FEBRUARY 4.-"Then came David to Nob."-1 Sam. xxi. 1. WHAT an extraordinary character was David! How large a portion of the sacred history do his memoirs occupy. And how profitable are they for "doctrine, and reproof, and correction, and instruction in righteousness."

He was now informed by Jonathan of Saul's determination to kill him. He is therefore compelled to flee for safety. The tabernacle being at Nob, he repairs thither, in his confusion and distress, both to take an affectionate leave of the house of God, which he despaired of seeing again for a long time; and also to obtain succour. He asks Ahimelech the priest whether he can give him any food for his hunger, or weapon for his defence. With regard to the former of these, Ahimelech told him he had nothing under his hand but the sacred loaves. These, however, he gave him; and our Saviour fully justifies the action: "Have ye never read what David did, when he had need, and was an hungered, he, and they that were with him? How he went into the house of God in the days of Abiathar the high priest, and did eat the showbread, which is not lawful to eat but for the priests, and gave also to them which were with him?" Teaching us-that the ceremonies of religion are to give place to the substance; that positive institutions are to yield to moral obligations; that God requireth mercy and not sacrifice. Upon the same principle, it is lawful to do good on the Sabbath, though the Pharisees condemned our Saviour for healing on this day and we have known some who have opposed Sunday schools as breaking in upon the command of God."

With regard to the latter, Ahimelech told him that he had nothing but the sword of Goliath, which was wrapped in a cloth behind the ephod. What a curiosity was here! How highly it was prized we may learn from the preservation of it in such a place and with such care! Nothing could have been more welcome to David than this weapon-"Give it me," says he; "there is none like it." It had been drawn against himself, and had been taken by his own hand--no one therefore seemed to have a greater title to it than David. It would strengthen his faith more than his arm. It would call to remembrance his former victory, and encourage afresh his confidence in God, being able now to add, "The Lord who delivered me from the paw of the lion and the paw of the bear," and"from the uncircumcised Philistine," will deliver me from every evil work. So he ought to have reasoned always, and so he sometimes did reason: but, alas! two things occurred here worthy of our remark. First, the manner of application was blamable. For, to obtain these supplies, he dissembled, affirming that he was employed by the king in a business that required haste. Is this to be justified because it came from a good man? It is the more to be censured. He should have maintained the character of an Israelite indeed in whom is no guile, and who is always to choose suffering rather than sin. But we see how well afflictions are called trials, and how difficult it is to act consistently in some conditions. How becoming is candour in judging others! Who knows that he should have acted better under the same pressure of circumstances! How necessary the prayer, "Lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil."

Secondly, the issue was tragical. For while the parties were having this intercourse, a man named Doeg happened to be there "detained before the Lord." This wretch, instead of minding his devotion, observed them, and resolved to ingratiate himself with his master Saul by an impeachment of Ahimelech. And so it fell out. "Then answered Doeg the Edomite, which was set over the servants of Saul, and said, I saw the son of Jesse coming to Nob, to Ahimelech the son of Ahitub. And he inquired of the Lord for him, and gave him victuals, and gave him the sword of Goliath the Philistine." Behold, first, the deceitfulness of this villain. Like ether slanderers, he does the business by a mixture of fact and falsehood. He ought to have told Saul that David had deceived Ahimelech, and made him believe that he was acting for the king; and therefore that what Ahimelech did was really in honour of the king. The whole truth would have entirely exculpated the high priest, but Doeg suppresses the most essential part of it. And behold, secondly, the cruelty as well as falseness of this informer. "And the king said, Thou shalt surely die, Ahimelech, thou, and all thy father's house." There was something venerable in the character and office of a priest, and as Ahimelech and his brethren stood dressed in their sacred robes, Saul's footmen shrunk back from slaying them. "And the king said to Doeg, Turn thou, and fall upon the priests. And Doeg the Edomite turned, and he fell upon the priests, and slew on that day fourscore and five persons that did wear a linen ephod. And Nob, the city of the priests, smote he with the edge of the sword, both men and women, children and sucklings, and oxen and asses, and sheep, with the edge of the sword."

