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Germs of Thought.

Contact with Christ.

"SOMEBODY HATH TOUCHED ME."-Luke viii. 46.

CHRIST was in the midst of a thronging crowd, and many had touched Him and were even pressing upon Him. But one touch was like no other. It was not involuntary, not accidental; meaning, purpose, desire, prayer, were in it,-faith, also, though not of the most spiritual kind. A touch peculiar in its effect on each of the two persons whom it brought into mutual relations. Three truths suggested:

I.—It is possible to be in close proximity to Christ without touching Him in any vital sense.

II. The slightest touch, if thus vital, is sure to elicit a response.

III. The response is the communication of the virtue that is in Christ Himself.

I. THERE MAY BE CLOSE PROXIMITY WITHOUT VITAL CONTACT. The many throng and press, only one touches. We are necessarily, each of us, one of a crowd of which Christ is the centre. How many points of external contact. A man is baptized in the name of Christ. One of his names is his Christian name. The date of his letters has reference to Christ's birth. The first day of the week is the Lord's Day, the day of His resurrection. Holidays are connected with thoughts of His birth, death, or resurrection. Inevitably, He enters into our thought and life. And the proximity may be much closer. We may be members of His visible church, accustomed to assemble for His worship, to partake of the memorials of His body and blood, to engage in current discussions respecting His character and work. And yet the contact may be external, mechanical, accidental, not

vital. A human life like a submarine telegraph wire. The wire passes through the water, but is insulated, comes never into contact with it. So a life may pass through an element charged with Christian ideas and influences without coming into true contact with it. The hidden Spirit travels on in darkness to the end, never finding its way through the sheath,-of natural insensibility, thoughtlessness, prejudice, self-will,-by which it is enveloped and shut in.

Contact with Christ like that we have with one whose house we visit when he absent. Name on the door. In the hall, his study, everything speaks of him; his handwriting in letters on the table; everything but-himself. So we may pass through the various chambers of the House of Human Life He made His home, but it will be as though He were absent. There are the linen clothes lying, many things to speak of Him, that belong to Him, but Him we see not. This a possibility to be gravely considered for two reasons:

1. Because it is easy not to believe in it. Men who have long been associated with Christ in external ways slow to understand or believe in a deeper way. They doubt the possibility here, at least, of a profounder experience, a closer fellowship. So easy to be careful about the many things, and not believe that the one thing is needful, or even possible.

2. Because when it is not only a possibility, but a fact, the loss incurred is so great. It is the loss of life's greatest opportunity. It is not to behold the fairest of all visions, not to listen to the divinest music, not to read the open secret of our strange existence. Regret of those who never knew or saw one great man whom they had the chance of knowing, compared with regret those are treasuring for themselves who never push through the crowd of beliefs, unbeliefs, fancies, prejudices, systems, theories, that throng Christ and press Him, that they may touch Him with the touch in which is spirit and life. Miss everything but that, throw away every other chance, sell all for this priceless pearl.

II. THE SLIGHTEST TOUCH WHICH HAS SPIRIT AND LIFE IN IT

WILL NOT FAIL TO ELICIT A RESPONSE. Complaint that this

But if she

The wearer

woman's faith was unenlightened, superstitious. believed in the robe, it was because it was His robe. gave to it its value. It was Christ, therefore, in whom she trusted. And the touch was felt, responded to, gained its end. So great is the sensitiveness of the Divine nature. Nothing is lost upon God. The shepherd lying in the night hears the faintest cry from afar of the sheep that has strayed, and knows what it means.

There may be much show of worship, but no response; but when the soul is awake and cries, the cry goes direct to the heart of the Lord. Somebody has touched Him! No fear that He is so much taken up with rulers of synagogues as to be insensible to the appeal of the humblest, inarticulate as it may be. He interprets sighs. He does not require that those who would receive His help should be learned in theology. A touch is not everything, but it is never in vain, and is the beginning of greater things.

III.-CHRIST'S RESPONSE TO THE TOUCH OF TRUE FAITH IS THE COMMUNICATION OF HIMSELF. He gives the greatest and best He has to give. "I perceive that virtue has gone out of Me." This He gives when He heals, the life that is in Himself. He gives, therefore, not that which costs Him nothing. Great services are never rendered cheaply. No true union with Christ which does not result in the reproduction of His life in us. Our true salvation in receiving His Spirit, living upon Him as upon the Bread of God. "He that abideth in Me, and I in Him, the same bringeth forth much fruit." The supreme question, Is His mind, spirit, life, in me?

BRISTOL.

H. ARNOLD THOMAS, M.A.

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Indisputably, the firm believers in the Gospel have a great advantage over all others, for this simple reason: that, if true, they will have their reward hereafter; and if there be no hereafter, they can but be with the infidel in his eternal sleep, having had the existence of an exalted hope, through life, without subsequent disappointment."-LORD BYRON.

Painful Soul Moods and their Antidotes.

