EARTHLY BLESSEDNESS:

A Sermon,

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During the last twenty years excavations have been made round the temple. Some valuable cimens of architecture have been discovered, and efforts consequently been made to restore the temple as much as possible to its former appearance. How vastly privileged are they on whom, in these later times, the Sun of mercy has arisen, with healing on his wings, to dissipate the clouds of ignorance and error! that Saviour manifested to be a light to lighten the Gentiles, no less than to be the glory of his people Israel! How deeply responsible to improve these privileges! Let the poorest individual, in whose heart the light of gospel truth savingly shines, remember, that all the wisdom of heathen learning is but foolishness compared to his; and yet the nominal Christian, who is bowing down in slavish obeisance to some darling lust, passion, desire, or propensity, is as great an idolator, in the estimation of him who weigheth men's spirits, as the most darkened Athenian whose feet ever trod the courts of the Parthenon. And let the Christian ever rejoice that he is not called on ignorantly to worship an "unknown God," but that eternal and merciful Jehovah who dwelleth not in temples made with hands, whose throne is heaven, whose footstool is the earth, and who has been pleased to manifest the spirituality of his nature, the graciousness of his purposes, and the richness of his mercy, in the revelation made by his blessed Son.

* The Marquis de Nointel had drawings made of them all when he was at Athens, but the artist whom he employed nearly lost his eye-sight, as he was obliged to draw them from the ground, without the aid of a scaffold (M. Spon's "Voyage to the Levant." Montfauçon's Antiquities).

BY THE REV. RICHARD SANKEY, M.A.,

Curate of Farnham, Surrey, and late Fellow of C.C.C., Oxford.

DEUT. xii. 9.

"For ye are not as yet come to the rest and to the inheritance which the Lord your God giveth you."

I NEED not now inform you, my brethren, that the whole history of God's ancient people, the Jews, may be considered, in a spiritual sense, as applicable to the believer in all ages. I do not mean to say that, when we read any thing about them, we are not to take it literally, as applying to them in the first place; but I mean that it may also be applied in a spiritual sense to ourselves. Their journey, e.g., out of Egypt, across the Red sea, through the wilderness, and again across the Jordan into Canaan, and all the variety of events and circumstances, both great and small (if indeed any of God's dealings with them can be called small), do most beautifully shadow much of the spiritual history of every child of God in his progress from the bondage of sin and Satan, through the washing of regeneration (figured by the Red sea), across the wilderness of this world, and finally through the grave and gate of death, which, like the Jordan, they are allowed to pass unhurt into the heavenly Canaan. I will not, I say, dwell upon these points now. Those who have turned their backs on sin and the world towards heaven will not need it, for they will have often derived instruction and warning and encouragement from this view of the word of God; and the subject is so large, that on the present occasion it would be impossible to open it to others. And I only allude to it now in order that it furnish needed) for taking this part of God's word, me with an apology (if an apology can be which I have just read to you, entirely in a spiritual sense, as applicable to the Christian's journey, to the history of the hearts of many I trust, of those who now hear me. May he that led his people through the wilderness, and fed them upon angels' food, and bore with their murmurs, condescend, my brethren, to bear with us, to feed us and to bless us in our meditation on his word, and thus make Israel after the flesh a blessing to the Israel of God, through Jesus Christ our Lord.

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I. Let us, then, first notice the terms in which the end of the Israelites' journey is spoken of. They are the very same terms which are used in the New Testament as applicable to the Christian's everlasting home,

1. For it is called a rest: "Ye are not as yet come to the rest." And this it is well known that St. Paul applies to our eternal home, when he says to the Hebrews, "There remaineth, therefore, a rest to the people of God." And in this expression, I repeat, is conveyed to us the great blessedness of that our eternal portion. For if there is one word which seems to contain within it an idea of what is really grateful and desirable and enjoyable in this world, it is the word "rest." Condemned, as we are, to eat our bread by the sweat of our brow, "and being born to trouble, as the sparks fly upward," rest is one of the greatest earthly blessings that God can bestow. I will ask some of you what you have most desired when lying on a bed of sickness, racked with pain and full of tossings to and fro? Was it riches, or luxury, or delicacies, or this world's pleasures or honours? Would you not rather have tossed them from you, if they had then been offered, as only mocking your misery, and have said, "I care for none of these things, give me, give me rest from this pain and suffering?" Or, again, take the labourer when he returns from his work, bowed down with fatigue, what is more delightful to him than rest? And those too, my brethren—and they are not few-who you may think live an easy life, because they do not work as you do, but whose minds are in continual exercise-the lawyer, the physician, the minister, the ruler, and the statesman, nothing is more pleasant oftentimes to them than rest. Wherever we are, whatever we are doing, it is rest we are looking for. And hence the Spirit of God has selected this word to convey an idea of what he had reserved for us in another world. It was the great object continually held up by Moses before the Israelites: it is that which is for ever held to you. It is, you will remember, this which constitutes the whole of the blessedness of the departed believer, in that voice which the apostle John heard from heaven: "Blessed are the dead which die in the Lord. Even so, saith the Spirit, for they rest from their labours."

