With warning the inspired teacher conjoins encouragement. The self confident are admonished lest their high opinion of themselves should be the occasion of their fall. And, in the next verse, the timid are cheered by the assurance that, although they must be tempted, a Divine Deliverer shall appear upon their behalf, and they shall be led in the path of safety. This is an assurance consolatory to all who are desirous to turn the discipline of life to high spiritual account, and especially to the doubtful and the diffident.

I. TEMPTATION IS PERMITTED BY GOD.

1. Seeing that it is allowed by Providence to be an incident of human life, none need expect to escape. The young are tempted by the pleasures of sense and of society; the old by avarice and the love of ease; the learned by self confidence; the great by ambition; the pious and the useful by spiritual pride.

2. There is in this very fact an element of consolation. To every tempted soul it may be said, "Your case is not peculiar; all the good have attained to goodness by passing through the fiery furnace of affliction and persecution, of doubt and spiritual conflict." Christ himself was sorely tempted, and the disciple is not above his Lord. It is the common lot, in which we have fellowship with one another and with Christ.

II. TEMPTATION IS WITHSTOOD THROUGH THE FAITHFULNESS OF GOD.

1. God has undertaken to defend and deliver his servants: "He knoweth how to deliver the godly out of temptation." The faithfulness of a true and unchanging God is the anchor by which the tempted shall ride out the fiercest storm.

2. God effects this by the instrumentality of his Word. This is "the sword of the Spirit." When Jesus was beset by the adversary, he warded off every thrust by the rower of the Scripture.

3. God encourages his people to call upon him in the day of trial. The sentry does not advance to meet the approaching foe; he falls back, and gives warning to the garrison and the commander. So, when tempted, should we arise and call upon our God.

III. TEMPTATION IS ITSELF TEMPERED BY AN OVERRULING PROVIDENCE. It shall not exceed our powers of endurance and resistance. It may be subtle; it may be sudden; yet the watchful, prayerful soul shall repel and overcome. The dart which would pierce the unarmed falls broken from the coat of mail; the flaming torch, which would explode the powder did it fall into a powder magazine, drops harmless into a pool of water; and the Ruler of all can both moderate the force of the onset and impart strength to stand in the evil day.

IV. TEMPTATION IS, IN THE CASE OF GOD'S PEOPLE, ACCOMPANIED BY A MEANS OF ESCAPE. The same God who delivered Daniel from the lions' den, and Peter from the prison, makes a path of safety for all who trust in him. The experience of every Christian verifies this assurance. The story of the soul is the same as the story of the Church; dangers and distresses ever recur, but they ever afford to the Divine Lord an opportunity for revealing his compassion, and for effecting an interposition and securing a deliverance. It is only when Christ's followers have entered the gates of heaven that they will be beyond the reach of the tempter's arm. - T.

I. A GREAT MANY BELIEVE THAT THERE NEVER WERE SUCH PEOPLE AS THEMSELVES.

1. Nobody ever did what they have done, or came through what they have come through. There never were such children as theirs; nor such toils, nor even such headaches and worries as theirs. All this comes of a morbid self-conceit.

2. But there is a particular manifestation of this tendency which deserves our heartiest sympathy. There are those who fancy there never were such sinners as they are: that you may just leave them alone, as past all redemption; and there are others who have found some little measure of hope and peace in Christ, but who seem likely to be desponding pilgrims to the end. They will have it that there never were believers so weak as they are, and never such temptations and perils as those which they must pass through. It was to such as these that St. Paul wrote.

II. WE MAY UNDERSTAND THE TEXT AS REACHING TO ALL THAT MAKES THE COMMON LOT OF HUMAN-KIND. We fancy, when painful trials come, that things so painful were never felt before. But our text reminds us that there is a limit, within which all human experience lies. Human ability and human endurance have their tether, and cannot range very far. Here is a lesson of humility for the self-conceited; let them remember that thousands more have been at least as good. Here is comfort for those bowed down under the sense of sinfulness; thousands are now in heaven who have sinned as deeply as they. Here is encouragement for the tempted: thousands have by God's grace been led safely through. So you see that the text may be useful as a medicine for two opposite spiritual diseases, presumption and despair. But it is to the comforting view of the text that I would direct your thoughts. It speaks —

1. To those under deep conviction of sin. If you wish to persuade a sick man to send for the physician, the first thing you must do is to convince him that he is sick. So the Holy Spirit begins His saving work by showing the careless soul how sick it is. Now there is something very startling in this. It is something quite strange. For the natural thing is, to think that we are not very great sinners. Then the soul is sometimes ready to run from presumption to the other extreme of despair. In that sad time, what unspeakable comfort to know that other men have felt the like!

2. To those under the pressure of temptation. Now there is comfort under any trouble in the bare thought that others have known the like; but the special comfort of the text is, that if no temptation is likely to assail us, except that through which souls as weak as we have by God's grace passed safely into glory — then that we too may hope, by the same blessed aid, to fight our way through. That which man has done, man may do. The great adversary, and the ensnaring world, fairly vanquished in a hundred battles, may well be vanquished again. But if you are an insincere and half-hearted Christian, seeking to just reach heaven at last after having held by the world here, you need never think to cloak your own proneness to go astray under the pretext that temptation overpowered you. Never think, as some hypocritically do, to cast wholly upon Satan the sin into which they went quite readily themselves.

3. Those under great sorrow and bereavement. The mother who has lost her child is consoled when another, who has passed through the like trial, does but come and sit by her, and say no word but that she has felt the same. Surely there is something consoling amid our earthly sorrows, in the bare remembrance that our Saviour understands them, because He has felt them all! But the text suggests comfort more substantial than this, viz., that others who have known such sorrow as we feel, have been enabled by God's grace to bear it, and profit by it; and surely there is something in that thought which should enable us to bow the more submissively to our Heavenly Father's will. It is not alone that the mourner travels through this vale of tears; apostles and prophets are of the company; saints and martyrs go with him; and the sorrowful face of the Great Redeemer, though sorrowful now no more, remains for ever with the old look of brotherly sympathy to His servants' eyes and hearts. Nothing hath come to us, nothing will come to us, but has been shared by better men.

(A. K. H. Boyd, D.D.)

"Ah," said one to me, "you do not know the peculiar circumstances in which I am placed." "I ask your pardon," I replied, "I thought I had spoken of peculiar circumstances." "Yes, but mine are very peculiar circumstances." "But is Christ not a mighty Saviour?" "Yes, but mine are very, very peculiar circumstances." "Will you look away from me now, and speak to God in heaven thus: 'God, I thank Thee for Jesus Christ. I thank Thee Thou hast looked down on my lost, hell-deserving state, and that He died to save me. I want to live a holy life to Thy glory. But my circumstances are so very, very peculiar that I cannot think Jesus Christ is quite able to keep me in them. I am very sorry for Jesus Christ, and I wish He were a little stronger?'" "But," she exclaimed, "would not that be blasphemy?" "Not more than your saying that in your very, very peculiar circumstances He cannot keep you. Let us try another way. Address yourself to God thus: 'I go out to my very, very peculiar circumstances, believing that there is for me a very, very peculiar Saviour, able to keep me every day in my very, very peculiar trial. I go believing He will help me if I trust Him, and go trusting Him.' Is that all 1 have to do?" "Yes, that is all. Go on trusting, moment by moment, and He will keep you, however peculiar the circumstances, moment by moment, to the end."

(H. W. Webb-Peploe, M.A.)

I. NONE OF OUR TEMPTATIONS EXCEED OUR POWERS OF ENDURANCE.

1. We shall never be placed where to sin will be inevitable. God will so adjust our surroundings that we shall always be able to do what is right. Even when our difficulties arise from what we unexpectedly find in the Church, we shall not find them invincibly obstructive.

2. There is great ground of encouragement in this. We are apt to suppose that our difficulties are unique, and some have sought to improve their position by entering on some more favourable line of life. But the apostle says, "Let every man abide in the same calling wherein he was called." And this is the highest and most practical wisdom. For every sphere of life has its peculiar temptations, and while we know something of those that meet us where we are, we know nothing of these that may meet us elsewhere, and they might be more perilous to us. But to one trying manfully to make the most of his lot my text comes with very potent help. All things seem to be against you. It was quite otherwise when you never tried to serve God. Still there is nothing in what you have to bear which may not be manfully borne. Christ has not come to save us by taking us out of the world, but to save us by a grace that brings salvation. Wherever you are, therefore, from that very point you may advance to sure, complete, and final conquest. Look at your sources of encouragement as well as your trials. And be sure if any man can be a Christian you are that man. There hath no temptation taken you but such as man can bear.

