death.

"His own arm brought salvation." He is so all in salvation, that "there is no other name given under heaven whereby we can be saved." We are so scarcely saved, that if he had not interposed we must have perished for ever.

"Believer, here thy comfort stands,

He has done all with his own hands:
'Tis thine to gather up the spoil,

And reap the fruit of all his toil!"

He is all in the proclamation of the gospel. "They ceased not to teach and to preach Jesus Christ in the temple." God the Holy Ghost ever owns the testimony of Christ; inspires his servants to proclaim him as the sum and substance of the gospel-to preach him in his Godhead, Sonship, mission, life of obedience, atoning death, glorious resurrection, and advocacy before the throne! Preach him as Jehovah's Christ-all the love of heaven opening in his person-all the grace of Jehovah revealed in his person, as the gift of God—the sent of God-the sealed of God-the fulness of God-the messenger of God-and as God's salvation to the ends of the earth! They preach him as the great all of the divine economy, the dwelling-place of Jehovah as the God of grace, as the only way of God's embracing of sinners, as all that God has to exhibit, all he has to bestow, and all he has to enrich the church for ever! What is a sermon without Christ? A cloud without water, or a world without a sun, to a perishing sinner. Christ must be all to meet an awakened sinner's case; it must be,

"Him first, him last, him midst, and without end."

He is all in the experience of his people. All that a self-stripped sinner wants to make him happy. The Holy Ghost makes him precious in every unctious disclosure of his almighty person. When a sinner is arrested by justice, the laws claims are laid open-all the transgressions of his days appear in view, and all the dreadful consequences spiritually apprehended: death, eternity, and hell fill the eye. Then the Holy Ghost leads him to Calvary's summit-opens the mysteries of his substitution-opens the glories of full, free, and endless salvation, and leads the soul to realize all as done for him— then he becomes the soul's all. While he gazes on the beauties of the Lamb, his heart is enamoured with his dying love; all his powers are overwhelmed in the vision, the soul is melted in love and wonder while he is lost in the overpowering discovery: not only in the renewed soul's pardon, but, the exclusive all in his justification in the sight of God-all his righteousness becomes filthy rags, while the perfect obedience of his Lord is the sole ground of his acceptance. He puts on by faith the righteousness of God his Saviour, and walks up and down in his holy name, admiring the robe with which he has covered him, and boasting in the grace that provided it. The happy soul thus favoured and banqueted, knows little of the war subsequent to this antepast of heaven, though thus embraced in the bosom of

eternal salvation and saved eternally; yet the heights, and depths, and lengths, and breadths of it are to be gazed at, and more fully entered into, by the mystery of iniquity being further developed, and being led into the chambers of imagery, the deep caverns of the human heart. The soul in its first awakenings views sin in the lump, but in after days there are further discoveries of its diabolical workings and heinous nature, by which we are led to see the extension of salvation, and the aboundings of almighty grace-thus he becomes the endearing all in our salvation. Being led through various conflicting scenes, self is laid low-the depravity of the heart, that fountain of iniquity is ever springing to annoy, distress, and grieve the heaven-born soul in ten thousand forms, which is only known to God and the conscience. This cuts off our vanity and pride; the world persecutes and hates us with an implacable hatred. No sooner are we seated in our nest, but one cause or another disturbs us; the world, conversation, craft and subtlety unite to elevate our thoughts towards home; the temptations of the devil often distress and harrass us, his fiery darts threaten to burn us up; his baits and the villainy of our hearts make us tremble, and flee to the strong for help. Our fellow travellers with whom we have oft held sweet converse in heavenly things, and felt a sweet union of soul are removed away, or the enemy is suffered to get among us, or oft their ways have created a distance; we find no solid source of comfort, no fixed resting place, no foot-hold for faith, but in our glorious Christ. Thus he becomes experimentally our eternal all and unchanging beloved, our sacred confident, and soulsatisfying rest, amidst all the changing scenes and passing away dispensations of time:

"Our idol, self, and all must fall

That Christ must be our all in all!"

