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Les cartes, [blanches, tableaux, etc.. peuvent Atre fiimis i des taux de reduction difftrents. Lorsque le document est trop grsnd pour Atre reproduit en un seul ciichi, 11 est film* A partir de I'angle supirieur gauche, de gauche A droite, et de haut en bas, en prenant le nombre d'images nicessaire. Les diagrammes suivants illustrent la mtthode. 1 2 3 1 2 3 4 5 6 1.0 I.I 1.25 1.4 11^ 2.2 II 2.0 1.8 1.6 M CROCOPY RESOLUTION TEST CHART NATIONAL BUREAU OF STANDARDS STANDARD REFERENCE MATERIAL 1010a (ANSI and ISO TEST CHART No. 2) '/)/ . 'i'^.:^ TWO SERMONS PREACHED In St. Luke's Cathedral. Halifax, Nova Scotia, In the Church of St. John the Evangelist, Montreal, P. Q., BY THE REV. ISAAC BROCK, D. D., Canon of St. Luke's Cathedral, Halifax. THE FIRST ON THE REST OF PARADISE. THC SECOND ON THE INTERMEDIATE STATE ITS EDUCATIONAL AND THE^IEFORE PROGRESSIVE CHARACTER. C. R. Rl'GGLES c\: CO., 143 Harrington vSt., Halifax. A. D. 1901. ri < _^^.„^^if^iims ~ TWO SERMONS I'KKACHKU IN ST. r.l'KES CATHKDHAI.. HALIFAX. X. S.. AM) IN THE CIU'RCH OF ST. .KUIX TMK KVAXUKLIST, MUXTHFAL. I'. Q.. i'HE REV. ISAAC BROCK, D. D., Cano>> jf St. Luke's Cathedral, Halifax. THK KIR.ST OX THE REST OF PARADISE. THK SKCOND ON THE INTERMEDIATE STATE: ITS EDUCATIONAL AND THEREFORE PROGRESSIVE CHARACTER. C. R. RUGGLES & CO., 143 Barrington St., Halifax. 10 CENTS- A. D. 1901. if THE PREFACE. TII1% two fullowitiji Siniionswerc priailifks li\- the Rev. .Arthur Chambers, \ icar of Hrockheiihi'rsi, Hants, Juij;lan for 25 copies, includiii.!.; Postage, by writinj^ to the Rev. Canon Urock. at the above address. THE REST OF PARADISE. ,^ jt j» - 77,., r rananulf, thence a ;, v/ to tlu- p.o/>!,- .>/ (.<»/.•'-//. f'. /:■. 9- The- u-.t. uhkh the people of ('-..l f.-y lure '^^^■^\^^'i'^ hereafter, a.lvnnccs through three successive i«es to Us m . MessiiiK after the Resurrection in the Ileavtiily /mn ,. -There is first the present rest which th • .■..■il. -f V.,>.\ enjoy now in Christ Jesus : The rest which our Saviour iroinis. , - ^ue he o ..n.l now t. the .-earv an.l the hunlene.l ones uhen ... spake th-se ^^''"'f;;' ' '" llrh." : -Conu. nnl.. Me, all ye that labor an.l are heav> a. n ana I will «ive you rest. Take My yoke upo:. you. an.l learn of -Me . an.l ye shall fin.l rest unto your souls." i.-TlK-re is next, the present rest which the V':o],W- of (-...l enjoy now in Tarailise : The rest that is referre.l t.. in those well-k.K.wn wor.ls ot St Tohn •• lUesse.l are the .lea.l which .lie in the Lor.l fron. hencetorth. Yea, saith the Spirit, that they may rest fron. their labors. , _l.-i„V • there is the future rest which a' the people of C,o,\ .hairenjov'aftJr the Resurrection in the perfect consunuuat.on an.l bliss of ('.o.Vs eternal an.l everlaslinj; ylory : The rest which. 1 think, is referre.l to in th..se w.,r.ls .,f St. Paul i„ II Thess. i. 7. •• To you wh., are trouble.l rest wUh us. whe lu Lor.l Jesus shall be reveale.l fron, V.eaveM vUh the an.-els ..f lh> power. " . , ; . The writer of the Kpistle to the Hebrews, ^whoever he was ts referring probablv to both the internie.liate rest ot Tara-hse, an.l to ZZ.\Ll mo;e perfect rest of Heaven. Of both, the rest o the earthlv Canaan, of which he has just been speaKUiK. was .. t>pe^ ' ?he;e remaineth therefore a rest .keeping of a Sabbath-.n the li y! u-*' margin) for the people of God." This blessed Sabbalh of rest be«ui: now in Paradise for Christ's departed saints, will be perfected here- after in the heavenly glory, after the Resurrection, and at the second coming of the Lord. Ivet lis look now at these three stages of the rest which the people of God enjoy now, or shall enjoy hereafter, though it is on thesecon.' Thk RiwT oi- I'ARADisK, that I wish more particularly to dwell. I. I'irst. there is the rest which our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ promised to all the weary and burdened sons and daughters of men wUo come to Him, or, as our Church puts it, to all, " Who trulv turn to Him." This is the rest, which through faith in our dear Lord, we may enjoy here an-l now : Ves even here and now, amid the trials and temptatic.::s and sorrows, auii.l the partings and changes and chances of our life on earth. This is the rest of pardon : the rest of deliverance from the