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.)