"That the world may know that Thou hast loved them, as Thou hast loved Me." Do you believe that? If you do not, it is positive unbelief.

Therefore we labor that, whether present or absent, we may be acceptable to Him."

…. Because many Christians have not seized the force of this truth [being "in Christ" and "not in the flesh,"] nor of the expressions of the apostle, they use Christ's death as a remedy for the old man, instead of learning that they have by it passed out of the old man as to their place before God, and into the new in the power of that life which" is in Christ. Ask many a true-hearted saint what is the meaning of, " When we were in the flesh," and he could give no clear answer; he has no definite idea of what it can mean. Ask him what it is to be in Christ:all is equally vague. A man born of God may be in the flesh as to the condition and standing of his own soul, though he be not so in God's sight; nay, this is the very case supposed in Romans vii, because he looks at himself as standing before God on the ground of his own responsibility, on which ground he never can, in virtue of being born again, meet the requirements of God, attain to His righteousness. J.N.D.

The doctrine of justification developed mainly in the first part of Romans, but extends, in a certain very important application of it, into the sixth chapter, while the latter part of the fifth, which we were last considering, connects it with the doctrine of the two Adams therein given. It is as in Christ we find it, accompanying the new life by which we are made of His race as last Adam:- "justification of life." For this reason a glance back will be here in place.

The truth is developed in this epistle in the order of application to the soul's need. And the first part accordingly begins with that which is its first conscious need, the guilt of sins committed; the second part takes up what is a later discovery and distress, the sin inherent in a fallen nature. The first of these is met by the application of the blood of Christ, justification by His blood. The second is met by the application of the death of Christ:"our old man is crucified with Christ;" " he that is dead is justified from sin " (6:6,7, marg.).

These are two different applications of the same work of Christ, which avails in all its fullness for every believer. No one can be justified by the blood of Christ who is not at the same time justified by the death of Christ. The blood is already the sign of death having taken place, and only as that could it avail for us. It is only as that that it could put away our sins, so as to give us effectual peace with God at all.

Justification is the act of divine righteousness. It is for this reason that the righteousness of God is so prominent in the first part of Romans, while it is not found at all in the second part. Righteousness is that quality in God which has of necessity to say to sin, and on account of which the soul conscious of its guilt trembles to meet Him. No one, whatever be his guilt, is afraid of God's love; but how great soever that love may be, the awakened conscience at once begins to realize that it is righteousness must have to say to sin. The glory of the gospel is this, that it takes up just this character of God to put it on the side of the believer in Jesus, so as to make it his very boast and confidence." I am not ashamed of the gospel [the glad tidings]," says the apostle; " for it is the power of God unto salvation to every one that believeth." And how this power? "For therein"-in these glad tidings to guilty men,-"the righteousness of God is revealed, by faith, to faith" (chap. 1:16, 17, Rev. Vers.). It is the revelation of divine righteousness in a gospel to the guilty, faith alone being required to receive the gospel, it is this which is the power of God for the deliverance of souls. – In the third chapter it is more fully made known as divine righteousness declared by the cross "in the passing over of the sins done aforetime, in the forbearance of God " (3:25, R.V..), and at this time, "that He might be just and the justifier of him that believeth in Jesus" (5:26). The righteousness of God is that, then, which makes Him righteous in pronouncing righteous the believer in Jesus. This righteousness of God becomes as it were a house of refuge with its door open " unto all," and its protecting roof, impervious to the storm, "over all them that believe,"-over all that have fled to the cross for refuge (5:22)*. *επι, "over," or "on." There is indeed a question of reading here, and some would leave out "and over all;" but we need not consider this now.*

It is the righteousness of God which repels every charge against the believer in Jesus. His justification is an act of righteousness, for the blood that is before God is the token of the death of his Substitute in his behalf. The penalty of his sins has been endured by Another, who, if "delivered for our offenses," " was raised again for our justification." This is the public sentence of it which declares on God's part His acceptance of the work. The ground is the blood; the sentence is the resurrection of our Surety. This sentence is God coming in to manifest Himself for us on account of the work of Christ accomplished. Faith rests in Him who raised up Jesus our Lord from the dead.

This might seem all that is needed. Assuredly the work of Christ meets every need, and His resurrection is the token of complete acceptance. What is needed is not in fact something more than this, but the fuller bringing out of what is involved in it; that in our Substitute we have therefore passed away as on the footing of the first man, identified with Adam, and are in Christ on the footing of the Second Man, alive in Him to God. For faith, therefore, I am dead to sin;" because He died to it, and cannot live in what I am, -though for faith only,-dead to. This approves the holiness of the doctrine, as the seventh and eighth chapters show its power. It answers the moral question with which the sixth chapter opens.

Let us notice the way the doctrine is unfolded. The objection is started, " If then grace abounds over sin, then the more our sin the more His grace. Shall we then continue in sin, that grace may abound?" To which he answers, "We are dead to sin, how can we live in it?" This is conclusive against the abuse of the doctrine, although it is only for faith that we are dead :for then faith in it must tend to holiness, and not unholiness. The truth is ever according to godliness.

But how then are we dead to sin? He bids them think of what was involved in their baptism. Baptized to Christ Jesus,-again the order of words whose significance we have seen before,- we were baptized to His death:to have our part in this, according to the ordained testimony of it upon earth. Burial is just putting a dead man into the place of death:" we are therefore buried with Him by baptism into death." Our place in natural life is ended:upon earth we have but our part in the death of Jesus. But He is risen; the glory of the Father necessitated His resurrection from among the dead, and this is to give its character to the new life in which henceforth we are to walk; " for if we have come to be identified* [with Him] in the likeness of His death, we shall be also on the other hand in the likeness of His resurrection."*I follow the London New Translation. "United," which the Revised Version gives, does not give the full force. It is literally "grown together" (not "planted") so as to be one. " With Him" is evidently to be understood.* That is, if our baptism-the " likeness of His death "—have real meaning with us, we shall be, in the character of our walk, in the likeness of His resurrection.* *Observe the gegonamen, "we have become," in contrast with the esometha, "we shall be,"-not" become." But this is only moral "likeness," not the full being " risen with Him" of Ephesians and Colossians.* One thing will be the result of the other; " knowing this, that our old man "-all that we were in that old fleshly life-"is crucified with Him, that the body of sin might be destroyed,"-"nullified," rather, "brought practically to nothing,"-"that henceforth we should not serve sin."

The "knowing this" connects with the sentence before, and confirms the meaning of " the likeness of His resurrection" as a present moral result. Our old man received its sentence of shame and condemnation from God, (for this is what the cross means,) where Christ died for us. We know and have accepted its setting aside thus.

But here we must inquire the exact force and meaning of " our old man." Many take it as the expression of the "natural corruption or unholy affections of men," or "the old nature." But Scripture has a different term for the old nature, and for the principle of evil in it. It speaks of the "flesh," and of "sin in the flesh." Between person and nature there is an essential and important difference ; and if we are to take the inspired words as a perfect guide, (which we surely are,) "the old man " is person, and not nature. The importance lies in this, that responsibility (because the real activity] belongs to the person, not the nature. It is not nature that acts, although it may give character to the actions; and we as Christians are exhorted not to "walk after the flesh, but after the Spirit;" practically – though with an important difference too, which we may by and by consider, -not after the old nature, but after the new. The responsible person is distinguished as such from both natures, which are together in him.* * "Nature" (from natus, "born,") means (he character derived from birth; and we are born, and born again. The man of Romans 7:17,18, although new born, and able to distinguish himself from "the sin that dwelleth in " him, still must say, in his " flesh dwelleth no good thing."*

So, in full accordance with this, we read of " the flesh with its affections and lusts," and even of " the works of the flesh" (Gal. 5:24, 19),-1:e., fleshly works; but "doings" (πράξεις) are attributed to the "old man" only (Col. 3:9).

Moreover, the old man is never said to be in the Christian, but always to have been " put off," as in Ephesians 4:22, Gr., Colossians 3:9, or as here, " crucified with Christ" (6:6); while the flesh, on the contrary, (though he is not in it,) is always recognized as in him.* * Galatians 5:24 may be objected to this, where it is said that " they that are Christ's have crucified the flesh with its affections and lusts." But this is not the same thing with Romans 6:6. There, it is " with Christ,"-the effect of His cross:here, it is they that are Christ's have done it, as accepting in heart and mind their place as His.*

The "old man" is not, therefore, "the flesh"- the old nature, but the person identified with the nature. It is myself as I was under the old head, -as a living responsible child of Adam. It is as such the Lord stood for me upon the cross, and dying, ended for me the whole standing and its responsibilities together. He died for me, not for the old man, to restore it, but for me, that as the sinner that I was, I -might find, in nature and activities together, my rightful condemnation in the cross, and have my place in Himself before God, and not in Adam. Responsibility as a Christian of course only here begins, but as a child of Adam it is over. My Substitute has died, and death ends the whole condition to which responsibility attaches. Eternal judgment is only for the deeds done in the body; and, my Substitute having died, I have died with Him-have passed out of the whole sphere of accountability in this respect.

We see how well it may be said, " Much more, then, being now justified by His blood, we shall be saved from wrath through Him." Every thought that might raise a question is indeed for the once-justified one completely gone; and, in Christ, we live because He lives.

And what is the consequence of this crucifixion of the old man? It is that "he that is dead is justified from sin." So the Greek, and. the Revised Version rightly now. We see how truly it is a question of person and personal standing all through here. Justification is of course that, but it is a justification more complete than in the first part of the epistle. No lust, no sin of thought, no evil passions, belong to a dead man-to a corpse. And this shows in how far we are dead to sin. Nothing of all this can be imputed to one dead with Christ. " Now if we be dead with Christ, we believe that we shall also live with Him." The life now begun is as much involved in and dependent upon His life as the death we have been considering is involved in His death. Changeless, -eternal, past the power of death it therefore is:" knowing that Christ being raised from the dead dieth no more:death hath no more dominion over Him; for in that He died, He died unto sin once; but in that He liveth, He liveth unto God."

He has died to sin, but what sin? In Him there was none, but on the cross-standing there for us- He had to say to it, and as " made sin for us" died. But thus He has passed away from it forever, to live ever to Him now from whose blessed face, when bearing the burden of it, it had necessarily separated Him. For us He died, and died to sin:this death and this deliverance by death belong to us. But in Him also we live, in the life He lives,
a life wholly to God. " Even so reckon yourselves dead indeed unto sin, and alive unto God in Christ Jesus" (5:ii, R. V.).

We are to " reckon" this so, not feel, find, or experience. It is not a matter of feeling or experience that Christ has died to sin. By faith we know it, and by faith also that He lives to God beyond the power of death. It is a most certain fact; but faith alone can apprehend it; and faith alone can apprehend our death with or our life in Him.

But here let us pause a little to consider some things that have been in dispute of late, and their application to what is before us. Is it condition, or standing, to be in Christ before God ? or is it perhaps both together? The doctrine already considered, if it be clearly according to the Word, will enable us, surely, conclusively to settle this.

What is meant by "standing"? Clearly it is the same as position or place*, but in a certain aspect which makes it practically somewhat narrower. *The same verb, istemi, in certain tenses means "to stand," and in certain others, transitively, "to make to stand:to set, or set up, establish, etc."* The last words are not found in Scripture in the present application, and in the New Testament in any real application to what we call Christian standing, the former possibly three times.* *Rom 5:1; 1 Pet. 5:12; Jude 24. In the last case it is in the transitive form, "present" or " make you stand." We must not confound with these such passages as Rom. 11:20; 1 Cor. 15:1; 2 Cor. 1:24; Col. 4:12, etc., the force of which is really different. The text in Peter is doubtful; many read " stand," not" ye stand.*" Two passages say it is in grace we stand; one speaks of standing " faultless in the presence of His glory." In Romans 5:I it is "this grace," referring, not necessarily to what has gone before, but to present known grace-the free and absolute favor of God. Further than this, if we insist on the direct use of the word, Scripture does not carry us.

But the force of the word is simple, and its legitimate application does not seem hard to reach. As I have said, "standing" is position in a certain aspect, namely, in view of its capability of being maintained. Thus it is used often for continuance, as in opposition to falling:" If a kingdom is divided against itself, that kingdom cannot stand"-" I continue [or stand'] unto this day." "Standing "is used, therefore, of position where there might be question of such continuance; and the question before God being as to the claim of His righteousness being met, and the claim of His righteousness being the demand of His throne, I believe "position before the throne" would fitly express what would be meant by "standing."
It does not follow that this will be negative merely, however,-a mere question of guilt. For the throne of God is surely as much that which appraises righteousness as guilt; nay, it is this which involves the other. Our standing before God is much-how much!-more than as justified from sins or sin; it is " the abundance of the gift of righteousness,"-the best robe for the Father's house.

But we do not ordinarily,-and I think, rightly- speak of standing as sons, or as members of the body of Christ. The terms of the throne we do not apply to the family, or to Church-relationship. Standing is what we call a forensic term, and does not convey the whole truth of our position.

Now if we speak of condition, it is simple that this may refer to either a fixed or a variable state. If born again, that is a condition which abides unchangeable, while there are states, as of feeling, etc., which may change in the lapse of a few moments.

In the application of this to what we have before us, what does this speak of ? standing, or state, or both-" dead to sin, and alive unto God in Christ Jesus"?

Now being "dead" is state-the state of one who has died. I have died with Christ to sin, as real a fact as can be; and though He lives, and death has no more dominion over Him, yet as to sin He remains still separated from it by death, to it still and ever dead:and this is my condition too as dead with Him. Though faith alone can realize it, it is a state in which I am unchangeably. So also, and of course, as to being "alive unto God:" that is unmistakably a condition contrasted with the other.

But What is implied in being "dead to sin"? The apostle answers, " Being justified from it." " Our old man is crucified with Christ." It is I myself as one standing on the old ground,-myself as identified with the old nature and its fruits alike -who have come to an end, and come to an end in deserved judgment:crucified; yes, and crucified with Christ. It is Christ who has stood for me, died for me:the old standing is gone. In this " dead to sin," condition and standing are inseparably united.

What then about the other side? If the old condition and standing are removed together, what replaces these? A new condition-"alive unto God; inseparably connected with a new standing-"in Christ Jesus." This, and this alone, is the complete answer. I have before remarked upon the order of the words. " In Christ," in contrast with "in Adam," speak of a new Head of a new race, who is at the same time the Representative of it, as Adam of his. " In Adam " we die:"in Christ we live,":-our life bound up with His life:"Because I live, ye shall live also."-"If we be dead with Christ, we believe that we shall also live with Him." This life is already begun:by faith we know, and reckon it so. We are "dead indeed unto sin, and alive unto God in Christ Jesus."

This gives us the new standing, and the positive righteousness which is ours before God. As Head of His race, He stands before God in the perfection of the work He has accomplished, in the value of that matchless obedience, raised from the dead by the glory of the Father. " Of Him are ye in Christ Jesus, who is made unto us wisdom from God,-even righteousness." This is not merely guilt removed; it is the best robe in the Father's house. (To be continued, D. V.)

In the eleventh chapter of Hebrews the apostle gives a long list of examples of what faith is, as found in men of old. Each one in some characters of it had manifested this, and God had owned them in it as those of whom He was not ashamed. But every example was imperfect, every witness defective, nay, as we know, with positive blemishes and contradictions in their lives to what yet characterized their lives. In the twelfth chapter, in contrast to them all, the apostle urges an example with positively no defect, One who led in and completed the whole course of faith; and that is the meaning of the expression in the second verse, -" The author [or Captain, leader,] and finisher [or completer, perfecter,]of faith." It is this divinely perfect course that the sixteenth psalm gives us in its principles; and these I desire to dwell a little on now, for our enjoyment and ad-monition both.

The sixteenth psalm gives us Christ Himself as the Speaker, as is evident from the tenth verse, which exclusively applies to Him. He alone is that Holy One who as such could not see corruption in the grave. David, as the apostle Peter shows the Jews, personate's in this prophetically Another, greater than himself, although his Seed; and it is the same blessed Person throughout the psalm, as the least consideration will convince every Spirit-taught soul. He who knows Christ will recognize at once the features of his Beloved. It is in this way we shall find the deepest blessing in it for our souls. It is indeed a Michtam,-"a golden psalm." There are five divisions:the human number thus giving us the "Man, Christ Jesus." And these divisions, in their combined significance, are a little Pentateuch. For the Pentateuch,-Moses' five books,-as seen in the new light of Christianity, covers the whole of man's spiritual life here, from its beginning to its end, and to that judgment-seat of Christ, where all will be rehearsed in its reality, as were Israel's wanderings in the plains of Moab.

First, in one verse, you have the characteristic of His whole life, (so strange for Him, when we consider what He was,) as a life of dependence, a life of faith:" Preserve Me, O God, for in Thee do I put My trust."

Then, two verses (2, 3,) show Him taking distinctly His place, not as God in divine supremacy, but as man in obedience, and for men,-for the saints,-in goodness which flows out to them as objects of His delight.

Next, three verses (4-6) proclaim the Lord Himself His whole portion; His lot therefore maintained by Him in pleasant places.

Fourthly, two verses (7, 8,) speak of Him as led by divine wisdom ministered to Him, His object before Him being only God; and thus of the unfaltering steadfastness of His steps always.

While, lastly, three verses trace the path to its end in glory; a way of life found through death itself into the fullness of joy in the presence of God, -the pleasures at His right hand for evermore.

The Lord enable us with wisdom and with reverence to look at these things a little in detail, and may bur "meditation of Him" be "sweet" indeed.

I.

The theme of Genesis is life, and that not of I fallen and ruined, but of restored and renewed man. Of this those biographies of which it is largely composed very plainly speak. This new V life, as developed in a world departed from God and under death, manifests itself in a life of faith whose springs and resources are in the unseen things, which are, in contrast with the seen, A things eternal.

In us, life begins with a new birth; and, when it exists, is found in contrast with another principle within us, Cain like, the elder born. The of the flesh," too, alas! are found disfiguring life of faith, how much! We are now to contemplate the perfection of One in whom nature was never fallen, in whom there was no principle evil, and upon whom (after thirty years passed in the world,) the Father could set the seal of perfect approbation. There is no dark preface to His spiritual history; and yet, as truly as,-more truly than-with any of us, His life was a life of faith Hard as it may be (just because of what we know and own Him to be,) to realize this, Scripture assures us of it in the fullest way. The epistle to the Hebrews, in giving the proofs of the brotherhood of the sanctified to Him by whom they are sanctified, brings forward, as applying to Him, a text exactly similar to the one before us:-" I will put My trust in Him " (Heb. 2:13); and again, in the passage with which we began, asserts Him to be the "leader and perfecter of faith." The glory of His Godhead must not therefore obscure for the truth and perfection of His manhood. He is One of whom it could be said, "Unto us a Child is born, unto us a Son is given," while at the very same time " His name shall be called . . . . The mighty God." And the gospel of Luke declares Him, as a child, to have grown in wisdom and in stature. How impossible for any uninspired writer to have given us such an account of One who is " God over all, blessed forever " ! But God is earnest to have us know the full grace of Him who descended for us into the lower parts of the earth. He is seeking intimacy. He is assuring us of His ability to sympathize with us in every sinless human experience :" in all things tempted like as we are, apart from sin." (Heb. 4:15, Greek.)

This too is His perfection, which could not be manifest in the same way if not subject to real and full trial. Explain it, reconcile it with His Godhead, we may be quite unable to :we are not called to do it. The blessed truth we need, and can accept, reverently remembering that " no one knoweth the Son but the Father" (Matt. 11:27). The depths of His love are revealed in the abysses of His humiliation ; and here we find our present sustenance and our joy forever. We must not for a moment suffer ourselves to be deprived of it :we must not allow its reality to be dimmed.

" Preserve Me, O God ! for in Thee do I put My trust" is the language of One as absolutely in need of God, and hanging upon Him, as any one whosoever. He has come down to man's world, such as sin has made it, not to hide Himself from its sorrows in any wise, but to know them all. Power may be in His hand, and manifested without stint in behalf of others; but to satisfy the hunger of forty days He will not make the bread for Himself which the need of others shall gain from Him without seeking. Conscious of the bleakness and barrenness of the scene into which He has come, "In Thee," He says, "do I put My trust;" or, more vividly, " In Thee have I taken refuge." The "dove in the clefts of the rock" (Cant. 2:14) is not only our emblem; it was His also, in days of real sorrow and distress, when, " though He were Son, yet learned He obedience by the things which He suffered" (Heb. 5:8). Precious assurance for us! Christ the very pattern of faith in its every character, in every circumstance of trial:"in all things tempted like as we are, apart from sin."

II.

In the next verses (2, 3,) He declares Jehovah to be His Lord. He to whom obedience was a strange thing has taken the place of it. We had swerved from the path even in Eden,-as soon as put on it; had turned every one to his own way, as if it were well proved that our wisdom was more than God's, and as if we owed Him nothing who created us. He, the Creator, here comes down Himself to take up and prove the path of His own ordinance for us, not as He had ordained it even, but with the thorns of the curse in it; amid all, to show how for Him it could be meat and drink to do the Father's will; to approve and vindicate it at His own cost when it cost Him all.

"Lo, I come to do Thy will, O My God" was the one purpose of His heart on earth. We allow ourselves many objects. We shrink from the intolerable thought of an absolute sovereign will with a claim upon us at all times, and one defined path from which there is to be no wandering. "Whither shall I go from Thy Spirit? or whither shall I flee from Thy presence?" But God revealed as He is now revealed makes His sovereignty the joy of a soul which knows that His will can only be according to His nature. For us, love, able to show itself as that, characterizes all His ways with us. But what was it for Him who had to meet, as we have not to meet, the prior demands of righteousness upon us, that love might act toward us? His path was not that which love to Him would have dictated. Would not a man spare his own son that serveth him ? Would not God, then, spare His own beloved Son ? Nay, " He spared not His Son, but delivered Him for us all." How wondrous a Leader have we, then, in the path of obedience, who could come expressly to do this will; " by which we are sanctified through the offering of the body of Jesus Christ once for all"! (Heb. 10:10.)

Thus He says also to Jehovah, " My goodness extendeth not to Thee;" words which are explained by what follows:" but unto the saints which are upon the earth, and unto the excellent, in whom is all My delight." He does not take the place before God to which His perfection would entitle Him. It is not to avail God ward for Him to give Him upon earth the place due to His absolute obedience; otherwise the death of the cross,- death in any wise,-could never have been His portion. This obedience of His,-this goodness manifested in obedience,-was for the saints, the excellent of the earth, in whom was His delight. For this, it must be " obedience unto death,"-going as far as that (Phil. 2:8). He must empty Himself of all, sell all that He has, if He would have what to Him is " treasure " (Matt. 13:44).

Thus He dignifies His poor people with those titles,-the saints and the excellent. Nothing but grace in Him could account them so. Not that there is not in them true spiritual worth and moral beauty:they surely are what He calls them. Yes; but they are made so by His call. And His heart looks on to the time of perfect consummation, when the glory of His workmanship shall be seen in them. "According to the time shall it be said of Jacob and of Israel"-measuring the distance between the natural and the spiritual, the Jacob and the Israel,-"What hath God wrought!" Thus we shall be not only " to the praise of the glory of His grace" but also "to the praise of His glory" (Eph. 1:6, 12,) which then shall be seen in us.

Thus, then, the Lord descends to a path which displays His love to His own, and not His personal claim on God; giving up that claim, that we might have claim. These two verses give, therefore, fittingly, the Exodus-section of this psalm, which, as applied to Him, exhibits, not redemption, but the Redeemer. Not yet indeed how low His grace must stoop is seen:the twenty-second psalm, for the first time, fully discloses that. Here it is His personal love which puts Him upon that path which, to accomplish such a purpose, cannot end but with the cross.

III.

Now we enter the sanctuary. The Levitical section (4-6) shows us what God is to this perfect Man. He is His all:most beautifully told out in the words, " the measure of My portion and of My cup." So it literally reads. As it was said of the Levites (Deut. 18:2), "The Lord is their inheritance," so here Christ is seen as the true Levite. "Jehovah is the measure of My portion,"-its whole contents. But who can measure this? It is an infinite measure, infinite riches.

" My portion and My cup:" what is the difference? The "portion" is what belongs to me; the " cup," what I actually appropriate or make my own. Eating and drinking are significant of actual participation and enjoyment. Many a person has in this world a portion which he cannot enjoy ; and many a one has a portion which (through moral perversity, it may be,) he does not enjoy. With the Lord, indeed, His portion and His joy were one. Jehovah was the measure of both. He had nothing beside; He wanted nothing beside. These two things should be found, through grace, in the Christian also. For all, it is true that God is the measure of our portion,-we have no other. Oh that it were equally true that He was the measure of our cup,-of our enjoyment!

