'l'he Spirit of God is already poured out. The beginning of the new lire is before our eyes. Ot-hers are changed, why not ye? Distinguish between the right and wrong use of such a fact. No necessity to we.it for great revivals. Danger of expecting excitement to do God's work for us. The actual existence of a living, working Church of Christ in our neighbourhood is the great call to us. 2. The offered, blessedness-the blotting out of sins. Sense of pardon the spring of the new life. The function of thankfulness in practical Christianity. The impossibility of progress without a sense of liberty. Hence the defective Christianity of our Churches. No sense of victory over sin. 3. The promised future. "Seasons of refreshing." Return of Jesus Christ. Restitution of all things. The key-note of revelation. 'l'he golden horizon of the world. Power of hope in awakening energy. "Pilgrim's progress" is towards" the celestial city." Turn your lace from the city of Destruction to the city of God. The call to repentance should never be a mere denuuciatory cry against sin, a mere pointing to the overhanging Mount Sinai, which gendereth bondage ; but as the loving invitation to rejoice in the "presence of the Lord," from which the blessing is rea.dy to come forth. Address men not as far off, but aa nigh-within the temple courts, under the outspread wings.-R. Ver. 26.-The mission of Jesus Christ. "Unto you first," etc. {Revised Version, " Servant," see ma.rgia ). The Bible its own interpreter. All acknowledge the greatness, wonderfulness, perfection of the gospel portrait. Misconstruction of the facts by the Jew, by the unbelieving philosopher, by the mere moralist, by the rationalist. The last verse of the apostle's sermon a summing up Scripture and facts of history. So always revelation and history explain one another. 'fhe truly evangelical view of Christ the only one that appeals to the universal human hea.rt. I. THE INFTh"ITE FOUNDATION ON wmcH THE GOSPEL BESTS. God, raised up bis Son (Servant); Gcd sent him. 1. The twofold aspect of the Divine character thus presented to us. Love desiring to bless; righteoumess requiring the putting a.way of iniquities. .All is from the Father. 2. 'rhe person and the work of Christ revealed in their intimate union. "Raised up," comprehending the whole conception of the mediatorial exalta- tion of Jesus Christ. Difference between his history and that of any mere human arrent raised up for action. The necessity for all that we find in the Scripture record. God knows it, though we may not see it. 3. 'fhe Scripture is not given to be worked up by men's devices into mere food for human pride; it is a practical Book, the foundation laid, to be built upon. Christ was sent to bless us, and we can find the blessing only as we seek it practic:a.lly. IL THE m'IVEBBAL :r,mssAGE TO THE WORLD. 1. The moral state of all men shows the necessity for such a proclamation. " Your iniquities." 'l'he history of the gospel reminds us that the most religiously instructed were far from being the most godly. The snperstitions and oppositions of the world multiply its iniquities. Man cannot turn himself to God. 2. The whole gospel must be preached, or its true success cannot be realized. The mutilated Christianity of our time is proving itself impotent. We must lead the hearts of men to a person; we must tea.eh them dependence on a power; we must call them to newness of life, a life already made manifest through Christ, both in his history and in the history of his people. Then: 3. The blessing should be put firRt aud foremost. Blessing which the world has been waiting for from the beginning. which it has been prepared for by the dispensations, which it received in germ in Abraham and his seed, but which is for all the families of the ea.rth. Hence it was" to the Jew first" as the consecrated messenger; but as the patriarchs were taken to the larger sph~re of Egypt that they might come forth from it prepared to be God's messengers, so Christianity must be taken from its Juda.istic standpoint, and put into the central position of the world's life, that it may draw to ~tself Greece and Rome, the East and the West the whole natnre and existence of humanity. So now the progress of man is from the eruancipation of the individual, through that of the nation, to the cosmopolitan blessedness of mankind as a race. 'l'he mission of Christ is to each and to all.-R.
Ver. 1---eh. iv. 4.-Peter's second sermon. and its results~ evening's good work. The hu;tory contained in the Acts of the Apostles continues to be a record of Peter'& lead. Thia great honour is bestowed on the active, earnest, impetuous disciple of the OH, IIJ. 1-26,] THE ACTS OF THE APOSTLES. 109