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VI.

use them for the regulation of the life, take the SERMON place of that acceptable service in the spirit, and not in the letter, whose praise is not of men, but Rom. ii. 29. of God.

manhood.

4. Let us now sum up in one comprehensive Spiritual statement all St Paul's teaching in this part of Scripture. We Christians are called to the duties and privileges of spiritual manhood, to obedience resulting from principle, from conviction, from gratitude for God's forgiving mercy, and a desire for true holiness. This desire can only be gratified, these feelings can only be realized, through fellowship with the Lord Jesus Christ by faith. Therefore, whatsoever keeps us from Him, or intrudes between Him and our souls, or detains us as it were in leading-strings, halting and stumbling on our way, instead of leaving us free to run, and meet Him, and seek his Spirit's help, is a return from the brightness of the New Testament to the twilight of the Old, from the spirit to the letter, from the Gospel to the Law, from freedom to bondage, from the true worship of God to the elements of the world, from Jesus Christ, in Col. ii. 3. whom are hid all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge, to the tutors and guides of the world's infancy. It is our only safety and happiness to live in union with Christ, for in Him alone can we be saved from sin and made partakers of God's promises. For thus He Himself has taught us. is life eternal, that they might know Thee the only

This John xvii.

3.

VI.

SERMON true God, and Jesus Christ, whom Thou hast sent. Let us then seek and pray for that life and that Heb. x. 19. knowledge, through Him in whom we have boldness to enter into the holiest, and the privilege of continual access to our Father who is in heaven.

MOULMEIN, 1861.

VII. SPIRITUAL CIRCUMCISION AND THE

NEW YEAR.

THE CIRCUMCISION OF CHRIST.

ROM. IV. II.

And [Abraham] received the sign of circumcision, a seal of the righte ousness of the faith which he had, yet being uncircumcised, that he might be the father of all them that believe, though they be not circumcised, that righteousness might be imputed to them also.

VII.

Connection

and eccle

season.

It will by God's blessing be profitable for us to ob- SERMON serve how admirably our Church services at this season are adapted to the beginning of a new year, between the and how completely the thoughts suggested by the natural Scriptures read to us are calculated to sanctify those siastical which naturally occur at this familiar division between two periods of time. The coincidence was not designed. The framers of our liturgy regarded Advent Sunday as the beginning of the Christian year, and the choice of this present season for the annual remembrance of our Lord's birth and infancy and circumcision was unconnected with the fact that we are passing from one secular year to another. Still, if we are at all disposed to encourage those solemn reflections and good resolutions which none but the careless sinner can avoid con

13.

VII.

SERMON necting with the new year, we shall be greatly helped to do so by the special subject brought before us, and the special prayer which we are taught to offer in the public worship of God. All the associations and lessons of this time, sacred and secular together, Heb. viii. speak to us of what is new, reminding us how that which decayeth and waxeth old is ready to vanish away, and that something more hopeful is taking its place. Especially they put before us new motives, new principles, and new opportunities. New motives and new principles are suggested by the ordinance of circumcision, which comes before us in the order of the Church services, new opportunities by the year now opening upon us in the order of nature. The meaning and intent of circumcision is especially taught us in the epistle for the day. We will first therefore try to understand the actual sense of that epistle; then we will consider its two practical lessons, and connect them both with the thoughts which seem most appropriate to a new year.

Design and paraphrase

of the epistle.

2. There is no difficulty in understanding St Paul's general design in writing the portion of Scripture chosen for to-day's epistle. When the Gospel was first preached, it was natural that those Jews who acknowledged Jesus of Nazareth as the Messiah, should find it hard to believe that there were no longer any exclusive privileges reserved for their Rom. ix. nation, to which had pertained the adoption, and the glory, and the covenants, and the giving of the law, and the service of God, and the pro

4.

VII.

mises, and that no blessing was henceforth attached SERMON to that venerable ordinance of circumcision, which had hitherto marked them off from other nations, and to which even Christ Himself had submitted, as a genuine Israelite bound to fulfil the law. They would not believe that all this was decaying and waxing old and ready to vanish away. It was therefore St Paul's chief work to convince them that Christianity was a universal religion, and to proclaim the message of peace and good will, not to the Jews only, but to all mankind. His doctrine is that men are forgiven by God, and adopted into His family, not because they are circumcised, not because they are descended from Abraham by natural birth, not through any personal merits or works of their own, but through union with Jesus Christ, and through a spiritual descent from Abraham, by the inheritance of his faith. He even assures them that circumcision itself, rightly understood, bears witness to this truth. He begins the passage by quoting the words of David, as a testimony to the happiness of those whom God has forgiven. Blessed is the man, he Rom. iv. says (citing the 32nd Psalm), to whom the Lord will not impute sin. And then, he asks, since such a man is declared blessed in God's word, how wide is the application of the promise? Does it extend to Jews only, or to all? Is this blessing pronounced over the circumcised, or over the uncircumcised also? We can answer the question, he adds, from Scripture, for we say that the ground of Abraham's

8.

Ps. xxxii.

2.

ver. 9.

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