January 8

"What must I do to be saved? And they said, Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ, and you shall be saved, and your house." Acts 16:30-31

THE faith of the child of God stands in the righteousness of the God-man Mediator—"the righteousness which is of God by faith." This faith has not been inappropriately termed the "poor man's grace." It is so because it comes to Jesus empty-handed. It travels to Christ in poverty and rags, in want and in woe. It is the grace of him who, feeling the working of an inward plague, and repudiating all idea of human merit, appears at the door of mercy, "poor in spirit," humbly knocking, and earnestly suing, and freely receiving, as a pensioner, the blessing of sovereign grace. Oh, how glorious to the eye of such an one appears the righteousness of the Incarnate God! How precious to his heart the atoning blood of Jesus! How suitable and attractive to his view the foundation to which he is invited, and upon which, with the confidence of faith, he is encouraged to build his assured hope of future glory! Who would not desire, and who would not seek, establishment in a faith like this? a faith that can read its pardon in the blood—its justification in the righteousness -— its sanctification in the grace, and its security in the resurrection, life, and intercession of the great High Priest enthroned in heaven.

Oh, let a man's faith cling to this, and he is a saved man! And to be saved! Oh, how will eternity prolong the swelling chant!—"Saved, for ever saved! A sinner the very chief—a saint the very least—a child the most unworthy! yet here, through grace, I am saved, forever saved!" Before the glory and importance of this salvation, oh, how do fade and disappear the grandeur and the significance of all other objects! "How shall we escape, if we neglect so great salvation?" "This is the record, that God has given to us eternal life, and this life is in His Son. He that has the Son has life, and he that has not the Son has not life." But the faith of the true believer is built upon Christ. It has Christ for its basis, Christ for its object, Christ for its beginning and its end. It is built upon the Godhead of His person, the obedience of His life, and the vicariousness of His death. He who builds his faith short of Deity, builds upon the treacherous sand which the first heaving billow sweeps from beneath his feet. We want, in the great matter of our salvation, Deity to become incarnate—Deity to obey—Deity to atone—Deity to justify—Deity to uphold—Deity to comfort—and Deity to bring us at last to the glorious abode of Deity, to dwell amid its splendors forever.