ful of duty and of danger, of privilege and blessing, and urges us to "work out our salvation with fear and trembling," and to "pass the time of our sojourning here in fear." This fear of God, casts out, as Burke well remarks, every other fear. It is therefore the parent of peace, joy, confidence and courage. It disarms the law of its penalty, and conscience of its lash,-death of its sting and the grave of its victory,time of its allurements and eternity of its terrors. anchor to the soul amid trials and temptations, and a haven from all the blasts of superstition. It enables the soul to be still amid every disquietude, to wait upon God, to hope in His mercy, and not to fear though the mountains.-Ps. 46, v. 1-3. From all that has been said we see how weak and foolish is the objection to the gospel founded on its appeals to man's fears. When the appeal is made exclusively to fear then it is on the one part arbitrary and on the other slavish. But where the principle of fear is addressed only as a means of awakening the understanding to consider this evidence,-the judgment to form conclusions, the conscience to urge truth and duty-and the affections to fix themselves upon their proper objects-then it is reasonable and proper and in every way worthy of man's nature and in accordance with his highest honor and nobility. Now, such is the fear of God. The divine anger and mercy shine out in God at the same time. God threatens only to alarm and enkindle attention, anxiety and determination. He apprises us of our danger and points out the yawning gulf into which we are ready to fall, and then calls upon us to look to His mercy for deliverance, to His Son for righteousness, and to His Spirit for sanctification. There is love, therefore, in God's threatenings and mercy in His denunciations. He affrights that He may save, and "frowns that He may smile." The hand of Jeroboam was dried up to convince him of his sin and lead him to repentance, but the moment he turned his heart to God and asked pardon for his crime he obtained pardon and the restoration of his limb. And so were "the terrors of hell" permitted to "get and to retain their hold of David until he confessed his sins and found forgiveness and then was he filled with peace and hope." Thus do we see in the appeals which the gospel makes to our fears the greatness and the reality of its mercy. It makes us sensible of our affliction that we may have nothing else to afflict us. It would have us know our misery that we may be thereby made happy. In reproving it is kind, and in making sore it heals. In its greatest severities there is abundant goodness. Its anger is always accompanied with patience and its indignation with clemency. It kills, in short, to make alive. We have also seen with equal clearness the essential difference between the fears of the sinner and the fears of the christian. The sinner thinks of God against his will and is as it were dragged into his presence to be there reproved and condemned. The believer seeks God's presence as a child does that of a loved and honored parent. The sinner fears God because he cannot avert that judgment he deserves, and which he cannot possibly escape, and which, nevertheless, he hates and dreads. The believer reverences God for his majesty, his justice and his holiness, and at the same time loves Him for His mercy, His grace and His free salvation. And now, sinner, whosoever thou art, wilt thou not fear while fear may avail you to secure salvation? I endeavored to shew you the consequences of meeting death in your sins. I told you. Let me now direct you to another consideration. The works of "the dead who die in the Lord" "follow them." That is, the good which is still accomplished by the good works performed by them while on earth-by the church they have established, by the parochial school or college they have endowed, by the missionaries in this shall it follow them. Now so also shall it be with the sinner. His works shall follow him. His example as a Father and friend, his neglect of the great salvation, in his fear shall remain. These shall like seed cast into the ground like seed, take root and spring up and bear fruit unto death. These shall scatter far and wide their death-bearing seed, and thus continue in endless progression to treasure up wrath against the day of wrath. This is the reason why the day of judgment is appointed at the end of the world. It is only then that all the good of the righteous can be fully known. |