HOMILETICS. Vere. 1-16.-.The numheringofGod'speopT,e. We have here, spiritually, the Church of God militant here on earth, "drawn up unto eternal life" (Acts xiii. 48), numbered and counted an~ orde_red by 0e Great Captain ?f the Lord's host; man by man, soul by soul, to be !us valiant soldiers and servants m tJ1e march and the conflict and the manifold trials and temptations of this probation. Consider, therefore- ' I. That this numbering of all his soldiers by name was MADB: AT THE EXPRESS AND PARTICULAR COMMAND o:F Goo, as it were for the Divine infonnation; herein con- trasting with that other numbering so sorely avenged under David, because made to feed bis own pride. Even so the Lord is exceeding careful of the number of his own ; one of the two sacred mottoes stamped upon his Church is, "The Lord knoweth them that are bis" (2 Tim. ii. 19); "The Good Shepherd calleth his own sheep by name" (John x. 3); and every one of them is expressed by name in his book (Rev. iii. 5). We are "numbered" in the census of a great nation ; every one of us is something stronger, holds his head somewhat higher, for the thought that he is numbered amongst the thirty millions of a great country, the ninety millions of a greater people. Are we also" numbered" among the innumerable and ever-victorious hosts of the Lord ? Are we included in his census ? If so, are we mindful of the condition? (2 Tim. ii. 3, 4). Are we tremblingly hopeful of the promise? (Rev. iii. 5). II. That it was IN THE SECOND YEAR that they were thus numbered "by their armies : " first came the great deliverance unto Sinai, the mount of God; then came the teaching of the moral law ; then came the instructions of outward religion ; then -and not till then-the command to number into the ranks. Even so .the soldiers of the cross are not called at once to arms; the deliverance came first of course, the decease, "the exodus" (Luke ix. 31) which he accomplished at Jerusalem ; after tliat came to each the inculcation of the immutable laws of moral conduct; after that the ordinances of public and private worship; and then only, after such training, with such aids, is each believer numbered unto active service, and called, as it were, by name to approve himself as a trusty soldier of Jesus Christ. III. That only those were" numbered," and entered, as it were, on the roll-call of the Lord, WHO WERE "ABLE TO GO FORTH TO WAR in Israel j" all the others, the women and the children, &c., remained unspecified and unnoted. Even so all the Lord's people whose names are written in the Book of Life must be combatants. They need not indeed be men, but they must "quit" themselves "like men" (1 Cor. xvi. 13). They may be weak women, or even tender children, for such have 1,hown themselves (and do sl1ow) to the full as valiant for Christ as any men. But they must be combatants, for that is the one condition on which we are received into that "multitude which no man can number" (but the Lord can), and the promise is " to him that overcometb," and to none other. IV. That of these names in ver. 161 renowned amongst men and chosen of God to honour and dignity, ALL BUT TWO ARE TOTALLY UNKNOWN '.l'O us, and those two only through their descendants. So in tbo Church, those that are the greatest with God are often the obscurest in the annals of men. As " Antipas " was expressly called (by a singular honour), " my faithful martyr" by Clmst; yet is there no knowledge of him, not even a legend concerning him, in the Church.
HOMILIES BY VARIOUS AUTHORS. Vere. 1, 2.-A HOMILY FOR THE CENSUS DAY, The numbering ofthe people. I. A FEW WORDS ABOUT THE CENSUS which is being taken to,day in every town, every hamlet, every remote habitation of the United Kingdom, from the English Channel to the sens that surge round the Shetland Islands. There are still some people-not many, let us hope-who have a scruple about filling up the census papers. They are haunted with an appd.1ension that there is something wrong, something d1mgerous, about the bUBi• <ll'I. I. 1-16.] THE BOOK OF NUMBERS-.