II. WITH EVERY TEMPTATION GOD WILL ALSO MAKE A WAY OF ESCAPE THAT WE MAY BE ABLE TO BEAR IT.

1. This is but an application of the general law that Christ's grace is sufficient for us. God is here said to make the temptation as well as the way of escape. He knows precisely the strength we need, because He has prepared the occasion on which we shall be called to use it. He never breaks the bruised reed, nor quenches the smoking flax.

2. But how is it He makes a way of escape? He does not withdraw the temptation any more than He took away Paul's thorn. This would be to defeat the very purpose for which He has sent it, viz., to develop by exercise the strength we possess, and train it into greater maturity. If the temptation were removed we should only be confirmed in our feebleness. We escape it by not only avoiding the sin to which it leads, but by using it as a stepping-stone to farther attainment.

3. This way of escape must be sought for, or it may not be found. It reveals itself to the eye that waits only upon God. In our very praying we shall enter into it, and by our very prayer we shall pass through it into larger liberty and strength.

III. GOD IS FAITHFUL Therefore He not only controls the strength of temptation, but will also enable us to sustain it. Should you be disposed to doubt this, remember His faithfulness. He cannot be true to His purpose of grace, and yet allow us to be overcome by the sheer weight and pressure of evil. This would also place Him in contradiction to Himself, which cannot be. His actions are never at variance with His nature, though sometimes they may seem to us to be so. He has pledged Himself by the gift of His Son to leave nothing undone to give it the victory. Let us, therefore, be of good courage. His presence is the guarantee of victory.

(C. Moinet.)

Many think that their temptations are —

I.SINGULAR. But they are common.

II.INTOLERABLE. But they are proportioned.

III.INVINCIBLE. But there is a way of escape.

A sentinel posted on the walls, when he discerns a hostile party advancing, does not attempt to make head against them himself, but informs his commanding officer of the enemy's approach, and leaves him to take the proper measures against the foe. So the Christian does not attempt to fight temptation in his own strength: his watchfulness lies in observing its approach, and in telling God of it by prayer.

(W. Mason.)

Professor Wyville Thomson remarks that the fact that a shark "can bear without inconvenience the pressure of half a ton on the square inch is a sufficient proof that the pressure is applied under circumstances which prevent its affecting it to its prejudice; and there seems to be no reason why it should not tolerate equally well a pressure of one or two tons. At all events, it is a fact that the animals of all the invertebrate classes which abound at a depth of 2,000 fathoms do bear that extreme pressure, and that they do not seem to be affected by it in any way." We turn from the kingdom of nature to the kingdom of grace, and we say to every child of God in the depths of doubts and distresses, "God is faithful, who will not suffer you to be tempted above that ye are able."

I. WHAT IS TEMPTATION? Generally an incentive, enticement, or provocation to sin. But there are other things called temptations which are not so in their own nature, but only as they become, through the corruption of our hearts, the occasions of sin, viz., afflictions, and the self-denying duties of the Christian life. God tempted Abraham, to try him whether he would be obedient or not. Afflictions are called temptations because they stir up impatience and provoke unbelief and apostasy. "Let no man say, when he is tempted, I am tempted of God." Strictly speaking He can tempt no man. He never provokes us to sin. But He does try and prove us, whether we will keep His commandments or not.

II. WHENCE COME TEMPTATIONS ? From what has been said it is evident that they come —

1. Permissively, from God. But permission does not imply approval. God looks on, and suffers creatures to work out their own purposes: that is all.

2. Externally and instrumentally, from Satan, the world, or providential circumstances.

3. Internally, and by way of assistance they derive their force from our own corruptions, and liability to be overcome. Our natures are like dry fuel, ready to kindle at the least spark. It is a happy thing that, while God permits temptation, He also governs and controls it, holding Satan himself in check.

III. WHY DOES GOD PERMIT TEMPTATION?

1. To prove and develop character.

2. To show His own power and wisdom in bringing good out of evil.

3. To strengthen the graces of sanctification in His people.(1) By giving scope and exercise to those graces. What would become of them if they were not called out into action?(2) By necessitating nearness to God and perpetual dependence upon Christ.

IV. HOW DOES GOD LIMIT TEMPTATION?

1. By controlling the power and malice of the tempter.

2. By adopting, moderating, alleviating providential circumstances, so as to suit the measure of our strength.

3. By raising our own strength in proportion to the temptation. "As-thy day is, so shall thy strength be."

V. WHAT SECURITY HAVE WE THAT GOD WILL SO LIMIT TEMPTATION? This: "God is faithful."

1. Therefore He will not break His word. This is the subject of express promise; and God is not a man that He should lie.

2. Therefore He will not falsify the assurances which He has given of His tender regard for the weakest of His people. They are His jewels. Will He suffer them to be trampled under foot? They are the sheep of His pasture. Will He, the Great Shepherd, permit the ravager to make havoc in the fold? They are His children. Will He abandon them to the rage of an implacable foe?

VI. WHAT ARE OUR DUTIES IN REFERENCE TO TEMPTATION?

1. Beware of rushing headlong into danger. The Word of God gives no sanction to foolhardiness. Why should Peter, in the plenitude of his vainglorious zeal, thrust himself into the high priest's palace, and dare the jealous scrutiny of a thousand eyes, as though it were impossible for him to faint in the hour of trial?

2. Be armed against timidity and discouragement. If God allows you to fall into circumstances of temptation, be not dismayed. What servant of Christ was ever conducted to heaven without being often confronted by the enemy?

3. Resist to the uttermost.

(D. Katterns.)

I. THERE HATH NO TEMPTATION TAKEN YOU BUT SUCH AS IS COMMON TO MAN. Our translators were not satisfied with this rendering, so they gave "moderate" in the margin, which is further still from the meaning of the original, which signifies "such as is suited to man's nature and circumstances, and what every man may reasonably expect." Consider —

1. Your body. How many are the evils to which it is liable! Now considering that all pain implies temptation, how numberless must the temptations be which beset every man while he dwells in the body!

2. The present state of the soul. How weak is the understanding! How liable are the wisest to form false judgments!

3. The situation of even those who fear God. They dwell amidst the ruins of a disordered world, among men that know not God, with sin remaining if not reigning, and exposed to the assaults of evil spirits. "The servant is not above his Master"; and if Christ was tempted can we expect exemption?

II. GOD IS FAITHFUL, WHO WILL NOT SUFFER US TO BE TEMPTED ABOVE THAT WE ARE ABLE. "He knoweth whereof we are made; He remembereth that we are but dust," and His justice could not punish us for not resisting a temptation disproportionate to our strength. Not only His mercy but His faithfulness is pledged, for the whole tenor of His promises is "As thy days, so shall thy strength be." Our great Physician observes every symptom of our distress that it may not rise above our strength.

III. HE WILL WITH THE TEMPTATION MAKE A WAY TO ESCAPE, i.e., a way out.

1. By removing the occasion of it. "I was walking," says one, "over Dover cliffs with the lady I was to marry in a few days, when her foot slipped, and I saw her dashed in pieces on the beach. I cried, 'This evil admits of no remedy. I must now go mourning all my days. It is impossible I should ever find another so fitted for me in every way.' I added in an agony, 'This is just such an affliction as God Himself cannot redress!' And just as I uttered these words I awoke: for it was a dream!" Just so can God remove any temptation; making it like a dream when one waketh.

2. By delivering in the temptation — suffering the occasion to remain, but removing its bitterness so that it shall not be a temptation at all, but a ground of thanksgiving. Thus the Marquis de Renty, when asked while suffering from a violent attack of rheumatism, "Sir, are you in much pain?" answered, "My pains are extreme: but through the mercy of God I give myself up, not to them, but to Him."

(J. Wesley, M.A.)

Among the various extenuations of sin, none is more common than that, considering the weakness of human nature and the strength of some temptations, it is not to be expected that we should get the better of them. But how groundless this is the text may inform us. Let me —

I. EXPLAIN AND STATE THIS TRUTH. Observe —

1. That the apostle is not speaking of the powers of mere human nature, but of human nature Divinely assisted.

2. That he does not affirm that the measure of Divine grace shall be such as to enable us so to baffle all temptations, as to live perfectly sinless, but only that we shall be preserved from falling into such sins as to throw us out of the favour of God.

