in the Divine power, not in an arm of man, is distinguished as the work of God. As the Spirit is given, it flourishes; as the Spirit is withheld, it decays. Besides which, this, of all his works, is the most replete with the display of his character, most brightly stamped with the Divine image. The Church, both the Jewish and the Christian (and both are one in design), is the grand instrument of Providence in reviving and sustaining the true knowledge of God among mankind.

II. When this "work" may be said to "appear." It may be described as appearing anew in different periods; as a work delayed at times, yet "revived in the midst of the years.” Often, after seeming to have let alone his work, has the Divine Being awoke, laid bare his arm, and set his hand a second time to his unfinished work. The degree of piety prevailing at any time is the gauge by which we may measure the progress of this work in the prosperity of Israel. If the prophets were revered, the idols abolished, the Sabbaths hallowed, iniquities forsaken-their peace flowed as a river, their prosperity as the waves of the sea: but if they were disobedient, their judges re gardless of justice, the word and worship of God despised-their land was desolate, themselves a prey to famine or the sword, or led captive by their foes.

Under the Christian dispensation, the Church of God has experienced similar fluctuations. At some periods it has appeared as if truth and piety had almost vanished from the earth; as in those dark ages when the pure light of the gospel was buried under a dense cloud of papal corruptions. Yet God has caused his work to reappear in various ways; as when, at the era of the Protestant Reformation, He put forth his hand a second time to restore his word and worship in its purity and power. If truth displaces error; if cordial piety succeeds to a merely nominal religion; if converts flock to the Church, as doves to their windows-then God lets his work appear to his servants, his glory to their children. The views and desires of good men are large and comprehensive in reference to the prosperity of the Church they look forward in hope to future generations, as destined to be more and more distinguished in piety. Such were the desires of Moses: if we, my brethren, are strangers to these desires, we are not true servants of the Lord.

III. Why it is so desirable that the prayer of Moses in the text should be accomplished, that "God's work should appear to his servants, his glory to their children."

Next to our own salvation, this will be the chief desire of every sincerely pious mind. The first concern of a Christian is, that his own life may be given to him as a prey; that He who has begun may perform the good work of his grace in his own soul: the second is, that the same good work may extend to others; that they also may be sharers with ourselves of the same salvation. . . . . Here we may observe a difference between the pursuit of earthly, and that of heavenly riches. In the former case, what others gain is lost to ourselves; hence, among the competitors for worldly wealth, a standard VOL. IV.-D D

of discord is raised.

But here, the more deeply we ourselves drink, the more earnestly we desire that others should drink also, of these free waters of eternal life. We feel no disposition to stint, no jealousy of others as our rivals: "Oh that men may know what God hath done for their salvation! may enjoy the same pure element of peace!" this is our only desire.

1. This desire is the dictate of piety, of a regard to the glory of God. In the work of his grace, as accomplished in the prosperity of his Church, all his perfections appear in a beautiful harmony. Here all that is awful in his justice is seen, as a wall of fire that surrounds the Deity; while all that is lovely appeals to our affections and animates our hopes. Angels desire to look into the wonders of redemption, and study the manifold wisdom of God displayed in the Church; not as the Church is a teacher, but as it is an illustration of that wisdom. Where are they that revere God and work righteousness to be found, but among those who are the subjects of this work, the members of this Church? No sooner does any one become one of these, than he goes forth to do the will of God.

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2. The sentiment of the text is equally the dictate of benevolence of a regard for the happiness of others. Until men come to know and love God, they never can be happy: they are withered, dead, as branches cut off from the root, from the source of all vitality, severed from the Divine Being, in whose favour is life! "I am the vine," says Jesus Christ, "ye are the branches; and, severed from Me, ye can bear no fruit, but are cast away as branches withered, and fit only for the burning." We must be here prepared for heaven, as a place prepared for those only who are sanctified, those who are wrought and polished by Divine grace into ornaments of the eternal temple. Whether we desire the happiness of men here or hereafter, we must desire the success of this pre-eminent work of God, which involves our only preparation for the realms of eternal victory and glory.

