are come to a mountain which is not forbidden to you; there are no bounds set about it to keep you off, but you are freely bidden and freely invited to come to it. And the God who invited you will give you grace to come. If he has given you the will to come, he will give you grace to climb the sides of the hill, till you shall reach its upper glories, and stand on its summit transported with delight. While I am talking about the nations that will flow to Christ, might we not weep to think that there are so many in this congregation that are not flowing to Christ but are going from him? Ah! soul; what are the splendors of the Millennium to thee, if thou art his enemy? For when he tramples his foes in his hot displeasure, thy blood shall stain his garments, even as the garments of the wine-pressers are stained with the blood of the grape. Tremble, sinner, for the advent of Christ must be thy destruction though it shall be the church's joy and Know ye not that to you the day of the Lord is darkness and not light, for that day burneth as an oven, and they that are proud and do wickedly shall be as stubble, and the fire shall consume them with burning heat. Oh! ye people that to-day hear the words of Jesus! ye are now this day invited to come to the mountain of his church, on which stands his cross and his throne. Ye weary, heavy laden, sin-destroyed, sin-ruined souls, ye that know and feel your need of Jesus, ye that weep because of sin, ye are bidden to come now to Christ's cross, to look to him who shed his blood for the ungodly, and, looking to him, you shall find peace and rest; so that when he cometh with rainbow wreath, and robes of storm, you shall be able to see him, not with alarm and terror, but with joy and gladness; for you shall say, "Here he is, the man who died for me has come to claim me; he who bought me has come to receive me; my judge is my Redeemer, and I will rejoice in him.' Oh! turn ye, turn ye unto God! some of you as vile as the inhabitants of Sodom; turn ye, turn ye to God! O Lord Jesus! by thy grace turn every one of us to thyself! Bring in thine elect; let thy redeemed rejoice in thee; and then let the fulness of the nations flow unto thee, and thine shall be the glory, for ever and ever.

comfort. Ye say, "Come quickly.”

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SERMON XV.

COVENANT BLESSINGS.

"He hath given meat unto them that fear him: he will ever be mindful of his covenant."-PSALM CXi. 5.

THIS verse occurs in one of the Psalms, the Hallelujah, commencing with "Praise ye the Lord." We often find the Psalmist praising and extolling God. Let us imitate his example. Let us do so, because we shall find it very pleasant and profitable, and because, also, it is our bounden duty. One of the highest exercises of the new life is praising God. Our doubts and fears may sometimes be indications of life; and doubtless they are, for the dead man neither doubteth nor feareth. But our songs of praise are far higher demonstrations of the life within, and are more worthy fruits of a soil which has been the subject of God's husbandry, which has been ploughed by the agonies of the Saviour, and made fertile through his precious blood. My brethren, our life should be one continued psalm, with here and there a note which descends deep. Yet, for the most part, we should always seek to sing as we live. The stars sing as they shine, and they sing by shining. Let us sing whilst we live, and live by singing; and let our life be singing one great psalm of life perpetually. There are many ways of praising God. We should do it with the lip; and grateful is the voice of song in the ears of the Lord God of Sabaoth. We should do it by our daily conversation; let our acts be acts of praise, as well as our words words of praise. We should do it even by the very look of our eyes, and by the appearance of our countenance; let not thy face be sad, let thy countenance be joyous. Sing where thou

goest; yea, when thou art laden with trouble, let not man see it. Thou, when thou fastest, appear not unto man to fast; anoint thy head and wash thy face that man may not perceive thy sorrows. Be thou ever glad, for it is God's commandment— "Rejoice in the Lord alway, and again I say, Rejoice." And yet once more, he saith, "Rejoice evermore." That we may have themes of song, David has in this psalm afforded us many subjects. Let us attend to the subjects of the text-the subject, I might have said, for it is all one. This verse is the voice of experience. It is not the voice of hope, saying, “He will give;" but the voice of experience, "He hath given meat unto them that fear him ;" and the voice of faith, "He will ever be mindful of his covenant."

We shall notice, first of all, the gift" He hath given meat unto them that fear him;" then we shall notice the covenant; then the character here spoken of "He hath given meat unto them that fear him."

We

I. Let us consider THE GIFT-"He hath given meat." are to understand this, of course, in a twofold sense of our neces sities; the first, temporal, the other, spiritual.

