This white-winged servant of the King
True Help and Food is meant to bring,
And ready aid to give
To all who grasp the great design
And who possess the "faith" divine
And in the " household " live.

The Help that youthful spirits need
To clearly understand and read
The message of the King;
The Help that strengthens pilgrim feet,
And which for service makes us meet,
Such Help it seeks to bring.

The Food that living souls desire,
The Food that thinking minds require,
The Food in Christ made known,-
With just such Food it ever strives
To strengthen all their earnest lives
Who live for Christ alone.

May He whose teachings we embrace,
By wisdom, guidance, strength, and grace,
Increase its power for good!
May many precious souls be led
In paths of faithfulness to tread
By reading " Help and Food."

T. Watson.

January, 1905.

(2 Timothy 2:19).

It is but natural for the heart to cast about for some consolation in a day of disquietude, and for guidance in a day of abounding difficulty. Happy, indeed, is that soul that gets its consolation and guidance from a source divine. The comfort that comes from man is often as evanescent as the morning dew, and the guidance given proves totally inadequate to meet the deep exercises of a soul in earnest before God. Not from the depths of human wisdom are the saints of God to obtain their guidance, but from His all-sufficient Word which is given "that the man of God may be perfect, thoroughly furnished unto all good works " (ch. 3:17).

The apostle Paul was warning his son in the faith about the departure that even then had commenced to set in. Formal Christianity was gradually superseding real, vital Christianity; and there were those, who, whilst possessing a form of godliness, in practice denied the power thereof. "From such," the Word says, "turn away" (ch. 3:5).

But in the Scripture immediately before us, we find mention made of a foundation marked by stability, because God's foundation; and the inscription on the seal wherewith it is sealed is deciphered for us. The writing on it is twofold, setting out on the one side the divine aspect of truth, the blessed security of those who are the Lord's-"The Lord knoweth them that are His;" whilst on the other side is found the corresponding responsibility of every one naming the Lord's name. It is incumbent upon every one of such to be separate from evil-"Let every one that nameth the name of the Lord depart from iniquity."

Here, then, as we note the inseparable connection between the electing love and perfect knowledge of our God, and the holiness of walk that is alone consistent with such, we can most assuredly find both consolation for our hearts and guidance for our feet in these days.

But what is " the foundation" ? In the immediate context we read of some whose words were subversive of God's Word, and "who concerning the truth have erred, saying that the resurrection is passed already." Then comes the connecting word, " Nevertheless," with the assurance following that "the foundation of God abideth firm." Is it not then abstractly the Truth, the whole revealed mind of God, wherein is found the perfect unfolding of what God and Christ are, and what He has done ? "The word of our God shall stand for ever." It is a rock that cannot be moved, and hence the exhortation of Jude-"Building yourselves up on your most holy faith " (ver. 20). The declension of those mentioned before affected some, and their faith was overthrown. They were forsaking what God had laid; "nevertheless," spite of the instability of some who professedly rested upon it, "the foundation of God abideth firm." That is not affected by the unstable sayings and doings of men, though ill consequences follow. One here and another there turn aside; but, blessed be God, His foundation abideth; and though renounced by some and denounced by others, it stands firm as the everlasting hills, and the puny efforts of faithless men to move it are as vain as endeavoring to overturn those hills with a needle. An insecure foundation must render insecure whatever is erected upon it; but firmness marks what our God has laid and our souls here rest in peace. The traditions of men are ever altering. God's foundation abideth firm.

Revealing then, as it does, what God is-both love and light, we turn to consider the seal of the great Architect. Cheering must the fact be to every true saint of God that "the Lord knoweth them that are His." In a day of general decline, often spoken of as a day of progress and ascension in the spiritual scale, when the world has its religion, the real and unreal, those merely professors, who assume the form of godliness, having by the knowledge of the Lord Jesus escaped the pollutions of the world, are, from a human standpoint, hopelessly mixed with true saints of God (2 Pet. 2:20).

Have any the ability to discern all who are born of God ? But the Lord knows His own. Not those who say "Lord, Lord," merely, will find acceptance with Him. Not those who are simply actively engaged in doing what are called good works will receive Christ's approbation, or be known of Him -"Then will I profess unto them, I never knew you," and this after they have declared, "Lord, Lord, have we not … in Thy name done many wonderful works ? " But whose will had they done ? Whose will had they ignored? (Matt. 7:21-23).

Ah ! the Lord knoweth them that are His. Sweet word for every true heart, a part surely of that everlasting consolation and good hope through grace that is being continually ministered unto those He knows. Hidden in obscurity, amidst much that tells of darkness rather than light, they are yet known on high. That word, uttered by One who knew, to desponding Elijah, comes afresh to the heart and mind, " I have left Me," says Jehovah "seven thousand in Israel, all the knees which have not bowed unto Baal, and every mouth which hath not kissed him" (i Kings 19:18). Thus the blessed God shows that He marks every individual true in heart to Him though not identified with, nor known to, the prophet of the Lord. He will recognize the fruit of His own grace, and will yet make them manifest, displaying every one in glory. Precious words on God's seal setting us more firmly on God's foundation! Every unreal soul will be exposed "in that day, " but not one of His own shall be lost, for "the Lord knoweth them that are His." Glory be to Him for that countless throng that shall declare the worth of the Lord Jesus throughout all eternity!

But grace imposes responsibilities as well as conferring privileges; and on turning God's seal we read of what is incumbent upon every one who names the name of the Lord. In its scope, then, it embraces every one professedly a Christian. Could it be less wide ? Responsibility in such a matter must necessarily devolve upon all who acknowledge the Lordship of Christ. All do not obey, for from some the saint has to purge himself.

Now iniquity (or unrighteousness) is what is contrary to God's Word; righteousness is what is consonant with it. To possess Truth and yet act contrary to it, is to hold it in unrighteousness, a sin of which God's ancient people were guilty (Rom. 1:18).To reject God's Word is iniquity; to subvert the order of God's House is overthrowing the authority of God, and is rebellion; and so when evils prevail, and systems are built up contrary to the express word of God, the godly man has the way from such shown him. The presence of pious men in any position does not of itself constitute such position right; nay, but if the system be wrong, their presence will give vitality to it and perpetuate the wrong upon which it is founded. To love the saints is commanded us; but here again God has pronounced for us:"By this we know that we love the children of God, when we love God and keep His commandments" (i John 5:2).

"Depart from iniquity," then, is His word. And where does Scripture reveal to us the way back to it? The rather it lays down that to build again the things once destroyed is to make oneself a transgressor (Gal. 2:18).Those who name Christ's name must not associate it with iniquity; so none are permitted to connect His name or presence with any form of unrighteousness. It must not be allowed to appear as though His sanction was given to such. That is an evil against which Scripture guards, and hence the imperative injunction here recorded. For, bear in mind, the question is not of recognizing or owning saints, but of permitting God to be supreme in heart and conscience. Obedience is thus the necessary requisite; and, plainly, truth, not feelings, God, not the saints, must govern us. To leave Him out of this and take counsel with our own hearts is to court disaster.

Considered soberly, then, this precious seal would point the way to deliverance from varied exercises respecting various evils; and a ready obedience rendered to the urgent word we are considering, to which God calls special attention by putting it on His seal, would effect deliverance from those evils. Here are maintained what is fully consistent with God's holiness and heart, and for the truest blessing of His own. Spiritual discernment and deepest joy are lost in fellowship with evil. Does it seem otherwise? Verily the words of our Lord here apply-"Judge not according to the appearance, but judge righteous judgment" (John 7:24) Facts and feelings both must be reviewed in the light of the Word.

And again, this Scripture raises no question of condonation of evil; it simply enjoins separation from it. But clearly to condemn iniquity, and yet remain in association with it, is, after all, to condone it and to be found guilty of disobedience to this plain injunction. And it is well to remember that by obeying God's Word no one means that real ignorance is wickedness, though that Word compels separation from many truly His. Such are known to Him, and the soul finds relief in glorifying Him in praises for every blood-bought one; but, we repeat, the issue is not of recognizing saints,-"The Lord knoweth them that are His,"-but of permitting God to be supreme in our heart and conscience.

And the application of this principle, not needed in Pentecostal times, but in days of decline and apostasy, maintains a truly divine unity; for God Himself defines the position of every one professing godliness. That this will be in perfect accord with Matt. 18:20, is apparent, for those found round the name of Christ do not gather themselves, but " are gathered" there. The act is a divine one and not any human agreement. Hearts actuated by the same divine principles find themselves divinely together.

So God Himself enjoins departure from iniquity, and then gives the suited instruction to regulate our walk:"Follow righteousness, faith, love, peace, with those that call upon the Lord out of a pure heart." May we, then, strengthen ourselves in the principles of God's word, and whilst enjoying what it teaches may we be found obeying what it commands. The exhortation sounds forth now:"Hold that fast which thou hast, that no man take thy crown." Shall it not be our endeavor, spite of all Satan's devices, to listen to that voice divine and be numbered with those overcomers?

"The Lord knoweth them that are His." Blessed assurance! '' Let every one that nameth the name of Christ depart from iniquity." Solemn injunction! H. F.

If Christ have taken a strong hold, the path is simple, and the young may be saved many a pang. If Christ's, they will surely learn the world is nothing, and its friendship enmity with God; but it is better, and happier, to learn it in the blessed company of Christ than in regrets on a dying bed, or a heart repentant at loss and unfaithfulness. I do not expect young Christians to have learned everything, but the Lord expects them to be faithful to the light they have got. '' And to him that hath shall more be given."

2 Chron. 32:31.

Hezekiah was a man of God."He trusted in the Lord God of Israel; so that after him was none like him among all the kings of Judah, nor any that were before him " (2 Kings 18:5). He had done much to restore in Judah the divine order of things, and undo the evil done by his own father and others.

He had been very ill a while before our present notice of him. He had besought the Lord for recovery, and it had been granted him. Moreover, as a pledge of that recovery, a wonderful sign had been given him:the shadow on the sun-dial had turned ten degrees backward. All creation bows before sovereign grace and creation-glory must stand back when "the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ " appears.

Such great notice and favor from the God of heaven is too much for man, however. It excites his pride. So '' Hezekiah rendered not again according to the benefit done unto him; for his heart was lifted up" (ver. 25).

What a lesson for us! What an explanation of much, which otherwise would be but mystery, of that which happens constantly before our eyes to them who have been most favored of God, individually or collectively!

After recounting the great things of his beautiful reign, the chronicler goes on to say, "Howbeit in the business of the ambassadors of the princes of Babylon, who sent unto him to enquire of the wonder that was done in the land, God left him, to try him, that he might know all that was in his heart" (ver. 31).

Here then is the secret! In all these beautiful features and works of his life he had not yet learned his heart. This is the most profound and most costly lesson with man. He will learn anything else more readily than this. It attacks the strongest and most formidable walls in his moral being. The outward works were carried when he learned he had no righteousness of his own, and found refuge in Christ, but they are by no means all. He may think that because he has learned the great and magnificent counsels and purposes of God, and can straighten many things thereby, that he has reached the end of all, but he may not know his own heart yet.

Paul knew his own heart. He had learned it with God, and so, though caught up to the third heaven and honored as none probably before him, nor since, he does not need, when he comes down, to be left to himself to be tried and learn his heart through failure. Yet he needs help against it. Hezekiah had not so learned his heart, so "God left him, to try him, that he might know all that was in his heart." Flattered by the notice of such great ones from Babylon, and the interest they express in "the wonder that was done in the land" he displays before them that in which such men, and from such quarters, could only see the glory of Hezekiah-not of Jehovah. He plumes himself with what grace had wrought. He is an object of admiration with men who know not the secret of the Lord, and judge as men. How sad ! What a downfall for that man of God. And he drags others down with him:"There was wrath upon him, and upon Judah and Jerusalem" (ver 25). But "Hezekiah humbled himself for the pride of his heart, both he and the inhabitants of Jerusalem, so. that the wrath of the Lord came not upon them in the days of Hezekiah" (ver. 26). Thank God for this blessed door ever open to us.

But why so insist upon our knowing our own heart? Why "left" of God to acquire such knowledge at such cost and dishonor ? Why so much government in the house of God in relation to it ?

It is because God values the heart of man more than all else beside. He values more the being known by man than all the service which can come out of man, good as that indeed is. And we know God only as we know ourselves. We read into the heart of God only in the measure in which we have learned to read into our own; and we can in truth say to Him, " Thou art my hiding place," only as in truth we have been driven out of ourselves by the abhorrence of what we find there. Here lies perfection in Christian character, "He must increase, and I decrease." We " decrease " through learning our own heart. He "increases" as we learn His.

