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THE ONE THING NEEDful.

and holy connexion with Him. In fact he is no longer a lifeless, cursed thing, broken off and separated from God and goodness, but he is one of the countless channels in which God's holy influence flows, to His own glory and for the good of His creatures; and he is gradually attaining, through the perpetual and increasing influence of this quickening power, to an entire conformity to the image of God, that he may be fit to dwell with Him in His eternal glory.

This vital change from a death in sin to a new living principle of holiness, is a very wonderful matter. To the unconverted mind it is incomprehensible. They who are strangers cannot receive the idea; they stumble at it, as it is stated in the Gospel, because that Gospel condemns as evil the best morality which they can muster, and exalts as good a spirituality of character to which they are adverse, as far as they can see it, but which in its main points cannot be seen by them at all, or if seen, is seen only through the distorting medium of carnal and irreligious opinions and prejudices.

Still, extraordinary as it is, and contrary to the original opinions and habits of all men, this spiritual life derived from Christ, is taught in Scripture to be the one thing needful, and it is offered to every individual to whom the Gospel comes. "I am come," said Christ, "that they might have life, and that they might have it more abundantly." "This is the record, that God hath given to us eternal life, and this life is in His Son. He that hath the Son hath life; and he that hath not the Son of God hath not life. These things have I written unto you that believe on the name of the Son of God; that ye may know

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that ye have eternal life, and that ye may believe on the name of the Son of God." "Turn ye, turn ye from your evil ways: for why will ye die, O house of Israel?" “Believe, and your soul shall live." And Jesus Christ thus reprehends those who still resisted what they heard,-"Ye will not come unto me that ye might have life."

In a preached Gospel the truth is plainly told to us, of our fall and of our death in sin; and the way of life is freely opened to us, - that God has provided a remedy for us in the death of His own Son, and that whosoever believeth may have life through His name. Now there is no impediment whatever to our believing the testimony of God to this gift of life and salvation, but our own wilful preference of that which is evil; nothing but our unholy bias to sin, our wilful persisting in rebellion, can weaken the force of the evidence which God has provided in favour of this great salvation; and therefore if we are yet without spiritual life, it is our own fault. If we are willing to choose this "better part," and, with Mary, to sit at the feet of Jesus, and to hear His word, and to submit ourselves to the authority of revelation, we shall find this blessing; we shall live; we shall find Jesus Christ to be to us,-life in this world to our souls, and resurrection to our bodies in the life to come, so that we shall never die. And in order to this, we are not called upon to resign our reason or our common sense, or our free will and liberty to choose and to act for ourselves; we are only called upon to do what reason dictates, to renounce our sin and our selfishness, and to listen to the voice of God speaking through His incarnate Son, and to receive from

Him the gift of a higher principle than natural or rational life, the gift of that spiritual renovation which assimilates us to Him who is perfect, and makes us a portion of that eternal stream of holiness which is ever flowing from God, the fountain of all good.

But now let us enquire, secondly, Why this "one thing is needful?"why is this spiritual life needful? And what do we mean here by needful? It means absolutely necessary. "One thing," says Christ, "is needful." Other things might be sought, might be allowable, might be desirable; but this, in contradistinction to them all, was really needful, was absolutely wanted, and could not be done without. As air and food are needful to animal life,-for without them the body must inevitably perish, -so this spiritual blessing is absolutely necessary to the soul. why is it so?

And

1. Because out of Christ we are condemned sinners, i.e. while we are destitute of the uniting influence of Christ's life-giving Spirit, we are lying under the condemnation and curse of God for sin. The world is a lost world, through wilful disobedience; and God, in His justice, has doomed its inhabitants to eternal death. If we at all seriously believe the word of God, we must receive this truth as one of the fundamental principles of religion. Now, then, if God's way of deliverance is in His Son; if it be true that "there is none other name under heaven given among men, whereby we must be saved;"—but, if it be true that there is no deliverance, but that believing in Jesus Christ we may have life through His name?then it is evident, that till we obtain this blessing of spiritual life by union

