XXV. SERMON Work, comes to dwell in our hearts, and testifies to us that we are God's children, with an assurance which we cannot doubt, because the Spirit is truth. Practical testimony. iii. I pass on to consider very briefly in the results of the twofold last place what we may learn from to-day's epistle as to the practical results which God expects to follow from this testimony of His three witnesses. The verses which I chose as my text are interposed between two portions of to-day's epistle, and are intimately connected with both. From the words which follow it we learn what the fact is to which the testimony is borne, that we have eternal life in the Son of God. But our text is no less closely united with the verses which precede it. This is the victory that overcometh the world, even our faith. Who is he that overcometh the world, but he that believeth that Jesus is the Son of God? This is He that came by water and blood, even Jesus Christ......and it is the Spirit that beareth witness......for there are three that bear record, the Spirit and the water and the blood, and these three agree in one. And this is [their] record, that God hath given to us eternal life, and this life is in His Son. Thus we see, by placing the most important clauses of the passage in close connection, that the eternal life in Christ of which the three witnesses bear record, is identical with the faith that overcometh the world. Here then is the result which ought to follow from their testimony, here is a new practical test by which each of us may ascertain XXV. whether we have as yet any real part and lot in SERMON eternal life. Are we in any true sense overcoming the world? Do we turn away from its temptations, shut our ear to its persuasions, disregard its threats, when any of these would lead us astray from duty, and principle, and from the love of Jesus. Christ? It is plain that while to-day's epistle is full of encouragement to those who are in earnest about their salvation, but vexed by doubts and anxieties, it contains stern warning for those who are living in careless worldliness. Even to them two of the witnesses speak; but one alas! is silent. The Water testifies that Christ has entered into covenant with them, and is ready most surely to "keep and perform" His part and promise made in that covenant; but they have deserted the banner under which they were pledged to serve, and forgotten their bounden duty of obedience to His law. The Blood testifies of pardon procured for them, of a barrier removed, of a propitiation which has averted from them punishment and death; but for them the Blood has been hitherto poured out in vain, they are yet in their sins, and unless they seek for help from the Son of God, they cannot have life, and in their sins they will die. But the remaining witness does not speak to them at all, for the still small voice of the Spirit is drowned amidst the buzz of worldly opinion, the uproar of worldly applause, and the clamorous demands of worldly ambition. If there be any one in this church to-day who feels that his case is here described with more or less truth and 5. SERMON reality, let me entreat him not to put away the feeling from him, but to pray for help to advance from it to some deeper and more permanent conviction. Let him recall to mind our Lord's familiar words, Joh. iii. 3, Except a man be born again, he cannot see the kingdom of God. Except a man be born of water and of the Spirit, he cannot enter into the kingdom of God. Let him reflect that this new birth implies a change from the life which he now lives in the flesh, that is from the bondage of this world to the eternal life which can only be found in the Son of God. Let him listen to the testimony of the three witnesses, recording the fact that Jesus is the Giver of that life, and then let him seek to obtain their further testimony, witnessing to his own heart, that in Jesus he himself has found that life. Only, brethren, let us all beware of resting on any false hope, or of trusting that we have that life, unless by the faith which is its source we do really overcome the world. If any man love the world, the love of the Father is not in him. And let no one madly prize the love of the world above the 1 Joh. ii. love of the Father; for the world passeth away and I Joh. ii. 15. 17. the lusts thereof, but he that doeth the will of God abideth for ever. The world with all its allurements must soon vanish from our sight and our affections, but the faith which overcomes the world, and which rests on the sure testimony of the Spirit, the Water, and the Blood, will abide with us, as the source of joy and blessing, to all eternity. DARJEELING, 1862. XXVI. FORGIVENESS AND PATIENCE, SECOND SUNDAY AFTER EASTER. 1 PET. II. 21, 22. Even hereunto were ye called, because Christ also suffered for us, leav ing us an example that ye should follow His steps, who did no sin, neither was guile found in His mouth. XXVI. Peter. THE apostle Peter wrote his first epistle from the SERMON famous city of Babylon, then still great and important The first even in its decay, and the dwellingplace of a large epistle of St body of Jews after other inhabitants had begun to 1 Pet. v. desert it. He addresses this epistle to the Christians 13. dispersed through the districts and cities of Asia i. 1. Minor, from the eastern hills of Pontus to the western extremity of the continent on the shore of the Ægæan'. These churches were at this time suffering, if not from actual persecution, at least from the threatening and foretaste of it: severe trials were impending, judgement was soon to begin at the iv. 17. house of God, the terrible afflictions which Christians were soon called to endure, already overhung them, 1 Observe the order in which the countries are enumerated in the opening verse of the epistle; as they would occur to the mind of a person writing from the East. 24. XXVI. SERMON and their approach was felt by many separate acts of hatred and tyranny, like the low murmuring of the wind ushering in the full violence of the tempest. Why St Peter, from his distant home on the banks of the Euphrates, addrest the churches of a district, including the province of Galatia, and the cities of Iconium, Lystra, Antioch, Miletus, Ephesus, and Colosse, names which so immediately remind us of the work and writings of another apostle, we cannot accurately determine. Possibly St Paul was withdrawn for a time to some more distant scene of misRom. xv. sionary labour, Spain for example, which we know that he desired and intended to visit. Or perhaps, as some perverse members of the early church used to quote the authority of the original Twelve, in disparagement of the great teacher who humbly calls I Cor. xv. himself the least of the apostles, because he was born 8, 9. out of due time, and thus parties had arisen, dis1 Cor. i. 12. tracting the church with schismatical cries I am of Paul, and I of Kephas, and I of Apollos, St Peter may have written this epistle to shew how completely his teaching and St Paul's were one, how both enforced the same doctrines and duties, especially those most needed in troublous times, such as an honest conversation among the Gentiles, submission to 10. xiii. 1- every ordinance of man for the Lord's sake, patience, forbearance under injustice, forgiveness of evildoers, I Pet. ii. 12, 13. Compare Rom. xii. 7. I Phil. ii. 3. I, 2. 1 Tim. ii. readiness to share the sorrows of Christ, strengthened by the hope of a future part in the glory of Christ. In any case it is interesting to see, as you will by Eph. iv. 31, &c. |