How strange and sorrowful that for us both should not be equally realized! How wonderful that we should seek elsewhere what cannot be found, while we leave unexplored the glories of an inheritance which is actually our own. We covet a wilderness while we neglect a paradise. " My people have committed two evils," says the Lord Himself; "they have forsaken Me, the fountain of living water, and they have hewn out to themselves cisterns,-broken cisterns, which can hold no water."

And this is the reason why, when we turn to God, and would fain comfort ourselves in Him, we do not find the comfort. Our portion does not yield us for our cup. Would we wonder if we saw an Israelite returning from, the worship of Baal refused acceptance at Jehovah's altar? "Covetousness is idolatry," says the apostle. But what is covetousness ? It is just the craving of a heart unsatisfied with its portion, for which the thing sought becomes an end that governs it; their lust, as you may see in many a heathen deity, becomes their god. "Their god is their belly,"-the craving part,-says the apostle again, " who mind earthly things."

But "the world passeth away, and the lust thereof; but he that doeth the will of God abideth forever." So here the voice of our blessed Forerunner :" Thou maintainest My lot." It is a sure abiding possession that does not leave the heart, to unrest. And how blessed a portion! " The lines are fallen unto Me in pleasant places; yea, I have a goodly heritage." It is the Son of God down here in a fallen world who says this. "He that hath received His testimony hath set to His seal that God is true."

IV.

Now comes (7, 8,) the proving by the way,-the wilderness-history of the Son of Man. And again how true a man is He! "I will bless Jehovah, who hath given Me counsel; My reins also instruct Me in the night-seasons." It is the same Person who speaks in the prophetic word of Isaiah :" The Lord God hath given Me the tongue of the learned, that I may know how to speak a word in season to him that is weary. He wakeneth morning by morning; He wakeneth Mine ear to hear as the learner."* *Same word as "learned" before; but the sense requires the change, as others have suggested. If " taught" were substituted in each place, there would be no need of change.* How real was thus His dependence, walking by the daily counsel of God, His ear early wakened to receive it. We remember how in His temptation by the devil He applied to Himself the saying in Deuteronomy, that "man shall not live by bread alone, but by every word that proceedeth out of the mouth of God shall man live." So did He live then, even as we, only in a perfection all His own. On the one hand, there was this direct guidance of the word of God; on the other, His own Spirit-led thoughts, the fruits of that word digested and assimilated, by which all His practical life was formed. What a place with Him had that Word! " Scripture" which " cannot be broken," as He said of it once in the face of unbelief. What a place should it not have with us!

This retirement with God; this meditation by night; this daily sought, daily found guidance from God:how much of it do we really know, in days of so much outward activity as these? The sweet communing of the soul with a living Counselor and Lord, how much is it to be feared that it less characterizes the Christian's life than it did of old, -in clays that we deem much darker. Yet nothing can really make up for such a deficiency. It is in secret the roots of faith lay hold of the sustenance that can alone mature into fruit in the outward life. "The secret of the Lord," which is "with them that fear Him," may we not say, is imparted in secret? How much does the Lord insist upon this secret life before God in His sermon on the mount, before "your Father, which seeth in secret." Surely, there is little of it as there should be, and must we not fear that it is becoming less?

It is literally, " My reins bind Me,"-My thoughts hold Me fast; those deep inner thoughts in which what we are in inmost reality expresses itself. Do such thoughts hold you fast, beloved reader? and if so, what is their character? Do they speak of joy, or sorrow ? of peace, or anxiety ? of earth, or of heaven? Does the Word of God blend with them in harmony, or reprove them ? In that season when God continually withdraws the soul into its individuality, apart from the intrusion of all outer things, does it freely, gladly rise to Him ? or where does it wander?-where else does it seek a more congenial companionship? Can you say, with the delight of one of old, " When I awake, I am still with Thee"?

Look now at the purpose which all this implies:" I have set the Lord always before Me." That is not, " I am saved:I am at peace about my sins." Surely that is a fundamental point to be assured of; but is it not to be feared that many stop there, with little thought of really living to God as their redemption implies? "He died for all, that they which live should not live unto themselves, but unto Him that died for them and rose again." Such alone is Christian life:its liberty is liberty to serve; its "joy in God through our Lord Jesus Christ, by whom we have now received the reconciliation." What else can reconciliation to God imply but a return to glad, whole-hearted service?

" He that saith he abideth in Him ought himself also so to walk even as He walked." And who can doubt how the Man Christ Jesus walked? If we have other ends before. us,-if we have set money before us, or a good name, or a life of ease, or whatever else it may be, is not our life in its whole principle different from His? You say, We all fail:true; but failure in the carrying out of a right principle is one thing, and having a wrong one is quite another. " I have set the Lord before Me" expresses the purpose, the choice of the heart; and He could say, "always" which we cannot. The essence of sin is, " we have turned each one to his own way;" and if " the Lord hath laid upon Him the iniquity of us all," it was not that, delivered from the curse of it, we might go on under its bondage, still less, freely following it. No; if it be iniquity, it is written, " Let him that nameth the name of Christ depart from iniquity."

And for Him who could say, " I have set the Lord always before Me," what was the sure result? " Because He is at My right hand, I shall not be moved," or perhaps better, " I am not moved." It was what by daily experience He found. There was no tottering, no unsteadiness in His steps:no circumstances, no power of the enemy, could hinder or turn Him aside. All other aims may be defeated, all other hopes frustrated; but where God is before the soul, it can never miss its aim, it is the secret of all prosperity and success. If we have set the Lord before us, we may go forward with the fullest and most assured confidence. And this is in fact found in such a path. What hinders faith like a double mind ? what strengthens it like a single eye ? How can we trust God for a selfish project? how doubt that He will fulfill His own mind? In the path of faith it is we find faith, and there alone.

V.

And now comes the final, the eternal result (9-11).The principles of divine government
secure the blessing or the curse, as the contrary goals of obedience or disobedience; and this is what Deuteronomy insists upon. The whole course through the wilderness is retraced by Moses in the plains of Moab, and the judgment of God as to it shown; and this is given as wisdom for the land upon which they are now to enter. So for us the judgment-seat of Christ will recount our lives before we enter heaven, and the lessons of time be for eternal wisdom.

For Him whom we have now before us, the government of God could have no mingled results, no doubtful or hypothetical blessing. If death were before Him, it was what was taken in the path of obedience simply, as the Father's will. From it the Father's glory necessitated the resurrection of His Holy One. " Therefore My heart is glad, and My glory rejoiceth; My flesh also shall rest in hope; for Thou wilt not leave my soul in hell [or hades]; Thou wilt not suffer Thy Holy One to see corruption."

There was but One who could come up out of death upon such a ground; He who, not for His sins, but in His matchless grace, went into it. " Who in the days of His flesh, when He had offered up prayers and supplications with strong crying and tears unto Him that was able to save Him out of death, and was heard for His piety (marg.); though He were Son, yet learned He obedience by the things which He suffered; and being made perfect, He became the author of eternal salvation unto all them that obey Him." (Heb. 5:7-9.) Thus as Captain of our salvation was the One personally always perfect perfected. In the psalm, we do not see it indeed, this descent into death as atoning work, but we do see it as part of a path which His love to the saints had made Him enter. But thus our souls recognize it as indeed "the path of life" trodden by Him as Forerunner and Representative of the host of His redeemed. " Thou wilt show Me the path of life; in Thy presence, fullness of joy; at Thy right hand, pleasures for evermore."

The path of life is the path that leads to it, for " life " in its full reality can only be enjoyed where God its Source is. Death is separation from the source of life. When the soul departs to God that gave it, the body left behind is dead; for soul and life are in Scripture one. But the soul therefore is not dead. So man, departed from God,-for here departure is on the reverse side,-spiritual death becomes his condition. And the world takes its character from this:it is out of correspondence with God. The breach is witnessed of through its whole frame; on account of it the whole creation groaneth and travaileth together; and we too, who have the first-fruits of the Spirit, even we ourselves also groan within ourselves, waiting for the adoption, to wit, the redemption of our body^ Thus, though we have life in us, it is a life whose proper display cannot yet be, a life hid with Christ in God, until. Christ our life shall appear. Meanwhile, our path leads up to it:opened for us through death itself, by Him who, going into it, has abolished it, and brought life and incorruption to light by the gospel.

" In Thy presence, fullness of joy." What indeed to Him who says this? The Son of the Father in His self-assumed exile; His face toward the glory which He had with Him before the world was! There is really no "in,'! and to leave it out brings out perhaps better the force:" Fullness of joys, Thy presence! at Thy right hand,"- the place of approbation,-" pleasures for evermore."

So for us the joy of heaven is defined in this:" We shall be ever with the Lord;" " Where I am, ye shall be also." " Father, I will that they also whom Thou hast given Me be with Me where I am, that they may behold My glory which Thou hast given Me; for Thou lovedst Me before the foundation of the world." The knowledge of the Father, and of Jesus Christ whom He has sent, characterizes now for us eternal life. Life in its fullness means, then, for us this knowledge in its own proper home. " In My Father's house are many mansions," says the Lord to His disciples; " if it were not so, I would have told you:I go to prepare a place for you." He would not have suffered them unwarned, to have enjoyed so dear an intimacy with Himself if eternity were not to justify and perpetuate. And for us, every taste of communion now, every moment of enjoyed intimacy, is the pledge of its renewal and perfection in the joy beyond. " If it were not so," He would not have permitted it. The glory into which He is gone could not change the heart of Him who once left it for our sakes. The One who descended is the same also who is ascended up. The Glorified is the once-Crucified. We shall see in His face above the tender lowly condescension of the days of His flesh; "we shall see Him as He is" only to find Him as He was:nearer as better known.

" At His right hand " too, we shall all be. Whatever special rewards there are, there will be gracious approbation for all. It is sweet to know that whatever differences may obtain among us, the common joys will be also by far the deepest and greatest joys. Fruits of our own work which we may have, what can they be compared with the fruit of His work which we shall enjoy together? Children of God we all shall be alike, and the Father's heart and home alike for all; to be members of Christ, and His bride, and joint-heirs with Him will be our common portion; "kings and priests unto His God and Father " also, His love has made our common privilege. There is an unhappy legal tendency to make special rewards mean what is real distortion of all this, as if some, after all He has done for them, might be yet in comparative distance from Him. Even the " many mansions" of the Father's house have been made to minister to this thought. Nothing could be less like what is the real purport of those blessed, assuring words, which emphasize the room for all, the taking all in, not leaving any out, not banishment of any into comparative distance.

For us, the joy into which He has entered is joy that awaits us now, how bright! how near! nearer and brighter with each day that passes.

Mark, in many respects so similar to Matthew, is in many respects also its perfect opposite. It is, as already said, the gospel in which we have the Lord in the humiliation so wonderful in view of His true glory, and which yet in fact glorifies Him so much. Only one so high could stoop so low; and Mark is the gospel of His service, even to the giving of His "life a ransom for many." The gospel divides, as it seems to me, into three parts, of nearly equal length:the first giving the character and results of the Lord's active ministry among the people (chap. 1:-5:); the second, the characteristics of discipleship to a rejected Master (vi-10:45); the third, His service perfected in suffering and death, even the death of the cross (10:46-16:).

The apostle begins the examples of faith by one not taken from the past, but from the present. He does not speak of the elders, but of ourselves, and claims all his hearers as belonging to this company of witnesses." Through faith we understand that the worlds were framed by the word of God, so that things that are seen are not made of things which do appear." It seems strange associating what now we deem simple and common belief with the list of precious fruits which follow; and we ask ourselves naturally, What is the meaning of such a preface? But in fact, a living faith in creation is one more connected with the elders than at first we may perceive. Creation is that with which the Old Testament begins, and it is the basis of the truth of all revelation. No heathen ever understood it; and to understand it is to do what faith must ever do-put God in His true place as the One upon whose mere, word all things, whatever they may be, depend. It is an immense principle, if realized in the soul, not simply the unseen things known, but known as that upon which the things seen are absolutely dependent. One walking in this spirit has alone the secret of endurance, the key of all just reasoning as to created things. I am supposing, of course, his relationship assured to Him without whom thus not a sparrow falls to the ground, and who is our Father. But this ascertained, then to walk before One at whose word the worlds sprang into being, -consciously to live and walk and have one's being in Him,-how sweet is the realization of this to the heart! In what corner of His universe shall we not then be with Him? or which of all the subject elements shall be our foes? "If God be for us, who shall be against us? . . . Shall even tribulation, or distress, or persecution, or famine, or nakedness, or peril, or sword? . . . For I am persuaded that neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor principalities, nor powers, nor things present, nor things to come, nor height, nor depth, nor any other creature, shall be able to separate us from the love of God, which is in Christ Jesus our Lord."

What encouragement for the pilgrim path is this! Moving through a world where things seen are entirely dependent on the unseen, not unknown, Source! True, sin has come in, and there is not only apparent but real confusion,-that is a thing none the less true, and to be ever kept in mind; but the rod of power belongs still to the shepherd-hand that will once more claim it, and justify Himself from all the suspicions that His creatures now may entertain. Meanwhile faith has learned deeper lessons from the One smitten with the rod than if smiting with it. He has stripped Himself that He might enrich us with His poverty, and yet shall have His own returned with usury in the glory soon to be revealed.

For the path of faith, then, the third verse of this chapter has great significance.

We come now to the examples which for our admonition and encouragement the apostle sets before us. And here it will be at once seen that there is an order of connection between them which it is for our profit to observe. The first example begins where every thing begins with us -with acceptance with God; and it lies at the threshold of history, speaking aloud in the solemn circumstances attached to it, which, for the fifteen hundred years before the flood, would make it impossible to be forgotten, and which the Spirit of God has recorded for the ages afterward. The way of Cain has indeed been constantly man's unhappy choice; but God has distinctly marked His approval of Abel's way,-no self-devised one, surely, or it could not have been the way of faith. " By faith Abel offered unto God a more excellent sacrifice than Cain, by which he obtained witness that he was righteous, God testifying of his gifts; and by it he being dead yet speaketh,"

There are some words in the sermon on the mount, which it is instructive to compare with this. There, the Lord speaks of a gift which cannot be accepted; not for any thing wrong with it, but because of wrong in the giver,-that is, of a gift which the state of the giver may discredit, if it. cannot accredit:while here, we are told of a gift which accredits the giver. " Therefore, if thou bring thy gift to the altar, and there rememberest that thy brother hath aught against thee, leave there thy gift before the altar, and go thy way; first be reconciled to thy brother, and then come and offer thy gift."

Now it may seem strange to some who read this, for me to say, what is but the simple truth, that this last gift is really the saint's gift; while the one in Hebrews is the sinner's. If I come to God as a saint, with something to present to Him, there must needs come in the question, Is it with clean hands I bring it? but a sinner has a gift which if he will he may bring to God, and no question of the cleanness of his hands be raised at all! How could it be the question with a sinner, of clean hands? That he is a sinner necessarily settles that. But is there not a way by which a sinner, as such, may draw near to God? Indeed, blessed be His name! there is. Faith is his resource, even as it was Abel's; and Christ, of whom the firstlings of the flock which Abel brought speak, is the precious gift which no hands of ours can soil when we bring it to God! Abel's was just the sinner's sacrifice; which his faith made what it was, for in fact it was but in itself a mere slaughtered beast, of no possible value to take away sin:faith made it what it was for God-the token of an infinite sacrifice to come. Thus offered, it stood for him-he was accepted in it:"He obtained witness that he was righteous, God testifying of his gifts." So too can any other be accepted.

Our text is a precious and incontrovertible evidence of what gave value to the offerings of the saints of Old-Testament times. Had they brought simply in blind obedience what God had bidden, it would have been at best their faith which God accepted and testified of:the testimony would have been to themselves, not really to their gift. Had faith not been needed, God could not have testified but to the mere value of the beast itself, which for the purpose could have had none. Thus that in faith they brought-that to which, and not to their faith, so brought, God testified, shows that what they in their faith really saw and brought was Christ; for only to the value of Christ could God bear witness. Doubtless it was through a haze of distance that they mostly saw; not clearness but reality of faith was necessary, as now also it is:but to Christ only could God ever witness. Could He to the cattle upon a thousand hills, or to man's faith itself, whatever it were, as making a sinner righteous before Him?

"Your father Abraham rejoiced to see My day; and he saw it, and was glad:" such are the Lord's conclusive words. Moses, says the apostle, "esteemed the reproach of Christ greater riches than all the treasures of Egypt; for he had respect to the recompense of the reward." How much they knew it may be impossible for us at all to understand ; but such statements as these are given us that we may recognize our brethren in these saints of an elder day, and that faith's object in all times may be seen as ever and only in Him of whom the seed of the woman, from the first moment of the fall, has spoken on God's part to men.

Acceptance by faith and acceptance in Christ are, in Abel, one; and this significantly begins the record of Old-Testament worthies. It begins, surely, every path of faith, the whole world over, and in every time. This testimony is sealed with the blood which declares too, from the beginning, into what a world God's grace has come. Six thousand years have past, and still He waits, and the long-suffering of God is still salvation.

( To be continued, D. V.)

Ah, Jesus, Lord, Thou art near to me,
Great peace flows into my heart from Thee;
And Thy smile of joy fills me so with gladness,
This weary body forgets its sadness
For thankful joy.

We see Thy countenance beaming bright;
Thy grace, Thy beauty, by faith, not sight;
But Thou art Thyself to our souls revealing,
We love Thee, Thy presence and favor feeling,
Although unseen.

Oh who would alway, by night and day,
Be set on joying in Thee alway;
He could but tell of delight abounding
Through body and soul, one song resounding,-
"Who is like Thee?"

To be compassionate, patient, kind,
Thy pardon, leaving our sins behind,
To heal us, calm us, our faint hearts cheering,
Thyself to us as a friend endearing
Is Thy delight.

Ah, give us to find our all of joy
In Thee ! Thy service our sweet employ;
And let our souls with a constant yearning
In need and love to Thyself be turning
Without a pause.

And when we are weeping, console us soon;
Thy grace and power for Thy peace make room;
Thy mirrored likeness Thy praises telling;
Thine own true life in our bosoms dwelling
In love be seen.

Truthful in childlike simplicity,
Guileless, arrayed in humility,
Be the holy wounds of Thy tribulation
The fount of our peace and consolation
In joy and woe.

Thus happy in Thee till we enter heaven,
The children's gladness to us be given,
And if peradventure our eyes are weeping,
Our hearts on Thy bosom shall hush their beating.
In full repose.

Thou reachest us, Master, Thy pierced hand;
Thy faithfulness, gazing, we understand,
And shamed into tears by Thy love so tender,
Our eyes flow over, our hearts surrender,
And give Thee praise.

My desire is to take up and discuss as simply as possible, and yet as fully as may be necessary, some of the leading truths of the epistle to the Romans. My aim is not controversy, as I trust, but edification; yet on this very account I shall seek to remember all through the need of those who have been exercised by questions which have of late arisen. Exercise is not to be deprecated. It is well to be made thus to realize how far we have really learned from God, and our need of being taught in His presence that which cannot be shaken. There is an uneasy dishonoring fear in the hearts of many as to submitting all that they have apparently learned, through whomsoever or in what way soever learned, to be afresh tested by what seems "novel" and in some measure in conflict with it. But it will only be found, by those who in patience and confidence in God allow every question to be raised that can be raised, and seek answer to it from Him through the Word, how firm His foundation stands, and how that which seems at first to threaten more or less the integrity of our faith only in result confirms it. Difficulties are cleared away, things obscure made to take shape and meaning, the divine power of the Word to manifest itself, Christ and His grace to be better known. Much too that we looked at or were prepared to look at as fundamental difference in another's view turns out to be only the emphasizing (though perhaps the over-emphasizing) of what was really defective in our own. And so "by that which every joint supplieth, according to the effectual working in the measure of every part," there is made " increase of the body to the edifying of itself in love."

Let us now look at what is surely the key-note to the interpretation of what is known to many as the second part of Romans (ch. 5:i2-8:), the two , contrasted thoughts, " in Adam " and " in Christ." This is what we start with in chap. 5:12-21, though as yet we have neither term made use of. Indeed the first term occurs but once in Scripture, and that not in Romans, but in i Cor. xv, where the first Adam and the last are put in emphatic contrast.

The statements of chap. 5:12-21 are the exposition of the doctrine :-.

" By one man sin entered into the world, and death by sin; and so death passed upon all men, for that all have sinned."

"If through the offense of one the many be dead."

"The judgment was by one to condemnation."

"By one man's offense death reigned by one."

"By the one offense toward all men to condemnation." (Greek.)

"By the one man's disobedience the many were made sinners."

'Sin hath reigned in death." (Greek.)

These are the statements as to the first man and the consequences of his sin. They show that his sin has affected not himself alone, but many with him; that it brought in death as a present judgment upon a fallen race, and tending to merge in final condemnation.

Two things as to present fact:a race of sinners; death as God's judgment-stamp upon this race. The final outlook or tendency for all, utter condemnation.

The first man was thus in a very real way the representative of his race; not indeed by any formal covenant for his posterity, of which Scripture has no trace; but by his being the divinely constituted head of it. As the father of men, he necessarily stood as charged with the interests of his posterity; from his fall, a corrupt nature became the heritage of the race, and thus death and judgment their appointed lot, the final issue no uncertain one. Thus in a real way he represented them before God; but, as I have said, not by any formal covenant on their behalf. His representative-character, was grounded in what men call natural law, which is nothing but divine law, and which is both evident in nature and asserted in the plainest possible way in Scripture. "Who can bring a clean thing out of an unclean? not one," expresses the law."What is man, that he should be clean? and he that is born of a woman, that he should be righteous?""Behold, I was shapen in iniquity; and in sin did my mother conceive me."The Lord's words in the gospel fully and emphatically confirm these sayings of saints of old:"That which is born of the flesh is flesh."What men now call, The principle of "heredity," is thus affirmed, and it is the whole scriptural account of the matter. The theories of a covenant with Adam for his posterity, and the imputation of his sin to them, are simply additions to Scripture, and as such, not only needless, but an obscuring of the truth, as all mere human thoughts of necessity are.

" By one man sin entered into the world, and death by sin; and so death passed upon all men, for that all have sinned."* *The marginal reading, "in whom all have sinned," will hardly be now justified by any scholar*. Such is the apostle's statement here. It speaks of death as with every individual the result of his own sins, although his being made (or "constituted") a sinner was the result of Adam's disobedience (5:19). I know it has been argued that this could not apply to "infants, who if they sinned could only have done so in Adam. But the apostle is not speaking of infants, nor did their case need to be considered here. Sinning in Adam is not a doctrine of Scripture, and it is not allowable to insert words of such a character and importance in this place. The apostle is addressing himself to believers, to show the application of the work of Christ to such, as delivering them from all that attached to them by nature or practice. From this the case of infants may be easily inferred, but it is not his object to speak of it, and it cannot be shown that he does so at, all.* *For those "that had not sinned after the similitude of Adam's transgression" (5:14) are not infants, as many have supposed, but those who had not sinned against positive law as Adam had. For Adam's law in its nature could not be that of his posterity, who, until Moses, had none. The words "from Adam to Moses" show what is meant.*

Sin, then, came in through Adam. The nature of man was corrupted; by his disobedience the many were made sinners:and thus death introducing to judgment was the stamp of God upon the fallen condition. Adam was the representative of his race by the fact that he was the head of it, and thus, as it is put in i Corinthians 15:22, " in Adam all die."

This expression, though found but once, is of great significance, because it is contrasted with

and throws light upon another expression which is of the highest importance to us, and which the following chapters of Romans use repeatedly. " For as in Adam all die, even so in Christ shall all be made alive." We are now prepared to understand how "in Adam all die." In his death was involved and insured the death of all men. As head of the race, his ruin and death was theirs, and so "in him," their representative, they die. " In Adam " speaks of place,-of representation; as the apostle argues as to Levi and Abraham (Heb. 7:9, 10):"And as I may so say, Levi also, who receiveth tithes, paid tithes in Abraham ; for he was yet in the loins of his father when Melchisedek met him." We too were in the loins of Adam when he fell and sentence of death was passed upon him; and in him we die. Thank God, we have heard the voice of Another, Head and Representative too of His race, which says, " Because I live, ye shall live also." (Jno. 14:19.) In Adam we die:in Christ we live.

