Master, on the servant's part surrender, "Ye are not your own, for ye are bought with a price, therefore glorify God with your body and your spirit which are His ". Both these are true; Christ hath purchased and claimed us, and we by grace have surrendered ourselves to Him-we call Him Master and Lord. This full surrender is, I judge, another pre-requisite for service. In 2 Tim. ii., 3, 4, Paul represents the soldier, the king's servant, as disentangled from all, comparatively at least, indifferent to all that is personally dear, even his own life, in order that he may do the one thing, viz., please him who has chosen him to be a soldier, to whom he has surrendered himself. This full surrender on the part of Christ's servant, this affection, whole-heartedness for Him, and ardour to do His will must nevertheless be accompanied by another qualification, subjection. This is taught in verse 5 of the passage quoted above. Paul changing the figure says, "If a man strive for masteries, yet is he not crowned except he strive lawfully," i.c., subject to the rules of the contest. So also we as the servants of Christ should ever consult the will of our Master, and bow to it. He has bought us for Himself, and undertaken to care for and direct us, He has also given us His rules for service; let us then, beloved fellowservants, be very careful to serve according to these, according to His revealed will, in subjection to His Word. Seek to serve in wisdom as well as with affection, truthfully as well as fervently, more careful (as others have said) as to the quality of service, than its quantity, remembering also, that although service is a present thing, and that God may show us present results, yet our service is done in faith, and we serve chiefly for the day of Christ for which also we live and suffer. Hence the need of patience or endurance, another principle of service. This also is illustrated in the same passage in Timothy, verse 6. The Apostle teaches us, that in order to partake of the fruit, the husbandman must first labour. James also tells us, that the husbandman hath long patience until he receive the early and the latter rain; then applying it servants, and sets himself in deadly opposition to every element of their service, ever seeking to act on the opposite evil in their flesh, and thus to hinder the manifestation of the grace. This he does with craft and force, aiming at the state of our hearts, seeking to unfit us for our service, hence our difficulties; but let us not faint, but remember that greater is He that is in us, than he that is in the world, that in the strength of the Lord, with the whole armour of God and the power of His might we can meet him and conquer. Christ has conquered for us, and will overcome in and by us; yet let us remember that He who has determined the end has also appointed the means. Therefore let us watch and pray; be sober and vigilant, because our adversary the devil as a roaring lion goeth abroad for mischief; let us by steadfastness in the faith resist him. Yes, resist him, we are never told to flee from Satan, but to resist him. Sinners are to flee for refuge to Christ, and young men are bidden flee youthful lusts, desires (specially necessary), in those days, but we are to stand our ground against Satan, "Resist the devil, and he will flee from you". May it ever be thus with us. A word in conclusion with reference to the sphere or spheres of service. We are in danger of defining too sharply, drawing the line too markedly between things called secular and things spiritual, and so get into bondage with regard to our daily duties, whether in the house or in the field, in the office or the shop. Surely everything done in connection with which spiritual life, love, surrender, subjection and patience can, and ought to be exercised and developed, is an act of service. Truly there is a service in the Gospel to the world, and service to Christ among believers which may be called direct spiritual service, but it is also true, that any and everything that can be done to the Lord (and such things alone should believers do) as service, "Whether therefore ye eat or drink, or whatsoever ye do, do all in the name of the Lord Jesus, giving thanks to God and the Father by Him". Space forbids my enlarging, but allows of a brotherly suggestion to my readers, viz., to search out, read, and pray over the passages of God's Word which treat of service, and then seek grace to act on them. H. W. It is one thing to be blameless before men, and another to be aiming at that perfect obedience which Christ rendered to the Father: "I do always those things that please Him". R. C. C. MA FORGIVEN AND FORGOTTEN. AN says he can forgive, but cannot forget. Not so with God. He can forgive, and forget too. And surely this is a wonderful thought for the doubting soul. To believe God, to receive His testimony, to set to our seal that He is true, is to have our sins forgiven and forgotten, for ever. And the word of God asserts it: "Their sins and iniquities will I remember no more ". (Heb. x. 17.) Now all true believers are spoken of in this very precious verse. They not only have the right to know that their sins are forgiven, but that they are also forgotten. They have been so perfectly put away, that the mind of God is not henceforth charged with them. They have been borne by the Divine scape-goat into a land not inhabited--the land of forgetfulness--eternal oblivion. (Lev. xvi. 20-22.) God has blotted them out; He has cast them for ever behind His back; they are lost in the depth of the sea. Every figure is used by God to express how completely the believer's sins have been met and put away out of His sight. But how could God speak thus? The simple answer is that Jesus has died and bare in His own body all the sins of His people; and as this Divine scape-goat He