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the era of their actual redemption. God made them willing and obedient to his servant's word. He gave the people to be his to lead up out of Egypt, for the faith by which he thus had given glory to the faithful God of promise*.

MISSIONS AT HOME.

No. XXVI.

"Let us show our thankfulness to Christ by fruitfulness. Let us bring forth the sweet fruits of patience, heavenlymindedness, and good works. This is to live unto him, who died for us. Be zealous for Christ's name and worship.

Zeal is increased by opposition: it cuts its way through

rocks.

....

....

We

Christ doth most abominate a lukewarm E temper. The Lord cause the fire of holy zeal to be be always burning upon the altar of our hearts."-T. WATSON. CLAIMS OF THE JEWS.-"We see the Jewish nation still in a state of unbelief!" What! the kingdom of Christ come, and the whole Jewish nation in a state of rebellion against the Lord's anointed! The idea is monstrous. What inconsistency and confusion must this view introduce into the scriptures and the prophets! It is a strange doctrine indeed which recognizes the kingdom of Christ as established, whilst the whole world lieth in wickedness; but it is setting aside a large portion of the word of God to assume the reign of the Messiah, without taking into account the condition of the outcasts of Judah and the dispersed of Israel. Shall it be thought that the kingdom of the Son of David is set up, whilst both Judah and Israel disclaim with one voice all part and all inheritance in David's Son? do not understand the nature of that kingdom which leaves nineteen-twentieths of the world in an unconverted state, and the whole Jewish nation in unbelief. The kingdom whereof we speak, and whereof prophets and evangelists write, comprehends the uttermost parts of the earth, embracing more immediately the twelve tribes of Israel. It would be difficult, if not impossible, to find a passage of scripture announcing the reign of Messiah, where the unconverted Jewish nation is not included, or where they do not occupy a very conspicuous position among the happy subjects of the great King. In all the prophets that nation has a distinguished position assigned unto it, in the kingdom of Immanuel. It is important to draw attention to the fact that throughout the bible the two are constantly joined together; and we must not put them asunder. According to the concurrent testimony of all the scriptures, the two events, the establishment of Christ's kingdom on earth, and the conversion of the Jewish nation, shall synchronize." The one cannot take place without the other: the one is part of the other. When the Deliverer shall come to Zion, he will then turn away ungodliness from Jacob (Rom. vi. 20). The day of Israel's conversion is the Messiah's coronation-day! .... Our efforts to promote Christianity among Jew and Gentile will ever be paralyzed in proportion as we fail to see and to embrace the scripture view of the present dispensation; a dispensation wherein God purposes to gather out "a remnant according to the election of grace" (Rom. xi. 5) from the dispersed of Judab, and to visit the Gentiles, to take out

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There seems a reference to this in Exod. xxxii. 7.

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of them a people for his name" (Acts xv. 14). To the converted Jewish nation verily we have to look, according to the testimony of scripture (Is. 1x. 1-3, xlii. 21; Zeph. iii. 14-20; Hos. xiv. 4-7; Zech. viii. 13, 20, 23; Rom. xi. 12) for accomplishing, under God, that great work which is the church's chief expectation. They are the people who are predestined, according to the hidden counsel of Jehovah, to be the instruments for ushering in that blessed dispensation, when "the knowledge of the glory of God shall fill the earth as the waters cover the mighty deep" (rev. A. M. Myers's "The Jew," fifth edit., 1852).

PASTORAL AID SOCIETY.-Upon opening the anniversary meeting held on the 11th of May last, the earl of Shaftesbury, its president, observed: "For all the purposes of this kingdom, and of the church, I hold that this anniversary meeting is the most practical affair of the whole year. I really do not know where at this time we should have been, without the exertions of this society. To have left the people as they were, to have left those large masses of the population which are congregated together in those great hives of industry in the counties of Lancaster, Chester, and York, and in other districts thronged by a teeining population, without superintendence and pastoral care, without persons commissioned to carry to them the word of God, to seek them out, and bring them to the knowledge of the truth, would, I believe, by this time have exposed us to such dangers that we should, probably, have been overwhelmed by an irresistible torrent of vice and violence. But it did please God, some years ago, to put it into the hearts of a few men to devise this scheme; and it pleased him, moreover, to realize this scheme; and I doubt whether any religious society has ever received, at the hands of God, more signal proofs of favour than has been vouchsafed to the Church Pastoral Aid Society. It has saved us, depend upon it: it has saved this realm, the whole of the realm, from great political trouble and convulsion; and it has set up a glorious standard of truth. Its teaching is evangelical, and its practice is in accordance with the truth and purity of its principles. Now, if ever there was a time in the history of these realms when the agency of such a body was required, depend upon it, we are now in that time; and a very little consideration will show to you that we are beset by dangers of a various and novel description, which nothing can encounter but such a body as this, based upon the truth, and earnestly determined to make known that truth, and to assert that Christianity is the beginning, the middle, and the end of all. Just look at the efforts that are made by that new system (for new it is as to its agency and mode of operation) just look at the efforts that are made in the circulation of infidel publications. They are of a more cautious and novel character than formerly. Many are gross and disgusting, it is true; but many are insidious, many are devised to catch well-inten tioned, though weak and doubting minds. The circulation of these works increases day by day, I might almost say hour by hour; and I was perfectly astounded and terrified the other day, upon looking into a small pamphlet that was placed in my hands with the view of calling my attention, and the attention of others, to the necessity of

