It is even so still. If ever we are to be truly saved, there must on our side be individual looking to an uplifted Saviour, and individual trust. Even now the Lord is graciously saying, "Look unto me, all ye ends of the earth, and be ye saved." Speaking of looking and leaning on Christ, the saintly Rutherford says: "What could we do without him? It is good for us that ever Christ took the cumber of us. It is our heaven to lay many weights and burdens upon him, and to make him root and top, beginning and ending of our salvation. Lord hold us here."

What time I am afraid, I will trust in thee. In God I will praise his word, in God I have put my trust; I will not fear what flesh can do unto me.-Ps. lvi. 3, 4.

David was greatly distressed; for the people spake of stoning him...but David encouraged himself in the Lord his God.-1 Sam. xxx. 6.

November 15.

BEFORE WE CAN ABIDE WE MUST COME.

HERE are in Scripture two words distinct in meaning,

are "

yet closely allied, and both so precious that, like sweet melody, we can scarcely hear them too often. These Come" and "Abide." They are both uttered by the same divine lips, and with the same warmth of affection; and though at times it is the latter only that is spoken of, yet it presupposes the former, for we cannot possibly abide in Christ till first we come to him.

In mounting a ladder, if we expect to reach the summit we must begin by putting our foot on its lowest round. Even so, in aspiring to a pure and lofty communion with Him who alone is our life and salvation, we must begin

by a lowly drawing near to him in simple faith. Accordingly, the very first invitations we have to do with are such as these, and they are familiar as household words,"Come unto me, all ye that labour and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest"-"Him that cometh to me I will in no wise cast out."

But here, alas! many sadly stumble. They cannot believe that a salvation so precious can be acquired so simply, and so, making that difficult which the Lord has made easy, they would first throw off their burden, then come to the Burden-bearer; first get rid of their debt, then come to the Surety; first wipe off their defilement, then enter the fountain opened for sin and uncleanness.

What could be more hopelessly unwise than this? An old divine says: "Sin gives you your first title to the Friend of sinners; and a simple, naked faith the second. Do not, then, puzzle yourself about contrition, love, joy, and a thousand such things, which the tempter will persuade you you must bring to Christ. He will receive you gladly even with a mountain of sin, and the smallest grain of faith at Christ's feet will remove that mountain. What the Lord asks of you is simply to come as you are, and leave yourself in his loving hands.

"When I come with troubled heart,

Jesus bids me not depart

Till he stills it;

When I come with empty urn,

Jesus bids me not return

Till he fills it.

Once I came in tattered dress,

And the God of holiness

Did not loathe me;

Bringing nothing for the payment,
When I came for change of raiment
He did clothe me."

In the last day, that great day of the feast, Jesus stood and cried, saying, If any man thirst, let him come unto me, and drink.-JOHN vii. 37.

The Spirit and the bride say, Come. Come. And let him that is athirst come. the water of life freely.-REV. xxii. 17.

And let him that heareth say,
And whosoever will, let him take

Ye will not come to me, that ye might have life.-JOHN v. 40.

November 16.

AFTER COMING WE MUST ABIDE.

O come to Christ is invariably the first thing to be

done: but, having come, we must then abide; for it is not merely our peace that depends on this abiding, but our very salvation. When the mariners, in the time of Paul, were about to desert the ship, and were in the very act of letting down the boat into the stormy sea, he said, with resolute earnestness, "Except these abide in the ship, ye cannot be saved." So is it in this case. Except we abide in Christ we perish. Apart from him we have no blood to cleanse us, no righteousness to justify, no Spirit to sanctify, nor strength to sustain, nor hope to cheer. It is only, therefore, as we now abide with him in grace that we can hereafter abide with him in glory.

We are not from this to suppose that there can be any final falling away of true saints, or that they will ever be abandoned by the Lord. There may, indeed, be occasional and even humiliating backsliding, and on this very account severe and bitter chastenings, but there will be no final desertion. His own blessed promise makes this sweetly sure to us: "If his children forsake my law, and walk not in my judgments; if they break my statutes and keep not my commandments; then will I visit their

transgression with the rod, and their iniquity with stripes. Nevertheless my loving-kindness will I not utterly take from him, nor suffer my faithfulness to fail. My covenant will I not break, nor alter the thing that is gone out of my lips." However it may be with mere human affection, which is often so fitful and transient, it is never so with the love of the Redeemer. Like his own nature, it is immutable: having loved his own from the beginning, he loves them to the end. Still, through unwatchfulness on the part of his people, while they may have saving union with their Lord, they may have very little intimate and sweet communion.

"I need thy presence every passing hour:

What but thy grace can foil the tempter's power?
Who like thyself my guide and stay can be?

Through cloud and sunshine, O abide with me!"

Many would fain come to God as a refuge who fail to abide in him as a home.

I am crucified with Christ: nevertheless I live; yet not I, but Christ liveth in me and the life which I now live in the flesh I live by the faith of the Son of God, who loved me, and gave himself for me.--GAL. ii. 20.

Abide in me, and I in you. As the branch cannot bear fruit of itself, except it abide in the vine; no more can ye, except ye abide in me.-JOHN xv. 4.

Little children, abide in him; that, when he shall appear, we may have confidence, and not be ashamed before him at his coming.-1 JOHN ii. 28.

IT

November 17.

ABRAHAM GOD'S FRIEND.

T was one of the high distinctions of Abraham to be known as the friend of God. "Art not thou our God," said Jehoshaphat, "who didst drive out the inhabi

tants of this land before thy people Israel, and gavest it to the seed of Abraham thy friend?" To be so related to God, and so spoken of, was one of the very richest of privileges. Many friendships are merely nominal; they are hastily formed, and, being without either vitality or warmth, they are often just as hastily dissolved. But not so the sacred intimacy enjoyed by the patriarch. It was the friendship of friendships, pure, elevated, and enriching. All through life God guarded and blessed him, opening up his way, directing his steps, showing him favour, and supplying his need. Nay, more: in infinite condescension he communed and talked with him as a man with his friend. And in times when special sin demanded special judgment, he confided to him his secret purpose, saying, "Shall I hide from Abraham that thing which I do?"

And what he did then he is ever ready to do still, in fulfilment of the promise: "The secret of the Lord is with them that fear him, and he will shew them his covenant;" and in fulfilment, too, of these words of the Redeemer: "Ye are my friends, if ye do whatsoever I command you. Henceforth I call you not servants; for the servant knoweth not what his Lord doeth: but I have called you friends; for all things that I have heard of my Father I have made known unto you." True, the disciples, as well as all Christians, continue to be the servants of Christ, but not in the sense in which the servant excludes the friend, but in that sense in which the servant is the chosen friend as well. "They are," says one, "no longer servants, but children, and heirs, and friends; because they have been redeemed from the bondage of the law, and have received the spirit of adoption, and abide for ever in the house