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ready to bestow. He hath Himself declared, that if man will repent, God will forgive, To doubt this gracious word is injustice to Him, and cruelty to ourselves; and to refuse the comforts and the peace which the mercies of a Redeemer's love to us all have purchased with the sufficient price of His own blood, is either a delusion of our spiritual enemy, or our own still hankering after sin. Let sin be indeed forsaken, and the Saviour's own promise is recorded in heaven, and preached by His express command upon earth, that sin shall be pardoned; that the sinner shall be restored to divine favour and love; that human weakness shall be strengthened in God's might; that ignorance and infirmity shall be cured in spiritual knowledge and imparted power from above; and that all the malice, fraud, and influence of Satanic power, shall be made to fly before the Christian's weapons gifted from the armoury of God. These are the promised offers of our Redeemer Jesus Christ to every creature under heaven, who is willing to accept them and apply them to himself. But still we must remember, that if we would join the multitude of His redeemed in heaven, we must follow Him, in His doctrine, and in His example upon earth. We must deny ourselves in every instance even of al

lowed pursuit of business, or lawful enjoyment of really innocent pleasure or personal gratifications, whenever we find that a love of this world and trust in the creature have the smallest tendency to draw away our love of the soul, and trust in God.

Let us be advised then, in a matter upon which our doom in an unchangeable eternity depends, to ponder these things with the solemn attention they deserve. If we have hitherto neglected them, or at least have given them only secondary concern, let us remember the dangerous précipice on which we stand. Let us quit the service of the God of this world, and try the service of a better master. Of the service of our soul's greatest enemy, we have already learnt, by dear bought experience, that it is labour in vain. We have found, in the trial of the past, that in the love of gain, in the anxious acquirement of wealth, in the immoderate care of earthly things, and too much desire of selfish consolation from personal gratifications, all hath been" vanity and vexation of spirit." Now let us try the service of God; of that Master who hath graciously declared to all who do serve Him in trust and devotedness of soul, that "Godliness hath the promise of the life that now is, and of that which is to come." Humbled

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under a deep and abiding sense of indwelling sin, let us go at length in earnest to Christ for pardon, for peace, for strengthening and directing grace.

We say that we believe in and trust in Him; let us prove that we do so. Let us remove far from us all that heavy load of care and anxiety for earthly things, that sad and impatient seeking after our own will and present pleasure, which oftentimes destroy our own peace, and interrupt the happiness of those with whom we pass our short pilgrimage towards eternity. Away with all other care of this world's goods, and our own short-lived enjoyments, save that only which, under God, shall fit us for the discharge of our various duties to our fellow-creatures. In every step of our future life, let us learn of Christ and follow Him. Let us imitate the spiritualized frame of Holy Mary's mind, and with her choose "that good part which shall not be taken from us. Our worldly employments, innocent in themselves, our moderate attention to providential temporal mercies, will then be made instruments of righteousness; and we shall be laying up a treasure in heaven, which in the full propitiation of a Redeemer's love shall be given us in "that day." His conquest over sin and death shall then

become our victory, and His glorified resurrection and ascension into His own heaven shall be made the pledge of ours. We shall be blest in His peace, and be finally crowned

with a portion of His own glory.

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THE IDOLATRY OF CHRISTIANS:

EPHESIANS, CHAPTER 5, VERSE 5.

"No man who is an idolater hath any inheritance in the kingdom of Christ and of God."

THERE are few errors of more dangerous consequence in the minds of Christians who hear or read the Word of God, than an unwillingness to believe it possible, that sins, which disgraced the heathens, and are held up as admonitions in Holy Writ, can ever be committed by those who profess to believe the Gospel. With respect to idolatry, the sin named in the text, nothing seems more generally supposed, than that this particular sin at least was confined to the worshipper of the sun and the moon, of the images of wood and stone.

But this is not the inference which must be drawn from texts of Scripture, written, by the express command of God, for our learning also. Though the Christian in his outward Christian and uncorrupted service, cannot, indeed be joined with the real worshipper of

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