has borne them away into the land of eternal forgetfulness. They are lost, and can rise no more against those whose sins they were. Blessed thought! "Jesus died for our sins, according to the scriptures; and was buried and rose again the third day, according to the scriptures". (1 Cor. xx. 3, 4). This is the answer to the question, "How can a holy God act thus with the believing sinner?" Now, what perfect peace this affords; what repose this imparts to the soul! To know one's sins to be forgiven and forgotten, must fill us with "joy and peace in believing". Especially when we know they have been atoned for, and borne away out of God's sight for ever, by the precious sacrifice of the Lord Jesus Christ. All is divinely and righteously done, and Christ is now in glory. What about us who have believed? It is ours to enjoy the fact, to rejoice in the truth of what God says. Does He say, He gave His Son to die for sinners, and consequently for me? Then I am to rejoice in it. Does he say that Jesus bare my sins in His own body on the tree? Then I am to rejoice in the fact that he did. Does He say that Jesus is raised from the dead and crowned with glory and honour at His own right hand? Then I am to rejoice that all is done done as God would have it done-done to His eternal satisfaction and glory. Does He say that I as a believer in the Lord Jesus am pardoned, justified, accepted, and saved? He does most undoubtedly. What then remains for me to do? Simply to rejoice in it. All this is very simple and blessed, is it not, beloved reader? To rely upon what God says in His word is to have assurance that we are pardoned and saved. As a young lady said some time ago, "Thus, I am to believe it simply because God says so". My answer was, “Yes, just so". Not This must ever be the ground of assurance. my works, but the word of God; not my feelings, but the word of God; not myself at all, but the word of God. That word in the power of the Holy Ghost bears witness to the infinite efficacy of the sacrifice of Christ -tells out God's thoughts and appreciation of the work and Person of His dear Son, and shows how righteous He is in pardoning and justifying the ungodly who be lieve. "It declares His righteousness, that He might be just, and the justifier of Him which believeth in Jesus." (Rom. iii. 26.) The Here is the secret of the enjoyment of peace. God rests in Christ who has accomplished a work by which He is glorified about sin. The believer rests where He does-in Christ. God has expressed his delight and satisfaction in the work of His Son in raising Him from the dead and giving Him glory. We rest in that expression of divine delight and satisfaction. infinite height of divine glory to which Christ has ascended, expresses God's estimate of the work of the blessed Lord Jesus on the cross. We rest in that estiWhat must be the result? Sweet and cloudless peace. Standing in God's favour we can think of His holiness and give thanks. Nothing can disturb our peace. It is peace founded on the Divine estimate of the sacrifice of Christ. We repose there, and with respect to the question of sin, death, and judgment, nothing can disturb our repose. Blessed thought! Happy people! Happy portion! mate. What follows? A life of self-surrender, of devotion, and of consecration to Him who loved us and gave Himself for us. To live no longer to ourselves, but to another-even our adorable, risen Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ! THE ALTAR WHEREOF WE EAT. Heb. xiii. 10. THE PART FIRST. THE Apostle in 1 Cor. x. 18 asks the question, "Are not they which eat of the sacrifices partikers of the Altar ?” And this identification of the sacrifices with the altar is seen too in Matt. xxiii. 20, Whosoever shall swear by the altar, sweareth by it and by all things thereon"; and in Hosea viii. 2, "Because Ephraim hath made altars to sin, altars shall be unto him to sin". It is in the light of such texts that we can understand the words in Heb. xiii. 10 "We have an altar, whereof they have no right to cat which serve the tabernacle ". What then is that altar, or sacrifice, of which the priests of the old dispensation had no right to eat? The grant to them, "by reason of the anointing," was very large from various offerings, but there were exceptions. Of course they had no part of the burnt-offerings which were ever ascending upon the altar, “an offering and a sweet-smelling savour" to Jehovah, deLoting and figuring the entire devotedness of Him who offered Himself without spot to God, and the everenduring fragrance of that consecration. They had no exclusive right to the peace-offering. And there was a special provision as to some offerings, because they were characteristically "most holy". (Num. xviii. 9, 10.) They were to be eaten in the most holy place by the males only. "This shall be thine of the most holy things reserved from the fire. Every oblation of theirs, every meat-offering of theirs, and every sin-offering of theirs, and every trespass-offering of theirs, which they shall render unto me shall be most holy for thee and for thy sons. In the most holy place shalt thou eat it. Every male shall eat it; it shall be holy unto thee." There was much that the sons and daughters might alike feed on, and in their own dwellings. But offerings of the special kind described-the meal-offering, the sin-offering, and the trespass-offering-were regarded as the special food of the priests to be eaten in the Holy Place. (See also Lev. vi. 14-18.) But besides these laws there was one memorable and significant reservation in respect of that sacrifice of sin-offering, of which the blood was carried within the veil. This was the grand distinguishing sacrifice on the great day of atonement, as we read in Lev. xvi. The terms σε λο of this particular law are found in Lev. vi. 30. sin-offering whereof any of the