xxxii. 32), he "could wish," were it right and would it secure their

salvation, to be himself "accursed from Christ" for them (Rom. ix. 3). With like self-devotion to souls, Rutherford, the eminent Scotch minister, while assuring his flock that they "were the objects of his tears, care, fear, and daily prayers," said "My witness is above, that your heaven would be two heavens to me, and the salvation of you all as two salvations to me." A ministry thus self-forgetting is of necessity a ministry of power; for God Himself works in it, as all history has shown.

IV. AN HABITUAL LOOKING ABOVE FOR THE REWARD.--"Godliness" has "promise of the life that now is" (1 Tim. iv. 8); and nowhere, perhaps, is that promise more fully realized than in the pastorate in the present age. In social relations, in opportunities for culture, in friendships formed, in means of influence, in popular estimation, and even in temporal support, few positions in life have higher advantages or more agreeable surroundings. But, with all this, life, even in a faithful ministry, is, on its earthly side, rarely other than a disappointment; and the pastor who seeks reward in human applause or in any form of earthly hope, not only thereby excludes the Holy Spirit from his life but is also sure to find unrest and failure as the ultimate result. The rewards of the faithful pastor are from God and are of special magnitude and blessedness.

The rewards come, in part, in the present life. A faithful minister finds them alike in a clear conscience and a sense of the approval of God, and in his work itself and the blessed results following it. With all its care and toil, the ministry, to the man who knows his call of God to the work and devotes himself to it without reserve, is the happiest work on earth. "Sorrowful" he is, "yet always rejoicing." Henry Martyn said: "I do not wish for any heaven on earth besides that of preaching the precious Gospel of Jesus Christ to immortal souls. I wish for no service but the service of God in laboring for souls on earth and to do His will in heaven." Dr. Doddridge: "I esteem the ministry the most desirable employment on earth, and find that delight in it, and those advantages from it, which I think hardly any other employment on earth could give me." Rutherford: "There is nothing out of heaven, next to Christ, dearer to me than my ministry." Brown: "Now, after forty years' preaching of Christ, I think I would rather beg my bread all the laboring-days of the week for an opportunity of publishing the Gospel on the Lord's Day than without such privilege to enjoy the richest possessions on earth." Such is the testimony of godly ministers in all ages, even in periods of bitter persecution. The conscious presence of Christ; the blessed privilege of declaring to guilty men God's rich and free mercy; the delight in the work of saving souls and of ministering comfort and strength and hope to the sorrowing, the weak, and the despairing; the joy of communion with saints,--all these enter into the minister's experience, and give to his work even on earth an unspeakably rich reward.

But the highest reward of the ministry is reserved in heaven. There they will "shine as the brightness of the firmament" "and as the stars for ever and ever" (Dan. xii. 3). "He that reapeth receiveth wages, and gathereth fruit unto life eternal" (John iv. 36). Every soul won to Christ here will there be an occasion of eternal joy. Paul said: "What is our hope, or joy, or crown of rejoicing? Are not even _ye_ in the presence of our Lord Jesus Christ at His coming?" (1 Thess. ii. 19). Glorious beyond our thought is the reward set before every faithful Christian: he shall receive a "crown of righteousness" (2 Tim. iv. 8), a "crown of life" (James i. 12), "an eternal weight of glory" (2 Cor. iv. 17) and shall "shine forth as the sun in the kingdom of God" (Matt.