while the head of the family is apt, on his part, to look upon his poor relations as idle folk, who might have done as well as he, had they only taken similar pains. But, surely, in this extended view of family life, we have need to ask the Holy Ghost to give us a right judgment; that, if we be poor, we may not presume upon such poverty to idle ourselves and live upon our wealthier friends; and if we be the better off, we may not be led to draw ourselves up as though we were but strangers, and to hide ourselves from our own flesh.

II. But there are trials peculiar to family life; and of these the chiefest is when a call comes from God to one member of a family to quit the ordinary groove and fulfil some mission-secular, it may be, or religious-to which God has specially called him. The old feelings and habits are broken through: the old landmarks of conduct become useless as guides. So it was when Joseph dreamed his dreams-prophecies as they were of his great deliverance which he should work out for his family; then his brethren "hated him the more for his dreams and for his words." So it was with David, when he felt and spoke of God's call within him, to rise and fight the Philistine. Eliab, his elder brother, could see no call from God here; all he can attribute it to is in the taunting words, “I know thy pride, and the naughtiness of thine heart; for thou art come down that thou mightest see the battle." When men get into the realm of grace, the natural heart cannot receive these things of the Spirit of God: a man who has not God before his eyes, cannot believe that his brother sees God beckoning him on to loftier things. Hence it is, that a prophet has no honour in his own

country, and among his own kin, and in his own house. Here it is that a man often finds his own family the greatest obstacles to his obeying God's call; his foes, them of his own household.

And why is it so difficult for one's own people to realize the call one of us has from God? They do not deny that such calls are heard sometimes. If their neighbour's son shows an inclination for the ministry, if their neighbour's son feels a call to go out as a missionary to heathen lands, they would very likely admit that God had called him. But when such call comes to one of their own family, they cannot away with it. Why is this? Sometimes the impediment lies with the man so called; sometimes it lies rather with his brethren.

(i.) Sometimes a man's brethren know too much of him. Though now, apparently, a man with good intentions, they can recollect the time when he was no better than themselves; and, as they feel no moving of the Holy Ghost within them, so they are loath to allow any such in him. At one time, he was a worldly man, perhaps ; perhaps, even an impure man; whence, then, hath he a call to any ministry for God?

(ii.) But very often a man's brethren see in their brother's earnest turning to do some new work for God, a tacit rebuke of their own sluggishness. Perhaps, like David, he is their youngest brother; they have nursed him as an infant; played with him; ordered him about; looked upon him naturally as inferior to themselves, because, at one time, certainly his mind was less mature than theirs. Hence they will not at first acknowledge any exceptional treatment of God in him, for this would

lift him up out of their category, and give him at once a superiority over them, or, at least, place him as independent of their circle of ideas.

But, if they be worldly, or less given up to God than he, it often will happen that the character which God calls him to assume is of a type they do not care for; and then, the real superiority of his character and work is what they resent. In the case of Joseph, we have no proof that he behaved himself conceitedly on account. of his dreams; all he did was with youthful simplicity to tell what he believed God had told him to his brothers and his father. But from the purity of Joseph's life, as was made manifest afterwards when he would not do that sin and sin against God, contrasted with the lust of a Reuben or a Judah, and the intellectual capacity and superiority of one who could wield afterwards for the king the whole power of Egypt, thus justifying the forecast of his dream, we see it was this superiority of natural character, and of added grace which made them resent his call to be a deliverer to them.

The text says, neither did His brethren believe in Him. It is with brothers and sisters, and relatives of the same generation, that the difficulty most lies. When young Saul was called to be king, his uncle Abner seems, from the point of view of one of the previous generation, to have noticed his aptitude for such promotion, even before it was announced: and when Joseph told his dreams, though his brethren hated him, and Jacob at first rebuked him, yet we are told, that "his father observed the saying." There is no rivalry between

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the uncle and nephew; between the father and son; but between brethren there sometimes is.

Thus, then, when Jesus manifested His divine commission in the words of wisdom, and works of mercy and of power, yet "His brethren, as a body, did not believe in Him." They had not the excuse which some brethren have; that their brother, who is rising into fame as a religious teacher, was once a profligate, or a half-hearted servant of God. Jesus had had early prophecies going before concerning Him: Jesus had gone down to Nazareth and been subject to His parents; Jesus had increased in wisdom, and in stature, and in favour with God and men. There were here no antecedent stumbling-blocks of his youth to stand in the way of His brethren's believing in Him. Nay, they had some help: John the Baptist, his kinsman and theirs, had some few months before announced His advent, had baptized Him, and at the same time, borne witness to His divine mission. Above all, His mother, Mary-pondering all those sayings of the angel in her heart; keeping in her heart all those sayings of His, when He was at the age of twelve, in the temple at Jerusalem-was able, with a mother's penetration, which sympathizes with, and feels proud and joyful in her Son's elevation, to say, before even His first miracle, to the servants at Cana, "Whatsover He saith to you, do it "surely His mother's faith and expectation might have welled over unto them.

The hindrance

Why did they not believe in Him? could not have lain with Him: it is in their hearts that we must look for the stumbling-block to their faith.

In addition to the ordinary motives which might make

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any brethren slow to recognize a member of their family as a new teacher come from God, there was one more, and that of a spiritual character. No doubt He came as the Messiah. But a Messiah who works in obscure Galilee, will never be recognized as Messiah by His people; a Messiah who altogether contravenes the notions formed by the popular mind of His office, will never succeed; there should be more show, more overt claim laid to the title. His unbelieving brethren say to Him, "Depart hence from this Galilee, and go into Judea, that Thy disciples also may see the works that Thou doest for there is no : man that doeth anything in secret, and he himself seeketh to be known openly. If Thou do these things, show Thyself to the world." Mighty works," they seem to say, "mighty works with notoriety, may win thee the position thou aspirest unto; and notoriety is not to be had here; Jerusalem is the place for that." They have mistaken His aim, His manner of pursuing it, and His time appointed of the Father. These brethren, the Dean of Chichester remarks, "Knew nothing of that goodness which seeks the honour that cometh from God only. As little did they know of that heavenly method which our Saviour Christ was at this very time pursuing,-in gathering together the outcast, and fetching home the wanderers from the fold; extending His kingdom upon earth by methods which to men seemed foolishness; building up His Church out of the base things of the world, and things which are not. They were ambitious of human honour; and thought all lost which was done in secret. Thus they were led to reject their Mighty Kinsman (as the people