1 Peter 1

19. Brethren may err from the truth. There is no saint mentioned in the word of God but his failings and errors are recorded. In the visible church there may be errors; God’s children may be sometimes led aside, not totally, not finally, even into gross errors. From the words “convert him,” we must understand restore him from his error. Among other acts of Christian communion, this is one of the chiefest—to restore those that are gone astray. T. M.

20. To impart to others is to gain for one’s self. Every honest effort to bring some other human heart into conscious possession of Christ’s love deepens my own sense of its preciousness. Every attempt to lead some other understanding to the perception of the truth as it is in Jesus helps me to understand it better myself. If you would learn, teach. That will clear your mind, will open hidden harmonies, will reveal unsuspected deficiencies and contradictions in your own conceptions, will help you to feel more the truths that come from your lips. A. M. —Is there anything so evident or so inexplicable as the paralysis that affects so great a multitude of professing Christians in their intercourse with those who plainly know not God? Is it that we do not believe that souls can be lost, or is it that we do not care? A. W. T.

Notice the words “shall save.” Man, under God, has this honor, to be a saviour. We are workers together with God. He is pleased to take us into a fellowship of his own work, and to cast the glory of his grace upon our endeavors. It is a high honor which the Lord does us; we should learn to turn it back to God, to whom alone it is due. When the honor of the supreme cause is put upon the instrument, the instrument may well ascribe all to the efficacy of the supreme cause. Such is the grace of God, that when thou hast used the means he will reckon it to the score: “Thou hast gained thy brother.” T. M.

Hide sins. Where no other interest is concerned, where no claims demand a disclosure, where no injury is done by concealment, and no benefit is conferred by giving publicity to a fault—there our duty is to cover it over with the veil of secrecy, and maintain an unbroken silence upon the subject. J. A. J.

1. PETER, an apostle of Jesus Christ, to the strangers scattered throughout Pontus, Galatia, Cappadocia, Asia, and Bithynia, elect according to the foreknowledge of God the Father, through sanctification of the Spirit, unto obedience and sprinkling of the blood of 3 Jesus Christ, Grace unto you, and peace, be multiplied. Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, which according to his abundant mercy hath begotten us again 4 unto a lively hope by the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead, to an inheritance 5 incorruptible, and undefiled, and that fadeth not away, reserved in heaven for you, who are kept by the power of God through faith unto salvation ready to be revealed in the last time. 6 Wherein ye greatly rejoice, though now for a season, if need be, ye are in heaviness through 7 manifold temptations: that the trial of your faith, being much more precious than of gold that perisheth, though it be tried with fire, might be found unto praise and honour and glory 8 at the appearing of Jesus Christ: whom having not seen, ye love; in whom, though now 9 ye see him not, yet believing, ye rejoice with joy unspeakable and full of glory: receiving the end of your faith, even the salvation of your souls. 10 Of which salvation the prophets have enquired and searched diligently, who prophesied 11 of the grace that should come unto you: searching what, or what manner of time the Spirit of Christ which was in them did signify, when it testified beforehand the sufferings of Christ, 12 and the glory that should follow. Unto whom it was revealed, that not unto themselves, but unto us they did minister the things, which are now reported unto you by them that have preached the gospel unto you with the Holy Ghost sent down from heaven; which things the angels desire to look into.

If such prospects as these be our covenanted inheritance—everlasting communion with the very Lord of glory, immersion in the very fountain-head of life and light, capacities of knowledge and happiness increased, and still filled and satisfied as they increase, earthly sorrows forgotten, or remembered only that we may feel how they are consumed and lost in the bliss of his immediate presence—if all of us are called, still called to this, entreated by its very Author, besought by Christ himself, as of old from the cross so now from the throne, to share it, and besought upon the one condition of turning to him in simplicity and obedient love, that is, besought to be happy hereafter on the sole condition of being, in the purest and deepest sense, happy now—what words can describe the folly, the fatuity, the madness, of those who, professing to believe this truth, will not turn this truth to account, will resolve—and to delay is to resolve—rather to cling to nothingness, emptiness, uncertainty, to moments of ease, hours of unquiet, a cloudy day at best for their life, an everlasting midnight for their eternity, than to seek the substance of immutable happiness in God, to bid boldly for this mighty prize, to attempt to reach the divine life, and, through good report and evil report, through trial and danger, to seek the one sole aim of reasonable man, the “inheritance incorruptible, and undefiled, and that fadeth not away, reserved in heaven for them who are kept by the power of God through faith unto salvation”? W. A. B.

THIS Epistle is written from Babylon, which probably means, not Rome, the mystic Babylon of the Apocalypse, but the ancient city on the banks of the Euphrates. In that region Jews were very numerous, and it is natural that the leading apostle to the Jews should be found among them. Whether he had visited the Christians of Asia Minor, to whom his Epistle is directed, is uncertain. G. P. F.

—The date of the Epistle is probably A. D. 60-62, and the place of composition, Babylon—this apostle having gone eastward to spread the gospel among the Jews in ancient Chaldea. He writes “to the strangers of the Dispersion in Pontus, Galatia, Cappadocia, Asia, and Bithynia.” The expression, the Dispersion, was a well-understood designation of Israelites scattered among the Gentiles. There are not wanting in the Epistle indications of a recognition of Gentile Christianity; but it is certainly intended as a communication to the Jewish Christians in Asia Minor. There is obvious propriety in this; for Simon Peter was the apostle of the circumcision, as Paul of the uncircumcision. D. F.

