Father that sacrifice of himself which he perfected upon the Cross, for the sins of the whole world? What if he be for ever sighing over every sin, every sorrow, every cruelty, every injustice, over all things, great and small, which go wrong throughout the whole world; and saying for ever Father, this is not according to thy will. Let thy will be done on earth, as in heaven.' And what, if he does not look up in vain, nor sigh in vain? What if the will of God the Father be, that sin and sorrow, disease and death, being contrary to his will and law, should be at last rooted out of this world, and all worlds for ever? What if Christ have authority and commission from God to fight against all evil, sin, disease, and death, and all the ills which flesh is heir to; and to teach men to fight them likewise, till they conquer them by his might, and by his light? What if he reigns, and will reign, till he has put all enemies under his feet, and he has delivered up the kingdom to God, even the Father, that God may be all in all? What if the day shall come, when all the nations of the earth shall thus see Christ's good works, and glorify his Father and their Father who is in heaven? and by obeying the Law of their being, and the commandment of God, which is life eternal, shall live for ever in that glory, of which it is written, that a river of water of life shall proceed out of the throne of God and of the Lamb; and the leaves of the trees which grow thereby shall be for the healing of the nations; and there shall be no more curse, but the throne of God and of the the Lamb shall be in the city of God, and his servants shall serve him; and the Lord God shall give them light; and they shall reign for ever and ever. : What those words mean I know not, and hardly dare to think but as long as those words stand in the Bible, we will have hope. For God the Father, who willeth that none should perish, and Jesus the only-begotten Son, who sighed over the poor man's infirmity in Judea, are the same yesterday, to-day, and for ever. SERMON XXVI. THE WOMAN OF SAMARIA. (Twelfth Sunday after Trinity, 1856.) 2 KINGS Xviii. 9—12. And it came to pass in the fourth year of King Hezekiah, which was the seventh year of Hoshea son of Elah king of Israel, that Shalmaneser, king of Assyria, came up against Samaria, and besieged it. And at the end of three years they took it: even in the sixth year of Hezekiah, that is the ninth year of Hoshea king of Israel, Samaria was taken. And the king of Assyria did carry away Israel unto Assyria, and put them in Halah and in Habor by the river of Gozon, and in the cities of the Medes because they obeyed not the voice of the Lord their God, but transgressed his covenant, and all that Moses the servant of the Lord commanded, and would not hear them, nor do them. THESE HESE are very simple words: but they are awful words enough. Awful enough to the poor creatures of whom they speak. You here, most of you, can hardly guess all that these words mean. You may thank God that you do not. That you do not know the horrors of war, and the misery of a conquered country, in old times. To lose all they had ever earned; all that makes life worth having. To have their homes burnt over their heads, their crops carried off their fields. To see their women dishonoured, their old men and children murdered-to be insulted, beaten, and tortured to make them tell where their money was hidden; and after they and theirs. had suffered every unspeakable shame and misery from the hands of brutal enemies, to be stripped, bound, and marched away, for hundreds of miles across the deserts, into the cold and dreary mountains of the north of Assyria, there to live and die as slaves, and never again to see their native land. And such a land as it was, and is still or rather might be still, if there were men in it worthy the name of men. For of all countries in the world, that land of Israel is one of the most rich and beautiful. The climate and the soil there is such, that two crops can often be grown in the year, of almost any kind which man may need; there are rich valleys well watered, where not only wheat and every grain-crop, but the olive, and the fig, and the vine, flourish in perfection; rich park-like uplands, where sheep and cattle without number may find pasture; great forests of timber, fit for every use; and all kept cool and fruitful, even beneath that burning eastern sun, by the clear streams which flow for ever down from Hermon, the great snow-mountain ten thousand feet high, which overlooks that pleasant land. There is hardly, travellers say, a lovelier or richer country upon earth, than the land of Israel, from Hebron on the south to Hermon on the north; nor a country which might have been stronger, and safer, and more prosperous, if these Jews had been but wise. It is, so to speak, one great castle, rising most of it two thousand feet high, and walled in by God a way as is seen hardly in any other land. On the west lies the sea; on the south and on the east vast wildernesses of sandy desert; and on the north, the mighty mountains of Hermon and Lebanon, which no invading army could have crossed, if the Jews had had courage to keep them out. And that, the noble and divine Law of Moses would have given them. It would have made them one free, brave, God-fearing people, at unity with itself; and the promise of Moses would have been fulfilled-that one of them should chase a thousand, and no man or nation be able to stand against them. In David's time, and in Solomon's time also, that promise came true; and that small people of the Jews became a very powerful nation, respected and feared by all the kingdoms round. But when they fell into idolatry, and forsook the true God, and his law: all was changed. Idolatry |