As in Adam, then, we are completely ruined. We are "constituted sinners"-sinners by constitution. Death and judgment are our appointed lot. This is what has to be met in our behalf, if Christ comes in for us. It is not enough for Him to be a new head and fountain of life for us from God. He must not only be our new Representative in life, but our Representative in death, and under curse also, taking the doom of those whose new Head He becomes. Hence comes a distinction which we must bear in mind. In life, He is our Representative that with Him we may live and inherit the portion He has acquired for us:in death, He is our Representative that we may not die, because already dead with Him. This last is substitution. He dies for us, and He alone:in life He lives for us, and (blessed be God!) lives not alone.

Now let us look at the apostle's statements. And first,-

Adam " is the figure of Him that was to come." (5:14.)

Thus it is that in i Cor. 15:22 "in Christ" is set over against " in Adam," and that in ver. 45 again " the last Adam " is seen in essential contrast to the "first:" "The first Adam was made a living soul; the last Adam was made a quickening Spirit."

But what, then, does a "last A dam " mean ? The head of a new race. And thus "if any man be in Christ"-set over against "in Adam" in the verse already looked at,-"it is a new creation." (2 Cor. 5:17, Gr., comp. marg. Rev. Vers.) The first Adam was the head of the old creation; the last Adam is the Head of the new. "In Christ" means to belong to the new creation and the new Head.

I merely link these terms together now. I do not propose to examine here what exactly the new creation is. The term is not used in Romans, though in Galatians (its kindred epistle, though wider in scope,) it is. But it should be obvious that the first Adam, as "the figure of. Him that was to come," figures Christ as "the last Adam," the representative Head of a new race. As such, the apostle compares the results of the obedience of the One to "the many" who stand in Him, with the results of the first man's disobedience to " the many " who fell with him.

But we must pause before proceeding with this, to make it perfectly clear to any who have a doubt that Scripture speaks of the last Adam as really the Head of a race. Spite of the term "last Adam," some have doubt of this. They say, "We are never called children of Christ, but of God;" which is true, because it is divine life that is communicated, and "children of Christ" would imply only human life. " The last Adam is made a quickening Spirit" surely proves, however, that in this character He quickens (or gives life), while at the same time it shows the character of the life communicated ; for " that which is born of the Spirit is spirit." And this action of the last Adam we find imaged by the Lord in resurrection breathing upon His disciples when He says, "Receive ye the Holy Ghost." The first Adam was but a " living soul" into whose, nostrils God breathed the breath of life, that he might become so. The last Adam breathes upon others; He is a quickening Spirit, not merely a living soul.

Isaiah also, foreseeing the glory of the Lord, declares, " When Thou shalt make His soul an offering for sin, He shall see His seed" (53:10). And again, in words which are quoted and applied to Christ by the apostle, " Behold, I and the children which God hath given Me"(ch. 8:18; Heb. 2:13).

There is surely no more need to prove that Christ as last Adam, like him whose antitype He is, is the Head of a race. It is the key to all that follows in Romans 5:and the two next chapters, where "in Christ" as Corinthians gives it, is in contrast, yet antitypical correspondence, with " in Adam."

Now, as in Adam's case we have traced the results of the disobedience of the one to the many, let us trace the results of the obedience of the new Representative-Head to the many connected with Him.

"Much more the grace of God, and the gift by grace, which is by one man, Jesus Christ, hath abounded unto many."

"The free gift is of many offenses unto justification."

" They which receive abundance of grace and of the gift of righteousness shall reign in life by one, Jesus Christ."

"By the one righteousness toward all men to justification of life." (Gr.)

"By the obedience of the one shall the many be made righteous."

These are the statements corresponding to, yet contrasted with, the former ones which we considered. One thing we must remember in considering them, that these two accounts do not exhibit a mere balance of results. "Not as the offense so also is the free gift" (5:15). If righteousness be shown in dealing with sin, the " free gift," while of course it must be righteous, absolutely so, is yet measured only by the grace that has given Christ for us. Hence His work by no means merely cancels the results of sin, but lifts us into a place altogether beyond what was originally ours. Let us see what we have here, although even here the tale is not fully told.

First, we have " life;" and this in the next chapter (5:23) is expanded into "eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord." It is not merely life from another source, but life of an entirely new character and quality; not a restoration of the failed and forfeited life, but a life infinitely higher-a divine life. There is but one life which is eternal, and "in Christ Jesus our Lord" declares its source to be in a divine Person, and now become man. Nor only so, for the force of the expression is precise. It is not correctly given in our common version, but in the revised it is, as I have quoted it. It is "in," not, as the common version, "through;" and " Christ Jesus," not " Jesus Christ." Such differences, minute
as they may seem, are in Scripture never without significance. " Jesus Christ" is the Lord's personal name emphasized; "Christ Jesus" emphasizes His official title. It speaks of a place now taken through His work accomplished. In the eleventh verse it should read similarly, "alive to God in Christ Jesus." Again we have it in the eighth chapter, " no condemnation to them which are in Christ Jesus;" and in the second verse, "life in Christ Jesus." Elsewhere we have "sanctified" and "saints in Christ Jesus," "created in Christ Jesus," "of Him are ye in Christ Jesus," and so repeatedly. Except once-Peter (i Pet. 5:10), no inspired writer uses this order of words, but only Paul. " In Jesus," or " in Jesus the Christ," we are never said to be, but only "in Christ," or "in Christ Jesus." The special force ought to be therefore clear.

Our life, then, is not only in Him, but in Him as now having accomplished His work and gone up to God. There, as Peter on the day of Pentecost bears witness, He is made Lord arid Christ (Acts 2:36), actually reaching the place which was His already by appointment, but to be reached only in one way. The last Adam becomes Head of the race after His work of obedience is accomplished, as the first Adam became head when his work of disobedience was accomplished. And as in the one case, so in the other, the results of the work become the heritage of the race. . The head of the race represents the race before God. The ruin of the head becomes the ruin of the race. If the head stands, so does the race.

In either case, the connection of the head and the race is by life and nature, a corrupt nature being transmitted from the fallen head, a divine life and nature, free from and incapable of taint, from the new head, Christ Jesus. Death and judgment lay hold upon the fallen creature; righteousness characterizes the possessor of eternal life.

But here there is another need to be met; for these possessors of righteousness in a new life are by the old one children of Adam, and under wrath and condemnation because of manifold sins. Christ, the Son of the Father, is not stooping to take up un-fallen beings, and bring them into a new place of nearness to God, but He is taking up sinners. For these, then, He must provide, along with a new life, a righteousness which shall justify them from all charge of sin. They must not only be delivered from inward corruption by a principle of righteousness imparted; they must be delivered from guilt also by a righteousness imputed. There must be a "justification of life,"-that is, a justification belonging to the life communicated:"by one righteousness toward all men,"-God's grace offering itself for acceptance by all,-" unto justification of life."

Here, then, comes in, not representation simply, but substitution,-representation under penalty for those who had incurred the penalty. He who is our Representative-Head in life must be our Substitute in death also. He must be "obedient unto death," standing in our place, that we may stand in His,-in the place He has won and taken for us with God.

His obedience avails for much more than negatively to justify from all charge of sin:it has its own infinite preciousness before God, in virtue of which we have a positive righteousness measured by this. He " of God is made unto us righteousness" (i Cor. 1:30). We " receive abundance of the gift of righteousness," as the passage before us says, and " shall reign in life by One, Jesus Christ."
Thus are the effects of the fall for us removed, and we stand in a new place under a new Head. We are in Christ, not Adam; and this, as we have seen, speaks of place in a representative,-that by virtue of headship of a race. Our connection with Christ is now, as formerly it was with Adam, by the life which we receive from Him, and of which we partake in Him,-that is, by belonging to the race of which He is head. This and its consequences are unfolded further in the following chapters, to which this doctrine of the two Adams is the key. (To be continued, D. V.)

It is evident, and easy to see, that conscience reveals nothing. It simply declares the character of whatever is presented, and that according to the light it has. As the eye is the light, only as it is the inlet of light, to the body, so the conscience is simply the inlet of whatever light morally there may be for the spirit. And just as disease may, to any extent, affect the bodily eye, so may it affect also the spiritual. Alas! the solemn consideration is, that sin has thus affected, to a greater or less degree, the consciences of all men. Yet in none, perhaps, is it altogether darkened, and its power will manifest itself often in the most unexpected and striking way in those who, notwithstanding, resist to the last its convictions.

The scribes and Pharisees, plotting to entrap the Lord by the case of the adulteress condemned by Moses' law, are thus driven out of His presence by the simple yet penetrating words, " He that is without sin among you, let him first cast a stone at her " (Jno. 8:7, 9).Conscience in Herod sees in Christ the murdered Baptist risen from the dead (Mark 6:16).Stephen's adversaries, on the other hand, rush into murder, cut to the heart by the conviction that they have resisted the Holy Ghost (Acts 7:54). Thus, in the midst of the most frantic opposition to the truth-nay, by this, the power of the truth over the conscience is clearly shown.

Scripture declares it in doctrine as well as example.-" This is the condemnation, that light is come into the world; and men loved darkness rather than light, because their deeds were evil. For every one that doeth evil hateth the light, neither cometh to the light, lest his deeds should be reproved. But he that doeth truth cometh to the light, that his deeds may be made manifest that they are wrought in God" (Jno. 3:19-21).Here is the principle of which the example last given is the illustration. The evil-doer is aware of the light when he shuns it; would quench it, if possible, because he is aware of it. In it he is not, because he flees, not welcomes it; yet in fleeing, carries the unmistakable witness of it in his heart.

Again, in the parable of the sower the Lord declares the same thing in another form. Of the seed sown by the wayside He says, " When any one heareth the word of the kingdom, and under-standeth it not, then cometh the wicked one, and catcheth away that which was sown in his heart. This is he which received seed by the wayside." (Matt. 13:19.) Now this is one apparently quite unconvinced; he does not understand; the seed lies merely upon the surface of the ground, inviting the fowls of the air to catch it away. The heart of this man, hard as the roadside with the traffic of other things, if you could say of any that it was untouched by the Word, you could say it here; yet the Lord expressly says, "Taketh away that which was sown in his heart." Even here, the Word has not only touched, but penetrated. The heart, unchanged by it, has rejected it:true, but it has had to reject it. Satan is allowed to remove the Word, and it is taken away; but its rejected witness will come up in terrible memory at another day.

And this exactly agrees with the words of the apostle:'"But if our gospel be hid, it is hid to them that are perishing; in whom the God of this world hath blinded the minds of them which believe not, lest the light of the gospel of the glory of Christ,, who is the image of God, should shine unto them." (2 Cor. 4:3, 4.) Here again the unbelief which refuses the gospel shuts the unbeliever up into the enemy's hand. The blinding of the mind by the god of this world, like the removal of the seed- by the fowls of the air, is the direct result of this first rejection of unwelcome testimony.
How immensely important, then, to the soul the treatment it accords to whatever it has to own as truth, little or much as it may seem to be! For God is the God of truth; and, where souls are themselves true, the possession of any portion of it is the possession of a clue-line which leads surely into His presence; the giving it up is the deliberate choice of darkness as one's portion. And this applies in measure to every one, sinner and saint alike, and to every truth of revelation. Every truth really bowed to in the soul leads on to more; every error received requires, to be consistent with it, the reception of more. It is darkness; and darkness is a kingdom, as the light is,-part of an organized revolt against God. As the truth leads to and keeps us in His presence, so error is, in its essence, departure from Him.

Of course, the truth may be received intellectually merely, not believingly; and if trifled with, it is no wonder if it result in terrible hardening of the heart. The more orthodox Pharisees were worse persecutors of the Lord than the infidel Sadducees. And the Jews every where led the heathen in their early attacks on Christianity. But in these cases it was still rejected truth that stirred up their opposition. But the truth is really and decisively rejected where its claim over the heart and life is allowed in word, and in word only. He who to his father's claim of service said openly, "I will not," yet afterward repented and went; while he who respectfully answered, " I go, sir," never went.

And this is the character of truth, that stirs up opposition. It speaks, prophet-like, for God, affirming His authority over the soul, and abasing the glory of man in His presence. Unbelief says, as Ahab of Micaiah, "I hate it, for it does not prophesy good of me, but evil." And even in the believer, it runs counter to all that is not faith within him; and alas! how much within us is not faith! Thus, among Christians themselves, the truth in any fullness stumbles so many, and at every fresh unfolding of it some who had followed thus far are left behind:it is even well if they do not become active opponents of it. Thus He who in the angel's announcement brings " peace on earth," brings in fact, nevertheless, because of man's condition, "not peace, but a sword." The fellowship of saints is disturbed and broken up; the thousands drop to hundreds in the very presence of the enemy. Romanism boasts, with a certain reason, of her unity at least in outward organization; while Protestantism proclaims the sanctity of conscience, and divides into a hundred sects.

Yet if conscience be in any respect given up, all is. For its principle is obedience to God, and to God only; and this is a first necessity for a walk with God. Conscience is, above all things, therefore, individual. It refuses to see with other eyes than its own; and refuses, too, subjection or guidance without seeing. It will easily incur in this way the reproach of obstinacy, contumacy, pride, self-will; while on the other hand there is constant danger of mistaking these for it. It is thus a thing which all ecclesiastical systems find it difficult to recognize or deal with, and which makes large demands for wisdom, patience, and forbearance with one another. " We see in part; we prophesy in part:" and what we see may seem in ill accord with what is really truth seen by others, just for want of knowledge of a larger truth embracing both. But even if we see not, and but think we see, still conscience, because it touches our practical relationship with God, is a solemn thing" to deal with:he who meddles with it interferes with God's rights over the soul, and usurps a vicegerency which He commits to no one.

Yet the voice of God, let us carefully remember, conscience is not. It is an ear to hear it only, and which may be dull and deaf, and hear with little clearness after all. God's voice is that which utters itself by the Spirit through the Word. But this voice speaks to the individual, to him that hath an ear to hear. None can, but at his peril, resign his responsibility in this to another; and none can, but at his peril, require this to be done, Yet, alas! how often, in various ways, consciously and unconsciously, is this required and yielded to!

3.-PURGED AND PURE.

"To serve the living, God," the conscience must first of all be " purified from dead works." (Heb. 9:14.) A soul alarmed on account of sin is driven by conscience into effort to escape from the wrath which it foresees as the necessity of divine holiness. In an unawakened condition, not so much con-science drives from God as the heart, estranged, refuses One in whom it finds no pleasure. Its pleasure is in banishing Him, if possible, from the thought; aye, terrible as it is to realize, sin as sin, as offense to Him whom it counts an enemy, is a real pleasure. Many, it is true, are quite ignorant of this, and would resent the imputation of it; for the heart is deceitful above all things, as it is desperately wicked, and who can know it? But when we wake up to realize our condition, we shall assuredly begin to realize it to be so, and none who has been truly brought to God but will own with the apostle, the remarkable example of it, that "when we were enemies, we were reconciled to God by the death of His Son."

When awakened, the holiness of God is seen as necessary wrath against sin; and then effort begins to secure shelter from it. And naturally this takes the shape of an attempt to keep those commandments of God hitherto despised and broken. Ignorant of how complete the ruin sin has caused,- ignorant of the unbending requirements of God's holiness,-ignorant of the grace which has provided complete atonement, the soul persists (often for how long!) in trying to bring to God some fruit that He can accept, and which will secure, or help to secure, the one who brings it. But this is only " dead work." It is neither "work of faith" nor " labor of love." It is self-justification, the fruit of fear and unbelief:hence truly "dead work," the mere outside of holiness at the best, with no life- no inward spirit in it to make it acceptable to the "living God." It is rather itself an offense, and thus a necessary defilement of the soul.

The blood of Christ therefore it is that purifies the conscience from dead works. Justified by faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ. Brought to God, and to God known in Him, there is "no more conscience of sins" in the rejoicing worshiper. Free from the load of guilt, he is able to welcome the light fully and without reserve-yea, with eager desire. The yoke of Christ is rest and freedom. Thus the apprehension of grace delivers from a morbid self-occupation to enable one for real holiness. The conscience is purified so as faithfully to receive, without partiality or distortion, the communications of the Father's will. " The fruit of the light as we should read Ephesians 5:9,] is in all goodness and righteousness and truth."

And if that were all, how blessed-how wholly blessed would be this condition! "Light is good" indeed, " and a pleasant thing it is to behold the sun." If in this all nature rejoices, how the new nature in that which is the " light of the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ." Thus the fruit of the light is found in this eternal day and summer of the soul.

From the side of God there is no need of change or variation more. His grace is perfect; His gifts and calling are without repentance. Here, in the enjoyment of its own things, the soul is called to abide; here all its own interests summon it to abide. What might be expected then but continual growth in grace and in the knowledge of our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ? Alas! that this rightful expectation should be so little fulfilled; but in whom is it perfectly fulfilled? in how many do we see almost the opposite of it, retrogression instead of progress! and how many are there who remain apparently almost stationary, although in reality of course with loss of zeal and fervor, year after year! What is the cause of all this, which we find acknowledged in apostolic times as in the present? For the Galatians were no solitary ex-ample of those who "did run well," being hindered from steadfast obedience to the truth. At Rome, those whose faith had once been" spoken of throughout the whole world," we find testified of by the same witness as all seeking their own, and not the things of Jesus Christ (Rom. 1:8; Phil. 2:21). And later he says of them, " At my first answer no man stood with me, but all forsook me" (2 Tim. 4:16). Corinth went into worldliness and immorality. Ephesus lost its first love. Of some of these it may be pleaded that it is assemblies that are spoken of, not individuals, but the two ordinarily go together, and the magnitude of the departure shows that the plea can hardly avail. The general fact is as plain as it is intensely solemn.

But the decay of the fruits of faith means the decay of faith itself. And this decay of faith, whence does it proceed but from failure to maintain the purity of conscience? In the case of some, (who had, no doubt, got far away,) the apostle argues this:" Holding faith and a good conscience, which [1:e., the latter,] some having put away, concerning faith have made shipwreck" (i Tim. 1:19). It is easy to show how heresies and false doctrines, and the reception of these by others, spring from a conscience defiled:but this is not now my point. For simplicity of faith itself, a good conscience must be maintained. As another apostle says, " If our heart condemn us, God is greater than our heart, and knoweth all things; beloved, if our heart condemn us not, then have we confidence toward God" (i Jno. 3:20, 21). And so the Lord, in view of Peter's grievous fall, and the natural result of it, assures him, " I have prayed for thee, that thy, faith fail not" (Luke 22:32). How vital, then, to the whole spiritual condition is the maintenance of a pure conscience!

But again, this pure conscience can only be maintained by exercise. " Herein do I exercise myself," says, once more, the apostle of the Gentiles, "to have always a conscience void of offense toward God and toward men " (Acts 24:16). How many mistake-how easy, therefore, is it to mistake-a conscience dulled by neglect, for one that is really "good"! How many persuade themselves all is well with them, while they are simply not near enough to God to detect the evil!

" As ye have received Christ Jesus the Lord," we are admonished, " walk ye in Him " (Col. ii 6). This alone is the Christian " rule " (Gal. 6:16); and that is alone a good conscience which keeps to the measure of this. Yet how easy to have the theory, nay, in certain respects, the faith of where we are, without this becoming the real measure for conscience of practical walk!

In the sanctuary, with God alone, we find the light in which things take their true shape and character. In Israel's sanctuary of old, the light of common day was jealously excluded. The light of the golden candlestick guided the priests alone in their daily service. For us, the light of the holiest is that of the glory of God in the. face of Jesus Christ. And in this, things look very differently indeed from the mere common light in which the natural conscience views them. Yet many Christians are able to be at peace with themselves merely because they are judging themselves by a standard little beyond the common one. They even ignorantly bring in the grace of God to quiet the stirring of self-accusation, which they suppose legality, and go on in a careless dream as far as possible removed from the peace of communion,-the "peace of Christ." But the apostle was not legal when he said, " Wherefore we labor, that, whether present or absent, we may be acceptable to Him " (2 Cor. 5:9, Gr.), nor in his exercise to have always a conscience void of offense toward God and toward men. (To be continued, D. V.)

I. (1:1-13.) The Person who comes to serve. (i) 1-3. Promised. Mark's gospel does not begin with a genealogy, nor contain one. Love needs no title to serve, except the power. In the power which He is to serve man, when we consider the greatness of his need, the true dignity of Him who ministers becomes apparent. Thus Mark starts with His title in the forefront,-" The beginning of the gospel of Jesus Christ, the Son of God." As this also He is announced by the prophets:it is Jehovah Himself whose way the predicted messenger bids prepare. Nor is this but a specimen; all former time has prophesied of Him.

(2) 4-8. Heralded. In fulfillment of this, John comes, and as remission of sins is the blessing to be brought, so it is by the baptism of repentance- in bowing to this-the way is to be prepared. And this is partially accomplished. Multitudes flock out to Jordan, the river of death, to acknowledge, in taking their place there, their just due, "confessing their sins." Separate as he himself is from the multitude in food and clothes, he proclaims a greater distance between himself and the One of whom he is but the unworthy herald. But his voice has in it here no note of denunciation:the baptism of fire is not found, as in Matthew; " He shall baptize you with the Holy Ghost."

(3)9-11. Attested. Then the Lord comes Himself to submit Himself to the baptism of John, taking His place, in grace, in that death which was the due of others; and there He is sealed with the Spirit, the witness of a perfection which the Father's voice proclaims, along with the full divine dignity which is His:" Thou art My beloved Son; in Thee I am well pleased." It is here not as in Matthew, however, a witness to the people, but to Himself, as the words show.

(4) 12, 13. Proved. Thus attested, He is "driven" by the Spirit into the wilderness, and is there for forty days tempted of Satan, and in circumstances of lowest humiliation, " with the wild beasts." At last, His perfection proved, ministered to by angels as to His bodily need, He is ready for His blessed service.

2. (1:14-3:6.)The character of His ministry.

(i) 1:14-20. The Word, and human instrumentality. His ministry begins with the presentation of the Word, with that gospel of which He is Himself the substance. This must of necessity be, of course, but it is well to notice it. John's message is confirmed, and his testimony-with a suited difference -taken up. Every new dispensation thus puts its seal on that which has gone before; while, throughout all, the Word maintains its place as the judge and arbitrator in every question that can arise. It is blessed to see the Lord Himself not refusing this test, but appealing to it on every occasion.

We next find Him gathering around Himself the human instruments, who, delivered themselves, are to be the means of delivering others. Men are to be fishers of men. How glorious here is the triumph of the gospel! how sweet and perfect the precious grace of God! It is, as another has said, "the fact in itself" that is given here; not the details, for it is the fact itself which is intended to have significance for us-a striking and blessed one.

(2) 1:21-39. The power of Satan met. In the next place, and first in the actual story of accomplished deliverance, we have the record of the power of Satan, man's terrible captor, met and foiled. It was the type of this which was the first sign by which Moses was to be made known to Israel as the deliverer raised up of God for them-the rod of power cast out of the hands of him to whom it belonged become a serpent, yet yielding itself with necessary submission to that hand put forth once more to claim it for its master. Man is captive in the grasp of one stronger than he. In the very synagogue is a man with an unclean spirit:terrible proof of Israel's condition! But the " Holy One of God"-tested and attested as this-has power to which the baffled enemy can only yield, the more unwillingly the more manifestly. The man is freed; and next, the diseases, so often his work, are healed, and we hear of devils every-where cast out. All men seek for Him; and He is found, having " risen up a great while before day," in a solitary place, in prayer. The pride of independence is the spirit of Satan. The Conqueror of Satan is the dependent One. It is thus Scripture, in its perfection, declares Him. Who would otherwise have dared to imagine it? Perfect Man as perfect God, how does His example speak to us in this!

(3) 1.40-45. Man's corruption cleansed. The root of man's condition is next reached; for leprosy is the well-known type of that for which it was so often inflicted-sin, as seen in its corruption, in its tendency to spread, in its contagious defilement, in its sure end which only God could avert. It is remarkable that here we have the second sign God gave to Moses; and here as there, though with how great a difference, the healing is by touch. It is the same story of redemption, however varied. Here how plain the assurance that to cleanse us from the sin by which we are inflicted there is needed, not simply the word of divine power, but the contact, so to speak, of incarnate deity! How wondrous this warm, assuring, health-giving touch! But the cross alone is that in which this " I will" of the blessed Lord could express itself; and in this it is He touches the leper. Who, more than he, could have imagined this " I will" ? (4) 2:1-12. Mans impotence removed. Next, and in perfect order, the impotence of man is met; and here, so beautifully, the place of human instrumentality is indicated. Powerless ourselves to heal or save, our one part is to bring the helpless one into the presence of Jesus. Is not this what must be the effect of all true preaching, as of all true prayer? and in both, is not faith the real worker? and does not Jesus still "see faith"?