3. That the supernatural assistance which enables us to resist temptations, supposes our use of means and our concurrence with it to the best of our power.

II. CONFIRM THIS BY VARIOUS WAYS OF POOOF.

1. By experience. There is no temptation but what hath been actually withstood by holy men and women, and what hath been already done may be repeated.

2. By reason. They who say any temptation is not to be conquered speak absurdly and inconsistently. For —(1) A temptation is an experiment, a trial, whether we will do or forbear such a thing; and therefore it supposes it to be in our power to do or forbear, else it were no trial.(2) What is grace but an extraordinary supply of strength to resist temptations? And therefore, if it be not now equal to every temptation, the grace of God has been given us in vain.(3) Is not man by nature a free agent? But if there be any such things as inducements to sin that are altogether insuperable, there is an end of his boasted freedom. The great end of man is to glorify God by living according to the perfect rule of right reason and virtue; and yet impossible it is that he should ever attain this end while he converses with temptations which he cannot surmount. Now all other beings have powers that enable them to fulfil the design of their creation. Is man alone utterly destitute of these powers?(4) Consider the nature and perfections of God.(a) How can He be holy, who is the author of sin? And how can He but be the author of sin who hath so adapted us that it is impossible for us to withstand the force of them?(b) How can He be said to be just who places us under irresistible temptations; and yet, as He Himself assures us, will punish us for not resisting them?(c) Again, how can He be true? His promises are most express and full (2 Corinthians 12:9; Romans 8:37; Numbers 23:19; Romans 3:4).

III. APPLICATION.

1. There is matter of encouragement arising from hence to the good (Psalm 112:7, 8). Is not He that is with you stronger than he that is against you? And hath He not promised that His strength shall support your weakness?

2. Here is ample matter of reproof to the hypocrite and the profane person. Let them not indulge the hope that in this thing the Lord will pardon His servant (2 Kings 5:18), and that one small fault will be overlooked among a crowd of other good qualities.

3. Wherefore, laying aside shifts and excuses, let us set ourselves in good earnest to resist all temptations; let us put out all the strength which we naturally have to this purpose, and beg of God supernaturally to supply us with what we have not.

(Bp. Atterbury.)

The word "temptation" in the first passage is the same as "trial" in the second; and this difference only reproduces the different use of the original word by Paul and Peter respectively. The testing to which Paul refers arises from solicitation to wrong-doing; while Peter speaks of a testing that takes the form of persecution. Our discipline arises first from the sin that is in us, and. secondly, from the sin that is without us. The first constitutes our temptation; the second our trial. The first has to do with our salvation; the second with our equipment for Christian service.

I. IT IS A UNIVERSAL LAW THAT A MAN'S REAL LIFE ONLY BEGINS WHEN HE HAS FOUGHT AND WON HIS FIRST GREAT BATTLE WITH SIN, OR WHEN HE HAS MET AND ENDURED HIS FIRST GREAT CRUSHING TRIAL. And yet, it is hardly less universally true that every man, when the hour of his temptation or his trial dawns, imagines that both are peculiar. As long as the thunder-cloud does not gather above their heads and burst upon them, they see nothing strange in the ways of God with men; hut, when the storm breaks upon them, it is "something very strange, very peculiar," they say. Now the great temptations in this century were never better summarised than they were in the Ten Commandments. The same is true of trials. They have their sources in the poverty, sickness, and bereavements which are common to man. You cannot mention a temptation or a trial of which you will not be able to find illustrations in your own community, to say nothing of past generations; so it will be to the end of time.

II. NOW, THIS FACT OF THE UNIVERSALITY OF TEMPTATION AND OF TRIAL SUGGESTS THAT THERE MUST BE SOME PROFOUND NECESSITY FOR ITS EXISTENCE. And this necessity is partly —

1. Because we are human — creatures of limited capacities. How many things we pant to do! How many things we want to know! And yet every advance only renders us more conscious of our constitutional limitations. Now, it is a severe trial to a man who is wide awake for him not to know what he wants to know, and to do what he wants to do. It is just here that we discover how it was possible for man, without any tendencies to sin, to fall from his first estate. The temptation was to resent the limitations that were imposed, to seek after a freedom that should be like the freedom of God. There will be always many more things in heaven and in earth than our loftiest philosophies dream of; problems in the moral government of God that stagger us, and where faith in His goodness and righteousness is our only refuge.

2. Because we are sinners, and because a heroic treatment is needed if we are to secure salvation from sin. "We are full of pride and obstinacy, and that covetousness which is idolatry, and self-righteousness. And so comes in the serious discipline of life, to teach us our weakness and show u s the weakness of our supports, that we may hasten to find refuge in His grace.

III. SO UNIVERSAL AND NECESSARY A DISCIPLINE AS THIS MUST BE PERFECTLY ADJUSTED TO OUR CAPACITIES AND NECESSITIES. God does not deal with men in the mass. He deals with each soul singly. In all wise parental government there is the most careful study of each child's peculiarities. One needs to be pushed; another needs the check. As a father pitieth his child, so the Lord pitieth them that fear Him.

1. No man is subject to any temptation for which there is not provided a way of escape; and there is no burden that needs to involve necessarily any serious injury. We hear a great deal about irresistible temptations, but there is no such thing. Sin always begins in an evil heart, and for the possession of that evil heart the sinner alone is responsible — not his circumstances nor the government of God. It is the plea of the devil when men say, "The temptation was so strong that I could not resist it." God bars no man's way up so that it becomes necessary for him to fall into captivity and to abide there.

2. And, as there are no irresistible temptations, so are there no trials so crushing that a man needs to be buried under them. God is too kind ever to impose any burdens that are heavier than our shoulders can bear.

3. And this brings me to the promised and assured deliverance. The fight may be long and hard, but it need not be of uncertain issue. The trial may be very severe, but God's pruning-knife never goes further than the requirements of the case. Every death-pang in your experience may be, by the grace of God, a birth-cry. The grave where your dearest hopes are buried may be the garden where the fairest flowers are blooming, filling your life with the very fragrance of heaven.

4. Perhaps some of you are tempted to say that your experience is like that of the apostle of the Gentiles, who had his thorn in the flesh. Well, that drove him to his knees when he found God's grace sufficient, and after thirty years of service for Christ, he learned to rejoice in tribulation and to glory in infirmities, because in his own weakness the strength of Christ was magnified.

5. But deliverance is not the sweetest nor last word in the gospel of consolation. The discipline is intended to leave us richer than we could have been without its endurance. Temptation and trial are God's drill and dynamite to blow up the obstructions that choke the channels of our affections and energies until the whole broad stream of God's life shall course through our own and have its own sweet will. There are three forms of gladness — the gladness that wells up from the comparatively innocent heart of the child, and which is only more intense in the youth; the joy which takes to itself the form of quiet contentment in the maturer years of manhood; and the blessedness of a ripe old age that has learned to submit its own will to the will of God.

(A. J. F. Behrends, D.D.)

It is said of a good portrait that the eyes of it seem always turned to the observer. So it is with Scripture. To the loving it rays forth love; to the trembling, comfort; to the presumptuous, admonition; to the desponding, encouragement. Mark this in the passage of our text. For the careless it has a look of warning: "Let him who thinketh he standeth take heed lest he fall." But to the anxious it turns a look of encouragement. Rouse up a child to its peril in playing on the brink of a precipice: for the moment this peril is increased; it may be scared into falling over. The hand of help, therefore, must second the voice of admonition. Hence the sudden turn in St. Paul's words, "But." Your safety lies: —

I. NOT IN WHAT YOU ARE TO YOURSELVES. Those Corinthians "thought they stood." But we may not trust —

1. Our wisdom. Paul had complimented the Corinthians on their wisdom (1 Corinthians 1:5). He makes appeal to them as wise (1 Corinthians 10:15). They could talk contemptuously of the emptiness of idolatry (1 Corinthians 8:1-7). Yet they ran into the peril of the idolatrous banquets.

