THE HUMILITY. JOHN xiii. 12-17. HE verses which precede these, from 6th to 11th, contain the incidental teaching of Jesus concerning the washing of the feet, and of the whole body. These teachings, though pre-arranged of God, were incidentally brought out by Peter's words, "Lord, dost thou wash my feet?" Much of the teaching of our Lord has this incidental character. For, as His ear was always open to hear, so His Father's teachings and words were by the Spirit always coming fresh to him. -Is., 1. 4. But, the teaching in verses 12-17 is the direct teaching of the passage-that which He had Himself guided, and which he had washed the disciples' feet, that He might teach them. As He says, "Know ye what I have done to you? If I, then your Lord and Master, have washed your feet, ye also ought to wash one another's feet". The washing of the feet literally was there often a much-needed thing, for it was a hot climate, and they walked in sandals. It was an act of hospitality (Luke vii. 44), and it was performed by a menial with a basin of water and a towel. And Jesus says, "If I, then, your Lord and Master, have so acted, ye also ought to act thus one to another". In His kingdom the rules are different from those of all other kingdoms: so much so, that trying to exalt one's self is only going down in His sight, and going down into the low place is really going up in His sight. "O Lord, open thou mine eyes." See Matthew xviii. 4; xx. 20-28. As going up is a great thing in the world, so coming down is a great thing in the Church. The coming down of Emmanuel can only be measured by God. It was infinite. Phil. ii. 5-8. The highest point was equality with God. The lowest the cross. If I want to be like Jesus, I must come down. When a Christian forgets what he was, yea, what he is as regards his flesh, and becomes conceited and proud, he is only like a beggar on horseback, or a man walking on stilts, uncomfortable and unsafe; and when he falls into sin, as he is pretty sure to do, he cannot rise till he takes off his stilts. If Jesus, their Lord and Teacher, washed their feet, they surely ought to wash one another's feet: and the instruction to us evidently is that we are called to be the servants to each other; that we are responsible to the Lord that our words and ways should be such as to help, and not to hinder, our fellow-Christians-in holiness and love, esteeming them better than ourselves; taking our place at their feet; seeking to raise them up if fallen; to urge them on to glory, and to help them onward through this dark and dirty world. There is in the Word sometimes a general address to all who read or hear it; there is also a particular application of it to us individually by the Holy Spirit. Then it is quick and powerful. It is said of the Apostle Paul, when the Lord spake to him as he went to Damascus, that the men who went with him heard a voice, but saw no man. It is also said, "They heard not the voice of Him that spake to me". Acts, ix. 7; xxii. 9. If we want power to follow Jesus, we must hear Him speaking in our hearts; the word must come to us individually. If I am rich, if all things are mine in Christ, then surely I should help my poor brother. If the Lord bears my burdens, then I should bear my brother's burden. Gal. vi. 2. If the Lord lifts up my weak hands, then I should also lift up my brother's weak hands. Is. xxxv. 3. As Jesus surrendered all for me, and sought always to please the Father and serve His disciples, so we should seek always to please Him who served us well at Calvary, and still is, although our Lord, our servant in Heaven (Heb. iv. 14-16; Rom. viii. 34), and should serve his people on earth. Oh, what an honour to be the lowest shoeblack or charwoman for God's kings and priests! And really the teaching of Jesus means this. If ye love me, do this for me. But, blessed Master, no one does this now! And if I begin to act so, all will stare at me: and, Lord look at William, and John, and Mary, they do not act thus ; and what shall they do, Lord? "Follow thou Me!' Has the word come really to you? Then act on it. Oh, let us be greatly afraid of becoming big talkers and low walkers, destitute of practical love-which is the only love Jesus acknowledges. Ah, what is the use of big talk and low walk but to grieve the Holy Spirit, hinder God's children, and be stumbling blocks to the world. We should covet and seek knowledge. Some one has said that heat without light is like the fire of hell. But right knowledge is light, and leads to Jesus. John, v. 39; 2 Peter, ifi. 18. Without that I had rather be as ignorant as the poor boy who had just trusted in Jesus, and being asked, why he loved Jesus, put his head down on the table and wept, and said, "Coz they killed Him". Neither must knowledge end in feelings and emotions; for Jesus said, "If a man love Me, he will keep My words," John xiv. 23. Yes, He died for us to redeem us from all iniquity, and to purify unto Himself a peculiar people, zealous of good works; but self-righteous works are bad works. Besides, brother, you are not greater than your Lord. The servant is not greater than his master. And if you do not get into this place of lowly