GOSPEL.
And He said unto them, Go ye into all the world, and preach the gospel to every creature.—Mark, xvi. 15.
To the poor the gospel is preached.—Luke, vii. 22.
For I am not ashamed of the gospel of Christ; for it is the power of God unto salvation to every one that believeth; to the Jew first, and also to the Greek.—Romans, i. 16.
The word of truth, the gospel of your salvation.—Ephesians, i. 13.
If ye continue in the faith grounded and settled, and be not moved away from the hope of the gospel, which ye have heard, and which was preached to every creature which is under heaven.—Colossians, i. 23.
And I saw another angel fly in the midst of heaven, having the everlasting gospel to preach unto them that dwell on the earth, and to every nation, and kindred, and tongue, and people.—Revelation, xiv. 6.
O, I have seen, (nor hope perhaps in vain,
Ere life go down, to see such sights again,)
A veteran warrior in the Christian field,
Who never saw the sword he could not wield;
Grave without dulness, learned without pride,
Exact, yet not precise, though meek, keen-eyed;
A man that would have foiled, at their own play,
A dozen would-be’s of the modern day;
Who, when occasion justified its use,
Had wit as bright, as ready to produce;
Could fetch the records of an earlier age,
Or from philosophy’s enlightened page
His rich materials, and regale your ear
With strains it was a privilege to hear:
Yet, above all, his luxury supreme,
And his chief glory was the gospel theme;
There he was copious as old Greece or Rome,
His happy eloquence seemed there at home,—
Ambitious not to shine, or to excel,
But, to treat justly what he loved so well.
Cowper.
Behold His life, and learn from Him to live;
In death still greater view thy dying Lord,
And imitate that worth thou canst not reach.
Smooth are His paths, and to conduct thy feet,
The Gospel’s holy light around thee sheds
Its mild effulgence.
William Bolland.
Gazing ever on the Gospel light,
That endless source of evidence and truth,
Prove every doctrine by that golden rule,
And “try the spirits if they be of God.”
Mrs. Sigourney.
The Gospel’s glorious hope,
Its rule of purity, its eye of prayer,
Its fort of firmness on temptation’s steep,
Its bark that fails not, ’mid the storm of death,
He spread before them, and with gentlest tone,
Such as a brother to his sister breathes,
His little sister, simple and untaught,
Did urge them to the shelter of that ark
Which rides the wrathful deluge.
Mrs. Sigourney.
The moon is up! How calm and slow
She wheels above the hill;
The weary winds forget to blow,
And all the world lies still.
The way-worn travellers, with delight,
The rising brightness see,
Revealing all the paths and plains,
And gilding every tree.
It glistens where the hurrying stream
Its little ripple leaves;
It falls upon the forest shade,
And sparkles on the leaves.
So once, on Judah’s evening bills,
The heavenly lustre spread;
The gospel sounded from the blaze,
And shepherds gazed with dread.
And still that light upon the world
Its guiding splendour throws;
Bright in the opening hours of life,
But brighter at the close.
The waning moon in time shall fail
To walk the midnight skies,
But God hath kindled this bright light
With fire that never dies.
W. B. O. Peabody.