1 Timothy 4:1-16

4. It entered patristic theology in the form of an exaggerated admiration for virginity, to the disparagement of married life.

5. It developed inside the Latin and Greek Churches into the celibacy of the clergy and the religious orders.

6. It was a tendency wholly opposed to Scripture teaching.

II. THERE WAS A PROHIBITION OR RESTRAINT UPON THE USE OF CERTAIN KINDS OF FOOD. "And commanding to abstain from meats, which God hath created to be received with thanksgiving by them who believe and know the truth." Probably the restriction was as to the use of flesh. The Essenes and the Therapoutae abstained from particular kinds of food. The Gnostic schools developed the tendency still more, and in due time it was stereotyped into the penitential usages of Romanism. The apostle argues strenuously against this abuse.

1. It was contrary to God's design in creation.

2. The conditions under which the true design of God in creation is fulfilled.

(a) that food is to be gratefully received as God's gift;

(b) that our thanksgiving is presented on the objective side by the Word of God, and on the subjective side by prayer. Thus the custom of grace before and after meat is grounded in a Divine command.—T.C.

1 Timothy 4:6, 1 Timothy 4:7.—The due equipment and duties of a minister of Christ.

I. THE MINISTER MUST BE ALWAYS TEACHING. "By setting forth these things to the brethren, thou shalt be a good minister of Jesus Christ." It was the duty of Timothy to counsel the brethren at Ephesus concerning the present signs of the coming apostasy, and to instruct them how they should counteract its mischiefs. It is probable that some at Ephesus had already been betrayed by ascetic seductions into an unhealthy mode of life. Timothy was to be mindful of the present truth and the present error.

II. THE MINISTER MUST BE ALWAYS LEARNING. "Nourishing thyself up in the words of the faith and of the good instruction which thou hast diligently followed."

1. There must be a continuous and permanent process of self-instruction, as the tense of the participle signifies. The minister must never cease to learn, because he has to set the truth in new lights, and to counteract error out of the large storehouse of Divine truth.

2. The minister's armory is the Word of faith and good instruction thoroughly mastered.

III. THE MINISTER MUST BE ALWAYS WORKING TOWARD A PROFITABLE RESULT. "But the profane and old wives' fables avoid, and rather exercise thyself unto godliness."

1. Negatively, the minister is to avoid foolish and unprofitable studies. The apostle referred to fables familiarily known, Jewish in origin, perhaps with a mixture of Gentile theosophy, which were morally unfruitful, but practically dangerous as preparing the way for the apostasy of the future. The minister must himself stand free from all sympathy with such injurious formalism as was embodied in the rabbinical studies, as leading to the neglect of the weightier matters of the Law.

2. Positively, the minister is to exercise himself unto godliness.

(a) It has its inner seat in the heart.

(b) It works outward into the life.

(c) It is a progressive state.

(d) It was the one chief concern of the apostle himself. "One thing I do."—T.C.

1 Timothy 4:8, 1 Timothy 4:9.—The advantage of true godliness.

The apostle gives a reason for his exhortation to godliness.

II. THE SUPERIORITY OF GODLINESS TO ANY MERE BODILY EXERCISE. "For bodily exercise profiteth to a small extent."

1. The allusion here is not to the ascetic discipline already noticed, because:

2. The allusion is to the gymnastic training which occupied so much of the time and energy of the Greek youth. It was profitable for the healthful development of bodily life, but by its very nature it was both temporal and temporary in its results and its rewards.

II. THE GROUND OF THE SUPERIORITY OF GODLINESS. "But godliness is profitable unto all things, having the promise of the life that now is, and of that which is to come." It has the profit and the promise of a double life.

1. It has the profit and the promise of this present life.

(a) of a good name,

(b) of riches and honor; for they will want no good thing.

2. It has the profit and the promise of the life to come.

III. CORROBORATION OF THE APOSTLE'S ASSERTION RESPECTING GODLINESS. "Faithful is the saying, and worthy of all acceptation." It was a truth of universal acceptance among Christian people, because, in spite of all the drawbacks of a persecuting time, it had been happily realized in their checkered experience.—T.C.

1 Timothy 4:10.—The practical effects of this truth in apostolic experience.

Looking to the realization of this promise, the apostle reminds Timothy how he was borne up by it in all his labor and suffering.