love and service, then you are taking a place higher than your Lord. Oh, think of that! A proud servant of a lowly Master and Lord! Worshipping Jesus as our Lord, and then taking a place above him! Is there any one whose heart burns thus to imitate Jesus? See, here is a word for you especially. If ye know these things happy are ye if ye do them. Oh, cry to God for grace to act thus, and he will fulfil the promise in your heart, and fill you with the finest of the wheat. Truly your fellowship shall be with the Father, and with His Son Jesus Christ. Waiting for Jesus, you shall return and come to Zion with songs. Dear Brethren, it actually is the Lord's will that we should, each of us, be found taking the lowest place, and if we knew our own sin and shame, and daily, hourly needs, and our obligations to Him, we shall find ourselves in it. But it is also His will that we should imitate Him in lowly, loving service to His members. It is, indeed. This thing has vanished almost from the world, yet still it is His will. He knocks by His word. (Rev. iii. 20.) When the Word comes home to the heart, that is a double knock. When it is accompanied with warning that is a danger signal. (Rev. ii. 5; iii. 15-19.) In Eli's case, the Lord at last gave such an awful ring in his heart that he never spoke again. Brethren, brethren, we are in a drowsy world. Let us awake to righteousness, for the coming of the Lord. draweth nigh. Oh, let us be real! It cannot be denied that Christians around us rightly look for a marked unworldliness in those who boast in high truth, and profess great love for Christ. Do they find it? Let those who tamper with a crucified world (Gal. iv.) beware? The only thing that can save the wondrous truth we hold from being despised and trodden under foot is, that the witnesses to it should be manifestly "not of the world" even as Christ. It is alike painful and needless to call attention to the displays of dress, etc., at many of our meetings. They are but straws that indicate the direction of the wind, and sad as it is to see the fashion of the world at the table of the Lord, it is but an index to a still sadder state of heart that can thus betray its Master. To be occupied with evil is, however, no way of correcting it. Occupation with and devotion to Christ can alone produce true unworldliness of heart; otherwise one evil is only replaced by another, and a self-satisfaction dwells securely beneath an austere demeanour and a serge dress that is equally as contrary to the Spirit of Christ as a display of silk and satin. If Christ be the motive, all will be right, but self is as far from Him as the world. He wants neither convents nor monasteries, but widowed hearts that mourn an absent Lord, and who are kept from the danger of the most attractive scenes, and from the love of the world or the things that are in it, by the ever-present thought, "He is not here." “A FAITH. BELIEVING mind is the happy mind, and it is the obedient mind also, and the God glorifying mind. It is the thankful and the worshipping mind; the mind too that keeps the saint the most in readiness for service, and in separation from pollutions. We may be watchful and it is right; we may be selfjudging and it is right; we may be careful to observe the rule of righteousness in all that we do, and it is right; but withal to hold the heart up in the light of the favour of God, by the exercise of a simple childlike believing mind, this is what glorifies Him, this is what answers His grace, this is what above all proves itself grateful to Him with Whom we have to do. 'We have access by faith into this grace wherein we stand'. It is not attainment, it is not services or duties which entitle us to take that journey that gives the soul entrance into that wealthy place of the divine favour. 'By FAITH we have access into this grace wherein we stand.'"-An Extract. WORSHIP. JOHN xii. 1-11.-EXTRACT. 10 sit at His feet and hear His word (Luke x. 39) its proper place. She came not to make her requests known to Him; though the time was, when, in deepest submission to His will, she had fallen at His feet, saying, "Lord, if thou hadst been here, my brother had not died" (John xi. 32). To pour out her supplications to Him, as her only resource, was not now her thought, for her brother was seated at the table. She came not to meet the saints, though precious saints were there, for it says, "Jesus loved Martha, and her sister, and Lazarus" (John xi. 5.) Fellowship with them was blessed likewise, and, doubtless, of frequent occurence; but fellowship was not her object now. She came, not after the weariness and toil of a week's battling with the world to be refreshed from Him, though, surely she, like every saint, had learnt the trials of the wilderness; and none more than she, probably, knew the blessed springs of refreshment that were in Him. But she came, and that, too, at the moment when the world was expressing its deepest hatred of Him, to pour out what she long had treasured up (v. 7) that which was most valuable to her, all she had upon earth, upon the One whose love had made her heart captive, and absorbed her affections. She thought not of Simon