A more important indication than that of place is found in the names of the persons who were with Peter when he wrote this Epistle, Silvanus and Mark. The close connection of both with Paul furnishes evidence of intercourse between the two apostles, though severed by the distance between the capitals of the Eastern and Western world. Of SILVANUS (or Silas) we have lost sight, since we saw him as the companion of Paul’s second missionary journey; and there is nothing to show how he came to be in Peter’s company. The case of MARK is clearer; for he was with Paul in his first imprisonment at Rome, and he was then contemplating a journey to Asia Minor. This intention was no doubt fulfilled, since we find him afterward with Timothy at Ephesus. The interval is just the time at which all indications concur to place Peter’s first Epistle, and consequently Mark’s companionship with him; and the inference is highly probable that Mark was the bearer of communications from Paul to Peter. The fact is deeply significant that, when Peter wrote this Epistle to the Hebrew Christians of the Eastern Dispersion, two of Paul’s companions were his intimate associates, and one of them the bearer of the Epistle which its writer intended as a manifesto of the true doctrine of the grace of God. “By Silvanus I have written briefly, exhorting and testifying that this is the true grace of God wherein ye stand.” S.

The individual character of Simon Peter seems to be better known to us than that of any of the disciples of our Lord, illustrated as it is in many incidents of the evangelical narrative, and in the early chapters of the Acts of the Apostles. The book before us was written in his old age, and shows a heart warm as in his youth, a spirit still fervent and courageous, but combined with a deeper self-knowledge and humility. Here is Peter strengthening his brethren, as the Lord enjoined him. D. F. —There is no Epistle in the sacred canon the language and spirit of which come more directly home to the personal trials and wants and weaknesses of the Christian life. Its affectionate warnings and strong consolation have ever been treasured up close to the hearts of the weary and heavy-laden but onward-pressing servants of God. The mind of our Father toward us, the aspect of our blessed Lord as presented to us, the preparation by sufferings for our heavenly inheritance—all these, as here set forth, are peculiarly lovely and encouraging. And the motives to holy purity spring direct out of the simple and childlike recognition of the will of our heavenly Father to bring us to his glory. The entire Epistle is the following out of our Lord’s command to its writer, “And thou, when thou art converted, strengthen thy brethren.” A.

As James calls Christianity a law, so Peter considers it a promise or prophecy, the precious earnest of a still more glorious future. This is well suited to his purpose of consolation, and of encouragement to persevere under suffering. At the very beginning of the Epistle he presents the Christian salvation as an inheritance reserved in heaven; and with the prospect of the eternal glory of God in Christ, to which we are called, the Epistle concludes. It is in perfect accordance with this conception of the gospel that Peter represents the Christian life, in the first place, indeed, as penitent faith in the revealed Messiah, the only Saviour, but at the same time as lively hope for the glorious return of the Lord, and the consummation of salvation thereby to be accomplished. Hence his predilection for the title “strangers and pilgrims” in addressing Christians. On account of this frequent reference to hope, Peter has been called the apostle of hope. Thus, according to the Petrine type of doctrine, objective Christianity is at once a fulfillment of the

Old Testament prophecy and itself a precious promise; subjective Christianity is at once faith in the revealed Messiah and lively hope in his glorious reappearance. P. S.

That Peter was not at Rome before the date of the Epistle to the Romans (about A. D. 58), we are sure; that he was not there during any part of Paul’s imprisonment there, we may with certainty infer; that the two apostles did not together found the churches of Corinth and Rome, we may venture safely to affirm; that Peter ever was, in any sense like that usually given to the word, Bishop of Rome, is we believe an idea abhorrent from Scripture and from the facts of primitive apostolic history. But that Peter traveled to Rome during the persecution under Nero, and there suffered martyrdom nearly at the same time with Paul, is a tradition which does not interfere with any known facts of Scripture or early history, and one which we have no means of disproving, as we have no interest in disproving it. A.—That he died as a martyr seems evident from John 21: 18, 19. The first authority in support of the belief that he died at Rome is Dionysius of Corinth, in an Epistle to the Romans, written about A. D. 170, who says that Peter and Paul suffered martyrdom there at about the same time. Ireneus (A. D. 176 or 177) refers to the preaching of both of these apostles at Rome, without speaking of the mode and time of their death. G. P. F.

The heads of doctrine that are most insisted on in the Epistle are these three: faith, obedience, and patience; to establish them in believing, to direct them in doing, and comfort them in suffering. And because the first is the groundwork and support of the other two, this first chapter is much on that, persuading them of the truth of that mystery they had received and did believe, viz., their redemption and salvation by Christ Jesus—that inheritance of immortality bought by his blood for them, and the evidence and stability of their right and title to it. And then he uses this belief, this assurance of the glory to come, as the great persuasive to the other two, both to holy obedience and to constant patience, since nothing can be too much, either to forego or undergo, either to do or to suffer, for the attainment of that blessed state.

2. There is none truly purged by the blood of Christ that doth not endeavor after purity of heart and conversation; but yet it is the blood of Christ by which they are all fair, and there is no spot in them. Here it is said, elect to obedience; but because that obedience is not perfect, there must be sprinkling of the blood too. Their estate is that they are sanctified and justified. The nearest cause of both these is Jesus Christ; he is made unto them both righteousness and sanctification; the sprinkling of his blood purifies them from guiltiness and quickens them to obedience. The appropriating or applying cause is the holy and holy making or sanctifying Spirit, the author of their selecting from the world and effectual calling unto grace. The source of all, the appointing or decreeing cause, is *God the

Father*; for, though they all work equally in all, yet in order of working we are taught thus to distinguish, and particularly to ascribe the first work of eternal election to the first person of the blessed Trinity. The Hebrew word of salutation we have here—peace; and that which is the spring both of this and all good things in the other word of salutation used by the Greeks—grace. All right rejoicing and prosperity and happiness flow from this source and from this alone, and are sought elsewhere in vain. L.

