THE

GOSPEL MAGAZINE.

"COMFORT YE, COMFORT YE MY PEOPLE, SAITH YOUR GOD. "

"ENDEAVOURING TO KEEP THE UNITY OF THE SPIRIT IN THE BOND OF PEACE"

JESUS CHRIST, THE SAME YESTERDAY, AND TO-DAY, AND FOR EVER." "WHOM TO KNOW IS LIFE ETERNAL

The Family Portion;

OR, WORDS OF SPIRITUAL CAUTION, COUNSEL, AND COMFORT.

"Who comforteth us in all our tribulation, that we may be able to comfort them which are in any trouble, by the comfort wherewith we ourselves are comforted of God."-2 COR. i. 4.

EVERLASTING LOVE IN GRACIOUS OPERATION
TOWARDS A COVENANT PEOPLE.

"The Lord hath appeared of old unto me, saying, Yea, I have loved thee with an everlasting love: therefore with lovingkindness have I drawn thee.”—Jer. xxxi. 3.

THIS most blessed passage was brought before us, very recently, in one of the most remarkable interviews with a dear dying saint that we ever remember to have had. She had been in the habit, for years past, of attending St. Luke's Church; and often, of a Saturday evening, at our prayer-meeting, after we had asked her son to pray, we have said within ourselves, "I wonder if the mother knows anything about the son's God?" She was so reserved-there was simply the occasional "good-night," as we passed out from the building-that we had no means whatever of knowing how matters stood in a spiritual point of view. Moreover, both mother and son lived in another parish; consequently there was less likelihood of our meeting. Sweet simplicity and precious pleading characterized the son's prayers. Her repeated absence at length led to inquiry after her, when we found she was laid aside in apparently her last illness. "She has never expressed a wish to see you but once," said her son at the close of our last prayer-meeting. "I'll come, was the reply. Other cases, however, pressed upon us for the next three or four days, particulars of one of which we may probably give in an early number. In this latter case a long-and-deeply-afflicted daughter (who had now just been bereft of her one great support-her mother) quoted the passage, "Thy shoes shall be iron and brass; and as thy days, so shall thy strength be." Poor dear child! she had indeed been a living witness of the truth of that precious Scripture, and so likewise had

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been her long-tried, but now we doubt not, triumphant, parent. To gratify the daughter (who for more than eight years had been confined to her sick bed) we had gone into another room, to gaze upon the sleeping frame of her departed mother. She had now followed her two daughters, who had both sickened and died in that house, since our connexion with the parish. We had the fullest conviction that both had died in the Lord. As we left the house of mourning, shrinking (as we commonly do) from gazing on the dead, we thought of the just-quoted passage of the remaining sufferer, "Thy shoes shall be iron and brass; and as thy days, so shall thy strength be." As we threaded our way through the busy streets of our very populous parish, we thought, "Well, it has been so hitherto; strength has been equal to the day, and is it not so still? I have sundry cases to visit this afternoon, and I have to preach to-night; but I am sure I shall have strength for this day at any rate. I cannot doubt it. And, when to-morrow comes, there is no question there will be strength for it also. I don't want to-morrow's strength for to-day. Am I not told, to take no thought [that is, no anxious, unbelieving thought] for the morrow; for the morrow shall take thought for the things of itself? Sufficient unto the day is the evil thereof."* And will it not be so to the end of the chapter? When death comes, will there not be strength to meet it? Oh, why should my coward heart despond? Why yield to these gloomy fears and dark forebodings? As thy days, so shall thy strength be.""

Amid these reflections we found ourselves at length entering a court in a neighbouring parish, and ascending the somewhat broken staircase of an old-fashioned house, in the top front room of which lay upon a sort of half-bed and half-sofa the object of our inquiry. "I knew you'd come," said she, as soon as we had taken a seat beside her. "They told me you couldn't walk, because of your foot;† but I knew you would come. I knew that the Lord wouldn't take me home until I had told you what He had done for my soul." She then burst forth in one continuous stream of most blessed testimony for God and truth. It exceeded for richness, freeness, and rapidity, all we ever witnessed. We sat dumb before the Lord, in holy admiration of His wondrous doings. We sought as long as possible to restrain our feelings, and to listen in silent wonder and adoration of Divine love, faithfulness, and all-sufficiency; but the effort failed. As the sufferer lay, with closed eyes, pouring forth as it were one continuous ceaseless stream of grateful acknowledgment of the Lord's tender mercy and goodness, the tears flowed down the cheeks in grati

* Coverdale renders this passage, "Every day hath enough of his own travail."

