our chief joy to acknowledge "the only Potentate" as the Master and Ruler of His own house. But is it so? There was no charge of insincerity at Laodicea, no record of contentions and divisions, no special outbreaks of evil troubling them, but with all the appearance of concord, and the maintenance of a church position, where, I ask, was the Master of the House?

The church was poor, and miserable, and blind, and naked, and knew it not. It was rich and increased with goods, but where was the pure gold, the white robe, and the needed eye-salve? Their self-complacent ease and carnal confidence had blinded them to their actual need, and led them to take the rule, service, and discipline of the church into their own hands. The flesh knows of no other ruling element than itself. The Lord was outside the door. It is a very solemn fact, and perhaps needful to be brought before us in these days.

The fine gold has indeed become dim, but the Lord's bowels yearn over this scene of spiritual poverty and weakness. Unsolicited, He stands at the door and knocks; unsought, He gives counsel, and proclaims the unchanged grace of His heart. It is the voice of patient, faithful love, that He utters; and He feels, and wishes them to feel, that He is outside their assembly, that barrenness of soul and spiritual blindness are the results, and that restoration of communion and blessing can only follow their opening the door to Him. It is well to observe, that both the appeal and promise are of indi

vidual application; "If any man hear my voice, and open the door, I will come in to him," &c.

Does not all this tell us how possible it is to begin in the Spirit, and afterward to come under the rebuke "thou art neither cold nor hot ;" how easily we may let slip the power, and retain only the "form of godliness;" content, alas! with an unholy quietude that excludes Christ? But what other channel of healing is there than through an open door to the Master of the House, receiving His counsel, and unfeignedly yielding to His gracious rule? If He be not regarded as the great attraction in our assemblies, the bond of union, the source of all rule, service and discipline, what marvel if lukewarmness, apathy, worldliness, and such like things abound?

May we, beloved in the Lord, lay these things to heart, and unsparingly judge ourselves as to our practical dealings with the Lord Himself. Is he now knocking at the door of our assembly for admission? Do we believingly gather together in His name, and feel the reality of His presence? Do we know what it is, when gathered together, to sit at His feet and to hear His word? Have we the heartfelt consciousness of the entire ruin of the flesh, and of the impossibility of obtaining any wisdom or blessing but from Him, who is Head over all things to the church, through whatever instrumentality He may appoint?

"He that hath an ear, let him hear what the Spirit saith unto the churches."

CHRIST IN THE HEART.

"That Christ may dwell in your hearts by faith," &c. Eph. iii. 17.

ONE very blessed feature in the life and ways of our Lord when on earth, was the evenness of His conduct, and its perfect adaptation to every circumstance. In every varied scene, under every varied trial, He still preserved the same unfailing and simple dependence on God; unruffled by all that passed around Him, never unprepared for the emergency of the moment. Whether alone with the Father in prayer on the mountain, or in the wilderness tempted of the devil; whether in the temple or in the house; whether surrounded by cavilling Pharisees, or in the midst of publicans and sinners; if at the rich man's table, or with the poor, the lame, and the blind; if ministering comfort to His disciples, or mocked by the brutal soldiery of Herod, there was in Him an unwavering steady grace, a wisdom, a beauty, a fitness, yea, an adorning of the circumstances in which, by the counsel of God, he was placed, which cannot fail to fill our hearts with wonder and praise; especially when contrasted with the instability, and un

certainty of conduct, exhibited by ourselves in the little chequered scenes of our lives. The fact is, that as to ourselves, we but little realize the truth of God's presence with us and in us, and thus failing to walk with God, we are taken by surprise by many of the events which happen to us, and we do not meet our difficulties and trials in the steady assurance that they are all appointed of the Father, and that we have Christ with us to help us to bear them, to make us more than conquerors in them, or to give us deliverance out of them. Our faith is too much kept, as it were, for great occasions, or for the question of our salvation only; and the exercise of it in the ordinary occupations of life, the habit of living by faith, is comparatively unknown to us. But surely one great purpose of God in giving us the history of our Lord's life on earth is, that we may see in Him the blessed example of living active faith, and ceaseless trust in the Father, and that we may follow His steps. And one object of the indwelling of the Holy Ghost is, that we may have God always with us and in us, to strengthen, to help, to comfort, and to guide us; so that we may live our life in the flesh, by the faith of the Son of God, who loved us, and gave Himself for us. There are three principal spheres for the exercise of our faith-our own hearts, our houses, and the church of God; and we shall find, that in proportion as we cultivate the presence of Christ in either of these three spheres, so shall we find Him with us in the other two.

But our first and most important duty is, the exercise of faith within our own hearts, and cultivating secret communion with Christ there, before we even seek His presence elsewhere. We shall find need of the ceaseless exercise of faith for the repression of evil within our own bosoms, and if we would have Christ dwell in our hearts, we must, as it were, prepare a place for Him, by watching against the intrusion of our own corruptions, and the first risings of the flesh; surely, here it is that we have all failed. We have seen errors in our brethren, and disorders in the church of God; and we have sought to remedy these evils without having first cleansed our own hearts; and the flesh has been allowed to remain working in our ownselves, whilst we have been turning our attention to rectify the faults of others. But what does our blessed Master say?—" Cast first the beam out of thine own eye." He concludes, that we necessarily have a greater defect ourselves than that which we perceive in our brother; nay, the very keenness of perception as to the failing of another, is of itself a proof of ignorance as to our own condition; and the sudden endeavour to remove an evil from a brother, is evidence of an unconsciousness of the darkness within ourselves. All external action should begin with self-judgment and self-humiliation. The more Christ dwells in our hearts, the more shall we discern what we ourselves are: no mere self-contemplation will reveal the secrets of our evil, but light alone will make manifest the darkness.