words, with all their mysterious meaning-words high as heaven, deep as hell, the measure thereof longer than the earth and broader than the sea. And Christ thought it fit and worthy to utter such words in the hearing, first of all, of a woman like this. Surely in the vilest of men and women there is a capacity—and how it makes one want to preach to them!-- there is a capacity for taking in God's revelation, if Christ said that to this woman. Here you have the Lord Himself unchurching Himself, keeping clear of the Samaritan temple, and keeping as clear of the Jerusalem temple. He was an unwelcome guest there.

Poor Ritualist, listen! Where are you? This is for you.

You are wanting to go back into temples again, and you are wanting to build religion into hallowed walls and consecrated buildings, and you are wanting to put religion again into the hands of priests and Levites, special men with special clothes, and special names and special functions. It makes us sometimes ask whether we are in a Protestant town. Now, here is our common Lord and Saviour-and it is grand to think of it here in London-taking this Ritualism and tearing it into rags, and flinging it back at us contemptuously, and showing us that there is nothing in it with its names, and millinery, and rags, and flummery-nothing in it. God is a Spirit. Meet with Him now. Scatter the priest and the Levite to right and left, and get to God, and get to do with God at first hand. That is the difference that Christ has made. Here, there, anywhere. God is a Spirit. To-night, in your bedroom, as well as here in the great congregation, or out there at the street corner, or under the street lamp, if you have no secret place to go to, find one there, and enter into the secret place of the tabernacles of the Most High, and dwell under the shadow of Him who is the Almighty.

The woman said to Him, "I know that the Messiah is coming, who is called the Christ: and when He has come, He will tell us all things." I think that this woman wanted to

have the last word. How often you read down through this narrative, "And the woman said unto Him." It is said so often, and so circumstantially, that there must be a meaning in it, and I think that part of the meaning, at any rate, is that it is like us all. We are all, first of all, too silent, and He has to start us, and then, when He starts us, we will never stop until He has to stop us again, and to apply the closure. The woman said unto Him, "I know." I tell you, she did not like to be taxed with ignorance. Neither do any of us. "I know that the Messiah is coming." Everybody knew that. Jew and Samaritan had a dim hope of that kind; for long the Messiah had been coming, and surely He was a little nearer then. 'I know that the Messiah is coming, who is called the Christ," she said: "and when He comes, He will settle all the disputes between Jews and Samaritans. He will tell us all things." And she was just going to stoop and fill her pitcher, and go away satisfied that she had got the last word, and had changed the conversation when it took that awkward turn into the conscience. She had got up her hand, at any rate, when Christ fixed her once more with His eye, for this Christ slays more gazers than the basilisk; "I that speak unto thee am the Messiah." no more, but she looked at Him, no doubt. little how she would look.

and He said, And she said

I can feel a

That woman got a sight that day that told on her for her betterment, and it is telling on her yet. She and the Christ of God changed eyes. They looked into each other's souls, and she said no more because she was thinking more deeply than ever she had done before. "I that speak unto thee am the Messiah." That was a big order-if you will allow the phrase. That was a big demand on that woman's faith

was it not?—just on the spot; but she stood it. She said no more, but she stood it. She said no more, but when she went into the town she spoke. "The woman then left her waterpot, and went into the city, and saith to the men,

Come, see a man, which told me all things that ever I did: is not this the Christ ?”

"Upon this" came these lumbering disciples, always putting their foot in it, always coming at the wrong time. They might have stayed away a little longer, when they were away so long. Anyway, now when the plot was thickening—now when this woman might have so much to ask, and Christ might have so much to explain—“ upon this came the disciples." No, there was no interruption. I should think, at any rate, that if there was an interruption, the interruption was as divinely planned as the interview. My sermon comes to an end, but there is no interruption. The clock does not interrupt it, and yet it says, "You must go." My hearer, if you have seen Christ, it is time you were away. It is time you were away back to the city, back to those who know you best, back to those who knew you in your sin-away back like an arrow from the string. God speed you back to Say, "Come. Come, share with me this has put to my lips. It is running over.

your friends. cup that God

Come, see a Man who told me all things that ever I did, and who forgave me all. Is not this more than man? Is not this He which was to come? Is not this the God-Man, the Messiah, the Saviour at last?" Away, back. There is no interruption. It is time that you were away. No testimony so swift and vivid as the testimony of the soul that is just beginning to open with the knowledge of Divine things. How vastly the Church has lost because she has not used the ringing testimony of new-born souls. We have gagged them, and quieted them, and said, "Now, before you dare speak, you must come and get a great deal of instruction; and we ram them and cram them with instruction, and make them stiff with knowledge, so that they cannot move at all. We need this word. She went. This woman knew that she was a poor creature to begin with; but in the end of that narrative-and I want to say this to the Christian

people here in the end of that narrative she is worth a score of you. I say it to your faces. She is worth a score of some of you for Christ's purpose. Christ thought that that woman was worth the saving, and she was worth the saving. She was a rare woman. She is an "elect lady," as John would say. My sister, my decent young brother, my moral friend, in the great day, when it comes, if we find a woman like this shut in, and our decent selves out, we shall simply know then that the true woman has got in, and that the real sinner has got a place outside. Never forget that for a moment. Now, where are we? Do we know this Christ, and are we beginning to live for His glory? This Christ is worth talking about. silent about Him?

to say.

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Oh, who that has seen Him can be Come, see a Man." Go and tell about Him, and as you think of Him, and try to tell of Him to another, He will be magnified to your own eyes; and it is wonderful what you will have I often think that just here comes in beautifully what the bride in the Song of Solomon says. It seems to be the language of rapture and ecstasy. How it would come pouring from this woman's lips, if afterwards she got to know it. Come, see a Man." Who is this Man? Do you want to know Him and to describe Him? Go away back to the Song of Solomon. My beloved is white and ruddy; his locks are bushy, and black as the raven; his countenance is like Lebanon, excellent as the cedars. His fingers are like rings which are set with the beryl. His body is like bright sapphires overlaid with ivory. His legs are like pillars of marble set upon sockets of fine gold. His mouth is most sweet; yea, He is altogether lovely." This is the Man who has entered into union with me for all eternity. Have you seen Him? Have you known Him? And if you have seen Him and known Him, how can you be silent about Him? "Spring up, spring up, O well!"

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THE OVERTHROW OF JERICHO

A Sermon
༢

PREACHED AT REGENT SQUARE PRESBYTERIAN CHURCH,

BY THE

REV. JOHN MCNEILL.

TEXT-Joshua vi. and Heb. xi. 30.

In order to bind together the teaching of this chapter, we might put as a headline over the narrative that summing up of its pith and meaning which we have in the eleventh chapter of the Epistle to the Hebrews, where the writer says, "By faith the walls of Jericho fell down, after they were compassed about seven days."

Faith is a plant of Divine planting and of Divine growth. It is, however, planted in a strange, churlish, uncongenial soil, and sometimes it suffers not a little from its environment. Sometimes it seems to wither away until it almost disappears from above ground; at other times it revives and brings forth its wonderful fruits to God's glory and praise. Now, on this occasion that precious thing, that only Divine thing in the heart of man, faith in God, was in splendid condition, in lively and vigorous exercise. Therefore this Vol. II.-No. 11.