told tliat " godliness has the promise of the life that now is, as well as of that which is to come^;" and that, if we " seek first the kingdom of God and his righteousness, all needful things shall be added unto us*^." A temporal recompence for our liberality we may not obtain : but a spirittial reward is sure. For thus said the Lord : " If thou deal thy bread to the hungry, and bring the poor that are cast out to thy house ; if, when thou seest the naked, thou cover him, and hide not thyself from thine own flesh; then shall thy light break forth as the morning, and thine health spring forth speedily : and thy righteousness shall go before thee ; the glory of the Lord shall be thyrereward. If thou draw out thy soul to the hungry, and satisfy the afflicted soul ; then shall thy light rise in obscurity, and thy darkness be as the noon-day : and the Lord shall guide thee continually, and satisfy thy soul in drought, and make fat thy bones : and thou shalt be like a watered garden, and like a spring of water, whose waters fail not^" An eternal recompence will also most assuredly await us : for our blessed Lord has expressly told us, that if, instead of lavishing our money in feasting the rich, we delight to expend it on the poor, " we shall be recompensed at the resurrection of the just*^." He has commanded us on this account to " make friends to ourselves of the mammon of un- i-ighteousness," in the full expectation that at our death " we shall be received into everlasting habitations'." And St. Paul speaks to the same effect, when he says, " Charge them that are rich in this world, that they do good, that they be rich in good works, ready to distribute, willing to communicate, laying up in store for themselves a good foundation against the time to come, that they may lay hold on eternal life™."
But, after all, we must not altogether put out of our consi- deration even a present reward in the precise sense spoken of in our text : for it is beyond a doubt, that God does engage to supply the necessities of those who honour him with their sub- stance": and we can appeal to many, and ask, whether they have not seen, in relation to their temporal concerns, many gracious interpositions of God in their behalf? But, indepen- dent of these, who does not know that liberality is the parent of economy, and economy of wealth? A man desirous of honouring God with his substance, is delivered at once from all those vices and follies which ruin the estates of thousands. Besides, who that delights in doing good has not fo\ind incom- parably greater delight in self-denial for the benefit of others, than the utmost latitude of self-indulgence could ever have afforded him? Granting, then, that no addition is actually
e 1 Tim. iv. 8. ^ Matt. vi. .33. '' Isai. Iviii. 7—11.
•^ Luke xiv. 12—14. i Luke xvi. 9. '" 1 Tim. vi. 17—19. n Phil. iv. 18, 19.