greater gifts. A great deal may be done by imitating Aquila and Priscilla, who helped Apollos. It is not given to everybody to preach to large numbers, or to preach at all, but you can often pick up a young man and say, "I will help him in his education and encourage him in his first efforts." You can always help young men by filling the offering box which supports the College.

I married a gentleman on this platform some time ago who said to me, "I wish I could preach; but I will tell you what I will do, I will keep a man to preach: I will find the money and you will find the man." I told him I must have him speak, too, as best he could. He said he would, but he wished to have somebody to speak better. Men of wealth should copy this example. Help the colporteurs, help the city missionaries, help all those who publish the word of the Lord.

And lastly, and this morning most to the point, there are the heathen perishing for lack of knowledge. Millions of voices call out of the darkness to you, "Come over and help us! You have the light, bring it to us! You have the bread, come and feed us! We perish, we perish, we perish." Brethren, the heathen are perishing. Will you let them perish? I wish that some young men here would go for missionaries. One of the leaders of a missionary society cheered my heart last week when he took out of his pocket an old sermon of mine, marked and crossed and scored. He said, "You will like to see that, Mr. Spurgeon." "What about it?" "That was given to me by a young man who has joined our mission. He read that sermon, and marked the passages which touched his heart, and now he is at work in China. I looked upon that sermon with great delight. I think I felt more pleased with that old sermon than if I had received a wreath of gold. I felt gratified that I had brought a young and fervent heart to devote itself to the Lord Jesus Christ. Give me like joy each of you; and if you cannot go among the heathen personally, help others to do so. Give this morning a liberal collection, and may God accept it at your hands for Christ's sake.

PORTION OF SCRIPTURE READ BEFORE SERMON-Luke xi., 44-54; xii. 1-12.

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HYMNS FROM "OUR OWN HYMN BOOK"-203, 96, 900.

Mr. Spurgeon has issued a revised edition of "Norcott on Baptism." It is a quaint, clear, forcible little work. Those who do not agree with it will be none the "Believers' worse for reading its arguments, and those who already acknowledge Baptism" will be glad of such a solid confirmation of their faith. The price is one shilling for a bound copy, and sixpence for the same in paper cover. Publishers, Passmore and Alabaster. Any bookseller will get it for you.

THE GLORY, UNITY, AND TRIUMPH OF THE CHURCH.

A $ermon

DELIVERED ON LORD'S-DAY MORNING, MAY 4TH, 1879, BY
C. H. SPURGEON,

AT THE METROPOLITAN TABERNACLE, NEWINGTON.

“And the glory which thou gavest me I have given them; that they may be one, even as we are one: I in them, and thou in me, that they may be made perfect in one; and that the world may know that thou hast sent me, and hast loved them, as thou hast loved me."-John xvii. 22—3.

SOME words serve diverse uses and have many meanings. We are very apt to make mistakes if we give the same sense in all places to the same word. The word "world" throughout Scripture is used with a very remarkable variety of meaning, and one had need to have his wits about him, and to read carefully, in order to know what is the precise force of the term in each place where it occurs. In the text before us it is evident that Christ had a view to the world: he desired that the world might know that the Father had sent him, and might also know that God had loved his people even as he had loved his Son. From the somewhat altered expression in the twenty-first verse we feel convinced that our Lord did not limit his desires for the world to its having a bare knowledge of these facts, but wished that it should also believe them, for thus runs the verse- "That the world may believe that thou hast sent me." He wished then that this "world" might do exactly what he elsewhere says his own disciples had already done: "O righteous Father, the world hath not known thee: but I have known thee, and these have known that thou hast sent me." Certainly there is a world for which Jesus did not pray, for he said, "I pray for them: I pray not for the world"; yet here there is a world for which if he does not actually pray, he yet prays that certain gracious events may occur, in order that certain results may be produced upon that world. I say again, the word "world" therefore has many shades of meaning, ranging from that jet-black meaning in which the "world lieth in the wicked one," and that other, "love not the world, neither the things that are in the world," upward to the milder senses in John i. 10, "He was in the world, and the world was made by him, and the world knew him not"; and yet higher to the brighter meaning, "The kingdoms of this world are become the kingdoms of our Lord, and of his Christ." It is not in the worst sense that our text speaks of the world, but in the same manner as we find it used in such passages as these, No. 1,472.