Then the secret of power is, first of all, forgiveness. Power is not wanted to obtain forgiveness, but it is an after-result for those forgiven. Power is to be indeed the sign of this, as we see in the palsied man; but more, it is to be in the face of the blasphemies of unbelief a witness to Christ, that the Son of Man hath power on earth to forgive sins, as still He has. How vain to expect this, then, where no present forgiveness, perhaps no forgiveness on earth at all, is known!

(5) 2:13-22. The exchange of law for grace. But this involves much more, which the Lord now openly announces:it is indeed the secret grace all along now openly announced. He calls Matthew from the receipt of custom,-a publican, the very type of a sinner, and to be not merely a recipient of salvation, but a special messenger to declare it to others. A feast at Matthew's house would be well understood in its significance for publicans and sinners. The Pharisees find fault. " How is it that He eateth and drinketh with publicans and sinners?" How perfect and beautiful the answer! how it encourages, and how it exposes at once!- " They that are whole are in no need of the physician, but they that are sick:I came not to call the righteous, but sinners."

But this was the reason why for so many the joy of the Bridegroom's presence was unknown. How should they know it who had no need to be relieved by His hand-need that no other could more unwillingly the more manifestly. The man is freed; and next, the diseases, so often his work, are healed, and we hear of devils every-where cast out. All men seek for Him; and He is found, having " risen up a great while before day," in a solitary place, in prayer. The pride of independence is the spirit of Satan. The Conqueror of Satan is the dependent One. It is thus Scripture, in its perfection, declares Him. Who would otherwise have dared to imagine it? Perfect Man as perfect God, how does His example speak to us in this!

(3) 1.40-45. Man's corruption cleansed. The root of man's condition is next reached; for leprosy is the well-known type of that for which it was so often inflicted-sin, as seen in its corruption, in its tendency to spread, in its contagious defilement, in its sure end which only God could avert. It is remarkable that here we have the second sign God gave to Moses; and here as there, though with how great a difference, the healing is by touch. It * is the same story of redemption, however varied. Here how plain the assurance that to cleanse us from the sin by which we are inflicted there is needed, not simply the word of divine power, but the contact, so to speak, of incarnate deity! How wondrous this warm, assuring, health-giving touch! But the cross alone is that in which this " I will" of the blessed Lord could express itself; and in this it is He touches the leper. Who, more than he, could have imagined this " I will" ? (4) 2:1-12. Mans impotence removed. Next, and in perfect order, the impotence of man is met; and here, so beautifully, the place of human instrumentality is indicated. Powerless ourselves to heal or save, our one part is to bring the helpless one into the presence of Jesus. Is not this what must be the effect of all true preaching, as of all true prayer? and in both, is not faith the real worker? and does not Jesus still " see faith "?

Then the secret of power is, first of all, forgiveness. Power is not wanted to obtain forgiveness, but it is an after-result for those forgiven. Power is to be indeed the sign of this, as we see in the palsied man; but more, it is to be in the face of the blasphemies of unbelief a witness to Christ, that the Son of Man hath power on earth to forgive sins, as still He has. How vain to expect this, then, where no present forgiveness, perhaps no forgiveness on earth at all, is known!

(5) 2:13-22. The exchange of law for grace. But this involves much more, which the Lord now openly announces:it is indeed the secret grace all along now openly announced. He calls Matthew from the receipt of custom,-a publican, the very type of a sinner, and to be not merely a recipient of salvation, but a special messenger to declare it to others. A feast at Matthew's house would be well understood in its significance for publicans and sinners. The Pharisees find fault. " How is it that He eateth and drinketh with publicans and sinners?" How perfect and beautiful the answer! how it encourages, and how it exposes at once !- " They that are whole are in no need of the physician, but they that are sick:I came not to call the righteous, but sinners."

But this was the reason why for so many the joy of the Bridegroom's presence was unknown. How should they know it who had no need to be relieved by His hand-need that no other could relieve? It is in the consciousness of sin that we learn grace, and in grace, the God who alone can show it. How readily a soul that has come to a genuine sense of utter ruin can distinguish the voice of Christ from every other! For a lost sinner, can there be two Christs? Here, in self-judgment, man escapes out of the devil's snare, and out of the perplexity in which so many are hopelessly involved, and enters into the light where God is! But the awful isolation of a soul on its way to God is gone in the new eternal joy of having found Him. How impossible to such an one the dull routine of legal ritualism! How could the disciples of the Lord fast like the Pharisees, or even John's disciples? The ignorance of the questioners was the gross spiritual darkness of those who knew neither themselves nor God. But in truth the legal righteousness could not be patched with the new gospel one, nor the wine of this new spiritual joy be put into the forms of the old ordinances. The new wine must find new skins to hold it. Judaism with its forms was now to pass away.

(6) 2:23-28. Mans need beyond ordinances. With this the question of the Sabbath' necessarily connects. The Pharisees find fault with the disciples for plucking the ears of corn on the Sabbath day. The Lord brings forward, as in Matthew, the example of David; but He presses specially the point of need-"when he had need,"-and adds the words, so decisive, and so characteristic of Mark, " The Sabbath was made for man, and not man for the Sabbath;" and that "-therefore the Son of Man is Lord even of the Sabbath day." Man's need is more with God than the maintenance of ordinances, as ministers to which in fact they were even ordained. To the "Son of Man," therefore, become that in pitying recognition of that need, and to relieve it, the Sabbath itself is subject.

(7) 3:1-6. The prerogative of good. In the case of the man that had the withered hand is added another consideration, more closely appealing to the conscience,-the prerogative of good. " Is it lawful to do good on the Sabbath day, or to do evil; to save life, or to kill?" They hold their peace, guiltily silent where the case was clear. The Lord answers His own question by healing the man.

3. (3:7-5:) Results.

(i) 3:7-19. "Whom He would.". The results of His work in detail are now to be brought before us. And here we must remember, and as of wider application, the words prophetically spoken of Him by Isaiah as to Israel:"Then I said, 'I have labored in vain; I have spent my strength for naught, and in vain:' yet surely my judgment is with the Lord, and my work with my God." Not only was it true of Israel, but all through the present time, apparent failure attaches to His work. Until He comes again in the clouds of heaven, the world remains the scene of His rejection, and none the less because whole countries are covered with nominal Christianity. Heaven is filling indeed with the fruits of His travail. The salvation of countless multitudes has not failed, but on earth we shall find His own warning words assuring us of what must be owned as failure. Yet neither His power fails nor His love. The end shall surely speak for Him; but in the meanwhile, faith and patience are needed constantly.

In the opening verses here, multitudes proclaim His power and goodness, and we find Him taking measures for the extension of His ministry by means of His disciples. No power can possibly be lacking to Him who is in His humiliation the Servant of the eternal counsels of divine love itself:"He calleth unto Him whom He would, and they came unto Him." He serves here who is sovereign. "And He ordained twelve, that they should be with Him, and that He might send them forth to preach"-again the Word of God takes its place in His thoughts-" and to have power to heal sicknesses, and to cast out devils." A divine place is here assumed, for who could give authority of this kind except God Himself? But it is in service that it is displayed,-in love that has made Him serve.

(2) 3:20-30. Rejection. But from the outset, and most manifestly, He is the rejected One. His very kindred treat Him as out of His mind, and would lay hold of Him; while the scribes, with malignant wickedness, ascribe the glorious works, which it was impossible for them to deny, to the power of Satan. The Lord rebukes them with the unanswerable argument that Satan could not be divided against himself, and warns them that blasphemy against the Holy Ghost would never be forgiven.

(3) 3:31-35. The link with Christ spiritual, not natural. Upon this, His mother and His brethren come, and, standing without, send unto Him, calling Him. He uses this to declare the true link of relationship with Himself as spiritual-a link which the new dispensation was openly to make known. Subject Himself to, and supremely delighting in, the will of God, it is he who does that will who is brother, sister, mother, to Him. The consequence of His rejection by the world is the necessary separation of His people from it.

(4) 4:1-34. The Word testing men, and faith in it the only possible condition of bearing fruit. A dispensational change, then, is now announced; but even here it is the moral character that is insisted on. The Word of God dropped into the heart of men tests the state it finds, and faith is the indispensable condition of fruit-bearing-of this relation with Christ. In fact, three parts of what is sown are destroyed by the influence of the devil, the flesh, and the world. And this in the kingdom of God, outside of Israel, to the nation to which as a whole "all these things are done in parables." " These are they which are sown on good ground:such as hear the Word, and receive it, and bring forth fruit;" though here also, alas! in different measures, for the influence of these opposing forces is but too plainly felt.

The rest of the parables given in Matthew are omitted in Mark, save one, and that very evidently in moral connection. On the other hand, we have one added here that no other gospel gives, and which plainly enforces the lesson of responsibility, which the Lord inculcates in plain words at this point. There is nothing hid which shall not be manifested, nor kept secret, but to come abroad at last. To him that hath shall be given, and from him that hath not shall be taken even that he hath. The kingdom of God itself is to be committed into the hands of men, as if He who begins thus the seed-sowing were asleep, or ignorant of all they did. Yet the harvest will come, and the hand of the first Sower will put in the sickle. In the meantime it will have changed form and character, and grown into the likeness of a kingdom of the world. This is a parable to many still, and yet the fulfillment is before the eyes of all. " If any man have ears to hear, let him hear."

These four sections give the result of Christ's work which are manifest and external. We now pass to three which give us more what is internal and spiritual-the divine view; and this is as well known, the common division, and common character of the division, of such sevens.

(5) 4:35-41. The security of faith amid whatever peril. The first of these results is the perfect security of those who are with Christ, whatever the seeming peril. Faith, alas! may fail, and does often, how miserably! Did they think the waters had power to engulf the Lord? He may seem asleep while the storm rages, but if with Him- and let our only care be practically to be with Him,-He on the throne of heaven is embarked with us in the vessel, and no wave can rise over the throne of God!

(6) 5:1-20. Deliverance, rest, clothing, and a right mind. Four precious things come now together, and who has words to tell their worth?

First, deliverance from Satan's bondage; in which naturally all are, although not as obviously as the Gadarene demoniac. His condition is most striking, dwelling among the tombs,-and the earth to which men cling is more a place of the dead than of the living; impossible to be kept bound, or to be tamed,-and so are all laws and civilizing processes unable to restrain or tame Satan's poor captives. Then," cutting himself with stones," self-torturer, and looking upon the Son of God as a tormentor! The deliverance is complete, decisive; then, what a change! Restlessness has given place to repose; his nakedness is clothed; his mind is cleared. How he clings to that dear Lord his Saviour, and would fain be with Him! but the word for the present is, " Go home to thy friends, and tell them how great things the Lord hath done for thee, and hath had compassion on thee."

(7) 5:21-43. Life out of death. Finally, we have, as in Matthew, (but here, surely, not with a dispensational meaning as in Matthew,) two histories intertwined. In Jairus' daughter we have man's state in its full reality discovered, his deepest need which must be met. The Lord is here the life-giver; and He is "declared the Son of God with power, according to the spirit of holiness, by resurrection of the dead." The dead hears the voice of the Son of God, and lives. This is the divine side, and man is necessarily merely passive and recipient. But there is another side, and this, it seems to me, the woman with the issue represents. Here, faith relies upon the Saviour for its need, and the issue is staunched. To adjust these things fully-the divine and human sides-may transcend our power, but both have their place.

Turning to Zechariah 13:6-9, we find a scene described of which the likeness to that in John 20:cannot be considered accidental. The question is the same-the identification of Christ, this time in His royal glory; and the inquiry, "What are these wounds in Thy hands?" with the answer, " Those with which I was wounded in the house of My friends," are so profoundly suitable to the occasion of our Lord's second presentation to His people that one marvels and worships to read .them as written full five centuries before His first coming to suffer that wounding at their hands. Wonderfully, too, the passage closes with the greeting of restored relationship that follows on His recognition by signs such' as these,-"And I shall say, It is My people;" and they shall say, "The Lord, my God!"Here, then, we discover the solemn truth that the wounds of Jesus' will, at His coming in His kingdom, prove His title to the homage of the repentant nation at whose hands He received them-a truth further taught in the previous chapter, where the familiar words occur, "And they shall look upon Me whom they have pierced, and they shall mourn," etc.;a word of prophecy repeated in almost similar terms by the same Spirit six centuries later, and after the piercing had taken place:"Behold, He cometh with clouds; and every eye shall see Him, and they also which pierced Him; and all the tribes of the land shall wail because of Him." (Rev. 1:7.)

With this also agree the strange words of the prophet Habakkuk, who (if we may accept the marginal reading of chapter 3:4,) describes the coming of God and the Holy One thus:," His glory covered the heavens, and the earth was full of His praise; and His brightness was as the light, and He had bright beams out of His side;" that is to say, that not only will the wounds of Jesus be His identification, commanding the obedience, submission, and worshiping love of His nation, but those very wounds will be themselves His highest glory, and from them, as from the stricken thunder-cloud, will issue forth " bright beams " of light, to the joy of His reconciled people, and the confusion and destruction of His enemies.

If, then, the wounds of Jesus-kept open, so to speak, in our love-feasts from week to week, through all the ages of this present interval-shall fulfill so glorious a function at His coming back to the earth to reign over Israel, can we be surprised to find that in the still further future, at His assuming universals way, His wounds will again prove His title to that throne of glory?

Opening at Revelation v, this scene is portrayed -portrayed in purpose so divine, in effect so dramatic, in language so wonderful, as to confound, overpower, and yet inspire and elevate, our minds as often as we read it. For there it is told how, , when every creature in heaven, in earth, and under the earth had failed to qualify to claim the title-deeds of universal sovereignty,-when the eyes of the se£r flowed with bitter tears to think that earth's long hopes of redemption from her cruel subjugation were to be disappointed,-a Lamb, a little Lamb, a little wounded Lamb, a Lamb as it had been slain, stood out in the midst of that glittering circle of glory, and, by right and title only of those visible wounds, took the book from off the hand of Him that sat upon the throne, and heard the joyful acclamations of all the great wide universe, which had now at last beheld its Redeemer.

Such, briefly, are the tremendous issues that have turned and shall turn upon the wounds of Christ, which in, our commemorative supper we love to discover symbolically shown forth. May it not be that hereafter, when faith shall change to sight, we shall make the personal proof of their identifying power which one has sought to convey in the beautiful lines that follow:-
" But how shall I then know Thee
Amid those hosts above?
What token true shall show me
The object of my love?
Thy wounds, Thy wounds, Lord Jesus,-
These deep, deep wounds will tell
The sacrifice that frees us
From self, and death, and hell!"

(G.F.T.)

The great supper of Luke 14:speaks of what God has treasured up in Christ for us. He sends out an invitation to tell men they are perfectly welcome to come and enjoy it:but having in hand present things-God's things really, which they treat as their own,-they excuse themselves. Seeking enjoyment in what they claim to be their possessions, the better and higher joy God invites to they care not for and refuse.

Where, then, will God find His guests? How the answer bows the soul and heart in adoration! . There are among men some who are not enjoying present things, such as the despised man of the streets, the destitute inhabitant of the lanes, and the wretched child of poverty, who, by dire necessity, has been driven to seek shade and shelter beneath the hedge; to such God turns; it is such He seeks and finds and brings to His table,-men who have no excuses to bring but whose necessity makes them willing to be simply receivers-debtors merely to simple grace.

In the beginning of chapter xv, our blessed Lord is in the midst of a company of such people; and who can measure His joy or theirs as He eats and drinks with them ? If there are some among men who cannot be happy with sinners, God can; nay, more,-it is such, and only such, He receives. Dear reader, do you complain of this? Does your heart murmur against the grace that stoops down to meet publicans and sinners ? Are you Pharisee enough to speak sneeringly of such grace? God grant you may not be; but whether or not, He finds His joy in His love to sinners, and vindicates Himself against every murmur lurking in the heart of all who scorn to be called sinners.

The parables of this chapter show us this. The first two tell us of the joy there is in heaven, and before the angels, over a sinner who repents. In the first of these, God is a seeker, and the sinner is a wanderer, who goes on and on, and further away, until, not only the joy of his own way vanishes, but worn out by the roughness of his road, he is at last content to be served by the God of all grace; who, finding him as such-a needy one, takes him up in the arms of His love and rejoices over him with a joy immeasurable, though divinely expressed.

In the next, God is a seeker still; but we have more the means and methods used to bring the sinner where God in His grace can meet him. As walking after the course of this world he is morally dead,-1:e., he has no apprehension in his soul of God or of his true condition before God. The lighted candle of the word or testimony of God, and the broom of circumstances, which are wholly under the ordering of God, whatever agencies may be employed in producing them, brings the sinner forth a heap of dirt and rubbish, which only divine grace can meet, and in which only God Himself can find the silver-1:e., one for whom Christ died to be his redemption. As being simply that God finds him; thus we learn it is the sinner who repents that God finds; and such, and only such, are the occasion of the joy with which all heaven rings in full accord with the heart of God.

The last parable describes, for our profit and learning, the wondrous welcome and reception God gives the sinner who repents, and in connection with this we are shown what repentance is. The younger brother having received his portion of his father's goods goes to the far country. He now belongs to the class who in the fourteenth chapter made excuse. He has in his hand what he wants to enjoy:but in the far country it soon goes; all is soon squandered and lost. A famine comes, and he is in want; his hand is empty now ; he has nothing to enjoy. But why does not the father go and meet him now? Simply because he is not yet the sinner that repents. He does not yet think himself the suited object for pure grace, and so he goes and joins himself to a citizen of that country, to try and see if he can retrieve his lost fortune; but, thank God! this cannot be done. When we have spent all our goods, and lost our reputation and our character, no effort, no reformation, can possibly regain what we have lost. We have written our history, and it is irreversible; we belong now to the men of the streets, lanes, highways, and hedges. Our names as being sinners are indelibly stamped upon us, and in spite of every thing we can do we find our selves put where we do not wish to be. Happy is he who submits to it; for until then, we must remain . strangers to the welcome and reception of the God of all grace.

At last the prodigal bows; he submits to his necessity. He thinks of the grace and plenty that is with his father, and he says, That is just what I need. It just suits him now. A hungry, perishing sinner needs the grace of God. He says, " I will arise, and go to my father, and will say unto him, Father, I have sinned against Heaven, and before thee, and am no more worthy to be called thy son; make me as one of thy hired servants." He is a sinner now-a man of the streets. He has accepted the counsel of God against himself; he will let God tell him all things that ever he did; but having bowed to this, he bows to the grace that meets it all. He renounces airworthiness of his own. Not knowing the character of the grace he submits to, he says, " Make me as one of thy hired servants;" but so saying, he shows he is willing and content to be indebted to grace. This is repentance. The prodigal is now a sinner that repents; he has risen up to go to his father.

We will now look at his welcome and reception. As soon as the prodigal has started for his father, the father is on his way to him. " When he was yet a great way off, his father saw him, and had compassion, and ran, and fell on his neck, and kissed him." How wonderful! Until he repented, the father could not go to meet him; but just as soon as he repents, the father hastens to him. Beloved reader, this is a picture of the way God meets a sinner. He is not austere, demanding of sinners to cease to be sinners. He invites them to come as sinners-as being simply sinners and nothing else; and the moment they take Him at His word, and consent, in the reality of their souls, to meet Him as simple sinners, needing, by that very fact, His grace, He comes to meet them just as here,-"When he was yet a great way off," 1:e., still in the far country-a sinner in his sins, " he saw him, and had compassion, and ran, and fell on his neck, and kissed him." How blessed that!

But this is not all. God not only comes and meets the returning, repenting sinner to welcome him back, but He at once, without the least delay, appropriates to him all the provision He has made for sinners in Christ, set forth here by the best robe, ring, and shoes. So fully has Christ answered before God for all the sinner's need, that as soon as a sinner takes his place with God as one of those for whom Christ died, all the fullness of the provision of God in Christ for sinners is his, and his forever; God having met and welcomed him to His bosom bears witness to him that all is his-his at once. When a sinner tells God he has no worthiness, God answers, I will clothe you with worthiness; I will put worthiness upon you; just as here, when the prodigal says, " I have sinned, and am no more worthy," the father replies, " Bring forth the best robe, and put it upon him."How wonderful! A sinner in his rags- his sins, in the full consciousness of having nothing else but his sins, in God's presence telling him so, and God at once giving him a change of raiment, even the worthiness and beauty of Christ, accepting him in His beloved, so that he is now henceforth forever before Him without blame- the blamelessness of Christ on him, in the eye of God. Oh, what grace! and how full and perfect! Dear reader, it is the grace of God, and nothing short of it, would suit him. It is a grave mistake to suppose any delay on God's part in making over to the sinner that repents the provision of His grace in Christ, as if He were waiting on sinners to cease being sinners, to become saints, ere He could give them His provision for them. God does not invite sinners to come to His great supper and then tell them when they come they cannot partake of it until they have passed through certain experiences, and made certain attainments. Such a thought is thoroughly derogatory to God. It makes the gospel only a half gospel; it falsifies the character of God, and denies His full and perfect grace. It is sinners He seeks; it is sinners He calls to repentance. " This is a faithful saying, and worthy of all acceptation, that Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners."So too the sinner that repents He receives and rejoices over. It is the ungodly that He justifies. Those who come as ungodly-as without strength and as lost, He meets, and that, too, in the very place they take before Him; and, meeting them thus, He assures them of a full and hearty welcome, and that every thing He has provided for them in Christ is theirs. The kiss upon the cheek of the prodigal is the token of the full and hearty welcome, and the best robe, ring, and shoes speak as clearly of the unreserved appropriation to the returning one of all that God has in Christ for sinners.

Beloved reader, have you ever received God's kiss of welcome? and do you know its full meaning? And further, have you ever gone to God without any reserve in your soul to tell Him all your heart-all your care and trouble, and all your sins? Ere your tale was fully told did you not find yourself in a change of raiment, shining before the eye of God in all the beauty and brightness of Christ? Truly yes, for then it was God accepted you in His beloved. Having thus received you and robed you, how He rejoiced over you! Already, from your meeting Him-at the very moment of your reception, God-the blessed God is merry and glad over you. It is His joy to have you in His family; it is yours, too, to be in it; and the joy thus begun is without end-eternal.

May our hearts know better the reality, depth, and blessedness of it. C.C.

We now come to the New Testament. We have already carried its doctrine with us in the interpretation of the Old; for our object has been, not to trace the gradual unfolding of the truth from age to age, but to get as completely as possible for our souls that truth, as Scripture, now complete, as a whole presents it to us. Thus we have already anticipated much of what would otherwise now come before us. Yet we shall find, if the Lord only open our eyes to it, abundance of what is of unfailing interest for us, and that the substance here goes beyond all the shadows of the past.

In the Gospels, however, the doctrine of atonement is but little developed. We have instead the unspeakably precious work which wrought it. The Acts also, while devoted to the history of the effects of its accomplishment, speaks little directly of the atonement itself. It is not till we come to Paul's writings that we find this fully entered into, and its results for us declared. He is the one raised up to give us the full gospel message, as well as the truth of the Church, of both of which he is in a special sense the " minister " (Col. 1:23,25).

The gospel of John, however, more than all the rest together, does dwell upon the meaning of the cross; and here it is mostly the Lord Himself who declares it to us. John's is, in a fuller sense than the others, the Christian gospel; and in it, we may say, we enter into that holiest of which they see but the vail rent at the end; while for John, the glory typified by that of the tabernacle of old shines out all through.* * John 1:14, where " dwelt" should be, as in the margin of the Revised Version, " tabernacled:" it is a plain reference to the glory of old.* It is necessary, then, to show how this is possible, man at the same time being fully shown out for what he is by the light in which he stands. Before we speak of this, we must take up, however, the "synoptic" gospels, and briefly examine their testimony.

