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no wise cast us off, till our evil lives have so hardened our hearts, that we cease altogether to love him, and so may be said to cast off him. "We are the sons of God;" to deny this were to deny the love of God in Christ; we dare not make the mercy of our heavenly Father less than it is his gracious pleasure to make it. "We are the sons of God;" most assuredly, all of us who this day assembled around Christ's table, and many, many more, I trust, besides ; Beloved, we are the sons of God; but it doth not yet appear what we shall be."

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O called by the love of God our Father, redeemed by the blood of Jesus Christ, and having received some first-fruits of the Spirit of God, for none can come unto God, none can confess the Lord Jesus, none can breathe one hearty prayer, but by the helping of the Holy Ghost:-O called to be heirs of our Father's kingdom, of a kingdom incorruptible, and that fadeth not away, reserved in heaven for us; O born again of a heavenly seed, into the likeness of God in Jesus Christ;-having all these hopes, which none may gainsay, shall we not purify ourselves, even as he is pure; that when he shall appear, he shall quicken our mortal bodies as his Spirit will have

quickened our spirits into his glorious image? It is most true, he that hath this hope in him, and this hope is ours by the blood of Christ, he that hath this hope in him purifieth himself, even as Christ is pure.

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But if we forget our privileges, and our hope ceases to interest us; if, being the sons of God, we do not grow in the love of our Father, then we shall not purify ourselves, nor will our seed continue in us, but be smothered and overgrown more and more, till it be utterly lost. God's love towards us is more than we can conceive; the danger is not that we think too highly of it, but too coldly; lest, not believing enough in his love to us, we lose more and more our love to him. You now think of him sometimes, and when you do think of him you love him, and cannot bear the thought of displeasing him. This is the natural feeling of a young mind; but this will not be so always. More surely than the winter is now coming on, will your hearts be hardened with advancing years, and that feeling of remorse and wholesome repentance which now makes you condemn yourselves when you think seriously, for having made such unworthy returns to your Father's love, will be exchanged for the spirit of doubt, or the spirit of self-justification, or the spirit of hardness and

callousness. And will you be the sons of God then, when in no portion of your souls is there any thing left of child-like confidence, or of child-like love? nothing but unbelief, or indifference, or slavish fear, mingled with something of slavish murmuring, I had almost said, of slavish hatred? No; you will have cast off Him who, with much long-suffering, and by unceasing offers of more than a father's love, strove in vain to keep you as his children. You will have cast him off utterly; and where is that second redemption that will again call you to him, when the redemption once made by the blood of his own Son has been cast in scorn behind you?

"We are the sons of God!"-It is a blessed word, and a most encouraging assurance; let us take heed that we doubt not of our Father's love, nor lose sight of the hope of his inheritance. "We are his sons," and he will not cast us off for every transgression; we are yet, most of us, young in years; and for what is life given us, or why are we not admitted at once whither Christ is gone before, but that we may have time to perfect in ourselves that image which cannot be the work of a moment? In your education for this life, the fulness of the knowledge of manhood is not expected of you in youth or in childhood; he is satisfying

his parents, and answering their wishes for him, who, never going backwards, nor ceasing to go forwards, strengthens his mind week by week, and month by month, and year by year, and removes one piece of ignorance after another, and opens and enlarges, gradually, the range of his knowledge, till his faculties have come to their full ripeness. And even so is it in our education for eternity. Our Father would have us always going forwards, always overcoming some temptation, some bad habit, some bad temper; always growing in confidence and love towards him, and becoming more and more like his first-born, Jesus. This is our course, as in the advance of our understanding, till our faculties have come to their full ripeness. But when will this be with the faculties of our spirits? Not at forty, not at fifty, nor at the very latest hour of undecayed consciousness; no, nor millions of years hence; no, nor ever. We shall never have attained to that perfection in love, but that we shall be growing more and more perfect still. Such is the course of the sons of God. Such will be ours, if we remember that we are so ; if, remembering our Father's love, and his glorious promises, the hope of his inheritance remains in us, so that we purify ourselves, even as he is pure.

SERMON III.

CHRIST OUR PATTERN.

MATTHEW XVII. 19, 20.

Then came the disciples to Jesus apart, and said, Why could not we cast him out? And Jesus said unto them, Because of your unbelief.

It is now not much less than three hundred years ago that what is called the Reformation was brought about in England. A great deal of good was done by it, and a great deal of harm; because what it destroyed was made up of evil and of good; and men, in plucking up the tares, rooted up, also, much of the wheat along with them. But one good was done by the Reformation, for which we cannot be too thankful; that is, it has made us understand that the sole authority for our faith is to be found in the Scriptures, and it has put the Scriptures, to speak generally, within the reach of all of us. Nor are we slow to confess that this is a very great blessing; it is for ever

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