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with other faithfulness, will add greatly to the richness, the appropriateness, the practical value and efficiency of the pulpit discourses. And while the minister must ever regard the pulpit as "his throne," and on no account neglect preparation for it, he will be greatly aided in his performance there by proper intercourse with the people of his charge. I know the opinions of those who would be strenuous to maintain a dignified reserve on the part of the minister, who would draw broadly the distinction between the Clergy and the Laity, and assert something of peculiar sanctity and mysterious awe in the character of the minister, as giving more force to what he says; who would throw the garb of mystery around the Christian priesthood as likely to impress men: but depend upon it, it is the man who is known as the sympathizing friend, who will most truly command the hearts of those who statedly hear him. He greatly errs who neglects to cultivate, by the right discharge of pastoral duty, that acquaintance and sympathy with men, which the pastoral relation was undoubtedly designed, and is so eminently adapted to produce; while it will obviously be greatly for the advantage of every congregation to secure the services of an affectionate and faithful pastor, and by the performance of their reciprocal duties, by treating him as a brother or a father, by opening to him their hearts, unbosoming their cares, and cheering him by a participation in their joys, to keep alive his sympathy with them, and help him to be unto them an able minister of the gospel of grace.

SERMON DXLVII.

BY REV. R. E. PATTISON, PROF. IN NEWTON THEO.
INSTITUTE.

THE SPIRIT RETURNING TO GOD.

"The spirit shall return unto God who gave it."-ECCLES. 12: 7.

In death man is the subject of a great change. It is not simply the change which these bodies experience; these frames dissolving and returning to the dust whence they were taken. Nor is it merely an exchange of worlds, the passing from one class of associates to another; to be met and to be treated on the principles which govern men in their intercourse in this life. The change effected by death is something more than a severing of those ties which bind men together in their present relations. Though through death we are to preserve our identity, and shall ever after that event be the same persons as have here lived and

acted, have enjoyed and suffered, have obeyed or sinned, the mode of our existence and action will unquestionably be very different. Though after the resurrection we shall have bodies, and therefore a suitable habitation, yet they will be spiritual bodies. This term may not express any specific idea as to their nature, still it does deny to our future bodies the usual properties and accidents of matter, to which they are now subject. They will be altogether unlike our present bodies as to their nature, and hence equally so in their relations to other beings.

Of nothing have we more satisfactory evidence, either from reason or from Revelation, than that both the mode of existence and the manner of action of body and soul in a future state will differ in many and important points from what they are in the present. As to the body we can form no very definite anticipations. Nor is it necessary that we should, farther than the assurance that it will be united to the spirit which it is to clothe. to the spirit's mode of action, though ignorant of much, we are sufficiently informed to enable us to prepare for our eternal state. No reflecting mind can for a moment doubt that the soul. at death, will enter upon a wider range of knowledge and action than is opened to it in this life.

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But whatever other changes we may be the subjects of at death, by none can we be affected so seriously as by the change in the manner of knowing God. We shall have an intimate acquaintance with God, such as we have not in this life. We shall not only have a more perfect, a more distinct and comprehensive knowledge of Jehovah, but my text intimates that the manner of knowing him will be more direct. "The spirit shall return to God who gave it." This is language adapted to our present conceptions and capacities. As if the reason why we see and feel no more the presence of the Deity is because we are removed to a distance from him; as if we were not with God, though it is "in him that we live and move and have our being." Whatever truth there is in the idea that God has a throne more central to his universe than earth; where he manifests himself more gloriously than he does here, or would do here, were we ever so holy, or were angels to make this their abode; yet most of the effect attributed to a change of place by which we are brought nearer to the Almighty is manifestly effected by a change in ourselves. We shall be able to see and know God with as much greater readiness and distinctness, compared with what we now do, as is the difference between a distant and a near view of material objects. That which in the distance is obscure becomes palpable and distinct when brought in contact with our senses. The same change, however, might be effected by an improvement in the power and perfection of our senses. Objects, the mere existence of which in the distance is now discovered with difficulty and uncertainty, would, under an increase of the power of vision, reveal to us their minutest parts, and

their most delicate texture. So when it is said "the spirit shall return to God who gave it," whatever may be its change at death as to residence or place, if spirit can be said to have either, the great change will be in its being made to open its eyes, if I may so speak, on the Divine Perfections, moral as well as natural.

The great change to be experienced then at death, is an increased vividness in our apprehension of the existence of God, accompanied necessarily with a kind of living consciousness of our personal relation to him. We find it difficult, if not impossible, to express this state of mind by a single term. We perceive what is out of, or foreign from ourselves; we are conscious of the operations and actions of our own minds; we apprehend an idea, a proposition, a principle. This last is too vague, and does not necessarily imply actual existence. Neither the first nor the second designates the complete fact. It is not merely God without us that we are to know, but ourselves in God, and God in us. Our own mental states will be an object of as distinct cognizance as the existence and attributes of God. We shall not only be conscious of our own mental exercises, but of exercises in their living connection with Him in whom we have our being."