I. ITS SUSTAINING EFFICACY. "For to this end do we labor and suffer reproach."

1. The apostle did not regard the life promised to godliness as one of mere corporeal enjoyment.

2. His life was actually one of severe and toilsome labor as well as of trying but unmerited reproach.

3. Yet he was stimulated to increased toil and supported under the infliction of unjust reproach by the thought of the promise involved in the life of true godliness.

II. THE SOLID BASIS OF CHRISTIAN EXPECTATION UNDER TOIL AND SHAME. "Because we have set our hope upon the living God, who is the Savior of all men, especially of those that believe."

1. The blessed nature and continuity of this hope.

2. The ground or basis of this hope. "Upon the living God, who is the Savior of all men, especially of those that believe."

(a) The Saviorship here has relation to the two lives of men, as expressed in the context. In the one sense, God is a Savior of all men, since by his watchful and sustaining providence he preserves them from destruction; in the other, he offers and bestows eternal life.

(b) The words do not warrant the Universalist conclusion that all men will be ultimately saved. The passage makes an express distinction between all "men" and "believers" inconsistent with this view.—T.C.

1 Timothy 4:11, 1 Timothy 4:12.—A series of admonitions for the guidance of Timothy.

I. TIMOTHY IS ENJOINED TO EXERCISE A DUE AUTHORITY. "These things command and teach." He is to instruct the Church at Ephesus with all authority in all that concerned the nature of true piety, the dangers to be guarded against, and the duties to be faithfully discharged.

II. TIMOTHY IS ENJOINED TO CULTIVATE A GRAVITY OF DEPORTMENT THAT WOULD MAKE HIS YOUTH RESPECTED. "Let no man despise thy youth."

1. Timothy was only relatively a young man. It is highly probable that he was very young when he first joined the apostle (Acts 16:1-3)—perhaps nearly twenty-five years of age—and as eleven years had since intervened, he would probably now be about forty years old.

2. As Timothy had to give counsel to persons much older than himself (1 Timothy 5:1), and even to call them to account (verse 19), it was necessary that he should cultivate a gravity of manner that would admit of his age being forgotten. Perhaps, also, as he was of a rather timid disposition—more disposed to obey than to command—the counsel of the apostle was more needed. He must be firm and manly, and destitute of every aspect or element of pretentious assumption.

III. TIMOTHY IS ENJOINED TO BECOME A PATTERN TO ALL BELIEVERS. "But become thou a pattern of the believers in word, in behavior, in love, in faith, in purity." Thus would he counteract any disadvantage arising from his youth. He was to be a pattern in all the leading characteristics of the Christian minister.

1. "In word."

(a) not corrupt, vain, or foolish;

(b) but always with grace, seasoned with salt—wise, grave, edifying.

2. "In behavior." In the Church, the family, the world, he must maintain a deportment becoming the gospel of Christ, in all godliness and honesty, with simplicity and godly sincerity, so as to stop the mouths of gainsayers and earn a good report from them that are without.

3. "In love, in faith." These are the two motive forces of the Christian life to influence both the speech and conduct of the minister. The one is set in motion by the other; for "faith worketh by love."

4. "In purity." The minister must be pure in life, in thought, in language, and in all his relations to the world.—T.C.

1 Timothy 4:13.—The duties of Timothy's public ministry.

The apostle urges him to the diligent exercise of his calling. "Till I come give attention to the reading, the exhortation, the teaching."

I. THE READING. This referred to the public reading of the Scriptures in the Church. The Old Testament Scriptures, and probably part of the New Testament, would thus be read at such meeting of the saints. This reading was necessary because

II. THE EXHORTATION. This refers to public ministry. Timothy was practically to enforce the duties of Christian life out of the Scriptures.

III. THE TEACHING. This refers to the matter of doctrinal instruction. Thus full provision would be made for building up the saints in their most holy faith, and in all the graces and virtues of a holy life.—T.C.

1 Timothy 4:14.—The duty of improving the Divine gifts of exhortation and teaching.

"Neglect not the gift that is in thee, which was given thee through prophecy, with laying on of the hands of the presbytery."

I. THE SPIRITUAL GIFT CONFERRED ON TIMOTHY.

1. It is not mere intellectual equipment, nor the mere possession of Divine grace, but the gift, which qualified Timothy for preaching the gospel. "For the work of an evangelist." It was a gift of interpreting the Scriptures, of dispensing the mysteries of grace with edification, of bringing forth things new and old out of the good treasure of a holy heart informed with truth.