3-9. Most characteristically this apostle rushes at once into an animated passage on the Christian hope and the inheritance of saints. He cheers “the strangers of the Dispersion” among their manifold trials by assurances of the abounding mercy of God, his powerful keeping of believers, and the triumphant issue of well-tried faith at the appearing of Jesus Christ. In this exordium we find faith, hope, and love—these three after the manner of Paul. The saints are “kept through faith”; they have a trial of faith; and the end of their faith is “the salvation of souls.” They are “begotten again to a living hope by the resurrection of Christ.” They have love to the unseen Saviour in whom they believe. Faith is not enough without hope and love, or hope without faith and love, or love without faith and hope. But from the three issues “joy unspeakable and full of glory.” D. F.

3. Unto a lively hope. Sons are heirs, but all this lifetime is their minority; yet, even then being partakers of this new birth and sonship, they have right to it, and, in the assurance of that right, this living hope. Christ, having conquered death and risen again, is set down at the right hand of God, and hath entered into possession of that inheritance. This gives us a living hope that, according to his own will, where he is there we may be also. Thus this hope is strongly underset, on the one side by the resurrection of Christ, on the other by the abundant mercy of God the Father. Our hope depends not on our own strength or wisdom, nor on anything in us—for if it did it would be short-lived, would die and die quickly—but on his resurrection who can die no more. This makes this hope not to imply uncertainty, as worldly hopes do; but it is a firm, stable, inviolable hope, an anchor fixed within the veil. L.

4. Fadeth not away. As it hath no principle of decay within itself, so neither can it be wasted by anything from without. It is “reserved,” or laid up, “for them in heaven”; a place of absolute safety, beyond the reach of every adverse power, and equally secured against deceit and rapine. There is no thief to steal, no spoiler to lay waste. In those regions of perfect light and love all is order and harmony; there is nothing to hurt, nothing to destroy, through the whole extent of the heavenly Jerusalem, that imperial seat of Zion’s king. R. W.—The blessedness of the saints, as it is without diminution, so it is without end: it is complete and continual for ever. This makes heaven to be heaven; the security is as valuable as the felicity. There is no satiety of the present, no solicitude for the future. Were there a possibility, or the least suspicion of losing that happy state, it would cast an aspersion of bitterness upon all their delights; it would disturb their peaceful fruition and joyful tranquillity; as hope in misery allays sorrow, so fear in happiness dashes joy; and the more excellent the happiness is, the more stinging would be the fear of losing it. “But the inheritance reserved in heaven is immortal, undefiled, and fades not away.” And the tenure of their possession is infinitely firm, by the promise of God, who is truly immutable, and immutably true; and by the divine power, the support of their everlasting duration. Our Saviour assures his disciples, “Because I live, ye shall live also”; and “he lives for evermore.” Bates.

Kept by the power of God. The children of God are kept safe indeed, but not unmolested and unassaulted; they have enemies, and such as are stirring and powerful; but in the midst of them they are guarded and defended. The word here translated kept is a military term, used for those who are kept as in a fort or garrison-town besieged. So Satan is still raising batteries against this fort, using all ways to take it, by strength or stratagem; unwearied in his assaults, and very skillful to know his advantages, and where we are weakest, there to set on. And, besides all this, he hath intelligence with a party within us, ready to betray us to him; so that it were impossible for us to hold out were there not another watch and guard than our own, and other walls and bulwarks than any that our skill and industry can raise for our own defense. In this, then, is our safety, that there is a power above our own, yea, and above all our enemies, that guards us: salvation itself our walls and bulwarks. L.

It is not the hold which we have of God, but that which he hath of us, that makes us hold on our way. We should quickly let go our hold of God if God had not infinite faster hold of us. Caryl.—Where is the vessel upon earth into which the fullness of the life of faith could be poured without its suffering it to be lost from time to time through want of watchfulness and prayer? and from this frail vessel of the human heart should we expect the fruit of constancy? Never; there is no feeling, there is no heart, which holds Jesus fast. Jesus holds us. Because he of his great grace and mercy holds us in repentance and faith, therefore it is that we continue in the constancy of the life of faith.

The faithfulness of Jesus Christ toward us is the ground of our constancy. A. C.

6. Whatsoever oppositions or difficulties grace meets with in its acting go under this general name of temptations; yet it is particularly meant of their afflictions and distresses, as the apostle James likewise uses it. And they are so called because they give particular and notable proof of the temper of a Christian spirit, and draw forth evidence both of the truth and the measure of the grace that is in them. L.—Mere feelings of irritability, indolence, weariness, partisanship, unkindness, suspiciousness, and so forth, are not in themselves sins. They must be consented to and harbored before they can become so. Our minds may be rendered uncomfortable by them; we may be “in heaviness through manifold temptations”; but heaviness and discomfort are no sins. Nay, heaviness of spirit resulting from temptation is the cross of the garden laid on us by him who bore it in Gethsemane; and it is a great honor and privilege to be called upon, like the three chosen ones of the chosen, to come and watch with him for one short hour. Multitudinous temptations are, indeed, if we comport ourselves well under them, a great means of spiritual advancement. E. M. G.

