Reader, if you and I want "strong consolation” in our time of need, we must not be content with a bare union with Christ. We must seek to know something of heart-felt, experimental communion with Him. Never, never let us forget, that "union" is one thing, and “communion another. Thousands, I fear, who know what "union" with Christ is, know nothing of "communion." The day may come when after a long fight with disease, we shall feel that medicine can do no more, and that nothing remains but to die. Friends will be standing by, unable to help us. Hearing, eye-sight, even the power of praying, will be fast failing us. The world and its shadows will be melting beneath our feet. Eternity, with its realities, will be looming large before our minds. What shall support us in that trying hour? What shall enable us to feel, "I fear no evil?" Nothing, nothing can do it but close communion with Christ. Christ dwelling in our hearts by faith,-Christ putting His right arm under our heads,-Christ felt to be sitting by our side,-Christ alone can give us the complete victory in the last struggle. Reader, let us cleave to Christ more closely, love Him more heartily, live to Him more thoroughly, copy Him more exactly, confess Him more boldly, follow Him more fully. Religion like this will always bring its own reward. Worldly people may laugh at it. Weak brethren may think it extreme. But it will wear well. At evening time it will bring us light. In sickness it will bring us peace. In the world to come it will give us a crown of glory that fadeth not away. The time is short. The fashion of this world passeth away. A few more sicknesses, and all will be over. A few more storms and tossings, and we shall be safe in harbour. We travel towards a world where there is no more sickness, where parting, and pain, and crying, and mourning, are done with for evermore. Heaven is becoming every year more full, and earth more empty. The friends ahead are becoming more numerous than the friends astern. Yet a little time He that shall come will come, and will not tarry. In His presence shall be fulness of joy. Christ shall wipe away all tears from His people's eyes. The last enemy that shall be destroyed is death. But he shall be destroyed. himself shall one day die. (Rev. xx. 14.) Death In the meantime, let us live the life of faith in the Son of God. Let us lean all our weight on Christ, and rejoice in the thought that He lives for evermore. die. Yes! blessed be God! Christ lives, though we may Christ lives, though friends and family are carried to the grave. He lives who abolished death, and brought life and immortality to light by the Gospel. He lives who said, "O death, I will be thy plagues: O grave, I will be thy destruction." (Hos. xiii. 14.) He lives who will one day change our vile body, and make it like unto His glorious body. In sickness and in health, in life and in death, let us lean confidently on Him. Surely we ought to say daily with one of old, "Blessed be God for Jesus Christ!" HYMN. 1-One sweetly solemn thought Comes to me o'er and o'er I am nearer home to-day, Than I ever have been before. K 2-Nearer my Father's house, Where the many mansions be; 3-Nearer the bound of life, Where we lay our burdens down; 4-But lying darkly between, Winding down through the night, 5-Jesus, perfect my trust, Strengthen the hand of my faith; 6-Feel Thee near when my feet Are slipping over the brink; CAREY. Scattered and Gathered." JEREMIAH XXXI. 10. "Hear the Word of the Lord, O ye nations, and declare it in the isles afar off, and say, He that scattered Israel will gather him, and keep him, as a shepherd doth his flock." THE text which heads this page is singularly full and comprehensive. It contains both history and prophecy. -It speaks of the scattering of Israel; this is history.— It speaks of the gathering of Israel; this is prophecy.— It demands the attention both of the Jew and the Gentile. To the Jew it holds out a hope;"Israel," it says, "shall be gathered." On the Gentile it lays a command: "Hear the Word of the Lord," it says, "O ye nations, and declare it in the isles afar off, He that scattered Israel will gather him." Reader, the whole body of Gentile Christendom is Originally preached as the Annual Sermon on behalf of the London Society for promoting Christianity among the Jews, at the Rectory Church, Mary-le-bone, in May, 1858. specially addressed in this text. There is no evading this conclusion on any fair interpretation of Scripture. We ourselves are among the "nations" to whom Jeremiah speaks. Upon us devolves a portion of the duty which he here sets forth. The text is the Lord's voice to all the Churches of Christ among the Gentiles. It is a voice to the Churches of England, Scotland, and Ireland. It is a voice to the Churches of Germany, Switzerland, Sweden, Holland, Denmark, and America. It is a voice to all Christendom. And what does the voice say? It bids us proclaim far and wide the will of God concerning the Jewish nation. It bids us keep one another in memory of God's past and future dealings with Israel. "He that scattered Israel will gather him." Reader, I ask your serious attention for a few minutes, while I try to place the Jewish subject before you in a connected and condensed form. I propose in these pages to show you from Scripture the past, the present, and the future of Israel. I know few texts in the Bible which contain such a complete summary of the subject as the one before you. This text I shall endeavour to unfold. I entreat you not to dismiss the subject as speculative, fanciful, and unprofitable. The world is growing old. The last days are come upon us. The foundations of the earth are out of course. The ancient institutions of society are wearing out and going to pieces. The end of all things is at hand. Surely it becomes a wise man, at a time like this, to turn to the pages of prophecy, and inquire what is yet to come. At a time like this |