of course.

Hence Christ is unknown to them in His real Attributes. But let it not be so with us. Let us not indulge ourselves in this vain and weak manner of treating the divine doctrines of our most holy faith. Let us seek more and more, by earnest study of the divine Word, by fervent prayer, by strict attention to the ordinances of religion, to obtain a knowledge of our glorious Saviour, so that we may worship Him “in spirit and in truth.”

To this end let us particularly keep in mind the circumstances of His Birth, the wonderful miracles which He wrought, the prophecies which by His coming He fulfilled. And let us try to keep fast hold in our minds that, although it is nearly two thousand years since He came into the world to visit our race, this distance of time does not make His coming at all less real than if He had come but yesterday. To God "a thousand years are as one day." It is not two days, then, in the sight of God since Christ was actually in the world.

And observe, it is said in the Collect that Christ came to visit us in great humility. To visit us! Not, you see, to stay; but as a visitant. Now a visitor is one who comes for a time, and then goes away again; and so did Christ. He was in the world but thirty-three years and a half. "He was

in the world, and the world was made by Him,

1 2 Peter iii. 8.

and the world knew Him not. He came unto His own, and His own received Him not." Such was His first coming. Though Creator, yet in the form of a creature. Though Lord of all, yet as servant of all. Though the Author of all happiness, yet to endure a life of all suffering. Though from all Eternity, yet to be born in time. Though a pure invisible Spirit, yet to take on Him our visible flesh, that in that flesh He might be crucified for our sins.

Now to enter into all this as we ought, requires much thought and serious reflection, and the whole bent of our minds. And this is what few bestow. Hence few are true believers. And although Christ has Himself said, " He that believeth not shall be damned," yet men are not alarmed on that account. So great is the evil of negligent and careless habits of religion, so powerful are they in strengthening the force of Satan and the world, and giving men over to darkness.

But, my brethren, that we may have a true wonder, dread, and reverence of our blessed Lord, it is proper not to confine our views to His first Advent, which is already past; but to look forward to His second Advent, which is yet to be, when " He shall come in power and great glory, to judge both the quick and dead." Were it not for this second coming of Christ, we who live now should have doubtless some excuse for not thinking about His 2 Mark xvi. 16.

1 John i. 10.

first coming, regarding it as something in which we But the undeniable truth is, that

had no concern.

He is to come again.

Persons sometimes say to themselves, "What is it to me to read in the New Testament concerning Jesus Christ, who lived so long ago; or to be told about His Apostles, who are all dead long since; or, again, to be told of the prophecies and types pertaining to the Messiah in the Old Testament? What are all these things to me, who live now in a different age, and in a different part of the world ?" Such, I say, is the feeling in the hearts of some persons. And others there are, who do not exactly think in this way, and yet they have a feeling of the same sort. That is to say, they think in their own mind, that it is foolish and unreasonable to meditate much upon events which took place so long ago as those circumstances which are recorded in the New Testament. The truth is, those circumstances and those events do not practically interest them. Now why is this? Why do they feel so little interest concerning these things? I will tell you. It is because they do not consider that they are mixed up in these very things themselves. True it is that Jesus Christ has long since departed out of this world, and gone to the Father. But equally true it is, that there is a time fixed when He will come again, and that "to be our judge." The scheme of human redemption is not yet finished. The Gospel is, as it were, but half completed. The first half is

E

come.

past. The first coming of Christ is over; His birth, His life, His death, His resurrection, His ascension, -these indeed are over; but the other half is yet to That is to say, His coming again with His holy angels on the clouds of heaven, in power and great glory, "when every eye shall see Him, and they also which pierced Him," when He shall come "like lightning shining from the East even unto the West." It is as though there were some great show or spectacle, of which the first half were over, and we, who live now, were waiting to see the other half. It is as though a master were gone into a far country, leaving his servants in charge of his household;3 and as if that master were not yet come back. Now it is plain that the servants whom that master left behind when he went, and not only those servants, but any others who in the course of his absence might be added to their number, that all these servants would have a great interest in their master. If, indeed, he were never expected to come back, they would not think of him so much. But even then those who were honest and well-disposed, and had loved him when he was present, would try to fulfil his wishes when absent. But if they were certain that he must come back, sooner or later, and that even the time of his coming, although unknown to them, was fixed, then they would be very anxious to be doing their duty, so that their lord, when he came, might find them well employed.

1 Rev. i. 7.

2 Matt. xxiv. 27.

3 Matt. xxv. 14.

Now this is the case with us. Our Lord and Master, Jesus Christ, so far as His visible presence is concerned, has disappeared out of the world. But He is to come again, and He is to come for a special purpose; to judge us; to judge the quick and dead; to examine and weigh in the scales of infinite wisdom, how we have employed ourselves in His absence. Hence every thing that He did and said whilst He was in the world, every smallest circumstance of His life which is recorded, every duty which He has enjoined, is a practical matter of immeasurable consequence to us. We are mixed up in all these things. Not only because we, according to the will of God, have been born and live during the particular period which fills up the interval between the first and second advent of Christ, but further, because during His absence we have been made members of Him and of His family. Doubtless to heathens there is an excuse for their not thinking about the first or second coming of Christ, though it may be that even they are more concerned in these things than they suppose. But we have in baptism been made members of Christ. We Christians have been, in the predestination of the most high God, most wonderfully and especially interested in these matters. We are the especial

household and family of Christ. Of us, then, when He comes again, He will take, both generally and individually, an especial account. And this we might expect, even if we had not been told. I say