Their direct teaching is scanty indeed. The Lord's own declaration that " the Son of Man . . . . came to give His life a ransom for many," and that His blood was " shed for many," is given in all; Luke indeed changing this last into " shed for you" and Matthew adding, "for the remission of sins." The doctrine of atonement is quite plain here, however little enlarged on. Luke gives us beside how after His resurrection, He appears to the two on the way to Emmaus, and reproves them for their unbelief of all that the prophets had spoken, adding, "' Ought not Christ to have suffered these things, and to enter into His glory ?' And beginning at Moses and all the prophets, He expounded unto them in all the Scriptures the things concerning Himself." Afterward, to the eleven He says, " Thus it is written, and thus it behooved Christ to suffer and to rise from the dead the third day, and that repentance and remission of sins should be preached in His name, beginning at Jerusalem."

When we look more deeply at the work presented in these three gospels, we find in them respectively, as I have elsewhere shown, the features of the trespass, sin, and peace-offerings respectively. The trespass-offering unites with Matthew's gospel of the kingdom as being the governmental aspect of atonement-the reparation for injury rather than judgment for sin; yet this in its Godward side reaches of necessity to the vindication of the holiness of His nature, so that Matthew and Mark alike give the forsaking of God. But while the three gospels show the rending of the vail, and the holiest opened, Matthew alone shows the meeting of death for us, the graves giving up their dead; for death is governmental infliction, and so belongs to Matthew's theme. So, evidently, does that view of the cross which is found in the two parables of the kingdom, the treasure and the pearl, where the work is looked at as a governmental exchange-a purchase:" went and sold all that He had and bought it."

Mark, while it has the forsaking of God also,- the characteristic features of the sin-offering,- omits these governmental features. It is the Son of God in the glory of His voluntary humiliation, obedient even unto death, glorifying God at His own personal cost,-as the bullock is the highest grade of the sin-offering,-but therefore glorified of God in consequence, so that He ascends to the right hand of God (16:19). But His humiliation is most absolute. He does not, as in Matthew, "dismiss His spirit" (27:50, Gr.), as One that had power to retain it, but, in true sin-offering character, " expires " (chap. 15:37, Gr.). Even in His cry upon the cross there is a note of difference which is significant. He says, not " Eli,"-literally, although it be a name of God, "My Strength"- but "Eloi," "My God."* *In the twenty-second psalm it is" Eli," not " Eloi," but 1 think it clear that the latter, in this connection, is the deeper word.*

So the results of the cross are characteristically different in Mark from Matthew. It is not a commission given to disciple into the kingdom, but to preach the gospel, with power over the enemy and over the consequences of sin accompanying the simple believing in this precious word.

In Luke, the peace-offering character is everywhere plain, as it is in the cross most manifestly. It needs scarcely comment. The Lord's cry is "Father;" and He openly assures a dying thief of a place with Him in paradise. But further exposition would belong rather to a sketch of the gospels than of the doctrine of atonement, and it has been given elsewhere.

The gospel of John introduces a subject in the Old Testament unrevealed,-eternal life. Personally, the Lord was this, and among men the light of men. But this only disclosed the truth of their condition. The world-and the Jews in this light were only part of the world,-lay in a darkness which no light merely could reach, for it was the darkness of death; but a spiritual death of sin which hot even life alone could reach. Guilt must also be met. " Except a corn of wheat fall into the ground and die, it abideth alone," are our Lord's words. Life must spring for man out of an atoning death. The water of cleansing and the blood of expiation must come out of the side of a dead Christ. The Spirit thus bears record that " God has given to us eternal life."

The first word as to atonement in the gospel of John is in the Baptist's testimony:"Behold the Lamb of God, who taketh away the sin of the world." This is the broad general view of Christ's work and its effect. By and by, a " new " earth- not another earth, but the earth made new as to its condition,-will be eternally the abode of righteousness (2 Pet. 3:13). To us, how wonderful a condition for this world, which for nearly six thousand years has been the abode of sin, to be the abode of everlasting righteousness! What will have accomplished this? The precious sacrifice of the Lamb of God. Every inhabitant of that new earth will be one redeemed by the blood of Christ, and secured eternally by its value. Sin will be completely banished. Its memory only will remain, to give full melody to the praises of the saints.

But who is this Lamb of God? "This is He," says the Baptist, "of whom I said, 'After me cometh a Man which is preferred before me, for He was before me.'" After in time as a man, yet the One inhabiting eternity! It is God Himself who is at the cost of redemption, and that when not power merely could redeem, but only blood! Therefore a man, incarnate, to be in meek surrender of Himself a Lamb slain. This is what is of moral value to fill the earth with righteousness, and to lift to heaven also, those made members of Christ by the baptism of the Holy Ghost(1:33).

In the next case, the need of man has just been fully exposed in the Lord's words to Nicodemus. He must be born again, as Ezekiel had already witnessed; although not able to declare the full truth and magnitude of this work of God in man. But One was come from heaven to declare it, Son of Man on earth, yet still in heaven. Nor only to declare it, but to make this work possible; for "as Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness, so also must the Son of Man be lifted up, that whosoever believeth in Him should not perish, but have eternal life."

The imperative necessity of atonement is here affirmed. The Son of Man must be lifted up, and faith in Him be the way of everlasting life. The type of the brazen serpent shows in what character "lifted up;" for Moses' serpent clearly represented that by which the people in the wilderness were perishing. At bottom, for them as for men in general this was sin, the poison of the old serpent, which has corrupted the nature of every one born of flesh. For this, "made sin," Christ was "lifted up,"-offered to God a sacrifice,-that men might have, by faith in Him thus offered, not a restoration of mere natural life, but one spiritual and eternal.

But again we are assured of who it is effects the sacrifice. Not only it must be One who as Son of Man could be lifted up, but " God so loved the world, that He gave His only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in Him should not perish, but have everlasting life." It is not only the Son of Man, lifted up to God, but the Son of God in the full reality of this, the eternal Son, the only begotten, sent down, God's gift, from God.

Thus eternal life is ours who believe. The character, privileges, and accompaniments of which are detailed for us in the chapters that follow. The sixth chapter shows it to us as a life enjoyed in dependence, lived by faith, maintained by the meat given by the Son of Man-meat which endures to everlasting life, as long as the life itself does. But this meat is the bread from heaven, and the bread is His flesh, which He gives for the life of the world. But this involves His death,-blood-shedding; so that "except ye have eaten the flesh of the Son of Man, and drank His blood, ye have no life in you; he that eateth My flesh and drinketh My blood hath eternal life,-abideth in Me and I in him. As the living Father hath sent Me, and 1 live because of the Father, so he that eateth Me, he also shall live because of Me." (10:53, 54, 56, 57.)

We must notice a difference here which neither the revised nor the common version makes apparent. The first expression-"have eaten," "have drunk,"-speaks of once partaking, the others of continuous. The once having eaten and drunk insures eternal life, but it is maintained as a practical life of faith by continuous eating and drinking. It is a life dependent though eternal, and what communicates it sustains it also.

The tenth chapter presents the Lord as the Shepherd of the sheep, giving His life for them, in perfect freedom, and yet as fulfilling the commandment of the Father. He is thus able to give a reason for the Father's love (5:17), and they are saved, have eternal life, and can never perish, nor any pluck them out of His .hand. In the twelfth chapter, again, He compares His death to that of a corn of wheat which dies to produce fruit; but I pass on to consider the character of the closing chapters.

Here, what is a feature every where, is just this voluntariness of self-surrender which the tenth chapter has declared. No one takes His life from Him:the men sent to take Him fall to the ground before Him, and while giving Himself up, secures the safety of His followers by an authoritative word. To Pilate, He declares His kingdom founded on the truth, and which every true soul would recognize; while the authority of the governor over Him existed but by divine permission for a special purpose. Upon the cross, there is no darkness and no weakness. He declares His thirst, to fulfill one final scripture, then announces the perfect accomplishment of His work, and delivers up His own spirit to the Father. The soldiers' errand doubly fulfills the prescient word of God, who on the one hand guards the body of His holy One from mutilation, while on the other giving to man the threefold witness of completed atonement. All this speaks of the offering for acceptance (Lev. 1:3, 4, Rev. Vers.), the voluntary burnt-offering.

To this the account of the resurrection answers also perfectly. Relationship established, the corn of wheat having died to bring forth fruit, the Lord owns His "brethren," ascending to His and (thus) their Father, His and their God. He assures them of peace, the fruit of His work (20:19, 20); of their new-creation place in connection with Himself, last Adam (5:21; comp. Gen. 2:7, i Cor. 15:43), and of their qualification therefore to " receive the Holy Ghost." All this is the testimony of perfect acceptance in the value of His completed work.

The Acts, while speaking throughout of the fruits of atonement, give little of the doctrine of the work itself. We may therefore pass it over. I am aware of no new aspect in which it is presented to us in it.

The word "mystery" in Scripture does not speak of any thing in itself impossible or even difficult to be understood, but of what is secret except to those to whom it is revealed. Thus the apostle says of the gospel, " But we speak the wisdom of God in a mystery, even the hidden wisdom, which God ordained before the world unto our glory:which none of the princes of this world knew; for had they known it, they would not have crucified the Lord of glory."

Again, in Revelation 1:20, John is told to " write the mystery of the seven stars which thou sawest in My right hand, and the seven golden candlesticks. The seven stars are the angels of the seven churches, and the seven candlesticks which thou sawest are the seven churches."

Even to believers, the New-Testament truths,- those proper to it-were thus mysteries; and so the apostle again and again applies the word. " According to the revelation of the mystery which was kept secret since the world began, but now is made manifest, and by prophetic scriptures , made manifest to all nations for the obedience of faith." " The mystery which from the beginning of the world has been hid in God, who created all things by Jesus Christ." " The mystery which hath been hid from ages and generations, and now is made manifest to the saints." And so, speaking generally of the New-Testament mystery, he says, " So let a man think of us as ministers of Christ, and stewards of the mysteries of God." (i Cor. 4:1:)

It is evident, then, that the New Testament as a whole gets its character from these mysteries, which are its own proper and distinct truths. The apprehension of these, and of these as distinct, must be of the very greatest importance to every one who desires the knowledge of the Word of God. The apostle does not even scruple to say of the " mystery of God,"-the sum of these various mysteries,-that therein " are hid all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge.*"*Colossians 2:2, 3. The words that follow " the mystery of God" are greatly in question, and the editors differ. Some add, as in our version, "and of the Father and of Christ;" some, "even Christ;" some, "which is Christ;" some, "the Father of Christ." The probability is, these are different versions of an attempt to explain what the mystery of God is, and that they ought really to be left out.* For it is what is distinctively Christian truth which is required to make us in knowledge and in practice Christians. Alas! the extension of the term backward to include all believers from Abel down shows how what is distinctive has been well-nigh lost, to the great injury of souls. Let us, then, with the more care, consider what this mystery of God is.

The first time the word occurs in the New Testament is in Matthew 13:11. Already rejected of Israel in fact, spite of the mighty works which showed conclusively who He was, the Lord has declared that spiritual relationships were those which now He could alone acknowledge. " But He answered and said unto him that told Him, 'Who is My mother, and My brethren?' And He stretched forth His hand toward His disciples, and said, ' Behold My mother and My brethren! for whosoever shall do the will of My Father which is in heaven, the same is my mother and sister and brother."

Now this is what Christianity affirms-a relationship purely spiritual, which Judaism never was. Accordingly the Lord now leaves the house and sits by the seaside; and there He begins to speak of that saying of the Word of God broadcast among men which was to introduce and characterize the gospel dispensation. The parabolic form is significant of the rejection of Israel. "Therefore speak I unto them in parables, because they seeing see not, and hearing they hear not, neither do they understand." And to His disciples He says, "To you it is given to know the mysteries of the kingdom of heaven, but to them it is not given."

Israel rejected, the word goes out addressed to faith any where, and the kingdom in the meanwhile taken from them, assumes another aspect from that announced by the Old-Testament prophets. It is a kingdom with a king absent; set up, not in power, but in patience; in a scene in which Satan, flesh, and world are leagued against it:this is closed by the coming of the Son of Man in person, and the casting out of His kingdom all things that offend, and them which do iniquity,-a coming which introduces the form in which Daniel sees it. Here, therefore, the New-Testament mystery of it ends.

If Daniel be referred to, and connected with the book of Revelation, it will be found how thoroughly this explains a difficulty which has long perplexed the interpreters of prophecy. The seventh of Daniel shows us four great empires, and only four, stretching from the prophet's own day, until the setting up of Messiah's kingdom. These four empires, it is almost universally agreed, are Babylon, Persia, Greece, and Rome. The empire of Rome, then, exists when the Son of Man comes in I the clouds of heaven. But here is the obvious difficulty, that the Roman empire has in fact already passed away, and the Son of Man is not yet come. Various efforts have been made to surmount this. Some would fain make the spiritual power of the pope the continuation of the civil imperial power; some would make the coming of the Son of Man a spiritual coming only, and the kingdom of course a spiritual one also. It is not needful for us here to argue as to either of these theories, for theories alone they are. The book of Revelation gives a wholly different and a complete solution. There we find, once more, Daniel's fourth beast, and in connection with the Lord's personal pre-millennial coming (ch. 19:19). But in what shape does this Roman beast appear? As one whom he sees rising up afresh out of the sea, expressly as one revived out of death (ch. 13:3, 12, 14). Beast and woman-civil and ecclesiastical power-are here distinct (ch. 17:), and the announcement angelic illumines with divine light the Old-Testament prophecy:"The beast that thou sawest was, and is not; and shall ascend out of the bottomless pit, and go into perdition; and they that dwell upon the earth shall wonder, whose names are not written in the book of life from the foundation of the world, when they behold the beast that was, and is not, and shall be present" So, and not "and yet is," should the last words be read.

Here we see that the whole time of the national existence of the Roman empire is omitted from the Old-Testament prophecy, and that this gap of omitted time corresponds with the development of the mysteries of the kingdom of heaven of which our Lord speaks. The ecclesiastical power which has so long ruled Rome finds its place in connection with these in the New-Testament prophecy; while for the same reason the kingdom of Christ spoken of by Daniel cannot be the spiritual kingdom of the Christian mysteries, which were then unrevealed. Concerning all these parables of the kingdom, the evangelist quotes and applies the prophet's words:" I will open my mouth in parables; I will utter things which have been kept secret from the foundation of the world."

These two phases of the kingdom, the present and the millennial forms, should not for a moment be confounded by any attentive reader of Scripture. The parables of the thirteenth of Matthew show us clearly the one ending with the other beginning; and the Lord distinguishes them in His address to the church at Laodicea as the times of His sitting on the Father's throne, and of His taking as Son of Man His own. So we are translated into the kingdom of God's dear Son (Col. 1:13); while Daniel speaks of the coming of the Son of Man, and similarly the Lord in the parables-"The Son of Man shall send forth His angels, and they shall gather out of His kingdom all things that offend, and them which do iniquity." (13:41.)

This, then, is the first of the New-Testament mysteries, and with this it is easy to see how their ends, named as such, coincide:thus the apostle speaks of the " mystery " of the partial blinding of Israel until the fullness of the Gentiles be come in; so too of " the mystery of the gospel" (Eph. 6:19), as concerning which they are enemies for the Gentiles' sakes (Rom, 11:28).

Basis of this gospel is the " mystery of godliness, He who was manifest in the flesh, justified in the Spirit, seen of angels, preached unto the Gentiles, believed on in the world, received up in glory." The actual coming of the Lord in fulfillment of prophecy takes its place thus in the front rank of Christian mysteries. Christ come in flesh; justified in Spirit, personally at His baptism, in testimony to the acceptance of His work when raised from the dead; a spectacle to angels; proclaimed beyond the range of Judaism, to those without claim or promise-those in grace; a testimony believed in the world; received up in glory, and abiding there:this is indeed the mystery by which men's hearts are won to God, and their lives changed to some reflection of His life which is itself light. In this way the Church becomes the " epistle of Christ, written, not with ink, but with the Spirit of the living God, not in tables of stone, but in fleshy tables of the heart."

"The riches of the glory of this mystery among the Gentiles is Christ among you, the hope of glory." (Col. 1:27, marg.) Christ among Gentiles no Old-Testament prophet ever spoke of, and the glory here is another than that which pertained to Israel. Heaven, which is opened to receive Christ, has received in Him the Forerunner of a heavenly people. For men on earth, it is a. hope,-not an attainment yet, but a hope how bright!

In Ephesians he develops more distinctly this mystery of Christ among the Gentiles:"Which in other ages was not revealed unto the sons of men as it is now revealed unto His holy apostles and prophets by the Spirit, that the Gentiles should be fellow-heirs, and of the same body, and partakers of His promise in Christ by the gospel" (Eph. 3:5, 6). Three things are now declared, which are all outside the older revelation:-

1. The Gentiles fellow-heirs :on equal terms with Israelites in a heavenly inheritance.

2. Gentiles and Jews made members together of the body of Christ.

3. Gentiles and Jews partakers together of His promise in Abraham's seed, by real identification with that seed, which is Christ.

These three wonderful blessings are all unknown to the Old Testament; they are divine mysteries which the "ministers of Christ" alone can speak of.

1. Of Gentiles being fellow-heirs with Jews no Old-Testament prophet ever spoke. It implies necessarily the setting aside of all such distinctions ; whereas the promise in the Old Testament to Israel is, that "as the new heavens and new earth which I will make, shall remain before Me, saith the Lord, so shall your seed and your name remain" (Isaiah 66:22). The apostle has already assured us that to Israel, his kindred after the flesh, these promises belong. So, again, Micah declares, "The law shall go forth from Zion, and the word of the Lord from Jerusalem. . . . And I will make her that halteth a remnant, and her that was cast afar off a strong nation; and the Lord shall reign over them in Mount Zion from henceforth, even forever. And thou, O tower of the flock, the stronghold of the daughter of Zion, to thee shall it come, even the first dominion; .the kingdom shall come to the daughter of Jerusalem" (4:2, 7, 8). Many more passages might be quoted, but it needs not. Any one can turn to almost any of the prophets, and read them for himself.

2. But the Church itself, the body of Christ, exists also as yet neither in fact nor in promise. In fact, for "we are all baptized by one Spirit into one body" (i Cor. 12:13); and this baptism of the Spirit, prophesied of by the Baptist as the future work of Christ, was announced by the Lord before His ascension as to take place "not many days hence." Not yet had He taken His place as Head in heaven, for it was then, when God " set Him at His own right hand in the heavenly places," that He " gave Him to be the Head over all things to the Church, which is His body, the fullness of Him that filleth all in all" (Eph. 1:20, 22, 23). At Pentecost, this wonderful relationship was first established, and to the saints of the present dispensation it entirely belongs. The distinctive promises to Israel which we have just been looking at are absolutely inconsistent with membership in the body of Christ.

3. Our place in Christ is another thing. .It is only as in Christ that we are accepted before God at all. But God's way of blessing us thus, by a new Adam in a new creation, was hid in God until the time that God made it known by Paul. Thus he alone speaks of justification even as before God; for of course James gives us not this, but that before men, by fruit which man can see.

To follow this out would lead us into too large a field; but it is easy to understand that by this truth of new creation is explained what the first chapter of Ephesians gives us:"The mystery of God's will, according to His good pleasure which He hath purposed in Himself for the dispensation of the fullness of times to gather together in one [more literally, "to head up,"] all things in Christ, both which are in heaven and which are on earth." We see fully in all this how the mysteries are but the out beaming glory of Christ, "the Father of Eternity;" "for Him," as well as "by Him, all things were created."

But the epistle to the Ephesians gives us yet another mystery–the relationship of the Church to Christ, as the Eve of that new creation of which He is the last Adam. This is based upon that of the body to the head; but it is a different thing, as we may easily see by reference to the type in question:" Husbands, love your wives, even as Christ also 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. 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 loveth it and cherisheth it, even as the Lord the Church; for we are members of His body."

Here the Lord is said to present the Church to Himself. Eve was presented to Adam by God; but the divine glories of the last Adam shine out every where; so also in this, that He gave Himself for His Church. " God caused," we read, "a deep sleep to fall upon Adam, and he slept; and He took one of his ribs, and closed up the flesh instead thereof; and the rib which the Lord God had taken from the man made He a woman, and brought her unto the man." Who can fail to see in Adam's significant sleep that sleep of death, deeper and more mysterious, of Him upon whom it could never have fallen had He not " loved the Church, and given Himself for it"? In this way only could the Church come into being; and as Eve was the very flesh of Adam, so is the Church the body of Christ. But Eve, by being Adam's flesh, was only thus prepared for being his wife; and so with the Church. We are already His body, but only by anticipation His bride,-"espoused," as yet not married. These, then, are two things, very closely connected, not to be confounded.

There is one more mystery, so called in the Word:"Behold, I show you a mystery; We shall" not all sleep, but we shall all be changed; in a moment, in the twinkling of an eye, at the last trump; for the trumpet shall sound, and the dead shall be raised incorruptible, and we shall be changed." (i Cor. 15:51,52.) This plainly and closely connects itself with what the apostle, if he does not use the same term, gives distinctly as a new revelation "by the word of the Lord (i Thess. 4:15-17), that we which are alive and remain unto the coming of the Lord shall not prevent them which are asleep; for the Lord Himself shall descend from heaven with a shout, with the voice of the archangel, and with the trump of God; and the dead in Christ shall rise first; then we which are alive and remain shall be caught up together with them in the clouds, to meet the Lord in the air; and so shall we be ever with the Lord."

This is what closes, not indeed the mystery of the kingdom, (which goes on until the Lord appears and sets it up in power; and there is a most important interval, although a short one, between these two things;) but it closes the Christian dispensation, and introduces the "end of the age,"- that is, of the Jewish age,-the preparatory of discipline and judgment for Israel and the earth, the fruits of which will be found in a remnant ready to inherit the blessing when He that shall come comes, and the times of restitution begin "from the presence of the Lord."

These, then, are the Christian mysteries; not one of them foretold or known in the Old Testament:although when known from the New, the types of the past dispensation catch and reflect back brightly many a gleam of the new glory. It is the same blessed God all through, with the precious grace in His heart from the beginning of those ways which lead steadily on to their full and glad accomplishment. These things, fully at last revealed, characterize, even more than do new-covenant blessings, the "new-covenant" books.

It is a deeply solemn thing to learn truth; for there is not a principle which we profess to have learned which we shall not have to prove practically.

It was a terribly solemn thing for the Pharisees to " resist the counsel of God against themselves." They stiffened their necks and hardened their hearts, and would not hear God's message through John the Baptist.

John came preaching repentance, exhorting the people to the confession of their sins, and faith in the One coming after him. "The people and publicans justified God, being baptized with the baptism of John; but the Pharisees and lawyers resisted the counsel of God against themselves, being not baptized of him." (Luke 7:29, 30.)

Two classes we find here,-those who justified God, and those who resisted His counsel against themselves. The one moved by the word of God, and took their place in self-judgment before Him, owning themselves sinners and needy; while the other built up in self-righteousness, and instead of yielding to the divine counsel which sought to lead them to repentance and blessing, they resisted that counsel, and were offended at His word. And when the One came of whom John spake, and told out the tale of divine love to a ruined world, and piped the sweet notes of grace, they were as far from receiving Him as they had been from receiving John. They neither mourned when John preached repentance, nor danced when the Son of God proclaimed the grace of God. Of the one they said, " He hath a devil;" of the other, " Behold a gluttonous man and a wine-bibber, a friend of publicans and sinners." " They resisted the counsel of God against themselves." How terribly solemn! God would lead them to repentance, but they would none of Him. All was resisted, despised, and set at naught.

" But Wisdom is justified of all her children." (Luke 7:35.) What distinguishes Wisdom's children from the unbelieving mass is that they justify God, and, in the reception and belief of the truth, they take their place as ruined and guilty before Him, and cast themselves upon His mercy. They resist not His counsel which leads to repentance, but own in full all that they are, and find pardon and eternal blessing at His hand. Their prayer is, " God, be merciful to me, a sinner!" and God answers their prayer by justifying them. It is God in grace meeting the repentant soul with a full salvation. This is how God is revealed in the gospel. The sinner, therefore, who justifies God and condemns himself is in return justified of God " freely by His grace, through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus." (Rom.' 3:24.)

In this very chapter (Luke 7:36-50) we have a lovely instance of one of Wisdom's children finding her way to Jesus, and what she received at His hand. In a way, her experience is the experience of all who return, for " Wisdom is justified of all her children."