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An abiding conviction that there is a God, is in this life, a difficult attainment. Though none but the fool can deny his existence, it is not a conviction that has prominence in our ordinary reflections. It would be a great attainment to be as conscious that there is a supreme spiritual Being, as we are sensible that there is a sun in the heavens in a cloudless day. Though many would not be more ready to surrender their belief of his existence than they would their knowledge of the existence of that luminary, still that there is a God is a conclusion arrived at in a different manner. It is the deduction of reason, enlightened by a divine Revelation. The Bible teaches us that there is a God. What we see around us of design impresses upon us the irresistible conviction that there must be a Maker. And the events daily transpiring within our limit of observation disclose to us the operations of a moral Governor. These produce conviction, when thought of and deliberately considered. But as they are the results of an intellectual process purely, they may be unnoticed or forgotten, and hence fail to exert at the time any influence upon our conduct or character. If we have rightly interpreted our text, this forgetfulness, or this want of cognizance and consciousness, will cease after death. There will probably never be a moment when we shall be unmindful of God in whom we live and move and have our being, more than we now are insensible to the warmth and light of the sun when it shines upon us in its effulgence; or, than we now are unconscious, when awake, of the ceaseless flow of thoughts and feelings which distinguish each individual from every other being in the universe. Every man has the witness within himself of his personal iden

tity and individuality, of what is peculiar to self. He never carries within him the witness of the existence of any other being. Though the testimony borne to other beings is irresistible, it is not unceasing like that of self-existence. This distinction will probably exist in relation to finite objects in a future world. But not as to God. Him we shall know as we are known. We are now absent; we shall then be present; we shall be for ever with the Lord.

It may not be improper here to notice the fact, that he who has been renewed by divine grace does hold a more satisfactory intercourse with the Deity than we have described. There is such a fact as the fellowship of the Spirit-a sensible presence of God to the soul. This power is still faith, not vision. The believer, though filled with the Spirit, is, so long as he is at home in the body, absent from the Lord. It is only a foretaste, an intimation of what he is to experience in heaven. We now know in part, but then that which is in part shall be done away. We now see through a glass darkly, but then face to face. In eternity we shall perceive God, and feel the power of his presence and the divinity of his attributes and our personal relation to them, as distinctly, and perhaps more vividly than we now apprehend our own existence, or the qualities of those material objects around us which are brought in contact with our senses, which we see, and hear, and handle.

It is in this sense emphatically that the spirit may be said at death to return to God. It is to experience a change in the manner of knowing God. Imperfectly as we understand this mysterious subject, there can be no doubt that our knowledge of God will more nearly resemble intuition than in this life. Such, we believe, is the only meaning which can be given to our text. The idea is also in obvious harmony with pregnant intimations in the Word of God, if not with its explicit teaching.

That this subject may exert a practical influence, leading us to make suitable preparation for death, when our spirits shall return to God who gave them, let us consider how such a change as we have described would affect us as individuals. Were we to die soon-at any moment-would this more intimate acquaintance with God, this living, eternal consciousness of his presence, promote our happiness, or would it annihilate the little we have? It will produce one or the other of these effects; and as death is certain and may be sudden, we ought to consider with care and impartiality the character of our religious feelings. In this way we need not mistake. We can easily decide whether to be brought into this intimate and conscious connection with the Eternal, into the presence of God, where for no moment of our existence we can be ever unmindful of his gaze upon us, would develop that deep and holy joy which in this life the most devout feel to be pent up in the soul, struggling to break forth into an ardent flame; or whether to be

stripped of this body of sense, and to be torn from these material objects with which we are now surrounded, would be like wresting from the warrior his shield, and like sweeping away the pilgrim's "covert from the storm."

The proper question to be put, as a test, is, Do we love God? 1. It is obvious that if we love God, the more distinct are our apprehensions of his being and perfections, the greater will be our happiness, as by it an opportunity is given for the proper exercise of that affection-an affection without the exercise of which there can be no happiness. The unutterable attraction of heaven to believers is the presence of God. They love the language of the Psalmist: "In thy presence is fulness of joy." They expect to realize this; and they will realize it when the spirit that has fellowship with the Father and with his Son Jesus Christ shall return to him.

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The happiness of the saints in heaven will not depend simply on the fact that they are no longer to be subject to vicissitudes and disappointments-that they are to live in the world where is neither labor, nor sickness, nor death-which will make it a mansion of rest. It will depend chiefly on that living, holy fellowship with God, of which in this life they enjoy only a foretaste. We now hear God as he speaks to us from his throne in heaven, through his Word and his Works, and by the "still small voice" of his Spirit, speaking conviction or peace to our consciences; but then we shall see him as he is. And if we now have peace in believing; if we can say, not seen we love; in whom, though we see him not yet believing, we rejoice with joy unspeakable and full of glory," what must be the fulness and the glory of this joy when our perceptions of his holiness and love shall be those of the heavenly? What a wonderful change must the redeemed spirit experience at death! How ineffably happy, yea, glorious, must that existence be in which, let us range where we will throughout God's vast dominions, we shall be with him and shall see him as he is; shall live and act with the eyes of the understanding ever open upon the full glory of every attribute of Him whom we love with all the soul. Those who have been conscious of the love of God shed abroad in the heart in this life will not wonder at the choice of the apostle to depart and be with Christ, feeling as he did that, whilst at home in the body, he was absent from the Lord. Nor again at the intensity of the Psalmist's longings: "As the hart panteth for the water-brook, so panteth my soul after thee, O God. My soul thirsteth for God, for the living God. When shall I come and appear before God?" He that hath such religious feelings need not fear death. The change which his spirit shall experience in that event will be his gain. It will open into his soul ten thousand streams of perfect, holy pleasure, which eternity will only increase and sweeten.

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