2. Our wakefulness. This indeed is an important means of safety. St. Paul had warned the Corinthians, "Take heed lest ye fall" (ver. 12). Forewarned is forearmed. But this is not enough. The disciples were forewarned (Matthew 26:31). Yet they all "forsook Jesus and fled" (Matthew 26:56). Therefore Jesus did not say merely, "Keep awake," but "Keep awake and pray" (Matthew 26:41).

3. Our will. The resolute man fancies he has built up a breakwater against sin. But who knows the height to which the tide may rise? "Let not a man," says Bacon, "trust his victory over nature too far; for nature will be buried a great time, and yet revive on the occasions of temptation. Like as it was with AEsop's damsel, turned from a cat to a woman, who sat very demurely at the board's end, till a mouse ran before her."

II. BUT IN WHAT GOD IS TO YOU. "God is faithful."

1. To His love for us. Mark the implied contrast in the word. You, alas! are becoming unfaithful to your relation to God (vers. 1-9).

2. To His care over us. "God will not suffer you to be tempted above that ye are able." One seems to see a careful father fitting gymnastic exercises to his son's age and skill and strength. The youth must indeed be exercised; trial is the very condition of growth; the fresh breeze is indispensable to the opening leaf; in the furnace we must be hardened into vessels unto honour, meet for the Master's use; but see the care with which the Father proportions these exercises, laying on such burdens only as the son's weak shoulders can bear; changing them according to his proficiency, fitting his discipline to his powers, and his powers to his discipline, so that while he becomes well breathed he may not be breathless; while stimulated, not broken down.

3. To His designs for us. "God will make a way to escape." He has ulterior views in everything. He makes all things work in concert for our ultimate good. And He will help us to bear up under every intermediate evil, till the way of escape, the passage out of it, is found. Imagine a forlorn hope, sent forward with promise of "supports" to follow (as in the storming of the Redan): the enemy may be mighty; he may now urge by promises, now scare by threats, into surrender; the spirits may faint; a treacherous whisper may arise, "It is no use to struggle any longer." But the "supports" are coming! Bear up therefore; hold on. Each particular temptation has its outlet; Jesus found it so with Satan's reiterated attacks. "Consider," then, those who have fought before you: observe "the end of their struggle"; the "way of escape out of it" (the same word in Hebrews 13:7, as in our text).

(T. Griffth, M.A.)

1. Of all the evils incident to man, there is none from which an escape is so difficult and desirable as from temptations. All escape imports some precedent danger — the difficulty of getting through it, and a final deliverance from it: so in this business of temptation, the danger threatening is damnation; the difficulty of escaping it is due partly to the importunity of the evil one, and partly to an inbred inclination to sin heightened by custom, and inflamed by circumstances.

2. Therefore nothing less than a Being infinitely wise can sound all the depths, and outreach all the intrigues of this tempting spirit; and nothing but a Being of infinite power can support the weaknesses and supply the defects of a poor mortal engaged against him. Now how God does this we shall now inquire.

I. If the force of the temptation be chiefly from the importunities of the evil spirit, God often puts an issue to the temptation, BY REBUKING AND COMMANDING DOWN THE TEMPTER HIMSELF. For although he acts the part of an enemy, yet he does the work of a servant. He is in a chain and that chain is in God's hand. Certain it is that God has put it into the power of no created being to make a man do an ill thing against his will; yet though Satan cannot compel to sin, yet he can follow a man with vehement and continual solicitations to it. Though none of his fiery darts should kill, yet it is next to death to be always warding off deadly blows. And being brought thereby to the very brink of destruction, God is then pleased to step in and command the tempter to hold his peace, or his hand, and so takes him off before he is able to fasten.

II. If the force of a temptation be from the weakness of a man's mind, God oftentimes delivers BY MIGHTY INWARD SUPPLIES OF STRENGTH. The former way God delivers a man by removing his enemy, but this latter by giving him wherewithal to conquer him. It is with the soul and temptation as with weak sight and the sunbeams: if you divert the beam you relieve the man, but if you give him an eagle's eye he will look the sun in the face, and so if God gives an assistance greater than the opposition, the man is delivered by a method as much more noble as the trophies of a conqueror surpass the inglorious safeties of an escape. Thus it was with St. Paul (2 Corinthians 12:7-9). God Himself fought his battles, and that brought him off, not only safe, but triumphant. But this kind of deliverance was never so signal and illustrious as in the noble army of martyrs. As God brings His servants into different conditions, He fails not to measure out to them a spirit proportioned to the exigences of each condition. And, therefore, let us so prepare for the day of trial before it comes, as not to despond under it when it comes.

III. If the force of a temptation springs chiefly from those circumstances which expose a man to tempting objects, God frequently delivers BY A PROVIDENTIAL CHANGE OF THE WHOLE COURSE OF HIS LIFE, and the circumstances of his condition. And this He may do either by a general public change which always carries with it the rise and fall of a vast number of particular interests, or by a personal change, affecting a man only. Accordingly, if God shall transplant a voluptuous person from a delicate way of living into a life of hardship, those temptations which drew their main force from his opulence will attack him but very faintly under penury. There is, however, such an impregnable strength in some natures as to baffle all providential methods, and even when occasions of sin are wanting, to supply the want by concupiscence from within. So that a man can be proud though in rags, and an epicure with the bread and water of affliction. In a word, a man can be his own tempter, and so is always sure of a temptation. Nevertheless, the way God took with His own people was to plague them in their bodies and estates for the salvation of their souls. And so now if riches debauch a man, poverty shall reform him. If high places turn his head, a lower condition shall settle it. If his table becomes his snare, God will diet him into a more temperate course of living.

IV. If the force of a temptation be chiefly from the solicitation of some unruly affection, God delivers from it BY THE OVERPOWERING INFLUENCE OF HIS HOLY SPIRIT gradually weakening, and at length totally subduing it. The tempter for the most part prevails not so much by what be suggests to a man as by what he finds in him. Archimedes said that he would turn the whole earth if he could but have some place beside the earth to fix his feet upon. So, skillful an engineer as the devil is, he will never be able to play his engines to any purpose unless he finds something to fasten them to. If he finds a man naturally passionate he has numberless ways and arts to transport him into a rage. It being with the soul as with some impregnable fort, nothing but treachery within itself can deliver it up to the enemy. "I withheld thee from sinning against Me," says God to Abimelech (Genesis 20:6); and no doubt God has innumerable ways by which He does this. God may withhold a man from sin by plucking away the baneful object, by diverting his thoughts and desires, by putting impediments in his way, and by various methods of restraint. But when, over and above all this, God, by the powerful impressions of His almighty Spirit, shall subdue and mortify the sinful appetite and inclination itself, and plant a mighty contrary bias in the room of it, this is a greater, a nobler, and a surer deliverance out of temptation than even the prevention of the sinful act itself.

(R. South, D.D.)

The design of the apostle seems to be the establishment of two things —

1. That it is not man himself, but God, who delivers out of temptation; and —

2. That the ways by which God does this are above man's power, and for the most part beyond his knowledge. Now these considerations are great in themselves, but greater in their practical consequences. These are: —

I. THAT THE ONLY TRUE ESTIMATE OF AN ESCAPE FROM TEMPTATION IS TO BE TAKEN FROM THE FINAL RESULT OF IT. From whence these two things follow. First, that an escape from a temptation may consist with a long continuance under it; indeed so long, that God may put an end to its life altogether. Secondly, that a final escape may well consist with several foils under a temptation. For a foil given or received is not a conquest. The tempter may be worsted in many a conflict, and yet come off victorious at last. True, "if we resist the tempter he will fly from us," but he may return and carry all before him. It is not every skirmish which determines the victory. Let no man then flatter himself, yet let him not despond; for God may deliver him for all this; only let him continue the combat still. Nothing should make us give up our hope till it forces us to give up the ghost too. But God will have us wait His leisure. There is a ripeness for mercy as well as for judgment, and consequently there is a fulness of time for both.

II. NO WAY OUT OF ANY CALAMITY IF BROUGHT ABOUT BY SIN OUGHT TO RE ACCOUNTED A WAY MADE OR ALLOWED BY GOD. On the contrary, it is a seeking to cure the burnings of a fever by the infections of a plague; a flying from the devil as a tempter, and running into his hands as a destroyer. The temptations which men generally attempt thus to rid themselves of are either from suffering, or from the pretence of compassing some great good by an action in itself indeed evil, but vastly exceeded by the good brought to pass thereby. But this is a wretched fallacy. The procurement of the greatest good cannot warrant the least evil, nor the safety of a kingdom commute for the loss of personal innocence. While men fly from suffering, they are so fatally apt to take sanctuary in sin: which is to go to the devil to deliver them out of temptation. For so men certainly do where suffering is the temptation, and sin must be the deliverance.

