names; banish from the religious vocabulary such a word as 'toleration :'-Christians tolerating Christians. Churches tolerating Churches. Strange paralogism of language arming alike the British scoffer, and the Hindoo idolater, with a keen weapon of assault against "the truth as it is in Jesus." IN CHRIST, ought to be the death-blow to religious party. The nearer His people are in Him, whether in their individual or corporate capacity, the nearer they will be to one another. It is because of their distance from the central Sun that they move in such wide and devious orbits. As it is expressed by a thoughtful Christian of recent times—“ The different modes in which different and differing people desire to do God's will are as lines converging to a common centre. When the truehearted meet in the centre, in the real knowledge and love of God, the distance of the varied lines from each other has vanished away, and all is one." "The Christian hope is common to them that are Christians, in which they all unite and meet; whereas, in reference to the hopes of other men, there is no such thing as a centre in which their hopes may unite and meet, and so they lie scattered. All the hopes of Christians do run into one hope."

"2

" 1

"What," it has been well said by yet another master in Israel," what were the letters of this man in Christ to the Churches, but proclamations of peace,

1 "Memorials of a Quiet Life."

2 Flavel.

edicts from the throne of Love, commanding Christians as they valued the Royal favour of the King of Saints, and hoped for a crown above, to love one another." 1

The day is at all events promised, when "in sweet fellowship beyond the stream" we shall all come “in the unity of the faith, and of the knowledge of the Son of God, unto a perfect man, unto the measure of the stature of the fulness of Christ" (Eph. iv. 13). Then, at least, the realisation and consummation of this longed-for Church fellowship will be ensured. The Church of the present economy, as observed in a previous page, may, in a mingled, imperfect state (and that with no breach of true unity) be composed of varied folds, though one flock. But in the pastures of the blessed,' even this divergence will cease. earthly fold will be no longer needed to protect from prowling robber and beast of prey. "The ransomed of the Lord," united, glorified, will gather in eternal harmony on the golden meadows of heaven. Here, the varied portions of the wide universal Church are like the briny pools of water on the seashore. There is no incongruity in their remaining separate and apart: each with its own distinctive and accidental conformation of rock and shingle, sand and seaweed. But when the mighty tide of heavenly glory-the waves of the

The

1 Dr. Harris. Chrysostom remarks that the "name of Christ is oftener mentioned in 1st Corinthians than in any other Epistle. The Apostle thereby designing to draw them away from their party admiration of particular teachers to Christ alone."

eternal ocean of Divine love sweep over, "all shall be one!"-no trace of separation will remain. The amalgamation will be complete. "One IN CHRIST!"

will be the boom of the everlasting surge of that unebbing sea. And the Apostle's own words will have their best and only true fulfilment "Ye are all the children of God by faith IN CHRIST JESUS!"

XIII.

THE CHURCHES IN CHRIST.

"The Churches of Judea which were IN CHRIST."-Gal. i. 22. "Wherefore remember, that ye being in time past Gentiles in the flesh, who are called Uncircumcision by that which is called the Circumcision in the flesh made by hands; that at that time ye were without Christ. . . . But now IN CHRIST JESUS ye who sometimes were far off are made nigh by the blood of Christ."Eph. ii. 11-13.

"IN CHRIST JESUS neither circumcision availeth anything, nor uncircumcision, but a new creature.”—Gal. vi. 15.

"Ye are all one IN CHRIST JESUS."-Gal. iii. 28.

HERE is another aspect of the subject treated

in the previous meditation, bearing on the Apostle's great motto, which demands a few passing thoughts. It is one that was very much local and temporary; having an almost exclusive reference indeed to the Apostolic age. As such, therefore, it is of limited interest as compared with the grandeur of that vast spiritual union, just considered, in reversion for the Church of the future.

But the subject is referred to in such distinct, and almost exulting terms (and that more than once), that

we cannot pass it altogether unnoticed.

"IN CHRIST."

That word—or rather the power and principle which it enshrines, was the mighty talisman that effected the strangest of all national and social revolutions: in the noblest sense of the term "turning the world upside down." To any diligent reader of St. Paul's Epistles, it is evident that next to his own marvellous conversion, there was nothing to him so wondrous, so almost incredible, as being able to speak of "the churches" in JUDEA which were "in Christ; the fusing (with all their antagonistic and irreconcilable elements) of Jew and Gentile "into one body." For what did such an amalgamation involve? The abandonment of all that an Israelite held most sacred. The renunciation of proud national and spiritual prerogative; the surrender of his chartered rights :-" to whom pertained the adoption, and the glory, and the covenants, and the giving of the law, and the service of God, and the promises" (Rom. ix. 4). The Jew had no dealing with the Samaritan: the Jew and Samaritan together had still less dealing with the outside Gentile. The Gentile was 'ostracised:' regarded as 'a dog,' unclean, an "alien from the commonwealth of Israel and a stranger from the covenant of promise." No wonder that Paul should speak of the

1 46 ταις ἐν Χριστῷ. This addition was necessary when speaking of the Christian brotherhood of Judea, for the unconverted Jewish communities might still be called the churches of God."--BISHOP LIGHT

Foor.