property. Somehow the young man became tempted to speculate, and was gradually led on to more and more hazardous ventures, without telling his sisters what he was doing. Presently, the crash came, and they found themselves penniless. The wrongdoer, who was of a reserved disposition, said very little in apology or extenuation of his conduct, yet he suffered greatly from depression and the pangs of self-reproach. His brave and loyal sisters guessed what was passing in his mind, and did everything in their power to show him that they cared for him as much as ever. The subject of the family misfortune was scarcely ever alluded to. When the inevitable privation came they shared it together without murmuring or discontent. One day, after the light had begun to shine again a little, the brother broke silence, and with considerable emotion told his sisters that their unselfish affection had saved him. If, he said, they had ever reproached him for his selfish folly, he would have put an end to his life, but instead of that they had led him to see and choose the better part, not so much by what they said as by what they did. They did not talk religion at him; they lived the principle of the Cross in his presence. They had drawn forth the better manhood by the Christ-like spirit they had shown in suffering for his faults. Here on a small scale is the very thing declared in my text; it is a limited. expression of what Jesus has done for the world. We do not need even to say that it is something like

L

it; it is the working of the self-same spirit, it is the application of the principle of the Cross. These brave and good women bore the Cross for their brother, and now as in all the yesterdays of history the Cross has power to win moral victory in your life and mine. This beautiful thing, this atoning love, this spirit of Jesus, needs to be manifested more and more every day and hour. It is the kind of doctrine that everybody can understand, and the only one that the world needs.

Twice within the last week a number of the poorest crippled children in this district have been entertained in the hall below the City Temple. I am told it was wonderful to see the compassionate goodwill with which the workers came to help on that occasion. Besides City Temple workers there came some music-hall artistes to amuse the children with songs and recitations. In the joy and pathos of that hour they had a not unimportant share. They came for nothing, of course, except the desire to help and heal. I have little doubt that those music-hall people would have been considerably astonished if some one had told them that they were first-rate theologians, and that what they were doing was mentioned in the Bible; and yet it was so. The songs they sang to the children were certainly not as beautiful as the fortieth Psalm, but they were akin to that Psalm in spirit and purpose. These singers came to brighten poor suffering lives, and in so doing they were manifesting something of

the spirit of Christ and helping to lift the world up to God. Do not tell me that this has nothing to do with Calvary; it has everything to do with it. I do not know what the world might have been if Jesus had never come; but the fact that He has come has meant the inpouring of the spirit of self-sacrifice into the life of mankind in such a way as could never have been without Him. By the way, during one of the little meetings to which I have referred it was determined to send a telegram of greeting to the Lord Mayor from the children. Then followed a pathetic scene which drew tears from the eyes of the spectators. When the proposal to send the telegram was made from the platform it was received with quavering cheers by these poor little guests of Jesus. They knew who their friend was, and in acting thus they were adoring the spirit of Christ in the Lord Mayor of London.

Sir William Treloar will not receive a worthier tribute than that in all his year of office, and I hope he never wants a greater. It was a great thing to be cheered by the sick, the maimed, the halt, and the blind. Blessed be God, while theologians are writing learned disquisitions on the Atonement, here it is in the midst of us.

Let us go home and practise the Atonement, the making-one of God and man. Just as the Psalmist meant himself when he wrote my text, and Apollos meant Christ, so I mean you and Christ, Christ in you. Ritual and dogma do not matter: "Sacrifice

and offering Thou wouldest not; then said I, Lo I come (in the volume of the book it is written of me) to do Thy will, O God. Yea, Thy law is within my heart." You fathers and mothers, go and set the Atonement to work in your children; you business men, give it a chance with those you employ, or who employ you. Never tell me you do not believe it: you do; everybody does. You burden-bearers and way-makers, whose lot is cast in obscure places, let it shine through your life. Never mind the scale on which the life is lived. The scale on which the

earthly life of Jesus was lived was not so very big after all. There is nothing small but selfishness; there is nothing great but love.

A LOVE THAT DIED

"He that eateth bread with me hath lifted up his heel against me.”- JOHN xiii. 18.

THIS pathetic saying of Jesus is, as perhaps you may have observed during the reading of the lesson, a quotation from, the forty-first Psalm. It has a special appropriateness to the experience of Jesus as described in this chapter and the parallel accounts in the synoptical gospels. As it stands it is peculiar to the fourth gospel, but I think we may fairly regard this as one of the few instances in which this particular gospel is more historical than the others. For the most part, as you know, the fourth gospel does not aim at historical accuracy, but at spiritual instruction. The writer takes up the historical material supplied by the others and uses it for his own special purpose, along with some other materials which are not historical at all, but merely symbolical. Notwithstanding this, however, I think we can perceive a genuine historical element in this book which is not to be found in other parts of the New Testament. I like to think that this particular element represents the special contribution of the Apostle John. I do not mean that he wrote it,