Though now for a season. A consideration that moderates this heaviness is its shortness. Because we willingly forget eternity, therefore this moment seems much in our eyes; but, if we could look upon it aright, of how little concernment is it what be our condition here? Well might Austin say, “Use me here as pleaseth thee, so as that hereafter it may be well with me.” L.

If need be. Affliction indeed is not good in itself, but only when God comes in and with it. Therefore no man is required to desire affliction or to pray for suffering, even for Christ’s sake, but if God sends it, to faint not, but receive and bear it as his discipline for good. There is always a need be connected with it; and those who are the subjects of such discipline, “kept by the power of God,” are enabled greatly to rejoice in the promises of God, though now for a season, “if need be,” they are in heaviness through manifold temptations. They may thus even count it all joy when they fall into divers trials, because, in the endurance of such trials, God deaeleth with them as sons, and their faith and patience are perfected. The seeds of a harvest of holiness are sown, and the causes are set in motion which will work out an exceeding and eternal weight of glory. This need be is exceedingly precious and encouraging; this is the way God must take with you; it is a need be on your account, not on his; a need be by reason of your weakness and of his great goodness; and if you persevere waiting upon him, your heaviness, under such circumstances, is quite as good a seal and proof of your sonship, of your belonging to God, as another person’s rapturous enjoyment under different circumstances. Only be anxious to please Christ; only wait on him. And remember that, when you pray that God would make you holy, you really pray that he would take whatever means might be necessary for the accomplishment of this prayer. G. B. C.

7. Here the apostle expounds the if need be of the former verse, and so justifies the joy in afflictions which there he speaks of, by their utility and faith’s advantage by them; it is so tried that it shall appear in its full brightness at the revelation of Jesus Christ. L.—A man must be proved before he can be approved. In the very nature of the case, trial precedes approbation. God tries and trains men before, and for, advancement. The advancement is to be great; the trial must be searching. Therefore the individual life is so adjusted in its circumstances, and so measured as to its length, as to constitute on the whole a complete probation for the man. What makes it such is not alone the tribulation that is in it. Health, and happy temperament, and prosperous circumstances, and pleasant friendships, and all social advantages, are elements in the probation just as much as the tribulation; indeed, in most instances rather more so, since, in by far the greater number of human lives, there is a large preponderance of what is felt to be good over its opposite. Still, without the tribulation, the trial would not be complete; it would be partial, and in regard to some men very superficial. Indeed, there is probably that in every one of us which only suffering in some form can touch and try. Hence we read such words of God as these: “I will bring the third part through the fire, and will refine them as silver is refined, and will try them as gold is tried.” A. R.

Might be found unto praise, and honor, and glory. This is the end that is intended, and shall be certainly obtained by all these hot trials. An unskillful beholder may think it strange to see gold thrown into the fire, and left there for a time; but he that puts it there would be loth to lose it; his purpose is to make some costly piece of work of it. Every believer gives himself to Christ, and he undertakes to present them blameless to the Father; not one of them shall be lost, nor one drachm of their faith; they shall be found, and their faith shall be found when he appears. That faith that is here in the furnace shall there be made up into a crown of pure gold.

8. Faith in Christ begetting love to him, and both these giving assured hope of salvation by him, make it as certain to them as if it were already in their hand, and they in possession of it. And from all those together results this exultation, or leaping for joy, joy unspeakable and full of glory. L.—Faith is indeed to us a second sight, which reveals Jesus crowned in heaven with glory and honor, and entering within the veil where his very presence is an intercession. To faith he is no mere bright record of the past traced on the most sacred page of history, still less is he an ideal of humanity that never was realized. For faith holds daily communion with him, as with a person, as with a vast, all-comprehending intellect, as with a resistless will, as with a living heart of surpassing tenderness. H. P. L.

The spiritual joy of the Christian takes root at the same time in faith, hope, and love, which are the great powers of the inner life. He believes, although he does not perceive; he loves, although he may not behold; he hopes, although he does not possess. Then he must rejoice in this Lord with a joy unspeakable, and, as it stands literally, a “glorified joy.” Yea, it is unspeakable, the calm joy of faith and love which, at least now and again, the ransomed sinner may attain! It may cause a reflection of heavenly glory to fall upon a pale, suffering countenance, and what shall it be when he, “whom having not seen we love,” shall stand before us, face to face, in all “his beauty”! Van O.—We never saw our Saviour’s face. We never heard our Father’s voice. Faith here achieves what in other things would be impossibilities. In Jesus Christ we believe in one we never saw; and we commit the keeping of our most precious treasure to one who dwells in a country from which no traveler has ever returned to assure us that his trust was not, and that ours will not, be misplaced. Yet blessed are they that have not seen and yet have believed. The seen are shadows; the substance is found in the unseen. These are the most real objects—God, whom no man ever saw and lived; the soul, which does not grow infirm with time and defies the sharpest darts of death; not this world of matter, which shall vanish in the smoke of its own funereal fires, but that world of spirits, where saints enjoy a glory that never fades. T. G.

