A Goodly Heritage

Can we do anything to render our death—which cannot be far off—both safe and comfortable? No doubt, by God's grace, we can do much to accomplish these desirable ends if we will set about the work in good earnest. I know that there is a feeling of despondency habitually existing in the minds of some aged people of serious disposition, which leads them to conclude that, if they are not now prepared to die, they never will be. And from all the acquaintance which I have had with professors of religion, I am constrained to think that, as their near approach to the grave does not increase their impressions of the importance of eternal realities. In like manner, old age has no tendency to render the evidences of their union with Christ more clear and satisfactory. You may frequently inquire of a dozen such professors in succession, whether they have obtained a comfortable assurance of the goodness of their spiritual condition, and the probability is that four out of five, if not nine

That a just God will render to every man according to his character and works, is a dictate of reason. Conscience also intimates to every man, when he sins, that he deserves to be punished; and when we see or hear of great crimes committed by others, such as murders, perjuries, robbery, or treachery, we feel something within us demanding that such should receive condign punishment. But we see that the wicked are not always punished in this world according to their evil deeds; it seems reasonable, therefore, to expect that there will be a judgment after death. We are not left, however, to the mere dictates of reason on this subject: God, in his word, has revealed in the clearest manner that there will be a day of reckoning at the end of the world. This day is appointed, and will certainly come. It is not so certain that we shall ever see the sun rise again, as it is that we shall see the day of judgment. The Lord Jesus Christ is also appointed to act as Judge on that day: "beca

Archibald Alexander Heaven is a  reality , not seen by eyes of flesh, but made known by revelation, and received by faith. Heaven is a  rest  from toil, trouble, temptation, and sin. Such a rest is very desirable, if it were only a sweet sleep; but heaven is more. It is a state of delightful  activity . Every faculty and every affection will find appropriate exercise; and probably latent powers, not needed here, will there be waked into activity—powers suited to the new condition in which the soul exists. Heaven is full of  light ; all darkness and doubt are absent. Knowledge will there be clear, and will possess a transforming efficacy; still, knowledge in heaven will be progressive; the pleasure will partly consist in ever learning something unknown before. Heaven is a region of perfect  love ; all the heart and mind and strength will be exerted in love. And if the power of loving should, in the progress of the immortal soul, be increased a thousand-fold, all this incr

Here the apostle setteth down three especial marks by which the children of God are known: the first is the joy of their hope; the second, the assurance of it; the third, the constancy and perseverance unto the end. And let us not think but that God hath done thus with us, whom He hath chosen to eternal life. He hath prepared our hearts to know and feel His unspeakable gift which He hath given us; for if we should bestow any gift upon men, we are not so unwise to give a precious thing unto him that knows not what it is; we would not give him a diamond that would think it to be a piece of glass, nor we would not give him a pearl that would think it to be a grain of salt, for we should lose both our labour and our thanks. And shall we think the Lord will so bestow His heavenly blessings? Will He give His gifts to those that know them not, who cannot give Him again the praise of His goodness? No, He will never do it; but, as Peter saith, He hath taken us for His own people to the end we

Where it is said further, "God laid the foundations of the earth, and the heavens are the works of His hands." We must consider the creation of the world is thus attributed to God, not only because all things were made by Him, but because He hath so made them that they carry a mark imprinted in them of the power and Godhead of the Creator. When I see the heavens I must see His greatness, who was able to set such a covering over the earth. When I behold the earth, I must behold His providence, who hath ordained such a place of nourishment for all creatures. When I look upon the unchangeable course in which all things are established, I must look upon His constant wisdom and goodness, who in a steadfast purpose hath extended His mercies over all His works. In the least of all the creatures of God, when I see wisdom, power, glory, more than all the world can reach their hands unto, let me humble myself under His high majesty, before whom no king, no prince, no power of the worl

It is a logical mistake to abandon faith in the Lord Jesus because of difficulties, insoluble perhaps to us, which occur in the books of the Old Testament. Look at the block of marble which has only just begun to feel the formative hand of the sculptor, and you may be uncertain whether or no the great master has realty had anything to do with the rough hewing of the still unshapely mass; but because of this you will not hesitate when the idea of the artist is perfected, when the marble has been inspired with beauty, majesty, and strength, and seems to have caught an immortal life from the imagination of genius. And so, whatever difficulty any of you may have for a time — and I believe it will only be for a time — in discovering the presence of God in His primitive revelations to the human race, this should be no reason for regarding with diminished faith the full revelation He has made of Himself in His Son. R. W. Dale, LL. D.

