and increase them. He can make us eminently useful. Oh, that we could just wait upon the Lord! Oh, my friends, let us learn in this Conference to wait more entirely upon the Lord, and to dedicate ourselves more fully and more willingly and more intentionally to Him, that He may use us as He sees best, according to His own wisdom and for His own glory.

And then there is the point where Jesus is led of the Spirit into the wilderness. Ah, dear friends, the first work, then, in which Jesus glorifies His Father, you see, is to submit Himself to temptation, to merge Himself, seeking those things that are above, where He now sits at the right hand of God. He bids us seek His glory first, before we seek the deliverance of others; and before we seek the kindness and service that we can do to our fellow-creatures, He would have us glorify Him. The glory of God, dear friends, is to be exalted; the glory and honour and name of the Lord are to be hallowed. There are enemies in our way, the world, the flesh, and the devil. The Spirit of the Lord was upon Christ and led Him immediately up into the wilderness; and when the Spirit of the Lord is upon us, it should lead us immediately against the devil, and against the flesh. We have a warfare, aye, my dear friends, and we have a victory too, blessed be God. Aye, the enemies that are against us are greater far and mightier than we, but they are not greater and mightier than our Captain ; they are not mightier and greater than the Spirit of God which directs us, and which would use us. Oh, honourable, glorious, blessed privilege that we should

be used for His purposes, to advance His kingdom and His glory, and overthrow those powers that have so long held poor humanity in bondage, and the world. under a curse. The Lord God would have us go forth in His strength, dear friends When Joshua led the hosts of the Lord against the Canaanites, the Lord promised him all the ground they might tread upon. He did not tell Joshua to wait till He had conquered his enemies for him, but He told Him to go forward in the strength of the Lord, and "the ground that you tread upon I will give you." Oh, it is in anticipating the victory that we have the victory. It is by faith, anticipating the manifestations of the mighty power of God, that we get to see this mighty power. Too often, dear Christian friends, we are hindered in this victory because we are waiting for strength, forgetting that if we are anointed with the Holy Ghost, if we have the grace of the Lord Jesus Christ we have that grace for the very purpose of securing us the victory; and we do not know the power of that grace till we venture upon it. We do not know the power of the indwelling Spirit of God in our souls till we really go out to the battle expecting to be victorious; and victorious we must be, for our Captain never loses a battle. Oh, for this mighty faith that we may venture more fully and more entirely. My friends, when God has given us grace for a work He does not bid us stand and wait and compare the work with the means. I look at this great field here before me, this great concourse of people, and dear friends-God knows I would much rather sit down and hear, than

stand here to speak to those who are far, far better able to teach me-but, oh, the honour and the privilege of being only as a voice borne up by your prayers and your faith, to be as the voice speaking God's word to you. May God give you, and give me His word of guidance.

There is a great work to be done outside this room, dear friends; and when we come to compare that work with ourselves and our feeble powers, we may well shrink, we may well retire; but in that Example that we have set before us here, the meek and the lowly One goes forward in the strength of Jehovah; and we may go forward with all our emptiness and weakness—and the more emptiness the better, and the more weakness the better-go forward with our weakness and emptiness, to be filled with power from on high. But, my friends, we do not realise that power, we do not feel and know that power, till we really venture: like the man with the withered arm, we do not know the healing power till we stretch out the withered arm. Oh, may God help us to know and feel more and more that we are but poor withered arms, the best of us, and that we can do nothing; but at God's bidding we can do all things,-for God can make us conquerors, and more than conquerors, through Him that loved us. Oh, may God, then, dear friends, teach us more and more this wonderful example, and impress it upon us that Jesus calls us to march forward! He is going forward, and He will win the victory for us. bids us follow.

He

And, thirdly, we have Jesus ministering-anointed

to preach the Gospel. Oh, what an honour, dear friends, to be ministers and witnesses for Christ here in this world! Just the same mission that God gave Christ to sinners He extends to those who believe in Christ, to carry Christ with them, and to go forth with Christ in them, to declare the salvation and the glory of God. Oh may God help us, dear friends, to go forth with Christ, and remember that, when we go to the work of preaching the Gospel, and giving deliverance to captives, we do not go alone, that Christ is surely with us; He promises to be with us when we are preaching the Gospel. Oh, may we pray, and look, and go forward with faith and confidence, leaning upon Him! He has bid us "fear not." He has assured us we shall catch men, and that He means to make us fishers of men. Oh, then, dear friends, for faith, faith in this wondrous grace that is given to God's children, that we may be strong, strong in the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ! And, however weak we are, let us look out of self, and look off unto Jesus, and from Him draw that strength and that grace and that nourishment we need, and act upon them. Oh, my friends, faith consists not in having faith, but in using faith, in acting with faith. Life consists not in the abundance of the grace and the things we possess, but in the use we make of those things. Oh, may

God help us, then, not only to have faith, but to believe; not only to have life, but to live; not only to have grace, but to use that grace for the glory of God, and for the good of those around us, in our time and generation! The Lord stimulate us, and encourage

us, and cheer us in this Conference. Our brother said, in the prayer this morning, we have gone in the strength of meat we have received here, for days and days; and I have had occasion to thank God for this place many and many a weary time. May God make this Conference ten times more abundant in blessing than ever before!

The remainder of the 5th Special Hymn was then sung:

"We've but a little while to fight,

To work, to wait for Thee;
Help us to labour in Thy cause
With mighty energy!

Help us upon our watch to stand,
And never quail for fear,
Till in the glowing eastern sky

The morning star appear.

Then, with Thy waiting saints above,
Thine advent, Lord, we'll hail,
And over death, and sin, and woe,
We'll joyfully prevail!"

The Rev. C. D. MARSTON then spoke :

Dear Friends,-I cannot conceive any subject more worthy the attention of the people of God, or any subject the consideration of which is more calculated to bring down God's blessing, than the subject which, in its separate branches, is intended to be brought before your minds at this Conference. For myself, the longer I live, the more I feel that of all the topics which a poor sinful man is allowed to handle, to study for his own good, and to speak of for the good of his