forming, if possible, a counteracting society, and
to see if we could not meet open publications by
open publications, and send them into all the
recesses, the courts and alleys, that are the resort
of these miserable and benighted people. I was
perfectly astonished to see the extent to which
this system is carried, and the prodigious success
it has obtained." The report of the society states
that the present grants of the society are-
For clergymen
For lay-assistants

Total

317

115

432

journey men or otherwise being 16, it follows that this excellent asylum is affording employment and support, together with important spiritual and moral benefits, to no less than 33 believing Israelites. Since its establishment in 1831, 309 members of the house of Israel have participated, more or less, of the privileges which it affords.

The

PROTESTANT ASSOCIATION.-It was stated at the anniversary meeting, on the 12th of May, that the income of the society for 1851-52 had been £1,013, and the expenditure £963. One of the resolutions passed at the meeting was to this effect: "As it is manifestly a departure from all sound principle The aid of the society is now afforded to 343 in- and consistency that protestants should propagate cumbents, in charge of an aggregate population popery by paying for the education or support of which gives 7,564 souls to each. The average a priesthood, whose object it is to disseminate that income of these incumbents is only £210 per religion against which we protest, as anti-social, annum, and 176 of them are without parsonage- anti-national, anti-christian, and idolatrous, this houses. The existing grants, when all are occu- meeting desires that all grants of public money for pied, for 317 clergymen and 115 lay-assistants, the support of popery in any shape may be with. make the total liabilities of the society £38,333. drawn, more especially that to Maynooth-college; Through the operations of the society 569 addi- and that, in order to this desirable end, it is highly tional public services on the Lord's-day have been expedient that the nature of the education there instituted, besides 307 week-day services, 376 given should be thoroughly investigated”*. school-room and cottage lectures, and 279 bible- IRELAND. THE IRISH SOCIETY. classes. The society's grants have likewise led to thirtieth annual meeting of the "Irish Society of the erection, opening, or keeping open of 150 | London" was held at the Hanover-rooms, Hanchurches or chapels; and, in districts at present over-square, on Thursday, May 6, the marquis receiving the society's aid, 158 rooms are, in con- of Blandford, M.P., in the chair. The meeting sequence, licensed for the celebration of divine was very numerously attended, every part of the service. It may be added that, by means of the large room being densely crowded. After prayer grants now made, additional and more systematic by the rev. C. Smalley, an abstract of the report pastoral visitation is provided for a population was read by the clerical secretary. The report exceeding 2,594,692. stated that 28 clerical missionaries, 220 lay-agents, scripture readers, and schoolmasters for the young, and 620 teachers were in connexion with the society during the past year; that the work had been considerably enlarged in the counties of Cork, Clare, Mayo, and Donegal, and that there were 50 congregations of converts ministered to by the missionaries of the society. The receipts for the past year were £10,273 14s. 11d. (being £3,124 88. 4d, more than in the year ending March 31, 1851). The receipts of the society in Dublia, exclusive of remittances from the London com in-mittee, were £5,654 7s. 7d. (being an increase of £799 23. 5d. above those of the last year), and o the Ladies' Auxiliary 1,604 103. 3d.; making £17,532 12s. 9d. as the total receipts of the Irish Society for the year ending March 31, 1852

