reign in his disposal, nationally, of temporal prosperities, as much as he is individually of spiritual blessings, we cannot but rejoice, that in our beloved country, God hath been pleased to run so lengthened and so widely the thread of his sovereign election, and that her sons and her language are the chosen instruments in so great a measure, of disseminating God's truth.

The christian, when in observation, he looks out upon the world and its events, cannot be unmindful of the fact, which scripture emphatically declares, and which the world's histories fully corroborate, that the world, and all its great ones, are but the scaffolding and the tools, whereon and wherewith God is building a spiritual house, a temple of lively stones; and when this shall be completed, and the top-stone shall have been brought forth with joy, the kingdoms of this world, like the scaffolding of a built palace, shall pass away, and her great ones shall receive the reward of their deeds: her great ones, who think never that they are merely doing God's work, and carrying into effect the purposes of him, whom they have never known.

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Verily, thou art a God that hidest thyself, O God of Israel, the Saviour." Concealed in the mystic wheel of thine own inscrutable designs, thou dost shroud thyself and the glorious ends thou hast in view, from the eye of a bold and presumptuous scepticism, and calm in thine own omnipotence, overruling all things according to the counsel of thine own will, even when the pot sherds of the earth, striving with the potsherds of the earth, fancy themselves to be plotting wisely, and executing successfully their own plans, dost write in bright and burning characters across the records of every year's history, God reigneth!

But let us circumscribe our survey, and looking off from the world, look only at the living church of the

living God. Alas, how narrowed hath become our prospect! Shut we out the heathen world; shut we out the adherents of the eastern and western antichrist; shut we out from amongst those who professedly trust in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ, all those who seek to weave a salvation partly out of his righteousness and partly out of their own works, alas, their seems not to be left a "number which no man can number;" on the contrary, in this day of much profession, there seems to be, of real followers of the Lamb, so few, that a babe can count them. But to do this is no part of our calling.

We have no commission from the Lord of the harvest to determine which are the tares and which are the true wheat. By their fruits ye shall know them." David, when he would have counted Israel, incurred the wrath of God; and Elijah, when, in a time of great spiritual declension, he thought he was the only faithful, was reproved by the information that even then the Lord had "reserved to himself seven thousand who had not bowed the knee to Baal." In all times, yea even now, "there remaineth therefore a remnant according to the election of grace;" a remnant which constitutes the true church, and to them we now address ourselves; and, if we might enlist for our purpose word so misapplied as it has been, we would urge them to cherish those feelings of fraternity which worldlings talk about, but which can never really exist, save amongst those who having tasted that the Lord is gracious, feel that they are the children of one Father, and joint heirs with the Lord Jesus Christ in one inheritance. Fraternity hath been, of late, a pass-word amongst the nations; let the church hear the voice, and exhibit to the world fraternity in its reality. Let all those who know the fulness that there is in Christ, and the nothingness of

a

self; all who have been taught by one Spirit to draw near unto the Father, in the name of one Lord Jesus Christ, recognize the brotherhood, and participate together the family blessings. And here a thought, a painful thought rushes upon the mind: Israel's God, in the sovereignty of his dispensations, hath been pleased at various periods of the church's history, to make visible more conspicuously the candlestick of a preached gospel sometimes amongst one denomination of believers and sometimes amongst another. Episcopacy, Presbyterianism, Independents and Baptists can boast their Romaines, their Rutherfords, their Huntingtons, and their Gills. Israel's God reigns above party names, and "giveth to each severally as he will." The candlestick it must be conceded is now most manifest amongst our Baptist brethren. Scattered up and down our land are some faithful ones and eminent ones in other denominations, but the doctrines of free grace are, perhaps, preached by their ministers the most fearlessly and the most unreservedly. Should they eat their morsel alone? Should they shut out from communion with them their brother confessed by themselves to be equally a participator of saving. grace, from drawing near with them to the Lord's table? Will they permit him to listen to the same minister, to contribute to the same funds, to share in the same esteem, and yet bolt and bar against him, yea even sometimes against the very preacher they have been listening to, the commemorative emblems of the same Lord? Is this fraternity? indeed the hollow, meaningless phrase as employed by the world, but it is very far from the love of the brethren as enjoined in the gospel. We enter not into the baptismal controversy; we give not even our own views upon it, but we feel impelled

It is

to lift up our voice at this time against this narrow-minded selfishness, and to suggest to our Baptist brethren, whether it may not ere long cause the removal of the candlestick, and the life and the liveliness which we trust is now amongst them, to be replaced by barrenness and mourning. We have been told of a baptist church in London, one of whose church articles is, that a member even once sitting at the Lord's table with an independent or a mixed church, shall by that one act be expelled from amongst them. Dreadful! Dreadful indeed! Oh, how sweet to know that God's ways are not as our ways, nor his thoughts as our thoughts. Is it a sin to commune with the Lord in company with a pædobaptist brother? How many times, enquired Peter of our Lord, "How oft shall my brother sin against me, and I forgive him? Till seven times? Jesus saith unto him, I say not unto thee, until seven times, but until seventy times seven." But, say our Baptist friends, the sin is not against us, else we might forgive it; it is a sin against God, and we are very jealous for the honour of the Lord of hosts. But when did the Lord give thee an authority to become the avenger of his wrongs?

