they heard that they lifted up their voice to God with one accord, and said, "Lord, thou art God, which hast made heaven, and earth, and the sea, and all that in them is; who, by the mouth of thy servant David, hast said: Why did the heathen rage, and the people imagine a vain thing?'”

Finally, may we study especially the direct testimony of Jesus Christ:

"The Lord Jesus Christ possessed the spirt of wisdom without measure, and came to bear witness to the truth." His works proved that he was what he declared himself to be,- the Messiah, the great Prophet, the infallible teacher. The faith which rests on him rests on a rock.

As soon, then, as we learn how he regarded the Scriptures we have reached the end of our inquiries. His word is truth.

Now every one who carefully attends to the four gospels will find that Christ everywhere spoke of that collection of writings called the Scriptures as the "Word of God." He re

garded the whole of it in this light. He treated the Scripture, and every part of it, as infallibly true, and as clothed with divine authority. He thus distinguished it from every mere human production.

Nothing written by men can be entitled to the respect which Christ showed to the Scrip

tures. This, to all Christians, is direct and incontrovertible evidence of the divine origin of the Scriptures. Of itself, and of itself alone, it is perfect and wholly conclusive testimony.

For this is the meaning. The Old Testament is authenticated by the New Testament. But in the New Testament we have the Incarnate Word. And the Incarnate Word is God. "In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God." The inspiration of the Old Testament is authenticated by the Son of God.

Turning to the inspiration of the New Testament. What is the direct testimony of Jesus Christ there?

We find that He promised the inspiration of the Holy Spirit to guide the apostles. "The Holy Ghost shall teach you in the same hour what ye ought to say." Luke 12:12. "For it is not ye that speak, but the Holy Ghost." Mark 13:11. "Which things also we speak not in words which man's wisdom teacheth, but which the Holy Ghost teacheth." I Cor. 2:13.

Now, if the Apostles were preserved against error in their oral utterances, how much more may we suppose them to have been inspired in writing what was to share the faith of the church for all time?

Peter sets his seal upon the writings of Paul as Scripture, thus: "In which are some

things hard to be understood, which they that are unlearned and unstable wrest, as they do also the other Scriptures, unto their own destruction." II Peter 3:17.

What, then, is our conclusion?

The Bible is the word of God. It is inspired. Therefore it is infallible. The Holy Spirit directed the sacred writers. They wrote His Word. Their individuality was not destroyed. Their liberty was not abridged. As teachers they were infallible. As Christians they were not perfect. And this is because inspiration is one thing. And sanctification is another thing. The Bible is a human book.

The Bible is a divine book.
The Bible had human authors.
The Bible had a divine author.

Moses wrote history. David wrote psalms. Paul wrote letters. But had these men not been guided their writings might contain much that was valuable, but they would not be an infallible guide to God. But the Scriptures have another author, and that author is the Spirit of God.

CHAPTER IX

THE LIVING WORD AND LIFE

ETERNAL

I. THE LAW OF OBEDIENCE IS THE LAW OF LIFE

Viewed from the bottom of an ascending scale, the law of obedience is the law of life. Unless the clay obeys the law of the plant, and is taken up into it, and assimilated by it, and organized into its substance, it must remain forever on the lower level. Unless the mind of the child obeys the law of education, it will remain forever uninformed, undeveloped, uncontrolled. Unless the moral nature heeds the imperial mandate of conscience, confusion and degeneration will hold riot in the garden of the soul.

II. JESUS CHRIST THE LIFE OF GOD IN
THE WORLD OF MEN

Jesus Christ, the Son of God, is the life of God, coming into the world of men. His mission is the lifting up of the lives of men from the lower levels of time and sin and death to the higher levels of righteousness and immor

tality. He accomplishes this through redemption, regeneration, and glorification. This He does, by virtue of what He is. For He is: The Creator of the ends of the earth, and all things under the sun. All things were made by Him, and without Him was not anything made that was made." "In Him was life, and the life was the light of men."

66

66

God, the Father, announced Him: This is my beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased." He announced, concerning himself: "He that hath seen me, hath seen the Father." 66 Believe me, that I am in the Father, and the Father in me.” "He that receiveth me, receiveth him that sent me."

III. THE ESTATE OF MAN, APART FROM
JESUS, THE CHRIST, THE SAVIOUR

Made in the image of the righteous and holy God; made for virtue, and holiness, and beauty, and immortality; "made but little lower than the angels"; behold, and wonder how he hath fallen.

We look abroad upon this world and call it the land of the living, but it might much more appropriately be called the land of the dying. For while nature breaks forth in perennial beauty with the returning of the seasons, the blight of death has fallen upon the life of man. Not only is the body wrenched from the soul,