Now, this act of the judge does not make the accused innocent, it merely declares him innocent in the sight of the law, and consequently justice has no claim to punish him. It is in this sense St. Paul employs the word justifies, both here, and in his Epistle to the Romans. But when it is used in connection with the fact of God's declaring the sinner to be innocent, it must be understood to comprehend something more extensive and noble than it does in the declaration of a judicial court. In this forensic sense of the term, it is obvious that no human being can be justified by the law, or before the throne of God. For as all mankind have disobeyed this law, it is clear that He whose judgment is invariably according to truth must declare them guilty. Still the Scriptures abundantly teach us that what the law could not do, in that it was weak through the flesh, “God, sending his own Son in the likeness of sinful flesh," and making Him a sin-offering for man, has, by thus condemning sin in the flesh, accomplished for multitudes of our sinful race.

Sin,

The justification of a sinner under the Gospel consists in the three following things; 1. The pardon of sin; 2. An acquittal from punishment; and 3. A title to the rewards and blessings due by law only to perfect obedience. until it is pardoned, is still charged to the sinner's account. Hence he is in this position exposed to the punishment which his sin has deserved; but Christ, by taking the load of our sins upon His own shoulder; by being "smitten of God and afflicted;" by being "wounded for our transgressions;" by being "bruised for our iniquities;" and taking "the chastisement of our peace" upon himself, rendered it perfectly consistent for God to be honourably just, and still the justifier of the guilty. By Divine justice having expended the force of its fury upon the Son of God, as the sinner's surety, the sinner himself can be pardoned; can be released from the deserved penalty of his transgression; and can be declared as perfectly innocent in the court of heaven, as if he had never sinned.

God does even more than this for the justified; He gives

him a claim to the rewards and blessings which only perfectly innocent beings could be entitled to. This is not absolutely necessary to complete the act of justification; the sinner might have been pardoned, and acquitted from the punishment due to his sins, and yet not be rendered the subject of future blessings, much less the blessings promised in the covenant of redemption. He might be annihilated. He might be placed in a state of happiness, imperfect and mixed like that of the present life; or he might be placed in a place of happiness unmixed and perfect, yet greatly inferior to that which shall be enjoyed by the penitent throng of Adam's race. God gives them a title to all that Deity can bestow upon a finite subject; to all that is necessary to constitute everlasting happiness, and honour, and glory, and enjoyment.

We come to consider

II. The inefficiency of legal works to effect the sinner's justification. "For by the works of the law shall no flesh be justified." By the law here is intended either the moral law, or the whole law given by Moses. You may take the one or the other, or both, for by the works of either law none can possibly be justified. If you ask, why? It is because no man since the fall of Adam (except the man Christ Jesus) has ever, or will ever in our imperfect state, pay the obedience required by the Divine law. No remittent imperfect obedience will satisfy the law of God. It must be perfect obedience throughout the whole course of one's existence. Were a man of 80 years to live 79 years, 11 months, 30 days, 23 hours, and 59 minutes in perfect obedience, and fail the last minute, or any minute of his life, the whole would be forfeited, and go for nothing; it would not weigh a single grain in the scale of his justification.

In the whole records of sacred and profane history, where can you fix upon a man who lived a perfectly holy, unblemished, and obedient life throughout the whole course of his existence in the world? Noah, of whom we read in our first lesson, is said to have been "a just man and

perfect in his generation." He "walked with God," and "found grace in the eyes of the Lord." Still he was not of an unblemished moral character. Abraham was distinguished from all the men of the earth, and was honoured with the name of the "father of the faithful;" but imperfection marked his steps. Moses was truly a "man of God," and was "faithful in all his house as a servant;" but Moses was not perfect, neither was Samuel, nor David, nor Elijah, nor any of the prophets, nor even the apostles of the Lord. They were all the best of men, but none of them were perfectly good men, inasmuch as no mau can render that perfect obedience which the law requires; "by the works of the law shall no flesh be justified." No moral act or religious performance, however great in magnitude; however brilliant in nature; however imposing in appearance, can merit the sinner's justification in the sight of God. Still, the sinner is not to be passive in his justification; there are exercises required from him; he must perform works without which he can never be justified.

