“Show yourselves joyful unto the Lord, all ye lands: sing, rejoice, and give thanks.
“Let the sea make a noise, and all that therein is: the round world, and they that dwell therein.
“Let the floods clap their hands, and let the hills be joyful together before the Lord: for He cometh to judge the earth.
“With righteousness shall He judge the world: and the people with equity.
“Glory be to the Father, and to the Son, and to the Holy Ghost;
“As it was in the beginning, is now and ever shall be, world without end. Amen.”
SERMON III. THE PURIFYING HOPE
Eversley, 1869. Windsor Castle, 1869.
1 John iii. 2. “Beloved, now are we the sons of God, and it doth not yet appear what we shall be: but we know that, when he shall appear, we shall be like him; for we shall see him as he is. And every man that hath this hope in him purifieth himself, even as he is pure.”
Let us consider this noble text, and see something, at least, of what it has to tell us. It is, like all God’s messages, all God’s laws, ay, like God’s world in which we live and breathe, at once beautiful and awful; full of life-giving hope; but full, too, of chastening fear. Hope for the glorious future which it opens to poor human beings like us; fear, lest so great a promise being left us, we should fall short of it by our own fault. Behold what manner of love the Father hath bestowed on us, that we should be called the sons of God.