Jesus was invited to eat with a certain Pharisee, and He accepts the invitation. And while there, a woman, a known sinner, crosses the threshold of the man's house, and finds her way to where Jesus was sitting. What has brought her there? Unbidden, and undesired by the Pharisees at least, she had come; but the burden of her sins, and the sense of her guilt, had driven her to the One who had come to seek and to save such as she, and had said, "Him that cometh to Me I will in no wise cast out." He had come from heaven to save such ; she comes to Him to be saved. His counsel drew her; she resisted not His gracious counsel against herself. She finds herself in His blessed presence, and with confidence in God already replacing itself in her heart, she had brought an alabaster box of ointment, for she felt that He was worthy. She stands at His feet behind Him weeping, washing His feet with her tears, wiping them with the hairs of her head, and anointing His feet with the ointment. Blessed place indeed! A repentant soul in the presence of the Lord Jesus Christ is a blessed picture. It furnishes joy for the unjealous hosts above, as it is written, " There is joy in the presence of the angels of God over one sinner that repenteth." (Luke 15:10.)

In the presence of this sovereign grace of God the hideous spirit of self-righteousness could not rest. The man who had bidden Jesus said within himself, " This Man, if He were a prophet, would have known who and what manner of woman this is that toucheth Him, for she is a sinner," Self-righteousness would upset the poor woman, but grace would draw her to the Saviour. Man's religion, as cold and heartless as death, would create a wide gulf between the sinner and the would-be-righteous people, but the sweet story of love divine told out by the lips of the God-man could but win her to Himself.

Jesus, who read the thoughts of the Pharisee's heart, said, " Simon, I have somewhat to say unto thee." " Master, say on," he replies. " There was a certain creditor which had two debtors:the one owed five hundred pence, and the other fifty:and when they had nothing to pay, he frankly forgave them both. Tell Me, therefore, which of them will love him most?" "Simon answered and said, ' I suppose that he to whom he forgave most.'" "Thou hast rightly judged," responded the Saviour. " And He turned to the woman, and said unto Simon, ' Seest thou this woman ? I entered into thine house, thou gavest Me no water for My feet; but she hath washed My feet with tears, and wiped them with the hairs of her head. Thou gavest Me no kiss; but this woman, since the time 1 came in, hath not ceased to kiss My feet. My head with oil thou didst not anoint; but this woman hath anointed My feet with ointment. Wherefore I say unto thee, Her sins which are many are forgiven; for she loved much:but to whom little is forgiven, the same loveth little.' And He said unto her, ' thy SINS ARE FORGIVEN.' "

Again the murmurs of self-righteousness are heard, " Who is this that forgiveth sins also?" but they are answered with a more positive expression of grace than before. "And He said to the woman, ' THY FAITH HATH SAVED THEE :GO IN PEACE.' "

How very beautiful is all this, as far as the Saviour and the poor woman are concerned! Condemned by the Pharisees, He is nevertheless justified by Wisdom's child, who is in repentance at His feet, and He lavishes upon her, poor needy sinner as she is, all His love and grace. She came believing, and He pardons and saves, and sends her away in peace. " "THY SINS ARE FORGIVEN." "THY FAITH HATH SAVED THEE:GO IN PEACE." Pardon, salvation, peace. Oh the precious grace of God! To the God of all grace, and to His adorable Son, be eternal praise!

Beloved reader, are you one of Wisdom's children? Are you pardoned, saved, and in peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ? or are you careless, indifferent, unbelieving, self-righteous, and therefore resisting the counsel of God against yourself? If the latter, O sin of all sins, which will blight and ruin your soul for eternity! E.A

Q 16. —-is not an exhortation needed as regards a reverential posture in prayer and worship? Formality we all desire to avoid, but is not the too prevalent custom of remaining seated during prayer a hindrance to simplicity, and itself a formality, which tends to chill the hearts of the worshipers? Certain forms are the natural expression of certain feelings, and their absence is an inconsistency and a loss. A few passages are added, as affording examples we may well take heed to. "And Solomon had made a brazen scaffold, …. and upon it he stood, and kneeled down upon his knees, and spread forth his hands toward heaven." (2 Chron. 6:13.) "O come, let us worship and bow down:let us kneel before the Lord our Maker." (Ps. 95:6.) "And He was withdrawn from them about a stone's cast, and kneeled down, and prayed." (Luke 22:41.) " And when he had thus spoken, he kneeled down, and prayed with them all." (Acts 20:36.)

A. Though put in the form of a question, our brother's words need no answer, and should need but little enforcement for souls before God. Scripture is surely clear, and all that is needed is subjection to it. Such as we are, body and soul react upon one another; and although we can become familiarized with an irreverential habit until we cease to feel the irreverence of it, it will and must have its effect. It is a subject on which a word of exhortation is quite timely, and many will thank our brother for it.

Q. 17.-Do not Luke 3:38, Acts 17:28, 29, and Eph. 4:6 teach that in a certain broad sense God is the Father of all men?

A. Assuredly; and Hebrews 12:9 explains how. He is the "Father of spirits," as He is the "God" also "of spirits." (Num. 16:22.) God is a Spirit, and man by his spirit (which is his highest part, and that which knows human things-1 Cor. 2:11) is His offspring, as the beast is not. Genesis 2:7, although in a way suited to a primitive revelation, shows us man in his creation receiving thus something peculiarly from God. This is his link naturally with immortality.

Q. 18.-Is angelic ministry a feature of this age ? Who are "those who shall be heirs of salvation" (Heb. 1:14.)?

A. The epistle to Jewish believers, partakers of the heavenly calling-Christiana therefore, of course; although there are passages in which, as has been said by another, the branches seem to hang over the wall, for the Israelitish remnant of a future day. The passage in question certainly applies to the present time, though "those who shall be heirs" might mislead one to suppose those of a future time intended. It should read, "those who are about to inherit salvation."

Q. 19.-Kindly explain 1 John 3:9.

A. The middle clause of the verse is the key to it.-"His seed abideth in him." He is born again, not of corruptible seed, but of incorruptible, by the Word of God" (1 Pet. 1:23.); has thus a new nature from Him, with no principle of evil in it, but wholly at war with it. He cannot practice sin (the true force of the word), nor "be sinning," as he once was. He cannot go back to the old condition, out of which God's grace has once for all brought him.

Q. 20.-Is not the Lord's supper a memorial of His death ? and therefore should we not be occupied wholly with what was the other side of resurrection ? and should not the scriptures and hymns used be in harmony with this thought ? or is it proper to think of Christ in any relation whatever, as is commonly done?

A. Of course we " show forth the Lord's death," and it is of this the bread" and the cup speak-the blood and the body separate,-the blood shed. But while this is true, and should be the central thought, there are other things to be considered. Must we not think of and celebrate who it is that has thus died ? It is the first day of the Week-the resurrection-day, and we have the Lord risen with us leading our praise. How then can we forget resurrection, which tells of the value and acceptance of that work in death ? Doubtless it should be the central thought, but to strip it of all that really sets forth its blessedness and value would not exalt it or give it its right character for our souls.

"We must either be subject to one who would like to tear every thing to pieces, or to One who delights to bless. Every man living is either in one or the other,-either nothing but a foot-ball of Satan's, or a poor withered flower picked up to be worn by Christ in His infinite grace."

"Be ye also patient; establish your hearts:for the coming of the Lord draweth nigh." (Jas. 5:8.)

Pleads the one desire of the soul to dwell in Jehovah's house ; yea, Jehovah had invited to seek His face, and faith had answered the invitation ; therefore He would not hide His face:he would see the goodness of the Lord in the land of the living.

[A psalm] of David.

Jehovah is my light and my salvation; of whom shall I be afraid? Jehovah is the stronghold of my life; of whom shall I be in dread ?

2. When evil-doers came upon me to eat up my flesh,-my oppressors and enemies,-they themselves stumbled and fell.

3. Though a host should encamp against me, my heart shall not fear; though war should arise against me, in this will I be confident.

4. One thing have I asked of Jehovah; this will I seek after:that I may dwell in the house of Jehovah all the days of my life, to behold the beauty of Jehovah, and to inquire in His temple.

5. For He shall lay me up in His pavilion in the day of evil:in the secret of His tent shall He hide me; He shall raise me up upon a rock.

6. And now shall mine head be raised up above mine enemies round about me; and I will sacrifice in His tent sacrifices of joyful sound:I will sing, yea, I will sing psalms to Jehovah.

7. Hear me, Jehovah! I cry with my voice:be gracious also unto me and answer me!

8. To Thee hath my heart said, " Seek ye My face?" Thy face do I seek, Jehovah.

9. Hide not Thy face from me! turn not Thy servant away in anger:Thou hast been my help; cast me not off, and forsake me not, O God of my salvation!

10. For if my father and my mother have forsaken me, Jehovah will take me up.

11. Direct me, Jehovah, in Thy way; lead me in an even path because of those that watch me.

12. Give me not up to the will of mine oppressors ; for false witnesses are risen up against me, and such as breathe violence.

13. -If I had not believed to see the goodness of Jehovah in the land of the living!-

14. Wait on Jehovah; be strong, and He shall confirm thy heart; therefore wait on Jehovah.

Text.-(8) " Seek ye My face :" Jehovah's words, which faith lays hold of.

(10) Lit., " For my father and mother have forsaken me, and Jehovah taketh me up."

(14) Or, " Let thy heart be firm."

The trespass-offering is for sin looked at as in-jury, and in view of the government of God, as the sin-offering contemplates it in its intrinsic character as abhorrent to His nature. Thus restitution-" amends for the harm that he hath done " -is so prominent a feature in the trespass-offering, the ram of which is itself valued, and becomes part of the repayment. The governmental view of the atonement, which so many in the present day contend for, while it is thus justified as a partial view, falls entirely short in its estimate of it when taken as the whole. It is not in government merely that God hides His face from sin. The darkness and the cry of desertion of the cross express more than governmental atonement. Indeed, to the mass of writers upon the subject these are features whose significance is of little import. In the punishment of the wicked finally, few or many stripes express the governmental award of the "great white throne;" but the "utter darkness," the necessary separation of God from what is abhorrent to His nature, is not merely governmental, but the necessary portion alike of all.

Hence that offering burnt in the outer place alone had power to penetrate into the sanctuary, the abode of divine light, and when really offered, to rend the vail and bring us into the light of the divine presence. Hence, as we have seen, the sin-offering for the high-priest and congregation is the only one which we can regard as the true sin-offering. All others were but partial and defective forms.

The trespass-offering, as far as its ritual is concerned, has little to distinguish it from these lower grades of the sin-offering. There is no laying on of hands, so far as we read, and the blood is not put upon the horns of the altar, but simply sprinkled on it round about. The fat alone is burnt upon the altar; the rest eaten by the priests.

The ram is the victim here alone appointed, although elsewhere for the leper (ch. 14) and the Nazarite (Num. 6:) a lamb was to be offered. The ram was evidently the fuller type,-the female sheep and lamb giving the character of meek submission, the male sheep more of energy in devotedness; in the coverings of the tabernacle the ram-skins were dyed red, to show that devotedness even to death which characterized the Lord.

The great thought impressed upon us in the trespass-offering is that of restitution-amends for the harm done. This has to be estimated by the priest in shekels of silver after shekel of the sanctuary. The estimation was to be a divine one, the priest giving the divine judgment; while the restitution-money was to be also the sanctuary shekel. But even this was not enough; the fifth part more was still to be added; for God would have an overplus of good result from evil, not mere making up to where things were before. That would not be worthy of Him. How could He have suffered sin at all, merely to show His power in vanquishing it and no more? Such victory would be little better than defeat. And yet this is what the mass of Christians perhaps suppose. Christ is to bring us back, they think, to the point from which Adam wandered, or which he ought to have reached but failed. But this is a deep degradation of Christ's blessed work. On the contrary, it is a second Man and a new creation which the word proclaims, of which the old is but the mere figure, and to which it gives place. The "fifth part more," heartily believed, would do away with much error and replace it with much precious and needed truth.

Christ has restored that which He took not away; but it is after the divine and not the human fashion. As the trespass-offering is here looked at in connection with trespasses against God or against man, so the cross has brought to God an infinite glory overpassing all the dishonor done to Him, by the fall of the creature, and to man a wealth of blessing such as Eden never knew.

For the detail of this we must go to the New Testament. The trespass-offering itself says nothing even in type, only indicates an over-recompense, the nature of which it does not further declare. But we, thank God, can declare it. " Now," says the Lord, speaking of what He was soon to suffer,-"Now is the Son of Man glorified, and God is glorified in Him; if God be glorified in Him, God shall also glorify Him in Himself, and shall straightway glorify Him." (Jno. 13:31, 32.) This surely is the key of all that the offering implies. The glory of God accomplished by One who has become Son of Man for this purpose; this answered in glory by God, an answer in which the objects of His grace are made to share:how far beyond the mere putting away of sin and its results is thus indicated! Goodness, holiness, righteousness in God maintained and manifested as no where else; mercy and grace declared how wondrously! For men, in result, not an earthly paradise again restored, but heaven opened; not innocence, but the image of God in righteousness and holiness of truth; not Adam-life, but Christ as Life eternal; not part with merely sinless men, but part with Christ in glory. For "not as the offense even so is the free gift;.:… for if through one man's offense death reigned by one, much more they which receive abundance of grace and of the gift of righteousness shall reign in life by One, Jesus Christ."

Thus in both ways through our Trespass-Offering is the fifth part more made good. And now, having completed, briefly enough, our survey of these Levitical sacrifices, let us look back at them for a moment in what was in fact, as we see in the law of the leper, the order of application. This was not a simple reversal of the order in which these chapters give them however, for while the "trespass-offering preceded in this way all the rest, and the sin-offering always, for an obvious reason, the sweet-savor offerings, on the contrary the burnt-offering invariably preceded the rest of these; the meat-offering following next, and connected with it often as if its proper appendage,- "the burnt-offering and its meat-offering" (Lev. 23:13, 18; Num. 8:8; 15:24; 29:3, 9, etc.) the peace-offering closing the whole. When, however, the peace-offering alone was Offered, the meat-offering became its adjunct, and was pre-scribed in a scale proportionate to the value of this, as it was in the case of the burnt-offering itself (Num. 15:1-14).

First, then, we have the offerings which settled the whole question of sin as against the offerer, and then those for acceptance, or a sweet savor. Not only the burnt-offering was for the "acceptance " of him who brought it, but the peace-offering also (Lev. 19:5 ; 22:25).This is not said directly of the meat-offering, but it is of the sheaf of first-fruits (Lev. 23:11), with which, however, a burnt-offering was offered. The difference of course results from the meat-offering being no real sacrifice, although it might be offered, as we have seen, even for a sin-offering, where the extreme poverty of the offerer permitted nothing more. The meat-offering spoke of Christ, but in the perfection of His holy life, not as a vicarious Substitute for sinners. The perfection of His life could not, it is plain, atone for sin, nor be in itself the acceptance of a sinner; yet it could not be omitted either from God's estimate of the work of His beloved Son. Hence, as it makes necessary part of that accomplished righteousness in the value of which He has entered into His presence and as man sat down there, so in its value also we stand before God. The place of the meat-offering in connection with the burnt-offering speaks clearly here.
Finally, the peace-offering closing all is witness to us that God would have our communion with Himself find its measure and character from the apprehension of this place of acceptance and what has procured it for us:in Christ; as Christ; justified and sanctified in His precious name. When we compare this place with the feebleness of our apprehension of it, we have cause indeed for the deepest humiliation before God; but what reason for encouragement also in this grace that continually beckons us forward to enjoy our portion according to the fullness of it as the word of God's grace so constantly presents it before our eyes, and in the power of the Spirit of Christ given to us, without limit, save as, alas! unbelief on our part may impose a limit!

(I.) The Dispensational Application.-In the chapter to which we are now come, the outward application has a prominence which it scarcely has elsewhere in the book of Genesis. No wonder, since in Isaac we have Christ personally, the central theme of the Spirit of God. The lapse here of that individual application which we have found so continuous hitherto,-the thread, indeed, on which the other truths are strung,-has its own significance and beauty. Of course it may be said that it is difficult to say whether this lapse be more than one in our knowledge; and indeed we have no plummet to fathom the depth of our ignorance. "If any one think that he knoweth any thing, he knoweth nothing yet as he ought to know." Still the fullness of detail on the one side, so coinciding with the apparent failure on the other, seems to speak plainly. It is (if I may venture to say so,) as when the geologist finds a sudden up burst from beneath disturb the regularity of the strata he is tracing out, but finds in it the outcropping of seams of precious metal or mineral, thus exposed for man's behoof and need. It is no disturbance really of the divine plan-no interruption to that continual thought and care for us which the individual ap-plication argues. What untold blessing in being thus permitted, in fellowship with Him whose record this is, to occupy ourselves with Christ!

Is there not a lack of ability generally for this, in spite of the way in which God is opening His Word to us, that speaks sorrowfully for the state of our souls? Are not Christians dwelling upon that which they count of profit to them, to the losing sight very much of that which is of greatest profit ? Is not even the gospel preached without the witness of that box of ointment for the head of Christ which He said should be told every where "for a memorial [not of Him, but] of her"?

Isaac is undoubtedly the living type of Christ which gives Him Tom us most in the work He has done for God, and thus for us. For a moment, as it were, from the solemn institution of sacrifice the vail is almost removed. Man for man it is must suffer:man, but not this man. Isaac is withdrawn, and faith is left looking onward to the Lamb that " God will provide for Himself" as a burnt-offering.

But if Isaac be the type of this, another comes no less distinctly into view. It is a father here who gives his son. Abraham seems, indeed, the most prominent figure, and necessarily for the type. It is the father's will to which the son obediently gives himself. In the antitype, the God who provides Himself the lamb answers to the father in this case. It is the Son of God who comes to do the Father's will. But what a will, to be the Father's!

" And it came to pass after these things"-the break is plain with what had gone before,-" that God did tempt [or"try"] Abraham, and said unto him, ' Abraham:' and he said, ' Here am I.' " . We wonder at this strange testing of a faith God held precious. Was it not worth the while to be honored with such a history? This was his justification by works now, God bringing out into open sight before others that which He Himself had long before seen and borne witness of. And then how wonderful to see in this display of a human heart the manifestation of the Father's !

How all is measured out to Abraham!-"And He said, 'Take now thy son,-thine only son,- Isaac,-whom thou lovest; and get thee into the land of Moriah; and offer him there for a burnt-offering upon one of the mountains which I will tell thee of.'" But who can fail to see that in these elements of sorrow that filled to the brim the father's cup we have the lineaments of a sacrifice transcending this immeasurably? Let us not fear to make God too human in thus apprehending Him. He has become a man to be apprehended.

"Thy son, thine only son," God says to Abraham:and " God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth on Him should not perish, but have eternal life." Thus is manifested His love, that it is His Son that He has given,-His only begotten Son. This is too human a term for some, who would fain do Him honor by denying this to be His divine title. They own Him Son of God, as "that holy thing" born of the virgin Mary; they own Him too as "God over all blessed forever;" but His eternal sonship they do not own.* *Two popular commentaries, those of Adam Clarke and Albert Barnes, are infected with this doctrine.* But thus it would not be true that" the Father sent the Son to be the propitiation for our sins," nor that "God gave His only begotten Son." And this term, " only begotten," is in contrast with His title as "First-begotten,"- " First-born among many brethren. "The former as decisively excludes others from sharing with Him as the latter admits. And when the " Word was made flesh, and tabernacled among us " (Jno. 1:14, Gr.), the glory of Deity seen in the tabernacle of His manhood was " the glory as of the Only Begotten of the Father, full of grace and truth." Again, if God only could fully declare God, it is "the only begotten Son, who is in the bosom of the Father, He hath declared Him."

John thus, whose peculiar theme is the divine manifestation in the Word made flesh, dwells upon this term, " the only begotten." " Had the Father no' bosom,'" it has been well asked, " before Christ was born on earth? " Nay, if there were no Son before then, there was of necessity no Father either. " He that denieth the Son, the same hath not the Father."

The Jews even understood that in claiming God to be His Father, He made Himself equal with God. Men argue from it now to show that, if true in the fullest way, it would make Him inferior! No doubt one may fail, on the other hand, by insisting too much on the analogy of the merely human relationship. We are safe, and only safe, in adhering to Scripture; and there the revelation of the Father and the Son are of the essence of Christianity.

"He spared not His own Son, but delivered Him up for us all." Here we are apt to fail, not in overestimate of the Son's sacrifice, but in losing sight of the Father's. It is this surely that in these words the apostle insists on:it is this which peculiarly the type before us dwells on. Let us not miss by any thought of impassivity in God the comfort for our hearts that we should find in this. We may easily make Him hard where we would only make Him changeless. But what to us does it imply, this very title, "Father"? and who is the Author of this fount of gushing feeling within us, which if it were absent we should necessarily regard as the gravest moral defect? "He that planted the ear, shall He not hear? He that formed the eye, shall He not see?" and He who gave man the tender response of the heart to every appeal of sorrow, what must He be who has made us thus?

God has given His Son, and His heart has been declared to us once for all. If He try us too, as He tried Abraham, how blessed to think that in this carefully measured cup of his, God was saying, as it were, " I know-I know it all:it is My Son, My Isaac, My only one, I am giving for men." The tree is cast into these Mara-waters thus that sweetens all their bitterness.

Isaac's own submission is perfect and beautiful. He was not the child that he is often pictured, but, as it would appear, in the vigor of early manhood. He nevertheless submits himself absolutely. How fitting a type of Him who stops the resistance of His impulsive follower with the words, " Put up again thy sword into its sheath:the cup which My Father hath given Me, shall I not drink it?"

Through all this trial of Abraham's we must not miss the fact that the faith of resurrection cheers the father's heart. The promises of God were assured in him, of whom He had said, " In Isaac shall thy seed be called." If therefore God called for him to be offered up, resurrection must restore him from the very flames of the altar; and " in a figure," as the apostle says, from the dead he was received. The figure of resurrection here it is very important to keep in mind, for it is to Christ in resurrection that the events following typically refer.

In fact, Isaac is spared from death; and here occurs one of those double figures by which the Spirit of God would remedy the necessary defect of all figures to set forth Christ and His work. Isaac is spared; but there is substituted for him " a ram caught in a thicket by his horns." Picture of devoted self-surrender, as we have seen elsewhere the ram is; he is "caught by his horns"- the sign (as others have noticed) of his power. Grace recognizes our impotence as claim upon His might:as He says, "I looked, and there was none to help, and I wondered that there was none to uphold; therefore Mine own arm brought salvation to Me."

In a figure, however, Isaac is raised from the dead; and as risen, the promise is confirmed to him,-" In thy seed shall all the nations of the earth be blessed." It is Christ raised from the dead who is the only source of blessing to the whole world. The value and necessity of His sacrificial work are here affirmed. Death has passed upon all men, for that all have sinned; only beyond death, then, can there be fulfillment of the promise, however free.

With the typical meaning of what follows (in Ch. 23:and 24:) many are happily familiar now. Sarah passes away and gives place to Rebekah,- the mother to the bride (24:67). Sarah is here the covenant of grace in connection with the people "of whom, as concerning the flesh, Christ came." God's dealings with the nation, in view of this, (for the present,) end, and a new thing is developed,-the Father's purpose to have a bride for His risen Son. The servant's mission shows us the coming of the Holy Ghost to effect this. Isaac remains in Canaan, as Christ in heaven. The Spirit of God, having all the fullness of the divine treasury "under His hand," comes down in servant-guise as the Son came before. Thorough devotedness to the father's will and the son's interests marks the servant's course. For those who are by grace allowed to be identified with the blessed service thus pictured, how instructive the fact that even his name we have no knowledge of. From what Abraham says, in chapter xv, of the steward of his house, it is generally inferred that it is Eliezer of Damascus, but this is by no means certain. Certainly he is the representative of One who does not speak of Himself, or seek His own glory; and for those whom He may use as His instruments, the lesson is plain.

So also is that of the waiting upon God which is so striking in Abraham's messenger. What sustains in prayer like singleness of eye ? If it is our own will we are seeking, what confidence can we have? Here we find prayer that God answers to the letter. If Christ's interests be ours, how fully may we count upon God glorifying His beloved Son! "Let it be she whom Thou hast appointed for Thy servant Isaac." How blessed to be working on to an already predestined end!

As for Rebekah, it is to be noted that she is already of Abraham's kindred:it is not an outside stranger that is sought for Isaac; and this is surely impressed on us in chapter xxii, where Nahor's, children are announced to Abraham. It is in the family of faith that the Church is found:it is the gathering together of the children of God who are scattered abroad (Jno. 11:52); not, as so many imagine, identical with the whole company of these, but only with those of the present period- from Pentecost till the Lord calls up His own. " Thou shalt go to my land and to my kindred, and take a wife for my son Isaac." Rebekah does not, therefore, I believe, represent the call of sinners by the gospel, but the call of saints to a place of special relationship with Christ on high. This is what began at Pentecost, plainly, where the hundred and twenty gathered were already of the " kindred;" and this is the character of the work ever since, although all that are saved now are added to the church. But this is a special grace none the less. We are in the mission-time of Genesis xxiv, and the Spirit of God is seeking a bride for the risen Son.