This explains the immense place which the government of the house of God has all through the Scriptures and in all true Christian experience. And it is because of the painful and distressing seasons through which the soul must needs pass from time to time, under that government, in view of its holy ends, that God has taken such pains to establish us in His grace. He must first have us know and rest in the fact that nothing whatever can turn His love from us; that His grace has put us in a place-in Christ Jesus-which nothing can ever change; that, through the Cross, His love has found a righteous way to ever abide with us, and never give us up.

Thus established He can now proceed to form Christ in us (Gal. 4:19), for we can then "endure temptation."We know what the trying of our faith is for (Jas. 1:), and "we know that all things work together for good to them that love God" (Rom. 8:28).We know that His omnipotent hand can grasp even the Serpent by the tail, and turn it into a rod of perfect blessing. We therefore cling to Him under the sufferings of His government, patiently endure that which otherwise would only excite rebellion in us, and at the end we shall reap unto all eternity the blessed results. Moreover, viewing those results, we can say with the apostle, '' I reckon that the sufferings of this present time are not worthy to be compared with the glory which shall be revealed in us" (Rom. 8:18).

Lord's Supper, then, was instituted for the Church of God-the family of the redeemed. All the members of that family should be there ; for none can be absent without incurring the guilt of disobedience to the plain command of Christ and His inspired apostle; and the consequence of this disobedience will be positive spiritual decline and a complete failure in testimony for Christ. Such consequences, however, are the result only of wilful absence from the Lord's table. There are circumstances which, incertain cases, may present an insurmountable barrier, though there might be the most earnest desire to be present at the celebration of the ordinance, as there ever will be where the mind is spiritual; but we may lay it down as a fixed principle of truth that no one can make progress in the divine life who wilfully absents himself from the Lord's table. "All the congregation of Israel" were commanded to keep the Passover (Ex. 12:). No member of the congregation could with impunity be absent." The man that is clean, and is not in a journey, and forbeareth to keep the Passover, even the same soul shall be cut off from among his people:because he brought not the offering of the Lord in his appointed season, that man shall bear his sin" (Num. 9:13).

I feel that it would be rendering really valuable service to the cause of truth, and a furtherance of the interests of the Church of God, if an interest could be awakened on this important subject. There is too much lightness and indifference in the minds of Christians as to the matter of their attendance at the table of the Lord; and where there is not this indifference, there is an unwillingness arising from imperfect views of justification. Now both these hindrances, though so different in their character, spring from one and the same source, viz., selfishness. He who is indifferent about the matter will selfishly allow trifling circumstances to interfere with his attendance:he will be hindered by family arrangements, love of personal ease, unfavorable weather, trifling or, as it frequently happens, imaginary bodily ailments-things which are lost sight of or counted as nothing when some worldly object is to be gained. How often does it happen that men who have not spiritual energy to leave their houses on the Lord's day have abundant natural energy to carry them some miles to gain some worldly object on Monday. Alas that it should be so! How sad to think that worldly gain could exert a more powerful influence on the heart of the Christian than the glory of Christ and the furtherance of the Church's benefit! for this is the way in which we must view the question of the Lord's Supper. What would be our feelings, amid the glory of the coming kingdom, if we could remember that, while on earth, a fair or a market, or some such worldly object, had commanded our time and energies, while the assembly of the Lord's people around His table was neglected ?

Beloved Christian reader, if you are in the habit of absenting yourself from the assembly of Christians, I pray you to ponder the matter before the Lord ere you absent yourself again. Reflect upon the pernicious effect of your absence in every way. You are failing in your testimony for Christ; you are injuring the souls of your brethren, and you are hindering the progress of your own soul in grace and knowledge. Do not suppose that your actings are without their influence on the whole Church of God:you are at this moment either helping or hindering every member of that body on earth." If one member suffer, all the members suffer with it." This principle has not ceased to be true, though professing Christians have split into so many different divisions. Nay, it is so divinely true, that there is not a single believer on earth who is not acting either as a helper to, or a drain upon, the whole body of Christ; and if there be any truth in the principle already laid down (viz., that the assembly of Christians and the breaking of bread in any given locality is, or ought to be, the expression of the unity of the whole body), you cannot fail to see that if you absent yourself from that assembly, or refuse to join in giving expression to that unity, you are doing serious damage to all your brethren as well as to your own soul. I would lay these considerations on your heart and conscience, in the name of the Lord, looking to Him to make them influential.

But not only does this culpable and pernicious indifference of spirit act as a hindrance to many, in presenting themselves at the Lord's table; imperfect views of justification produce the same unhappy result. If the conscience be not perfectly purged, if there be not perfect rest in God's testimony about the finished work of Christ, there will either be a shrinking from the Supper of the Lord, or an unintelligent celebration of it. Those only can show the Lord's death who know, through the teaching of the Holy Spirit, the value of the Lord's death. If I regard the ordinance as a means whereby I am to be brought into a place of greater nearness to God, or whereby I am to obtain a clearer sense of my acceptance, it is impossible that I can rightly observe it. I must believe, as the gospel commands me to believe, that all my sins are forever put away ere I can take my place with any measure of spiritual intelligence at the Lord's table. If the matter be not viewed in this light, the Lord's Supper can only be regarded as a kind of step to the altar of God, and we are told in the law that we are not to go up by steps to God's altar, lest our nakedness be discovered (Ex. 20:26). The meaning of which is, that all human efforts to approach God must issue in the discovery of human nakedness.

Thus we see that if it be indifference that prevents the Christian from being at the breaking of bread, it is most culpable in the sight of God, and most injurious to his brethren and himself; and if it be an imperfect sense of justification that prevents, it is not only unwarrantable, but most dishonoring to the love of the Father, the work of the Son, and the clear and unequivocal testimony of the Holy Ghost.

But it is not unfrequently said, and that, too, by those who profess spirituality and intelligence, " I derive no spiritual benefit by going to the assembly:I am as happy in my own room, reading my Bible." I would affectionately ask such, Are we to have no higher object before us in our actings than our own happiness? Is not obedience to the command of our blessed Master-a command delivered on " the same night in which He was betrayed " -a far higher and nobler object to set before us than anything connected with self? If He desires that His people should assemble in His name, for the express object of showing forth His death till He come, shall we refuse because we feel happier in our own rooms? He tells us to be there :we reply, "We feel happier at home." Our happiness, therefore, must be based on disobedience ; and, as such, it is an unholy happiness. It is much bet-ter it should be so, to be unhappy in the path of obedience than happy in the path of disobedience. But I verily believe, the thought of being happier at home is a mere delusion, and the end of those deluded by it will prove it such. Thomas might have deemed it indifferent whether he was present with the other disciples, but he had to do without the Lord's presence, and to wait for eight days, until the disciples came together on the first day of the week ; for there and then the Lord was pleased to reveal Himself to his soul. And just so will it be with those who say, "We feel happier at home than in the assembly of believers."They will surely be behindhand in knowledge and experience; yea, it will be well if they come not under the terrible woe denounced by the prophet:" Woe to the idol shepherd that leaveth the flock! the sword shall be upon his arm, and upon his right eye ; his arm shall be clean dried up, and his right eye shall be utterly darkened" (Zech. 11:17).And again," Not forsaking the assembling of ourselves together, as the manner of some is; but exhorting one another, and so much the more as ye see the day approaching. For if we sin wilfully, after that we have received the knowledge of the truth, there remaineth no more sacrifice for sins, but a certain fearful looking for of judgment and fiery indignation, which shall devour the adversaries" (Heb. 10:25-27;.

As to the objection upon the grounds of the barrenness and unprofitableness of Christian assemblies, it will generally be remarked that the greatest spiritual barrenness will always be found in connection with a captious and complaining spirit; and I doubt not that if those who complain of the unprofitableness of meetings, and draw from thence an argument in favor of their remaining at home, were to spend more time in secret waiting on the Lord for His blessing on the meetings, they would have a very different experience.

From C. H. M's " Thoughts on the Lord's Supper."

'I am Jehovah, I change not."

Unchangeable! How strange it seems
And yet how blest.
Amidst the fitful changefulness
Of life, what rest
Unspeakable! Here, hearts we trust
May change with changing years,
Requiting bitterness, and tears,
For all our love-
Not so above.
We know one faithful heart is there,
Who loveth, and will ever care.

Unchangeable! Alas, we know
Indeed too well
The changefulness of human hearts.
Who but could tell
Of trust betrayed, ingratitude.
Yea, serving man, how oft we reap
The bitterness which makes us weep.
Ah, well indeed
The heart should bleed,
If thus it learneth to confide
Full trust in Him, Who doth abide.

Unchangeable! tho' I may change
From mood to mood,
From warm to cold, and ofttimes brood,
And must be wooed
Afresh by mercy, love, and grace.
O, heart of mine, with shame I move,
That thus thou couldst requite such love.
Unchangeable!
I know it well. In that He loveth me today,
I know He'll love eternally.

O heart bowed down, and sore distressed,
What wouldst thou now
Not give, that God might thee endow?
How wouldst thou vow
To toil and slave, for love like this.
Ah, thus His love thou couldst not have.
Thou needest not for this love to slave.
Unchangeable!
O, hear Him tell- To him who asketh life of Me,
Is life eternal, full, and free.

But thou must own that thou art dead-
In need of life-
Beyond the power of prayer, or strife,
To win thee life,
But dead in trespasses and sin.
Could Christ so suffer, die and bleed,
Had there not been the deepest need?
' Twas for the lost
He paid such cost. He said it, the Unchangeable,
"Come unto Me, whoever will."

Unchangeable-that haven sweet,
The haven of His breast.
Let go thy fears, thy heart's unrest,
And be thou blest.
He'll chase all doubts and fears away,
And give thee such a resting place
As only can be found by grace.
Thy sorrow tell
Th' Unchangeable:
He'll heal thee with life's waters pure,
And speak a peace that shall endure.

Yea, Lord, Thou art th' unchanging One,
I bless Thy name,
Thy love is evermore the same.
None ever came
To Thee for life, and was refused.
I rest me on the Riven Rock,
Tho' men may laugh, or scorn, or mock,
Unchanging One,
Th' Eternal Son, Thou art eternally the same,
Thy love, Thy power, Thy gracious name.

H. McD.

There is no need for man to be proud. The wisest among them could never even find out of himself who are his own father and mother. He has to be told.

No more can he tell of himself what is his origin unless he is told. Adam himself, fresh from the hand of God, could no more have told how he got there than a babe just born. Man was not made self-sufficient.

All the thinkers put together could never think out the origin of one atom. All therefore who refuse to be told how the things that are have come into being, are doomed eternally to be "truth seekers" and never truth finders.

So it comes to pass that it is after all the "babes " – those who can trust God, who alone knows – that are wise, that have the true science which needs not to shift its base every few years.

How painfully foolish, not to say silly, does the "science falsely so-called " seem which, turning its back to the light, wanders about in the dark to ever come back to its starting point without having found what it seeks.

Then see the troop of traitors who call themselves "higher critics," trying to pose as superior minds because they have made shipwreck of faith and are groping in the same darkness.

It is a pitiable sight!

What shall I feel in the glory, when first
The visions of heaven upon me shall burst!
Since now my soul fainteth and thirsteth for Thee,
O when, my dear Saviour, Thy face shall I see?

That face, once so marred, I shall gaze on at length,
And fearless behold, tho' all shining in strength ;
Those eyes, flames of fire, so searching I prove,
Shall beam on me then inexpressible love.

That voice, like great waters – how calmly my soul
Will hear, in the glory, its deep thunders roll!
Though now it rebukes me and humbles all pride,
It shall speak only love to Thy glorified Bride.

Dear Zion above ! O how oft have I trod
Thy streets of pure gold, the blest courts of my God!
The voice of thy harpers hath burst on my ear,
And thrilled through my spirit with heavenly fear.

Like John in the Spirit, that heavenly flame
Hath borne up my soul to the source whence it came;
The Spirit of glory the glory reveals,
And all "God's true sayings" triumphantly seals. G.

"And His name shall be called Wonderful," is the prophecy concerning the Christ which was fulfilled in the Lord Jesus. The truth of Christ, "God manifest in the flesh," is too wonderful for our feeble powers to grasp. Man cannot fathom this "great mystery;" faith alone can make it real to the soul. We can but believe it and worship.

