And home of rest! The milky way chalkt out with Suns, a clue That guides through erring hours; and in full story A taste of Heav'n on earth; the pledge and cue Of a full feast; and the out-courts of glory !^
iii. It is a Gift that is without Repentance.
"There remaineth a sabbath rest for the people of God" (Heb. iv. 9). The Epistle to the Hebrews was written to prevent Jewish Christians from apostasy to Old Testament Judaism. The un-Christian Jews would entice them tbus : " We have Moses ; we have Aaron, the high priest ; we have Joshua, who led the people into Canaan ; we have a Sabbath, pointing to Canaan as the promised land; we have a ministry of angels." Now, to furnish the Christian with an argument to meet all these weighty claims this letter was written. The Christian can say : Jesus is greater than angels, greater than Moses, a greater priest than Aaron, greater than Joshua, redemption is greater than creation, and as God rested from the works of creation, sanctifying the seventh day for a Sabbath, so as Jesus rested from the works of redemption on the first day of the week, they too have a Sabbath. So it is established that the people of God are to have a Sabbath-keeping. If the reference be exclusively to the heavenly rest, the argument is not weakened, since the type must abide until the antitype fulfils it.^
^ This blessed day is an earnest, an infallible prophecy of the eternal rest which awaits us in heaven. Here, we have conflicts and trials. This life is full of toil and strife and disappointment and bereavement. There is no absolutely perfect rest in this life. But that rest which remains to God's people in the immortal life which is to come, will be perfect. The toil is here, but the rest is yonder. The conflict is here, but the victory is yonder. The cross is here, but the crown is yonder. The sorrow is here, but the happiness is yonder. God gives us one day in every week in which to think especially about these things. Every Lord's Day this perfect rest, this final victory, this complete happiness, this
^ Henry Vaughan. » B. H. Carroll.
ST. MARK — 8
114 THE GREAT TEXTS OF THE BIBLE
glorious reward should be brought prominently before the Christian's mind and heart.^
Yes, there remaineth yet a rest!
Arise, sad heart, who now dost pine, By heavy care and pain opprest, On whom no sun of joy can shine; Look to the Lamb ! in yon bright fields Thou'lt know the joy His presence yields ; Cast off thy load and thither haste;
Soon shalt thou fight and bleed no more, Soon, soon thy weary course be o'er, And deep the rest thou then shalt taste.
The rest appointed thee of God,
The rest that nought shall break or move, That ere this earth by man was trod
Was set apart for thee by Love. Our Saviour gave His life to win This rest for thee ; oh, enter in !
Hear how His voice sounds far and wide:
Ye weary souls, no more delay,
Nor loiter faithless by the way, Here in my peace and rest abide I^
* "W. G. Neville * Lyra Gennanica.
An Eternal Sin.
Literature.
Abbey (C. J.), Divine Love, 44.
Alexander (W.), Primary Convictions, 133.
Almond (H. H.), Christ the Protestant, 30.
Bonar (H.), Family Sermons, 330.
Candlish (J. S.), The Work of the Holy Spirit, 65.
Challacombe (W. A.), Bond and Free, 59.
Critcliley (G.), WTien the Angels have gone away, 46.
Fairweather (D.), Bound in the Spirit, 93.
Grane (W. L.), Hard Sayings of Jesus Christ, 133.
Hammond (J.), Forgiveness of Sins, 109.
Horton (R. F.), The Teaching of Jesus, 67.
Morison (J.), Sheaves of Ministry, 260.
Moule (H. C. G.), Veni Creator, 19.
Moulton (J. H.), Visions of Sin, 116.
Newbolt (W. C. E.), Words of Exhortation, 230.
NicoU (W. Robertson), Ten-minute Sermons, 95.
Robson (J.), The Holy Spirit, 198.
Shutter (M. D.), Justice am,d Mercy, 187.
Weeks (G. E.), Fettered Lives, 91.
Wilberforce (B.), Sermons in Westminster Abbey, 84.
Expositor, 2nd Ser,, iii. 321 (Cox) ; 7tli Ser., ii. 81.
Expository Times, iii. 50, 76, 215, 217 ; xi. 2.
Homiletic Review, v. 104 (Lawrie) ; xzxi. 155 (Stevens).
n6
An Eternal Sin.
Verilj I say unto you, All their sins shall be forgiven unto the sons of men, and their blasphemies wherewith soever they shall blaspheme : but whosoever shall blaspheme against the Holy Spirit hath never forgiveness, but is guilty of an eternal sin : because they said, He hath an unclean spirit.— iii. 28-30.
I SHALL never forget, says Dr. Samuel Cox,^ the chill that struck into my childish heart so often as I heard of this mysterious sin which carried men, and for ought I knew might have carried even me, beyond all reach of pardon ; or the wonder and perplexity with which I used to ask myself why, if this sin was possible, — if, as the words of our Lord seem to imply, it was probable even and by no means infrequent, — it was not clearly defined, so that we might at least know, and know beyond all doubt, whether it had been committed or had not. And, since then, I have again and again met with men and women of tender conscience and devout spirit who, by long brooding over these terrible words, had convinced themselves that they had fallen, inadvertently for the most part, into this fatal sin, and whose reason had been disbalanced and unhinged by a fearful anticipation of the doom they held themselves to have provoked. The religious monomaniac is to be found in well-nigh every madhouse in the kingdom ; and in the large majority of cases, as there is only too much ground to believe, he has been driven mad by the fear that he has committed the unpardonable sin : although the man who honestly fears that he has committed this sin is just the one man who has the witness in himself that he cannot possibly have committed it.