Philippians, iii. 10.---“ That I may know him, and the power of his resurrection, and the fellowship of his sufferings, being made conformable unto his death." and his servants. Other wishes and hopes they have as human beings, but these occupy the prime place in their hearts. It is said, my brethren, of St. Au- | heart-that they may be his children gustine, that he wished to have seen three things before he died; Rome in its glory-Christ in the flesh, and Paul in his preaching. Many saw Rome in its glory, but were never made holy by its sight; many saw Christ in the flesh, but were never made happier in consequence; many heard St. Paul preach who have passed away into perdition. But St. Paul, in this and the preceding chapter, expresses seven wishes, and all these wishes centre in Christ. He wishes that he might know Christ -that he might win Christ-that he might magnify Christ-that he might be conformed to Christ-that he might be found in Christ-that he might rejoice in the day of Christ—and that he might be for ever with Christ. Now, these seven desires correspond perfectly with the desires of every child of GOD in this present state; these are the supreme wishes of their And, my beloved, I wish this to be the criterion in your ChristianityWhat think ye of Christ? Do not allow Satan for a moment to divert your minds from this question, by telling you of your unworthiness, and your guilt, and your wretchedness, and your misery: your Saviour knows much more about that than you do about yourselves. Now, ask this question in his sight this morning-What do I think of the remedy? What aspirations have I after the balm of Gilead, and the physician there? How stands Christ in my affections? What estimation do I hold him in? Because this, after all, is the test: "Unto you, therefore, who believe, he is precious." Now, I ask every child of GOD in this house to-day--I ask every individual who may be trembling on the threshold, as it were, afraid to launch away into that ocean of divine love, an assurance that Christ is his, and that he is Christ's: I ask every such individual, What think you of Christ? If he is very precious to you, if your estimation of him is very high, if your delight in him is very great-why, then you may feel, though many infirmities may be manifest in you, that you have the marks of a real Christian; and then the aspiration and response of every one of you will be-" That I may know him, and the power of his resurrection, and the fellowship of his sufferings, being made conformable unto his death." : I will not occupy your minds with any artificial divisions of the words before us, but beg your devout attention to the three parts into which the apostle seems to divide his desires for knowledge and then bring your minds to the great end for which this desire of knowledge possessed his breast-that he might be made conformable unto his death." Oh that my lips may be instructed, and my heart filled with divine unction, that I may set forth Christ, and the knowledge of Christ, and the excellency of the knowledge of Christ, so to you, that not only those who know him may feel this to be their prayer, -but that every young man, and every young woman, and every hoary-headed sinner in this place may make the prayer their own, and never be satisfied until it is answered from heaven. obtain is this "THAT I MAY KNOW HIM." Paul had traversed the fields of Jewish literature--he had walked in the paths of Rabinical learninghe had been brought up at the feet of Gamaliel-he had stood high in the schools-he was acquainted with profane and sacred literature; but still observe, that though he had gathered these flowers, and had tasted their sweets, and had smelt their fragrance, when once he had by faith entered the garden of Eden, plucked the rose of Sharon, and put it into his bosom, every other flower of literature had lost its sweetness; and therefore he says, "That I may know him." And you will observe, this was the subject of his preaching wherever he went. It was not simply a mere address to the passions-it was not an exhibition to the minds of men of his own great learning-it was not a fine lecture on some science, which pleased and delighted his mind; but wherever he went the apostle said, "I am determined"-I have made the solemu resolution before GOD "not to know any thing among you,” you learned Corinthians, you with whom knowledge so much abounds, you by whom taste and politeness are so much cultivated." I am determined to know nothing among you, save Jesus Christ, and him crucified." This too was the subject of his glory; "God forbid that I should glory, save in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ; by whom the world is crucified unto me, and I unto the world." Now, then, he wished to know him-increasingly-experimentally—super, The first part, then, of this