SOCIETY FOR PROMOTING CHRISTIANITY AMONG THE JEWS.-I desire to commend to the support of those who have large hearts in Christ's cause the "Operative Jewish Converts' Institution," in Palestine-place; and the more so | as "the income with which it is at present provided is not sufficient for the support of more than twenty Israelites." This deficiency of means is the occasion of painful embarrassment to the committee in the prosecution of their work. “While the sum raised by the efforts of the Jews employed in the institution, as the result of their dustry, is increasing very considerably, it is surely not too much to expect that the income derived from the contributions of its friends should increase in the same proportion. Many converted and inquiring Jews are suddenly reduced to want as soon as their Jewish relatives discover that they are believers in the Saviour. They cannot continue those occupations from which they formerly derived a subsistence: their friends are become their enemies, their nearest relatives are often their greatest persecutors. Their previous educahas not prepared them for following those trades which are the only sources from which they can expect to procure a subsistence. If we wish that the Jewish mission should prosper, and that the gospel should be preached to the poor among the descendants of Abraham, we ought assuredly to aid, as far as we can, in an attempt to provide for the pressing necessity which is occasioned by the success which crowns our efforts; and we may well be thankful to hear that God has graciously granted a great blessing on that which has hitherto been done." The present number of inmates being 17, and the number of those employed as

THE LITTLE CONVERT'S ANSWER TO ROMAN PRIEST.-Kilmacthomas, Waterford.Yesterday one of the children here, who with their parents have embraced the religion of the bible (& most interesting child), was met by a Romanist in this place, who asked him to repeat the Lord' prayer. He did so; but not adding the "Hail, Mary," he was desired to go on. His reply was, "That is all of it." He was tempted with sugar candy, and still refused. He was then asked, will you come to mass?" "No." "How, then, can you be saved?" Answer: "Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ, and thou shalt be saved." The man was astonished and went away. May this child continue to be trained up in the truth.-J. F. PARKER.

* We regard such a resolution as almost nugatory. The We do not now want investigation, but extinction of the grant. education at Maynooth has been sufficiently investigated.

-ED.

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THE CHURCH OF ENGLAND MAGAZINE.

SUNDAY-SCHOOLS. The annual scholars' meeting of the "Church of England SundaySchool Institute" was one of peculiar interest, from the circumstance that, among the crowded multitude which gathered together on this occasion, no fewer than 37 Sunday-schools were represented by the presence of teachers from each of them, and 3,000 pupils. The earl of Waldegrave presided; and one of the resolutions adopted was, I conceive, quite in the right direction: it announced "the opinion of the meeting, that it is desirable that senior Sunday scholars should be well instructed in the evidences of Christianity, and in the protestant principles of the established church of this realm; and they therefore strongly recommend the formation of classes for these especial purposes." At a time when the souls of millions are imperilled by the aggressive character which the Romish church has assumed throughout the land, the universal adoption of such a system in all our Sunday-schools, where it admits of being carried out, commends itself with abundant reason to all those followers of Jesus who are engaged in bringing "little ones" to him through the instrumentality of the Sunday-school.

Weekly Almanac.

H. S.

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REALIZING OF FAITH.-" After all, faith in God's sayings, which is surely a very obvious, simple, and intelligible idea, how seldom is it realized by any of us! People think they believe in them because they so far acquiesce as not to gainsay them; and yet, with this acquiescence, an acquiescence so resolute and strong that you would be shocked to utter ought in contradiction to them, there may yet be no faith. For let there be but belief in the gospel, and where lies the hinderance to peace, joy, confidence in the good-will of a reconciled Father even at this moment? Why postpone all this? Why not rely on the good tidings of great joy, and be glad accordingly? How long shall we put off trusting to God for that redemption which is through the blood of Jesus, even the forgiveness of sin? It may startle

you to be told that this last question is tantamount to the following: How long shall we persist in holding God to be a liar? He himself distinctly resolves it to this alternative: he tells us of the record that he has given of his Son, even that he has given us eternal life, and that this life is in his Son; and he complains of being made a liar by all who will not believe all this! (He that be lieveth on the Son of God hath the witness in himself: he that believeth not (rod hath made him a liar; because he believeth not the record that God gave of his Son. And this is the record, that God hath given to us eternal life, He that bath the and this life is in his Son. Son hath life; and he that hath not the Son of God hath not life" (1 John v. 10-12). This, one might think, is bringing salvation very near to us. It is telling us to take and live; to trust and be satisfied. On this footing, and it is the true one, there should be an instant transition from death to life, from darkness to the marvellous light of the gospel. Let us not think that the way of being washed from our sins is anything more complex or circuitous than this, else we into the error of Naaman the Syrian, when told to wash him from his leprosy in the waters of Jordan, 'We are washed from our sins through the blood of Christ.' But this is, through faith in his blood. Let us so believe; and so shall it be done unto us. These are plain sayings; yet how few think of a salvation so nigh, and so placed by God within our reach, even that God who offers and entreats, and beseeches and commands, nay, threatens it upon our acceptance! What need of prayer, then, that the scales might fall from our eyes!" (Chalmers to his daughter, July 24, 1841).