III. TO CHOOSE OR SUBMIT TO THE COMMISSION OF A LESSER SIN TO AVOID THE COMMISSION OF A GREATER OUGHT NOT TO BE RECKONED AMONGST THOSE WAYS WHEREBY GOD DELIVERS MEN FROM TEMPTATION. I have heard it reported of a certain monk, who for a long time was worried with three temptations, viz., to commit murder, or incest, or to be drunk; till at length, quite wearied out, he pitches upon the sin of drunkenness, as the least, to avoid his solicitation to the other two. But the tempter was the better artist. For having prevailed upon him to be drunk, he quickly brought him in the strength thereof to commit both the other sins too. Such are we when God abandons us to our own deluded and deluding judgment.

IV. IF IT BE THE PREROGATIVE OF GOD TO DELIVER MEN OUT OF TEMPTATION, LET NO MAN, WHEN THE TEMPTATION IS FOUNDED IN SUFFERING, BE SO SOLICITOUS HOW TO GET OUT OF IT, AS HOW TO BEHAVE HIMSELF UNDER IT. Nothing so much entitles a tempted person to relief from above as an unwearied looking up for it. In every arduous enterprise, action must begin the work, and courage carry it on; but it is perseverance only which gives the finishing stroke.

V. THERE CAN BE NO SUFFERING BUT MAY BE ENDURED WITHOUT SIN; AND IF SO, MAY BE LIKEWISE MADE A MEANS WHEREBY GOD BRINGS A MAN OUT OF TEMPTATION. The Christian martyrs were a glorious and irrefragable proof of this. No evil, how afflictive soever, ought to be accounted intolerable, which may be made a direct means to escape one intolerably greater. And death itself, which nature fears and flies from as its greatest enemy, is yet the grand instrument in the hand of mercy to put a final period to all temptations.

(R. South, D.D.)

The verb to tempt meant originally to try, to test, or to prove. This is its meaning in John 6:6; Acts 26:7; 2 Corinthians 13:5; Revelation 2:2, etc. This is its meaning in the Lord's Prayer, which means "Lead us not into trial." The text suggests that —

I. GOD PERMITS THEM. "God will not suffer you," etc. It has been asked, Is not a being responsible for an evil which he can prevent? Answer.

1. If the prevention would outrage the constitutional liberty of the moral creature, it would be wrong.

2. If the permitter of this evil had determined to subordinate it to the highest beneficence, its permission involves no wrong. If I had the power of preventing a terrible trial befalling an ungodly man, which I knew would turn him to God, should I be justified in preventing it?

II. HE ADAPTS THEM. "Above that ye are able." He adapts them —

1. To the character. The trial that would touch one man's leading central imperfection would not affect another. Some men require a blow that shall wound their sensuality, others their greed, others their ambition, others their love. The trial that is needed He will "suffer" to come.

2. To the capacity. He will not allow any trial to happen which the sufferer is incapable of bearing. "As thy day so thy strength shall be."

III. HE SUBORDINATES THEM. "Will with the temptation also make a way to escape." Or, "make the issue that ye may be able to bear it." Whether the trial is a temptation to your patience, honesty, resignation, confidence in God, etc., He will cause this issue to be good. And this virtually will be for you a deliverance. All the good in heaven have come out of "great tribulations."

(D. Thomas, D.D.)

(text and 2 Corinthians 12:9): — There is nothing more wonderful than a man whose nature is essentially evil, whose path is thronged with spiritual enemies, should be brought off "more than a conqueror." The only explanation is to be found in our texts.

I. THIS IS MATTER OF DISTINCT, POSITIVE, REPEATED PROMISE. God has bound Himself, even by covenant, to stand by His child and never to suffer the enemy to prevail over him. He never goes back on His word.

II. THESE PROMISES ARE MATTER OF EXPERIENCE. They have been put to the test in every age, land, and occasion, and such a thing as a failure was never known.

III. THESE PROMISES ARE WORLD-WIDE IN THEIR APPLICATION. They cover every moment of life-extend to every need and duty — are equal to any emergency or strait.

IV. THE SIGNIFICANCE, THE FULNESS, AND THE ALL-SUFFICING OF THE PLEDGES OF GOD'S FAITHFULNESS CAN BE KNOWN ONLY WHEN WE HAVE PUT THEM TO THE PROOF!

(Homiletic Monthly.)

Let us consider the matter by way of objections. It is objected —

I. THAT MEN ARE DEPRAVED CITIZENS OF A FALLEN WORLD. The answer is that the world is redeemed.

II. THAT THERE IS AN UNUSUAL, startling, compelling ELEMENT IN THEIR TEMPTATIONS. The answer is, that even temptation is tethered by law, and the special severity of it is a myth.

III. THAT THE TOTAL MORAL AND SOCIAL ENVIRONMENT MUST CONSPIRE WITH THE INNER DEPRAVITY TO MAKE SIN VICTOR. The answer is that, practically, there is much in these relations of ours to sin, on the one hand, and righteousness on the other, to break the force of temptation.

1. There is the danger which attends sinning. This is one of God's ways for our escape.

2. Our memory reproduces the pain and sorrow which past sins caused us. This is another of God's ways.

3. We know that sinning is wrong, and conscience, more or less alert in all souls, makes another of God's fire-escapes.

4. Every sinner is, to some extent, conscious of coming retribution, and that mingles with his motives and makes a way of escape.

5. Nor is it a small thing that every grace and nobleness are honoured in the censoriousness of sinning men. Is it no way of escape that right-doing wears the purple of royalty?

IV. THAT, though these things may be true, yet COMMON EXPERIENCE PROVES THAT MEN ARE IN A HARD CASE AS RELATED TO RIGHTEOUSNESS. Admitted. Because it is hard infinite love stoops to help us. A hard case, therefore, is not a hopeless case. Redemption has made obedience possible. Suppose you were as anxious to win righteousness as to win your way in the world?

V. THAT "ANYHOW SOME MEN HAVE NOT A FAIR CHANCE," e.g., the heathen in the slums of our cities and the heathen abroad. But what does this objection mean? "The race is not fair, and though I might win, I'll not run where my fellows must fail." Beautiful self-abnegation! But will this objector apply the principle? These same people have not his chance to be rich — will he surrender his chance on that account? What good of Providence does he refuse because street Arabs have it not? And how can any of us know that others have not a fair chance for salvation?

VI. THAT GENERAL EXPERIENCE CONFIRMS THE VIEW THAT THE CHANCE IS NOT FAIR. And now we study arithmetic and the saints are few while the sinners are countless legions. But is there one saint? Has one climbed the hill of virtue? Then you also may climb. That men choose to be morally lazy, rather than agonise for righteousness, may he true. But the men who escape prove to us that there is a way of escape.

VII. THAT THE LAW IS RIGOROUS AND MEN VERY WEAK. Here the sinner stands by the sea and tells us it is wide, at the foot of the mountain and declares that it is high. All this is pretty enough. The rigour of the law and the far-offness of perfect character may be admitted. But that is not our practical question. When men began to sail the seas they did not hesitate to creep along the coasts, because the ocean was wide; knowing the Alps to be high, early men struggled up them and through them. The practical man has never hesitated to do what he could because there seemed to be no end to his possible labour. The practical question is not whether you can do all, but have you a margin? Are you conscious of no power to do anything that the law of right asks of you in betterment of your life? This which you can do is your fair chance for salvation.

(D. H. Wheeler, D.D.)

1. St. Paul was writing from Asia to Europe. Many things divide us: time and place, rank and worth, age and country, and yet, in Christ, all may be one; and St. Paul can write, under the shadow of Diana, to dwellers in another idolatrous city, and touch a chord to which their hearts vibrate as one, because Christ is the theme, and the Spirit of Christ the inspiration. And that theme and that inspiration enables us to read, as if written to us, this ancient Greek epistle, though Ephesus and Corinth have passed away.

