till thou hast paid the uttermost farthing!" O! to be lost, and lost for ever! even for ever and ever! Think upon that, and may God have mercy upon your souls!

3. How blessed it is to have God upon our side. If God, the great God, be for us, who can be against us? He who is infinite in wisdom and in power, he who has a control over all means and agents, what a powerful friend and protector must he be! Hence the language of the Psalmist, "As the mountains are round about Jerusalem, so the Lord is round about his people, from henceforth and even for ever!" And again: "The Lord is my light and my salvation, whom shall I fear? the Lord is the strength of my life, of whom shall I be afraid?" Ah, my brethren, if God be upon our side we are safe and happy, for time and for eternity! and well may it be said happy is that people who is in such a case, yea, happy is that people whose God is the Lord! This happiness belongs to all the truly pious of every place and every age. Yes, it is the privilege of each and all such to say with the sweet singer of old, "This God is our God for ever and ever; he will be our guide even unto death." And again: "The Lord liveth, and blessed be my Rock;" and, in the language of our text, "O Lord, my God, thou art very great." There is oftentimes great meaning and great sweetness in the little pro

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noun my. And if it be pleasant sometimes to be able to say, this is my house, my field, my wife, my child, how much more delightful, yea, infinitely more delightful, after contem-> plating the grandeur of the Eternal King, to be able to say, "this God is our God for ever and ever!" Yes, great and glorious as he is, this-the Christian may say, this is my Heavenly Father, the friend and portion of my soul; very pleasant therefore must have been the feelings of the Psalmist when he uttered the language of our text, “O Lord, my God, thou art very great." This is the language of joy, of triumph, and of complete exultation, reminding us of the well known language of Moses, "Their rock is not. as our Rock, even our enemies themselves being judges." My brethren; I repeat it, if God be for us who can be against us? He is a shield and buckler to his people on earth, and afterwards he will receive them to glory. He was a shield to the patriarch Jacob. You recollect this man of God having been improperly treated by his father-in-law, Laban, leaves him, and with his family and all that he had, sets out on his journey to see his father Isaac, who was still alive. When Laban heard that Jacob was gone, he gathered a force and pursued after him, resolved it seems to bring him back. The very night however, before he came up with Jacob, the Lord ap

peared to Laban the Syrian in a dream, and said unto him, Speak not a word to Jacob, good or bad.. The next day he overtakes Jacob, and still wrathful he said, It is in the power of my hand to do you hurt, but the Lord God of your fathers appeared to me yesternight saying, Speak not a word to Jacob, good or bad. O Lord of hosts, blessed is the man to whom thou art a shield and buckler! Jacob thus protected, continues his journey. On his way to the dwelling place of Isaac he must needs pass by Mount Seir, the dwelling place of Esau. It will be recollected that some twenty years before, Esau had threatened that he would slay Jacob. Drawing near to Mount Seir, and remembering this, Jacob sends messengers to Esau, to conciliate him. Esau deigned no reply, and Jacob's messengers returned to him, saying,. We came to thy brother Esau, and also he cometh to meet thee, and four hundred men with him; then Jacob was greatly afraid, and he divided the people that were with him, and the flocks and the herds, and the camels, into two bands, and said, If Esau come to the one company and smite it, then the other company which is left shall escape. Having made this arrangement, he turned aside to pray, and we may judge of the feelings of his heart from the words of his lips: "O God of my father Abraham, and God of my father Isaac, deliver me I pray thee

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from the hand of my brother, from the hand of Esau, for I fear him, lest, he come and smite me, and the mother with the children." And now the moment of meeting arrives; and as Esau lifted up his eyes and beheld Jacob his brother, the Lord touched Esau's heart, and he ran to meet his brother, and embraced him, and fell on his neck and kissed him, and they wept! O Lord of hosts, blessed is the man whom thou dost shield and protect! The Lord can hold the enemy in check by a vision of the night, or by converting a heart of enmity into a heart of love! yea, in many ways. Take one case more: Jezebel, the wife of Ahab, had sworn that Elijah should not live another day. Elijah hears of the threat, and went a day's journey into the wilderness and sat down under a juniper tree. Methinks I see this venerable man under the juniper tree. He is in great sadness. Methinks I hear him sigh, methinks I see the tears trickling down his furrowed cheeks. But now he prays, and we may judge of the feelings of his heart from the language of his lips. It is enough now, O Lord, said he, take away my life, for I am not better than my fathers. And now, my brethren, see that Elijah who would willingly have died under the juniper tree, without a friend to close his eyes or dig his grave-only see! the heavens are opened! the heavens are opened! and lo, a chariot of fire, and horses of

fire descend, and that good man who would fain have died under the juniper tree without a friend to close his eyes or dig his graveonly see how he is rapt away in triumph to the bosom of his God, in glory! Of a truth, "he has found a most secure abode, who has made his refuge God." "The Lord is thy keeper," says the Psalmist, "the Lord is thy shade upon thy right hand. The sun shall not smite thee by day, nor the moon by night. The Lord shall preserve thee from all evil; he shall preserve thy soul. The Lord shall preserve thy going out, and thy coming in, from this time forth and even for evermore." So that we may say to the humblest child of God,

"Go and return secure from death

'Till God command thee home."

Then comes joy, heavenly joy; bliss, unutterable and everlasting bliss! O think what a full tide of joy an infinite God can pour into our souls, through all the ages of eternity! O, my brethren, believe me, riches are nothing; honours are nothing; worldly pleasures are nothing; thrones and kingdoms nothing, in comparison with the favour of God: Thy favour, O God, is life; thy loving kindness is better than life; for if God, the great God of heaven and earth be for us, who can be against us? O! then seek his favour, and may you never rest until you find sweet repose in the bosom of a God reconciled through the mediation of his Son. Amen.