Do we need a justifying righteousness? To him we must look for it, and from him we must receive it : " We must call him, The Lord our Righteousness d." Do we need grace to sanctify and renew our souls ? From him we must receive it, accord- ing to our necessities6. Our wisdom, our strength, our peace, our all, is in him, and must be derived from him in the exer- cise of faith and prayer f. Thus it was that St. Paul himself walked : " The life which I now live in the flesh I live by the faith of the Son of God, who loved me, and gave himself for meg." And thus it is that we also must live, depending on him for every thing, and glorying in him alone h.]
2. Walk after Christ, by a holy conversation —
[This also is particularly specified by another Apostle as essential to an acceptable walk with God : " He that abideth in him ought himself also so to tvalk even as he walked1." Our blessed Lord " has left us an example, that we should follow his steps." Like him, we must live altogether for God, making it " our meat and our drink to do his will." Like him, we must rise superior to all worldly cares, or pleasures, or ho- nours, " not being of the world, even as he was not of the world." Like him, we must exercise meekness and patience, and forbearance, and love even to our bitterest enemies, never swerving in the least from the path of duty for fear of them, nor yielding to any thing of a vindictive spirit on account of them, but rendering to them, under all circumstances, good for evil, and committing ourselves entirely to the disposal of an all-wise Godk. In a word, " the same mind must be in us as was in him," under every possible situation and circumstance of life1: and then, as "he pleased the Father always," so shall we infal- libly be approved by him in the whole of our conversation"1.]
The Apostle, appealing to them that he had so taught them, exhorts them to press forward in the course he had pointed out. Let us proceed then to. consider,
II. The exhortation —
In this he acknowledges, that they had already done well : but he wishes them to redouble their exertions in their heavenly way. Let us notice here,
1. The fact conceded —
[When he says, " Ye have received of us," he does not mean merely that they had heard his instructions, but that
d Jer. xxiii. 6. e John i. 16. f \ Cor. i. 30.
s Gal. ii. 20. h Isai. xlv. 24, 25. j 1 John ii. 6.
k 1 Pet. ii. 21—23. i Phil. ii. 5. m Rom. xii. 2,