FAITH IN THE ATTRIBUTES.

"By faith Noah, being warned of God of things not seen as yet, moved with fear, prepared an ark to the saving of his house; by the which he condemned the world, and became heir of the righteousness which is by faith.

"By faith Abraham, when he was called to go out into a place which he should after receive for an inheritance, obeyed; and he went out, not knowing whither he went. "By faith Moses, when he was come to years, refused to be called the son of Pharoah's daughter; Choosing rather to suffer affliction with the people of God, than to enjoy the pleasures of sin for a season."-HEBREWS 11: 7, 8, 24, 25.

THE faith of Noah, of Abraham and of Moses, is most fully described of all that is recorded in this chapter of faithful men, because they occupy the most conspicuous position in the Hebrew history. These three men stand at the transitions of history-that history which, according to the record of his word, God himself had arranged and ordered. They stood at the test-places. They were the strong pivots around which all human affairs turned. And although Enoch was eminent for holy living, and did great and lasting good-we may believe-in influencing the men of his

age, yet his faith was not so directly and openly and remarkably seen in its results on the world, and especially on the chosen people of God, as was the faith of these others. The faith of Isaac and of Jacob and of Joseph, of Joshua, of Gideon and even of Samuel and of David, does not stand out in such bold relief, in such towering grandeur, as does the faith of Noah, of Abraham and of Moses-a faith exercised when the foundations of the world were moved, or when the great currents of human society, which were for ever to determine the opinion and the thought of the world, were beginning to take their permanent channels. This is the reason therefore why here and elsewhere in the New Testament the faith of these great men stands prominently forth. The religious interests of the world, in their time, were committed to them. It is true indeed that they could not fully comprehend all which was wrapped up in the sacred trust committed to them; yet they appreciated the trust, and by them the great periods of religious confidence were marked. It is interesting and profitable, at times, to make some comparison of these great examples of Christian life; to notice the peculiar circumstances in which each of these great men lived; to see the peculiar exercise of faith, which the time and the work called out; to notice how the same implicit confidence in God's word, which existed in all, was differently developed in respect to different attributes of the divine character; and to see, as we can now see, and as neither of them could see (for then it would have been sight and not faith), the great results which have been so full of blessing from that time to this.

Let me try to direct your attention to the especial characteristic of faith in each of these three eminently faithful servants of God. It is not to be denied that the substantial elements of faith were the same in each, nor that each possessed all the characteristics of faith which the other possessed,-faith is one every where; but I think we shall obtain ground for comfort, for caution and for strength, if I shall be able to show the prevailing characteristic in each. Especially in times like our own, when the foundations of the nation seem to be moved, may we find that the strength which animated their faith is able to sustain us also!

I. The faith of Noah reached its maturity in the building of the ark. That work was committed to him, because his previous character with God had been fully established. He was a just man among a wicked people; he was an upright man; he was a man of faith among faithless and self-justifying men. "Noah was a just man," it is said, "and upright in his generation; and Noah walked with God." "The earth was corrupt before God: the earth was filled with violence." "Noah found grace in the eyes of the Lord." He was the preacher of righteousness in those corrupt nd violent generations. Now however much we may amplify

the thought of the circumstances in which Noah faithfully proclaimed the word of God to the wicked inhabitants around him, however directly we may bring before our minds the building of the ark, the length of time, the patience, the labor, the reproach, the contempt, the simple adherence to the one vital thought and belief, the resolution to begin, the firmness to persevere, the confidence to complete his great work, the prediction of a flood to come, while as yet the order of nature was not diverted from its regular course-so fertile a theme for ridicule on the lips of the ingenious and the wicked-and so, by bringing up before our minds those years of work and of warning, expand and strengthen our conception of Noah's implicit trust in God-we shall leave out one most important thought if we do not think of that sublime power in Noah's heart, by which he was enabled to give up the whole world to destruction. It could not have been an entirely natural and easy thing for Noah to commit friends, neighbors, communities, the wide sea of populous life around him— wicked as it all was-to inevitable ruin. The human nature was then what it now is. The tendency to palliate and to relieve the horror of wickedness, was strong then as it now is. The inclination to bring from character, lite, circumstances, social influence, from nature and even from the course of Providence, some equivalent, which should in some way balance the tremendous evil of sin, existed then as now. It required something more than the natural tendencies of the human heart to hold firm and resolute, the purpose; to say, day by day, in the building of the ark, to himself, to his own heart as much as to the life around him, that all the world was soon to be destroyed. Left to this one vision of men in their exposure, in the dreadful and overwhelming nature of their destruction-left to think only of their sufferings; to think of the pouring floods of heaven which would bear up the ark; of the rising waters which would engulf houses and lands, valley and city, trees and hills and mountains, and at length submerge the whole habitable earth; left to look at this dreary prospect only, we may well imagine how the faith of even Noah might have shrunk back; how his heart might have fallen beneath its high hope and single purpose; how he might have intermitted his warnings; how, at the very least, he might have labored, only with a dull and selfish determination to save himself. Who could hope to convince men whose wickedness demanded such an overthrow? But there was an energy in the faith of Noah, which was more than human. It was the energy which rose high above the wide mass of wickedness and misery, and which rested its weakness on the Infinite Strength. The faith of Noah was faith in God's justice. It was a faith in the righteous and unvarying movement of his eternal government. It believed the word: it did the work: it rested on the just character of an eternal God.