The believer, then, is one day, and that perhaps no distant day, to rest completely and eternally from all that pains and grieves him here. He shall rest from suffering, "for there shall be no more pain:" he shall rest from sorrowing, for "there shall be no more death, neither sorrow nor crying;" but above all he shall rest from sin. A Christian can bear suffering and can endure sorrow: he can glory in the one and rejoice in the other; but sin he cannot endure. You remember one. If tribulation beset him, he

Now, it is from this that the Christian is to rest. To this does the Saviour allude when he says, "Come unto me, all ye that labour, and I will give you rest." It is this one word which is made to describe the blessedness of heaven; and the only case in which we read of no rest there is of those who rest not day and night, saying, "Holy, holy, holy, Lord God Almighty, which was, and is, and is to come."

"Ye

2. But there is another expression here used, which the New Testament warrants us to apply to the rest that remaineth to the people of God, viz., "inheritance :" are not as yet come to the rest and the inheritance." I need scarcely remind you of that passage in St. Peter, in which he describes this as an "inheritance undefiled, incorruptible, and that fadeth not away.' Nor need I recall to your recollection many other passages in which the child of God is spoken of as an heir of God, and therefore a joint-heir with Christ; and his future portion is called an inheritance. I have said that this expression denotes the certainty of the believer's portion; and it is a figure which I cannot but think does convey most beautifully and most exactly an idea of the certainty of this to every believing child of God, and in this way: there are only three things in the dealings of this world which can disappoint the heir of his inheritance; and, if it can be shown that then these things cannot take place as regards the believer, the case is clear. For, in the first place, in earthly things, the parent or the person owning the property may, from some cause or other, change his mind, and cut off the heir from the inheritance, But, in the case now before us, "the gifts and calling of God are without repentance." Or, secondly, the heir may rebel or run away, and so forfeit and give up all claim to the inheritance. But in this case this is provided against; for one part of the adoption into the family of God is the gift of the Spirit, to keep the heir in the love and fear of

God, according as it is written: "I will put my fear within them, that they shall not depart from me." Or, thirdly, the heir may die before the time appointed of the father, and so be disappointed. But, as regards the heavenly inheritance, this can never be: "The soul once quickened shall never die:" "The heirs of God are kept by his power through faith unto salvation:" "I give unto them eternal life, and they shall never perish:" "Because I live, ye shall live also."

Thus, then, my Christian brethren, if God has sent forth the Spirit of his Son into your hearts, it is "the Spirit of adoption, whereby ye may cry to him, Abba, Father." If God has begotten you again, it is to this inheritance, undefiled and incorruptible, and that fadeth not away. Nothing shall disappoint you of it. Though hand join in hand, the hand of Satan with the hand of the world, greater is he that is for you than he that is against you. Your greatest danger lies within: the united powers of the devil and the world against you would not be formidable, if it were not for the traitor within, the heart, which is too willing to be tempted. Nevertheless, I repeat, greater is he that is for you than all that is against you. Faithful is he that hath promised, who also will do it.

3. But there is yet another expression here used, which appears to denote the freeness with which it is offered, and which we find used in the New Testament in strong contrast, to denote the same idea. It is spoken of as a gift: "Ye are not come to the rest and the inheritance which the Lord your God giveth you." Now, the New Testament invariably speaks of this as a gift. St. Paul says, particularly, "The wages of sin" i. e., the due and just and deserved reward of sin-"is death; but the gift of God"observe, not the wages, nor the reward, but the gift, i. c., the free, undeserved gift of God" is eternal life, through Jesus Christ our Lord." It is very important ever to recollect this; for by nature we are inclined to forget it. We are too apt to think that eternal life is given to a man as a sort of reward for a good life; and it is not unfrequently the case, that persons who know better are yet secretly cleaving to some goodness which they find, or, if they do not find, are diligently looking for in themselves, by which they think God may be prevailed on to have mercy on them. No wonder, my brethren, if such persons fail to find comfort or joy or peace.

My brethren, God is a sovereign: he has a right to do what he will: he is our sovereign, and he has a right to our services: he is our maker, and he has a right to our selves. And there is no obedience, no service, no allegiance, which it is in our power

| to render him, to which he has not already an undoubted right and claim; and, consequently, we can never do any thing for which God is bound in the least degree to bless us. You remember what pains he takes to remind Israel of this truth: "Beware lest thou forget the Lord thy God, and say in thine heart, My power and the might of my hand have gotten me this wealth." And again: "Speak not, saying, For my righteousness the Lord hath brought me in to possessthis land." "Not for thy righteousness, or for the uprightness of thine heart, dost thou go to possess this land; but for the wickedness of these nations, and that he may perform the word which the Lord sware." "Understand, therefore, that the Lord thy God giveth thee not this good land to possess it for thy righteousness; for thou art a stiffnecked people" (Deut. ix. 4-6).