But see upon what little occurrences surprising coincidences and great consequences often depend. The word of the Lord had denounced the house of Eli: but the threatening could not be fulfilled without the destruction of these priests: but these priests would not have been destroyed but for the malice of Saul: Saul's malice would not have been excited but for the infamy of Doeg; and Doeg would not have informed against Ahimelech had he not been detained at the tabernacle the day when David entered it. All this seemed accidental; but it was not. All parties acted freely, yet necessarily too. What was unjust in Doeg was righteous in God. He knew how to accomplish his word by human falsehood and cruelty, and yet he was of purer eyes than to behold iniquity. Nothing was more certain as well as important than the death of Christ, and he was delivered according to the determinate counsel and foreknowledge of God; yet by wicked hands the Jews crucified him. Ask me not for a solution. I only know the fact. I see the two ends of the chain, but the middle is under water: yet the connexion is as real as it is invisible. By-and-by it will be drawn up. In the mean while, we must walk by faith, and not by sight. Judge nothing before the time. We know that Messiah cometh which is called Christ: when he is come, he will tell us all things.

FEBRUARY 5.-"WHEN I AM WEAK, then am I strong."-2 Cor. xii. 10. CHRISTIANITY is not only mysterious with regard to doctrine, but also experience. Christians are men wondered at. They are a VOL. I.

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peculiar people; and the world knoweth them not. Some of the effects and advantages of their religion indeed, may be palpable to others; but its principles and resources are among the deep things of God, which the natural man knoweth not, because they are spiritually discerned. How strange to many must the language of Paul appear-"I am crucified with Christ: nevertheless I live; yet not I, but Christ liveth in me." "Most gladly will I glory in infirmity, that the power of Christ may rest upon me--I take pleasure in infirmities, in reproaches, in necessities, in persecutions, in distresses for Christ's sake: FOR WHEN I AM WEAK, THEN AM I STRONG."

As this expresses his experience not only or principally as he was an Apostle, but a Christian, let us in this exercise consider the weaknesses to which he refers; and in the next see how it becomes an accession of strength.

The weakness is spiritual. But we must distinguish between the reality of it, and the apprehension. The fall has deprived us not only of righteousness, but of strength; and by nature we are weak, as to all the purposes of the divine life. But all are not sensible of this. In general, men are far from believing it; and will sooner acknowledge their guilt than their inability. They will confess that they have not been what they ought to have been, or done what they ought to have done; but they always presume upon their competency for these things; and resolve by-and-by to accomplish them. But Paul speaks of the apprehension of our weakness. This is effected by the Holy Spirit; who convinces men of sin, and makes them acquainted with their true character and state before God. But the sense of their weakness is increased by observation and experience. They hear of many falling around them who once seemed much more likely to stand than themselves; and each of these declensions cries, "Let him that thinketh he standeth take heed lest he fall." And when they read the Scriptures, they see the falls of good men there, and men whose grace was very superior to their own and can they help fearing for themselves, when they find Abraham betrayed into dissimulation by unbelief; Moses speaking unadvisedly with his lips; Job cursing the day of his birth; Solomon playing the fool; and Peter acting the coward? The events of life also enlarge their self-acquaintance. Who knows what he is till he is tried, and till he meets with his own trial? For every one is not discovered in the same way: and as Joab adhered to David in the rebellion of Absalom, yet turned aside after Adonijah; (so we may be firm in one peril, and fail in another. Afflictions are frequently called temptations, because they try and prove us: and where is the Christian who, in consequence of these experiments, has not been led, if not to question the reality of his religion, to mourn over the deficiencies of it? Thus fresh and painful secrets are constantly coming to light; and the knowledge of their depravity, which they could not have borne at once, is produced by little and little. "And where," says the Christian, often appalled, “where will the mystery end? Who can understand his errors? Who can say, I have made my heart clean, I am pure from my sin?" Thus he often seems worse, because he is wiser. There is not more in him of unbelief, and impatience, and vain thought; but he sees and feels more of them.

And how far does this sense of the Christian's weakness extend? He feels that he is unable to do what he ought. His work is laid down in the Scripture. It requires him to run the race that is set before him; to fight the good fight of faith; and to perform a thousand duties with regard to God, his neighbour, and himself-the view of which forces him to exclaim, "Who is sufficient for these things?" He feels that he is unable to do what he would. To will is present, but how to perform that which is good, he finds not. He would gladly flee, but the wires of his cage tell him that he is a -prisoner. He attempts to sing, but his voice is untuned; and his harp is hung on the willows, and sometimes too high for him to reach. He feels that he is unable to do what he has done. His former experience humbles him. "O that it was with me as in months past!" I fear I shall never pray again as I have prayed. Never trust in the promise as I have trusted. Never kneel before the cross again as I once did, and said

"Here it is I find my heaven,

While upon the Lamb I gaze."