guilt, and also from the reigning power and dominion of sin. through the precious blood of Jesus, ;iii 1 the indwelling pre.sence in our hearts of the Holy Ghost. Ves, through that precious IJlood sprinkling our conscience, and through that hallowed Presence ruling our will, an.l sanctifying our whole inner man, we may attain to this i)resent rest of the neonle of (^od. ' This is the rest of which one of Scotland's poets sings as he dwells oi: the gracious promise of our Lord : " I heard the voice of Jesus sav, Come unto Me and rest ; Lay down, thou weary one, lav down Thy heafl upon Mybreast : I came to Jesus as I was, \Vear\- and worn and sad ; I found in Him a resting-place. And He has made me glad." II. There is next, Thk Rkst ok Paradisk. On this I wish to dwell a little .nore fully : and from this part of n,y subject. I would like to remove, so far as I an. al.le, s..u.e ol the popular misconceptions. This is the rest of Christ's departe.l saints in Paradise, of which a sainted Bishop of our Church siuKS in one of our loveliest and best known hymns : •' I'or all the saints who from their labors rest. Who Thee bv faith before the world confess d. Thy Name, () Jesu. be forever ble.st. \iieluia The golden evening brightens in the west : Soon, s:on to faithful warriors comes the rest : Sweet is the calm of Paradise the blest. __ This is the rest from the toils, and weariness, and strifes of earth : this is the rest from all the pains and diseases, and manifold ills and sorrows of this mortal life : but uot, ( oh ! .,o) »ol a rtst from prayer, and praise, and holv worship ; not a rest therefore fron. the loftiest. the noblest, the most inspiring of all our spiritual activities. The saints departed are described by our Lord not as dead, but as living, living unto C'.od. They are living in the Intermediate Lite In the words of St. Paul, 'They are absent from the body, present with the Lord : - That is. their spirits, their living spirits, equippe. no doubt with a spiritual body, are now present with their Lord, and ours, in Paradise. It is needless to sav that this Intermediate Lite, lived in the presence of Jesus in Paradise, is a life of happiness. Holy Scripture more than justifies our Church in describing the present state of Christ's departed saints as one of " joy and felicity. But for all that, they are not yet made perfect. How can they be made perfect till they receive the resurrection body? How can their happiness reach its fulness till after the awards of the judgment throne of the Son of man ? Till they hear the voice of their Saviour and their Judge welcoming them to their heavenly home, and to their eternal inheritance : " Come, ye blessed children of My 1-ather, m- _ 8 herit the Kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world." They, (the saints departed in Paradise) without us, (the saints still on earth) cannot be made perfect. (See Heb. xi, 40) Therefore our Church teaches us to pray, "That we with all those that are de- parted in the true faith of God's Holy Name, may liave our perfect consummation and bliss, both in body and soul, in God's eternal and everlasting glor}'." The rest of the saints of God in Paradise therefore is not the rest of perfection, or of consummated happiness. No, they are still being trained, trained by our Lord and His Holy Spirit in a more perfect school than that of earth : and as they are being traine / that are dead, that they might be judged according to men in the flesh, but live according to God in the spirit."—/ Peter w., 6. The subjea to which I wish to invite your most thoughtful atten- tion this morning is this :— The Educationau, and therefore Progressive Character OF THE INTERMEDIATE LIFE ; that is, the Life in Hades, the unseen world. La me preface all I have to say on this subjeA by the remark that our light on the Intermediate Life is to be gathered, not from the very imperfect glimmerings of the O. T. Scriptures, but from the clearer teaching, and tl:e fuller revelation of the N. T. Scriptures. It is the risen Saviour, the Lord J--.