any thing but general signs of such a thing as citizenship in heaven. Alas! much, very much, of the contrary. Yet on this account we should only strive the more, seeing that conversation is neither to be gained nor maintained together with conversation in a sinful world; but that before we can exercise the one, we must desist from the other. May the Lord direct our hearts and minds, so that we may refuse the evil and choose the good!

One especial part of our heavenly conversation is mentioned in the text. It is the looking to our Lord Jesus Christ coming from heaven as our Saviour, to change our bodies from the vileness of mortality to the glory of immortality. He is our life, and when He shall appear, then we, if our lives shall have been hidden with Him, shall also appear together with Him in glory. And if we indeed know ourselves, having examined our heart, and questioned our conscience, and hidden nothing in self-delusion and hypocrisy from ourselves, then the joyful hope and long-suffering patience with which we look forward to that day, are a sure earnest of the blessedness to come. O if men would but keep that day continually in mind, and in such a mind too, how many sins would never have been committed, how much would have been spared from appearing before the judgment-seat of Christ! What a voice of warning does it raise, how loud, how distinct!

Heaven, it says, will send forth Jesus Christ. Therefore be prepared for Him by having your conversation in heaven; be with Him there in spirit, that then ye may appear together with Him in glory. Quit the sin that so easily besetteth, escape from the snare and trap of the devil, crucify the world of sin, present your body a living sacrifice unto the Lord. Take your heart from the things of earth, set your affections on things above. Live as in the presence of Christ, as standing in the heavenly city before his throne, like the angels that wait to do his commandments. Whatever thought comes into your heart, remember that He sees it, and that you take it in to cherish, or drive it out, under his eyes. Can you then take in thoughts which He abhors, and will judge with fiery judgment; or can you drive away thoughts which savour of Him and his Spirit of grace? And still more, whatever you do, remember that it is done openly in his sight; and if it be evil, is a direct affront to his majesty, a daring defiance of his power, a thankless casting of dulness on the brightness of his glory. He is coming as our Saviour to raise us from death to life. Shall we not be prepared to appear together with Him?

Heaven is still open. Its everlasting doors have not yet been shut. Our spirits can still enter that city, and dwell there, and enjoy the peace which passeth all the understanding of

this world. There we can still be fellow-citizens of the saints, in all joy, and join their song of praise and thanksgiving. What a glorious privilege to mortal man, what a merciful condescension to a creature born in sin! Shall we not avail ourselves of such a gracious calling? Shall heaven, the place of eternal happiness and glory, have no pleasures for us? Shall heaven, into which every one that has a single thought in his heart concerning the world to come, desires to enter, and hopes to enjoy it, when the body shall be raised again, shall it not be an object of delight now, when it is freely open to our spirits? Can we be fit for it hereafter, if we keep ourselves in unfitness now? Can our bodies enter then, if our

spirits refuse now?

O let us have our conversation there, let us thankfully exercise the glorious privilege to which we have been so mercifully called, taken out of the dust and mire of the earth to sit in heavenly places! Our gracious Lord would not lose us from his sight. It pains and grieves Him to see our places empty in that city. And if they be empty there, where are we filling them? Where, indeed! Should we not tremble at the answer to such a question? What should we think of the man who, when he was invited to the house of a mighty wise. and good king, chose rather to live in the society of the most low and profligate beggars?

Yet such is he who, when called to a state of holy conversation in heaven, chooses rather to abide in a state of sin. He is filling a place in the seats of the ungodly; he is found in the haunts of iniquity and disobedience, while he might have been sitting as fellow-citizen of the saints, and is missing from the ranks of the servants that look upon the face of their Lord, in the city built by God.

O may that gracious Lord ever have us in his presence; may He, through his Holy Spirit, endue us with such a spirit of watchfulness and perseverance, that we may ever hold fast the place which He hath so mercifully assigned us in his Church, that we may obtain in the world to come a place whence we never can be removed, and a blessedness to which there shall never be an end!

SERMON XXXIV.

THE CHRISTIAN NOT OF THE CROWD.

LUKE XIX. 5.

"And when Jesus came to the place, he looked up, and saw him, and said unto him, Zacchæus, make haste, and come down; for to-day I must abide at thy house."

HERE is one of those gracious calls of our Saviour, who knows what is in the heart of man, and therefore often chooses first him whom his fellow-men had put last. He saw in the heart of Zacchæus that repentance and desire of amendment, sinner though he was reckoned, which the self-righteous Pharisees had no thought of; and they were mad with anger at the honour and preference which the Lord showed him. Not but that Zacchæus gave an outward sign also of his interest in the Lord. We see that he was so desirous of seeing Him, that he climbed into a tree, that he might not be hindered by the crowd. He sought to see Jesus, who He was, what He looked like, what was the countenance and the person of