This brings us to consider

III. The means divinely appointed on man's part for his own justification. "That we might be justified by the faith of Jesus Christ." Then faith on the part of the sinner is God's plan of his justification. Not that faith in itse'f contains anything meritorious, but it is a condition prescribed, upon the exercise of which God has graciously engaged 'o pardon, and to release from the punishment of sin. Faith is the hinge on which the whole Evangelical system turns. "If ye believe not," said our Saviour, "that I am he, ye shall die in your sins." "He that believeth on the Son, hath everlasting life; and he that believeth not, shall not se life." All the future interests of man are suspended upon this nail, "justified by the faith of Jesus Christ." I understand the Apostle to mean, that the mind is brought to place simple and implicit reliance on the work, the suffer. ing, and death of Christ, as the only meritorious ground of

By this

acceptance with God, and thus it feels that as the Saviour suffered the penalty due for man's transgression in the capacity of the transgressor's surety, God can be just and at the same time the "Justifier of him who believeth in Jesus." Faith is confidence; it is trust; it is a full belief that the Son of God has done all for us that was necessary to meet the demands of Divine justice, and that those demands being met, the curse of the law is for ever removed from us, although hell-deserving sinners.

You may ask, why is faith regarded by the Almighty as sufficiently virtuous for justification? I answer, beause it is a voluntary act of obedience to the command of God. Take away the volition from the act, and it ceases to contain such virtue. Faith in all instances is a voluntary conformity to truth, and the mind becomes convinced of the truth of any statement by examining the evidences respecting the statement. "Faith cometh by hearing, and hearing by the word of God." God does not compel us to believe on the name of His Son. He commands us to do so, and He places the evidences of His allsufficiency to save us at our disposal; then He leaves us to decide for ourselves. We may believe, or disbelieve; accept or reject, according to the inclinations of our own minds. God has endowed us with power of action in this case, He does not require from man what he is not both physically and morally able to perform. Therefore He requires faith in Jesus Christ as the voluntary condition of our justification. Faith is only the medium of our access to God. Reject this, and you are lost; embrace the condition— obey the command, and you are saved for ever. "He that believeth on the Son hath everlasting life, but he that believeth not the Son hath not life, but the wrath of God abideth on him."

67

The Fourth Sunday after Trinity.

MORNING SERVICE.-Second Lesson: Matthew iii.

Verse 11.-" I indeed baptize you with water unto repentance; but he that cometh after me is mightier than I, whose shoes I am not worthy to bear: he shall baptize you with the Holy Ghost, and with fire."

JOHN THE BAPTIST was the harbinger or forerunner of the Lord Jesus Christ. He was the "voice crying in the wilderness, Prepare ye the way of the Lord, make His paths straight." One of the Christian fathers called him "All voice,"-a voice in his habit-a voice in his diet-a voice in his whole conversation. His example was to teach others the lessons of self-denial, earnestness, and perseverance. The Papists very groundlessly regard the fact of John living in the wilderness as a precedent for their order of hermits. He was in the wilderness for a very different purpose from theirs. He was not there as a recluse, buried alive and doing nothing, but he was devoting his time in preaching and crying to others, whilst his auditors flocked around him from "Jerusalem, and from all Judea, and from all the region round about Jordan." His voice emptied the towns and populated the desert, indicative of the future effect of the Gospel making the wilderness and the solitary places to be glad, and to blossom as the rose. The Baptist treated all persons who attended his ministry, with a candour and openness, with a boldness and faithfulness peculiar to himself and his great prototype Elijah, so that he is justly said to go before Christ in the spirit and power of Elijah, that is, he evinced that same fearless disposition in the discharge of his office among the Jews of all classes as did Elijah when he faced the idolatrous Israelites in the days of Ahab. When the hypocritical Pharisees and the