Put ye on therefore, my beloved, by faith, the Lord Jesus Christ; so shall ye be justified by his righteousness, rendered holy by the influences of his Spirit leading you in the paths in which he walked, and be made at length meet to become partakers of the inheritance among the saints in light. Put ye on the Lord Jesus Christ, and make no provision for the flesh to fulfil the lusts thereof; for the day of the Lord is at hand; now is our deliverance from the power of all our enemies through Christ, nearer than when we first believed. A little while, and all will be over; and then comes the exceeding and eternal weight of glory.

468

SERMON XXII.

COLOSSIANS, VI. 6, 7.

As ye have therefore received Christ Jesus the Lord, so walk ye in him; rooted and built up in him, and established in the faith as ye have been taught, abounding therein with thanksgiving.

THE church at Colossé was a favourite church of the Apostle. And as grateful that the Lord had made him the instru ment in delivering them from the power of darkness, and translating them into the kingdom of his dear Son, he gave thanks to God the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, praying always for them, since he heard of their faith in Christ Jesus, and of the love which they had to all the saints. He knew that they had received Christ in the ground of their hearts; and

being highly gratified at their good order and at the steadiness of their faith, he, in the words of our text, exhorts them, as they had received Christ, to "walk in him, rooted and built up in him, and established in the faith, abounding therein with thanksgiving." He knew what was in man; no one, indeed, more sensibly felt the risings of inward corruptions, and the perpetual warfare carried on between flesh and spirit in the heart of a believer, and therefore failed not, on every occasion, to exhort them to perseverance and diligence in the Christian Course. As ye have received Christ Jesus, so walk in him, stand not still, suffer not your Christian armour to grow rusty, sleep not on the post of duty. As the foundation has been laid on the Rock of ages, see that the edifice be completed; let it not be a confused mass, jumbled together without form or order, but let it be built up a beautiful edifice, and firmly established in Him who is the chief corner-stone, the Lord Jesus Christ.

The exhortation of St. Paul to his church at Colossé, is equally an exhortation to every Christian church, wherever established. Christianity is the same in all ages of the world, and in every place; and the duties enjoined by our holy religion are also the same. What the Holy Spirit has commanded by the mouth of the immediate Apostles and disciples of our Lord, he speaks now in their writings to the followers of the same Lord and Saviour to the remotest period of time.

What is meant, let us inquire, in the first place," by by receiving Christ Jesus

the Lord."

You have frequently heard me, my brethren, declare from this pulpit, that the heart is the seat of religion: notions floating in the brain, unless they descend to and are fixed in the heart, are worse by far than nothing: for notions, if they be only in the head, however correct they may be, will but add to the degree of our condemnation. Those who are mere no

tionists in religion, are like that son spoken of in the Gospel, who said, "I go, but went not to labour in his father's vineyard;" or like that servant mentioned in the 12th chapter of Luke, ver. 47, "And the servant which knew his Lord's will, and prepared not himself, neither did according to his will, shall be beaten with many stripes."

It is true, indeed, that proper notions or right ideas of the plan of salvation are necessary; yet in themselves they are not salutary, unless they descend into the heart, and show that they are engrafted there by the hand of God, from the practical influence they have on our lives. And this idea is strongly confirmed by the parable of the sower, where the same word was sown on different soils; but it only sprung up and produced fruit abundantly in the good heart,-the heart made good by Him who alone is able to change the heart of stone into a heart of flesh.

The heart, then, being the seat of reli