“he is precious.”

: “To them who are disobedient, the stone which the builders disallowed, the same is made the head of the corner, and a stone of stumbling, and a rock of offence, even to them which stumble at the word, being disobedient; whereunto also they were appointed.” The language is elliptical, and the manner in which the ellipsis is to be supplied, depends on the manner in which you translate and explain the clause which immediately precedes, rendered in our version, “he is precious.” “To you who believe, he,” that is, Jesus Christ, “is precious;” he is highly valued by you. Supposing this to be the true rendering, the ellipsis must be thus supplied, ‘To them who are disobedient, he is contemptible; by them he is undervalued and despised;' and what follows should be the illustration of this. I have already stated to you the reason why I cannot consider these words, “To you who believe, he is precious,”—though embodying in them a truth very dear to the heart of every Christian, expressed in words very delightful to the ears of every Christian—as giving the meaning of the inspired writer. They are not the natural meaning of the original words. The statement they contain does not well accord either with what goes before, or with what follows them. It is plainly a conclusion or inference from the prophet's declaration, “He who believeth” on Christ, as the foundation, “shall not be ashamed.” Now, that Christ is precious to believers, is no inference from this declaration; and the words that follow are plainly meant to be a contrast; but what contrast is there between these statements? Christ, as the foundation, is precious to believers; but unbelievers stumble over him so as to fall, and to be broken, and perish. The natural contrast is, Christ is precious to believers; he is little prized by unbelievers. On the supposition, that the true rendering of the words is, “to you who believe there is honor,” a rendering warranted, if not absolutely required, by the original terms, and giving exactly the inference warranted by the prophet's declaration, “he that believeth on him shall not be confounded” to you, then, that believe, there is, according to the prophet's declaration, not shame, but honor—on the supposition that this is the true rendering, the ellipsis must be thus supplied, ‘To you, then, who believe there is honor, but to those who are disobedient, there is shame.' What follows is the illustration of this. The stone which they, like the builders, disallowed, is, in spite of their disallowance, made the head stone of the corner. This must cover them with shame and confusion. Nor is this all; they stumble over the stone which they refuse to build on, and are, in consequence, broken in pieces. There is a reference here to two passages of Old Testament prediction: “The stone which the builders rejected is become the head stone of the corner;” “and he shall be for a sanctuary; but for a stone of stumbling, and for a rock of offence, to both the houses of Israel; for a gin and for a snare to the inhabitants of Jerusalem. And many among them shall stumble, and fall, and be broken, and snared, and taken.” The figure seems to be this: ‘You, the unbelieving and disobedient, rejected the stone laid by God in Zion, and would not build on it; yet, in spite of your rejection, this stone is made the head stone, that is, the chief stone of the corner; and multitudes build on it, and grow up into a holy temple in the Lord.' The word “head stone,” does not refer to its being the topmost, but the principal stone of the corner. Indeed, it seems plain, the stone referred to is a foundation stone, not a cope stone, and this explains what follows. Not only shall the stone you reject be made the chief stone of the corner; but as foundation cornerstones often projected from the building, it shall become to you “a stone of stumbling, a rock of offence,” two expressions of exactly parallel meaning; a stone, a rock, over which you shall stumble so as to be greatly injured, indeed destroyed; stumble so, to use the prophet's words, as to “fall, and be broken.” The words, “whereunto also they were appointed,” which have occasioned much controversy among critics and commentators, refer to the word “stumble,” not to the word “disobedient.” The reference would have been more obvious had it been rendered, “who, being disobedient, stumble at the word,” or rather, “who, being disobedient to the word, stumble.” Stumbling is at once the consequence and the punishment of unbelief and disobedience. Sin is never represented as appointed by God; punishment is. God permits men to be sinners—that is, he does not hinder them from sinning; he appoints them, if they sin, to be punished. The reference here, however, does not seem to be to the Divine decree, so much as to the revelation of the Divine decree in the Divine prediction. The apostle refers to the passage quoted, and his words are equivalent to,—'to which stumbling, it appears, from the saying of the prophet, those who are disobedient are appointed.' God has connected this stumbling with unbelief as its natural effect, and in his word has said so. The word rendered “disobedient,” signifies unbelieving as well as disobedient, intimating to us the important truth, that faith and obedience, and unbelief and disobedience, are indissolubly connected; unbelief being disobedience to the great commandment, and the root of disobedience to all the commandments. The unbelieving and disobedient are represented as discrediting and disobeying the gospel revelation; but there seems to be a peculiar reference to “the word” or discourse, the prophetic declaration which the inspired writer is immediately referring to. The direct reference in the term disobedient is, no doubt, to the unbelieving Jews. When God proclaimed to them, “Behold, I lay in Zion for a foundation, a stone, a tried stone, a precious corner-stone, a sure foundation; he that believeth shall not make haste,”—they disbelieved the declaration. They disobeyed the command. They rejected the stone. They would not build on it. They would not receive Jesus as the Messiah; on the contrary, they “took him, and with wicked hands they crucified