March 25

ourselves of the privilege—It is a mercy that we repair to the service, knowing that it is not a vain thing to seek the Lord, and able to plead the promise, I will make the place of my feet glorious. But we need not confine the subject. To creatures so unworthy and guilty as we are, every thing is mercy: the air we breathe; the water we drink; our food; our sleep. Let us think in what a multitude of mercies we come together; public and private; personal and relative; temporal and spiritual: redeeming mercies, justifying mercies, renewing mercies—Let us dwell on the plentitude of his undeserved favours, that we may not murmur or even complain of a few trials, but come before his presence with singing and praise.

He would also do it filled with holy veneration. And in thy fear will I worship toward thy holy temple. This fear is not dread, and therefore comports with the cheerfulness of which we have been speaking. The first believers walked in the fear of the Lord, and in the comforts of the Holy Ghost: and we are commanded to serve the Lord with fear and rejoice with trembling. We are to be in the fear of the Lord all the day long—but God is greatly to be feared in the assembly of the saints, and to be had in reverence of them that are about him. Nothing more becomes his majesty and purity, his omniscience and omnipresence. Nothing more becomes our meanness and vileness; and the importance of the work in which we are engaged; and the consequences depending. We sing and pray and hear for eternity. We are responsible for all our opportunities. We never leave the house of God as we enter it—How dreadful is the place! It is none other but the house of God, and the gate of heaven—and of hell! To some the word preached will be the savour of life unto life; to others it will be the savour of death unto death. Nothing is so likely to secure our edification by the means of grace, as a solemnity of mind in our attendance. And where it prevails, the eyes will not rove all over the place. Sleep and drowsiness will be excluded. We shall not leave the sanctuary with levity, and fall into vain and idle discourse. Nor shall we ever come to it without reflection and prayer.

MARCH 25.—“I am in a strait betwixt two.”—Philippians 1:23.

NOTHING is more trying and distressing than a state of uncertainty, indecision, and perplexity—or being in a strait between opposing claims, one of which only can be chosen. What a strait was David in when he had to choose between pestilence, and war, and famine! And what a strait was Jacob in between his wish for relief and the fear of sending Benjamin!

Paul is here in a strait, but it is between two things, each of which is agreeable and inviting. We might have been sure that whatever weighed with him would be something pertaining to Christ. Accordingly his drawing was, on the one side, the enjoyment of his Lord’s presence in heaven; and on the other, the serving of his people on earth. Let us notice the former of these—“Having a desire to depart to be with Christ, which is far better.”

The Apostle means death; but he avoids the name, and calls it a departure. We are much more influenced by words than we may imagine; and as there is so much to render death formidable, we

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should, as far as possible, soften it even in the representation. And the Scripture does this. It tells us that if a man keeps the sayings of Christ, "he shall never see death." Is he then exempted from the law of mortality? No: but death is so changed with regard to him, that it does not deserve the name. It is therefore a gathering to his people, a falling asleep, a putting off this tabernacle, a departure—"I long to depart." Does the Apostle refer to a mariner loosing anchor from a foreign shore to depart for his own country? or to a traveller departing from an inn to which he has turned aside for a night to go on his way? or to a prisoner departing from his dungeon and chains to enjoy his freedom? or to a soldier departing for his peaceful home after his warfare is ended? The death of a Christian furnishes all these images and fulfils them. But how surely does the representation remind us of the complex nature of man! If nothing survived at death, death would be a cessation, not a departure. We do not say an animal departed this life. If we buried a beast we should not inscribe on a stone, "Here lies his body"—Here lies the whole of him. But over the grave of a man we say, "Here lies the body"—or, "Here repose the remains"—For "there is a spirit in man:" and when "the dust returns to the dust whence it came, the spirit returns to God who gave it."

The effect of this death is "to be with Christ." It is obvious the Apostle supposed that a separate state immediately followed the dissolution of the body, as he says in another place expressly, "Absent from the body, and present with the Lord." Had he expected that he should not be with Christ till the resurrection, his dying would have been of no advantage to him. It might have freed him indeed from his sufferings: but he is not speaking of what he should leave, but of what he should reach. In a blessed sense Christ was with him here; and this, with all his trials, was better than annihilation till the last day. It is useless to say the period would seem only as a moment to the individual—for this is not the question—the difficulty lies here—that let the term be long or short, such inaction and insensibility could not be better than the presence of Christ with Paul even in this life.

I love the very words the Holy Ghost useth. Paul does not say I long to depart to be in heaven. This is his meaning—but he speaks in a way that while it expresses the blessedness, characterizes it also at the same time. To be in heaven is to be with Christ. Our Lord affirms this himself in his promise to the thief—"This day thou shalt be with me in paradise." And in his prayer for the disciples—"That they may be with me where I am to behold my glory." Is this our heaven? Could such happiness make us happy? Whatever that state be, we must be prepared for it by a conformity to it in our views and feelings here. What a delightful prospect is the social intercourse of that world! If Socrates could comfort himself that he was going to Museus and other worthies that had lived before him, what is the attraction of a Christian, that he is going to join his own beloved connexions, and the martyrs, and the apostles, and the prophets, and the patriarchs, and the innumerable company of angels—and above all, "the Lord of all," the most wonderful of all characters, the most endeared of all benefactors, the most precious of all friends!