2. It was a gift conferred by means of prophecy. The Holy Spirit had, by one or more of the prophets, declared his will to confer this gift upon Timothy. The prophecy was the Divine assurance as to Timothy's qualifications.

3. The response to this Divine act is signified by the action of the presbytery in formally designating him to his special ministerial work.

II. THE DUTY OF EXERCISING AND IMPROVING THIS GIFT. "Neglect not the gift that is in thee." There were several reasons to enforce this duty.

1. The prophetic declaration accompanied by the concurrence of the whole body of presbyters would fill his mind with a sense of his high privilege and great responsibility in the possession of such a gift.

2. The exercise of a gift is the only method of preventing its complete lapse. The disuse of a limb causes it to decay. All faculties must be kept bright and vivid by constant exercise.

3. Our Lord, by the parable of the talents, teaches us the sin and danger of hiding our talent uselessly in the ground.—T.C.

1 Timothy 4:15, 1 Timothy 4:16.—The necessity of a minister giving his whole energies to his work.

The apostle here concludes his solemn instructions to his chosen representative at Ephesus.

I. THE DUTY OF BEING MINDFUL AND DEVOTED TO ONE'S MINISTRY. "These things do thou care for: be in them."

1. A minister's heart ought to be anxious about his work. It is this anxiety that secures the efficiency of work in this world. But the minister's concern is full of an inspiring zeal for God's honor, and is sustained by encouraging promises of help from on high.

2. A minister ought to devote himself exclusively to his work. "Be in them." The obstacles to this devotion are:

II. THE MOTIVE FOR THIS EXCLUSIVE DEVOTION. "That thy progress may appear to all."

1. This does not imply that Timothy was to have exclusive regard to his right standing with the Church. This might be a questionable motive.

2. It implies that his devotion to his work should be so altogether conspicuous that it could not but be seen by all.

III. THE CONNECTION BETWEEN THE PERSONAL LIFE AND THE OFFICIAL WORK OF THE MINISTER. "Take heed to thyself and to the teaching; continue in them: for in so doing thou shalt save both thyself and them that hear thee."

1. The direct object of the minister of the gospel is the salvation of studs.

2. This salvation comes by hearing the gospel. "Faith cometh by hearing.

3. It is the duty of the minister to persevere with a pious insistency on all the objects of his ministry. "Continue in them."

4. Nothing is so well adapted for the salvation of ministers as their pious labors in behalf of the salvation of others.

5. There is to be a double service in this ministry. The minister must first look well to his life, exemplifying the holiness of the gospel in word and deed (1 Timothy 4:12); and then his teaching must be good (1 Timothy 4:6) and salutary (1 Timothy 1:10). Thus he will be the instrument of much good; he will thus cover the multitude of sins, and save a soul from death (James 5:20).—T.C.

1 Timothy 4:4.—A false asceticism.

"For every creature of God is good." The gospel stood in a difficult position. On the one hand was asceticism, with its hermits of every creed, and its retreats in Asia, Africa, and Egypt; on the other hand was Epicureanism with its philosophy of enjoyments, which ran into lawless excess. We must judge a new religion by its first teacher; for Christ was his own religion alive and in action. John the Baptist was an ascetic; but Christ came eating and drinking, and his enemies said, "Behold, a wine-bibber, and a friend of publican and sinners." His first miracle was at a marriage festival, and he dined with the Pharisees. We have here an example in morals. Every creature or creation—not necessarily a living thing—is good. Show that it is from God, and then it must be good. In the story of Creation, after every new day, "God saw that it was good."

I. ASCETICISM MAKES A FALSE WORLD OF ITS OWN. It narrows life; it empties the fountains of joy, it destroys the hopes of youth, it degrades the body, and treats matter as though it were evil. God's idea of life is that body, soul, and spirit are to be redeemed.

II. THE CHRISTIAN. FAITH MAKES A TRUE WORLD OF MEN'. We are to be trained through use, even when use is dangerous; for test makes manhood. "Blessed is the man that endureth temptation." We are to have the analogy in Nature. She is to stand the storm, and be strengthened by it. So the atmosphere is purified, so the roots of the trees take faster hold of the soil. What a world of disease and death this would be without currents and waves and storms!

