ourselves-we should hate ourselves if capable of it--but we lay all at the feet of Jesus! Yet we can say, “Ye are our children." If these walls could speak," the stone would cry out of the wall, and the beam out of the timber would answer it ;" yea, if angels could speak out here, they would say of this and that man that they were born here. Rejoice, then, and shout for joy. Yet these are but the beginning of good days. Then pray for the peace of Jerusalem.

II. The means of attainment proposed.

Prayer. I cannot express my feelings on this-" Paul may plant, Apollos water, but God alone giveth the increase." It is a first principle that all good is from God. Your preachers can do nothing. "Brethren, pray for us." We entreat you, pray, &c., not for our comfort, &c., but our usefulness.

Remember, you must love Zion. "They shall prosper that love her." Prayer is only the effect of this. And not only are you to pray, but you are to exert yourselves: "I will seek thy good." Christianity has no dead members; all my means, talents, influence, &c., must be employed. III. The motive.

This brings the matter to a point. "My leanness, my leanness ;" and why? You long to feel better, to handle the word of life, &c. But "when I attempt to rise I am beaten back." This is the reason, "I have not loved Zion more." Many lose sight of their connexion with Zion as a body; if so, you will never prosper in your own souls. It is as easy to prove it as the Divinity of Jesus! Am I to live for myself only, or my family? No; for the whole world.

You may not, perhaps, prosper in the world-the Holy Ghost did not mean this in the text. God looks for the other world. But, if devoted to the prosperity of Zion, God will direct all the streams of the Church for my good. His angels are charged with the care of me; his finger will lead me, and point me out to the heavenly host.

Application.-Let us now pray and believe for the coming year.-"Lord, revive thy work."

Pray for your ministers; they are the medium of God for knowledge and holiness to his Church. *** I know you love them; but have you prayed enough for them? must live in your hearts.-I shall die otherwise.

We

SERMON XXXV.

O THAT I KNEW

WHERE I MIGHT FIND HIM.

Job, xxiii., 3, 4.-O that I knew where I might find him! that I might come even to his seat!

I would order my cause before him, and fill my mouth with arguments.

MANY opinions on this book; probably the most ancient, and certainly the noblest composition in the world. Some think the author Solomon, from the uncommon grandeur of the style, &c. Others, though with little probability, Ezra. The current opinion is in favour of Moses, while keeping Jethro's flock, and designed as a word of consolation to his Hebrew brethren then suffering in Egypt-a drama. * * * Job's friends contend that great afflictions are certainly the wages of great sinners, &c. They entirely mistake his case and character. Job contends for his innocence; but, failing to convince them, he inquires where he shall find the Lord as his Judge. "O that I knew where I might find him that I might come even to his seat! I would order my cause before him; I would fill my mouth with arguments.'

As these words are often the language of a penitent heart seeking the Saviour, Comforter, and Sanctifier, who wishes to come to his seat, &c., inquire,

I. Who are the characters that employ this language? It is language highly becoming every son of Adam; all are morally distant from God; yet how few employ it! What will please my senses and increase my treasures is general; but how few inquire, Where is God my Saviour? Only these,

1. The sinner under conviction. The light of heavenly

truth has discovered to him his sins. He sees that God alone can save him, but he has provoked his Majesty. Hence he appears as one that hideth himself in darkness. In his distress the penitent hears, reads, prays, "I go forward, but he is not there; and backward, but I cannot perceive him on the left hand, where he doth work, but I cannot behold him: he hideth himself on the right hand, that I cannot see him." Still, an intolerable load is pressing him down, and he exclaims, "O that I knew where I might find him!"

2. Believers in distress. Their piety, as Job's, gives no exemption from distress. But, besides the afflictions common to others, there are times when temptation, persecution, reproach, and the feelings of unsanctified nature, &c., during which they may deplore the absence of their Lord. Perhaps unbelief prevails, and they know not whither they should go.