and slew him.” But what was the consequence? Was the stone laid by Jehovah in Zion prevented from becoming the great foundation it was intended for, “the chief stone of the corner?” Oh, no; hear what Peter said on a memorable occasion, and what I have little doubt was in his mind when he wrote the passage now before us—”Jesus Christ of Nazareth, whom ye crucified, God raised from the dead. This is the stone which was set at naught of you builders, which is become the head of the corner.” Disappointment and shame were their portion. In all their attempts to prevent the foundation being securely laid in its place, they had been furthering it; and when “they gathered together against the Lord and his Christ,” they had done but “what his hand and counsel aforetime determined to be done.” But this disappointment was not their only punishment. “The stone laid in Zion,” which they rejected, on which they would not build, “was to them a stone of stumbling, and a rock of offence.” Their opposition to the declared purpose of God brought on them severe inflictions of the Divine wrath. “Wrath to the uttermost,” as the apostle speaks, “came on them.” They “fell, and were broken.” The awful prediction in the book of the prophet Isaiah, connected with the passage quoted, was fulfilled: “Judgment also will I lay to the line, and righteousness to the plummet; and the hail shall sweep away the. refuge of lies, and the waters shall overflow the hiding-place. And your covenant with death shall be disannulled, and your agreement with hell shall not stand; when the overflowing scourge shall pass through, then ye shall be trodden down by it. For the Lord shall rise up as in Mount Perazim, he shall be wroth as in the Valley of Gibeon, that he may do his work, his strange work; and bring to pass his act, his strange act.” These awful predictions found their accomplishment in the siege and sack of Jerusalem, in the destruction of the temple, the dissolution of the polity, the dispersion of the nation of the Jews. To these unbelieving, these disobedient ones, in consequence of their unbelief, their not coming to Christ, their not believing in him, there was not honor, but shame; they were confounded. Their emblem is not the temple, to whose stately buildings our Lord directed the attention of his disciples, but its scattered ruins, when one stone was not to be found upon another. Instead of “the chosen generation,” they became “a rejected race.” Instead of being “a royal priesthood,” Jehovah proclaimed to them “He that killeth an ox, is as if he slew a man; he that sacrificeth a lamb, as if he cut off a dog's neck. Bring no more vain oblations.” Instead of being a holy nation, they left “their name as a curse to God's chosen; for the Lord God slew them, and called his people by another name.” Instead of being called out of darkness into God's glorious light, their light was turned into darkness; they were “cast into outer darkness.” They who were the people of God were no more the people of God, not even a people; they who had found mercy, no longer obtained mercy; “they were a people of no understanding! therefore he that made them would not have mercy on them, and he that formed them would show them no favor.” Their privileges were taken from them, and heavy judgments inflicted on them. While I cannot doubt that the primary reference of these words is to the unbelieving Jews, both as individuals and as a nation in the primitive ages, it is plain that the statement here is substantially true of all who are unbelieving and disobedient, of every country and in every age. All who, being “disobedient to the word,” “disallow the stone laid in Zion,” must be disappointed. “He must reign.” It is easier to pull the sun from the firmament than to remove the Saviour from his throne; easier to arrest the course of that sun than to stop the progress of his gospel. Those who reject him show their wish that all should reject him, and that his religion should be extinguished; and sometimes they are mad enough to think, as the Jews no doubt did, when they had brought him to the cross and laid him in the grave, that they shall be successful. Voltaire proudly boasted, that one wise man would undo what twelve fools had done. Hume said, that Christianity could not survive the nineteenth century; and in the insane impieties of revolutionized France, many of their disciples fancied they saw the token of the accomplishment of these anticipations— “Fond impious man! think'st thou yon sanguine cloud Rais'd by thy breath has quench'd the orb of day? Tomorrow He repairs the golden flood, And warms the nations with redoubled ray.” Oh, how will confusion of face cover all unbelievers, when, on the great day, they find him whom they rejected, on the throne of universal judgment, and themselves trembling before his tribunal. Their miscalculations will make them the objects of “shame and contempt” to the whole intelligent creation of God to all eternity. But this is not all. They shall stumble so as to fall—fall into hell. It is a serious matter to reject the Saviour. He is the only Saviour “There is no other name given under heaven among men whereby we must be saved.” “There remaineth no more sacrifice for sin.” He who will not be saved by him cannot be saved at all. He who rejects his sacrifice must bear the weight of unexpiated sin forever. “There remaineth for such, nothing but a certain fearful looking for of judgment and fiery indignation, to destroy them as the adversaries of God.” To many “this is a hard saying,” and they refuse to hear it. They cannot think that there is such a difference, in a moral point of view, between faith and unbelief, that their consequences should be more distant from each other than the poles of the earth, as distant as the heights of heaven are from the depths of hell. But steadily look at this unbelief, and you will cease to wonder. What is it, but to trample at once on all that is great, and all that is gracious, in the Divine character; to call the God of truth a liar, and the God of wisdom a fool; to despise his proffered gifts, and defy his threatened vengeance? If there be power in the arm of omnipotent justice, against whom