are declared to be one spirit with Him, so that the very mind of Christ is ours, and the very Spirit of God, the Holy Ghost, who abides in Christ abides in us, and we may serve accordingly; the Head guiding the whole body with all that power which He is pleased to confer, according to our necessities, so that we may each day go on fearing nothing, doubting nothing, hesitating not one moment, because the Holy Ghost indwells in the body, and the members of that body are in abiding and eternal union with their great and glorious Head.

Consider this resurrection-life further. Look at Christ sitting upon the throne, waiting there till the Father shall say, "It is enough. Go down again to the world." He is waiting up there, waiting in His glorious estate, waiting still for the Father's word, and will be waiting till He is pleased to send Him once again to take His people to Himself. What a lesson for us! We have to wait upon the Father often as Jesus did and does, to listen to what He shall say, to wait that His will may be revealed to us, that we may know what we are to do, and when to do it. We are not to follow our own inclination, or our own ideas or will, or our spiritual bias, or to walk in this direction or that, but to wait upon God. As David says in Psalm lxii. "My soul, be silent before God, from whom cometh my salvation." Waiting upon God, we wait upon Him for salvation from sin's utmost power and presence, as it is written, "Sin shall not have dominion over you: for ye are not under the law, but under grace.'

Is any

Is there trial in our life, or in our family? Is it too much? Can we not bear it? Nay, perhaps we have not been waiting upon God; we have not been in silence before Him. thing too hard for the Lord? That is the question. It may be too hard for me, but I am dead to the law that I might live unto God. I have been crucified with Christ, nevertheless I live, yet not I, but Christ liveth in me, and I have put off the old man and put on the new. And what have we in that new man? Neither Jew nor Greek, barbarian, Scythian, bond nor free, but Christ who is all and in all. There is my power to

give light, and my influence, and my overcoming might, and all I need. He rose from the dead with power, and the power of the Spirit of holiness by the resurrection from the dead is manifested in Him that we may overcome.

Now I should like very much, if we had time, to go into that list of special marks of the pathway of service brought

before us in our paper. The uprightness of the service is one mark; we have spirituality for another; then the presentation of our bodies as a living sacrifice; constancy, zeal, and fervency. These are easy things to dwell upon, but only he who follows our Master will live in them. Dear friends, look upon Christ. We have seen how blessed it is to follow such a Leader; we have seen what power we have-the power of the Holy Ghost abiding in the body of Christ, because Christ is everlastingly the Head of that body; we have seen what power is given in following Him, and that in Him we have that power; and that in order to its exercise, as He emptied Himself, so are we called to empty ourselves; and as He was crucified for us, so we are called upon to stoop down and grasp the cross to the full experimental death of the old nature. We have seen how He rose again, and has ascended up to high heaven, and so we are called upon to lift the hand of faith, and lay it upon His resurrection and ascension, that we may live in the power of eternal life. This done, we have henceforth union with Him, and may live in the consciousness of that union day by day, and so press on firmly towards the great goal of eternal glory in the everlasting kingdom, where crowns are laid up that according to our service in Him, as we have walked along the pathway of that service day by day, He may give these crowns to us according to our works. Then the verity of union with Him shall be manifested before the world, that verity of union which He foretold in times gone by, which He is deigning to make manifest day by day, and will deign to manifest until that day on which these crowns shall be given, and Christ shall be glorified as the Salvation, Life, and Head of His body; yea, as that Christ to whom the honour of the fulness of the redemption of that body belongs, and who shall have the praise thereof from saints and angels for ever and ever.

At the close of this address hymn No. 46 was sung—

"Revive Thy work, O Lord!

Now to Thy saints appear!

and the following address was given by

LORD RADSTOCK.

Beloved brethren and sisters in the Lord, before attempting to speak to you on the subject for our thoughts to-night, I would just mention that some brethren this afternoon said there was

a tone of confession of failure in the Conference. That is a blessed tone, and I cannot help feeling that there may be souls and spirits yearning to get quite at rest with God. If we are not quite at rest with God, somehow or other the teaching does not come into spiritual contact with us, and it seems well that we should have a few moments of silence before Him.

Then, as a good help to meet Him, let us remember the ground that God has given us, that the precious blood is to purge our conscience from dead works to serve the living God. It may be that the Lord sees some of His dear children here unpurged; and just as the whole camp of Israel was stopped for one woman who had sinned-it was stopped until she was cleansed-and as the Lord leaves the ninety and nine, and goes out into the wilderness after that which was lost, so it may be that in His tender love He sees some here who are not at rest. They have heard most precious things, and unconsciously almost have said, "It is not for me."