It is thus also, I doubt not, that Rebekah is found by the well of water, the constant figure of truth as a living reality for the soul. Already she has this, when the call is received to be Isaac's bride in Canaan. Indeed Isaac's gifts are already upon her before she receives this. She is betrothed, as it were, before she realizes or has received the message. So at Pentecost, and for years after, the Church, already begun, knew not the character of what had begun. It is only through Paul's ministry that her place with Christ is fully at last made known.

Simplicity of faith is found in Rebekah; she believes the report of him whom she has not seen, and as the messenger will have no delay, so she on her part seeks none. The precious things she has received are earnest already of what awaits her. Details of the journey there are none; but at the end, Isaac comes to meet her. "And Rebekah lifted up her eyes, and when she saw Isaac, she lighted off the camel. For she had said unto the servant, 'What man is this that walketh in the fields to meet us?' And the servant had said, 'It is my master.' Therefore she took a vail and covered herself."

What a word for heart and conscience in all this! Are we thus simple in faith, thus prompt and unlagging? And at the end of our journey nearly now, when the cry has already gone forth, " Behold the Bridegroom!" for those to whom the Interpreter-Spirit has spoken,-shall there not be with us any thing that answers to this beautiful action of Rebekah's, when "she lighted off the camel" and " took a vail and covered herself" ? It is He whose glory Isaiah saw, before whom the seraphim cover themselves; and the nearness of the place to which we are called, and the intimacy already ours, if we enjoy it, will only manifest themselves in deeper and more self-abasing reverence.

The rest is Isaac's joy. What gladness to think of His who even in glory waits as a Nazarite yet, to drink the wine new with us in His Father's kingdom!

In chapter 25:we find another wife of Abraham, and a hint of the multiplied seed which was to be his; from which Isaac, as the heir of the promises, is separated entirely. Ishmael's family is then rehearsed. These three,-Isaac and his bride, Ishmael, and Keturah's sons,-seem sufficiently to point out the diverse blessing of the family of faith in the Church, Israel, and the millennial nations.

Further than this, whether the dispensational application can be traced, I am not clear. It is plainly a history of failure that begins", very dis-tinct in character from the previous one; which, moreover, seems to have a very plain end in chap-ter 25:18.

An appeal against the enemy ; upon the ground of the personal perfection of Christ associating Himself with the people.

A Prayer of David.

Hear righteousness, Jehovah! attend unto my cry:give ear unto my prayer, from no deceitful lips.

2. Let my judgment come forth from Thy presence ! let Thine eyes behold things equal.

3. Thou hast tried my heart; Thou hast visited me by night; Thou hast assayed me; Thou findest nothing:my mouth does not exceed my thought.

4. As for works of men, by the word of Thy lips I have kept me from the paths of the violent.

5. My steps holding fast to Thy ways, my footsteps have not slipped.

6. I have called upon Thee, for Thou wilt answer me, O God*:incline Thine ear unto me; hear my speech.

7. Distinguish Thy mercies; saving with Thy right hand those who take refuge in Thee from those rising up against them !

8. Preserve me as the apple of the eye! hide me in the shadow of Thy wings!

9. From the wicked that oppress me,-my enemies that with desire encircle me.

10. They are closed up in their own fat; with their mouth they speak proudly.

11. Now at our steps have they compassed us; their eyes they have fixed [on us] to bow [us] down upon the earth.

12. His likeness is of a lion greedy of prey; even as a young lion couching in the coverts.

13. Arise, Jehovah! anticipate him, cast him down; deliver my soul from the wicked one, Thy sword,

14. From men, Thy hand, Jehovah,-from men of this world, whose portion is in [this] life, whose belly Thou fillest with Thy store; sons have they to the full, and leave their residue to their babes.

15. For me, in righteousness shall I behold Thy face:I shall be full, awaking in Thine image.

Text.-(3) "My mouth does not exceed my thought:" the translations differ greatly; some give as the A.V.; others, "Thou wilt not find in me [evil] thoughts; my mouth doth not transgress;" others, "My thought doth not go beyond my mouth."

(6) "God," when El, "Mighty," will be marked henceforth with an (*) asterisk.

(9) "Desire" is here nephesh, "soul, life:" translated by some, therefore, "deadly."

(11) Or, "have set their eyes, bowing down to the earth."

(13. 14) Some say, "[with] Thy sword," "[with] Thy hand."

I thank Thee, O my gracious God,
For all Thy love to me,
As deep, as high, as long, as broad,
As Thine eternity.

And when I far from Thee did rove
In paths of sin and shame,
'Twas then Thou called me in Thy love, '
And gav'st me to the Lamb.

Oh, happy day when, drawn by love
To Thee, my Saviour-God,
My guilty conscience came to prove
The power of Jesus' blood!

And happier still Himself to know,-
The changeless One on high,
Whose love led Him to stoop so low
To suffer and to die.

Praise-praise to Thee, my God, I give,
Who gav'st Thy Son for me!
I'll render praises while I live,
And through eternity's.
J. W. S.

The Dispensational Application. – Joseph, whose touching history closes the book before us, is so well known as a type of the Lord that there is no need to insist upon the reality of the application. It is one of the longest, fullest, and clearest to be found in Scripture; and here, as we have seen before in another case, the inward, individual application seems almost to be absorbed by and make way for the outward. Nor need we wonder:for in these stages of the divine life in man we have now reached that in which finally the fruit of the new nature, its proper characteristic fruit, is found, and here it is no longer I that live, but "Christ liveth in me."

The first view that we have of Joseph is at seventeen years feeding the flock along with his brethren. How ever the typical ruler for God is the shepherd! of Moses and of David both we find this; and in Matthew (the kingdom-gospel) we hear the scribes quoting Micah to the king:"Out of thee shall come a Governor who shall rule My people Israel." In the margin this is "feed;" it is literally " be a shepherd to" My people Israel. Jacob's prophecy at the close of this book connects this character of Christ's rule with the type of Joseph (49:24).

It is with the children of the bondmaid too that we find him,-a significant expression of Israel's condition, politically perhaps as well as spiritually, when the Lord came in flesh; but separated from them morally far, the ground of the after-separation upon their side, not on His. " Me the world hateth," said the Lord to His brethren, " because I testify of it that its deeds are evil."

Special object of his father's love, and prophet of his own coming exaltation, he incurs through all this an intensity of enmity which finds its opportunity in his mission of love as sent of his father to them. He seeks them in Shechem, finds them in Dothan, and there in brethren after the flesh, in will and intent, murderers. But these names, like all others in Scripture, are suggestive; and it is surely in place to inquire what they suggest.

Now Shechem we have already had twice before us, and it seems referred to again in chap. 48:22. It is here translated "portion;" a meaning which in Scripture it never elsewhere has:its undoubted uniform sense is " shoulder," which is usually considered to refer to the "position of the place on the 'saddle' or 'shoulder' of the heights which divide the waters there that flow to the Mediterranean on the west and to the Jordan on the east."* *Smith's Dictionary of the Bible.* There is no need to exclude this significance, any more than to stop here as if it were the whole matter. The natural constantly typifies the spiritual ; and so it may well be in this case.

Figuratively the shoulder finds its place as the burden-bearer, and this with the thought of service and subjection as in the blessing of Issachar afterward :" He bowed his shoulder to bear, and became a servant unto tribute;" but the burden may be one of a very different character, as it is said of the Lord, "The government shall be upon His shoulder:" the place of service and the place of power being here one. How truly so of Him whom this declares!

In the first case in which we have to do with Shechem, I have sought to show that we have the former thought. The oak of Moreh (the " instructor") at the "place of Sichem," Abraham's first resting-place in the land, gives beautifully the fruitfulness of subjection to divine teaching; and here Jehovah Himself appears to him. We need seek no further for the significance of Shechem in the history of Joseph's brethren. From Abraham's place Abraham's seed had but too far wandered when the Lord came as seeking them. Zealous law-keepers they were, and to this Dothan, if I mistake not, very exactly points. It means " laws," in the sense, not of " precepts," (moral-spiritual- guidance, such as the divine law was,) but of imperial "decrees."* *Dothan" is generally held to mean "two cisterns" or" wells;" some, however, prefer the meaning " laws," from doth, a very different word from torah, (akin to Moreh above,) the usual word for Jehovah's " law."* To Israel, away from God and from the path of their father after the flesh, such had the divine word become.

At Dothan, then, Joseph's brethren are found, and at once they counsel to slay him. In fact they cast him into a pit, but which holds no water-" It is not lawful for us," the Jews said to Pilate, "to put any man to death ;"-and out of this they draw him to sell him to the Ishmaelites for twenty pieces of silver. So by Israel was the Lord transferred to the Gentiles.

How striking is that touch in this terrible picture, "And they sat down"-with Joseph in their pit-" to eat bread"! How much more terrible in the case of the pharisaic persecutors who "would not go into the judgment-hall, lest they should be defiled, but that they might eat the passover"! History does indeed repeat itself, because each generation but repeats the one before it :as Ahab, Israel's worst king, was but after all what his name signifies, his "father's brother."

Thus Joseph is brought down into Egypt; but before his history is proceeded with, that of Judah, terrible record as it is, is continued through another chapter (xxxviii). That it is simply Judah's history is itself significant. Israel (the ten tribes) have for long had none; the Jews for us represent the whole people. Here at the outset Judah separates himself from his brethren and connects himself with the Canaanite, – the "merchantman,"- marrying the daughter of Shuah (or "riches"). Surely these names give us in plain speech the characteristics of the nation for these centuries since the cross! His seed is thus, however, continued upon the earth, although God's wrath is upon the first two sons, (whose names speak, Er, of "enmity," and Onan, of "iniquity,") while the third son, Shelah, ("sprout"?) speaks of divine power in resurrection bringing out of death.* * " Come, and let us return unto the Lord :for He hath torn, and He will heal us; He hath smitten, and He will bind us up. After two days He will revive us:in the third day He will raise us up, and we shall live In His sight." (Hos. 6:1, 2.).* Thus is a remnant preserved.

The history of Tamar shows us in God's own marvelous way how Christ comes into connection with Judah, and thus it is her name appears in the Lord's genealogy in the gospel of Matthew, first of those four women's names, whose presence there demonstrates the grace which has stooped to take up men. Each of these four has its own distinctive gospel-feature to bring out, as has been elsewhere shown. * *"The Women of the Genealogy," first published in " The Present Testimony."* It is Tamar's sin that is insisted on, as it is Rahab's faith; while for Ruth to come in, the sentence of the law has to be set aside, and Bathsheba shows us grace triumphing even over a believer's sin. A salvation for sinners,-a salvation by faith,-a salvation from the sentence of the law,-an eternal salvation:this is what the simple insertion of these names declares. And in this chapter of Genesis, whatever else may be contained, we are assured, as every where, for Jew first, and for Gentile also, sin it is which through the infinite pity of God connects us with a Saviour. Tamar's sin alone brought her into the Lord's genealogy; and God has taken pains to record, doubly record, this striking fact. Even so as simply sinners have we title to rejoice in a work accomplished for the need of sinners. Judah shall find in a coming day his title, not in legal righteousness, nor in Abrahamic descent, but in what God has emphasized for us here.

With chap. 39:we come back to Joseph,-in type, to see Christ among the Gentiles. It is evident that thus viewed there is no direct continuity with the thirty-seventh chapter, but in some sort a new beginning. Even the position of Joseph under an Egyptian master may remind us of Zechariah's words, which I believe with others to be intended of Christ:" Man acquired me as a slave from my youth" (ch. 13:5, Heb.). Here, notice, it is not Israel:the lowly service to which He has stooped has the widest scope. Of course He is at the same time, and always, Jehovah's perfect servant:the one thing, far from being inconsistent with the other, involved it. But what response did this service receive from man? "What are those wounds in Thine hands? Those with which I was wounded in the house of My friends."

With Joseph in it, the house of the Egyptian is blessed of God; but with Christ ministering in it, how unspeakably was the world blessed ! All the power was there, and manifesting itself, which could have turned, and will yet turn, the need of man, however great and varied, into occasion for the display of the wealth of divine loving-mercy. But it availed not to turn man's heart to God:false witness casts Joseph into Pharaoh's prison, where, however, all things come into his hand; while under false accusation the Lord descends into a darker prison-house, in result to manifest Himself as Master of all there.

A higher power than man's was working beneath all this in Joseph's case. The path of humiliation was to end for him in glory; the sorrow of the way was to issue in the joy-love's own joy of service in a higher sphere. " God did send me before you to preserve life," he says to his brethren afterward; and he who in prison reveals himself as the interpreter of the mind of God, is as such qualified to administer the resources of the throne of Egypt for the relief of the distress which is at hand for the world. All this is easily read as typical of the Lord, only that the shadows of the picture are immeasurably darker here, as the lights are inexpressibly brighter. From the humiliation and agony of the cross, in which He is the interpreter of man's just doom on the one hand and of the mercy for him on the other, the lowly Minister to human need comes forth to serve as Wisdom and Power of God upon a throne of grace. She-chem is the portion of our Joseph's inheritance, for a better kingdom than any kingdom of the nations is that He receives. (Mark 10:42.)

Seven years of plenty to be succeeded by seven years of famine which shall devour them up,-such is the prophecy of Pharaoh's dream. Even yet is the world enjoying its plenteous years, and little it believes in its plainly predicted future. The time of famine is nevertheless surely not far off which is to manifest the resources of Him who will then be seen alone competent to meet its terrible exigencies. In that sore time of trial both Israel are to be brought back to Him whom they have rejected, and the world to be subjected to the throne whose provision of grace He ministers. These things are now in our type with some detail set before us.

But first, and as soon as ever he is exalted, we hear of new relationships for Joseph:"And Pharaoh called Joseph's name Zaphnath-paaneah; and he gave him to wife Asenath the daughter of Poti-pherah priest of On; and Joseph went out over all the land of Egypt." The name given we may take as Hebrew,* and in the meaning anciently given to it, "Revealer of Secrets." *The absurdity does not follow which Grove suggests (Smith's Dict, of the Bible) that it makes Pharaoh speak in Hebrew. If it has pleased God to speak to us in Hebrew, why should not the Egyptian name be translated into this to make it intelligible to us ? I am not convinced of the wisdom of seeking the meaning of these names in ancient and little known tongues, and these "Shemiticized;" at least when the Hebrew furnishes a satisfactory one nearer at hand.* How precious a title for Him who has indeed revealed to us the secrets of the heart of God! And especially is it appropriate typically in connection (as the text suggests) with Joseph's Gentile marriage. To Christianity belongs, above all, the revelation of the divine " mysteries." The " mysteries of the kingdom," the " great mystery" of "Christ and the Church;" the " mystery of His will. . . for the administration of the fullness of times, to head up all things in the heavens and earth in Christ" (Matt. 13:II; Eph. 5:32, 1:9, 10) are given to us for the first time in these Christian days; while He Himself is, in His own person and work, the " mystery of godliness."Even the false church appropriates (only to pervert) this idea of "mystery" (Rev. 17:5); while the apostle desires no better estimation for himself and others than "as ministers of Christ, and stewards of the mysteries of God" (i Cor. 4:i). For us, even the stored treasures of the past dispensation are revealing themselves, and things which happened unto Israel happened unto them for types, and are written for our admonition upon whom the ends of the ages are come (i Cor. 10:II). All these things are pledges of new relationship, confidences (how unspeakably precious!) of the heart of Christ (Jno. 15:15). Revealer of secrets indeed is He; no truer or sweeter name for Him who has been pleased to take, in these plenteous days before the time of the world's famine, a Gentile bride.

As to Asenath, if the meaning of her name is conjectural only,* yet those of her two sons are very significant. *According to Poole (Smith's Dict.), probably "storehouse;" but Simonis, with the help of the Ethiopia, suggests "beauty." The old conjecture, " worshiper of Neith," every way objectionable, is generally given up.* Born before the famine, and while Joseph's brethren are yet strangers to his exaltation, he " called the name of the first-born Manasseh:For God hath made me forget all my toil, and all my father's house;" while " the name of the second called he Ephraim:For God hath made me fruitful in the land of my affliction." Here, clearly, is our place and relationship with our blessed Lord; and how blessed to realize the value to Him of which these names speak. For His Church, His heavenly bride, He has been content to be as if He remembered not His relationship with His people of old. The thread of prophecy lies unwoven on the shuttle of time, as if its wheel had stopped forever. What means this attitude of forgetfulness on the part of Him who neither slumbereth nor sleepeth? Surely no change, but the pursuance of eternal purposes, which accomplished, Israel shall look upon the face of Him whom they have pierced, and a fountain be opened to them also for sin and for uncleanness.

So "the seven years of plenteousness, that was in the land of Egypt, were ended. And the seven years of dearth began to come, …. and the dearth was in all lands. …. And when all the land of Egypt was famished, the people cried to Pharaoh for bread:and Pharaoh said unto all the Egyptians, ' Go unto Joseph; what he saith to you, do.'"

So when God's judgments are in the earth, the inhabitants of the world will learn righteousness. It is face to face with our need that we learn our true nothingness, and cry out to Him who then proves Himself the living God. But God's remedy is Christ alone. He has put, absolutely and unrepentingly, all things in His hand. He would have all men to be saved, but there is no other name given whereby we can be saved. As for the individual, so for the world:not in the plenteous times, of Christianity will the world at large turn to God ; and therefore come drought and famine from the same hand that, unknown, bestowed the blessing.

The present dispensation closed by the removal of the Church to be with her Head and Lord, the times of the Gentiles will close as the Lord Himself predicts :"And there shall be signs in the sun and in the moon and in the stars ; and upon the earth distress of nations with perplexity, the sea and the waves roaring ; men's hearts failing them for fear, and for looking after those things which are coming on the earth ; for the powers of heaven shall be shaken. And then shall they see the Son of Man coming in a cloud with power and great glory." (Luke 21:25-27.)

But before He appears, and amid all the trial of a time such as the world has never seen – will never again see, – Israel will be preparing to recognize and receive her rejected Lord. "Ask ye now, and see whether a man doth travail with child? where-fore do I see every man with his hands on his loins, as a woman in travail, and all faces are turned into paleness? Alas! for that day is great, so that none is like it; it is even the time of Jacob's trouble; but he shall be saved out of it, and …. they shall serve the Lord their God, and David their king, whom I will raise up unto them " (Jer. 30:6, 7, 9). It is indeed the travail-time of Israel's new birth.

In the type before us, the famine reaches Canaan, as all the countries around", and Joseph's ten brethren come down to buy corn in Egypt. We are all familiar with what follows, and how their hearts and consciences are probed by him who knows them and loves them well, but whom they know not. They obtain indeed a temporary supply for their necessities, but leave Simeon in prison, and are bidden not to appear again except they bring Benjamin with them. Famine again forces them to come down, and this time, Judah having under-taken for Benjamin with his father, they bring him also; are then feasted by Joseph still unknown; sent away with the cup in Benjamin's sack; pursued and brought back under the charge of theft; Benjamin is to remain as Joseph's slave, but Judah, his heart fully reached, offers himself in his stead:then Joseph's love bursts out; he makes himself known to them; they own their sin, are reconciled and comforted with his love.

In all this it is plain how every thing turns on Benjamin and their state toward him. This is made the test of their condition. The power for their deliverance lies in Joseph's hands alone, however, and their exercises as to Benjamin all tend to awakening conscience and heart as to their sin against Joseph. The key of the typical interpretation is to be found in this.* *"His brethren, who had rejected him, forced by famine, are brought, by the path of repentance and humiliation, to own him at length in glory whom they had once rejected when connected with themselves. Benjamin, type of the power of the Lord upon earth among the Jews, is united to him who unknown had the power of the throne among the Gentiles; that is, Christ unites these two characteristics. But this brings all the brethren into connection with Joseph." (Synopsis of the Books of the Bible. 1:59.) *

Joseph is, as we know, Christ once rejected and suffering, now exalted:this is He whom Israel does not know. A Christ triumphant simply and reigning upon earth is the Benjamin who is found among them, whether in the days of the Lord's rejection or the latter days. The conqueror they were prepared for; the Sufferer-not knowing their own deep need-they have refused. Yet the two are really one:even Benjamin was first Ben-oni; and for them the Conqueror cannot be till they receive the Sufferer; not the faith of a sufferer merely, but the One who has been this. Power lies with Joseph, not with Benjamin.
But Joseph's heart longs after Benjamin:Christ longs to display this character of power for them; but for this they must be brought to repentance, and He uses the ideal, prophetical Messiah to bring their hearts back to Himself the true one.

Amid the sorrows of the last days this will be accomplished for them. He who unknown is seeking them will make them realize their Benjamin as Ben-oni, the son of sorrow, and that as the fruit of their own sin (ch. 44:16). Benjamin is taken from them:they have lost their part in Messiah as having rejected Him. All the depths of Judah's heart are stirred; and in his agony for Benjamin, he is met and overwhelmed by the revelation of Joseph. They look upon Him whom they have pierced, and mourn for Him as one mourneth for his only son, and a fountain for sin and for uncleanness is opened to them.

This, I believe, is the true, however meager, interpretation of the type before us. But, this brings the whole nation into blessing under Christ; and here, as far as they are concerned, the type (I suppose) ends. They are established in Goshen, and the fat of the land of Egypt is theirs.

After this we read of the reduction of Egypt itself under the immediate authority of the throne. The people, bankrupt through the famine, receive back their lands from the bounty of the king, returning him one fifth of the produce of the land as the token of their indebtedness to the grace from which they have received all. Two tenths may remind us of the double claim of God upon us- by creation and by redemption. All the world shall own this in the day to come.

From chap. 47:28, I think we have a separate part, an appendix to this history.

"John answered and said, 'A man can receive nothing except it be given him from heaven.' " (Jno. iii, 27.)

What gives firmness and comfort and power to the servant is the consciousness of doing the Lord's will. Self-complacency of fleshly zeal easily deludes, but nevertheless the path of communion with God and obedience is open to every one of us; it is a reality. There is great comfort in John the Baptist's reply, "A man can receive nothing except it be given him from heaven," when questioned about his service. There is that which I am sent to do. Outside of that, nothing is required of me; I am freed from vain attempts of self-will. But in that to which God has called, there is the power of God and rest of heart, joy in the soul and blessing in ministry. And the power and blessing are not to be measured by the sphere of service. The whole power of God is with the least as with the greatest true service for Himself, as the smallest stream runs by His power as well as the mightiest river. " As every man hath received the gift, even so minister the same one to another, as good stewards of the manifold grace of God. If any man speak, let him speak as oracles of God; if any man minister, let him do it as of the ability which God giveth:that God in all things may be glorified through Jesus Christ, to whom be praise and dominion forever and ever. Amen." (i Pet. 4:10.)

To know what is one's path of service is not self-occupation. On the contrary, it is what alone excludes it, and brings soberness and the fear of God:"For I say, through the grace given unto me, to every man that is among you, not to think of himself more highly than he ought to think, but to think soberly, according as God hath dealt to every man the measure of faith." No man could work in the making of the tabernacle except as God gave ability:"And the Lord spake unto Moses, saying, ' See, I have called by name Bezaleel, . . . and I have filled him with the spirit of God, in wisdom, … to devise cunning works, . . . And I, behold, I have given with him Aholiab, . . . and in the hearts of all that are wise-hearted I have put wisdom, that they may make all that I have commanded thee." (Exod. 31:) " Then wrought Bezaleel and Aholiab, and every wise-hearted man in whom the Lord put wisdom and understanding to know how to work all manner of work for the service of the sanctuary, according to all that the Lord had commanded. And Moses called Bezaleel and Aholiab and every wise-hearted man in whose heart the Lord had put wisdom, even every one whose heart stirred him up to come unto the work to do it." How vain and irreverent for any man to have put his hand to the work without wisdom from God! And with the wisdom was needed the true heart-" even every one whose heart stirred him up." (Ex. 36:) It was a work of obedience, but in liberty; from a heart devoted to the Lord and His service, and to His people. They served gladly and freely, but in no other work than the Lord had appointed and fitted them for.

