Many motives are adduced by the apostle to enforce this brotherly love among the children of God. If we walk in the light, we must love each other. We walk in the darkness if we do not. It is sin to do otherwise. God's love is perfected in us if we love one another. Hating a brother is accounted murder. Christ came to destroy the works of the devil, amongst which is hatred. Brotherly love is the command of God. God sets the example to His children (chap. iv. 11). He is a liar who says he loves God and hates his brother. To love our brother is part of our love towards God (v. 1). The practice of this love evinces that we are born of God and know God (iv. 7.); he that loveth not, knoweth not God.

This brotherly love is to be displayed by uniting with Christ's people (chap. i. 7; ii. 19); by laying down our lives for them (iii. 16); by relieving their necessities (iii. 17); by praying for them if they sin (v. 16). R. N.

HOW A PASTOR MAY HELP THE FLOCK.

I. BY EXAMPLE.

So fully may a good example be set by one who is a pastor after God's heart that when he is removed by death he may still be remembered, his faith followed, and the end of his manner of life be considered. (Heb. xiii. 7.) If however, he exhort others to be followers of himself, let him add the qualifying words "even as I am of Christ." (1 Cor. xi. 1.) Let Christ in glory be so fully his object that he may be able to say, "Be followers together of me," or with me. (Phil. iii. 14-17.)

This principle so animated Paul, that we find him counselling Timothy in accordance with it. How is his "son in the faith" to command the respect of others, notwithstanding his youth? By being "an example of the

believers in word, in conversation, in love, in spirit, in faith, in purity." (1 Tim. iv. 12.)

How impressive, by reason both of its nature and of its circumstances, is the scene in John xiii. 1-17 where our Lord washes His disciples' feet.

thoughts which might here pass

Apart from all other through our minds, we

would, for our present purpose, simply draw attention to verse 15, "I have given you an example, that ye should do as I have done to you."

II. BY PRAYER.

Epaphras, who is one of you, a servant of Christ, saluteth you, always labouring fervently for you in prayers, that ye may stand perfect and complete in all the will of God." (Col. iv. 12.) Thus did this fellow-prisoner of Paul (Philemon 23) much help his Colossian brethren, while forcibly kept from them. He could not follow up his prayers by other pastoral service, but he so felt the value of prayer that it is said that in it he "laboured fervently." The Greek word implies a very wrestling of soul in prayer, and is of the same root as the substantive translated" agony" in Luke xxii. 44.

Paul's writings give frequent evidence of his abundant. prayers for his brethren, for those unknown to him by face as well as for those among whom he had personally laboured. Yea, he did "not cease to pray" for the Colossians, though he had only "heard of their faith." (See chaps. i. 4-9 and ii. 1.) Recognising that he was their debtor, they were thus continually upon his heart, and we may be sure that he was all the better able to help them by an epistle, in that he had already long done much for them in prayer.

Our Lord, too, values such intercessory prayer. He does not depend only upon warning when he says to

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Christ was being made sin for us, and before the atonement had been sealed in death, God as the sin-avenger had heard and answered, He would have violated all the conditions that brought Christ to the cross. Thus in Heb. v. 7 we read that He who in resurrection was constituted “a priest for ever after the order of Melchisedec," in the days of His flesh "offered up prayers and supplication with strong crying and tears unto Him that was able to save Him from death;' but the answer came only after He had passed through death, and He was saved "out of" it. Also in Psa. xxii., He who said in verse 2, "Thou hearest not," said in verse 21, in connection with resurrection, "Thou hast heard Me," and adds, "I will declare Thy name unto My brethren; and in verse 24, "He hath not despised nor abhorred the affliction of the afflicted . . . but when He cried unto Him He heard.” What is the distinction between "the kingdom of heaven" and "the kingdom of God?"