III. THE CHRISTIAN FAITH HAD FALSE INTERPRETERS. It could but be that the surrounding tendencies affected the Christians. Just as there were Judaistic Christians, so there were those affected by the old Manichean doctrine "that matter was evil." Consequently they would treat the body as corrupt and evil. The apostle, therefore, is not only general, but specific in his statement, "Some forbid to marry and forbid to eat meats;" and he repeats the expression, "which God hath created." The same tendency appeared, and was fatally developed, in the monastic life of the Church. The monk and the nun appeared to possess a special sanctity, but it was not really so. The forces of nature, if they have not pure avenues of enjoyment, will be sure to find impure channels; and history shows that monasteries have been associated with hidden vice and criminal deeds of shame, though softened over with vesper chants and morbid garments of melancholy hue.—W.M.S.

1 Timothy 4:4.—A universal use.

"And nothing to be refused." The apostle has shown that government is a creation of God; we are to pray for kings and all in authority, and this is acceptable in the sight of God our Savior. And he has taught us to obey the powers that be; for they are ordained of God. He has shown that the place of man in the Creation is of God. A woman's lot is not to be the world's leader or teacher, but the equal companion of man. All social economies break to pieces that deny God's ordinations in the universe. No order that he has created is to be refused.

TO REFUSE IS TO IMPLY A SUPERIOR JUDGMENT TO THAT OF GOD. The wisest must know best. He who is from everlasting to everlasting has given a revelation for all aspects of society and all ages of men. Individual liberty is left. We are not to forbid to marry or to command to abstain from meats; though, if any thought the meat was offered to idols, and that they sanctioned idolatry, they might refuse it; as our temperance friends think that when use runs to abuse, and is a stumbling-block, they have a perfect right to use liberty of abstinence. "Nothing to be refused." Wonderful words! The imagination of the mind is a creation of God. Poetry, affection, and art alike may be used in the Christian sphere. The intellect of the wise is a creation of God; it is not to be blindfolded. We are not to say, as Rome said to Galileo, "Faith does not inquire;" but we are to use it in its own sphere, reverently looking up to God for more light. "Come, and let us reason together, saith the Lord." All natural beauty is of God. It is no sign of religion to love ugliness. Only let your beauty not be meretricious beauty. Let it be pure, as God is pure. "Nothing to be refused."—W.M.S.

1 Timothy 4:4.—A grateful heart.

"If it be received with thanksgiving." We are always to be conscious of dependence, or else our very blessings turn to curses. We become full, and we deny God. There is a prosperity without God which makes men proud and hard. Men lose the consciousness of the transitoriness of earthly good, and of their entire dependence upon God. We are, therefore, to live in an atmosphere of gratitude. We are not to receive mercies as though we had a right to them, but always, as Paul says, "Be ye thankful."

I. THINK OF THE THOUGHT MANIFESTED IN THESE GIFTS, Every student of nature becomes surprised that beauty is born out of such strange elements, and that there should be such harmony of forces that, taken alone, would be terribly destructive. God's thoughts are, toward us, precious thoughts, spoken in all ages by holy men, and symbolized in the world of nature. God has thought out all that is needful for our life. He has stored the earth, interlaced it with rich metallic veins, filled it with limestone and coal, that all might be ready for his child. And in grace we see how God promised a Savior, and, when his Son came into the world, "all things are now ready."

II. THINK OF THE FORBEARANCE THAT CONTINUES THEM. Men have abused God's mercies. If men destroy the nobleman's shrubs, he closes his grounds. If men deface the pictures, the galleries are no longer free. And yet God bears with all the sin and frailty of man; and from generation to generation this is the thought that should move man most—not only the forgiveness, but the forbearance, of God.

III. THINK OF THE PLEASURES RECEIVED FROM THEM. What millionfold ministrations of pleasure there are! What has not nature been to you, and love, and thought, and home! There is no more wonderful contemplation than the varied pleasures of heart and mind.

IV. THINK OF THE UNCREATIVE POWER OF MAN. We cannot create an atom; we can only readjust and combine. And the artist cannot create his colors; he can only mix them. The physician cannot create his remedies; he can only find them. The builder cannot create his stones, he can only quarry them. The child can gather the flower; but a whole universe of men cannot give it life again. Let every creation of God be received with thanksgiving..—W.M.S.

