glory, majesty, dominion, and power, before all time, and now, and for evermore. Amen.

1908

THE JOY OF THE LORD

BRETHREN OF THE GRADUATING CLASS: I give you a motto to-night. It will serve you as you go out to your work. I hope you will carry it with you all your lives. It is a well-worn motto, for, as nearly as I can compute, it is twenty-three hundred and fifty years old. It comes down to us from the times of Ezra and Nehemiah, when a new Jerusalem had to be built upon the ruins of the old. In view of their poverty and weakness the Jews were tempted to mourn. But their leaders restored the feast of Tabernacles which commemorated God's guidance of his people in the wilderness. They began the public reading of the law. Yet they urged the duty of gladness. And the reason for it all was the motto which I repeat to you to-night, "For the joy of the Lord is your strength."

How much of the motto those Jews understood, I do not know. It must have reminded them of the covenant-keeping Jehovah whose representatives they were, and whose protection insured their safety. Even the human authors of the saying may not have known all it meant. It had a divine author, as well as a human. It was a word of the Lord, as well as a word of man. And we can interpret it better than could they. The joy of the Lord is the joy of Christ, and

the joy of the Lord is our strength, because our union with Christ makes his joy our own.

There is no real joy apart from Christ. The joy of pardon is possible to us only as we become one with him who is justified in the Spirit, the perfect exemplar and source of redeemed humanity. There is One over whom sin and death have no more dominion. He has borne our guilt; he has made purification of sins; he represents us before God. In him we have entered into the very life of God; we are accepted in the Beloved; his joy of acceptance has become ours. The joy of the Lord is the joy of being pardoned after being condemned, of being right after having been wrong, of having peace with God after being shut out from his presence. And this is the first joy of the Christian life.

But it is not the last. There are the beginnings of purity and of unselfishness, which testify to a new force working in our natures. The joy of the Lord is our strength, not only because it takes away all fear of God's anger, but because it is evidence of a power to overcome evil and to do good. Joining ourselves to Christ, we have become partakers of his life, a life that is indestructible and eternal. I do not agree with Ritschl, when he makes mastery over the world to be the main blessing of redemption. But I do hold that the joy of the Lord is our strength, in part at least, because union with Christ imparts a holy energy which puts our sins beneath our feet, turns irksome duty into delight, impels to all manner of Christian work and service, and makes that work and service mighty to save men around us.

The joy of the Lord is the joy of self-sacrifice, and that because it is the joy of love. Not only peace and power are the fruits of it, but also partnership with Christ in his great work of saving others. Could you enjoy a Delmonico banquet if you knew that a thousand starving creatures at the door were crying for bread? Would you not rejoice to give up your own meal, and to distribute to them? The heathen conception of joy was that of feasting "on the hills, like gods together, careless of mankind." But the joy of Christ was the joy of coming down from heaven to feed the hungry, to succor the oppressed, to seek and to save those that were lost. And we have the joy of our Lord only as we enter into the fellowship of his sufferings, and find it more blessed to give than to receive.

There is joy in the presence of the angels over one sinner that repenteth. What joy that must be in the heart of God! It is that joy which in Christ overflows and takes possession of us. It is a joy of triumph as well as of sacrifice. The long labor shall not be in vain. God's elect shall be gathered in. The joy of the Cross shall become the joy of the Crown. Peace, power, partnership, these shall be followed by possession. The meek shall inherit the earth, and all things shall be theirs. Indeed, all things even now are ours de jure; they shall be ours de facto. Because we are Christ's, and Christ is God's, the kingdom and the dominion, and the greatness of the kingdoms under the whole heaven, shall be given to the people of the saints of the Most High.

This may be the last class which I address on such

an anniversary occasion. Whether this be so or not I take pleasure in commending to you, members of the class of 1908, this motto of olden time, interpreted in the light of Christ's own teaching and example: It is safe to follow him, to seek our joy where he sought his; to find it, not in receiving, but in giving. We cannot do this by any mere effort of our wills. His joy can be ours, only as he is ours, and as he himself becomes the soul of our soul and the life of our life. As my last word to you, therefore, I urge you to abide in Christ and to let him abide in you. Only thus can you have that joy of the Lord which brings peace and purity and power; which makes you masters of men because you are their servants, and which insures. your participation in the victory and the triumph of Christ.

You are going out to the ends of the earth. These happy days of fellowship are to be followed by separation and, perhaps, by trial. But you go to preach glad news, the glad news of the kingdom, the glad news that the penalty of sin has been borne and that the dominion of sin has been broken. Go with gladness in your hearts, and let your ministry be a ministry of gladness. "Have peace in thine own heart," says Thomas à Kempis, "else thou wilt never be able to communicate peace to others." May God give to you the joy of his salvation, or restore it unto you if you have lost it, so that you may be radiating centers of gladness, beginners and prophets of that glad day when the joy of the Lord shall fill the earth.

Weak and unworthy as we are, it is a wonderful thing that such a gospel is committed to us, and more

wonderful still that we can succeed in proclaiming it. Who is sufficient for these things? Truly our sufficiency is of God. May the joy of the Lord be your strength! May he give you the joy of following in his footsteps, the joy of unbroken communion with him, the joy of seeing many brought into that same communion through your words, the joy at last of hearing him say: "Well done, good and faithful servant; thou hast been faithful over a few things; I will make thee ruler over many things. Enter thou into the joy of thy Lord!"

1909

UNSEARCHABLE RICHES

BRETHREN OF THE GRADUATING CLASS: The laws of our seminary require that its president should address you on this happy, yet momentous, occasion. Though I have been absent for the past year, I gladly avail myself of the opportunity to renew a valued acquaintance and to give you a few parting. words of encouragement and of counsel. You have passed your period of scholastic preparation, and the most of you are to enter at once upon your active ministry. It is a glorious but solemn service to which you have devoted yourselves. I bring you both cheer and admonition in the words of the Apostle Paul: "Unto me, who am less than the least of all saints, was this grace given, to preach unto the Gentiles the unsearchable riches of Christ."