advanced into the sanctuary ? We read of those " whose faith and love grew exceedingly ;" and so should yours grow : nor should you ever cease to press forward, till you are come into the holy of holies, even into the immediate presence of your God ]
2. In a way of information —
[God's work, I trust, is really going forward in the
world0 And this at least I can say, that, whether we
have laboured and suffered for the Lord, or only followed with our prayers those who have laboured, we have no cause to complain that we have either laboured in vain, or prayed in vain — ]
3. In a way of excitement —
[All of us have a work to do ; a work to which God him- self has called us, and to which at the baptismal font we were set apart. Let me ask, then, whether we have engaged heartily in it? and whether, if we were called to give an account of it at this moment, we could say, " Father, I have finished the work which thou hast given me to do ? " Know assuredly, that the whole Church will speedily be convened before the Judge of quick and dead : and " then must every one of us give account of himself to God." Say, brethren, whether, if called to that account, we should now " give it up with joy," or whether it would be " given up with grief." Let us think, also, what account we shall give of the efforts we have made in behalf of others. Have we " minded, not our own things only, but every one of us the things of others also?" Have we our- selves laboured, or have we, with prayer and fasting, co- operated, to the utmost of our power, with those who have gone forth to labour, in the cause of God? Think not that this was the. duty of the primitive Christians only: it is no less ours than it was theirs. The cause of God ought to be dear to us; and the souls of our fellow-sinners should be precious in our eyes. Our charity, indeed, must begin at home : but it must not end there : it should be extended to the whole world : nor should we relax our efforts for the extension of the Redeemer's kingdom, till " all the kingdoms of the world shall have be- come the kingdom of our God and of his Christ."]
c Here any particulars may be mentioned, only with diffidence and modesty.
m ACTS, XV. 10, 11. [1783.