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LECTURE VI.

THE CONQUEROR.

"He that overcometh shall inherit all things."-Revelation xxi.

WAR is the aspect of this dispensation; earth is a battle-field; Christians are soldiers; the Bible is our armoury; victory our hope.

We are encompassed with a cloud of enemies as well as of witnesses; the whole field of our existence and action is covered with them; every hill, and dale, and valley; every height and depth; the past, the present, and the future,-all glisten with their hostile array. The stamp of Satan has conjured up these desperate squadrons, and they are prepared for victory or destruction. Sin is not the least powerful nor the least present enemy. It has infected the air we breathe with hostile miasma; it has left its sear blight on every acre of the earth; it has distilled its deadly poison into every heart, from royal height down to plebeian level; it waits and watches for impress and victory at every avenue, and even in a Christian's heart it is not utterly extirpated; its condemnation is put away through the blood of Jesus, and its power is broken by the Holy Spirit; but it still vexes, assails, and sometimes prevails against the believer. It is, indeed, denuded of all its attractions in a Christian's eye, and arrayed in its own inherent and essential hues; so truly so, that it comes to him always as a foe, and is never welcome as a friend. Sin lives in the Christian, but the Christian does not live in sin; it exists in him as an intruder, detested and extruded by every energy he has, not as a lodger, either welcome from character, or tolerated for profit. There is the same difference between sin in a converted man and sin in an unconverted man, as there is between poison as it exists in a rattlesnake, and poison found in the body of a human being. In the one it is congenial to its nature, and

cherished as its defence; in the other it is felt as a foreign element, and the system has no repose till it is expelled. In the unbeliever sin overcomes the man; in the believer the man overcomes the sin. In the heart of the former, sin luxuriates an indigenous plant; in that of the other it is cut down, and crushed, and stunted as a poisonous exotic. Sin overcomes the child of nature sin is overcome in the child of grace.

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The next enemy we have to overcome is the world. It is now in all its phases and aspects the world-the enemy of the people of God. The friendship of the world is enmity to God, and whoever is the friend of the world is the enemy of God. "Love not the world, neither the things that are in the world. If any man love the world, the love of the Father is not in him for all that is in the world, the lust of the flesh, the lust of the eyes, and the pride of life, is not of the Father, but of the world." It is, however, a disheartened, because a discomfited foe; it wars against the people of God, not as a confident and hopeful enemy, but because it is incapable, from its instincts, of doing otherwise. Its opposition is its necessity. It battles without hope, or rather in despair. It must, however, be remembered that this victory consists not in mechanical separation from the world, but in collision with it-in resistance, in protest, in spiritual victory over it. The epicurean says, "Eat, drink, and be merry; for to-morrow we die." The Romanist says, "Fast, and starve, and stint, and escape into a convent, for if you remain in the world it will conquer you." The Christian says, "Remain in the world, but be not of it; do not shrink from its responsibilities to avoid its perils. Stand where God in his providence has placed you-patient in suffering, humble in prosperity, Christian in all things. Do the good that requires to be done-avoid the evil that menaces youtreat the smile of the world as the passing sunbeam, and its frown as a momentary cloud." "Endure as seeing Him who is invisible."

We are called upon to overcome the world's allurements. A corrupt world crowds its temptations upon you; places of sinful amusement, and others of yet deeper evil, open their doors, and light up their lamps, and display all their attractions. These are the splendours of corruption-the phosphorescence of decay.

Ambition bids you sink the Christian in the candidate for office. Fame beckons you with her trumpet to lay aside simplicity of life; and wealth spreads its shining heaps, and invites you to become its devotee. These are the world's basilisk eyes, its baits, its snares. Withstand them in their beginning. Hear sounding in your ears the Master's voice: "He that overcometh shall inherit all things."

We are called on to overcome the afflictions of the world. "In the world ye shall have tribulations," is the law of our life here. This tribulation has various manifestations. The loss of health, of property, of relatives; these either cry aloud to you, "Curse God and die;" or whisper in the depths of the broken heart, "God hath forsaken you, and your God hath forgotten you." Can you say, "The Lord gave, and the Lord hath taken away; blessed be the name of the Lord?" Does your Christianity shine forth as the sun, heightened in effulgence and glory by the contrast? Do you pray in trouble, and praise in joy, and cling close to God in all things? Then its glare does not dazzle you, and its scorn does not irritate you. You overcome. Still have faith in God as your God, and in Jesus as your righteousness-in holiness as perfect beauty-in love as true happiness.

