the comfort of the Holy Ghost;" and the apostle shows the compatibility of the fullest assurance of God's love and mercy with the most cautious and reverential demeanour, when he says, "We receiving a kingdom which cannot be moved, let us have grace whereby we may serve God acceptably, with reverence and godly fear."

But while Joshua calls for their reverential regard to God, that they should serve him with fear, he adds this likewise, that they should serve him IN SINCERITY AND TRUTH, and with singleness of heart, with It would seem

WHOLE AND UNDIVIDED AFFECTION.

likely that there were some who dissembled with God, whose prayer came forth out of feigned lips; who drew nigh to him with their mouth while their heart was far from him. These went through the routine of outward services, forgetting that God was a God that searcheth the heart and trieth the reins, and who requireth truth in the inward parts; a Spirit, who must be worshipped "in spirit and in truth;" who does not reject outward services, but who requires that the outward service should be accompanied by the devotion of the inmost soul, without which it is no better than a dead and lifeless carcase. It is likewise probable that there were some among those to whom Joshua spoke, who had a leaning to idolatrous worship; otherwise Joshua would hardly have thought it necessary not only to enjoin them to serve the Lord in sincerity and in truth, but "to put away the gods which their fathers served

5 Acts ix. 31.

6 Heb. xii. 28.

7 1 John iv. 23.

on the other side of the flood and in Egypt." We well know how strangely the people of Israel were addicted to the idolatrous worship of the nations with whom they were connected. It is continually referred to as calling down the anger of the Lord. Isaiah concludes with it in his appeal to God against them, when he invokes and justifies the divine displeasure. "Thou" (that is, God) "hast forsaken thy people, the house of Jacob, because they be replenished from the east, and are soothsayers like the Philistines, and they please themselves in the children of strangers; their land also is full of silver and gold, neither is there any end of their treasures; their land also is full of horses, neither is there any end of their chariots; their land also is full of idols; they worship the work of their own hands, that which their own fingers have made; and the mean man boweth down, and the great man fore forgive them not."s

humbleth himself; thereBut when they did not worship of the God of

utterly fall away from the Israel, there is too much reason to believe that they connected his service with that of the false gods; like those Samaritans who "feared the Lord and served their own gods after the manner of the nations." We see this in the instance which is recorded in the thirty-fifth of Genesis, where Jacob gathered from his own household their strange gods, and hid them under the oak which was by Shechem. And this is still the constant endeavour of men. 92 Kings xvii. 33.

8 Isa. ii. 6-9.

They will not altogether throw off the service of God; (this is a step of bold and open impiety which many hardly dare to do;) but they try to divide their services; they will stand balancing and deliberating, halting between two opinions; they will try to serve God and mammon; to be at one time, as they think, the followers of the Lord Jesus, and at another the lovers and disciples of the world; to be now full of devotion, perhaps in the preparation for some more solemn season, or for the reception of the Lord's supper, and again to be mixing in all the vanities of the world. But this will not do. God, as I have said, is a spirit, and his call is for your heart. God is a jealous God, and he will have your whole heart. He will not suffer you to bow down and worship other gods, nor allow his glory to be given to another. Neither, if he would suffer it could you do it. The thing is an impossibility in itself. No man can serve two masters, more especially of totally opposite characters. You cannot love them both. Say what you will to deceive yourselves, if you love the world you cannot love or serve God. There is no agreement between them; they are as opposite as light and darkness, as heaven and hell. Christ hath no concord with Belial. My brethren, do we believe this? Do we believe that we are Christ's, do we call ourselves by his name? The demand is one of entire devotedness. You must serve him not only with your body and your spirit, but with all your powers, all your spirit, and all your body. You must cut off, if it be needful, the

right arm, or pluck out the right eye; whatever you do, you must do all to his glory. I know the difficulty of this, I know how foreign it is to our corrupt hearts, I know that nothing but divine grace can incline or enable you to do it.

But this I know, that no man can pretend to serve God who has not sincerely resolved to renounce the idols to which the heart of man clings.

II. And this leads to the next subject for our consideration. THE MISERABLE ALTERNATIVE WHICH THEY ARE REDUCED TO, WHO WILL NOT RESOLVE TO SERVE THE LORD SINCERELY AND UNRESERVEDLY.

It is evident that Joshua supposes the possibility of some rejecting the service of the true God, when the real nature of his claims was put before them; for he says, "And if it seem evil unto you to serve the Lord." He considers that it is not unlikely that some of those to whom he is speaking will think this service too uncompromising; that it lays too great a claim upon their affections, and leaves them too little at liberty; that it exacts more from them than they are willing to give. And therefore he shows them, if they come to the resolution not to serve the Lord, that nothing is left them but a choice between the two sets of false gods; the old, which their fathers had served, which were on the other side of the flood, that is, on the other side of the Euphrates; and the new, the gods of the Amorites, in whose land they were dwelling. Now the object of Joshua in this was to shame such persons. He is not here in

1 1 Cor. x. 31.

viting them to make choice between the true and the false gods; but he is supposing some to have left the true God, discontented at his service. And he would merely point out to them the miserable alternative to which they were reduced. They had thrown off God, and there was nothing left them but to make their selection between two poor and wretched systems of idolatry; between two sets of gods, equally vain and impotent. He, as it were, points to them in derision, saying, which then of these will you embrace and bow down before and worship and serve?

In the application of this part of the subject, may we not suppose that there may be some who will think as these did? To whom it may seem evil to serve the Lord? Are there none who will refuse when the true nature of God's service is set before them, when it is shown to demand all their powers -who, when they count the cost, will not take up the cross and follow Christ-who are like the young man in the Gospel, unwilling to part with what interferes with their coming after him—who will not, in fact, follow the Lord fully; and, who, when they find that there is no other way in which they can follow him, will turn from him altogether? Are there none to whom either the doctrines or the precepts of the Gospel are too strong? who are ready to say, concerning the truth of God's word, "this is a hard saying, who can hear it?" Or concerning the duties, the devotedness of soul and

9 John vi. 60.