it. Strive to love with your whole hearts him who first loved you. Give your whole selves to him who has already given himself for you. Remember that you are no longer your own, for you are bought with a price. Glorify him then in your souls and bodies which are his; and let his love constrain you to live for him who died for you. Surely, if his love does not constrain you thus to live, it must be because you do not realize it. Surely, you cannot refuse to love and live to him, who is so infinitely lovely, and who loves you with such an intense and unalterable affection, notwithstanding all your unworthiness, His language to you is, as my Father hath loved me, even so have I loved you continue ye in my love. I have not called you servants, but friends, and then are ye my friends, if ye do whatsoever I command you. O then, love, love and praise with all your powers this infinitely gracious, condescending and affectionate friend, who declares that though mothers should forget and cease to love their infants, he will not forget or cease to love his church. Let our love to him be equally unchanging. Though parents should forget their children, and children cease to love their parents; though the titles of brother and sister, husband and wife, should cease to excite affection; though every other tie should be dissolved, and all other love banished from the earth, yet never let the church cease to love him who has loved and given himself for it.

4. While you have this friend, be careful to trust in his love, to confide in him unreservedly without the least anxiety, doubt or suspicion. You well know that nothing grieves us more than the jealousies and suspicions of our friends, that we do not love them. Beware then that you do not grieve this best of friends, by indulging them. He surely has a right to be believed, when he professes to love his people, since he has already given them such strong and infallible proofs of his affection. His promises and assurances come to us sealed with his own life-blood; and if he loved us and gave himself for us while we were yet enemies, how shall he not also with himself freely give us all things. We appeal to yourselves, would he who has freely given you his blood, his life; he who has suffered so much for your sakes; would he deny you more wealth, more friends, more temporal comforts, if he saw that they would prove really beneficial? Would he ever afflict you, if it were not absolutely

necessary for your good? To die for you, cost him much; to give you mere temporal blessings would cost him nothing. Since then he has done the former, can he be unwilling to do the latter? If his love has led him to do that which was most difficult, will it not lead him to do what is most easy? And has he not promised that he will withhold from you no good thing? that he will cause all things to work together for your good? that he will never leave you nor forsake you? Why then, oh ye of little faith, why do ye doubt? Why do you distress yourselves and grieve him by needless anxieties respecting what you shall eat, and what you shall drink, or how you shall be carried through the trials and difficulties which are before you in your way to heaven? Banish, I beseech you, all your groundless fears and anxieties. Cast all your care upon him, for he careth for you; and while you love and praise him for all that is past, so trust him for all that is to come.

5. Did Christ give himself for the church with a view to render it perfectly holy, without any blemish or imperfection? How strong then are our obligations, and how great our encouragement, to aim at universal holiness. What, oh Christian, do you above all things desire? Is it not to be holy as Christ is holy, and to be with him where he is? And does not he ardently desire the same? Did he not give himself for you for this very purpose, that he might sanctify, cleanse, and present you to himself, perfectly glorious and holy? And will he fail of accomplishing his purpose? No; as certainly as Christ has died, so certainly shall every real member of his church, every one who truly hates and mourns for sin, be presented to him at last, freed from every spot and blemish. Arise, then, ye who are weak, wounded, and desponding, and renew the conflict with sin. While endeavoring to subdue it, you are fighting the battles of Christ; you are engaged in a cause which is dear to him; you are contending with his enemies, as well as yours; he has determined that they must and shall be conquered. Fight then courageously a short time longer, and the victory shall be certainly yours. The object of Christ's death must not, shall not, cannot be frustrated; but every member of his real church shall be made perfectly like him, and see him as he is. Soon will the blessed day arrive, when he will present to himself the whole church of his redeemed, as a glorious

church, not having spot, or wrinkle, or any such thing. In this number you will then be found, and sit down with him forever at his marriage supper in heaven. Wherefore, my beloved brethren, comfort and encourage one another in your Christian warfare with these words.

Lastly, Does Christ thus love his church? How desirable then is it, my impenitent hearers, that you should become members of it, and thus share in his love. Mistake me not, however. We wish not to induce you to make a hypocritical profession; for this would not render you members of his church. But we wish you to unite yourselves to his real church; to join yourselves to the Lord in an everlasting covenant, ordered in all things and sure. Till you do this, you have no right to hope for a share in the blessings which Christ has purchased; but having done this, you shall finally become members of the church of the first born, which are written in heaven, and be partakers of the glory that shall be there revealed.

The Son of man is come to seek and to save that which was lost.
LUKE xix. 10.

THERE cannot, my friends, be a more striking and satisfactory proof of our stupid insensibility to religious truth, than the indifference with which we naturally view the gospel of Christ. Among all the wonderful things which God has presented to the contemplation of his creatures, none are so well suited to excite our deepest interest and attention, as those which this gospel reveals. We see that God, who is wise in counsel, and wonderful in working, constantly employed for four thousand years in making preparations for Christ's appearance on earth. We see many holy and divinely inspired prophets raised up in different ages, to predict his incarnation. We see a person, born contrary to the common course of nature, employed as a harbinger to prepare his way. We see an angel sent from heaven. to his intended virgin mother, to announce his approaching birth. We see a multitude of the heavenly host, sent to reveal the accomplishment of this event, and hear them shouting, Glory to God in the highest, and on earth peace, good will to men. We see a miraculous star appearing in the East, to announce the same event to distant sages, and guide them to the feet of the new-born infant. Finally, we see the heavens

opened over his head, the Spirit of God descending like a dove to rest upon it, and at the same time hear the voice of the omnipotent, eternal Father of the universe, exclaiming, This is my beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased. By comparing the predictions of his birth, with other parts of revelation, we find that the child thus born, the son thus given and ushered into our world, is in fact the mighty God, the everlasting Father, the Prince of peace, God manifest in flesh, God over all, blessed forever, by whom and for whom all things were made, and in whom all things consist.

And what is the end and design of all these wonders? For what purpose is all this preparation made? Why do we thus see heaven opened, its inhabitants descending, and behold God dwelling in flesh, living, suffering, and dying as a man? To these questions, our text furnishes the only satisfactory answer. It teaches us, that all this was done for our salvation. The Son of man came to seek and to, save that which was lost.

In meditating on this passage, we are naturally led to inquire, I. What it is that is here spoken of as lost? It can scarcely be necessary to say, that it is the human race. Mankind are invariably represented by the inspired writers, as morally depraved, ruined and lost; and they are here spoken of as one, because they are all alike in the same lost condition, in consequence of their descent from the saine parents. In Adam all die.

As descendants from him, all are lost. In the first place, they are lost to God. He is our Creator, our Shepherd; and we, as the Psalmist expresses it, are the people of his pasture, and the sheep of his hand. But, to use the language of the prophet, we have all gone astray like lost sheep, and have turned every one to his own way. Like the prodigal son in our Saviour's affecting parable, we have forsaken our Father's house, and wandered from him into a far country. These, and other passages which represent us as being at a distance from God, are to be understood, however, not in a natural but moral sense; for in a natural sense, it is impossible for any creature to depart from God, since in him we live, move, and have our being, and cannot go from his Spirit, or fly from his presence. But while we are thus constantly surrounded by God, we are far from him in a moral sense. To use the expressive language of Scripture, He is not in all our thoughts; we live without