Think of all the affection of human hearts that has been given to the Saviour of the world since he withdrew his visible presence from it! He has appeared to no eye of man since the apostles; but millions have loved him with a fervency which nothing could extinguish in life or death. Think of the great “army” of those who have suffered death for this love, and have cherished it in death! And a mightier number still would have died for it, and with it, if summoned to do so. Think of all those who in the incitement and inspiration of this love have indefatigably labored to promote the glory of its great object! And the innumerable multitude of those who, though less prominently distinguished, have felt this sacred sentiment living in the soul, as the principle of its best life, and the source of all its immortal hopes! J. F.—Once, as I rode out into the woods, having alighted from my horse in a retired place for divine contemplation and prayer, I had a view, that for me was extraordinary, of the glory of the Son of God as Mediator between God and man, and his wonderful, great, full, pure, and sweet grace and love, and meek and gentle condescension. The grace that appeared so calm and sweet appeared also great above the heavens. The person of Christ appeared ineffably excellent, with an excellency great enough to swallow up all thought and conception; which continued, as near as I can judge, about an hour; which kept me the greater part of the time in a flood of tears and weeping aloud. I felt an arclency of soul to be—what I know not otherwise how to express—emptied and annihilated; to lie in the dust and to be full of Christ alone; to love him with a holy and pure love; to trust in him; to live upon him; to serve and follow him; and to be perfectly sanctified, and made pure with a divine and heavenly purity. Edwards.

9. This is the certainty of their hope, that it is as if they had already received it. If the promise of God and the merit of Christ hold good, then they that believe in him and love him are made sure of salvation. Sooner may the rivers run backward, and the course of the heavens change, and the frame of nature be dissolved, than any one soul that is united to Jesus Christ by faith and love can be severed from him, and so fall short of salvation hoped for in him; and this is the matter of their rejoicing. L.—The end of this salvation is in the immortal result toward which the change of spirit and life experienced on earth continually points; in a power ever exercised, yet ever renewed; in the inward sanctity made complete; in the fellowship of saints, our eternal possession; in the wisdom, before which all secrets open; in a joy ecstatic, that touches with its intenser beauty whatever surrounds it; in the perfect love, that makes each work an exulting worship, toward him once suffering and now crowned; in the beatific vision of God! R. S. S.

10-12. If we collate these words with the first sermons of Peter, we shall find they take up the habitual theme of his preaching at Jerusalem; and if we remember further that we are to seek the special doctrinal characteristic of the various sacred writers in the solution given by them to the question of the relation of the two covenants, we shall feel that we can not attach too much importance to this passage of the Epistle of Peter. He affirms most explicitly the unity of the old and new covenants. The Spirit of Christ which lives in the apostles was also the animating Spirit of the prophets, who were the true forerunners of the evangelists, since they foretold both the sufferings and the glory of Messiah. True religion rises before his eyes like a vast and splendid temple—prophecy its foundation, the gospel its top-stone. De P.—The gospel is represented as the doctrine of the sufferings and glory of Christ as the means of salvation. The worker of this salvation, whom the prophets and apostles make the sum of all their doctrine, is Jesus Christ, and the sum of that work of redemption, as we have it here, is his humiliation and exaltation, his sufferings and the glory that followed thereupon. L.

12. Unto us they did minister. The law and the prophets, as scriptures, as a book, were still under the new dispensation what they had been under the old—the voice of the Spirit and the word of God. Nay! this written word belonged to the new dispensation more truly than the old, for these Scriptures also were now raised to newness of life, and were recognized as prepared for the uses to which they were now applied, and written less for the immediate than for the ulterior purposes, as Peter has here expressed it. T. D. B.

The angels desire to look into. These, like us, are powers of endless life, intelligences that have had a history parallel to our own. Some of them, doubtless, have existed myriads of ages, and consequently now are far on in the course of their development. Hence their interest in us, who as yet are only candidates, in their view, for a greatness yet to be revealed. They break into the sky, when Christ is born, chanting their all-hail. They visit the world on heavenly errands, and perform their unseen ministries to the heirs of salvation. They watch for our repentances, and there is joy among them before God when but one is gathered to their company in the faith of salvation. And the reason is that these ancient princes and hierarchs, that have grown up in God’s eternity and unfolded their mighty powers in whole ages of good, recognize in us compeers that are finally to be advanced as they are. H. B.

The glory of redemption! It is the chief delight of the infinite mind; the joy of angels; the bliss of mankind; the central sun and moral bond of the universe. As the theatre of this redemption, our world is honored above all worlds. Though in itself an obscure corner of creation, it is made the center of highest interest. A moral force is gathering in it to uphold the universe in love and obedience. It is heaven’s laboratory, in which are to be worked out the great principles which are to exist in and rule God’s kingdom. It is the battle-field of the universe, on which holiness and sin, truth and error, life and death, Christ and the devil are to wage their one great and decisive warfare. History may record her eventful eras, when all the powers of earth were drawn up in hostile array, and all its interests suspended on a single conflict. But time is a more eventful era, in relation to eternity. The spiritual powers of the universe are met on this earth in hostile array; for nearly sixty centuries has the conflict raged already, and it will continue to rage we know not how long. And who can conceive the extent of the interests at stake in this warfare? The honor of God, the maintenance of law and order, and the happiness of all worlds are involved. Our highest conceptions of the grandeur and importance of this contest fall amazingly short of the reality. There is a breadth of purpose, a depth of meaning, a height of glory, and a fullness of love and blessing in this work of redemption, which eternal ages will hardly disclose. An.

—The main ground of submitting to human authority is the interest that Divine authority hath in it; having both appointed civil government as a common good among men, and particularly commanded his people obedience to it as a particular good to them and suitable with their profession—it is for the Lord’s sake. Although civil authority, in regard of particular forms of government and the choice of particular persons to govern, is but a human ordinance, or man’s creature, as the word is, yet both the good of government and the duty of subjection to it is God’s ordinance; and, therefore, for his sake submit yourselves. But not only ought the exercise of authority and submission to it be in things just and lawful in themselves, but the very purpose of the heart, both in command and obedience, should be in the Lord and for his sake. This is the only straight and only safe rule both for rulers and for people to walk by. L.

