brethren according to the flesh :" and, when he could not pre- vail on them to embrace the Gospel which he offered to them, he called God to witness what grief their obduracy occasioned him: "I say the truth in Christ, I lie not, my conscience also bearing me witness in the Holy Ghost, that I have great heaviness, and continual sorrow in my heart, for my brethren's sakep." Still more, for the prosperity of his converts he was so anxious, that his whole soul was, as it were, wrapt up in them : " Now I live, if ye stand fast in the Lordq." And so far was he from regretting any thing that he suffered for their sake, that he accounted such sufferings his privilege, his honour, his happiness : " If," says he, " I be offered upon the sacrifice and service of your faith, I joy and rejoice with you all : for the same cause do ye also joy and rejoice with mer."]
And, now, who can doubt, III. The blessedness of taking him for our model ?
Doubtless here is a high standard for us to aim at : but no lower standard can possibly be admitted. What, if we cannot attain to the eminence of St. Paul ? we should not willingly rest in any thing short of it ; or, if we had even attained to it, we should, like him, press forward for still higher attainments, that, if pos- sible, we might be " pure as Christ himself was pure," and " perfect even as our Father who is in heaven is perfect." And to this we are encouraged by St. Paul, who says, " Those things which ye have learned and received, and heard and seen in me, do ; and the God of peace shall be with you." Now, it is certainly true, that if we aspire thus after universal holiness, God will be with us,
1. In a way of special manifestation —
[He assumes the endearing name of " the God of peace," as he does elsewhere of " the God of love and peace s :" and under this character will he reveal himself to his obedient people. Yes, "great peace shall they have who love his law," " a perfect peace," " a peace that passeth all understanding." What terms would suffice to give any adequate idea of " the love of God shed abroad in the heart," and of " the light of his reconciled countenance lifted up upon the soul ?" You would in vain attempt to convey to a person who had all his days been immured in a dark dungeon, a just conception of
P Rom. ix. 1, 2. <i 1 Thess. iii. 8.
r Phil. ii. 17, 18. s 2 Cor. xiii. 11.