In these few words are set forth the relation in which the two dispensations stand to one another, the light in which the revelation as a whole is to be regarded. No words can more strongly lay down a principle which was for long regarded with suspicion. That revelation was given by degrees. This truth is necessary in order to prove the necessity or even the allowableness of Christianity; the incompleteness of the first covenant must be admitted ere the reason for the existence of the second could be perceived. God had undoubtedly spoken, but how had He spoken? He had spoken at sundry times and in divers manners. 1.  At sundry times, or rather, by divers portions. It was by degrees — fragmentarily — one truth at one time. another at another. And the degree in which God was known, in which He had been manifested to successive generations, was clearly not the same in all. There might be faith, there might be obedience in all ages to Him who was invisible; but unquestionably, though th

The great object of the Epistle is to describe the contrast between the old and the new covenant. But this contrast is based upon their unity. The new covenant is contrasted with the old covenant, not in the way in which the light of the knowledge of God is contrast d with the darkness and ignorance of heathenism, for the old covenant also is of God, and is therefore possessed of Divine glory. Great is the glory of the old covenant; yet greater is the glory of the new dispensation, when in the fulness of time God sent forth His own Son and gave unto us the substance of those things of which in the old times He had shown types and prophecy. "God hath spoken unto the fathers"; and by that expression "unto the fathers" the apostle reminds us that without a church, without a union of believers, without a manifestation of God in grace, historically, among a people whom He had set apart for His service, there would have been no Scripture; and that there was a congregatio

And again He stooped down. It is with sins as with men, some have pedigree and some have not; for some are, and have always been, held in respect and others in contempt. The sins of place, power, bravery, genius, and those of felony, vice, brutality, are judged differently. These distinctions had little weight with Christ, and He deals with the hypocrisies of religion, the impostures of learning, and the gilded shows gotten by extortion in terms of abhorrence. Hence the jealousy with which He was watched, and the endeavours of the rabbis to draw Him into some kind of treason in His doctrine, because they feared His influence with the people, and lest He might head a revolution which would subvert the present social order. Hence the plot here so signally frustrated. And now look upon these scribes, etc., as they withdraw and follow them as Christ add the whole assembly did. Observe the orderly manner of their shame, "beginning at the eldest," etc. See how care. fully they

Jesus is writing as one in an office, absorbed in some account, might write, not hearing the question another had put to Him. They think He will answer directly, but He continues writing. They continue asking, and press Him for a reply. Possibly they enlarge on the heinousness of the offence — an easy task and a sort of solace for a bad conscience. These men knew that they had committed sin enough, which should have made them charitable, but it did not. Christ is never in a hurry to condemn; hence His silence. Moreover, He had no wish to be judge. "Who made Me a ruler and a judge over you?" They think Jesus is pondering a reply; He has no need, for one is ready. He keeps it back for some time, knowing that silence up to a certain point is more powerful than speech. They ask Him the more vehemently, for the silence now becomes painful. How they wish He would cease that writing and say something! They could bear an open accusation. That could be rebutted with all the force of

John 8:3-11 And the scribes and Pharisees brought to him a woman taken in adultery; and when they had set her in the middle,… No thoughtful Christian can fail to have been struck by the fact that except these few words Christ wrote nothing. He did not bow down over a table piled with manuscripts, and in hours of meditative thought, during which He outwatched the stars, erect a monument which might be admired by a succession of sages and critics; He did not write out the complete text of an elaborate system of theology. He went out into the throng of men. He spoke by the highways and the lake side, in words which, if they were high as heaven and deep as the transparent lake, were in form broad and popular. When we consider the analogy of the "tables which were the work of God" and "the writing which was the writing of God" ( Exodus 32:16 ), and the value of books in excluding error and securing permanence, we ask why He did not write. There is one reason

Preachers must pray much . Look at Baxter! he stained his study walls with praying breath, and, after he got anointed with the unction of the Holy Ghost, sent a river of living water over Kidderminster, and converted hundreds. Luther and his coadjutors were men of such mighty pleading with God, that they broke the spell of ages, and laid nations subdued at the foot of the cross. John Knox grasped in his strong arms of faith all Scotland: his prayers terrified tyrants. Whitefield, after much holy, faithful closet pleading, went to the devil's fair, and took more than a thousand souls out of the paw of the lion in one day. See a praying Wesley turn more than ten thousand souls to the Lord! Look at the praying Finney, whose prayers, faith, sermons, and writings have shaken the half of America, and sent a wave through the British churches.

At the close of the day Jesus withdrew to the Mount of Olives, and it is interesting to trace in Him once more that dislike of crowded cities, that love for the pure, sweet, fresh air, and for the quiet of the lonely hill, which we see in all parts of His career. There was, indeed, in Him nothing of that supercilious sentimentality and morbid egotism which makes men shrink from all contact with their brother men; nor can they who would be His true servants belong to those merely fantastic philanthropists "who," as Coleridge says, "sigh for wretchedness, yet shun the wretched, nursing in some delicious solitude their dainty loves and slothful sympathies." On the contrary, day after day, while His daytime of work continued, we find Him sacrificing all that was dearest and most elevating to His soul, and in spite of heat and pressure and conflict and weariness, calmly pursuing His labours of love amid "the madding crowd's ignoble strife." But in the nigh

Let us talk a little about what is known as environment. Men are apt to think they would be better if their circumstances, their surroundings were of another kind and quality. They do not go in upon themselves and say, We are to blame. We must get rid of that delusion before we can make any real progress in life. All history shows us that whatever a man's environment may be he can conquer it; or he can respond to it in the degree in which it is Divine, beautiful, and fascinating. Where did man first fall, according to the Biblical history? Was it in some narrow, ill-lighted street? Was it in soma swamp or wilderness? It was possible to fall in Eden. Therefore do not say that if you were in Eden you would be safe. Men say that, if they were only in the city, at the very centre of civilisation, if they had the security of social life as it is to be found in the metropolis of any country, all would go well. The Apostle Paul answers that in our text, "In perils in the city.&quo