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with Christ, we are still in our natural state, under the curse of God for sin. And however deceitfully calm the appearance of things may be, it is only a deceit. There is a curse upon us in this world; there is a curse awaiting us in the world to come. Here the God of holiness is adverse to us, because we are hostile to Him. The tide of His providence does in fact run against us; and all His earthly gifts, bountiful as they are, operate as curses through our sin. And then, with reference to the other world, the matter is still worse. curse, the weight of which is inconceivable, awaits us at the bar of God. Now the tide of this world's concerns may run prosperously with us; we may ride triumphantly, with gallant bearing, upon the stream of God's providential bounties; the sky may be calm over our heads, and each sun more smiling than another; but the day of account is coming, and if it finds us without spiritual life,-not really believing in Christ, not living by His own Spirit's vital influence to His own glory,—then, if the word of God be true, we are inevitably marked for a miserable end. We are then found to be tares among the wheat, to have reached the utmost limit of merciful probation, without accepting the Remedy of our fall; we have preferred the course of this world, and the rule and the influence of the dark spirit who has usurped its dominion; and consequently, if up to that hour we have lived delicately, and fared sumptuously, and feared no evil, and known no sorrow, then our sorrow begins. We are not the Lord's; we still retain the carnal heart, which is enmity to Him; we would not have Him to reign over us. And then we must experience what it is to have God for

THE ONE THING NEEDFUL.

an enemy, an insulted Saviour for a Judge, and wrath justly gone out against us, but aggravated by a wilful and obstinate resistance of the mediation of mercy,—wrath unto the uttermost poured out upon us. Verily, then, this "one thing," this spiritual life is absolutely necessary to save us from condemnation to the hopeless agonies of everlasting fire.

But then, secondly, this "one thing is needful," because when we are in Christ we are justified and saved. This is a view of the other side of the question, the blessings that flow to him who has been quickened by the Spirit of Christ.

The great feature of God's remedy for our lost state is substitution, the putting His own Son in the place and the stead of the sinner, as a representative of him; the appointing Him to endure the sinner's sufferings, to work out for the sinner a justifying righteousness; so that when, by a spiritual conversion, the individual is made one with Christ by spiritual life, the vicarious sufferings and the doings of Christ are applicable to the individual sinner so united to Him, and are as meritoriously available for his deliverance and salvation, as if they had been really his own. There is no other perfect obedience to the law of God, that could be offered or accepted for us, but the righteousness of the incarnate Son of God. That this is acceptable on our behalf, is the statement of the Gospel; that, on the other hand, it should be accepted by us, is the offer and the entreaty of the Gospel. When, therefore, we have come believingly to Christ for this salvation, and have really received it with our hearts, then we are actually united to Christ, as the living graft is to the vine, and the "living stone" to

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the foundation stone of the building; the union is as real as in the human body is the living member to the living head. And then, by the appointment of God, and the terms of the covenant of grace, the sufferings and the doings of Christ become ours by imputation; we are in Christ by the operation of a spiritual quickening; and as we have all in Him one life, which He has given us by His Spirit, we have in Him one righteousness, which He mercifully bestows upon us for our justification, i.e. henceforth we are judged in the sight of God, "not by works of righteousness which we have done," but by the perfect obedience accomplished for us by Jesus Christ, as our representative and surety. And as this righteousness is perfect, and has been accepted on the part of the Son of God himself, as the ground of His own dead body being raised from the grave, it is acceptable and sufficient also for all those who trust in it, who have come to it with a believing reliance upon its sufficiency; and consequently they all stand justified in the sight of God, having the same basis for their confidence of safety as that on which Jesus Christ claimed that His flesh should rest in hope, that His soul should not be left in hell, nor His body see corruption; having the same ground of hope for eternity that Christ had, that as Mediator His glorified body should sit on the right hand of the Father. And if they who have this spiritual life by faith in Christ are so justified, and delivered from guilt by the righteousness of God, then they are saved; they have received an effectual title to the inheritance in light,—the atonement of Christ, which acquits them from guilt, opens to them the gate of heaven;

and in every one who has really so believed in Jesus Christ, eternal life is begun; the act of a living faith does, by God's appointment, make the righteousness of Christ our own. And that is the ample title to heaven which God mercifully bestows on a perishing sinner. "He that believeth on the Son hath everlasting life," "and shall not come into condemnation, but is passed from death unto life."

So that if it be true that any one, like Mary, does sincerely and heartily sit at the feet of Jesus, and hear His word, and learn of Him, and simply believe on Him as the Saviour of the soul, he does really stand acquitted from the evils of original and actual transgressions; he has really received, for the sake of Christ, the gift of a principle of godliness, or likeness to God. And that is a principle of eternal duration; it is in its very nature everlasting life; it must be where God is, it cannot remain elsewhere; it is itself the pledge of God's presence. While that soul is on earth, in the body, God comes to dwell with it; and when it leaves this short, uncertain life, God takes it to dwell with Him.