He who has resolved to stand on the side of God is the best friend of his country that any country can have; and there is no earthly country good enough to be loved safely, except the love of it be hallowed by faith in a better country, even a heavenly. F. D. H.—We should be accustomed to look upon political matters as Christians; we should by that standard try our common views and language about it, and, if it may be, correct them, that so, when called upon to act, we may act according to the apostle’s teaching, for the sake of our Lord Jesus. And I am quite sure if we do so think and act, although our differences of opinion might remain, yet the change in ourselves—and I verily believe in the blessings which God would give us—would be more than we can well believe; and a general election, instead of calling forth a host of unchristian passions and practices, would be rather an exercise of Christian judgment and forbearance and faith and charity, promoting, whatever was the mere political result, the glory of God, advancing Christ’s kingdom, and the good of this, as it would be then truly called, Christian nation. T. A.

17. Here is the sum of our duty toward God and men: to men in general, honor all men; in their Christian or religious relation, love the brotherhood; and in a chief civil relation, honor the king. And our whole duty to God, comprised under the name of his fear, is set in the middle betwixt these, as the common spring of all duty to men and of all due observance of it, and the sovereign rule by which it is to be regulated. Honor all men. The Jews would not willingly tread upon the smallest piece of paper in their way, but took it up; for possibly, said they, the name of God may be on it. Though there was a little superstition in that, yet truly there is nothing but good religion in it if we apply it to men. Trample not on any; there may be some work of grace there that thou knowest not of. The name of God may be written upon that soul. Wheresoever thou findest the least trace of Christ’s image, if thou lovest him, thou wilt honor it. L.—The divine image, expressed in man’s intelligence and freedom; the atoning blood, giving the measure of man’s preciousness in the eyes of God; the glorified manhood of Jesus, revealing to man his capacity for glory—these are the privileges of no class or station; they are the right and the possession of humanity. H. P. L.

Fear God. This fear hath chiefly these things: a reverent esteem of the majesty of God that molds the heart most powerfully to the obedience of his will; a firm belief of the purity of God and of his power and justice; that he loves all holiness and hates all sin, and can and will punish it; a right apprehension of the bitterness of his wrath and the sweetness of his love. From all these things springs a desire to please him in all things, and an unwillingness to offend him in the least; and because of our danger through the multitude and strength of temptations and our weakness, a continual self-suspicion, a holy fear lest we should sin, and a care and watchfulness that we sin not. L.

19. The virtue, value, and glory of conscience have been manifested in its habitual predominance in the spirit and conduct of good men. A good conscience has been the source of unspeakable complacency and delight; it has been mighty in trial and temptation, consolatory under injustice, reproach, and undeserved ignominy; a sublime energy under persecution for fidelity to God. J. F.

21. God’s thoughts are not ours; those whom he calls to a kingdom he calls to suffering as the way to it. He will have the heirs of heaven know they are not at home on earth, and that this is not their rest. He will not have them with the abused world fancy a happiness here, and seek a happy life in the region of death, as Augustia says. That we are called to suffering, the apostle puts out of question by the supreme example of our Lord Jesus Christ; for the sum of our calling is to follow him. In both suffering, and suffering innocently and patiently, the whole history of the gospel testifies how complete a pattern he is. L.—Christ left us an example of all meekness, and patience, and humility; he left us an example of perfect submission to God’s will; he left us an infinite comfort by letting us feel when we are in any trouble, or pain, or affliction, that he was troubled too; that he knew pain and endured affliction. Above all, in that hour which must come to all of us, he has left us the greatest of all supports; for he endured to die; and we may enter with less fear into the darkness of the grave, for even there Christ has been for our sakes, and arose from out of it a conqueror. T. A.

13. WHEREFORE gird up the loins of your mind, be sober, and hope to the end for the grace that 14 is to be brought unto you at the revelation of Jesus Christ; as obedient children, not fash- 15 ioning yourselves according to the former lusts in your ignorance; but as he which hath 16 called you is holy, so be ye holy in all manner of conversation; because it is written, Be ye 17 holy; for I am holy. And if ye call on the Father, who without respect of persons judgeth 18 according to every man’s work, pass the time of your sojourning here in fear: forasmuch 19 as ye know that ye were not redeemed with corruptible things, as silver and gold, from 20 your vain conversation received by tradition from your fathers; but with the precious blood 21 of Christ, as of a lamb without blemish and without spot: who verily was foreordained be- 22 fore the foundation of the world, but was manifest in these last times for you, who by him 23 do believe in God, that raised him up from the dead, and gave him glory; that your faith 24 and hope might be in God. Seeing ye have purified your souls in obeying the truth through 25 the Spirit unto unfeigned love of the brethren, see that ye love one another with a pure 26 heart fervently: being born again, not of corruptible seed, but of incorruptible, by the word 27 of God, which liveth and abideth for ever. For all flesh is as grass, and all the glory of man 28 as the flower of grass. The grass withereth, and the flower thereof falleth away: but the 29 word of the Lord endureth for ever. And this is the word which by the gospel is preached 30 unto you.