And so also with the Bible. It is wonderful. There is nothing like it in all the world. It is indeed as the palmist says:"Thy testimonies are wonderful; therefore doth my soul observe them." And when one comes to see the wonderful things in this wonderful book, then he also understands what the psalmist meant, and is able to use those words for himself.

The Bible is wonderful in its antiquity; in its preservation ; in its contents, its doctrines, its revelations. It is wonderful in its authorship; in its claims; in its prophecies. It is wonderful in its continuity of thought, seeing its writing has covered so many years and was done by so many and diverse authors. It is wonderful in its depth of truth; in its subject matter; in its structure.

No book has received so much study, and been so loved and so hated. None has so baffled the " wise and prudent" and refused to be penetrated by the learning of the learned. Yet none has brought such light and intelligence to the " poor in spirit." No book has been the subject of such malignant attacks, and none has ever beaten and thrashed its enemies as this one. No book has been more constantly defamed and none more strenuously defended. The world offers no record of a book which has successfully withstood all the hostile attacks of criticism except the Bible. It confounds the critics when they think they have triumphed. It puts them to shame just at the time when they boast of victory.

The Bible is wonderful in its influence upon individuals and upon the world. It has produced multitudes of martyrs and its teachings have strengthened them in their cruel sufferings; its promises have comforted the bereaved ones; its assurances have given courage to the hearts of all who believe it. The Bible has brought the joy of sins forgiven to countless multitudes of all nations, climes and conditions -an innumerable host of men, women, and children; it has dried up the tears of the sorrowing; it binds up the broken heart; it makes the bed of affliction lose its pain. The hope it sets before those who believe its teachings causes the trials and cares of this life to vanish as the mist before a rising sun; a hope that makes all the treasures of this whole world seem as moth and rust eaten; a hope that enables men to look upon the things that are eternal instead of the things that are temporal; a hope of glories that transcend all man can ask or think; a hope that is based upon the immutable word of God, who cannot lie and who changes not.

The influence of the Bible has made and undone kingdoms; it has introduced mighty changes in the course of this world. It has erected schools; founded hospitals, built everywhere asylums of mercy; it has stayed the hand of crime; it has bettered the condition of whole communities. It gave us the reformation ; it broke the tyranny of Popery. The Bible rebukes sin, it condemns wrong, it encourages the feeble, it cheers the faint, it preaches glad tidings to the lost. The Bible brings light and dispels darkness. Its influence is eternal.

O reader, do not these things mean something to you ? Can you be passive before this wonderful book ? Our own soul has been stirred to its depths by its mighty and wonderful contents. And we ask you to search it with us, search it prayerfully and humbly until you too have felt their power and preciousness, and can say reverently and truly, "Thy testimonies are wonderful; therefore doth my soul observe them." F. H. J.

2. I AM THE BREAD OF LIFE.

(Continued from page 221.)

The parallel thought suggested by the miracle preceding the discourse of John 6:is that, as bread is the sustenance for the natural life, so He who is the " Bread of life " is this for the life He has given. Such a life was what the world needed in its state of spiritual death and alienation from God. The light of such a life, as shining from the Word become flesh, was required to fully manifest the darkness of the world. And the gift of this life, to whoever would receive it, turned that one from the darkness to the glory of the light of life. Therefore "work not for the food that perisheth but for the food that abideth unto eternal life, which the Son of Man will give you." Satan's and man's opposition make labor necessary to obtain this food. " The work of God," which they must do, is to "believe on Him whom He hath sent." This would obtain for them eternal life (verse 40). He enforces this a little later on. "Verily, verily, I say unto you, he that believeth on Me hath eternal life ; " and He is the Bread of that life-the means of its sustenance and the power of its perpetuity (vers. 47, 48). "This is the Bread that cometh down from heaven, that one may eat of it and not die." The secret and power of eternal life is in Him, and He came down from heaven to give it to men.

He is this Bread, the "Bread of God" (ver. 33) -the "true Bread from heaven " that they who eat of it may live forever.

He is the "living Bread," the Son to whom the Father hath given to have life in Himself (John 5:26). We may well note in connection with this the comparison the Lord draws between His own life and the Father, and that of the one who feeds upon Him and lives by reason of this. "As the living Father hath sent Me, and I live by reason of the Father, so he that feedeth on Me shall live by reason of Me" (ver. 57). The Father abides in Him, and, in this place of obedience and dependence He had taken, it is the life of the Father given to Him by which He lives. The carrying out of the Father's will and purpose was the whole expression of His life. He that feedeth on Me, Christ says, "abideth in Me and I in him" (ver. 56). The parallel is plain. As the Father is the explanation of the life of Christ here, so now Christ is the explanation of the believer's life. It is that, doubtless, in the mind and counsel of God, and will be that in fulness in the glory of eternity ; but to what extent is it that in our daily life here ? Is He the motive of thought and action in our lives here ? and is our obedience and service springing from love for Him ? Thus He is "the bread of life," assimilated by those to whom
this life has been given, through faith in Him. This is eternal life, and is sustained for eternity by the same Bread-"he that feedeth on this Bread shall live forever" (ver. 58).

As the Lord speaks of Himself under the figure of bread, the process of preparation should also be instructive in this connection.

First as to the grain. "A body hast Thou prepared Me." Of this body the grain in plainly a type, speaking of the Person of Christ. The grain must be crushed and undergo the action of fire. This tells of how Christ, in the body prepared Him, must needs bear the fire of God's wrath that He may be '' the Bread of life " to others. He links with this title the fact that the bread He will give is His flesh which He will give for the life of the world (ver. 51). The language, of course, we understand to be figurative. It is in connection with His death that Christ becomes this bread, just as the prepared grain only becomes bread through the action of the fire. Thus the bread, in accord with the Lord's language, is the flesh of the sacrifice after it had been subjected to the action of fire (Exod. 12:9).

The grain of wheat the Lord uses as a type of Himself. It "consists of an outer husk or covering, an embryo or germ, and a central mass of farinaceous material." The husk or covering is separated in the grinding process and does not become part of the wheaten flour; the germ is that from which the life of the plant springs; and in the central mass, in which the germ is hid, we find that matter on which so much of the nutritive value of the grain depends. This mass, with the germ, when ground constitutes the flour. Here we have a parable of nature stamped with that triple character which marks it as full manifestation of Him concerning whom it is a type. We have, in the outer covering of the grain, the body of humiliation, the tabernacle of Deity. "The Word became flesh." In the germ of life we have the fact that " in Him was life," that "as the Father hath life in Himself, so hath He given to the Son to have life in Himself." In the central mass of the grain, in which the germ of life is hid, we have the elements of His Person, in which is found the eternal life He had in Himself – that germ, as we may say, from which alone springs all of new creation life and fruitfulness. It is this central mass with the germ in it which, when ground and subjected to the action of fire, becomes the bread of natural life. So, too, the elements of the Person of Christ in which is the eternal life, becomes the Bread of life after He passes under the fire of divine wrath for others, that they might feed on this Bread.

In the process of preparation, the crushing of the grain is the first step; then the flour is combined with water in the kneading; and, finally, it is subjected to fire. Christ, the true grain of wheat, passed through all of these three stages.

We have spoken of the central mass of the grain with its germ, as typical of the elements of the Person of Christ. It is these elements which come out under the crushing-stones of suffering and affliction, constituting the life manifested, with the Eternal Life permeating throughout, even as the germ and the central mass are crushed together and displayed in the fine flour-the product of this process. Thus was the Eternal Life, which was with the Father, manifested here. That fine flour speaks to us of the separate, holy, altogether lovely character of in all its perfect elements, crushed out in a wondrous display of perfection by the awful pressure in every form of trial to which He was subjected. What material for the food of the creature! The fine flour is not ready for the fire, however, until it has been kneaded with water. Water is a type of the written Word. Here the thought seems to be that all which He endured, the whole of His life, as manifested in the fine flour, is perfectly mixed, as we may say, bound up together with the fulfilment of, and in obedience to, the word of God. Its every requirement is met by Him. This all proved Him as the One alone fit and ready to bear the fire of judgment and be the Bread of life, just as the wheat is made ready by this double process, to be baked and then fed upon by man.

The fire is that which finally makes the bread ready for food. It is the fire of judgment endured by Christ which makes Him the Bread of life for the believer. " My flesh " (the perfect humanity, the fine flour) is the bread Christ declares He will give for the life of the world. It becomes this, therefore, through sacrifice and the shedding of His blood.

The Christ who lived, but passed through death, is the Bread of life for those who, linked with Him, stand in the glory of His resurrection. Here we may draw a distinction. It is not the bread which gives life; it is the sustenance of life. "The blood is the life;" and Christ links flesh and blood together. The drinking of the blood gives life-that is the entering by faith into the work accomplished by the life given up, to which the blood shed bears witness. Then for this life we have what sustains it, "My flesh." In the types of the Old Testament it was only after the sacrifice, the blood all poured out, that the flesh could be eaten. In this we see how He becomes the Bread in connection with His death. It is that which makes it good to us. How precious the food thus provided for the need of new-creation life! How infinite its value since the cost was so great by which it was made good to us. But let us consider this question:To what extent does our regularity in partaking of this food compare with our regularity in partaking of "the food that perisheth?" Our hearts are searched, surely, as we think of how seldom we sit at meat with our blessed God. May we by His grace be quickened afresh to feed upon this bounteous provision of divine love which has spent itself to the full in providing for the objects of its affection. Let us remember that Christ is the Bread of our life-not the world nor the things of the world. "I am"-absolute and excluding all else,-"the bread of life." J. B. Jr.

QUES. 12.-What is the king spoken of in Rev. 9:11? ans.-We believe it is the "Antichrist; " the one mentioned in 2 Thess. 2:8-10; who brings on the fulfilment of Matt. 24:15-22. His name, whose interpretation is destroyer, and given in both Hebrew and Greek, indicates his character and work, both toward the worship of the restored Jewish nation, and of apostate Gentile Christendom. It is the Christ of Satan against the Christ of God. The spirit of this is now abundantly at work, and deceiving many.

QUES. 13.-Does 1 Cor. 11:30 and 3:17 teach us that God takes those of us away who bring reproach upon the cause of Christ ?

ANS.-The first scripture you refer to does. But mark, it does not say that God does so in every case, for the very sinful brother of the fifth chapter was not taken away, but judged by the assembly, and thus brought to repentance and restoration. God knows each case fully and deals with each one in perfect wisdom, though we who know but in part, may not always be able to understand His ways.

The second scripture you refer to is quite different. It is the doom which awaits the destroyers of God's temple, which is now in process of building-of which Christ is the foundation, and every child of God a living stone. The servants of Christ who are good builders bring in what will abide, and for which they will receive their reward from the Lord at the end; other servants, who are bad builders, bring in what the Lord will have to consume at the end, and though they themselves will be saved, they will lose their rewards.

Those of the seventeenth verse are not builders at all, but destroyers, as for instance, "Christian Science," "Millennial Dawn-ism," "Higher Criticism," "Seventh-day Adventism" and many more which, while they profess to be builders, are in reality the defilers, or destroyers, of the temple of God.

QUES. 14-In Luke 22:17 the Lord took the cup. What does that refer to?

In verse 18 He says, "I will not drink of the fruit of the vine, until the Kingdom of God. shall come." What time does this refer to?

Then in vers. 19 and 20, is it the rule laid down by our Lord for us to go by at this present time?

ANS.-The cup in ver. 17 refers to the Passover cup-the symbol of what He was about to accomplish. The purpose for which the Lord had established it being fulfilled, He dismisses it with the honor and dignity due to it.

The time referred to by " the Kingdom of God," is the establishment of that order of things perfectly suited to God which would result from the Lord's death and resurrection-an order of things already existing now among those who are of faith, but which will be fully reached only in the age to come.

Yes, vers. 19 and 20, are our Lord's rule for us now until He comes. It is the new ordinance, which points back to the sufferings of Christ, of which all the present grace and the coming glories are the result-the foundation upon which the Kingdom of God is established. The wine of this kingdom the Lord has been drinking with us and we with Him since He rose from the dead; and if the Passover cup is empty and dismissed, we who drink of this new wine can say from our hearts, "Thou hast kept the good wine until now."

QUES. 15.-Reading Deut. 24:1, in connection with Matt. 5:32, why is she not allowed to marry again while in the former scripture she was?

Can we assume from these scriptures that a wife could set aside her husband in case of his committing adultery ? And would she be allowed to marry another man ? Would her divorced husband be allowed to marry again ?

