covenanted with God, in a solemn form indeed, but with a most shallow purpose,

to "do all the words which the Lord Exod. xxiv. had said."

It is to be feared that many who come to Confirmation are only re-enacting the old covenant, and saying either heedlessly, or with self-confidence, "All that the Lord hath Isaid will we do and be obedient."

Our Confirmation promise, however, is not the blind and self-confident promise of keeping the commands with a view to Life, but an acceptance of God's promises of remission and of sanctification to them that are in Christ Jesus.

The words "I DO" in the Confirmation Service, if they referred solely to the purpose of keeping the commands, would mean that we are trying again the old and oft-tried way to Life which never yet brought one soul there.

But those words, taken as they stand really, express the purpose of obedience on the basis of the Creed. "I do" believe in the remission of my past disobediences through the precious "Blood of the New Testament" (or covenant), and I do believe that the

3-8.

VIII.

Faith at the king's Feet.

"Only be thou strong and very courageous, that thou mayest observe to do according to all the law, which Moses my servant commanded thee: turn not from it to the right hand or to the left, that thou mayest prosper whithersoever thou goest. This book of the law shall not depart out of thy mouth; but thou shalt meditate therein day and night, that thou mayest observe to do according to all that is written therein for then thou shalt make thy way prosperous, and then thou shalt have good success."-JOSHUA i. 7, 8.

"And she had a sister called Mary, which also sat at Jesus' feet, and heard His word."-LUKE X. 39.

THUS far, during the preceding chapters, we have been trying to look at (1) the great Object of our Faith, even the Lord Jesus Christ, through whom we have access by the Holy Spirit unto the Father: (2) the great and paramount importance of our having

Confirmation
Service.

Faith (3) the victory of Faith over all evil: (4) the necessary fruit of true Faith, even a sincere spirit of obedience to God's holy Law.

But in order to nourish and ripen faith, we must be continually growing in our knowledge of God, of His Wisdom, Power, Faithfulness, Love, etc., and of His great Works and Purposes. And likewise in order to more complete obedience, we need fuller instructions and continual reminders as to our duty. Both these are furnished to us in the Bible, which supplies us with the rule of Faith and of Practice; for the Bible is simply a vast and varied expansion or enlargement, first of the Creed, and secondly of the Ten Commandments.

As, therefore, before Confirmation, it is our duty to know as much of that Creed and of those Commandments as possible, so, after our Confirmation, it is our duty to go forward and grow upward "in the Last Collect knowledge and obedience of God's word," Joshua i. 8. for "then we shall make our way prosperous, and then shall we have good success." That God may lead you on in this knowledge and obedience will be one of the great

but one.

prayers of the Confirmation Service; and before passing on to three other subjects still remaining, I desire now to impress upon mind and conscience the great privilege and duty of constant searching the Scriptures.

For upwards of 2,500 years of human history men were, as far as we know, without a Bible. The first person who can be said to have possessed a Bible was Joshua. It was a little Bible then. It had only five books. But it was complete as far as it went, just as the little blade that comes out of the ground is complete. Afterwards it grew, somewhat as a plant grows, rooted in the past, sending up its branches into the future. "Holy men of old, moved by the Holy Ghost," added a history, or a biography, or a proverb, or a prophecy, or a prayer, or a lofty song. By far the chief part of these additions were made between about B.C. 1050 and B.C. 400. Then at length, after the Ascension, there were added, within about 50 years, the great fourfold Gospel, the Record of some Acts of the two leading Apostles, twenty-one letters of Apostles or Apostolic men, and the great

2 Peter i. 21.