"The Lamb of God, which taketh away the sin of the world," "God was in Christ, reconciling the world unto himself, not imputing their trespasses unto them"; and again in 1 John ii., "And he is the propitiation for our sins and not for ours only, but also for the sins of the whole world." It is certain that "God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting life," and we cannot suppose that the great Redeemer would refuse to pray for those for whom he was given. I understand in this particular place by the word "world" the whole mass of mankind upon the face of the earth who are not as yet converted among them there is an elect part, for our Lord speaks of some men who shall yet believe on him through the word of his servants, but these at this present moment are undistinguished from the rest. I understand here by the word "world" all as yet unrenewed out of the whole living family of man; and on account of these our Lord would have his believing people brought into that admirable condition which we shall now attempt to describe. For the sake of the world he would have the church in a high state of holy beauty and strength. May his gracious prayer be answered in all of us by the working of the Holy Ghost.

I trust that I may say of all of you, my beloved in Christ, that you are living with this object: at any rate, I know that you desire to live for the glory of our Lord Jesus and the salvation of men. We would make all men see what is the fellowship of this mystery; for we would have all men to be saved and come to the knowledge of the truth. Our wish is to bring multitudes to the Saviour, and to conquer province after province of this revolted world for King Jesus. "Let the whole earth be filled with his glory" is a prayer which we cannot, dare not, would not, straiten. Half the world would be a poor reward for the Redeemer's travail-"The earth is the Lord's and the fulness thereof." Even here, where he was despised and rejected of men, our Lord must reign with fulness of glory, having dominion from sea to sea and from the river even to the ends of the earth. This is the consummation towards which we are tending by the grace of God, striving earnestly for it, according to his working, which worketh in us mightily. Daily we labour to bring others into subjection to that blessed sovereignty under which we delight to dwell.

In this place our Lord tells us that this desirable end is to be brought about by a marvellous unity which is described in our text-a unity of men with Christ, a unity of these men in Christ with one another, and the unity of Christ himself with the eternal Father. "I in them, and thou in me, that they may be made perfect in one." Let us speak about this unity this morning, always keeping in mind the drift, end, and object of it, namely, that the world may believe that God has sent the Lord Jesus.

First, then, let us think upon the great means of that unity, and then, secondly, upon the unity itself. Lastly, let us more fully consider the effect to be produced by it.

I. First, then, let us reflect upon THE GREAT MEANS OF THE UNITY which Christ proposes here. It lies in a nutshell-"The glory which thou gavest me I have given them;" with this object, that they may be one, even as we are one." Here our blessed Lord does not speak

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of what he will give to his disciples, though there is a glory which is laid for them which the faithful shall receive at the last; but he mentions a glory which he has already given them. This could not be the incommunicable glory of his Godhead, for that was his by nature, and not by the Father's gift. He speaks throughout the whole of his prayer in the capacity of the Mediator, who is both God and man in one person; and the glory which he says he had given to his people is a glory which the Father had given to him in his complex person as incarnate God. We are to regard, therefore, our Lord Jesus Christ as speaking here as Immanuel, God with us, who, though he counted it no robbery to be equal with God, had made himself of no reputation, and taken upon himself the form of a servant. He appeared on earth as the Son of man, the Son of God; but even in that condescending capacity he was surrounded with a glory of which John speaks in his first chapter, "And the Word was made flesh, and dwelt among us, and we beheld his glory, the glory as of the only begotten of the Father, full of grace and truth." As the Word made flesh the Father has given our Lord an exceeding glory.