ANS.-The answer to your first question is in Matt. 19:3-9. Ver. 8 gives the reason why Moses permitted divorce under such circumstances. Judaism was but a temporary order of things which "made nothing perfect"(Heb. 7:18, 19). It did not even abolish polygamy. It did not restore the order of God in creation which sin had corrupted. Christianity does; and so in Matt. 19:the Lord restores the true order in the marriage relation. There He affirms that henceforth, "Whosoever shall put away his wife, except for fornication, and shall marry another, committeth adultery; and whoso marrieth her which is put away doth commit adultery."Fornication is then the only thing which breaks the marriage tie, and permits divorce; aud none may shield themselves by what Moses only "suffered," after all, because of the hardness of the people's hearts.

We need not assume from these scriptures what is in the second question. Mark 10:12 shows that the woman puts away as well as the man. The right of each to put away the other in the case of fornication on either side is thus established.

As to the liberty to marry again, in the one who has been sinned against, Matt. 19:9 clearly implies it; whilst it declares it adultery for any one to marry the other.

One thing, however, must never be lost sight of by the people of God in such matters:Where the husband has sinned against the wife, or the wife against the husband, if there be repentance, forgiveness is the blessed remedy-not putting away. We who have been forgiven so much, find our blessing in forgiving what others do against us.

(To the Editor of the "Witness" Montreal.)

Sir,-I desire to reply, as briefly as the importance of the subject will permit, to the letter of Mr. E. H. in last Saturday's issue of the "Witness." I. He draws a distinction between the "Word of God" and "the word of man," both, he says, contained in the Scriptures. Will he give a single instance where this distinction is made by our Lord, or by His apostles, or by any Old Testament writer? Can we imagine our blessed Lord "disentangling" the true Word of God from the " errors" of Moses? Of course, we may be referred to Matt. 19:7-9, where our Lord shows that Moses " suffered " a modified divorce, "for the hardness of your hearts." But it was not merely Moses, but the permission of God, for whom Moses spoke, and it only furnishes an illustration of the partial and temporary character of much of the Mosaic ordinances, because it was a time of spiritual infancy.(See Gal. 4:1-7.)A sober, prayerful study of dispensational truth will enlighten those who desire light upon this whole matter.

2. Let the "Higher Critics" honestly answer this question:Do they absolutely indorse every word spoken by our Lord Jesus as true and divine? And do they accept what He says as to the Old Testament Scriptures as final? If so, then " Moses wrote " of Him (John 5:46, 47); Isaiah wrote his prophecy (Luke 4:17; the Evangelist here states what our Lord read); David spoke of Him (Matt. 22:43, 44); Jonah was the veritable history of a veritable person (Matt. 12:38-41); the flood was an actual judgment, and no "myth " (Luke 17:26). Now it is notorious that these and other scriptures which space will not allow me to quote, are all denied by these "sages of the latter days." I therefore point out that they deny the word of Christ, and the word of His inspired apostles. What fair-minded person will contradict this?

3. Would our Lord have allowed His disciples to think that what they had been taught to believe was the absolute truth-the Scriptures they held in their hands-were not so, but full of myth, error, and human teachings? No! " If it were not so, I would have told you," states a principle of wide application. Either our blessed Lord was ignorant, or " Moses and the prophets," are "the Scriptures of truth." Christian, was the Son of God ignorant? and if not, did He wilfully conceal the truth from us? "Ye have not so learned Christ."

4. But look at these "words of man," and "words of Satan," too, scattered through the Scriptures. Is there any doubt whose words they are? "Ye shall not surely die;" "Ye shall be as God." Is there any danger of confounding these words with the words of God? And yet God has recorded them for our instruction, admonition, and to lead us to Christ. So with the words of Cain, Esau, Pharaoh and many other wicked men, or men ignorant of the true ways of God, as Job's friends. But God has recorded these in His inspired Word, and along with them He has given us His truth as the remedy. There is a great difference between inspiration and revelation. God has given us an exact account of the wicked words and deeds of men. We know exactly what they have done and said. Does that mean we are to follow what they have said? But is it fair to say that the "Higher Critics" are simply pointing out the words of wicked men, which God recorded in His Word? None know better than themselves that this is not the case. Any babe knows that when the Pharisees said of our Lord, " He hath a devil and is mad," it was awful blasphemy and wickedness. But when we are told that the Scriptures are full of error, and of false statements which pass with people for truth, let the plain fact be stated-these people are making our Lord Jesus to be an ignorant person or a liar.

5. Let the issue be faced plainly:-What do the (1) As to the narrative of the Creation?-that it was a myth.

(2) As to the Fall?-that it was not historical.

(3) As to the Flood?-that it did not occur, but was a legend.

(4) As to Abraham?-that he may not have existed.

(5) As to Moses?-that he did not give the law.

(6) As to the books of Law?-that they were written many centuries after the time stated on their
pages.

(7) As to David?-that he did not write the Psalms he is said by our Lord to have written; in fact, never wrote any of the psalms ascribed to him.

(8) As to Isaiah?-that he did not write the latter half of his book.

(9) As to Jonah? -that the whole story is a fabrication.

(10) As to Daniel?-that his book is no prophecy, but a forgery.

6.What does this involve?

(1) That the Bible is a tissue of error and falsehood, mixed with truth.

(2) That our Lord did not know this, but was as ignorant as any other pious Jew.

(3) That the apostles and inspired men had the same errors.

7. Let it not be thought that all this is put before the public as bluntly as the above. It is ever the way of Satan to introduce error insidiously. He is transformed into an angel of light, and we need not marvel if men speak in a pious tone of the Lord while denying His deity or His atoning work. But men in the professors' chairs in theological schools are teaching these errors; the younger generation of the clergy are being filled with them, and so they are passed on to the pulpit and the pew, until "the whole is leavened." Let the people of God awake as to these things. The Lord is being attacked, and the Word denied. Do not be deceived by the apparent sincerity of these men. They may be deluded themselves, but we are responsible to refuse and turn away from error even though it were taught by "an angel from heaven." S. R.

This is the mystery. It is the same Jesus, Emmanuel, the Son, and yet the Kinsman of the seed of Abraham. And here I would say- for there is a call for it-I know we are not to con-found the natures in this glorious and blessed One. I fully bow in faith to the truth that the Sanctifier took part of flesh and blood. I avow with my whole soul the true humanity in His person; but it was not an imperfect humanity, in the condition or under the results of sin, in any wise. But I ask, with that, Is there not some unsuspected and yet real unbelief touching the mystery of the Person in the minds of many? Is the undividedness of the Person throughout all the periods and transitions of this glorious, mysterious history kept in the view of the soul? I would have grace to delight myself in the language of the Holy Ghost, and speak of "the Man Christ Jesus."The " Man " that is risen is declared to be the pledge of resurrection to us (i Cor. 15:21) The " Man " that is ascended is the great assurance to us that our interests are, every moment, before God in heaven (i Tim. 2:5).The "Man" to return from heaven by and by will be the security and joy of the coming kingdom (Ps. 8:).The mystery of the "Man,"-obedient, dead, raised, ascended, and returned, thus sustains, we may say, the whole counsel of God. But still, again I say, the Person in its undividedness is to be kept in the view of the soul. " The perfect and complete work of Christ in every act of His office, in all that He did, in all that He suffered, in all that He continueth to do, is the act and work of His whole person."Yea, indeed, and His whole Person was on the cross, as everywhere else. The Person was the sacrifice, and in that Person was the Son, '' over all, God blessed forever." He "gave up the ghost," though He died under God's judgment against sin, and though He was by the hands of wicked men crucified and slain. And this is an infinite mercy.

It was Himself, beloved, from first to last. He trod the mysterious way Himself, though He trod it unaided and alone. None other than He, " God manifest in the flesh," could have been there. The Son became the Lamb for the altar here; and then the Lamb that was slain reached the place of glory, far above all heavens. It is the Person which gives efficacy to all. Services would be nothing; sorrows would be nothing; death, resurrection, and ascension, all would be nothing (could we conceive them), if Jesus were not the one He is. His Person is the "Rock;" therefore "His work is perfect" (Deut. 32:4). It is the mystery of mysteries. But He is not presented for our discussion, but for our apprehension, faith, confidence, love and worship.

Extract from "The Son of God" by J. G. B.

1 Kings 17:2-9.

The way the Lord would have us spiritually is that He never gives us a stock of anything – of grace or of gift – so that we can say, "I have got enough to last me so long at least. " That would be taking us out of the place of faith, and depriving us of the blessing God has for us. He covets to show us what He is :His power, His love, His unforgetfulness of us. As it is said of the people whom in His love and His pity He redeemed:"He bare them and carried them all the days of old. " It is a great thing to get this in a real and practical way for ourselves with God. If He keeps us low down here, – and you know it is His way in more senses than one to call and choose the poor, – it is not because His hand is niggard, God forbid, but that we may not miss realizing this great blessing of His care. Often, all we think of is having our need met; but how little a thing is that with God! It would cost Him nothing, we may say, to meet the need of a life time in a moment ; and a lesser love than His, would supply it at once and get rid of a constant burden. But that is not His way. To sup-ply the need is a small thing; but to supply it in such a way as to make us feel in each seasonable supply the Father's eye never withdrawn from us, the Father's heart ever employed about us, – that is what He means. "Give us day by day our daily bread," is the prayer the Lord taught His disciples; and thus we ask Him continually to be waiting on us. Is it not much more than to ask, Give us now, that we may not have to come again ? F. W. G.

Unto Him that loved us, and washed us from our sins in His own blood, and hath made us kings and priests unto God and His Father; to Him be glory and dominion forever and ever. Amen.
(Rev. 1:5, 6.)

Until there is confession of sin, and not merely of a sin, there is no forgiveness. We find David (Psa. 51:) when he was confessing his sin, saying, " Behold I was shapen in iniquity, and in sin did my mother conceive me;" etc.-not merely, I have done this particular evil; that he does (vers. 1-4); but he recognizes the root and principle of sin. When our hearts are brought to recognize God's hand, it is not merely, then, a question of what particular sin, or of what particular iniquity may need forgiveness; God has brought down the soul, through the working of His Spirit on it, to detect the principle of sin, and so there is confession of that, and not merely of a particular sin. There is then positive restoration of soul. " J. N. D.

(in "Watchword and Truth" Nov. 1904.) (Concluded from page 213.)

In speaking of the final state the Editor says, "Then will come 'the new heavens and new earth wherein dwelleth righteousness,' and 'into that new sphere of glory will come the new Jerusalem, and the new humanity under the one Head to be in blessing forever.' But because this ' Son of Man' is also ' Son of God,' there will not be a glory to which He is heir, as the only begotten Son of God, into which this redeemed multitude will not be received as 'heirs of God and joint-heirs of Jesus Christ;' the whole of redeemed humanity will enter into its 'inheritance, incorruptible, undefiled, and that fadeth not away, reserved in heaven' for them all."

No distinction is made by the Editor between the heavenly and the earthly portions:but when Eph. 1:10, tells us "that in the dispensation of the fulness of times, He might gather together in one all things in Christ both which are in heaven, and which are on earth," it evidently means that such being the great consummation at the end, it is a condition of things that will endure forever. Therefore, there will be both heavenly and earthly glory forever in the Kingdom of God, and a heavenly and an earthly people of those who are redeemed, as other scriptures show. And as to saying that "into that new sphere of glory (the new heavens and new earth) will come the new Jerusalem," this is leaving out the truth that according to Rev. 21:, the new Jerusalem descends from heaven not once only, but twice-once at the beginning of the Millennium (ver. 10), and again at the beginning of the eternal state of glory (ver. 2) described in the first eight verses. But when the picture of the events of time is complete, in chap. 20:, and a view of the descent of the new Jerusalem and of the blessedness of the eternal state has been presented in the earlier verses of chap. 21:; then, a separate, retrospective vision of the new Jerusalem is set before us from 21:9, on through the earlier verses of chap. 22:This review, or vision, evidently present the new Jerusalem at the dawn of the Millennium, for the tree of life is mentioned, and the leaves of the tree are for the "healing of the nations;" showing thus that time is still continued. It is the glory of the new Jerusalem-the glory of the heavenly state, shining upon the earth, during the millennial period.