H. S.

fall

THE LOVE OF GOD SHOWN IN THE PROPITIATION MADE FOR SIN :

A Sermon,

BY THE REV. R. H. DAVIES,

Assistant Curate of St. Luke's, Chelsea.

1 JOHN iv. 10.

"Herein is love; not that we loved him, but that he loved us, and sent his Son to be the propitiation for our sins."

IN the verses just before the apostle discusses the character of God, as it is exhibited to fallen, sinful man. This character is love. In the eighth verse, and again in the sixteenth "God is love." Wonderful verse, he says, words these! The apostle would not say, "God loves," or "God has love;" but "God is love," love itself; that is to say, God's love, like all his attributes, is perfect, complete, consummate, wonderful. But how do

we know this? Because he created us? because he abundantly blesses us with health, plenty, comfort, luxury? No. These are not the circumstances by which we judge of

God's immense love; and, therefore, St. John leads us higher, and says: "In this was manifested the love of God towards us, because that God sent his only-begotten Son into the world, that we might live through him." But he takes us higher still in the verse which forms our text; for he says, "Herein is love; not that we loved God, but that he loved us, and sent his Son to be the propitiation for our sins." That is, the apostle would say, God's love was indeed exhibited in having sent his only-begotten Son; but it was exhibited in far mightier energy, with vastly increased magnitude, in colours far more gorgeous, imposing, and excellent; when we remember the fact that God loved us without our loving him, nay, while we were enemies to him, that he displayed this love by not only providing the means by which we might be reconciled to him, but by sending, giving his only-begotten Son, that he in our nature might obey the law for us, because we cannot obey it ourselves, and by the sacrifice of his body make the propitiation for the sins of the whole world. So this apostle confirms the testimony of another, who thus writes on the same topic, "God commendeth his love towards us, in that, while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us."

Now, there are three chief points here to be considered, the facts which God the Holy Ghost here puts before us

1. Our state by nature, i. e., enmity against God: "Herein is love, not that we loved God."

II. The fact that God loves man, though fallen: "He loved us, and sent his Son."

III. The provision his love has made for us: "He sent his Son to be the propitiation for our sins."

God; for what can an enemy do more than to dishonour you in every way he can, to speak ill of you, despise your orders, disregard your wishes, and live in rebellion against your lawful authority? This is exactly what the poor wretch does, who does not love God. He serves the devil, who hates God, and all that is good and holy. He then despises the commandments of his Maker, and shows that he does so by breaking them. He disregards the will of God; for he refuses to listen to it as it is revealed to him in the written word, or as it speaks to his sometimes moved conscience. And thus he lives in rebellion against the King of kings, in hatred against his Father, Preserver, Redeemer.

But you will say, perhaps, "This is the character of the very profane and wicked; whom everbody condemns as the devil's friends, and God's enemies." True, we reply; but, if you pass on to observe those whose position in life prevents them from committing great sins in public, or whose education has properly trained them to dislike and avoid the grosser vices of humanity, unless they have been converted to God, made new creatures by his Holy Spirit, they are still the enemies of God; for they are living in disobedience to his will. For such, if they seek salvation, seek it not altogether through the Son of God, but through them. selves, through their own doings, and their own fancied merits; not remembering that the word of God denounces all the righteousness of man as utterly worthless to procure salvation; not remembering that God says, as plainly as language can speak, that no works of man, no virtues, no education, no talent can save man; but, that if he be saved, it can, and must be, only by his grace, I. First we are to consider the fact, that through the merits of Jesus Christ. Then I by nature "we do not love God." This is put it to you, my brethren, to decide for your one of the principal features of our ruin, we selves whether, if men do not seek salvation do not naturally love God. Among earthly as the first duty of life; if they do not obey relationships we love those who are bound to the command to "seek first the kingdom of us by the closer ties, and we love those too God and his righteousness;" if they turn a who are in no way related to us except by the deaf ear to the gospel, its promises and its bond of dear friendship. We possess some threats; or if they attempt the hopeless task sort of love too, and usually show it, for those of procuring salvation by some other way who are kind and benevolent to us. But than that appointed by the Almighty, and relook at man in his relationship towards God, vealed in his gospel, can they love God? who is his Maker, his preserver, his bene- No; for they despise the richest boon he has factor every hour that he breathes. Man in given to this wicked world. And, surely, if his natural state, if he acknowledges this with they do this, whatever may be their natural his tongue, proves the falsehood of his asser- amiability, or what we call good disposition, tion by his wicked conduct. Surely, he, who they must after all be the enemies of God. can wilfully and openly break God's positive" The carnal mind is enmity against God," commandments and live in gross sin, cannot love God, whatever he may say; nay, he must hate God, whatever he may say. He is nothing more nor less than the enemy of