1 Timothy 4:5.—Creation sanctified.

"For it is sanctified by the Word of God and prayer." Here, then, is an exquisite harmony. We have been talking of creation, and now we come to consider the Word of God. And these creative things are to be "sanctified by the Word of God and prayer." Men can talk with God. His fellowship is a test of all our pleasures and companionships and associations—"Would the Bible be out of place here?" It is never out of place in nature's gardens and groves. The best descriptions of nature are in the Bible. It is never out of place in pure festivities. It records the marriage supper, and the music and the dance when the prodigal came home. It is never out of place in children's joys; for it gives the picture of a glad and happy childhood. The prophet says, "The streets of the city shall be full of girls and boys playing;" and Christ took up little children in his arms, and blessed them. It is never out of place in pure human love; for that is poetized in one entire book of the Bible. It is not out of place in the earnest pursuit of secular things; for the proverbs appeal to personal endeavor, and to the right enjoyment of riches and honor. The Bible sanctifies life from the cradle to the grave, and any social economy apart from the Word of God is only a paper defense against tyranny and wrong. "And prayer." For we may speak to God. The neutral face of nature is ghastly without him. "Speak, Lord; for thy servant heareth." Can I ask God to be there at all? Can I ask him to aid me in my work? Can I ask him to comfort me if I fail? Can I ask him to quicken my powers and enlarge my opportunities? Can I ask him to sanctify my associations? These are vital questions; for nothing is sanctified without him, and everything is "sanctified by the Word of God and prayer."—W.M.S.

1 Timothy 4:6.—A wise reminder.

"If thou put the brethren in remembrance." We cannot create truth, any more than the artist can create nature. Revelation is not imagination. A teacher can combine, harmonize, reproduce, and call to remembrance. Timothy cannot add to the gospel. In the eleventh verse of the first chapter it is called "the glorious gospel, which was committed to my trust." A trustee does not alter the will, neither does he add to it. All that he has to do is sacredly to carry out the last wishes of the testator. And when Christ had finished the gospel by his ascension, then he sent them into all the world to preach it.

I. THE CHURCH A BROTHERHOOD. "Put the brethren." Here is no priestly domination, no hierarchical pretension.

1. Brotherhood in service. We may have different functions, but we are all servants. We have it in type in the great Servant, "who came not to be ministered unto, but to minister." We ought never to be ashamed of service. The old guilds in England were beautiful things. It is a pity now that retirement is thought more honorable than service.

2. Brotherhood in sympathy. The most precious element in life is the sentiment of pity. Some men despise sentiment; but without it you take away the atmosphere of life, as in nature atmosphere is the drapery of the hills and the haze of the mountains. This sympathy is subtle, not merely spoken, but breathed in tones and glances at us in looks of thoughtful love. It is an angel of help, always swift to help, and ready to fly to sorrow. Shakespeare calls it "Heaven's cherubim horsed."

3. Brotherhood in pilgrimage. In Church life there will be absence of mere etiquette and ceremony. It will be a contrast to the world. It will not be easy to come and go from a true pilgrim Church. Pride may not care for it; fashion, in its novelistic literature, may laugh at it; but the Christian knows that there is something strengthening in the fellowship of the saints.

II. THE GOSPEL A REMEMBRANCE. "Put them in remembrance;" because of their preoccupation. Business life, the cares of home, make us forget the heavenly Word. Too often the angels of God stand outside the heart. In a busy age like the present there is nothing men so much need as quiet hours for the quickening of memory. "Remembrance;" because of familiarity. As the Swiss mountaineer thinks little of the beauty which the traveler goes miles upon miles to see, so the gospel has been round about our childhood and youth, and there is a danger lest we make light of that which is so familiar to our thought. "Remembrance;" because of pride. We forget that we need the gospel, and once felt ourself to be chief of sinners; forget that we were slaves, and can now go back and take up the broken chains of old sins. "Remembrance;" because we may seek to make a new religion for ourselves. Earnestness may take the forms of Pharisaism and asceticism; we may try Emersonian self-dependence. We are to remember that the gospel of the grace of God is what we all need unto the end.—W.M.S.

1 Timothy 4:6.—Ministerial vocation.

"Thou shalt be a good minister of Jesus Christ, nourished up in the words of faith and of good doctrine, whereunto thou hast attained." Taking your own medicines. Eating the bread you recommend. A good horticulturist will show you his own garden. The test, therefore, of Christian faith and good doctrine is—being nourished up.