Therefore in this review the new Jerusalem descends from heaven (21:9) to begin the Millennium, "having the glory of God," which harmonizes with Rom. 5:2, " We rejoice in hope of the glory of God;" and again "when Christ who is our life shall appear then shall ye also appear with Him in glory " (Col. 3:4). "Then the nations of them that are saved (on earth), shall walk in the light of it and the kings of the earth do bring their glory and honor unto it." They pay homage to that which is above them. Thus the heavenly state of the new Jerusalem is distinguished from the earthly state in the Millennium -and so also, as we shall see, in the eternal state. It comes down from God, out of heaven (21:2) but it does not say it comes to the earth; the contrary is shown. There is "no temple in it," but there will be a temple in the Jerusalem on earth. "And the city had no need of the sun … and there shall be no night there;" but on earth, while it "remains," "day and night shall not cease." There is no merging of the two conditions. And even where it is said, as to the eternal state (21:3), "the tabernacle of God is with men," "and God shall wipe away all tears from their eyes; and there shall be no more death"-clearly referring to men on earth-still it is not that His heavenly saints (who are His "tabernacle ") will be on earth; for were it so, God Himself would make His abode on earth:but there will be intimate association between heaven and earth.

This is foreshadowed, as to Millennial times, by "Jacob's ladder," set up on earth, and reaching to the heavens, angels ascending and descending upon it. And again in the vision on the mount, when Moses and Elias talking with Jesus in heavenly glory were seen by the disciples:this, Peter tells us, was " the power and coming of our Lord Jesus Christ."

But if the holy city, Jerusalem, comes down from heaven for the Millennium, and yet does not come to the earth, but remains distinct from it, it shows that the same thing is true as regards the eternal state. The city descends again from heaven, but abides forever a heavenly city. There will be therefore saints on earth, and saints in heaven, of the redeemed family, forever.

All Scripture is in harmony as to this. "The new heaven and the new earth," take the place of the first heaven and the first earth; but as this "first heaven" in connection with the "first earth," is not the heaven of God's dwelling place, neither is this "new heaven " God's dwelling place; it is, as it were, but the envelope of the earth. It is not the heaven where Jesus is, and where He went to prepare a place in the Father's house, for those for whom there is a "hope laid up in heaven " (Col. 1:5).

As to the earthly hope, not only will Israel and saved Gentiles inherit the earth in the Millennium, but the first three verses of Rev. 21:show that "men" will be on the "new earth," while, as already seen, in intimate association with the glory of the heavenly Jerusalem. Redeemed people will also dwell on the "new earth," in the eternal state, as well as during the Millennium. This distinction is uniformly maintained in Scripture, as in Eph. 3:15. "Of whom (the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ), the whole (or every) family in heaven and earth is named."

One extreme view would exclude the earth, as an abode for redeemed people for eternity; another would exclude heaven, and reduce all to an earthly hope. But Scripture sets forth both sides:a heavenly hope for heavenly saints, and an earthly hope for earthly saints. This is the harmonious doctrine of Scripture. Old Testament saints, the Church, and martyrs of the "tribulation" period, are marked out by Scripture to inherit heavenly glory; but Israel and saved Gentiles, to inherit the earth:the latter two classes, during the Millennium. In the eternal state, in connection with the new heaven and new earth, "men " are spoken of:" the tabernacle of God is with men;" but in view of Isa. 66:22 are we not assured that Israel, as a nation, will exist forever? " For as the new heavens, and the new earth which I will make shall remain before Me, saith the Lord, so shall your seed and your name remain before Me." The teaching of Scripture therefore is that there will be redeemed saints on earth, and redeemed saints in heaven in the eternal state:all will know Him as Head and Lord and Saviour; but there will be various relationships, plainly delineated in Scripture. See Numerical Bible-Hebrews-Revelation, p. 487. Those only who are of this present dispensation being of the Church which is His Body" (Eph. 1:22; i Cor. 12:13; Acts 1:5; Acts 2:14). E. S. Lyman

(Concluded-from page 167.)

Acts 2:38, "Then Peter said unto them, Repent and be baptized every one of you in the name of Jesus Christ for the remission of sins, and ye shall receive the gift of the Holy Ghost," is taken as presenting " the two great conditions of receiving the Holy Ghost:repentance and faith in Christ for the remission of sins.'' " No other conditions," he tells us, are required. (See page 24, "The Three-fold Secret.")On page 32, this is re-asserted, and he remarks:

" But. mark this, that both of these were essential. One was not sufficient. Men must repent and believe. For a man simply to repent of his sins, without faith in Jesus Christ for the remission of sins, would not bring the gift of the Holy Ghost, for one of the essential conditions would be missing. So also for a man to attempt to believe in the Lord Jesus Christ without repenting of his sins would not, and could not, bring the gift of the Holy Ghost, for the same reason."

Is it possible if faith in the Lord Jesus is wanting that there should be genuine repentance? Do not these two things go together ?

Acts 19:1-6, is interpreted in the light of this dogma. (See page 33.) After referring to Paul's "inquiry," Whether they had received the Holy Ghost? and the "negative" answer given to it, he says:

" 'Unto what then were ye baptized?' said Paul; and they said :'Unto John's baptism,' 'Oh, I see,' says Paul, in effect, 'but don't you know that John baptized only unto REPENTANCE? Now repentance is not enough to bring the gift of the Holy Ghost; you must believe in Jesus Christ.' "

Did not John teach his disciples to believe on the One to come after him ? Was it really so, that these disciples had not received the Holy Spirit because they had only repented? had not yet believed on Christ? We shall see. Mr. McC. further states, on page 34:

"And when they heard this, they believed on Jesus Christ, and, baptized into His name, received the Holy Ghost." (The italics here are mine. I have omitted his.)

I will now quote the scripture."When they heard this, they were baptized in the name of the Lord Jesus." There is nothing said about their believing on Jesus Christ. Mr. McC. has put that in. Further, if we read the next verse, we find that even yet they do not have the Holy Spirit. They are believers and are baptized, but still for some reason they did not get the Holy Spirit. It could not be because they, had not repented. He tells us they had. Here is something for Mr. McC. to explain. Here is a company who have complied with the "two only essential conditions" for the reception of the Spirit and yet have not received Him !He has overlooked the fact that they did not receive the Holy Spirit until Paul laid his hands on them. There was no laying on of hands in Acts 2:It was not necessary there. The company had already received the Spirit, with whom the converts in Acts 2:were connected, when they were baptized. Now here at Ephesus there is an independent company. Will the Holy Spirit own and form two independent bodies or companies?"By one Spirit we are baptized into one body."This must be demonstrated. Paul, then, lays his hands on them-the sign of identification and fellowship, and then they receive the Holy Spirit.

When, as on page 35, speaking of Aquila and Priscilla expounding to Apollos "the way of God more perfectly," it is added, " doubtless teaching faith in Christ for remission of sins," it is going beyond Scripture. It is also wise above what is written, when on the same page the twelve disciples at Ephesus are called, "Apollos' mis-instructed disciples."

But I must hasten on. The comments, on page 36, in regard to " the case of the Samaritans recorded in Acts 8:5-25 " are very bad.

"There certainly was at least an intellectual belief in the Lord Jesus Christ. Why then was the Holy Ghost not received? Since, as we have seen, God distinctly says that He will be received if men but repent and believe, the fair inference would be that they had not honestly repented. We believe this to be a case where the other condition of a true heart-repentance was lacking, even though they professed faith in Christ. This was surely the case with one of them. For Simon, the sorcerer, had professed belief and been baptized at this time (ver. 13), and yet Peter declared to him, 'Thy heart is not right with God.' "

Where has God "distinctly" said, The Holy Spirit will be received "if men but repent and believe"? What is supposed to be this is Acts 2:38. What is " distinctly " said is, "Repent, and be baptized every one of you in the name of Jesus Christ for the remission of sins, and ye shall receive the gift of the Holy Ghost." The 7th chapter of John's Gospel, ver. 39, shows that the condition of believers receiving the Holy Spirit is the glorification of Jesus. Now here in Acts 2:, Jesus has been glorified and the Holy Spirit has been given. Believers have received Him. The Spirit given to believers was a public acknowledgment of them on the part of God. The Christ-rejecting Jews were thus convicted of their sin, and, stung thus in their consciences, cried out, "What shall we do ? " Peter tells them, Submit to Jesus-the One you have rejected. In submitting they became believers, no doubt. But the whole emphasis in their case is on submitting. If they did so they would have the remission of their sins and partake in the gift which was God's public acknowledgment of believers.

Now the case of the Samaritans is altogether different. Philip in the progress of his evangelizing came to Samaria. The purpose of the Lord was that He should be testified of, not only "in Jerusalem" and "in Judea," but "in Samaria" also, and "to the uttermost part of the earth." (See Acts 1:8; Luke 24:46-48, and elsewhere.) Philip is now in Samaria testifying of Christ. The testimony is heard, and it is seen also that it is confirmed by signs and wonders; for God gave the tokens of His attestation of His witnesses and servants. The testimony was received and submitted to by many, "both men and women."Was Simon a fair sample of all these? He was manifested as having no " part nor lot in this matter." Were all these so ? Were they all shown to have been unreal in their submission ?Not at all. Their repentance and faith, then, was not a mere intellectual belief and a dishonest repentance. Nor was it " a case " of one condition fulfilled and another lacking of having believed while yet " they had not honestly repented." Their repentance was " a true-hearted repentance."But why is it they do not receive the Spirit? Why does not God give them the same public acknowledgment He has given to other believers. Simply because it must be demonstrated that there is to be only one body or company. So Peter and John come from Jerusalem-from the company already owned of God. When they had prayed for them and laid their hands on them-the sign of identification, as we have already seen, these Samaritan believers receive the Holy Spirit.
On page 44, the new nature and the Spirit are confused. He says, "When the new life, the Spirit, came in." There are other instances of this, but I pass on to notice a statement on page 47 :

"But now being set free (Greek) from sin (God's act in Christ) and become servants to God (your act of surrender, needful to make yon realize that freedom which is in Christ), ye have your fruits unto holiness."

I do not argue against the believer surrendering. On the contrary I join Mr. McC. most earnestly in urging it. Nor do I oppose the thought that the surrender which he insists on is " needful" in order to " realize " or enjoy our "freedom which is in Christ." But I must strenuously resist the thought that this-our " act of surrender" is what makes us "servants to God." It is God's act in Christ, by which we are redeemed, through which we are saved, that establishes God's claim upon us and makes us His bond-servants. The extent of this claim we have to learn, and practically we find, as we yield ourselves to Him, our sense of the claim He has upon us is constantly deepening.

There is a statement on page 101 that needs to be corrected.

" Christ did not raise Himself:it was not so appointed:He was raised by another-the Father."

Acts 2:24 says, " Whom God hath raised up." Chap. iii 15 reads, "Whom God hath raised from the dead." The reader will find readily other passages in which the resurrection of the body of Jesus is attributed to God. Rom. 6:4 teaches us that "Christ was raised up from the dead by the glory of the Father." In i Pet. 3:18, we read that He was "quickened," or raised, "by the Spirit." In John 2:19, we find, "Jesus answered and said unto them, Destroy this temple" (His body), " and in three days I will raise it up." In accordance with this, we read in i Cor. 15:4, " He rose again the third day.'' The statement, " Christ did not raise Himself," denies Scripture and robs Him of glory which belongs to Him glory in which He shares jointly with the Father and the Spirit.

There is much more of like character in these writings, but I will not pursue the matter further. We have seen enough to refuse his system as being unscriptural. It weakens the power of the word of God in the souls of those who receive it. May the Lord keep His people from it.

In closing I think it is due to Mr. McC. that I should say there is much that is really good in his books. I join him heartily in seeking a truer spiritual state than is commonly found. While I have condemned his system, perhaps severely, yet I have eliminated the personal element altogether, or as nearly so as was possible. While I reject his system and warn the Lord's people against it, I can most cheerfully thank God for the evidences I have found of his personal piety, earnestness and zeal, godly purposes and a heart that is right with God.

May the truth which God has given us, in order that we may be in communion with Him, be deepened in the soul, both his and mine, and in the soul of the reader also. C. Crain

(Phil. 2:9-11.)

Our Lord and King,
To Thee we cling
While we Thy promise claim
Our brightest hope
In all its scope
Is centered in Thy name.

Through changing years
Thy love appears
Forevermore the same:
In earth and heaven
To Thee is given
By right the highest name.

And we draw near
In faith sincere
As first Thy loved ones came:
Thy smile is sweet
To all who meet
Alone in Thy great name.

Our hearts we raise
In grateful praise,
Touched by devotion's flame:
When in our need
For aid we plead
We know alone Thy name.

Though other themes,
Like fleeting dreams,
May end in fear and shame:
In light divine
Will ever shine
Thy one exalted name.

