecting this, how many strong men have fallen, and how many a defeat, as at Ai, have the people of God sustained.
The third word of this first group is "knowledge," and it falls fittingly in its place. "Zeal without
knowledge" is worthless, and even pureness is but the white frame in which to exhibit the picture of-divine truth.

In the second group, which speak of association, we have, first, longsuffering, followed by kindness, but all to be under the leading of the Holy Ghost, without whose help and guidance both longsuffering and kindness may degenerate into weakness. We are tempted to apply these truths, but leaving that to the individual conscience, we pass on to the last of the three groups, where we find ourselves on high ground indeed,-love unfeigned, the word of truth, and the power of God. Love, truth, power ! Oh, for a ministry, both public and private, that exhibits these !

The group of nine words descriptive of the circumstances in which ministry is exercised will not require much in the way of exposition; experience is not doctrine.

The first three words,- "afflictions, necessities, distresses," suggest the general character of troubles the servant of Christ may expect to meet, increasing perhaps, in intensity. The next group of three,- " stripes, imprisonments, tumults "-bring in the hostility and opposition of man, of which illustrations can be found all through the book of Acts. These too seem to increase in violence from the stripes to imprisonment and thence to a tumult, such as that which drove Paul from Ephesus (Acts 19:). The third group-"labors, watchings, fastings"-speak of those exercises in behalf of the Lord's people which weary the outward man, while yet the devoted servant "will very gladly spend and be spent." Here too there is a progress, downward so far as the strength of man is concerned, though faith can say, "For which cause we faint not, but though our outward man perish, the inward man is renewed day by day."

We come next to a group of three phrases suggesting the moral means employed in connection with service.

"By the armor of righteousness on the right hand and on the left." Practical righteousness is absolutely essential, if the servant is to be protected from the assaults of the enemy; and this armor must be complete. It suggests a word from this very epistle, "By manifestation of the truth commending ourselves to every man's conscience in the sight of God" (chap. 4:2). He is doubly armed who walks in uprightness; "The righteous is as bold as a lion." "Our rejoicing is this, the testimony of our conscience, that in simplicity and godly sincerity, not with fleshly wisdom, but by the grace of God, we have had our conversation in the world, and more abundantly to you-ward" (2 Cor. 1:12). Let it be remembered that this armor must be complete, on the right and left, in public and in private, in things sacred and common, so called.

Then one is prepared for the "honor and dishonor," "evil report and good report; " each will but contribute to the Lord's interests. The "sect everywhere spoken against" will but awaken inquiry, while men themselves will be ashamed at their evil speech, and others "report that God is among you of a truth." Paul might be thought a god one day and be obliged to refuse worship, and the next day be dragged out of the city. All winds blow fair for the sailor who can trim his sails to catch the gale and bound forward over the waves that would drive him back.

These balanced and apparently contradictory phrases bring us naturally to the concluding portion, where we have, not at haphazard surely, seven paradoxes enumerated. In these we have apparently the outward and the inward aspect of ministry, to the eye of the world and to the eye of faith.

To men the apostle might seem, as his Master before him, as "one who deceiveth the people." Truly the truth was presented in wisdom as men were able to bear it, and as it was received lead them, with eyes open, into further light for which they would not before have been ready. The apostle was thus "all things to all men," meeting them on their own level with the truth of God suited to their state. This is farthest removed from the Jesuitic practice, "the end justifies the means." The apostle says of those who would teach " Let us do evil that good may come," "whose damnation is just." "As deceivers and yet true." How true is that word which brings us to Him who is true-the Holy and the True.

"As unknown and yet well known." " The world knoweth us not, because it knew Him not." The Lord's servants are His "hidden ones"; their names are not among the great and the popular; but oh how well known there, where our Lord confesses them before His Father's face; how well known in that book of life-

" Men heed thee, love thee, praise thee not,
The Master praises, what are men?"

And even here to those who receive the precious truth of God, how well known are Christ's servants. How well known was Paul in his day to the saints; and how the names of those who have ministered the things of Christ to us are enshrined in our hearts.

"As dying and behold we live." Paul perfectly exhibited this, "always bearing about in the body the dying of the Lord Jesus that the life also of Jesus might be made manifest in our body " (2 Cor. 4:10).

And in our measure it should be true. That which to the world speaks of death is but the opportunity for the life of Jesus to be manifested. The chastening in like manner is not to death, but for further holiness and usefulness.

"As sorrowing yet always rejoicing." How true is this! Not only to the world does the servant of Christ seem a mourner; he must be a mourner in a world like this, where his Master was the "Man of sorrows." It seems as though the new nature gave capacity for grief-men perishing all around us, dear ones unsaved, the Lord's sheep scattered, His name dishonored-surely without extravagance the true-hearted servant could say with Jeremiah, "Oh that my head were waters, and mine eyes a fountain of tears that I might weep day and night."

"Did Christ o'er sinners weep,
And shall our tears be dry?"

And yet there is a joy, not occasional, but in the midst of the sorrow-joy at the repentance of "one sinner," at the restoration or growth in grace of a saint, in sweet communion with Christ through His word, and in the hope of His speedy coming. Surely we all know something of that joy-may we know more of it.
"As poor yet making many rich." "Silver and gold have I none, but such as I have give I thee," and Peter, in the name of Jesus gave the poor cripple at the temple gate what all the gold in the world could not buy. How much more is it true that saints are the dispensers of wealth, when we think of the "unsearchable riches of Christ" it is our privilege to unfold to the needy.

"As having nothing and yet possessing all things." Here we have the climax, the limit in both directions. To sight we have nothing, to faith-all things. "All things are yours." What cheer is this, what joy. He who has gone on high possesses and fills all things, and we are His, and in Him, and filled up in Him!

Do we wonder that the apostle passes on in the enlargement of his heart under the expansive force of these precious truths to urge the Corinthians,-to urge us-to be also enlarged? Why should we be straitened, why should service be perfunctory or desultory ?

We would note too, in closing, how this last series of seven gives us a true progress, with each stage corresponding to the significance of its number:first we have as a basis, truth; following this is the report, well known; the third, the resurrection number, tells of life, and the fourth of the chastening-the wilderness experience; number five gives the exercises through which we pass; six, the limit to man's need; while seven completes all, with nothing in ourselves and yet possessing all things. May the sense of our riches indeed make us bountiful to others; "freely ye have received, freely give."