Referring to the sprained ancle under which we were suffering for so many months; but which, through God's great mercy, has since been completely rectified through the skill of a justly-celebrated operator, Mr. Hutton, of Watford. We strongly advise any of our readers who may be suffering from dislocated joints to make a point of seeing him. The relief we have personally experienced calls for this simple acknowledgment at our hands.-ED.

tude and thankfulness for what so good and gracious a God is pleased, even in these last days of rebuke and blasphemy, to do for poor lost and guilty sinners.

In an earlier part of the interview, the dear afflicted one had said, "The love of God if it be so here, what is it—what will it be-what CAN it be in heaven ?" She lay such intense stress upon the word what will it be-what can it be in heaven? "Oh, it is like the rain that refreshes the garden, and causes the sweet smell and perfume to ascend." "How long have you known that love ?" we asked. “Oh, for six or seven years. It was at your church. I thought I had known it for twenty years before, but I was mistaken. It was when you were preaching upon the love of God (I don't remember the text), the scales fell off from my eyes-the scales fell off from my eyes," she repeated, "and I felt as I never had felt before. I thought I must have gone right home from that church." She then went on in the most beautiful and blessed strain, declaring what the Lord had donehow faithful and gracious and condescending He had been, during years and years of affliction. "And He'll never leave a poor old sinner now,' said she. "Oh, no." "Death! death !" she exclaimed; "what is death? Why, it's only falling asleep, and opening the eyes to look at Jesus! I was seized," she continued, "when my son was at the prayer-meeting last Saturday evening, but I thought of the lady you spoke about some time ago; she had lost her foot, but she was found upon the Rock of Ages."

In the course of the few observations which we were led to make during this memorable visit-and they were but few, for we felt that there was no need of our talking; all we wanted to do was to listen, and we felt how thankful we should have been, could we but have noted down what was said by this dear sufferer-but among the few things. that we did say was, "We love Him because He first loved us ;" "Yea, I have loved thee with an everlasting love: therefore with lovingkindness have I drawn thee." "Oh, that was the text," she said, "that you spoke from. I had forgotten it, but that was it. It was a Sunday or two after the gas went out, and you gave out a hymn." "It was the hymn," said her daughter, who, with a young friend, was sitting in the

room,

"God moves in a mysterious way

His wonders to perform;

He plants His footsteps in the sea,
And rides upon the storm.""

We had quite forgotten the circumstance until thus named by our sick friend. When in London in the spring of last year, a dear friend told us of a certain Christian lady who had gone to church one evening the previous week. They had sung in the service that precious hymn, "Rock of Ages, cleft for me." Whilst returning home, her husband said, "My dear, how you sang to-night! I wish you would sing at home as you did at church." "I don't care to hear my own voice," was her answer; "but I do love to unite with the people of God in singing His praises." In another minute or so, she exclaimed, "Oh, I've lost my foot ;" and, but for her husband's arm, she would have fallen, having been seized with apoplexy, of which, in a short hour or so, she quietly passed away. When informed of what had occurred, her minister (the Rev. Mr. Mackenzie) remarked, "she had 'lost her foot,' but it was found upon the Rock of Ages." Dear reader, are your feet found there ?-ED. 002

"I thought," added the mother, "it was such a solemn time in the dark, and I sat and prayed that it might be sanctified to some poor souls then present. "There's my daughter," she continued, "she doesn't know the Lord like my son does; but she will-a mother's prayers will never be suffered to fall to the ground." We directly thought of our sainted one-the mother of our dear children, and we remembered the holy confidence with which she went out of life, assured that in due time each and every one should be brought to know the Lord.