know-latively. ledge which the apostle desires to (To be continued.) THE PREACHER. No. 152.] SERMON BY THE REV. J. SHERMAN. THURSDAY, AUGUST 29, 1833. (Rev. J. Sherman's Sermon concluded.) He wished to know him increasingly. He did know him, perhaps more than any other man on the earth; but he wished to know him more. Once he did not know him; once he blasphemed the worthy name which was now so blessed to him. Once he compelled the saints to blaspheme; once any individual who only acknowledged Christ to be his Saviour-it was quite enough to Saul of Tarsus to thrust him into prison, make his feet fast in the stocks, and never liberate him until he blasphemed the Jesus whom he avowed. But now, when Christ sent one single ray of his beauty, one ray of heavenly light into his bosom, while the sun was shining in its strength in the midst of the day-from that moment nothing else but Christ would do; now he must know him, know him increasingly. [Price 3d. and its employment this morning, is to meditate on the subject of my text, to know him extensively and increa singly. There is this excellency in this knowledge-that it never cloys. Those who know most of the Saviour see how little they do know of him. Some young people, it is true, when they have attained a little knowledge, think they have a great deal more than that hoary-headed pilgrim who has made great advances in the divine life, though he bow down his head like one of the shocks of corn which is fully ripe, and ready to be gathered in by the sickle, feeling that he knows so little, and that he must know much more before he can know him aright: that knowledge which he, perhaps, thought at first to be so great, is, comparatively, only the ABC of Christianity; and he has to advance further and further and further into the mysteries of the gospel; and the more he knows, the less he sees he does know. So that every Christian in this case may well say, "That I may know him!" And what a comfort is it if, when this prayer is put And there is no wonder in this desire: every thing in Christ is worthy to be known. The dignity of his person, the depth of his humiliation, the height of his exaltation, the efficacy of his atonement, the plenitude of his fulness, the exuberance of his love, and all the riches of his grace-up, the answer comes from heaven, these are subjects which occupy the highest intelligences from the first moment they were made known: into these things the angels desired to look: and the recreation of heaven, YOL, VI. that what we ask we shall obtain ! "Then shall we know if we follow on to know the Lord." Observe again-be not only wishes to know him increasingly, but he N wishes to know him experimentally. | Saviour." It is this which brings To know, in Scripture, is to experience the excellency of a thing; and therefore the same word is used in various parts of Scripture, in order to point out its excellency. To know is to see: Every one that seeth the Son, and believeth on him, may have everlasting life." To know is to taste: "If so be that ye have tasted that the Lord is gracious." To know is to handle the word of life, and so to know as to have the experience of it; like as it is said by Christ, " My sheep hear my voice, and I know them, and they follow me." So that, you perceive, this spiritual knowledge of which the apostle speaks includes an experimental acquaintance with Jesus Christ; not the speculative knowledge which devils have, whereby they tremble and fear before him; not the knowledge which the ungodly have, whereby they know that such a person as Christ existed, and that he died on the tree; but such a knowledge as a poor hungry man has, who, starving for food, stops at a friend's house, and has bread set before him, | and eats, and revives; such a knowledge as that which the weary traveller has of the beauteous shade of a rock on a hot sunny day, who, ready to drop through exhaustion, comes beneath its shade, and finds it animating to his spirit and to his frame. This is the knowledge the apostle wishes to experience; this is the experience which every child of GOD, in connexion with his knowledge, must have, if it be genuine : not simply to say that he is a beloved, but to say, as the church says, " This is my beloved:" not simply to see him as a king, ruling with his sceptre over all the earth; but to say with Thomas," My Lord and my GoD:" not simply to see him as a priest, atoning for my sins; but to say with Mary, "My spirit hath rejoiced in GoD my sweetness, this which brings him home to my soul, makes him mine, and enables me to repose and rejoice in him. It is this knowledge which all the saints rejoice in. And is not this your desire? Are you satisfied with mere theory in knowledge? Are you not wishing to be acquainted with Christ in a far greater degree than you ever have known him before? "He that follows him," aims at an increasing knowledge of him,-" He that follows him shall not walk in darkness, but shall have the light of life." Again, the Apostle wishes to know him superlatively—that is, above every thing else. This he tells us, was the state of his mind immediately after conversion. In the seventh verse of this chapter he declares, “What things were gain to me, those I counted loss for Christ."