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Love is comfortable in its immediate feelings, and in its pacific influence. The Apostle says, "If there be any comfort of love, fulfil ye my joy, that ye be like minded." The pleasures of society spring from peace and love.

Love brings comfort to the soul, as it is an evidence of godly sincerity. "By this we know that we have passed from death to life, because we love the brethren."" By this shall mankind know that we are Christ's disciples, because we love one another.” “In this the children of God are manifest, and the children of the devil: Whosoever doth not righteousness is not of God, neither he that loveth not his brother." "Let us love, not in word and in tongue, but in deed and in truth-hereby we know that we are of the truth, and shall assure our hearts before God."

If we would enjoy the comfort, we must maintain the temper of religion. To look for religious comfort in any other way, is contrary to the design of the gospel. And comfort that comes in any other way, is delusive any transient. The joy of the hypocrite is but for a moment.

Peace and love come from God. They are the fruits of his Spirit. While we attend to the precepts and doctrines of the gospel for instruction in, and excitement to our duty, we must pray for the work of the divine Spirit in our souls, to form them more and more to the temper of peace and love, and thus to fill them with hope and joy.

The wisdom, which is pure, peaceable, gentle, easy to be entreated, full of mercy and good fruits, is wisdom from above. If we lack wisdom, let us ask it of God, who giveth liberally and upbraideth not; remembering, that every good gift, and every perfect gift cometh down from above, from the Father of lights, with whom is no variableness, nor shadow of turning.

If we of his good will have been begotten by the word of truth, it is that we may be a kind of firstfruits of his creatures. Let us therefore be swift to hear, slow to speak, slow to wrath; for the wrath of man worketh not the righteousness of God. And let us lay apart all filthiness and superfluity of naughtiness, and receive with meekness the ingrafted word, which is able to save our souls.

Thus may peace and love with faith be multiplied to us, from God the Father and the Lord Jesus Christ. -Amen.

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SERMON L.

Sincere Love to Christ.

EPHESIANS vi. 24.

Grace be with all them that love our Lord Jesus Christ in sincerity.

ST. PAUL, though a man of liberal education, seems not to have been expert in writing the Greek characters; for which reason he usually employed an amanuensis. He speaks of it as something extraordinary for him to write, with his own hand, a letter so large as that to the Galatians. But though he usually dictated his letters to a Scribe, yet he always took care to subjoin to them, with his own hand, a form of salutation, by which the genuineness of them was ascertained. His second epistle to the Thessalonians he thus concludes, "The salutation of Paul, with mine own hand," a hand well known, or easy to be known by comparing it with his other writings, "which is the token in every letter so I write: The grace of our Lord Jesus Christ be with you." When this salutation, in Paul's hand, was seen at the close of an epistle, it was known that the epistle was from him.

As Paul, so doubtless the other sacred writers, took immediate care to prove their works to be genuine, and to prevent spurious writings from being palmed on

the churches under their names. Hence we may conclude, that the churches from the beginning, had sufficient evidence, that the sacred books were written by the men, whose names they bear.

The books of the New Testament appear to have been written in the time when their reputed authors lived. They were at that time publicly known and received as the genuine works of those men. They were acknowledged as such in the next age, both by friends and enemies. They have been conveyed to us by an uninterrupted series of vouchers. They must therefore be regarded as the genuine works of the men, to whom they are ascribed.

This signature, which Paul affixes to his epistles, speaks the goodness and benevolence of his heart. "The love of Christ be with you all." But while he wishes to all the grace of Christ for their eternal salvation, he reminds them, that in order to obtain this grace, they must love the author of it in sincerity. "If any man love not our Lord Jesus Christ, he will be accursed when the Lord shall come."

Our text leads us to consider, in what respects Christ is an object of our love-what it is to love him in sincerity-how a sincere love to Christ will discover itself and the benediction connected with this love.

I. We will consider on what accounts Christ is entitled to our love.

Love, which is the inclination and attachment of the soul toward an object, supposes an apprehension of something which is good and excellent in that object.

Jesus Christ once dwelt on earth, and there were those who saw him and beheld his glory. But he is now gone to the invisible world, and we behold him only by faith: And the ground of our faith is the exhibition made of him in the gospel.

Christ is a divine person. The scripture calls him "the true God;" ascribes to him divine perfections and works, and pays him religious honors. Love to

him, in this view of him, is the same as love to God; for, in respect of his divine nature, "He and the Father are one."

The gospel teaches us, that "God was manifest in the flesh"-that "the word was made flesh, and dwelt with men"-that "in Christ dwelt the fullness of the godhead bodily." In the man Christ Jesus, appeared every virtuous quality which can dignify and adorn human nature. Benevolence, humility, condescension, patience, resignation, fortitude, contempt of the world and a heavenly conversation, were conspicuous in his character. In this view he is an object worthy of our love And love, regarding him in this character, is the same as love to our fellow Christians, only with the difference resulting from the want of that perfection in them, which we contemplate in him.

The Apostle says, "No man hath seen God at any time; the only begotten Son, who is in the bosom of the Father, hath declared him." As God is a Spirit invisible to the eye of sense, we can have no direct view of him: But in Jesus Christ, who became man, the divine character is rendered visible. An immediate display of the glory of God would overpower our feeble nature: In Christ the glory of God shines upon us in a soft and gentle light, being kindly mitigated in passing through the veil of his flesh. He is "the mighty God:" But as he appears in human flesh, the terrors of divinity are prevented. He, as God, is full of power and justice; but, as man, he can be touched with the feeling of our infirmities. As God, he is infinitely above us; but as man, he is familiar to us. The bright beams of divine glory, thus blended with the softer rays of human virtue, exhibit to our view an object of peculiar amiableness and delight.

Farther: Christ's mediatorial offices entitle him to our love.

A sense of our wants adds worth to an object suited to relieve them. An apprehension of our guilty and

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