He is all in the wonders of his person-in the love of his heart-in the riches of his grace-in all his covenant undertakings from of oldin his stoop of condescension-in his incarnate compassion and unparalleled kindness in being made flesh-in all the labours of his lifehis travels in Judea-in his inconceivable sufferings, his dying agonies, his reigning triumphs, and all his advocacy, and living on high. All in his perfections and glories, his relations, characters, and offices; so all, that we have not to look off from him for any good. All excellence, all fulness, all treasures, all grace, all glory centres in our glorious Christ, and divine Husband.

"He's all that faith can grasp,

Or hope could e'er receive;
And all that love can ever clasp,

Or joy could e'er believe."

He is all our joy in trouble, our help in adversity, our access in drawing near to God, the subject matter of praise, the fulness of preaching, the substance of spiritual conversation, the heart gladdening theme of our rejoicing, the germ of our spirituality, the dignity of our new-born minds, the summit of our soul's wishes, the fulness of

thought, the heaven of fellowship, the ravishing centre of delight, the sea of blessedness, and the ocean of our bliss, the pearl of great price, the treasure hid in the field, the one thing needful, the glory of the Father, the ravishment of angels, the terror of devils, the wonder of glorified spirits, the fulness of prophetic thought and celestial vision, the glorious luminary of eternal day, arising on the region of the shadow of death; all the fulness of the gospel, and comprehensive substance of its blessings. He is all a sinner's hope, a saint's confidence, and the heaven-elevated soul's triumph; all in life, all in its closing scene, in death, in the day of judgment, and to and through all eternity, all our portion, our glory, and inheritance.

"With raptures all divine,

I long to soar away;

To see the all of unknown time,
And vast eternity."

Golden Square, London.

A SERMON ON PHILIPPIANS II. 12, 13.

E. M.

"Work out your own salvation with fear and trembling, for it is God that worketh in you both to will and to do of his good pleasure."

ONE of the ancient fathers used to say (St. Augustine, I think,) "that is the best preaching which has a tendency to humble the sinner, to exalt the Saviour, and to promote holiness." And so we' may say, the end of all our preaching should be the exaltation of the Saviour, and the setting forth of his perfect and complete salvation-the instruction of the ignorant-the conversion of sinnersthe building up of the saints in their most holy faith-and the promotion of real religion in the world. But it is a well-known fact, that every kind of preaching will not have this tendency, especially that which is of a controversial character.

Now the text which I have read, sounds as if it would lead me into a controversial discussion; but I have no such intention. I have not taken this text for any such purpose. Those who think otherwise, are quite mistaken in the man. Those who know me, well know that no man would avoid controversy more than myself; for if I were to enter into such an engagement, I should soon find myself out of my depth, and out of my element too. Perhaps there is no text in the whole book of God on which arminians and calvinists differ so much as on that which I have selected for the present occasion. It is a pity it should be so; but perhaps it is for want of comparing scripture with scripture, that some good men err in a single passage, and make it controvertible when in itself it is not so. As I have already hinted, I am no controversialist, being desirous only of advancing truth unmixed with error, and sentiments which I conceive to be perfectly consistent with the analogy of faith, both for my own sake and for the sake of those that hear me. I will, therefore, without any further preface, enter upon the subject before me; and which, I think, I cannot do better than by consideringVOL. VIII. No. 86.]

D

FIRST. What the apostle means by the expression in the text, "work out, &c."

SECONDLY. That salvation is nothing, unless it be personally experienced.

THIRDLY. The positive fact of divine agency, and the absolute necessity of divine influence for every purpose of a saving nature.