"MY SOUL FAINTETH FOR THY SALVATION: BUT I HOPE IN THY WORD. MINE EYES FAIL FOR THY WORD, SAYING, WHEN WILT THOU COMFORT ME? FOR I AM BECOME LIKE A BOTTLE IN THE SMOKE; YET DO I NOT FORGET THY STATUTES. HOW MANY ARE THE DAYS OF THY SERVANT? WHEN WILT THOU EXECUTE JUDGEMENT ON THEM THAT PERSECUTE ME? THE PROUD HAVE DIGGED PITS FOR ME, WHICH ARE NOT AFTER THY LAW. ALL THY COMMANDMENTS ARE FAITHFUL : THEY PERSECUTE ME WRONGFULLY; HELP THOU ME. THEY HAD ALMOST CONSUMED ME UPON EARTH; BUT I FORSOOK NOT THY PRECEPTS. QUICKEN ME AFTER THY LOVING KINDNESS; SO SHALL I KEEP THE TESTIMONY OF THY MOUTH,”Psalm cxix. 81-88.

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"My soul fainteth for Thy salvation." "The word here rendered 'fainteth' is the same that in Psalm lxxiii. 26, is translated faileth.' The idea here is that his strength gave way; he had such an intense desire for salvation that he became weak and powerless. Any strong emotion may thus prostrate us; and the love of God, the desire of His favour, the longing for heaven, may be so intense as to produce this result." -Barnes. "Mine eyes fail for Thy word, saying, When wilt Thou comfort As the eyes of him that watches for one that cometh not fail with watching. "For I am become like a bottle in the smoke; yet do I not forget Thy statutes." "This is not a figurative representation of one who had become mellow and ripened by affliction."-Hupfield. "Not taken from the custom of ancients of hanging bottles, filled with wine, in the smoke, high up above the fire; for wine is not the subject of the verse, nor is there any comparison to a bottle hung up in order to make it dry and wrinkled so as to adapt it for preserving wine."-De Wette. "It seems more suitable to refer to the effects of smoke as destroying and rendering useless. Accordingly the meaning would be that he allows nothing to force God's Word from his consciousness, although already he has become like a bottle blackened and shrivelled up in the smoke. The object of hanging such a bottle high up would be to set it aside in the meantime as not immediately needed. And its contact with the smoke would be merely the consequence of its hanging in an elevated position, whither the smoke, in the absence of chimneys, would naturally rise. The point of comparison would then be the being set aside."-Lange's Commentary on Psalms. "How many are the days of Thy servant? when wilt Thou execute judgment on them that persecute me?" "This is almost equivalent to how

few. His prayer for speedy judgment on his enemies is grounded on the shortness of his life and of the time within which the Divine justice can reveal itself (Ps. lxxxix. 47). The case does not admit of delay."—Young. "The proud have digged pits for me, which are not after Thy law." "Proud men have digged pitfalls for me, because they are not in accord with Thy law. So in Jer. xviii. 20-22. They dug pits for him, as if it were a wild beast that had to be captured."-Kay. "All Thy commandments are faithful, they persecute me wrongfully; help Thou me." "God help

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me is an excellent comprehensive prayer; it is a pity it should. ever be used lightly, and as a bye word."-Matthew Henry. They had almost consumed me upon earth; but I forsook not Thy precepts. Though they had almost completed his ruin, his faith in the Divine Word remained unshaken. "Quicken me after Thy lovingkindness; so shall I keep the testimony of Thy mouth." "According to Thy mercy revive me, so will I observe the testimony of Thy mouth." Homiletically this passage may be taken to illustrate painful soul moods and their antidotes. Observe here

I.-PAINFUL MOODS OF SOUL. questioning, and sense of injustice.

There are painful yearning, anxious

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First: Painful yearning. "My soul fainteth for Thy salvation." There is, perhaps, in all human souls a yearning for something not yet possessed—a deep, gnawing, constant hunger for a real or imaginary good. The whole human creation "groaneth and travaileth together," &c. Man never is but always to be blest." The words suggest (1) The general objects of this yearning. (a) A sense of security. "My soul fainteth for Thy salvation.” Where is there a mind in which there is not some foreboding of future ill, either of a temporal or a spiritual kind? Excited conscience is ever sounding the trump of spiritual danger and ruin. Hence the all but universal yearning for "salvation," or a deep sense of security. Another object of yearning, (b) A sense of comfort. "When wilt Thou comfort me?" Where are souls to be found on this earth entirely free from sorrow, sorrows arising from the disruptions of friendship, the blastings of hope, the breaking down of cherished plans, the sense of guilt, and the forebodings of retribution? Hence the yearning for consolation. "When wilt Thou comfort me?" When shall the clouds be scattered, the storm hushed, the wound healed, the distressing hunger appeased? The words suggest (2) The distress of this yearning. The words suggest that this state of mind is (a) Weakening. "My soul fainteth." "Fainting," says

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