can it be more worthily put forth than against the impenitent unbeliever? And, let it never be forgotten, the unbeliever is the destroyer of his own soul. He refuses to build on the foundation Jehovah has laid. This is folly and sin enough. But this is not all: he madly dashes himself against the chief foundation corner-stone, and breaks himself in pieces. Oh, how different the state of the believer and the unbeliever; how happy the one, how miserable the other! Look at the two, and say if he who has secured the former has not reason to say, that the Lord has been gracious to him, for there was no alternative. If he had not obtained the honor and happiness of the believer, the shame and ruin of the unbeliever must have been his. And then let him further think, Who made him to differ? ‘I was an unbeliever and a disobedient one, and left to myself, I should have been an unbeliever and disobedient one still. In that state I should have lived and died, and entered into eternity. What has made me to differ? Sovereign kindness. Whence came my faith, and all its blessed consequences, in time and in eternity? It is not of myself, “it is the gift of God.” It was given me “on behalf of Christ to believe on his name.” Surely, surely the Lord has been gracious to me.' I have thus brought before your minds the four great sources of illustrative proof, that the Lord is gracious to Christians. Their natural condition, the manner in which that condition was changed, the blessings of their new condition, and the final state of those who obstinately continue in their natural condition; all these, rightly considered, are fitted to deepen this conviction on a Christian's mind,—'Verily the Lord is gracious, and I have tasted of his grace.' It is of importance to inquire, What is the practical end which the apostle seeks to gain by pressing on the attention of Christians these proofs that the Lord is gracious? That end is easily discovered. This was his wish, as it was his Master's will, even their sanctification; and he was fully persuaded that men will never be holy, but in the degree in which they believe that God is good, good to them. “When the love of God our Saviour toward man appeared, not by works of righteousness which we have done, but according to his mercy he saved us, by the washing of regeneration, and the renewing of the Holy Ghost; which he shed on us abundantly through Jesus Christ our Saviour; that we, being justified by his grace, might be made heirs according to the hope of eternal life. This is a faithful saying, and these things I will that thou affirm constantly, that they who believe in God may be careful to maintain good works.” The apostle Peter does not leave us to find out his object by such a reference as we have now made to general principles. He distinctly shows us why he appeals to the graciousness of the Lord: “Love one another with a pure heart fervently. Lay aside all malice, and guile, and hypocrisies, and envies, and all evil-speakings,” “As newborn babes, desire the sincere milk of the word, that ye may grow thereby,” “Seeing ye have tasted that the Lord is gracious.” He plainly acts on the same principle as his beloved brother Paul, when he says, “I beseech you, brethren, by the mercies of God,” manifested in the divine method of justification, “I beseech you, by the mercies of God, that ye present yourselves as living sacrifices, holy and acceptable to God, by Christ Jesus, which is your rational ministry as spiritual priests; and be not conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your minds, that ye may prove what is the good, and perfect, and acceptable will of God.” I cannot conclude these illustrations without dropping a word of warning to those to whom this word of salvation has come, but as yet come in vain; to whom God has long been proclaiming, “Behold, I have laid in Zion as a foundation, a stone, a tried stone, a precious corner-stone, a sure foundation,” but who, instead of believing on it, coming to it, building on it, have been, like the Jewish builders, rejecting it, disallowing it. Your situation, “men and brethren,” is awfully perilous. If you will not build on that stone, you must stumble over it, and fall, and be broken. As to present privileges, you are in far better circumstances than the heathen, who never heard of the way of salvation; but as to future destiny, if you do not enter on the way of salvation opened before you, you shall be in far worse circumstances than they. Yes, in the day of judgment, “it shall be more tolerable for the inhabitants of Tyre and Sidon, of Sodom and Gomorrah, than for you.” All the happiness of the highest heavens is freely offered you, if you will accept of it in the only way God can give it, or you receive it; but if you contemptuously put it away from you, you not only must lose it, but you must sink yourselves into the very lowest depths of hopeless misery. If you perish—and you cannot perish but by your own obstinate refusal of a salvation, ready to be bestowed on you if you will but accept of it—your perdition will be no ordinary perdition. The awful declarations of the Apocalypse will be realized in your experience: “The same shall drink of the wine of the wrath of God, which is poured out without mixture into the cup of his indignation; and he shall be tormented with fire and brimstone in the presence of the holy angels, and in the presence of the Lamb; and the smoke of their torment ascended up forever and ever: and they have no rest day nor night.” But, oh, why should it be so? God has no “pleasure in your death he swears by his life that he has not. He wills you to turn from your evil ways, and live. If you perish, you must be self-destroyers. “Turn ye, turn ye, why will ye die?” Be no longer disobedient to the word of mercy. Receive it gladly, gratefully; and in receiving it you will receive the Saviour and his salvation. The feast of gospel grace is set before you, and urged on your acceptance: “O taste and see that the Lord is good.” May the good Spirit render effectual the invitation of the word, and induce you all to take of the bread and the water of life freely, that, eating and drinking, you may live forever.