2. And there is yet another thought in this obliteration in Christ of all natural distances and differences. Mark how St. Paul freshens into new life the old histories of the Bible — makes these Corinthians see in Israelite wanderings the type of all human wanderings and in Israelite judgments the history of the dangers and catastrophes of their own. Such is the setting of my text.

3. Temptation is another word for trial. It is exploration. It is the probing or the sifting which shows what is in us, how much and what kind of natural or acquired evil — how much, if any, of the grace of God's Holy Spirit, sought and cherished by prayer.

4. Though St. Paul would have us be serious, he would not have us to be despondent, and therefore he adds three words of encouragement about this life of trial.

I. DO NOT IMAGINE THAT YOU ARE ALONE IN THIS EXPERIENCE. YOUR TEMPTATION IS QUITE COMMON. Every physician of the soul knows it perfectly well.

1. There is consolation even in the sympathy of faith. It is no selfishness, it is nature as God made it, to find comfort in the fellowship of suffering. On this principle, in part, the Cross was uplifted. "In all their affliction He was afflicted, and the angel of His presence saved them." If you could place yourself in imagination among the first readers of this letter, you might have said to yourself, "I live here in a city wholly given to idolatry. My own house — wife or husband, sister or mother — scoffs at my faith in Jesus, and threatens me with excommunication if I confess it. How can St. Paul tell me that I am under no temptation but the commonest of all? "But when we turn to our own life, with Christians all around, ought we not to say, "I, at all events, cannot call myself exceptionally tempted."

2. Yet there is not one who has not some imaginations of a peculiarity in his own temptation. One says, "If my disposition were but passionate instead of being sullen!" Or, "If my snare were only temper instead of being the flesh!" Or, "If I had but a parent who could feel with me, or a husband who was helpful, it would be so much easier to be a Christian! But as things are with me, there is a force in my temptation which is not common at all."

3. Now let this message straight from God weigh with you in this matter. "Depend upon it," St. Paul says, "there is more of equality than you reckon in the spiritual circumstances of God's creatures. Temptation is not so disproportioned as you, in your own little instance, may imagine, and if you knew all you would admit it."

II. ST. PAUL AFFIRMS THAT, IF IT WERE NOT SO, THERE WOULD BE A BREACH OF ENGAGEMENT, where we are quite certain there cannot be, IN GOD HIMSELF.

1. If God did suffer this, He would not be faithful. It is like St. John saying, "God is faithful and just to forgive us our sins." There is nothing in the religion of nature which binds God to forgive sin, or to so temper temptation as to make Him unjust if He did not do so. But the gospel, which is God's covenant in Christ, has introduced new equities; God has promised salvation; therefore all things that accompany it, strength as the day, and a Fatherly hand so guiding that all shall work together for good. It cannot work for good that a man should be overpowered with evil; therefore the promise that the temptation shall be coerced into an exact adaptation to the strength given, i.e., grace, is involved in the promise that faith shalt save.

2. What a serious hue does this give to being tempted! With many of us it is a light thing. It is but to sin and be sorry, and all will be well again. St. Paul assumes the terribleness of sin, and says that God Himself would be unfaithful if He left you to it.

III. THE TEMPTATION COMES, BUT WITH A WAY TO ESCAPE. "The exit" — "the way out."

1. It may have happened to one of you, on some dull November evening, to find yourself surprised by a sudden transition from twilight to darkness. You have been, perhaps, in a meadow, surrounded by woods. There was one little wicket gate somewhere, but you could not find it. You went round and round the enclosure, but the light was gone, and you might remain there till morning. Accident or Providence at last guided you to it; and then you could understand what St. Paul means — the one way out which makes all the difference between a hopeless entanglement and a remediable perplexity.

2. There is a moment in every temptation when God makes the exit. There is a pause between the suggestion and the execution of every wrong thing, which leaves room for escape. An angry retort is upon your tongue: it need not become articulate. A passionate impulse is upon you: you need not strike. A sinful desire is in your heart: you need not take that turn which will lead you by the house of danger. When lust conceives it bringeth forth sin; but it takes time.Conclusion:

1. If no temptation is above the common, away with our excuses for being what we are.

2. If God adapts the temptation to the strength, you must pray. It is not the strength of nature, but the strength of grace.

3. When temptation is upon you, look out for the way of escape. It is there: take heed that you miss it not. God makes it: it is yours to watch for it, and not to lose it.

(Dean Vaughan.)

We are all familiar with the severity of life; we often feel, and feel bitterly, the extreme tension and painfulness of our present situation. It may be quite true that the fiery law is on the whole benign, that the battle of life ends with a victory for the better, ere it begins again a battle for the best; but so far as we are concerned individually, it is very difficult to bear the pressure and pain. Very delightful, then, is our text, showing how the Divine love tempers life's fierce tyranny.

I. WHILST DISCIPLINE IS ESSENTIAL TO THE PERFECTING OF OUR NATURE, THE STRUGGLE OF LIFE MIGHT BE EXCESSIVE AND DESTRUCTIVE. "Tried above that ye are able." How easy this might be! We see in nature that the law of antagonism may become so severe and unremitting that it makes impossible those things of beauty and joy which prevail under normal conditions. In arctic regions plants, which under more genial conditions would unfold themselves in a delightful perfection, remain stunted and mean, exhausting their vitality in withstanding the severities of the climate. The same is true of animal life. The Newfoundland dogs of Kane in the Polar seas become mad through the excruciating severity of the cold. The birds come to a certain strength and glory through the necessity of awareness, but there is often such a fearful bloodthirstiness in the tropical forest, such a profusion of cruel hawks, owls, serpents, and beasts of prey, that a bird's life is one long terror, and it forgets its music. And this applies equally to man. He is all the better for a regulated conflict with his environment, but all the worse if the conflict attain undue severity. Sometimes a hopeful people have collapsed because they have been compelled to struggle at once against human oppression, and the destructive forces of inorganic nature; with both combined against him, man sooner or later succumbs, and the fields he has won from the primaeval wood relapse once more into wild forestry, or into barren wildernesses. And all this is just as true of our moral as it is of our physical and intellectual nature. A fair share of hardship develops heroic qualities, but when existence becomes too hard it breaks the spirit; the child cruelly treated becomes cowed; men and women bred in misfortune's school becomes timid, nervous, cowardly. So, if Heaven did not temper life, the finer qualities could never be developed in us. Overborne by unmitigated pressure, we should lose all faith, courage, hope; nothing would be left to us but atheism, cynicism, despair. "God is faithful, who will not suffer you to be tempted above that ye are able." Amid all the confusion, waste, ruin, sweat, tears, and blood of the groaning creation, God stands with the measuring-line, dealing to every man trial, as He assigns to every man duty, according to his several ability. "For He knoweth our frame; He remembereth that we are dust."

II. SOME OF THE LIMITATIONS WHICH GOD HAS IMPOSED ON THE SEVERITY OF LIFE. "But will with the trial also make a way of escape."

1. There are doors of escape in the direction of nature and intellect. It is not all conflict with nature. Summer hangs out a gay flag of truce. Men shout in the gladness of the vintage; the sky rings with the joy of harvest. We have all gracious hours in which the discords of life are drowned in the music of the world. There are doors of escape also into the intellectual world. The door opening into the library, the picture-gallery, the observatory, the museum — all are doors of hope and salvation. In literature, art, and science increasing multitudes are finding bright intervals which make life endurable, and something more than endurable.

2. The Divine government softens the severity of life by the disposition and alternation of the trials by which we are exercised. A door of escape from one trial is sometimes found in the door which opens upon another, and one, perhaps, not at all less severe. Now, this variation of trial must be regarded as a mitigation of trial. Peter speaks of "being in heaviness through manifold temptations"; but that heaviness might have been utterly crushing had those temptations been less diversified. We little know how much we owe to the vast variety and unceasing change which obtain in the discipline of human life. Change and novelty play their benign part in trial as in pleasure. Manifold temptations are counter-irritants; they relieve one another; together they work to a complex strength and perfection.

