hand."

When Christ himself assumed the functions of the ministry, He commenced His preaching in the very same terms: Repent ye, for the kingdom of heaven is at hand." At a subsequent period, when he commissioned his disciples to preach in Judea, his charge to them was in a strain precisely similar: "Go ye and preach, saying the kingdom of heaven is at hand." To the individual confession of St. Peter our Lord responds, by the promise not that every soul making that confession shall be saved, but with a far wider scope, that upon this rock He will build his church. The same kingdom of heaven is the principal and nearly uniform antitype of His parables. When after the Resurrection He abode forty days with His disciples, and prepared them for their high office of propagating the Gospel and governing the Church, His speaking was of the things pertaining to the kingdom of God. Why is it then that we deem this kingdom of heaven" so secondary a representation of our religious life, while in the teaching of our Redeemer it is so prominent ?||

66

23. There is indeed another passage of Scripture where our Saviour says, "The kingdom of God cometh not with observation; neither shall they say Lo here! or Lo there! for behold, the kingdom of God is within you:" and which might at first sight seem to indicate a different idea from that of the pub

lic, universal, visible Church. But in truth there is no opposition. The Pharisees demanded of our Lord when the kingdom of God should come. He shows in His reply that the access of the religious system so represented as a kingdom to the individual, is, in the first instance, by means of an internal work; without which no man may enter therein. It is when the principle, by virtue of which we become obedient subjects of the kingdom of God, is already born within us, that the corresponding outward development is required. And if this text were to receive an interpretation adverse to the doctrine of the visible Church at all, it would be likewise and equally adverse to all visible forms of the kingdom of God, in individuals and voluntary associations, as well as in the Church, which is evidently out of the question.

*

24. The commencement of the Lord's Prayer affords another striking instance of this principle. Connecting it with the directions immediately preceding it, (“but thou, when thou prayest, enter into thy closet," &c.) we must, of course, regard it as intended not alone for joint, but also, and that too primarily, for private devotion; and yet the address is, My," but " Our" Father. We are taught to call upon Him in this solemn and endearing exordium, not under the view of His personal love to each one of us, but in virtue of that bond of grace wherein we are all embraced. We may also remark by the

not

way

*Rothe, Anfänge, i. 2.

how faithfully this unselfish character (for how easy it is to become selfish even in our prayers, and how wisely therefore does the Apostle St. Paul also* guard us against it by supplying directions in detail for our intercessory petitions) has been transfused into the tone and phraseology of the Christian Liturgies.

25. On this principle surely it was that our Lord in determining the form of that grand rite, which was to remain as an everlasting token among his disciples, and to convey to them the grace that should feed their spiritual existence, made choice of a supper, which is in its nature social, as the occasion of its institution. That grace might have been given through another medium; or the soul of one man might have received it independently of the souls of others; why then was a mode chosen which required the presence and participation of several? May we not answer, it was probably, in part at least, from the design of our Saviour to imprint strongly upon us our character as portions of a whole, that whole being the Church? Does not His solemn promise to hear the prayer of two or three point distinctly to the same end? Why of two or three? The prayer of one righteous man availeth much. It is not bare numerical multiplication which can give weight to our petitions. No; but Jesus Christ it seems has willed, that creatures, whose joys and sorrows, whose hopes and fears are the same, who are involved in a common ruin and are heirs of a

* 1 Tim. ii. 1, 2.

common recovery, should

pray too with that unity of voice which belongs to their unity of spiritual existence and relationship to him.

26. It may next be observed that to the Church in general the promises of victory over the gates of hell,* and of the Lord's perpetual presence with her governors, belong. So St. Paul writes to the community of the Corinthians, which seems to have comprised offenders of almost every class, "who also shall confirm you unto the end, that ye may be blameless in the day of our Lord Jesus Christ." And to that of the Philippians, "being confident of this very thing, that He which hath begun a good work in you, will perform it until the day of Jesus Christ." It is very instructive to compare the unqualified tone of these declarations respecting the blessedness of the Christian community, with the not faint nor desponding but yet more guarded terms in which St. Paul|| writes of the salvation of an individual, although that individual was one so eminent for gifts and graces as himself.

27. The Church is the body of Christ, ¶ for He is one body, having many members; into which we are all baptized by one spirit. And we " are the body of Christ, and members in particular.”** Christ is "the head of the Church," "the Saviour of the body;" the spouse of the Church. And she is " the

bride, the Lamb's wife,"* that longs for his coming. Again: "the bread, which we break, is it not the communion of the body of Christ; for we being many are one bread, and one body." The house of God is "the Church of the living God, the pillar and ground of the truth." He that will not hear her voice in her discipline is to be regarded as an heathen man and a publican.§ And, finally, when her warfare is accomplished, the Redeemer will present her to His Father a glorious Church, holy and without blemish.||

28. And this Church is called to unity; as the coat of the Lord was woven throughout without seam from top to bottom, even so " there shall be one fold and one shepherd."¶ "For," says St. Paul, "I beseech you, brethren, by the name of our Lord Jesus Christ, that ye all speak the same thing, and that there be no divisions among you.' ""** And divisions were, according to the mind of this great Apostle, a sign of carnality; but is it not true that according to the mind of modern religion, an absolute indifference to them is too often regarded as a sign of spirituality? "For are yet carnal; for whereas there is among you envying, and strife, and divisions, are ye not carnal?"†† And it is obvious, that it was not merely an inward unison or concord which was contemplated by Him, for this reason as well as others, because such is not the natural signification of the terms used to denote

tt 1 Cor. iii. 3.

ye

1 Tim. iii. 15.

** 1 Cor. i. 10.

§ Matt. xviii. 17. || Eph. v. 27. ¶ Job. x. 16.