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God loved him-no feeling that God pitied him-no feeling that God supported him. God was his sun before-now that sun became all darkness. Not a smile from his Father -not a kind look-not a kind word. (2.) He was without a God-he was as if he had no God. All that God had been to him before was taken from him now. Godless-deprived of his God. (3.) He had the feeling of the condemned, when the Judge says: Depart from me, ye cursed," "who shall be punished with everlasting destruction from the presence of the Lord, and from the glory of his power." He felt that God said the same to him. Ah! this is the hell which Christ suffered. Dear friends, I feel like a little child casting a stone into some deep ravine in the mountain side, and listening to hear its fall—but listening all in vain; or like the sailor casting the lead at sea, but it is too deep-the longest line cannot fathom it. The ocean of Christ's sufferings is unfathomable.

III. Answer the Saviour's why.

Because he was the surety of sinners, and stood in their

room.

1. He had agreed with his Father, before all worlds, to stand and suffer in the place of sinners: Every curse that should fall on them, let it fall on me. Why should he be surprised that God poured out all his fury? "Why hast thou forsaken me?" Because thou didst covenant to stand in the room of sinners.

2. He set his face to it: "He set his face like a flint" "He set his face steadfastly." God set down the cup before him in the garden, saying: Art thou willing to drink it, or no? He said: "The cup which my Father hath given me, shall I not drink it?" "Therefore it pleased the Lord to bruise him." Why? Because thou hast chosen to be the surety-thou wouldst not draw back?

3. He knew that either he or the whole world must suffer. It was his pity for the world made him undertake to be a Saviour: "He saw that there was no man, and wondered that there was no intercessor. Therefore his arm brought salvation unto him, and his righteousness it sustained him." Why? Either thou or they-hell for thee or hell for them.

1. Lesson to Christless persons. Learn your danger. Wherever God sees sin he will punish it-angels-Adamold world-Sodom. He saw sins laid on Christ, and for

sook his own Son. You think nothing of sin. See what God thinks of it. If so much as one sin upon you uncovered, you cannot be saved. Though thou wert the signet on my right hand-though thou wert the son of my bosom -yet would I pluck thee thence. Oh, let me persuade you this day to an immediate closing with Jesus Christ!

2. Lesson. Admire the love of Christ. Oh, what a sea of wrath did he lie under for you! Oh, what hidings did he bear for you, vile, ungrateful soul! The broken bread and poured-out wine are a picture of his love. Oh, when you look on them, may your heart break for longing toward such a Saviour!

3. Lesson. Say to all who close with Jesus Christ, he was forsaken in the room of sinners. If you close with him as your surety, you will never be forsaken. From the broken bread and poured-out wine seems to rise the cry: "My God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me?"

For me for me. May God bless his own Word!

(Action Sermon.)

SERMON XXVII.

DEATH OF STEPHEN.

“And they stoned Stephen, calling upon God, and saying, Lord Jesus, receive my spirit."-ACTS vii. 59.

STEPHEN was the first to die as a martyr in the cause of Christ; and he seems to have resembled the Saviour more than any that followed after. His very face appeared like the face of an angel. His irresistible wisdom in arguing with the Jews was very like Christ's-his praying for his enemies with his dying breath nearly in the same words as the Saviour, and his recommending his soul into the hands of the Lord Jesus, were in the same spirit of confidence as that in which Christ said: 66 Father, into thy hands I commy spirit." There cannot be a doubt that it was by looking unto Jesus that he became thus Christ-like; and the last view which he got of Christ seems especially to

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have given him that heavenly composure in dying which is so much above nature.

Two things are to be noticed:-1. That it was a sight of Christ at the right hand of God. 2. That it was a sight of Christ standing there. Christ being at the right hand of God is mentioned sixteen times in the Bible; thirteen times he is described as seated there; twice as being there; but here only is he spoken of as standing. This appears to have made a deep and lively impression on the mind of Stephen, for he cries out: "Behold, I see the heavens opened, and the Son of Man standing on the right hand of God; and then, with a sweet assurance that Christ's hands were stretched out to receive him, he cried: "Lord Jesus, receive my_spirit."

Doctrine.-Since Christ is at the right hand of God, and since he rises up to receive the dying believer, believers should commend their spirit to the Lord Jesus.