3. The severity of life is broken by that law of reaction which God has established within our nature. Trials without discover forces within. Mighty forces often lie latent in nature until peculiar conditions elicit them. The trembling dewdrop is an electric accumulator, and within its silvery cells is stored a vast energy; the raindrop and the snowflake are the sport of the wind, but, converted into steam, we are astonished at their potentiality; the tiny seed seems weakness itself, yet, beginning to germinate, it rends the rock like a thunderbolt. Thus is it, only in a far more eminent degree, with human nature strengthened by the indwelling Spirit of God. Says Victor Hugo, "There are instincts for all the crises of life." A deep perplexity awakens a flash of insight; a bitter opposition sets the soul on fire; a grave peril opens our eyes to horses and chariots of fire; a severe catastrophe evokes a heroism of which the sufferer had not thought himself capable. The mere metaphysician perceives the extraordinary virtue of this mystic interior power: "In extreme cases the inner-deriving activity will conquer. Martyrs may find the flames at the stake as pleasant as rose-leaf couches." God dwelling in us, working in us, speaking in us — here is the limitation of the otherwise overwhelming burden of life. As we pass through scorching flame and sweeping flood, He giveth us the victory through the Spirit which worketh in us mightily.

4. The rigour of life is abated by the social law. If, says the modern evolutionist, stern competition is the fundamental law of nature, coalition is the fundamental law of civilisation. The social law is the principle of civilisation, and the process of civilisation is nothing else than the giving to the principle of reciprocity ever more complete ascendancy.

5. Finally, life is blessedly tempered by the religious hope. "Behold, a door was opened in heaven." What a hiding-place is the Church of God from the storm and stress of life! Strengthened by its sacraments, uplifted by its songs, ennobled by its solemnities, the penitent believing soul forgets its griefs and cares, tasting the powers of the world to come. No language can express the infinite preciousness of the grace flowing to us through the ministers and institutions of the Church of Christ. A lady recently related in one of the journals how she went through a veritable blizzard to see a flower-show. With one step she passed out of the wild night, the deep snow, the bitter wind, into a brilliant hall filled with hyacinths, tulips, jonquils, cyclamens, azaleas, roses, and orchids. It is the privilege of godly men, at any time, to pass at a step from the savage conflicts of life right into the sweet fellowship of God, finding grace to help in the time of need. It is the knowledge of God, the light of His truth, the power of His Spirit, the hope of His glory, which makes us more than conquerors in the times when men's hearts fail them for fear. "For which cause we faint not." No men knew more of the travail of existence than did the apostles, but by laying hold of the Eternal they smiled at life in its darkened aspects, at death in its cruellest forms.

(W. L. Watkinson.)

"Chronicles of Froissart" relate the issue of a siege, which took place in the days of chivalry, and somewhere, I think, in France. Though gallantly defended, the outworks of the citadel had been carried. The breach was practicable: to-morrow was fixed for the assault. That none, alarmed at the desperate state of their fortunes, might escape under the cloud of night, the besiegers guarded every sally-port, and, indeed, the whole sweep of wall. They had the garrison in a net, and only waited for the morrow to secure or to slaughter them. The night wore heavily on: no sortie was attempted; no sound came from the beleaguered citadel; its brave but ill-starred defenders seemed to wait their doom in silence. The morning came: with its dawn, the stormers rushed at the breach; sword in hand, they poured in to find the nest empty, cold. The bird had flown, the prey escaped. But how? That was a mystery: it seemed a miracle, till an opening was discovered that led by a flight of steps down into the bowels of the rock. They descended, and explored their way with cautious steps and lighted torches, until this subterranean passage led them out a long way off from the citadel, among quiet green fields and the light of day. It was plain that, by this passage, the doors of which stood open, their prey had escaped under cover of night. A clever device, a wise precaution. It was a refuge of the besieged, provided against such a crisis. And when affairs seem desperate, and the worst has come to the worst, how should it encourage God's people to remember that He has promised them as safe a retreat!

(T. Guthrie, D.D.)

Corinthians, Israelites, PaulCorinthAble, Allow, Bear, Beyond, Common, Endure, Escape, Except, Faithful, Human, Issue, Man's, Nature, Outlet, Overtaken, Power, Provide, Seized, Stand, Strength, Suffer, Temptation, Tempted, Test, Undergo1. The sacraments of the Jews are types of ours;
7. and their punishments,
11. examples for us.
13. We must flee from idolatry.
21. We must not make the Lord's table the table of demons;
24. and in all things we must have regard for our brothers.

1 Corinthians 10:13

     1320   God, as Saviour
     1330   God, the provider
     3254   Holy Spirit, fruit of
     4122   Satan, tempter
     4124   Satan, kingdom of
     4126   Satan, resistance to
     5184   standing
     5480   protection
     5598   victory, over spiritual forces
     5762   attitudes, God to people
     6030   sin, avoidance
     6738   rescue
     8027   faith, testing of
     8162   spiritual vitality
     8244   ethics, and grace
     8349   spiritual growth, means of

1 Corinthians 10:12-13

     6249   temptation, universal
     8707   apostasy, personal

Ninth Sunday after Trinity Carnal Security and Its vices.
Text: 1 Corinthians 10, 6-13. 6 Now these things were our examples, to the intent we should not lust after evil things, as they also lusted. 7 Neither be ye idolaters, as were some of them; as it is written, The people sat down to eat and drink, and rose up to play. 8 Neither let us commit fornication, as some of them committed, and fell in one day three and twenty thousand. 9 Neither let us make trial of the Lord, as some of them made trial, and perished by the serpents. 10 Neither murmur ye, as …
Martin Luther—Epistle Sermons, Vol. III

December the Twelfth Relating Everything to God
"Whether therefore ye eat, or drink, or whatever ye do, do all to the glory of God." --1 CORINTHIANS x. 23-33. And so all my days would constitute a vast temple, and life would be a constant worship. This is surely the science and art of holy living--to relate everything to the Infinite. When I take my common meal and relate it to "the glory of God," the common meal becomes a sacramental feast. When my labour is joined "unto the Lord," the sacred wedding turns my workshop into a church. When I …
John Henry Jowett—My Daily Meditation for the Circling Year

Mental Prayer.
"Pray without ceasing."--1 Thess. v. 17. There are two modes of praying mentioned in Scripture; the one is prayer at set times and places, and in set forms; the other is what the text speaks of,--continual or habitual prayer. The former of these is what is commonly called prayer, whether it be public or private. The other kind of praying may also be called holding communion with God, or living in God's sight, and this may be done all through the day, wherever we are, and is commanded us as the …
John Henry Newman—Parochial and Plain Sermons, Vol. VII

Doing Glory to God in Pursuits of the World.
"Whether, therefore, ye eat or drink, or whatsoever ye do, do all to the glory of God."--1 Cor. x. 31. When persons are convinced that life is short, that it is unequal to any great purpose, that it does not display adequately, or bring to perfection the true Christian, when they feel that the next life is all in all, and that eternity is the only subject that really can claim or can fill their thoughts, then they are apt to undervalue this life altogether, and to forget its real importance. …
John Henry Newman—Parochial and Plain Sermons, Vol. VIII

The Limits of Liberty
'All things are lawful for me, but all things are not expedient: all things are lawful for me, but all things edify not. 24. Let no man seek his own, but every man another's wealth. 25. Whatsoever is sold in the shambles, that eat, asking no question for conscience sake. 26. For the earth is the Lord's, and the fulness thereof. 27. If any of them that believe not bid you to a feast, and ye be disposed togo, whatsoever is set before you eat, asking no question for conscience sake. 28. But if any man …
Alexander Maclaren—Romans, Corinthians (To II Corinthians, Chap. V)

Men Often Highly Esteem what God Abhors.
Ye we they which justify yourselves before men; but God knoweth your hearts for that which is highly esteemed among men, is abomination in the sight of God." -Luke xvi. 15. CHRIST had just spoken the parable of the unjust steward, in which He presented the case of one who unjustly used the property of others entrusted to him, for the purpose of laying them under. obligation to provide for himself after expulsion from His trust. Our Lord represents this conduct of the steward as being wise in the …
Charles G. Finney—Sermons on Gospel Themes

God's Glory the Chief End of Man's Being
Rom. xi. 36.--"Of him and through him, and to him, are all things, to whom be glory for ever." And 1 Cor. x. 31--"Whatsoever ye do, do all to the glory of God." All that men have to know, may be comprised under these two heads,--What their end is, and What is the right way to attain to that end? And all that we have to do, is by any means to seek to compass that end. These are the two cardinal points of a man's knowledge and exercise. Quo et qua eundum est,--Whither to go, and what way to go. …
Hugh Binning—The Works of the Rev. Hugh Binning

