A Goodly Heritage

One Sunday morning," said Mr. Spurgeon, in an address at Mildmay Hall, June 26, 1890, reported in the Christian of July 4, "I preached from the text, 'My God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me?' I could not tell why I should be made to preach it. I felt while preaching as if I were myself forsaken. On the sabbath evening, there came into the vestry a man of about sixty, whose eyes were bright with a strange lustre. He took my hand, and held it, and cried. He said to me, 'Nobody ever preached my experience before. I have now been for years left, deserted, in a horrible gloom of great darkness; but this morning I learned that I was not the only man in the darkness, and I believe I shall get out!' I said, ' Yes; I have got out; but now I know why I was put in.' That man was brought back from the depths of despair, and restored to joy and peace. There was a child of God, dying in darkness. He said to the minister who spoke with him, 'Oh, sir, though I

Think you not that you make many prayers? You both think it and say it, as you use to say, I pray both day and night. Nay, but count after this rule, and there will be found few prayers in Scotland, albeit you reckon up both private and public. Once scrape out of the count the prayers of the profane and scandalous, whose practice defileth their prayers; and again, blot out the prayers of men’s tongues and mouths when hearts are absent, and again, set aside the formal, dwyning,(318) coldrife, indifferent supplications of saints, and the prayers that carry no seal of God’s name and attributes on them, prayers made to an unknown God, and will you find many behind? No, certainly,—any of you may take up the complaint in behalf of the land, “There is none that calleth on thy name,” or few to count upon. You may say so of yourselves, if you judge thus,—I have almost never prayed, God hath never heard my voice; and you may say so of the land. This would be a well-spent day, if this were but ou

Malachi 1:13, 14 Vain oblations L. O. Thomson. (taken with Isaiah 1:13): — Each age has its characteristic. No two are just alike; and though history repeats itself, yet there is progress. Its processes are those of a spiral. I. In the age of Isaiah the Jews were full of religiosity. Sacrifices were not neglected — a multitude were offered. They brought the best of all kinds, not as in the days of Malachi, the lean and the poor, but abundantly they brought the blood of bullocks, of lambs, and of he-goats. Clouds of incense arose; they carefully kept the new moons, the Sabbaths, the assemblies, and the solemn meeting, not only all appointed feasts, but even others they observed in an intense devotion to the forms of religion. Why were their oblations vain? Why were they not regarded in their sacrifices and accepted in their persons? 1. As in the days of the Saviour, so now, whilst they were careful to tithe, mint, anise and cummin, they omitted the weightier matters of the law, judgme

"For God so loved the world, that he gave His only begotten Son, that whoever believes in Him should not perish — but have everlasting life!" — John 3:16 Here is what Cyprian calls "an ocean of thought — in a drop of language!" Who can sound the depths of this "thought of God?" It will form the theme and the mystery of eternity. Manifold and glorious are His thoughts regarding His people. But this is the center and focus of all — around which all the others cluster. It is the jewel of which all the others are the setting — the thought of thoughts — the gift of gifts. We may well say, "How precious!" There is no measuring that love; it defies all human computation. Christ Himself, in speaking of it, can only intimate its indescribableness. He puts the plumbline into the hand — but He does not attempt to gauge or fathom — all He can say of the precious thought and the precious love is, "God SO loved!" And His redeemed Church in Heaven wil

Psalm 22:24 For he hath not despised nor abhorred the affliction of the afflicted; neither hath he hid his face from him; but when he cried unto him, he heard. For he hath not despised nor abhorred the affliction of the afflicted,.... That is, Christ, who was afflicted by men, both by their tongues, and by their hands; by devils, by the temptations of Satan for Christ suffered being tempted, though he was not overcome; and by his attacks upon him, both in the garden and on the cross; and by the Lord himself, Jehovah his Father, who laid on him the iniquity and chastisement of his people, bruised him, and put him to grief; awoke the sword of justice against him, and spared him not: his afflictions were many, both in body and soul; in body, being scourged, buffeted, bruised, pierced, racked, and tortured on the cross; in soul, being made exceeding sorrowful, and an offering for sin; sustaining his Father's wrath, and seeking and enduring affliction by the rod of it; see Isaiah 53:4;

What is a revival of religion? In general terms it is synonymous with the prosperity here prayed for; or the wider salvation implied in the "Save now, I beseech thee!" If this was a psalm composed for the opening of the second temple, as is likely, after the return from exile, we can see plainly what the "saving" and "prosperity" mean - a renewal of more than the faith and heroic words of the patriarchs, warriors, psalmists, and prophets of former days - a renewal that should embrace the whole of the people. I. A REVIVAL, WHETHER INDIVIDUAL OR NATIONAL, SUPPOSES AN ANTECEDENT RELIGION, THE POWER OF WHICH HAS DECLINED OR BEEN LOST. The spirit of our relation to Christ has evaporated, and left little but the forms of Christianity. "I have somewhat against thee, because thou hast left thy first love; Thou hast a name that thou livest, and art dead;" "Thy works are not perfect before God;" "I know thy works, that thou art neither cold