I. IT MAKES MEN STRONG TO ENDURE. Ministers are men of like passions with others; as Shakespeare says—

"We are all men!

In our own nature, frail, incapable.

Of our flesh, few are angels."

Paul realized all this himself, and said, "We are men of like passions with yourselves." In the daily conflict, the soul that is nourished up and made strong in Christ can "endure as seeing him who is invisible."

II. MADE STRONG TO ENJOY. Full of deep and quiet joy. It is a poor strength that can merely show self-denial! There must be self-exercise—the ability to show that life in God leads to a ministry of service that shall be full of heart and hope.

III. MADE STRONG TO TESTIFY. "Nourished up in the words of faith," so as not merely to expound them or to give elaborate exegesis of doctrine, but to live out the heavenly truths. Timothy was to attain unto this, and to let no man despise his youth, because age alone is not wisdom, and Paul speaks of him as having "attained."—W.M.S.

1 Timothy 4:8.—Religious recompense.

"Godliness is profitable unto all things, having promise of the life that now is." It is a fair charge against mediaevalism, that it left out of sight the Christianization of this present life, and became only another-worldism. The host carried to the dying was everything; the elevation of the earthly life was nothing. Marshes might remain undrained, habitations unimproved, knowledge be imprisoned, science be garroted, and this earth neglected, provided the people became true sons of the Church and possessed the priestly passports to eternity! The religious nature (and there is that in every man) was perverted. Man became the subject-power of those who, in the name of God, darkened the moral sense, and degraded human nature under the pretence of saving it. The gospel has always had the promise of the life that now is; it saves men from selfishness and sin, as well as from Gehenna.

I. THE LIFE THAT NOW IS WAS CREATED BY GOD. Human life and human history are not accidents. God created us, and not we ourselves. Better to be born and to die in the same hour, than to live on through weary years, if human life has not a heavenly purpose in it. God thought out this world. God designed us to use it; and when we mourn over sin and ignorance and darkness, we rejoice that Christ came to put away sin, and to bring in an everlasting righteousness, Nature is ours, with all her mountains and seas, her pastures and flocks, the silvery thread of her rivers, and the Gothic arches of her forests, richly to enjoy. Christ came to claim humanity, to redeem humanity. The broken harp he will restring and set to divinest music. We will not put sepia into all the pictures of earth's to-morrow; for "the crooked shall be made straight, and the rough places plain: and the glory of the Lord be revealed, and all flesh see it together."

II. THE LIFE THAT NOW IS TO BE MOULDED BY GOSPEL INFLUENCES. We read that Paul "persuaded and turned away much people." If the gospel has the promise, we must help in the fulfillment of the promise. When we see wrongs, we must try to remedy them. When God gives us the remedy, we must take care to point to the great Physician alone. We need not be afraid. The gospel is unique; it stands alone. It has done more for this sin-stricken world than any words of man can tell. And Christ still lives on, and his Spirit is one of restraint in men, even when it is not a salvation. If caricature could have crushed Christianity, it would have been silenced long ago. The life that now is was molded by the gospel, so that men who were once darkness had light in the Lord. Humanity breathed again; slavery felt its grasp grow weaker; polygamy became a cruelty and a shame; and as we look at its beneficent progress, and see orphanages and homes and refuges rising up on every hand, we have abundant evidence that the gospel is promise of the life that now is. Suicide, that had been the euthanasia of Rome, ceased, Men who had lost their love of life in the satiety of its pleasures, and to whom death was a relief from its ennui, gave place to a race who found new hope and new joy in the pursuit and pleasures of the life that now is, under the lordship of Christ.—W.M.S.

