us as fellow-members at all, but we are members notwithstanding, by ties which they have done nothing to creato and which they cannot undo by their exclusiveness or their bigotry. Yet all the members are really bound to each other by the tie of a commou life, for they live by faith in Obrist Jesus, and of a common ·love; for faith worketh by love, and never works without it. Jesus says," Love one another, as I have loved you." That is, we are to Jove with a love practical, humble, bountiful, patient, gentle, all-embracing, and lasting as Christ's own love. II. THE CHURCH IS A FAMILY BY ITS UNITY. There is but one Father in the Divine family, who unites in himself the perfection of fatherly and motherly affection. There is but one Church on earth," one body," as there is but one faith, one baptism, one hope. Wherever there is union with Chlist, there is membership in his body the Church. The indwelling of the Holy Spirit is the bond of unity in the Church. It follows, therefore, that believers must be one in faith, love, and obedience. Ill Tim ClWBCH AB A FAMILY ADMITS OF GREAT DIVEBBITIES. TherE: are grea.t diversities of affection, of temperament, of character, in the same family, contributing, indeed, to the fulness and happiness of its life. The completeness of the family depends, indeetl, on the beautiful fusion of its masculine and feminine elements. Now, the Church similarly, though one, exists under great diversities of form and condition. There are, first, the two great divisions of the Church into the heavenly and the earthly membership. It is a mistake to say, as some do, that the Church consists only of living saints, as if the dead ceased to be in its unity. God does not set members in the body that they may die out of it again ; he is the God, not of the dead, but of the living; and if such members are not in the body, they are without a Head, that is, without Jesus Christ, who is the only Head of the body. Can" the whole body" grow to the measure of the stature of a perfect man without including the growth of the entire Church of God? Then, again, there are the diversities of dispensations. Believers of every age, no matter under what dispensation they lived, are members of the Divine family. The way of salvation was always the same (Rom. iv.). The one Lamb of God who took away the sin of man was "slain from the foundation of the world" (Rev. viii. 8). The variety of dispensations marks the onward stages of the family life. Then, again, there are the diversities of opinion which have existed within the Church of God without destroying its unity; and endless diversities of character and temperament, all governed more or less by the subduing grace of God; and the dive1sities of lot, service, and event, illustrated in the career of the members of this family. IV. THE CHURCH 1B A FAMILY WITH A FINAL GATHERING AND A HOME FOR ALL rrs BEPABATED llDlUIEBS. There is a house of" many mansions," which our Saviou.. has gone before to prepare (John :xiv. 2)-" the holy places made without hands;" the grand metropolis of God's moral rule," whither the tribes go up, the tribes of the Lord," from every realm of earth, from every age of time. '!'here angels will minglo with saints, and interchange experiences of the love of God. 'l'he fatherhood of God is thus seen to connect different orders of beings by a new and loving tie. Happy family, whose names are written in heaven I Happy family, whose ranks are unbroken, whose hearts are one I Gathered home at last, to be for ever with th& Lord, and for ever with one anotherl-T. C.
Ver. 16.-..d prayer fqr apiritt.uJl alrength. Thie beautiful supplication suggests aeveral interesting points. I. IT IS A PRAYER FOR THE SAINTS. It is not for their conversion, but that they might have life still more abundantly. The apostle's desire was to make men emintnt Christians, to quicken them in the heavenly race, to promote in them a growth in grace and knowledge which would contribute to their spiritual robustness. II. THE BLESSING BOUGHT 1B REGARDED AB .A. FREE GIFT. "That he would grant you •.. to be strengthened." All true prayer proceeds upon the supposition that we can expect nothing from God but as a free gift through Jesus Obrist. There must be a aense of want along with a spirit of entire dependence on the Lord, so that the believer may realize the sweetness of the promise, "My God shall supply all your need according to hie riches in glory by Christ Jesus" (Phil. iv. 19). IIL Tu BLEBBDIG IS SPIRITUAL STBENGTH. "Strengthened with might ... in the THE EPISTLE TO 'l'HE EPHESIANS. [OB. m.1-21.