the leper-she passed the disciples by-her brother and her sister in the flesh and in the Lord engaged not her attention then-"Jesus only" filled her soul-her eye was on Him-her heart beat true to Him-her hands and feet were subservient to her eye and to her heart, as she "anointed the feet of Jesus, and wiped His feet with her hair ". Adoration, homage, worship, blessing, was her one thought, and that in honour of the One who was "all in all" to her; and surely such worship was most refreshing to Him. The unspiritual (v. 4) might murmur, but He upheld her cause, and showed how He could appreciate and value the grateful tribute of a heart that knew His worth and preciousness, and could not be silent as to it. A lasting record is preserved of what worship really is by the One who accepted it, and of the one who rendered it. And now, dear reader, is this your mode of worship, or do you on the Lord's day go to hear a sermon, say your prayers, meet the saints, or be refreshed after your six days toil? Oh! if every eye were on the Lord THE LOVE OF JESUS TO A SICK ONE. "HOW full of pain that aching brow, But I the Lord am near thee now; I know thy wish, I note thy tears; This wish-Thy will be done in me.'” PRAYER. HAST thou within a care so deep It chases from thine eyelids sleep, Hast thou a hope with which thy heart E that uttereth a slander is a fool." So once the Spirit of truth spoke by the pen of Solomon, and yet how many in our day use their redeemed lips freely in the service of Satan, yielding to him as a scourge" (Job v. 21) that which God has chosen to be as 66 Low But all this flows from something within. thoughts of His love to His saints, and little fellowship with Him in it. Not grasping in our measure the sympathies that make every wound in the members as a two-edged sword to Him, not comprehending the grace that could speak of His disciples in His hour of deepest need, as sleeping for sorrow; and again, They believed not for joy". He meant us in our words and ways to "adorn the doctrine". Ah! how have we misrepresented it to the world? 66 But is there no remedy Only one. To get our empty vessels filled again from the living Fountain on the Throne, that in fellowship with Him we may speak of those whom He has purchased with His own blood, remembering how once for us His blessed lips drained the cup of wrath and suffering, that the lips to which He has brought the cup of blessing might drop as an honeycomb" to His praise. (Can. iv. 11.) A. E. W. "choice silver" (Prov. x. 21) in its purity; as 'honey and milk" (Can. iv. 11) for sweetness and sustenance; and as a "well of life" (Prov. x. 11) in its refreshing power. How many practically say to God, "our lips are our own, who is lord over us"? How many whose feet and hands are used much in the blessed service of the Master forget that it cost Him the same anguish, the same tears and blood, to redeem every member of their bodies to Himself, that we are henceforth no longer our own to think or speak of ourselves, but the temple of the Holy Ghost. How awful then to speak in His holy hearing words which he must condemn. Let us remember what we do, taking must find u the age those who have a desire to win souls back from the altar a part of the sacrifice (Rom. xii. 1) WE give the following extracts from letters, in order which love like His should bind there with everlasting cords, grieving the heart that once was broken for us by our thoughtlessness and our sin. But perhaps we never meant to wound Him. We had only forgotten that the saints against whom we were speaking were the members of His body and the purchase of His blood. We were singing, it may be, hymns of praise a little before, and we never thought how keenly we were wounding Him in the tenderest point by speaking ill of those He so dearly loved. Ah! these lips of ours, how much grief they cost Him, like a fountain sending forth at the same place sweet water and bitter; redeemed at such a price for God; used so often and so lightly for Satan, and the tongue to which He left the heavenly embassage, "speaking the truth in love," set on fire of hell. Ah! the coming judgment-seat, how much of all the words we have spoken will stand there the searching eye of God. We can speculate about it so easily as to its scriptural meaning, and perhaps even look at the current of our lives sometimes in its consuming light, but we have forgotten that by our words we shall be condemned. These words so lightly uttered, yet bringing from the God of truth the judgment that sets us, as to His approval, on the same ground as the fool who saith in his heart, There is no God. 66 WOMAN'S MINISTRY IN THE GOSPEL. for Christ, but who imagine that their sphere of usefulness is very restricted. The sister whom the Lord used to the conversion of the writer of these letters lives on a country road, almost isolated from Christian fellowship. Her's being one of the first houses to be met with for many miles, she is visited by not a few weary tramps and beggars: these she regards as the sphere of service which the Lord has given her, none of whom she ever turns from her door without lovingly seeking to meet the need of both body