scarce a city or town, in the whole earth, where there is not to be found a simple believer in a crucified Christ a murdered, living, risen Jesus. "We were eye-witnesses of his majesty," of his glory -the glory in which He will appear in the latter day. "For some are here," said He, "who shall not taste of death [shall not die] until they see the Son of man coming in his glory." Six days after He gives this sample of that glory, "when," says Peter, "we were with Him on the holy mount," and what glory! no longer His sorrowing visage, or marred face; but "Forms too pure for human sight, Grew visible amidst His light." Dear Do you remark how they knew one another in the holy mount? I do believe this is a distinct assurance that we shall know one another in glory. brothers and sisters, my companions in this work of the Lord Jesus, when the trumpet shall sound and the dead shall be raised, and we who may have slept in Jesus, or are alive and remain at His coming-who have been associates in sorrow and in joy-we shall stand together, in that glory, with each other and the Lord, on that coming Tabor; we shall know each other. Moses and Elias were a type of the glory. Peter, James, and John, of the kingdom. I cannot enter on that now; but you might write over this scene, on the Holy Mount "THE KINGDOM AND THE GLORY." "For what we declared unto you," said the Apostle, the power and coming of our Lord Jesus Christ;" the kingdom over which He shall reign, and the glory in which we are to be associated with Him; which kingdom and glory may be soon! Oh, come the day! "was Now, so far, in our subject, I have endeavoured to show you how what Peter, James, and John, as eyewitnesses, saw in the Holy Mount, is one of the buttresses of our faith. 66 But touching the other buttress of our faith, the Apostle adds, "We have a more sure word of prophecy." You say, "Could anything be more sure than seeing?" Well, it is possible that the eye might be deceived, but it is not possible that a whole volume of evidence could be false. God's Word stands good, according to admitted rules in human jurisprudence. "In the mouth of two witnesses let every word be established." We have the witnesses; but we have also" a more sure word of prophecy." We can search the writings, we can examine the testimony, we can compare the evidence, and find it all of God. Knowing this first that no Scripture is of private interpretation." Do you know what this means? (I speak now to those who understand the Olympic games.) Suppose two posts, and a bar which extended from one to the other; this bar in the games was used as a starting bar; the men stood inside the bar, surrounded by a great crowd of witnesses; the withdrawing of the bar was to determine their start-without a fair start the wreath would not be fairly won. Now one end of the bar rests on this pillar and the other on that, and no runner could have a private start; the bar was to be drawn by no one of or for himself; it was to be by no private act— but by the judge who was to determine the start; the very moment the bar is drawn they start. Now, no prophecy, not an atom of it, is of any private starting, neither from heaven or hell, neither from man, or angel, or devil; but it takes its start from the mind of God, by the Spirit of God. "Holy men of old spake as they were moved by the Holy Ghost." The " sure word" of our salvation is all from God-God. Ah! dear believers, these are two sure buttresses; we see, we do not follow a cunningly devised myth; for, besides what the apostles saw, our faith rests on the word of the living God, who cannot lie. Knowing that what we believe is true, silences every doubt. Does He promise eternal life on believing, we know He will perform. We believe, for He hath said. "Oh! this is rest to our souls." I conclude with a solemn illustrative circumstance. I have alluded to a friend who has been called away by death. As the bar in the games was of no private drawing, and as the truth is of no private starting, but "holy men were moved by the Holy Ghost;" so, likewise, with the bar of life, it is of no private drawing. "There is a time to be born," even the beginning of an existence, never to terminate; and "there is a time to die”—a time which lies at the beginning of a great end. Any mention of the time to live is omitted by the wise man-so rapid is it, so evanescent is it, so soon forgotten-for who knows anything of the man that sowed your acres a hundred years ago? What is known of the man who rode your horse before he came into your possession ? What know you of those who owned your property ere you bought it? Many a lost soul may have lived in your house, sat in your carriage, or died in your bed! Believe me, life is brief, the bar must soon be drawn, and then how will it be? But as I was about to say, one day my friend was at the Westland Row Terminus, and as he reached the door, a lady fell back, as it were in his arms. He said, "Madam, is anything the matter?" and she said, "Oh, Sir, the door is shut!" by which he understood that she was late for the train - matters of importance demanded that she should go by that train, but now she was late, and was prostrate under the circumstance. Well, my friend said to her, "Do you ever think of a time when another door will be shut ?" She implied she would rather not speak of it, so he left her; but the half-hour elapsed, and they were in the same carriage. He renewed the conversation, but as he thought without effect. About six months after, a servant called and said, there was a lady dying, and she much wished to see him; he went, and when he entered the room, he identified the dying lady as the one who had lost the train. When he came to the couch, she raised her head, and said, "Only that I lost the train, and the door was shut, this, the heavenly door, would now have been shut;" or words to that effect. Beloved, the bar may soon be drawn for you and me. Are you treating the Gospel as a myth? or are you thinking that death is a reality, and that when the bar is drawn, you will be in heaven or hell for all eternity? Do you believe in God? have you believed in the Lord Jesus Christ? You ask, "What is the Gospel ?" The Gospel is that Christ "died for" (or because of) "our sins, and was raised again for" (or because of)" our justification." He emptied the cup of our woe, and it is now a cup of salvation. Every believing sinner may say, "God knew me-He judged me worthy of death, and the Gospel is, that either I must die or some other in my stead; that other is Christ, who died. I owe it all to God, who gave Christ; and to Christ, who gave Himself." This is no myth, but a reality, on which all who rest have life and peace. All you want, sinner, even supposing this is the first time you ever heard it, is simply to believe it. The sinner has but to receive the righteousness of God. Do you wonder at this?-at its simplicity? Wonder no more, but know what you are, full of sin and death; and what Jesus is, who became sin, who died; and what now, you are in Him, even complete-" complete in Him." May the Lord, by His Spirit, show it to you now "All that I was, my sin, my guilt, My death was all my own; "The evil of my former state, ADDRESS IV. THE GOD OF GLORY. "The God of glory appeared unto our father Abraham, when he was in Mesopotamia, before he dwelt in Charran, and said unto him, Get thee out of thy country, and from thy kindred, and come into the land which I shall shew thee. Then came he out of the land of the Chaldeans, and dwelt in Charran and from thence, when his father was dead, he removed him into this land, wherein ye now dwell. And he gave him none inheritance in it, no, not so much as to set his foot on: yet he promised that he would give it to him for a possession, and to his seed after him, when as yet he had no child." -ACTS vii. 2-5. You will find in these words that there is a beautiful order in Christian life. Abraham, a simple idolater, dwelling in Mesopotamia, was without God in the world, as is the condition of every natural man. God it was who appeared to Abraham. found of one who sought Him not. He was But the God who appeared to him was a God of glory; One whom the carnal mind could never have seen, but who is revealed by the Spirit as possessing a power to draw to Himself a power stronger than all obstacles. Abraham's response to the divine call was at the first hindered by nature; but nature dies, and the response is complete. God is the genesis-the beginning of everything |