living will be caught up into the air to which make it useless-and it is a state meet the Lord. First of all, then, we are taught that at the resurrection there will be a modification in the bodies, or rather in the attributes of the bodies which we bear with us on the earth: for, as all flesh is not the same flesh, but there is one kind of flesh of men, another flesh of beasts, another of fishes, and another of birds; so also, says the apostle, is the resurrection of the dead. As the nature of the living body of one class of created beings differs from the living body of another class of created beings, so also does our present body of clay differ from that with which we shall be clothed when brought forth from the grave to an eternal existence. The nature of this change in general the apostle thus describes :-"The Saviour, when he shall appear, will not only call up our vile bodies from the grave, but so change them that they shall be no longer vile, but become like unto his own glorious body, according to the mighty working whereby he is able to subdue all things to himself." Nor is the apostle content with this single and general intimation on the subject; he has pursued it into a variety of the most interesting particulars; he has given us every degree of information which it is necessary to possess. Our body, when it dies, he tells us, in the first place, "is sown in corruption :" it is the heir of death, the daughter of the earth, and the sister of the world; a vessel of clay, with the principle of dissolution bound up in its very essence, and the sentence of mortality written on its brow. It is to be raised in incorruption, without the possibility of being either crushed by violence, or worn away by suffering, with the germ of life planted in its centre, and springing up into a continual renewal of its vital powers, free from the decay of death, unchanging and unchangeable. Our body will, it is added, be sown "in dishonour." It is a body which hath its shameful and less honourable parts, as well as its more noble and dignified members. It is subject to deformities which make it hideous-to losses and defects of wounds and bruises, and putrifying sores. In its most beautiful state the body has some uncomeliness, and its best honours fade and depart with youth, and turn into the wrinkles of wretchedness and age. But it will be raised in glory— the glory of unblemished righteousness, and the unspotted loveliness of a perpetual spring; and also in the ethereal and eternal charm of an angelic purity. It will be without spot, or wrinkle, or any such thing, a delight to every eye that looks upon it; walking like our first parents in the paradise of God, naked, but not ashamed; without one dishonourable member, without one dishonourable infirmity. Our body, when it dies, is sown as it had lived, in weakness, in utter inability to labour without weariness in any work, however good or great. The body is in its power unable to fulfil the grand and lofty desires of the understanding; weak it is to obey the holier aspirations of the soul. The mind museth upon many things in its activity and strength-the body weigheth down in its musings. The spirit searcheth even the deep things of God; but the languid incapacity of the sluggish flesh is unable to sustain the weight of its desires. The mind can do many things; but the weakness of the body hindereth. It circumscribes my longings after wisdom-checks me in my pursuits after truth. I would go and find wisdom in the uttermost parts of the earth-my body is weak in motion. I would search for hidden treasures day and night-my body is weak in watching. I would penetrate the deepest mysteries by the energy of unbroken meditation-my body is feeble, and its feebleness must be renovated. It is the same also in my pursuits of holiness. Suppose the mind forms the image of a great and godly enterprise for God's glory and man's welfare; then the living portion of strength fails, and the heart faints, ere half the task of holiness has been accomplished. It is a feeble and unready instrument of the will, ever disappointing our best wishes, and leaving our best ideas unfulfilled. But it will not ever be thus. It is sown in weakness-it will be raised in power: its capacities of activity and endurance of motion will fly from one end of heaven to the other at the bidding of our good intentions, and feel no decay of strength, never be weary in welldoing, and never sink under the burden. Lastly, says St. Paul, the body that dies is "sown a natural body," the source of all fleshly natural lusts, and the seat of all earthly natural passions. But the body of the natural man is not subject to the law of God, neither indeed can be; for the flesh of the natural man lusteth always against the Spirit, and mindeth earthly things. But it will be raised a spiritual body-spiritual, and therefore holy in all its feelings, desires, and wants: the ever living, never failing instrument of obedience to