Let but our Baptist brethren concede that others have, like them, maturely and prayerfully considered the ordinance, and that it is in sincerity of heart they have embraced the opposite sentiment; let them repress the taunt and the insult in which they too much indulge; let them, as brethren, agree to differ upon a doctrine not essential to salvation, and brethren thus differing may walk together the way to heaven in love.

We leave the subject; we may not say more; we could not persuade ourselves to say less may the Lord incline all our hearts to act in accordance with the Lord's will.

Turn we now altogether from the lattice, and looking only into our own souls, let us read there the history, the feelings, and the aspirations of those, who like us, are sojourners in the wilderness, pilgrims to the celestial city, heirs of the glory that shall endure.

It may be that some of them, like us, in life's early springtide when all around seemed bright and green, when the atmosphere was balm, and the sky cloudless, looked out upon the world, and thought it a worthy and a possible ambition to act a conspicuous part upon its theatre. Well do we remember the time when we smiled incredulously and almost scornfully upon an aged kinswoman, who frequently would repeat the Hymn, 'Lord! what a wretched land is this,' &c, and we thought it a pity needlessly to abuse so beautiful a world. But as we advanced along life's pathway, we discovered that its beauty was like that of the apples of Sodom: like them, it was a deception, and like them, corruption within; but he who opened our eyes to perceive the world in its true character did not leave us there. He led us into the wilderness, but it was to speak comfortably unto us; he opened up the fountains of the great deep, revealing more and more the deeds and the darkness of our fallen nature, and shewing to us that even while he restrained from the outbreak of gross sin in the act, the seeds of every abomination were to be found in our own hearts; and then it was, when we had learned our helplessness and our unworthiness, our weakness and our want, that the name and fame of Jesus became attractive to our souls. Then it was that the world became a wil derness unto us, and we felt that we were but as sojourners and strangers; then it was that our feelings became changed, and our desires became elevated, and our ambition more

aspiring. The precious blood of Christ sounded as sweet music to our ears. Way of access unto the Father came as glad tidings indeed, and atonement and reconciliation, and the teachings of the promised Comforter were themes of encouragement and of joy.

We may not pursue the history; we have touched upon the first stages in the saints' progress, but we may not lay down waymarks for every pilgrim's future path. He hath set out to go to the land of Canaan, and to the land of Canaan he shall assuredly come. He hath known condemnation in the court of his own conscience, and shall never know condemnation in the court of heaven. He hath been brought to rely on the finished work of a precious Christ, and that faith shall never fail. What may be the circumstances of his future pilgrimage is with God. He may share bereavement and anxiety, reproach and privation; he may be sorely tried by the tempter, he may seem deserted by his God, he may walk in darkness and have no light, but he is safe for eternity; and as he emerges out of the trouble and the trial and is cheered occasionally by being brought spiritually into a wealthy place, he will sometimes sing, what at the end of his journey he shall sing loudly, rapturously, and gratefully, "By the right way he led me that he might bring me to the city of habitation."

Thus as a pilgrim he advances along the world's wilderness, while as an heir of glory his thoughts are fixed upon his home, and upon his God. He is like Manasseh, it is but part of him that remains on this side Jordan; the other part, and that the best part hath gone already over the river; his heart and his affections, his thoughts and his aspirations are already with his Lord; and when privileged, from the summit

of Pisgah to bask in the sunshine, and to catch a glimpse of heaven he bursts out in uncontrollable desire, "Oh that I had the wings of a dove, for then would I flee away and be at rest."

Stay, happy soul! repress for a time thy longings! The Zion of the Holy One, the church of which thou art a part, is like thee also as yet on each side of the dark river. The church triumphant is with Jesus; the church militant still in the world hath a voice to each of its members. Ask thyself whilst yet a sojourner, Canst thou not, like thy Lord, be about thy Father's business? The reciprocal relations of life are not to be neglected by the grace-born soul; he should be a good child, a good husband or wife, a good parent, a just master or servant, a faithful friend he should not be a drone in the church, a loiterer in the vineyard; "Work while it is day: the night cometh when no man can work." Is there no saint in sorrow to console? no babe in Christ to feed? no foe to oppose? Unto every one is committed a talent. Remember the reproof administered unto him who wrapped it up and buried it. Work not to gain thy heaven, that hath been secured by thy Lord, but learn the work of faith, the labour of love, and seek to shew the genuineness of thy profession by a consistent and dilligent walk before men. Let not thy religion be all selfish; sustain thy christian character, and when the messenger shall come, enter joyfully into the joy of thy Lord.