If there be a true purpose in the life, it shall reach a perfect close one day; its shortcomings shall yet be completed, its errors rectified, its visions realized. There are no ruins nor half-finished structures in the city of God. One of the most blessed assurances of the Christian faith is, that not only can there be a compensation for failure now, in the lessons of humility, of trustfulness in God, and of inward peace amid outward loss, but that there shall yet be a compensation in the perfectness of deed and of attainment. All the inward gains of the soul in its struggles, its defeats, and disappointed hopes shall be represented, and more than represented, in the fullness of power and possession which shall be its heritage in the endless life. It is by privation, not unfrequently by disaster, that God qualifies souls for the highest ends, and the thought of this may make the most wearied heart among us bear up bravely, and “hope to the end for the grace that shall be brought to it at the revelation of Jesus Christ.” Ker.

13. The great error of man’s mind, and the cause of all his errors of life, is the diverting of the soul from God, and turning downward to inferior confidences and comforts; and this mischievous is the very root of all our miseries. Therefore, the main end of the holy word of God is to untie the hearts of men from the world, and reduce them to God as their only rest and solid comfort; and this is here the apostle’s mark, at which all the preceding discourse aims. It all meets and terminates in this exhortation: Wherefore gird up the loins of your mind. Hope to the end. The difference of the two graces, faith and hope, is so small that the one is often taken for the other in Scripture. It is but a different aspect of the same confidence, faith apprehending the infallible truth of those divine promises, of which hope doth assuredly expect the accomplishment, so that this immediately results from the other. This is the anchor, fixed within the veil, that keeps the soul firm against all the tossings on these swelling seas. The firmest thing in this inferior world is a believing, hoping soul!

14,15. Of all children the children of God are most obliged to obedience, for he is both the wisest and the most loving of Fathers. And the sum of all his commands is that which is their glory and happiness, that they endeavor to be like him, to resemble their heavenly Father. Be ye perfect as your heavenly Father is perfect, says our Saviour. And here the apostle, citing out of the law, Be ye holy, for I am holy (Lev. 11 : 44). Law and gospel agree in this. L.

17. “And if ye call him Father.” T.—Pass the time in fear. The fear here recommended is, out of question, a holy self-suspicion and fear of offending God, which may not only consist with assured hope of salvation, and with faith and love and spiritual joy, but is their inseparable companion, as all divine graces are linked together. The apostle, having stirred up his Christian brethren, whatsoever be their estate in the world, to seek to be rich in those jewels of faith and hope and love and spiritual joy, and then considering that they travel among a world of thieves and robbers, he advises them to give those their jewels in custody, under God, to this trusty and watchful grace of godly fear; and, having earnestly exhorted them to holiness, he is very fitly particular in this fear, which makes up so great a part of that holiness that it is often in Scripture named for it all. L.—This grace of fear is the softest and most tender of God’s honor of all the graces. To keep a good watch is a wonderful safety to a place that is in continual danger because of the enemy. Why, this is the grace that setteth the watch and that keepeth the watchman awake. Bun.

18,19. He sets forth this as the strongest incentive to holiness. Not only have you the example of God set before you as your Father, and the justice of God as your Judge, to argue you into a pious fear of offending him, but he is your Redeemer; he hath bought out your liberty from sin and the world, to be altogether his; think on the price laid down in this ransom. L.—Christ our Passover is no unconscious victim, but one who freely gives himself that he may bring us to God. It is no corruptible thing that is the ransom price, but the precious blood of Christ, as of a lamb without blemish and without spot. In this was seen the height of divine love and the depth of human sin and loss, that the highest in the universe devoted himself for the lowest, and died the death for them, which was the ransom of the soul. He who made the world came into the world to save it, and bore for it the burden of shame and guilt. Ker.—The precious soul could be redeemed by no blood but that of this spotless Lamb Jesus Christ, who is God equal with the Father, and therefore his blood is called the blood of God (Acts 20). So that the apostle may here well call it precious, exceeding the whole world and all things in it in value. Therefore, frustrate not the sufferings of Christ; if he shed his blood to redeem you from sin, be not false to his end. L.—Without blemish. It is the extraordinary combination of excellences which it displays that constitutes the peculiar attraction of the character of Christ. Meekness and majesty—firmness and gentleness—zeal and prudence—composure and warmth—patience and sensibility—submissiveness and dignity—sublime sanctity and tender sympathy—piety that rose to the loftiest devotion and benevolence that could stoop to the meanest sufferer—intense abhorrence of sin and profound compassion for the sinner, mingle their varied rays in the tissue of our Saviour’s character, and produce a combination of virtues such as the world never saw besides. W. L. A.

20,21. Before there was time or place or any creature, God, the blessed Trinity, was in himself and as inhabiting eternity completely happy in himself. But intending to manifest and communicate his goodness, he gave being to the world, and to time with it; made all to set forth his goodness, and the most excellent of his creatures to contemplate and enjoy it. But amongst all the works he intended before time and in time effected, this is the master-piece that is here said to be fore-ordained, the manifesting of God in the flesh for man’s redemption; and that by his Son Jesus Christ. This is the great work wherein all those glorious attributes shine jointly, the wisdom, and power, and goodness, and justice, and mercy of God. L.—The agency of the Father ordained the Saviour: he manifested him to the world; he raised him up from the dead; he gave him glory. And all those particulars are made known to us. For what end? That our faith and hope may be in God! R. W.