Scripture after Scripture and verses of hymn after hymn did this dear woman continue to repeat, until we feared her poor frame would be exhausted. Indeed, we were full to overflowing and wanted to retire "to weep to the praise of the mercy we'd found." Among the many precious lines she repeated were those of the blessed Watts:"There shall I bathe my weary soul,

In seas of heavenly rest;
And not a wave of trouble roll
Across my peaceful breast."

"Oh," said she, as she raised her hands, "how sweet it will be

Dear reader, the foregoing is but the very faintest outline of that most refreshing, never-to-be-forgotten visit to the sick and dying. There was but one in that room who was not bathed in tears, and that was the dear sufferer herself.

It is time, however, that we said a little about the text, and the most we can say upon a subject so great and so glorious is little indeed.

Do mark, beloved, how graciously the Lord introduces the matter. "At the same time, saith the Lord, will I be the God of all the families of Israel, and they shall be my people." No doubt this comprehends the latter-day glory of the Lord's ancient people, but it embraces likewise all that He has ever been to and for His spiritual Israel in every age. "Thus saith the Lord," it is added, "The people which were left of the sword found grace in the wilderness; even Israel, when I went to cause him to rest." Ah, beloved, here is the secret-here the spring-of all blessing and blessedness, the "finding grace;" it was not merited grace; not purchased grace; the very idea of merit or purchase would be to nullify-to destroy the very nature and intrinsic value of grace. Grace! grace! what is grace? It is free favour-pure mercy -unspeakable goodness-rich, unmerited, sovereign love. "Noah found grace in the eyes of the Lord." A sovereign, merciful, unaccountable act, as bestowed upon him of Jehovah. And so it is, beloved, with each and every member of the one redeemed, elect family. No better than other men--in all probability, worse than others; because Satan, having, in numberless cases, some suspicion of grace

being treasured up in the loving heart of Jehovah towards certain singularly-preserved and remarkably-protected-and-delivered characters, makes the more deadly onslaught in his temptations upon such, if possible to entangle and destroy. Hence such are more tempted, more tried, more captivated and ensnared than men in common. Still, blessed be God, because He will have it so, they "find grace in the wilderness," and the Lord, sooner or later, draws nigh with the sweet, blessed, unspeakably-precious assurance: "The Lord hath appeared of old unto me." Now, do mark, dear reader, just upon the same footing as "finding grace in the wilderness," how all is of necessity traced up to the Lord; how all and everything of blessing and blessedness originates with Him; how all emanates from Him: He the grand Springhead and Fountain, as well as the ceaseless Channel and continuous Stream.

If you look at the words as rendered "appeared of old," and thus comprehending date, it is very blessed; or, if you regard them as expressed in the margin, "from afar," and thus embracing place, it is unspeakably precious. Be it date or distance, the sovereign love-act of Jehovah, as manifested and exhibited in the drawing His people through and by the dear Mediator, Christ Jesus, the Son of His love, is both great and glorious. And, when either place or period is thus considered, how sweetly, beloved, under the precious ministry of the Holy Ghost, does it draw up the mind out of and off from its own little contracted self, causing it to rest in the covenant choice and the covenant settlements of a covenant Jehovah. Oh, how beautiful and how blessed it is, when the hearts of the Lord's poor tried and tempest-tossed people, are thus led into a contemplation of these eternal verities. They as it were stamp every leading and movement of Jehovah with such a peculiar definiteness so unalterable a purpose-so distinct a design and object, that the soul argues with itself, "How can a Being so infinite in wisdom, so boundless in love, so omnipotent in power, suffer Himself to be defeated? How can He fail in the accomplishment of all He has pledged Himself to be and to do?" Now, in proportion as we are enabled thus to argue, beloved, in that very proportion shall we be lifted up above all the sorrows and perplexities and apprehensions of the way. "It is enough; my God hath promised. The God who cannot lie-the Omnipotent whose power is engaged on my behalf-must and will accomplish all that He hath promised. His word and His power are at stake."

"The work that Wisdom undertakes
Eternal mercy ne'er forsakes."

Poor worn and weary souls, this view of the case is sweetly confirmed by those favourite lines of ours, as expressed by the sainted Kent:

"Here let the weary rest,

Who love the Saviour's name;

Though with no sweet enjoyment blest,
The COVENANT stands the same."