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the riches of His love-He will open His arms to receive you. He will take you into His very heart and soul. You shall be swallowed up in Jesus. This is your repose, under trial- that He is your exceeding great reward.

Christian Reader, what a view this gives us of Christian practice-its motives, and its consequences! We work not, that we may be saved -but we work, that we may have more of Jesus -that we may realise more of His Person, His presence, and His grace. We work not, that we may be more sure of heaven; but that we may have more of Jesus by the way. He is our reward. Now, a reward is not given for nought. It must be worked for-it must be earned.

If we would have the smile of Jesus, the presence of Jesus, the sensible outgoings of the heart of Jesus, we must work for it. It is given in answer to the prayer of faith-in return for heart-felt communion with God over His Word, or for any work or labour of love, done for His name's sake. It is the reward of the heart being kept with all diligence-for every thought being brought into captivity to the obedience of Christ. It is the feast, prepared by Jesus, for the new nature, that dwelleth in us. The only thing, that could be appreciated as a reward by the divine

nature in us, is the enjoyment of the divine Person of the Father, and of the Son. Such reward have all the saints. He is "the rewarder of them that diligently seek him." Heb. xi. 6. If we seek Him diligently, we are sure to have our reward. This is the confidence of the saintsthis is their repose.

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If Christ is our exceeding great reward here, how much more so in the world to come.! to this that Moses looked, when he chose "rather to suffer affliction with the people of God, than to enjoy the pleasures of sin for a season "—to this, when he esteemed "the reproach of Christ greater riches than the treasures of Egypt"-he had respect unto the recompense of the reward. Heb. xi. 25, 26.

It was to this that Christ referred, when He said, “Rejoice ye in that day, and leap for joy; for behold, great is your reward in heaven." Luke vi. 23. And it is on the same principle that it will be said, in the great day, “Come, ye blessed of my Father; inherit the kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world; for I was an hungered, and ye gave Me meat," &c. Matt. xxv. 34.

But let us ever remember that, as with the recompense of the reward bestowed here below,

so also in the kingdom of heaven, it is entirely distinct from the gift of salvation. This is not, and never could be, a reward. No sinner merits grace; "otherwise grace is no more grace." Rom. xi. 6. "Eternal life" is "the gift of God, neither merited, earned, nor worked for. But grace introduces a new order of things, and bestows a nature alike capable of meritorious working, and, in its working, sure of reward.

When Jesus was about to leave the world, He prayed, "And now, O Father, glorify Thou Me with Thine own self with the glory which I had with Thee before the world was." John xvii. 5. And is not the prayer of the child of God, "Lord Jesus, reward me with Thine own self?" What is happiness? What is heaven? What is glory to come? Is it not the Person of Jesus? To behold Him with our own eyes-to hear Him with our own ears-to feast for ever on the divine radiance of His countenance-for ever to "drink into the refreshments of His glory." Oh Believer, this is what we have to repose inChrist has said, "I am thine exceeding great reward."

REPOSING ON OUR ONENESS WITH

JESUS

BELIEVER, this is your repose, that you are one with Christ-One with "God manifest in the flesh" -one with Him, "in whom dwelleth all the fullness of the Godhead bodily "-one with Him, who hath said, "I and my Father are one," Jo. x. 30,-one with Him, of whom it is written, Awake, O sword, against my shepherd, against the man that is my fellow, saith the Lord of hosts." Zech. xiii. 7.

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To be one with Christ is nothing less than to be one with God-for Christ is God. He, that is one with Christ, is one with the Father in Christ -as it is written, "That, which we have seen, and heard, declare we unto you, that ye also may have fellowship with us, and truly our fellowship is with the Father, and with His Son Jesus Christ. 1 Jo. i. 3.

The unity of one being with another is what exists no where but in God, and in those, whom He makes partakers of the divine nature. A man cannot, as man, be one with another man.

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mind of the one is as distinct from the mind of the other, as their bodies are distinct from each other—you cannot, by any possibility, blend them into one. Except in as far as they communicate externally with one another, man lives in isolation from his fellow man. Separate they came into the world, and separate they leave the worldand, as far as any unity of spirit goes, unless they are joint subjects of the grace of God, separate they must continue from one another to all eternity.

If man, by nature, is distinct from his brother, how much more is he distinct from God! What oneness can there be between a fellow creature, and the Great Creator-between a sinful being, and the Holy God? Between man and man there is mutual likeness, and a common nature, though there is no blending into one. But between man, and God there is not only the barrier of sin, on the part of man, to shut out all fellowship with holiness-but there is entire difference of being. Man is mortal; God is eternal. Man is finite; a spirit; man is flesh.

God is infinite. God is God is in heaven; man

is on earth. God is self-existent; man is a created being-the creature of a day. There can be no self-existent unity between God and man.

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