Trials may then come, and press you sore: but the Safety-mark is yours. Woes may come on the earth, but they cannot injure you; death shall come, but it shall prove life to you; the judgment-day shall but gather you to glory. "And after these things," (saith the apostle John, Rev. vii. ver. 1, 2, 3,) "I saw four angels standing on the four corners of the earth, holding the four winds of the earth, that the wind should not blow on the earth, nor on the sea, nor on any tree. And I saw another angel ascending from the east, having the seal of the living God: and he cried with a loud voice to the four angels, to whom it was given to hurt the earth and the sea, saying, Hurt not the earth, neither the sea, nor the trees, till we have sealed the servants of our God in their foreheads."

Brethren, barter not this hope for worlds: Sin will soon be shame, and that shame eternal; conflict with sin will soon be victory, and that too eternal; "Sigh and cry," pray and strive, for a short season longer, and “your sorrow shall be turned into joy, and your joy no man taketh from you."

XI.

"THE SIFTING."

ST. JOHN vi. 66–69.

"From that time many of His disciples went back, and walked no more with Him. Then said Jesus unto the twelve, Will ye also go away? Then Simon Peter answered him, Lord, to whom shall we go? Thou hast the words of eternal life. And we believe and are sure that Thou art that Christ, the Son of the Living God.”

IT is the storm that tries the strength of the foundation, it is the temptation that tests the reality of our Christian profession. Disciple is a name easily taken up, not easily kept in that course whereby alone we deserve the name. Some "endure but for a time," and then, when some blast of trial comes, “fall away;" blessed are they who "endure to the end, the same shall be saved." Our text brings before us both characters, and whilst we are warned by that mournful record, " From that time many of His disciples went back, and walked no more with Him,"-we are

cheered by the ready confession of the affectionate Peter, "Lord! to whom shall we go, Thou hast the words of eternal life"...

O Lord our God, keep us steadfast in the faith, teach us to abide in Christ, let "Thy right hand uphold" us, that we may "follow hard after Thee," and "go from strength to strength," by the might of Thy Holy Spirit, for Jesus' sake, Amen.

The subject will open to us

I. Some Occasions of Offence to those who stumble and fall; as well as

II. The Grounds of Steadfastness to the true Disciple of Christ.

I. Some Occasions of Offence to those who stumble and fall. Who but God can search the heart? Who but God can find the clue to that labyrinth of deceit-the mind of man? Yet shall we do well to trace its workings, under the guidance of the Spirit, in the word of God. We read for instance this solemn fact that "many" who followed our Lord, and were called "His disciples;" at a certain time" went back, and walked no more with Him;" it surely becomes us to inquire into the causes of this their desertion, involving as it did, unless repented of, the ruin of their

souls; it becomes us to search into these causes with application to ourselves, that we, knowing our dangers, may "watch and pray" against the same.

66

1. Reproof of their sin appears to have been one cause of offence that stirred up their secret enmity of heart. Verily, verily, I say unto you," are the words of our Lord, (26th verse,) "ye seek Me, not because ye saw the miracles, but because ye did eat of the loaves and were filled." He disclosed to them their doubledealing, their unsound motives, the deceit of which they were till then perhaps, only in part conscious, but which they then felt to be too truly charged against them: their self-approval was destroyed, and they disliked Him who had destroyed it. Brethren! one mark of the unchanged heart is found in these words of Psa. 1. "Thou hatest instruction." When the wounded refuse to have their wounds probed, there is little hope of the extraction of the ball:when the sick man turns away from the wholesome advice of the physician, what expectation can there be of a cure? If we will not bear the sight of our sins now, we may cover them up for a season, but we shall not loathe them, we shall not leave them, and the leprosy will become eternal. And yet how

few will bear to be told of their faults: this honesty, this true act of friendship produces coldness to the minister of Christ from that seemingly attached one of his flock, it parts from us the servant on whom from long service we had looked on as on an attached friend; children too often murmur at reproof, even when administered by a parent's love. Oh! it is a blessed thing when our heart's best thanks are given to those who "smite us friendly and reprove us." It bears witness to us that pride is somewhat dislodged, that we are in earnest against sin, that "we are not of them who draw back into perdition, but of them that believe to the saving of the soul," Heb. x. 39.

2. But these unstable disciples found another occasion of offence in the humbling mysteries of the gospel. The Saviour's announcement of Himself as "the bread which came down from heaven," (33rd and 41st verses,) whilst they thought that they knew His earthly origin as the son of Joseph, (42nd verse,) this offended them. Presenting such claims He came not as they would have had Him come; they put the plumb-line of their intellect to the plan and counsel of Omnipotence,-no marvel that that plan received not their approval. Union with