It is too plain, that if God had cared as little for us as we cared for God we should have been long since outcast, forsaken, and forgotten: but "herein is love, not that we loved him, but that he loved us, and sent his Son to be the propitiation for our sins." And thus it

is stated by St. Paul: "God commended his love to us, in that while we were yet sinners Christ died for us" and again, "When we were enemies, we were reconciled to God by the death of his Son." In these passages we perceive that it means the same thing to be a sinner-to be the enemy of God—and not to love him; and yet for these sinners, for these his enemies, he sent his own Son to be the propitiation for their sins. Herein is love! The apostle seems to pronounce upon this as if there was no other love in all the world besides, as if every thing like love was swallowed up in this boundless profusion of mercies. It is extraordinary with what cold and composed feelings we can read and think of this extraordinary sacrifice. It is no doubt impossible to comprehend its full extent; perhaps it is the employment of blessed spirits, for ages and ages to come-aye, or for all eternity, to make new discoveries in the love of God and the death of the Redeemer. Grander knowledge,-new blessings,—fresh features, from this wonderful sacrifice, may be shewing themselves to the spirits of just men made perfect at every moment, world without end. They are things which the angels desire to look into."

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But God has given us, perhaps, the fullest idea of it that we are capable of conceiving, when he tells us that he was his Son-his only Son. It is as if he desired every one of us to go to his own heart, and find out who is the being upon the earth that is dearest to its affections,-husband, wife, or only child; the person whom we regarded with the fondest love and the most unbounded delight; the person in whom your whole soul seems to be wrapped up,-in whom you almost live, and move, and have your being; and to imagine this object of your hopes and affections dashed from a state

of happiness, and flung helpless into the midst of enemies and persecutors; become "despised and rejected of men, a man of sorrows, and acquainted with grief;" and at length brought as a lamb to the slaughter, and then descending into the grave with torture, insult, and infamy. God himself seems to teach us to regard it in this point of view, for he said unto Abraham, "Take now thy son,-thine only son, Isaac, whom thou lovest." He repeats it, as if for the purpose of cutting the father's heart, and giving it a new stab at every word of fondness. "Take now thy son,—thine only son, Isaac whom thou lovest, and offer him for a burnt-offering upon one of the mountains that I will tell thee of." Abraham rose up, and took Isaac his son, and went into the place of which God had told him. Then, on the way, a conversation occurs, in which every word that the son speaks is calculated to make the father's heart bleed freshly. It would be an insult to tell a father what were Abraham's feelings when he bound his son, and took the knife in his hand. At that moment, however, the angel of the Lord called out of heaven, and bade him stay his hand. But when the Son of God bore his cross to the spot of agony and shame, and was laid bleeding upon the altar, no guardian angel descended to relieve his sufferings; and when he cried, My God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me?" the whole host of heaven stood still no voice of consolation was heard, and no minister of mercy descended to save his Son, his only Son, whom he loved.

Such is the idea that God has given us of his love; but still it is imperfect, for it seems as if every thing relating to God was infinite. His power is infinite; and we should judge but poorly of its greatness if we measured it by human power. In like manner his wisdom is infinite and we should never be able to conceive its extent by comparing it with the greatest wisdom of man. So also may we conclude of his love. The sufferings of Christ appear to contain something in them indescribable to the human imagination, and unfathomable to

human discovery. His mysterious agony in the garden, the weight of our sins upon his soul, and the fearful exclamation, "My God! my God! why hast thou forsaken me!" convey an idea of suffering, that we neither do nor can comprehend. Such is the love of God manifested upon the cross,-the love of God manifest in the flesh!

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But, we may say, where was the necessity of all this vast profusion of suffering,-this expenditure of means, -this astonishing machinery of redemption? Could not God have forgiven us at a word? Now, only consider what idea it is we form of God, when we imagine that forgiveness is so very easy a matter. We conceive him to be an arbitrary and capricious Being, who can make laws and break them at random, and fling his pardon to his creatures carelessly from his throne. Is this a worthy idea of him "who cannot lie, and who cannot repent?" Recollect that mercy, with us, means the reversing of a law, the changing of an established order of things our very idea of mercy implies an imperfection in the law, in the decision upon the law, or in the execution of the law. If human laws were perfect, or human judges infallible, where would be the room for mercy? It was a question reserved for the wisdom of Almighty God alone, to prove how justice and mercy could be reconciled; to hold forth forgiveness to the offender without violating, relaxing, or suspending that law, which is "holy, and just, and good." Accordingly, we find that, upon the cross, the violation of that law was visited to the uttermost; that "he bore our sins, and carried our iniquities,"-that "the chastisement of our peace was upon him" and thus we are told, in the passage before us, that "the love of God was manifested in sending his Son to be the propitiation for our sins and again, "God was in Christ, reconciling the world unto himself."

It is a terrible truth, which men would do well to recollect more than they do, that the same cross shews God's hatred for sin as well as his love for the sinner;

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the same cross shews that he cannot forgive iniquity, and yet that he was willing to visit it upon his own Son for our sakes it shews us his wrath and his love, and the one appears to be the measure of the other. We have been this day endeavouring to fathom his love,— and have found it impossible; and yet the very immen sity of that love seems to consist in averting wrath, that is equally boundless and inconceivable. Alas! alas! we deceive ourselves strangely by fancying that it is an easy thing for God to forgive sin. Consider well what it is that makes it such an easy thing for you to commit sin; and you will find that it is because you fancy it an easy thing for God to forgive it.

The great and fearful question with every man amongst us is, "Has the blood of Jesus Christ cleansed him from all sin?" or, shall he himself abide the awful consequences in the eternal world? For, as surely as God is true, one or other of these must be the case. The word of God supplies us with the means of judgment," If any man be in Christ, he is a new creature." It seems to be founded upon a principle plain and obvious to any man's common sense,--if we need no change, we need no mercy.

He now stands at the door and knocks, and invites you to acknowledge yourselves his at his table, and if we come with but half the good-will with which he invites, and waits to receive us, we are blessed and, happy beings! Let us beware how we turn our back upon it; or how we take it unworthily. We must come to that table, forsaking our sins, which were so hateful in the sight of heaven that they crucified the Son of God, and forsaking all claims upon the ground of our own imperfect righteousness. Let us "make mention of his name only;" and may we so share the fellowship of his sufferings that we may know the power of his resurrection! Amen.

SERMON XV.

1 CORINTHIANS, X. 13.

There hath no temptation taken you but such as is common to man: but God is faithful, who will not suffer you to be tempted above that ye are able; but will with the temptation also make a way to escape, that ye may be able to bear it.

PERHAPS nothing can exceed the efforts of God to enable us to overcome temptation, except our own endeavours to disappoint them. There would be something amusing, if it were not too terrible to amuse us, in observing the riches of our resources, and the curious variety of expedients which we have invented for trifling with temptation; forgetting, that to trifle with temptation is to trifle with God.

Some of us plunge into it headlong,-with a sort of heedless and frantic desperation, never stopping to look to the right hand or to the left, even for the shadow of an excuse; shutting our eyes as we hurry on, and imagining there is no danger, because we do not see it ; flying so rapidly from one temptation to another, that there is no time for thought or reflection between ; until at last we arrive, full speed, at the brink of the grave! There is no stopping then; the force with which we arrived hurries us onward of its own accord; and we are hurled to the bottom, with the weight of all the sins we have committed bearing us down with greater fury.