and yet neglect so great salvation. Come, then, to the table of your Saviour, that, seeing the extent of His love, you may drink into his spirit, and say, with him, "Father, forgive them, for they know not what they do." 117 SERMON VII. THE PRAYER OF THE CHURCH. CANTICLES 1. 4. Draw me: we will run after thee. IT has been well observed, that the religion of our blessed Lord is the religion of the heart; that if we were to pursue it merely by dry and scholastic rules, we never could feel its power or enter into its design. How unintelligible, for instance, to a dry critic, is that sacred book from whence my text is taken! Those who have treated it in this way, have considered it as an ode made on the marriage of Solomon with the daughter of Pharoah; and have applied to it the classical rules by which the poetry of the Heathen has been measured: but what have they made of it? Comparatively nothing for they have omitted to seek for that which is its true expositor,-the heart of a Christian under the teaching of the Holy Ghost. But they who have opened it with these remem brances, that God is love, that Jesus Christ is the Son of his love, that the Holy Spirit is the Spirit of love, that the Divine command is the law of love, that the Gospel is the manifestation of love, and that, when faith and hope have performed their office, charity, or love, will still abide those who have taken this key have found it to be a book in which the Holy Spirit has in a very remarkable manner laid open the joys, the sorrows, the hopes, the fears, the desires, the conflicts-or, in one word, the experience of the true believer. So much so, that we generally notice that as Christians advance in spirituality they find more and more edification from this blessed book. To-day, my Christian friends, is one of our privileged days: a day in which not only supplication is offered to the Throne of Grace, the praises of God are sung, and his word read and preached, but in which "the King sitteth at his table," and frequently makes himself known in the breaking of bread. On such a day the Christian would desire, as St. John says, to be "in the Spirit," and to have his heart in unison with the privilege. Some also, who on the last Sabbath heard the condescending request made by our heavenly Father, "My Son, give me thy heart," may desire to yield themselves to God. It is more particularly to meet these classes that I have selected my text; that they who would surrender their hearts might have them drawn ; and that they whom he has to a certain extent attracted, may find his ordinances as the bands of love to bring them into still more intimate communion. Let me therefore have your prayers, that the Holy Spirit may graciously assist us whilst we are meditating upon these words; putting this petition of the church into all our hearts, "Draw me: and we will run after thee." The term " Draw," is one frequently used in Scripture, to describe that power which the Lord exercises upon the mind and heart of man. Thus we find, in the book of Judges, the Lord promising Barak, "I will draw unto thee, to the river Kishon, Sisera, the captain of Jabin's army, with his chariots and his multitude; and I will deliver him into thine hand* :" that is, I will exercise that secret influence upon the mind of Sisera, which shall lead him to come down with his army to the river Kishon. So our Lord, "No man can come to me, except the Father, which hath sent me, draw him :" that is, No one can truly rest his soul upon the Saviour unless the Lord by his Divine power overcome * Judges iv. 7. ་ his natural reluctance. And again; "I, if I be lifted up from the earth, will draw all men unto me:" or will attract persons of all characters; taking them off from worldly confidence and worldly desires, and fixing their affections upon me as their only Saviour. In doing this, the Lord acts with us as beings intelligent and affectionate: as he says, "I drew them with the bands of a man, with the cords of love:" that is to say, he will, by the medium of his word and ministers, present to their minds that which may convince their judgments; which may shew them the necessity there is for their coming to him,—that they have transgressed the Divine commandments, and are on that account exposed to the curse of a broken law; that their state is remediless in themselves, the law making no allowance for any one sin, not even for a sinful thought, and providing no way of escape when the breach is made, simply declaring, Do this and live, transgress and die:' shewing them also, that in these circumstances the Lord Jesus has become their surety, making, by his death, a "full, perfect, and sufficient sacrifice, oblation, and satisfaction, for the sins of the whole world," and offering this to them with the greatest freedom;-thus convincing |