the will of the spirit. There is but one other particular to be mentioned, and that is, that though the body of every redeemed Christian will at the resurrection be risen up, the glory will not be equal in all. The stars in the firmament on high shine not all with an equal lustre, or with an equal force: the beams of some are faint and feeble-the glow of others powerful and bright; yet the shining of them all, however pure and powerful in the darkness of night, is lost before the coming splendour of the great luminary of day. When the sun rises on the earth, the stars get them away together, and their beautiful brightness is perceived no more. And thus also will it be, as we are taught by the apostle, with the bodies of the saints when called from the grave to walk their everlasting rounds upon the face of God's heavenly firmament. Some will have a higher and better glory, and some will have an humbler bliss. The glory of the most glorious of all the stars will dwindle, decay, and fall disregarded in the presence of the superior excellency of the Lord Jesus, the sun of righteousness, the ruler of the heavens and everlasting day. So are we taught by the apostle Paul when he says, "that as there is one glory of the sun, and another glory of the moon, and another glory of the stars; and as one star differeth from another star in glory-so also shall be the resurrection of the dead." Blessed be the Lord Jesus, that he hath inspired the apostle to make known to man these circumstances; for had we not known them, had we been left to imagine that any single portion of the folly and infirmities of this life would have clung to us in another life, we should have looked on the one doctrine of the gospel with dread rather than joy. It would have been a melancholy prospect to have thought that in eternity we should have borne about with us a body subject in the slightest degree to our present wants and weariness. Yet that may, perhaps, be a portion of the punishment of the wicked in a future life. And be it well remembered that in all that Scripture saith concerning the changes of the resurrection, it speaks only of the bodies of the redeemed: it passes over what will happen to those who will then stand at the left hand of the Lord with a carelessness, a sort of contemptuous silence for them. Therefore we are still left to apprehend that there will be no ameliorating change wrought upon their bodies by the resurrection, save the change from mortal to immortal. They will then, if that be the case, still be the victims of all the sufferings, sorrows, and wretchedness of this earthly state; and they will carry with them, as their everlasting curse, an incorruptible corruption —a weakness too strong to sink into dissolution-perpetual dishonour-lusts that cannot find exercise-diseases that have no hope of death. This will be their portion, to drink for ever the miseries of earth with the eternity of hell. Sad contrast of their own thorns in the flesh and the glorified and sanctified bodies of the redeemed. Such are the answers that Scripture enables us to give to the questions of the text; such the manner and order in which we are taught the dead will be raised; such the bodies with which we may expect they will rise. What, then, is the lesson of profit we may derive from this consideration? The first is that of a warning to prepare for this awful change. If there will all other fleshly lusts of the eye, the tongue, and the body. Why, what is the hope of the resurrection which I shall see? What is the nature of the change for which I am to prepare? It is that this poor pitiful frame, this tabernacle of clay which I bear about with me here on earth, the source of my pains, the fountain of my sorrows, the seat of disease, and the heir of death-it is that even this wretched frame shall spring up from its dust, throw aside its dishonour, forget its weakness, be purified from all the dregs of its earthly corruption, rise from the dead, ascend up into heaven with Christ, who is gone before; and there stand, the fellow of angels, before the throne of God. Glorious hope! mysterious exaltation! be indeed a rising again both of the just and of the unjust-and if even after death the body as well as the soul will be made to inherit the reward of its deeds, how holy should we become in all manner of conversation and godliness. For it is no half measure of retribution which we shall receive; the same man that sinneth, the same being in flesh and spirit shall be in eternal misery or joy. We have here, therefore, a rule and a line by which to calculate the amount of our punishment or our recompense. We know well what it is to rejoice in the days of our youth, in the sunshine of the heart, and the energy of the bodily powers. We know equally well what it is in sickness and sorrow to endure, though it be but for a single night, the anguish of a wounded spirit united to the pains of a diseased body. We have only to extend the duration of these