His offices, and His ways. We may study Christ and His gospel for ages, and yet find something to learn. There is a depth in them to which the minds of angels, after ages of inquiry, have never yet penetrated, and a height to which they have not climbed. Let the Bible, then, which testifies of Jesus, be often in our hands and still more often in our hearts. All our employment and happiness in Heaven will be to speak of Him and sing of Him; and surely we might begin this work of Heaven here, and find happiness in it also if we were not wanting to ourselves.

But if we would habitually remember Jesus, let us not forget the command given us in the text: "This do in remembrance of Me." We soon forget objects which are removed from our sight; and our Lord, who knows and pities this weakness of our nature, has given us an abiding memorial of Himself. He has appointed an ordinance for this very purpose, to remind us of His love. There we see Jesus evidently set forth before our eyes, crucified among us; so plainly set forth, that if we have any seriousness of spirit we shall find it difficult not to see and remember Him. And yet, from this ordinance many of us can often turn away without a struggle and without a sigh. What does such conduct prove? Our humility? the tenderness of our conscience? Alas! brethren, it proves much more clearly that the dying request of a crucified Redeemer is forgotten and despised. We do not so treat a departed parent or friend. His last requests are cherished in the memory, and we almost dread to violate or neglect them. How is it, then, that Jesus only is despised when He says, "This do in remembrance of Me?" There is reason to fear that

we must find an answer to this inquiry, not in a tender conscience, but in a cold, careless, worldly heart. There the evil lies, and there the remedy must be applied. The love of the world and of sin must be rooted out of our souls, and all their energies and affections fixed upon God. Deem not these hard sayings; the heart must be won to Christ before sacraments and ordinances will be loved by us, or be beneficial to our souls. If Christ is not remembered in them, and remembered, too, with affection, they will bring no comfort, no holiness, to our hearts, but will leave us as they find us, trifling and cold, earthly and sinful. The consequence of such a state as this is plain. If we do not remember Christ, He will in the end cease to remember us. We need Him now, but we shall need Him much more soon; and in that great day of our need, which is fast approaching, He will act towards us as we act towards others when we forget them He will take no interest in anything that concerns us, but will leave us to be our own defenders and saviours, to plead our own cause at the bar of God, and to keep off with our own feeble arm the stroke of vengeance. He will leave us to perish. We may not think much now of the misery of being thus forsaken. We may have no spiritual feelings and no dread of spiritual evils in our minds. But the dream of life will soon be ended; and we shall awake in a world where all our dormant powers will be roused to action in all their energy, either by that fulness of joy which fills the exalted minds of angels, or by the bursting wrath of an insulted God. We shall then be forced to feel that there is nothing more desirable for an immortal being than to be remembered by the Lord of glory in His kingdom, and

:

nothing more dreadful than to be forgotten by Him there. If He were to forget us, even here, in this world of mercy, we should be undone. Thousands of our fellow-creatures might remember us, and millions of angels come to our help, but all the inhabitants of Earth and of Heaven could not supply the place of a departed God. All their united efforts could not keep for one moment our bodies from the grave, nor our souls from destruction. Who then among us can bear the thought of being forgotten by the Lord Jehovah ? Which of us shall ever dare to forget Him and be easy? May we all be led this very hour to His throne ! May each of us offer there, with a contrite heart, this simple prayer, which has never, since the day of His agony, been offered to Him in vain-" Lord, remember me!"

XIII.

Temples of the Holy Ghost.

"What? know ye not that your body is the temple of the Holy Spirit which is in you, which ye have of God, and ye are not your own? For ye are bought with a price: therefore glorify God in your body, and in your spirit, which are Goa's.""—1 COR. vi. 19, 20.

THERE are many expressions used in Scripture which we can best understand by looking at the nation, or people, or church to which they are addressed.

For instance, when "the sacrifices of God" are said to be "a contrite heart," we understand the term by putting ourselves in the place of the Jew to whom the words are addressed. We offer no sacrifices. The Jew was every day offering sacrifices. When the words were addressed to the Jew, he understood them. "A broken and contrite heart," he would say, "is to God as acceptable as sacrifices offered on the altar."

In the same way, when St. Paul spoke of many running in a race and one receiving the prize, he was speaking to the Corinthians.

It was at Corinth that the Isthmian games and races were held, to which people of all nations flocked every year. The Corinthians, therefore, would say, 'As in our contest men strain every nerve, so must we do in our Christian course; we must run, not as

uncertainly, not as those who beat the air, but must keep our bodies in subjection, as men do who are training for a race or a wrestling-match.'

And the same idea holds good in this text. St. Paul talks about people being bought with a price, of their not being their own. In a land where labour is free, as in England, we cannot understand a man being bought or sold. For the relation of man with man, or between master and servant, is one of contract, not of sale.

But in a land like ancient Greece and Corinth, slaves were either born in slavery, or bought, i.e. purchased with money.

A rich man wanted a servant: he put down a sum of money and purchased a slave. That slave had no right to do what he liked. He was not master of his own actions. He might not come and go at will. In fact, "he was not his own; he was bought with a price."

Now we see the full force of the expression, We are not our own; we are bought with a price. Freedom and independence are dear to a man, and in one sense we are free; for those whom Christ has liberated have a noble freedom. "His service is perfect freedom."

But in the sense of our being under a law, we are not independent. We may not go and come as we like. We may not do what we like with our time, our talents, our money, unless we wish to be brought to account, as a purchased slave would be who should leave undone what his master had set him to do.

We may misuse our talents or lay them up in a napkin; but when God comes, He expects His own with usury; and will then call us unprofitable servants, just because we were "not our own," but "bought with a price."