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are living "without Christ, having no hope, and without God in the world." You may keep the feast of a Saviour's birth, but it is with the "old leaven" of carnal mirth and thoughtless riot. He is no Saviour to you. True, his name was called "Jesus," but it was in token that he should "save his people from their sins." "You are yet in your sins." Beware-lest you die in them. Brethren, need I say it, " my heart's desire and prayer for you is, that you may be saved." But if you continue careless, lukewarm, indifferent to the warning tokens of decay, I ask-yourselves, being judges-are you in the way of salvation ?-Can you be saved?

SERMON XXII.

PSALM CVII. 7.

66 HE LED THEM FORTH BY THE RIGHT WAY, THAT THEY MIGHT GO TO A CITY OF HABITATION."

"WHATSOEVER things were written aforetime" says the apostle "were written for our learning;" and happy would it be for you, dear brethren, if you were all able to realize the fact. The privilege of appropriation is that which gives its highest charm to every blessing-and thus the word of grace and truth acquires a ten-fold interest, and conveys a ten-fold comfort, when the reader is enabled earnestly to believe that, every precious text was inspired and written for him. This is the case, not only with the preceptive and doctrinal parts of the volume, which are obviously of universal application, but with every fact and every narrative. Let your first question be, what does the Lord say to me, and concerning me, and for me,

in this portion of his book-and you will assuredly find that he has some message, some word in season adapted to your very case.

You are all familiar with the application of the history of ancient Israel to the life and circumstances of all God's chosen people. You know how striking the comparison is, in every leading particular. Their bondage and redemption, their distresses and deliverances, their sins and their mercies, are the faithful and designed types of your own experience. In the record of their perverseness and unbelief, you are furnished with a glass in which to behold the reflection of your own natural face-in the longsuffering, the tender mercies, the many lovingkindnesses of their covenant-God, you are reminded of the single cause why you are not consumed. Thus applied personally to yourselves, the history of those chosen but rebellious children, is calculated at once to abase and to comfort-to shew your own unworthiness of the least of all your mercies your abuse of them--your ingratitude for them and at the same time, to awaken your wondering and adoring thankfulness, for every blessing in providence and grace.

Such is precisely the sentiment of the Psalm before us, in which the inspired writer makes mention of the extremities to which the people of God (whether understood nationally or individually is immaterial) had been reduced, and the uniform deliverance which they had experienced at his hand. It is

a song of praise—and the system of its composition is at once simple and beautiful. Successive providences are enumerated, and on the review of each, the spontaneous burst of gratitude is repeated"Oh, that men would praise the Lord for his goodness, and for his wonderful works to the children of men!" The first mercy recounted, which calls for this ascription of glory to the Father of mercies, is that of the text, in which it is said, that "he led his people forth by the right way, that they might go to a city of habitation." There is some little doubt as to what particular period of their history is here indicated. The third verse seems to point to their return from captivity-the fourth to their exodus from Egypt-and it is in reference to this latter event that I now venture to apply the passage. Three simple points are presented by it to our prayerful consideration.

I. THE END.

II. THE WAY. III. THE GUIDE.

I. THE END for which the people of God were led forth from Egypt was, that "they might come to a city of habitation;" in other words, " to a city, or cities, which they might inhabit." There is more implied in the expression than at the first sight meets the eye. The idea conveyed is one of secure and settled rest, and is strikingly contrasted with their intermediate condition as described in the preceeding context. They wandered in the

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wilderness" says the Psalmist, "in a solitary way; they found no city to dwell in." "Hungry and thirsty, their soul fainted in them." But at length their flittings had a period, and they entered into a land of fenced cities, wherein they might dwell," and no longer sojourn in the shifting tabernacles of the wilderness. How natural and delightful the application of all this to the believer's spiritual progress from wrath to glory! Or rather, to confine ourselves to the particular point we are considering, how glorious is that antitype of that city of habitation, towards which, every day is conducting him! Fully to understand its glory, you must have passed like Israel, the streams of Jordan, and dissolved the earthly house of this tabernacle." But though we are at present called to walk its far-off-streets" by faith, and not by sight," yet, in proportion as faith searches and believes the word of promise, it brings a good report and always returns laden, as it were, with some first-fruits of the tree of life. That "there remaineth a rest for the people of God," we might have argued from their present condition, as compared with their relation to Him. Here they are only " pilgrims, and sojourners," and "have no continuing city." And, "this is not your rest, it is polluted "—is a warning which almost every day rings in your ear. If they had their only portion in this life, it would not be an inheritance, meet for the vessels of mercy, or worthy of those whom the King of glory delighteth to honour. Hence, the apostle observes, that

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