says the apostle Paul; and the "carnal mind" is the mind which is still unrenewed by the Holy Ghost, which has no sense and conviction of sin, which loves itself, and decides

the that, since great evil is avoided, and kindness manifested and outward duties attended to, salvation must be the consequence. O fatal : delusion! O ruinous darkness! So that if men say they are seeking salvation, yet do so, not by howing completely before the gospel (not by yielding themselves to God as clay in the hands of the potter), but by doing works of their own, and calling these their stepping-stones to heaven, are they not setting up their own doctrines against the p'ain doctrines of the gospel? Are they not thus disputing, doubting, and contradicting those gospel doctrines, and thus living in opposition to God's revealed will? Then, if so, they do not love God: they are his enemies.

Yes, my brethren, believe me, that, if you will judge yourselves by the pure word of God, you will soon see that all classes of people who call themselves Christians, while their hearts remain unchanged, whether they be gross and open and notorious sinners, or whether they be only what are called moral and respectable people, or whether they be the self-righteous ones, who make their own conduct the groundwork of their hopes for eternal safety-all such are, in fact, the enemies of God.

Now, I wish to put this very plainly be fore you, because, though it is so clearly expressed in the bible, the bible is so little ad and studied by people in general, that really the greater number of them are quite ignorant of the humbling truth of the gospel; and go on fancying that, if they are well-behaved and kind, and do not fall into very gross crimes, they will be rewarded hereafter as a natural consequence. They say the Lord is merciful; but they forget that he is just likewise, and must punish those who live and die in opposition to his will, and in departure from his truth. Not if your virtues were without number, not if you could live a thousand years in what we call goodness, would you obtain your salvation by these means. It is utterly impossible. God has pronounced it so: "By the deeds of the law shall no flesh be justified." Therefore your labour will be in vain if you attempt it. And while you thus labour you do not love God: you are at enmity against him: you are yet in your sins: you are in a lost state. Humbling truths these, my brethren; but they come from the gospel of Christ; and I pray that they may humble your minds. They are not the "witty inventions" of man: they spring from the fountains of God's unerring wisdom. And, therefore, if men are not humbled by them, if they resist them, and live in opposition to them, they show that they do not love God. And this is the state of all

men by nature; this is the state of each one of you, if grace has not converted your hearts. This is the awful state of the whole unconverted world: "The whole world lieth in wickedness." The "natural man" is in a state of alienation from God, is " far off" from God; and therefore does St. John say, "Herein is love; not that we loved God, but that he loved us."

II. And this leads us on to the second fact which our text announces, viz., that, though man does not by nature love God, God loves him, and has manifested this love, by having sent his Son to be "the propitiation for our sins." As you have often heard, God hates sin, but loves the sinner. He creates man with never-dying properties. The soul, even in its lowest state of sin, yet retains the stamp of the divine image in this respect-that it is immortal. When once it is called into being, it no more loses its powers, but goes on increasing in these powers, from childhood to manhood; and when God calls it to himself again it does not cease to exist as the body it leaves behind does; it does not cease to perceive and understand as the corpse does. Its faculties are yet in full energy, its powers in full exercise in another world more fitted to its nature; and so will it continue to exist. for ever and ever, doubtless increasing in knowledge, in comprehension, in capability of enlarging happiness, or more deep despair, eternal glory, or eternal shame. But, though dyed with sin the moment it begins to live in this world, the soul, my brethren, may be cleansed of its inquities, and so made fit even to dwell in the palaces of heavenly majesty itself. On the other hand, if it should not be cleansed, if it should pass from this world in its natural state, then it must be doomed to the lowest depths of degradation, and be for ever the tenant of that awful world of sin, where the devil and his angels hold their cruel and abominable dominion. But God loves your souls. He would see them rescued from the wilderness of sin, and transplanted into the happy regions of holiness. He would rather exercise his bright attribute of mercy than the stern attribute of condemning justice. But man was lost by sin. Sin had ruined him; sin had destroyed the excellence, the purity, the perfect innocence which marked him as he came fresh from the hands of his Maker. How was he to be restored? Could he restore himself? No; for now he could do no good thing whatever. Sin was mixed up with his every thought, word, and action. Besides, how could he appease God's wrath against him? How could he turn away the just anger of the Almighty? Could he ask, as we read in prophet Micah:

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