them as soon as made: but go rather and exercise faith on God, and on his great and precious promises : go and contem- plate the incomprehensible love of Christ in dying for you : go and sprinkle his blood upon your conscience, and get a sense of his pardoning love upon your soul : Go, I say, and get your faith increased, and exercised; and you shall no longer have to complain of want of power to do the will of God: let him "perfect that which is lacking in your faith;" and you will then be enabled to perfect that which is lacking in your practice : " through him strengthening you, you will be able to do all things1."]
r Tit. iii. 8.
Luke xvii. 10. So likewise ye, when ye shall have done all those things which are commanded you, say, We are unprofitable servants : we have done that which was our duty to do.
PRIDE is deeply rooted in the heart of man. It was that which first instigated him to disobedience ; he wished to be as Goda. Since his fall it leads him openly to cast off his allegiance to the Supreme Being, and to become a god unto himself, independent, self- seeking, and self-sufficient. This principle operates even in the renewed mind, and endangers the accept- ance of our persons and services1*. Our Lord fre- quently cautioned his Disciples against it. He had just inculcated the arduous duty of forgiving injuries0, and had assured them that, however difficult it might be, faith would enable them to fulfil itd; but, aware that such obedience might serve as an occasion for pride and vain-glory, he now teaches them, by a just comparison6, what thoughts they should ever enter- tain even of their best services. We shall consider, I. The comparison —
The extent of God's authority over us is not suf- ficiently considered. There is no slave so much at
a Gen. iii. 5. b ] Tim. iii.' 6. ° ver. 3, 4.
d ver. 3, 6. e ver. 7—9.