In that, there is the whole power of God in the humblest life and service. It is the whole power of God:how great a power! and there is none other. "Except the Lord build the house, they labor in vain that build it." Of the two evils common in the church,-holding back from service, and too great forwardness, the latter is a pressing evil. Often a ministry of this character rests as a weight upon God's assembly. But the two evils are found together, and the responsibility for a ministry, and life (for the two are united) without power is upon the whole assembly in measure:"Thou sufferest that woman Jezebel," and "So hast thou also them that hold the doctrine of the Nicholaitanes," shows the principle. How humiliating to consider it! but how easy to groan under the evil without realizing either our responsibility as regards it or the power of God for deliverance. The absence of the power of God in an assembly allows the work of the flesh to come in, as the lack of fruit-growing and cultivation in the garden leaves room for the weeds; and the richer the soil, the ranker the growth. The same lack of communion that leads one to over-activity may be the cause in another of self-indulgence that shrinks from responsibility, or weakly leans upon another, and leaves things to man. A subtle evil, because a spirit of indolence so easily indulged, with little thought of how carnal a state it is, and how great the responsibility.

It is a serious evil to use the word of God in ministry without corresponding inward exercise. Gift is from God, and the power to use it for edification at any moment is from God, whether in public or private ministry. This is no doubt a common evil among us. We may often weary one another with the truth known and easily repeated, but the reality not enjoyed in the soul. The power of our ministry will not be above our daily life. And the power of our testimony in daily life is not a mere absence of wrong conduct before man. It is not a negative thing, but a positive power of the Holy Spirit in inwardly enjoyed communion with God, and the outward result must follow-the rivers of living water. A stream cannot rise above its source. Let us beware of burdening our brethren and injuring our own souls through lack of watchfulness and prayer. "Let us have grace, whereby we may serve God acceptably with reverence and godly fear; for our God is a consuming fire." But it is to Mount Zion we are come, the place of His delight-the fullness of His favor in Christ. " For the Lord hath chosen Zion. . . . this is My rest forever. … I will clothe her priests with salvation, and her saints shall shout aloud for joy." In such a blessed and holy presence we are to work out our own salvation with fear and trembling, knowing that it is God that worketh in us to will and to do of His good pleasure. E.S.L.

Is there not too little consistent exemplification- too little proof of our " counting all things but loss for the excellency of the knowledge of Christ our Lord"? On the contrary, do not the deceitful-ness of the heart, or carelessness of the Lord's glory, lead many to seek by various sophistries to satisfy themselves that the Christian may have fellowship with the world, at least in some things, if not in all? But if there be any truth in every Scripture-declaration respecting the world, this one thing is certain, that he who argues deliberately how far he may continue in the world, proves that his affections are in it altogether. The application of the expressions of Scripture is often, indeed, sought to be evaded by the question, What is the world ? But is it probable that the Scripture would set forth so pregnant, so critical, a principle, enforced by such fearful warnings, and then leave to every man's notions what he was to avoid? The truth is, that its language is infinitely more exact than is commonly supposed; and the every-day conversation of men, in their common use of the term " the world," invariably expresses the thing against which we are warned. But do not such answer it full well themselves ? When they speak of rising in the world, or getting credit and a name in it, they know precisely what "the world" means:but when any thing is to be given up for Christ's sake, a sudden indistinctness invests every thing; and the unfaithful heart is allowed to draw its own line between what is and what is not of the world. But in all the various appearances which it assumes, however fair and attractive to the mind and eye, it is exclusively spoken of in Scripture as a thing to be overcome.

The example of others is often pleaded, but to our own master we stand or fall. If many Christians are mingled with it, this only renders it the more imperative on any who see the mischief, to give by their lives a more distinct protest; and thus it becomes not only a matter of faithfulness to God, but of love for the souls of others.

Lot.

"And there came two angels to Sodom at even; and Lot sat in the gate of Sodom :and Lot seeing them rose up to meet them:and he bowed himself with his face toward the ground; and he said,' Be-hold now, my lords, turn in, I pray you, into your servant's house, and tarry all night, and wash your feet, and ye shall rise up early and go on your ways.' And they said, 'Nay; but we will abide in the street all night.'"

How every circumstance seems designed to bring out the contrast! Two angels come, not men:there is distance, not familiarity; and the Lord Himself does not come nigh. Hence communion there is not and cannot be. Evening, too, is fallen; they come in gloom, and as if not to be seen. And although Lot's hospitality is as ready as Abraham's, there is no such readiness in the response. They yield, however, to his urgency,- "And he pressed upon them greatly, and they turned in unto him, and entered into his house; and he made them a feast, and did bake unleavened bread, and they did eat."

But even the semblance of communion is not possible for him. Out of the path of faith, he is not master of circumstances, but they of him. The men of Sodom break in upon him, and the very attempt to entertain the heavenly guests only provokes the outbreak of the lusts of the flesh. Instead of the good he seeks, Lot has to listen to a message of judgment, which falls upon all with which he has chosen to associate himself.

How solemn is the lesson of all this in a day when heaven is indeed allowed to be the final home of the saint, but in no wise his present practical abiding-place; when Christians count it no shame to be citizens of this world, to be " yoked " in every possible way-commercially, politically, socially, and even ecclesiastically-" with unbelievers;"to sit as judges in the gate of Sodom, and mend a scene out of which He who came in blessing for it has been rejected, and which, when He comes again, for that rejection, He comes to judge! If all this be not just Lot's place, what is it? Personal "righteousness"-in the low sense in which necessarily we must think of it here,- no more exempts one from the condition pictured than it actually exempted Lot. God's Word persists in claiming one's voluntary associations as part of one's personal state. Not to be "unequally yoked with unbelievers" is the condition God gives upon which alone our Father can "be a Father to us;" to be "purged" from "vessels to dishonor" is the only state which has attached to it the promise, "He shall be a vessel unto honor, sanctified and meet for the Master's use, and prepared to every good work."(2 Cor. 6:17, 18; 2 Tim. 2:21.)

I am well aware that such principles are too narrow to meet with aught but contemptuous rejection in the present day. Evangelical leaders even can now take their places openly on public platforms with Unitarians and skeptics of almost every grade; and societies, secret or public, can link together all possible beliefs in the most hearty good fellowship. It is this that marks the time as so near the limit of divine long-suffering, that the very people who are orthodox as to Christ can nevertheless be so easily content to leave Him aside on any utilitarian plea by which they may have fellowship with His rejecters. Do they think that they can thus bribe the Father to forget His Son, or efface the ineffaceable distinction between the righteous and the wicked as " him that serveth God, and him that serveth Him not " ? Alas! they can make men forget this, and easily teach the practical unimportance-and so, really, the untruthful-ness,-of what in their creed they recognize.

O for a voice to penetrate to the consciences of God's people before judgment comes to enforce the distinction they refuse to make, and to separate them from what they cling to with such fatal pertinacity! The days of Lot are in their character linked in our Lord's words with " the day when the Son of Man is revealed."May his history, as we recount it, do its work of warning to our souls. Communion we have found to be one thing impossible for Lot in Sodom. It is surely what is implied in that assurance on God's part,—" I will be a Father to you,"-which He conditions upon our taking the separate place from what is opposed to Him that our relationship to Him necessitates. How is it possible, indeed, if " whoever will be the friend of the world is the enemy of God," to have communion with both at the same time? How is it possible to say to the world, " I will walk with you," and stretch out the other hand to God, saying, "Walk with me"?

But if this be so, communion with God must be how rare a thing! How many things must be substituted for it, and, with the terrible self-deception which we can practice on ourselves, to be taken to be this even! With, most, indeed, how little is Christ abidingly the occupation and enjoyment of the soul! And when we would be with Him, in our seasons of habitual or special devotion, how often do we perhaps all realize the intrusion of other thoughts,-unwelcome as, to Lot, were the men of Sodom. We are apt, at least, to console ourselves that they are unwelcome, perhaps to silence, or seek to silence, conscience with the thought, as if this relieved us from responsibility about them. Yet who could assert that Lot was not responsible for the intrusion of the men of Sodom? If their being unwelcome settled the whole matter, there is no doubt that they were unwelcome. But why had Abraham no such intruders ?

The thoughts that throng upon us when we would gladly be free-at the Lord's table, at the prayer-meeting, or elsewhere,-'have we indeed no responsibility as to these? The effort necessary to obtain what when obtained we can so little retain, while other things flock in with no effort, does it not reveal the fact of where we are permitting our hearts to settle down?

It may be, perhaps, a strange and inconsistent thing at first sight, in view of what has been already said, and if we are to find a figure here in Lot's case as in Abraham's,-that he has the materials wherewith to entertain his heavenly visitants. It is true he has neither the "calf, tender and good," which Abraham has, nor the " three measures of meal."Applying these figures, we may say that Christ is not, in the way thus pictured, present to the soul of one in Lot's case. Yet he has, what may seem almost as hard to realize, that "unleavened bread" with which the apostle bids us keep our passover-feast, and which he interprets for us as "the unleavened bread of sincerity and truth." How, then, may we attribute this to Lot? The answer seems to me an exceedingly solemn one. It is found, I doubt not, in the very first case in which the command to keep the feast of unleavened bread was carried out. How, in fact, and why, was it carried out? Nothing would seem clearer than to say, Because the Lord enjoined it. But it is not this that Scripture itself gives as the reason.

"And the people took their dough before it was leavened; their kneading-troughs being bound up in their clothes upon their shoulders. …. And they baked unleavened cakes of the dough which they brought forth out of the land of Egypt:for it was not leavened; because they were thrust out of Egypt, and could not tarry ; neither had they prepared for themselves any victual." (Ex. 12:34, 39.)
That is, their obedience to the divine command was not the fruit, alas! of the spirit of obedience. It was the product of necessity, the fruit of their being forced out of Egypt. And do we not, indeed, easily recognize in the Church's history under what circumstances in general the feast has thus been kept? Has it not been when by the hostility of the world she has been forced out of the world? Persecution has always helped men to reality. If it be simply a question between open acceptance of Christ or explicit rejection of Him, this will be a matter necessarily settled alike by every Christian. The black or white would have no possible shades of intermediate gray. The "perilous times" of the last days are not such to the natural life. All the more are they perilous to the soul.

Similarly, in the shadow of calamity and distress men wake up to reality. Their desire, the object of their lives, is taken from them, but the stars come out in the saddened sky. Face to face with eternity they have to learn how " man walketh in a vain show, and disquieteth himself" too " in vain." There are times when even Lots become real. Yet, as the mere fruit of circumstance, it has no necessary permanence in it, nor any power to lift to a higher level one in fact so low. Nay, a Lot stripped of his cover, how degraded does he seem! Strip some of my readers, perhaps, of every artificial help to make something of them,-of every thing Outside the man himself,-what would be the result? Yet to this it must come:aye, to this. We brought nothing into this world; we can carry nothing out:the world passeth away and the lust thereof. If our hearts have chosen that which passes, retain it we cannot. We must some day stand where Lot stood, and hear, as he did, words of judgment from the very lips of grace.

" And the men said unto Lot,' Hast thou here any besides? son-in-law, and thy sons, and thy daughters, and whatsoever thou hast in the city, bring them out of this place:for we will destroy this place, because the cry of them is waxen great before the face of the Lord; and the Lord hath sent us to destroy it."

And then we find how utter had been the wreck of testimony with a man personally righteous. Nay, that character of his (who can doubt?) would only contribute to the rejection of so strange a story as that God would visit with signal judgment for its wickedness a place so attractive as Sodom had proved to righteous Lot. God, then, it would seem, had not been in sympathy with him. This was his own confession:but if He now were, who could then possibly tell ? " He seemed as one that mocked unto his sons-in-law."

Here we have, clearly, designed, sharp contrast with what had been God's own testimony as to Abraham's household. Evil has thus its law and order, we may be assured, as good has. "Train up a child in the way he should go, and when he is old he will not depart from it." Train him up for the world, and can you marvel if your work be as successful?

"And when the morning arose, then the angels hastened Lot, saying, 'Arise, take thy wife and thy two daughters which are here, lest thou be consumed in the iniquity of the city.' And while he lingered, the men"-notice how in the time of his strait the more familiar term is used again,-" the men laid hold upon his hand and the hand of his wife and the hand of his two daughters, (the Lord being merciful to him,) and they brought him forth and set him without the city."

But now the shipwreck he had made of faith begins to be apparent in him. How often do you hear people speak of not having "faith for the path" Here it becomes plain that what is needed is to have the path in order to faith. How, indeed, can one speak of faith except for God's path ? Can we have faith to walk in some way that is not God's? or does He put before us one way for faith, and some alternative way if we will be excused from the necessity of faith?

If we have not, then, faith for the path, we must walk, manifestly, in unbelief, where God is not with us, where no promise of His assures us, where the might of His arm cannot be reckoned on. What a thing for men to choose-from weakness, as they would urge, or fear-a path in which God is not! Surely the sense of weakness it is not which drives men away from Him :it is willfulness, or love of the world,-sin; but never weakness.

Had one to ask really, Have I faith for the path? who could dare to say he had? This excuse might well excuse us all. Which of us knows where God's path may lead? The one thing certain is, it will be a path contrary to nature, impossible to mere flesh and blood. Had we in this sense to count the costs,-or better, to meet the charges of the way, we would all be bankrupts the first day's journey.

But is there, then, no Shepherd of the sheep? or does He not lead now in green pastures, and beside still waters? and even in the valley of death-shade is there no virtue in His rod and staff? shall we malign a path which is His path, or count upon all that which calls for His power and grace, but not upon Himself to show this?

In the path it is that He sustains the faith for the path. Out of the path, faith goes overboard at the first step; and then the after-life becomes necessarily the diligent practice of an unbelief which strengthens itself with all the maxims of sense and selfishness and worldly calculation. In Lot we have to recognize now this utter prostration of faith in a believer.

" And it came to pass, when they had brought him forth abroad, that he said, ' Escape for thy life; look not behind thee, neither stay thou in all the plain; escape to the mountain, lest thou be consumed.

" And Lot said unto them, Oh, not so, my Lord; behold now, thy servant hath found grace in thy sight, and thou hast magnified thy mercy which thou hast shown me in saving my life; and I can-not escape to the mountain, lest some evil take me, and I die:behold now, this city is near to flee unto, and it is a little one:oh, let me escape thither, (is it not a little one ?) and my soul shall live!' "

How many prayers does not unbelief dictate! and how plainly does it characterize this prayer throughout! He owns a mercy he yet dare not trust; asks God for Zoar as a little city, that He might spare as such; and for his own good, not the human lives that were involved. How base is unbelief! How wonderful the goodness that, at such intercession, could spare Zoar!

But for Lot there is no revival. His wife's end follows, involved in the destruction of from which she had never really separated. Then he leaves Zoar, haunted still by the unbelieving fear which had taken him there at first. Finally, he is involved in the infamy of his own children, and his death is unrecorded:he had died before.

Thus far, if the anchorage be lost, may the vessel drift. And this is what the Spirit of God has put before us as the contrasted alternative with the life of faith in Abraham. Let us remember that the grossness of the outward history here may have its representative before God in what to mere human eyes may appear as correct as can be. God knoweth the heart. Blessed be His name, He has shown us also what is on His own.

Christian, there is a power in you-the "Holy Ghost-which is ever ready to lift you up in soul to the heights whence He's come. But the way to it is the cross. If you have learned to glory only in the cross, you know that power and you know those heights. But beware lest power be your object, for if it is, a work is needed to be yet done in you which will make you not desire for power, but glory in the cross.

I Beseech you, carry about in your body the dying of the Lord Jesus, that the life also of Jesus may be made manifest in you, as you pass through the world:not having a word to say for self, not coming with I, I; not wishing to become more worthy,-not I at all, but reckon yourself to be dead. Had not Paul thoroughly done with self when he could say, "Not I, but Christ liveth in me; and the life which I now live in the flesh I live by the faith of the Son of God"?

" Then Jacob went on his journey, and came into the land of the children of the east." And here the second period of his life begins. He is now a stranger, a servant for hire, the victim of deceit and self-aggrandizement on the part of Laban, his relative, and morally also near akin. It is impossible to mistake the retribution all the way through, in which the measure he has meted to another is measured to himself again; but it is impossible also not to see that in the manner in which it is dealt out God is speaking to the heart and conscience of the wanderer. There is governmental equity, but also the chastening of a holy love. Beth-el is vindicating itself. The Father scourgeth every son whom He receiveth. The scepter of the kingdom is the rod of discipline of the Father's house.

Deceit and injustice practiced upon ourselves, how easy to read them in their true character! how the poor pretense of justification we had attempted in our own behalf betrays its shame when another attempts it against us. Thus can God overrule sin to teach us holiness. Yet the lesson this way is long in learning, as we surely see in Jacob. Throughout it he is Jacob still, though by degrees becoming fruitful and prosperous.

The general teaching here seems plain enough, while the details are difficult to follow. The names of wives and children too bear witness to the subjective character of the line of truth which presents itself to us. Rachel, "sheep," seems significant of the meekness and patience of true discipleship, the very opposite of Jacob's hitherto self-willed and unrestrained temper. But her he must obtain by means of undesired Leah, whose name, " wearied," suggests the "tribulation" by which "patience" is wrought out. And even then, before Rachel is fruitful, and in despair of her fruitfulness, the bondmaids are received, Bilhah, " terror," and Zilpah, a "dropping" (as of tears).

These names seem to harmonize very strikingly with the general purport of the history. Indeed, putting them together, they carry conviction scarcely to be resisted. The names of the children, again, as they should do, speak on the other hand of various blessing, but which I am not prepared to enter into here. But Joseph, Rachel's son, surely, in beautiful conformity to his origin, expresses that steady " virtue " (or courage) which goes through whatever trial to the crown, and with which Peter commences that spiritual " adding " to which he exhorts (2 Pet. 1:5), and which seems indicated in Joseph's name. From his birth Jacob begins to look toward his own place and country once more; and though at Laban's request he continues six years longer in his service, he yet now emerges from the poverty in which he has for so long been, until his riches awaken the envy of Laban's sons and of their father. Yet he waits until Jehovah's voice bids him return to the land of his fathers, though still lacking faith to take an open course-he steals secretly away, God interposing to save him from the pursuit of Laban, who follows him to Gilead, but there to part from him with a solemn covenant.

Jacob now pursues his way, and angels of God meet him:how ready is He to assure us of His power waiting only a fit moment to be put forth in our behalf! It must have reminded, and been intended to remind him too, of Beth-el, and of the promise there ; but there Jehovah had appeared to him, if but in a dream. Here He does not appear. Jacob an outcast and wanderer could have that which Jacob returning in wealth and with a multitude could not now be permitted. Then, it was grace; now, it would be fellowship; and for fellowship he was not yet prepared. " This is God's host," (or "camp,") he says; and he calls the place "Mahanaim,"-that is, "two hosts," or "camps." Here he must have counted in his own, and accordingly we find him immediately dwelling upon it in his message to Esau:" I have oxen and asses, flocks and men-servants and women-servants, and I have sent to tell my lord, that I may find favor in thy sight." How significant that in but a little time we find him dividing this host of his into two camps (the same word as before), saying, "If Esau come to the one camp and smite it, then the other camp (the same word as before) which is left shall escape"! "The same word as before. Such is our strength when built upon, although we would fain perhaps associate God's power with it. In the time of need, our own, what is it? and God's, where shall we find it?

It is remarkable too that it is just when he has met God's messengers (same word as "angels") that he sends his own to Seir to Esau. But God and Esau are evidently mixed up in his mind all through. Nor is it strange, but inevitable, that what recalls God to our souls should recall also one against whom we have sinned, and sinned without reparation; perhaps without possibility of reparation. Beth-el is still manifesting itself in all this-the discipline which becomes God's holy house. There was but too much truth hid under Jacob's servile words to his brother a little later:" I have seen thy face as though I had seen the face of God."

Yet when he said this, Peniel had intervened; and he had " called the name of the place Peniel, because [he said,] I have seen God face to face." How could he after that fail to distinguish between God's face and his brother's.

He could not, had Peniel really answered to its name; but how often do we misinterpret the significance of what has been (as Peniel was to Jacob) of most real importance to our souls! Had he seen God in reality " face to face," how could he have added to this as the wonderful thing (as we find him doing,) " and my life is preserved" ? Who that has seen God's face but has found in it deliverance from self-occupation and from fear, such as controlled Jacob when he met his brother?

God had indeed met Jacob, but met him by night and not by day:when the day broke He had disappeared. And correspondingly, though He blessed him finally, He refused to declare His name to Jacob's entreaty. Unknown He had come and unknown He departed.

Jacob it was who had acquired a name at Peniel, and yet even this cannot be said without reserve; for at Beth-el afterward he has afresh to receive it, -there where Beth-el itself for the first time really acquires its name. These two things are surely connected. What he has learned at Peniel is expressed in his altar at Shechem, where he proclaims exultingly God to be the God of Israel-his God; but his altar at Beth-el owns Him God of His own house, in which in subjection Israel must find his place in order to have really the power of his name.

At Peniel God meets him (His face hidden) to make him learn the strength which is perfected only in weakness. With his thigh out of joint he prevails and is blessed. The secret of strength is learned, and yet, strange as it may seem, the power that he has with God he cannot yet find before man. He meets Esau with abject servility, practices still his old deceit, talks of following him to Seir, and as soon as freed from his presence, crosses into Canaan, building him a house at Succoth, and buying a parcel of ground at Shechem. There he proclaims God as God of Israel, when presently Dinah falls, and the massacre of the Shechemites makes him quake with fear because of the inhabitants of the land. No part of his history is so dark and shameful as that which follows the scene in which (and they are divine words) " as a prince he has power with God and with men, and prevails."

If this be a mystery, it is one with which the experience of the saint is but too familiar. Power may be ours which yet we cannot manifest, or find for our emergencies. " I besought Thy disciples to cast him out, and they could not," says the father of the possessed. And those to whom this very power had been committed ask in perplexity, "Why could not we cast him out?" And the Lord replies, "Because of your unbelief;" but adds, " Howbeit this kind goeth not forth but by prayer and fasting."

Even so he whose name is already Israel is practically Jacob still, as God says to him afterward (35:10). Only in obedience can power be used; our meat and drink-our strength and refreshment -are in doing His will; grace, where realized, breaks the dominion of sin; and "sin is lawlessness," our own will and not His. Divine power must be realized in the divine ways:grace only establishes, never alters this. So at Beth-el alone the promise of Peniel can be fulfilled.

How many are there whose altars are to " God their God," and who exult in a grace which proves yet no practical deliverance; who dwell in an unpurged earth, and are reaping, and must be allowed to reap, the sure and bitter fruits! God's princes, how far from knowing the dignity of their calling!

In the extremity of his distress God's voice arouses Jacob to "go up to Beth-el and dwell there;" and then we hear of strange gods in his household to be put away, and purification effected to meet Him " who answered me in the day of my distress, and was with me in the way I went;" and the terror of God falls upon the cities round about, so that they do not pursue after the sons of Jacob. At Beth-el his wanderings really end; his new name is confirmed to him, and God declares His own, as at Peniel He could not; the blessing now is fully his; and Jacob bowed in gratitude recognizes the house of God, in which (the purpose of discipline being accomplished,) he finds at last his rest.

Still he journeys on, for pilgrimage is not over, although in the land now, his portion. Sorrow still comes, for on the road to Bethlehem his beloved Rachel dies, but Jacob now shows his mastery over it. Him whom his dying mother names Ben-oni, "son of my affliction," his father calls Benjamin, " son of the right hand." We can easily discern the reflection of Christ in this the glory fruit of the cross. With our eye on this, Mamre, which is in Hebron, (the "richness of communion,") Abraham's old resting-place, is soon reached. With how great toil and how many experiences is he back at last, whence only unbelief had ever driven him! And we? how much do most of us resemble him in this! Yet with him and us " tribulation worketh patience, and patience experience, and experience hope, and hope maketh not ashamed."

The next chapter follows with a long list of Esau's generations, prematurely ripening into dukes and kings. The world must have its day; and yet amid it all a significant sign is given of fulfillment of that divine purpose " which is not of works, but of Him that calleth;" for we read that " Esau took his wives, and his sons, and his daughters, and all the persons of his house, and his cattle and his beasts, and all his substance, which he had got in the land of Canaan, and went into the country from the face of his brother Jacob."

While in chapter 37:one verse contrasts Jacob's portion its very brevity speaking volumes to the ear that hears:-

" And Jacob dwelt in the land in which his father was a stranger, in the land of Canaan."