destined office, we are sure : for God himself says respecting them, " They shall declare my glory among the Gentiles ; and they shall bring all your brethren for an offering unto the Lord, out of all nations, upon horses, and in chariots, and in litters, and upon mules, and upon swift beasts, to my holy mountain Jerusalem, saith the Lord, as the children of Israel bring an offering in a clean vessel into the house of the Lord1." They are the appointed reapers of the whole world. Precisely as, by the Jews, God, in the apostolic age, reaped the first- fruits of the Gentiles, so will he, in due season, gather in by them the whole harvest.]
Here then we may also see, II. What we ought now to be —
We are God's Israel, as much as ever they were ; and heirs of all these blessings no less than they : for, " if we be Christ's, then are we Abraham's seed, and heirs according to the promise V Standing, then, in this relation to the Deity, can we doubt our obliga- tion to serve and honour him? Surely it becomes all who " name the name of Christ,"
1. To take root in him —
[This is expressly told us by the Apostle Paul : " As ye have received Christ Jesus the Lord, so walk ye in him, rooted and built up in him, and established in the faith as ye have been taught, abounding therein with thanksgiving1." We are, by our very profession, " plants of righteousness, of the Lord's planting ; " and it is on Christ Jesus that we stand. Into him we must shoot forth our roots : and from him must we derive all the sap and nourishment, whereby we are to live, and to bring forth fruit to his glory. Nothing is to move us from him, even for a moment : nor must we entertain a thought of find- ing support from any other than him. It is " in him that all fulness dwells ;" and " out of his fulness must we receive " all our supplies of grace and strength. Our whole life must be one continued exercise of faith in him ; and we must " cleave unto him with full purpose of heart."]
2. To bring forth fruit to his glory —
[Christians must not be like the world around them, " barren and unfruitful in the knowledge of the Lord ; " but abounding in the fruits of righteousness, which are, by Jesus Christ, to the glory and praise of God." Would you form a perfect idea of this distinction, go and behold two trees, one laden with leaves only, the other covered with blossoms and
1 Isai. lxvi. 19, 20. k Gal. iii. 29. > Col. ii. G, 7.