The explanations of the words before us are as many as the words themselves, and I suppose there is a measure of truth in each of them. I do not think it possible in one sermon, perhaps not in a hundred, nor even in a thousand, to bring out all that is intended here; therefore I shall not attempt any such a task, but shall only follow one narrow track of practical thought, even as one passes through a field of corn along a narrow pathway, gathering a few ears as he moves along. It seems to me that a main part of the glory of our Lord when on earth lay in the moral and spiritual glory of his character. He was indeed glorious in holiness, and this is evidently the glory which he transfers to us. See the second epistle to the Corinthians, the third chapter and eighteenth verse," But we all, with open face beholding as in a glass the glory of the Lord, are changed into the same image from glory to glory, even as by the Spirit of the Lord." To the like effect are Peter's words in his first epistle, 66 If ye be reproached for the name of Christ, happy are ye; for the Spirit of glory and of God resteth upon you." The essence and cause of the glory which the Father gave the Son, was first of all that He endowed him with the Holy Spirit. "God giveth not the Spirit by measure unto him; the Father loveth the Son and hath given all things into his hand." (John iii. 34, 35.) The Holy Ghost descended upon our Lord in his baptism and abode upon him, so that in the power of the indwelling Spirit he lived, and spake, and acted, and in all that he did the Spirit of God was manifest. In him was fulfilled the word of the Lord by the prophet Isaiah," And there shall come forth a Rod out of the stem of Jesse, and a Branch shall grow out of his roots and the Spirit of the Lord shall rest upon him, the Spirit of wisdom and understanding, the Spirit of counsel and might, the Spirit of knowledge and of the fear of the Lord; and shall make him of quick understanding in the fear of the Lord." In this Spirit there is glory, for the prophet further says, "his rest shall be glorious." Now this glory our Lord Jesus has given to all his disciples. Upon each true disciple the Spirit of God rests according to his measure. If we have not the anointing to the full it is either from want of capacity or by reason of

our own sin, for the Spirit of God is given to the saints: he dwelleth with us and shall be in us evermore. My brethren, I would to God we realized this, that the glory of the Holy Ghost which was given unto Christ is also given unto us, so that it is ours to think, to feel, to speak, to act under his guiding influence and supernatural power. What are we of ourselves apart from the Holy Spirit? How can we hope to convince even one man, much less the world, that God hath sent his Son, apart from the Holy Spirit being with us? But if he will come, and I trust he has come upon many of us; if he will take possession of every faculty, and rule and reign in us in all the splendour of his holiness, then we shall indeed become a power for the conversion of mankind. Behold the Lord Jesus has given us this Spirit, and in that power let us henceforth live. Owing to this endowment of the Holy Spirit there rested upon Jesus Christ a wondrous glory in many respects. One of his first glories was that as man he knew the name and character of God. He knew what no man knoweth, unless it be revealed unto him of the Holy Spirit, namely, the nature, attributes, and mind of God. "The pure in heart shall see God," and those pure eyes of his had seen God to the full. Has he not given us that same vision of the Father? Yes, for he tells us, "He that hath seen me hath seen the Father"; and again in the sixth verse, "I have manifested thy name unto the men which thou gavest me out of the world." Our eyes have been opened by the blessed Spirit of God to see the invisible, and our understandings have been strengthened to know the incomprehensible. Now, according to the language of the apostle, we "know God, or rather are known of God." "No man hath seen God at any time; the only begotten Son, which is in the bosom of the Father, he hath declared him." Not to the full have we beheld the Father, but still, according as we have received this glory which rested upon Christ we have been made to know the Father, and now we have access to the heavenly, we are familiar with the divine, we speak with the Most High, and delight ourselves in the Lord. As we gaze into the unspeakable glory we discern something of the holiness, the justice, and the wisdom of Jehovah; and we behold yet more of his great mercy and abounding love. We were once blinded, but now it is our glory that we see and know the Lord our God. Henceforth we become like our Lord in another beam of his glory: for we also begin to manifest the divine name unto the sons of men who dwell around us. The church, like the

moon, reflects the glory of the great Father of lights, and so is glorious with the borrowed splendour which her Lord puts upon her. Christ's knowledge of the Father is given to us, and we endeavour to make it known to others. If men would see God let them look at. Jesus, for there is he to be seen; and, with bated breath, we add, let them look at Christ's people, for there also is God revealed. It is the glory of the saints that they are the mirrors of the divine character, and when they wear the glory which Jesus has given them they manifest the eternal name unto those whom the Lord has ordained to bless by their means.

The glory of our Lord consisted next in the power of the Spirit in his receiving, keeping, and giving forth the word of God. Our Lord Jesus was a full revelation of the mind of God. "The law was given by Moses,. but grace and truth came by Jesus Christ." He knew the plan of God, that blessed method of infinite love; and he imparted it to his followers,—