3. Penitent backsliders. As backsliders they are com- . mon; but, as penitent ones, rare. They have known God, but wickedly departed; have walked in light, but "the light that was in them has become darkness." Once they were in the way to heaven, but now "their feet go down to death, and their steps take hold on hell." But mercy-and oh! how great that mercy-has made them willing to return. But what reflections do they endure? The clear light and bleeding love against which they have sinned! the effect of their ur gracious example; the wound inflicted on the cause of God; and especially their ingratitude to that God who found them in a waste howling wilderness-led, and fed, and bore them as on eagles' wings!" O that I knew where I might find him! that I might come even to his seat! I would order my cause before him, and fill my mouth with arguments." These few characters we would assist.

II. Point out where the Lord may be found. And where is it? or, rather, where is he not? "If we ascend up to heaven, he is there; if we make our bed in hell, behold, he is there." His centre is everywhere: "In Him we live, and move, and have our being."

1. In his works, as a God of power. In everything crea

ted does his presence appear. In every body, from the largest celestial orb placed, &c., hanging, &c., moving, &c., to the smallest atom, invisible to the most powerful optic glass, and the existence of which is only shown by the power of elective attraction. In every agent in nature, from the gentlest breath of air that scarcely moves the leaf to the furious hurricane that lashes the sea, &c., and tears the deep-rooted forest. "He rides upon the storm." From the latent spark of fire which lies hid in the flint, to the vivid lightning which glares with death, or the bursting volcano which shakes the earth with its thunder, darkens heaven with its smoke, desolates fruitful provinces with its lava, and threatens to burn the world. From the smallest particle of dew which glistens on a blade of grass, or hangs in the bell of a flower, to the immeasurable ocean.

He is present in every animal-the sportive shoals in their briny element; the frantic-winged inhabitants of the air; from the unwieldy elephant to the smallest mite. The earth, dressed in her verdure, proclaims the presence of God; from the tallest cedar and the sturdiest oak, to the bending reed and the hyssop on the wall. But in nothing does his presence more clearly appear, than in the structure of the human body, and the powers of the mind. "Excellent is he in counsel, and wonderful in working."

2. In Providence, as a God of wisdom and goodness-the Governor of all. He governs this wonderful fabric-not left to chance. * * * Every occurrence is an event of his Providence, and one of his footsteps, who ruleth over all, and doeth all things as seemeth him good. The provision for man and beast; his daily supply of all things living, with every morsel of food, portion of drink, drop of rain, and breath of air, of every degree of strength and measure of health, with all social comforts-all these manifest his wisdom and his love. Nor less is he to be found in our af flictions, losses, and disappointments-in the place and period of our birth-in our parents and their circumstances. In all the commotions and revolutions of the world, God is present, correcting, instructing, comforting, and so benefiting man.

3. In the human breast, as a God of purity and justice

Judge of the world. Conscience felt by all-infusing gall into their secret, their sweetest cup. *** Now, this is God in his own tribunal, beginning that work which the last day will finish, and commencing that punishment which hell will continue, but eternity will not end. Yet from this very source, the believer, though conscious of many defects, cherishes more than a hope that he is God's-an inward assurance that he is such the "testimony of his conscience." And this is the beginning of his heaven, the commencement of his final acquittal if he hold on his way-"if his heart condemn him not."

4. In the ordinances of religion, as a God of Grace-the Saviour of men. This is the relation in which he most delights to be sought by men. It is this which is most interesting to sinners, and it is under this character that the per⚫ sons formerly described are saying, "O that I knew where I might find him!

Now of these ordinances the first is the word of his grace. This reveals his being and unveils his character; it shows his very heart through the wounds of his Son. Here he is

found "the Lord, gracious, merciful, slow to anger, and plenteous in mercy," saying, "Though your sins be as scarlet, they shall be white as snow; though they be red like crimson, they shall be as wool." "I will blot out as a thick cloud thy transgressions, and as a cloud thy sins." "I will heal all their backsliding." "God is in Christ, reconciling the world unto himself, not imputing their trespasses unto them;" for "it is a faithful saying, and worthy of all acceptation, that Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners."

Here you find power omnipotent, and this power is to save. You have wisdom and goodness greater than in Providence; and all to supply your wants. Here is purity and justice .superior to that of the judgment to justify the ungodly, and the whole combining with mercy and love, and harmonizing in Christ.

Wish you to find him? Go to his word, and how will you find him? "Waiting to be gracious"-" stretching out his arms all day long!" Go to his word; there you will meet him as a father running to embrace a lost child.