Communion with Christ and his People.
AN ADDRESS AT A COMMUNION SERVICE AT MENTONE. "The cup of blessing which we bless, is it not the communion of the blood of Christ? The bread which we break, is it not the communion of the body of Christ? For we being many are one bread, and one body: for we are all partakers of that one bread."--1 Cor. x. 16, 17. COMMUNION WITH CHRIST AND HIS PEOPLE. I WILL read you the text as it is given in the Revised Version: "The cup of blessing which we bless, is it not a communion of the blood of Christ?" …
Charles Hadden Spurgeon—Till He Come

The Rock of Ages
(Ninth Sunday after Trinity.) 1 Corinthians x. 4. They drank of that Spiritual Rock which followed them; and that Rock was Christ. St. Paul has been speaking to the Corinthians about the Holy Communion. In this text, St. Paul is warning the Corinthians about it. He says, 'You may be Christian men; you may have the means of grace; you may come to the Communion and use the means of grace; and yet you may become castaways.' St. Paul himself says, in the very verse before, 'I keep under my body, and …
Charles Kingsley—Town and Country Sermons

Heaven on Earth
1 COR. x. 31. "Whether ye eat, or drink, or whatsoever ye do, do all to the glory of God." This is a command from God, my friends, which well worth a few minutes' consideration this day;--well worth considering, because, though it was spoken eighteen hundred years ago, yet God has not changed since that time;--He is just as glorious as ever; and Christian men's relation to God has not changed since that time; they still live, and move, and have their being in God; they are still His children--His …
Charles Kingsley—Twenty-Five Village Sermons

Touching Jacob, However, that which He did at his Mother's Bidding...
24. Touching Jacob, however, that which he did at his mother's bidding, so as to seem to deceive his father, if with diligence and in faith it be attended to, is no lie, but a mystery. The which if we shall call lies, all parables also, and figures designed for the signifying of any things soever, which are not to be taken according to their proper meaning, but in them is one thing to be understood from another, shall be said to be lies: which be far from us altogether. For he who thinks this, may …
St. Augustine—Against Lying

But, as I had Begun to Say, Whether the Fruit an Hundred-Fold be virginity...
47. But, as I had begun to say, whether the fruit an hundred-fold be virginity dedicated to God, or whether we are to understand that interval of fruitfulness in some other way, either such as we have made mention of, or such as we have not made mention of; yet no one, as I suppose, will have dared to prefer virginity to martyrdom, and no one will have doubted that this latter gift is hidden, if trial to test it be wanting. A virgin, therefore, hath a subject for thought, such as may be of profit …
St. Augustine—Of Holy Virginity.

Here Peradventure Some Man May Say, "If it was Bodily Work that the Apostle...
14. Here peradventure some man may say, "If it was bodily work that the Apostle wrought, whereby to sustain this life, what was that same work, and when did he find time for it, both to work and to preach the Gospel?" To whom I answer: Suppose I do not know; nevertheless that he did bodily work, and thereby lived in the flesh, and did not use the power which the Lord had given to the Apostles, that preaching the Gospel he should live by the Gospel, those things above-said do without all doubt bear …
St. Augustine—Of the Work of Monks.

Nor, Because I Called Ruth Blessed, Anna More Blessed...
10. Nor, because I called Ruth blessed, Anna more blessed, in that the former married twice, the latter, being soon widowed of her one husband, so lived long, do you straightway also think that you are better than Ruth. Forsooth different in the times of the Prophets was the dispensation of holy females, whom obedience, not lust, forced to marry, for the propagation of the people of God, [2242] that in them Prophets of Christ might be sent beforehand; whereas the People itself also, by those things …
St. Augustine—On the Good of Widowhood.

Perseverance of Saints.
FURTHER OBJECTIONS ANSWERED. 4. A fourth objection to this doctrine is, that if, by the perseverance of the saints is intended, that they live anything like lives of habitual obedience to God, then facts are against it. To this objection I reply: that by the perseverance of the saints, as I use these terms, is intended that, subsequently to their regeneration, holiness is the rule of their lives, and sin only the exception. But it is said, that facts contradict this. (1.) The case of king Saul is …
Charles Grandison Finney—Systematic Theology

The Saint Resumes the History of Her Life. Aiming at Perfection. Means Whereby it May be Gained. Instructions for Confessors.
1. I shall now return to that point in my life where I broke off, [1] having made, I believe, a longer digression than I need have made, in order that what is still to come may be more clearly understood. Henceforth, it is another and a new book,--I mean, another and a new life. Hitherto, my life was my own; my life, since I began to explain these methods of prayer, is the life which God lived in me,--so it seems to me; for I feel it to be impossible that I should have escaped in so short a time …
Teresa of Avila—The Life of St. Teresa of Jesus

Of Resisting Temptation
So long as we live in the world, we cannot be without trouble and trial. Wherefore it is written in Job, The life of man upon the earth is a trial.(1) And therefore ought each of us to give heed concerning trials and temptations, and watch unto prayer, lest the devil find occasion to deceive; for he never sleepeth, but goeth about seeking whom he may devour. No man is so perfect in holiness that he hath never temptations, nor can we ever be wholly free from them. 2. Yet, notwithstanding, temptations …
Thomas A Kempis—Imitation of Christ

Man's Chief End
Q-I: WHAT IS THE CHIEF END OF MAN? A: Man's chief end is to glorify God, and to enjoy him for ever. Here are two ends of life specified. 1: The glorifying of God. 2: The enjoying of God. I. The glorifying of God, I Pet 4:4: That God in all things may be glorified.' The glory of God is a silver thread which must run through all our actions. I Cor 10:01. Whether therefore ye eat or drink, or whatsoever ye do, do all to the glory of God.' Everything works to some end in things natural and artificial; …
Thomas Watson—A Body of Divinity

But one Sometimes Comes to a Case of this Kind...
24. But one sometimes comes to a case of this kind, that we are not interrogated where the person is who is sought, nor forced to betray him, if he is hidden in such manner, that he cannot easily be found unless betrayed: but we are asked, whether he be in such a place or not. If we know him to be there, by holding our peace we betray him, or even by saying that we will in no wise tell whether he be there or not: for from this the questioner gathers that he is there, as, if he were not, nothing else …
St. Augustine—On Lying

Indeed in all Spiritual Delights, which Unmarried Women Enjoy...
27. Indeed in all spiritual delights, which unmarried women enjoy, their holy conversation ought also to be with caution; lest haply, though their life be not evil through haughtiness, their report be evil through negligence. Nor are they to be listened to, whether they be holy men or women, when (upon occasion of their neglect in some matter being blamed, through which it comes to pass that they fall into evil suspicion, from which they know that their life is far removed) they say that it is enough …
St. Augustine—On the Good of Widowhood.

For that Both History of the Old Testament...
8. For that both history of the Old Testament, and ætiology, and analogy are found in the New Testament, has been, as I think, sufficiently proved: it remains to show this of allegory. Our Redeemer Himself in the Gospel uses allegory out of the Old Testament. "This generation," saith He, "seeketh a sign, and there shall not be given it save the sign of Jonas the prophet. For as Jonas was three days and three nights in the whale's belly, so also shall the Son of Man be three days and three nights …
St. Augustine—On the Profit of Believing.

W. T. Vn to the Christen Reader.
As [the] envious Philistenes stopped [the] welles of Abraham and filled them vpp with erth/ to put [the] memoriall out of minde/ to [the] entent [that] they might chalenge [the] grounde: even so the fleshly minded ypocrites stoppe vpp the vaynes of life which are in [the] scripture/ [with] the erth of theyr tradicions/ false similitudes & lienge allegories: & [that] of like zele/ to make [the] scripture theyr awne possession & marchaundice: and so shutt vpp the kingdome of heven which is Gods worde …
William Tyndale—The prophete Ionas with an introduccion

The Lord's Supper
And as they did eat, Jesus took bread,' &c. Mark 14: 22. Having spoken to the sacrament of baptism, I come now to the sacrament of the Lord's Supper. The Lord's Supper is the most spiritual and sweetest ordinance that ever was instituted. Here we have to do more immediately with the person of Christ. In prayer, we draw nigh to God; in the sacrament, we become one with him. In prayer, we look up to Christ; in the sacrament, by faith, we touch him. In the word preached, we hear Christ's voice; in the …
Thomas Watson—The Ten Commandments

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