22. Purified your souls in obeying the truth through the Spirit.** Here is the chief seat or subject of the work of sanctification, the soul; the subordinate means, truth; the nature of it, obeying of truth; the chief worker of it, the holy Spirit. They are here said to purify themselves. For it is certain and undeniable that the soul itself doth act in believing or obeying the truth; but not of itself, it is not the first principle of motion. They purify their souls, but it is by the Spirit. They do it by his enlivening power, and a purifying virtue received from him. Faith, or obeying the truth, works this purity; but the Holy Ghost works that faith; as God is said to purify their hearts by faith, he doth that by giving them the Holy Ghost. The truth is pure and purifying, yet can it not of itself purify the soul but by the obeying or believing it; and the soul can not obey or believe but by the Spirit, which works in it that faith, and by that faith purifies it and works love in it. L.—If Christ becomes wisdom to any mind, it is because that mind exercises its thought upon Christ and his truth—opens itself to his teaching, yields to his truth. If Christ becomes righteousness to any soul, it is because that soul by its own act of faith, by looking to him and trusting in him, accepts his atonement as its plea for pardon. If Christ becomes sanctification to any soul, it is because that soul, feeling its guilt and need, seeks by his grace to conquer sin, to become holy, and to purify itself by obeying the truth through the Spirit. But while man’s activity must be put forth in acts of thought and resolve, in faith and love and obedience, or Christ will never avail him, it is yet true that no man really comes to Christ, “except the Father draw him.” The holy Spirit takes the things of Christ and shows them to us, and thus makes Christ our wisdom; the holy Spirit incites us to the act of faith; the holy Spirit by the truth kindles within us desires after holiness, and inciting us to prayer and watchfulness, promotes our sanctification; and therefore, though Christ can be literally nothing to us without our own act of reflection, of repentance, of faith, of love, yet since we will put forth no proper act toward him except as moved by grace, we do owe to that grace our salvation from first to last. J. P. T.

There may be truth in the intellect separate from its regenerating power on the soul; light in the reason without the corresponding love in the heart; but there can not be the transforming and regenerating effect, nor the intelligent kindling of holy emotion, without the truth and the light first. There may be little truth, and feeble perception of it; but truth and the sight of it there must be. Now, the influence or work of the holy Spirit is that movement—whatever it be, or however exercised—which gives truth its regal and penetrating power, and kindles through it the fire of the affections. T. B.

—Let us never forget that, in speaking of divine truth, the Spirit of God, and the soul of man, we are speaking of living and life-giving things, and that therefore the whole subject devolves on us the duties of prayer and watchfulness, of labor and study, of thought and effort, to see that these living and life-giving things be not kept apart. It is only by keeping the truth, the Spirit, and the soul in close companionship, that we can expect the blessed result of renewed and purified natures. Indolence and indifference here are as deeply mischievous, and, in one sense, as deeply criminal, as dislike and opposition. Though God is always first in action in the great work which we have considered, yet we should always labor as though first action belonged to us; and though he will ever be found to have wrought all our good in us, yet we should always work as though there were a sense in which all things depend on ourselves.

Unfeigned love for the brethren. Literally, a “love without hypocrisy,” “fervent love for one another out of a pure heart”; this is religion in its fairest, most perfect development on earth. Were all that claims to be religion really imbued with this spirit, truth would have a safer as well as a warmer home than she now has in this lower world. Pure, holy, Christian love furnishes no soil for the roots of error; nor does it ever baptize truth in the waters of strife. J. S. S.—Love one another. They that are indeed lovers of God are united; by that their hearts meet in him as in one center. They can not but love one another. And as the Christian’s love is pure in its cause, so in its effects and exercise; his society and converse with any tends mainly to this, that he may mutually help and be helped in the knowledge and love of God; he desires most that he and his brethren may further one another in their way to the full enjoyment of God. And this is truly the love of a pure heart, that both begins and ends in God.

23. This incorruptible seed is the living and everlasting word of the living and everlasting God. Because the word is enlivening and living, therefore they into whose hearts it is received are made alive by it; and because the word endureth for ever, therefore that life begot by it can not perish; no, this spiritual life of grace is the certain beginning of that eternal life of glory and shall issue in it.

24. How easily and quickly hath the highest splendor of a man’s prosperity been blasted, either by men’s power, or by the immediate hand of God! The Spirit of the Lord blows upon it, as Isaiah says, and not only withers the grass, but the flower fades though never so fair. Would we consider this, it would give us wiser thoughts, and ballast our hearts; make them more solid and steadfast in those spiritual endeavors which concern a durable condition, a being that abides for ever; in comparison of which the longest term of natural life is less than a moment, and the happiest estate of it but a heap of miseries. Were all of us more constantly prosperous than any of us is, yet that one thing were enough to cry down the price we put on this life; that it continues not. L.

The word endureth. It is an authority which survives when others perish, and a light which waxes when others wane. By it, as the instrument of God for the education of men, nations are humanized and churches sanctified. And yet more real and lasting than these are the ultimate results which it secures. An elect nation is being gathered from among us, and an eternal Church prepared which shall supplant all transient and provisional societies in that day for which the whole creation waits. Then is it not to each of us a matter of the deepest personal concern that the truth which it teaches and the spirit which it breathes should have entered into his own soul; and that he should thus become a partaker in the life which it reveals, an example of the character which it demands, and an inheritor of the portion which it promises? But this can not be, unless he yield to the written Word the confidence which it claims. Oh, deal worthily, deal trustfully with such a guide as this! Receive the message “not as the word of man, but as it is in truth, the word of God,” and then you will find that it “effectually worketh also in them that believe”; for he who obeys it from the heart finds that a course of progressive teaching is opened in his own soul, to which the holy Scripture will never cease to minister, and which the Holy Spirit will never cease to guide. T. D. B.