then quotes a maxim of our blessed Lord, not preserved in the Gospels, but known to the apostles: "It is more blessed to give than to receive;" a very precious maxim, and like many other maxims I dare say in the epistles of Paul, and James, and Peter, and John, which we regard as their own, heard originally from the lips of our blessed Lord. I know not anything more striking than this: it is greater happiness to give than to receive. Of course, a worldly, avaricious, miserly man never could feel so; his only happiness is in getting, and his greatest pain and agony is in giving. But to a true Christian it is a source of greater happiness to give a sovereign to a good cause, than it is to have one given to him. And we may very much test our spirit, and whether we have the spirit of our blessed Master, by ascertaining if we feel more pleasure in giving than we do in getting. Not giving, as many of us I fear do, superfluities that we can easily spare, but denying a little gratification to ourselves in order that we may give, and do a great good to a suffering and needy.

brother.

Then they all showed their affection to the apostle when they wept sore, and fell on his neck, and kissed him; and he kneeled down, and prayed with them;" and they sorrowed the most that so precious a teacher, so eloquent though so long a speaker, of whose presence they never wearied, and of whose sermons they never complained-they sorrowed most that they should see his face no more. And they accompanied him to the ship, to bid him farewell.

CHAPTER XX. 27.

COUNSEL OF GOD-OUR RUIN OUR

RESTORATION-GROUND OF

MEANS OF REGENERATION-OBJECTIONS-FAITHFULNESS.

A TRULY important fact and precedent for ministers of Christ occurs in this chapter. It is "For I have not shunned to declare unto you all the counsel of God." (Ver. 27.)

The apostle uses the word "counsel" in its old and its strictest sense; namely, the sketch, the plan, the mind of God; and when he says, "I have not shunned to declare unto you the whole counsel of God," he tells them, "I have not kept back one doctrine because it would be unpalatable, or taken one topic because it would be popular; I have ascertained what is the mind and the revelation of God himself; and whatever it was, whether men wept or smiled, whether they applauded or condemned, that counsel, or doctrine, I have determined to make known, and have in some measure," as if he had said, "succeeded in doing so."

Let us first very briefly ascertain what is this whole counsel of God. To begin with Matthew and end at the last verse of the Apocalypse would be the full exhibition of it; but in this counsel, in its grand stream and current, there are as it were stepping-stones, so prominent that they must strike every eye, and are in their place keys and steps to the knowledge, and apprehension, and investigation of the whole. In other

words, there are certain truths so constantly repeated, set forth so sharply and so unmistakeably, that he who can read the New Testament and miss them, must either have a very blind mind or a very prejudiced heart. Let us see what some of these doctrines are which constitute together the chief and salient points in the whole counsel of God.

One thing the apostle must have taught, and constantly taught, was man's ruin by nature. In the epistle to the Romans, this doctrine is the basis of all he constructs. Man is fallen; "there is none righteous, no, not one." “All have sinned, and come short of the glory of God." Now, I do not think it is possible to read the Bible and to escape discovering that man is there constantly assumed to be, and treated as a fallen, helpless, ruined, guilty, condemned creature. Having laid this down, the apostle next declares, in making known the whole counsel of God, that man has no power in himself and of himself to reinstate himself in the glory, innocence, and perfection from which he has fallen. He might just as well try to step from this orb to the most distant fixed star, as in his own strength and in virtue of inherent power to rise from a state of condemnation to a state of acceptance with God. We are not only without holiness, but we are described by the apostle Paul, who uses these words, as without strength. We can no more save ourselves than we can lift ourselves from the floor on which we stand and remain poised in mid-air. Even the Roman Catholic is not sunk so far as to believe that he can save himself; he looks to another to do it for him. And we are satisfied and know that when we would do good, evil is present with us; and the good that we would we often do not; and

the evil that we would not, that we often do. Another point that the apostle would state for a certainty in making known the whole counsel of God is, that salvation has been revealed, that a remedy has been provided in the death, the atonement and meritorious sacrifice of the Son of God in our nature. You cannot open a page in the New Testament without discovering this. Salvation by Christ is not a doctrine of Christianity; it is the doctrine of Christianity—not an incidental thing that may be passed by, or a subsidiary buttress, merely ornamental; but it is the very foundation, it is the very substance of the fabric. The abnegation of this is the renunciation of the Gospel. Disguise it as you like, to conclude that we are not saved by Christ alone as our only righteousness, through his blood alone as our only atonement, is to renounce Christianity and go to another gospel; which indeed is not another, for it is no gospel at all. We are sick, and we cannot cure ourselves; there is a Physician that can. We are ruined; we cannot recover ourselves; there is a Saviour who can. We are lost; we cannot find our way back to the fold; there is One coming after us ready to carry us on his shoulder and to bring us home to the fold rejoicing. These are three prominent points in this counsel of God which are set forth by this apostle in every epistle that he writes; prominent, unmistakeable, distinct.

Another point he would set forth no less definitely would be how we are saved through Christ; how we become connected with him; by what means we obtain an interest or a share in what he did. He says it is by faith: "Ye are saved through faith; and that not of

yourselves, it is the gift of God." And the apostle

takes great care to keep this distinction before you : that you are not saved by faith as if it were the saviour; but by Christ. In that sense a man is no more saved by faith than he is saved by his own works. You can no more get to heaven by merit of belief than you can get to heaven by merit of good deeds. If it were otherwise, as we were saved in Paradise by absolute innocence, we should now be saved by pure orthodoxy. But it is not faith that is our saviour; it is not faith that is the ground of salvation. The aphorism, "Saved by works," is not now translated word for word into "Saved by faith." Faith does not take the place of works; it is merely the instrument or the means by which we apprehend Him who is our Saviour, and on whom alone we lean for pardon and acceptance. The hand carries the bread to your mouth, and you say so far you are nourished by your hand; but your hand is the instrument of carrying to your mouth the bread that you eat; it is the bread that nourishes you. You do not say you are cured by taking the medicine: it is by the medicine itself you are cured. You are saved by faith, not as if faith were the saviour, or as if faith died for you; but by Him whom faith lays hold of. And faith has this peculiar position, because by its very nature it assumes that I have nothing, and that Christ has done all; that I am dying, and he has life; and then declaring my destitution, and proclaiming Christ's fulness; its excellence lies in its having nothing, bringing nothing, pretending to nothing; and, therefore, the only appropriate grace to see, and seek, and lean, and rest on Him who is the Lord our Righteousness, all our salvation and all our desire.