SERMON VII.

NATIONAL DECLENSION.

Shall I not vifit for these things? faith the Lord: and fhall not my foul be avenged on Such a nation as this?--Jer. v. 9.

DEPARTURE from God, either by nations or individuals, is fraught with extreme peril to either. As a nation, the chosen race of Ifrael were a notable example of this. The fovereign choice of Jehovah fixed on them, above all the people of the earth, to be taken into special covenant with Himself. Lamentable, in

deed, were the returns which they rendered to their gracious and merciful Lord. Expoftulation and affectionate remonstrance, offered again and again, failed of its intended effect. Stiffnecked and rebellious was ftill the characteristic of the nation: so that the long-fuffering of Jehovah at length broke forth in this addrefs:-"O Ifrael, thou haft deftroyed thyfelf;" ftill, however, reminding them that their help was in the Lord their God. Every fign of repentance was hailed by the Lord God with a fatisfaction which we may suppose to be akin to the emotions which fill a parent's breast at the firft figns of softening in a wayward and hardened child.

This door of repentance is ftill open to them, although fo long nationally alienated from God. "Hath God caft away His people? God forbid." "God is able to graff them in again," fays St. Paul, in Rom. xi.,

"if they abide not in unbelief." Through

Gentile mercy, that is, mercy fhown to them by us, they are to receive mercy, he tells us. So that, if they remain hardened, let us not be unmindful, brethren, that it is through our want of mercy to them that they do not obtain mercy. "For how fhall they hear without a preacher? and how fhall they preach except they be fent?" We pride ourselves, brethren, on our national and on our religious privileges. Let us not boast against the ancient stock: for if God spared not the natural branches, let us take heed left He cut us off.

The chapter out of which my text is taken contains remarkable paffages connected with the people of Jerufalem, and the dealings of Jehovah with them. It alludes to their backflidings-to God's threatenings to His tender mercies.

The words occur twice in the chapter, as if the Lord would rife in His wrath and inflict fummary vengeance. Mercy and judgment feem contending as to which shall be extended to the guilty people. In wrath He would fmite them; and yet, remembering His lovingkindness, He would still spare. When judgment overhung the Cities of the Plain, had ten righteous perfons been found therein, the Almighty, at the prayer of Abraham His servant, would have held back the fiery ftorm. In the times referred to in Jeremiah he says, "Run ye to and fro through the streets of Jerufalem, and fee now, and know, and feek in the broad places thereof." Injunctions are reiterated street or open space is to be omitted. It is to be searched, as in Zephaniah i., “with candles," and that, not if peradventure ten righteous fhould be found, but one. "If

no

ye can find a man, if there be any that executeth judgment, that feeketh the truth; and I will pardon it." Judgment and justice had departed. Truth was abhorrent to them. In nominally calling on the Lord and acknowledging Him, they took His name in vain. They were stricken of God. His arm tried them, but they were not grieved. Affliction did not have its intended effect of softening their heart. In setting themselves against the correction of God, they have made their faces harder than a rock. Like lost sheep they strayed, and have refused to return. No gleam of penitential forrow illumined the dark atmosphere of evil-no coming to a right mind, as did the repentant prodigal no whispering foliloquy, "I will arife and go unto my Father." No: they refused to return. Thus acted the generality. They might have been ignorant. "They