For truth revealed,
For spirits healed,
For souls set free from blame,
We evermore
Praise and adore
And glorify Thy name. T. Watson

5.MOSES, AARON, AND THE PRIESTLY HOUSE. (Numbers 3:38.) (Continued from page 42.)

We have brought before us in this verse the position occupied by the priestly house in association with Moses and Aaron, in reference to the tabernacle. " But those that encamp before the tabernacle toward the east, even before the tabernacle of the congregation eastward, shall be Moses and Aaron and his sons, keeping the charge of the sanctuary for the charge of the children of Israel; and the stranger that cometh nigh shall be put to death."

Our attention is here particularly called to the east, and those influences of this world which it may speak of to us. It is noticeable that this direction is spoken of twice in the verse-"east" and "eastward." In the original a different word is used in the second case from that employed in the first, and we get from this two very distinct thoughts. In the first case it is from a root meaning "to project," or "precede; " so that there is the thought of a preventative obstacle to advance toward the desired object. By this, hostility comes in. The character of the east wind agrees with this. "Its effects are thus described by a traveler in the desert:'When this wind blows, the atmosphere assumes a yellowish appearance, fading into gray, and the sun becomes of dusky red. The smell is nauseating and sulphurous, the vapor thick and heavy, and, when the heat increases, one is almost suffocated.'" (Ency. Biblica.) We can easily see how, in a natural way, these influences would be hostile to advance and continued progress in wilderness travel. But it has its spiritual meaning also. It speaks of the hatred, or enmity, of the world under Satan's power and control, which he desires to use in preventing all progress and development in a spiritual sense. He would use the adversity which so often besets us, and those things which are the needed trial of our faith, as a means to drive us back and out, if possible, from the maintenance of all faithfulness to God. In this connection Israel met her enemies as she traveled eastward toward the promised land, and so do we.

This is one side of what the east speaks of; but in the second case the word used means "sunrise." It presents to us the thought of that bright sunrise of glory which lies just a little beyond-our portion and eternal rest. Eastward is the direction in which our advance must be made; hence the enemy's malign power to oppose us; but the goal is God's glory; and without a doubt we shall reach it in spite of all.

Let us put these two aspects of the east together. For us undoubtedly there should be only one thing filling our eyes, that is the glorious light of the sunrise, God's glory. We have been taken out of the kingdom of darkness, and translated into the light of God. His glory, which is all light tempered for us by the rays of infinite love, is the portion for our faith, while, also, the ultimate end of our journey, our eternal abode. It is this, with all its connected blessings, that God would have in all its luster fill our eyes and hearts. A sky without a cloud, filled only with light. But then the east wind of adversity, trial, or, it may be, in the form of failure, and its consequent sorrow, blows upon us. What then ? How soon the atmosphere changes ! The light, with its brightness and joy, which we have been delighting in, seems to wane. There is that "fading into gray, and the sun becomes of a dusky red;" its brightness is deadened. How simple to translate this into the language of our spiritual experiences. And then, how the vapors of this world's noxious condition press one down with their nauseous fumes until, soul-sick and heart-racked, escape must be made. Then it is that Satan will seek to draw the heart away, for relief, to some other and fairer side of the world and its influences-perhaps westward or southward. But is our refuge, or way of escape, to be found in this way ? And if the soul will not yield to his lies and false ways, the fiery trial of persecution will be felt, with its hot and withering blast "the heat increases," says the traveler before quoted, "one is almost suffocated." The heart and soul writhe under the intense pressure, while Satan seeks to press in his evil wedge and turn the oppressed one into his destructive ways. Whither shall the burdened soul flee ? Where is the avenue of escape, and the refuge of peace and calm repose ? The brightness of the sunrise is dimmed:darkness has come in :the joy and previous sense of favor is gone. What is the way of recovery, and how obtained ?

Our answer is to be found in those who confront and face the east,-the priestly house,-who go in and out of the sanctuary, feeding upon the sacrifice and the "presence bread." Their charge, and the burden of their service, is all in connection with the sanctuary. Beloved, our way of triumph over eastern powers and their influences is abiding in the sanctuary, occupied with our priestly service therein. Thither must we ever flee. It is not a question of battling with those influences we have been describing. To do this would be but to feel their power the more:thus we would become weaker, and more easily fall a prey to the enemy's devices. We must ever turn to that blessed Presence from whence comes all our light and joy. The moment this is done the atmosphere is cleared, the sun shines as bright as ever. " We rejoice in hope of the glory of God." Well indeed will it be for us to maintain our priestly character and its associate blessings, as occupying the place of service eastward. And no fear need there be in turning to the sanctuary after failure has come. No smiting rod awaits us, but only the welcoming love of the Father. Christ now appears in the presence of God for us, and in His value we can ever enter without fear or doubt. Blessed, wondrous grace !

But let us notice the blessed association in which we are placed as occupying our priestly position. The priestly house encamps eastward with Moses and Aaron:they are typical of Christ as " the Apostle and High Priest of our confession " (Heb. 3:i). Moses was the appointed and faithful servant in God's house (the tabernacle) set over it all to govern and direct. The tabernacle pictures for us the Church of God in a double way. The court represents it in the individual aspect of the saints bearing before the world the testimony of the truth in practical righteousness. And it is this which blessedly introduces through the "One Way" of entrance to the Altar of Burnt-offering, where that sacrifice, wholly burnt and all sweet savor, was offered for the acceptance of the offerer, speaking of the one sacrifice of Christ; then to the Laver, the word of God, the means of practical sanctification and holiness. The boards, etc., speak of the Church in its corporate aspect, as seen by God in the glory Christ has given to it. Thus, the coverings which speak of Him cover all the structure, and the Church before God is in Christ, hid, as it were, under His wondrous perfections. Within this God dwells. Thus the Church is the temple of the Lord, and a habitation of God through the Spirit. In a broader sense, also, the tabernacle is a type of the whole universe of God. Moses, in connection with these typical meanings of the tabernacle, is the type of Christ as the Head over all things to the Church-"the Apostle," God's representative, who has been set in authority over all.

Aaron is the high priest ordering the priestly ministry-type of Christ as the great High Priest over the house of God, under whose leadership the whole universe will be filled with the sweet odor of praise and worship resulting from His service.

The other Levitical families, Gershon, Kohath, and Merari, are not in the same immediate and close relationship with Moses and Aaron as the priestly house is. Their service is especially toward men, but dependent upon, and flows out of, the performance in the first place of the priestly office. This is toward God, and in the sanctuary-thus in immediate association with the governing and priestly heads, since it was done in the place with which they are especially connected. Likewise with us in our priestly activity. It is in special connection with Christ, the governing Head and great High Priest, it being carried on for faith in the place where He now is, that is, in heaven, in God's presence. Our service typified in Gershon, Kohath, and Merari, is like theirs towards men, and entirely dependent upon the priestly service under the leadership of Christ being, first of all, properly fulfilled. Thus, the priests keep "the charge of the sanctuary," and upon the carrying out of this charge depended all other Levitical service. We see from this, that as priests in the sanctuary we are in the nearest relation to Christ of any; yea, all other relations flow from it. How blessed, then, to know we are in this position, and to maintain it in all its fulness! In this lies the secret of our progress and further advance, while also, alone, as occupying the place of service eastward in this character, can there be proper enjoyment of the glory and blessing God has made our own, and the victory gained over every hostile power or influence. May it be so with us to the glory of His grace!
J. B. Jr.

(To be continued.)

I will set thee up on high.

Lord, unto my soul Thou art
All, my all.
Yet, when I would fill my heart,
Oh how small
Its capacity I find,
And my narrow, finite mind
Shrinks before the infinite;
Lord, my God, Thou art very great.

Thou the holy, I th' unclean,
Yet, how blest! Thou hast made my head to lean
On Thy breast.
'Tis Thy pierced hand doth lead,
Yea, supplieth all my need;
And I'll soon behold Thy face;
Lord, my God, What wondrous grace!

Thou my Lord, my Saviour art
Near, so near;
To my lonely, longing heart,
None so dear.
Yet, the ground on which I tread
Fills me with a holy dread,
That for me Thou'st stooped to die;
Lord, my God, Thou art very high.-

Thou my Saviour, couldst not rest
Up on high
While my soul was still unblest,
Thou must die.
That alone Thou shouldst not be,
But, throughout eternity
Thou mightest have Thy loved ones there,
All the joys of heaven to share.

When I try to measure love-
Love like Thine,
And remember Thou hast "proved
It is mine-
Tho' I know Thy holy word
Never could deceive me Lord-
Yet, I own Thy love to me
Is a strange, sweet mystery.

Oft I ponder o'er Thy words,
Sweet to me,
And the meeting on the clouds
Soon to be:
And it seemeth hard to wait,
And Thy coming groweth late-
Will this longing ever cease ?
Never, till I see Thy face.

Tho' Thou art so great, so high,
Lord, my God,
Through Thy deep humility
And God's rod,
I was drawn from out the deep,
Dark abyss of Satan's keep,
Up to Thine own heart and home,
Henceforth nevermore to roam.

H. McD.

"Faith is not a force or power which the individual can use or manipulate at his pleasure. It is not some natural force of human character that can be lessened or increased at the will of the individual. Faith does not produce any of the grand truths which it makes real to the soul. The scientist does not create a single fact nor a single atom of what he discovers; he can but seek for and point out that which is already in existence. And so with faith:it does not create a single truth, but it does make truths already existent good to the soul. The only thing we can hope to do is to simply discover what God has for us as a fact, and by faith receive it-appropriate it. It is so with salvation; with our acceptance in Christ; our boldness to enter the holies by the blood of Christ:the facts are there, and it is the province of faith to make them real to the soul. The blessed fact in all this is that all the precious truth has its source in God-faith neither adds to nor takes away from it-it is of God, and stands in all His stability and perfection. Well for us that it is so. _F. H. J.

There seems to be need of considering afresh the subject of leprosy. There are frequent allusions to it in Scripture, but it is in Lev. 13:, 14:that we find the subject specifically treated of. These two chapters are a divine treatise on leprosy. Just what divine teaching about it is we may then expect to find there.

At the outset of our inquiry into the contents of these chapters we must remind ourselves that "all these things happened to them as types, and have been written for our admonition" (i Cor. 10:2:J.N.D.) So then there is "admonition," or instruction, for us -instruction about that which leprosy is a type of.

But of what is leprosy a type ? It is of primary importance to be clear as to this. Is it a type of sin
-sin in the flesh, the natural inheritance of every one born into the world ? Or is it a type of sin in its activity – in its outbreaking and outward manifestation ? Is it a type of sin in the sinner as in his sins merely-whether the inward evil nature or its external display-or, is it a type of either one or other of these in the believer as well ?

The distinction between sin in the flesh (an inward corrupt nature) and the manifestation of that nature in positive evil works ought not to be a difficult thing to realize. Scripture sufficiently makes the distinction. It speaks of " sin in the flesh" (Rom. viii 3) and of the "body of sin" (Chap. 6:6). We read also of " sinful flesh" and of " sin in the mortal body." It is plain the allusion is to the inherited corrupt nature which every child of Adam possesses. On the other hand we read of '' the works of the flesh" (Gal. 5:19)-things in which sinful flesh manifests itself, deeds which speak of the sinful nature in activity. Now with which of these two things is leprosy connected in Scripture? A glance at the concordance will easily convince one that the Spirit's use of the term leprosy is as a symbol of sin in activity. The activity may take different forms. It may be the working out of the " desires of the mind," or it may be the working out of the "lusts of the flesh," but in either case it is sin at work-the sinful nature manifesting itself in outward deeds.

That this is applicable to the mere sinner in his sins will, I think, be admitted by all. It will not be necessary, therefore, to dwell on this application. We may, then, proceed at once to inquire, Is it applicable to the believer ? With the list of cases of leprosy mentioned in Scripture before us, we cannot for a moment doubt that it is. If we did not find any reference to it in connection with the people of God we might doubt it. If every case spoken of clearly applied to those outside the acknowledged relationship with God we might then question it; but such is not the fact. We are forced then to conclude that leprosy as a type of sin in its activity has an application to the believer as well as to the unbeliever -to one who is a saint as well as to a mere sinner in his sins. And why refuse the application ? Is the activity of sin in a believer less heinous to God than it is in an unbeliever ? Must not the government of God be concerned with it in the case of a saint as well as in the case of a sinner in his sins ? It would be a serious reflection on the character of God not to think so.

