Suppose for a moment that it were otherwise. Suppose that a man was forgiven on account of his love, and in proportion to his love. And now trace the consequence. Then God would do something because man had done something for Him; and not man would do something because God had done something. Then, the priority would be with man; then, God would not take the initiative. Is that putting God in His proper place? Then, a man would have first to work without motive,—a machine would be expected to go without its mainspring; man must begin by loving God,—but what is he to love God for? I do not hesitate to say, A man never does love God till he feels that God has forgiven him. No other love is worth the name. Besides, love is a fruit of union with Christ; and when there is union there must be forgiveness.

And thirdly, if you are not to be forgiven till you love, and if your forgiveness is in proportion to your love,—then, when will you ever begin to venture to believe that you have loved enough to be forgiven? When will you know that the price covers the purchase? Will any love seem good enough? Will anything seem,-will anything be, real love? Is not this putting off the sense of forgiveness indefinitely,—to a death-bed,—nay, beyond it, for ever?

But now, give the other order. How it honors God! For His own love's sake,-because He is all He is,-of free grace, for the sake of His dear Son,-your heavenly Father, because He is your heavenly Father, forgives you. Christ's death has made it possible for Him to do it. He has received an equivalent,-far more than an equivalent, -for your sins; your whole debt is paid, God is just to forgive you.

And must you do nothing? Are there no conditions,—

only that you want it, and that you feel you want it,-and that you take it? No love? None, unless it be the love that there is in the taking. The love is to follow, and it will follow, if you take it.

And how comforting this is to a sinner,-pardon for nothing,-pardon at once,—pardon, free as air,—so very good, and so very wonderful,—so unlike man, that the only difficulty is to believe it. The fact is, the difficulty is always in taking God at His own word.

But how it will move and melt,-how it will draw and purify the heart, when once it really feels," God loves me, -God has forgiven me!" What a different love it will be which it feels then! how practical! how humbling! how elevating!

I do not know when the woman was forgiven. But I think no one in the world doubts that when she took her place at Christ's feet, and began to weep her tears, and with those tears to wash His feet, and then to wipe them with her hair, and kiss them, and to anoint them with the ointment out of the alabaster box,she had been forgiven. Mere sorrow for sin never did that. Sorrow will weep, but sorrow alone would not kiss the feet, and store the ointment, and wipe away her own tears with her own hair. There was more love than sorrow there. I am not quite sure, but I think there was more peace and joy than there was sorrow there.

Take care that you know the precedence in which these things come. You say,-penitence, forgiveness, love;yes;-but much more,-forgiveness, love, penitence.

Jesus, if He did not know it by his own omniscience, knew by the sure indications that He saw, that she was a pardoned woman;-not the unclean woman, as she showed

to the Pharisees, but white as snow; and He condesended to prove it to her accuser, and He used an argument true to every feeling of our nature; and which every one may understand:—“Wherefore I say unto thee, Her sins which are many, are forgiven; for she loved much: but to whom little is forgiven, the same loveth little."

If this be true, there are some important inferences. Do not you be afraid to take forgiveness. Never think of working up to your forgiveness; accept it; lay it as the basis of your spiritual life. It is the great element of your sanctification. You will do very little without it. Your active, useful, honoring life will begin at the date when you rest in the sense that you are forgiven. Is not it a marvel before high angels, that there should be any man upon this earth who should be content to go on without feeling forgiven, when forgiveness is such a very easy thing?

It is the most wonderful part of all spiritual transformations that sin turns into love. It is a strange and blessed thing that a sorrow need not go away, but will become a joy. But it is something greater still that a sin may become an affection.

No one can look back without a dark retrospect. I question whether any man who really puts all he has done, said, thought, and all he has not done, not said, not thought, by the side of all he has received, and all he has felt, and all he has promised, and all he is responsible for, --but he will unfeignedly hold himself and call himself the greatest sinner upon the face of the earth,-"the chief of sinners." I am suprised that any should be offended at St. Paul's using that expression about himself.

But it is in your power now, not only to make all those

sins as if they had never been, but far better than that, to convert them every one into pious, holy, tender feelings, which shall be the seeds of multitudes of actions, which feelings, and which actions, but for those sins, those sins so changed and so transformed, would never have been. He who makes the rainbow out of the mist,-He who makes the diamond out of the charcoal,-He does it.

Make haste to place your sins in God's hand, that He may make affections out of them. What a noble ambition this is! "My sins have been greater than any one's; so shall my love and service be. First in transgression,first in mercy,-I will be first in devotedness. I will be a great worker all the rest of my life; I will be a great sufferer all the rest of my life. My sins shall be the measure of my love; and all men shall see my sins, how great they are, in my love, how great it is,-that He may be glorified!"

She was a blessed woman, in whom Jesus recognised His own much grace by her much love. We should carefully note the features of that love, which He who knows the loves of heaven, still called "much." A lowly seat, a spirit soft and melting,-early vanities consecrated now to spiritual uses, the whole body instinct with sacrifice, and fragrant with Jesus everywhere, beauty, fondness, energy, His,—the last to leave a scene of sadness, --and the first to meet the dawn of joy. And first shall that heart be at the resurrection morn,-and this its fitting, chosen recompense,—to love most for ever and ever.

XII.

Christ's Pre-eminence.

"That in all things He might have the pre-eminence."

i. 18.

-COLOSSIANS

TH

HIS is an important view of the resurrection,-that Christ was the first who ever rose from the dead, -for the very few, who in point of time, rose before Him, rose through Himself and His resurrection, and therefore, in real order of succession, rose after Him,—that Christ was the first that ever rose from the dead, in token that as He was the first in this, so in all other things whatsoever, -"in all things He should have the pre-eminence."

And you must remember, that up to the moment when Christ left the grave, He had only been going down continually, to a lower and a lower degradation. It was the last point of humiliation,-death, the death of the cross, the descent into hell. And then immediately, not by slow degrees, as He had descended, but at once, He went to the very top.

We are speaking, of course, of Christ in His manhood. In His Deity, He was eternal, and unchangeable, and supreme; but in His manhood, He went down that He might carry up manhood to the very highest.

And this He did at the date of His resurrection. For though He waited forty days before He actually ascended, -and that for many great and sufficient reasons, and spe

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