enjoyments or sufferings from time to eternity; and, behold, we have before us a picture of Christian-will see the brightness of his gloryretribution such as will, and such as is most of all adapted to work upon our minds and hearts; intelligible in its nature, and therefore powerful as a motive; not vague nor imaginative, and therefore neither visionary nor curious. What reward, then, shall I give to the Lord for his mighty marvellous lovingkindness to this earthly body? These eyes, if they be admitted into heaven, will look upon the holiness of the Lamb marvel at the majesty of his Deity-and almost be blinded in the excessive glories of the heavenly host. Shall I, then, fix these eyes upon the vain and unholy objects of the earth? And shall I fill them with intemperance, cruelty, lust, and so But there is another peculiar class of unfit them for the contemplation of the duties to which this doctrine more parti- spiritual splendour of God's unblemished cularly persuades; and there is one pe- purity? These ears-they are hereafter culiar class of sins from which it more to listen to the harps of the angels, to especially guards us: I mean the sins hear the unceasing songs of gratitude of and duties of our fleshly members. "I the redeemed; shall I turn them away, beseech you, by the mercies of God, that then, from this their holiest and most ye present your bodies a living sacrifice, honourable occupation, and bid them holy, acceptable to the Lord." So speaks drink in with greedy readiness the temptthe apostle, alluding more particularly to ing accents of the charmer who would that great mercy of having our vile body charm me from the ways of righteous. changed, that it should be like to the ness? Or shall I let them unhallow my glorious body of Christ, which he calls, soul by being open to the deceitfulness especially, the redemption of the body. of that philosophy which would take There is, truly, no other doctrine which away my heart, and destroy its delicacy can so forcibly exhort to the mortification by listening to the voice of wit and jestof our members which are on the earth. ing, and licentious thoughts? Shall I And you find St. Paul continually using take the members which are predestined it: "Mortify therefore your members"— to the holy office of serving before God's he has just been speaking of our being unblemished throne, and make them the raised from the dead-" mortify therefore members of a harlot, the instruments of your members which are upon the earth; uncleanness, and the slaves of vice and fornication, uncleanness, inordinate affec- licentiousness? Shall this tongue which tion, evil concupiscence, idolatry”—and is hereafter to cry out with all the saints, "Glory and blessing, honour, and praise all are comparatively forgotten. He be for ever and ever to the Lamb that hath heard tidings of distant provinces sitteth on the throne"-shall I degrade over which superstition rolls her chariot my tongue by lying, by deceit, by licen- wheels, red with the blood of human tious conversation? Shall that which is sacrifice he hath listened to the recital intended for a blessing in heaven, be made which speaks of tribes and multitudes on earth the instrument of cursing? Shall passing into eternity, darkly and cheerthese hands, which are to be lifted up to lessly as the beasts that perish-he hath God in his holy place, be taught the spread before him the map of the world, ways of wickedness, of theft, and mur- and he hath dissected it into moral partider, and cruelty, and revenge on earth? tions, and he hath wondered and he hath Shall these organs of life, which are to wept, when taught that Christ, who died eat and drink in the presence of the Lord, for the sins of the dwellers in every land, be corrupted with gluttony and drunken- is known and believed on only in scanty ness? Shall any one part of that body and scattered districts, and all this hath which shall hereafter converse with an- agitated and convulsed his spirit—all this gels, which hath been honoured with the hath conspired to annihilate the ties of indwelling of the Divinity which now former citizenship, to link him in brotherrules in heaven-shall that body be con- hood with the benighted and degraded of verted into a temple of God's worst his race-and he snatches up a banner, enemy, and of man's worst enemy, and and emblazoning thereon simply the name the worst enemy of all that is happy and of Jesus Christ, leaps upon the waters, good-the prince of darkness, the author and hastens to erect the standard amid of misery, and of all that is miserable, polar snows or arid sands, in the valleys and vile, and guilty, and to be despised? and on the mountains of secluded and God forbid. The body is to be the scarce accessible domains. Lord's; and, as the body is to be the Lord's, let it glorify the Lord. Let me be doing while I can, and as long as I can. Fasting is hard; yet, if meat offend my God, I will eat no meat as long as I live. If he require chastity, I will give it. If he ask temperance, I will check my appetites: if purity, why I will even close my eyes, lest they should look on the cause of temptation. In all things, since God has given us such a glorious hope, I will endeavour to sanctify myself, through grace, for the great end of my calling, the entire devotedness both of my body and soul, that both my body and soul may be fitted to stand up in his holy presence, being justified, washed, and glorified by the blood of my Saviour, Jesus Christ. CHRISTIAN MISSIONARY. A MISSIONARY arises amongst his fellows almost like the denizen of another sphere: home, and country, and kindred, VOL. 1.