justified by faith we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ.

The doctrine thus contained in this passage, seems to be in perfect accordance with the other Scriptures of the New Testament. So St. Peter, in his first Epistle: "Ye were redeemed-with the precious blood of Christ, as of a lamb without blemish and without spot; who verily was foreordained before the foundation of the world, but was manifest in these last times for you, who by him do believe in God that raised him up from the dead, and gave him glory, that your faith and hope might be in God," in which words St. Peter distinctly declares that the purpose of Christ's manifestation was that we might have the opportunity of reposing faith (faith which justifieth) in God the raiser of the dead. So again St. Paul to the Corinthians: "Christ died for our sins, according to the Scripture1;"—but “ if Christ be not raised, your faith is vain; ye are yet in your sins."

But while these passages seem abundantly sufficient to prove this great Christian doctrine, that the design of the Resurrection was to give to man an object of the Faith which justifieth, it does not follow from hence that we in looking back on the events which have reconciled us to God, are to confine our faith to the Resurrection. It is true that without the Resurrection of Christ we could

1 1 Cor. xv. 3.

have had no faith at all. But now that Christ is risen from the dead and become the first fruits of them that slept, we are enabled thereby to put faith in the sacrifice, the blood, the atonement. This again seems to be the uniform doctrine of Holy Scripture. We must believe, as St. Paul says to the Thessalonians "that Jesus died and rose again;" "we are justified by his blood, we are reconciled to God by his death," says the same Apostle to the Romans1. "Our joy is in God, through our Lord Jesus Christ, by whom we have now received the atonement 2." God hath set forth Christ to be a propitiation, through faith in his blood ""

When we consider, by the light of these passages of Holy Scripture, the importance of the event of the Resurrection in the great scheme of reconcilement and restoration, we shall not be surprised at the uniformity with which the first preachers of the Gospel put forward this great fact as the very ground and foundation of their teaching. The whole of Prophecy, while it recognized a suffering Messiah, spoke of Him also as triumphant over His sufferings. He had Himself referred to His Resurrection as to the final proof of His divine mission. Therefore until that event took place, faith was suspended; those whose minds were prepared to believe, were anxious and doubtful; and while there was no faith, there was no justification.

1 Rom. v. 9, 10.

2

Rom. v. 11.

3

Rom. iii. 25.

Such then is the doctrinal view in which I desire to present the Resurrection of Christ to your meditation. The Resurrection opened the way to the Cross. By it faith is enabled to rest on Christ. "He was delivered for our offences; but he was raised again for our justification."

With what feelings then ought we, who trust that we are justified in God's sight, and called to the state of salvation, to look back upon this glorious fact which we this day celebrate. It is to us the fact which offers us the opportunity of benefiting by the great Sacrifice. It is to us the means of admission, the earnest of participation, the entrance to justification. On it hang all our hopes, although it was by the death of Christ that those hopes were purchased; for by it we are enabled to know of the purchase, to repose on the Sacrifice, to believe in Him who died for us. Surely then the thought of Christ's Resurrection ought to be familiar and delightful to us. The details of the fact are exhibited to us in the Gospel History.

to it are various and numerous.

The witnesses

The practical evidence afforded by the effects which it produced is strong and obvious. All of these may well occupy our thoughts on this holy day. We may in thought visit the sepulchre, and with the two Apostles, come and see the place where our Lord lay, and learn to become nearly and familiarly acquainted with an event which concerns us so deeply. It will interest us more the more we think of it. We are apt perhaps

to pass it over as true indeed, but not bearing any very direct reference to ourselves. By such study we shall learn to regard it very differently; to feel with the Apostle that "if Christ be not raised, our faith is vain and we are yet in our sins," and therefore to prize it as one of the most precious facts of all the great history of the Gospel.

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Therefore being justified by faith, we have with God through our Lord Jesus Christ.”

peace

We have seen how it is to the Resurrection that we owe the great blessing of being justified by faith and being so justified by faith, adds the Apostle, we have peace with God. The Resurrection enables us (under the Spirit) to have faith, the inward virtue which characterizes and distinguishes the Christian morality. Faith is by the merciful dispensation of God, as shadowed forth in the promise made to Abraham, and brought into full light by the Gospel of Christ, the personal condition of being accounted righteous in the sight of God. This is the virtue, and this the gift. And so, sanctified with this virtue, faith, and blest with this gift, justification, we have peace-peace with God, peace with our brethren, peace with ourselves. Peace is the earthly earnest of that justification which shall bring us bliss hereafter.

Peace is the best earthly bliss, and the bliss we look for is but that peace made heavenly, immortal, divine; it is that peace made active with new and unimagined energies, exalted by approach to

the presence, and resemblance to the nature, of the holy and perfect God; purified from every earthly alloy, unbounded in time, and infinite in capacity, both of adoration and delight.

And emphatically does peace belong to the subject of the Resurrection. The first word which the risen Lord uttered to His anxious and doubtful, yet affectionate Disciples, was, Peace. "The same day, at evening, being the first day of the week, when the doors were shut where the disciples were assembled for fear of the Jews, came Jesus and stood in the midst, and said, Peace be unto you."

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He had brought peace from the grave, that 'peace on earth," which was the burthen of the angels' song in announcing His nativity; even though that peace was to prove "not peace but a sword" to those to whom all blessing only ministers death, to whom the patience of the humble Christian is only "an evident token of perdition." And He shed it forth upon the hearts of the Apostles (" and not for these alone did He pray or bless, but for them also which should believe on Him through their word") and it stilled, we doubt not, every troubled feeling and thought, all fear and doubt and sorrow, by means of that Divine energy which even the winds and the sea obeyed, which said to the storm, "Peace, be still!"

It was peace to doubtfulness and wavering faith: for He was risen from the grave, whom the Jewish rulers with wicked hands had crucified and slain.