blood is brought into the tabernacle of the congregation to reconcile withal in the holy place shall be eaten; it shall be burnt with fire." When Nadab and Abihu died after the appointed sacrifice had been offered upon the consecration of the priests, we find that Moses diligently sought for the goat of the sin-offering, and beheld it was burnt, and he was angry with Eleazar and Ithamar, the sons of Aaron which were left alive, saying, "wherefore have ye not eaten the sinoffering in the holy place seeing it is most holy, and God hath given it to bear the iniquity of the congregation, to make atonement before the Lord. Behold the blood of it was not brought in within the holy place; ye should indeed have eaten it in the holy place as I commanded." (Lev. x. 16-18.) It was as much the high privilege of the priests to eat the ordinary sin-offerings as it was their duty to abstain from eating any part of that special sin-offering of which the blood was taken within the veil by the High Priest according to Lev. xvi.; and whenever faith unfolded to them the full meaning of sin-offerings in general, they must have known the peculiar sanctity of all the food which such offerings supplied to them, and the fitness of the ordinance that it should be eaten in the Holy place, and in that place alone. We cannot tell the extent to which their minds were enlightened as to the distinctive meaning of the various offerings; but no devout priest searching into the meaning of the ordinances which the Spirit of the Lord had given with such exactness, and so elaborately, in the Book of Leviticus, could fail to mark the special character of the sin-offering. "Every one that toucheth it shall be holy." (Lev. vi. 18.) What could participation of the priests in such food (as they fed on it in peace in the holy place) imply? Were they not consciously brought near by the blood which had been shed? And then, as they thought that there was one solemn occasion on which a sin-offering was presented with a special provision that not even the priests should have any part of it; when the great day of atonement periodically came round, and that occasion arose, and the special sin-offering of that day was burned outside the camp without any of the priests being permitted to take any share of it; and when they considered the reason of this, namely, that its blood had been taken by the High Priest within the veil, what depths of undiscovered meaning must have been shadowed to their souls! It was not consistent with the purpose and character of that dispensation that the prohibition should be removed. The veil in front of the Holy of Holies taught the lesson of which the Apostle speaks in Heb. ix. 8: "The Holy Ghost this signifying, that the way into the holiest was not yet made manifest". The sin-offering in its ordinary course had its proper effect, as we read in Lev. iv. The offerer came with it, with the confession of his sin, and when the sacrifice was offered the sin was forgiven. To feed on that through which sin was forgiven was the highest honour of the priests. And to this extent every true worshipper might be enlightened. He might know that his sin for which he had offered his sin-offering was really forgiven, and that the priests in the holy place were feeding on that which had satisfied God. But on the day of Atonement the great ceremony of the High Priest taking the blood of the sin-offering within the veil typified something more than the forgiveness of a particular offence, and the enjoyment of a temporary fellowship with God. It spoke of sin being fully and finally put away-"sin condemned in the flesh "of an end of all offerings, once for all, and therefore only, as the Apostle says, it spoke of "boldness to enter into the holiest ". The type was imperfect, as every type of such a glorious and transcendant truth must have been. It exhibited an earthly High Priest, himself full of infirmity entering within the veil once a-year with sacrifices which could never take away sin, so as to make the offerer perfect as pertaining to the conscience. And yet there was in it a wonderful picture of accomplished redemption, with its rich and necessary consequences. It pointed to the moment when the veil should be rent, and entrance should be manifested by a new and living way to the Mercy Seat. But of that time the law with its shadows could not give, even to the most devout worshipper, anything but the most feeble conception. David might know the blessedness of the man whose transgressions were forgiven, and whose sin was covered, and to whom the Lord would not impute iniquity; but who could have foreseen the day in which a body of saints, gathered from Jews and Gentiles alike, should be made priests to God, and in the fulness of a calm experience of acceptance in the Beloved, with a true. heart, in the full assurance of faith, should feed on a sin-offering which had made them clean every whit, complete, perfect, and in truth and reality, one with the Son of God, who had taken the sinner's place, and then had entered into the heavens themselves with His own blood as Head and Representative of His redeemed people? The contrast in Heb. xiii. 10 is between our high and wonderful privilege in this access into the holiest, with its accompanying satisfaction and rest of heart, in the presence of the God of Peace, and the limited privilege of those who served the tabernacle. Theirs was a ministration which was glorious, for it was full of shadows of good things to come, but our ministration is "still more glorious". "That which was made glorious had no glory in this respect, by reason of the glory which excelleth." Great as the privilege of the priests was, as they fed on the sinoffering in the Holy Place, relatively it had scarcely any glory at all. That the Apostle in Heb. xiii. is alluding distinctly to