- Christ, who hath "The keys of Hades and of death." He, and He alone, " hath brought life and immortality to light through the Gospel." To Jesus Christ, therefore, and to His Holy Apostles, wi:ym He guided by His Holy Spirit into all truth, are we indebted for our knowledge of the Intermediate Life, that is, Life in the vast and varied realms of Hades, the world unseen. One further prefatory remark I must make. Numerous side- issues, which this subjea suggests to thoughtful minds, I mus,t leave undiscussed. The short epace of time allowed in tVese days to a ser- mon compels me to do this. My first statement is this :— Preaching is a Means of Education. It is not necessary for me to prove this. However some persons to-day may be disposed to undervalue preaching, most people would admit 14 I thp.t preachitiff ir- at least one means of wlucation. and that, under favorable conditions, it is a most important means of education. Is preaching then carried on in the Intermediate Life? In my text St. Peter tells us that "The Gospel was preached to them that are dead." And lest we should by any possibility misunderstand >his general statement, the Apostle in the preceding chapter has reminded us of one notable instance in which the Gospel was preached to them that are dead. '"he preacher was Jesus Christ Himself. The time was the interval between His death on the cross and His resurrection from the grave. The audience was the vast multitude of those who had perished Tn the judgment of the flood. Te place was one of those divisions of Hades where these people were in ward, or safe-keeping. The Apostle's words literally translated are, "Christ was put to death in the flesh, but quick (or alive) in the spirit, (that is, His own spirit, ) in which (spirit) He went and preached to the spirits in ward : which sometime were disobedient, &c. ' ' It may be fairly asked, why this visit of our Lord in Hades should be specially recorded .> Bishop Horsley. in one of his sermons on this pas.sage, points, I think, to the true answer. The circumstances under which those vast multitudes perished in the judgment of the flood were so exceptionally terrible, that they above all others in Hades needed the comfort to be derived from our Lord's preaching : for this reason Christ's visit to them is specially recorded. But surely it was not the only visit : surely we r^iy reasonably conclude that our Lord, in the inter\al between His ;eath and His resurreaion, visited, as far as possible, all the realms of Hades, and announced to the dwellers therein the glad tidings, or tlospel, of His accomplished sacrifice on the Cross, through which alone salvation is offered to mankind. We are justified in drawing this inference by the general statement of the text: "The Gospel was preached to them that are dead. ' ' More than this. We aie justified by this general statement of St. Peter in concluding that the preaching of the Gospel in the realms of Hades, inaugurated by our Lord between His death and His resurrec- tion, has been carried on ever since by the ministry of His Church in Paradise. 16 If, then, preaching is a means of education, and if preaching is carried on in the Intermediate Lite, as the passages I have referred to from the third and fourth chapters of the first Epistle of St. Peter prove, then the progressive chai aaer of the Intermediate Life follows. Education, where effeaive, implies and necessitates progress. n. I pass to the second division of my subjea. The Need for an Educational and therefore Progressive State in the Intermediate Life. This need may be contemplated from (a) Its aspe«5l towards God • and, (b) Its aspeA towards Man. {a) Its aspe<5l towards God. The ultimate salvation of all through the infinite merits of our Divine Saviour is again and again revealed in Holv Scripture as the earnest desire of our God and Father. Take the words of St. Paul in I Tim., ii, as a specimen of many like statements of the Word of God. " This is good and acceptable in the sight of Gr ur Saviour; Who will have all men to be saved, and to come to the Knowledge of the truth : for there is one God, and one Mediator between Go'' - a men, the man Christ Jesus ; Who gave Himself a ransom for all, to be testified in due time." God's earnest desire that all should be saved, so forcibly brought out by these inspired words of St. Paul, does not, of course, imply that all will be saved. We have to bear in mind the ae cast with those of whr.ni we read in Hel.. xu. "The •tpiritH of jnst men made jwrrecl." There is yet another conwderalioti which mnst not