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LTS ferrea preacher of righteousness, as we are is remercion. He was the plain, earnest advocate mees and of the punishment of disobedience, teaser peeple, who had passed the line of shame and Puscience. He preached righteousness by his TOS: 15ersation and in the gatherings, by his work, in are ark from day to day, from week to week, #12 wertà. And righteousness implies all those s we are linked to it-government, authority,

session, condemnation following, and suffering, Nwas therefore, a preacher of law; and espeval we refissed to obey the law, or to return to its 38 as $ preacher of condemnation. And therefore do Ta Noah, being warned of God of things not a mered with fear, prepared an ark to the saving of his newch he condemned the world." By faith, he

: he believed God's word, that his own house was coming destruction. By faith, he was God: he be credited and accepted the warning. By is weed with fear; for he bowed trustfully before the estate and is hamble, filial reverence sought his work. Terre of these acts, condemned the world. He The red the just and terrible punishment of every

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givet or despise the warning he had received

8 were not sen as yet), who should be unaffected & should fail to build and to make use of Desery of Nosh was a ministry of condemnation em to be did not love men, not because God did every centre of his justice in that great enforceCareers his love for mankind)-but because p with a holy and pure affection; because te desins or the terror and not the comfort of and peace from it; opposition, and not Cand not love and happiness. His INAN 2-aith in God's Justice. He was S...I God's love, in God's mercy, in God's were reclaim all the wicked of his generation; reet & de sth of Noah is seen, in that, while hageless warning, and his life was placed he world when all the deep emotions of st nave been stirred from the foundations, he ustice which rests on inscrutable wisdom and

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acid that merer was not wanting even then. more show the delay, and the space for repentpering of God sted, in the days of Noah, a was a prepact" But neither his patience nor

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his mercy availed with the wicked people. The preaching of righteousness and of condemnation was an indifferent thing to them. The ark was completed, and they cared not for it. The four families made themselves safe from the coming storm. Noah became fully the heir of the righteousness which is by faith; and they turned not aside from their common pursuits to think or to consider. "They were eating and drinking, marrying and giving in marriage, until the day that Noah entered into the ark, and knew not, till the flood came and took them all away."

II. How different was the especial characteristic of the faith of Abraham! Although at times he was required to give testimony against the wickedness of men, yet it can not be so fully said of him as of Noah that his one especial work in life was to be witness against the sins of men. And although Abraham's faith included implicit trustfulness in the divine justice, as when he saw the cities of the plain destroyed, yet the peculiar reliance of Abraham's faith, from his earliest to his latest years, was on God's personal promise. And this was not simply faith in a promise at some one great important period of life, like Noah's faith in the divine personal promise during the time of the flood, but it was faith in one great promise made to Abraham only, and reaching all through his journeying, from the time when he left Mesopota mia till he died in the promised land. It was a promise which was gradually defined. It was at first only general, and as Abraham followed obediently the successive steps indicated to him, the limit of the promise grew more and more narrow, the method of the promise more and more clear, until in his old age Isaac was established in life within the patriarch's own house. Notice the development of this promise to him. The first and the evident intimation of the promise was made to Abraham in Mesopotamia, in the first call. That first call was for him to leave his own land and kindred, and to seek another land. And then departing for the land of the Chaldees, removing from his kindred, save only from his father's house, and from Lot, not knowing whither he went, nor how the implied promise was to be accomplished, he came to Haran. Thus was he called to go out unto a place-some place, which he did not yet know-which he was after to receive for an inheritance. He obeyed; and he went out not knowing whither he went. Then came the more definite second call. The second call was, that he should leave his country, his kindred, and his father's house-all-to go unto the land which I will show thee. I will make of thee a great nation." "Thou shalt be a blessing." "In thee shall all families of the earth be blessed." And Abraham came to Canaan, and the promise is still more defined: Unto thy seed will I give this land." Then, afterward, Lot is separated, and the promise is more fully developed. "Lift