Let this, then, be the object of our fervent prayers, that God would cause his work to appear, and to redound to his glory, in the view of his servants and their children; that He would enthrone his word in the hearts of his people, as the law of their lives and actions. How many, with the gospel resounding in their ears, live as the Gentiles that know not God! If we have any regard for the glory of God, or the good of man, in the present or the eternal world, here, in the success of the gospel, is the nexus, the nucleus, of all benevolence and piety combined. It is impossible to say whether a person is more the friend of his Maker or his brethren, who prays for the advancement of this Divine work in the world. This alone can subdue the pride of man, and lay all flesh prostrate before God. This alone can transform the moral desert into the garden of the Lord. Thorns and briers must overspread the land, until the Spirit be poured out from above; then "the wilderness shall become a fruitful field: for not by might, nor by power, but by My Spirit, saith the Lord."

XX.

THE DIVINE COMPLACENCY IN PUBLIC WORSHIP.* PSALM 1xxxvii., 2: The Lord loveth the gates of Zion more than all the dwellings of Jacob.

[Preached at Broadmead, Bristol, July 11, 1830.]

THE dispensations of revealed religion have been very different in different ages of the world, each adapted to the particular circumstan ces of the Church at the time it was instituted. The patriarchal dispensation was different from that introduced by Moses; this continued among the tribes for many generations, and has been superseded by Christianity, which is much more simple in its construction, much more sublime in its doctrines, and promises, and precepts. But yet, notwithstanding this diversity in the mode of communication of Divine truth, there is an identity on the great subjects of religion which may be discerned by every serious mind. The devotion of the patriarchs was of the same character and description in its essential properties with the devotion of the saints under the Mosaic economy; and the heart of a pious Jew would correspond with the heart of a pious Christian of the present day. Notwithstanding the continual allusions to the institutions of Moses, and the peculiarities of that economy, the' language of the Old Testament is the fit and proper vehicle for our devotion nor are there any parts of the word of God more precious than those in which the Psalmist expressed his feelings. of the Psalms will ever retain its authority in the Church of God, by its presenting such a number of forms of devotion as are adapted to the purposes of prayer and praise for the faithful in every age.

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By Zion we are to understand the Church of God as then constiIt took its name from that hill on which the tabernacle was placed, and the neighbourhood of that hill on which the temple was afterward erected. Zion appears to have been the name of the glorious residence of the Deity, who was pleased to manifest himself by a visible appearance, by the Shekinah which went over the mercyseat, whence he communicated answers when the high-priest or the King of Israel sought and inquired at the mouth of God. When it is said," the Lord loveth the gates of Zion more than all the dwellings of Jacob," the meaning is, that the Divine Being takes a peculiar com placency in the worship and service of his people; that although He loves his people, and always looks with regard on their dwellings, yet when they are assembled at Zion-when the tribes go up to give thanks to the name of the Lord-in the character of an assembled Church and people they are peculiarly dear to Him, and He looks down upon them with peculiar satisfaction and delight.

* Reported in the Pulpit,

Dropping the Jewish cast of the phraseology here, it amounts to a similar proposition with regard to the Church of God at present. that He never looks upon the saints with so much complacency as when engaged in the solemnities of public and social worship.

First, it is here assumed that the Lord loves the dwellings of Jacob-he loves those that are true Israelites. These are succeeded by the name Christian, for the Christian Church is now become the true Israel of God. He loves his saints on account of the image of himself which they bear; He loves them on account of those graces which are infused into them when they are renewed by the Spirit; He loves them on account of the relation they stand in to Him as his people, and as his Church, who are qualified for the duties of the relation by that love of their Father, that reliance upon his care, that delight in his person, that enjoyment in his service which belongs to dutiful and affectionate children.