1 Timothy 4:8.—The great beyond.

"And of that which is to come." It is not too much to say that the gospel alone, in this age, is the witness to immortality—a witness preserved in three aspects: it is taught by Christ's words; illustrated in Christ's life; and attested by Christ's resurrection. Outside the gospel we Lave materialism, which denies it; agnosticism, which says it does not know about it; and the modern school who use the word "immortality," but mean immortality of influence, or a life which has on earth its permanent pervasive power after we are gone: just as the oak is immortal which sends on, from acorn to acorn, its being. Before Christ came:

1. Immortality had its place as an instinct. The philosophers admitted that.

2. It had its place as an imagination. The poets made dreams out of it.

3. It had its place as an ancient revelation.

The Hebrews had knowledge of it. But secularism, in the fashionable school of Sadducees, had darkened it. Christ came to bring life and immortality to light by the gospel. It is this light in which the gospel is bathed; the perspective behind all its picture-teachings; the consolation of apostles, confessors, and martyrs. But Paul links it with the life that now is, because he would not let the doctrine of immortality become basely used, as it was in Persia. There slavery and wrong were unredressed. Persia said to the oppressed, the poor, the serf, the miserable, "Never mind, Ormuzd will make it right hereafter!" Not so says Paul. Religion has its rectitude's and its rewards here as well. The gospel has the promise of the life that now is, and of that which is to come.

I. THEN LIFE IS CONTINUOUS; THERE IS NO BREAK. Death is not a dividing power. It is a dark arch through which the river flows. If a pure river, then he which is holy shall be holy still. If a fetid river, then he which is filthy shall be filthy still. This is life eternal—to know Christ; and, having him, we have glory and immortality. The insect does not die when it changes its garment from the grub to the winged being, when it exchanges earth for air. Nor do we die. We are unclothed that we may be clothed upon with our house which is from heaven. The body sheds itself often. At seventy we have had ten bodies; but the mind, the heart, the conscience, the memory, have a consciously unbroken continuity. We never shed them! The road is seen today from the child's first step; the river flows through town and city, but it is the same river. We feel this; it is the mystery of personality; it is the symbol of continuity. Through all the years we have had one being, and through the dark arch of death it flows on into the life that is to come.

II. THEN LIFE IS A PROPHECY. There is no difficulty here. As the child is the prophecy of the man, so the man is the prophecy of the immortal. In a mirror, and that mirror himself, man may read the future world. His tastes, desires, pursuits, pleasures, all globe themselves in the microcosm of his heart. He need consult no augurs about future destiny. Here are the mystic pages: "He that believeth on the Son hath life;" its form, shape, color, quality. Christ has changed the nature, and made it God-like and Divine. The Christian life may be shady, imperfect, and stained with evil; but it is a God-like thing; its pity, purity, righteousness, holiness, are attested. Perfect it, and you have heaven. It were well for men to think, not only of what is, but of what is to come. Even bad men hope to alter. Men think a sudden change at last may come; a turn of the helm just as the vessel nears the rapids may cause it to glide into the river of life. But life here is a prophecy. It is the earnest of the inheritance of reward or shame—the life that is to come, with its advent hour so quiet, so sure, so solemn; coming but once, but coming to all. We thank God for the great sky of immortality above us, and for the rest that remaineth for the people of God.—W.M.S.

1 Timothy 4:10.—Adequate reasons.

"For therefore we [both] labor." To understand a man's history, we must understand his philosophy of life—that is, his motives and his reasons. For no life has unity without this. It may have spasmodic activities and instinctive virtues, but no completeness or consistency. Here is—

I. THE ARGUMENT OF A TRUE FAITH—"THEREFORE." A man's thought does not always rule his life, even though conscience enforces truth as a duty. A man's conscience does not always rule his life. It is said that man is a will; and this is true, for it is ever the supreme power. Man is made up of three things—"I can," "I ought," "I will." Christ had become the Master of Paul's life; therefore he labored, because the gospel was a fact, not a fable (1 Timothy 4:7) spun out of Jewish brains. Men like Strauss have tried to prove it a myth—something that grew up in the minds of men. Imagine the Jewish mind that had grown more ritual and legal, developing into the simplicity of Christianity! Imagine philosophy that had grown more and more proud and exclusive, developing a religion for the common people! The gospel was a faithful saying, and St. Paul did not alter and improve his doctrine and teachings; he preaches the same gospel in his earlier and later Epistles. He was a man of sober judgment and of intellectual power, and no mere rhapsodist. He says, "It is worthy of all acceptation"—by the scholar and the peasant, the Jew and the Gentile, the bond and the free. The Jew would find it fulfilled his Law, his symbols, his prophecy. The Gentile would find it answered to his instinct, his hidden desire, his deepest intuition. "Therefore" is the argument of a true faith. We are not the disciples of a new sentiment or a mere romantic embassy; for the new temple is built, like the temple of Jerusalem, upon a rock.