I. If Christ be at the right hand of God, the believer's sins must be pardoned, so that he can peacefully say: " Lord Jesus, receive my spirit." If the grave had closed over the head of Christ for ever-if the stone had remained at the mouth of the sepulchre to this day-then we might well be in doubt whether he had suffered enough in the stead of sinners. "If Christ be not risen, your faith is vain-you are yet in your sins." But is it true that Christ is at the right hand of God?-then the stone has been rolled away from the sepulchre. God has let him go free from the curse that was laid on him. The justice of God is quite satisfied. If you saw a criminal put into prison, and the prison doors closed behind him, and if you never saw him come out again, then you might well believe that he was still lying in prison, and still enduring the just sentence of the law; but if you saw the prison doors fly open, and the prisoner going free-if you saw him walking at large in the streets-then you would know at once that he had satisfied the justice of his country-that he had suffered all that it was needful to suffer that he had paid the uttermost farthing. So with the Lord Jesus; he was counted a criminal-the crimes of guilty sinners against God were all laid at his door, and he was condemned on account of them. He was hurried away to the death of the cross, and the gloomy prison-house of his rocky sepulchre-the stone was rolled to the mouth of the grave. If you never saw

him come out, then you might well believe that he was still enduring the just sentence of the law. But, lo! "he is risen, -he is not here"-" Christ is risen indeed." God, who was his judge, hath raised him from the dead, and set him at his own right hand in the heavenly places; so that you may be quite sure he has satisfied the justice of God. He has suffered everything that it was needful for him to sufferhe has paid the uttermost farthing. Now is there any of you hearing me, who cleaves to the Lord Jesus? is this the Saviour whom you take to be your surety? "Be of good cheer, thy sins are forgiven thee." For if your surety is free, then you are free. It was this which gave such a tranquil peace to the dying Stephen. He had the same vile nature which you have-he had committed the same sins as you have―he had the same condemnation over him which you have; but when he saw Jesus Christ, whom he had taken as his surety, standing free at the right hand of God, then he felt that the condemnation had been already borne-that God's anger was quite turned away from his soul; and thus being inwardly persuaded of pardon, he committed his spirit into the hand of Christ: "Lord Jesus, receive my spirit.'

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Oh! brethren, cleave to the same Lord Jesus-he is still as free as he was when Stephen died. He always will be free; death hath no more power over him; for he hath suffered all. Take him as your surety-cleave to him as your Saviour, and you may this day have the same peace that Stephen had, and may die with the same peaceful breast, saying: "Lord Jesus, receive my spirit."

II. If Christ be at the right hand of God, then the believer is accepted with God, and may peacefully say with Stephen: "Lord Jesus, receive my spirit."

The Son of God came to be a surety for men in two respects:-1. In suffering the wrath which they deserved to suffer; and, 2. In rendering the obedience which men had neglected to render. If he stood as surety in suffering, then every dying sinner that cleaved to him was to be freed from the curse of God. If he stood as surety in obeying, then he and every sinner that cleaved to him was to be rewarded with a place in glory. Now if Christ had not risen from the dead, then it would have been manifest that God had not accepted his obedience as worthy of eternal life. But if Christ is risen, and not only so, but

if he be at the right hand of God, the place of highest glory in heaven, where are pleasures for evermore, then I am quite sure that God is satisfied with Christ as a surety for man. If you saw some peer of the realm sent away by the king upon a distant and hazardous undertaking, with the promise that, if he succeeded, he should be advanced to the seat nearest the throne-if you never saw that peer return to claim his reward, then you would say at once that he had failed in his undertaking. But if you saw him return, amid the applause of assembled multitudes, and if you saw him received into the palace of the king, and seated on the right hand of majesty, then you would say at once that he had succeeded in that which he undertook, and that the king upon the throne was well pleased with it.

Just so, dear brethren, if you had been in heaven on that most wonderful day that ever was, of which the Christian Sabbath is an ever-enduring monument, when Christ ascended to his Father and our Father-had you seen the smile of ineffable complacency wherewith God received back into glory the surety of men, saying: "Thou art my Son, this day have I begotten thee;" as if he said: "Never till this day did I see thee so worthy to be called my Son;" and again: "Sit thou at my right hand, till I make thine enemies thy footstool"-had you seen all this, then you would have known how excellent the obedience of Christ is in the eyes of the Father. But all this obedience was endured, not for himself, but as a surety for men. He was accepted himself before he left heaven. He was infinitely near and dear to the Father, and did not need to become man, to obey for himself. Everything that Jesus Christ did or suffered was as a surety in the stead of sinners. Do you take him for your surety? Do you cleave to the Lord Jesus, because you have nothing of your own to recommend you to God? Then look up with the eye of faith, and see him at the right hand of God. If you cleave to him, you are as much accepted with God as Christ is-you are as near to God as your surety is. Ah! it was this that gave the dying Stephen such calm tranquillity. He had the same vile nature that you have-he had as little obedience to God as you have he was a naked sinner as you are; but he took the Lord Jesus to be his surety-the man in his stead; so that, when he saw him at the right hand of God, he felt that Christ was accepted, and that he, also, was accepted in the Beloved. And thus, being inwardly persuaded that in

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