The

First then, we are to consider what the apostle means by the expression in the text, "work out your own salvation." Perhaps we shall better understand the apostle, if we consider what he did not mean by the expression, "work out your own salvation." apostle did not certainly mean to say, that the believing Philippians could perform the work of salvation of themselves, either in the concrete or in the abstract, in whole or in part; nor could he mean that salvation would not be complete unless they did something towards it; for this would be to contradict every other part of this epistle, and of every other epistle, as well as the general tenor of the whole scriptures. The work of salvation, both in the old testament and in the new, is uniformly ascribed to God; and how can it be otherwise, if we consider what is implied in the term. Salvation, my friends, is a deliverance from sin-from the guilt of sin-from the consequences of sin-from the curse of the law-from the demands of justice-and from the present and everlasting wrath of God:-thus as it respects salvation in general. The like may be said of salvation in particular. It is an incontrovertible fact, that no man can quicken his own soul-no man can bring himself into a state of salvationno man can convert his own heart-regenerate his own mind-no man can repent-no man can believe of himself. The work of salvation from first to last is entirely of God.

That salvation is a work, is evident from the language of prophecy in reference to the Messiah, concerning whom it was said, “Behold, his reward is with him, and his work before him." And when our Lord was upon earth he told the Jews, "That he came to do the will of him that sent him, and to finish his work," John iv. 34. And again, John ix. 4, "I must work the works of him that sent me." And when some of the people asked him, what they should do that they might work the works of God? He directly told them what their work was, namely, "To believe on him whom God had sent." This led them to enquire, what was his work. "What dost thou work?" said they, John vi. 30. He answered them, by giving an explanation at large, in an interesting discourse recorded in the remaining part of that chapter. And in our Saviour's last prayer, he says to his Father, "I have finished the work, which thou gavest me to do." His work was then finished in purpose; and just before he expired on the cross, he exclaimed, "It is finished!" Now after so much as this, we must not talk of working out our own salvation, in the sense that some would understand the apostle.

The apostles in all their preaching, declared Christ to be the only way of salvation, "Neither is there salvation in any other, (much less

in ourselves,) "for there is no other name under heaven given among men, whereby we must be saved," Acts iv. 12. "By him all that believe are justified, or saved from all things, from which they could not be saved by the law of Moses," Acts xiii, 39. And without following the apostle Paul through all his epistles, it is sufficient for the purpose that we notice what he hath said in this which lies before us in reference to the work of salvation, especially personal salvation.

There is one consideration in reference to the epistles, not only of St. Paul, but of the rest of the apostles, which if duly attended to, would remove many difficulties from our minds, which occur in reading these epistles; and that is, that those epistles are addressed to believers, and to such only. Now respecting these Philippians to whom this epistle was sent they were believers-they composed a part of the church of God-they were already in a state of salvation. This great work was already effected in their behalf, as it was in the behalf of all the church and people of God in every age and country: moreover, this great salvation had been personally applied by God the Holy Ghost-these believing Philippians were already the subjects of itthey not only professed the doctrine, but they were the subjects also of the grace of salvation. The apostle addresses them in this relation, calling them "saints," which is the legitimate character of those who are already the subjects of a present salvation. In the 6th verse of the first chapter, he says, Being confident of this very thing, that he which hath begun a good work in you will perform it until the day of Jesus Christ" that is, he will finish it, as it reads in the margin : as much as if he had said, he will crown that grace which he has given, and of which you are the subjects, he will crown that grace with glory; having laid the foundation of the work, "he will bring forth the top-stone, with shoutings of grace, grace unto it." Now to exhort such to work out salvation, which was already effected for them, would have been laying a stumbling-block in the way of these believing christians with a vengeance; especially as the apostle was about to write, that he accounted all things as dross and dung in comparison with Christ, and that he was willing to sacrifice every thing for the attainment of Christ and his righteousness.

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What then did the apostle mean by this expression, "work out your own salvation;" for it must be confessed, that there is not the like in any other part of scripture; the language of the old testament being, "stand still, and see the salvation of God"-" the Lord shall work for you, and ye shall hold your peace." And the language of the new testament is equally strong, or even stronger," not by works of righteousness which we have done, but according to his mercy he saved us, by the washing of regeneration, and renewing of the Holy Ghost, which he shed on us abundantly through Jesus Christ our Saviour; that being justified by his grace, we should be made heirs, according to the hope of eternal life," Titus iii. 5, 6, 7.

By christians working out their own salvation, we are to understand neither more nor less than shewing by their works that they are in a