Now the attentive reader of Lev. 13:and 14:will easily observe that leprosy is considered in three connections. It is looked at as connected with a person, a "garment" and a "house." As connected with the person it speaks of something in the person's character-what he is. It is some natural characteristic in exercise; some feature of the " mind of the flesh" displaying itself. " The mind of the flesh is not subject" to God. It is "enmity." The working out of this in subject mind is manifested in some outward act of disobedience, in which some feature peculiar to the person's natural character as in alienation from God is exhibiting itself. It is the will in exercise in opposition to the will of God.

As connected with a garment leprosy speaks of the activity of the sinful nature as occasioned by the circumstances in which we move. If these are not according to God, not answering to His holiness, they will induce habits unsuited to the mind, character and nature of God. It is not now the display merely of some natural characteristic; but the formation of a regular course of conduct, the establishment of habits to which the person conforms himself as thinking that they are necessitated by the circumstances in which he is. How dreadful this slavery to unholy circumstances! How awful the bondage to conditions that are not of God!

Leprosy in the house tells us of the home, the dwelling-place of the believer where the moral influences are such as make it a place abhorrent to God. The moral character of a believer's home should be founded on holiness. The tone, character and moral influences of the place should be such as to exercise a sanctifying effect; but if these, either entirely or even in part, are unholy, the sanctifying power of the truth is nullified and the character of God is compromised.

But may there not also be another application of leprosy in the house ? If the believer's home, in the moral character of it, is a picture of the house of God (and who will deny it ?) then the house here, while on the one hand applying to the dwelling place of the individual believer, on the other applies to the local assembly, as this in its own locality represents the whole house of God.

Now the moral and spiritual influences which characterize the dwelling place of the holy God should characterize every local assembly. There should be nothing in the moral make up of it, in the moral material of which it is composed, that is destructive of the holiness of God-nothing that compromises His holy name or blasphemes the Holy Spirit.

Having glanced at the various connections in which leprosy is mentioned and the application of it all, we must now turn to the subject of the proper method of dealing with it. Let our inquiry be, What has God revealed to us as His way for us to deal with leprosy ? What does divine teaching say to us about it ? If we study our chapters with which we are now concerned in the spirit of these questions, we shall surely find important instruction.

The first thing to be considered is the fact that leprosy is a matter for priestly discernment. The man in whom there was leprosy, in whom there was even the suspicion of it, was to be " brought unto Aaron, the priest, or unto one of his sons the priests." The garment was to be "shown unto the priest." The "owner of the house" was "to come and tell the priest." The priest here speaks of spiritual discernment-that discernment which is the fruit of nearness to God, of the enjoyment of the word of God in communion with Him. Now this makes the Scriptures the judge of what is leprosy. In having to do with it, acquaintance with the mind of God, as that is revealed in His written Word, should be sought. Without this acquaintance there is no proper capacity to judge, or discern. Spiritual understanding is the fruit of the truth held in communion with God ; the mind, conscience and heart exercised by it. Alas! how many forfeit their right to deal with evil through failing to seek spiritual discernment. What a sad spectacle is a man dealing with leprosy apart from that ability which the word of God alone gives! Let us keep in mind that, if called on to discern evil, we need spiritual discernment.

The spiritual mind will find provision has been made to secure him in a right judgment. While on the one hand there must be no flinching from judgment in a plain and clear case, yet on the other hand there must be no undue haste to judge. If the case is not clearly manifest when first investigated, it must then be watched. Things that differ must be distinguished. There must be no confounding with leprosy what is not in fact that. A simple mistake, an unintentional error, being suddenly overtaken in a fault, anything in which the mind of the flesh is not really working, must not be mistaken for leprosy, which is the mind of the flesh in active opposition to the will of God. In how many cases, time to observe and watch is necessary. The mere appearance of what seems to be symptoms of leprosy may be indeed ground for suspicion, but it is not ground for judgment. If there are suspicious indications, then they are to be carefully watched until it becomes clear whether it is a real case of leprosy or not.

On the other hand there should be no negligence, or indifference. Our instructions simply submitted to will preserve us from this as well as from hasty judgment. Furthermore, they give us infallible evidence of the existence of a real case of leprosy. Spiritual decay (the "hair turned white"), while always present when evil is active in a person, may also result from other causes, and hence must not be the sole ground for judging a case to be leprosy. But if this is found in combination with the energy of inward evil-a "spot deeper than the skin," then it is a clear case. Spiritual discernment will distinguish between mere surface signs-what is merely casual and unintentional-and signs of deep-seated evil.

Again, there must be discernment as to whether it is a case in which the energy of spiritual life has overcome the evil, or if the evil is a matter of present activity. If through the power of the spiritual
life asserting itself there is the frank, sincere acknowledgment of the evil and submission to the judgment of God upon it in the light of the cross of Christ(" all the skin covered") it is not a case of evil at work. In this case there has been deliverance and recovery.

Again, there are various weaknesses and infirmities which attach to us all, but which priestly discernment will readily distinguish from leprosy. Still these things may develop into leprosy, or be the occasion of its setting in. While they need careful attention they must not be confounded with the activity of inward evil.

The same carefulness and spiritual discernment must be employed in the case of leprosy in a " garment" or in a "dwelling." The judgments of the Lord are true and righteous altogether. How needful always to remember this. C. Crain

(To be continued.)

(Extract from "Papers on Evangelization," by C. H. M.)

And in the first place I deeply feel our lack of a prayerful spirit in carrying on the work of evangelization. I have referred to the subject of the Spirit's work; and also to the place which God's word ought ever to get; but it strikes me we are very deficient in reference to the matter of earnest, persevering, believing prayer. This is the true secret of power. " We," say the apostles, " will give ourselves continually to prayer and to the ministry of the Word."

Here is the order :" Prayer, and the ministry of the Word." Prayer brings in the power of God; and this is what we want. It is not the power of eloquence, but the power of God; and this can only be had by waiting upon Him. " He giveth power to the faint; and to them that have no might He increaseth strength. . . . they that wait upon the Lord shall renew their strength" (Isa. 40:29. 31).

It seems to me, dearest A., that we are far too mechanical, if I may so express myself, in the work. There is too much of what I may call going through a service. I greatly fear that some of us are more on our legs than on our knees; more in the railway carriage than in the closet; more on the road than in the sanctuary ; more before men than before God. This will never do. It is impossible that our preaching can be marked by power and crowned with results, if we fail in waiting upon God.

But there is more than this. We fail in our public meetings for prayer. The great work of evangelization is not sufficiently remembered in our prayer-meetings. It is not definitely, earnestly, and constantly kept before God in our public reunions. It may occasionally be introduced in a cursory, formal manner, and then dismissed. Indeed, I feel there is a great lack of earnestness and perseverance in our prayer-meetings generally, not merely as to the work of the gospel, but as to other things as well. We do not seem like men in earnest. We seem to forget that God will be inquired of; and that He is a rewarder of them that diligently seek Him.

And if we fail in waiting on Him, He will get others to do His work. The work will be done, no doubt, but we shall lose the dignity, the privilege, and the reward of working. Is this nothing ? Is it nothing to be deprived of the sweet privilege of being co-workers with God, of having fellowship with Him in the blessed work which He is carrying on? Alas! alas ! that we prize it so little. Still we do prize it; and perhaps there are few things in which we can more fully taste this privilege than in united earnest prayer. Here every saint can join. Here all can add their cordial Amen. All may not be preachers ; but all can pray-all join in prayer; all can have fellowship.

Moreover, when this is the case, when this most excellent spirit pervades the whole assembly, you may be sure there will be no trouble as to what is called "The responsibility of the preaching." It will be all the same who does the work, provided it is done as well as it can be. If the assembly is waiting upon God, in earnest intercession for the progress of the work, it will not be a question as to the one who is to take the preaching, provided Christ is preached and souls are blessed.

We have but little conception of what an assembly would be were each one distinctly led by the Holy Ghost, and gathered only to Jesus. We should not then have to complain of dull, heavy, unprofitable, trying meetings. We should have no fear of an unhallowed intrusion of mere nature and its restless doings-no making of prayer-no talking for talking's sake -no hymn-book seized to fill a gap. Each one would know his place in the Lord's immediate presence-each gifted vessel would be filled, fitted, and used by the Master's hand-each eye would be directed to Jesus- each heart occupied with Him. If a chapter were read, it would be the very voice of God. If a word were spoken, it would tell with power upon the heart. If prayer were offered, it would lead the soul into the very presence of God, If a hymn were sung, it would lift the spirit up to God, and be like sweeping the strings of the heavenly harp. We should have no ready-made sermons -no teaching or preaching prayers, as though we would explain doctrines to God-no praying at our neighbors, or asking for all manner of graces for them, in which we ourselves are lamentably deficient-no singing for music's sake, or being disturbed if harmony be interfered with. All these evils would be avoided. We should feel ourselves in the very sanctuary of God, and enjoy a foretaste of that time when we shall worship in the courts above, and go no more out.

We may be asked, "Where will you find all this down here?" Ah! this is the question. It is one thing to present a beau ideal on paper, and another thing to realize it in the midst of error, failure, and infirmity. Through mercy, some of us have tasted, at times, a little of this blessedness. We have occasionally enjoyed moments of heaven upon earth. Oh, for more of it! May the Lord, in His great mercy, raise the tone of the assemblies everywhere! May He greatly enlarge our capacity for more profound communion and spiritual worship ! May He enable us so to walk in private life from day to day, so as to judge ourselves and our ways in His holy presence, that at least we may not prove a lump of lead or a waster to any of God's assemblies.

And then, even though we may not be able to reach in experience the full expression of the assembly, yet let us never be satisfied with anything less. Let us honestly aim at the loftiest standard, and earnestly pray to be lifted up thereto. As to the ground of God's assembly, we should hold it with jealous tenacity, and never consent for an hour to occupy any other. As to the tone and character of an assembly, they may and will vary immensely, and will depend upon the faith and spirituality of those gathered. Where the tone of things is felt to be low-when meetings are felt to be unprofitable- where things are said and done repeatedly which are felt by the spiritual to be wholly out of place, let all who feel it wait on God-wait continually -wait believingly -and He will assuredly hear and answer. In this way the very trials and exercises which are peculiar to an assembly will have the happy effect of casting us more immediately upon Him; and thus the eater will yield meat, and the strong sweetness. We must count upon trials and difficulties in any expression of the assembly, just because it is the right and divine way for God's people on earth. The devil will put forth every effort to drive us from that true and holy ground. He will try the patience, try the temper, hurt the feelings, cause offence in nameless and numberless ways-anything and everything to make us forsake the true ground of the assembly.

It is well to remember this. We can only hold the divine ground by faith. This marks the assembly of God, and distinguishes it from every human system. You cannot get on there save by faith. And, further, if you want to be somebody, if you are seeking a place, if you want to exalt self, you need not think of any true expression of the assembly. You will soon find your level there, if it be any measure what it should be. Fleshly or worldly greatness, in any shape, will be of no account in such an assembly. The Divine Presence withers up everything of that kind, and levels all human pretension.

Finally, you cannot get on in the assembly if you are living in secret sin. The Divine Presence will not suit you. Have we not often experienced in the assembly a feeling of uneasiness, caused by the recollection of many things which had escaped our notice during the week? Wrong thoughts-foolish words-unspiritual ways-all these things crowd in upon the mind, and exercise the conscience, in the assembly ! How is this? Because the atmosphere of the assembly is more searching than that which we have been breathing during the week. We have not been in the presence of God in our private walk. We have not been judging ourselves; and hence, when we take our place in a spiritual assembly, our hearts are detected-our ways are exposed in the light; and that exercise which ought to have gone on in private -even the needed exercise of self-judgment, must go on at the table of the Lord. This is poor, miserable work for us, but it proves the power of the presence of God in the assembly. Things must be in a miserably low state in any assembly when hearts are not thus detected and exposed. It is a fine evidence of the power of the Holy Spirit in an assembly when careless, carnal, worldly, self-exalting, money loving, unprincipled persons are compel-led to judge themselves in God's presence, or, failing this, are driven away by the spirituality of the atmosphere. Such an assembly is no place for these. They can breathe more freely outside.

From C. H. M's " The Assembly of God."

QUES. 7. – In 2 Chron. 11:20, the mother of Abijah is called Maachah, the daughter of Absalom. In 13:2, she is called Michaiah, the daughter of Uriel of Gibeah. What is the explanation " this difference? Is there any special teaching connected with it.