—that is, when Christ enlightened my mind, I counted these things loss:" but, as it might be expected, a change took place in his mind. And that this was not the enthusiasm of a moment he tells us, in the next verse, "Yea doubtless, and I do count"-at this very moment, with my most enlarged experience in divine things-" I count all things but loss for the excellency of the knowledge of Christ Jesus my Lord; for whom I have suffered the loss of all things, and do count them but dung, that I may win Christ, and be found in him." I ask this morning, who ought to have the throne of our hearts if Christ has it not? Who ought to have the supreme place in our affections if Christ has it not? Who has such a claim to our hearts and love as Jesus, our Saviour and our friend? What are all the empty things of the world on which men set their hearts, and on which we used to set our hearts in the days of our vanity and folly? What indeed is all readily; they understand the theory and the doctrines of the Gospel very clearly, and perhaps can converse on these doctrines, and hold controversies on them. But then they know nothing of it vitally; it does not affect their lives; it does not bring them to Christ; it does not make them purer or happier. Then what is wanting? The power of Christ's re Now, what is this power of Christ's the science that ever was accumulated in the mind of any man without this knowledge? I rejoice whenever I see the bent of a young man's or a young woman's mind after the attainment of knowledge that will be useful in the world, extend their influence in the world, and make them useful among men, and give them a dominion over the follies and vanities which exist in this vast metro-surrection. If that is experienced it polis: but if this head knowledge, brings this knowledge into action, and this attainment of science are not and makes the mind joyful and subordinate to this one great thing, happy. you can do nothing; if the knowledge of Christ be not paramount-resurrection? The resurrection of if the desire of the heart be not first Christ has a vast power in our justo attain this, enjoy this, and let this tification, in our sanctification, in our be superlative all other is but sound-edification, in our glorification. ing brass and as a tinkling cymbal, Christ's resurrection has a vast vanity and nothingness. "But whe-power in our justification. Christ ther there be prophecies, they shall came as our surety; he undertook to fail; whether there be tongues, they pay our debts and to set us free; he shall cease; whether there be know- gave himself a ransom for many; ledge, it shall vanish away." But, and, blessed be GOD, this ransom "this is life eternal, to know him the was paid down-this price itself, his true GOD, and Jesus Christ whom he precious blood, was given; and the has sent." Wherefore, my young happy consequence is, that his people friends, "Remember now your Crea- who believe and receive this are set tor in the days of your youth, while free. But observe, that in itself this the evil days come not, nor the years ransom could avail nothing if Christ draw nigh, when you shall say, We be not raised; although he offered have no pleasure in them." himself on the tree, yet that ransom But I pass on to observe the second would avail nothing for man if Christ branch of this prayer: be not raised. Hence says the Apostle, power of his rESURRECTION." This" If Christ be not raised, your faith one word, "power," makes all the is vain; ye are yet in your sins. difference between religion in the Then they also which are fallen asleep head and religion in the heart; this in Christ are perished:" Abraham, is all the difference between the pos- Isaac, and Jacob, the prophets, and session of religion and the profession all the worthies who died in expectaof it; it is all the difference between tion of the Messiah, and in the exthe believer and the unbeliever. pectation of his sufferings and death, Many of you, in all human proba- have not entered heaven: there is bility, know quite as much as ano- not one there if Christ be not raised. ther individual. There is in some young persons a very great facility in acquiring knowledge, they attain it very quickly; and they acquire, especially, spiritual knowledge very 66 AND THE So that you see this is a main point that has great power in our justification. The resurrection of Christ was necessary to complete his work, to give the finishing stroke to |