Our space is more than exhausted; we have scarcely room to express our thanks and our best wishes to our correspondents and readers. Brethren beloved, "The Lord bless thee and keep thee; the Lord make his face to shine upon thee, and be gracious unto thee; the Lord lift up his countenance upon thee, and give thee peace." Amen.

THE EDITORS.

THE GOSPEL PULPIT.

THE EXPECTATION OF THE CREATURE. A SERMON,

Preached at the Baptist Chapel, Bedworth, on Lord's-Day Afternoon.

BY MR. WILLIAM SMITH.

Ir is a solemn truth, that there is nothing precarious respecting our salvation; that is, the salvation of the Lord's people. So Paul begins this chapter, with shewing the blessed state and condition of the believer in Christ: wherein he says, "There is no condemnation," not even now, "to them that are in Christ Jesus, who walk not after the flesh, but after the Spirit :" and then gives us to understand, at the close thereof, that there is no such thing as being separated from God, no separating any believer in the Lord Jesus Christ, from that love of God which is from everlasting to everlasting towards them that fear him. The Arminian's god will not do to be my God. I do not want his god. A god that loves to-day, and hates to-morrow, is not the God of Israel, is not the unchangeable Jehovah, is not a God keeping covenant, a faithful God, infinite in wisdom, boundless in power, whose attributes all harmonize and shine in the salvation of his church, shewing it to be to the praise and glory of his own grace. Some have said ere now, If God loved a part of Adam's race, why not take them to heaven without falling? why not make them happy at once? I answer, We should not

have had so large a display of God's wisdom, power, grace, mercy and love, had things turned out SO. But doing as he did, suffering man to fall so far away from him, to wander so far away, that he never would be able, according to nature's capability to find his way back; by his acts of grace God defeated the devil, removing every obstacle out of the way, justifying his church, bringing her nigh to God, to the praise and glory of his own grace, through the redemption which is in the Lord Jesus Christ. This is indeed love. "Herein is love, not that we loved him (first), but that he first loved us, and gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth on him should not perish, but have everlasting life." Now some that are not very tenacious of the work and agency of the Holy Ghost, tell us, that God should be loved without any motive whatever moving the creature to love. They say, to do this is love like a God, because it is disinterested love. I once heard a man say in this pulpit, that there is no such thing found in heaven or earth as disinterested love; that it is not to be found even in God, for he loved himself.

Father,

Son, and blessed Spirit, so loved themselves, that all that was and is done in creation, providence and grace, in the salvation of his church and people, was for the sake of his own glory; so it is not disinterested. But as it respects the child of God, renewed by the Spirit of the living God, he can set his seal thereto in this matter, and say, before the Lord did bring home and reveal a little mercy with love and power, there was no such thing to be found in his heart, soul or affections, as gospel love to God or his Christ. Therefore it holds good, if we love him at all, it is because he first loved us.

Paul runs over many things in this chapter. I was going to say there is a whole body of divinity

wrapt up in the eighth chapter of Romans, as well as in the seventh. I believe none of the children of God, come into the eighth without going into the seventh. After Paul had been caught up into the third heavens we hear him saying, “Oh wretched man that I am, who shall deliver me from the body of this death." He treats of the Spirit and the flesh, the law and the gospel, condemnation, and then under it also of the people who enter into all bliss and blessedness, the people whose God is the Lord, who are made free by the Spirit of the living God, the law of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus entering into their heart, and making them free from the law of sin and death, who no longer walk after the flesh, but after the Spirit. Thus it comes to pass that sin is condemned, and the sinner spared thus the grace of God in the poor sinner's heart changes the bias of his mind, his heart, soul, and spirit are turned towards God, and divine things; though he go astray, yet the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus that first quickened him, will be his instructor, and will bring him back by the way of weeping and groaning. "Oh wretched man that I am;" here Paul sets forth the miserable state and condition of this world; he tells us in consequence of Adam's sin and transgression, the whole creation of God is put into irregular motion: a motion not as once was before Adam's sin and transgression: a motion that causes all creation to groan in consequence of man's sin and fall. We have proved this, and we often see it falls to the lot of ungodly persons, they having many privations, trials, losses, crosses, and much sickness of body; many things fall to their lot in consequence of Adam's sin, because they have nothing that balances with all this, "for the wages of sin is death," they are under sentence of that law that condemns to death, so that if almighty