that in this place He compares Himself to the sun. Like the sun, He has risen on this sin-darkened world with heal- ing on His wings, and shines for the common benefit of all mankind. Like the sun, He is the great source and centre of all spiritual life, comfort, and fertility. Like the sun, He illuminates the whole earth, and no one need miss the way to heaven, if he will onty use the light offered for his acceptance.
Forever let us make much of Christ in all our religion. We can never trust Him too much, follow Him too closely, or commune with Him too unreservedly. He has all power in heaven and earth. He is able to save to the uttermost all who come to God by Him. None can pluck us out of the hand of Him who is one with the Father. He can make all our way to heaven bright and plain and cheerful, like the morning sun cheering the traveller. Looking unto Him, we shall find light in our understandings, see light on the path of life we have to travel, feel light in our hearts, and find the days of darkness, which will come sometimes, stripped of half their gloom. Only let us abide in Him, and look to Him with a single eye. There is a mine of meaning in His words, " If thine eye be single, thy whole body shall be full of light." (Matt. vi. 22.)
Another thing shown in these verses is, the certainty of a judgment to come. We find our Lord saying, " He that rejecteth Me, and receiveth not my words, hath One that judgeth him : the word that I have spoken, the same shall judge him in the last day."
There is a last day ! The world shall not always go on as it does now. Buying and selling, sowing and reaping, planting and building, marrying and giving in marriage, — all this shall come to an end at last. There is a time ap- pointed by the Father when the whole machinery of crea- tion shall stop, and the present dispensation shall be changed for another. It had a beginning, and it shall also