1. We are to understand this gift in a temporal sense. Our bodies need meat; we cannot keep this fabric in repair without continually providing it with food. God's children are not, by their being spiritual men, prevented from feeling natural wants; they hunger and they thirst even as do others. Sometimes, too, they are even called to suffer poverty, and know not where their next morsel of meat shall come from. Blessed be God,

"He who has made our heaven secure
Will here all good provide."

And the covenant is not merely the covenant of the great and marvellous things that we need spiritually, but it is a covenant which promises in the catalogue of its gifts mercies that are food for the body, mercies for our immediate and pressing wants— “He hath given meat unto them that fear him." God has never suffered his people to starve. "The young lions do lack and suffer hunger, but they that wait upon the Lord shall not want any

good thing." The promise is as true under the new covenant as under the old—" Bread shall be given you, and your water shall be sure." The Lord who feeds the ravens will not be less careful of his people; he who supplies every insect with its food, and feeds the prowling lion in his majesty, will not suffer his own home-borne ones, those who are nearest his heart, to perish for lack of nutriment. "The cattle on a thousand hills are his;" he will not suffer his children to lack for their meat. "He it is to whom the earth belongeth, and the fulness thereof;" he will not, then, suffer his children to go without necessary supplies. "He hath given meat unto them that fear him." Some of us are not qualified to speak from experience upon this point. We may say, indeed, that God has ever given us our meat; we have not lacked any thing. Hitherto, the road has been to us like that of Israel when they came to the camp of the Syrians, strewn with gold, and silver, and garments. God has provided for our wants even before they have come; he has anticipated our necessities. But there are others of you that have been brought so low by poverty and affliction that you are qualified to speak. You have sometimes been to an empty cupboard with an empty stomach; you have sometimes wondered where your supplies should come from; you have been even houseless and homeless. But, ah, children of the living God, has he ever failed you utterly? Has he not, after all, though he has reduced you very low, so that the last morsel was eaten from the wallet, has he not ultimately supplied you, and that, too, by means not miraculous, but almost so? Has he not in providence sent you things which you needed, and which you scarcely expected to receive? In answer to prayer has he not heard you in your deepest tribulations? And when you were well nigh famished, has he not spread your board with plenty when you have bent your knees before him? Yes, ye tried ones, ye have tried this promise and have proved it true. Ye sons of poverty and toil, ye have had to rest the whole weight of your daily maintenance on the promise, without any thing to look to save that; and have you ever found him fail? No; you· will unanimously bear witness that this is a great truth-" He hath given meat unto them that fear him.”

But it is surprising, sometimes, how God has done it. Many

a story have I heard from the poor amongst my own flock of how God has delivered them-strange stories, which you would laugh at. There are some of them that could write "Banks of . Faith" that would be as wonderful as that of William Huntington. Some of you laugh at that, and do not believe it; but it is only because there are so many things of the same sort all put together that they seem to be incredible through their number. But there are many of the Lord's servants who could easily compose a "Bank of Faith" like his, for they have had their necessities most deep and their sorrows most poignant, and they have had their reliefs well nigh miraculous, so that if God had thrust his hand out of the clouds and handed down bread for them and clothing, their deliverance would not have been more apparently from his hand than it has been in the way whereby his providence has supplied their wants. They can say He hath done it, and hath done it marvellously, and constantly too—“ He hath given meat to them that fear him." Why, if the child of God were in such a position that the earth could not yield him bread, God would open the windows of heaven and rain manna from thence again. If he could be placed in such a position that the common course of providence could not serve his end, God would change the nature of every thing rather than change the standing of a promise; he would break all the seasons, and unloose the very bonds of nature itself, and let the laws of nature run riot, rather than suffer one of his promises to fail, and his children to lack. “He hath given meat," and he will ever do so, “unto them that fear him."

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2. But we are to understand this chiefly in a spiritual sense. God's people are a people to need spiritual meat. I was talking to a minister the other day, who certainly was not noted for his great soundness. He was making a joke to me about certain people in his congregation, who said they could not feed under him. "There is Mrs. So-and-so," says he, "who tells me that she cannot get a bit of food out of my ministry. I do not know how it is," continued he, jocularly, "for I do not think you say half as many good things as I do; but yet the old woman cannot feed well enough." He laughed at the idea of feeding under a ministry. But there is a good deal more in the expression than