and soul. The following extracts show how the Lord is faithful to own and bless such humble and truly womanly ministry for Him: "Dear Madam,-It is now with the greatest pleasure that I am enabled, by the blessing of God, to redeem my promise to you, to write and let you know the state of my heart. But, perhaps (as I don't think I gave you my name when I parted from you), I will have to explain who it is that writes to you. You will remember how on Friday morning, 30th May, you kindly gave a warm breakfast to a poor tramp (after you had done the same kindness to his companion); and how you spoke so kindly and so earnestly to him regarding the welfare of his soul, urging him to come to Jesus by simple faith, and trust Him alone and entirely for salvation; and how that He loved poor sinners, and is over ready and willing to receive and save to the uttermost all who come unto God through Him. I am that poor tramp; and I thank God who directed my steps to your house; for your kind and earnest pleading was under God, the means of breaking my hard heart. I wept. He On I felt how great a sinner I was; that within me there was nothing but the blackness of darkness. But you showed me how simple was the plan of salvation; how that by simply believing the word of God, and relying on the finished work of Christ Jesus, who once offered up Himself for us all, a sacrifice to satisfy Divine justice, I could attain everlasting life. I saw it all then, and determined to have Christ for my Saviour. Even then I felt a newness of life I had not hitherto experienced; and assured you of having accepted the free gift of salvation by Jesus Christ. But after leaving you Satan began to be very busy with my soul. tried to persuade me that I had lyingly professed to love Jesus out of gratitude to you for the breakfast and the money which you gave me. Then again I was in the company of my irreligious companions, and heard them blaspheming and talking all manner of iniquity; and, alas ! I had not the courage to stand up for Jesus. I could only groan and pray that God would be merciful to me a sinner. How to withdraw myself from the evil influence of my companions 1 knew not. We came to this town and remained over Saturday night, begging the means to pay our lodging. Sabbath, 1st inst. (June), we again started to go to C. By this time Satan had well nigh induced me to think that I had made a mistake in thinking I was saved; but the Spirit of God strove with me. I felt that if I went with my companions, I was going away from God. But thank God His Holy Spirit prevailed. I parted from my companions, and determined to go and hear the word of God preached. I went and stood opposite the door of the M. Mission Hall wishing to go in, yet ashamed on account of my ragged clothes. But the Lord put it into the heart of the doorkeeper to ask me in, and I gladly went. Strange to say, the young man who was preaching came to this towna tramp-only fourteen weeks ago. He once professed infidel opinions; but the Lord found him out, and now makes him the honoured instrument of bringing others to Christ. His text that day was Preaching peace by Jesus Christ ;" and I thank God that I then found a renewal of that peace which I first experienced in your house; and I now rejoice in full assurance of faith, knowing that God will perfect His own work in my soul. I thank my God that I now experience that peace of mind which passeth all understanding; and that I can calmly look around me in this present world, knowing that, whatever be my lot here, I have an inheritance incorruptible and that passeth not away.' Dear Madam, under God, I attribute my conversion to your kind words spoken in season, and also to the preaching of Mr. E. (the young man referred to). I have also derived much spiritual benefit from the preaching and conversation of Mr. K-, missionary in this town. May God bless you and them with all spiritual blessing, and make you the instruments in His hands of bringing many souls to Christ. Mr. K- and Mr. E-, have been very kind to me, having provided me with clothing, and are now maintaining me, endeavouring to get me some employment in the town. I am sorry to say that their endeavours have not yet been crowned with success; but I trust in God He will take care of me. I commenced life as a clerk and book-keeper, in which I have altogether had about fourteen years' experience; but, alas! I gave way to drink, and, step by step, I was brought lower in the social scale, till I became what you saw me; and I tremble to think what I might have become, had not God arrested my steps through you. I am now willing to work at anything to start with, so that I may be enabled to provide for myself and do something for Christ's cause. As it is, I hope I may be of some use in striving to bring others to the Cross. I now know something of the love of Jesus in dying for sinners; and that love fills me with a desire to see others saved. May God make me a useful labourer in His vineyard. I hope that you will pray for me. And now with kindest love to all your household, and praying that God will shower down richest blessings upon you all, I remain, yours very respectfully, |