-44 An unregenerate minister !—there may be such a thing. An unregenerate missionary! I dare not, (knowing that the heart is deceitful above all things, and desperately wicked,) I dare not say there cannot be such a thing; but certainly it would be in no slight degree difficult to determine the motives which actuate an unregenerate missionary-to develope the secret springs of a conduct so opposed to all the dictates and desires of a carnal spirit-and if it be a positive case that a man, not converted himself, should engage, by the surrender of whatsoever is dearest to the natural heart, in the work of converting others, we have a new case to add to the catalogue of anomalies and phenomena whose solution must be left amid the hopeless desiderata of moral science. I can suppose no other principle actuating a missionary, save zeal for the name of our Lord Jesus Christ; he is not a missionary unless this principle arouse him and nerve him.-Melville. SERMON XXXVIII. THE GLORY OF THE LATTER HOUSE. BY THE REV. J. GRANT. The glory of this latter house shall be greater than of the former, saith the Lord of hosts; and in this place shall I give peace, saith the Lord of hosts.”—Hag. ii. 9. containing the same allusion to the translacent column, the internally illuminated cloud, the glory, the presence of Jehovah. This portable tent accompanied the people in all their journeyings; and after their arrival in the promised land, it was pitched in Shiloh, a city situated on a hill, in the tribe of Ephraim, and the name of which was prophetic and typical. Here it remained for many years, till in consequence of the vileness of the sons of Eli, the ark of the covenant was taken in battle, and carried into the cities of the Philistines. As this ark was the encasement of the gem, the chief article of furniture in the moveable temple, being that on which the divine presence rested, the disconsolate widow of Phineas gave to her posthumous child the name of Ichabod, signifying, that "the glory," or divine presence, "was departed from Israel." On the restoration of the ark, and on the taking of Jebus, David erected a tabernacle, not like the former, made of pillars and boards of acacia wood, set in sockets of silver, but rather resembling GOD having called Moses to a confer- | presence-" shall be thy rereward." Inence with him on Mount Sinai, imparted numerable passages might be adduced, to him specific and minute instructions for the building of a tabernacle, or pavilion in the wilderness, as the peculiar habitation of the divine glory. By this glory is here meant the Schechinah, or bright cloud, emblematic of his immediate presence and protection, which hovered over the Holy of holies. When it was appointed by God that the army, or host of the Israelites, should march from one station in the wilderness to another, this luminous column or glory, slowly rose into the air, and moved before them in silent and mysterious majesty, till it arrived at the stage where the camp was to be pitched, when it stooped again upon the mercy-seat, and thus gave the signal to halt. When the fiery pillar rose, the whole multitude bearing the ark, amidst the announcements of trumpets, and the waving of emblematic banners, set forward singing and shouting, in the first words of the sixty-eighth Psalm-"Let God arise, let his enemies be scattered: let them also that hate him flee before him." And when the mist-robed intelligence-the a tent, in which the recovered ark, the divine presence stopped-the army obeyed the notice, and welcomed the descending Jehovah, as they deposited their burthens, with the words," Return, O God, to the many thousands of Israel." Hence God is said to be the leader of his people: hence in the promises which Isaiah makes to Israel, if they will turn unto God with Having thus introduced the subject, I a fast of sincerity and charity, it is said, shall now in the First place, consider and "Thy righteousness shall go before thee, compare THE TWO PERMANENT BUILDINGS and the glory of the Lord"-the divine | WHICH SUCCEEDED. And pedestal and vehicle of the "glory," was deposited on Mount Zion; with the songs and dances of religious exultation. A procession typically representing the ascent of the Messiah, the King of glory, into heaven, after the conquest over his spiritual enemies. |