ANS. – Absalom and Abishalom (1 Kings 15:2) are variants of the same name. Some have tried to explain Maachah and Michaiah in the same way, but without, good grounds for it. The Septuagint has Maachah in 2 Chron. 13:2, which implies that Michaiah was substituted for Maachah by some copyist of the Hebrew after the Septuagint was executed. There is evidence of an early date for this substitution as both Josephus and the Vulgate are witnesses. There is another point to be borne in mind. The Hebrew word for daughter may also be used for granddaughter. It often is. Mother is also used for grand-mother. So also queen may be queen-wife or queen-mother. In 1 Kings, 15:10, 13 and 2 Chron. 15:16, mother should be taken as grandmother, and queen as queen-mother. Queen-mother was an official title, which could be forfeited.

Now Absalom had a daughter whose name was Tamar (2 Sam. 14:27). It would seem that she became the wife of Uriel of Gibeah, and by him the mother of Maachah, who was married to Rehoboam and became the mother of Abijah. She was thus the grand-mother of Asa, and, supposing the mother of Asa to be dead, would hold under him the office of queen-mother, which he took from her. Josephus calls Maachah "daughter of Absalom by Tamar," 1:e., he considered her to be a grand-daughter of Absalom.

Now as to the special teaching connected with this, Absalom represents an influence operating in the days of David quite inconsistent with one form of his name (Absalom, "the father of peace") but strikingly consistent with the other form (Abishalom, " my father is peace"). "We have here the principle of traditionalism as the basis of peace, yet in practical effect a source of conflict. Tamar means palm, palm-tree, and suggests in this connection, I think, the prosperity of traditionalism. But the fruit of the prevalence of the principle of tradition is oppression, tyranny. This is what Maachah means. By the usurpation of authority, a false worship has been established which requires the faith of an Asa, (healer, restorer) to destroy. C. CRAIN.

QUES. 8.-In 1 Kings 9:28, we read that 420 talents of gold were brought to king Solomon, while in 2 Chron. 8:18, it is stated to be 450. In what way is this difference to be reconciled ?

ans,-Some have thought there was a double standard, a sacred and a royal. Others speak of a sacred and commercial standard. I am not able to find satisfactory evidence of it; but if true it is a possible explanation of the difference in the two statements ; if not, we must suppose a copyist's error. I cannot say which verse is to be regarded as containing the error. C. CRAIN.

"There will be no divisions in heaven, and there ought to be none on earth among Christians." True, but the reason why Christians will all be one in heaven is that every one there will have confessed and judged all sin, and be filled therefore with the mind of God. That will make them of one mind and of one heart.

Let it be so here, and all divisions among the people of God will be at an end. How solemn is the thought! How responsible it makes each one of us! Our most secret individual ways have to do with the most public failures of the people of God. It is often, alas, when we walk in the greatest self-indulgence that we can most vehemently condemn the divided condition of God's people. To weep over it, and minister acceptably to God in the midst of the ruin, is quite another thing.

"Keep thy heart with all diligence; for out of it are the issues of life."-Prov. 4:23.

God's love rests upon all His own alike because they are all alike linked with Christ by one Spirit; all possessors of the same eternal life with and in Him; all alike washed from their sins by His blood.

But there is a vast difference in the pleasure which God may find in the different individuals of His people. "Greatly beloved " is not His message to many of them. It was to Daniel who, from his youth, had set his heart to please God. He had realized that the heart must be right if the issues of life were to be right. He had sought that diligently, through self-denial, and had found it.

Moses was another. He had discarded all personal advantage and ease, and, entering into God's heart about His people, had cast his lot with them. Viewing them with God's eye, in the light of God's purpose toward them at the end, he suffered at their very hands all manner of opposition and reproach, and fulfilled his service. He had a single eye, and the issues of life manifested it. Therefore "the Lord spake unto Moses face to face, as a man speaketh unto his friend."

The apostle Paul was another. He had sincerely believed Jesus to be an impostor, and he had accordingly pursued to the death His followers. But now all is changed. He knows who and what Jesus is, and he is at His feet. No reserve, no division of interests. Christ for that heart and that heart for Christ, henceforth Christ may do with him as He likes. The heart is right, and the issues of life, long and arduous as it may be, prove it. He will be honored therefore with marks of special favor, and the highest of all dispensations committed to him.

How God encourages us in these and many other instances of men like ourselves, to keep our heart with all diligence, knowing that out of it are the issues of life.

The circumstances of one life are never repeated in another. What God has committed to one is not I the same in another, even in the same dispensation. This frees God's men from being mere imitators of each other, save in the devotedness and moral qualities seen in the former ones. Mere imitation is but fanaticism. It is the heart God wants. '' My son give Me thy heart." When He has that, the defects in His servant will be overcome; the weakness of the vessel will but serve God's strength; in the anxiety to please the Lord in everything, the knowledge of His mind will be acquired in such a fashion as to give understanding to the simple, power to the weak, and wisdom to the foolish.

Humility – The only true independence is in humility; for the humble man exacts nothing, and cannot be mortified-expects nothing, and cannot be disappointed. Humility is also a healing virtue:it will cicatrize a thousand wounds, which pride would keep forever open. But humility is not the virtue of a fool, since it is not consequent upon any comparison between ourselves and others, but between what we are and what we ought to be-which no man ever was. Selected.

At the Manchester, Kansas Conference Oct. 1905 Chap. 1:-2:14.

Note first how the apostle insists on his apostle-ship. On this depends the authority of the teaching. It was to establish the divine authority of apostolic teaching that God imparted miraculous gifts until the whole revelation He was giving us through them was completed.

Ques. But why should he insist on his apostle-ship here more than elsewhere ?

Because false teachers had come in to subvert the truth, and when that is the case there must be a recognized authority to settle where the right is. The word of "an apostle … by Jesus Christ, and God the Father" settles everything.

Mark in verse 4 the object Christ had in giving Himself for our sins. It is not to deliver us from the wrath to come, as elsewhere, but "from this present evil world." The false doctrine which had come in among the assemblies of Galatia had for its end the linking them again with the world, as indeed all false doctrine does. The devil dreads a church that is holy and separated to Christ, because in that alone is true testimony for Christ to the world.

Ques. What was the special evil doctrine which had come in among the Galatians ?

He begins to discuss that in the next chapter, then onward, as we shall see. Here he only alludes to it.

He marvels that they should so soon be removed from Him that called them into the grace of Christ to " another gospel, which is not another." It is a perversion of it. And as the true gospel is the very glory of God, and the only true blessing of man, he twice pronounces anathema upon any being, man or angel, himself included, who would pervert it. It has become, alas, so universally perverted that, throughout Christendom, it is an exception now to hear a pure gospel. The reformation recovered it in part, but until the new reformation among Protestants of late years one seldom heard a pure gospel among them either. They had it all so mixed with law that none could you find who knew he had eternal life-who knew that he was justified from all his sins by the cross of Christ; none therefore who enjoyed "peace with God." The most pious doubted the most, for the nearer we get to God the more we feel our sinfulness and unfitness to dwell with God. It is the revelation made in the gospel of the grace of God which brings peace and liberty.

Ques. Why does Paul dwell so much on his having received nothing of the gospel which he preaches from any of those who were already apostles before him ?

Because his gospel is a further revelation, beginning, so to speak, where the others end-a revelation of things in Christ which no other had, which Christ had not taught to the twelve when He was with them upon earth, and which completes the unfolding of God's eternal counsels. After Paul there is no more to be said; there is no further revelation to be made. Col. 1:25, 26 tells us that.

The gospel of the other apostles was still connected with the Kingdom; with the earthly hope therefore; the Jewish nation in the lead, the Gentile nations after-eating the crumbs. The salvation they preach until Paul's gospel comes to the front, is still in view of earth, of the kingdom from the heavens set up here on earth. No attentive reader can fail to see the marked difference between the preaching in the first seven chapters of Acts and that which follows after. The speech and stoning of Stephen show all hope of national Jewish repentance is over, and therefore the establishment of the Kingdom for the present must be given up. Saul's conversion takes place, the new gospel is revealed to him by the Lord from heaven, and henceforth the Spirit gives him the lead. It is his gospel which marks this present dispensation. In it, baptism is in the background, as in the other it was in the forefront. In it, the full ruin of man and the full grace of God are told out, and the treasures of that grace brought to light. And, mark it well, the most ignored and obnoxious part of the Scriptures to a fallen Christendom is what comes through Paul. Satan always attacks first what in the purpose of God is first for the time being, because whatever is the purpose of God for the time being is the only true testimony.

Ques. Is not Christ always the same, and always the heart of the gospel?

Surely so. There are many things, however, concerning Christ, and very different from each other. Christ as king of the Jews, which He is yet to be, is a very different thing from Christ as Head of the
Church.

Chap. ii, 15-3:14.

Here now begins Paul's defense of the gospel which he has received from the Lord:even they, Jews, whose lives were regulated by the law and not lawless and licentious as the Gentiles, even they had
learned that their moral lives could not justify them before God. It was by the faith of Christ alone they could be justified, as any other man; "for by the works of the law shall no flesh be justified." The best of men are justified before God only through and in Christ, and the worst are justified before God in the same way.

But if we are thus freely and absolutely justified by this provision, of the grace of God through the cross of His Son Jesus Christ, will it not lead us to sin ? God forbid. Christ is our Master now, and He leads not to sin. He has made us free. He has died under the sentence of the law which rested upon us, and in His death, which ends all the claims of law against us, we have died to the law, and can now live to God in blessed freedom.

You see, brethren, it is not merely that our sins have been put away by the cross of Christ, but we, ourselves, have been put to death there. To the man who knows himself, who realizes that only evil is the make up of his fallen nature, and that try as he may he cannot improve it, and that, moreover, God Himself never improves it, to that man, I say, what an unspeakable deliverance it is to know that by the act of God he himself has been "crucified with Christ." We get eternal life upon believing on the Lord Jesus Christ; we get peace upon learning that He '' was delivered for our offences and raised again for our justification;" we get deliverance, and oh how blessed a deliverance! when we learn that we have been crucified with Him. Do we all know that deliverance ? Are we earnest enough to be unable to do without it ?

Thus, the grace of God is not frustrated. It is maintained in all its glory, and its effects are seen in the holiness of life it produces.

Ques. What is the force of " Christ crucified among you ?"

It refers to the vividness with which Paul had preached the gospel among them. He had in his preaching so held up the death of Christ, as their only hope and ground of salvation, that they had no excuse for returning again to their own works; in so doing they were making the death of Christ a useless thing. Legality puts up good works for justification instead of the death of Christ for me, and again it puts up good works for sanctification instead of my death in His. Wherever legality begins there Christ ends, or is made useless. But God puts Christ everywhere. There is no place before God for the first man; all blessing is in Christ.

Law produces no persecution, for its principle is human. Grace does. Its principle is divine, and man opposes it. Paul appeals to what the Galatians had suffered on account of it. Had they then made a mistake ? When they had received Christ they had also received the Holy Spirit. Had the law ever given the Holy Spirit to men ? Brethren, do we realize that in all the gifts God has given us in Christ He is thereby displaying the honor which belongs to Christ, for whose sake He gives them, while thus blessing us beyond all that man could ever ask or think ?

Ques. Why is Abraham always spoken of as the father of faith ? Were not other men of God before him men of faith too ?

Yes, surely. Heb. 11:is witness to that; but Abraham is the first man in whom God reveals faith as the principle of justification before Him, and of separation from the world. He believed God and he was thereby accounted righteous-no sin any more to be charged against him. So we believe too, and we also are accounted righteous.

But God is righteous and holy. How then can He thus pronounce us righteous before Him whilst a multitude of sins has filled our days for which His righteous and holy law had cursed us? There is the blessed, glorious secret:"Christ hath redeemed us from the curse of the law, being made a curse for us." So faith is the principle of our justification, but the atoning sacrifice of our Lord is its holy ground and righteous cause. Dear brethren, is it not sufficient? Were the Galatians wise in trying to add to it? The apostle calls them "foolish."

Ques. What is the "promise of the Spirit" in ver. 14 ? Is it the Spirit Himself, or something the Spirit has promised ?

It is the Spirit Himself, who was promised before. The curse is removed; by the "one offering" of Christ we who are of faith are "perfected forever," and so God gives us His Spirit to dwell in us as the seal of that perfection; as the earnest of our glorious inheritance ahead; as the Uniter of all believers in one body; as the Communicator to our souls of all the blessings that are ours in Christ, and the Leader of the Church of God in her journey through the wilderness. May we learn to value the grace of God in this great gift of the Spirit, that we may neither grieve Him in His holiness nor quench Him in His operations.

(To be concluded in our next number).