March 25

Your life is hid with Christ in God. — COL. iii. 3.

For as the Father hath life in himself; so hath he given to the Son to have life in himself. — JOHN v. 26.

THE gospel assumes and illustrates the doctrine of the Trinity. The ineffable relations of the Father, Son, and Holy Ghost are all recognized and embodied in the structure of the economy of grace. As in the constitution of the Godhead the Father is first, the Son second, and the Holy Ghost third, — the Son being from the Father, and the Holy Ghost from the Father and the Son, — so in the arrangements into which they have entered for the salvation of men, the Father stands at the fountain-head carrying out the eternal purpose of mercy through the Son and Spirit. The text carries us back into the fathomless depths of this glorious mystery, and represents the Son as the God-man, as receiving from the Father for redemptive ends a life which is as truly divine and self-contained as that possessed by the Father himself. This life, in all its divine vigor, is exercised by him in the impartation of spiritual life to souls dead in trespasses and sins, and shall at last be revealed with majesty and power in the resurrection of the dead. Truly "our life is hid with Christ in God." Its guarantee and pledge are bound up indissolubly by covenant with the vital relations of the Godhead itself.

Robert Watts.

Jesus is God! Oh, could I now But compass land and sea, To teach and tell this single truth, How happy should I be!

Oh, had I but an angel's voice I would proclaim so loud: Jesus, the good, the beautiful, Is everlasting God.

FABER.