All his gifts, therefore, to us are free and undeserved, and as such he offers them to us; and whatever he gives or offers he gives and offers of his own free and sovereign grace; and as such we must receive them and acknowledge them, or perish without them; and as such the child of God, convinced and taught and drawn by the Spirit of God, is content, nay, is happy to receive them. It is a thought most cheering, that God will thus deal with him; and to be saved by grace is all his dependence and all his desire, as, when he is saved, it shall be all his joy and the burden of his song for ever. "Unto him that loved us, and washed us from our sins in his own blood, and hath made us kings and priests unto God and his Father; to him be glory and dominion for ever and ever." "Not unto us, O Lord, not unto us, but to thy name be all the praise."

II. Such being the terms in which the heavenly inheritance is spoken of, let us turn to another point suggested by the text, viz., the proofs which the Christian has that he has not yet come to the rest which is reserved for him. These, indeed, are many and various, but we will take only a few which come more immediately in connection with the text.

1. The imperfection and vanity of every thing connected with his life-its sorrows, disappointments, pain, and bereavements-all these things are enough to remind us, as I believe they are graciously intended to remind us, that this is not our home. Thus the Israelites, wherever they rested, wherever they went, were still in the wilderness: turn where they would, the same barren scene would probably continually present itself, and remind them that this is not Canaan, this is still the wilderness. We cannot, indeed, suppose that there was nothing beautiful or inviting there; no hiding-place from the world, no covert from the tempest, no rivers

of water, no shadow of a great rock. In one place we know there were twelve fountains of water, and three-score and, ten palm trees; but still it was not Canaan, still it was the wilderness.

And so it is with the Christian: every thing around him, every step he takes shows him the same. There is not a pleasure and advantage, there is not a flower in all this wide world, beautiful as it is, but wears the stamp of mortality, the mark of death, the blot of sin and corruption upon it: the grass withereth, and the flower thereof falleth away, and all our brightest schemes and fairest hopes are blighted sooner still. It was the sentence of one who had tasted of every form of earthly pleasure, lawful and unlawful, and who spake by inspiration of God about it all, and said, "All is vanity and vexation of spirit." Let us be blessed with whatever joy or advantage we will, there is a worm at the root; and, with all its capabilities of affording happiness, still it is not permanent, it perishes in the using. Friends disappoint, children and those dear are removed, health decays, riches make to themselves wings, and fly away; so that, with all our earthly comforts, and they are not few, with all our earthly blessings, and they are not small, and with all our earthly mercies, and they are neither few nor small, we are still reminded by them, and it is the crowning mercy of them all that we are reminded and by them, that this is not our resting-place, and we are strangers and pilgrims here.

2. But the Israelites would be reminded, from time to time, that they had not entered into rest, by the continual attacks to which they were exposed from their enemies, and perhaps also by the continued murmurings and rebellions which arose among themselves. True it is that even in Canaan, the nations greater and mightier than they were to be dispossessed; still, even on their road they would feel that they had not yet attained what Moses had promised: "When the Lord God shall have given you rest from all your enemies round about."

And this, my brethren, is an especial mark to a Christian that his rest and his inheritance is not here. Wherever he looks the enemy meets his view; whether he look around him or within him, the scene is the same. I mean not that he takes a gloomy view of all these things, but he cannot deny the fact that "the world lieth in wickedness." Though there may be more than seven thousand whom he knows not, who have not bowed the knee to the god of this world--and this consideration will make him charitable-still the fact stares him in the face, that the mass of mankind are not under the saving and sanctifying influences of the Spirit

of God, and therefore are secretly, if not openly, enemies to God and to all godliness. O, when he turns his eyes inward, and looks into his own heart, there the matter is even worse. The murmurings and rebellions in the camp of Israel are but too faithful a counterpart of what he feels to be at work within himself.

My brethren, we do not know our own hearts, if we do not know this to be the case. With all our fancied resignation and submission-which, after all, we seldom feel but when we cannot help ourselves-how much of secret murmuring and repining! how many a golden wedge is secretly harboured! how many a longing, lingering look cast back upon the flesh-pots of Egypt! how many a a time are we discouraged because of the way! how much ignorance of God and his ways; how hard it is, with all our lip-service, to say from our heart, "Thy will be done!" how difficult, with all our profession, to take up our cross daily, as a fresh work every day, and follow Jesus Christ! The Christian knows and feels this, aye, and much more than this; and it is the sense of this that tells him where he is. There may be seasons when he is enabled so to possess things hoped for, and to behold things not seen, as that he for a time forgets that he is not there; but, like the glorious scene on the mount of transfiguration, it soon passes away, and he feels that he is distant from the land he loves. His own experience tells him that he has not yet reached that place or that state where ignorance shall not exist, where there shall be no night, and we shall know even as we are known, where every murmuring disposition shall be for ever hushed, where every rebellious feeling shall be for ever slain, and every thought of his heart shall be brought in complete and eternal captivity to the obedience of Christ.

