this prayed saints of old, "Teach me to do Thy Will. Incline my heart unto Thy testimonies." And for this our Lord taught us to pray when we say, "Thy Will be done."

III. WHY SHOULD GOD'S WILL BE DONE?

Because it is God's. He has every right to rule; as Creator and Preserver, He gives laws to all things that depend on Him for existence; as infinitely Good, He has a moral right to the willing homage of all intelligent beings. It is reasonable that they should employ the faculties He gave in accordance with His own inherent perfections and revealed commands. We ask for the fulfilment of "that good, acceptable, and perfect Will of God." We obey it because it is His, and because it must be beneficent like Himself; for it is our Father's will, and corresponds to His Name. His precepts no less than His promises are the expressions of His love; in commanding duties, He bestows benefits; in forbidding sins, He guards from injuries. "Honour thy father and thy mother" implies, Receive honour in your turn. Thou shalt not kill" involves, None must kill thee; and "Thou shalt not steal" declares, None must rob thee. His most emphatic warnings against sin mean, "Do thyself no harm;" His severest threatenings cry in the ears of sinners, "Why will ye die?" Nothing is forbidden. which would not be an injury to ourselves; nothing enjoined which is not for our good. He places us on an estate and bids us cultivate it for Him, asking

no rent but our diligence, and promising that we shall enjoy as our own the fruits of orchards and corn-fields. “He bids us dig a mine, and then take all the gold for ourselves."

But besides the benefits resulting, there is joy in the very act of performing His Will. When we obey Him, our lesser wheels revolve smoothly in harmony with the great machinery of Love, instead of grating and breaking in hopeless counteraction. There is peace in being consciously in accord with our own higher nature. We rejoice when what we will and what we do is what Truth and Righteousness require. Above all, there is satisfaction in feeling that our strongest and most habitual desires and efforts correspond with the holy laws of our Creator and the loving Will of our Father. "In keeping of them there is great reward." This dignifies the humblest lot, and raises to the rank of Divine service the most menial employment. The apostle comforted those bond-slaves of the Roman Empire who believed in Jesus by this grand consideration, that however unjust or cruel their earthly masters might be, yet in obeying them those slaves were serving the Lord Christ. Physical bondage became spiritual freedom when endured patiently from love to the Lord. When the thing we do possesses in itself neither interest nor honour, if we do it in His name, it at once becomes noble and blessed.

"Teach me, my God and King,

In all things Thee to see,

And what I do in anything,
To do it as for Thee.

A man that looks on glass,
On it may stay his eye;
Or if he pleaseth, through it pass,
And then the heaven espy.

A servant with this clause

Makes drudgery divine;

Who sweeps a room, as for Thy laws,

Makes that and the action fine.

This is the famous stone

That turneth all to gold:

For that which God doth touch and own
Cannot for less be told."-GEORGE HERBERT.

IV. ANGELIC NATURE.

As Moses when erecting the tabernacle was commanded to "make all things according to the pattern showed him in the mount," so we have here set before us an example of the way in which the will of God is to be done by men on earth-" as it is done in heaven." If for a moment the word suggests the starry heavens, we see an illustration of obedience, unceasing, untiring, exact; but it is mechanical, involuntary, lifeless. One man endowed with mind and will may render more homage than all the solar system. We must look beyond the sidereal, even to "the third heavens," for the pattern of our obedience.

The resemblance of the obedience of angels to that of men suggests resemblance of nature. At the creation of the world "the morning stars sang together, and all the sons of God shouted for joy." We say "Our Father," and rejoice that "now are we the sons of

God." There exists therefore a near brotherhood. God made man "a little lower than the angels." This implies only a difference of degree between kindred natures. Our Lord, when He became man, " was made a little lower than the angels." He who appeared to the patriarchs as the angel of Jehovah, appeared in the fulness of time as "the Son of man." Angels are described as men. "Three men appeared to Abraham," who at first took them to be simply men. He "entertained angels unawares." "There came two angels to Sodom." "And the men said unto Lot, Hast thou here any besides?" "There came an angel of the Lord" to Gideon, and as "he sat under an oak," Gideon thought he was a man, but afterwards exclaimed, "Alas! for I have seen an angel of the Lord face to face." Thus Daniel describes the angel Gabriel: Whiles I was speaking in prayer, even the man Gabriel, being caused to fly swiftly, touched me about the time of the evening oblation." Zechariah speaks of "the

man that stood among the olive trees" as being "the angel of the Lord." St. Matthew describes "the angel of the Lord" rolling away the stone from the sepulchre, but Mark describes him as "a young man sitting where the body had lain; and St. Luke says "two men stood by them in shining garments." When Jesus ascended, "as He went up, two men stood by them in white apparel." In St. John's description of the heavenly city, we have this remarkable expression: "He measured the wall thereof, an hundred and forty and four cubits, according to the measure

of a man, that is, of the angel." In the closing chapter the angel forbids the homage of the apostle, saying, "I am thy fellow-servant."

From such statements we may infer that angels are only a higher species of man; higher in endowment; higher by actually obeying, just as we ought to obey, so that the true ideal of humanity is to be found in them; and we are restored to the true human type, by resemblance to angels, when the Will of God is done by us as by them. It is a joy to feel that if there are spirits of evil plotting to do us harm, there are holy angels, closely allied to us, only a little above us, in sympathy with us and employed in helping us. Very little has been said of the angelic nature in Scripture; but obedience is the same with all moral beings. Everywhere the same authority exists, the same wisdom and love appeal to a similar understanding and volition. Holy angels as well as good men, from love to God, give heed to His Will; perform it; delight in it; and so their obedience is a model for our own.

V. ANGELIC OBEDIENCE.

1. Angels do the Will of God lovingly.—It must be universally true that no obedience is acceptable to God which love does not inspire. Angels are highest in the scale of moral beings, and highest in the possession and exercise of that love which is the fulfilling of all law. They are in the

must therefore be