which God spake to Moses in the bush : ''I am the God of Abraham J and the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob." (Exod. iii. 6.) He adds the comment, ^' God is not the God of the dead , but of the living.'' At the time when Moses heard these words, Abraham, Isaac, and Ja- cob had been dead and buried many years. Two centmies had passed away since Jacob, the last of the three, was carried to his tomb. And yet God spoke of them as being still His people, and of Himself as being still their God. He said not, " I ivas their God," but " I am."
Perhaps we are often tempted to doubt the truth of a resurrection, and a life to come. But, unhappily, it is easy to hold truths theoretically, and yet not realize them practically. There are few of us who would not find it good to meditate on the mighty verity which our Lord here unfolds, and to give it a prominent place in our thoughts. Let us settle it in our minds, that the dead are in one sense still alive. From our eyes they have passed away, and their place knows them no more. But in the eyes of God they live, and will one day come forth from their graves to receive an everlasting sentence. There is no such thing as annihilation. The idea is a miserable delusion. The sun, moon, and stars, — the solid mountains, and deep sea, will one day come to nothing. But the weakest babe of the poorest man shall live for evermore, in another world. May we never forget this ! Happy is he who can say from his heart the words of the Nicene Creed, ^' I look for the resurrec- tion of the dead, and the life of the world to come."
Let us observe, in the last place, the account lohicli our Lord givesof the state of men and womenafter theresurrec-
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tion. He silences the fancied objections of the Sadducees, by showing that they entirely mistook the true character of the resurrection state. They took it for granted that it must needs be a gross, carnal existence, like that of mankind upon earth. Our Lord tells them that in the next world we may have a real material body, and yet a body of very different constitution, and different necessi- ties, from that which we have now. He spealft only of the saved, be it remembered. He omits all mention of the lost. He says, " In the resurrection they neither marry nor are given in marriage, but are as the angels of God in heaven."
We know but little of the life to come in heaven. Perhaj)s our clearest ideas of it are drawn from consider- ing what it will not be, rather than what it will be. It is a state in which we shall hunger no more, nor thirst any more. Sickness, pain, and disease, will not be known. Wasting, old age, and death w^ill have no place. Marri- ages, births, and a constant succession of inhabitants, will be no more needed. They who are once admitted into heaven shall dwell there for evermore.— And, to pass from negatives to positives, one thing we are told plainly — w^e shall be ^'as the angels of Grod." Like them, w^e shall serve God perfectly, unhesitatingly, and un- weariedly. Like them, we shall ever be in God's presence. Like them, we shall ever delight to do His will. Like them, we shall give all glory to the Lamb. These are deep things. But they are all true.
Are we ready for this life ? Should we enjoy it, if admitted to take part in it ? Is the company of God, and the service of God pleasant to us now ? Is the
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