Do you overcome the world by endeavouring to bless the world? This is the noblest victory. When you hear of whole lands lying in darkness and in the shadow of death, do you respond to their piercing appeal? Does sympathy with souls loosen the attraction of wealth? Do you resist the suggestions of avarice, and lay what you can on the altar of the gospel? A religion that does not finally overcome the world, and rise superior to it, is not of God. "Who is he that overcometh the world? It is he that believeth that Jesus is the Christ," who is born of God.

The next enemy we have to war with, and to overcome, is Satan. He is no figure of speech-he is a fact, a great and active fact-a composite of a fiend and angel-cunning and craft, and power and energy, enlisted against us. In all sins there is diabolical venom. Satan "filled the heart of Ananias." The "god of this world blinds the minds of them that believe not." Our salvation moves hell as much as heaven. Angels minister to it, and Satan labours to undermine it. He varnishes vice with virtue

-covetousness with the aspect of economy-pride with that of self-respect revenge with righteous retribution, and rejection of the gospel with consideration. "We wrestle not against flesh and blood, but against principalities and powers; against the rulers of darkness of this world; against spiritual wickedness in high places." There is a sympathy, too, between our hearts and Satan: each corrupt desire puts on his uniform, and serves in his cause, and pleads with powerful eloquence for allegiance to the usurper. Satan, too, has vast powers. He is strong in might, and profound in cunning; he overcame even in innocence; he is the prince of this world. His malignity is equal to his might; his only gleam of joy shoots from success in ruining, and hence all the energies and efforts of his fiendish nature are concentrated in efforts to contaminate. He vitiates in order to vanquish. None are too high to be beyond his reach, and none too holy to defy it: the more exalted you are in society, or in moral and intellectual eminence, the more you are open to his fiery darts. And his perseverance is equal to his power and enmity. He is never weary of his work. In all places-the sanctuary, the exchange, the sea, the garden, the bed-he tracks his victims as the wild beast his prey. Our only safety under God is resistance in the strength of the Spirit of God. Resist him, and he will flee from you. He is a coward-a vanquished enemy-desperate only in the agonies of certain defeat. Christ bruised his head, and he flees from any that withstand his assaults in the strength of him who overcame him at first. "Whosoever is born of God keepeth himself, and that wicked one toucheth him not"—that is, so as to overcome or destroy us. A stronger than Satan is on our side. Divine strength is made perfect in weakness. Hence ours is the victory of God. "Thanks be to God, who giveth us the victory through Jesus Christ." We gain, and yet God gives the victory; we fight, but not at our own charges; we overcome, but not in our own strength. By grace we stand.

It is "through Jesus Christ." In him we are accepted, adopted, glorified. Through him our imploring look, our fainting heart, our failing strength, send their appeal to God; and, in return, we hear sounding in our hearts glorious promises-and

invigorating our spirits, omnipotent strength-and cheering us, the crown of life suspended in the future.

But we ought not to be discouraged because our victory is not instantaneous. It is not the act of a day, but the accomplishment of a lifetime.

God "giveth us the victory." There may be failures in certain parts of the warfare. It may not be victory at every point, and every hour of the battle of life; but its close will assuredly be so. Thus Abraham overcame, and entered into that city for which he looked, "whose builder and maker is God." Thus Jacob "gathered up his feet into his bed, and yielded up the ghost, and was gathered to his people." Caleb "wholly followed the Lord," and said, "I am this day fourscore and five years, and yet I am as strong this day as I was in the day that Moses sent me." Moses was transplanted, like a glorious tree, from the borders of the earthly to the sunshine of the heavenly Canaan.

They too are there, having overcome, who "weep as though they wept not, and who possess the world as though they possessed not, and use it as not abusing it." They too are victorious who can say, "Whom have I in heaven but Thee? and in the earth there is none that I desire besides Thee." They too who run the race set before them, looking to Jesus. They, in short, who, by the might of weakness, fight the good fight, and lay hold on eternal life.

In order thus to overcome the world, you must be a Christian indeed. Any thing short of this will fail in the hour of conflict. "Almost Christians" will be altogether lost. You must be a convert, not a merely sober, and honest, and industrious person. We, the ministers of the gospel, must be more anxious to see around the pulpit, not crowds of curious inquirers after something new, but living, and thirsting, and praying converts, subdued by the Spirit of God, and overflowing in sympathy with all that is holy, beautiful, and true.

You must abjure all that stands between you and the full reception of the truth. It matters not how dear, or old, or popular, or profitable, this obstruction may be. Is it the absorbing love of money-a love to which you sacrifice time, and