GENERAL CONCLUSION.

DESIGN OF THE GOSPEL.

"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 THAT YE HAVE ETERNAL LIFE, AND THAT YE MAY BELIEVE ON THE NAME OF THE SON

OF GOD."-1 John v. 11-13.

Ir is a solemn consideration that God has spoken, and that God still speaks to His creatures! High as the heavens are above the earth-far removed. as the bright and holy Throne of the King of kings and Lord of lords is from this world which is His footstool-He who made us has not left Himself without a witness here. He has given us a clear declaration of His Will; how we are to walk so as to please Him; what we are to do to be saved; and how we may stand in the judgment. Yes! God has given us his testimony, and what a weighty responsibility rests upon us if we give not to it the most earnest heed! For:-"If we receive the witness of men, the witness of God is

greater for this is the witness of God, which he hath testified of his Son. He that believeth in the Son of God hath the witness in himself: he that believeth not God, hath made Him a liar; because he believeth not the record that God gave of his Son. And this is the record, that God hath given unto 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." It is plain, then, why the Gospel has been preached to us; it is evident why the Scriptures have been revealed :"They were written that we might believe that Jesus is the Christ the Son of God, and that believing we may have life through His name." Here, then, is the turning point for salvation. Here we must begin to work the works of God; for "This is the work of God, that ye believe on Him whom He hath sent."

To what, then, as a General Conclusion to these discourses illustrating the Gospel's power, can I more fitly and more solemnly call your attention, than to the necessity of receiving the "Record which God has given us of His Son ?"—for this is clearly the whole design of the Gospel. It leads us to look unto Jesus, and believe in Him as the Christ the Son of God; and through that act of believing, which becomes to us as "the righteousness of

God," gives us a participation in that Life Eternal which is from Him and through Him. What is the end of our Faith? The Salvation of our Souls! What is the beginning of our Salvation? Faith!" without which it is impossible to please God."

I know that, to some, it is a doctrine difficult to be received that we are thus to be saved by Grace through Faith; but this doctrine will be cleared of much of its difficulty, if we consider that, in requiring us to live by Faith, God requires of us that we should receive His witness, and act upon it, as being infinitely greater than any witness of men. And hard to be understood as the doctrine of Justification by Faith at first appears, nothing seems simpler, if we reflect upon it, than that the great thing required of us by God should be a perfect belief and reliance in what He has said and done.

For if Faith were some undefined and unearthly exercise-if "living and acting by faith" were a practice quite strange to our ordinary experience, something in fact which we could not understand, then there would not be that awful announcement of condemnation against those that believe notwhich we read in the Gospel-they are condemned already. But it is not so. "We are all our lives

acting on faith. We never transact any matter of business we never go from one place to another- -we never depend on any statementbut it is an act of Faith. For years past we have done many things, we have risked many things, we have laboured in many things." And in all this our daily life has been one continued act of Faith. So that it is nothing strange of God to ask of us to act by Faith, and to live by Faith; for this, in a general sense, we have been accustomed to all our days. But there is something new in God's demand in a spiritual sense. Faith in our ordinary actions has rested on the witness of men, but in the Faith which God requires of us, we are to act on the witness of God. It is as if God should say to us:-"You have listened to parents, to teachers, to friends, and acted upon their testimony-now I speak, receive my testimony. Your life has been a life of faith in worldly thingsexercise as strong, if not stronger, Faith with regard to eternal things. You have been often moved with terror upon man's report of danger; you have rejoiced when man has pronounced glad tidings. Now let your hopes and your fears, your joys and your sorrows, be moved by what God threatens or declares." And what in fact can be more reasonable, than that if we will act by Faith

in what easily-deceived and easily-deceiving man declares, that we should act by Faith concerning what God, who cannot lie, declares. "For it is a principle that all will acknowledge, that the witness of God must be greater than that of men ; that in acting on God's word, or God's promise, we must be acting on higher, firmer, surer ground, than in acting on man's word. Nay, this is so evident, that every one is not only ready to admit it—but the condemnation, both in respect of folly and of sin in preferring the witness of men to that of God, is so obvious, that no one is willing to take it to himself."

There are three things in the text which more especially claim our attention. 1st. That we

have a Record from God. 2nd.-What that Record is. "That He has given unto us Eternal Life." And 3rdly-Whence that Life is to be derived. "That Life is in His Son."

The 1st assertion of the Apostle which we have to consider, is-that we have a Record from God. God has spoken to man. Much as too many of us despise it, much as too many of us disbelieve it— God has spoken unto us. It is true, in His essen

1 The general argument of this paragraph, as well as the words quoted, are from "Notes of Sermons," by the Rev. J. M. Campbell.