HOMILIES BY VARIOUS AUTHORS. Ver. 1.-" Follou:ers of God.''._ This is the high destiny of God's children. I. 'l'HE DUTY HERE COMMANDED. "Be ye imitators of me." It is to do (1) what Guel does ; (2) because be does it ; (3) as ho does it. The special point of imitation here is the duty of showing a for@:iving spirit to ono another. II. WIIY WE SHOULD IMI'l'ATII GoD. 1. Because we are his "dear children." Whom should children imitate but their father? Believers have had experience of their Father's wisdom, love, and power, and it is only an instinct of filial lovo to imitato such !l. Father. 2. Because we were originally made in ltis image (Gen. i. 2G), and though that image has been marred by sin, it is to bo renewctl in the process of I\ Christian experience (eh. iv. 23). 3. Holiness consists in the imitatim of God. "Ilccause it is written, Be ye holy, for I am holy " ( 1 Pet. i. IG). 4. Tho prospect ofperfect likeness to God in the day of our Lord's appearing. (1 John iii. 2.) III. MEANS TOWARDS THE FULFil.MENT OF THIB DUTY. 1. Pray without ceasing, especially for fuller measures of his grace, for larger disclosures of bis love, for o. deeper insight into his truth. 2. Live continually as being under his eye. (Ps. cxxxix. 6, 7.) 3. Consider how others have followed him. (1 Cor. xi. 1.)-'l'. C.
Ver, 2.-The walk of love. We are bound to love one anothor. THE EPISTLE 'l'O THE EPHESIANS. [oa. v. 1--33.
I. Tms WAS THE GREAT DUTY OF THE LAW. cc All the Law is fulfilled in one word even in this, Thou. shalt l~ve th_y n~ighbour as thyself" (Gal. v. ~4). "The end of the commandment 1s love (1 Tim. 1. 5). All our duty to our neighbour is summed up in love. Love supplies the motive-power to all right relations with our fellow-men. II. Tms WAS THE NEW OOMMANDMENT OF CHRIST. "A new commandment give I unto you, that ye love one another" ( John xiii.\34). The .love thus newly enjoined has ceruiin important characteristics. 1. It must be tl1e lot'tl of deeds, fl,Ot words. "Let us not love in word, neither in tongue, but in deed and in truth" (l John iii. 18). 2. It mu.st be ardent. "Above all things have fervent charity among yourselves" (1 Pet. iv. 7, 8). 3. It must be se/,f-sacriftci:ng. cc We ought also to lay down our lives for the brethren" (1 John iii. 16). 4. It oughJ, to be a love well guided and controlled. "This I l:':r~y, _that YO_?r love may abound yet more aud more in knowledge and all judgment" ~~nu. L 9)._ ~- It ought to be a constant love lilre that of (Jhrist. "Having loved ms O'l\"Il which were in the world, he loved them unto the end" (John xiii. 1). 6. It ougl.t fo be a decisire t£st as to our condition in God's sight. "He that loveth his brother abideth in the light, and there is none occasion of stumbling in him" (1 John ii. 10). "We know that we have passed from death unto life, because we love the brethren" (1 John iiL 14). 7. It must be a love recommended by the highest examples. "God is lo,e." " If God so loved us, we ought also to love one another." We are to •• walk in love, as Christ also loved us." "Let the same mind be in you which was. also in Christ Jesus" (Phil ii. 5).-T. C.
Ver. 2.-The pattern of (Jhristian love. "As Christ also hath loved us, and hath. given himself for us an offering and a sacrifice to God for a sweet-smelling savour." Jesus was an example of love in his life, for he went about every day doing good (Acts L 38). But it is to his suffering .of death that the apostle points us for •the most sublime and impressive illustration of his love. The words suggest many pregnant though~ . L WHO OFFERED Bll[SELF ? It was Christ, the only begotten Son of God. It was his own volnntary act. " Greater love hath no. man than this, that a man lay down his life for his friends" (John xv. 13). "Who loved me, and gave himself for me" (Gal. ii 20). It was love that prompted the gift of himself-eternal, infinite, free. IL WHAT DID HE OFFER? Himse!L Not the blood of ot-hers, much less the blood of bnlls and goats. It was the offering of the body of Christ (Heb. L 10). IlL Fo& "1!0ll? For us, while we were yet enemies (Rom. v. 10). Whether he died in oar stead or merely for o~ benefit is determined by the context, which represents him as giving himself" an offering and a sacrifice." This language marks the distinctly substitutionary character of Christ's death,just as he is himself described elsewhere as" a ransom for many." IV. To WHOM DID HE OFFER HIMSELF? To God. That is, with the design that God might accept the sacrifice. God had pleasure in the death and atonement of his Son. V. IN WHAT MANNER? "As an offering and a sacrifice." The term "offering" 2.pplies to _propitiatory sacrifices, as well as to free-will offerings (Heb. x. 18, 14). The additional word, "sacrifice," marks the clearly propitiatory character of his offering (Heh. vii. 27). VI. WITH WHAT RESULT? "For a sweet-smelling savour." This phrase is applied to propitiatory as well as to free-will offerings, as, for example, ~o the burnt offerings of Noah (Gen. viii. 21). The sacrifice of Christ was well-pleasrng to God, who could henceforth manifest his character" as jll6t, and the Justifier of him who believeth in Jesus." 'l'he whole passage teaches us: 1. The unsoundness of that theology which sees in the sufferin(J's of Christ, not a propitiatory sacrifice, but the love, faith, 3111d sub- mission of God's Son, as an example to man. This view is altogether one-sided. 2. 'Jhe unsounciness of that theology which sees in his sufferings a mere exhibition of lwe, without that element of righteousness which made these sufferings necessary. If lo,e alone could sa"re, why should he have suffered or died at all? It is the atoning 10,e, that is the element of consolation to man. 3. 'l'he unsoundness of that theology whid1 ~s the rt,aeeming power of Christ in his birth rather than in his death, as if the: event rJf Bethlehem were trawicendelitly more important than the event of OH. V, 1-33,] THE EPISTLE TO THE EPHESIANS. 217
Golgoth11. 4. That there is in Christ's love, not merely a force of argument or motive, but a very rule or measure, of the love which we ought to exercise toward each other in the bonds of the gospel.-T. C.