the one altar or sacrifice of which we have spoken seems clear from the context: "We have an altar whereof they have no right to eat which serve the tabernacle. For the bodies of those beasts whose blood is brought into the sanctuary by the High Priest for sin (which was the special ordinance of the day of Atonement) was burned without the camp. Wherefore Jesus also, that He might sanctify the people with His own blood, suffered without the camp. Let us go forth therefore unto Him, without the camp, bearing His reproach." It is by His precious work— the reality of that which was typified on the day of Atonement-that we now have access into the Holiest. He entered in there once, having obtained eternal redemption. That was the antitype of the High Priest's action in Lev. xvi. Moreover, He suffered without the gate, as made a curse, bearing the whole weight of guilt, Himself taking the place once for all, of all the many offerings which could never settle the question of sin; and in doing this He glorified God, and fulfilled His will. "By the which will we are (or literally, have been) sanctified by the offering of the body of Jesus Christ once for all." That was the work of obedience by which many were made righteous (Rom. v. 19), by which our sanctification was accomplished. Now being sanctified we have fitness for the Holiest, there can be no barrier to our access; and having access there, faith finds the nourishment of the soul in the flesh and blood of Him who died for us; and this is" meat indeed". M. W. ON LUKE xii. 32-48. NOTES OF AN ADDRESS BY MR. J. G. BELLET, 7th SEPTEMBER, 1852. THIS is part of the answer of the Lord to the appli cation made to him in the 13th verse; the application was not unrighteous, but observe the Lord's reply-"Who made me a judge or a divider over you?" The Lord here shows us, that though a thing may not be wrong, it may not be dispensationally right. Great mistakes are made. If Christ gave up the world, so is the Church to give up the world. I am sure of this-that the path of the Church to glory is just that of the Lord, except as to atonement. We are not to expect everything set to rights before our passage to glory is accomplished; and, therefore, if you weigh things in the balances of human thoughts, you get them approved; but if according to the mind of Christ, you get them condemned. Christ did not go up to glory through the judgment of the world; nor did He regulate the world. Now this generation is setting it in order through benevolence-largehearted benevolence. But the Lord Jesus is not acting on the world for God-he is not regulating it, just as he is not judging it; but he is separating a people out of it. We should be ready for every good work-ready to pay even to the last penny; it is impossible to measure the benevolence of the Church, but we are not to seek to regulate the world. Verse 25. "And which of you with taking thought can add to his stature one cubit. If ye then be not able to do that thing which is least, why take ye thought for the rest? Consider the lilies how they grow they toil not; they spin not; yet I say unto you, that Solomon in all his glory was not arrayed like one of these. If, then, God so clothe the grass, which is to-day in the field, and to-morrow is cast into the oven; how much more will He clothe you, O ye of little faith?" In these beautiful reasonings, He contends with the principle of covetousness, and then He comes into His own proper sphere, and addresses us on the principle of faith that casts in our lot with Himself. "Fear not, little flock; for it is your Father's good pleasure to give you the kingdom" (ver. 32). It is not the fear of persecution that the Lord has before Him, but of circumstances. You may be disinherited but fear not, you have a kingdom that none can take away. Now beloved, does your heart and mind prize Jesus after this manner? If we do not, they will not be music to us; but the more I cleave to Christ, the more is it music to me; if I be lying on the heart of Christ, then I can enjoy it. Amidst the changes and exigencies of human life, this word would be music on the ears. Ver. 33 "Sell that ye have, and give alms; provide yourselves bags which wax not old, a treasure in the heavens that faileth not, where no thief approacheth, neither moth corrupteth." Oh! if we have cast in our lot with Christ, this 33rd verse will be infinitely delightful; because we are to have a common. kingdom, the same glorious inheritance. If we have cast in our lot with a rejected Lord, these demands will be acceptable. Why was not the feast acceptable? Nothing was wanting, but the heart was preoccupied. The farm had got the heart-the oxen— the wife; and they pre-indisposd the heart for the feast. Verse 35. "Let your loins be girded about, and your lights burning; and ye yourselves like unto men that wait for their lord, when He will return from the wedding; that, when He cometh and knocketh, they may open unto Him immediately." That is, men of one intent, waiting for Jesus. What is wanting is to be men of one purpose-and waiting-and watching. The Lord does not give us a minute account of these things; but He gives us a summary view of what He meant--being all day long in the attitude of "waiting" for one loved, not feared (verses 37-39). There is no "blessedness" attached by the lips of Christ, to the man waching against the thief-to keep his own house is not keeping his master's house. There is safety attached to it; but he does not say "blessed". Now, in what attitude are we? Are we like men that have something to guard, or like those who are waiting for their loved and coming Lord. The Lord grant it may be so! I NEARLY HOME. AM growing very weary, I have been a long, long journey, When the road was steep and rugged, All the closer to His side. I have passed through many troubles, X. |