3. But I think it may be said that our very spiritual blessings are calculated to remind us of this. All our means of grace, and all our privileges, many and great and blessed as they are-and God forbid that any man, much less any minister, should undervalue them-are yet adapted for a state of ignorance and imperfection. The manna which the Israelites gathered from day to day, and the "spiritual Rock that followed them," would especially remind them of the truth adverted to in the text. How different from the grapes of Eshcol! how far short of the land flowing with milk and honey, to which they were repeatedly encouraged to look! and yet they were marvellous blessings in themselves.

And so it is with us. The spiritual life is but a small foretaste of that fulness of life which is hid in Christ with God; and the

How inferior, too, is the very written or preached word on earth to what the believer will hear in glory! How inferior the worship in the earthly courts to the worship of the redeemed! How inferior is that feast of the Lord's supper, to which we are often invited, to that supper at which the bride of Christ is one day to be present. The very emblems of water and of bread and wine in the two sacraments, beautiful, simple, and significant as they are, are yet adapted for a wilderness state, a state of imperfection and ignorance, where at best "we see through a glass darkly;" and, while we use them diligently, and bless God for them, yet let them continually remind us that we are not as yet come to the rest and the inheritance which the Lord our God giveth us.

III. What then, let us ask, in the third place, are the lessons of warning, of duty, or of encouragement which we are to learn from these considerations?

1. We learn a lesson of warning, not to fix our habitation here, still less to look back upon the world which we have left. As he said to his people in the days of Micah, so he says to us: 66 Arise ye, and depart; for this is not your rest: because it is polluted, it shall destroy you, even with a sore destruction." The pathways of this world are full of sin. The Christian pilgrim is travelling along a dusty road: with all his care he is continually contracting defilement. Beware, then, how you make it your home. If you take up your portion with the world, you must not be surprised if you are condemned with the world. You may meet with much to dismay and terrify you, but beware how you turn back; beware how you stay with the world. You may have enemies within and without to encounter; but your only safety is in going straight on.

And if there be any here who know that they have not even set out on this journey, who have never had a desire to be delivered from the terrible and galling and soul-destroying bondage of sin; in one word, if there be any habitual sinners here, O that they would take warning. My friends, who are living without God, listen to this. You are in daily and hourly danger of everlasting ruin, and you cannot, you dare not deny it; you know that you have no hope in Christ. But can you not, dare you not cast away your sins? Can you not, dare you not look unto Jesus? Do you love your sins more than you love your souls? O, this world is passing away;

2. But, again, we learn a large lesson of duty. We learn that we must not lay aside our armour while we are in the enemy's neighbourhood; we must not cease our watchfulness while we are beset by foes within and without; we must not be contemplating on the length of road we have past, but looking on to what remains. Our language must be that of St. Paul: "I count not myself to have apprehended; but this one thing I do: forgetting those things which are behind, and reaching forth unto those things which are before, I press toward the mark for the prize of the high calling of God in Christ Jesus.” We must follow the great Leader and Captain of our salvation, both as our atonement and our guide. We must keep close to him. From him we must derive all our strength and all our graces.

Be ye followers of him: where

you see the print of his step, there be sure to place your feet. We must make a diligent and faithful use of all the means of grace, especially the two sacraments.

My brethren, that may be common water with which your babes are sprinkled, and to the eye of sense it may seem so; but it is sanctified by the word of God and prayer, and shadows forth the promised Spirit. And that may be common bread and wine which you partake in the supper of the Lord; but it shadows forth, to the eye of faith, that only sacrifice of the body and blood of Jesus by which our sinful bodies and souls can possibly be made clean. O, despise not, neglect not these or any other means of grace; but use them in faith and prayer, and you will find your souls strengthened and refreshed. And, O, be found in daily, hourly application to the blood of sprinkling, and for the Spirit of grace to change your hearts and sanctify your souls, and make you holy enough to enjoy the happiness and the holiness of heaven.

3. And, lastly, let us learn a lesson of great encouragement. The very expression, "Ye are not as yet come," seems to imply that the day is at hand when you certainly shall come; and there is nothing so encouraging in any work as the certain conviction of success. Now you know of your heavenly journey what you know of no other, that you shall not be disappointed; "your labour shall not be in vain in the Lord." Gird up, then, the loins of your mind, and lay hold on eternal life. He that has awakened you to the danger of sin by his Spirit, and brought