grounded in love. And this, we are taught here, is only possible by our believing in Christ. For lovo is in Christ, as Christ in us. As believing, then, is rooting and grounding ourselves in Christ, so it must mean rooting and grounding in love-gettir,::; down into the eternal substratum of all being. And we ask for supplies of the Divine strength that, through a vigorous faith, this rooting and grounding in love may go forward in our life. Fourth petition-" May be strong to a'f>PTehend with all the saints what is the breadth, and length, and height, and depth, and to MllYIJJ the love of Christ which passeth knowledge." The rooting and grounding in love is our qualificatwn for apprehending its greatest manifestation. Cold hearts can do nothing here. The apostle's own heart is in such a glow that the love of Christ rises before him as though it were a body in space having dimensions of breadth, and length, and height, and depth. We are not to suppose that he was so mathematical as to associate different ideas with these dimensions. The use that they serve is to fix and detain the mind over the magnitude of the love of Christ. The magnitude of the love of Christ appears in two things. 1. It is bestowed on the undeserving. How was it possible for Christ to love us? It was not that there was any goodness in us with which he could have sympathy. For we were the opposite of what he was. As described in this Epistle, we walked according to the course of this world ; we lived in the lusts of our flesh, doing the desires of the flesh and of the mind. It was not that be underrated what we were; for he saw our depravity in all its breadth, and length, and height, and depth. It can only be stated as n great inexplicable fact that, in the full view of what we were, he was i1Tesistibly drawn toward us in saving love. 2. It is bestowed in the sacrifice of himself. In order to gratify his love in our salvation, he had not only to lay aside his Divine glory, but to come down into our nature, and, in that nature, to suffer shame and death. It is no ordinary love that is needed to impel one to sacrifice his life for another. "Skin for skin," said the arch-deceiver, "yea, all that a man hath will he give for his life." " Love,'' said the Spouse to her Beloved, " love is strong as death, many waters cannot quench love, neither can the floods drown it; though a man would give all the substance of his house for love, it would utterly be contemned." And Christ falsified the base insinuation of his adversary, and verified the loving declaration of his Spouse. His love was proved stronger than death, though that death was ten thousand deaths in one, in having in it the curse of the broken Law. This is the love of our Beloved; and say not then any more, " What is thy Beloved more than any other beloved?" " For fainter the.n the pale star's ray Before the noontide blaze of day . Is all of love the.t man can know,- A.11 that in angel bree.st can glow,- Oompa.r'd, 0 blessed Lord, with thine, Eternal, infinite, Divine." We are t.o seek to apprehend with all the saints the magnitude of this love. For this is saintship, according to the apostle, to have the mind opened to s;:,me sense of its magnitude, and we must not make it narrower than that. We are to seek to" appre- hend," along with others, the dimensions of this love; but we are also to seek to know it by ourselves, that is to say, to have it in our own experience. \Ve can have a certain "apprehension" of its infinitude; but our experimental knowledge of it is necessarily finite. The reality, being infinite, always passcth our knowledge. But we are to ask of God, that, being rooted and grounded in love, we may know more of this wondrrful love of Christ. Fifth petition-" That ye may be filled unto all thefulness of God." The apostle here indicates the goal toward which we are to be blessed. We have now some of the fulness of God. Through the agency of the Spirit, we have poured into us out of the Divine fulnrss, strength, light, purity, love, peace, joy; and these in us are the same in kind that they are in God. We look forward to the time when we shall ho filled out of this fountain even up to our capacity. Meantime we would have more of the knowledge of Christ's love, which umeal., the fountain of the Divine fulness.-R. F.
Vers. 20, 21.-Doa:ology. I. How GoD IS GLORIFIED. "Now unto him that is able to do exceeding abundantly above all that we ask or think, accordinr to the power 13-1 THE EPISTLE '.l'O THE EPHESIANS. [CB. III. l,-21.