He loves them because they imitate his perfections in some humble measure because they receive the word of his mouth-because they are ready to obey every call of his Providence, setting themselves in the paths of his testimony wherever He may direct-because they yield themselves to God as those that are alive from the dead, and their bodies as instruments of righteousness, no longer walking after the deeds of the flesh, but after the will of God. He takes a delight in them; the Lord delighteth in the righteous; He knoweth their way; He loves, approves, and confirms it. The most common occupations of life-the honest industry of the servants of God is looked upon by Him with approbation. By these they show forth their Father, and the praises of Him who called them from darkness to light. The most ordinary duties of our calling become sacrifices to God, and religious duties, when performed in the Spirit, and directed to the great end of glorifying God. He looks with peculiar complacency on them on account of those domestic devotional acknowledgments of his majesty which are there maintained: when the head walks before his family, the priest to offer praise and thanksgiving, this attracts peculiar approbation and delight. He loves to see his people training up their children in the nurture and admonition of the Lord, and walking after them in the paths of that obedience which He has enjoined. He delights to see the course of purity which runs in Christian families. He loves to see the progress which the younger parts of religious families make in piety, while they grow up in grace, and in favour with God and man. He looks down with peculiar delight on such circles as these there He deigns his presence, and bestows peculiar blessings. However obscure the dwellings of Jacob may be, to Him they are open and manifest at all times; and whether in cottages or in pal aces, his eye rests there with complacency, and He says of such places, "Here will I dwell forever and ever." Prayer and devotion sanctify every family, and diffuse a spirit of piety through all the avocations of life, so that we need not retire from the world, but are rather called to show forth the virtues of the_Christian life in it.

But it is said that, although He loves the dwellings of Jacob, yet

He loves the gates of Zion more than all the dwellings of Jacob; that nothing in the dwellings of Jacob so much attracts his attention as the people of God connected together in a social capacity. For the Church signifies nothing but the gathering together of individual saints; and wherever two or three are gathered together in the name of the Lord, they are, for that place and time, a Church: and when they are in the habit of uniting together by voluntary and social ties, they become a permanent Church of the living and true God; for the Church differs from an individual only by the circumstance of number. Let us see, then, on what account it is that the Lord feels a greater complacency towards his saints when thus viewed in connexion together than in an individual character.

In the first place, the Divine Being regards with peculiar complacency the worship of his saints on its own account. Worship cannot be the business of life, nor be made to occupy the principal part of our time, nor the greatest number of our thoughts. The distractions of business, the necessities arising from our corporeal structure, are such as to force on the most devout mind a very strenuous application to things that have an opposite tendency to religion. It is peculiar to heaven to be that place where God's people will serve Him day and night, and where God will be all in all. But in proportion as we attain to some resemblance of that employment, in that proportion may we be supposed to be acceptable to God; nor can we be supposed to be so much so in his sight as when we partake of this devotion. The common business of life is sanctified by piety; but devotion is the very element of piety; it is the principal end for which we were created; it partakes of our final destination, and it will be the perpetual employment of eternity. When the saints assemble together for devotion, they call into action all the graces of the Spirit; faith rests upon his promises-love grows in the contemplation of perfectiongratitude is felt warm and vivid in the heart-adherence to Divine truth is experienced so as to produce a resolution to buy the truth, and sell it not-reverence for the service of God and for his majesty, deference to his authority, a desire of being acquainted with his will, and entire resignation of ourselves to his discipline, are the sentiments expressed in praise and prayer. These actuate the breasts of Christians, and they produce a great mass of devotional feeling experienced nowhere else. They cannot but be acceptable to God in their insulated state; but when combined together-when, as now, there are thousands engaged in the same worship, and actuated by the same graces of the Spirit of God, called into exercise on these occasions--who can fail to perceive how acceptable such a spectacle must be to the great object of worship!

As the worship of God consists in yielding to Him that which is his prerogative, in giving Him that which is his due; so, in proportion as this is exhibited upon a wide and extended scale, in that proportion must it be a most acceptable offering to God.

In the next place, the Divine Being regards with complacency the gates of Zion, on account of that union of mind and consent of heart