he lost Mght of in this part of our subject. ThinV ot earth's l.loody battlefields strewn with the oead : Think of what we read of almost every day in our newspai)ers ; tl .se api>all- inK catastrophies. those railway acci catastrophies. if we can briuK ourselves to believe that «leath d(K:s »ol fii.l all • that the school of earth may lie followeears that among our Lonl's objects in giving the Christian Ministry were these : " The perfecting of the saints : " and the bringing of His people "unto a perfect man, unto the mecsure of the stature of the fulness of Christ." Will any one venture to assert that these objects have been a.s yet attained by ny portion of the Church of Gwl on earth ? Have anv of God's saints on earth been perfected? Among the holiest of God's people have we as yet seen any who have reached 1 20 "The perfect man," or who have attained here to "The measure of the stature of the fulness of Christ ? ' ' And if not, does it not follow as a matter of legitimate inference, that in the Intermediate Life beyond by gradual growth, development and progress such perfection is to be reachetl ? If this does not follow, we are then confronted with the possible failure of our Lord's great purpose in the gift to His Church of the Christian Ministry. There is yet another passage whose bearing on this subject should, be carefully weighed. St. Paul in writing to the Church at Philippi is confident that "He (God) which hath begun a good work in you will perform it, (will finish it, is the marginal reading) until the day of Jesus Christ." How often, by an early death or otherwise, is the good work which God has begun broken off, yes broken off here, only to be car- ried on in the Intermediate Life, until it is finished and perfected in the day of Jesus Christ. IIL Passing to another part of my subject : There is yet another reason why there must be progress in tire Life to come, the Life in Hades. The whole analogy of Nature demands it. Nature shows us that where there is no progress there is death. All living things grow. The departed are not dead : They are living, they are living to God, and in God, as our Lord showed in His reasoning with the Sad- ducees, when God called Himself, "The God of Abraham, and the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob. For He is not a God of the dead, but of the living : for all live unto Him." Therefore, the departed in Hades, absent from the earthly body, t n the spiritual body, present with the Lord. They are therefore, living: and if living they are making progress : they are growing, growing in knowledge, growing in grace, growing in likeness to our great lixample, Jesus Christ, yes they are growing up unto " The perfect man ": they are gradually and slowly attaining " Unto the measure of the stature of the fulness of Christ." Life. . ,. jg not a hopeless life, be- lt i« neither the one nor the otner. ii i* "" •, i^ « j;"g«»: in.p,ove„». .nd growth .re ..«.,s pos„.,.e. T,.e babes in ChrU. are «ro._i,,K 'll^^lZlZ'i^lt. dt. ^"tu however o, .he highest «rn^-«. -/S'" th'.t ™r Chamber, a. forcibU- pointed o„t ,,.^» ^^-^^^txac^o the degree position in the Intermediate Life »'" ™'" , '„„,,. Gh„„, i„ ^, »»a»tf ta^V'^T^r^X d^^^^^^^^^^^ "'■— ' T' the period before death. TUe roaa ^^^^^ ^^ '''-'n^^S^nde^.h :S:h:"osrSo"'tor man,. ,ea,., have r ;"U -Te-eringi. ^^^^^^ IV. This leads hv a natural transition to the great practical lesson of this .hole subiea. at which I n.ust glance ^n conclusion. THE VIT.X. IMPORT..NCE OE THE CC.tlV.TIOS ANP THE FOHM.TXO. OF CHRISTIAN CHAR.^CTER HERE AND NOW. . ..e author to ^^^^s^^^^r^ ^J^^ ^^J^, Uan people ^^^^^^^^'llZ't^tl n.eans .hat He says when He The pardon of our sins through the precious blood of Jesus cannot reverse thi, 1,» of O0.I, or ,lo »w.y «itli the coii«,|„e„ces of a Ion., and evil seed-sowing^. Mr. Chambers uses a very happy illustration on this subject, which 1 think may help to impress upon us the vital importance of the culti- vation and the formation of Christian charafter here and now :- "If we be wi.se men, the truth that there are different spheres of experience in the Hade.s-World will ^oad us into »,eing earnest about our life an.l charader. Just as we dare not be neKledful of our educa- tion in youth, because our position in later years will be affecle