Two ministries, in striking contrast, are presented to us in the 3d chapter of 2d Corinthians. One is the ministry of law, with its just demands upon man; and because of man's inability to meet its just claims, became the ministration of condemnation and of death. The other is the ministry of grace, in which God provides for the believer what the law demands, but which we could not give-this is the ministration of life by the Spirit, and of righteousness through Christ our Saviour.

Even the ministration of condemnation and death by the law was not without glory (coming from God through Moses as it did), so that Moses, who had seen but "the back parts" of God (Exod. 33:21-23) had to cover his face before the children of Israel; they could not even stand the reflection of glory in his face, for, under law, man cannot stand what reflects the glory of God; thus it was said to Moses, as minister of the law, "there shall no man see Me and live" (ver. 20).

After Moses, we read of none seeing God, until our blessed Lord, who is "the brightness of God's glory, and the express image of his Person" came into the world. Of Him it has been recorded, "The Word was made flesh and dwelt among us, and we beheld his glory-the glory of the Only-begotten of the Father-full of grace and truth" (John 1:14). And what glory did John behold? Not the display of His Godhead glory and majesty, for we read in Philippians 2, that, though equal with God, our Lord would not cling to the form of God in which He was, but took a servant's form, and was made in the likeness of men. What glory then did you see, John? What beauty, which the unbelieving nation saw not? Ah, it was in the Minister of "grace and truth" who, to lay hold of us and deliver us from the condemnation and death in which we lay, took them upon Himself! Has the reader seen that glory in the face of Jesus Christ? Has it satisfied your soul and made you truly His disciple?

"Oh the glory of the grace
Shining in the Saviour's face,
Telling sinners from above
God is light and God is love!"

I love those words in their order-"full of grace and truth." Grace, boundless grace to draw to itself the burdened, weary heart, and fill it with peace and love. Then, truth to cleanse the ways and fit the soul for the enjoyment of God in the light. What a lovely example of this has been given us in the 4th chapter of John, in our Lord's dealing with a poor sinner standing there before Him, and He in tender grace drawing her out to confide in Him! A sinner in the presence of God, and not made afraid! Oh, what a scene-it is grace, precious grace-"The grace of God to me!" Then the light of truth comes out:"Go, call thy husband,"He says. He knows all our ways; He has seen all our past; yet He can say as to another convicted sinner:"Neither do I condemn thee:go, and sin no more;" for He Himself has "borne our sins in His own body on the tree."

And now, the blessed Lord who died for us is risen, and seated in the glory. Our blessed privilege (too little enjoyed) is to behold Him there. We hear some say, If I could only have seen and heard the Lord as He was here on earth! They think they would have been attracted then. But how many saw Him and hated Him; they saw no beauty in Him, and hated Him without a cause. Only faith beheld the glory of grace and truth in Jesus; and so today. And we Christians, do we value this "light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ" as we ought? Moses saw but "the back parts;" but John, and we, and all who will may see in the face of Jesus glorified all that God is, revealed to us In grace.

True, it says we behold it as in a glass, or mirror, not yet face to face. When we do, we shall be like Him; but I love to think of faith as the glass of a telescope pointed to Christ in glory. It is by faith through the Word that we, believers, behold our Jesus in glory. It is the business of the telescope to bring near things afar oft'. So faith, through the Word and the Holy Spirit, makes the distant vision near to our heart-"we see Jesus." Oh, dear fellow-Christian, how much do we, in prayer and through the Word, gaze with the telescope of faith upon our precious Jesus? It is thus we are changed into the same image, from glory to glory. Moses did not rub his own face to make it shine. No; but he looked; and though he saw but the "back parts" of his Lord, it made his face so to shine that Israel could not look upon it. And so we must look on Him, that He may be reflected upon us.

We have a beautiful picture of this transforming power in the history of Elisha as he followed Elijah, in 2 Kings, chap. 2:"What shall I do for thee before I be taken from thee?" asked Elijah, "Let a double portion of thy spirit be upon me," answered Elisha. A large request, surely! Oh, do you and I desire as much? Is that the burden of our souls to be more like our blessed Master? We know Elijah's answer. In substance it is this:Keep your eyes on me, and it shall be as you request. Brother, sister, keep the telescope of faith on Jesus; so will His image be reflected upon us.

Again, see our dear apostle Paul in 2 Cor., chap. 12. There, in glory, he saw and heard the blessed Lord, no doubt-for is He not the attraction of all in heaven?- and twice the apostle, to assure us how completely unconscious of himself he was there, tells us he did not know whether he was in or out of the body. Yet, mark it well, when returned to earth the flesh had to be kept down, and even needed a thorn, lest he should be exalted. So, his being caught up even to heaven for a while did not remove the flesh in Paul, neither does occupation with Christ remove the flesh in us, but it will more and more lighten the consciousness of it and the need of battling with it; for as the telescope of faith is turned to the Lord, we shall be changed from glory to glory, into His image.

Now, in Philippians 1 :20, the apostle desires that Christ may be magnified in his body. Perhaps I may call this a reversing of the telescope, which is to bring things afar off near to our view; but the microscope is to enlarge what is near at hand. The world sees not Christ in glory, for it has not faith, but it sees us, near at hand, and we are to exhibit Him to the world. How is this to be? We have an example of it in the apostle:"For to me to live is Christ," he says. Christ was the object of his whole life, since Jesus in glory had appeared to him-to live unto Him and serve Him in all things. "/ (the selfish I) no longer live," he says, "but Christ liveth in me; and the life I now live in the flesh (1:e. in this body) I live by the faith of the Son of God, who loved me, and gave Himself for me" (Gal. 2:20). Does the world see Christ in me, and in you, dear fellow-believer? May we so gaze upon the beauty of Christ, that He may be magnified in our life before the world.

In that coming day, spoken of in 2 Thess. 1, "He shall be glorified in his saints, and admired in them that believe." The world will then have to say, as it were, What a wonderful Saviour He is, that He should have taken up such unworthy creatures and fashioned them thus for His glory! "Therefore, my beloved brethren," says the apostle, "be ye steadfast, unmoveable, always abounding in the work of the Lord, forasmuch as ye know that your labor is not in vain in the Lord" (1 Cor. IS:58); and let us seek to bring sinners to Him now, remembering it will be to late then. A. V. R.