It will have been noticed that while the expression "the kingdom of heaven" is almost invariably used in the gospel of Matthew, it is never used elsewhere in the New Testament. The reason of its use by Matthew is evidently not from any essential difference between the terms "kingdom of heaven" and "kingdom of God," but because Matthew's gospel has especial reference to Christ as the Son of David and lawful inheritor of David's temporal, earthly throne; and the Spirit of God by this expression emphasises the fact that the kingdom of the Messiah will not find its establishment and support from conflicts and struggles upon earth; but, as we are told in the book of Daniel, its establishment and its glory will be directly from heaven. Thus while in Matthew the heavenly origin of the kingdom is dwelt upon, what we may call the Gentile gospels of Mark and Luke, as well as Paul's writings and ministry to the Gentile Churches, bring into prominence the fact that the kingdom is set up by GoD, and not by man. Our Lord alluding to this, says to Pilate, “My kingdom is not of this world;" the preposition of" (ek) implying that earth was not its source. Christ was

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Himself the basis of the kingdom, for all centred in Him, and God says, I lay in Zion for a foundation, a stone, a tried stone, a precious corner stone, a sure foundation." God, not man, is the founder of the kingdom; and heaven, not earth, is the source of its authority.

Who are the "angels that sinned,” referred to in 2 Peter ii. 4 ; Jude 6? THE language used concerning them shows that they are not the "wicked spirits in the heavenlies" (Eph. vi.), who are to be cast out of heaven. (Rev. xii.) It is unsafe to hazard conjectures, and our wisdom in this as in other matters is to await the unfoldings of eternity.

"BE STILL."

"Be still, and know that I am God."-PSALM xlvi. 10.

IF we carry our minds back to the city of Cæsarea in the year A.D. 62, we find Paul a prisoner under the power of the Roman governor; with liberty, however, to receive visits from his friends. Had we been amongst their number, we should probably have asked the beloved apostle how he liked the enforced rest and quiet of those two long years; how, with his ceaseless energy, and burning zeal to accomplish the work put into his hands, he could endure a confinement that allowed him nothing more than the occasional visit of his friends. Had such a question been asked, the answer would doubtless have been given in much the same words as those written to the Philippians when he was in somewhat similar circumstances, "I know how to be abased, and I know also how to abound: in every thing and in all things have I learned the secret both to be filled and to be hungry, both to abound and to be in want. I can do all things in Him that strengtheneth me” (Phil. iv. 12–13, R.V.); and he might have added, that he had learned the secret both how to do and not to do.

It is well for us to remember that however much God values the work He may do by us, He values far more the work that He does in us; for that which He does in us will pre-eminently manifest the grace which makes us vessels of His eternal glory. When laid aside from the activities of service, workers for the Master are prone to forget this, and a painful sense of useless inactivity is taken advantage of by Satan to mar that calmness of soul which is needful for the carrying on of God's mighty work

within, in order that the faithful servant may thereby be ripened, it may be for brighter service here, it may be for brighter service yonder. Lessons in being "still" have to be learned by every child of God sooner or later, and we are often slow in learning these lessons by which God seeks to bring out the softer tones of the divine likeness, the lowlier features of divine grace-those doubly precious resemblances to the character of Christ, which it is well nigh impossible to fix upon the soul amidst the din of strife, the activities of real service, and the outworkings of the energies of faith. In the one case the heart is occupied with its own workings and doings for the Master; in the other it yields to the quiet operation of God's workings and transformings, and learns the blessed secret of that direct and personal knowledge of God into which the believing soul is led in the quiet stillness of apparently unoccupied hours. From necessity rather than from choice the heart is then contented not to do, that God may the more effectually do what He sees needful, in order to pourtray by His Spirit upon the living tables of the heart the image and likeness of Christ. God's object, it may be, is to make His child no longer a preacher, a speaker, or a doer; but a silent epistle to be read by men and angels.

The following story about a child beautifully illustrates this. A friend going once to call upon a lady, found her child seated by her side, and while the little one's eyes beamed with intelligence, neither did her little tongue speak nor did her hands move; she was silent and motionless. The friend was struck at the quietness of the child, and before leaving asked her what she was doing. Her reply was, “I am learning my still lesson." How precious an answer! How obedient the child; how wise the mother! Now, what if God is again and again teaching His faithful ones that of all lessons this "still" lesson is