Now what we want is, just by God's grace, that this heart should be satisfied, and that if only one of His sheep here with us is astray, He, if He sees that one is astray and out of harmony of spirit, He would wait till that one is brought right with Him first. Oh, I do thank God for the requests for individual prayer, because I believe that is the very mind of Christ to be occupied about, the small things, the little ones; other words, that the whole of His little ones should be right with Him. Let us then for a few moments bow in the presence of the blessed Shepherd, so that every heart may get at rest before Him, and then we may hear His voice. (A short time was spent in silent prayer.)

in

There has been a Church of Christ and saints of God, of whom it was said that their bodies were the temple of the Holy Ghost, but who had got into disobedience, and they had got away from Him; trouble had come in, there were divisions among them, and therefore there was no joy. They had allowed evil, and they were thinking every one of taking their own supper one before another, and their consciences had become so blinded, that terrible evils had arisen and been allowed to remain unjudged, and one had to be put away from the communion of the body of Christ.

But not very long after, addressed to the same people (the first letter began as all letters began, "Grace be unto you, and peace from God our Father, and from the Lord Jesus Christ "); and

now this second letter began in the same way, for the love never fails. The saints had failed, the Church had failed; but the love never faileth; and so again it begins with "Grace be to you, and peace from God our Father, and from the Lord Jesus Christ." God never can be anything else than the Father longing to bless His children. Then there was the message of tender love and restoration to that guilty one-he was to be restored. Why? Lest he should have sorrow upon sorrow. Mark you, that one had done such terrible evil, and yet the Father's heart went out to him, that he should be restored, lest he should have sorrow upon sorrow. So it was with our blessed Lord seeking His sheep to bring it back again, and then, lest any mistake should occur, finally blessing. Let us take it unto ourselves in faith, and in the power of the Holy Ghost. The grace of our Lord Jesus Christ, and the love of God, and the communion of the Holy Spirit be with you all. All? That restored one, even though he had grieved the Holy Ghost? Yes, no one left out; it is to all. And now you are in a fit state to serve. You have got your link with God. Before, you realized that the communion of the Holy Ghost and the love of God was with you; but something seemed to stop you, or to become the occasion for an accusing conscience to say, "It is not for you; you must not take it." But now, your conscience being purged from dead works, you serve the living God. How wonderful it is!

Well, there is one aspect of the service which I do not see in the programme, to which I would call your attention for a few moments; and it is this, that it is not merely the service for Christ, but the service of Christ. This has been alluded to; but it is well for us to bear in mind the service is the outcome of the commission to the Christ. You remember that remarkable passage in Isaiah xlix. where our Lord gets His commission. "I will also give Thee for a light unto the Gentiles." And you remember the apostle quotes these words, in Acts xiii. 47, "For so hath the Lord commanded us, saying, I have set thee to be a light of the Gentiles, that thou shouldest be for salvation unto the ends of the earth." In other words, the Holy Ghost seemed even then to be teaching the apostle Paul the wonderful mystery of the communion of the body of Christ. By that Holy Spirit He took up the commission of Christ, and said it was given to the whole Church. And that is our position to-day, that the commission given to Christ is the commission to the Church, not merely to us individually, but to us collectively.

Let us now look at another aspect of how the service is to be done. Turn to Deut. x., "At that time." What time? It was a time something like our own day, when the mass of the people had gone after an idol and were leaning upon themselves, and said, "These are thy gods, O Israel, that brought thee up out of the land of Egypt." They had departed from the living God, and so He could not have fellowship with them, and the tabernacle was pitched far off outside the camp, and every one that sought the Lord went there to meet Him. That was the tabernacle of the congregation-the congregation of those who met God. Now at that time He separated the tribe of Levi. Why? Were they distinguished for holiness? Were they the best men in Israel? Why were they chosen and crowned with peculiar excellence? Why, because they were Aaron's. It was because of what Aaron was that the tribe of Levi had the blessing. You remember when the question of which tribe was to take up the priesthood came to be settled, that twelve great sticks were put up before God; and God said, "The man whom I shall choose, his rod shall blossom."

You remember Reuben had a rod, and wrote his name upon it; Judah had a rod, and wrote his name upon it, and so with all the tribes; but one tribe did not write their name upon their rod, the tribe of Levi took the name of Aaron. That was the rod God chose—that is the secret of priesthood-lost in the federal head. "The one whom I shall choose, his rod shall blossom and bear fruit." And so God bore testimony to Aaron and that rod, simply because it had on it the name of the federal head. As representing the whole tribe, that rod had miraculous life given to it, and it blossomed and bore almonds, and was laid up in the ark of the covenant. Yes, the tribe of Levi belonged to Aaron, and therefore it was separated.

Well, what is the first thing, as our beloved brother reminded us this morning? Covenant truth is just getting to the foundation of all access to the God of power. At that time He separated the tribe of Levi to bear the ark of the covenantthe tribe joined. You know Levi is "joined," and thus they were separated for the Lord and for His service.

And we read in the Epistle to the Romans that we are married to Him who is raised from the dead, that we should bring forth fruit unto God. Mark, it is not ye, but we, the Church, that is to bring forth fruit unto God. We are dead to the law, and it is not you must do this, or you must do that;