He feels that he is unable to do the least duty. He always thought himself inadequate, were he called to die at the stake, or to offer up an Isaac: but he is beyond this now. He now feels that he cannot order his speech properly in company; nor endure, with Christian temper, the trifling vexations of the hour-yea, that without Christ he "can do nothing." He feels unable to preserve himself from the greatest sins. He once thought that he was in no danger from these; and supposed that reputation, and common prudence, would secure him from such miscarriages. But he now prays with David, not only, cleanse thou me from secret faults, but keep back thy servant also from presumptuous sins.

And what is there to meet all this weakness? When he examines, he finds that nothing is sufficient. He cannot depend on the grace he has received-He can no more live without fresh supplies of the Spirit, than he can see with the light, and respire with the air, of yesterday. He cannot depend upon his present frames. These may be lively and delightful; but they are of the nature of cordials, not food-he cannot live by them. He knows too how variable they are; and how often rapture has ended in gloom. He cannot depend upon his resolutions and vows. He has seen their vanity in) binding his depraved heart. Though they seemed invincible, they have yielded in the hour of temptation: and before the assaults of the enemy, they have been no more than a hedge of cobwebs, or a wall of vapour. He cannot depend upon means and ordinances. He values these, and will be found in the use of them; they are his privilege as well as duty. But unless the Lord give the increase, Paul plants and Apollos waters in vain. We are to wait only upon

God. His influences and communications can alone relieve and elevate, refresh and strengthen the soul. This seems a discouraging state of mind to be in-but what follows?

FEBRUARY 6.-"When I am weak, THEN AM I STRONG."--2 Cor. xii. 10. THE Consciousness of our spiritual weakness becomes the acces sion of strength three ways.

face? But suppose they had known that he had more than forgiven them; and when he saw them would fall on their necks and kiss them then they would have gone down, confident, yet feeling much more of their unworthiness than before. Thus should we apply to the Lord Jesus; with hope, rendering us more sensible of our vileness. But let us not keep away from Him. He invites us near. He assures us that while He has plenty we shall not want.' Because He lives we shall live also. Let us remember the relation⚫ in which He stands to us; and see where and what He now is. In what distress will not this encourage us? "Fear not; I am the first and the last; I am he that liveth, and was dead; and, behold, I am alive for evermore, Amen; and have the keys of hell and of death."

JANUARY 31.—"In many things we offend all."-James iii. 2.

To exemplify this in our conviction, we must estimate our offences according to the mind of God, and not by a human judgment. When David says, Who can understand his errors?" he means to intimate that no one can be fully acquainted with them. We are too full of self-love; and are too averse to dwell on the discovery of our faults. The heart is not only desperately wicked, but deceitful` above all things; and has a thousand artifices to delude us into a more favourable opinion of ourselves than we deserve. Hence we excuse many evils; we question the guilt of others; and as to those we consider really sinful, we do not condemn them according to their aggravations. From various causes therefore, we see only a small part of our sins; and we must not suppose we appear in the eyes of God as innocent as we are in our own-In his sight the very heavens are not clean. And does he set our iniquities before him, our secret sins in the light of his countenance?

Neither must we judge of the number of our offences only by our remembrance of them. We are affected with recent transgressions; but we are not struck with those we were guilty of ten or twenty years ago. And wherefore? Though they are past as to us, they are not so as to God. Nothing is future, nothing is past, with Him -With Him every thing is present-and we are at this very moment committing those sins with Him, with whom one day is as a thousand years, and a thousand years are as one day. Though we have forgotten a countless multitude of our offences, God has forgotten none of them. They are all recorded in the book of his remembrance-and cou'd we consult this awful register of our lives from the beginning, with all the sins of youth and manhood, of secrecy and openness, of infirmity and wilfulness, of purpose and accomplishment; and could we peruse one chapter, or one verse only, we should exclaim-we cannot answer Thee for one of a thousand of our transgressions. "Innumerable evils have compassed me about: mine iniquities have taken hold upon me, so that I am not able to look up: they are more than the hairs of mine head: therefore my heart faileth me."

Have we not in many things offended all-First, in our disregard of the Lord Jesus? Secondly, in the neglect and formality of our devotion? Thirdly, in the coldness and contractedness of our cha