Evidently, then, this spiritual life is the one thing needful, because they who have it, and they only, are justified from all the consequences of their sin, and are saved with an everlasting salvation.

Then, in the third place, we come to inquire, When it is that this spiritual life is needful? And to this the answer may be directly given: At all times, without exception. If there is a period when it could be desirable to encounter God as an enemy,-to be avowedly a stranger to the influences of His Spirit, and to the cove

nant of His mercy, and to the offer of His salvation; if there is a period when it could be wise for a creature of the dust, the very exemplar of weakness and worthlessness, to stand in his own independent strength before God, to present himself, in his abject nothingness, before the scrutiny of Omniscience, or rather to come, covered with all the filthiness of his innumerable sins, before a God of purity; if there is a period when so rash and impious a daring would be advisable;-then there is a time when this one thing is not needful; when the good part that Mary chose is not necessary. But who that knows himself would wish for one single moment to be without the shelter of Divine compassion and covenant mercy? Who that has an awakened conscience, would wish to be destitute of that spiritual life which unites him to the Saviour, and makes him a partaker both of His merits and His holiness; that spiritual life which is in its results the ample and satisfactory evidence both to himself and others, that he is the Lord's. No, there is not a moment of a man's life, when this " one thing" is not absolutely necessary. And if at this moment any one individual who hears the Gospel, does not really possess its blessing, then, at this very moment, that gift is absolutely necessary to him; for how can he tell but that the next moment may find him, not only alienated from God, but suddenly brought to the bar of that God as his Judge. "There is therefore now no condemnation to them which are in Christ Jesus, who walk not after the flesh, but after the Spirit." But to all others 'there is;-"He that believeth not is condemned already." "And this is the condemnation, that

THE ONE THING NEedful.

light is come into the world, and men loved darkness rather than light, because their deeds were evil."

If, then, we would be rescued from the horrors of the curse of God; if we would fly from the misery of being eternally alienated from the presence of God, and the consequent allotment of our portion with the fiends whom He has driven from His presence; if we would have a portion in that bright, and holy, and peaceful kingdom, where Almighty mercy collects, and glorifies the children of its compassion, we must have this one thing needful. And we must have it now, that we may have it for ever. We must secure it while we may, for the present moment only is the time for action; the only moment we can call our

own.

to trust to.

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with Him in glory,-he has nothing Then every human delusive invention entirely fails him, and he finds that he has no more real ground of confidence than the brutes that perish. It is absolutely necessary, then, that in the hour of weakness and affliction a man should have this spiritual blessing, and that he should be able to refer with composure to the deepest secrecy of his heart, and to call up, even from thence, the clear evangelical proof that he is born again of the Spirit to a new and heavenly life of love and cheerful obedience, by hearing and believing the word of the Son of God.

But if experience shews that in the hour of adversity and distress the comfort of this hope is needful, then it follows that in the hour of prosperity it is more so; for that is the time which is really given for seeking the blessing that can alone calm the agonies of approaching trial. The present moment of peace is our own. Now, in the midst of indulgent mercies, we may turn calmly to examine the question; we may inspect the record. By the power of conscience, we may call up before the face of our Omniscient Father the realities of our moral state, and ascertain where we are, what we are doing, and what is our hope; and if we are in error, we may seek for guidance; we may recede from the wrong way, and turn our feet into the way of peace. And if we find that we have "lived without God in the world," we may now ask for the blessing of that spiritual quickening which shall graft us into Christ, and make us living heirs of His eternal glory.

But again, in answer to the question, When is it needful? we answer: This blessing is much needed in adversity, but most of all, in the day of prosperity, to prepare us for the day of trial. It is necessary in the hour of calamity. They who have come near to the brink of the grave, know what it is to look out anxiously for a foundation to rest upon. They know what it is to inquire with deep solemnity of spirit, whether, when their eyes are closing upon this material scene, they have any solid ground of trust for the untried hereafter. Now that is a time in which a man feels this—That this spiritual life is indeed the one thing needful; for if he has not that, he has nothing. If he has not a vital principle beyond the reach of human contingency, and which will bear the scrutiny of Omniscient justice,- a life which is hid with Christ in God, and which secures to him, that when Christ who is his All this may be done now. life shall appear, then shall he appear now, then, that it is especially need

It is

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